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starryjkoo · 5 months

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I’m a Jimin + Jikook focused blog and I’ve been a bit critical of Golden on here, so I wanted to have my personal opinions on Jungkook, Golden, HYBE and Jikook promotions documented and clarified a little bit for my own peace of mind. I’m going to attach a VERY long ramble clarifying two points someone asked me about because I think it summarizes some of my overall feelings.

RE: Jungkook sacrificed creative control over Golden for better promotions + Jimin not wanting to give up said creative control for better promotions and playlisting

By saying JK had more creative constraints, I hope that anyone who has read my posts understands I simply mean I assume HYBE is only going to heavily invest in projects that (they think) have major GP appeal or align with their own special interests. I also think Seven level promotions might be limited to HYBE America. I think JK was simply limited in that if he specifically wanted the Seven rollout he would have likely been locked into a project like Golden. Corporations are always going to be extremely self serving but I do think JKs interests happened to align with HYBE in this instance, so it was beneficial for both parties.

JK loves and excels at mainstream pop so it’s not surprising he would like to have a solo career modeled after pop boys like Bieber. It was a harmonious collaboration. I don’t think he majorly sacrificed his artistic integrity or did anything he didn’t want to do when it was clearly music that he liked and a sound I think most of us weren’t surprised to hear considering his known music tastes. Golden probably also wasn’t supposed to be his magnum opus when it seems like it came about partially because he was in a creative block and had a time limit because of enlistment.

I still think HYBE and SB’s involvement + some of the promotions and “media-play” around Golden were heavy handed and occasionally pretty excessive (although I don’t agree with anyone who uses JKs promotions to try and invalidate his success). But I’ve already talked about how I think they were using it to try and boost their A&R system + HYBE America in general. I think they’re personally invested in JKs success more than they are the other members because they have more to gain from it — and it shows. And I do think it’s funny that JK said a few things almost verbatim to BangPD (and could explain why I found some of them a bit awkward/off-putting) because they were probably directly pitched to him by them.

But I don’t think it went against JKs desires or that he was strong armed into doing something he didn’t want to do. Like I said above, this is the kind of music JK enjoys, producers he was probably interested in, artists he was emulating that he likely admired, a career trajectory and image he resonated with and wanted to take etc. Even if the idea and direction of the project didn’t originate from him (I assume), it was clearly how he wished to express himself and be seen as a soloist. It was also an opportunity to put out an album when he was stuck (and no, I don’t think HYBE was purposefully targeting or sabotaging other members, even if I 100% stand by they should have done better and absolutely deserve criticism for various things around all the solo releases. I also remain a HYBE America anti (said half seriously lol) who dislikes the idea of them only going all out for these specific projects and the ramifications that could have on future BTS music, especially when I dislike SB’s A&R work so far).

So when I talked about Jimin possibly not wanting to sacrifice any creative control for playlisting or better promo, I simply meant that -

a. Once again, my current assumption (that could be wrong!) is that HYBE is only going to go all out for projects that specifically align with their own interests and/or have a sound they think has big commercial potential, therefore limiting the members creative freedom if they want that kind of rollout. I also think it might potentially be limited to HYBE US projects. I don’t think FACE met most of that criteria (and I don’t think JM would have wanted to promote FACE that way regardless). So no, I don’t think JM wanted to sacrifice his vision for FACE to get that level of promotion even if it was an option.

b. FACE was clearly a personal project for JM. He had a very clear story he wanted to tell and very clear emotions he wanted to convey. I think the process was possibly more important to him than the outcome, especially when you consider he was about to release it as a free mixtape. I think creative freedom and self expression were his main priorities vs modifying his album to be more commercial to justify a bigger marketing push. Especially when it looks like he was given the same base level support as the non-JK members and didn't seem overly invested in promoting or results in general.

That said, I don’t personally think JM is against albums or rollouts like Golden. He obviously enjoys a lot of mainstream pop and I wouldn’t be surprised if he released a HYBE US project one day in the future too. If he doesn’t I’m going to assume it’s because he’s not interested, not that he’s barred from doing so (of course we’re going to have to wait to see how future solo releases are handled to really know anything, but that might take a few years). But FACE was an “unambitious” project by Jimin’s own admission, so I’m curious to see how he decides to shape the rest of his solo career and what it’ll look like when he releases something he deems “ambitious”. I think it’ll be more fair to weigh the promotions of something like that vs Golden as well. That said, I do 100% give JM massive kudos for putting out an album like FACE. I absolutely think he deserves heaps of praise for it and I could go on about my love and admiration for FACE nonstop.

And I’m still pretty critical of the process of Golden and I stand by that. But that just aligns with my own personal preferences and my relationship with music that has existed long before I got into BTS. Admittedly, I’m also just not a big fan of mainstream pop so JKs solo career might end up just not being for me, and that’s okay. But I still really liked several of the songs on Golden and I respect how much work, charisma, and emotion JK poured into his album. His vocals were beautiful and I think he’s heads and tails above any other western pop boy right now and could easily take off even further with the right direction. I’m genuinely excited to see where he goes. I also recognize JK is a proficient lyricist and producer already, so I’m not knocking him as an artist even if I don’t vibe with one of his projects (although I sincerely hope he doesn’t use the same process for JJK2)

Sort of an unrelated tangent, but the criticism for Golden and JK as an artist gets unfairly overblown and knocking it at this point feels a bit tiring and redundant, so I get it. Especially when antis will jump on and exaggerate any criticism from a fan to unfairly drag him. The level of hypocrisy from other kpop stans is also really annoying. It’s crazy to watch them criticize HYBE and JK and then hype up their faves who are also releasing full English albums. Or how they act like other kpop companies are artistic paragons righteously holding onto their roots even though they’ve ALL been aggressively pursuing the Western market for years now. The hatred BTS members face from other kpop stans, akgaes, western stans, and even institutions like billboard is so immense that I can understand why so many ARMYs are defensive and adverse to certain criticisms and discourse that antis will often use to fuel their talking points. It’s impossible to have critical discussions in good faith on most platforms these days and prioritizing protecting your artist from getting unfairly attacked does imo understandably take priority for most.

Not saying that fans shouldn’t express critical opinions but I understand why you’re not going to see many ARMYs admitting to not liking a song on Twitter, or thinking the number of remixes is excessive, when you have thousands of nasty antis stalking and screenshotting those ARMY opinions to drag BTS members and get hit tweets. Pretty sure that’s why you see most nuanced/critical discussions taking place in private group chats, less populated platforms like Tumblr, or even in person rather than on places like Twitter.

But it’s also sometimes frustrating that it’s so hard to have open discussions about all this without people mobbing you and accusing you of being an anti. Imagine a world where people could acknowledge that JK had certain advantages that helped him on the charts and how that doesn’t invalidate his success. But with the current stan climate I doubt that’s going to happen anytime soon. It doesn’t really matter at the end of the day when it doesn’t change anything, but I’ll admit that the straight up lying and gaslighting from some ARMYs still really frustrates me sometimes. And I do think it’s a contributing factor to the deterioration of the fandom.

ANYWAYS, I got off topic, but my original point I wanted to clarify was just my assumption that the criteria for Seven level marketing would have conflicted with JMs vision and desires for FACE, but not for JK and Golden. And I wanted to expand a bit on my thoughts about JKs career path as I’ve been really critical of it when I don’t have any negative feelings towards him nor do I think he’s some kind of sellout or company puppet for going in that direction. I also don't think there's anything wrong with the promotions he used, or wanting to go in a pop route. It's genuinely cool to see him seamlessly pull off an album like Golden and I have no issue with "taking the k out of kpop" in a general sense, as long as it doesn't impact the quality of music or limit their creative freedom. JK shouldn't be forced to stay in a kpop box if he wants to branch out and I think what he's doing is genuinely really cool in that sense.

And going back to promotions, if I haven’t already made this clear, just because I think this might be the way some things work at HYBE doesn’t mean I agree with it or like it either. Maybe all of JM’s budget limitations were self-imposed and HYBE offered him as much funding as he wanted, but I still think HYBE should have had a higher baseline of support for all of their rollouts, should absolutely be giving the members of the biggest group in the world better playlisting, shouldn’t have neglected JM’s RIAA certification, should have at least sent all of their songs to radio, should have reacted in some way to those sales being deleted, should have updated D2C earlier than Haegeum, should be raked over the coals for some of those weverse articles etc. That said, I recognize that’s just my uniformed and probably pretty biased opinion. I’m definitely not an industry expert nor have I paid all that much attention to any of this until recently. But I stand by it for now lol.

And regarding HYBE US, I just want to make sure to state again that JK didn’t need them, they needed him. But I just sincerely hope they don’t keep pushing this whole system so hard onto the BTS members that they feel obligated to use it if they want top promotional tools, or that they think it’s the only way to top the charts again. The possibility that HYBE thinks that only HYBE America projects deserve top level promotions is a really concerning thought to me, but we'll have to wait and see.

Anyways, I hope that all makes sense? And I do think most of this is probably pretty obvious to most people, but I still wanted to clarify because I see some takes that sound similar to mine but are actually pretty different and I don’t want to be lumped in there lol. And mainly I just wanted my feelings documented somewhere on my blog because it made me feel bad to think someone might lump me in with some of the JK antis who have been overly critical of Golden and the whole promotional process.

Also, just because I criticize HYBE a lot doesn’t mean I think they're worse than the other kpop companies (they seem like the best by far imo), just because I think SB is clearly using JK’s debut for his own gain doesn’t mean I think JK is a hapless victim or that there's anything sinister about Golden or that he's not also getting what he wants out of the situation, and just because I think BangPD seems arrogant and out of touch doesn’t mean I think he’s the devil or an idiot or that I know better than him.

Lol, anyways, this whole post was very self indulgent, shocked if anyone actually reads this to the end (thank you if you do!), but these are basically my thoughts on all of this! It’s been messy being JM biased and an ARMY as well as any form of Jikook biased/bond enjoyer so I’ve been trying to approach all this with a lot of thought. But as always I could totally be wrong and I try to keep an open mind about all of this and listen to as many opinions as possible.

#jungkook #jimin #discourse #hybe #this is a mammoth post #but the thought of people misinterpreting some of my opinions #was making me a little anxious and sad this morning #so I just wanted this documented on here somewhere

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cinna-wanroll · 2 years

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On Homophobia Surrounding Queer Obi-Wan

Queer people get asked to settle or let things go so often that it baffles me. As a genderqueer, bisexual, and gray romantic person, my experiences get invalidated or criticized daily. It is exhausting. I feel that queer people are often pushed into scenarios where they have to prove who they are, but not too much, lest you cause discomfort to some cishet people who may be sensitive to "that sort of thing." Queer characters and expressions are, unfortunately, no different.

What's my point? My point is that I should not be up at 3 am, my stomach turning, because of something I knew was bound to happen. As soon as I read that Obi-Wan's identity was going to be elaborated upon in Padawan, I expected the incessant whinings. I expected the shocked, ridiculously wounded alpha-male routine. And yet, as @sunflowersinheaven 's post: https://www.tumblr.com/blog/view/sunflowersinheaven/691110776621219840?source=share crossed my dashboard, I began to spiral. At first, sure, it was vaguely amusing. Then, it became sickening.

Still, I have a few things I would like to address:

This is not new. Obi-Wan was referenced as bisexual in the Revenge of the Sith novelization. Those claiming that this is to fulfill Disney’s queer agenda need to admit to the fact they didn’t know everything prior to this now, and if they have such a problem with it, then why not call out Lucasfilm too? They aren’t trying to preserve representation that is marginally accurate, they’re being a bigoted assholes.

People saying this "doesn't prove Obi-Wan is queer" are fooling themselves. No, it's not pushing lgbtq+ identity(s) onto him just because he's around queer people. Obi-Wan uses gender-neutral language when expressing attraction, and he even addresses the fact that he generally finds the group of people he's with attractive. Obi-Wan says that he may want to kiss ALL of the people he's surrounded by, except for a character who uses she/her pronouns. Hmm. That does not sound super heterosexual to me. As a side note, for those who read this more in an a-spec interpretation, I am approaching this from an opinion that Obi-Wan experiences sexual attraction. I read this as Obi-Wan being confident that he finds people attractive but unsure whether he wants to act on that attraction. Therefore, somewhere in that bi umbrella is where I see his identity. At Obi-Wan's age (now, obviously, everyone's experiences with attraction are different and equally valid), I was sure I liked many genders. Now, what I wasn't so sure of was my romantic or sexual attraction toward them. Writing a character uncertain about their identity does not invalidate their current feelings. Sexuality and attraction (romantic and non) are fluid. And Obi-Wan being young is not an excuse to use homophobic/invalidating rhetoric to try to flip around on queer Obi-Wan supporters.

People who blame the author for "ruining Obi-Wan's character," need to do some serious self-reflection. Why does a character being queer ruin their character for you? That is astoundingly ridiculous to me, especially coming from a group of people who so often express the opinion, "Oh, well 'gay people' always make their sexuality their entire personality," and various other bullshit. Really? And yet, you can't seem to overlook a character's sexuality, which ruins everything they are to you. Some of these people are the same ones who were creaming themselves over the Kenobi show, TCW, etc. Which, I mean, hey! Kenobi has been my favorite man since I was five. I get it! And yet, I'm still a fan, unlike the manchildren wailing about the fact that Obi-Wan likes men. Sad. Now, if they're claiming that Obi-Wan being anxious and emotional in the book ruined his character... leave your fragile masculinity at the door and remember what it was like to be a teenager for fucking once. I only say "teenager" in this circumstance not because I feel adults can't feel this way (I am an emotional, anxious WRECK y’all), but because these are not traits Obi-Wan keeps into adulthood.

People who say this is either trying to invalidate his relationship with Satine or can't be true because of his relationship with Satine need to shut up. If you know my blog, you know I am a day one Obitine stan. What I refuse to engage in is bigotry based on my personal ship preference. (Although I am a multishipper). Select members of the Obitine fandom; do better.

To the people complaining: Please stop. I am tired, and people on the internet need to work on their goddamn (not so critical) thinking skills. If you don't want to accept part of a character, examine why. Your prejudice and weak claims that this is only to feed the "woke agenda" are rooted in misogyny, homophobia, and transphobia, and I hope I never have to meet any of these people in real life.

#obi wan kenobi #padawan #homophobia #star wars

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of-substandard-parts-a · 8 months

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❛ don't you think you've already done enough damage for one day? ❜ - from beverly

At the disparagement, a languid smile crept onto his lips, gently easing the corner of his mouth upwards. He marginally inclined his head, his light brow raised provokingly, while he regarded, scrutinised, the Enterprise Doctor in complete silence. To be frank, his knack for causing damage was interminable; he relished in the anarchy his deployed subterfuge, his shenanigans, carved in his wake; he revelled in other people’s subsequent inconveniences and misfortunes engendered by his astute stratagems... And the reason that was the focal point of his exhibition of dishonesty and defiance, was to prove a point: humans held themselves in such a grotesquely high esteem, thought they were superior to species they encountered, therefore, Lore took great delight in invalidating their self-appointed position in the hierarchical ladder. They were weak, they were vermin... And his little enterprises substantiated this fact time and time again — one gust of wind and they were no more...

An insouciant roll of his shoulder communicated his disagreement to her rhetorical question; his oeuvre contained a more expansive array of mischief than what he'd currently displayed — and he was more than eager to provide her with a more comprehensive demonstration.

‘I barely started,’ he answered, batting his eyes innocuously. ‘Don’t you approve of the art I have created in sickbay, Doctor?’ he added, clacking his synthetic tongue and shaking his head in disapproval. ‘And here I was, thinking all humans were such great aesthetes. Apparently, I overestimated you organics... What if the art had been created by my brother’s hand, mhm? would you have reprimanded him as well?’

The smirk that had ornamented his artificial features minutes ago, evaporated instantaneously. His chartreuse eyes grew darker, more ominous, like a blizzard looming, stirring, raging on the horizon. His jaw tensed in anticipation of her answer.

‘My uneducated guess: probably not...’ he said acrimoniously. ‘You’d just blame it on some defective circuit — a minor fluctuation in his positronic matrix —, resolve the problem, ask if he’s alright, hand him a lollipop, and send him on his merry way — forget his error ever occurred... You pretend to be a non-discriminatory and inclusive race — you receive unmerited admiration for your accomplishments, in my opinion —, but if that were true, why am I here? I didn’t inflict physical detriment to anyone — to my knowledge, everyone’s fine. All I did was having a little fun...’

#storiest0ld // beverly crusher #verse // often wrong's got a broken heart; can't even tell his boys apart #ooc: bitch probably made a mess of sickbay and now he's playing the victim -- he has an interesting sense of humour asdfghjkl

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vicsdeangelis · 1 year

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He said it most recently in the Spotify interview they did the other day which is here, but he’s said it a few times now. I didn’t mean to suggest you said he was complaining, sorry if it seemed that way, but that’s exactly what the other anon yesterday said. I don’t think it’s lacking in empathy to not feel sorry for him, but I do personally think it’s lacking in empathy to see someone expressing how much they struggle with certain aspects of anything (be it fame or anything else) and essentially telling them to shut up because you’re bored of it. He’s also not really talking about fame specifically but things like stalking, being scrutinised, overworking, pressure, etc which I think plenty of people can relate to in general even if they aren’t famous. But to each their own I guess.

(link to the second interview)

don't worry, i didn't feel like you were saying i said that about him, but i like to make it clear anyway just in case anyone wants to put words in my mouth. not you, i just mean in general

i'm glad you sent another ask with the second video, because i feel like that one expresses way better what he's trying to say, and makes me understand him better too

i wasn't aware he was feeling those things, both because i haven't been watching their interviews, and because, personally, i didn't feel any of that in their recent songs (with the exception of la fine, i definitely felt that one)

the thing i have to do a better job of remembering, and it's funny that damiano mentioned that in the second interview when i've been thinking about it the whole day after reading your first ask, is that those songs, the ones i love the one i hate the ones i don't care about, they still come from real people, real people who put effort into them. and i don't get to say how much emotion someone put into their work just because it didn't translate well for me. i also don't want to contribute to an atmosphere where people's feelings and struggles are invalidated, and i am really sorry about that. i am hard on them sometimes, bordering on being a cunt, but i don't want to invalidate what he feels and how he feels it

that isn't to say i'm not gonna keep expressing my opinions, because i couldn't shut up to save my life tbh, but i will try to keep those things in mind when i do it in the future

and now i can say i am curious to see what else he has to say about the topic of fame in the new album

(what i will say that i still agree with the first anon, but i think he's not doing it as often as he did like at the beginning of the year, is talking about haters. i just find it so juvenile, but maybe that's just me being older than him and therefore more Tired™ of this type of thing kdjskss)

#ask

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punkscowardschampions · 6 months

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Java Pt.1

Ava: Teddy has your journal

Ava: I don’t know how but he sent a page to me, in case I could decode it, I didn’t, of course

Ava: She knows, except neither of them knows what any of it means, that’s something…

Ava: I’m so sorry, James, tell me you’re okay when you can, please?

James: [Obviously not replying until after this screaming match has occurred and Chlo has to take herself off to bed like an invalid, god knows how long said public argument went on for]

James: I’m sorry, that must have been an alarming message to receive

Ava: I thought he had worked it out, my name, or something

Ava: I’m almost entirely certain he hasn’t, he wouldn’t be able to bluff that convincingly

Ava: How are you, as ridiculous as it feels to ask

James: Yes, I would’ve liked to warn you, but I was rather tied up and opportunely his inability to comprehend any of what he read quickly became apparent

Ava: What’s going to happen now?

James: In the immediate aftermath of our drawn out confrontation, she has gone to bed exhausted, a response I can’t fault, feeling similar myself

Ava: That doesn’t seem like the worst idea

James: Tomorrow, I don’t know

Ava: You can’t possibly know, predict any of this

Ava: Is Jay okay?

James: She’s picked up on the lingering tension, unavoidably, but she didn’t witness anything, as opposed to everyone else here

Ava: I’m glad that she didn’t, it is bad enough that you had to be part of the spectacle

Ava: Do you want me to go away, or is there anything else I can do for you?

James: Please don’t, my family are predictably inebriated and the conversation I attempted with my marginally more sensible sister didn’t exactly leave me with the ally I hoped for

Ava: She can’t be on your wife’s side though, surely?

James: No, but she is my father’s, and they are inclined to hold fast to the, admittedly not untrue, belief that it’s my mess and sympathy is therefore limited

Ava: The mess, like the marriage, takes two

James: Yes, but their willingness to vilify her for her part in things doesn’t help me rectify them, I’ve been trying to make her understand that our separation doesn’t mean I’ll abandon her entirely and a witch hunt led by my relatives somewhat contradicts that

Ava: I see your dilemma

James: Perhaps I’m wasting my breath, having given her an ultimatum when she was issuing her threats which hardly lends credibility to those attempts to keep the situation civil

Ava: Or perhaps you can apologise, and undoubtedly she said things she could also apologise for

Ava: I think you should leave, you and her, as you can’t really make everyone else leave you without people having opinions on the politeness of that

Ava: Show you intend to work it out between you and not an entire jury panel

James: She refuses, nonetheless, you’re right, if I grovel suitably there’s the smallest chance she may reconsider

Ava: She’s going to sleep on it, the reaction has to be less explosive by default in the morning

James: All I can do is continue to try

Ava: Precisely, and I think removing the family element will make her feel protected, prioritised…

Ava: and I think I should actually let you do that, without any interference

James: I can’t insist you go against what your instincts and good judgment are telling you to do when I scarcely trust my own in either case

Ava: I can’t make this any harder for you, however painful it is for me, it could be so much worse for you

James: You’re the lone person making it any easier, but I’m aware, too, I shouldn’t be saying so

Ava: I don’t want to do this

Ava: but I want your separation to work, for it to be as good as it can be, for you all

Ava: Me being in the picture jeopardises that chance for you

James: It isn’t your fault, we’re sabotaged by my wife’s fixation upon how the situation may look in place of how she or I feel

Ava: I wouldn’t expect anything less than loathing of me from her

James: An amicable split was always a reach, but I foolishly endeavoured to suggest the possibility, because of my desperation to escape the alternative, the blame lands squarely at my feet, not yours

Ava: Maybe not, not if you stay for now, until she feels it’s her decision, or, mostly hers but still enough to do it

James: I already promised to, whilst I was still capable of conducting myself relatively calmly, allowing her time to decide the story she wishes to concoct, as that’s all she cares about, coming out of this whole sorry saga well, or as well as can be expected

Ava: Well, stories are your forte

Ava: Can you help her?

James: I don’t know

Ava: There’s no rush, you’ve told the truth

James: I haven’t, not about you

Ava: You’ve done it before, it doesn’t matter who I am

James: It does to me

Ava: James

James: I didn’t mean to betray you, for today to proceed as it has, I wouldn’t have forced the conversation, allowed it occur in this moment or location, if my hand hadn’t been by Teddy’s antics

Ava: You didn’t betray me, it was him, and I couldn’t say anything, not enough

James: I should’ve acted otherwise, as usual

James: Gia isn’t wrong, my entire life is comprised of a litany of mistakes

Ava: You couldn’t have done anything else, nor more, not in this situation

James: Am I making another by demanding that you stay?

Ava: I don’t know how to answer that

James: The answer I have is that I’d beg, go against your valid points, against all reason, in fact, without hesitation

James: because you do matter to me, I told her the first time my brother stirred the pot after your birthday party, I don’t have a guilty conscience, and I truly do not

Ava: I don’t think I can untangle myself from this now either, from you

Ava: That might sound ridiculous, in comparison to your real potential separation but I truly mean it, the dread I feel at having to begin is unbearably real

James: It sounds like an echo of how I feel

James: I’d repeat these actions, ours, tenfold

James: more than that, I’d begin us over and over again

Ava: I won’t go, I can’t

Ava: I’ll do everything else I can not to complicate things but I have to stay

James: It’s me putting you in unthinkable positions and I hate myself for that, acutely

Ava: Please don’t, I wanted this as much as you, I still do

James: It clearly isn’t wise for your association with Teddy to carry on, which is yet another thing I feel awful for having to bluntly state

Ava: No, you’re right

Ava: He hasn’t intentionally done this to me but he has to you, and I don’t believe he wouldn’t continue so

Ava: He isn’t all that interested in being my friend, it shouldn’t be that hard

James: I’m upset not to have the slightest indication of when and how he became this callous

Ava: I won’t attempt any excuses or reasoning on his behalf

Ava: Sometimes I don’t think he sees the seriousness, other times, I’m not so sure

James: Granted, my sister’s often cold indifference should have prepared me, but it’s different with him, his active delight at participating in the torment of people close to him, there isn’t an adjustment I know how to, or was ready to make in order to accommodate such a nature

Ava: I know what you mean, I have witnessed it too, on a lesser scale perhaps but still, it does ring true

Ava: If he was always like it, it would be easier for you to write him off

James: He’s too young to be written off, as I was

James: but to feel so unsupported has been challenging, the day has been a bleak one, and I supposed, absurdly in hindsight, as we got older we’d provide a measure of it where our parents seemingly won’t

Ava: I don’t think that’s an unreasonable thing to imagine, definitely not to want

Ava: I’m sorry, that it didn’t work out that way, that you’ve felt so alone with it all

James: I know better, still I also want better, for all of us, nevertheless

Ava: If there’s nothing else to do, all that’s left is hope, right

Ava: The disappointment can’t be as bad as giving up feels

James: Agreed, giving up is inconceivable and would be unforgivable

Ava: but I do know, how tempting it can be, I have my own sibling issues that are, somehow, not all too dissimilar to the ones you’re describing so

James: I can’t help yearning for a rewrite in which I exited the car with you and holed up, or we fled in search of a wanted holiday, the three of us, however temporary the fix and unproductive the solution

Ava: It feels so much worse now, you being there, that there’s no quick way to you when you need me

James: I’m most afraid I’ll drink once she and I commit to remaining here alone, she goads me to, prefers the person I am when I indulge and the life we shared before which I barely recall

James: I thought I could explain to Gia and she simply reminded me of the expense as a deterrent

Ava: If you gave her everything she wanted, then this wouldn’t be a separation, things have to change, you have your principles and things you aren’t willing to compromise on

Ava: I know you can do this

James: Everything is tenuous and then there’s you

James: I couldn’t do this if you weren’t with me, Ava

Ava: It doesn’t scare me, for you to ask me to stay

James: I need you, as you said

Ava: I want to be a constant, for you

James: I’m sorry I’m in the state that I am

Ava: I’m sorry for what today became for you

Ava: Do you think you’ll be able to sleep, you said you were exhausted

James: No, if Jay had her own room I’d sleep there but she’s with her grandparents

Ava: Let’s think then

Ava: Is there some kind of indoor pool, you could snooze on a sun lounger

James: I’ll pretend I’m [a character in a book, idk, I’m sure it or something similar has happened]

Ava: Were you swimming when he got the book?

Ava: That was the only scenario I could imagine when I was going over and over it

James: Yes, in light of what happened as a result I may never venture into a pool again though

Ava: It’s such a violation, those are your private thoughts, I’m so angry

James: At least they have been kept private

Ava: Only by your incredible foresight

James: It throws a devious light upon my habits, but I promise I haven’t written novels about each affair

Ava: It’s okay if you have

James: Be that as it may, it’s a new creative pursuit

James: rediscovered from when I was a small child, one could argue, but I certainly didn’t write romance stories at that age

Ava: You have to tell me what you did write about, it’s too adorable

James: I had a pet hamster for a time, he featured heavily

James: rugby, of course, when I wanted to be a star player as previously mentioned

Ava: Did the two ever crossover, hamster rugby could be a whole thing

Ava: that is rugby for and played by hamsters, I’m not a sadist

James: They did, I’ll have to scour my parents’ attic as additional bedtime reading for you

Ava: I don’t know if I’ll survive

James: Please find a way to, you’re extremely important, and not just for further plot of my current book

Ava: I’ll try my best but you are very, very sweet

James: Talk to me about your [the bookshop] adventure, there’s a reason to live

Ava: Yes, luckily I did complete that mission before the world was momentarily turned upside down or I would have horrified even the people on the tube, I think

Ava: [tell him all about it, nerd out]

James: [be a nerd back because you both need this reprieve from the drama]

Ava: Oh I miss you

Ava: I bet it’s nice and warm in there though, like sleeping in a greenhouse

James: Your balcony is my nearest approximate exposure to how I imagine stepping into a greenhouse would be

Ava: When it’s warm here, we can sleep out there, we’ll not need a blanket

James: Summer will arrive soon

James: Would you be warm enough with a blanket, sleeping out now?

Ava: Yes

Ava: and Frank is like a hot water bottle

James: How is he?

James: I fear I may be forced to relent on my daughter having a puppy after all

Ava: I’ve given him so many treats whilst you’ve been away, he is benefitting from my love having no other outlet

James: Oh, I’m happy to hear someone is

Ava: But I think he misses you too, though he’s sworn to secrecy

James: I’ll have to bring him a thank you gift, for looking after you as devotedly as he has

Ava: If you wanted, you and Jay could take him for walks, to let her get an understanding of having a puppy before you commit

James: You’re incredibly thoughtful

Ava: It sounded a bit like I already can’t be bothered to walk him myself

Ava: but I assure you, my own dedication hasn’t waned

James: I would never doubt you, my darling

Ava: [send him a selfie from your balcony ft the blanket and this pup]

James: [send her one back of this toll boy on his sun lounger]

Ava: It’s so comforting to see your face

James: [send her a voice note, which is just you being a nerd and saying hello to her and Frank basically so she can hear your voice too because we all know them falling asleep on the phone together the way they used to OG is coming, but for now]

Ava: [send him a video back of this pup listening and doing the head tilt thing when they’re like HEWWO because adorable and isn’t just you screaming ILY so we gotta]

James: She’ll be too excited to walk, I’m under no illusion, I’ll end up carrying them both

Ava: I might have to come and give you a hand then

James: You’re always welcome

Ava: I didn’t know, if that would be okay

James: To quote you, as I am want to do when you’re being brilliant, things have to change

Ava: You flatter me, I don’t deserve it

James: You deserve more compliments than I have the time or energy to pen

Ava: You certainly looked quite cosy

Ava: I should be telling you a story tonight, I think

James: As did you, I’m pleased he has a good listening face for the barrage of questions he’ll be asked during his first walk

James: Oh, will we fight for the honour of storytelling?

Ava: He’s nothing if not a fabulous listener, I didn’t intend for him to be my captive audience but I fear he may be

Ava: We could but fighting with you is just the last thing I ever want to do

James: Naturally he’s a good boy, you’re his owner

James: Do you really want to read to me or be read to? I haven’t forgotten I owe you tonight’s chapter of [what they are reading] but I’m unopposed to you taking a turn if it’ll make you happy

Ava: I only want to make you happy, you do so much for me, I feel so spoiled

James: What you’ve done and how you make me feel is impossible to put into words, it’s going to forever elude me, I know it

Ava: I feel kinda tongue-tied now too

James: It’s okay, we can both read, I’ll go first

Ava: I do prefer it when you take the lead

James: [write her a little dancing scene because you can hear music coming from somewhere and you’re in love rn so gotta bring the peak romance with a what if]

Ava: [read this back to him, even though he said he’d go first, you simply gotta because it killed you and you need to be like LOOK WHAT YOU DID]

James: I’m sorry, I can’t go to sleep yet

Ava: I’m not going without you

James: Just to [another bookshop like he’s giving her a clue for this book hunt] and back

Ava: One step closer

James: Another day endured

Ava: But what a day

Ava: how you’ve not passed out is beyond me

James: I had to spend time with you

Ava: I am beyond grateful, I thought you might stop talking to me, fairly so

James: No, you’re mine and these moments are ours, albeit snatched and hurried too frequently

Ava: I was just scared, that you may need to

Ava: but you’re here and I’m here

James: I’m deeply sorry Teddy frightened you with his theft and the subsequent events stopped me from quieting said anxiety as fast as would have chosen to, had I been offered a choice

Ava: You’re a good person, do you know that

James: My heart breaks at the idea of you upset, that’s all

Ava: I promise I can handle it

James: You’re a brave and resilient person

Ava: You might just be my favourite person

James: May I? If you’d allow me to be, I think I’d be content with that

Ava: There aren’t any other contenders but I only want it to be you, no matter what

James: Thank you for bestowing upon me a future I sincerely look forward to experiencing

Ava: Do you believe that things can change, that it will work?

James: I have no faith in her, but I do in us

Ava: That’s enough

Ava: I won’t let you live life only in stolen moments, it isn’t good enough for you

James: It won’t be like this indefinitely, which is so much more than I once dared to consider possible

Ava: [write him a lil what if that is basically how you imagine his life and is him getting to do all the things he wants and actually being happy]

James: Ava

Ava: I can picture it so easily

James: You’re ever that vivid, I understand

Ava: I can feel your arms around me now, if I concentrate

James: And my watch proves any moment is capable of lasting beyond itself, to linger until we’re reunited

Ava: Exactly

Ava: alone feels less lonely, you exist in so many places my senses can comfort themselves, you are my constant too now

James: [tell her about how whatever trinket she gave you from her bedroom has moved from where you were keeping it on your desk at work while you were there hating it to being with you on this holiday, in a more poetic and extra manner but that’s the gist]

Ava: Oh

Ava: a piece of me being there brings me such an intense feeling of comfort, my head is reeling

James: It feels reckless with the fate of my notebook what it was, but I made the decision prior, and I’m not sorry I did

Ava: It could be worse, I had intended to gift you my underwear but that didn’t feel appropriate as work colleagues

James: [ofc writing a what if for if she could have though, because we all know how feral he’d be being with them rn if she had, much like when he took that pair to work that time to get through it, but even more so because the feels are even higher and he is essentially alone on this sun lounger at this o clock clearly with less chill needed than at his office]

Ava: Around the time you had fucked my ankles behind my head was when I realised my error in logic, definitely

Ava: now the only reason to wear any is to have something to present to you

James: My impatiently awaited homecoming will be faultless, yes

James: you and I have both fervently learned lessons

Ava: You won’t ever want to leave me behind again

Ava: Deciding whether to drop my pants or to my knees first is going to be a tough decision

James: Let me help you

James: [write both of these scenarios for her, as if that won’t just make it harder to decide lol]

Ava: James

James: You have my permission for either, for anything

Ava: I’m thinking about the positions a sun lounger affords us, that’s what I’m picturing now

James: [again write about it, this boy is on a roll, and we’re all buzzing Teddy can’t read this the sneaky rat]

Ava: It can be just like in the car

Ava: but you’re coming back to me

James: Yes

Ava: I want you home

James: A home with you is all I want

Ava: Do you mean that

James: Completely

Ava: Being a recluse has never sounded more heavenly, wow

James: I swear I’ll free you on occasion

Ava: Just take me those unavoidable places you have to go that aren’t our home

James: The absolutely perfect office paperweight, your body on my desk

Ava: Yours, to admire or play with until it’s a quivering mess that begs for you

James: An ideal stress ball too

Ava: I want to feel it, to take on the pressure and absorb it, be so used and useful for you

James: Can you take all of it?

Ava: You know I can, you taught me

James: You’re a pleasure to teach

Ava: You’re a very good teacher

James: [asking her a revision question, how they do]?

Ava: That’s not fair, sir

James: Have you been neglecting your revision?

Ava: It’s just been hard to concentrate

James: Perhaps, but there are people you’d like to make proud, aren’t there?

Ava: Yes, very much

Ava: I’ll try harder, I promise

James: [asking her the question again like okay go on]?

Ava: [give your best answer after having clearly thought about it and truly done your best here and now]

James: I knew you could do it

Ava: Are you proud of me, sir?

James: You’re top of my class

Ava: then I’m proud of myself

James: As you should be, you’re going to have a bright future and achieve a lot of great things

Ava: I couldn’t do it without you, you push me to be better

James: You could but you never need to

Ava: I need your encouragement

James: You earn it

Ava: I can do anything if it means I earn your approval

James: You’re capable of an extraordinary amount

Ava: You can’t believe it either, how I’ve blossomed under your tutelage

James: I recognised your potential immediately, from the moment I first saw you, remember?

Ava: I’ll never forget

Ava: I wanted you to take me, uncover every hidden depth, mould me into the woman I want to be, the one you need

James: You have the most unmarred beauty, irrespective of how deep I go

Ava: Nothing is out of bounds for you, you know I want more, I want you to see everything

James: You’ve claimed that word, I don’t hear it in any voice but yours

Ava: I can’t pretend I’m sorry about that

James: No apologies

Ava: I don’t think I’ll be satisfied until you’ve claimed and charted every inch of me, even then

James: Every inch of you is mine already and you definitely aren’t

Ava: No apologies?

James: None

Ava: You can ask me another, I’m ready this time

James: [do, clearly a harder question]?

Ava: [we still gotta slay, I’m afraid, we have been revising, until this latest drama, unlike some people]

James: Good girl, it’s apparent you’ve worked diligently and will reap every reward

Ava: Yours, always

Ava: You know how devoted I am, don’t you?

James: I’d struggle to question your passion even as a shameless ruse to praise you anew

Ava: I’ve never met anyone as encouraging as you, it makes me feel lucky to have you in my life

James: I’m the lucky one, my life has changed drastically thanks to you

Ava: You’re the one making the changes, and you deserve me, entirely

James: Your strong will inspires me

Ava: You make stubborn sound much sweeter

James: You’ve turned it into a positive trait

Ava: Do I even need to say how worth it I think this all is, if something seems worth pursuing, I just can’t not

James: I’d encourage you to say whatever you desire, especially out loud

Ava: It does feel as if I could speak it to the sky and those thoughts could get to you, undisturbed and unobserved by anyone else

James: And selfishly, I miss hearing your voice

Ava: [send a voice note of you doing that, with the ambience of being outside on a summer’s night and all the extra shit you just have to say]

James: I appreciate not being on the tube considering my reaction

Ava: I’m glad you’re alone too

Ava: I have to admit how thoroughly I enjoy monopolising your attention

James: You did with my drunk brother on my arm and a waiting car in our peripheral vision, my attention hasn’t shifted since

Ava: I’m still not sorry

Ava: I wasn’t then, only in my moments of fear and doubt have I questioned any of this

James: I’ll keep you safer, I promise

Ava: Do you want to?

James: Of course

Ava: I’m not hard work, am I?

James: You aren’t work at all

Ava: Good

Ava: because I want that

James: Then I’ll better protect you

Ava: You do it amazingly

Ava: you think about me more than anyone else, just knowing and believing that makes me feel so cared for

James: No, I let you down earlier

Ava: You didn’t

James: From now on, I refuse to

Ava: [send him a blushy selfie because he’s being so daddy and you can’t cope]

James: [drop a peak romance poetic af line about it which could be a quote but isn’t]

Ava: I feel like I’m getting better at spotting your work, as I should as your biggest fan

James: [see if you can guess what page she’s on because you left her the fancy notebook aka the whole story so far, just dropping a page number without any context like ? because you know she’ll know what you’re asking]

Ava: So close

Ava: [going to say you have read slightly more because keen ofc]

James: Are you going to read the other [however many pages she has left, because he’s so nervous and nearly didn’t pack that lol]?

Ava: Of course I am, I should have lingered and really savoured every word but I can read it at least another few times before you’re back

James: I’ll rewrite it as many times as you think fitting

Ava: But I like it how it is

Ava: I know that rewriting and multiple drafts are key to being a serious author but it’s exactly how it felt, how it happened

Ava: I wouldn’t want that lost on the cutting room floor

James: [tell her how many drafts you’ve done pre-fancy notebook because likewise keen obvs, tis all he do atm haha, like maybe it’s okay to not again and I can still be a serious author]

Ava: The words I can come up with now off the top of my head aren’t sufficient enough to tell you how good it is

Ava: my extraordinary bias taken into account beforehand too

James: The number of pages you’ve read through is a fair indicator, it must be passable

Ava: Absolutely

Ava: I’ve noted my favourite parts but I want to give it back to you so you can read along with my notes

James: Or your bias is substantial enough to overcome my lacklustre efforts

James: but, your notes will reveal more on that

Ava: Do you know any of the English faculty at King’s?

Ava: I bet you could charm one of them for a more expert and unbiased opinion, if you wanted

James: Yours is the only opinion which matters, will ever have any real significance to me

Ava: Okay, then you’ll have to believe me, I love it

James: I adore you

Ava: I adore you too

James: I’m risking getting you into trouble if the bear’s eyes aren’t covered, my apologies

Ava: [do cover them with his paws and send a pic like lol]

James: Crisis narrowly averted, well done, darling

Ava: I’m sure I could talk him ‘round if necessary, after all, he’s got to spend all this time with me and not you

James: True, you are the sweetest talker and it’s I who should be envious of his privileged position

Ava: I may have to find him a new position, pride of place, when you come home

Ava: we won’t all fit

James: And perhaps momentarily, as he is my temporary stand in

Ava: Oh

Ava: that is an idea

James: [obviously wax lyrical about the position this bear should be aka you wanna be in sir, in explicit detail, which at this precise moment of time is head between her legs doing the absolute most]

Ava: Fuck, James

James: That’s my aim, yes

Ava: I’m truly sorry for what I’m about to do to this bear’s face, Jesus

James: He isn’t because I’m not

Ava: You’re still proud of me

James: Didn’t I tell you that you deserve every reward?

Ava: I feel like I’m behaving very badly now though

James: You’re acting on my instructions

Ava: True

Ava: my favourite way to behave

James: So be a good girl

Ava: Yes

Ava: I’m doing it just like you showed me

James: As promised, I’ll look after you

Ava: You can look, hear, whatever you ask of me

Ava: though my blushes may reach catastrophic levels if you listen to the things I didn’t even know I wanted to say to you

James: I’m afraid to ask everything of you, it would form an instant habit

Ava: But that does seem right, as you never leave my mind, nor does the effect you have on my body, so I think you have a right to know at any given moment

James: It would feel right

Ava: [send him video of your unhinged behaviour because literally cannot stop yourself grinding against this bear, nor can you stop the 🥺 noises or the way you are unable to not call him daddy in this moment]

James: Oh fuck

Ava: Is that okay, I’ve felt this way for so long but I don’t have to tell you

James: You can tell me anything, you should

Ava: You’re just so protective and capable and supportive and everything I already have told you, it’s fitting

James: It’s okay, more than

Ava: That’s how I feel too

James: I don’t know how to verbalise what it means that you construct for me an identity I didn’t have, always

Ava: It’s just how you are, to me, what I see

James: Ava

Ava: What are you doing right now, I want to know I’m not alone with how much I’m doing in almost public

James: [send her a video of your own unhinged behaviour, soz to this sun lounger getting abused in this manner but he doesn’t have a bear to]

Ava: I can feel that, the hold you have over my imagination is like nothing I’ve ever known before

Ava: I’ve missed you

James: I love your imagination, I don’t intend to ever leave

Ava: Stay, stay, stay

Ava: Please

James: It’s a home away from home, I won’t

Ava: I’d offer you the key but you have it already, clearly

James: You can have a key when I move

Ava: I can?

Ava: That means so much

James: Yes, I want you to stay as well

Ava: It would be really strange if I started crying now, all things considered

Ava: just know how touched I am

James: You’d have to move the bear to let him hold you as I would

Ava: and I don’t think I can

James: Not yet

Ava: You tell me when

James: When I’m back, a moment prior would be too soon

Ava: The practicalities of this intrigue me and make for a maybe hilarious maybe as tantalising mental image

James: You’ll need to remain where you are

Ava: I would love that, missing you is easier when not surrounded by other people

James: [do a countdown as if she’s really gonna not move]

Ava: [make it a reminder on your phone calendar, again, like you won’t move a muscle]

James: [not this boy writing it on his hand like you do with casual reminders but not at all casually and exactly like when she wrote his name on her thigh, we all remember]

Ava: Being right where you left me feels like where I should be

James: Can you put my watch on without getting up or going inside?

Ava: Without going inside, yes, hold on

Ava: [I imagine you have everything he gave you in the bag out here with you so get to that without moving from this bear and send him the proof]

James: I stand corrected, it’s yours

Ava: I couldn’t possibly keep it but I like wearing it, and the time is memorised and imprinted on my brain

James: Please

Ava: Won’t you miss it?

James: Should I we’ll stop another

Ava: An excellent plan

Ava: I fear nothing we do is replicable but we can try our hardest

James: As long as you’re sure that what you’re doing is something I can, and am going to

James: [write about it again in detail because you are extra and you’ve seen her doing it now so you fully can]

Ava: Obviously it’ll be unbearably better when it’s you

Ava: even the best replacement is only that

James: He has an advantage over me in that he doesn’t require pauses for breath, but I’d gladly sacrifice taking any

Ava: You know you’ll kill me before you run out of breath

James: The only way I’ll permit you to die for me

James: [a countdown for this like die rn immediately because I say so please and thank you]

Ava: Shit

James: [write all the praise and encouragement in all the ways like you did until the moment she was standing in front of you IRL]

Ava: [taking what would feel like ages, for the constant back and forth you have been having, to reply because that killed you, even if it’s just a minute]

Ava: I

James: You can tell me, it’s okay

Ava: I’m still searching for the words to

James: There’s time, you and I have plenty

Ava: So much more to come

James: Absolutely

Ava: You seem confident, in a way you didn’t before

James: I am

Ava: I love it

James: The prospect of you nobly walking away reiterated to me I’m totally unprepared for our separation

Ava: I am only hypothetically interested in how I intended to pull it off myself, I can’t bear to think about it any other way

James: I crave you, this life

Ava: We’ll find a way to make it happen, we need to, this is so right that any other life is rendered irrelevant

James: I’m hostile to the mere possibility and exclusively open to actions which help me to hold onto you

Ava: I’m not going anywhere, I want this to be long-term

James: I could die happy if I got to see you every day, to publicly be with you on any number of those days

Ava: The idea that, one day, that can be more than fantasy in my head is wild

James: I had hope before, but I recently have resolve too

Ava: No secrets, no lies, it’s liberating

James: A new leaf

Ava: I don’t know where you’re going to find the time to write about us when we never have to be apart

James: I’ll insist you sleep for the recommended hours

Ava: Hey, what about your recommended hours

James: I’ve been deprived for the last four years, I’ll be fine

Ava: No

Ava: I admit that storytime had the opposite effect tonight but I will work out how to get you to sleep

James: [shade authors how you two like to do being like you could read them to me lol without actually saying that, and then pick some journalists because she is gonna be one who won’t suck, casual list of boring bastards]

Ava: I don’t want to bore you to death, darling

James: I could listen to you recite [something really REALLY boring, like the phonebook but they don’t exist, you know what I mean, maybe he’s sassing school/the revision she hates most, just for fun], and indeed will

Ava: You’ll love running lines with me just as much as I will then

James: I’m really looking forward to it

Ava: There’s a lot I’m looking forward to

James: Me too

Ava: I know this part is going to be really hard for you

Ava: but I’ll be here for you

James: Thank you

Ava: Of course, you shouldn’t be on your own through this

James: Shy of imposing, which I baulk at, I’ll try to embrace your full support

Ava: That’s what friends are for

James: Rarely has anything of the sort been my experience

Ava: No

Ava: A good friend, then, a rarity, not to toot my own horn but I shall try to be one

James: You’re a wonderful companion, along with esteemed faux work colleague, lest we forget

Ava: How could we?

Ava: Our lunch dates are the highlight of every working day

James: They are

Ava: I hope we can keep it up

James: Retirement is far off

Ava: So is Uni for me, I think we can manage

James: A little less so, but yes

Ava: Two whole years before we need to think about that

James: Shh, [a teacher he had that she therefore still has who is that bitch] would despair to hear that you aren’t

Ava: They have bigger fish to fry right now, maybe [this teacher] can beg your brother and the other culprits to do some revision before final exam…

James: It is a tactic he’d be inclined to respond to, unlike [another teacher who we are shading because they either do nothing or they are shouty and go too hard, whichever]

Ava: Mm, more carrot less stick

Ava: He is like Frank in that way

James: Most are partial to honey rather than vinegar

Ava: [this aggy teacher] will have to get some treats in

James: A student council worthy recommendation

Ava: I can assume you had different priorities than my brother and were not on the prefect team in sixth form, right?

Ava: Competition for head boy had to have been thin on the ground

James: I wasn’t many years into secondary in advance of being deemed an academic lost cause, [the head teacher] would have been taken ill, I fear, dare I utter the words head boy

Ava: I don’t know if I can call that a shame in good conscience, even only as a hypothetical

James: I’m intrigued what you would call it

Ava: Don’t get me wrong, I’m not wishing death on [the head] and the rest of the faculty

Ava: I just think [their school] is as questionable an institution as any other people buy their way into

James: You’ll hear no counter arguments from me on the subject

Ava: Even though I apparently give off prefect energy, I doubt I’ll bother with it

James: Undercover journalism is bound to be time consuming, I can’t in good conscience champion the assignment

Ava: Exactly

Ava: My friend Raz will have to report back to me when she invariably decides she must be head girl

James: You’ll have your own hands full with [some hilarious guesses for what the school play might be] once you get the bug this term

Ava: Will you even be able to cope if I go full theatre kid annoying?

James: The weekly dose of baby ballerinas and their mothers stands me in good stead, I suspect

Ava: Oh, well that is just not a favourable comparison at all

Ava: I don’t think I can live with that

James: You’ll have to hold onto the character you’re already endowed with, in that instance

Ava: Or hold onto summer as long as we can

James: I think I can live with that

Ava: It isn’t too late for me to consider other schools, if necessary

James: You have the luxury of time to contemplate all manner of things

Ava: Not that long but, again, the summer

Ava: I hadn’t contemplated anywhere else but it would be less complicated, for numerous reasons, I don’t know

James: Perhaps and one less complication is one less complication

Ava: Sorry, what you don’t need right now is another choice to make

Ava: I’ll work it out, it doesn’t matter right now

James: It isn’t my choice and I won’t make it for you, but that doesn’t mean we’re barred from discussing it, that’s never the case

Ava: I know

Ava: I think the shock has perhaps worn off and I just feel a bit, well, you know

James: Yes, but don’t worry, I’d dissuade you from a hasty decision, as much as I possess any influence

Ava: You possess plenty of influence, I care about your opinion

James: And I the trajectory of your life, the smaller steps and the larger

Ava: Knowing everyone and everyone knowing you has always seemed like such a negative

Ava: but if I don’t know anyone at a new school, maybe that’s a different kind of awful

James: There is a loneliness in fresh starts which are seldom talked about

Ava: It must be hard, losing friends because you need to lose a lifestyle, especially so young

James: That said, you’re not me, I believe you’d make new ones

Ava: That wasn’t entirely under your control, don’t say it like a failing

James: It was a failing to relinquish control over the amount of things I did

Ava: If it were possible to resist, you would have

James: Defiance is always possible, if you’re willing to face the consequences, I wasn’t

Ava: You were trying to make it work, whether you see that as a foolish endeavour now

James: A house built on sand, not that I’m poised to make your bedtime reading biblical all of a sudden

Ava: An interesting proposition

James: You’d sleep for the recommended hours but your dreams may be fascinating

Ava: The Book of Revelation is meant to be a trip

Ava: I don’t want to go to bed, still

James: I’m not ready to let you either

Ava: We could go for a swim, if I was there

James: [write about it ofc, any excuse for a what if scenario and that would be peak romance as well as a hot move]

Ava: Just add skinny dipping to the endless list of things I need to do with you

James: Turn to the back of the notebook and compose your list please

Ava: You told me to so nicely, I have to

James: I’ll contribute my own ideas when you return it

Ava: I’m afraid this list can’t be rushed, what if I miss something and you think I don’t want to do it?

James: The handover doesn’t need to be rushed, I trust you to take care of this draft of my scribblings

Ava: I’ll take all the care deserving, though I fear I will need more drafts than even you, darling

James: Perhaps you deserve your own notebook for this venture

Ava: I doubt the gift shop has any worthy

James: I’ll organise a detour via [where they were shopping the other day, deliberately so]

Ava: I owe you so many presents

James: You don’t owe me a thing

Ava: Okay, owe isn’t the word

Ava: I want to spoil you as much as you do me

James: I am, the sensitivity and attentiveness you show is unparalleled

Ava: But I want to give you more

James: You’re giving everything you can, I know that

Ava: Don’t forget

James: How could I?

Ava: I know I’m not as mature or as interesting as the girls you’ll be free to see when you’re through all this

James: You’ve approached this with a maturity no one else I’ve spoken with has come close to, not to mention, you’re the most enchanting person I’ve ever met

Ava: It wasn’t super mature of me to bring up my insecurities there though

Ava: I like you, more than just a fling, I want you to know that

James: Well, that’s a relief because this is more than just a fling, isn’t it?

Ava: Yeah

Ava: I hope so

James: I want us to be

Ava: I know, and I do too

Ava: I just know how fast this has been and where you are in your life, I don’t want to be foolish

James: I’d hate to pressure you, I hope you don’t feel that way

Ava: No, not at all

Ava: I told you, I have a habit of getting carried away

James: I’d be suspicious of someone who wasn’t, with emotions as intense as these

Ava: If I had learned any lessons, heeded any advice, we wouldn’t be here

Ava: I’m not mad that we are, by any means

James: I’m typically plagued by regret, but it hasn’t found me here

Ava: I’ll never regret you

James: On the contrary, I’ll pay tribute to you whenever the opportunity arises

Ava: This isn’t too much, it’s the idea that one day it could be taken away, that’s what I was trying to say

James: I’m scared too, again, how could we not be?

Ava: It’s normal, you’re right

Ava: Thank goodness, right

James: Whether or not I’ve learned nearly enough from my copious errors in judgment and bad choices, it’s fair to say I’ve grasped that it’s worth having things you’re anxious you may lose in lieu of having nothing you much care for

Ava: I entirely agree

James: Will you agree to be my girlfriend? I realise it’s just a word, that we can’t actually be together officially, but despite that hurdle yet to be navigated

Ava: Yes

Ava: It means a lot when everything would be simplified by not acknowledging me at all, I know that to be true but to say I don’t want this would be a complete lie

James: You mean a lot, Ava

Ava: I might be floating, I hope that doesn’t break the rules about not leaving here

James: Kindly drift toward me, if so

Ava: I know you can’t possibly guess at this point

Ava: but tell me you’ll be home soon

James: We’ll create a home together soon, I promise

Ava: I can’t even comprehend how happy I would be, to see you that often, get to be with you

James: Until that moment I’m homeless, and aware how dramatic that sounds

Ava: I am a fan of your flair for the dramatic, it matches my own so well

James: It would be awkward for me to disclose something like that if we weren’t perfectly suited to each other, thank you for sparing my blushes

Ava: I do miss them but we need to be in person for me to fully appreciate

Ava: Where shall we live?

James: [send her a picture anyway, just cos]

James: I don’t know, I’ve lived in a grand total of one postcode to date

Ava: God, I can already feel the hours I’m going to spend staring at that rushing past

Ava: I barely have you beat, but that’ll mean it’ll be all the more fun searching

James: I almost feel as though I should get in the pool, then we can both float for a while

Ava: I absolutely think you should

Ava: We all know they’ve had to tolerate worse debauchery from guests who think they can buy their way out of rules, you’ll be fine

James: Shall I? Okay

Ava: I wish I had a pool to get in right now, maybe I’ll get in the hot tub, if I find IV a suitable floaty to keep him, hm, dry is no longer the word

James: [send her a picture of you on one so she can copy it with this bear]

Ava: 🥺

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gendercensus · 3 years

Text

On fae/faer pronouns and cultural appropriation

HOW IT STARTED

I had a handful, a very small handful but more than two, responses in the Gender Census feedback box telling me that fae/faer pronouns are appropriative. The reasons didn’t always agree, and the culture that was being appropriated wasn’t always the same, but here’s a selection of quotes:

“Fae pronouns are cultural appropriation and are harmful to use“ - UK, age 11-15

“I’m not a person who practices pagan holidays but, my understanding is that pronouns like fae/faeself are harmful because the fae are real to pagans and is like using Jesus/jesuself as pronouns“ - UK, age 11-15

“I know you've probably heard this a million times, so has everyone on the internet, but the ''mere existence''of the fae pronoun feels really uncomfortable for some of us. I'm personally not against neopronouns like xe/xim, er/em and the like, I am a pagan but apart from the, imo most important, reasoning of that pronoun being immensely disrespectful, I worry as an nb about people who banalize the usage of pronouns ''for fun'', and I'm quoting what some people have told me.“ - Spain, 16-20

“I don't agree with fae/deity pronouns just from a pagan perspective it's very disrespectful to the cultures they come from. Like Fae are a legit thing in many cultures and they hate with a fiery passion mortal humans calling themselves Fae to the point of harming/cursing the people who do it“ - USA, age 16-20

“only celtic people can use far/ faers otherwise it’s cultural appropriation, many celts have said this and told me this“ - USA, age 16-20

So that’s:

❓ Someone who doesn’t say whether they’re pagan or Celtic.

❌ Someone who definitely isn’t pagan.

✅ Someone who is pagan.

❓ Someone who doesn’t say whether they’re pagan or Celtic.

So, just to disclose some bias up-front, I am English so I’m not Celtic, but I do live in Wales so I am surrounded by Celts. The bit of Wales that I live in is so beautiful in such a way that when my French friend came to visit me she described it as féerique - like an enchanting, magical land, literally “fairylike” or thereabouts. Coincidentally I have also considered myself mostly pagan for over half of my life, and I can’t definitively claim whether or not the Fae are “part of paganism” because paganism is so diverse and pick’n’mix that it just doesn’t work that way.

To me the idea that fae/faer pronouns would be offensive or culturally appropriative sounds absurd. But also, I am powered by curiosity, and have been wrong enough times in my life that I wanted to approach this in a neutral way with an open mind. Perhaps what I find out can be helpful to some people.

So since we only have information from one person who is definitely directly affected by any cultural appropriation that may be happening, the first thing I wanted to do was get some information from ideally a large number of people who are in the cultures being appropriated, and see what they think.

WHAT I DID

First of all I put some polls up on Twitter and Mastodon. [Edit: Note that this post has been updated with results from closed polls.]

I specified that I wanted to hear from nonbinary Celts and pagans, just so that the voters would be familiar with fae/faer pronouns. I asked the questions in a neutral way, i.e. “How do you feel about...” with “good/neutral/bad” answer options, instead of something more leading like “Is this a load of rubbish?” or “are you super offended?” with “yes/no” options. I provided a “see results” option, so that the poll results wouldn’t be skewed as much by random people clicking any old answer to see the results. And I invited voters to express their opinions in replies.

Question #1: Nonbinary people of Celtic descent (Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Cornwall, the Isle of Man, and Brittany), how do you feel about non-Celtic people using the neopronoun set fae/faer? [ It's good / No strong feelings/other / It's bad ]

Question #2: Nonbinary pagans, how do you feel about non-pagans using the neopronoun set fae/faer? [ It's good / No strong feelings/other / It's bad ]

The Twitter polls got over 1,100 responses each, and the Mastodon polls got over 140 responses each. With a little bit of spreadsheetery I removed the “N/A” responses to reverse engineer the number of people voting for each option, combined those numbers, and recalculated percentages.

Obviously this approach is not in the least scientific, but thankfully the results were unambiguous enough and the samples were big enough that I feel comfortable drawing conclusions.

Celts on fae/faer pronouns being used by non-Celts (561 voters):

It's good - 42.5%

No strong feelings/other - 44.0%

It's bad - 13.5%

Pagans on fae/faer pronouns being used by non-pagans (468 voters):

It's good - 47.2%

No strong feelings/other - 39.5%

It's bad - 13.3%

Here’s how that looks as a graph:

The limitations of polls on these platforms means that we have no way to distinguish between people who have more complicated views (”other”) and people who have “no strong feelings”, so we can’t really draw conclusions there. If we stick to just the pure positive and pure negative:

Celts were over three times as likely to feel positive about non-Celts using fae/faer pronouns than they were to feel negative.

Pagans were over three and a half times as likely to feel positive about non-pagans using fae/faer pronouns than they were to feel negative.

So Celts and pagans are way more likely to feel actively good about someone’s fae/faer pronouns, even when that person is not a Celt/pagan. That’s some strong evidence against the idea that fae/faer pronouns are appropriative, right there.

CORRECTIONS

To be clear, I haven’t done any research about the roots of fae/faer or the origins of the Fae and related beings, but my goal here was to get a sense of what Celts and pagans think and feel, rather than what an historian or anthropologist would say.

On the anti side, here were the replies that suggested fae/faer either is or might be inappropriate:

“I only worry that not everyone understands the origin of the word outside of modernized ideas of fairies.“ - pagan

“As a vaguely spiritual Whatever (Ireland), I think a mortal using "fae" as a pronoun/to refer to themselves is asking for a malicious and inventive fairy curse (on them, their families and possibly anyone in their vicinity, going by the traditions). I have not heard of this term before, so this is an immediate reaction from no background bar my cultural knowledge of sidhe/fae/term as culturally appropriate. My general approach is people can identify themselves as they want.“ - Celtic

So we’ve got a pagan who’s wary that people who use fae/faer (and people in general) might not have a fully fleshed out idea of the Fae. And we’ve got a Celt who doesn’t mind people using fae/faer personally, but based on what they know of the Fae they wouldn’t be surprised if the Fae got mad about it. No outright opposition, but a little concern.

There were not a lot of replies on the pro side, but not because people weren’t into it, judging by the votes. There were a lot of “it’s more complicated than that” replies, many of which repeated others, so quotes won’t really work. Here’s a summary of the Celtic bits:

“Fae” is not a Celtic word, and Celts don’t use it. It is French, or Anglo-French.

“Fae” can refer to any number of stories/legends from a wide variety of cultures in Europe, not one cohesive concept.

There are many legends about fairy-like beings in Celtic mythologies, and there are many, many different names for them.

The Celts are not a monolith, they’re a broad selection of cultures with various languages and various mythologies.

And the pagan bits:

Paganism is not closed or exclusive in any way. It might actually be more open than anything else, as “pagan” is a sort of umbrella term for non-mainstream religions in some contexts. A closed culture would be a prerequisite for something to be considered “appropriated” from paganism.

From my own experience, pagans may or may not believe in the Fae, and within that group believers may or may not consider the Fae to be sacred and/or worthy of great respect. (I’ve certainly never met a pagan who worshipped the Fae, though I don’t doubt that some do.)

And then we get into the accusations. 🍿

“this issue wasn’t started by Celtic groups or by people who know much about Celtic fae. It was started primarily by anti-neopronoun exclusionist pagans on TikTok.“

“[I’m] literally Scottish [...] and it’s not appropriative in the least and honestly to suggest as such is massively invalidating towards actual acts of cultural appropriation and is therefore racist. Feel like if this was actually brought up it was either by some people who seriously got their wires crossed or people who are just concern trolling and trying to make fun of both neo-pronouns and of the concept of cultural appropriation and stir the pot in the process.“

“It wouldn't be the first time bigots falsly claim “it's appropriative from X marginalized group" to harass people they don't like, like they did with aspec people when they claimed "aspec" was stolen from autistic language (which was false, as many autistics said)“

“It's been a discussion in pagan circles recently ... People were very quick to use the discussion as an excuse to shit on nonbinary people.“

“I think it would be apropos to note that the word "faerie/fairy" has been a synonym for various queer identities for decades, too. The Radical Faeries are a good example.“ (So if anyone has the right to [re]claim it...)

A little healthy skepticism is often wise in online LGBTQ+ “discourse”, and some of these people are making some very strong claims, for which I’d love to see some evidence/sources/context. Some of it certainly sounds plausible.

HOW DID IT START?

I had a look on Twitter and the earliest claim I can find that fae/faer pronouns are cultural appropriation is from 18th February 2020, almost exactly one year ago today. Again, tweets are not the best medium for this, there was very little in the way of nuance or context. If anyone can find an older claim from Twitter or Tumblr or anywhere else online, please do send it my way.

I have no idea how to navigate TikTok because I’m a nonbinosaur. (I’m 34.) I did find some videos of teens and young adults apparently earnestly asserting that they were Celtic or pagan and the use of fae/faer pronouns was offensive, but the videos were very brief and provided nothing in the way of nuance or context. For example:

This one from October 2020 with 29k ❤️s, by someone who I assume is USian based on the word “mom”?

This one from December 2020, that says “I am pagan and i find it rather disrespectful. It’s like using god/godr or jesus/jesusr.” That’s probably what inspired the feedback box comment above that refers to hypothetical jesus/jesusr pronouns.

If anyone is able to find a particularly old or influential TikTok video about fae/faer pronouns being appropriative I’d really appreciate it, especially if it’s from a different age group or from not-the-USA, to give us a feel for how universal this is.

For context, fae pronouns were mentioned in the very first Gender Census back in May 2013, though you’ll have to take my word for it as the individual responses are not currently public. The word “fae” was mentioned in the pronoun question’s “other” textbox, and no other forms in the set were entered so we have no way of knowing for sure what that person’s full pronoun set actually is. This means the set may have been around for longer. The Nonbinary Wiki says that the pronoun set was created in October 2013, as “fae/vaer”, later than the first entry in the Gender Census, so I’ll be editing that wiki page later! If anyone has any examples of fae/faer pronouns in use before 2013 I would also be very interested to see that.

IN SUMMARY

Obviously I can’t speak for everyone, as the Twitter polls are not super scientific and they only surveyed a selection of Celts and pagans within a few degrees of separation of the Gender Census Twitter and Mastodon accounts, but I can certainly report on what I found.

For a more conclusive result, we’d need to take into account various demographics such as age, culture, location, religion, race/heritage, etc.

As far as I can tell based on fairly small samples of over 400 people per group, a minority of about 13% of Celtic and/or pagan people felt that use of fae/faer pronouns is appropriative.

A much higher number of people per group felt positive about people who are not Celts or pagans using fae/faer pronouns. The predominant view was:

It can’t be cultural appropriation from Celtic cultures because fairy-like beings are not unique to Celtic cultures and Celtic cultures don’t call them Fae.

It can’t be cultural appropriation from pagan cultures because paganism is not “closed” or exclusive in any way, it’s too broad and open.

If your experience of your gender(s) or lack thereof isn’t described or encompassed by the gender binary of “male OR female”, please do click here to take the Gender Census 2021 - it’s international and it closes no earlier than 10th March 2021!

#fae/faer #pronouns #neopronouns #cultural appropriation

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religion-is-a-mental-illness · 2 years

Text

The following was sent to me through private message.:

I wanted to reach out privately and earnestly to let you know something that (I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt) you probably didn't know.

Advocating for the abolition of ALL religion is cultural genocide.

Jewish people, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Taoists and several groups of folk religions and pagan religions will be eradicated, taking important cornerstones of people's culture with them.

Most of these people are disenfranchised (at least in the west anyway) and advocating for their culture to be wiped out is both harmful and dare I say a very insidious kind of bigotry.

I don't blame you if you didn't know but I wanted to tell you so that, well, you would know. What you choose to do with that information is up to you but seriously consider whether who you WANT to hurt is worth hurting thousands of people you might not even have been thinking of.

Anyway, thanks for reading all this and please consider focusing on more constructive efforts, like advocating against cults and proseletyzing.

Have a good day, whenever it is that you see this.

As there is far too much to address in e mere private chat (this is one of the longest posts I've ever written), I said I would address it in a full post and gave her the option of how I would convey her original question:

Quote the whole thing, including her name.

Quote the whole thing, but removing her name.

Summarize as faithfully as possible the issue, but in my own words and understanding.

I also answered that in short, the answer is no.

The response was that she didn't want this taken public, followed by:

And it IS cultural genocide. Judging by your blog, you either grew up or still are culturally Christian so it isn't really your place to tell religious minorities or disenfranchised people how to handle our own disenfranchisement.

Basically, that I'm not allowed to have an opinion or better information. Or less racist ideas. Based, as usual, on stereotypes (don't worry, we'll get there). She assumed my identity categories in order to justify ignoring me. This is Standpoint Epistemology.

https://twitter.com/SwipeWright/status/1410359907249971207

Standpoint theory combined with intersectionality, taken to the extreme (as is currently being done), is the codification of the ad hominem fallacy into an epistemology. It no longer matters what is said; it matters who said it.

They will assume your categories and decide "your place" (their word) for you. And you must stay in the lane they have prescribed for you, and adhere to their higher awareness, or you're a blasphemer and heretic. You must not burst their confirmation bubble. You must adhere to the narrow path. You must not offer an "outside" (by their judgement) perspective to counterbalance groupthink.

"Listen and believe." "Shut up and listen."

https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/logicalfallacies/Ad-Hominem-Circumstantial

Ad Hominem (Circumstantial)

argumentum ad hominem

(also known as: appeal to bias, appeal to motive, appeal to personal interest, argument from motives, conflict of interest, faulty motives, naïve cynicism, questioning motives, vested interest)

Description: Suggesting that the person who is making the argument is biased or predisposed to take a particular stance, and therefore, the argument is necessarily invalid.

She then proceeded to block me.

Except, that's not how this actually works, no matter how shrill the protestations. And how racist the assumptions are.

So, I have decided to make the choice for her (#2), and proceed to point out how ignorant and also racist this entire mess of nonsense is.

Whether or not she wanted this public, I can certainly write up my own post on this topic. While I will generally try to honor the wishes of those I talk to - e.g. anonymity for ex-Muslims who are in physical danger - I am not beholden to such demands, least of all from people who insist I must only talk about a particular topic in private, and cannot write anything publicly on the subject. (This is not unlike the current campaign against curriculum transparency, opposing the idea that you should be able to see what people are up to.)

Strap in, this is lengthy, which is why I wasn't prepared to do it in private chat.

Let's begin.

In your opening, you indicated that you wanted to reach out "earnestly." The follow-up would suggest otherwise, that this was not for discussion, but for immediate action and compliance. The postmodernist equivalent of being told to accept Jesus Christ or burn in hellfire.

Yeah, I don't do that. You clearly don't know anything about me.

Confirmed.

So, in the interests of that earnestness and sincerity, I suggest we cut to the chase and name up front what we're talking about. Let's be clear, this is very specific terminology that doesn't just come from nowhere.

A person doesn't just come up with such histrionic ideas and hyperbolic language out of thin air, from her own contemplations. As we've already seen based on your complete, unrepentant adherence to the Ad Hominem fallacy through Standpoint, this is postmodern Critical Theory activism being parroted. It's textbook. Literally. There are no new or independent ideas here, just the vacuous, empty echo of a drone repeating its programming.

So, just so that we're clear, yes, I see you.

But what actually gave it away is the phrase "cultural genocide". Because this is what we're actually referring to.

To normal, sane humans this looks, well, insane. While activists will try to gaslight you into accepting that this is a more enlightened, greater understanding - as the private messager did - it truly is deranged and unhinged from reality.

So, let me explain. Critical Social Justice does not deal with individuals or with universal humanity. Indeed, it actually explicitly rejects it.

"Many of these movements initially advocated for a type of liberal humanism (individualism, freedom, and peace) but quickly turned to a rejection of liberal humanism. The logic of individual autonomy that underlies liberal humanism (the idea that people are free to make independent rational decisions that determine their own fate) was viewed as a mechanism for keeping the marginalized in their place by obscuring larger structural systems of inequality. In other words, it fooled people into believing that they had more freedom and choice than societal structures actually allow."

-- Sensoy/DiAngelo, "Is Everyone Really Equal?"

Only categories matter, since CSJ views society as stratified by categories, and individuals are simply puppets in this structure (i.e. literally a conspiracy theory).

And this includes Ability/Disability as an identity characteristic. That is, they think people do and should consider their (dis)ability as a core element of their identity.

This is the exact opposite of the "I am not my disability" that is the counterpart of the Liberal mainstay of color-blindness: I am not defined by my skin color. I am not defined by my disability. You may observe and note them, but I am not defined by them, and I don't want you to deal with me through those aspects.

This is actually the foundational premise of Critical Disability Studies. Also not a joke. This is a real - in the sense that it exists, not in the sense it's legitimate - pseudo-discipline in the Theoretical Humanities.

(So is Critical Animal Studies, by the way, which asks why we grant humans rights and privileges that we don't grant to other non-human animals, and encourages us to rid ourselves of the language of oppression we use when referring to our pets. Such as the word "owner". Not a joke.)

So, when you consider that people are born deaf or may become deaf through some kind of condition or accident, CSJ theology regards that as an identity category, rather than simply a medical condition.

It is actually opposed to medical treatments that would restore or grant hearing, because it would erase that identity group. Nobody would die, but nobody would identity with this medical condition any more.

(They won't have any qualms about transitioning a four year old, though.)

This is what CSJ activists mean by "cultural genocide." They mean that "deaf culture," whatever that means, will be systematically exterminated by powerful groups to enforce "normativity", akin to how the Nazis exterminated Jews. They're not joking.

Make no mistake, cultural genocide exists, such as the Uyghurs. People can, and have, invaded and sought the decimation of entire people.

But, while activists are desperately trying to pretend they're equivalent, they're not. And it's testament to this ideology's disconnect from reality that they would work so hard to pretend so, and how they would throw people's wellbeing under the bus of their theology's virtue.

Nobody dies by finding technologies and medical procedures to grant people hearing, or prevent deafness occurring in the first place.

Nobody dies by people discarding superstitious beliefs and changing their culture to be aligned with reality and non-theistic values, which is what we mean by embracing the ongoing decline of religion.

All that happens is that an identity label disappears. Because nobody needs it any more.

This bizarre mentality isn't just reserved for deafness, it's pervasive across Disability Studies, including curing blindness, restoring limbs, treating mental illness, and for some bizarre reason, autism. That is, it's "cultural genocide" to treat "schizophrenia culture" or to support research into eliminating autism. It's typical for people with this kind of activism to adopt the mental health identities, as they're self-identified and invisible; my interlocutor had self-diagnosed and self-identifeid as "autistic." In her bio, of course.

It's also pervasive across the anti-science of Fat Studies, which views "the effort to eradicate fat people via weight loss as a form of genocide perpetrated by the medical profession" (direct quote from the doctrine).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zy7O-xgN3hw&t=24m36s

"More recently we've seen the rise of Critical Studies of Ableism and Fat Studies. These draw to a great extent on Queer Theory.

They ask themselves why we think it is better for body parts to work and for people not to be morbidly obese.

They answer themselves that it's because science, that false authority that seeks to police and oppress people, has declared it to be so due to an underlying hatred of disabled and fat people.

They advocate a different form of knowledge. One that relies on the lived experience of disabled and fat people.

Unless they prefer not to be disabled or fat, in which case they've internalized this medicalized oppression, and they need to be reprimanded and ignored."

-- Helen Pluckrose, "The Rise and Whys of Grievance Studies"

(BTW, this is the reason that there was precious little talk about the significant risk factor obesity plays in survival of COVID. Activists will say "hey, this slim person died too" - not knowing what "risk factor" means - "so this is just medicalized bigotry.")

It's like getting upset when Ford discontinued all cars in favor of SUVs, and calling it "vehicular genocide." No one actually dies, and no production capacity is actually reduced, but nothing will roll off the assembly line with the badge "Taurus" ever again. Just like how people discarding Islam will mean that their children will be born, but won't call themselves "Muslim" any more.

What this is really bemoaning is the end of a label. Because that's what this ideology cares about. Ones that it fetishizes, while ignoring the ones it doesn't. Like Xianity. You'll see no such alarmist language over the decline of Xianity.

Why this is the case is itself worth a look, because it's just as deranged as the resulting wails of "cUlTuRaL gEnOcIdE!1!!"

The aforementioned stratified power structure is formalized in the Intersectional Wheel of Power. This Sesame Street-level understanding of society is taught unironically in colleges, and increasingly, in the lower schools by activist teachers sneaking it into their curriculum. It takes everyone and pigeon holes them into stereotyped "oppressor"/power and "oppressed"/"marginalized" classes within each identity category - race, gender, ability, etc.

It cares nothing about the individual or their circumstances. For example, Oprah Winfrey, with her millions of follows and billions of dollars is "oppressed" and "marginalized" as a black woman.

To disagree with this higher wisdom means you have "fragility," or "internalized oppression."

While "religion" does not appear on the above linked copy of the Wheel, I've seen some that do. And Xianity is an "oppressor" class in this domain, with... what was it?

Jewish people, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Taoists and several groups of folk religions and pagan religions

Ah yes, that... as the "oppressed" class. It doesn't matter to the activist that Hinduism has 1.2 billion adherents, or that Hindutva fundamentalists are seizing control of segments of India. It doesn't matter that Islam is dominant in many countries, to the point of making it illegal to not be a Muslim in some. It doesn't matter that there are 1.9 billion Muslims. Because Xianity has been the most prevalent in the USA and many western countries, and Islam much less so, this means "Muslim" is an oppressed identity, while "Xian" is a privileged, oppressor identity.

Notice how parochial and juvenile this proposition is, though. This is all about the limited, childish view of academics in privileged positions in higher education in first world countries. It's a completely US-centric view, ironically colonized to other countries.

But it's why people critical of Islam, and particularly ex-Muslims, are routinely accused of "Islamophobia". The fact that someone can simply think their way out of a (purported) "oppressed" class just blows their tiny minds. Because in the Clown World of Intersectionality, opposing Islam is opposing a marginalized, oppressed group. Even where it's dominant.

This is also why it's okay to whine about the "oppression" of women in first world secular countries, where their rights are enshrined in law and their voices hugely influential, but where Xianity is prevalent. But you must not mention that women are routinely arrested for removing hijab or being unaccompanied, gay people are routinely executed, and blasphemers routinely sentenced to death.

The only thing surprising to me about this person's unhinged "genocide" claim is that it included Judaism, as Jews are traditionally given "white privilege" by Intersectionalists.

"Another aspect of the construction of whiteness is the way certain groups have moved into the white race. For example, early in our history Irish, Jews, and Italians were considered nonwhite—that is, on a par with African Americans. Over time, they earned the prerogatives and social standing of whites by joining labor unions, by swearing fealty to the Democratic Party, and by acquiring wealth, sometimes by illegal or underground activity. Whiteness, it turns out, is not only valuable, it is shifting and malleable."

-- Delgado/Stefancic, "Critical Race Theory, An Introduction."

Which is the reason for the recent uptick in antisemitic attacks. Antiracist (i.e. neoracist) and Intersectional activists view Jews as "white allied" and therefore fair game. The Squad is notorious for exactly this.

Ditto the anti-Asian violence. All fuelled by Intersectionality, and unsurprising given the stratification Intersectionality invented and insists is pervasive, the "normal science" of society.

A look at her blog, however, suggests she herself is Jewish, providing the explanation, as self-interest will always win out in the more ambiguous areas.

With all of that out of the way, there isn't a whole lot else that needs to be said to rebut this idiocy, where people can't walk away from their religion or it'll hurt the feelings of Intersectional lunatics.

Still, it's worth exploring some of the other fallacious and reality-disconnected thinking.

If you were simply trying to puzzle out the meaning of this bizarre claim, you now have your answer: a label will fade out of use. Nothing more, nothing less. Like "Ford Granada," "Hellenist," "slave owner" or "Führer." If you're happy with that explanation, you can probably scroll on to the next post in your dashboard.

For more on how this mentality meanders, crashes and burns, feel free to Keep Reading after the jump. Be forewarned that it's very long.

Now that we know what "cultural genocide" means in this context, we can reject this entirely and need address nothing further. It's already fallen apart. But let's proceed.

Advocating for the abolition of ALL religion is cultural genocide.

Jewish people, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Taoists and several groups of folk religions and pagan religions will be eradicated, taking important cornerstones of people's culture with them.

Let's notice the sleight of hand being pulled here. Going from "all religion" in the first line to "people" and "groups" in the second. And even going so far as to attempt this gem of blatant dishonesty.

hurting thousands of people

Religions are just ideas. They're not entitled to exist. We have thousands of abandoned and discarded religions through our history, and nobody need weep for them. We have even more abandoned ideologies and beliefs than full-blown religions.

"People" and "groups" are, well, people.

Not only does this conflate - or misrepresent - religion with culture, worse, it's conflating culture with the people participating in it. That people are their beliefs.

More insidiously, that one can deduce someone's beliefs from their identity categories. That all people in any given category have the same experience and viewpoint, or if they don't, they have "internalized oppression" and are dismissed as not Authentic.

So, let's rephrase this just a little, but not actually all that much.

Advocating for the removal of magical thinking and ancient superstition is cultural genocide. Abandoning magical thinking and ancient superstition will eradicate Jewish people, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Taoists and several groups (of people) of folk religions and pagan religions, taking away the foundation (magical thinking and ancient superstition) they sit upon.

Read the original and the rephrasing again. How did I do? Does it seem more sane or less sane when clarity is added.

While, as we've already seen, it is true that removal of religion will remove the terminology of "Jew", "Muslim", etc, because those terms will serve little purpose, that's like complaining that if we get rid of Nazism, we won't be able to call people "Nazis" any more. I doubt Intersectional activists know, let alone worry, what a Zoroastrian or Hellenist is, or why there are so few of them.

In any event, it's not phrased that way, is it? It's phrased as if advocating for people to abandon primitive superstitions is the same as calling for them to be hunted down, rounded up and killed. Using the incendiary word "genocide," after all, not to mention "hurting thousands of people."

But people abandoning religions doesn't involve anyone dying or being hurt. Non-belief has steadily grown in countries like the US, UK, Canada, Australia and many others without a single death. Except, you know, when the fundie relatives "honor kill" the apostate. But that's probably their "culture."

Sure, people's feelings might be hurt.

"If someone tells me that I've hurt their feelings, I say, 'I'm still waiting to hear what your point is.'

In this country, I've been told, 'That's offensive' as if those two words constitute an argument or a comment.

Not to me they don't."

-- Christopher Hitchens

But, so what? It's trivially easy to manufacture offence from nothing. Anyone can claim offence, real or imagined. People's feelings are their problem. The person who messaged me doesn't seem to give a shit about my feelings while lecturing me, so clearly this doesn't really bother her.

"It's now very common to hear people say, "I'm rather offended by that" - as if it gives them certain rights.

It's no more than a whine. "I find that offensive. " It has no meaning, it has no purpose, it has no reason to be respected as a phrase.

"I'm offended by that."

Well, so fucking what?

-- Stephen Fry

Or is it that she only cares about certain people's feelings? Like any garden variety bigot?

People can simply change their minds. And they don't need arrogant ivory-tower ideologues to gatekeep whether they do so. One of the best ways to actually destroy a culture is to gatekeep it, because people will simply stop participating. People don't need to be made to feel guilty by shallow, racist activists invested in sustaining the romantic stereotypes they've built up in their minds.

Because that's what this ideology runs on: cliches and stereotypes.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noble_savage

A noble savage is a literary stock character who embodies the concept of the indigene, outsider, wild human, an "other" who has not been "corrupted" by civilization, and therefore symbolizes humanity's innate goodness.

The noble savage is exotic, unfamiliar, has a mystique, glamor and romanticism compared with the boring predictability of the familiar. The grass is always greener. "Hijab is empowering!"

What's not stated outright in this fetish, but is made clear in the assertion of "cultural genocide" is that cultures other than liberal, western society are sufficiently dependent upon superstition and magical thinking for their "other ways of knowing" that if you take those away, there is nothing left of them.

While western societies are stuck scrutinizing the minutiae of mathematic calculationa and fussing about with testing evidence, non-western societies are engaged in broad, romantic storytelling of sweeping tales that tell of an imaginary origin, and which they hold dear. Even if they're not true. To take that away is to destroy them, because they have nothing else. Science, evidence and reason are "white, western" ways of knowing.

Except that non-Western societies haven't collapsed as they've already been discarding superstition and magical thinking, and are continuing to do so.

(On the other hand, Western civilization itself might collapse if the postmodern form of superstition of numinous forces, magical thinking about language, and anti-science, anti-objectivity social constructivism continues to infect it.)

This ideology doesn't actually think very highly of other cultures. It regards them as primitive and credulous, and its members practically another species. That they don't have the same wishes and desires. It just regards that as a good thing. A good thing for them to be immune to science. A good thing to put myth and storytelling above objective reality. It just wants to appear more morally righteous about "diverse" and "inclusive" and "tolerant" it is about looking down on them.

Because this ideology is founded on stereotypes and cliches. Where we had spent decades abandoning stereotypes of all types, this ideology recapitulates them as virtues. It is thus extremely racist, sexist, bigoted and, ironically, colonialist. See: Anti-colonial Diktat.

Let's take a moment though, because we've been talking about "culture" but we need to consider what we mean by that.

Culture is something you participate in, it's something that you do, it's what surrounds you, it's your way of life.

Culture is not a biological or inherent property of anything or anyone. It is what people do and the way they do it. And that is completely independent of any inherited, biological trait.

I know two people from different parts of Africa. Both were born, raised and grew up in Africa. They even completed mandatory military service. Both are white. Both are more culturally "African" (ignoring for a moment that "Africa" is not a monolith or single culture) than Oprah Winfrey or Kanye West, who are black Americans; both Oprah and Kanye are culturally American, not African.

There are some particularly troubling inevitable conclusions/side effects of this culture vs ethnicity train of thought. Because it positions someone like Oprah as being not- or less-American, as being outside of American culture, by associating her with being African. She's not. She's culturally American. Her ethnicity and biological ancestry trace back to Africa, but she herself is culturally American.

Because culture does not travel down ethnic or biological lines. It's worth noting here that the average black American has between 16-24% European ancestry, and about 5% native American ancestry.

Since it's something you participate in, culture changes all the time, because what people do and how they do it changes. It's not a defined box of someone's personal preconceptions that must be protected at all costs. When people discard a tradition, it's not for you to decide that they shouldn't, or that it ruins their culture, or that their culture has been destroyed by not complying with your expectations.

Nobody owns culture.

https://cheshireinthemiddle.tumblr.com/post/131407267302

And to top it off, basically 80 percent of japanese customs, traditions, and food, came from other countries. Japanese is an integration of different cultures, like america. Japan takes influences from places like korea, china, russia, and europe. If japan stuck to itself, there would be no tempura, japanese tea, tea ceremonies, kabuki, japanese bread, japanese curry, j- pop, anime, cars, or modern fishing techniques.

Not only do these change over time, but one of the key points about culture is that it's shared and adopts parts of other cultures it encounters. Cultures mash together, they split apart, they change and evolve.

That's what humanity does. It stops living in isolated boxes and thinking it got everything right the first time, and instead interacts and learns from each other.

People like this clearly sheltered activist should try it some time.

And religion itself is not "culture." An American Xian and an American atheist will have far more in common culturally than an American Xian and a Zambian Xian. Religion is only one part of any given culture, and yes, that includes Islam and Judaism and other religions. Those religions are not practiced the same everywhere in the world, and to think so would be incredibly ignorant.

The Arabs existed as Arabs long before Islam came along and conquered them 1400 years ago. The Canaanites existed before Judaism arose. Indonesia was a country with people in it long before it became infested with Islam. Ditto Pakistan, Afghanistan, Somalia and Iran.

Remember Egypt? Remember Egyptian culture? Existed long before Islam came along and imposed its dogma onto the country.

Consider Islam itself. Moderate, "religion of peace" Islam is an invention of the last 100 years. Its purported inclusiveness and congeniality is a modern, Western fabrication. As any recognized Islamic tafsir (exegesis/commentary/analysis, e.g. Ibn Kathir) will confirm, traditional Islam looks far more like the Taliban than the "religion of peace" hijabi with a tattoo showing in the small of her back above the waist of her low-rise jeans.

Is it "cultural genocide" if Islam moderates and becomes less fundamentalist as many Muslims are trying to achieve, as Xianity underwent reform? Are you suggesting that it's unreasonable for Islam to change, and that it should remain in its original war-like state? If you're concerned about "cultural genocide," shouldn't you want Islam to remain in its purest, most untainted, most fundamentalist original state? Rather than adopting values and ideas from Western cultures?

And no, that's not a misconception.

Islam has also only existed for the last 1400 years. When it arose, it stole "borrowed" from Xianity and Judaism. It plagiarized the previous mythology (compare Sura 5.32 with Sanhedrin 37a) and claimed to be the "true" version of the word of the Abrahamic god. Does it trouble you that the spread of Islam wiped out the Quraysh? Both the people and the culture? How do you decide which cultures to get upset about and which ones to let die out without any concern?

Women being trapped in black body bags might be - nay, is - completely Islamic, but it's not Afghan culture, Somali culture or Indonesian culture. Those still exist, buried and half-remembered under the Islamic bullshit.

If you want to talk "cultural genocide," let's talk about the obliteration of many cultural traditions at the point of an Islamic sword. About how distinct, rich cultures are now haunted by interchangeable Dementors, who only exist and never get to live.

Given all of this, labelling the decline of religion "cultural genocide" is one of the single stupidest things I've ever heard.

People are not their beliefs. They are not their traditions.

Jewish people, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Taoists and several groups of folk religions and pagan religions will be eradicated, taking important cornerstones of people's culture with them.

Cornerstones will be removed? Good. Build new cornerstones. Better ones. Ones built on reality. Ones built on truth. Ones built on humanity rather than power and control justified by magic, divine revelation and the god of the gaps.

This mentality seem to convey the misconception that religions and cultures don't already do this anyway.

Islam consistently tries to pretend that the quran doesn't say that the Earth is flat. Judaism has already abandoned the notion that the Exodus is literally true.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Exodus#Origins_and_historicity

Mainstream scholarship no longer accepts the biblical Exodus account as history for a number of reasons. Most scholars agree that the Exodus stories were written centuries after the apparent setting of the stories.

So, what's going on here then? "Cultural suicide"? People aren't allowed to change their own cultures? They're only allowed to make them more superstitious, more magically thinking, rather than less? They're to be denied access to such resources as scientific archaeology, and instead remain under traditional, ancient misconceptions?

https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/logicalfallacies/Appeal-to-Tradition

Appeal to Tradition argumentum ad antiquitatem (also known as: appeal to common practice, appeal to antiquity, appeal to traditional wisdom, proof from tradition, appeal to past practice, traditional wisdom) Description: Using historical preferences of the people (tradition), either in general or as specific as the historical preferences of a single individual, as evidence that the historical preference is correct. Traditions are often passed from generation to generation with no other explanation besides, “this is the way it has always been done”—which is not a reason, it is an absence of a reason.

Religions didn't get into place by being true, or by reasoning themselves into their positions of influence. It was wrong for them to seize that influence and control in the first place. That they've had it for a long time is not a reason to perpetuate it.

Eliminating religion has literally nothing to do with eliminating people. Nor does it have anything whatsoever to do with everything else about their culture that is not religious.

Over 100 infant boys die each year of circumscision-related causes. That's 1.3% of all male neonatal deaths. One day, Jews may finally abandon the superstition that they should cut off a chunk of their baby boy's penis in order to garner the favor of a god who stars in a book they wrote declaring themselves to be that same god's Chosen People. One day, Muslims may abandon the same to comply with the demands of their prophet's sock-puppet god.

Innumerable children would be saved, by abandoning these primitive superstitions. Not to mention the lives of their potential offspring (that was me doing a cute callback to 5.32/Sanhedrin 37a).

Imagine for a moment that all these superstitious, religious traditions start to fall away. People abandon them, as they've abandoned stoning non-virgin girls to death (well, excluding Islam, of course), and justifying slavery with religious doctrine (again, excluding Islam, of course).

So, who has actually been exterminated by abandoning these myths? Uh, nobody. What has been lost? Belief in a magical man in the sky who was never there in the first place, and people praying to him instead of solving their problems, and devoting their lives to something that isn't true.

And an identity label. But, of course, this is the most important thing of all to the Intersectionalist.

What culture has been lost? Evidence-free - and false - superstitious delusion. What happens to Jewish culture now? It adapts using human traditions, including the history of magical myths and delusions, but without the continuation or declaration of them being true.

As their children - well, the ones who survive - become less and less religious, what exactly has been genocided? Why not evolve what could - admittedly, uncharitably - be regarded as an absurd weekly Friday-night seance, conducted over scriptural events that never happened, and turn it into a cultural tradition of gathering as a family once a week to Chromecast photos. What's wrong with a cultural tradition that no longer includes the threat of some ghastly overlord who will rebuke them for serving ham?

This type of person really doesn't seem to understand that culture and traditions are not people. That it's the people who determine and make the culture, not the other way around. This really seems to be how little they understand culture.

Many of the members of these religions are themselves trying to reshape the religions. While Western feminists are prancing about playing dress-ups in hijab, women are getting arrested in Iran for removing the hijab because they want the same privileges that the feminists take for granted.

And yet, activists lecture us about preservation of "culture." There are people literally dying to reshape their own culture to gain access to the privileges they spit on.

Muslim Reformist to Sally Kohn: Stop Working Against Us

it is not "genocide" when the people decide not to do it any more. Even when triggered activists don't like it and somehow conjure offence out of asserting the cultural agency that they would prefer to deny them.

Using absurd, alarmist language - and the fallacy of Argument by Repetition - doesn't change that.

https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/logicalfallacies/Argument-by-Repetition

Argument by Repetition

argumentum ad nauseam

(also known as: argument from nagging, proof by assertion)

Description: Repeating an argument or a premise over and over again in place of better supporting evidence.

Simply insisting over and over that it's "cultural genocide" doesn't make it true. It might be "true" by the tortured, contrived jargon that some ivory tower academic has invented for political means. But that doesn't make it legitimate complaint.

As the second message indicates, this person didn't really have anything else to offer. She just repeated her assertion and expected - nay, demand - it to go unchallenged. I am neither stupid nor gullible.

I mean, really, I didn't have to go to all this trouble of writing all this up. She offered literally nothing, so I could really simply ignore her.

But this is more fun, so here we are.

So for someone to insist that culture can be exterminated by the decline of religion is just a roundabout way of saying that they don't have any idea what culture actually is.

Most of these people are disenfranchised (at least in the west anyway) and advocating for their culture to be wiped out is both harmful and dare I say a very insidious kind of bigotry.

Except that people actually travel to the west, don't they, in order to seek and participate in the benefits of such a society. To find and obtain enfranchisement. This is playing pretend like they're trapped and imprisoned in western societies, at the mercy of some repressive regime.

You're thinking of the Taliban, sweetie.

disenfranchise | ˌdisənˈfran(t)SHīz | (also disfranchise | disˈfranCHīz | )

verb [with object]

deprive (someone) of the right to vote: the law disenfranchised some 3,000 voters on the basis of a residence qualification. • (as adjective disenfranchised) deprived of power; marginalized: a hard core of kids who are disenfranchised and don't feel connected to the school. • deprive (someone) of a right or privilege: a measure that would disenfranchise people from access to legal advice. • archaic deprive (someone) of the rights and privileges of a free inhabitant of a borough, city, or country.

Nobody in a western country is "disenfranchised." Liberal, secular societies are notoriously neutral in their applications of rights and privileges, including voting. As long as you're a citizen, which is not an unreasonable requirement.

What's amusing is that activists like this will wail about disenfranchisement or marginalization on the one hand, and also rail against "The Wall" on the other. Look at the way she phrased it:

disenfranchised (at least in the west anyway)

This means certainly disenfranchised in the west, and maybe, but maybe not, disenfranchised elsewhere. That things will be worse in a western country with liberal, secular values.

Surely if this is the case, one should really be in favor of "The Wall" to prevent immigrants from wasting their time in a country where they'll be worse off? I wonder whether the people who risked their lives, or abandoned everything they knew to make the journey, to find new opportunities, who now drive this activist's Ubers and tend the grounds to her college think the same way? What a luxury belief to hold.

In regards to "power," there are people like Ayaan Hirsi Ali, who was elected to Dutch parliament, you have the proudly unrepentant antisemite, Ilhan Omar, among many others. Nobody is preventing anyone from accessing all levels, all opportunities within society, if they wish to, or have the capability.

You know where people are disenfranchised? India. Where there are castes and untouchables. In Iran, where women are denied rights and privileges on religious grounds. In Saudi Arabia where an actual patriarchy exists, and women are subject to guardianship laws. Who else is disenfranchised? Women in Pakistan, gay people in Iran, the Uyghurs in China.

But wait a minute. The word "power" doesn't mean that in a postmodern sense, does it? It's more vague, and refers to the idea of one's practices being the cultural norms. That is, that groups are "disenfranchised" simply by virtue of being in a relative minority.

That's literally all it means. It doesn't matter what those people actually think or what they actually experience. It doesn't matter that people want to be in countries where these norms exist, because they value them too, the ideology defines this "problem" into existence.

"I read Alexis de Tocqueville, and I read about democracy, and I lived in countries that have no democracy, that have no founding fathers… so I don’t find myself in the same luxury as you. You grew up in freedom, and you can spit on freedom because you don’t know what it is not to have freedom."

-- Ayaan Hirsi Ali

The postmodern conception of being "disenfranchised" is the trivial fact of being held to the same standards and expectations as everyone else in the country in which they choose to reside - and in many cases, risk their lives to emigrate to.

This absurd, postmodern ideology is based on identity groups, and it finds it unreasonable for cultural relativism (I refer you once again to Yasmine above) to not be applied, no matter what the outcome. Because noble savage. Because different species. Because there's no universal humanity, only categories and boxes and lenses and identity groups and positionality.

What it calls for, and this isn't even a secret, is segregation. We're seeing exactly this in schools. Because with people divided into superficially homogenous groups (ala "affinity groups"), there are no "minorities." The "norms" of the group are perceived to be all the same. Which is to say, this ideology is racist, sexist and full of every other bigotry ever invented, because it assumes everyone with the same superficial group markers has the same values. It values only diversity of these superficial attributes, not diversity of ideas.

What's actually bigotry is cultural relativism. Holding one culture to a lower standard than another. The bigotry of low expectations. Expecting and accepting lower or different standards because of the belief that they're not capable of it and cannot achieve it.

Such as the notion that it's unreasonable to expect immigrants to Sweden to not rape.

Even when people come to liberal, secular countries to embrace the freedom and opportunity and marketplace of ideas, the adherents of this idiotic and racist ideology want to keep those immigrants in their box, to maintain the "purity" of the culture. Even when the people don't want it. Even when they want to live a pluralistic life, where they are both an Indian and a Canadian. Nigerian and a Brit. Somali and Dutch. Jewish and American.

No, it's not "cultural genocide" for cultures to change and adapt. Every culture that has survived, has survived because it does so has throughout time, and continues to do so, despite the protestations of activists.

So, if by "cultural genocide" you mean that people will actually die, then I call you a histrionic liar.

If by "cultural genocide" you mean that humans put old ideas out to pasture and discard them, like they've discarded Ford sedans, then I say, sweet. An excellent synonym is "idea expiration." We've discarded lots of bad ideas.

So, I say bring it on.

I will continue to do exactly as I always have been. And not merely because nothing you've said actually holds up when examined.

I advocate for rationality, reason, evidence and logic over superstition, purported divine revelation (as told only by humans) and magical thinking, just as I advocate for science, evidence and reason over pseudoscience, woo, anti-science, anti-vax, denial of reality and ignorant bullshit.

But i'm not the racist bigot you are, applying this inconsistently and selectively, and reserving criticism only for preferred political targets.

I support the ongoing erosion of Xianity and Islam and Judaism and every other superstitious belief. All of them.

For the exact reason of humanity. Because humans cannot reliably navigate this world without an accurate and objective understanding of it.

We know through long painful history, that ignorance or denial of objective reality has actual genocidal consequences. The Russian Famine brought on by Lysenkoism, the Black Plague, the devastation in China during the Cultural Revolution, and even the unnecessary deaths due to COVID are all testament to our need to discard superstition and ignorant beliefs so that we can accurately deal with a world that doesn't give a shit what we believe or prefer.

Your insistence that we must not disrupt this reality-denial out of some misplaced sensitivity is something I unequivocally reject and oppose. Your priorities are fucked up, sweetie.

Flat Earth is no more true than Islam, and I reject both on the same grounds. Will it bother you if Flat Earth culture disappears?

Or do you only care about culture associated with brown people? What about the preservation of Cosby fan culture, or R. Kelly fan culture?

Anyway, thanks for reading all this and please consider focusing on more constructive efforts, like advocating against cults and proseletyzing.

Oh, don't worry, I am. I'm advocating against the cult you've joined. Because your belief system itself functions the same way as a cult. I am, after all, a heretic, a blasphemer. People who disagree with you and do not comply are burned as witches (online mob).

The entire point of you messaging me was to proselytize your born again faith to me and tell me to accept your beliefs and seek salvation. Beliefs that are as unfalsifiable as any god. Beliefs that are performative and allow you to be as hateful as you like as "divine" virtue. Beliefs that are held with faith, not reason or evidence. Beliefs that are based on insular circular scripture that refers to nothing but itself. Beliefs that created the vulnerability that they purport to solve.

You are a religionist. You have every hallmark.

One striking thing that stands out about this is the sheer paternalism and audacity to speak on behalf of Jewish, Muslim and a long string of other religions, as if you represent all of them. You do not. You speak only for yourself. One person.

While also remaining silent on the decline of Xianity, other than to frame it as an accusation leveled at me.

And this is where the unrepentant sociopathy of this ideology comes into play.

Protect Judaism and Islam from "cultural genocide", but let Xianity slide into oblivion without protestation. Because reasons. Because hegemony power normative marginalized structural discursive intersectional genocide hegemony. Yes, I know the language. The empty, empty word salad, obscuring the empty, empty claims. The juvenile, parochial view of someone with the first world privilege to be able to waste their education studying vanity courses about luxury beliefs.

"Hate" is bad and wrong... except when it comes to hating the "right" people; particular people from particular groups or categories, because then it's a virtue. Because then we can pretend it's not really hate. Because they deserve it. Because they're the Bad™ people. Because we're on the "right side of history."

Because our bigotry to them isn't the same as their bigotry to us, because they're different. Because our bigotry is justified. They're not capable of the same range of emotions or understanding. Being vilified doesn't impact them the same way it impacts us.

https://cheshireinthemiddle.tumblr.com/post/190100729802

'Except for the fact that boys don't experience "some form of sexual abuse" ever, and all apparent "cases" of male sexual abuse are always from people who lack any understanding of the definition of such terms.

Sexual abuse involves mental trauma, males do not experience mental trauma as they are incapable of doing so, similar to how males cannot experience emotions such as remorse and generosity and therefore the term sexual abuse does not apply to men, there should be another term that does apply to men but I have been unable to locate such a term.'

https://torontosun.com/2017/02/11/black-lives-matter-co-founder-appears-to-label-white-people-defects

“Whiteness is not humxness,” the statement begins. “infact, white skin is sub-humxn.” The post goes on to present a genetics-based argument centred on melanin and enzyme.

“White ppl are recessive genetic defects. this is factual,” the post reads towards the end. “white ppl need white supremacy as a mechanism to protect their survival as a people because all they can do is produce themselves. black ppl simply through their dominant genes can literally wipe out the white race if we had the power to.”

What you're actually looking for is special treatment. You're okay with Xianity being attacked and would likely be thrilled for it to collapse and fade away entirely, as the statistics currently suggest it will, long term. The "cultural genocide" of Xianity is acceptable, even to be applauded. Because Xianity isn't like all the others. The others are cornerstones of fetishized groups, while Xianity is a (supposed) cornerstone of a disfavored group: western society.

Cheering the removal of the cornerstones of hated groups is a virtue. Consistently advocating for the removal of superstitious, primitive and false cornerstones of all groups - and doing so consistently, as I do - is like literal genocide or someshit.

And I don't think you'd even disagree with this, which is worrying. Because it's this exact mentality that proposed Proposition 16 in California, to re-legalize discrimination based on race, gender, etc, as a virtuous endeavor. Treating people differently to construct preferred outcomes based on identity groups, and denying qualified, merit-based promotions and admissions.

But this ideology is so invested in this fetish, this hypocrisy, this double-standard, this discrimination, this bigotry that you've adopted as core to your identity, that you're willing to discard real human people into the abyss of toxic, destructive, and false religious beliefs. As "culture" that must be protected from the intrusion of reality.

This ideology is one of the most dehumanizing, hateful I've ever encountered.

The problem here isn't me. The problem here is that you put ideas, myths and beliefs above people. Oh, you talk a big game about "groups", but what you're referring to is the categories, not the individuals.

And this is the great tragedy and destructiveness of the woke theology It both denies the universal (e.g. common humanity, one single race), and the individual, and instead fixates entirely on categories and identity groups based solely on stereotypes and cliches, about what it means to be that type of person. This isn't a bug, it's a feature.

As usual, this broken, deranged ideology goes in exactly the wrong, anti-human direction, especially when it uses its authoritarian nature to lecture to others how they should feel and what is an "authentic" way to feel or be a particular category of person. It divides humanity up into categories and insists on preserving and upholding the boundaries between those categories as a virtue.

Here's the difference between you and me. I believe that people can change their beliefs, that they can discard old, bad ideas, and adopt new, better ideas. That they can evolve their cultures and societies to the benefit of their own and everyone else's humanity. It's how we got where we are today.

You just want to protect ideas rather than people, and make sure everyone acts out the roles you've assign them in your head.

Sweetie, the problem is you've become an authoritarian bigot who has subscribed to a hate-cult. You lost your shit when I simply said no, before I even explained why - you weren't interested in that.

Your beliefs are toxic shit. Your values are completely messed up. It's time to stop using your adopted identity categories as an excuse for your shitty ideas and untreated personality disorders. You can be better than this.

Genocide your bigoted, hateful, sociopathic cult-like beliefs, sweetie.

#decline of religion #critical theory #cultural genocide #wokeness as religion #wokeism #cult of woke #woke activism #woke #woke authoritarianism #long post #very long post #standpoint epistemology #standpoint theory #identity politics #fetishization #religion is a mental illness

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lightaflametoburnmethrough · 2 years

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A Study of Soulmates Analysis #3.5 - “My Only One”

Originally, this was supposed to be part of Analysis #3 but since that post was so long understatement and discussed multiple things at once, I decided to write this separately for better coherency.

So...soulmates! 👏

Any CLAMP fan who calls themselves a true CLAMP fan knows this is a staple trait of all their works. TRC was pretty much the authors’ massive statement that “these connections between certain characters are immovable even across different realities”.

With the introduction of the phrase “私だけの人” (“The only person for me”) in chapter 60, it warrants a deeper study into that aspect of Akiho and Kaito’s relationship.

Because if there’s one thing CLAMP doesn’t joke around about, it’s the ships they bring to the table as the main courses.

Let’s start this off with Lilie.

Since more of her character was revealed in chapter 60, there was bound to be an increase in speculations about her significance to both Akiho and Kaito. Kaito in particular because so far, we’ve only seen Lilie interact with him (and Momo) while her relation with Akiho was just implied (though strongly so cuz of their similar appearances) until it was confirmed that they are indeed mother and daughter in chapter 61.

And while I don’t like to dwell on these thoughts (cuz I simply don’t like or care about fandom), I can’t lie that YunaAki is detested for all the wrong reasons among western (mostly American, eww) audiences while even a small portion of the people who aren’t as opposed towards YunaAki was tempted to jump onto the idea that there was something going on between Kaito and Lilie.

In spite of the facts that Kaito was still just a kid and Lilie was a full-grown adult when they met (so they’re not even a part of the same generation), Lilie already had someone else she loved ever since she was a child herself (therefore, it couldn’t be Kaito since he wasn’t even born yet) and looked like she was about to get married, and Kaito was still in no mental state back then to properly develop a strong attachment to anything yet. Just to name a few things that run contrary to that notion.

My point is, if there are those who don’t like something or lean heavily towards doubt, they’ll tend to read everything in poor to bad faith. They’ll twist and disregard whatever they see in the narrative to suit their argument against the truth right in front of them. In this case, trying to invalidate Kaito’s feelings towards Akiho by saying “he’s only doing it for Lilie”.

Rule #1 of fandom: learn to think for yourself. Don’t rely on the superficial observances of others. Opinions are not facts no matter how vocal they are. Facts are established through canon and theories should be made to suit and follow those facts, not the other way around.

That’s what I’m going to do now.

If you read my YunaAki analysis post before this one or even if you didn’t, you should still already know Akiho and Lilie are two completely separate people.

It doesn’t matter how much they uncannily resemble each other or share a number of the same mannerisms and whatnot. They’re still different people with different identities because the lives they led are unique to themselves.

So it’s not just because one has magic and the other doesn’t that sets them apart either. It’s the experiences and their own feelings that shaped them into their own individuals that do.

Lilie was the most powerful magician in her clan and therefore, she was at least valued by its members. She grew up with confidence and optimism about the future because there was no abuse to constrain her.

That’s not what it was like for Akiho, who was subjected to horrible treatment and neglect by that very same clan just because she didn’t have any powers. The strength Akiho gained from that ordeal is marked by numerous emotional scars. It is a pain that her mother will never know and never have.

If anything, chapter 60 made it even clearer to me just how distinct Akiho and Lilie are from one another and gave further evidence why Akiho is meant to be the only one for Kaito.

Because the only thing Kaito and Lilie really had in common were being the strongest magicians of their respective groups. That’s all.

Not to mention, going by what the manga showed us, they only interacted a handful of times, the majority of which was Lilie’s attempts to get Kaito to talk with her. Their lengthier conversations seemed to number around two or four before she exited his life, which is not enough time for two people to get to significantly know each other.

And no matter how gifted a person is at premonition, an actual relationship cannot be based on visions and dreams or even short-lived memories. It has to grow through a good amount of mutual time and effort spent in reality.

The few times Kaito has conversed Lilie, meaningful though they were, do not meet those criteria.

On the other hand, Kaito has been traveling with Akiho for years, throughout which he has really gotten to learn pretty much everything there is to know about her. What she likes and dislikes, how her personality is, what her insecurities are, where her weak and strong points lie. All of it.

And it shows in their close bond and how utterly devoted he is to her. How he’s always attentive in taking care of her needs and how he helps allay her worries and doubts. How he’s the most expressive around Akiho while everyone else just gets his trademark mask of a enigmatic smile.

Seriously, have you ever seen Kaito make a face that’s full of emotion when Akiho wasn’t concerned?

These. These faces were the ones he wore whenever Akiho was at the very center of his mind.

I had to leave out a few cuz some have angles that are a b*tch to crop

He doesn’t do this for anybody else. Not even Momo or Lilie, the only other two people who can be considered to hold any importance in his life.

And that’s because he doesn’t connect with anyone else as deeply as he does with Akiho.

Akiho, who is just like him. An orphan without parents or family, exploited by magicians as a tool. Children who only knew loneliness before they found each other.

What made Kaito decide to go with Akiho was guilt over that “blank book” comment he made...but what drives him to fight so hard for her are the feelings that were born out of their time together. The feelings she enabled him to feel.

He saw how pitiful her situation was and desperately wanted to change that. He related with her over the turmoil of self-worth and how they were both measured by whether they could do magic or not, how “useful” they could be for somebody else. He always becomes so angry just thinking about what the Squids made Akiho go through and is visibly saddened whenever she expresses shame in herself for not being able to meet their expectations.

He wants to make Akiho happy with his own power, no matter what it takes.

If he was doing this for anything else, anybody else, why would he need to go so far for Akiho then? To show this much concern if she’s not his most important one? That makes absolutely no sense just like it makes no sense to claim he’s doing this for Lilie. Because Lilie has already long passed away at this point so he can’t do anything for her.

But Akiho is still here and she’s the one who contributed to his growth as a person the most. Akiho is the one who inspired him to make the first decision for himself. To want to do something out of his own will and not because someone ordered him to.

The farthest Lilie ever got in “motivating” Kaito was getting him to eat some sweets she brought over. For the purpose of searching for something Kaito would “like” (好き).

Even that didn’t amount to more than a rather lifeless “I can eat this” before the meetings stopped. Because Lilie knew, from the future she saw in her dreams, that she didn’t have much time left and would have to leave this world soon (see ch 61, Akiho mentioning the “incident” that took her parents’ lives).

Still, she left him with these words:

The “like/love” that belongs only to you is surely waiting for you out there, waiting for you to realize (them)

This not only confirms Lilie isn’t the “love” Kaito’s meant to find (because if she was, why would she need to say this to him in the first place?) but also shows how the nature of his relationship with Lilie is noticeably different from his relationship with Akiho.

In a similar vein as how mother and daughter are distinct from one another.

With Lilie, there’s a great sense of parent-child dynamics, especially the asking questions aspect.

The way Lilie tried to get Kaito to stay and chat with her is the same as how an older female figure (ex. a mommy or auntie or even an “Oneechan”) would try to engage with a child. By appealing to them.

“Hey, would you like some candy? Let’s do something you would enjoy.”

I have cousins more than a decade my junior along with several nieces and nephews and I figured out the key to getting and keeping their attention is to talk about or do something the kid has an interest in.

However, for Kaito back then, he didn’t have anything like that. All he knew was magic and it wasn’t even for himself but the Association that demanded it. He just hung around, waiting for orders day in and day out. Living a very dull, very bored existence. He had nothing to share, no desire to talk with anybody because nobody wanted to care for him. And that unfortunately reflected in his own perspective towards the world.

Which is why Lilie proposed that they go search for something he would “like” (好き) together and brought over all those chocomint snacks. Chocomint was something that she loved and she wanted to see if Kaito would as well.

He didn’t (he hated it) and that prompted her to switch over to chocolate pretzels but the point of this “quest” is that Lilie was trying to foster intrigue in a little boy’s mind. Because that’s what children are supposed to be like at that age. Because it’s not normal for someone that young to be so depressed.

Her efforts worked somewhat because Kaito did gradually get used to her popping up every so often. He warmed up enough to her that he was willing to at least try the food she offered and not mind having her in his company.

And this led to him becoming more comfortable to talk with her as well.

The things they discussed weren’t of the ordinary kind as they still mostly revolved around magic. But it’s notable that Kaito has begun to ask Lilie questions.

“Did you make these (pretzels)?”

“You seem happier than usual, did something good happen?”

(about Lilie’s special person) “Are you drawn to them because they have lots of magic like you do?”

“Did you know they’d be “the one” for you because you saw it in your dreams?”

For once, Kaito was actually curious, if just a little bit. But that only happened because there was someone who was willing to engage with him, to actually talk to him like a human being and stimulate his blank mind into having thoughts.

He didn’t understand what this “love” Lilie always spoke of was...so he asked. He wondered if there was any purpose for him to have all this magic...so he asked her if she knew from the future she saw in her dreams.

Like how a child would seek guidance from an adult. Like how a boy would go to his mother for help when something leaves him stumped and frustrated.

Which is very normal behavior to expect because every child wants a mother or parental figure to care for and look after them. And remember that Kaito grew up with no parents or family so he feels that void even more strongly despite the indifferent face he always wears.

It is not farfetched to think he may be slightly projecting his inner need for a mother onto the older Lilie, who actually cared enough to reach out out to him for him and not his magic.

Moving on, Lilie does respond to his inquiries but not in a way that really satisfies Kaito or puts him at ease. She can say with certainty about herself and the decisions she makes for herself.

But for him, it’s all still very vague and confusing. She keeps telling him that he’s going to find his “love” (好き) eventually but he’s like “How? I don’t even know what that means” and is obviously bothered he doesn’t have everything figured out. He’s anxious that he doesn’t have dream seer powers like she does to provide him with the answers he seeks deep down.

For what reason am I alive? Why am I here? What am I living for?

But Lilie is ever nurturing and kind and supportive to the loss he feels.

She tells him, guides him, “It’ll be alright. I won’t be able to search with you...but the answer you’re looking for is surely out there, waiting for you. You will find it one day. When you finally decide for yourself, that’s when you’ll know. You’ll understand what you want to do, what you’re meant to do.”

Lilie purposely leaves him with all these questions, this tiny budding desire to know.

So that when the moment came for someone to accompany Akiho around the world, he would take that first step towards finding the answers to those questions. The first step towards understanding love.

Akiho is the answer. Akiho is the love he’s been searching for.

Where his interactions with Lilie were all about preparing Kaito for the journey ahead, the journey itself is where Kaito discovered what he wants.

And that is for Akiho to be happy.

Akiho who he learned to smile for. Akiho who he learned to do many things for, from taking care of the house and brewing tea and so on, just so he could bring a smile to her face.

Akiho whose suffering he empathizes with and understands only too well but also Akiho whom he watched with his own eyes try her very best to not let the magicians’ vicious criticism drag her down and discourage her from being a good person.

He admires her in a way he never did about Lilie or anyone else. Because unlike Lilie, who never showed signs of struggles with self-esteem and sense of worth, Akiho most certainly did.

Just like him.

He saw how strong Akiho really was, how she was so brave to want something better for herself. How she still had it in her to be so kind and compassionate despite being hurt so many times...even to a self-degrading person like him.

Kaito thought “even someone like me, who’s just a mere caretaker, whose only worth is my magic, can be treated with dignity by a wonderful person like her.”

Yes, Akiho may not have powers...but has so many great qualities about her that are so much more than that.

She has hopes and dreams and is willing to work hard for them with her own strength. She’s so thoughtful and caring and wishes to study more so that she can be more helpful to others.

Just by being herself, Akiho brought warmth and joy to Kaito’s cold, desolate world. He was comforted by her presence and he experienced for the first time what having a (nearly) normal life was like. The smiles he practiced became more genuine over time, if only for Akiho. And though he still carries that guilt of unwittingly playing a part in turning her into a magical artifact, he acquired new reasons to fight even harder for her.

Kaito didn’t just want to save her. He didn’t just want to take her away from the magicians’ world where there was nothing for her but a fate worse than death.

He also wanted to give Akiho happiness. Not just any happiness but all the happiness she deserved.

Because that’s what she gave him. She treats him as a human being, gave him respect. She appreciates everything he does for her and never takes him for granted. She gave him a purpose, made his days meaningful. She brought peace to his troubled soul.

Unlike the Association who only sought his powers and were more than ready to dispose him when he was no longer useful to them, Akiho would never do anything to hurt him.

Akiho taught him to believe that there is some good in this shitty world and that good, the only “good” he’s ever truly come to understand in his whole life, is her.

So for him to reach the decision to do everything he can, to risk everything he has, for the sake of saving Akiho...it’s a given one after all those years spent by each other’s side.

By the time they reached Japan and Akiho met Sakura, she has already become the most important person in his life.

Even though Kaito doesn’t realize the extent of how deep his feelings run yet (because he’s still confused, still afraid to acknowledge he is capable of love), there can be no doubt he truly does love Akiho and places her above all.

There can be no argument that the answer, the very answer to the question Momo posed towards him in chapter 51 “For who are you doing this for?”, is Akiho.

Because nobody but Akiho has ever been able to move Kaito towards action. Nobody but Akiho has ever been able to make Kaito feel so much to want for anything.

And there are several instances that back that up as well.

For one thing, it’s been shown a couple of times that Kaito displays a yearning to be close to Akiho. When they’re either alone by themselves or when time for everyone except him and Momo has stopped.

The first case has been occurring more often in recent chapters where Kaito reaches out a hand towards Akiho but retracts it at the last second. The nature of this action is rather ambiguous (platonic or romantic) but it’s so obvious all he wants to do is to comfort her when she’s upset.

He might be hesitating for a few of the following reasons:

1) It’s inappropriate to act in a way not befitting of his position as her caretaker (at least, how he defines that job in his head) so he doesn’t want to cross the line and do something that’s “unprofessional”.

2) He is also well aware that Akiho is a 13-year old girl, that they are not related and that there’s an age gap between them. Knowing how much Kaito cares for her, he is definitely a person who’d want to respect those important boundaries.

But probably more than either of those...

3) Kaito stops himself because he doesn’t believe he has the right to be close to her. Not after what he said that put her in this current mess where she’s in danger of losing her soul.

Kaito feels so guilty about his mistake that even something as simple and innocent as a pat on the head, something that can easily make Akiho feel better in an instant (especially if it’s from him, the person she loves most), isn’t allowed to come from him. Because that’s just how much he hates himself for that “blank book” comment.

Even though it wasn’t his intention, he still thinks “I did this to you. Because of that, I don’t deserve to be by your side.”

None of these thoughts or feelings has anything to do with Lilie or anybody else. He feels guilt because it concerns Akiho. He wants to make Akiho feel better when Akiho is down. Everything about his behavior and how he acts traces themselves back to Akiho as the source.

Then there’s the scene from way back in ch 28, when Kaito stopped time for the first time in the story (iirc). Everyone but him and Momo were frozen and couldn’t hear the conversation going on between him and his contractor.

But as Kaito delved more into Akiho’s past, how devoid it was of any happy memories (much like his own), he moved closer to Akiho as if wanting to embrace her and seemed to have forgotten for a second that Momo was still there.

The proximity between them is significantly more intimate here (in a very non-familial way) than it is when he reaches out to Akiho while she’s “awake” ...but it’s still within the lines of “safe” because frankly, there is nothing sexual or sensual about this panel.

All Kaito wanted was to be close to Akiho because he could see how lonely was. How tormented she still is by the past.

He can feel her pain like it was his own.

Akiho’s pain is his pain as well. He learned the extent of that anguish because he finds bits of himself reflected in her.

This sort of connection did not exist between him and Lilie.

And Lilie likely also knew this as well because the only time she ever got physically close to him, she stopped short of touching his face.

She couldn’t promise him anything, after all. Not when she was going to leave soon. Not when she knew he was still very wary of people so showing him any form of affection before he’s ready to receive it might hurt him more than anything.

Kaito has been abandoned before and look where that landed him. In the abusive hands of the Association where trust couldn’t exist.

He was already so damaged by life, she didn’t want to add more to it. He only barely just opened up to her and she was going to disappear.

This is why Kaito remembers Lilie well (because she left a strong impression on him) ...but never mourned the loss her. She never got close enough for him to truly miss her after she was gone.

But more than that, Lilie knew there was someone out there, someone in his future, who will give and offer Kaito so much more than she ever could. Who will never give up on him and never leave him alone to suffer.

Someone who can promise him what he needs and will give their everything to make him realize he is so loved and cared for.

Lilie saw the future. She told Kaito “the love that belongs only to you is waiting for you to realize it (them)”

Who else but Akiho is waiting for Kaito to realize her love for him? Who else is persistently trying to get their feelings across to Kaito if not Akiho?

This is not a coincidence. It’s the inevitability, the hitsuzen, that Lilie saw in her dreams.

With Lilie, Kaito was always so aloof and skeptical. He never smiled for her. He always avoided others because dealing with them was an annoying hassle. He does this with Momo, too, whenever she tries to make him face his own heart.

But with Akiho, it’s different. With Akiho, he always goes towards her on his own accord. He always smiles at her with sincerity. This shows he wants to be with her. Because he knows her. He knows she’ll never intentionally hurt him and finds solace in that.

Even when he runs away, whether it’s because he wants to keep her safe from him or he’s afraid of accepting the truth about himself (that he loves her), if Akiho’s hurting, he always goes back to her because he cares for Akiho, loves Akiho, like he doesn’t for anybody else.

He will never forgive anything that makes Akiho cry, not even himself.

That too is inevitable because Kaito has never allowed anyone but Akiho to get close to his own heart, close enough to actually stay there.

Furthermore, the fact that Kaito never projected Lilie onto Akiho at any point in the story should be the strongest proof that he’s not chasing after a dead person through her daughter.

We never see him actively thinking about Lilie or mention her at all for the first 40 chapters of this arc (that’s two-thirds of the entire story so far, peeps). It wasn’t until ch 41, when Nadeshiko forced the memory out of him, did Lilie appear for the first time in canon.

And even then, his thoughts didn’t linger on Lilie or the past. They immediately went back to Akiho when Nadeshiko started talking about her own family. He tossed aside trying to understand Lilie’s words about love in favor of his mission to save Akiho.

In favor of thinking about Akiho foremost.

He said that Sakura had everything Akiho doesn’t: a warm home, kind family and friends, happy memories and a hopeful future.

He said all that with such bitterness in his expression that you can’t possibly misinterpret those feelings are for anyone but Akiho.

It’s not fair. Why does Akiho-san not have these things as well? She deserves it just as much, if not more, so why? Why did the world bless everyone but her?

This feels so wrong to Kaito that he can’t stand it. He seriously gets tunnel vision whenever he thinks of all the things Akiho was deprived of. Of all the times Akiho was lambasted, looked down upon, violated and abused by her own goddamn "family”.

He is angry enough to even break character from his servant façade to defend her.

You’re so much better than they’ll ever be. You’re capable of so much more than those fools can ever dream to accomplish. You’re fine just the way you are.

People keep mentioning how her parents had so much power and how disappointing it was that their daughter didn’t possess an ounce of magic within her. But Kaito insists Akiho doesn’t need magic to have worth.

People have commented how Akiho and Sakura are so alike, to a disturbing degree partially due to the machinations of the synchro. But Kaito, with full knowledge of Sakura’s identity as a magician and of how Akiho adores her best friend, never suggests to Akiho to become more like her.

When he looks at Akiho, he only sees Akiho.

He only sees the girl doing her best with all her courage to move forward. He only sees the person who’s given him everything he ever needed. He only sees the greatest good he’s ever known.

And that’s love.

For Kaito, Akiho is love because she’s Akiho. She is not Lilie or Sakura or somebody else. Only Akiho can be Akiho and that is sacred to him. He’d sooner change the world than ever contemplate of ever turning Akiho into something she isn’t.

And the only time we ever see him actually place the image of another person (Lilie) next to Akiho isn’t even prompted by him but Akiho herself.

In ch 61, when Akiho mentioned suddenly wanting to see her mother’s photo (because the synchro is influencing her feelings to align with Sakura’s, who was looking at a picture of Nadeshiko at that moment), Kaito’s expression becomes quite alarmed.

This is a indication of how he thinks of Lilie in regards to Akiho:

1) Mentioning Akiho’s parents is not a common occurrence in their home. And since they both know Akiho’s parents died in an “incident” to protect Akiho from something, it isn’t a topic they can just casually bring up in conversation due to how sensitive a matter it is to her.

Which is why Kaito is worried over what suddenly brought this on since he couldn’t have known Sakura was talking with Fujitaka about Nadeshiko right then.

2) This chapter also revealed that Akiho has always been aware of her magical lineage and that her parents were especially powerful magicians in her clan. Knowing how Akiho was scorned by her own kin for being born without magic and how her emotional wounds haven’t completely healed from that yet, Kaito would definitely not wish to provoke any thoughts about Lilie out of fear of Akiho possibly comparing herself as inferior (“defect”, “failure”, “useless”) to her mother.

In short, Kaito does not want Akiho to think of things that would make her sad.

And that’s such a heartbreaking thought because of all the terrible memories she has with the Squids, her parents should be the one good thing she could take away from being born into that wretched clan. They gave their lives to protect their daughter, the ultimate act of a parent’s love.

Yet even that is marred by so many factors because they left Akiho before she even turned one year old. She was too young to remember what they looked like and she wasn’t even given a photo of them to keep.

What’s worse is that the other magicians constantly berated Akiho and the memory of her parents when she was still so little.

“If they were going to leave behind a child with no powers at all, we shouldn’t have let them meet in the first place!”

In essence, they see Akiho as a burden who shouldn’t have been born.

They had the audacity to say that to Akiho’s face with their backs turned as if she didn’t matter. Making her feel not only ashamed about herself for lacking magic but probably also sorry to the parents who died to protect her. The parents she will never know, the parents she probably thinks might’ve been disappointed in her too if they lived long enough to learn that she has “nothing”.

As Akiho’s attendant, it is not Kaito’s place to say anything that’s related to her family...but even so, with how Akiho was treated by them, would he have even wanted to? Would he want to talk about anything that reminds her of her clan, especially who her parents were?

Unlikely.

It will only hurt Akiho to remember the past and make him even angrier than he already is...so there is no need for him to bring it up. There’s no need for him to talk about them, to talk about Lilie.

Right now, Kaito is absolutely determined to make sure Akiho is safe and happy so saying anything that could do the opposite of that is detrimental to his goal.

I won’t be like them. I refuse to be anything like them. Akiho-san is Akiho-san and I will never compare her to someone else. I can’t hurt Akiho-san like that.

If Kaito really didn’t have true feelings for Akiho, if he only saw her as a replacement for Lilie or just a means to fulfill this perceived view that some readers have of his “feelings” towards Lilie ...then Kaito wouldn’t have needed to be this careful around Akiho in the first place.

He would’ve mentioned Lilie more often, given signs much earlier that his mind was occupied with someone else.

But it wasn’t. He never spoke of Lilie in front of Akiho.

His mind was only ever focused on Akiho. He only ever thought of what he could do to make Akiho happy.

That’s why this page of Akiho and Lilie together must not be misconstrued as Kaito “overlapping” Akiho with Lilie.

Because it really isn’t.

From a literary perspective, a comment about Lilie coming from Kaito can contain negative and mixed connotations. But if it’s coming from Akiho, it’s a different story.

Akiho was the one who wanted to talk about what little she knew about her parents...and that is they were chocomint fans just like her.

Remember that Akiho has no keepsake of them so whatever information she could get from her clan, that piece of knowledge will become very precious to her.

Akiho, who never knew what her parents were like, hopes that she can find some connection with them, even if it’s just the tiniest bit. Even if it’s something as mundane as liking the same candy flavor, it would be enough to make her happy because “Look, I have something in common with my parents, after all!”

And because Akiho is so happy about that, because Akiho can smile about taking after her parents that way, it allows Kaito to drop his guard down slightly and see for the first time how much Akiho really resembles her mother.

You can tell by his reaction that this isn’t something that happens often. He’s a little stunned, to say the least, but not in a bad way.

Because if Akiho doesn’t see it in a bad way, then he wouldn’t need to either.

If Akiho is okay with it, then he would be as well. He’d support her.

The reason he says this “I’m sure you take after your mother” to Akiho is to reinforce that positive feeling she has about her parents.

It’s not for his benefit since it does nothing for him. It’s for Akiho’s because it definitely brings her joy, which she had none of before she met Kaito.

It makes Akiho happy (look at the bottom panel, tell me that she isn’t). It tells her she came from somewhere, was born from someone...and Kaito wants her to know that someone loved her very much. Loved Akiho so much, she was willing to sacrifice her life to preserve her child’s future.

Kaito smiles at Akiho so gently like this, remembers Lilie and affirms the similarities they share...because it holds great meaning to Akiho, the one he treasures most.

Finally (yes, we’re nearing the end, rejoice), the phrase “ 私だけの人”

“The only person for me.”

From what I heard, these are the arc words of Chobits and they carry the same narrative “weight” as the phrase “いちばん大切な人” (“the most important person”) does in CCS.

I haven’t had the chance to read Chobits yet but when I saw this line in ch 60, it reminded me of a particular scene in TRC (WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD):

Ch 178-179 where real!Syaoran/Tsubasa (let’s just call him Tsubasa-kun) cried out Sakura’s name after clone!Syaoran pierced through her with his sword.

clone!Sakura then turns towards him and sadly says “I am not your Sakura.”

It’s such a striking blow of a moment to the soul because not only are we given the shocking revelation that the SyaoSaku we started the story with are clones of another SyaoSaku...but it also confirms that appearances, no matter how alike they may be to each other, do not determine where a person’s heart points to.

In other words, the special feelings you have towards a specific person are not transferrable to someone else. Because those special feelings were brought about by the time you spent with that specific person. They exist within the memories you have with that one person and therefore, are unique to your relationship with that one person alone.

Keep in mind that (iirc) Tsubasa-kun had no idea that clone!SyaoSaku are his actual parents, which wasn’t revealed until later chapters. At this point in the story, he only knew they were copies created by Fei Wang Reed.

Even so, he never mistook clone!Sakura for his Sakura, who is Tsubasa-hime. He gave Syaoran one of his eyes in hopes that Syaoran will grow a heart of his own, develop feelings and create unique memories of his own (through his interactions with clone!Sakura), and become more than a pawn of the villain.

Sakura understood all this when she realized remembered what she was. She kept Tsubasa-kun at a distance once he joined their group and was always searching for her Syaoran, the one whom she started with this journey together. The Syaoran she spent time with and actually grew feelings for.

“The Syaoran-kun I love is right in front of me, right here. He is the only Syaoran for me. I can never mistake him for anyone else.”

“The Sakura you love is waiting for you. She is the only Sakura for you. You will never mistake her for anyone else either.”

And what does that “waiting for you” on the right page-panel sound so similar to?

Lilie’s words to Kaito in ch 60:

The “like/love” that belongs only to you is surely waiting for you out there, waiting for you to realize (them)

“The only person for you is waiting out there, waiting for you to find them.”

She sent him off to go find this very person...and that person cannot be anyone other than Akiho.

Because the time he spent, the precious memories he created and the special feelings born from those moments up till now are all with Akiho.

Again, if you’re a longtime CLAMP fan, you’d know that the themes they carve for stories tend to migrate back and forth across their works and also that later series often pay homage to older ones as well.

YunaAki in particular share a lot of parallels with TRC!SyaoSaku:

- SyaoSaku journey together throughout different "countries” with the purpose of collecting Sakura’s memories/feathers (source of a magical power); YunaAki travel the world together with the purpose of Akiho storing taboos from books (source of magical power) into the artifact

- The circumstances surrounding clone!Sakura were orchestrated by Fei Wang Reed, the big bad of TRC; the circumstances that turned Akiho into an artifact were carried out by her clan and the Magic Association, the true villain of Clear Card

(hell, even the designs of their signature plox dresses are similar)

- clone!Syaoran gained a heart by spending time and falling in love with clone!Sakura; Kaito learned how to love by spending time with Akiho.

- Both boys are willing to do anything, anything, to save the life of the ones they hold most dear. Even at the cost of themselves (which makes their girls worry themselves out of their minds for them, dumbies).

With these consistent patterns, it is not hard for me to believe that the likeness Akiho has with Sakura, the strong resemblance with Lilie and the constant mentioning/allusion to both throughout the story are there to illustrate a point and not (just) to throw us off.

That Akiho is her own individual with traits unique to her. That she isn’t someone without (i.e. a Lilie without magic, a Sakura without magic) and how grievously incorrect it is to think of her as “less” that way.

She is Akiho and deserves to be loved for who she is...

And Akiho already has a person who does that better than anyone else can.

This is a reiteration of what was shown in TRC...just like how “the only person for me” is another, different way of saying “my most important person”.

It means “the one I love most is like no other in the world.”

“Only this person can give me this kind of happiness. Only this person can make me feel this way. This special way I do not feel for anybody else.”

Hence, soulmates.

So far in the manga, we’ve only seen two people use this phrase:

- Lilie about the person she loves. The one who doesn’t like chocomint, is the second most powerful in her clan after her and presumably Akiho’s father.

- Nadeshiko about Fujitaka as he recalls his wife’s words to him to Sakura in ch 61.

...by all means, isn’t this CLAMP’s way of hard-lining these phrases (that THEY coined) as being romantic in nature? Cuz I certainly think so.

And that these words (“the only person for me”) were discussed with Kaito and Sakura specifically (who as a matter of fact are paralleling each other atm) ...it just foretells that at least one of them is going to end up saying this line after some kind of grand epiphany that may or may not happen somewhere during the climax.

Which we are heading towards now cuz that’s what Ohkawa confirmed on Twitter at the beginning of the year.

If it does indeed happen, 99% believe of me believes Kaito will be the one to say it because his personal story arc is the most properly built up for that kind of moment to play out. And of course 100% of me knows he’s going to declare Akiho as the only one for him.

For all the reasons above and what was discussed in Analysis #3.

And for sure, Akiho will reciprocate. Hell, she already is reciprocating because there really is no one like Kaito who would move mountains, fight monsters, challenge the world, threaten to tear it apart and rebuild it...all to express to her that he loves her more than anything else.

It can only be Kaito for her.

Just like it can only be Akiho for Kaito.

#i feel so powerful but lemme tell you I did tear up again (several times) while writing this #cuz when am I ever not going to cry over YunaAki?#never I don't think #I've really gone and sold my soul for good this time #jie jie I hope you FEASTED cuz we're gonna cry on the elliptical together later to burn off these calories ahahaha~ ❤️#cardcaptor sakura #clear card hen #shinomoto akiho #yuna d. kaito #yunaaki #akiyuna #🕰️🌾🐇

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citrina-posts · 4 years

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Avatar: Cultural Appreciation or Appropriation?

I love Avatar: the Last Airbender. Obviously I do, because I run a fan blog on it. But make no mistake: it is a show built upon cultural appropriation. And you know what? For the longest time, as an Asian-American kid, I never saw it that way.

There are plenty of reasons why I never realized this as a kid, but I’ve narrowed it down to a few reasons. One is that I was desperate to watch a show with characters that looked like me in it that wasn’t anime (nothing wrong with anime, it’s just not my thing). Another is that I am East Asian (I have Taiwanese and Korean ancestry) and in general, despite being the outward “bad guys”, the East Asian cultural aspects of Avatar are respected far more than South Asian, Middle Eastern, and other influences. A third is that it’s easy to dismiss the negative parts of a show you really like, so I kind of ignored the issue for a while. I’m going to explain my own perspective on these reasons, and why I think we need to have a nuanced discussion about it. This is pretty long, so if you want to keep reading, it’s under the cut.

Obviously, the leadership behind ATLA was mostly white. We all know the co-creators Bryan Konietzko and Michael Dante DiMartino (colloquially known as Bryke) are white. So were most of the other episodic directors and writers, like Aaron Ehasz, Lauren Montgomery, and Joaquim Dos Santos. This does not mean they were unable to treat Asian cultures with respect, and I honestly do believe that they tried their best! But it does mean they have certain blinders, certain perceptions of what is interesting and enjoyable to watch. Avatar was applauded in its time for being based mostly on Asian and Native American cultures, but one has to wonder: how much of that choice was based on actual respect for these people, and how much was based on what they considered to be “interesting”, “quirky”, or “exotic”?

The aesthetic of the show, with its bending styles based on various martial arts forms, written language all in Chinese text, and characters all decked out in the latest Han dynasty fashions, is obviously directly derivative of Asian cultures. Fine. That’s great! They hired real martial artists to copy the bending styles accurately, had an actual Chinese calligrapher do all the lettering, and clearly did their research on what clothing, hair, and makeup looked like. The animation studios were in South Korea, so Korean animators were the ones who did the work. Overall, this is looking more like appreciation for a beautiful culture, and that’s exactly what we want in a rapidly diversifying world of media.

But there’s always going to be some cherry-picking, because it’s inevitable. What’s easy to animate, what appeals to modern American audiences, and what is practical for the world all come to mind as reasons. It’s just that… they kinda lump cultures together weirdly. Song from Book 2 (that girl whose ostrich-horse Zuko steals) wears a hanbok, a traditionally Korean outfit. It’s immediately recognizable as a hanbok, and these dresses are exclusive to Korea. Are we meant to assume that this little corner of the mostly Chinese Earth Kingdom is Korea? Because otherwise, it’s just treated as another little corner of the Earth Kingdom. Korea isn’t part of China. It’s its own country with its own culture, history, and language. Other aspects of Korean culture are ignored, possibly because there wasn’t time for it, but also probably because the creators thought the hanbok was cute and therefore they could just stick it in somewhere. But this is a pretty minor issue in the grand scheme of things (super minor, compared to some other things which I will discuss later on).

It’s not the lack of research that’s the issue. It’s not even the lack of consideration. But any Asian-American can tell you: it’s all too easy for the Asian kids to get lumped together, to become pan-Asian. To become the equivalent of the Earth Kingdom, a mass of Asians without specific borders or national identities. It’s just sort of uncomfortable for someone with that experience to watch a show that does that and then gets praised for being so sensitive about it. I don’t want you to think I’m from China or Vietnam or Japan; not because there’s anything wrong with them, but because I’m not! How would a French person like to be called British? It would really piss them off. Yet this happens all the time to Asian-Americans and we are expected to go along with it. And… we kind of do, because we’ve been taught to.

1. Growing Up Asian-American

I grew up in the early to mid-2000s, the era of High School Musical and Hannah Montana and iCarly, the era of Spongebob and The Amazing World of Gumball and Fairly Odd Parents. So I didn’t really see a ton of Asian characters onscreen in popular shows (not anime) that I could talk about with my white friends at school. One exception I recall was London from Suite Life, who was hardly a role model and was mostly played up for laughs more than actual nuance. Shows for adults weren’t exactly up to par back then either, with characters like the painfully stereotypical Raj from Big Bang Theory being one of the era that comes to mind.

So I was so grateful, so happy, to see characters that looked like me in Avatar when I first watched it. Look! I could dress up as Azula for Halloween and not Mulan for the third time! Nice! I didn’t question it. These were Asian characters who actually looked Asian and did cool stuff like shoot fireballs and throw knives and were allowed to have depth and character development. This was the first reason why I never questioned this cultural appropriation. I was simply happy to get any representation at all. This is not the same for others, though.

2. My Own Biases

Obviously, one can only truly speak for what they experience in their own life. I am East Asian and that is arguably the only culture that is treated with great depth in Avatar.

I don’t speak for South Asians, but I’ve certainly seen many people criticize Guru Pathik, the only character who is explicitly South Asian (and rightly so. He’s a stereotype played up for laughs and the whole thing with chakras is in my opinion one of the biggest plotholes in the show). They’ve also discussed how Avatar: The Last Airbender lifts heavily from Hinduism (with chakras, the word Avatar itself, and the Eye of Shiva used by Combustion Man to blow things up). Others have expressed how they feel the sandbenders, who are portrayed as immoral thieves who deviously kidnap Appa for money, are a direct insult to Middle Eastern and North African cultures. People have noted that it makes no sense that a culture based on Inuit and other Native groups like the Water Tribe would become industrialized as they did in the North & South comics, since these are people that historically (and in modern day!) opposed extreme industrialization. The Air Nomads, based on the Tibetan people, are weirdly homogeneous in their Buddhist-inspired orange robes and hyperspiritual lifestyle. So too have Southeast Asians commented on the Foggy Swamp characters, whose lifestyles are made fun of as being dirty and somehow inferior. The list goes on.

These things, unlike the elaborate and highly researched elements of East Asian culture, were not treated with respect and are therefore cultural appropriation. As a kid, I had the privilege of not noticing these things. Now I do.

White privilege is real, but every person has privileges of some kind, and in this case, I was in the wrong for not realizing that. Yes, I was a kid; but it took a long time for me to see that not everyone’s culture was respected the way mine was. They weren’t considered *aesthetic* enough, and therefore weren’t worth researching and accurately portraying to the creators. It’s easy for a lot of East Asians to argue, “No! I’ve experienced racism! I’m not privileged!” News flash: I’ve experienced racism too. But I’ve also experienced privilege. If white people can take their privilege for granted, so too can other races. Shocking, I know. And I know now how my privilege blinded me to the fact that not everybody felt the same euphoria I did seeing characters that looked like them onscreen. Not if they were a narrow and offensive portrayal of their race. There are enough good-guy Asian characters that Fire Lord Ozai is allowed to be evil; but can you imagine if he was the only one?

3. What It Does Right

This is sounding really down on Avatar, which I don’t want to do. It’s a great show with a lot of fantastic themes that don’t show up a lot in kids’ media. It isn’t superficial or sugarcoating in its portrayal of the impacts of war, imperialism, colonialism, disability, and sexism, just to name a few. There are characters like Katara, a brown girl allowed to get angry but is not defined by it. There are characters like Aang, who is the complete opposite of toxic masculinity. There are characters like Toph, who is widely known as a great example of how to write a disabled character.

But all of these good things sort of masked the issues with the show. It’s easy to sweep an issue under the rug when there’s so many great things to stack on top and keep it down. Alternatively, one little problem in a show seems to make-or-break media for some people. Cancel culture is the most obvious example of this gone too far. Celebrity says one ignorant thing? Boom, cancelled. But… kind of not really, and also, they’re now terrified of saying anything at all because their apologies are mocked and their future decisions are scrutinized. It encourages a closed system of creators writing only what they know for fear of straying too far out of their lane. Avatar does do a lot of great things, and I think it would be silly and immature to say that its cultural appropriation invalidates all of these things. At the same time, this issue is an issue that should be addressed. Criticizing one part of the show doesn’t mean that the other parts of it aren’t good, or that you shouldn’t be a fan.

If Avatar’s cultural appropriation does make you uncomfortable enough to stop watching, go for it. Stop watching. No single show appeals to every single person. At the same time, if you’re a massive fan, take a sec (honestly, if you’ve made it this far, you’ve taken many secs) to check your own privilege, and think about how the blurred line between cultural appreciation (of East Asia) and appropriation (basically everybody else) formed. Is it because we as viewers were also captivated by the aesthetic and overall story, and so forgive the more problematic aspects? Is it because we’ve been conditioned so fully into never expecting rep that when we get it, we cling to it?

I’m no media critic or expert on race, cultural appropriation, or anything of the sort. I’m just an Asian-American teenager who hopes that her own opinion can be put out there into the world, and maybe resonate with someone else. I hope that it’s given you new insight into why Avatar: The Last Airbender is a show with both cultural appropriation and appreciation, and why these things coexist. Thank you for reading!

#this deleted idk why #so here is me reposting it #atla #avatar #avatar the last airbender #cultural appropriation #meta #atla meta #racism

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