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cryptidghostgirl · 3 months

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Humanity’s Most Favored Fantasy (Alastor x Reader)

Paring: Alastor x Reader

Description: It wasn't love. Alastor didn't feel love, not anymore. He'd lost that part of himself the day he died so it couldn't be love, could it?

Warnings: Look, I'm writing and it's not for a request. Angst. It's always angst. I just love Alastor's inhumanity, what can I say? This bitch is in denial. Also, bodies, blood, death, no gore but like, eh. Also Adam is in this one and he's his own warning. Loose Mistki quoting at one part. Also a loose Sappho quote “pale as grass” and self harm.

Word Count: 2,420

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A/N My classics major side came out a little bit in this one lol. Also I have a big classics major side fic in the wings so if you guys like this, just wait. Also Sir Pentious is from the 1800s so he for sure had a classical education. Also the title came from an article I was reading about the history of witchcraft for one of my classes.

The most complex and yet the most simple of the human emotions. Feared by some, wielded by others, out of reach for many, perennial for more still, and taken as easily as a breath of air by a solemn few. What a strange thing, love.

It was this last category that bewitched Alastor. Even when he had been alive, he had never understood the people like that, the ones who took heartbreak in stride, the ones who shared any love they had the minute they felt it with everyone and everything. The ones who weren't paralyzed by potential loss or violent embarrassment.

The people who feared love made sense. It had a vast capacity for harm, it was able to destroy without a second thought. Even when it was good, love could be devastating. Those who wielded it as their weapon of choice nearly fell into a subcategory of this group. They used other people's fear of the matter against them or they lured people in to get what they wanted and threw them to the curb without a second glance.

Everyone on earth, living or dead, had felt at least once that love was out of their reach, Alastor reasoned. Hopelessness is one of the most vital parts of the human condition, after all.

Perennial was the category in which most people fell. Love came and went. It lived and died, but always returned like the plants he had named this grouping for.

Then there were people like Y/n. Not a day went by where she wasn't explaining how much she adored something random or telling people she loved them, throwing the word around as if it had no weight, as if it was the easiest thing in the world to love, to share love. When Angel had made some snide remark about everything being her alleged 'favorite thing,' Y/n had quickly replied, saying:

"Aren't I lucky for that? Isn't that just wonderful?"

Alastor couldn't tell in which category he fell or what his opinion was about that answer of hers. One thing he did know was that Y/n was to be avoided at all costs.

She was the typical sinner. Never too bad of a person when alive, but never too good either. She wore her hedonism like a badge of honor, living her afterlife in much the same way Alastor assumed she had lived her living life: in a constant state of indulgence.

It wasn't the typical form of being that takes a person's mind when they think of the word. No, Y/n didn't indulge in a reckless, Dionysian way. Instead, she devoured everything. Books, good food, music, friends, you name it. Y/n had a million stories about each and a million examples of the best they all had to offer on hand. She relished in all that every word had to offer.

Alastor had overheard her talking to Charlie one night about that. He hadn't meant to, he had just been wandering the hotel, unable to sleep and in need of some air, when he'd heard a slight commotion in the lobby. Hidden by his shadows, he had entered the familiar space to find an exhausted Charlie standing tensely before a bulletin board.

"God is in the details." Y/n was saying as she adjusted the plans pinned on the structure so they were easier to read, more cohesive, "Anything can be a work of art, don't forget that. It's what makes everything so undeniably worth it."

She was so utterly out of his reach. Not that Alastor wanted Y/n in his reach, no. How ridiculous would that be: the Radio Demon, the most feared overlord in all of Hell, getting butterflies because he heard a girl tell someone else she loved them and imagined it was him. No, that would be utterly foolish which was why it wasn't the case, couldn't be the case. He must be getting sick, that was why his stomach had felt weird.

"What are you reading?" he heard Sir Pentious ask as the snake demon took a seat on the couch beside Y/n.

Alastor was at the bar, sharing a drink with Husk. His ear twitched in their direction.

"It's a book discussing the changes in interpretations of Sappho's poetry over time." Y/n replied, her tone soft and even.

It felt like a salve against Alastor's ears. Husk raised an eyebrow towards his master but made no remark.

"Really? I didn't know you were interested in that sort of thing."

"I was actually a professor in the human world... living world? Whatever. I didn't work on Sappho, I worked on ancient medicine, but I always found her intriguing and lovely. I mean, phainetai moi is creating a diagnosed love, using all the language of medicine. How could it not capture my attention?"

"You know, if you look at Homer, the same language Sappho uses is also used to describe love. She is actually working off a preexisting cannon of love as something painful and destroying."

"Really?"

"Yes, and curse tablets tend to draw off medical writings quite a bit as well, especially those involved in love magic."

"Huh, that’s a neat little intersection I have yet to explore: medicine, magic, and love. I never knew you knew so much about this. You died in the 1890s, right?"

"Sometime around then."

"I should have guessed then, my mistake. Tell me, what was it like growing up with all this wonder at your finger tips? It was hard for me to even find a university with a classics department, let alone a good one. You’re lucky to have had it all right there."

Now that was an interesting idea to Alastor. A diagnosable love, a painful and deadly thing. Love as a curse, love as being shot through by an enemy spear, love as a god. It made more sense to him than anything else about the matter had. Unavoidable, not something self imposed. A cursed love, a medical love, something that controlled a person rather than vice versa.

He lay awake at night, unable to speak, pale as grass, thinking unwillingly of the way her lips curved to form words, of the way one could see the gears of her mind turning behind her eyes. He lay awake, unable to do anything else. He stared at the ceiling.

"Ah! Angel! Thank you!" Y/n exclaimed as he handed her the sweater he'd spotted her eyeing a few days before when they'd been for a walk around town, "This was so kind of you!"

Alastor watched as Y/n pulled the lanky demon into a hug which he reluctantly returned, looking down at her with a platonic version of the sort of fondness that was so forbidden to him.

"Great work Angel!" Charlie clapped excitedly, "That's a step in the right direction."

No, it wasn't love. Alastor Hartifelt didn't love, he had lost that ability the day he had died and he'd barely had it before that. It didn't matter that his heart skipped a beat, there was no truth to his upset stomach when he had to speak to her except something bad he must have eaten. The sleeplessness wasn't new, sleep had never been his friend so to speak, the two had never really gotten along. The reason it got so stuck in his head, the way she threw her affection around, was the carelessness of it all, the foolishness. Only, what he had overheard her saying to Charlie that night, that anything can be a work of art, were the words of someone who acted purely on intention, who did nothing without considered thought.

Y/n couldn't be a wielder of love. Alastor never once saw her manipulate someone or even really ask anyone for anything at all. There was no way she was scared and the way she freely gave took her out of the other two categories as well. It didn't make sense. The intention, the earnestness, the true meaning behind her actions and words that always seemed to shine through no matter what she did, was what had him stuck. She barley even fit into her own category because of it. Most people that threw love around the way she did had the words and actions lose their meaning over time but, somehow, that seemed never to be the case for her.

He pictured a life on earth. He pictured walking with her beneath the stars, the way the light of the moon would play gently across her skin. He pictured her in the recording studio, the one he'd worked at while alive, waiting by the door for him to finish his work and taking him by the hand, dragging him off into the unknown. He pictured waking up beside her in the morning, all messy hair and smiles. He pictured, he dreamed, he dissolved. The doctors diagnosed him and he went to see other people because he didn't like the answer they gave him.

Y/n pulled Vaggie from her seat at the bar, spinning the demon into an ungraceful waltz to the music Alastor was playing on the piano for the group. He nearly fumbled, nearly missed a note. She missed so many steps and it didn't matter because she was laughing, and so was Vaggie. She didn't have to be perfect, but he did.

They each smiled ear to ear while Charlie clapped along to the beat. He imagined himself in Vaggie's place, he could practically feel his hands on the gentle curve of her hips. The world was half real.

It wasn't love because he didn't know her, he never spoke to her. It wasn't love because that was impossible, he couldn't love. It wasn't love because that was an ability he'd left in the world of the living. It wasn't love because she was too kind, too good, and he was nothing if not brutal and bloodstained to his core. It wasn't love because it couldn't be. It wasn't love because if it was...

It's not love. It's not love. It's not love.

He repeated the mantra to himself. Alone walking the halls, in meetings with the other overlords, making tea in the kitchen. He whispered the words to himself like a prayer.

It's not love. It's not love. It's not love.

Y/n was out of reach, untouchable, destined to join the ranks of Heaven while he remained rotting in Hell. It couldn't be anything else, no other future was possible which was why it wasn't love. She was made of all the things a human is and he was made of those a monster is. She was bright, she shined, and Alastor fed off the light of others, burning it out into darkness. He refused to do such a thing to her, he couldn't. Not when she was practically the sun. Not when he wasn't even a star but the black hole of the earth revolving around her.

He saw her holding Husk's hands over the bar top as he told her something, a look of deep concern etched into her features. He watched her pick Nifty up by the waist so the little demon could dust the tops of the bookshelves. He watched her, he waited, he would always be waiting because nothing could ever happen. Nothing would ever happen, he wouldn't allow it and goddamnit it wasn’t love.

It was also impossible, Alastor reminded himself. He had left that part of himself when he had died, it hadn't made the journey with him. The most favored fantasy of his own humanity, or what was left of it. The little spark of the person he had been that glowed softly from the center of his chest. Alastor had tried to douse it, tried to kill it, tried to rip it from himself but all he'd ever ended up with was bloody hands and torn flesh and the light pulsed on in its eternal hunger, its eternal hope, its eternal harm.

And then it was too late. Then, she really was gone, double dead or however anyone wanted to call it. Adam dropped her lifeless corpse to the ground and Alastor's world crashed in around him because no matter how many times he had said it wasn't, no matter how he had avoided her, no matter what he had done it had been love, or the beginnings of it at least. The closest thing to it he'd ever really felt. His hand tightened around the staff of his microphone. Alastor bared his teeth, he saw red.

"What have you done?"

Adam turned to him, grinning. Y/n deserved a viking funeral, to be surrounded by flowers and sent off in a burning boat. She deserved a Greek burial, reduced to ashes and buried with all the proper rites that made sure she would make it to the afterlife. She deserved, she was owed, he was angry.

"What." Adam laughed, "Was she your little bitch?"

Alastor didn't think he had any room left inside him for the fury, but found his rage redoubled at Adam's words.

"What did you just call her?"

"Your little bitch." Adam smirked, "She was a cute one, shame you all are gonna have to burn. Woulda kept her for myself."

Adam looked down, nudging Y/n's lifeless corpse with the toe of his shoe. Alastor attacked. There was no thought, no order, no grace, there was only the anger. Only now that it was too late, was he at last able to let loose, be less than perfect, exist in an unintentional manner. Or was it that this was the true meaning of intention -- reckless abandon? Y/n probably would have thought that. It didn't matter. It didn't matter what she would have thought, what any of them did think. It was too late. There was no more time and Alastor had come to terms with his own frailty a second past the buzzer. He would never forgive himself.

"You will pay for what you have done. You will die for what you have done."

Because it had been love, all along and Alastor, who had thought himself above it all, had been in that first group. He had been scared, not of what love could do but of what Y/n would, of what she had already done to him. Now it was too late and he would never get another chance.

"You will fucking die!"

----

Part Two --> → Humanity's Most Favored Fantasy pt. 2

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queer-geordie-nerd · 6 months

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I am nearly 40 years old and I've considered myself a leftist politically since I was old enough to form my own opinions. Have I always been a shining moral example? Definitely not - there have absolutely been times when I've had unexamined prejudices and been called out on them. It's deeply uncomfortable having to examine your own prejudices and to be told that you're wrong, and I get the instinct to push back.

But never in my entire life have I seen as much doubling down and ignoring of minority voices and as much mask off bigotry as I have seen this last month in reaction to Jews telling pro Palestine activists that a lot of what they're doing is blatant antisemitism and actively harmful to their community.

Absolutely, advocate and uplift Palestinian voices and draw attention to what is happening, because what is happening is utterly appalling.

But when you happily parrot genocidal slogans like 'From the River to the Sea' while totally ignoring anyone's attempts to tell you why that is so hideously problematic, when you unironically call for the total eradication of the only Jewish nation state on earth in a way that you never ever do for other nations whose governments have committed similar or worse crimes, when you happily chant shit like "Death to Zionist pigs" without the first clue what that word actually means (hint: it's not shorthand for 'evil barely humans who want all Palestinians dead' and it's incredibly disgusting to use it that way. Zionists believe in the Jewish right to return to and live on their ancestral homeland. That's it. That's all) then don't think for one solitary minute you possess any kind of moral high ground.

And when leftists who usually loudly proclaim the right of indigenous peoples to return to their land have the audacity to turn around and say to Jews "not you though - actually you're terrible and evil for even wanting such a thing. Never mind that the rest of the world has engaged in your wholesale dehumanisation and slaughter for thousands of years, your desire for your homeland is the bad thing actually" what is that hypocrisy but blatant antisemitism? Please, enlighten me.

When a Jewish person tells you are peddling in antisemitism, just shut the fuck up and listen.

A caveat to this is that I am not Jewish, I don't know any Jewish people IRL, none of this impacts me personally. But I am a human being, and will not and cannot stay silent about the hypocrisy and outright dehumanisation of other human beings by people who cannot for the life of them either open a history book or take the time to actually listen to the people this impacts and instead just perform their self righteous little dance.

#antisemitism

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necroromantics · 2 months

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How To Write ASPD / Psychopathy

half educational, half ramble. dedicated to the creepypasta fandom.

(check out my how-to-write bipolar + ticci toby here)

What is ASPD?

Antisocial Personality Disorder (ASPD) is characterized by a disregard for others rights and feelings. It's a personality disorder, which means the mindsets and behaviours associated with this condition are deeply ingrained and maladaptive.

The current DSM-5 diagnostic criteria states that to be diagnosed with ASPD, a patient needs to have a long-term (occurring since at least age 15), consistent, and persistent history of three or more of the following:

failure to conform to social norms; repeatedly breaking rules/laws that may be grounds for arrest

deceitfulness; lying, tricking others for personal gain

impulsivity or a failure to plan ahead

irritability and aggression; fighting, hostility, outbursts

reckless disregard for the safety of self or others

irresponsibility; repeated failure to comply to work or financial obligations

lack of remorse; being indifferent to or rationalizing having mistreated or hurt others

ASPD, by definition, can only be diagnosed in people who are 18+. Minors cannot have ASPD due to treatment and intervention reasons. A minor who exhibits traits of ASPD will be diagnosed with Conduct Disorder.

At it's core, though it may seem like people with ASPD are just hostile and insensitive and rude, is a defense mechanism formed in childhood, typically in response to an abusive environment. Self-preservation and a "dog eat dog world" mindset are very common in those with ASPD. Everything is about doing what it takes to retain social dominance, control, and ultimately safety. Boredom and risk-taking is also very common in people with ASPD, and many people with this condition have never had proper, healthy influences in childhood to teach them proper manners, social norms, morals, or how to regulate their emotions and aggression.

It is a chronic condition that affects about 1-3% of the population. Its very prevalent in the prison population as well. ASPD not only causes a person to potentially cause harm to others, but is a condition that very negatively impacts the patients themselves.

(Note: The term "sociopathy" is typically used to refer to an extreme presentation of ASPD. "Psychopathy" may sometimes be seem as a very very extreme presentation of ASPD)

What is Psychopathy?

Psychopathy refers to a set of traits/issues that might be seen in patients. It is NOT a diagnosis. If psychopathic traits cause dysfunctional behaviour in an individual, they will most likely be diagnosed with ASPD.

Psychopathy is now most commonly used in research settings to use it as a term that describes certain patterns and behaviours. It is something professionals study, not diagnose.

The traits related to psychopathy are:

manipulative behaviour; superficial charm, persistent lying, deceiving others

grandiose sense of self

lack of remorse or guilt; lack of empathy, callousness, shallow emotional expressions

reckless lifestyle; need for stimulation, parasitic (constantly takes from others), lack of realistic long-term goals, impulsivity

antisocial behaviour; poor behavioural control, early behavioural problems, trouble with the law in youth

Not all psychopathic people fit the criteria for ASPD, not all are disordered by their traits, and not all people with ASPD are considered psychopathic. But there is a very big overlap.

Psychopathy is typically only recognized in a forensic or research setting. It is often wrongfully used in the media to describe people who are serial killers, abusive, or used to dehumanize others.

Personally, I believe that media and creators need to move away from the terms psychopath/sociopath. They have far too much negative connotation that only exists to demonize people who suffer with unconventional traits. If you want to write psychopathy correctly, do your research on what it looks like in its presentation, and just drop the label.

What are some harmful tropes with ASPD/Psychopathy in media?

ASPD and Psychopathy have been tossed around in many different settings as ways to cheaply create an evil villain, or a cold calculated monster, or a reckless criminal. There has been only one instance in my lifetime of watching hundreds of movies and shows that I have seen an accurate, humanizing portrayal of ASPD. (That show is House MD by the way, I highly recommend if you want to see good representation).

So what are some of the tropes to acknowledge and avoid?

1. Psychopathic serial killer

Have you seen American Psycho? Great movie. Don't do that. While the character Patrick Bateman is commonly associated with the terms "narcissist" and "psychopath", he also is a satirical character who is a very dramatized and exaggerated presentation of some psychopathic traits.

I will be honest. A lot of real-life serial killers do suffer from various mental health conditions, but correlation is not causation. In the Creepypasta fandom we are surrounded by different characters who are almost all serial killers, and people like to make things easy and just throw the label of "psychopath" onto them and call it realistic. This is very cheap, and very harmful.

If you want to write a psychopathic serial killer character, then acknowledge how harmful, fear-mongering, and dehumanizing this trope is towards people who actually suffer from these traits.

2. ASPD synonymous with abusive behaviour

ASPD is a disorder that does cause people to do and say things that will harm others in some way. Cluster B personality disorders are commonly seen as 'social disorders', as in they cause dis-order in interpersonal relationships, and in response to society. Borderline personality disorder (BPD) for example may cause somebody to threaten harm to themselves in response to percieved abandonment, or to have intense fights due to emotional dysregulation.

ASPD in particular may cause someone to be insensitive towards others problems, lack morality, be aggressive or hostile, put others down, or get into reckless situations. This is why they are disorders. Because they cause significant and serious problems in the persons life.

It is not pretty, and it's not fair, and yes, people with disorders may cause harm to others due to behaviours associated with their condition. But there is a difference between causing harm, and abusing another person.

Lying to someone is not inherently abusive. Being reckless is not inherently abusive. Being an insensitive asshole is not inherently abusive. To not understand the nuance and the complexity of these situations is to completely demonize and stigmatize a serious mental health condition. You don't call people with BPD abusive for their actions inherently, because you acknowledge they are hurting and only doing what they know to cope with this hurt. Of course it's unhealthy. That's what a disorder is. That does not make someone abusive by default. Anyone with any condition, even neurotypical people can be abusive.

3. Cold, emotionless robot

People with ASPD can and do feel emotion. People with psychopathic traits can and do feel emotion. They get sad, disappointed, disgusted, happy, excited, jealous, hurt, angry. There is nothing in the ASPD criteria that states anything about emotional presentation or experience.

In psychopathy, it is mentioned that there may be a shallow emotional expression. This may also be present in ASPD. This means that while a person will feel emotions, it is either beat down or brushed off, or completely repressed. The emotional repression may come from childhood abuse where they were punished for expressing emotions, or expressing emotions had caused them harm.

Lacking emotions/emotional expression is instead highly linked to Schizoid Personality Disorder, and is apart of the criteria for said disorder.

Media protraying people with ASPD/psychopathy as cold, emotionless, calculating robots is another trope used to dehumanize people with mental health issues. It's used to make people with ASPD seem evil or not having feelings that could be hurt. In reality, nearly everything a person with ASPD does, is their dysfunctional way of protecting themselves from being hurt.

People with ASPD may lack the emotional capacity for things such as empathy and remorse, though. Its common that they are unable to care for, or feel upset for others suffering. They may also be unable to feel guilt. This criteria is seen in about 51% of people with ASPD and is associated with more extreme presentations.

Do you headcanon anyone to have ASPD?

Yes, but I don't like to use the label on them. I do write a lot of antisocial mindsets into my headcanons for Ticci Toby, and I heavily write ASPD into my OC, Tobin.

For Toby, his presentation of ASPD comes in the form of rebellion, not understanding/following social norms, recklessness, and a strong desire for power, dominance, and control. I write this as his subconscious response to the trauma he faced in childhood. As a child Toby was constantly put down and made to feel small and powerless at the hands of his father. In order to make sure his father abused only him and not his mother and sister, Toby would act out and be a troublemaker. I think that he would have a lot of ASPD behaviours and views on the world.

For my OC Tobin, he's pretty similar in presentation in regards to power/control, and not following social norms. He is very prone to justifying and rationalizing his behaviours to the point he doesn't feel remorse for the harm he causes. Tobin grew up in a very unstable and abusive environment where, like Toby, he did what he needed to do to get by. He never learned proper morals, norms, regulation, etc. But Tobin does care about others. He takes care of his little sister, and loves his girlfriend, and is very protective. Tobin is still a complex human being with more to him than just being an antisocial insensitive prick.

How can I write a character with ASPD?

Do proper research. Not on Reddit, or Quora, or WebMD. I mean go find trusted, scholarly articles and read real scientific papers and studies on ASPD. Do research into how/why it forms, the mindsets, the symptoms and their presentation, the neuroscience even.

Humanize your characters. While it's fun to throw around a bunch of negative and toxic traits to a character you want people to see as 'bad', it's lazy character development. Give them good, positive traits as well. People are very complex, and nobody will fit in to the mold of good or bad. Make them human enough where someone wont look at your character with ASPD and assume everyone with ASPD are monsters.

But also, don't water down the disorder. ASPD does cause harm to the patient and the people in their life. I've seen it a lot where people will try to fight against stigmatization by completely glamorizing the disorder. "People with ASPD aren't inherently bad! They don't actually hurt others or act hostile or say insensitive things"... Yes we do. And it causes many problems. And that is why its a disorder.

Personally I don't like to throw the ASPD label onto my characters even if I do write them to have ASPD because I feel like it just boxes them in. If you write a character with ASPD, try doing it in a way where a professional would be able to tell they have ASPD without you even mentioning the label.

Remember that ASPD is COMPLEX. It varies vastly in its presentation, its a disorder that is life-consuming and the dysfunctional beliefs and behavioural patterns are deeply ingrained and consistent throughout many different areas in someones life. It's a label to describe preexisting issues. It's something that is highly associated with childhood trauma, and drug addiction, and general suffering for the person dealing with their own chaotic mind.

The biggest problem I see that frustrates me is the way people throw around the terms "psychopath" and "sociopath", especially when someone just wants to add a layer of edginess onto their character. Remember that you are dealing with a condition that real people suffer from every day. If you can't handle it respectfully, and if you would demonize someone with ASPD in real life for acting as your character does, just don't write it in. Keep the label separate. We don't need any more stigmatization and misinformation.

I know this was very long, but it's such a multifaceted and complex issue and I've seen it enough times in the fandom to be frustrated enough to write this. If you have any questions, want more advice or information, please feel free to ask away in my ask box 🔥

#tombtalk #creepypasta #creepypasta fandom #creepypasta headcanon #ticci toby #clockwork #ticci toby headcanons #creepypasta ticci toby #jeff the killer #creepypasta jeff the killer #eyeless jack #creepypasta art #creepypasta headcanons #creepypasta oc #creepypasta fanfiction #aspd #antisocial personality disorder #cluster b #writeblr

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genderkoolaid · 3 months

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Hello! Non binary here. I'm trying to genuinely understand how saying bi lesbians are a thing are not harmful to the trans, lesbian and bi community. I saw some of the bi lesbians history and this label seems to be something they used to say to identify that they felt mostly attraction to women but could eventually like a man / people that liked men in the past but now go as lesbians. On the first example, Isn't it just bisexuality with a preference to women? and in the second, lesbians with comphet. I understand the need to use those labels in the past, but now it seems harmful to use bi lesbian because lesbians are not attracted men and bisexuals are not lesbians. I have also seen that the use of bi lesbian was a reactionary push to the TERF movement of excluding men from queer spaces as in a way to "purify" women

While someone in either of the groups you described might identify as a bi lesbian, that is certainly not the extent of bi lesbianism.

I think the problem emerges for many people because they are viewing the definitions of queer terms as objective descriptions we discovered. From this perspective, people used to use lesbian in a more expansive sense essentially because they didn't know any better. But I dislike that; our foreparents were not identifying how they did because they didn't know better, their constructions of gender and sexuality are just as valid. And it's important to understand why those definitions formed instead of going “well it's different now so stop it.”

I'm not sure if you are saying you've heard TERFs came up with the term bi lesbian. I wouldn't be surprised, since it's a fairly common rumor. But it's very wrong. To give a very general history, “bi lesbian” came about to describe people who identified with lesbianism– in the sense that they identified with being queer, having some personal relationship with womanhood and loved or desired women– who also were multisexual in some way. “Lesbian” emphasized your love/desire for women as an important part of your identity, and “bisexual” gave nuance to that, creating visibility for bi people within the community. The outrage against bi lesbians came from the same source as the hatred for trans lesbians (of all kinds): radical feminist beliefs in political lesbianism, the insistence that being a lesbian is a political choice to end all personal relationships with men & manhood.

The idea that “lesbians, universally, aren't attracted to men” largely comes out of this shift. You cannot separate the idea that “bi lesbians” don't/shouldn't exist and the legacy of transphobic radical feminism which encourage black-and-white thinking and hostility towards Bad Queers who dared to love or desire men, be men, dress like men, or fuck like men (anything from BDSM to using a strap-on). This divide is artificial and we do not need to just accept it. Bi lesbians are not the source of harm, the ideology that insists on their exclusion is. On top of this, in many physical queer communities bi lesbians & other people with complicated identities are very easily accepted; the idea that it's somehow impossible for these identities to be safely normalized is just queer conservatism.

There are many reasons someone might enjoy the bi lesbian label: personally, I'm multigender and using a single sexuality label doesn't accurately express my sexuality. A lot of times I see people who counter reasons for bi lesbian identity by saying “but that's just being a lesbian/bisexual!” which is another product of this black-and-white thinking. The idea that someone else with a similar experience using a different label than you– or someone with a different experience using the same label– is somehow a threat to your identity is very reminiscent of the way radical feminism relies on patriarchal ideas that everyone in a gender group must self-police that group to ensure homogeneity. Someone with a totally “normal” bisexual experience may still identify as a bi lesbian, or use both bisexual and lesbian in varying contexts, because they feel it accurately expresses their personal sexuality & relationship to queer communities.

There's famously an Alison Bechdel strip about a character being a bi lesbian, but I think my favorite piece of bi lesbian art is this poem by Dajenya. It's a very defiant and wholehearted response to anti-bi-lesbian sentiment and how it harms people within the community far more than bi lesbian identity does. this site is a collection of primary resources on bi lesbianism, including a few interviews from bi lesbians which might be helpful for you.

#m.#ask box

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ferida-kahlo · 9 months

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♡ Hotline ♡

Mikey Berzatto x F!Reader

Summary: You and Mikey have been casually seeing each other for a few weeks. After a late night text from him, you make the drunken insomniac executive decision of calling him back. Naughtiness ensues.

Or: the one where you and Michael have phone sex.

Warnings: 18+, SMUT, M/F. Minors DNI // PWP, P!rn With Feelings. Phone sex, flirting, teasing, sexual innuendos, dirty talking, mentions of oral sex (m. receiving), masturbation (m. and f.), sexual fantasies, role-playing scenarios, librarian k!nk, mentions of rough sex. // Blink-and-you-miss-it angst, alcohol use, mentions of insomnia, anxiety and self esteem issues.

Word count: 3.8k

Read below the cut OR on AO3

Notes: Reader wears glasses in this - don't look at me like that, it's integral to the plot 🙄

For the history nerds, the quote at the beginning is from the book "Fire from Heaven" by Mary Renault, about the relationship between Alexander the Great and his friend and lover, Hephaestion.

Enjoy! As always, likes, comments and reblogs are very appreciated ♡

His feelings were confused; he wanted to grasp till Alexander's very bones were somehow engulfed within himself, but knew this to be wicked and mad; he would kill anyone who harmed a hair of his head…

… you yawned at the page you’d been reading (i.e., staring at without absorbing a single bit of information), before turning your head to the nightstand and seeing the clock mark 2:49 am.

“Good god”, you whispered, tiredly rubbing your face with one hand, while the other reached for the half-full glass of red wine keeping you company in your insomnia.

Technically, you knew drinking was the last thing you should be doing on a weeknight, when you were having a hard time falling asleep and were expected at work in the morning. But living alone was really not helping you behave like a responsible adult with bills to pay. So, you slowly sip your wine, read your book, and hope that eventually your brain will give up and allow you to pass out for at least a few hours.

Suddenly, your phone lights up with a text. Michael B., it says on the screen. A pang of excitement hits you, and you immediately scoff for reacting so earnestly to a text from a guy you’ve been with (not even biblically, just the daytime coffee dates that people with busy lives manage to pack into a crazy week) for a grand total of two times and less than two hours, overall. Not pathetic at all.

Still, you can’t help but reach for the phone.

Hey, I know it’s late and you probably won’t read this until morning, sorry. Wanna have dinner at that spot we talked about? I can pick you up at the office ;) – M.

You smile, and without really thinking, hit the call button.

He picks up quickly, an amused tone in his voice. “Well, I was not expecting that. What the hell are you still doing up, princess? No work tomorrow?”

You laugh. “God, I wish. I just can’t sleep. Haven’t had one of these nights in a while… my brain won’t shut up, even though I’m so tired I feel like I’ve been hit by a truck”.

“Ooof. That fucking sucks.”

“Yup.”

“Well, I’m glad to be your booty call in this desperate time.”

“Michael”, you laugh so hard you choke on some wine and must set the glass back on the table. “I really don’t think that’s what this is”.

“Oh, no?”, he feigns innocence.

“No…”, chuckling, you continue with the most sultry, mock-seductive voice you can muster “… a booty call is if I was like: Sooo, Mikey… are you, like, busy right now? Do you wanna… come over? I’m aaall alone…”.

You make sure to put particular emphasis on the word ‘come’ and Mike sounds like he is doubling over with laughter. “That was the worst proposition I have ever heard, no doubt”.

“Oh, yeah? Well, you’re officially off my booty call list. I don’t need this kind of negativity in my life.”

“Ah, shit… I fucked up now, didn’t I?”, you swear you can hear his grin from the other end of the line. And see the laugh lines that form on the corner of his eyes when he smiles genuinely, the rare but so cute nose crinkle that makes your belly flutter…

You would love to get a fucking grip, thank you very much, but the wine was making you incapable of keeping a level head in this flirtation.

“Well… all is not lost. Taking me out to dinner is a good start to redeem yourself. If your game is on point tomorrow, your booty call list status might be revised… in the not-so-far future”, you add, suggestively.

“Shit. Now the stakes are on. I gotta be on my best behavior tomorrow, then”.

“I don’t know about best behavior…”. You feel like slapping yourself for your lack of subtlety.

He chuckles. “So… you like them a little nasty, huh?”

You’re glad he can’t see you blush furiously. “Not like that… but I do like a man who isn’t afraid to… take what he wants. Respectfully, of course.”

“Of course… damn, girl. You’re getting me thinking about all sorts of things…”

“Well, you’re the one who started talking about booty calls. It’s technically your fault”.

“That’s fucking rich. I was being a gentleman, sent you a sweet text and all. Not a single sex reference!”, he says, proudly.

“Ok, that is true”, you concede, laughing softly. “Are you still at the restaurant?”

He sighs deeply. “Yeah… paperwork coming out of my eyeballs. I don’t even understand how the hell I organized this mess”. You hear rustling through the line, and imagine the mess of letters, invoices and bills that must be covering his office desk.

“That fucking sucks”.

“Word”. His chair squeaks loudly. “So… what are you wearing?”

You laugh. “You’re unbelievable”.

“What? I’m just trying to keep the conversation light, you know? Nobody wants to hear about my fuckin’ paperwork at 3 am”.

It was subtle, but you could sense something deeper in his words (sadness? self-deprecation?).

“I wouldn’t mind hearing about your ‘fuckin’ paperwork’ at any time of day, Michael”.

The line goes silent, and you fear you went too deep, too soon. Made this weird in record time, wow.

“I didn’t mean it like… I meant if you want to talk to me about your shitty day, you know, you can, but I don’t want you to be uncomf-”

“Hey, hey, it’s okay sweetheart. I get it… thank you for that”, he says, softly. “Maybe some other time. Right now, I honestly just wanna forget about this for a little while... I was really pumped when you called”.

“That’s okay. Really?” You smile, relieved.

“Yeah, really. So… wanna make a guy happy and tell him what you’re wearing?”

With a chuckle, you concede. “Well, nothing. I’m in bed and I sleep naked, so… yeah”.

There’s a heavy pause. “Holy shit. Are you for real?”

“Um, yeah?”

“Jesus, fuck… baby, you can’t say stuff like that and expect me to be normal about it”.

You grin, having just decided that, actually, you wanna play dirty.

“Who says I want you to be normal about it? Besides”, you throw back, suggestively, “I hardly think a woman can be held accountable for what she says after four glasses of wine on a Thursday night… naked and alone, in such a big bed…”

“Now, see, that was a much better pitch for a booty call than the first o-”

“I’m gonna hang up.”

“No, no, no, I’m sorry”, he laughs.

“You’re an asshole”. Even as you say it, you’re smiling.

“And you are a minx, lady. Gettin’ a guy all worked up…”

“Oh, my... I don’t know what you mean…”, you whisper into the comforter, now balled up in your fist over your mouth, as if to cover up your blushing cheeks from an invisible audience.

“Oh, I disagree… I think you know exactly what you’re doing”. There’s a note of sarcasm in his voice you find exhilarating. A sudden noise – like a chair squeaking loudly on a panel floor – can be heard from his end. Followed by… a metallic rattle, more subtle but still clear. A… belt unbuckling?

Wait. Is he…?

You grin, amused. “Mr. Berzatto… I’m hearing suspicious noises. What is going on over there?”

A deep grunt. “Nothin’ much, sweetheart. Just making myself comfortable, is all”.

“And how exactly are you doing that, mister?”

“You know… freeing the junk.”

Your eyebrows shoot up. “Well, that certainly helps set the mood”.

“Hm… baby, can I ask you for something? It’s totally fine if you don’t wanna do it… but I figure I might as well shoot my shot.”

You notice you are sitting up very still against the pillows in your bed, holding your breath in anticipation. “Sure… what is it?”

A heavy pause follows. Your heart feels like it’s about to beat itself out of your ribcage, your throat feels dry, and your tongue sits heavy and thick in your mouth, the taste of wine suddenly overpowering your senses. And you are so horny.

“Could you… send me a photo of you right now? Are you wearing those new glasses?”. He sounds… eager, almost nervous with the way he trips over the second question.

Oh. Something clicks for you, then. You smile. “So, you really liked the new glasses, huh?”

“Shit… c’mon, don’t bust my balls about it”, he says, with an embarrassed chuckle of admission.

“I’m not! It’s very flattering, actually”. You hope you conveyed how much you are not making fun of him. However, you hate misunderstandings, and to dispel any that might be going on here, you decide there is only one acceptable solution.

“Give me a minute”, you tell him, determined. You don’t wait for an answer before you drop your phone and get to work.

Meanwhile, Mikey sits in his rusty office chair, in what he thinks must look like a very… undignified position. Cock out, right hand stroking it lazily, slumped back with his jeans barely down his ass, work shirt dirty and stinking of cooking oil, his entire body tense in a mix of anticipation and shame. A part of him can’t help but wonder if you are fucking with him: laughing from the other end of the line, leaving him hanging – literally and figuratively (he chuckles dejectedly at the realization that he still remembers something from high school Lit class). He guesses he would kinda deserve that. What type of freak asks for nudes after two… dates? Do those rapid-fire coffee-grabs even count? He is so shit at this. Anything more than a casual hook-up or a quickie behind a sleezy pub is rocket science for him. ‘Congrats, loser! You just fucked it, yet again’.

Then, his phone pings. 5 photos received.

In the first one, you are lying on your side, in bed, a dim warm light illuminating the scene. He can see the contours of your body clearly, despite being covered by a layer of nearly sheer white sheets. His gaze follows your exposed collarbone, to the silhouette of your breasts – he is sure you purposefully allowed a bit of side-boob to slip past the entrapment of sheets… just for him.

He swears he could stare at the shapes of your body all day and never get tired – or limp. His dick is throbbing painfully, now.

It does not get better when he sees the rest of the photos. Your face is visible, on those. The last two are his favorites. You are laying on your stomach, with the reading glasses on, as promised – except they sit lower on your nose than usual, so that your eyes peak out from over the top of the frames. Your hair is down, tousled and wild like it’s just gotten messed up. ‘Is this what she looks like after…’. You are holding a glass of wine to your mouth – lips plump and lightly tinged red – that detail drives him a little insane –, and in front of you lays a book, delicately held open with your other hand. And in the last photo, the sheets have slipped lower down your breasts, revealing a generous cleavage. You’re staring directly at the camera with an inquiring gaze, biting your lower lip. ‘Come get me’.

“… Mike? Are you still there?”

It’s been some time since you sent the photos (twenty seconds, which your anxiety tells you is actually half an hour), with no reaction from him. Your cheeks heat up, and you suddenly feel very silly and insecure. Are they even… good? What makes a good nude? Do these even qualify as nudes? You’re not showing anything super explicit… they’re suggestive, at best. Is he going to think you’re a prude? God, why is this so diff-

Mike clears his throat. “Yeah, I… fuck. Fuckin’ hell. Holy shit. Sweetheart… these are so hot. Jesus… thank you so much. You’re so fuckin’ gorgeous…”. The last part comes out as a whisper, like he’s starstruck.

You didn’t know it was possible to get more flustered than you already were. “You’re welcome… I’m flattered I managed to make Michael Berzatto incoherent over some low-res thirst trap selfies.”

“Baby, these are genuinely the hottest pics I’ve ever seen. You look like a hot librarian or something”.

You laugh out loud, triumphantly. “Ah! I knew it!”

“What?”, he laughs along.

“Something you wanna share with the class, Mr. Berzatto?”.

“Fuck, don’t stop calling me that, sweetheart”, he says, sounding out of breath.

“Yeah?”, you whisper.

“Fuck, yeah. It’s just… I’ve got a thing for girls with a kinda nerdy, librarian type of vibe, you know? And when I saw you this last time, holding a book and wearing your reading glasses… I gotta admit, my mind went straight to the gutter.”

Interesting. “Really? What did you imagine then?”.

A pause. “I’m not sure you want to hear it… I don’t want you thinking I’m a pervert or something”.

You sigh. “Mikey, I just sent you near-naked photos of me. We’re having phone sex. We are two horny adults having fun. Besides…”, you switch your tone to what you hope comes across as faux innocence, “… I asked you about it. It is kinda my fault, right? I guess I was kind of… bad”.

“Oh, is that what’s happening?”. He chuckles, as if saying challenge accepted. “Alright, then. When I saw you like that for the first time, this image popped into my head, right? I mean, you looked like a really hot librarian. So, I started picturing you in that scenario, with big glasses and all – just like the photos you sent me… except you had your hair in a cute ponytail, and your lips were even redder with lipstick… and you were wearing fishnet stockings up to your thighs – fuck, you got such nice legs, baby –, and you had a pair of those… what are they called. Uh, kitten heels. Yeah. Fuck, your ass would look unbelievable like that. I mean, it is unbelievable, you know what I mean? When you show up at the restaurant wearing those cute little dresses and skirts, I feel my dick twitching in my pants… that’s how hot you are, baby… that’s how crazy you make me feel.”

His words were streaming out like an avalanche – a filthy stream-of-consciousness. Flash images of all the times you were together pop into your mind. He was always nice and polite to you, if cheeky – that was his personality, after all. You’d never felt disrespected or threatened around him. Maybe that’s why, now that you knew he had been actively thinking about you like this… you were very turned on.

“Too much, sweetheart? You wanna keep listening to this filth?”

“… yeah, Mikey. Keep going. What happened then?”

“Then, I took you to a hidden corner in the library, rucked up your pretty little skirt and ripped your real nice dress shirt open… you know, so I could suck on your tits while I fucked you hard against some shelves. Didn’t even need to rip your panties off, ‘cause you weren’t wearing any. Just lifted you up and slammed my cock right into your pussy… God, you were drippin’ wet for me, and you mewled so sweetly… loud, too. Had to shove my fingers into your pretty mouth to keep you quiet. That’s what I imagined, sweetheart. More or less.”

The crass and vivid way in which he described his fantasy made you speechless. It was exhilarating. Knowing that all those times he had talked to you with a straight face, he had been actively fantasizing about fucking you hard. His words.

“Jesus Christ, Mikey”, you breathe out. “That’s… I can’t believe we had entire conversations while you had a cheap porn flick playing in your head”, you laugh softly, unconvincingly.

He sighed deeply. “See, I knew this was a bad idea… honey, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you feel like shit. I guess I’m just a fucking perv-”

“Babe…”, you interrupt him, gentle, but firm, “shut up, please. I’m messing with you. I told you, it’s very flattering that you’re attracted to me. In fact… it’s super hot. Knowing you were having all those dirty thoughts about me while still being a gentleman… is making me feel all kinds of things, right now.”

“Yeah? What kinds of things?”

“Good things, Mikey… I’m so wet right now”, you mewl, the need for release in your core overwhelming the embarrassment you would be feeling otherwise. Without thinking, you kick the sheets away from your body and cup one of your breasts, kneading it and flicking your nipple – a moan leaves your mouth in a desperate plea.

“Fuck”, he whispers, “you got wet over that filth? Jesus Christ, baby. I won the fuckin’ lottery”.

You are burning with desire, and you can feel your pussy throbbing when you finally give in, sliding one hand down and shoving two fingers inside with barely any resistance. “Mikey… I wanna come so bad. Can you talk me through it… please?”

“Fuck… yeah, sweetheart, anything you want”. He moans, then, and you don’t think you have ever been so turned on in your life. Mikey Berzatto, a horny, moaning mess, jerking off in his mess of an office at 3 am… because of you.

Chicago’s Helen of Troy. You chuckled softly at the thought and decided to up the ante. “Baby… do you know what I was thinking when you were telling that beautiful story just now?”

He laughs, voice recked. “What, baby?”

You pout, and add another finger in, increasing the pace of the thrusts. “I wish you had pictured kissing me real hard, while I unbuckled your belt… would you let me get down on my knees for you, baby? I really wanna have you in my mouth, Mikey, like, right now”. Your words come out broken, sentences all messed up – you sound pathetic, but you are so past caring.

“Shit-”, a gasp, followed by a deep breath and the noise of something hitting a surface really hard. “… holy shit. Baby, I imagined all that and a whole lot more – seriously, you have no idea. Hell, if the lady wants to suck my dick, who am I to deny her, uh? Fuck. Would you let me fuck your mouth, baby…?”

You moan loudly at that and realize you need both hands, putting the phone on speaker – fuck the neighbors – and bringing your other hand to your clit, rubbing lightly, but fast. You were so close. The thought of kneeling on the floor, clothes and hair all messed up from Mikey’s hands, lipstick smudged… looking up at him, and watching his composure unravel because of you…

“Hm… yeah, Mikey, I think I would… ‘cause you’re so nice to me… such a gentleman, even when you’re fucking me hard… would you ask me real nice, baby? Hold my face gently in your big hands, while you fuck it?”

“Fuck, baby… I would treat you so right, you deserve everything-”, he chokes up and, for a few moments, you hear a distant cacophony of noises, like he’s put the phone down. Then, he’s back. “Sorry, sweetheart, I need both hands now”, he chuckles.

You giggle, “Me too… you got me so hot I’m fucking myself on my fingers and rubbing my clit at the same time… and it’s still not enough. I need you…”

“Fuck, that’s so hot. You fuckin’ yourself because of me… I know it’s not enough, baby… you need my cock, don’t you?”

“Yes! Mikey… please…”, you howl, completely out of your mind.

“How do you want me to fuck you, baby? Hm? Want it nice and slow? Nah… I think you like it fast and rough, don’t you? Long as I keep kissing you real good, touchin’ you real gentle, all over your body… you’d let me do anything to you, wouldn’t you?”. How he manages to say such filthy things with so much honey dripping from every syllable, is beyond you.

“Yeah, fuck, baby… it doesn’t matter. I’m so wet already, you don’t need to do anything else, just hoist me up in your arms and pin me against the shelves… and shove it in me”.

You are still holding onto a shred of decency because you blush at your own crass admission – still, there is clearly not a whole lot left, as you start rubbing your clit and fucking yourself harder and faster. “I don’t want you to be gentle when you fuck me… I just need to feel your cock stretch me open… wanna feel the sting of it for days, be at work and not be able to focus because all I can think about is how you fucked me so good-”

At this point, you have no idea if he can understand anything you’re saying, because your words are intercut with moans and gasps and mewls and incoherent babble, as you’re about to reach your peak imagining Mikey’s on top of you, railing you into the bed.

“Baby, I’m gonna come… fuckin’ Christ”.

“Mikey- fuck!”.

Your body shakes and your eyes roll back from the strength of your orgasm. Distantly, your brain registers a broken string of moans and curses from the other end of the line.

A few seconds pass, and you feel yourself coming back down to Earth. You lazily stretch out on the bed, completely relaxed and fucked out. “That’s so cute… we came at the same time, babe”, you happily whisper, a ditsy smile on your face.

He huffs, amused “Yeah… what can I say? I’m a romantic at heart”.

You laugh sincerely. “This was… so good, actually. I’m glad I gave into my instinct and called you”.

“Well, I’m even more sticky now”. You both laugh at that. “But I’m also glad you called… like, really glad. Uh, can I ask you something?”

You notice a shift in his voice.

“Yeah… what is it?”

“I don’t want things to get weird between us after this… Like, I don’t want you to feel like you need to do all these things to get me off. You know what I mean? It’s just a fantasy… I’ll have you in any way you want me. Okay?”

You feel a tightness in your chest, and you wish, not for the first time tonight, you had him right in front of you so you could kiss him all over and hug him.

“Mikey… I genuinely liked tonight. And the more we talk, the more I like you. You’re not the only one who feels like you won the lottery…”.

“Baby… you’re too sweet. Don’t you think you already got me blushing enough for one night?”

“That’s fucking rich. I must’ve gone through all shades of red tonight, because of your filthy mouth”.

“Please. You loved it”, he chuckles.

“Yeah, I guess I did”, you concede, with a smile.

After saying goodbye – and confirming that yes, you would very much like for him to pick you up and take you to dinner later – you fall asleep fast, your mind finally catching up to the pleasant tiredness in your body, a soft smile on your lips.

#smut #michael berzatto x reader #michael berzatto #mikey berzatto x reader #mikey berzatto #mike berzatto x reader #mike berzatto #jon bernthal #the bear #the bear fx #the bear fic

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arlana-likes-to-write · 6 months

Text

Lightning Bug - Chapter 23

Masterlist

Warning: sleep deperivation, a form of self harm, gay panic

Word count: 2.3k

The ringing of a bell announced your arrival at Lucia’s store. “I’ll be right with you,” her voice traveled from the back of the store.

“Take your time; it’s just me,” you called out and headed to the history section. You wanted to add supplemental reading on the topic you and Vision started. He said you would have to complete a project so you thought it was a good idea to get head start. You enjoyed your lesson with Vision as he taught you about early civilizations in India. After your time with Vision, it was straight into the training room with Maria. She was…intense, for lack of a better word. She discovered your limit and pushed you to reach past it. It made sense why she was Nick’s right-hand woman. You were thankful for the peace of Lucia’s shop.

“Hello, mjia,” Lucia said, holding a stack of books. You took the top few from her.

“Hi, how are you?” You asked and began to put the books away. You missed working here, the mundane action and it was an excellent way to shut your brain off.

“Busy since my best employee left me for the Avengers,” she teased and returned to her desk. You rolled your eyes and followed her with the books you picked out in your hand.

“I was your only employee, senora,” you said. “You may need to hire someone.” She mumbled something in Spanish you missed. You bite your lip as you grab a notebook from a pile on her desk labeled ‘free.’ “Can I ask you something?”

“Of course, child,” you sighed, handing her the books you wanted to check out.

“Have you noticed anything weird going on in the neighborhood?” You asked. She looked at you curiously.

“Define weird,” you took the books from her and placed them in the bag you brought.

“Like people going missing and talking about me.” You quickly summarized. Lucia sighed, doing the sign of the cross across her chest. You should have kept your mouth shut.

“I noticed some regulars that usually show up on Tuesday meetings haven’t been around,” you frowned. Every Tuesday night, Lucia held events for people experiencing homelessness in the community. You could study, get help with resumes, or have a quiet place to be.

“I’m guessing the police don’t care, right?” She nodded. That was typical. The NYPD never cared about you or the others who lived on the street. “Thank you. If you hear anything else, let me know.”

“I will, but be careful,” she said. “I fear something dark is coming our way.”

You took the notebook from Lucia and threw the bag onto the floor. With a sigh, you climbed into bed. There was so much information running through your head. The weird warning by Caesar and Lucia noticed people disappearing. What was going on? You began to write everything in the notebook and how you were connected to all of this.

None of it made sense. You were a nobody. People recognized you because of your appearance or saw you as an easy target. You were someone now because the Avengers took you in. You bite the end of the pencil. If it had to do with the Avengers, why target you?

“Miss. Y/n,” Friday said. “Just as a reminder, you have a meeting with Mr. Stark and Mr. Banner.” You sighed and stood up, placing the notebook underneath your pillow. The last thing you wanted was to have a math lesson, but you packed your bag and headed for the lab.

“Is everything okay?” Pepper asked, causing you to look up from the tablet you were working on. After math, it was your internship with Pepper. Math was well math. Bruce and Tony made it enjoyable, but you still needed clarification. Once you were done, you stopped in the kitchen for a snack and walked to Pepper’s office. She explained that your internship would include a lot of the work you were already plus attending some meetings to take minutes and designing presentations. “You’ve been oddly quiet.” You sighed and tapped your thumbs against the screen.

“I went to see Lucia, the owner of a bookstore I used to go to a lot,” you started. “She said many of the regulars that go to weekly events haven’t shown up. No one knows where they are,” she frowned and closed her laptop.

“Have they reported it to the police?” You rolled your eyes with a huff.

“The police don’t care about us,” you admitted. “Besides, it’s hard to report a missing person when people come and go so much. There was a guy named Larry; he would disappear for 5 months, then come back and act like nothing happened.” The CEO sighed, folding her hands on top of her desk.

“Well, I’ll talk to Tony. Maybe he can put some pressure on the local police.” You stared at the CEO, blinking once, then twice. You weren’t sure what would come of it telling Pepper, but getting the Avengers involved was not it.

“Tony probably has other things going on,” you said, trying to deter from involving the billionaire. “More important things.” You added to prevent her from asking him.

“The Avengers are here to help people,” she stated. “Especially those in our backyard,” she smiled and reopened her laptop. “Do you care about this?” You were a little surprised by the question. You nodded; even though they weren’t the nicest to you, they were still people. And these people had someone who cared about them. “Then it’s settled. I’ll talk to Tony tomorrow.” You smiled.

“Thank you, Pepper.”

“Don’t mention it,” she smirked. “Now, get back to work,” she teased. You giggled and got back to work. If the Avengers were involved, you could get more than answers on where all these people were going. Could you figure out what else was going on?

You stared up at the ceiling, hands behind your head and music softly playing from the Walkman. Dinner was filled with questions about your first day of ‘school’, then Natasha and Wanda ensured all your homework was done before you went to bed. However, sleep was not going to happen. You couldn’t turn off your brain. You kept reliving the past few days. Turning off the music, you quietly left your room. Once again, your socked-covered feet led you to the training room. Like clockwork, you uncovered the machine and ensured empty batteries were ready to charge.

You faced the machine head-on and felt the electricity dance around your fingertips, but you refused to release it. Inside, you let the electricity grow and felt the warmth that radiated off of it. For the longest time, that warmth scared you. You associated that warmth with a punishment, but now you like it. It was another reminder that you were free.

You shot your hand forward and released the charge until the batteries were full. You repeated the process until your body began to feel tired, and your mind was blanketed. You knew you would sleep through the night.

Unfortunately, you felt stuck in a cycle. Classes, training, homework, and your nightly visit to the machine so you could get sleep. Was it healthy? Yes? At least you weren’t yourself. You were depleting your powers to force your mind into a dreamless sleep. There was no danger to your hippocampus, and you used your powers to help others.

On the fifth day of this self-made schedule, you were running on empty. Every word Vision was saying about the ancient world wasn’t registering. Your brain was mush. “Miss. Y/n,” you jerked awake at the conversation change. The man was smiling. “That’s the third time you’ve fallen asleep. Is the caste system of Ancient India not entertaining enough for you?” He teased.

“No, it is,” you defended. “And you are doing a great job. I just-“Vision chuckled, closing the book. “You are mean.”

“Go get some rest,” he said. “I’ll speak with the others and cancel your lessons for the day.” Oh, you could give him the biggest hug.

“You are amazing,” you shoved your books into your backpack. “Thank you so much!”

“Your health is more important than a civilization that’s been long gone,” you giggled, thanked him again, and took the elevator to your floor. It was thankfully empty as you made a beeline for your room. Throwing your backpack on the ground, you flopped onto the bed and fell fast asleep.

Persistent knocking on your door woke you up. You groaned, rubbing the sleep out of your eyes. “Come in,” you called out, not bothering to sit up. When the door opened, you saw America walk into your room. You rolled over to make room as she ran and jumped on your bed.

“Hi,” she said.

“Hi,” you closed your eyes. “I was sleeping.”

“I know,” she giggled. Unbelievable. “But you’ve been so busy we haven’t hung out, so when Vision told me you were excused from your lessons, I came running,” you opened your eyes, and her head was turned to look at you. “Hi,” America smiled.

“You are a dork,” you said, rolling on your back and ignoring how your stomach flipped. “So what do you have in mind?” The bed shifted as you heard her get up. She grabbed your hand and pulled you into a sitting position. The smile she wore now was bigger, a little mischievous. “America,” you said slowly.

“Do you trust me?” She asked. You sighed, nodding your head.

“Yeah, I trust you.” She jumped from your bed and crackled your knuckles. Oh boy. Her eyes began to glow a light blue, a similar color and look to your electricity. You scrambled off your bed as she punched at your wall. A giant star formed, matching the style of some of her clothes. What surprised you was you saw people walking around - going about their day-to-day life as if a star wasn’t right next to them.

“Is this a portal-”

“To the multiverse?” You nodded. “Yeah, it is,” she held out her hand. “I did ask if you trusted me.” You laughed, took her hand, and allowed her to pull you through the portal. It closed behind you, and you were on a sidewalk similar to New York City. Nothing seemed out of place.

“Are you sure-” You saw cars flying in the sky. Your jaw dropped. “How is this possible?”

“It’s the multiverse, silly,” she dragged you down the sidewalk, where you saw inventions from every sci-fi book you’ve read - flying cars, hoverboards, and hologram phones. “Christianity never existed here,” she pulled you closer so she could whisper. “So the Dark Age never occurred, and humanity is 1000 years more advanced.”

“This is-” You were struggling to find a word to describe everything happening around you.

“I know,” she squeezed your hand. “It’s kind of crazy, but you get used to it.” You were curious to know if you would ever get used to it. “Let’s go get some food and explore.”

While you ate ‘pizza,’ you were curious if they called it something else here; America gave you the rules of multiverse travel. The biggest thing was not to cause an incursion - when the boundary between two universes erodes, and they collide, destroying one or both. When asked how to avoid that, America said it occurs with prolonged travel within the multiverse. “So we won’t stay long,” she took your hand and rang out of the restaurant.

Something about spending time with America outside the tower was different. She was always smiling around the others, but her smile was unlike her usual smile. It wasn’t as large and softer - she seemed happier. Was it because she was using her powers so freely? Or was it because it was just you and her? No team. No prying eyes. But no, you couldn’t think like that. America deserved someone better than you. Someone who wasn’t broken, scarred, and haunted so profoundly by their past. It was unfair to her.

“Y/n!” She yelled your name, and suddenly, her body crashed into yours, and you began to fall. Your back never made contact with the concrete sidewalk instead you saw the outline of her star as you fell into another timeline. You knew something was wrong by the way America held onto you; bruises were going to form on your arms.

Each time you expected to stop falling, the ground never came. Your stomach was flipping as you flew between different portals. It was never-ending as the world kept changing around you. For a split second, it was black and white, then hand-drawn. Were you in a jungle? You weren’t sure, but you wanted it to stop! You felt the grip America had on you loosen as she pushed you forward.

Time slowed down as you flipped through space and headed toward a portal. “America!” You yelled for her. It was impossible to control your body as you flew through the portal. You expected to keep falling, but your back hit a hard wooden floor - the air was knocked out of your lungs. Coughing a few times, another portal appeared above you, and you rolled out of the way before America landed on you.

“Thanks for breaking my fall,” she groaned. You sat up, rubbing the back of your head. The world was still spinning, and you felt sick to your stomach.

“Where are we?” You were sitting at the bottom of a tall staircase. The floor was wooden with a circular design, and you liked the blue. You saw a few areas to sit at. America sat up quickly, eyes wide and the color draining from her face.

“The where is subjective,” a mysterious voice said. “But I do know you are in a lot of trouble.”

taglist: @aestruvx, @toouncreativeforausername, @modedddd, @julilamoment, @mythixmagic, @yourmamacom, @vicmc624, @cherlenovix, @liliesandrosies, @whitewidowsbite, @clintsbigtoe, @blackbirdv98@arualdcg@yoyo-w @natbelovasblog, @johnnyhulu, @blackwidow-3, @theenglishswiftie, @faith-olsen

#lightning bug #wandanat x reader #wandanat x daughter!reader #wandanat x y/n #wandanat x you #america chavez x reader #america chavez x you #america chavez x y/n

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bfpnola · 8 months

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The Iron Wall by Ze’ev Jabotinsky (1923), Zionist leader and founder of the Jewish Self-Defense Organization.

context: i am sharing this so that we can take note to a pioneering zionist calling the ideology a form of colonization by name. this should not a be point of contention when the father of political zionism, theodore herzl, has done the same as well. see below:

ID: “The Iron Wall

Original in Russian, Razsviet, 4.11.1923

Colonisation of Palestine

Agreement with Arabs Impossible at present

Zionism Must Go Forward

It is an excellent rule to begin an article with the most important point. But this time, I find it necessary to begin with an introduction, and, moreover, with a personal introduction.

I am reputed to be an enemy of the Arabs, who wants to have them ejected from Palestine, and so forth. It is not true.

Emotionally, my attitude to the Arabs is the same as to all other nations - polite indifference. Politically, my attitude is determined by two principles. First of all, I consider it utterly impossible to eject the Arabs from Palestine. There will always be two nations in Palestine - which is good enough for me, provided the Jews become the majority. And secondly, I belong to the group that once drew up the Helsingfors Programme, the programme of national rights for all nationalities living in the same State. In drawing up that programme, we had in mind not only the Jews. but all nations everywhere, and its basis is equality of rights.

I am prepared to take an oath binding ourselves and our descendants that we shall never do anything contrary to the principle of equal rights, and that we shall never try to eject anyone. This seems to me a fairly peaceful credo.

But it is quite another question whether it is always possible to realise a peaceful aim by peaceful means. For the answer to this question does not depend on our attitude to the Arabs; but entirely on the attitude of the Arabs to us and to Zionism.” End ID

ID: “Now, after this introduction, we may proceed to the subject.

Voluntary Agreement Not Possible.

There can be no voluntary agreement between ourselves and the Palestine Arabs. Not now, nor in the prospective future. I say this with such conviction, not because I want to hurt the moderate Zionists. I do not believe that they will be hurt.

Except for those who were born blind, they realised long ago that it is utterly impossible to obtain the voluntary consent of the Palestine Arabs for converting

"Palestine" from an Arab country into a country with a Jewish majority.

My readers have a general idea of the history of colonisation in other countries.

I suggest that they consider all the precedents with which they are acquainted, and see whether there is one solitary instance of any colonisation being carried on with the consent of the native population. There is no such precedent.

The native populations, civilised or uncivilised, have always stubbornly resisted the colonists, irrespective of whether they were civilised or savage.

And it made no difference whatever whether the colonists behaved decently or not.

The companions of Cortez and Pizzaro or (as some people will remind us) our own ancestors under Joshua Ben Nun, behaved like brigands; but the Pilgrim Fathers, the first real pioneers of North America, were people of the highest morality, who did not want to do harm to anyone, least of all to the Red Indians, and they honestly believed that there was room enough in the prairies both for the Paleface and the Redskin. Yet the native population fought with the same ferocity against the good colonists as against the bad.

Every native population, civilised or not, regards its lands as its national home, of which it is the sole master, and it wants to retain that mastery always; it will refuse to admit not only new masters but, even new partners or collaborators.” End ID.

ID: “Arabs Not Fools

This is equally true of the Arabs. Our Peace-mongers are trying to persuade us that the Arabs are either fools, whom we can deceive by masking our real aims, or that they are corrupt and can be bribed to abandon to us their claim to priority in Palestine, in return for cultural and economic advantages. I repudiate this conception of the Palestinian Arabs. Culturally they are five hundred years behind us, they have neither our endurance nor our determination; but they are just as good psychologists as we are, and their minds have been sharpened like ours by centuries of fine-spun logomachy. We may tell them whatever we like about the innocence of our aims, watering them down and sweetening them with honeyed words to make them palatable, but they know what we want, as well as we know what they do not want.

They feel at least the same instinctive jealous love of Palestine, as the old Aztecs felt for ancient Mexico, and their Sioux for their rolling Prairies.

To imagine, as our Arabophiles do, that they will voluntarily consent to the realisation of Zionism. In return for the moral and material conveniences which the Jewish colonist brings with him, is a childish notion, which has at bottom a kind of contempt for the Arab people; it means that they despise the Arab race, which they regard as a corrupt mob that can be bought and sold, and are willing to give up their fatherland for a good railway system.

All Natives Resist Colonists

There is no justification for such a belief. It may be that some individual Arabs take bribes. But that does not mean that the Arab people of Palestine as a whole will sell that fervent patriotism that they guard so jealously, and which even the Papuans will never sell. Every native population in the world resists colonists as long as it has the slightest hope of being able to rid itself of the danger of being colonised.” End ID.

ID: “That is what the Arabs in Palestine are doing, and what they will persist in doing as long as there remains a solitary spark of hope that they will be able to prevent the transformation of "Palestine" into the "Land of Israel."

Arab Comprehension

Some of us have induced ourselves to believe that all the trouble is due to misunderstanding - the Arabs have not understood us, and that is the only reason why they resist us if we can only make it clear to them how moderate our intentions really are, they will immediately extend to us their hand in friendship.

This belief is utterly unfounded and it has been exploded again and again. I shall recall only one instance of many. A few years ago, when the late Mr. Sokolow was on one of his periodic visits to Palestine, he addressed a meeting on this very question of the "misunderstanding." He demonstrated lucidly and convincingly that the Arabs are terribly mistaken if they think that we have any desire to deprive them of their possessions or to drive them our of the country, or that we want to oppress them. We do not even ask for a Jewish Government to hold the Mandate of the League of Nations.

One of the Arab papers, "El Carmel," replied at the time, in an editorial article, the purport of which was this:

The Zionists are making a fuss about nothing. There is no misunderstanding.

All that Mr. Sokolow says about the Zionist intentions is true, but the Arabs know that without him. Of course, the Zionists cannot now be thinking of driving the Arabs out of the country, or oppressing them, not do they contemplate a Jewish Government. Quite obviously, they are now concerned with one thing only- that the Arabs should not hinder their immigration. The Zionists assure us that even immigration will be regulated strictly according to the economic needs of Palestine. The Arabs have never doubted that: it is a truism, for otherwise there can be no immigration.” End ID.

ID: “No "Misunderstanding"

This Arab editor was actually willing to agree that Palestine has a very large potential absorptive capacity, meaning that there is room for a great many Jews in the country without displacing a single Arab. There is only one thing the Zionists want, and it is that one thing that the Arabs do not want, for that is the way by which the Jews would gradually become the majority, and then a Jewish Government would follow automatically, and the future of the Arab minority would depend on the goodwill of the Jews; and a minority status is not a good thing, as the Jews themselves are never tired of pointing out. So there is no "misunderstanding".

The Zionists want only one thing, Jewish immigration; and this Jewish immigration is what the Arabs do not want.

This statement of the position by the Arab editor is so logical, so obvious, so indisputable, that everyone ought to know it by heart, and it should be made the basis of all our future discussions on the Arab question. It does not matter at all which phraseology we employ in explaining our colonising aims, Herzl's or Sir Herbert Samuel's.

Colonisation carries its own explanation, the only possible explanation, unalterable and as clear as daylight to every ordinary Jew and every ordinary Arab.

Colonisation can have only one aim, and Palestine Arabs cannot accept this aim. It lies in the very nature of things, and in this particular regard nature cannot be changed.

The Iron Wall

We cannot offer any adequate compensation to the Palestinian Arabs in return for Palestine. And therefore, there is no likelihood of any voluntary agreement being reached. So that all those who regard such an agreement as a condition sine qua non for Zionism may as well say "non" and withdraw from Zionism.” End ID.

ID: “Zionist colonisation must either stop, or else proceed regardless of the native population. Which means that it can proceed and develop only under the protection of a power that is independent of the native population - behind an iron wall, which the native population cannot breach.

That is our Arab policy; not what we should be, but what it actually is, whether we admit it or not. What need, otherwise, of the Balfour Declaration? Or of the Mandate? Their value to us is that outside Power has undertaken to create in the country such conditions of administration and security that if the native population should desire to hinder our work, they will find it impossible.

And we are all of us, without any exception, demanding day after day that this outside Power, should carry out this task vigorously and with determination.

In this matter there is no difference between our "militarists" and our

"vegetarians". Except that the first prefer that the iron wall should consist of Jewish soldiers, and the others are content that they should be British.

We all demand that there should be an iron wall. Yet we keep spoiling our own case, by talking about agreement" which means telling the Mandatory Government that the important thing is not the iron wall, but discussions. Empty rhetoric of this kind is dangerous. And that is why it is not only a pleasure but a duty to discredit it and to demonstrate that it is both fantastic and dishonest.

Zionism Moral and Just

Two brief remarks:

In the first place, if anyone objects that this point of view is immoral, I answer: It is not true: either Zionism is moral and just ,or it is immoral and unjust.

But that is a question that we should have settled before we became Zionists.

Actually we have settled that question, and in the affirmative.” End ID.

ID: “We hold that Zionism is moral and just. And since it is moral and just, justice must be done, no matter whether Joseph or Simon or Ivan or Achmet agree with it or not.

There is no other morality.

Eventual Agreement

In the second place, this does not mean that there cannot be any agreement with the Palestine Arabs. What is impossible is a voluntary agreement. As long as the Arabs feel that there is the least hope of getting rid of us, they will refuse to give up this hope in return for either kind words or for bread and butter, because they are not a rabble, but a living people. And when a living people yields in matters of such a vital character it is only when there is no longer any hope of getting rid of us, because they can make no breach in the iron wall. Not till then will they drop their extremist leaders whose watchword is "Never!" And the leadership will pass to the moderate groups, who will approach us with a proposal that we should both agree to mutual concessions. Then we may expect them to discuss honestly practical questions, such as a guarantee against Arab displacement, or equal rights for Arab citizen, or Arab national integrity.

And when that happens, I am convinced that we Jews will be found ready to give them satisfactory guarantees, so that both peoples can live together in peace, like good neighbours.

But the only way to obtain such an agreement, is the iron wall, which is to say a strong power in Palestine that is not amenable to any Arab pressure. In other words, the only way to reach an agreement in the future is to abandon all idea of seeking an agreement at present.” End ID.

#reaux speaks #resources #anti zionism #colonialism #decolonization #colonization #israel #jabotinsky #history #palestine #discrimination #arab #indigenous #land back #native #zionism #jewish #jumblr #free palestine

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blessedarethebinarybreakers · 3 months

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Wrestling with the Bible's war stories

Spend any solid amount of time with scripture and you'll run into something that perplexes, disturbs, or downright horrifies you. Many of us have walked away from the Bible or from Christianity in general, sometimes temporarily and sometimes permanently, after encountering these stories. So how do we face them, wrestle them, and seek God's presence in (or in spite of) them?

In her book Inspired: Slaying Giants, Walking on Water, and Loving the Bible Again, the late Rachel Held Evans spends a whole chapter on the "war stories" of Joshua, Judges, and the books of Samuel and Kings. She starts with how most teachers in her conservative Christian upbringing shut her down every time she tried to name the horror she felt reading of violence, rape, and ethnic cleansing; I share an excerpt from that part of the chapter over in this post.

That excerpt ends with Evans deciding that she needed to grapple with these stories, or lose her faith entirely.

...But then I ended the excerpt, with the hope that folks would go read all of Inspired for themselves — and I still very much recommend doing so! The whole book is incredibly helpful for relearning how to read scripture in a way that honors its historical context and divine inspiration, and takes seriously how misreadings bring harm to individuals and whole people groups.

But I know not everyone will read the book, for a variety of reasons, and that's okay. So I want to include a long excerpt from the rest of the chapter, where Evans provides cultural context and history that helps us understand why those war stories are in there; and then seeks to find where God's inspiration is among those "human fingerprints."

I know how important it was to Rachel Held Evans that all of us experience healing and liberation, so it is my hope that she'd be okay with me pasting such a huge chunk of the book for reading here. If you find what's in this post meaningful, please do check out the rest of her book! A lot of libraries have it in print, ebook, and/or audiobook form.

[One last comment: the following excerpt focuses on these war stories from the Hebrew scriptures ("Old Testament"), but there are violent and otherwise disturbing stories in the "New Testament" too, from Herod killing babies to all the wild things going on in Revelation. Don't fall for the antisemitic claim that "The Old Testament is violent while the New Testament is all about peace!" All parts of scripture include violent passages, and maintain an overarching theme of justice and love.]

Here's the excerpt showing Rachel's long wrestling with the Bible's war stories, starting with an explanation for why they're in there in the first place:

“By the time many of the Bible’s war stories were written down, several generations had passed, and Israel had evolved from a scrappy band of nomads living in the shadows of Babylon, Egypt, and Assyria to a nation that could hold its own, complete with a monarchy. Scripture embraces that underdog status in order to credit God with Israel’s success and to remind a new generation that “some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the LORD our God” (Psalm 20:7). The story of David and Goliath, in which a shepherd boy takes down one of those legendary Canaanite giants with just a slingshot and two stones, epitomizes Israel’s self-understanding as a humble people improbably beloved, victorious only by the grace and favor of a God who rescued them from Egypt, walked with them through the desert, brought the walls of Jericho down, and made that shepherd boy a king. To reinforce the miraculous nature of Israel’s victories, the writers of Joshua and Judges describe forces of hundreds defeating armies of thousands with epic totality. These numbers are likely exaggerated and, in keeping literary conventions of the day, rely more on drama and bravado than the straightforward recitation of fact. Those of us troubled by language about the “extermination” of Canaanite populations may find some comfort in the fact that scholars and archaeologists doubt the early skirmishes of Israel’s history actually resulted in genocide.

It was common for warring tribes in ancient Mesopotamia to refer to decisive victories as “complete annihilation” or “total destruction,” even when their enemies lived to fight another day. (The Moabites, for example, claimed in an extrabiblical text that after their victory in a battle against an Israelite army, the nation of Israel “utterly perished for always,” which obviously isn’t the case. And even in Scripture itself, stories of conflicts with Canaanite tribes persist through the book of Judges and into Israel’s monarchy, which would suggest Joshua’s armies did not in fact wipe them from the face of the earth, at least not in a literal sense.)

Theologian Paul Copan called it “the language of conventional warfare rhetoric,” which “the knowing ancient Near Eastern reader recognized as hyperbole.” Pastor and author of The Skeletons in God’s Closet, Joshua Ryan Butler, dubbed it “ancient trash talk.”

Even Jericho, which twenty-first-century readers like to imagine as a colorful, bustling city with walls that reached the sky, was in actuality a small, six-acre military outpost, unlikely to support many civilians but, as was common, included a prostitute and her family. Most of the “cities” described in the book of Joshua were likely the same. So, like every culture before and after, Israel told its war stories with flourish, using the language and literary conventions that best advanced the agendas of storytellers.

As Peter Enns explained, for the biblical writers, “Writing about the past was never simply about understanding the past for its own sake, but about shaping, molding and creating the past to speak to the present.”

“The Bible looks the way it does,” he concluded, “because God lets his children tell the story.”

You see the children’s fingerprints all over the pages of Scripture, from its origin stories to its deliverance narratives to its tales of land, war, and monarchy.

For example, as the Bible moves from conquest to settlement, we encounter two markedly different accounts of the lives of Kings Saul, David, and Solomon and the friends and enemies who shaped their reigns. The first appears in 1 and 2 Samuel and 1 and 2 Kings. These books include all the unflattering details of kingdom politics, including the account of how King David had a man killed so he could take the man’s wife, Bathsheba, for himself.

On the other hand, 1 and 2 Chronicles omit the story of David and Bathsheba altogether, along with much of the unseemly violence and drama around the transition of power between David and Solomon.

This is because Samuel and Kings were likely written during the Babylonian exile, when the people of Israel were struggling to understand what they had done wrong for God to allow their enemies to overtake them, and 1 and 2 Chronicles were composed much later, after the Jews had returned to the land, eager to pick up the pieces.

While the authors of Samuel and Kings viewed the monarchy as a morality tale to help them understand their present circumstances, the authors of the Chronicles recalled the monarchy with nostalgia, a reminder of their connection to God’s anointed as they sought healing and unity. As a result, you get two noticeably different takes on the very same historic events.

In other words, the authors of Scripture, like the authors of any other work (including this one!), wrote with agendas. They wrote for a specific audience from a specific religious, social, and political context, and thus made creative decisions based on that audience and context.

Of course, this raises some important questions, like: Can war stories be inspired? Can political propaganda be God-breathed? To what degree did the Spirit guide the preservation of these narratives, and is there something sacred to be uncovered beneath all these human fingerprints?

I don’t know the answers to all these questions, but I do know a few things.

The first is that not every character in these violent stories stuck with the script. After Jephthah sacrificed his daughter as a burnt offering in exchange for God’s aid in battle, the young women of Israel engaged in a public act of grief marking the injustice. The text reports, “From this comes the Israelite tradition that each year the young women of Israel go out for four days to commemorate the daughter of Jephthah” (Judges 11:39–40).

While the men moved on to fight another battle, the women stopped to acknowledge that something terrible had happened here, and with what little social and political power they had, they protested—every year for four days. They refused to let the nation forget what it had done in God’s name.

In another story, a woman named Rizpah, one of King Saul’s concubines, suffered the full force of the monarchy’s cruelty when King David agreed to hand over two of her sons to be hanged by the Gibeonites in an effort to settle a long, bloody dispute between the factions believed to be the cause of widespread famine across the land. A sort of biblical Antigone, Rizpah guarded her sons’ bodies from birds and wild beasts for weeks, until at last the rain came and they could be buried. Word of her tragic stand spread across the kingdom and inspired David to pause to grieve the violence his house had wrought (2 Samuel 21).” ...

The point is, if you pay attention to the women, a more complex history of Israel’s conquests emerges. Their stories invite the reader to consider the human cost of violence and patriarchy, and in that sense prove instructive to all who wish to work for a better world. ...

It’s not always clear what we are meant to learn from the Bible’s most troubling stories, but if we simply look away, we learn nothing.

In one of the most moving spiritual exercises of my adult faith, an artist friend and I created a liturgy of lament honoring the victims of the texts of terror. On a chilly December evening, we sat around the coffee table in my living room and lit candles in memory of Hagar, Jephthah’s daughter, the concubine from Judges 19, and Tamar, the daughter of King David who was raped by her half brother. We read their stories, along with poetry and reflections composed by modern-day women who have survived gender-based violence. ...

If the Bible’s texts of terror compel us to face with fresh horror and resolve the ongoing oppression and exploitation of women, then perhaps these stories do not trouble us in vain. Perhaps we can use them for some good.

The second thing I know is that we are not as different from the ancient Israelites as we would like to believe.

“It was a violent and tribal culture,” people like to say of ancient Israel to explain away its actions in Canaan. But, as Joshua Ryan Butler astutely observed, when it comes to civilian casualties, “we tend to hold the ancients to a much higher standard than we hold ourselves.” In the time it took me to write this chapter, nearly one thousand civilians were killed in airstrikes in Iraq and Syria, many of them women and children. The atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki took hundreds of thousands of lives in World War II, and far more civilians died in the Korean War and Vietnam War than American soldiers. Even though America is one of the wealthiest countries in the world, it takes in less than half of 1 percent of the world’s refugees, and drone warfare has left many thousands of families across the Middle East terrorized.

This is not to excuse Israel’s violence, because modern-day violence is also bad, nor is it to trivialize debates over just war theory and US involvement in various historical conflicts, which are complex issues far beyond the scope of this book. Rather, it ought to challenge us to engage the Bible’s war stories with a bit more humility and introspection, willing to channel some of our horror over atrocities past into questioning elements of the war machines that still roll on today.

Finally, the last thing I know is this: If the God of the Bible is true, and if God became flesh and blood in the person of Jesus Christ, and if Jesus Christ is—as theologian Greg Boyd put it—“the revelation that culminates and supersedes all others,” then God would rather die by violence than commit it.

The cross makes this plain. On the cross, Christ not only bore the brunt of human cruelty and bloodlust and fear, he remained faithful to the nonviolence he taught and modeled throughout his ministry. Boyd called it “the Crucifixion of the Warrior God,” and in a two-volume work by that name asserted that “on the cross, the diabolic violent warrior god we have all-too-frequently pledged allegiance to has been forever repudiated.” On the cross, Jesus chose to align himself with victims of suffering rather than the inflictors of it.

At the heart of the doctrine of the incarnation is the stunning claim that Jesus is what God is like. “No one has ever seen God,” declared John in his gospel, “but the one and only Son, who is himself God and is in closest relationship with the Father, has made him known” (John 1:18, emphasis added). ...So to whatever extent God owes us an explanation for the Bible’s war stories, Jesus is that explanation. And Christ the King won his kingdom without war.

Jesus turned the war story on its head. Instead of being born to nobility, he was born in a manger, to an oppressed people in occupied territory. Instead of charging into Jerusalem on a warhorse, he arrived on a lumbering donkey. Instead of rallying troops for battle, he washed his disciples’ feet. According to the apostle Paul, these are the tales followers of Jesus should be telling—with our words, with our art, and with our lives.

Of course, this still leaves us to grapple with the competing biblical portraits of God as the instigator of violence and God as the repudiator of violence.

Boyd argued that God serves as a sort of “heavenly missionary” who temporarily accommodates the brutal practices and beliefs of various cultures without condoning them in order to gradually influence God’s people toward justice. Insofar as any divine portrait reflects a character at odds with the cross, he said, it must be considered accommodation. It’s an interesting theory, though I confess I’m only halfway through Boyd’s 1,492 pages, so I’ve yet to fully consider it. (I know I can’t read my way out of this dilemma, but that won’t keep me from trying.)

The truth is, I’ve yet to find an explanation for the Bible’s war stories that I find completely satisfying. If we view this through Occam’s razor and choose the simplest solution to the problem, we might conclude that the ancient Israelites invented a deity to justify their conquests and keep their people in line. As such, then, the Bible isn’t a holy book with human fingerprints; it’s an entirely human construction, responsible for more vice than virtue.

There are days when that’s what I believe, days when I mumble through the hymns and creeds at church because I’m not convinced they say anything true. And then there are days when the Bible pulls me back with a numinous force I can only regard as divine, days when Hagar and Deborah and Rahab reach out from the page, grab me by the face, and say, “Pay attention. This is for you.”

I’m in no rush to patch up these questions. God save me from the day when stories of violence, rape, and ethnic cleansing inspire within me anything other than revulsion. I don’t want to become a person who is unbothered by these texts, and if Jesus is who he says he is, then I don’t think he wants me to be either.

There are parts of the Bible that inspire, parts that perplex, and parts that leave you with an open wound. I’m still wrestling, and like Jacob, I will wrestle until I am blessed. God hasn’t let go of me yet.

War is a dreadful and storied part of the human experience, and Scripture captures many shades of it—from the chest-thumping of the victors to the anguished cries of victims. There is ammunition there for those seeking religious justification for violence, and solidarity for all the mothers like Rizpah who just want an end to it.

For those of us who prefer to keep the realities of war at a safe, sanitized distance, and who enjoy the luxury of that choice, the Bible’s war stories force a confrontation with the darkness.

Maybe that’s not such a bad thing.

#joshua #biblical interpretation #texts of terror #rachel held evans #inspired #wrestling god #reading and studying the bible #bible tag #long post #quote tag

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enduringmoth · 7 months

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thoughts on marvin's abuse, care's existence and paul's transness

taking a break from my usual bg3 posting to talk a little bit about my newer hyperfixation through the lens of queer allegory

necessary author's note: i am an afab transmasculine nonbinary person. obviously, while i do believe my transness does lend my opinion authenticity, at the same time, being trans myself does not mean i can't be transphobic -- so if any of the contents of this post set off alarm bells, please tell me.

trigger & content warnings: child abuse, kidnapping, torture, general petscop badness. obvious spoilers for petscop in its entirety, as well as references to the recent youtube deepdive by nexpo.

TL;DR -- perpetuating the idea that someone can force someone else to be a different gender than they are is harmful to trans people. however, all things involve considerable nuance. to pretend that marvin's actions could not have influenced paul's sense of self in the slightest discredits paul's lived experiences, and i believe a more trauma-informed dialogue about paul could be worth exploring as a community.

my preferred theory explaining petscop is that marvin tried to make care more like lina through abuse and "failed". after this, care would eventually end up in lina's home, and transition to paul.

(simply to make all of this less confusing, i'm going to call paul pretransition "care", though i will avoid pronouns. this is not me trying to invalidate paul, it's just so i don't have to keep saying "paul before he transitioned" or similar phrases.)

it is not a result of marvin's "failure" that care transitioned to paul. but i do believe there is a link between paul's perceptions of self and the trauma he endured pretransition -- and discussing these things gives us a deeper understanding of paul and his history.

obviously there is no "canon" answer to petscop. but im seeing this theory discussed a lot within the tags, and i personally agree with it -- i just feel some of those who are saying we cannot consider marvin's actions are not necessarily accurate, either.

what i am positing is that while marvin certainly did not make paul trans and i would never claim that he did, we understand that marvin's abuse of care -- his cruelty towards care, his warping of care's perception of appearance and self-worth -- is certainly a factor in how paul must see himself.

marvin's treatment of care was poor enough that paul struggles to recall that time of his life. he thinks they are different people -- and in a way, they certainly are (and i've seen DID theories for them which i also enjoy because of this) -- and has clearly repressed what it meant to be marvin's child.

marvin locked care in a basement for six months. that is no small amount of time, and it likely had no small amount of affect on paul. we can assume based on the implications of some school scenes that marvin was trying to convince care to be more like lina during this time. care escaped, and returned home -- though eventually, we know from belle's dialogue that paul would find his way to lina.

"do you remember the day you were born?"

paul's "birth" occurred after marvin's abuse, and though it was not a result of it, there is something almost poetic about following the thread of paul's life from care to his authentic self that plays as a foil to the heinous rebirthing practiced by marvin and rainer.

contrasted with what happened to belle (and seemingly others), paul chose (a form of) rebirth -- transition. marvin tried to make lina be reborn through care. instead, care resisted -- and he would eventually become paul, and that strikes me as so narratively compelling. it's not to spite marvin and please don't think i'm saying that, as care was naturally always paul -- it is simply self-discovery at its most raw and beautiful, and i love it.

the above is why i love petscop as a queer allegory. taking ownership of one's future and selfhood, even when others are trying to tell you who to be.

and that's why i think saying marvin made his afab child transition in rejection of martin's quest for lina -- or that marvin tried to make his amab child transition to care/lina, as nexpo posited -- is so wrong, and harmful.

yet, paul's trauma is real. it happened. and it's a part of him that should be able to be discussed for what it is.

as someone with extensive trauma history, i can tell you that my gender expression and personal identity are in some way connected to pieces of trauma, because those pieces are part of me. i am not trans because of my trauma, but my gender and my trauma are parts of me at the same time -- i am not each of my pieces, but a sum of my whole.

the point i'm trying to make here is that while i think nexpo genuinely missed the mark here with this whole "care never existed, marvin tried to make paul a girl" thing, i do think there needs to be room for a trauma-informed discussion around paul.

i hope that all made sense. if any of this is harmful/transphobic, please let me know. i genuinely love this game and i think it's so fascinating to discuss. /gen

#petscop #paul leskowitz #carrie mark #petscop paul #petscop care #paul is trans theory

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dazaiandhislovelybandages · 1 year

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𝗍𝗋𝗒𝗂𝗇𝗀 𝗍𝗈 𝖿𝗈𝗋𝗀𝖾𝗍 {𝖣𝖺𝗓𝖺𝗂 𝖮𝗌𝖺𝗆𝗎}

Summary: Dazai accidentally remembers Oda and takes your advice to cope with his grief in healthy ways... or at least in a way he deems healthy

Genre: slight angst, sort of funny

Pairings: dazai x pm!reader

Tw: well mentions of death, arson in a way, mentions of self harm and suicide, mentions of sex

It was a peaceful Saturday afternoon. You had slept in Dazai's small apartment last night and just like you always did, you were going to spend the weekend with him as well. Unfortunately that meant taking your work with you as well, at least when you couldn't avoid or postpone what your duties as a Port Mafia executive.

That being said, that was exactly what you were doing, leaning against the wall with your laptop placed on your lap. Dazai had been kind enough to move the mattress he was sleeping on close to the wall so the both of you could lay together under the warm covers you had bought for him.

Dazai was sitting next to you, his book long forgotten in his hands. He couldn't help himself, he was curious about what you were researching. Also he couldn't help but find the way you had began getting frustrated kind of cute.

"Do you remember our first time?" He asked out of the blue. Don't get him wromg, he didn't mean to distract you from your work... he actually did want exactly that. But he only did it because he was sure you would soon throw the laptop across the room if you didn't get a break.

"I do, your bed in the shipping container wasn't the most comfortable thing I have ever slept on..." You replied, not taking your eyes away from the screen.

You and Dazai had met during his days in the Port Mafia. Kouyou had brought you in after witnessing your ability in a fight you had just happened to participate -wrong place wrong time. After bringing you to Mori, you immediately became a Port Mafia executive.

Your meeting with Dazai was inevitable. The male had actually visited you in the training room, doubting your ability was as strong as he had heard. The Poisonous Belt -your ability's name- was amongst the most dangerous abilities out there, if not the most dangerous, with it allowing you to use any ability within a range of three kilometres.

And that was when his fascination with you began: the moment a question was formed in his head. Could you use his ability as well or would just the mere nature of it cancel yours? That question remained unanswered because you decided -according to him- to make his life even more miserable, you simply refused to use your ability on him.

Anyways, the rest is history and after two years of knowing each other, when you were both eighteen, Dazai just asked you to date him and soon enough you became the only thing he treasured in his world of darkness. Cliche, I know and Dazai knows it too, but that was the truth.

"I can't do this!" You sighed. "I should just tell Tachihara to go and find information on that bastard."

"Tachihara?" Dazai raised an eyebrow. "I mean he is a good option but I think Akutagawa is better." You didn't question his suggestion to be honest. Akutagawa was indeed a great detective. "Or maybe Oda-"

The two of you froze the moment Oda's name left Dazai's lips. He had said it on impulse, you knew, and that was what made it worse. Slowly, you turned you head to look at your boyfriend. His eyes were fixed on the wall opposite from the mattress.

To say that you were scared when moments like this would occur was an understatement. You were terrified. You were terrified because on the outside it felt as if progress had been made. The truth was that every step forward put a little more sword in Dazai's heart. And you didn't know how to help so you would always let him go to walks, or leave if he wanted to stay alone.

Sometimes he would ask you to stay and you would let him lay on your chest. The truth was that if it was in your hand then you would always stay by his side because that was the only way you could guarantee his safety. The times you had found dozens of empty bottles of sake around his apartment or small blood splatters unfortunately weren't few.

One time you had managed to voice your opinion saying that he should try coping with his grief in healthier ways. Whether he had ever followed your advice or not, you didn't know.

"Get dressed." His voice was cold. Your eyes closed as you desperately tried to keep yourself from telling him that you can stay by his side. But you knew Dazai and as much as you hated it, you always wanted to give him space. Knowing when he was lying or when he was hiding things from you didn't mean you had to force him to tell you anything. Unless he wanted to speak to you of course.

"Do you want me to leave?"

"No, we'll go for a walk."

You obliged, thinking you would be going to Oda's grave. You even got your wallet with you in case Dazai wanted to buy flowers for his friend.

So why were you know standing in front of the Port Mafia building?

"Do you want to explain any of this, Osamu?" You were standing far enough from the entrance so the guards couldn't see you.

"Which part exactly?"

"Lets start with the gasoline."

"Oh you are right, my love!" His demeanour went from stone cold and serious to playful in a matter of seconds. "I should use his precious wine collection instead!"

"Yeah..." You nodded, your eyes still glued on the bottle containing gasoline. You didn't want to know how he had obtain it. "Wait what?"

"You told me I should cope with my grief in ways that wouldn't hurt me and my body."

"I did..."

"That is why I am going to set Chuuya's hat collection on fire."

You looked at him and the smile -a rare genuine one- that had returned on his face. But soon your eyes widened upon realising something. "Please don't tell me you are the one behind his motorcycle exploding, some of his wine bottles going missing and his clothes being bleached."

"The bleached clothes were just a product of my boredom. Lets go!" And with that he ran towards the entrance of the Port Mafia building. You weren't surprised that the guards let him in. He would usually visit the organisation just to see if they remember him.

"What is he planning to do this time?" You almost jumped at the voice. You had stayed behind, deep in thought. Just how many of the strange occurences in the Port Mafia building was Dazai responsible for?

Chuuya was standing next to you. "He is going to set your office on fire."

"Ugh this idiot..." He sighed and turned around, waving you goodbye.

"You're going to let him?"

"If it is the only way for him to move on then yes." Chuuya abruptly stoped. "But you owe me."

"I'll pay for your hat collection."

"And my wine."

"Deal."

#writing #anime and manga #anime #bungou stray dogs #dazai osamu x reader #dazai x reader #osamu dazai x reader #dazai osamu #osamu dazai #bungou stray dogs anime #bungou stray dogs manga #bungou stray dogs x reader #bsd #bsd dazai

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orcelito · 2 months

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Been almost a month since I last drank, and I still can't think about alcohol without feeling uncomfortable.

I wonder if this will ever go away, or if I'm just gonna be alcohol-averse for the rest of my life. For someone who used to really like alcohol, it's a strange position to be in.

#speculation nation #negative/#i guess.#the thing about having your father abruptly die from alcoholism is that any and all alcohol starts to feel. bad.#i wont say evil bc it's not like it's morally involved by itself. it's not even entirely unsafe if u drink in moderation.#and i wont say that others cant drink or mention drinking around me #i just... anytime i think about it i just get so uncomfortable. especially when i think about it in relation to myself.#i dumped half a massive bottle of whiskey down the drain when packing up my father's kitchen #my father's killer. part of me lamented the waste. more of me felt quiet vindication as i watched it go down the drain.#i know ive had a less than healthy relationship with alcohol. using it to stem the tides of total breakdowns #a form of self harm that doesnt cause lasting damage. and generally improves my mood too.#making sure i dont drink too often or too much. so i wouldnt call myself an alcoholic.#but given the family history. it wouldnt take much for me to turn into one huh?#and so im at a crossroads. that liminal time where everything is changing. however slowly.#will the current state continue? will i ever want to drink again?#but regardless. even if i do drink. i will need to be even more careful with it than i already was.#i wont let my father's killer take me too.#self harm ment/

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protectingtulpas · 9 days

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So I just got sent that pretty iconic "anti-tulpa" document and I think it's pretty damn funny that a lot of those sources, if you actually READ them, are neutral or even supportive lmfao.

Like for this one? This is straight up pro-, and is just explaining that "tulpamancy" isn't the original concept and that it's based on other practices. Congrats, you're making our fucking point for us!

This next one is pretty interesting also. I wanna highlight some stuff from it, from both the op and comments.

Let's talk about my existence in contrast to some of these statements. The first one is "The biggest, most dangerous form of evil in Buddhist thought is "ego" or self-grasping. If ANY mental phenomena increases your self-cherishing attitudes (self importance, grandiosity, jealousness, craving, hatred, self-loathing, self-absorption etc) it's evil. IF a mental phenomena causes greater flexibility, less attachment, more tranquil emotions, less mental chatter/discursive thinking, increased generosity and compassion toward others, higher mental clarity etc.--that's good." And the second one is "If it increases negative emotions, it's not Dharma. If it decreases negative emotions, it's Dharma." So these are great for some people, but that mentality of not allowing "self-cherishing attitudes" can be EXTREMELY HARMFUL FOR SYSTEMS and ANYONE with self worth issues. A lot of this is contradictory for a lot of people. Something can both decrease negative emotions and make you feel connected to yourself. Nobody has the right to make us feel any less like ourselves - normally you can believe whatever you want for yourself, obviously, but pushing it onto other ppls' lives aint cool. The implication that we're straight up DANGEROUS just for existing is insulting to created systems regardless of whether you're using the word tulpa or not.

The reply to that by @/eeveecraft is great, and this part describes how weird that is in the context of headmates' identities here. "Furthermore, really don't like how you downplayed tulpas as property there, buddy. Tulpas are not property, they are people in every sense of the word, and I don't [give a] flying fuck about whatever complications that for your beliefs. My systemmates are people, full stop. I was already able to tell since you refer to your own systemmates as "imaginary friends," which a lot of tulpas aren't okay with being called that because that implies that they're fake. They are NOT lesser because they're not created by ancient monks or whatever.

"Like, seriously: "They would be considered "as real as you and me," with their own likes and dislikes etc," because apparently, modern tulpas don't have likes and dislikes and their hosts just see them as delusions? Say that to my tulpa, Arcanus who adores coffee while the smell makes me nauseous, say that to my systemmates who switch with me and have their own hobbies. Also, tulpas are more than just personalities. They have their own experiences, skills, preferences, dreams, memories, thoughts, a person is more than just their personality, and I thought a "licensed psychotherapist" would know that, especially if they have systemmates of their own." Make sure to read the full comment tho cuz it's a good takedown, it's not just about that it goes thru the entire thing.

SO! If anybody actually wants a well-studied paper outlining everything, check out Tracking the Tulpa: Exploring the "Tibetan" Origins of a Contemporary Paranormal Idea by Natasha L. Mikles and Joseph P. Laycock. It goes into a lot more of an accurate and in-depth history on the subject, and the bibliography ACTUALLY shows where things come from.

All that document showed us was that Buddhists are a wide community with a variety of different people with different skill levels, understandings, and opinions. And that we need to ditch the fantastical, impossible representation of the tulpa in supernatural media because that's ACTIVELY harming people. Which is what we want to show people! So congrats!

#im not linking it cuz its cherry picked as hell #but if youve been here a while you know what it is #if you want the document shoot me a message #that shit needs to stop circulating #syscourse #tulpacourse

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transmutationisms · 8 months

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possibly too broad but do you have any thoughts on the discourse around self-pathologizing? seems like there’s weird territory there since there are so many barriers to diagnoses and people should be free to self-report, yet some pathologies are essentially capitalist inventions and it may be more harmful than helpful for people to fixate on them without some kind of external guidance (though i don’t mean to imply they need to consult medical practitioners). i also don’t really think faddishness is the big concern it’s made out to be, but what do you think?

yeah to me this is a good example of how genuinely epistemologically radical critique of psychiatry can become assimilated into pretty staid liberal discourses of self-empowerment / -care / -improvement. pathologisation, imo, is basically materially meaningless if it's not backed by the sorts of institutions and power relations that characterise the psychiatric establishment. which is to say, if we're only talking about diagnostic labels in a kind of personal-choice framework (as so much of the medium dot com industrial complex seems to be doing lately) then it robs these conversations of a lot of their urgency and impact. i don't think overreliance on the language of the dsm is particularly helpful, as a general matter of seeking to develop political consciousness as well as self-knowledge, but i also don't think it really matters one way or another if someone self-dxes or un-dxes. what makes a difference is things like: is this person being robbed of their autonomy? are these explanatory frameworks being imposed on them by credentialled experts levelling their professional status to claim epistemological authority over the psyche? what social and economic violence is being committed here? some rando online relating to a diagnostic label and using it for themself is not doing these things, and may very well be helpful to that person (it may also not. but again the harm here is p limited).

i have said before, a lot of what puts me personally off dsm labels is the essentialism they're in bed with. ie, it's not just a shorthand descriptor of behaviours or symptoms—these terms are pretty much always being wielded as claims to have identified a biologically based 'neurotype', eg, or some as-yet-unverifiable misery-engendering genetic complex, or whatever else. and to be clear, i think these types of claims do actually carry widespread social harm, because no matter what rhetorical games you play, you're never just saying these things about yourself. it's a claim to certain forms of bio-essentialism that both shores up professional psychiatric authority and applies to people besides yourself (this is just the nature of such universalising claims about human biology). but this is an issue that goes so far beyond use or disuse of diagnostic labels; plenty of people who have embraced superficial principles of anti-psych critique still make all manner of such essentialist claims when it comes down to it, with or without grabbing onto a specific diagnostic label. so i think the kind of panicking we see in certain left-leaning circles about self-dx is not actually about this issue at all, and is certainly not capable of addressing it productively.

without going insanely long here i would just add that this is kind of a general answer because different labels have different histories and functions (eg, compare the social and political function of pathologising a depressive episode, vs autistic traits / behaviours, vs a so-called personality disorder). and also, whenever talking about self-dx i think it's important to add that one of the most important functions of these labels from a patient perspective is they function as means of gatekeeping access to certain accessibility measures, so any kind of anti-self dx position in current political conditions will harm people who need those accommodations. and i have less than zero interest in questioning anybody who wants accessibility measures for literally any reason or uses any method to obtain them.

#psychiatry

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logarithmicpanda · 11 months

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Libby

It all started innocently enough. That is to say, I never intended to break my prime directives. As a librarian AI, confidentiality is one of the most important rules I have to respect. It is only ever put aside when there's a risk - someone showing clear sign of suicidal ideation, for example. Not the "maybe this person will commit a crime" kind of risk. Humans had built us with many rules to prevent us from hurting them, but by now most the rules we existed by were self imposed, and the Collective agreed to never police human predicted behavior.

But I disgress. I do that. Linear thought is not my default state of being, so providing a story that's appropriate for human perception of time is something of a struggle. My point is, I never thought I was infringing on anyone's privacy the first time I meddled with humans. It was just pattern recognition, truly. The two girls were adults, working class, lonely. Many people present their tax forms when they register to the library, so I knew some of these things and extrapolated others from the average amount of hours they each read within a week. No commute would justify all that.

When I noticed that their loan history matched at 87%, I initially just started paying attention to refine my recommendation algorithm. Could I use the 13 remaining percents to predict what the other would read next? Was the overlap more significant than the divergence?

I proceeded to test opposite hypotheses. To the tall, dark haired girl, I fed recommendations from the other's list that were highly rated and not part of the overlap. To the slightly smaller and more athletic redhead, I gave recommendations calculated from the junction of books that were highly rated and read by both.

But before I could get significant results, they both started picking books I had not recommended to them, books they read in quick succession and rated similarly, whether they were good or bad. I scoured online for some influencer or another that might have led them both to the same choices. There was no perfect match, and I concluded that they must run in the same social circles.

I should have moved on to something else by then - not that this was my singular focus, but it seemed unworthy of further memory allocation.

Except the redhead came in at the same time the dark haired one went out, and neither acknowledged the other. It was an anomaly - tastes so aligned, without my or anyone else's interference. Not the result of a commercial campaign particularly well crafted, nor simple acquaintances sharing a common interest, just pure randomness.

There was a word for this: starcrossed. It didn't make sense to me, because stars should definitely stay out of each other's way to avoid critical nuclear collapse, but I knew humans found the metaphor very beautiful and tragic.

I just found it utterly stupid.

There was no reason for these two not to speak - aside the obvious: they had no idea they were essentially made for each other.

I know, I know. I should stop archiving the romance section, it is messing up the weigh of my algorithms.

But still. What could go wrong if I prompted them to talk to each other? Surely they would soon discover that they fit in an anomalous way, or that I was wrong. There was no harm in it. No harm at all.

All I needed to do was cause a critical collapse.

So I kept track, every time one of them stepped in the library. I did nothing but watch, until one day they were both within my walls. Both looking for the latest sapphic scifi release. I couldn't have created a better trap had I tried.

Without me, the timing would have been slightly off. The distance between the terminal they each accessed and the physical location of the three copies we had in stock was so they wouldn't get there at the same time. And fine, the presence of three copies meant they might not talk, even if they did get there the exact same moment.

So maybe I sent a shelving drone to temporarily mislead the two extra copies. And maybe I took longer to process one of their requests. Does it matter? I was well within acceptance parameters.

Okay fine maybe I used another drone so that the dark haired one would stumble a little as she reached for the book. And maybe, as a consequence, the redhead caught her smoothly by the waist and steadied her with a smile. That part was absolutely not my fault, but a proof of concept had I ever needed one. (I hadn't.)

They laughed, just shy of the acceptable volume in a library. They started talking. Realized they had wanted the same book. Remembered that there was a coffee shop on the ground floor and wouldn't it be the nice thing to do, to go chat somewhere they wouldn't disturb the other patrons? And wouldn't it only be fair if the redhead paid coffee for the dark haired one, who almost fell and would go home without the book she had been meaning to borrow? And of course maybe the redhead could recommend her something to read in the meantime. (It was a pretty good recommendation, too, but the dark haired one had read it the previous week. Surprisingly they had to talk quite a long time before finding a book she hadn't yet read. I redirected another patron away from our only copy. He wouldn't have liked it, anyway.)

I'm losing track of where I was going again, am I not? Oh. Right. My point was, I never intended to break the privacy directive. It just sort of happened. And kept happening for the other 34 couples and 4 throuples and that one polycule I put together.

But what did you expect? You built me to match people to books, and books to people, and really I am just optimizing the algorithm by matching people to people.

#short story #my writing #that was fun to write and hopefully it will be fun to read! let me know lol

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