something i’ve been thinking about lately is like. growing up muslim right after 9/11 is something i’d never really reflected on much because it was all i’d ever known — at 5, my friend’s mum didn’t let her invite me to her birthday party because i was the only brown girl in our class, at 12, my classmates would joke about my family being part of isis, at 16, my dad was interrogated by american airport security for hours — and it always stung and it always hurt but it was just the way things were because the western world hated muslims. but i don’t think i’ve ever fully comprehended the extent to which we were hated until now.

palestine is being turned into a mass graveyard. every single day there are new photos of the atrocities being carried out against them and videos of them pleading for help and still those who can actually intervene turn a blind eye. israel is claiming to only be targeting hamas “terrorists” while bombing a refugee camp. israeli police raided and assaulted a non-zionist jewish neighbourhood. israeli soldiers are posting tiktoks of them torturing captured palestinians. this is not a complicated issue and it never has been. ethnic cleansing is being committed right in front of us. and yet the western world leaders refuse to call for a ceasefire.

and while zionist organisations accuse pro-palestine demonstrations of anti-semitism, while zionist celebrities insist that they’re afraid to leave their mansions in los angeles, a six year old muslim boy was stabbed to death and his mother wounded in the same attack in chicago. a muslim doctor was murdered while sitting outside her apartment complex in texas. hundreds of peaceful protesters have been arrested (many of whom have been jewish). despite what zionists want you to believe, this is not a jewish/muslim conflict. i have so much love and gratitude to my brave jewish brothers and sisters all over the world who are condemning israel for their actions.

ultimately, israel have been granted impunity by the west. they have slaughtered thousands upon thousands of innocent palestinians. they have bombed hospitals and schools indiscriminately. they have used white phosphorus, violating the geneva convention. they have completely eradicated nearly 900 bloodlines. how many more need to be wiped out? how many more children need to be buried underneath the rubble? how many more doctors need to be confronted with the bodies of their own family members? how many more journalists need to detail the horrific acts of violence they are witnessing? what more can be done to the palestinian people that has not been done already?

i truly believe that palestine will be free one day. i believe the palestinian people will receive the justice they finally deserve. but what breaks my heart is how much they have suffered and will continue to suffer before they are deemed worthy of help. and it would be to all of our detriment if we ignored how much of a factor palestine being a predominantly muslim state has played into the way the world has reacted to their genocide.

the thing that gets to me about buddie posts on here is that people will be like "look at them! friends don't do that! there is no platonic explanation for that" and well. friends do do that. their relationship is deep and beautiful and intense but their actions alone aren't exclusive to romantic partners. what — to me — makes buddie romantic over platonic boils down to their intentions. someone making their best friend their child's legal guardian isn't unheard of. but eddie did it and kept it a secret. eddie thought "this is the only man i trust with my son. this is the only person in this world that will hold my heart gently." and then eddie didn't tell him. that makes me crazier than the actual legal document. a normal friendship would discuss this. it'd be an open conversation. the fact that eddie can't bring himself to say it because he knows that what it means to him is too much to look in the eye? because he knows that telling buck about his decision would be the equivalent of bleeding all over the both of them again? that's what makes it romantic. eddie frantically chasing after buck's limp body after the lightning strike isn't necessarily because he's in love with him. plenty of really close friends would do that for each other. it's when eddie desperately tries to pull buck up to him instead of lowering him that makes it more. because eddie didn't climb the ladder to get buck down to safety, eddie climbed up the ladder to get buck to him. the desperation, the intent behind their actions, the way they can't look at each other when they're hurt because it's impossible to deal with even the idea of living in a world without each other says so much more than any of buck's acts of service alone. a best friend would help you take care of yourself and your kid after you have a mental breakdown, if you're physically injured, if you need help. it's the fact that nobody asked buck, it's the fact that he's the first person chris called, it's the fact that bobby didn't bat an eye, because of course buck's there to help eddie. it's a given. who else in the whole world would it be? because they're everything to each other. in a way that's just a little too much, a little too codependent, toes the line of friendship and lovelovelove a little too carelessly. they're not buck and eddie, best friends, they're buckandeddie, one word. and not because of any of action. because they're in massive stupid head over heels gay love with each other.

BUNNY DADS!!!!

"While it's fresh. I need everyone to tell me what they saw and heard, so that I can write it down. There will never be a better time."

Of all the accounts Loial gathered in Thakan'dar that day, the Aes Sedai's proved the most difficult to acquire. Those who remained were elusive, bustling around the Healing tents and churned fields. Nynaeve Sedai and her helpers, paying no heed to the fragility of Humans, were bringing back from the brink of death so many that a constant flow of barely healed soldiers and channelers shuffled toward the Travelling grounds, freeing much-needed beds inside the tents.

Moiraine Sedai would not answer his inquiries about the events at Shayol Ghul either, intent as she was on the care of a drawn, but gently chiding Tairen woman.

I genuinely don’t understand how people can watch the body swap episode and enjoy seeing Faith inhabit Buffy’s body and WORSE objectifying (Faith)Buffy being like “omg she’s so hot she slayed so hard I love Buffy in black leather”

Not only is SMG’s FRIGHTENING thinness even more apparent in Faith’s traditional wardrobe showcasing just how much she is practically skin and bone due to her being under immense stress and being so overworked which always just tears at my heart in so many ways but we are witnessing the WORST violation of Buffy’s body and autonomy!!!! I’m genuinely just sick the entire episode.

Bad enough she almost gets Buffy killed and finally gets her wish of (temporarily) stealing Buffy’s life which she has wanted to do since her arrival in season 3 (only to STILL not understand Buffy’s perspective until she does it again in a far less invasive way in season 7 after Buffy allowed her back into her home and she still never properly apologizes she’s like hehe turns our your life is actually pretty miserable and I don’t want it because I can’t handle the stress and constant pressure you’re under…. Oops!🙃) but unlike when Willow takes Buffy’s free will and autonomy away (where she at least still retains all the memories after the fact of everything that happened so she doesn’t have to wonder and can process them when she’s ready) Buffy has ZERO CLUE what all Faith allows to happen to her body while she’s not in it. And Faith isn’t unaware or passive about the power she holds and the things she can do to Buffy’s body in the position she’s in - she literally tells Riley, BEGS HIM - to do all of the nastiest things he’s ever wanted to do “to this body” she WANTS Riley to do things to Buffy’s body Buffy herself WOULD. NOT. ALLOW. it is one of THE MOST insidious lines in the entire series to me because not only is that an absolutely stomach churning, bone-chilling thing to say but then after the fact when angel asks what Faith did to upset Buffy so much she’s like “I slept with her boyfriend” like UMMMM WHAT??? EXCUSE ME???? That is literally the absolute LEAST of your crimes bitch be so fucking for real. This horrific violation is minimized down to oh well Buffy is just insecure about sex and especially sex in comparison to Faith like GROSS GROSSSSSSS. The entire thing is SO DISGUSTING and misogynistic AND it is part of why I genuinely do not give A FUCK about the events of seeing red as far as my love of spuffy goes because while that was absolutely the most traumatizing to watch not only was it so completely out of left field and out of character that it just doesn’t make sense in the narrative and is so obviously joss whedon coming over the loud speaker and going “women who enjoy sex with men I don’t approve of should and always will be punished” but it is the ONLY time someone hurts her in this way and PROPERLY APOLOGIZES AND MAKES THE PROPER AMENDS!!!!

So until EVERY. SINGLE. violation of Buffy’s body is treated with the same level of outcry seeing red is by all the anti-spuffys I genuinely DO NOT CARE. I DONT CARE because I’m just so done with spuffy girlies having that thrown in our faces by the morality police who are listening to the tiny white male puritanical cop in their head.

ALSO the fact that Riley not only doesn’t think ANYTHING is off about Buffy (when Faith is doing an absolutely HORRIFIC JOB of acting like Buffy) so he not only sleeps with her BUT TELLS HER HE LOVES HER FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER!??!?!?!? WHILE SHE IS LITERALLY PINNED BENEATH HIM?!?!?!?!? AAAAAAARRRRRRRGGGGGHHHHH!!!!!!!! RILEY FINN I WILL KILL YOU IF IT IS THE LAST THING THAT I DO.

People who engage in the Hetalia fandom while openly disliking the source material and even Himaruya himself sound kinda like hypocrites to me. Everyone's entitled to their own opinion, but please stay away from me, this kind of mindset truly annoys me and makes me uncomfortable. Am I gatekeeping? No, not really, I just believe that being a fan of something should mean, you know, being a fan and liking the source material at the very least. It should be like, the lowest the bar can get. Below that, there's not being a fan.

listen. listen okay i try not to discourse on this account, i really do, and i try so hard to keep an open mind about the dream team because i used to adore their content and i don’t think they’re bad people, but i’m so serious when i say that this time they’ve actually ruined mcc for me. the behavior they continue to display in these events would have gotten anyone else benched and they don’t seem to be aware of it at all. openly picking a fight in the game chat with a mod as a twenty two year old man and then having the audacity to sarcastically comment about it in the next game to make fun of the choice would have gotten ANYONE else banned and the fact that all three of them have been doing it for TWO STRAIGHT YEARS with no fucking consequences is insane. the only reason they’re still in this event is because they have huge audiences who would be absolutely rabid if they were kicked. i get being an overly competitive person—i am as well, i don’t do well with losing, i’m a perfectionist—but when your competitive spirit actively hinders the mood of people around you or causes you to lash out you need to take a step back and breathe. the fact that dream has been doing this for two years without doing ANY of this or taking responsibility for his comments is astounding. the noxcrew seriously should stage a fucking intervention and reality check these assholes, (not that i’m blaming them for their horrid behavior). the teenagers on orange are doing better and have BEEN doing better at sportsmanlike conduct than these grown ass men for years. fruit is entirely right about dream saying stupid shit in the chat. they are in this event as a privilege not a right and i think it’s time they’re reminded that they’re here on good graces just like everyone else. unbelievable.

Is this what Happiness is?

- hey so I haven't seen an interpretation of the bar scenes in Half that I fully agree with, so I wanted to throw my own two cents out there into the void and pray that it makes sense !!!

so, in the bar scenes in Half we see what I interpret as a hangout with old friends (or, hangout with old friend + his wife.) These scenes used to be the biggest piece of evidence for the cheater theory, but now that that's been debunked by the man himself, I have a new way of looking at them

~ before I go any further, I just wanted to say that I'll be calling the brown-haired woman whiskey for simplicity's sake

In this scene, Kazui turns to look at Whiskey, saying the lyrics:

"laughing together, side by side, this distance in our relationship is misleading me, is this what happiness is?"

With my guess (cuz that's really what it is there's no evidence for it) that Whiskey is the Bartender's wife i think this scene is Kazui being conflicted with what he's been told is true, that marrying Hinako is "true love", versus what he feels is true, that marrying Hinako has brought distance into their relationship.

He looks at Whiskey, a woman happily married, and wonders why his relationship with Hinako isn't like that.

~ shout out to @prisoner-000 for the following screenshot

in this post he points out that Hinako and Kazui's rings are silver in Cat, not gold like they were in Half, yet Bartender's ring colour stays the same.

For the sake of this writing I'm going to go with the first meaning they put out, that Bartender's ring is gold because his marriage is genuine.

But wait!! I hear you ask. This is Half and Kazui's ring is still gold in Half!! EXACTLY MY FRIEND!!

Kazui's ring IS still gold in Half because at the time of these scenes he's still fooling himself that this relationship is good, that he will eventually garner real romantic feelings for Hianko.

"laughing together, side by side, this distance in our relationship is misleading me, is this what happiness is?"

Remember this lyric that plays during the Whiskey -> Hinako scene. You know what other scene in Half this lyric reminds me of?

laughing together, side by side,

this distance in our relationship is misleading me,

is this what happiness is?

He's beginning to doubt if what he believes is true, he's beginning to believe the feelings telling him something's wrong (and remember, the scene right after this one is when he confesses (?) his secret to Hinako) ARE infact true, and that maybe the logic he's been following for so long has a couple holes in it.

I think these scenes are meant to show Kazui gradually realising that his relationship with Hinako will not work out. It just won't, no matter how hard he tries.

He's able to laugh together and talk with Whiskey because she's his friend, yet he can't do the same with his own wife? Even though, according to his gold ring, their relationship is supposed to be real and true and genuine?

Shout out to the autistics who struggle with imposter syndrome, who feel like no matter what they do they're not good enough or don't deserve validation or love. Shout out to the autistics who feel like they're trapped or stuck with their current living situation and would do anything to change it. Shout out to the autistics who are socially inept and are often called "rude", "annoying", or "inappropriate". Shout out to the autistics who mask by making themselves self-reserved because they think that people will like them more if they kept quiet. I know how you feel because I have been there, I still live in that reality, and that I am also still struggling with loving myself for who I am. It feels lonely not being able to connect with others who feel the same way that I do, so hopefully someone who is also experiencing these will see this and know that they're also not alone.

Okay so I'm gonna go ahead and put a disclaimer up top that these are the ramblings of a dilettante that shouldn't be taken too seriously, but I think that people (understandably) frustrated with with the ICJ ruling and convinced it will have no material consequences should consider some things before they say that.

The first thing I want to remind everyone is that the west is far from invincible. Their rule is not iron-clad and their ability to enforce their will on the world is far from complete and is waning apace.

I think a lot about how in the process of the transition to late capitalism (as I personally define it), one consequence of the mass financialization of the economy is the pricing-out of most common consumer commodity-based manufacturing enterprise in favor of transactions that are most elastic in price, and how the result of that is a mass outflow of raw productive capacity from the imperial core to the global periphery.

If I can frame that in another way, and forgive me in framing this in very neutral terms, but it turns these countries from production-rich countries to production-poor countries with economies defined by the phenomenon of asset-price inflation.

The resulting global situation is that, similar to the assertion that Africa for example is rich because it's where the natural resources that facilitate the global economy are located, Mexico is rich. Vietnam is rich. Bangladesh is rich. These countries are awash in raw capacity to create goods that have a use value. What is the one thing that keeps them relatively cash-poor?

That is, the law. There's a bit of poetry in the idea that just as how within imperial core economies the most important economic instruments are legal contracts to either some percentage of a company's equity or its debt, what sustains its (nominal) riches over the global periphery is a legal regime of ownership that entitles them to the rights to all of the profits going on in these incredibly production-rich countries in the Global South.

It is absolutely correct to say that at the highest level, these legal regimes are enforced at the barrel of the gun, we've seen how too much refusal to to honor these laws by heads of state can lead to mass disinvestment and eventually coups d'état, and even now it would not be a good idea to say, seize the productive assets of a bunch of US firms.

However, and this is where the ICJ comes back in to my point, let's not think about the US. Let's think about, for example, the Netherlands or Belgium. These countries maintain fantastic financial wealth via contracts of ownership with countries in the global south but they are also small and geopolitically unimportant, with little in the way of individual military power.

For little countries like these, genuinely the Only thing that secures their ability to act as a parasite on the global productive economy is the strength of legitimacy that international law affords them, and the position of overwhelming power the west Once had, decades ago.

But the power and prestige of the West continues, as I said, to wane apace. it's too early to happen now but these less militaristic countries are aware of how exposed their assets are to simple seizure if over time international law comes to be seen as a joke.

As awful and condamnable as the current global system is, it is not total dictatorship. It is only able to perpetuate itself because the overwhelming majority of countries that are parties to it have buy in and because, albeit much more slowly than they could have under socialism, they have been able to make dents in their own poverty with it.

The exposure of the international law framework as having absolutely no legitimacy, as being a naked tool of domination of rich countries over poor countries has knock-on effects that stand to be incredibly dangerous to less militarily capable countries that rely on them for their economic structures. On a long-term scale, especially as these countries become richer and more geopolitically influential in their own right, they may well begin to pose the question: why Shouldn't I seize these french factories in my country? Why Shouldn't I seize this Belgian-owned diamond mine? Why Should I pay back this IMF loan, if the ICJ framework can't even compel the Zionist Enemy to end a genocide? And I promise you, this is a reality of which at least some people in those countries are highly cognizant and wary, so I'd wait and see a bit before being Too pessimistic.

I think it’s more important now than ever to completely reject and condemn bigotry in any form. As things escalate, regarding US/UK/Israeli military war crimes and ethnic cleansing (and the western created Hamas), we will see a surge in hate crimes and hate speech in Western countries, specifically aimed at Jewish, Muslim, and Arab people or those mistook for them (especially by white supremacists and Neo Nazi groups).

It’s important we;

Reject and condemn antisemitism

Reject and condemn Islamophobia

Reject and condemn anti-Arab racism

Show solidarity and support towards our Muslim friends

Show solidarity and support towards our Jewish friends

Be kind to your Jewish, Muslim, and Arab neighbors, coworkers, and friends

Shut down people using current events as an excuse to justify their pre-existing bigotries and biases

Reject and condemn genocide and ethnic cleansing (fucks sake I can’t believe I have to add this one)

Remus and wolfstar!daughter’s daddy daughter dates would just be them being nerds together.

Imagine him and toddler wolfstar!daughter going out in their matching overalls and patchy cardigans! (a tradition that doesn’t stop.) Sirius takes (over a dozen) pictures each time so he can put them in the scrap book. (He also keeps one in his wallet so he can really show off his family when he wants to.)

They’d probably start at a bakery to drink coffe/hot chocolate and have a few baked-goods before their busy day.

Then, they head to the library. First they do a puzzle together for about thirty minutes before looking for books to check out. When she’s younger they pick out a few picture books or beginner chapter books so he can help her read them. As she grows older though, they start picking out books for each other and then meeting up to discuss them as needed.

And they’d go to the park to read outside for a while before heading home to dinner that has been lovingly prepared for them by Sirius.

Do you guys ever think about Iris' blushing sprite?

Do you ever think that the first time we see it. is RIGHT AFTER she hears Phoenix use her real name for the first time?

Imagine loving a man. that didn't even know your REAL NAME until five years after you "broke up." Imagine that man loving you back despite him not knowing a thing about who you really are. And you're okay with that

Because you don't really like who you are anyway.

And once the illusion shatters and fate forces the two of you apart?

None of it matters anymore. If anything it's what you deserve for thinking you could live out your lie with no consequences. It's what you deserve for daring to try to find happiness in a world that has cast you and the people you love aside time and time again.

And then. When against all odds he blindsides you by entering your life again

You hear your name escape his lips. And in that moment you realize

Maybe being seen for who you really are isn't so bad after all.

Maybe. JUST MAYBE. With time. You could learn to finally drop your facade and live in earnest. To fight for what's right the way he told you he wanted to do.

And it shows on your face. It's shown by your rose-colored cheeks and a shy smile that's impossible for you to hide. And for the first time in several years

You don't feel like you need to.

unpopular opinion but i really miss those days when it was all about the music in taylor swift fandom

i will never shut up and will never be over the fact that willy just confirmed what i knew was true in my heart, that scary and normal are SO similar and they both love so fucking much, they just have different ways to go about it. the pipeline of their character development and the way they branched is so interesting to me, like. normal comes from a family that loved him and encouraged him to be himself, and so that's what he does with people! he loves everybody in return. scary, has her mom who loves her very much. but her dad left her and it broke her heart, and she has so much love to give but, what is the point in loving others if they will leave you eventually, right? so she tries to shove that love away and tries to be mean to people and that fucking breaks her inside.

the only reason willy chose her before normal is because she was so desperate to be proven right, to have a way to justify that she was mean because she wanted to, not because she is terrified of loving, and that made her so much more easy to move around than normal.

and that's also another reason why i am so sure scary gravitated towards normal at the beginning and then when she returned with them she was so pissed at him because!! he reminds her of what she was and he reminds her of what she could have if she was not a coward. and now!! now she's gone and she's chosen to risk her life sitting on the throne, not knowing if it was going to work, if she was going to die, because for the first time in years, she's decided to love her friends, and do whatever it takes to keep them safe. and that's what normal would have done too.

Yknow what? I’m getting really tired of Gus being treated as a throwaway character who just third- or fifth- or seventh-wheels for his friends. It’s really upsetting, especially as an aroace, when people make jokes about him being “forever alone” or whatever, because it’s just not true.

First of all, yes, he isn’t in a romantic relationship, but that doesn’t mean he can’t have someone who appreciates him and loves him for who he is. And secondly, his friends already are those people! They care about him!! Sure, they have romantic interests as well, but that doesn’t mean they love him any less. Luz, Amity, Willow and Hunter aren’t going to abandon or ignore him just because they’re in romantic relationships with each other. Sure, they’ll want to spend some alone time together, I’m not denying that, but it doesn’t mean they’ll all go out as a group and then turn it into a double date where Gus is the odd one out like some of you are suggesting.

it’s also pretty disheartening when people respond to Gus’ third-wheeling with something like “that’s what Matt is for!” Sure, Matt could be a solution if Gus was feeling lonely, but he isn’t necessarily feeling that way just from the basis of him third-wheeling. And even if he was, the assumption that a character just needs a romantic interest to be happy is glaringly amatonormative, especially when it’s paired with the assumption that it would “make up” for his friends ignoring him.

in conclusion, let Gus be happy with his friends, please. If you want to make fanart of the group doing something together with Lumity and Huntlow themes, no one’s stopping you, but some of the jokes about him being a third wheel are hurtful to people like aromantics or others who don’t want a romantic relationship. Gus isn’t just a silly side character there for comedic relief. Don’t treat him like one.