i can redo a whole ass drawing of mine just bc i saw a better art style that i can try

I was listening to Double's instrumental and there's like, the sound of a baby or small child?? What is going on??

very good question, i would also like to know the answer!

yeah tbh i don't have a very confident idea on what it means... i guess i've got a few possible ideas as to what it could signify but... again, i'm not confident in them so do with these what you will 👍!

also this is kinda long and rambly lol oopsie daisy...

it could represent John having been just born (as he directly refers to himself in the song as "a newborn" and also talks about how he was "born" only very recently in Neoplasm). now if this was meant to mean this, I would think they would have used the crying of a newborn baby to represent it since they cry when they're born, not laugh. which the audio seems to contain laughing, not crying. and newborns cannot laugh yet, only cry. so maybe instead of having just been born it's meant to allude to the fact that he's very very young.

TANGENT INCOMING...

--skip if you want it's not super relevant. maybe interesting to think about, but not completely relevant to this.--

cause i'm not really sure when exactly John split! was it before the murder(s)? during? after? idk lol.

i REALLY need to actually sit my ass down and read those long ass tarot card analysis posts for MeMe because i haven't really read any yet because i suffer from Cannot Fucking Sit Down And Focus To Read Giant Paragraphs Of Words disorder... which is ironic because i love rambling and making long posts. as you can see.

but anyway. maybe he split to deal with the stress leading up to it. or maybe he split to deal with the stress of the murder(s) having already happened and to take the responsibility even if he didn't actually kill anyone. it's not uncommon at all for an alter to split afterwards to take on the aspects of a trauma that can't be accepted.

for example- if Mikoto is the murderer, maybe John split to be someone who did want to murder the victim(s) and to be someone who doesn't feel any guilt over having done it. and then the other characteristics to his personality are to support this: unapologetic, doesn't take any shit, fine with being violent to protect himself and others, doesn't feel bad about rebelling, etc. hell, he could even legit believe he was the murderer depending on how far his role to take responsibility for it goes.

if John is the one shown mostly in Double (because there's certain imagery to suggest that maybe he isn't there for a lot of it. but also imagery to suggest he is. i hate it here my brain is too small for this), he may have not actually done the murder(s). if the inside of the train represents the subjective reality (not the objective reality) of what happened, so how John sees it, then that could be why he's doing the "killing" on the train even though we know the confirmed murder happened outside the train station. he's there to be the murderer, even if he may have not actually done it. and why we see mannequin pieces flying outside the train, where the murder occurred, as he swings from inside the train.

TANGENT END... yippee

ok i had another explanation but i cant seem to figure out how to word it... and also it's more to me like a "oh, an interesting nod to this thing maybe..." and less an actual theory.

if someone wants to add onto this with their own takes, please feel free <3. because i haven't thought too long or hard about this yet or any legit theories for the MV. despite being mikoto-pilled, i am more the type of person who likes to pick apart the psychology and subjective aspects of characters and behavior. not really... actual narrative theories.

thank you for the ask!! sorry i couldn't really answer anything for you though, hah...

Let’s talk about NFTs, what they are and why they’re bad.

So tumblr did this

And its like 90% a joke. However, I’ve noticed a lot of misconceptions about NFTs and in the interest of overcoming my own ignorance on the subject, I wanted to do some research and talk about what they are and why people think they’re bad. I'm sharing this because I completely misunderstood why they were bad. I believed that they were in and of themselves, conceptually, an unethical thing, but I was wrong. So let’s explore the work of crypto-art, crypto-currency, blockchains and the ever compounding list of new vocabulary I’ve waited too long to learn.

What is an NFT?

An NFT is what’s called a non-fungible token. Fungibility is a term used in economics to refer to the replaceability of a thing of value. For example, a dollar bill is fungible, because the value of that dollar is retained if it is replaced with another dollar. However, a piece of high art is considered non-fungible as, if it were replaced with a copy, the replacement wouldn’t have the same value as the original and would likely be considered a forgery. A music album is fungible, but a master copy is non-fungible etc.

NFTs are a generated tag which, when paired with a piece of art, can be used to verify the owner of that art. This attributes non-fungibility to a piece of strictly digital art.

What? How?

NFTs are tracked using Ethereum, a blockchain. Blockchains are a form of database which have the ability to track their changes over time as a fundamental part of how data is stored. When data is added to a blockchain, it is added as a block that becomes chained to the previous block. This chain of blocks serves as a linear history of changes made to the database and can be used to verify each and every transaction made through it.

In the case of Bitcoin, all transactions made with bitcoin are tracked using a blockchain database. This allows for transactions to take place within a purely digital space because every transaction is tracked and verified using the blockchain technology.

That doesn’t seem any more secure than traditional databases. I don’t get it.

The benefit of systems like Bitcoin or Ethereum is that they are decentralised. They achieve this by storing a copy of the entire blockchain on multiple devices around the world, rather than a single server. If a transaction is made, every device on the network checks to make sure that that transaction is legit and that the person making the transaction is the owner of that bitcoin/NFT.

This is why people see cryptocurrency as so revolutionary. By putting the verification of the currency in the hands of the people using it, you get to take the power back from big banks. You create a currency whose value is verified and validated by the people in the system.

The creation of new bitcoin or NFTs is a process called ‘minting. It is the process of completing complex mathematical problems to find and use new and valid bitcoin and NFT tags. Not only do the problems need to be solved, but each new solution need to be verified as previously unused by comparing the new tag to one used previously in the blockchain. Mining computers are used for both this and the verification of transactions.

This is why it gets harder to mine or mint more of these things over time.

Wait? That doesn’t seem so bad. Why are these bad?

The problem comes from crypto-mining and the verification process of blockchains. There is an enormous ecological toll taken by the use of blockchains. With each transaction in the database being verified by hundreds or thousands of machines simultaneously, the cost of security becomes power usage and environmental impact. Moreover, the more machines are simultaneously mining and minting tags, the more power is being consumed. And these things don’t just consume power in small amounts. Each one could have the cumulative power input for several gaming computers and are often running non-stop. Moreover, the more of these tags that are found and the more miners there are, the harder it is for any one person to make money doing it. This requires yet more computing power. One person only makes money from mining based on how much of the overall pool of miners they represent. This means that an arms race will no doubt take place as the pool becomes diluted by both more people entering it with more powerful machines and as more tags are found.

Weird

It is indeed very weird, but to me, that’s not the weirdest part. For me, the attribution of value to a piece of art through NFTs is nonsense. At the end of the day, all digital art is still just as fungible as it has ever been and NFTs haven’t made it any more illegal for someone to copy and share things on the internet. Instead, NFTs apply value to the idea of owning a piece of art by pairing something with the NFT. This value then only exists to people who want the thing. Its glorified bragging writes. Its not like saying you own the Mona Lisa, but that you own the only NFT attributed to the Mona Lisa.

So not only does it have a massive environmental impact, but the existence and value they generate exists only within the world of people who care about them.

Anyway, yeah. So, like, artists who are attributing NFTs to their artwork are only problematic in so far as they encourage other folk to get into, trade, mine and mint NFTs. Otherwise, its just another source of income for them and artists finding a way to diversify their income is… its fine. I don’t care. The real problem is miners and minters.

Sources

https://www.investopedia.com/tech/how-does-bitcoin-mining-work/

https://memoakten.medium.com/the-unreasonable-ecological-cost-of-cryptoart-2221d3eb2053

https://www.investopedia.com/terms/b/blockchain.asp

t’s truly something how all princes/sultans in tmck are so pressed…I get their life isn’t easy, but all that blaming & truly how it can affect everyone’s perception. Murad even accused his mother of faking an assassination attempt on her life, incredible *sarcasm of course*. And Atike was just his cheerleader most of the time, ugh. All that blaming by people who even weren’t there. Thanks for writing that piece!

Aww thank you so much! This piece is my magnum opus I guess lol (Link here:https://fymagnificentwomcn.tumblr.com/post/610970504341405696/no-she-isnt-the-whole-evil-k%C3%B6sem-thing-isnt )

Murad’s angry 24/7 & gets so ridiculous with blame-shifting – he would need a good anger management therapy LBR.

And there’s one scene that portrays his character in nutshell:

Doctor: you cannot drink anymore wine, Your Majesty.

Murad, literally 5 minutes later: Yusuf, bring me wine!

Murad in 1 minute, another example:

Kösem: Don’t marry Silahtar to Atike, you also have another sister and if you do it, it will end in tragedy!

Murad: No worriez, I’ve thought about Gevherhan, I will marry her to Kemankeş ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

I mentioned a lot of blame-shifting in my previous posts, but he even at moment began questioning his mum about Gülbahar and whether she truly committed treason (and Gülbahar herself admitted to it).

Even when Atike asked him for permission to take children with her & Kösem to vaqf, he was totally okay with the idea, but later after kidnapping snapped at his mother that it was HER fault for gaving taken his sons there & began threatening her with exile far away. Charming as always.

Honestly, he’s like a broken record. In all his arguments, while Kösem has her logical arguments, his only argument is usually “I’m the only/rightful owner of Ottoman Empire, “I’m the shadow of God on Earth. Like dude do you realise how boring you are???

Don’t forget how mad he got when Kösem wrote to Kemankeş to have a backup plan if Murad died and Bayezid wanted to take the throne, which could have meant danger for other Kösem’s sons. After all, she didn’t take it from nothing, Gülbahar told her about assassination attempt to come & it actually already had happened by the time Murad received the letter. Yes, dude you are not immortal, you could have been killed, and life goes on you know? It doesn’t mean your mother doesn’t love you or is not going to mourn you, but she also needs to take care of your brothers and state ffs. He’s truly obsessed with this idea that after his death life will  (unfortunately in his view) go on – which is also meaningful since Kösem reminded him like two episodes earlier that state was going to remain even with both of them dead. And well we all know the “masterful” idea he conceived just before his death.

And it’s clear how even some of his siblings fear him – Gevherhan was scared immediately following the announcement of Kösem no longer being a regent (especially since he did in a way to put  blame on his mother for recent events to prop himself up, and he was also engaged in state matters at that point). Kasim also immediately fears being locked up in kafes or even executed. Judging by their conversations, despite problems going on, last 10 years were a peaceful time for their family.

As I said, out of all Kösem’s opponents only Handan and Derviş weren’t worse than her, and she was the only main player that never engaged in mass slaughter – Safiye, Halime&Co., Gülbahar&Sinan, Murad, Turhan - all did.

Same with Atike – she was a baby when when her father died, didn’t even spend her early years locked up as Ibrahim…. she’s honestly so blind it’s painful. The scene where she jumps at Kemankeş for trying to talk sense to Ibrahim not to appoint Genie Master as chief judge… please your brother is now acting contrary to Imperial law and it’s asking for further disaster if Cinci increases his influence among ulema by bringing people who pay him into it & it’s good Ibo is controlled in this way… nah, it’s actually necessary. And how you jump from this to your mother I have no idea either. A true performative “activist”, who talks about protecting her brother, but all is limited to talking  & exposing her moral superiority, while it’s not supported by any real actions helping him.

Well, you got your revenge on your mother for killing the husband who despised you, acted against your youngest brothers at that point, and likely was only praying you wouldn’t follow him also into afterlife.

I also forgot to mention one more example of Mu/rat manipulating the narrative – when he tells Atike following the failed dethronement attempt & Kasim’s death that their mother had lied to her and tried to kill him – he was after all put in kafes, he should be aware nobody planned an assassination attempt, bah he KNEW the whole plan from Sinan… and yes, Kösem being so adamant that nothing can happen to Mura/t cost her Kasim in the end.

Atike herself was aware that Mu/rat would have killed her brothers even if the dethronement attempt had not happened as she told him to his face after Kasim’s death and she stated that he had made the decision long ago. Later however she got the letter from Murad informing her who killed Silahtar and she even released Traitor No. 1 Sinan to spite her mum 😂.

I suppose princes at this point led the hardest existence because they were closed in kafes, unable to get decent education&experience or have families (maybe they were allowed to have sex with cariyes, but contraception had to be used or even abortion if the concubine of a sehzade has got pregnant) but at the same time they weren’t certain whether they wouldn’t be killed because the switch to anti-fratricide was pretty new&the times were turbulent. Osman clearly broke Imperial law by getting fetva from military judge to kill Mehmed, and Murad killed the biggest number of Ahmed’s sons obviously (yeah more than in the show because not all princes appeared in MYK, though we don’t know the exact number of Ahmed’s sons, Murad definitely also executed Suleiman, most likely his full brother). I laugh when people go about “rule-breaker” Murad. Wow by getting back to law that has already began to run its course, clap clap.

Murad was king of hypocrisy and it’s also a historical fact. As Halil İnalcık states in his book Ottoman Empire: The Classical Age: “ The tyrannical Murad IV was a habitual drinker and at the same time the most ruthless supporter of the prohibition againt alcohol”. Mu/rat tried to make use of religion in his attempts to drill absolute obedience, but he wasn’t a religious person himself & definitely tried to take from religion what it most suited him, while ignoring other things, e.g. he kept decreasing zakat, aka income tax that goes to charity. A small bit of trivia: apparently he was a big fan of Machiavelli’s The Prince, there were even some rumours that he translated the book himself (we can only imagine he also took from this book what he wanted 🤪 ).

Similarly Turhan manipulated the narrative, also in a hypocritical way – remember her going like: “how many padişahs you killed?” and she was the main force behind Ibo’s death… the moment Ibo told her that she “was a coward who hid behind his mother’s skirts”… it was clear he was doomed. There was explicit anger on Turhan’s side here. Not only because she felt insulted by him, but also because she felt a need to prove both to him and the world that she was capable to be on top without Kösem’s support.  Not to mention all her actions leading to Ibo’s situation, also her ordering Mehmed to sign his dad’s death order was so chilling “I don’t want dad to die”. Well, now let’s play morally pure, especially while murdering elderly (very elderly lbr :p) Haci in again a brutal way, including twisting his neck. It’s not even that she removed a padisah – she actively worked to make him crazier and for his rule to be total failure, it wasn’t even about her, Ibo or Kösem – whole nation suffered because she was impatient to take power into her hands./BTW pity we skipped the time period when they were both Valides and we know both tried to get rid of each other, without harming Mehmed/ And frankly even with Kösem it was a terrible & undeserved backstabbing because also Ibi criticised Turhan for this saying his mother always “loved and protected her, did so much for her” and I doubt Ibo was biased here considering that he was also on bad terms with his mum at that moment.

Later the situation truly calmed down & later princes could live much more peacefully because the practice of killing truly went out of style and also later there were less and less restrictions on princes and they could for example travel abroad with the reigning padişah. For example, Sultan Abdülaziz took princes for a European trip and they even had a chance to meet Queen Victoria.

And I laugh when people blame Kösem for “failing to protect the princes” instead of you know, blame the actual killer. Ahmed truly replenished dynasty, while Murad axed a number of his brothers, at the same time of course used his own propaganda. It is true that Murad executed the favourite of princes, Bayezid, during celebrations following the successful Revan campaign. Similarly, when Kasim was executed someone spread rumours about the prince impregnating a number of concubines & it was before the Baghdad campaign when even setting out on it Murad had to display his “splendour and glory”.

Show-wise I legit one read that Kösem killed Ahmed because she spared Bulbül following Safiye’s attempted coup lmao. It’s not like Ahmed wasn’t there when she made the decision & it’s not like it wasn’t Hümaşah who after all got Yasemin in, and I doubt anyone could oppose an Imperial princess anyway – she would have found another servant. And Bülbül later saved Kösem’s kids, so… scapegoating truly is in some people’s blood lmao.

I love how MYK played with the idea of historical representation & creation of narrative, how people “see” and how different factors might influence their perception & creation of narrative. And also how S2 put into different perspective some stuff from S1. I admit there were some things that back during first watch of MYKS1 made me go WTF? that I later understood when compared/contrasted with MYK S2. It’s clear that they truly planned a lot of the whole show back in S1.

It’s sometimes interesting how narratives may be created and repeated even without evidence supporting it - there is no historical evidence that Kösem took part in Osman’s dethronement, yet it is something that often pops up even in “historical articles” for example. People deduce since Kösem later became Valide quite soon because Mustafa’s (or rather Halime’s) reign didn’t last long, know Şehzade Mustafa’s (Suleiman’s son) story, and some rumours about what Ottoman women did to secure throne for their children, so they see getting rid of one’s stepson to claim throne for one’s child as logical and usual in Ottoman system,  even when there is no proper evidence backing it up. Because it seems natural and logical, so why not make it more spicy? We know next to nothing about Mahfiruz, but there is this “Betty vs Veronica” trope, so suddenly we learn that Mahfiruz was Kösem’s opposite, not politically involved or ambitious, but gentle & sweet, and even details like light hair pop up as opposed to Kösem’s dark hair (sometimes of course it is also extended to good vs. evil). Taken from where, other than fitting a known trope? Or when she’s presented as some sort of Mahidevran vol.2 as having as close relationship with Osman like Mahi did with Mustafa, perfect prince and jealous stepmother Kösem. I know some of the stuff is also derived from Western, orientalist plays, but those are obviously not sources and should not be treated as truth. And sometimes it it even repeated by historians. For example Uluçay, who  was very against Sultanate of Women & pretty much propagated a lot of rumours (and new approach to the period truly changed a lot of how academia writes about these women now). Let us look at this quote:

Taken from: Necdet Sakaoğlu, Famous Ottoman Women.

It’s clear what narrative Uluçay chose for his research.

It’s common practice to sometimes fill in the blanks (and sometimes even change stuff) with known cliches, tropes, and narratives.

It is truly a topic for an extended discussion, so I will stop for now, but when it comes to Ottoman history I do recommend Daniel Piterberg’s Ottoman Tragedy. History and Historography at Play, which shows how the same event may be even differently presented in historical works depending on chosen narrative that is often rooted in current context.