here’s another one of these drabbles i’ve had floating around for a while @jericholeader​

The trial had been going for months -- over a year.  

The courtroom was crowded, public gallery packed with media and people who either had some tenuous connection to one of the parties (Markus, or the police officers being charged with his attempted murder) or who had simply been one of the first in line to take up the last few seats in the public gallery. The judge was solemn. The officers had been brought out from somewhere within the court, being held there during their trial (they’d been released, initially, and used the opportunity to extend their trial with a second charge). Connor sat in the right side of the courtroom, beside Markus, with Carl Manfred on his other side. Carl was a good man. Markus’ hospitalisation, and the courtroom dates, had not been an ideal way to get to know him. 

Connor was holding his hand, because Markus’ had been too deliberately-calm, flat against his own knee and falsely-comfortable.  There were many good reasons to be waiting, today, as there had been many good reasons to be waiting this past year in its entirety. Sitting here holding his hand was a sort of truce.

It had happened, now. They’d gone through everything. There was nothing left here, for this case, the jury had been deliberating just over seven hours and they’d just called to say they had a verdict. Seven hours was fast, for a jury’s deliberation. It was rarely good news for the defendant, when it was that fast.

Connor didn’t say as much out loud, because the last thing they needed was him to jinx it.

There were five separate charges, of varying severity. The first charge listed, the charge of theft (they’d emptied out his wallet): not guilty. The second charge, relating to their misuse of police property and weapons, outside of their scheduled shifts: not guilty.

Connor slipped his fingers through Markus’, a firmer grip on his hand.

Assault with a deadly weapon -- guilty.

Two counts of attempted murder --

guilty.

That was it. Just those words. “As to the two counts of attempted murder,” and the word, “Guilty,” and Connor would wonder, in the years to come, about the flash of surprise: the flash of how he had thought he’d need to ready himself for a different outcome. Two counts, both charges, both times it had stuck -- the lesser things did not matter, both times.  Connor let out a breath, ragged, not really a celebration but a breath nonetheless, and he turned to repeat the word for Markus, free hand on Markus’ upper arm: “Guilty.”

Guilty.

:) 🖤

@mlsecretsanta gift for @thequeenofspace! happy belated holidays and apologies for the delay, had a serious family emergency followed by sickness! I had so much fun making this though, was so excited to finally draw these two 🖤 hope you enjoy!!!

"this is too raw of a line to come from—" shut up. beauty and meaning is everywhere

The urge to make him painfully hard when we're out in public.

To rub his inner thighs near his crotch while we're sitting next to each other, brush against his nipples by accident, whisper the most disgusting things into his ear, to kiss his pretty neck a second too long. To see him crumble, see his pupils dilate, his pants getting too tight.

To make him a dumb and blushy mess for me until he's not even able to talk, just waiting patiently like a good boy until I finally take him home.

FNAF Pizza sim’s plot is just the Afton’s fighting

ICJ Ruling

Okay, let's get into this.

First of all, I get the frustration at the court not ordering a ceasefire. I was disappointed and frustrated at first too, since a ceasefire was the biggest and most important preliminary measure South Africa was requesting - and of course we just all want this horror to finally end for the people in Gaza. So I get the frustration and disappointment, I really do.

However, I do think this ruling is still a major win for South Africa, Palestine, and international law as a whole and here's why:

The court acknowledged that it has jurisdiction over this case and completely dismissed Israel's request to throw out the case as a whole. It will now determine at the merits stage (that will probably take years) whether Israel is actually commiting genocide.

The court acknowledged that Palestinians are a "distinct national or ethnic group and therefore deserving of protection under the genocide convention". Pull this out next time someone tells you "there's no such thing as Palestinians, they're all just Arabs".

The court acknowledged very unambiguously that "at least some" of Israel's actions being genocidal in nature is "plausible". South Africa has a case, officially. Israel is accused of genocide, in a way the ICJ deems "plausible", officially. This is huge. (And seriously, how freaking satisfying was it to hear all of those genocidal statements by Israeli politicians read out loud and used as justification for this rulling?)

The court might not have ordered a "ceasefire" in those words, but they did order Israel to "immediately end all genocidal acts" (which includes killing and injuring Palestinians) and submit proof that they actually did. How are they going to comply with this ruling without at least severly reducing or changing what they're doing in Gaza?

In fact, this wording might actually be more appropriate for a genocide (vs a war), as author and journalist Ali Abunimah notes on Twitter:

He's completely right. Israel lost today, by overwhelming majority (I mean, 15 to 2? I heard people predict the rulings would be very close, like 9 judges vs 8, but instead we got 15 to 2 (and even 16 to 1 on the humanitarian aid). Holy shit.) The court disimissed almost everything Israel's side of lawyers said, while acknowledging that South Africa's accusations are "plausible".

And this is important especially because of Mr Abunimah's second tweet there^. Because the question is, where do we go from here?

This ruling means that Israel is officially /possibly/ commiting genocide and that should have huge international consequences. The rest of the world now HAS to take these accusations seriously and stop arming and supporting Israel - and if they won't do it on their own, we, the people, have to make them. This is THE moment to rise up all around the world, especially in the countries most supportive of Israel (the US, the UK, Germany): Protest, call your representatives and demand a ceasefire and an end of arms deliveries to Israel.

We now have a legal case to back our demands: If Israel is, according to the ICJ, "plausibly" commiting genocide, then all of our governments are, according to the ICJ, "plausibly" guiltly of aiding in genocide. And we need to hold that over their heads and demand better. We need to do that right now and in huge numbers. Most politicians only care about themselves and saving their skin. We have to make them realize that they could be accused of aiding in genocide.

(As a German, I'm thinking of Germany here in particular: After South Africa's hearing, our government dismissed their case as having "no basis" - how are they going to keep saying that now that the ICJ officially thinks otherwise? Over the last months, people here have been arrested at protests for calling what's happening in Gaza a genocide. How are the police supposed to legally keep doing that now that the ICJ has officially deemed this accusation "plausible"? I used to be scared to use the word "genocide" at protests or write it on my protest signs - not anymore, have fun trying to arrest me for that when the ICJ literally has my back on this one 🖕🏻.)

So yeah - don't be defeatist about this, don't let Israel's narrative that they "won" (they didn't) take over. This might not be everything we wanted, but it's still a good result. Don't let what the court didn't say ("ceasefire"), distract you from the very important things that they did say. Let this be your motivation to get loud and active, especially if you live in any country that supports Israel. Put pressure on your governments to not be complicit in genocide, you now officially have the highest international court on your side.

i think what pisses me off the most is that last year, nobody had trouble going against russia. companies dropped everything so they could keep russians off their sites, to block them from their news articles and to sanction in other ways. eurovision kicked it out. even steam, discord, any fucking western apps or websites have been so willing to perform in ‘activism’. musicians and celebrities speaking out and country-blocking their work, and so much more. but now what? where is all of that now for israel? where are all the brands leaving the country to ‘protest’? where is anything? what pisses me off the most is that none of them have actually really cared about ukraine, ever, and none of them care about palestine now.

the tim drake experience

Visions

They get along great, what are you talking about?

as sad and disappointing as this is, look me in the eyes and tell me that this isnt the absolute funniest shit youve ever seen. like, they changed their bio to ONE vaguely implicative sentence and posted some promo statement about where you can find it on streaming services, and this little shitty cockroach fandom (affectionate) absolutely BLOWS THE FUCK UP. like, within the span of 2-3 days, we completely took over tumblr so that this 15-year-old fandom was trending, their twitter account gained roughly 6k followers, and everyone is theorizing about a season six a reboot a spin-off a red white and royal blue crossover every thing under the SUN and it literally gets so bad that the poor intern (thats probably gotten two hours of sleep this week and is running solely on celsius and coffee) and the two-person marketing team that managed this whole thing had to scramble to clarify that WE'RE NOT ACTUALLY DOING ANYTHING WE'RE JUST ADVERTISING THE SHOW AGAIN

like. thats the funniest shit EVER.

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stillness in these waking hours

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UH- UM- MY HAND SLIPPED-

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