#I live in a neighborhood that’s been gentrified into hell
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I do appreciate the irony of really expensive and scenic parts of the city smelling like absolute shit because the rich patrons in the apartment complexes don’t pickup after their pets.
#ramblings#I live in a neighborhood that’s been gentrified into hell#and there’s this sidewalk I walk to get to the train station that’s in front of expensive apartment complexes#and it’s very pretty but there is dog shit everywhere#it smells bad
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hey is racism one of your obsessions? also white and ocd. if it is, how u cope with it? i'm really afraid all the time to hurt my loved ones who are black people, and they're the majority of my loved ones. and how do u identify whats racism from whats an intrusive thought?
Most of my race-related OCD is abstract stuff like “if I move out of my parents’ house and try to live my own life outside of their control, I will have to find somewhere I can afford to pay rent, which will probably mean moving into a low-income neighborhood, which would mean inadvertently helping to gentrify the community, which would gradually push the original residents out of their homes and disrupt community ties and support systems and creating housing insecurity, so therefore I can’t move out or move on”.
I think that’s just part of a larger existential terror that I can only ever make the world worse by living in it—a net harm to the universe, molecule by misspent molecule.
I have been letting this ask sit in my inbox for weeks now because I’m convinced that anything I say will be destructive. What if my answer enables or excuses racism? What if my answer fuels the anguish of the mentally ill?
The rational and compassionate part of my mind insists that your loved ones (and mine!) understand that you (and I) are white, and have likely dealt with white peoples all their lives, and are capable of judging for themselves whether you are good to them and deserving of their intimacy. It is impossible to go through life without hurting and being hurt by people you care about—always you will have blindspots and miscommunications and competing needs. That’s just part of the curse of consciousness and being a social species. We all get a little blood on our hands eventually, one way or another… friendship involves knowing this, accepting this, and committing to avoid it and then, that failed, to make things right.
Again: your friends know you’re white. They have reason to expect the best of you or they wouldn’t be your friends. They choose to have you in their lives; trust them to trust you, and to recognize the difference between a beloved friend struggling with a treacherous and unkind brain and doing their best in an inescapably racist society, and a racist who whose bigotry makes them unworthy of their time and affection.
I do think racism obsessions are a particularly difficult manifestation of OCD to cope with because they’re hard to discuss at all without feeling like you’re implicitly asking for absolution. With other types of OCD, it’s common to seek reassurance that what you’re obsessively afraid of isn’t true—but what feels more racist than asking someone to reassure you that you’re not racist…? LMAO.
They say the “cure” to OCD, such as it is, is just to learn how to embrace the existential horror of uncertainty. Tall fucking order. Hell on Earth! But in a bizarre way I have found the rhetoric that “everyone is unconsciously and incurably racist” to be unexpectedly helpful… there is no total psychological purging and mental purification we can undergo, no amount of ritual self-flagellation that will drive the demons out, no pristine state we can aspire to and hate ourselves for soiling. Only mundane everyday commitments to compassion and empathy and solidarity and cleaning up our messes. But even then, a thought isn’t a mess. A thought I’d not a thing that happened or a choice you made. It doesn’t represent an alternate timeline branching off into a parallel universe where you have acted on it and hurt people.
Earlier this year I was playing a video game—during my lunch break I got to wondering what happened if you failed a skill check that I had passed in my own playthough, so I looked up a clip on YouTube and was so triggered by the answer (the player character calls his companion a racial slur in the heat of the moment, without meaning to, even if you’ve played him as a committed anti-racist) that I immediately spiraled and was close to throwing up in the broom closet, and when I got home I opened my own save and tried to make the player character kill himself as catharsis. It was an incredibly unreasonable guilt response to a completely fictional scenario that I hadn’t even gotten in my own playthrough, but in retrospect it was a safe way to explore fear of my own internalized racism hurting somebody and what might happen if my intrusive thoughts came true. It sucked and it was terrible and I was angry at myself for being crazy about it, but it ended up being a small dose of exposure therapy and practice at not repenting for nonexistent through self-abuse.
I dunno. This has been a long uncomfortably personal ramble but I hope it’s helpful. I don’t know if your friends know you have OCD (or how it manifests) and I don’t know whether telling them would help. But allowing yourself to trust others to trust you is far more useful than beating yourself up for thoughts you don’t want. I have on occasion warned people that I am cautious about doing certain things with them—particularly drinking—because there is a risk that I may spiral and show symptoms humiliating and uncomfortable to both of us, and I don’t want to put them in a position where they witness or feel like they have to help me manage the white guilt elements of my disorder. These conversations have usually gone well, and the mutual understanding to boundaries takes some of the tension out, which seems to reduce the triggers. It’s messy and awkward and maybe it limits who is willing to be friends with me, but IMHO it’s better than surprising someone.
As for determining whether something is an intrusive thought or actual racism, I guess my answer is: does it matter? Would you manage them differently? Intrusive thoughts may be an evil voice in your brain, but racism is an evil voice in society’s brain.
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How @yellowocaballero and I Fixed Daredevil by Headcannoning Him as Mexican
When Daredevil first appeared in 1964, he was a second-generation Irish-American from Hell’s Kitchen, a working-class Irish-immigrant neighborhood. In a time where Irish people weren’t viewed as “white” or “real Americas.” They were a part of the oppressed working class, the bottom of the food chain, who had nothing but their religion, the vehicle of their culture from the old world, to keep them together.
Note: Today, the argument that “Irish people aren’t really white” has been co-opted by white supremacists and has often been used in bad faith against POC. I want it to be clear that what is considered “white” is and has always been a political term with no backing in science. Discrimination against the Irish back in the day was tied to anti-Catholic sentiment in predominately Protestant states, such as England, Scotland, and the United States. Naturally, Anti-Catholic discrimination overlaps with nativist, xenophobic, ethnocentric and/or racist sentiments (ie Anti-Italian, Anti-Polish, Hispanicphonia).
Jack Murdock was a poor boxer with no education or prospects who had to exploit his body to provide for Matt. And recognized that not a way to live and thrive, so he pushed Matt into academics for social mobility. Sound familiar?
At its core, the story of Matt Murdock is an immigrant story. Matt has the immigrant mentality; immigrants-get-the-job-done type of thing. Gotta hustle and became a lawyer because that’s how he moves up the social and class ladder. And when he does “make it” he chooses to stay and help his neighborhood because he has a cultural connection to it.
This worked in 1964, I don’t know how much it works now.
Hell Kitchen isn’t a rough neighborhood primarily occupied by working-class immigrants, it’s another gentrified hipster hellhole. Irish people and people of Irish ancestry in the United States no long face systemic discrimination.
Therefore, modern-day recontextualizing is to make Matt Mexican.
Technically, Matt can also be from any other Latin American country or Filipino but I lean towards Mexican since a) this is my post go make your own and b) we get the most discrimination from the mainstream media. Yes, a lot of it is because racists use “Mexican” as a catch-all term for anyone from Latin America but still. Trump made his presidential platform by calling Mexicans illegal rapists and druggies.
If Matt was actually the son of Jack Murdock*, an undocumented brown immigrant living in a working-class immigrant/POC neighborhood, it gives him the underdog immigrant arc the character is missing in modern-day adaptations. Matt's core is still the same Matt we know and love, he’s still the son of a boxer, whose dad’s pushed him into succeeding academically, who lost his dad to gang violence, and who is extremely Catholic. Someone who wants to fit into middle-class educated (white) society and feels like he has to suppress the "devil" inside until one day he can’t. He's seeing discrimination and poverty and crime and gentrification tear his neighborhood apart and the police turn their back on it since it's predominantly POC. The law has failed them, he's not going to fail them too.
Meg made the fantastic point that Matt should still be white-passing (and ginger) so he could exist somewhere in between worlds. And Matt takes advantage of that, as well as his Columbia Law degree to help his community. Matt not using his conditional whiteness and the fancy degree to “escape” his community and instead help it.
#daredevil#matt murdock#daredevil comics#marvel#foggy nelson#karen page#comics#stan lee#mcu#charlie cox#usaigi meta#usaigi speaks#mateo murdock au
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An old neighborhood block I made.
gonna have to take more aesthetic photos next time.
It comes with,
-Bodega/Corner Store, with things missing probably because I deleted Srsly's overhaul for an update im not sure.
-Record store for aesthetic and hangout.
-Laundromat
Three Apartments:
-Crackhouse apartment behind the record store.
-Older Apartment that's been lived in, (sans clutter because burnout).
-Gentrified Apartment because hell yea gonna represent my reality.
I may modify it overtime to fit a more cyberpunk aesthetic in the future. I recently collected all my builds and sims from other save files and put them in the same world so I'm gonna be remodelling a few of my older builds.
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I had an interesting conversation with a pal yesterday, but it really just goes to show how the US suppresses so much in this country. Like, I still barely know a lot about it myself (only thanks to Native Hawaiians voices spreading the news where others fail) and need to do more research but it's super depressing.
So, because of all the bullshit happening in Hawaii rn (like how areas don't have clean running water, it's been contaminated and all the good clean water is being sucked out by tourism and resorts, I know there's more shit but it's been an ongoing list for the past couple of years. covid restrictions being lifted made it worse), and he had no idea anything bad was happening there at all. I get it, why would he when the news won't report it? We don't live on or near the islands, he lives on the east coast and I live elsewhere. I was just ranting to my pal cause I needed to blow steam on this shit that was pissing me off as someone who is half Hawaiian and care about my extended family that still live on the islands.
But, he really thought because of how brainwashed we all are about Hawaii being a 'destination tourist getaway', that tourism is the best thing for Hawaii and helps the natives. No the fuck it does not, not now anyways. So many natives are yelling to get the fuck out of here, but people keep coming because they 'missed vacationing'. You know fuck your vacations, my people fucking need clean running water and not to get their neighborhoods gentrified and prices raised because rich people keep moving to their own little 'tropical paradise' and raising the cost of living for everyone else.
And you know it's mostly rich white people.
I'm so fucking steamed you have no idea, I rarely talk about these things because I'm sadly very disconnected from my own culture since my only Hawaiian parent didn't teach my jack shit about it growing up, hell I didn't even know I was Hawaiian til I was like 9 cause of my Auntie talking about our culture. But I still care about it, I still care about the people of Hawaii and how they've been fucked over time and time again by tourism and the US government. It blows big time. It's depressing. I wish I could do more than just spread the word on twitter about the issues going on, but I don't have the money to fly out to Hawaii and protest (and I don't want to travel there rn anyways out of respect), and I also don't have money to donate to organizations working against all the issues going on either.
All I can do is quietly support where I can.
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Mario Kart & Real Hearts
Word Count: 2.9K
Pairing: timeskip!ceo Kodzume x reader
Warnings: career choices are brought up; contracts and breaking them; addendums including the dating clause (for the sake of the story, not necessarily in practice as far as i know)
this is one of the custom controllers you were cleared to mod eventually.
One road, eight racers, corn puff chips, and half-drank tall cola cans means only one thing:Friday Night Games! (hosted by your roommate, Kodzume Kenma).
How you wound up here is kind of a short, yet funny story. If anyone were to blame, it would be a blind ad placed in the classifieds for a paid personal assistant job in the heart of Tokyo. The need for an entrepreneur,who sponsored one of Japan’s rising athletes, that lacked the personell to handle the day to day itineraries was actually quite high. Granted, the person who placed the ad, is one of the man’s closest friends—a menance in a suit. Or so you’ve been told during the interview process.
Out of the 90 applicants who read and filled out the forms, twenty were kept for in person screenings. The other seventy were given a polite, ‘thanks but we’re moving in another direction for what we seek’ email.
In that target group of twenty people, there were three or so odd tasks to help narrow the field. All of them were games of some kind. Brackets were drawn, which in hindsight, as a precaution all the while the CEO of Bouncing Ball Corp made content videos from his home office. The first set which knocked out five candidates was Tetris 99; the second was a trivia game circa JackBox games; third was Frogger; fourth was Scrabble for mobile; and fifth, the one where you came out on top, was Street Fighter. Unique was one of the best ways to describe this process. Intricate and pretentious, yes, but also you got paid to play video games. Was it an aptitude test as well? No,but to hell with it! That was the most relaxed you’ve been in a month since your last job decided to let you go (the restaurant you originally worked at was sold by a land developer to gentrify that part of the neighborhood you inhabited). Regardless, your new job to be a personal assistant was decided quite easily.
Now, here you are, after hours, with your boss in his living room. You were informed by other members of the e-board that he is a private person, a bit timid around strangers, yet the confidence he has in bringing out the best in those who know him, is astounding. Being someone’s personal assistant is not quite like being a babysitter or a caretaker: you are to make sure the itinerary is followed, chores like picking up the dry cleaning or submitting the next idea for a (reaction) video are completed, and reminding the man to sleep are some of your responsibilities.
“Y’know, most bosses won’t have their assistants play games with them,” you tease, shaking the controller in your hand.
You’re sitting on the couch with a pillow for back support and your ‘casual Friday’ black shirt and red jeans outfit. Your flats are close to the front door and your socked feet lay under your thighs as you sit cross legged on the cushion. Your boss with the out grown blonde hair sits in front of you under the kotatsu looking more like a Yakuza member than a multi-million dollar business man with ripped sweatpants (well loved he’d have you know), white undershirt, and merch hoodie. His controller in his hand vibrates as the choice is selected for the next race.
“Believe me, I know,” he answers.
He turns to give you a look meaning that he won’t go easy on you. It’s been several months of this sarcastic, teasing, yet endearing tone and if you’re not paying attention, you’d miss the color gaining in his cheeks. His best friend points it out one night after you’ve gone home for the day.
"What was that?" Kuroo asks. It's been several years since either of them have made time for a call of normalcy-falling in love was replaced with the need to create content; spending time with family became a call to action for donating for the latest cause; dressing fancy was more for networking than just for fun. Perhaps this time around things are different because you entered into the outskirts of the life of a gamer.
"Whatever you're thinking, I'm sure you're wrong," Kenma says.
"Are you going to prove my hypothesis wrong? We've known each other for as far back as you can remember..."
"And so?"
"Is that all you can say? I mean, from where I'm standing, it sounds like you're having trouble denying the truth..."
Kodzume can’t even deny it on the phone,blatantly so as the young twenty-something entrepreneur feels himself attempt to smile. His internal monologue continues: why does a workplace crush have to form when a) you come over once a week to hang out (ie drop off the paperwork your boss needed to read over) b) bring takeaway boxes from the cantina services he orders from and c) the worse one in his opinion, was the fact you are always so physically intimate without even trying causes his heart to beat arrhythmically. Like you’re close enough when he’s stamping a few papers that need his signature and he can smell the perfume lingering off your skin and he has to stop himself from actually acting on that thought alone.
"Kuroo, I need to call you back."
The last thing Kodzume hears is his best friend cackle.
You're already an hour and half into your nightly routine. Then when you hear your phone go off, you jump as though you're in a horror game. When you gain your resting rhythm again, the kanji of the name of the caller now flashes for a third time. You slide your finger against the tempered glass smoothly and bringing the phone up to your ear, your voice raises in volume.
"What the hell?!"
"Hello to you too."
Your boss' voice is coming through the receiver and you nearly lose your composure.
"Please don't tell me I forgot something at the office," you say in a post-apologies exchange.
"Yeah," you hear a chime and a greeting from a convenience store clerk in the background. You stop talking as you listen to him shopping between the aisles. There's a certain je ne sais quois about this: then again your boss is an internationally ranked streamer and owner of one of the most successful businesses thus far. You listen on as you continue brushing your hair then you carry on to your bed. The shuffling of your sheets catches his attention as the transaction starts and upon the end; the clerk says their exit salutation. As you hear the shuffling on the other end of the line continue, you fill in the gaps by listening to your boss hesitate silently. You decide to be direct in hopes he'd provide a reason why he called you even if it was a made up reason like you 'forgetting something'.
"Is this the part where you're going to tell me what I forgot?"
"You know Kuroo called me after you left," he starts his answer with this preface.
"He did, did he?" you hum. "Well, what did your best friend say?"
Kodzume is not good with words, he never really was unless it was meant to inspire his friends on and off the volleyball court. This was not one of those times.
"That I should ask you out to dinner."
You ask him to repeat what he just said twice more for good measure in case he changed his mind.
"Do you want to?" you ask instead of giving him a proper answer.
"Of course I do," he exasperatedly says as a short attempt of a chuckle follows.
You take a deep breath and without any warning, you ask your boss a favor before you give him a proper answer.
"Fire me."
You hear the rustling of leaves around your gentlemanly caller and figure he is not too far from the penthouse where you spend a majority of your day. At least that is what he wants you to think. It was his turn to ask you to repeat yourself because his friend ultimately led him to believe your answer to be an obvious ‘yes!’ Yet why are you being so difficult now? Did the KodzuKen just get trumped by reading too much into your friendly and optimistic demeanor? No, that wasn’t it. Was it? Only one way to find out, his brain tells him.
"What?"
You pinch the bridge of your nose and sigh into the receiver.
“Your company has an addendum for dating in the workplace,” you gently inform him. “Even though it kills me to turn down your offer, if we pursue this, it’ll create a shitstorm around you and your company as a whole…”
“And your proposed solution is to have me fire you?”
Now he starts to understand. Of course! How could he forget such a clause existing? Was it because he thought even though he’s the head of the company he founded, he thought he was outside the parameters. How utterly foolish.
“You read this part when we sent you your terms and the NDAs for employment?”
“Of course I did! I had to sir.”
You really are stubborn. More than one wealthy gamer can ever think possible. With a cheshire cat grin, he pulls the phone away from his ear and he opens up another app that has your track record with the company. He sends a cover letter attached to it to everyone he knew in the corporate realm who had been searching for someone of your skillset. You hear the chime of an outgoing message (you only knew of it after being the one to hit send after editing a few emails for your boss after you organize the drafts folder on his behalf).
“... sir?”
“You don’t have to call me that,” Kodzume places the phone back on his ear. “Not anymore.”
Those are the last things you hear before the line cuts out and the call drops. You’re still sitting puzzled at the dark screen of your phone. The recent call log page is open though for a few more seconds before your iOS settings turn off the backlight after two minutes of inactivity. Sometimes you wish the phone would ring, but as it stands, you’d be left with more disappointment since experience has taught you nothing more than to rely on yourself and you do mentally kick your ass for not replenishing your ice cream stock in your freezer. You want to curl up on your couch and just play a game to forget about the conversation you just had with your boss.
On the other side of a door with the number of your unit facing him, does one thing that terrifies him. For the first time in a while, Kodzume Kenma makes a fist and knocks. A series of footsteps are heard coming closer and in hindsight, perhaps letting you know your boss would be making a house call would have been good to know. The deadbolt unlocks to reveal you in your pajama top and bike shorts.
“Holy shit,” you shake your head before your free hand pulls on his hoodie forward until you feel him smile against your cheek when he raises his free hand to pat your shoulder. The bag of late night snacks still swishes on his wrist. Your door closes behind him as he walks past you post-haste. Dark roots be damned when he turns to face you, placing the bag on the end table.
“Sir, why are you here?” you ask a fair question.
“I told you, you don’t have to call me that any more,” his smile is saccharine. Your answer is staring you in the face and though you don’t want to admit it, this is somewhat endearing and subsequently straight out of every soap-drama your aunties have watched in the last five to ten years. You make the conclusion when you stand in front of him again. Your eyes are searching for any kind of sign of whatever this would essentially become.
The clock in your living room adjacent to your bedroom door begins its song to announce the next quarter of the hour. When it ceases,he notices how both you and him stand considerably closer to the other. At least half-an arm’s reach away anyway.
Kodzume feels tensely nervous; he plays with his sweater’s fabric more so than his thumbs.
“I figured if I were to fire you, I’d at least do it face to face,” he begins. You didn’t think he’d take what you said so literally, but then again you did have a point. You had viable proof considering the contract you were able to quote, thus breaking his heart simultaneously in the process. Words have power, you know this, so perhaps this is the second scariest thing your boss has done ever in his lifetime. And you don’t know why, ok, you do know, but as the tears threaten to spill from the corner of your eyes, you steel your resolve when he pulls you calmly into his hold. He comforts you like he’s seen his best friend’s grandparents do when they were younger.
“You’re something else,” he chuckles against the shell of your ear. You echo with similar praise, mentioning how talented you are and getting to the next level.
“Are you, the Kodzume Kenma of Bouncing Ball Corp, confessing right now?” you wonder now that it’s past five minutes. It takes everything in his will power to not laugh at your suddenly verbose declaration. As the silence returns, your pried away from his hold only to feel his calloused fingertips trace your features only pausing at the corner of your eyes.You lean into his touch a bit more, breath hitching a little when you hear his answer whispered above your lips. Gently brushing his nose against yours in a brief nod causes your lips to meet for just a moment–to be fair, fully kissing your boss was the one thing that terrified you still.
Following your lead, Kodzume keeps you steady as he tilts your face upward. You don’t really notice nor do you care when you choose to kiss him more firmly for a second time. There’s a sense of uncertainty at first, yet the longer he allows you kiss him, the more he pulls you into him. Your hands and arms raise to embrace his shoulders because you know he’s not going to let you go. He notices how you’re hesitating to deepen this silent exchange until he nibbles on your top lip; hearing a sharp inhale from you, Kodzume tastes your teeth for the first time. You’re not shy either when your tongue darts across to taste the remnants of a cola flavored chapstick you left on his desk earlier that summer. And though this giddy feeling in your souls carries through as the seconds pass, you’re both willing to accept the changes that come with pursuing the other romantically. Casually making out with your boss in your apartment was not one of the things you’d think you’d be doing when you signed on as his personal assistant. Reality sets in and you break this kiss by pulling away first. Kodzume looks at you with a confused, curious stare, lips slightly agape, with a hand still pressed upon your cheek. As her feels the smoothness of your skin under his thumb, his brain catches up with his heart: he notices how in the fluorescent light you’re truly more breathtaking than any current character model he’s seen. Your breath tickles his palm every now and then, but you force yourself to stare up at his eyes.
You’re about to suggest he leaves before either of you make something out of nothing, but that’s not what was important here.
“Worth it,” his voice is laced in a sweetness you didn’t know he had.
“Kodzume,” your tone warns him.
It was in that moment, Kodzume sees the invisible line you create while trying to be respectful of your work relationship. The clause lingers in the back of his mind where as for you, it’s in the foreground.
You blink back to view him properly under the light of your backlit hallway. You never noticed how tall he was, and though the top of your head reaches his shoulder, you seem to be cosmically positioned to be at his side. You lean forward, forehead coming into contact with his fresh rain scented hoodie. His arms still embrace you comfortably and you make a startling discovery: he might not have been the most athletic person like his best friend, but he’s strong in other aspects. Keeping you close to him is quite a turn of events, addendums be damned.
“I’m sorry,” his voice is barely above a whisper.
If falling in love had been as easy as playing those otome games, he would have done so long ago. You made it seem easy, so effortless. Glancing up to drink in the company you head over, you notice his lips were slightly less chapped. Then again, you did just kiss your boss, after office hours.
“Don’t be,” you peck his lips causing both of you to smirk at each other.
Your phone’s email notification continually goes off a couple yards away.
“Then I’m definitely fired now, right?”
“‘Fraid so.”
His hand snakes around your waist and the other one which had rested on your face for a little bit, is now brushing your hair behind your ear before continuing this touching act of defying the liabilities in the contact you signed once upon a time.
“Then why is my phone’s email notifs going off?”
“...because what kind of ex-boss would I be if I didn’t forward your stellar track record to other companies who would kill to have someone like you on their roster?”
“You’d do that... why?”
“Believe it or not, Kuroo talked some sense into me–”
Your boss, well ex-boss now, explains how he’d arrive here at this point in front of you in his arms. As tangible as this love is, it is a familiar sense of comfort and the minute it materializes in the actions he did to prove himself worthy of your affection. And when the weakness in your knees returns, you let him help you walk toward your couch.
“Stay here for me, yeah?” you nod as you observe him walk toward where your consoles are located and watch him turn on the switch connected to the entertainment center. He comes back to kneel down in front of you, and you lean down to meet him. Your hair brushes against his face, reminiscent of the first time you told him to take a break.
“Confession aside,” you take his hand in yours. “I think you deserve an answer to your question…”
“Oh?” His smile is lopsided at best.
“I think I’d actually take you up on that offer.”
Three…two…one, your brain counts down as quickly as you witness his expression changes.
“Oh thank the gods,” he recovers, resting his head against your lap. You burst out laughing when you hear his reaction. You gently, but firmly pull him up only to have him seat side by side with you. You turn your body to face him with a blush forming on your cheekbones.
“You like me a lot, huh?” your tone is a bit hushed.
“More than you’ll ever know,” is his reply when he leans in far to brush his lips across yours. “But for right now, I think you and I have a score to settle on Rainbow Road…”
“You’re on.”
The loading screen timer finalizes and the opening theme of Mario Kart pours out of the speakers while two young adults prepare for pursuing the next level of their blossoming relationship.
#kodzume kenma x reader#timeskip!ceo kodzuken x assistant!reader#coworkers to lovers: the beginning/origin story#🌻— flying around collecting pollen—queue#sora scribbles 2022
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obliquely, this is in reference to how formerly working class bastions in the midwest that used to elect socialists now elect republicans. if we all gave up the theory that LGBT people are normal, we might once again go back to the days where we elected socialists across the country. thomas frank, what’s the matter with kansas:
But its periodic bouts of leftism were what really branded Kansas with the mark of the freak. Every part of the country in the nineteenth century had labor upheavals and protosocialist reform movements, of course. In Kansas, though, the radicals kept coming out on top. It was as though the blank landscape prompted dreams of a blank-slate society, a place where institutions might be remade as the human mind saw fit. Maps of the state from the 1880s show a hamlet (since vanished) called Radical City; in nearby Crawford County the town of Girard was home to the Appeal to Reason, a socialist newspaper whose circulation was in the hundreds of thousands. In that same town, in 1908, Eugene Debs gave a fiery speech accepting the Socialist Party’s nomination for president; in 1912 Debs actually carried Crawford County, one of four he won nationwide. (All were in the Midwest.) In 1910 Theodore Roosevelt signaled his own lurch to the left by traveling to Kansas and giving an inflammatory address in Osawatomie, the onetime home of John Brown.
The most famous freak-out of them all was Populism, the first of the great American leftist movements.* Populism tore through other states as well—wailing all across Texas, the South, and the West in the 1890s—but Kansas was the place that really distinguished itself by its enthusiasm. Driven to the brink of ruin by years of bad prices, debt, and deflation, the state’s farmers came together in huge meetings where homegrown troublemakers like Mary Elizabeth Lease exhorted them to “raise less corn and more hell.” The radicalized farmers marched through the small towns in day-long parades, raging against what they called the “money power.” And despite all the clamor, they still managed to take the state’s traditional Republican masters utterly by surprise in 1890, sweeping the small-town slickers out of office and ending the careers of many a career politician. In the decade that followed they elected Populist governors, Populist senators, Populist congressmen, Populist supreme court justices, Populistcity councils, and probably Populist dogcatchers, too; men of strong ideas, curious nicknames, and a colorful patois....
For a generation, Kansas has been the testing-ground for every experiment in morals, politics, and social life. Doubt of all existing institutions has been respectable. Nothing has been venerable or revered merely because it exists or has endured. Prohibition, female suffrage, fiat money, free silver, every incoherent and fantastic dream of social improvement and reform, every economic delusion that has bewildered the foggy brains of fanatics, every political fallacy nurtured by misfortune, poverty and failure, rejected elsewhere, has here found tolerance and advocacy.
Today the two myths are one. Kansas may be the land of averageness, but it is a freaky, militant, outraged averageness. Kansas today is a burned-over district of conservatism where the backlash propaganda has woven itself into the fabric of everyday life. People in suburban Kansas City vituperate against the sinful cosmopolitan elite of New York and Washington, D.C.; people in rural Kansas vituperate against the sinful cosmopolitan elite of Topeka and suburban Kansas City. Survivalist supply shops sprout in neighborhood strip-malls. People send Christmas cards urging their friends to look on the bright side of Islamic terrorism, since the Rapture is now clearly at hand.
Under the state’s simple blue flag are gathered today some of the most flamboyant cranks, conspiracists, and calamity howlers the Republic has ever seen. The Kansas school board draws the guffaws of the world for purging state science standards of references to evolution. Cities large and small across the state still hold out against water fluoridation, while one tiny hamlet takes the additional step of requiring firearms in every home. A prominent female politician expresses public doubts about the wisdom of women’s suffrage, while another pol proposes that the state sell off the Kansas Turnpike in order to solve its budget crisis. Impoverished inhabitants of the state’s most scenic area fight with fanatical determination to prevent a national park from opening up in their neighborhood, while the rails-to-trails program, regarded everywhere else in the union as a harmless scheme for family fun, is reviled in Kansas as an infernal design on the rights of property owners. Operation Rescue selects Wichita as the stage for its great offensive against abortion, calling down thirty thousand testifying fundamentalists on the city, witnessing and blocking traffic and chaining themselves to fences. A preacher from Topeka travels the nation advising Americans to love God’s holy hate, showing up wherever a gay person has been in the news to announce that “God Hates Fags.” Survivalists and secessionists dream of backyard confederacies out on the lone prairie; schismatic Catholics declare the pope himself to be insufficiently Catholic; Posses Comitatus hold imaginary legal proceedings, sternly prosecuting state officials for participating in actual legal proceedings; and homegrown terrorists swap conspiracy theories at a house in Dickinson County before screaming off to strike a blow against big government in Oklahoma City.
the problem with this simple story is that social liberalism actually grew in lockstep with an economic policy tailored to the poor. in the 70s, the most common place to get gender reassignment surgery was at a catholic hospital in small town colorado. in 2010, in response to deep opposition in the town, the practice was forced to move to california. the second most common place was at a baptist hospital in oklahoma city, where such surgery was viewed as routine until a number of religious leaders decided to oppose it in the 70s. at the same time, many other religious leaders spoke out in favour of the surgery, saying that it comported well with religious tenets.
likewise, colorado legalized abortion in 1967, as did states like kansas, missouri, georgia, and north and south carolina prior to roe v wade. today, these states are considered anti-abortion and anti-lgbt hotspots, yet prior to the late 70s, compassion for such people was viewed as paramount in the life of america’s christians. so what happened? it clearly wasn’t an emphasis on the social aspects of poor american lives that shifted the political arena in favour of religious conservatism. rather, as thomas frank points out in the same book:
Nobody mows their own lawn in Mission Hills anymore, and only a foot soldier in its armies of gardeners would park a Pontiac there. The doctors who lived near us in the seventies have pretty much been gentrified out, their places taken by the bankers and brokers and CEOs who have lapped them repeatedly on the racetrack of status and income. Every time I paid Mission Hills a visit during the nineties, it seemed another of the more modest houses in our neighborhood had been torn down and replaced by a much larger edifice, a three-story stone chateau, say, bristling with turrets and porches and dormers and gazebos and a three-car garage. The dark old palaces from the twenties sprouted spiffy new slate roofs, immaculately tailored gardens, remote-controlled driveway gates, and sometimes entire new wings. One grand old pile down the street from us was fitted with shiny new gutters made entirely of copper. A new house a few doors down from Esrey’s spread is so large it has two multicar garages, one at either end.
These changes are of course not unique to Mission Hills. What has gone on there is normal in its freakishness. You can observe the same changes in Shaker Heights or La Jolla or Winnetka or Ann Coulter’s hometown of New Canaan, Connecticut. They reflect the simplest and hardest of economic realities: The fortunes of Mission Hills rise and fall in inverse relation to the fortunes of ordinary working people. When workers are powerful, taxes are high, and labor is expensive (as was the case from World War II until the late seventies), the houses built here are smaller, the cars domestic, the servants rare, and the overgrown look fashionable in gardening circles. People read novels about eccentric English aristocrats trapped in a democratic age, sighing sadly for their lost world.
When workers are weak, taxes are down, and labor is cheap (as in the twenties and again today), Mission Hills coats itself in shimmering raiments of gold and green. Now the stock returns are plush, the bonus packages fat, the servants affordable, and the suburb finds that the princely life isn’t dead after all. It builds new additions and new fountains and new Italianate porches overlooking Olympic-sized flower gardens maintained by shifts of laborers. People read books about the glory of empire. The kids get Porsches or SUVs when they turn sixteen; the houses with asphalt roofs discreetly disappear; the wings that were closed off are triumphantly reopened, and all is restored to its former grandeur. Times may be hard where you live, but here events have yielded a heaven on earth, a pleasure colony out of the paintings of Maxfield Parrish.
america's workers and small farmers were saved by the reforms of the 1930s, as frank explains, then crushed as the wealthy found out how to squirrel away their taxes (in part thanks to the collapse of the british empire), accumulate wealth away from prying eyes, lobby the government for preferential treatment, and between 1976 and 2000, triumph completely in the political domain. mission hill donates more money to politicians than the rest of kansas combined. unions are swamped in state politics, and see declining fortunes. as a result, neoliberal social atomization takes effect, which sees even workers demanding beggar-thy-neighbour policies. and when thy neighbour is socially distinct from you, it becomes easier to justify voting for such politics based on a survival instinct. the majority of the working class tuned out and do not vote any more. among the rest, low skilled working class jobs in highly stratified and inequitable cities vote democrat, hoping for some patronage from the white collar creative class voters they serve, while blue collar skilled workers tend to vote republican, devoid of any examples of class politics in their lives with the death of unions and hoping to keep their share of wages against their only opposition, the tax man.
ultimately, any socially liberal politics sustained by donations from rich big city donors is unsustainable. on the other hand, the notion that “woke” politics is holding back leftism is, save for a few clearly absurd situations (robin diangelo, for instance) also wrong. economic leftism leads to social leftism, because respect to the working class leads to respect for its identities. neoliberal atomization is a much deeper force than can be surmounted at the ballot box, even in a primary, but it is always an economic force first and foremost.
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pel!ivan and fedyor went through a lot of ups and some downs from the end of pel and 2021 but they also celebrated 10 years together 🥳 i hope fedyor shoved cake into ivan’s face and also you know, im sure they were mushy like the saps they are
Ivan was supposed to be out of here ten minutes ago – actually, at this point, more like twenty – but the clients are still fucking talking, and if they keep it up much longer, he’s going to add it to the bill for “initial consultation.” Drew has a man-bun and unbearably hip black glasses, and works as a developer for some start-up app that he’s tried to convince Ivan to download at least twelve times. (What does the app actually do? Don’t know don’t care.) Mia is thin, blonde, waifish, smells like essential oils, and has been flitting around with her smartphone the entire time, getting in Ivan’s way as she snaps perfectly filtered pictures of the “developmental process” and posts them nonstop on Instagram. They both have a lot of opinions on how they want the energy of the space to feel, and a preapproved list of ethically sourced suppliers. They have paid some ludicrous price for this converted loft in Prospect Heights and chose the location for its proximity to the best farmer’s markets and hippie coffeehouses. Did Ivan die? Is this hell?
Somewhat ostentatiously, he looks at his watch. “Okay,” he announces. “I think that wraps up. You have work number, so – ”
“Oh, just one more thing!” Drew has recently read one (1) book on home design and thinks he’s an expert, so Ivan is forced to suffer his idiotic opinions about the kind of tile they want to use on the kitchen backsplash. Somehow, he manages not to roll his eyes directly out of his head, for which he should be commended. Ivan has discovered that the secret of successfully dealing with people, especially clients, is to smile and nod at everything they say, while mercilessly mocking them in your head. Amazing, the things you learn as a small-business owner in Brooklyn in the year of our lord 2021. Especially when it comes to renovating overpriced tiny gentrified apartments for insufferable techno-douchebags and their vapid influencer girlfriends. And people think Ivan might want to live like this more often? No fucking thank you.
Finally (it’s another ten minutes after that, this is definitely going on the bill), they more or less wrap up, except for the fact that Mia then wants a picture with the three of them. “It’s just so important to us that we’re supporting the immigrant community,” she explains earnestly. “After all, being open, tolerant, learning from our neighbors, people who are different from us, that’s what life is all about. We just love that you’re foreign. The energy feels so right, you know?”
Ivan wonders whether to inform her that he has lived in this country for eight years and been a full citizen (passport and voting rights and everything) for three, then decides that this would venture into sharing-personal-information territory and he is having none of it. His English has improved to the point where he can handle almost all business transactions by himself, but feigning incomprehension can sometimes get him out of them when they turn really stupid. Unfortunately, that isn’t an option here, and so he diligently leans into the frame, smiling half an inch, while Mia snaps a picture of “us and our adorable Russian contractor!!” Ivan informs her of the correct flag emoji to add to the filter, decides that he’s going to add an extra fifty bucks just for that, and finally, finally, makes his escape.
It’s rush hour, and the Q is crammed as Ivan heads into midtown. So much for social distancing and not getting too close to anyone, which is the only thing from the pandemic that he wouldn’t mind keeping. Only about half the crowd is wearing masks, including him, and so he gets off at Times Square, dodges the latest lunatic standing on a soapbox and shouting about how it is all a hoax, and walks several blocks uptown, just to get some space. He finally reaches the restaurant, where he has to flash his vaccination card to get inside (Ivan, who remains Russian to the marrow of his bones, is a little irked that he couldn’t get Sputnik here and had to settle for Pfizer) and climbs up to the open-air rooftop terrace. It is only when he spots his husband, waiting at a table that overlooks the glittering evening lights of the city, when Ivan pulls off his mask and allows himself to properly smile. “Sorry I’m late,” he says. “They are the worst.”
“I figured it was something like that.” Fedyor musters a smile in return, though his eyes look permanently tired these days and Ivan would bet that he’s been scrolling through more depressing emails on his phone. Technically Fedyor is on a two-month sabbatical from work, but he can’t stop himself, and Ivan has had to pry it from his fingers on a number of occasions. “But you’re here now. That’s what matters.”
Ivan nods stoutly, they are furnished with the drinks and appetizers list, and when the waiter asks if there’s any special occasion tonight, tell him that they are celebrating their ten-year anniversary, albeit somewhat late. This was supposed to happen last spring, but obviously, nobody in New York was going out to a restaurant in the early months of 2020, and Ivan himself had barely gotten home from the hospital and still could be knocked over in a strong breeze. They’re celebrating a lot of things tonight, in other words, even if it’s now been eleven years, not ten, since the day Ivan marched into a Red Square coffee shop and engaged in – well, Fedyor has made sure to inform him that the first date didn’t go nearly as well as Ivan always thought it did. But it worked, didn’t it? Here they are, wedding bands on their fingers, a couple of successful American urban professionals who have built a nice life for themselves and are, if anything, even more madly in love than they were when this whole nutty adventure together first began. So really, if you ask Ivan Sakharov Kaminsky, it went just fine after all.
The waiter congratulates them, gives them two drinks for the price of one, and they both relax and start to talk, fully at ease in the way they only are in each other’s company. Ivan does his Mia impression in an extremely convincing falsetto (after all, [NAME REDACTED] has practice at this) and Fedyor almost dies laughing. They hold hands on the table – no need to hold them under the table – and gaze into each other’s eyes all they want, order dinner and dessert, and take a long time about it. They raise several toasts to this, to them, to ten years, may there be many more. Ivan pays the bill, his treat, and they walk slowly back to Times Square, hand-in-hand, Fedyor’s head nestled on Ivan’s shoulder. It’s New York. Nobody cares.
They ride the Q home, in all its smelly, secondhand glory, taking an hour to bang out to Brighton Beach and descending the elevated stairs into the familiar down-at-heel comfort of their Russian-American neighborhood, neon Cyrillic signs glowing in windows and somebody shouting about how if Sergei ever shows his face here again, she is going to cut his dick off. Ivan and Fedyor look at each other and snort, resisting the urge to shout up and ask what exactly Sergei did, and walk a few more minutes to their building. They climb up three flights of stairs to their apartment, unlock the door and the deadbolt, and step inside.
The instant they are home, Rasputin shoots out of nowhere, yowling as if he has been neglected for months, and curls himself around Ivan’s ankles (he is still liable to give Fedyor evil looks when he feels that this interloper has been stealing his human too often). Ivan sighs, trudges to the kitchen, points out to Rasputin that his food bowl is still half full, gets a wounded look in return, and adds an extra scoopful. Once the cat is happily snarfing down, Fedyor pulls Ivan by the hand, into the dim living room with its blowing curtains. “Come here, my love,” he says. “Hold me.”
Ivan does as ordered, because it’s his favorite thing in the world: cuddling Fedyor close, nothing but the two of them in all of time and space, swaying slowly in the blue hour with fingers and arms and hearts entwined. Ivan kisses Fedyor’s temple, and Fedyor nestles even closer, melted into his embrace. “I love you, Vanya,” he mumbles against Ivan’s collarbone. “I love you so much. I love you more than anything in the world. I love you, I love you, I love you.”
“I love you too, Fedya.” Ivan leans down and kisses him properly, sweet and slow and lingering, as they continue to waltz in stately time to a music that nobody except the two of them can hear. “I’m still not always sure why you married me, but I am very glad you did.”
#heartrender husbands#fivan#fivan ff#ivan x fedyor#a phantom in enchanting light#pel asks#anonymous#ask#(in repayment for the pain i have inflicted on you with the lighthouse au)#(ahem)
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querencia (jang han seo)
🎤 hello and gather around fellow himbo lovers, here is a small fic about our beloved and his life after That guy kicks the bucket. also idk how i managed to turn this into a love story? anyways lmfao, hope y’all enjoy!
Everything felt so different.
Truthfully, Han Seo never imagined what his life could be like, would be like, without the proverbial ever tightening noose around his neck. One that had been unexpectedly and disappointingly placed on him as a child by the one person that was supposed to remove such things. He was now free of that person, and the fear that stemmed from veering off the path set by them, but wasn’t entirely too certain that he was free of that feeling.
His muscles couldn’t shake it. The sudden chill to the bone, the anticipation of retaliation from an act that hadn’t yet occurred. Such an act that could never occur anymore given that his brother was dead. He knew this, but his mind had never been good at accepting possibilities that were positive.
This much was evident in the case of his relationship with Vincenzo. There was no reason why the stoic yet baby faced Mafia member would want to keep him around, at least not any that he could see. So, Han Seo spent the first few weeks asking the question both silently and aloud, will you kill me? Vincenzo had the motive, it’s not exactly like his hands were clean in his previous dealings with Babel, and he most certainly had the means.
It wasn’t until Han Seo was told that because he was trying to make amends, he wouldn’t end up in the Jang family crypt well before his time that he started to feel at ease. Still, for months after that conversation, he still had the nagging feeling that some invisible fist was lurking around every bend.
Regardless of that, Han Seo decided he would not waste his liberation however short lived it might have been. He made up his mind that he was going to do all the things that he was either too scared or outright forbidden to do before. The first thing on his list was to clean up his business. Luckily for him, the Guillotine file made it easy to weed out the snakes in the grass and allow him to steer Babel in the direction that the core of the business was about.
The hardest part was going to be restoring the public’s faith in the organization. Cha Young told him as much, and advised him not to agonize over it as there will be new corruption that will grab their attention (and hers). He intended to be the Chairman that such a company deserved, and therefore continued to study no matter how nonsensical and outdated the information seemed.
The second order of business was moving out of the place that felt more like a prison than a home to one that he liked. The realtor immediately recommended a few luxury places, but he turned them down to their surprise. Maybe it was due to the fact that he had seen what the quest for material wealth had done to his family (or more realistically because he wanted to be closer to newfound hyung and his girlfriend).
Either way, the house he settled on had its luxuries, but in a more affordable and quaint neighborhood. Han Seo even went as far as to attempt painting on his own, which went as well as expected for someone that didn’t even know the difference between a brush and a roller.
Being able to do what he wanted proved to be chaotic at times. There was no one to stop him from going on last minute trips to Jeju just for oranges and a quick dip into the ocean. Or to take away all the sweet and savory snacks that he found at these things called convenience stores.
He would stay up all night sometimes, not to binge watch all the shows he missed out on, but just to sit in silence. He didn’t know that the quiet could be so nice. That it was a space of tranquility and relaxation rather than one filled with anxiety. Of course, Han Seo more often than not regretted the choice not to sleep and ended up at the cafe a few blocks from his place.
While obviously no one had better coffee than the one at Babel, he found himself going to the cozy spot with increasing frequency because of her. The first time he saw her, she was deciding on which apple to choose from the basket beside the register. He then noticed that her canvas bag was filled with art supplies, and decided that it was a brilliant idea to draw a conclusion.
I think the one to the right would make a great subject on paper, he grinned.
She stared at him in a way that made him contemplate whether to not she was related to Vincenzo hyung before replying flatly:
I’m looking for the tartest one to go with my tea.
He was left a bumbling mess of flustered sounds and rapidly blinks, not getting the opportunity to insert some retort that undoubtably would’ve put him deeper into the realm of idiot.
The following morning he went again. No cup of coffee, not even the ridiculously overpriced espresso at Babel, would give him that jolt of electricity he felt under her gaze. And sure enough, she was there. This time her apple sat upon a folded napkin right beside her tea, and in front of them both was her sketchpad. On the page? A picture of the fruit. He couldn’t control the noise of exasperation that left him as he passed her table. On his way out he tossed over his shoulder with a grin so wide it hurt:
Nice drawing.
Their interactions continued in that same vein. Short, filled with just the right amount of bite. The balance of who had the best and last say constantly shifting, becoming somewhat of a competition.
You’re outside today, is that weed your subject?
As if there weren’t enough clowns in this neighborhood already.
You buy a lot of lattes for an artist that’s supposed to be starving.
Ironic coming from the gentrifier walking around a working class neighborhood in thousand dollar shoes.
He had look up what that g word meant after their last exchange.
There was something else he never got to do in his past. Sure, Han Seo had the occasional date or two, but commitment? That was out of the question. It wouldn’t have served his brother well if there was anyone around that would motivate him to step out from his hold. The realization that he never had a serious relationship hadn’t hit him until he started to have inconvenient thoughts during board meetings about stuff like taking a long afternoon stroll, and holding hands with her.
Han Seo could barely focus on the stack of jargon dense reading before him. He sent Vincenzo a text saying that he was coming over with soju, not waiting for a reply before making the short journey to Geumga. Cha Young’s face fell when she answered the door, muttering that she thought he was her delivery, but lit up once she saw he brought along alcohol. After poking around the rice he begged for them to share and sighing loudly for half an hour, Vincenzo ushered him out. He implored him to get a hobby so that these late night visits wouldn’t become a habit.
He was confused by that. Weren’t studying and running a company hobbies? On his walk back home he spotted a flyer that someone was offering private classes for beginners painting. The nightmare of a time he had trying to get the walls in his kitchen evenly colored popped up in his brain, instantly making him tear off one of the numbers. He didn’t exactly know how learning to paint homes was going to be a practical hobby, but hell, he would have something to show Vincenzo later.
While he was on one of his impromptu trips to the seaside, Han Seo had his assistant set up the class for him to take when he returned. As a gift for the instructor, he thought it would be nice to bring them an extra bag of oranges. If the session sucked, or if he hated it, at the very least there was going to be something to brighten the mood.
The day he got back, he even went as far as to tidy up the place on his own and put some fresh flowers around so the air was lightly scented. He practically waited at the door until the alarm sounded to let him know that his instructor arrived.
Is this a joke? She huffed.
No, I didn’t even know you were the teacher! His protest was adamant. I was on a trip and even brought back Jeju- He paused. Han Seo knew he wasn’t the brightest, but bringing up the oranges seemed like it would upset her given their previous history.
You brought back what? Her brow raised.
Mmm, good energy! Don’t you feel the vibes from the ocean? He spread his arms wide.
Han Seo waved her inside hurriedly, trying desperately to get past the awkward exchange. Of all people, he never would’ve thought it would be the neighborhood’s cute sass machine. A small noise of happiness couldn’t be stopped from escaping him as she accepted the invitation. Her eyes scanned the place without restraint, nose wrinkling when she took a look at the kitchen.
Where are your supplies? A slender finger ran across the surface of his counter.
Supplies? He thought that was included in the price for the lessons.
She sighed, placing a sketchbook, brushes, and small pots of paint onto the table. It was now very apparent to him that the advertisement did not mean what he thought it did. Thank goodness he also didn’t decide to open his mouth about that beforehand, it probably would’ve made her smack him with her bag.
Here, the materials were slid over when he sat. Paint something.
His facial expression surely mirrored what he was thinking. Han Seo had no recollection of ever trying to do this, not even during the course of his way overpriced private school education. She urged him on with a nod, only relaxing into her chair when he flipped open the book and picked up a fine brush.
There was nothing in particular he wanted to paint. Hell, he didn’t even know if he wanted to paint at all. This was simply something random that came up when he needed it.
To avoid being chastised, he dipped his brush into the light blue color and started swiping randomly across the blank page. He swapped the brush and added some dark green, then pink, and finished if off with small dots of white. At the end it looked like something a toddler would’ve considered a masterpiece. She eyed it with surprising interest.
You clearly didn’t know what you wanted to achieve with this, or why you were doing it at all.
Han Seo was about to interject with a prideful defense before she continued.
That’s good. It’s better to work with an unbiased mind. Her eyes met his. Your technique is shit though.
He laughed, like truly laughed. It was a full bellied, unashamedly loud, attack of sonic waves. She seemed to find it amusing, a hint of a smile dancing across her lips.
Alright, let’s start with how to actually hold a paintbrush.
There was no telling when their interactions had gone from less than playful banter to warm and friendly (still with a side of joking). Han Seo couldn’t put his finger on it. Did it happen during the second lesson where he mistakenly put paint on her hands, and didn’t settle for no when he said he would wash them off for her?
Or was it the time he was running late for work, but the barista already had his order prepared because she told them that he was on the way? Perhaps it was the time she had to reschedule their Saturday morning for the evening instead, and all he could think about was trying to replicate the color of her alcohol flushed cheeks onto the page before him.
Han Seo had never done the whole confession thing before, so he wasn’t sure about how it worked. An unfamiliar kind of anxiety crept up his spine as he poured glasses of wine and organized a fruit plate. Soft music played in the background accompanied by the crackle of the expensive candles he bought specifically for the occasion. Her mouth parted slightly as she took everything in once she arrived for what was supposed to be an ordinary session involving watercolors.
Wow, got a hot date later or something? Her legs seemed to automatically take her to the table.
Actually, He brought the glasses over to where she sat. It’s for you.
Oh…She gasped. A few seconds passed that felt more like minutes before she picked one up and held it high. Cheers then!
Something about it made him feel like he made a mistake. Did he misread their change in demeanor towards one another? Was she truly just being kinder to him because she considered him to only be a friend? Han Seo tried to not let the embarrassment he felt seep into the room, keeping a smile locked and loaded for when she made a witty remark about stuff like him painting in the most inappropriate white button down.
Don’t you have something to say to me? She quipped, neatly putting her things away after he finished.
Me? I- no…I... He clenched his fists. Why couldn’t he come out and say it?! This was as good as a chance as he was ever going to get. If he let this opportunity slip, he wasn’t sure if there would be one again. He had to act, he had to-
What sounded like a small growl came from her as she raked her hand through her hair. She pulled him closer by the collar of his shirt, her nose just shy of rubbing against his.
Jang Han Seo, when are you gonna stop driving me insane? She murmured, labored breaths dancing across his cupid’s bow.
If only she knew how true and reciprocated that question was to him too. From the moment he couldn’t fight against thoughts about her entering his mind, to the smile she wore when he stepped across his threshold, and the way she said his goddamned name, it was all enough to make him want to combust. To burst out of his skin, transforming into something or someone else entirely. A person that fully accepted that there were no more restraints on their lives, that they was no more fear and no more betrayal. Someone that was completely in control, and free to take what was theirs. And so he did.
It was painful, almost, the first time he kissed her. The second time even more so. By the third time, coupled with the question of her tongue prodding at his bottom lip, Han Seo had shedded the last of his previous being. He cupped her face, thumbs toying with her curled sideburns as he consumed her. Quiet whimpers made way for desperate cries, shivers were replaced by the searing heat of skin on skin.
The high he’d chased fruitlessly so many times throughout his life was finally achieved with his arms wrapped tightly around her, their bodies pressed together as she shuddered and sighed his name. He was in disbelief that what he had experienced was real, so he chased it again and again, receiving the same result each time his sweat slicked forehead bowed to meet hers.
Han Seo would learn that it could be obtained outside of that space they filled with the tangible evidence of their desire. It was also in buying melon flavored ice pops to eat in the park together on sunny days. The look on Vincenzo and Cha Young’s face when he timidly made the introduction. Her expression when she took her first bite of Hee Soo’s tteokbokki. When Mr. Nam and her had an hour long debate on which shade of red made the most realistic fake blood color. The flashing Best Chairman Ever coming from her phone when Babel secured their biggest deal yet without any dirty deals behind the scenes.
That feeling, one that outshone the other by such a long shot that it was nearly eradicated, had been there all along in the life he’d made. She just helped him see it.
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do you all remember this meme?
This is an example of what we consider NIMBY-ism on the left. Turns out that picture chosen was of affordable senior housing. Whoops. There’s a whole article about it here.
Anyway, if you know anything about how the housing market works, building high density housing is good, actually, and this article gets into it.
Some on the left (those that don’t understand how the housing market works, mostly) have for some reason decided that it wants to criticize new development because new development=gentrification, but in reality they’re just fighting the battles their rich white boomer home owning parents want them to fight as a way to keep the cost of housing as high as possible. A lot of leftists want rent control before anything else, but rent control is a mixed bag, even in countries that do housing way better than the US does. If we’re going to involve the government, the best way forward instead is to build a lot of government housing... which you can’t do as long as our racist, restrictioned zoning is in place. Zoning is the battle ground, and it has a long, storied history of being racist as hell, and remains so today.
The thing I personally can’t get over is how much city Californian liberals have taken leftist language and used it to protect their own single family homes in rich neighborhoods. They’ll cry “gentrification” when the neighborhood is already gentrified and has been for decades. Gentrification is a complicated word and can mean a lot of things, but generally once new development shows up, the place is already gentrified. No developer is plopping down luxury apartments in the middle of a neighborhood they don’t think white people with money want to live.
Anyway, the article above gets into it, but the leftist obsession with rent control over all other options is weird to me. you can have all the rent control in the world; if you don’t have enough homes to put people in, then you have a problem.
From the article:
Despite all of this, a common claim used to discredit YIMBYism is that “there are more vacant homes than there are homeless people”. While this can be true in some cases, the implicit conclusion to that argument is usually “so we should focus on reducing vacancies instead of building more housing”.
However, this misses the mark for a variety of reasons: Most vacancies aren’t where people want to live. The highest vacancy rates are in low-demand places: primarily rural areas with few good job opportunities. On the other hand, you can see that the lowest vacancy rates are in high-demand areas on the West Coast and Northeast. Telling someone who works in the Bay Area that there’s an abandoned home in Detroit or Lubbock that they can move into isn’t a solution.
Dense housing is absolutely critical if we want to hit any of our climate goals. Private cars are the MAIN source of carbon dioxide in the US, and we can pass around that stat saying 10 companies are responsible for 70% of the CO2, but those companies are the ones putting oil in our cars to drive us 15 minutes to get get milk from a store that is unreachable by foot or bike.
Less sprawl, more apartment buildings, even if they look like that affordable housing for seniors as shown above.
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Congrats on the kudos, u deserve it! I did not undestand if I'm supposed to choose one of the lines for the prompt or if I have to combine two or more lines lol. But if it is to choose only one: number 5. If more than one: 5 and 45. *---*
Thank you! I used both. Great inspiration, actually. It spun out of control! 😀
Prompt 2: “How much of that did you hear?” + “Why are you helping me?”
Interloper
“Jesus, Iggy, I’m gonna fuckin’ murder you myself one of these days,” Mickey threatened in exasperation.
They were both leaning over, hands on knees, gasping for air, just having run full-speed for at least twelve blocks. The pillars beneath the L tracks were now providing the mild seclusion they needed to wait out a cursory police search of the area.
“Ain’t my fault!” Iggy exclaimed defensively.
Mickey’s face scrunched up to a degree that only his dumbest family members could make it reach. “Yes it fuckin’ was! Who else’s fault would it be?”
He’d always kind of wondered how he was the only one in his crap-ass family to be gifted with at least half a brain. Well, him and his younger sister, Mandy. She was alright. Skanky and crazy, but not a total idiot. He couldn’t say the same for his brothers, male cousins, father, uncle, etcetera. Mickey couldn’t even get his begrudgingly favorite brother to follow a simple goddamn plan that would’ve kept them out of trouble when they were out committing crimes. He was just gonna have to start doing everything himself. Safety in numbers didn’t apply when the other member of your team seemed to have been lobotomized when no one was paying attention. It was probably all the meth. Mickey was smart enough to stay away from that particular bullshit. Didn’t want to become a scabby, denture-wearing, toothpick skinny, low-life with no mind left to lose. He was content to stick to coke and weed like a normal person.
“That old bitch came outta nowhere! Self-defense!”
“It ain’t self-defense if you’re robbin’ the joint, numbnuts! We’re lucky you fuckin’ missed!”
If he had it his way, Mickey wouldn’t be doing these petty robberies anymore. He much preferred bigger jobs, like gun and drug running. But times were tough, and he had to do what he had to do. He’d even considered getting a legit job for once in his life, but the skills he possessed weren’t exactly easily adaptable to the straight and narrow path. Being a criminal was how he was raised, and all he knew. It brought heat, but it was still a comfortable fit. Living without the constant presence of major risk would probably feel so foreign as to drive him crazier than a meth addiction in the long run.
The job Mickey’d lined up involved hitting up a few different borderline upmarket stores that’d opened up in their neck of the woods since the gentrifiers had set upon The Yards, then selling the goods to a guy he knew in the online black market trade. Not as lucrative as heavy metal and funny powder, but a decent payday nonetheless. Except fuckface over here who had to ruin everything by getting trigger-happy on Main while they were attempting to heist merchandise from location number two of three. If the pigs nabbed either one of them, they’d be going down for at least five to ten. Years. Mickey was done donating years to the prison industrial complex. The most he could afford was months at best.
“When’d you turn into such a giant asshole?” asked Iggy. “Oh, nevermind, probly when you started gettin’ it railed on the reg.”
A giant smile stretched across his perpetually dirty face, causing Mickey’s eyebrows to lift dangerously high on his forehead. Occasionally, his dumber-than-rocks older brother managed to think up some admittedly clever asides. Mickey didn’t know whether to punch him or give him daps.
Before he could decide, however, he heard a distinct little snicker from the other side of the large concrete column they were leaning on, raising his hackles to invisibly join his eyebrows in their heightened incredulity.
Mickey hastily rounded the pillar and grabbed the giggler by the shirt collar, hauling him to their side and pinning him next to Iggy with his forearm. He looked into the guy’s eyes, and finally registered who it was. He kinda sorta knew him from around town. Used to hang out with his sister back in high school. He was a lot scrawnier then. This version of the dude could probably hold his own with Mickey in a fight. He’d built some definite muscle.
“How much of that did you hear, asshole?” Mickey demanded, seeing Iggy flash the gun in his waistband in his periphery.
This idiot didn’t look as rattled as he should be, though. He just shrugged his shoulders.
“Considering I was here first, I guess… all of it?”
He was wearing an annoying little smirk, his green-blue eyes shining bright, and his red hair distracting Mickey as much as the light dusting of freckles across his nose and cheeks. He had a stupidly ultra-defined chin, and Mickey immediately hated it. His chin hadn’t looked like that when he was a 15-year-old pipsqueak.
“Wipe that smile off your face, bitch,” ordered Mickey, pressing his arm harder against the guy’s pale throat. “You think this is fuckin’ funny? You know who we are?”
The guy shrugged again, like this was all a casual conversation on the corner. “Mickey.” He glanced at his dumb, blonde, curlicue brother. “And Iggy, right? I used to hang out with Mandy all the time. Have a good memory.”
“Yeah? Well I remember your goofy ass too, Gallagher. I know where you live and I know who your family is, so if you know what’s good for you, you’ll keep your big mouth shut or I’ll pick ‘em off one by one and save you for last. Got it?”
The dude snorted, and Mickey wondered if he was some kind of crazy tweaker with no sense of propriety or self-preservation.
“You outta your goddamn mind or somethin’?” Mickey added. “I ain’t jokin’.”
“Look, Gallaghers don’t snitch, alright?” He held his hands up placatingly. “I promise not to say shit to anyone. It’s none of my business, and I really don’t care. That good enough for you?”
Mickey loosened his hold, but sized him up all the while. “Maybe. But it’s possible you need a little lesson to remember it good. Wouldn't want you to forget about the consequences of you breakin’ your word.”
The dude winced and shoved Mickey off. “I don’t need a fucking beatdown, Mickey. I get it.”
“Ohhhh,” Mickey singsonged derisively, meeting Iggy’s gaze. “He gets it.” He thumbed his eyebrow. “Guess I’m just s’posed to believe you, huh?”
“That would be ideal, yeah.”
Mickey had to give it to him; he almost cracked a smile. The kid had balls. Most people around their neighborhood cowered before a Milkovich like spring lambs. Still, he lived by a code, and letting some rando walk away unscathed when he had dirt on him just didn’t fit the rules.
He cocked his fist back to knock it into tall, pale, and red’s pearly white teeth, just as the stunted siren of a cop car rang out very close by. Their collective heads all snapped toward the sound, and after sharing a meaningful look between brothers, Iggy took off running once again, without a word.
Normally, Mickey would’ve followed hot on his heels, but some unknown force was keeping his useless feet stuck to the dirty ground, eyes watching as Gingerballs glanced around the column at the flashing lights, taking a very long look that wasn’t suspicious at all.
Before he could react outwardly, Mickey was pulled against a hard body, Gallagher’s warm breath sending a shiver down his spine as he whispered, “Be cool. I got you.”
Suddenly, big hands were caressing Mickey’s back, and despite a part of him not minding in the least, the rest of him stiffened considerably.
“What the fuck are you doing?” he rasped out, hearing the telltale slam of a car door, and attempting to pull away. But a strong grip held him close, spinning him around so that he was the one up against the concrete now.
“Saving your thug ass. I know this guy, okay? Just chill and follow my lead.”
Okay, what the hell was this surreal turn of events? Gallagher was bold as shit, cradling Mickey all gay like. Sure, Iggy had made a fag joke earlier, kicking off this whole… whatever it was, but still. This guy had no way of knowing it was based in reality. Did he?
And had Gallagher really been gay this whole time? How had Mickey never sniffed this scorching information out?
“What’s going on here, boys?”
The copper rounded the corner, genuinely swinging his nightstick like a cartoon character, and Mickey had to suppress a deep roll of his eyes.
“Milkovich?” Mr. CPD continued, extreme disbelief coloring his voice.
Mickey was abruptly reminded that he was currently stuck between a rock and a hard body, and nothing about their entanglement screamed anything other than gay, gay, super-fucking-gay. Not that Mickey hadn’t come to accept who he was and what he liked, but he didn’t go around spreading the truth all over town either. This could seriously damage his carefully crafted reputation.
“Tony!” Ian interjected, sparing him from having to invent some lame excuse, and the cop’s eyes snapped to him instead.
“Ian?” His tone was still dripping with astonishment.
“Yeah! What's up? How you been?”
Mickey shot him an ‘are you goddamn serious right now?’ look, and Ian just squeezed his hip in tacit reply.
“Uhhh… gooood? Care to explain whatever…” he waved his stick between them, “this is?”
Ian laughed and he figured the dude truly was a nutcase. Mickey was going to jail for sure.
“Um, well,” answered Ian, suddenly playing it very meek and demure, “Mickey and I were just… you know…”
“You and… Mickey?”
“Not fucking or anything! Just... hanging out?”
“Hanging out.”
“Yeah, you know how it is. I’m tryin’ to convince Mick here to come home with me, but he’s being squirrelly.” He shook his head and shrugged. “South Side guys.”
“What the fuck?” Mickey whispered harshly, completely taken aback.
Ian just squeezed him tightly again, which was not helping his whole brain scramble situation.
“Huh,” said Tony, a tone of acceptance seeping in. “Mickey Milkovich, eh? Wow.”
“Come on, Tony. I don’t have to tell you this is all a big secret, do I?” replied Ian.
“And blondie who ran away like there was a damn fire? Did he flee a threesome?”
Mickey frowned and fake-wretched, finally speaking up. “Fuck no, man. That was my dumbass brother. He don’t like cops.”
“Uh huh. And you and your brother didn’t happen to be getting into trouble about 15 minutes ago, did you?”
“No sir,” Mickey said with a mock salute.
Ian kicked at his foot in warning.
“He’s been with me since like 3 o’clock, Tone. Scout’s honor.”
Officer Tony eyed them both with a look of skepticism, but didn’t contradict Ian’s word. The CB sounded from the open window of the black and white, with some cop-speak crackling over the airwaves.
“Stay put,” said Tony, eyes lingering longer on Mickey’s than Ian’s. “Both of you.”
He retreated to answer the radio call, and Mickey let out a deep whoosh of air.
“Goddamn, Gallagher. You’re spinnin’ quite a yarn here.”
“Yep,” Ian agreed. “A big gay yarn.”
“How the fuck did you know—”
“That you’re gay? Well, I heard Iggy make that joke, obviously. Pretty specific bottom joke to make if you weren’t actually into it. Plus, I always had my suspicions.”
Mickey scoffed. “Yeah fuckin’ right!”
“I did!”
“Whatever. Why are you helping me?”
“Out of the kindness of my heart?”
“Try again.”
“I don’t know. Why not? Makes us even or something. Now you know I won’t rat you out. About any of it. I wouldn’t out someone like that, and I don’t give a shit about the illegal crap you’re wrapped up in. Tony Markovich is like turbo gay too. Used to bang my sister, I think, but he came out a couple years ago. He won’t let it slip about you. He’s not a total bastard just cuz he’s a cop, ya know?”
Mickey bit his lip in contemplation. Gallagher seemed pretty genuine. Still didn’t much make sense in his brain, but whatever.
“Fine. But you know what’s gonna happen if—”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah, kick my ass, kill my family, got it.”
“You’re a cocky little shit, ain’t you?”
Ian smirked again, and it was pretty sexy, actually. “Maybe.”
He had the gall to push against Mickey more fully, pressing the bottom halves of their bodies closer together.
Mickey gasped. “Gonna have to ask you again… what the hell do you think you’re doin’?”
“You wanna go out sometime?”
Mickey cackled in his face. “You’re off your fuckin’ rocker for sure.”
“Am not! I can tell you want me.”
“Oh, Jesus Christ. Cocky little shit doesn’t even begin to cover it, does it?”
“Come onnnn,” Ian prodded.
“Do I look like I date, Gallagher?”
“A date can be whatever we want it to be, Milkovich. I’m easy.”
“Yeah, I bet you are.”
“Okay,” Tony interrupted, coming back into view. “Get the hell outta here. You wanna bang, do it indoors somewhere, or I’ll have to arrest you for public indecency or worse. And Milkovich… if I find any evidence of what I’m sure you know I’m talking about, I’ll be paying your ass a visit real soon.”
Mickey let the eyeroll loose then, withholding a flip of his middle finger, and deadpanning instead, “Don’t know what you’re talkin’ about, officer.”
Tony sighed loudly. “Whatever.”
“Thanks, Tony!” Ian cried at his retreating back.
“You always kiss cop ass like that? Cuz that’s not the way to get into my pants, Red.”
Ian just grinned, finally pulling his body away as he looked around. “You gonna follow me home or what?”
Mickey wanted to tell him to go fuck himself and swagger away like a badass. But was he not a thirsty man being propositioned by a hot guy who just randomly saved his ass from a trip to the slammer?
He at least feigned protest, huffing and puffing as he kicked at the dirt. “Goddamn it, Gallagher, you drive a hard bargain.”
Ian’s face lit up like a Christmas tree, as Mickey added, “Lead the way, weirdo.”
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Gentrification Blues
I woke up this morning, I walked out my door,
I noticed my neighbors weren't there any more,
I've got the gentrifi-, gentrification blues.
When I asked where they gone to,
That's when I heard the bad news.
They call it Boerum Hill to make it sound classy;
Used to be Gowanus and they said it was trashy.
But some folks still remember this neighborhood,
When the rents were lower and the living was good.
Well, I look in the windows, I looked in the doors,
They were hanging up the chandeliers and sanding the floors,
I've got the gentrifi-, gentrification blues.
The rent sign said "$550, one floor through."
Now we've got Haagen-Dazs ice cream and the New York Times,
'Cause the real estate agents brought in their own kind.
But good-bye to Bustelo and the people who drink it,
Good-bye to integration and the people who think it.
When the brownstoners came, they said they liked integration,
To live with other races and have neighborly relations,
I've got the gentrifi-, gentrification blues.
Now it's to Hell with good relations,
If it doesn't raise the property values.
They say that a brownstone is the people's housing,
But what about the folks who can't afford a hundred thousand?
I've got the gentrifi-, gentrification blues.
They're living somewhere else now,
They're the many who've been kicked out by the few.
I woke up this morning, I looked next door -,
There was one family living where there once were four,
I've got the gentrifi-, gentrification blues.
I wonder where my neighbors went 'cause I know,
I'll soon be moving there too.
Somebody said, "Where will we go?"
'Cause there ain't no place to live 'round here anymore.
I've got the gentrifi-, gentrification blues.
Guess we gotta fight back,
'Cause we ain't got nothin' to lose.
Lyrics by: Judith Levine & Laura Liben 1982
Sometimes I can locate the lyrics but not a recorded version of the song. Usually from songs pre-1900. This one is not that old, but I am unable at this time to find it. Though through the search was able to find other songs with the same title which eventually will be posted.
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ESSAY: Berserk's Journey of Acceptance Over 30 Years of Fandom
My descent into anime fandom began in the '90s, and just as watching Neon Genesis Evangelion caused my first revelation that cartoons could be art, reading Berserk gave me the same realization about comics. The news of Kentaro Miura’s death, who passed on May 6, has been emotionally complicated for me, as it's the first time a celebrity's death has hit truly close to home. In addition to being the lynchpin for several important personal revelations, Berserk is one of the longest-lasting works I’ve followed and that I must suddenly bid farewell to after existing alongside it for two-thirds of my life.
Berserk is a monolith not only for anime and manga, but also fantasy literature, video games, you name it. It might be one of the single most influential works of the ‘80s — on a level similar to Blade Runner — to a degree where it’s difficult to imagine what the world might look like without it, and the generations of creators the series inspired.
Although not the first, Guts is the prototypical large sword anime boy: Final Fantasy VII's Cloud Strife, Siegfried/Nightmare from Soulcalibur, and Black Clover's Asta are all links in the same chain, with other series like Dark Souls and Claymore taking clear inspiration from Berserk. But even deeper than that, the three-character dynamic between Guts, Griffith, and Casca, the monster designs, the grotesque violence, Miura’s image of hell — all of them can be spotted in countless pieces of media across the globe.
Despite this, it just doesn’t seem like people talk about it very much. For over 20 years, Berserk has stood among the critical pantheon for both anime and manga, but it doesn’t spur conversations in the same way as Neon Genesis Evangelion, Akira, or Dragon Ball Z still do today. Its graphic depictions certainly represent a barrier to entry much higher than even the aforementioned company.
Seeing the internet exude sympathy and fond reminiscing about Berserk was immensely validating and has been my single most therapeutic experience online. Moreso, it reminded me that the fans have always been there. And even looking into it, Berserk is the single best-selling property in the 35-year history of Dark Horse. My feeling is that Berserk just has something about it that reaches deep into you and gets stuck there.
I recall introducing one of my housemates to Berserk a few years ago — a person with all the intelligence and personal drive to both work on cancer research at Stanford while pursuing his own MD and maintaining a level of physical fitness that was frankly unreasonable for the hours that he kept. He was NOT in any way analytical about the media he consumed, but watching him sitting on the floor turning all his considerable willpower and intellect toward delivering an off-the-cuff treatise on how Berserk had so deeply touched him was a sight in itself to behold. His thoughts on the series' portrayal of sex as fundamentally violent leading up to Guts and Casca’s first moment of intimacy in the Golden Age movies was one of the most beautiful sentiments I’d ever heard in reaction to a piece of fiction.
I don’t think I’d ever heard him provide anything but a surface-level take on a piece of media before or since. He was a pretty forthright guy, but the way he just cut into himself and let his feelings pour out onto the floor left me awestruck. The process of reading Berserk can strike emotional chords within you that are tough to untangle. I’ve been writing analysis and experiential pieces related to anime and manga for almost ten years — and interacting with Berserk’s world for almost 30 years — and writing may just be yet another attempt for me to pull my own twisted-up feelings about it apart.
Berserk is one of the most deeply personal works I’ve ever read, both for myself and in my perception of Miura's works. The series' transformation in the past 30 years artistically and thematically is so singular it's difficult to find another work that comes close. The author of Hajime no Ippo, who was among the first to see Berserk as Miura presented him with some early drafts working as his assistant, claimed that the design for Guts and Puck had come from a mess of ideas Miura had been working on since his early school days.
写真は三浦建太郎君が寄稿してくれた鷹村です。
今かなり感傷的になっています。
思い出話をさせて下さい。
僕が初めての週刊連載でスタッフが一人もいなくて困っていたら手伝いにきてくれました。
彼が18で僕が19です。
某大学の芸術学部の学生で講義明けにスケッチブックを片手に来てくれました。 pic.twitter.com/hT1JCWBTKu
— 森川ジョージ (@WANPOWANWAN) May 20, 2021
Miura claimed two of his big influences were Go Nagai’s Violence Jack and Tetsuo Hara and Buronson’s Fist of the North Star. Miura wears these influences on his sleeve, discovering the early concepts that had percolated in his mind just felt right. The beginning of Berserk, despite its amazing visual power, feels like it sprang from a very juvenile concept: Guts is a hypermasculine lone traveler breaking his body against nightmarish creatures in his single-minded pursuit of revenge, rigidly independent and distrustful of others due to his dark past.
Uncompromising, rugged, independent, a really big sword ... Guts is a romantic ideal of masculinity on a quest to personally serve justice against the one who wronged him. Almost nefarious in the manner in which his character checked these boxes, especially when it came to his grim stoicism, unblinkingly facing his struggle against literal cosmic forces. Never doubting himself, never trusting others, never weeping for what he had lost.
Miura said he sketched out most of the backstory when the manga began publication, so I have to assume the larger strokes of the Golden Arc were pretty well figured out from the outset, but I’m less sure if he had fully realized where he wanted to take the story to where we are now. After the introductory mini-arcs of demon-slaying, Berserk encounters Griffith and the story draws us back to a massive flashback arc. We see the same Guts living as a lone mercenary who Griffith persuades to join the Band of the Hawk to help realize his ambitions of rising above the circumstances of his birth to join the nobility.
We discover the horrific abuses of Guts’ adoptive father and eventually learn that Guts, Griffith, and Casca are all victims of sexual violence. The story develops into a sprawling semi-historical epic featuring politics and war, but the real narrative is in the growing companionship between Guts and the members of the band. Directionless and traumatized by his childhood, Guts slowly finds a purpose helping Griffith realize his dream and the courage to allow others to grow close to him.
Miura mentioned that many Band of the Hawk members were based on his early friend groups. Although he was always sparse with details about his personal life, he has spoken about how many of them referred to themselves as aspiring manga authors and how he felt an intense sense of competition, admitting that among them he may have been the only one seriously working toward that goal, desperately keeping ahead in his perceived race against them. It’s intriguing thinking about how much of this angst may have made it to the pages, as it's almost impossible not to imagine Miura put quite a bit of himself in Guts.
Perhaps this is why it feels so real and makes The Eclipse — the quintessential anime betrayal at the hands of Griffith — all the more heartbreaking. The raw violence and macabre imagery certainly helped. While Miura owed Hellraiser’s Cenobites much in the designs of the God Hand, his macabre portrayal of the Band of the Hawk’s eradication within the literal bowels of hell, the massive hand, the black sun, the Skull Knight, and even Miura’s page compositions have been endlessly referenced, copied, and outright plagiarized since.
The events were tragic in any context and I have heard many deeply personal experiences others drew from The Eclipse sympathizing with Guts, Casca, or even Griffith’s spiral driven by his perceived rejection by Guts. Mine were most closely aligned with the tragedy of Guts having overcome such painful circumstances to not only reject his own self enforced solitude, but to fearlessly express his affection for his loved ones.
The Golden Age was a methodical destruction of Guts’ self-destructive methods of preservation ruined in a single selfish act by his most trusted friend, leaving him once again alone and afraid of growing close to those around him. It ripped the romance of Guts’ mission and eventually took the story down a course I never expected. Berserk wasn’t a story of revenge but one of recovery.
Guess that’s enough beating around the bush, as I should talk about how this shift affected me personally. When I was young, when I began reading Berserk I found Guts’ unflagging stoicism to be really cool, not just aesthetically but in how I understood guys were supposed to be. I was slow to make friends during school and my rapidly gentrifying neighborhood had my friends' parents moving away faster than I could find new ones. At some point I think I became too afraid of putting myself out there anymore, risking rejection when even acceptance was so fleeting. It began to feel easier just to resign myself to solitude and pretend my circumstances were beyond my own power to correct.
Unfortunately, I became the stereotypical kid who ate alone during lunch break. Under the invisible expectations demanding I not display weakness, my loneliness was compounded by shame for feeling loneliness. My only recourse was to reveal none of those feelings and pretend the whole thing didn't bother me at all. Needless to say my attempts to cope probably fooled no one and only made things even worse, but I really didn’t know of any better way to handle my situation. I felt bad, I felt even worse about feeling bad and had been provided with zero tools to cope, much less even admit that I had a problem at all.
The arcs following the Golden Age completely changed my perspective. Guts had tragically, yet understandably, cut himself off from others to save himself from experiencing that trauma again and, in effect, denied himself any opportunity to allow himself to be happy again. As he began to meet other characters that attached themselves to him, between Rickert and Erica spending months waiting worried for his return, and even the slimmest hope to rescuing Casca began to seed itself into the story, I could only see Guts as a fool pursuing a grim and hopeless task rather than appreciating everything that he had managed to hold onto.
The same attributes that made Guts so compelling in the opening chapters were revealed as his true enemy. Griffith had committed an unforgivable act but Guts’ journey for revenge was one of self-inflicted pain and fear. The romanticism was gone.
Farnese’s inclusion in the Conviction arc was a revelation. Among the many brilliant aspects of her character, I identified with her simply for how she acted as a stand-in for myself as the reader: Plagued by self-doubt and fear, desperate to maintain her own stoic and uncompromising image, and resentful of her place in the world. She sees Guts’ fearlessness in the face of cosmic horror and believes she might be able to learn his confidence.
But in following Guts, Farnese instead finds a teacher in Casca. In taking care of her, Farnese develops a connection and is able to experience genuine sympathy that develops into a sense of responsibility. Caring for Casca allows Farnese to develop the courage she was lacking not out of reckless self-abandon but compassion.
I can’t exactly credit Berserk with turning my life around, but I feel that it genuinely helped crystallize within me a sense of growing doubts about my maladjusted high school days. My growing awareness of Guts' undeniable role in his own suffering forced me to admit my own role in mine and created a determination to take action to fix it rather than pretending enough stoicism might actually result in some sort of solution.
I visited the Berserk subreddit from time to time and always enjoyed the group's penchant for referring to all the members of the board as “fellow strugglers,” owing both to Skull Knight’s label for Guts and their own tongue-in-cheek humor at waiting through extended hiatuses. Only in retrospect did it feel truly fitting to me. Trying to avoid the pitfalls of Guts’ path is a constant struggle. Today I’m blessed with many good friends but still feel primal pangs of fear holding me back nearly every time I meet someone, the idea of telling others how much they mean to me or even sharing my thoughts and feelings about something I care about deeply as if each action will expose me to attack.
It’s taken time to pull myself away from the behaviors that were so deeply ingrained and it’s a journey where I’m not sure the work will ever be truly done, but witnessing Guts’ own slow progress has been a constant source of reassurance. My sense of admiration for Miura’s epic tale of a man allowing himself to let go after suffering such devastating circumstances brought my own humble problems and their way out into focus.
Over the years I, and many others, have been forced to come to terms with the fact that Berserk would likely never finish. The pattern of long, unexplained hiatuses and the solemn recognition that any of them could be the last is a familiar one. The double-edged sword of manga largely being works created by a single individual is that there is rarely anyone in a position to pick up the torch when the creator calls it quits. Takehiko Inoue’s Vagabond, Ai Yazawa’s Nana, and likely Yoshihiro Togashi’s Hunter X Hunter all frozen in indefinite hiatus, the publishers respectfully holding the door open should the creators ever decide to return, leaving it in a liminal space with no sense of conclusion for the fans except what we can make for ourselves.
The reason for Miura’s hiatuses was unclear. Fans liked to joke that he would take long breaks to play The Idolmaster, but Miura was also infamous for taking “breaks” spent minutely illustrating panels to his exacting artistic standard, creating a tumultuous release schedule during the wars featuring thousands of tiny soldiers all dressed in period-appropriate armor. If his health was becoming an issue, it’s uncommon that news would be shared with fans for most authors, much less one as private as Miura.
Even without delays, the story Miura was building just seemed to be getting too big. The scale continued to grow, his narrative ambition swelling even faster after 20 years of publication, the depth and breadth of his universe constantly expanding. The fan-dubbed “Millennium Falcon Arc” was massive, changing the landscape of Berserk from a low fantasy plagued by roaming demons to a high fantasy where godlike beings of sanity-defying size battled for control of the world. How could Guts even meet Griffith again? What might Casca want to do when her sanity returned? What are the origins of the Skull Knight? And would he do battle with the God Hand? There was too much left to happen and Miura’s art only grew more and more elaborate. It would take decades to resolve all this.
But it didn’t need to. I imagine we’ll never get a precise picture of the final years of Miura’s life leading up to his tragic passing. In the final chapters he released, it felt as if he had directed the story to some conclusion. The unfinished Fantasia arc finds Guts and his newfound band finding a way to finally restore Casca’s sanity and — although there is still unmistakably a boundary separating them — both seem resolute in finding a way to mend their shared wounds together.
One of the final chapters features Guts drinking around the campfire with the two other men of his group, Serpico and Roderick, as he entrusts the recovery of Casca to Schierke and Farnese. It's a scene that, in the original Band of the Hawk, would have found Guts brooding as his fellows engage in bluster. The tone of this conversation, however, is completely different. The three commiserate over how much has changed and the strength each has found in the companionship of the others. After everything that has happened, Guts declares that he is grateful.
The suicidal dedication to his quest for vengeance and dispassionate pragmatism that defined Guts in the earliest chapters is gone. Although they first appeared to be a source of strength as the Black Swordsman, he has learned that they rose from the fear of losing his friends again, from letting others close enough to harm him, and from having no other purpose without others. Whether or not Guts and Griffith were to ever meet again, Guts has rediscovered the strength to no longer carry his burdens alone.
All that has happened is all there will ever be. We too must be grateful.
Peter Fobian is an Associate Manager of Social Video at Crunchyroll, writer for Anime Academy and Anime in America, and an editor at Anime Feminist. You can follow him on Twitter @PeterFobian.
By: Peter Fobian
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Me watching Riverdale S2:
THE WAY KEVIN IS RAISING HIS HAND TO THE MOTHERFUCKING SKY WHEN HIRAM ASKS FOR A VOLUNTEER FOR A WRESTLING DEMONSTRATION. THIS THIRSTY MOTHERFUCKER. HIS FACE IS PRICELESS.
I wish I could just jump into Riverdale and shake the characters and be like
Cheryl: Your parents fucking suck
Josie: Your parents fucking suck
Veronica: Your parents fucking suck
Betty: Your parents fucking suck
Archie: Your dads okay so far, I don’t know about your mom
Jughead: Your dad used to fucking suck but as a person, at his core, I don’t think he’s evil, and he’s getting better, but he’s got a ways to learn. I don’t know about your mom
Kevin: Your dad’s decent so far? Don’t know about your mom
Like especially Josie because I know it’s hard and that a lot of the trauma her mom felt probably manifested itself badly and Josie probably feels attached to her mom and like she owes her being a good daughter because her mom’s had it bad but like I also DON’T CARE. FUCKING TREAT YOUR CHILD RIGHT. I DON’T GIVE A SHIT WHAT HAPPENED. THATS YOUR CHILD. WOMAN UP AND BE A FUCKING DECENT PERSON. I DON’T CARE THAT YOU PUT A ROOF OVER HER HEAD, FOOD IN HER MOUTH, GAVE HER A SINGING CAREER (But continue to control it and not give her leeway to think and act on her own). SHE DON’T OWE YOU SHIT. FUCK OFF WITH YOUR WEIRD LIFE-FUCKING-SUCKED-FOR-ME-BUT-IM-ALSO-A-CLASSIST-BITCH PARADOX. MY DAD’S GOT IT MADE RIGHT NOW BUT HE HASN’T FORGOTTEN HIS ROOTS, HASN’T FORGOTTEN THE DISCRIMINATION HE FACED AND THE FACT THAT HE GREW UP SHIT POOR EARLY ON AND HE HASN’T DECIDED “Hey, let’s ridicule people for being in a similar position that I was in!”
Basically, this is me begging for for Josie’s mom to ✨fucking do better✨
Anyways yeah normalize Riverdale characters disowning their own parents ✌🏽🥰
Hmmm. If I wasn’t completely and utterly for the Serpents before, the white serpents learning to shut the fuck up and stand with Toni and her grandfather in opposition of the genocide and colonialism that was perpetrated by Cheryl’s great great grandfather? Hell fucking yeah
Dude I’m sorta crying at the scene with Hiram seeing Veronica in her confirmation dress because he’s a piece of shit but this is how it goes down, like it’s a whole thing
I love that I immediately knew the meaning of “Catholic chic”. Apparently that’s all going to church every Sunday for the formative years of my life accomplished
I hope Penelope Blossom dies in a fire :)
OH MY GOD, LOVE SIMON CAME OUT RIGHT AROUND HERE, KEVIN IS ASKING MOOSE TO IT, MY COMFORT MOVIE OH MY GOD-
Ugh, I don’t trust Midge. Something about the tropey-ness of her being The Girlfriend™️ and her face, as well as the fact that she played Gen in tatbilb, something doesn’t sit right. The haircut feels too manic pixie, like she’s hiding something. Bad vibes
NOOO CHERYL ILL GO ON A VACATION WITH YOU 😭 GOD IM SO GONE FOR HER
Aaaaand she did some fuck shit. Aaaand Toni is pretty. Aaaand there’s the internalized homophobia.
Jughead saying that growing up Betty’s and Archie’s windows being parallel always bothered him sounds more like a jarchie admission than a bughead one, I’m just sayin’
BETTY AND JUGHEAD’S REACTIONS WHEN THEY HEAR THE BED SQUEAKING IS ME. Like the little amused but lowkey confused and baffled expression on his face as he’s like “is that their solution to everything? Can’t they ever just talk?” Like no apparently not. Me too Jug, me too-
Idk Vee, maybe he’s asking questions about your father’s line of work and the business of his associates because your dad and mom are fucking evil
What the fuck Veronica. I mean yay because that just gets us closer to Jarchie kiss but like what the fuck Vee. Also Jughead is super cute, like why does the blue eyes black hair thing absolutely melt my weak heart, like I didn’t choose to fall for this pasty ass white boy but here we are. Also Veronica’s eyes are really big and dark and pretty like girl help im falling for these two-
BETTY LITERALLY POINTED IT OUT, C’MON NOW CW, I KNOW WE’VE MADE THE MISTAKE OF GROVELING WITH SPN BUT PLEASE IM BEGGING YOU WE NEED A JARCHIE KISS-
CAN HETEROSEXUALS PLEASE STOP FUCKING ALL THE TIME ON TV. WHY DO YOU HAVE TO SHOVE YOUR STRAIGHTNESS IN MY FACE. NOT EVERYONE IS STRAIGHT YOU KNOW.
“Entertain Jughead” 😏
DUDE. They were sitting ALONE. TOGETHER. In the WOODS. With them being the ONLY ones who haven’t kissed. DUDE.
C’MON MAN, THEY’RE STARING FUCKING LONGINGLY AT EACH OTHER
If there are weird gay ships for straights then Jeronica is the weird straight ship for gays
Ok so is there a legitimate reason why Veronica is faithful to her parents and defends them to a tee and partakes in their mob shit or is she just daddy’s little fucking girl. Like it isn’t her fault that she’s been manipulated but it pisses me the fuck off. And people who want her to stay with her parents because supposedly they’re the only ones who love her even though it’s toxic and warped? Like do you have a brain?
Archie and Veronica really love supporting gentrification, classism, and Vee’s rich daddy and mommy’s innocence huh
Look i actually agree with Reggie for once, get Hiram’s ass, deal with it Veronica
Wow, nice, shaming Jug for eating. That’s cool, Arch. That’s awesome. And no Betty, she doesn’t have everybody’s vote. Because Veronica’s parents are motherfuckers and when it comes to choosing between a murderer/abuser/rich/classist/gentrifying fuck and supporting your bestie uwu guess which one im fucking picking. Also, THANK YOU JUG for explaining to your friend that even though he lives in a fantasy land where northside Riverdale is the only one worth referring to when talking about Riverdale at all and thus the only one that matters and is worth protecting, the southside exists and people live and have grown up in the southside and building a prison there where it will be even more easy to profile and incarcerate southside residents under false or exaggerated pretenses ISN’T A GOOD THING. That his own friend isn’t quite apart of his and Veronica’s and Betty’s socioeconomic caste and that he’s not going to pretend like he is, he isn’t going to be quiet about it just because you’re friends again. That he’s not going to lay down and let Archie explain what a good move for Riverdale is when he clearly means northside riverdale, let him explain how the southside needs to be dealt with to someone who grew up on the southside and knows it more (not the most, I’m not saying Jug isn’t out of his depth with certain aspects of being a full southsider) intricately than him. LIKE FUCK. ARCHIE. WHO THE FUCK DO YOU THINK YOU’RE TALKING TO. Like he just doesn’t get why building prisons and stereotyping and condemning all southsiders and gentrifying entire neighborhoods is really fucking bad and a big deal and it annoys me so much. Like yeah Arch, obviously you don’t see the big deal because it doesn’t affect you and you delude yourself that it doesn’t affect your friend either, but it actually is that bad.
In conclusion, Archie and Veronica and sometimes Betty are giving me headaches rn. Like I’m not saying Jughead is perfect at all but in this particular instance he’s the only one I agree with for the most part right now.
Yeah Arch, you see things differently because you’re not the one who’s on the receiving end of the problem
YES MOMMA ANDREWS. SNAP! GO FERAL! SHOW THAT SOB SOME CONSEQUENCES!
Ah, so this is the jarchie “break-up” scene. You know what. I feel no heartbreak. Get his ass Jug.
Get. His. Ass.
They sent Cheryl to a conversion institution. I’m literally crying. This isn’t an exaggeration. I feel like I want to cry. Just. God fucking damn it.
SHE DOESN’T WANT TO GET BETTER. SHE’S NOT SICK. YOU ARE. DIE. FUCKING DIE. BURN IN HELL. AND PENELOPE BLOSSOM TOO.
“That’s not how things go in Riverdale” is a veiled way of saying “don’t challenge the upper class and don’t try to stifle gentrification,” I hope you all know
#she speaks#riverdale#cheryl blossom#josie mccoy#veronica lodge#betty cooper#archie andrews#jughead jones#sierra mccoy#you know how spn and merlin fans have that one tag?#u kno the one#john winchester’s a+ parenting#uther pendragon’s a+ parenting#petition to use the same thing when a riverdale parent does something shitty and manipulative to their kid#sierra mccoy’s a+ parenting
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Henri: Oh, wow! Please, tell me how much you hated it.
Travis: [laughs] Gotta hand it to you. You’re pretty damn good at this.
Henri: Thank you! I wasn’t sure if Socret would be the best place for a specialty bakery, but business is going pretty well.
Travis: Hold up. What the hell is Socret?
Henri: This area? Southern Newcrest, by the river.
Henri: That’s what the realtor called it, anyway. She said this area is really up and coming.
Travis: [laughs] You’re a fucking gentrifier!
Henri: I am not!
Henri: Okay, maybe I am. I’m sorry! But a storefront in Willow Creek was way more than I could afford. Opening this bakery has literally been a life-long dream. I’ve been baking since before I could hold the mixing bowl on my own.
Travis: I get it. I mean, I wasn’t doing the neighborhood any favors when I opened up the garage, but you do what you gotta do. You gotta look out for yourself, ‘cause nobody else is guaranteed to help you.
Henri: That’s very ‘me-against-the-world’ of you, Travis.
Travis: [laughs] Yeah, well. You live, you learn, you open a bakery and next thing you know there’s… fucking brewpubs and guys in cardigans with wax in their beards.
Henri: [laughs] I really am a gentrifier. I’m one of those people.
Travis: Yeah, you are. But Newcrest has been shitty for a long time. A name change and pie shop aren’t gonna change that overnight…
Travis: …even if it’s run by someone as beautiful and talented as you.
Henri: Looks like I’ve got some customers, but, seriously, stay as long as you like. Can I get you another slice of something? I’ll surprise you this time.
Travis: Too late, Henri. You’ve already been surprising me.
#oh sorry#i can't find my eyes#they rolled right out of my head#ts4#sims 4#ts4 screenshots#ts4 story#southern crest#travis selby#henrietta griggs
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Every Record I Own - Day 532: Harms Way Rust
I picked up this LP at a Harms Way show at Brooklyn’s Knitting Factory back in July 2015. It was a good show, although the turnout was surprisingly light. There were maybe 50-60 people there, which seemed odd for a hardcore band on a solid label touring on a well-received new album. It might have had something to do with Knitting Factory. The venue didn’t typically host hardcore shows, and they might not have directed their advertising accordingly. Or maybe it had something to do with the overall strength of the bill. Not that the other four bands that played that night were by any means weak or a deterrent, but they were all relatively unheard of, and five years later I honestly can’t remember any of their names. But I think maybe there was another factor at play...
I’ve talked about this phenomenon a bit in the past, but one of the biggest shifts I’ve witnessed in my 25 years of touring is how shows have moved from suburbs and outlying urban areas into city centers. I toured through California probably a dozen times before one of my bands played in LA as opposed to somewhere in Santa Barbara, Long Beach, Anaheim, Riverside, or some other surrounding community. Similarly, out east we were more likely to play somewhere on Long Island or New Jersey than in Manhattan. Hell, it was even hard to play an all ages show in Seattle in the ‘90s---you were far more likely to get booked in Tacoma, Redmond, Bellevue, or Olympia.
I’ve often wondered if the shift has something to with the repopulation of city centers. Hardcore is a predominantly white scene, and the phenomenon of white flight meant that in the ‘90s you were more likely to see DIY shows in predominantly white areas---suburbs, college towns, etc. But white flight has seen a reversal in the 21st century as more people are moving back into city centers. So shouldn’t a hardcore show in a gentrified area like Williamsburg draw a big crowd? Or maybe I’m viewing this all through the lens of a guy that’s grown up with all his peers following a similar trajectory---go to shows at suburban spots when you’re a teenager, then continue going to shows around your college, then move to the big city and go to shows downtown. Maybe a certain style of hardcore still thrives in the suburbs but I’m just too old to see it.
With that in mind, maybe Harms Way’s brand of hi-def industrialized moshcore was less suited to the Williamsburg crowd than a band like, oh... say... Iron Lung or HOAX. After all, Brooklyn hardcore has a totally different connotation in 2020 than it did back in 1995. Maybe this was one of those shows that would have done better in New Jersey or somewhere further out on Long Island. But one of the coolest things about that Harms Way set was the fact that the gnarliest dancers in the pit were young African-American women who were just straight up wrecking shit. I guess it’s safe to say there isn’t a lot of crossover between the Harms Way’s crowd and the stereotypical Williamsburg hipster (and I’m not meaning to use that word as a pejorative). Maybe Harms Way’s crowd lives on the edges of the city, whether it’s people that have been forced out of their old neighborhoods or people who are tired of the soul-sucking void of strip malls and subdivisions.
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