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onewordshy · 8 months

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Children's Music as an Agent of "Yassification"

My reddit account got flagged for spam and all my old posts were removed so I'm backing this up here for posterity.

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DISCLAIMER: I’m going to be using a lot of generalizations here about gay men/young girls but I would be remiss if I didn’t mention that no demographic is a monolith. These experiences are common (and I think will resonate with many) but not universal and if your experience was different, that’s valid too. This is a very “if you know, you know” topic, and if you don’t know… well you probably know something I don’t.

So if you’re on certain circles of the internet (like this one) you’ve probably heard the term “yassification” pop up recently. It’s a meme term began as something of a joke but I think it’s actually evolved into a useful term for a specific phenomenon so I wanted to discuss it a bit.

I’ll begin by setting the clear definition for the term that I’ll be using for this post:

Yassify (verb): to make something more “fabulous” by rendering it brighter, sleeker, glamorous and more beautiful, especially in a way that is traditionally feminine and appealing to the sensibilities of young queer people

To abstract this a bit further, yassifying something means turning it into something that would make you scream “YAAAASSSS!,” a phrase a comment on the video I linked jokingly describes as “the battle cry of the gays.” It’s a bit similar to bimboification but with different implications (less pornographic, more LGBT).

Know-your-meme has a very detailed history of the term but in my opinion (and there are conflicting sources on this) the moment that kicked it into the internet mainstream and lead to the current wave of usage was when this image of the famous “Dust Bowl Migrant Mother” photo edited to be smiling went viral and lead a meme so big Teen Vogue did an article on it. To quote:

For the last few years, Instagram filters have been altering the way we think about beauty and makeup. Yassification takes that one step further (or, maybe more like one hundred steps) by oversaturating images with FaceApp filters to exaggerate the “beauty” features to the extent of becoming unrecognizable.

While the hyper-FaceTune trend has died down a bit, the term has stuck around and today enjoys a more abstract usage. Yassification no longer requires a literal face to be filtered, instead the very spirit of something can be run through a metaphorical FaceApp and come out the other side yassified and ready to serve. Here are some examples:

Legos -> Lego Friends

KK Slider then -> KK Slider now

Katherine Hudson -> Katy Perry

Survivor -> America’s Next Top Model -> RuPaul’s Drag Race (the yassification of reality television)

Are we all on the same page now? Good.

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Inherent in all this is an undertone of queerness. Yassification is, in a way, rebellious because it takes things that are dark, serious, and oftentimes coded as masculine and transforms them into something fabulous. When something is yassified, it is claimed for the gays.

It’s shallow, yes, and unfortunately tied to some toxic aspects of consumerism, but to throw out another buzz word that’s having its moment… it’s camp. Yassification is not meant to be taken seriously, it’s a celebration of fun before anything else.

Appropriately enough, when I type “yassify” into YouTube the third video to appear is “Faceshopping” by SOPHIE (seizure warning). A queer anthem, this song has also become something of an unofficial theme for the yassification movement thanks to its impossibly glossy sound and lyrics which focus on commercialism and aesthetics.

Using this song as a starting point, we can get a feel for the general “sound” associated with yassification: any music that is bright and poppy, and ostentatiously so. Mainly this is bubblegum pop and club music but the specific genre is flexible as long as it feels the spirit. Think about the kind of stuff that would blow up on stan twitter.

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So why am I talking about children’s music? Well, to quote one tumblr user:

Not enough people talk about this Kim Possible song that sounds like it was produced exclusively for gay clubs.

The song in question is “Say The Word,” sung by Christy Carlson Romano for the soundtrack of the landmark Disney animated series Kim Possible, and as this user points out it has massive undertones of yaaaasssss. The attitude, the gratuitous autotune, that bubblegum beat… there’s no question about it, this track was meant to yassify.

Do I really think that listening to Kim Possible makes kids gay? Of course not, that’s not how it works. But I do think that a child could listen to a song like this and really connect with it and it could be an early indicator of certain interests that will follow them as they grow up.

Children who are often limited in what media they’re permitted to access (or at least were before everyone had smartphones lol) so songs like this are an approachable avenue of exposure to a certain lifestyle/aesthetic that (as we’ve established) is heavily gay coded. We could say the Kim Possible soundtrack is a gateway drug to, say, a Charli XCX mixtape.

Yassification is associated with bright colors, loudness, commercialism, a fashion focus, and children’s media (specifically media targeted at young girls) is built off of these tenants as well so it’s just a hotbed for yas.

Obviously everyone likes toys, cartoons, video games, etc. but gay and gay adjacent people have a special connection with them. Similar to the relationship between gays and horror many gays find solace in the imaginative worlds created for youngsters. The hyper stylized aesthetic and imaginative themes of something like, say, The Winx Club or Steven Universe, are attractive to gay audiences in the same way as more mature films like The Fifth Element or Spiceworld.

Tying into this is a focus on strong female characters and themes of magic/adventure, more things that are like catnip for the gays but sometimes lacking in mainstream adult media. Being able to see traditionally feminine characters portrayed as free agents rather than romantic objects, with an added emphasis on female friendships and self-acceptance, can be so empowering for people who fall outside of the norms of mainstream masculinity.

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So when we take these principles and apply them to music, timeless bops are born! The genres and sounds most adults consider child friendly have a lot of overlap with the aforementioned sounds of the yassified, and thus children's media is flooded with dance pop, '00s r&b/bubblegum, disco, pop-rock, all perfectly designed to be as frothy and ear catching as possible.

Many of these yassifying children’s songs come from musicals and tv shows but there’s also a market for specifically created image songs as well that I’ve found are particularly prone to yas.

These songs provided us pop girls to stan before we even knew that was a thing, and our society is built off of them.

In my opinion, the unquestioned queen of childhood yassification who ties all of these ideas together is Sharpay Evans from the High School Musical franchise. Pink, glamorous, and unapologetically bitchy, her legendary demand that everything be “fabulous” became a rallying cry for a generation of young girls and boys who would grow up expecting nothing less. She even had a gay sidekick! She must have yassified millions of children.

Also in the royal pantheon is are the Bratz Dolls, who have had a (much deserved) resurgence of popularity recently as people finally recognize their status as style and music icons. Notably they had a more rock influenced sound but still fit the definition of yas music very well (see also: Hex Girls and Ember).

Other landmark moments in junior yassification:

Lizzie McGuire - What Dreams Are Made Of

Barbie - A Girl Like You

Oliver and Company - Perfect Isn't Easy

Sonic the Hedgehog - My Sweet Passion

Novi Stars

Monster High - Empire

Warioware - Ashley's Song

Sailor Moon - The Power Of Love

Everything the Cheetah Girls did

I invoke historical examples because, well, they're from my childhood, but the yassification machine is still alive and well in the modern age too. For more contemporary examples we can look at things like the recent Teletubbies album or the new L.O.L. Surprise album that was, I kid you not, called Fierce.

It's good to know there's still people watching out for the kids.

#I worked too hard on this for it to be made invisible #will probably trawl through my account history and back up some other posts too #long post

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maryswrld4 · 1 year

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INSTAGRAM

Hello everyone, welcome back to my blog. In today’s blog, we are focusing on the social media platform “Instagram” which was one of the presentations done in class.

Instagram is one of the most popular social media platforms, ranking number 4 among the world’s most-used social platforms.

What is Instagram?

Instagram is a photo and video-sharing social networking platform where users can share photos and videos as well as connect with friends and family, and discover new content.

Here are some of the strengths and weaknesses of the platform:

Strengths:

Visually appealing - Instagram is a great platform for sharing photos and videos in a visually appealing way

User friendly - the platform is relatively easy to use and its basic features are easy to understand

Advertising - it does a great job of targeting specific demographics and interests which can allow businesses to easily advertise their brand

Strong influencer community - the platform has a large community of influencers and brand ambassadors which makes it a great platform for businesses to leverage influencers to increase their brand exposure and reach newer audiences

Weaknesses:

Authenticity - the platform deals with a lot of fake accounts and bots which can make it difficult for users to determine an account/brand’s authenticity

Privacy concerns - users have raised concerns about how Instagram gathers user’s personal data and shares it with third parties

Weak/limited engagement reach - the platform’s algorithm can make it difficult for users/brands to reach their target audiences

Personally, I spend the majority of my time on Instagram than any of the other social media platforms that I use. Just last week, I spent about 10 hours on the platform. I remember being on Instagram since I was in middle school and the platform has definitely grown since then. I remember when I first made my account, you could only post pictures and not videos.

I like to use Instagram to see what my favorite celebrities are posting and explore food recipes. I usually like to post on my story whenever I am traveling or eating good food. I also post a lot on my “finsta” (which is a “fake Instagram”) where I post more private things to my close friends.

What are your thoughts on Instagram?

Thanks for reading :)

#instagram #social media #branding

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meruz · 3 years

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once again i am answering asks in a big compilation post. included is... gotham, patrick stump, tips about drawing backgrounds, tips about drawing in general, links to my faq, and infinity train

like.... the tv series? No... I’ve drawn dc comics fanart before, though. But it’s been years since I’ve been really into it. I like jumped ship like 10 years ago when the New 52 happened LOL.

AFJHDSLKGH I’m sorry I (probably) won’t do it again??

Actually full disclosure I have a truly cringe amount of p stump drawings/photo studies in my sketchbook right now LOL. He’s just fun to draw... hats, glasses, guitar, a good shape... but I don’t think I’ll rly post those until I can hide them in another big sketchbook pdf.. probably Jan 2022. Stay tuned........ (ominous)

(ominous preview)

These are all sort of related to backgrounds/painting so I grouped them together even though they’re pretty much entirely separate questions.... ANYWAYS

a) How is it working as a BG artist? Is it hard? What show are you drawing for?

I think you’re the first person to ever ask me about my job! Being a background artist is great. It’s definitely labor intensive but I think that could describe pretty much any art job (If something were rote or easy to automate, you wouldn’t hire an artist to do it) and I hesitate to say whether its harder or easier than any other role in the animation pipeline. Plus, so much of what truly makes a job difficult varies from one production to the next, schedule, working environment, co-workers etc. But I will say that I think while BGs are generally a lot of work on the upfront, I think they’re subject to less scrutiny/revisions than something like character/props/effects design and you don’t have to pitch them to a room like boards. So I guess it’s good if you don’t like to talk to people? LOL

A lot of my previous projects + the show I’ve worked on the longest aren’t public yet so I can’t talk about em (but I assure you if/when the news does break I won’t shut up about it). But I’m currently working on Archer Season 12 LOL. I’m like 90% sure I’m allowed to say that.

b) ~~~THANK YOU!! ~~~

c) What exactly do you like to draw most [in a background]?

@kaitomiury Lots of stuff! I really like to draw clutter! Because it’s a great opportunity for environmental storytelling and also you can be kind of messy with it because the sheer mass will supersede any details LOL.

I like to draw clouds... I like to draw grass but not trees lol,,, I like to draw anything that sells perspective really easily like tiled floors and ceilings, shelves, lamp posts on a street etc.

d) Do you have any tips on how to paint (observational)?

god there’s so much to say. painting is really a whole ass discipline like someone can paint their whole life and still discover new things about it. I guess if you’re really just starting out my best advice is that habit is more important than product. especially with traditional plein air painting, I find that the procedure of going outside and setting up your paints is almost harder than the actual painting. There’s a lot of artists who say “I want to do plein air sometime!!” and then never actually get around to doing it. A lot of people just end up working from google streetview or photos on their computer.

But going outside to paint is a really good challenge because it forces you to make and commit to lighting and composition decisions really quickly. And to work through your mistakes instead of against them via undo button.

My last tip is to check out James Gurney’s youtube channel because hes probably the best and most consistent resource on observational painting out there rn. There’s lots other artists doing the same thing (off the top of my head I know a lot of the Warrior Painters group has people regularly posting plein air stuff and lightbox expo had a Jesse Schmidt lecture abt it last year) but Gurney’s probably the most prolific poster and one of the best at explaining the more technical stuff - his books are great too.

e) Do you have tips for drawing cleanly on heavypaint?

@marigoldfool UMM LOL I LIKE ONLY USE THE FILL TOOL so maybe use the fill tool? Fill and rectangle are good for edge control as opposed to the rest of the heavy paint tools which can get sort of muddles. And also I use a stylus so maybe if you’re using your finger, find a stylus that works with your device instead. That’s all I’ve got, frankly I don’t think my drawings are particularly clean lol.

f) Tips on improving backgrounds/scenes making them more dynamic practicing etc?

Ive given some tips about backgrounds/scenes before so I’m not gonna re-tread those but here’s another thing that might be helpful...

I think a good way to approach backgrounds is to think of the specific story or even mood you want to convey with the background first. Thinking “I just need to put something behind this character” is going to lead you to drawing like... a green screen tourist photo backdrop. But if you think “I need this bg to make the characters feel small” or “I need this bg to make the world feel colorful” then it gives you requirements and cues to work off of.

If I know a character needs to feel overwhelmed and small, then I know I need to create environment elements that will cage them in and corner them. If a character needs to feel triumphant/on top of the world then I know I need to let the environment open up around them. etc. If I know my focal point/ where I want to draw attention, I can build the background around that.

Also, backgrounds like figure compositions will have focal points of their own and you can draw attention to it/ the relationship the characters have with the bg element via scale or directionality or color, any number of cues. I think of it almost as a second/third character in a scene.

Not every composition is gonna have something so obvious like this but it helps me to think about these because then the characters feel connected and integrated with the environment.

Some more general art questions

a) Do you have any process/tips to start drawing character/bodies/heads?

I tried to kind of draw something to answer this but honestly this is difficult for me to answer because I don’t think I’m that great at drawing characters LOL. Ok, I think I have two tips.

1) flip your canvas often. A lot about what makes human bodies look correct and believable is symmetry and balance. Even if someone has asymmetrical features, the body will often pull and push in a way to counterbalance it. we often have inherent biases to one side or another like dominant hands dominant eyes etc. you know how right-handed artists will often favor drawing characters facing 45 degrees facing (the artist’s) left? that’s part of it. so viewing your drawing flipped even just to evaluate it helps compensate for that bias and makes you more aware of balance.

2) draw the whole figure often. I feel like a lot of beginner artists (myself included for a long time) defer to just drawing headshots or busts because it’s easier, you dont have to think about posing limbs etc. But drawing a full body allows you to better gauge proportion, perspective, body language, everything that makes a character look believable and grounded.

Like if you (me) have that issue where you draw the head too big and then have to resize it to fit the proportions of the rest of the body, it’s probably because you (I) drew the head first and are treating the body as an afterthought/attachment. Sketching out the whole figure first or even just quick drawing guides for it will help you think of it more holistically. I learned this figure drawing in charcoal at art school LOL.

oh. third mini tip - try to draw people from life often! its the best study. if you can get into a figure drawing/nude drawing class EVEN BETTER and if you have a local college/art space/museum that hosts those for free TREASURE IT AND TAKE ADVANTAGE OF IT, that’s a huge boon that a lot of artists (me again) wish they had. though if youre not so lucky and youre sitting in a park trying to creeper draw people and they keep moving.. don’t let that stop you! that’s good practice because it’s forcing you to work fast to get the important stuff down LOL. its a challenge!

b) I’ve been pretty out of energy and have had no inspiration to draw but I have the desire to. Any advice?

Dude, take a walk or something.... Or a nap? Low energy is going to effect everything else so you gotta hit that problem at its source.

If you’re looking for inspiration though, I’d recommend stuff like watching a movie, reading a book, playing video games etc. Fill up your idea bank with content and then give yourself time/space to gestate it into new concepts. Sometimes looking at other art works but sometimes it can work against you because it’s too close.

Also something that helps me is remembering that art doesn’t always have to be groundbreaking... like it’s okay to make something shitty and stupid that you don’t post online and only show to your friend. That’s all part of the process imo. If you want to hit a home run you gotta warm up first, right? Sports.

I should probably compile everytime i give tips on stuff like this but that’s getting dangerously close to being a social media artist who makes stupid boiled down art tutorials for clout which is the last thing i want to be... the thing I want to stress is that art is a whole visual language and there are widely agreed upon rules and customs but they exist in large part to be broken. Like there's an infinite number of ways to reach an infinite number of solutions and that’s actually what makes it really cool and personal for both the artist and the viewer. So when you make work you like or you find someone else’s work you like, take a step back and ask yourself what about it speaks for you, what about it works for you, what makes it effective, how to recreate that effect and how to break that effect completely, etc. And have a good time with it or else what’s the point.

for the first 2, I direct you to my FAQ

For the last one, I don’t actually believe I’ve ever addressed artwork as insp for stories/rp but I’ll say here and now yeah go ahead! As long as you’re not making profit or taking credit for my work then I’m normally ok with it. Especially anything thats private and purely recreational, that’s generally 100% green light go. I only ask that if you post it anywhere public that you please credit me.

(and I reserve the right to ask you to take it down if I see it and don’t approve of it’s use but I think that case is pretty rare.)

a) @lemuelzero101 Thank you!!! I haven’t played Life is Strange but actually that series’ vis dev artist Edouard Caplain is one of my bigger art inspirations lately so that’s a really high compliment lol. And yeah I hope we get 5-8 too...!

b) Thank you for sticking around! I’ve been thinking about Digimon and Infinity Train in tandem lately, actually. They’re a little similar? Enter a dangerous alternate world and have wacky adventures with monsters/inanimate objects that have weird powers... there’s like weird engineers and mechanisms behind the scenes... also frontier literally starts with them getting on a train. Anyways if anyone else followed me for digimon... maybe you’d like Infinity Train? LOL

c) @king-wens-king I’M GLAD MY ART JUST HAS PINOY VIBES LOL I hope you are having a good day too :^)

a, b, c, d) yessss my Watch Infinity Train agenda is working....

e) aw thank you!! i think you should watch infinity train :)

#ask #trying this new thing where i tag people in the body of the post instead

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edwinkjayesh · 2 years

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WhatsApp Too Getting Updated!

Last week I have blogged about the updates made Meta for Instagram and Facebook. Where Facebook got something really mind blowing and Instagram got more space to play the game. So Meta brought some more updates for WhatsApp and unlocked some features. Let's peak into those.

Starting of let's hit the smallest update going to happen that is, unlocking audio playback speed control for iOS WhatsApp users. Yeah same thing that Android users know. They are now available in the beta version.

We all were pumped of an early news that was released officially about the multiple device access for the same account. So this will come very soon and this can also work even if there is no network. It offers a multi-device beta program right now that gives users early access to try a new version of WhatsApp for Web, Desktop, and Portal. It allows WhatsApp users to use linked companion devices without the need to keep their phones connected. Yeah the same but bit earlier. The company has confirmed that the feature supports end-to-end encryption. But you should also consider that, they aren’t currently supported if you are planning to use this multi-media feature. The company says in its blog post that this feature will not work if someone clears or deletes chats on companion devices if the primary device is an iPhone. The feature doesn’t support those devices that are using a very old version of WhatsApp. This is also the case with tablets. WhatsApp notes that one won’t be able to view live location on companion devices. The multi-device beta feature also doesn’t support messages with link previews from WhatsApp Web and creating/viewing a broadcast list on companion devices.

So another update that was found on latest beta update was, "last scene" time stamp edit option. Yeah as we all have used a kind of similar feature in Instagram and Facebook. So yeah we can decide what should our chats shows others about us completely. So users will be able to hide their Last Seen time from specific contacts with this new and fourth option. Users must choose which contacts they do not wish to share their last seen time with. This is similar to the feature WhatsApp is introducing to allow users to choose who can see their profile photographs and information. That's pretty much it.

WhatsApp also introduced new safety features in India called Flash Calls and Message Level Reporting features. Flash calls is an additional layer on top of the SMS verification during the registration process on WhatsApp. Users can verify their number via an automated call while setting up their WhatsApp account. WhatsApp for desktop beta 2.2146.5 update lets users have more control over the privacy features. Users will be able to manage their last seen, profile photo and about pages directly from the WhatsApp Web and WhatsApp for desktop clients. There is no official word yet on when the WhatsApp privacy features will be made available for all users of desktop and web app. And that's all about privacy updates and all of them are great move too.

WhatsApp Delta Version

WhatsApp Delta is essentially a modified version of the regular WhatsApp app you and me use. The idea behind these modified versions is to offer an enhanced messaging experience with new and better features. WhatsApp Delta is developed by Deltalabs Studios and can be downloaded via third-party app depositories.

With WhatsApp Delta, you can get to customize your WhatsApp experience. You will be able to change accent colors from the usual green, change the UI, apply customized font, and more. The mod also brings features such as auto-reply, third party video player, call block, hide online status, hide typing status, do not disturb, and more.

The Delta mod also allows users to send high-resolution photos, photos and videos of large sizes, and even extend the duration of status. However, the biggest feature with this mod is the ability to edit messages that have already been sent.

If you want to know more about WhatsApp Delta let me know in the comments, I can do a separate blog for that. Of course no extra thoughts on these updates because all of them are necessary and let's hope that all these come into action properly. Especially Privacy updates are a factor, which makes WhatsApp more effective and acceptable. And I think this is for the first time, that WhatsApp to come up with this much updates at once. Anyways fingers crossed and this is - Edwin K Jayesh.

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ifuckinglovestvincent · 3 years

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THE FORTY-FIVE: ST. VINCENT

Sleazy, gritty, grimy – these are the words used to describe the latest iteration of St. Vincent, Annie Clark’s alter ego. As she teases the release of her upcoming new album, ‘Daddy’s Home’, Eve Barlow finds out who’s wearing the trousers now.

Photos: Zackery Michael

Yellow may be the colour of gold, the hue of a perfect blonde or the shade of the sun, but when it’s too garish, yellow denotes the stain of sickness and the luridness of sleaze. On ‘Pay Your Way In Pain’ – the first single from St. Vincent’s forthcoming sixth album ‘Daddy’s Home’ – Annie Clark basks in the palette of cheap 1970s yellows; a dirty, salacious yellow that even the most prudish of individuals find difficult to avert their gaze from. It’s a yellow that recalls the smell of cigarettes on fingers, the tape across tomorrow’s crime scene or the dull ache of bad penetration.

The video for the single, which dropped last Thursday, features Clark in a blonde wig and suit, channeling a John Cassavetes anti-heroine (think Gena Rowlands in Gloria) and ‘Fame’-era Bowie. She twists in front of too-bright disco lights. She roughs up her voice. She sings about the price we pay for searching for acceptance while being outcast from society. “So I went to the park just to watch the little children/ The mothers saw my heels and they said I wasn’t welcome,” she coos, and you immediately recognise the scene of a free woman threatening the post-nuclear families aspiring to innocence. Clark is here to pervert them.

She laughs. “That’s how I feel!” From her studio in Los Angeles, she begins quoting lyrics from Jimi Hendrix’s ‘Red House’. “It’s a blues song for 2021.” LA is a city Clark reluctantly only half calls home, and one that is opposed to her vastly preferred New York. “I don’t feel any romantic attachment to Los Angeles,” she says of the place she coined the song ‘Los Ageless’ about on 2017’s ‘Masseduction’ (“The Los Ageless hang out by the bar/ Burn the pages of unwritten memoirs”).“The best that could be said of LA is, ‘Yeah it’s nice.’ And it is! LA is easy and pleasant. But if you were a person the last thing you’d want someone to say about you is: ‘She’s nice!’”

On ‘Daddy’s Home’, Clark writes about a past derelict New York; a place Los Angeles would suffocate in. “The idea of New York, the art that came out of it, and my living there,” she says. “I’ve not given up my card. I don’t feel in any way ready to renounce my New York citizenship. I bought an apartment so I didn’t have to.” Her down-and-out New York is one a true masochist would love, and it’s sleazy in excess. Sleaze is usually the thing men flaunt at a woman’s expense. In 2021, the proverbial Daddy in the title is Clark. But there’s also a literal Daddy. He came home in the winter of 2019.

On the title track, Clark sings about “inmate 502”: her father. He was sentenced to 12 years in prison for his involvement in a $43m stock fraud scheme. He went away in May 2010. Clark reacted by writing her third breakthrough album ‘Strange Mercy’ in 2011; inspired not just by her father’s imprisonment but the effects it had on her life.“I mean it was rough stuff,” she says. “It was a fuck show. Absolutely terrible. Gut-wrenching. Like so many times in life, music saved me from all kinds of personal peril. I was angry. I was devastated. There’s a sort of dullness to incarceration where you don’t have any control. It’s like a thud at the basement of your being. So I wrote all about it,” she says.

Back then, she was aloof about meaning. In an interview we did that year, she called from a hotel rooftop in Phoenix and was fried from analytical questions. She excused her lack of desire to talk about ‘Strange Mercy’ as a means of protecting fans who could interpret it at will. Really she was protecting an audience closer to home. It’s clear now that the title track is about her father’s imprisonment (“Our father in exile/ For God only knows how many years”). Clark’s parents divorced when she was a child, and they have eight children in their mixed family, some of whom were very young when ‘Strange Mercy’ came out. She explains this discretion now as her method of sheltering them.

“I am protective of my family,” she says. “It didn’t feel safe to me. I disliked the fact that it was taken as malicious obfuscations. No.” Clark wanted to deal with the family drama in art but not in press. She managed to remain tight-lipped until she became the subject of a different intrusion. As St. Vincent’s star continued to rocket, Clark found herself in a relationship with British model Cara Delevingne from 2014 to 2016, and attracted celebrity tabloid attention. Details of her family’s past were exposed. The Daily Mail came knocking on her sister’s door in Texas, where Clark is from.

“Luckily I’m super tight with my family and the Daily Mail didn’t find anybody who was gonna sell me out,” she says. “They were looking for it. Clark girls are a fucking impenetrable force. We will cut a bitch.”

Four years later, Clark gets to own the narrative herself in the medium that’s most apt: music. “The story has evolved. I’ve evolved. People have grown up. I would rather be the one to tell my story,” she says, ruminating on the misfortune that this was robbed from her: a story that writes itself. “My father’s release from prison is a great starting point, right?” Between tours and whenever she could manage, Clark would go and visit him in prison and would be signing autographs in the visitation room for the inmates, who all followed her success with every album release, press clipping and late night TV spot. She joked to her sisters that she’d become the belle of the ball there. “I don’t have to make that up,” she says.

There’s an ease to Clark’s interview manner that hasn’t existed before. She seems ready not just to discuss her father’s story, but to own certain elements of herself. “Hell where can you run when the outlaw’s inside you,” she sings on the title track, alluding to her common traits with her father. “I’ve always had a relationship with my dad and a good one. We’re very similar,” she says. “The movies we like, the books, he liked fashion. He’s really funny, he’s a good time.” Her father’s release gave Clark and her brothers and sisters permission to joke. “The title, ‘Daddy’s Home’ makes me laugh. It sounds fucking pervy as hell. But it’s about a real father ten years later. I’m Daddy now!”

The question of who’s fathering who is a serious one, but it’s also not serious. Clark wears the idea of Daddy as a costume. She likes to play. She joins today’s Zoom in a pair of sunglasses wider than her face and a silk scarf framing her head. The sunglasses come off, and the scarf is a tool for distraction. She ties it above her forehead, attempts a neckerchief, eventually tosses it aside. Clark can only be earnest for so long before she seeks some mischief. She doesn’t like to stay in reality for extensive periods. “I like to create a world and then I get to live in it and be somebody new every two or three years,” she says. “Who wants to be themselves all the time?”

‘Daddy’s Home‘ began in New York at Electric Lady studios before COVID hit and was finished in her studio in LA. She worked on it with “my friend Jack” [Jack Antonoff, producer for Lana Del Rey, Lorde, Taylor Swift]. Antonoff and Clark worked on ‘Masseduction’ and found a winning formula, pushing Clark’s guitar-orientated electronic universe to its poppiest maximum, without compromising her idiosyncrasies. “We’re simpatico. He’s a dream,” she says. “He played the hell outta instruments on this record. He’s crushing it on drums, crushing it on Wurlitzer.” The pair let loose. They began with ‘The Holiday Party’, one of the warmest tracks Clark’s ever written. It’s as inviting as a winter fireplace, stoked by soulful horns, acoustic guitar and backing singers. “Every time they sang something I’d say, ‘Yeah but can you do it sleazier? Make your voice sound like you’ve been up for three days.” Clark speaks of an unspoken understanding with Antonoff as regards the vibe: “Familiar sounds. The opposite of my hands coming out of the speaker to choke you till you like it. This is not submission. Just inviting. I can tell a story in a different way.”

The entire record is familiar, giving the listener the satisfaction that they’ve heard the songs before but can’t quite place them. It’s a satisfying accompaniment to a pandemic that encouraged nostalgic listening. Clark was nostalgic too. She reverted to records she enjoyed with her father: Stevie Wonder’s catalogue from the 1970s (‘Songs In The Key Of Life’, ‘Innervisions’, ‘Talking Book’) and Steely Dan. “Not to be the dude at the record store but it’s specifically post-flower child idealism of the ’60s,” she explains. “It’s when it flipped into nihilism, which I much prefer. Pre disco, pre punk. That music is in me in a deep way. It’s in my ears.”

On ‘The Melting Of The Sun’ she has a delicious time creating a psychedelic Pink Floyd odyssey while exploring the path tread by her heroes Marilyn Monroe, Joni Mitchell, Joan Didion and Nina Simone. It’s a series of beautiful vignettes of brilliant women who were met with a hostile environment. Clark considers what they did to overcome that. “I’m thanking all these women for making it easier for me to do it. I hope I didn’t totally let them down.” Clark is often the only woman sharing a stage with rock luminaries such as Dave Grohl, Damon Albarn and David Byrne, and has appeared to have shattered a male-centric glass ceiling. She’s unsure she’s doing enough to redress the imbalance. “There are little things I can do and control,” she says of hiring women on her team. “God! Now I feel like I should do more. What should I do? It’s a big question. You know what I have seen a lot more from when I started to now? Girls playing guitar.”

If one woman reinvented the guitar in the past decade, it’s Clark. Behind her is a rack of them. The pandemic has taken her out of the wild in which she’s accustomed to tantalising audiences at night with her displays of riffing and heel-balancing. Instead, she’s chained to her desk. Her obsession with heels in the lyrics of ‘Daddy’s Home’ she reckons may be a reflection of her nights performing ‘Masseduction’ in thigh highs. “I made sure that nothing I wore was comfortable,” she recalls. “Everything was about stricture and structure and latex. I had to train all the time to make sure I could handle it.” Is she taking the heels off when live shows return? “Absofuckinglutely not.”

Clark is interested in the new generation. She’s recently tweeted about Arlo Parks and has become a big fan of Russian singer-songwriter Kate NV. “I’m obsessed with Russia,” she says. In a recent LA Times profile, she professed to a pandemic intellectual fixation on Stalin. “Yeah! I mean right now my computer is propped up on stuff. You are sitting on The Gulag Archipelago, The Best Short Stories Of Dostoyevsky andThe Plays Of Chekhov. I’m kinda in it.” The pop world interests Clark, too. She was credited with a co-write on Swift’s 2019 album ‘Lover’. At last year’s Grammys she performed a duet with Dua Lipa. It was one of the queerest performances the Grammys has ever aired. Clark interrupts.

“What about it seemed queer?!”

You know… The lip bite, for one!

“Wait. Did she bite her lip?”

No, you bit your lip.

“I did?!”

Everyone was talking about it. Come on, Annie.

“Serious? I…”

You both waltzed around each other with matching hairdos, making eyes…

“I have no memory of it.”

Frustrating as it may be in a world of too much information, Clark’s lack of willingness to overanalyse every creative decision she makes or participates in is something to treasure. “I want to be a writer who can write great songs,” she says. “I’m so glad I can play guitar and fuck around in the studio to my heart’s desire but it’s about what you can say. What’s a great song? What lyric is gonna rip your guts open. Just make great shit! That’s where I was with this record. That’s all I wanna do with my life.”

More than a decade into St. Vincent, Clark doesn’t reflect. She looks strictly forward. “I’m like a horse with blinders,” she says. She did make an exception to take stock lately when the phone rang. “I saw a +44 and that gets me excited,” she says. “Who could this be?” Well, who was it? “Paul McCartney,” she says, in disbelief. “Anything I’ve done, any mistake I’ve made, somehow it’s forgiven, assuaged. I did something right in my life if a fucking Beatle called me.”

Now there’s a get out of jail free card if ever she needed one.

Daddy’s Home by St. Vincent is out May 14, 2021.

#‘I HAVE NO MEMORY OF IT’#LOOOOOL #WHY ARE U LIKE THIS #st vincent #full of shit #annie clark #Annie Clark on beds #yellow is the color for dull ache of bad penetration?

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deardragonbook · 3 years

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How I use Trello for Book Series Management (a Free alternative to so many of those overpriced world building programs!)

I constantly see posts about how these world building programs changed the way you write, help you write faster and accomplish more. And then you go in and they’re super expensive and you read comments are people are like, well, I’m too poor for this, shame.

And I’m just like, okay but... there are alternatives, ya’ll know that right? Right?

So, today I’m going to talk about my alternative and how I use it.

This might not be the best tool for everybody, it works really well for me but I do compliment it with a timeline and a map that I keep separate (will eventually get round to an couple of posts about how I do them).

I use Trello, for this tutorial, I’m specifically going to use this board, I’ve made it editable (I think, I don’t usually work with other people) so you can play around and get a feel for it, please don’t mess it up too much so others can mess with it later.

I had to make a separate board for this tutorial to my usual book board because spoilers! Like, big spoilers. Like, the entire series outline is up there, but I’ve copied pretty much the same lists:

Progress: Here I keep track of what I’m up to and more importantly I will store outlines and drafts through attachments. Basically just another backup (you can never have too many).

Scenes Book 1: Here I write down anything and everything I would like to include in the first book. This can be important things, plot points or silly bits of dialogue.

Done Book 1: Once I’ve written something into the draft I will move the content from “Scenes Book 1″ here.

Future Book Scenes: Here I write scenes I plan to include later on in the series but don’t have a specific book for yet.

Cut Content / Just Writing: If something that was previously in “Futre Book Scenes” or “Scenes Book 1″ gets cut, due to plot changes, fluidity or any other reason, I will move it straight here. This is also a place I use when I get the urge to write something random.

Locations: a quick list of important locations for me to reference (usually because I forget names or spelling).

Characters: a quick list of character’s full names and sometimes pictures for me to reference (usually because I forget surnames).

The second and third I have several off (for each book) and I will drag them to the very end of the screen once I’m done with them. Right now in my original board all the book 1 content is at the very back (where Characters is on this example board).

Each little white square with text is called a card. As you can see, you can add attachments to cards (the little paperclip), these can be images that show up on the main board, perfect for characters or locations:

Or they can also be documents (pdfs, word documents...) perfect for saving drafts. (I uploaded a social media planner just to show you can upload PDFs because it’s what I had on my ipad, don’t pay it much notice).

As you can see below, in each card you have the option to write a description. I don’t think there’s a limit to how long this can be (I’ve never found it), and if you have the time and motivation Trello has several formatting options you can use to make it look more appealing. I don’t tend to use them but it’s nice that they’re there. (This shows up on your card on your board as couple of lines underneath the title, so you can easily see which cards have content in them and which don’t).

If after writing a nice little description you want to add something but don’t want to add it to the description, Trello allows you to add comments, I use this for clarifications or quick added info. (This shows up on your Trello board as the little speech bubble with a number referring to how many comments).

This is an example of a character sheet with a photo and description I made to give you an idea of how to do this!

(Yes, there are two characters in the photo as a pose to one, it’s the last picture I saved on my ipad, just roll with it).

Now that you’ve seen a quick walk through how I use Trello, you’re probably wondering why Trello? Why not posts its or normal lists? Well, Trello has a simple yet powerful feature that makes managing my storm of ideas far easier! The easy drag and drop feature. As well as how quick it is!

Check out this quick video of me moving cards around like I would when editing my main series, creating a new list for book 2 scenes and adding a card.

youtube

Are there better apps out there?

Probably.

But trello had served me extremely well for years now! I love it’s functionality, and none of the features locked behind premium seem particularly important to my personal experience.

Another thing to keep in mind is it’s online, which means I have Trello on my phone, ipad and computer and use it in all three locations. A lot of programs are not available on all of these systems which can make for a slower experience. Especially when I wake up at 3 in the morning and need to add a card somewhere, being able to just reach out for my phone and throw it in is a huge advantage!

They also allow you to add Check lists. My current WIP Oppida Institute for Reformation is actually fully outlines in Trello, I use the comments to write out scenes that are important and hide ticked of boxes for a cleaner look.

I use a different Check List for each Act of the story and so far it’s been a very good experience!

If you have any questions about specific aspects of Trello, feel free to ask because I’ve been using it for a long time and feel like I have a pretty good idea about most stuff.

And if you use a different program for managing series, why not tell us about it? You thinking of trying out a new program?

As always, feel free to:

Buy my book here. (Or read it on amazon unlimited!)

Check out my website

Check out my wattpad

Check out my Instagram (you can see some of my art! Plus real time updates on what I’m up to)

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not-majestic-bluenicorn · 3 years

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Cravity’s League of the Universe Theory UPDATE

Season 3 Hideout: Be Our Voice & The Awakening: Written in the Stars

Hello! My name’s Ori and I write k-pop theories and fanfics and today I’m revisiting my Cravity theory cause apparently I didn’t update for Hideout Season 3 even though I thought I had lol This is going to be a mini update since there isn’t much to add, but let’s get right into it.

Arc 1: Hideout Season 3 Main Plot Points

During the prologue of Season 3 we finally get to see more about Woobin, Seongmin and Minhee. At the beginning they hear their names being called by Wonjin, who’s probably using his power to convince them to meet the others. Then we get to see a little of their private lives.

First Woobin is studying in his room when he spots a dead butterfly and revives it. He then tries to take the elevator to leave his apartment building but he ends up getting too scared and gives up; the instagram account also confirms his fear of elevators. He then presumably leaves to spend some time at the arcade. From Minhee, we get to see how carefully he cleans and takes care of his room, making sure even the smallest object is in place, before his alarms sound and he has to get ready to leave.

[Gif: Woobin picks up a dead butterfly, the scene cuts and we see the butterfly flying again.]

Seongmin is at the bus stop at night, waiting for it. We know from the Instagram posts he doesn’t want to go home so ends up choosing to go to the arcade and he forgets his cellphone. Minhee finds the cellphone and upon touching it discovers Seongmin’s plans and goes to meet him there. At the arcade, Seongmin struggles to play with the dart, but when he closes and opens his eyes again, suddenly he’s nailing every single shot.

[Gif 1: Minhee picks up Seongmin’s cellphone at the bus stop and has a vision of Seonming playing with darts and failing all his shorts.

Gif 2: Seongmin is at the arcade playing darts, he closes his eyes and after he opens them he does a perfect shot.]

Minhee arrives during this and gives Seongmin his cellphone, which is when they notice they both have similar stones. Woobin also notices this and joins them. They notice Seongmin’s injured hands and Woobin heals him, revealing his power to them.

[Screenshot: Woobin standing with his back to the camera. His arm is up as he shows Seongmin and Minhee his stone.

Gif: Woobin grabs Seongmin’s injured hands in his and his hands start to shine as he heals Seongmin. The scene fades to white with the light coming from his hands.]

After a cutscene, we see the other six at their hideout. Wonjin is explaining that Seongmin and Minhee are a year younger than them and that Woobin is his and Hyeongjun’s classmate. He also mentions already calling them and Allen adds that he’s dreamt of them as well. Finally, the three of them arrive and introduce themselves.

[Instagram screenshot: A picture of a table with pictures of Minhee, Seongmin and Woobin sprawled on it. The caption reads “The friends from Allen’s dream that he talked about. Friens that Allen introduced to me. I’m sure they could hear my voice will they? Finally today! #photo taken by Hyeonjun

Screenshot from Epilogue: The nine members sitting around a table in their hideout.]

In the epilogue, they’re all spending time together at the hideout. Wonjin and Taeyoung are talking. Seongmin is repairing something for Hyeongjun. Serim, Jungmo and Minhee are with Revue when Jungmo tests Serim’s power by asking him what is the color of the third cloth in his wardrobe. Serim correctly guesses it’s a purple hoodie. We also confirm Jungmo’s ability to communicate with animals. Finally, Woobin is asking Allen if he can predict which team will win tomorrow’s game, to which Allen responds that’s not how his power works, before they’re interrupted by Seongmin asked to be healed by Woobin.

The scene cuts to them playing a board game. Taeyoung tries to cheat by freezing time but Hyeongjun discovers and stops him. Suddenly, Allen looks up and all the lights around them begin to turn off before they look at the camera and the final light goes out. Then, Allen wakes up to Woobin calling him. Finally, in the Hidden Film we see all but Seongmin and Minhee celebrating their graduation.

[Gif: The members look around as the lamps they were using for light start to turn off on their own.]

What is happening?

Before we update the character profiles let’s talk a little bit about what’s going on. First of all, they’ve finished reuniting and Hideout is over just as we had predicted. This means the stasis stage of the story is over and now we need a trigger. While I think that The Awakening: Written in the Stars is sort of a little break while they work on the next part of the story, because we didn’t get any films or updates on the Instagram account, I also think that the title has more meaning to it than that.

First of all, the simple phrase “the awakening” already feels like a trigger because the word itself alludes to the start of something. I also think it might be literally referencing Allen waking up from the vision he has in the Season 3 Epilogue. Yes, I’m pretty sure the whole last scene is a vision, and while it’s a little different, it does preserve that 4th-wall-breaking aspect we’ve seen in some of his visions before, so it’s not a stretch.

What does this mean for them? Well, simply put, danger is coming, and whether they like it or not, they might have to start learning real soon how to better use their abilities. To be honest, I’m still not sure Starship is gonna go full superhero on them, because most of their powers are very passive, but we’ll see!

Updating the profiles

Now that we know a bit more about our last three characters, let’s summarize what we know and then make a list with their powers.

Minhee

He is an extreme perfectionist, to the point that every single thing must have its place and it seems that he has a very detailed routine to keep order in his room. We can also see that he has quite a lot of alarms that establish the order of his day. He doesn’t seem to have an adverse reaction to disorder though, and simply seems to enjoy the act of keeping his space clean and perfect, because we don’t see him do that with the hideout.

[Instagram screenshot: A picture of a perfectly organized shelf with the caption “Neat and tidy. Finished cleaning up my room.”]

Seongmin

Seongmin hates being home, to the point we don’t even get to see his house in any of the videos. He doesn’t mention it in the videos but he’s pretty verbal about it in the Instagram posts. It is quite likely he has a bad relationship with his parents and he seems to wander around a lot. He is also extremely prone to getting injured apparently. Someone help the lost puppy.

[Instagram screenshot: A picture of Seongmin sitting on a bench at a bus stop with the caption “Not yet... don’t wanna go home like this, should I go there again?”]

Woobin

Woobin lives in an apartment complex and he seems to be a good student. The one thing that definitely stands out about him is his fear of using the elevator. It’s still unknown if it comes from any particular elevator-related trauma or if maybe he has major claustrophobia caused by something that isn’t specifically related to elevators. However, he’s pretty terrified of them and although he’s been trying to overcome it, it hasn’t worked for him at all.

[Instagram screenshot: A picture of Woobin’s hand as he presses the button to call the elevator with the caption “Please, just for today...”]

The powers

Finally, the list:

Serim - People-focused psychometry, he obtains information about others, seemingly by accessing their knowledge and memories. So far his ability has only been seen with the members.

Allen - Precognition through dreams, he has dreams in which he’s able to see the future. All dreams seem to be tied to the members so far.

Jungmo - Animal Telepathy, he’s able to understand and communicate with animals.

Woobin - Accelerated Healing, so far we’ve seen him heal small injuries and bring back to life small creatures.

Wonjin - Telepathy, he can communicate with others through the mind, even if they’re far away. So far his ability has only been seen with the members.

Minhee - Future-focused psychometry, this one is still in doubt since we’ve only seen him use it once, but he seems to be able to see the future of the person who last touched the object.

Hyeongjun - Legit, no idea, what is your deal, child?

Taeyoung - Time stopping, he’s able to completely stop time for everyone else except Hyeongjun. He can continue moving and doing things normally when he does it.

Seongmin - Enhanced accuracy and precision, again this one is still in doubt since we’ve only seen him use it once, but he seems to be able to perfectly nail every shot he makes.

Conclusions

Cravity might actually be in danger, depending on what Allen’s vision meant. One thing is for sure though, the story is starting to move forward. On the other hand, someone help me with Hyeongjun, I accept suggestions.

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hectabdr · 3 years

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Dragon Raja IV - Chapters 13 - 15 + epilogue (Abridged)

Hi everyone, sorry for taking so long to post the last part, I had a lot of work this week.

BTW, since it's over, I put the whole novel summary on a PDF document, which you can download from here.

Previous Chapters

Chapter 13

The nurse at the mental hospital couldn't believe her eyes when Luminous came back and requested to be admitted in his old room. He asked for his usual injection and went back to his not-so-favorite video game level.

In his vision, he kept accelerating far away form the swarm of death servitors, everything went according to plan and they still had lots of time to spare. He made many excuses to Nono in an attempt to justify his incredible performance, in the radio, there was a very strange song, Luminous recognized it, the name was "Daily Growing" by the folk group Altan, it was the same song that Johann and his father heard before they ran into Odin.

Nono was confused, Luminous just seemed to know way too many things. He knew about the damaged tire, about every safe route, the reach of the Nibelungen and the presence of a small, strange building hiding in the distance. It was the Media Asia Group building, according to Finger, this is the place where Nono found Chu Tianjiao's home. If this was a Nibelungen, an exact copy of the room should be there as well, still intact.

There was nothing surprising about the small place, but that was intentional. A person like Tianjiao was probably trained against people with skills like Nono's, so there had to be a secret compartment or a hidden door. He lifted the bed and there it was!

Mr Chu managed to create an underground bunker for himself. There was a bigger, more comfortable bed, a record player with Elvis Presley's discs and leather jackets. Luminous wanted to be more like this stylish man every second he spent there.

He noticed a bunch of pictures hanging from a string. Tianjiao spend a lot of time making copies of photographs from his family, but he wasn't in them, there was another man next to his wife and his son, but he used chemicals to erase him from the images. He also wrote small phrases dedicated to his wife in the back of the photos, like:

"This is the first year since you left me, you look good"

"This is the third year, you're getting fat"

"Fifth year, I don't have time to think of you anymore"

"Sixth year. ...but I still miss you".

The rest of the walls were filled with images and documents connected by red strings. Multiple events were listed in them, including the fall of Black Swan Bay in 1991 and the Greenland incident from November 7, 2002. These events related to dragon sightings and awakenings all led to a specific incident: The resurrection of the Black king Nidhogg. Even to the other dragon overlords, Nidhogg is a god-like existence, and its words are taken as prophecies. Chu Tianjiao was the city's watchman, he came to that place with a special purpose, but he mistakenly fell in love with a young dancer. They got married and had a child, they were happy, but he knew very well that he couldn't give them a peaceful life, so he signed the divorce papers and watched her take Johann away and marry a different man. While that family went to amusement parks and movie theaters, Tianjiao stayed on his underground room thinking about the fate of mankind.

Luminous memorized as much as he could from Tianjiao's investigation and went back with Nono, he kept driving and they entered the empty city, the lights were still on and the amusement park shined like a neon show.

- I always wanted to be in a Nibelungen, but I didn't expect it to be like this.

- How did you think it would be?

- Distorted, scary, definitely not this beautiful.

They looked up and they saw Odin, standing on top of the clock tower, Nono raised a gun and pointed at him but Luminous held it down, telling her not to disturb him, they kept driving silently and the god didn't notice their presence.

Luminous took her to a shopping mall, where they entered a department store and he gave her a dry change of clothes. This was still strange to her, he already knew her size, he never stopped looking at his watch and somehow he also picked an outfit that she liked (a pair of burgundy sports trousers and a fleece hoodie).

He gave her a cup of hot coffee and he suggested they waited on an empty movie theater while they waited for help.

Nono waited uncomfortable in front of the screen, Luminous picked up a random movie from the projector room, it was Wall·E, the second film roll to be exact, so the film started from the halfway point. The movie slowly relaxed her and she started chewing popcorn while they waited.

- I've been here before, haven't I?.

This was the theater where she rescued him from a failed love confession to Wenwen, before taking him to sign his Cassell admission papers. Actually, Luminous was watching Wall·E with his fellow literature club members. All of these were deliberate choices, he only picked the second half of the movie because they didn't have enough time to watch it from the start.

- You have been here, you have experienced all the things we are experiencing now and I have lived this moment many times.

Nono was a profiler, it wasn't that easy to trick her, so he admitted the truth. At 12:00am, Nono was going to die, like every other time.

- This dream will become a reality. I have repeatedly entered this dream just to find a way to save you, but I couldn't find it.

- If you can't find a way to save me, why don't you save yourself instead?

- My senior brother said that he always regretted leaving his father here alone, that feeling of regret is so terrible, it made him want to go back and die right there.

- Don't say such disgusting things, if this is really my end I will accept it.

The answer became obvious, the only way to escape this Nibelungen was for one person to stay behind and die. As the movie reached its climax, a spear broke through the screen, Nono didn't move, Luminous didn't move.

- No, senior sister, this will not be you end, it will be mine.

Chapter 14

Luminous opened his eyes, it was still a quiet summer night, he slid a small knife that he bought at the convenience store and ripped the straitjacket open. The hospital personnel were resting in different rooms so he sneaked out with ease.

His last attempt was the 108th, none of them managed to give him the perfect ending that he desperately chased. The old man with the tricycle was waiting for him outside, Luminous got on the small bike and drove away. The security guard couldn't believe it when he saw the same tricycle pass by for a third time that night, straight into the elevated road.

Luminous reached the old Asia Group building, now flooded and filled with rubble and mud. He managed to find the secret door and found the insides half-submerged as well, but not everything was ruined, he located a small metal suitcase in the corner that was filled with multiple weapons, including a revolver, a tactical shotgun and a Uzi submachine gun.

All seemed to indicate that this equipment came directly from Cassell College, an academy that never bothered to mention Tianjiao's existence.

In his way out, he picked one of the photographs that managed to survive the flood, it portrayed a family of three. Johann was probably five years old and his expression was as emotionless as usual, his robot face wasn't the result of some traumatic event after all, it came with him from the moment he was born. In the corner, Tianjiao wrote some words as well: "Stay like this, not crying, just looking into the distance".

This arsenal was strong, but insignificant in front of a being like Odin. Ming·Z·Lu showed up to offer one last gift.

Something for nothing, 50% fusion.

Luminous was familiar with that sensation, his nerves burned and the depths of his mind seemed to be cracked open, the pain was bigger than any human can endure, but once it was over, there was a feeling of euphoria, a need to fight. His senses increased immensely, he could now distinguish every single drop in the middle of the rainfall. This usually costed him a full quarter of his life but now it was... Free?

He finally heard the distorted noises of the death servitors, it sounded like the crying of babies. The wall of water and wind that protected Odin became visible, the black figure mounted an eight legged horse. He was in the Nibelungen again, this time he didn't plan to turn around.

Luminous approached them and parked the tricycle next to the Maybach, he stood in front of Odin and the god stayed silent. The words "You are finally here" were not uttered this time, he was right, Odin was waiting for Nono, but he didn't bring her this time, Luminous's presence was meaningless to his rival.

Odin kept staring at the end of the road, waiting for Chen Motong to appear and show her face.

- This is the right way to start the game, my senior sister is not here, only you and me, only one of us can leave this place alive!

He was vey happy, he finally played the god. He slowly grabbed a spear rocket launcher from the tricycle, the little devil was as reliable as always. The servitors immediately recognized the destructive potential of the weapon and tried to disperse, but Luminous opened fire first and scattered their shadowy remains on the road.

He saw his face in a puddle, the crazy expression of Ming·Z was now his own, like every other time they fused, it felt like this was his true nature. Weapon after weapon he ran out of ammo, some servitors sneaked behind him and sliced his torso with their claws, if it wasn't for the bulletproof vest that Tianjiao left in his suitcase, Mingfei would have died already.

A shot of his last gun, a M500 revolver finally broke one of the servitor's masks. He hadn't seen one of those faces since his mission in Japan, their skin was covered in scales and their teeth were long and alien-shaped. Odin gave them black robes and masks to use them as his personal servants. Odin was definitely different to every other dragon king he had faced before, they were all savage and aggressive, but this one was stoic and dressed like a figure of mythology, unless...

That was it! Odin wasn't a dragon disguised as a mythical character, Odin, the myth himself has been a dragon all along. The secret party had misread norse mythology, now it was clear that it narrated the history of the dragon clan and it was written by the dragons themselves. Every god was in fact a dragon king, in those myths, the main antagonist of Nidhogg was Odin. This god had already foreseen the coming of the end of the world, the so-called twilight of the gods, where the world tree would wither.

The suppressed Nidhogg will rise in the air, ready for revenge, it will destroy everything and ruin the kingdom of the gods. Therefore, Odin prepared himself for this battle, ordering the Valkyrie goddesses to gather the heroes's souls and place them in the Hall of Valor to assist him in resisting the black dragon. If the norse myths are indeed dragon history, the hall of valor must represent a place filled with countless dragon cocoons and embryos waiting to be awakened.

This information, this great secret was about to be buried there with him if he didn't survive this battle. Nono was probably packing, ready to leave with Finger and go back to Cassell, for whatever reason Odin needed her, she would be out of his reach, he just needed to endure and Odin was still as invincible as ever. Making a deal with Ming·Z was inadmissible, giving the little devil enough power to materialize could bring an immeasurable catastrophe. The boy appeared in front of him.

- Brother, you finally asked to see me, do you want to... Shake my hand?

The multitude of servitors overwhelmed him, he contemplated dying there, it wouldn't be so bad, just very lonely. With a loud bang! the strongest servitor flew out and fell motionless on the mud.

A red BYD car swiftly parked next to him, a hand came out of the window and shot the three closest servitors, that was Finger, of course it was him!

- Drive faster! Why the fuck are you here?

- What do I know? I was eating dumplings with your aunt and the hospital called to tell me you were gone!

Finger placed a tracking device on Luminous just like he did with Nono and saw his trace disappearing in the highway, so he went to investigate and entered the Nibelungen by accident.

- Don't get confused by my F-Rank rating, I started as an A-rank, remember?

Flammel tasked Finger with helping Luminous to prove Johann's existence, he didn't remember the young hybrid either, but he trusted Anjou, and Anjou believed in the importance of Luminous more than anyone. Not everyone on Cassell gave up on him after all.

- Don't drive away, we can't escape!

- I thought you told me to drive faster!

- Yes I did, but I meant towards Odin!

The servitors quickly realized what they were intending to do, so they formed a barrier in front of their master. Finger pressed a button on the car and one mini-gun came out of each side of the vehicle.

- The equipment department makes phones that double as grenades, you think they can't make 007's car?

The gatling guns opened fire on the crowd of servitors, effectively cleaning the way. Finger put the car on self destruct mode and got ready to jump out, Luminous got on the roof, aiming his knife at Odin. The car hit Odin's water barrier and exploded, the shockwave soared into the sky, filled with flames. Luminous jumped and managed to pass through, and with a swift move, he pierced through Odin with the blade, just like Tianjiao attempted to do many years before.

Every servitor stopped their movements, Odin's scores started dropping down immediately and his body got split in two. There had to be something wrong with that, there's no way he would fall to his death so easily. Luminous took the god's skull and removed the mask, under it, the face of a death servitor greeted him instead, the others started crying and laughing at them. Odin's only goal is Nono, it had always been Nono, this was a trap and he was already on his way to get her.

Chapter 15

Nono was sitting next to Su Xiaoyan's bed, peeling an apple. The woman happily ate the bonbons that Nono brought for her as a gift.

- Nono, how is your mother doing?

- She's fine, she's still working and always asks me when I'll get married but I just don't tell her.

Nono had to make up that story, but at that moment she really felt like Xiaoyan's niece. She checked the woman's medical records, apparently the doctors thought she was schizophrenic and amnesiac, as long as Nono played her role well, the medical personnel would think Xiaoyan's amnesia made her forget about her relative.

Because Nono brought Bonbons, Xiaoyan recognized her immediately and happily accepted her gift.

She had been there since her son's death, she lost track of time, to the point where she felt like she had been there for three or four months, when in reality, seven years had passed. Not many people visited her in that time, her husband would take her home for a few days every now and then, but those events became less and less usual. Of course, Nono was there for a reason, without Tianjiao's apartment, her only remaining clue was Johann's mother, but the woman wasn't very open about her life. Nono's ability allowed her to put puzzles together, but Xiaojiao kept messing up the pieces.

- Did your former husband treat you well?

- He couldn't make enough money and he was very unmotivated, playing foolish all day long, I had enough of him!

- But he's handsome, and he's probably still breaking hearts.

- How do you know that he's handsome? You haven't seen him before.

- Of course I have, I remember hugging my uncle!

- Come on, do you really think I'm that broken? I know I don't have a niece.

- Then why didn't you tell the doctor?

- Because you're so pretty, and I like to chat with pretty girls, there's no one else here to chat with me, and you don't look like a bad person either.

Nono was genuinely surprised, so she declared her intentions straight on, she wanted to know more about Chu Tianjiao, but his ex-wife didn't seem to know a lot about him either, he would constantly lie about his past and alternate between multiple versions of the story.

- Sometimes he told me that he was a great spy, and that he came here to complete a task, and I believed him, without a clue of his salesman-like nature!

- And you still married him?

- He was handsome, and I was young.

Xiaoyan didn't express any regret in divorcing him, she'd rather be with someone she could rely on, but there was something else she could not explain.

- But he seems to have left something behind with me, a very important thing, I just can't remember it.

- What is it?

- I said I can't remember it, I've been thinking about it for a very long time.

- What kind of thing?

- A very important thing, I must find it, it would be very bad if I didn't.

A burst of cold wind opened the windows and made them shiver, Nono stood up and went to close them but she noticed something strange, the flowers on the outside were all withered, black petals flew through the room, she closed the window as fast as she could, something bad had happened and the air outside smelled of death.

She took out a desert eagle from her bag and stopped Xiaoyan from screaming, the woman relied on her intuition to understand that Nono wasn't going to hurt her. The place was silent and the lights flickered, the instinctive feeling of being alert that came from true isolation soon got a hold of her. She and Xiaoyan got out of the room, door after door, every doctor and every patient had disappeared.

The rain and the wind rapidly eroded the building. The day was finally here, she had never been in a Nibelungen before, she once regretted not being able to experience it, now Nibelungen came to see her. She didn't knew wether to be nervous or excited.

- Someone, someone is coming. Su Xiaoyan's voice trembled slightly.

The sound of footsteps made an echo in the building, those weren't human steps, that sounded like a few horses were coming their way. The storm, the Nibelungen, the steed, the rider, it seemed to be an ancient king who came with a strong breath of death, and the flowers in the garden withered in front of him. Nono remembered him, she saw his silhouette in the reflection of the glass when she went to Tianjiao's apartment.

The rider didn't seem to know where Xiaoyan's room was and he was checking them one by one. They ran towards the elevator, the rider was on the first floor so they needed to get to the top as fast as they could without the sound of their steps giving away their position. Behind them, the fluorescent lights went out one by one. Nono finally saw the reflection of the elevator's door in a mirror, but when its doors opened, the light of Odin's flames came out.

They ran in the other direction and soon reached the stairs, they ran down but it didn't matter, they were trapped on an endless loop. She shot at the creature but the bullets melted before touching the god's armor. They kept running and Nono kept shooting back but it wasn't buying them any more time, temperatures were rising and there was no way out.

Odin wasn't even in a hurry to reach them, Nono took Xiaoyan in her arms and ran across a hallway, enduring the terrible heat of the floor. She tried to get out through a window, but after opening the curtains she noticed that the whole world outside had changed and she was greeted by the sight of a roman pantheon.

Nono suddenly fell silent, she helped Xiaoyan to sit down on a bench and put her boots on the woman's feet. She noticed something, she was crying, she was remembering.

- There might be a way for you to get out of here by yourself, now tell me, what did Tianjiao left for you exactly?

- It's... A child. I had a son with him, his name is Johann Chu, I can't find my son... I can't find my son!

Xiaoyan was holding a pillow in her arms, the doctor said that she would put this pillow in her belly every morning and happily declare that she was pregnant. Nono took it from her hands and threw it away.

- Since you have a clear memory of him, you don't need this anymore, you will find your son, although I don't know where.

In this world, those who are not lunatics are the ones who were deceived. Luminous and Su Xiaoyan were the craziest because of their link to Johann Chu, to the truth. His mother's mental disorder was not there because she had lost a son seven years ago, a certain god wanted to modify her memory of him and she was resisting. She tied the little pillow to her back because a child is only safe in his mother's body, she sensed that someone was going to hurt her boy, so she wanted to feel like she could protect him.

Nono pushed Xiaoyan into a cubicle next to the ward and told her to keep the door closed until someone came to rescue her. She took Finger's GPS device out of her bag and broke it, expecting Luminous and Finger to arrive there after seeing her signal disappear. Odin arrived, his flames evaporated the strong currents of water and stood in front of her, Nono kept two knives on her back and a desert eagle in each hand.

- Odin!

The creature and his lance were impossible not to identify, the god actually exists.

- You are finally here.

He slowly raised Gungir and a faint white thread appeared, connecting the tip of the spear and Nono's heart. She thought his goal was Xiaoyan, due to her connection to Johann, but she was wrong, Odin's goal was her and only her. No wonder Luminous threw her down in the library, he probably had a foreboding of her death for some reason and tried to save her, his eyes showed a constant state of panic.

She didn't believe him and they put him on a psychiatric institution. She really wanted to tell him that she was sorry, because she had underestimated him.

She had always tried to be there for Luminous, she couldn't deny that she saw a lot of herself in him, this obsession with taking care of her sidekick was so prevalent because she knew how it was like to be powerless, lost and defenseless, but in the most critical moment, she had failed him.

Nono vaguely heard a song, a duet about a father and his daughter, it was coming from somewhere, along with the noise of a car engine. Luminous was coming, that song came from the radio, but how could she hear him? It didn't matter, she felt him presence and she believed it.

- Luminous! Don't you fucking dare to come here!

Nono shot every bullet she had left and they melted on Odin's presence. The lance was thrown and suddenly, the Maybach smashed through the wall, its lights illuminated Nono's eyes. She smiled, the moment she saw him, the cartridge of her gun was empty. The lance had already started its course and Luminous could only see her lips moving:

- I'm sorry

- Ming·Z·Lu! Luminous roared, time slowed down in his eyes

- The little one is here! Ming·Z smiled, Since I promised my brother that I'd try everything!

Come out! Golden saint cloth of the zodiac!, Phase shift armor!, Fierce fist! Seven-fold ring of the blazing sky!, Absolute domain AT Field!.

Every time he yelled a strange name, Luminous froze for a moment, these strange spells were taken directly from anime shows, they were weapons that lined up in front of Odin's lance, even a nuclear explosion could be rejected by them.

- What are you doing?

- I don't really know what tricks would work so I'm doing all of them!

Ming·Z kept casting spells, the speed of the lance was indeed affected but it never stopped nor it changed its trajectory.

- Hurry up brother, run!

Nono tried to yell, telling Luminous to stay away, but her mouth moved too slowly. Luminous ran past Odin and past the lance. The seven-fold ring was the strongest defense against projectiles, every time the Gungir lance pierced through a layer, it made a loud noise. Nono dropped the empty gun, she didn't have the strength to wield her knives. The spear hadn't arrived yet, and she was already like a lamb crucified on an altar.

Gungir hit the final defense, the sound was almost glass shattering.

- I couldn't stop it, even with the last layer. Give her a hug, kiss her! This is going to be your last chance! I'll buy as much time as possible for you!

Ming·Z made another barrier but the lance broke it, the little devil's hands were splashed with blood and they stained his bow tie, but he didn't care and looked at his side as an indifferent Luminous passed by and stood in front of Nono. He never managed to change the events, just the scenery. Gungir pierced through Ming·Z's chest.

- Brother, I tried my best

- It's ok, I'm here as well.

Luminous wasn't going to hug or kiss Nono, he was there to take her place. He could clearly feel his heart being cut open. The spear hadn't even touched his skin and his body had begun to carbonize and turn black, showing a rare struggle, burning it inch by inch.

- No! No! No! Nono struggled to stand up and pull the lance away from him.

- Don't come near me!

The lance tried to go through him, but it only managed to pin him against the wall. Nono shivered slightly and tears slowly ran down her face, but she didn't realize that she was crying. She always wanted him to grow up and go his own way, to use any advantage she might have over him to push him forward, but now the person who was crying on the floor was her.

- Senior sister, are you okay? It's okay.

Luminous raised his head, half of his head and body were carbonized, the cracks at the end of his lips extended all the way to the roots of his ears. He was really happy, because he finally managed to achieve his goal. He didn't want to live with the regret of losing her, he had seen Johann's own regret already.

Odin wasn't pleased, the god roared as he realized he had missed his chance. Luminous whispered:

- Ming·Z·Lu...

- Brother, I am here, you really found a method to stop the lance!

- In this world, only a monster can stop a monster, and I am the biggest monster in the world...

- Yes, you are the biggest monster in the world, brother! You are awesome! Then, are you ready to make the last deal? I can't do much against the lance, but I can take care of the monster behind it, the little devil is good at this dirty work!

Luminous stared at him and asked for two conditions:

- Kill Odin, but also take Nono back to safety.

- Alright but hurry up! That guy is almost here!

Sleipnir's eight legs made a thunderous sound, the dragon subspecies that Odin mounted carried its master into the room. Luminous raised his blood-soaked hand and gave the little devil a high-five. Ming·Z's figure suddenly appeared in the night sky, this time he stopped laughing and opened his arms. He looked like a suspended cross.

- Something for nothing, 100% fusion.

He breathed deeply, as if he wanted to inhale all of the world's air into his lungs. Sharp bone spurs protruded from his body and he was covered in black scales. Huge black wings sprung from his back and he took flight, diving down, his image poured into Luminous's body.

The carbonized skin quickly peeled off, he experienced musculoskeletal growth and deformation and the sound of a glacier cracking was heard across the hospital.

The black wings were opened and Gungir was ejected from his chest. Sleipnir couldn't move a single inch closer to them, because Luminous placed his hand on the horse's chest. Nono stared blankly at him, because she couldn't tell if the monster in front of her was a friend or an enemy, but Luminous stared back at her.

- Sister, don't be afraid, as long as I live, you'll be fine.

After two years, Chen Motong saw the devil that rescued her from the bottom of the Three Gorges Dam once again. She remembered how he held her, his childlike fear and his voice.

Don't die, don't die, don't die... Don't Die!

- So it was you...

But Luminous didn't hear those words at all, he rushed to Odin, at the flash of lightning, the monsters that had been in conflict with each other so many times, leaving countless disasters, clashed once again, and the claws and the sword stained the place red and black.

They roared, they fought, a war between kings that can only be ended by death.

Epilogue

On the elevated road, Finger stopped for a moment to catch his breath. This guy is usually slacking and his posture is erratic. The death servitors are struggling to even reach his clothes.

There should be half a marathon left before he can lose them, however, the physical strength of those things is almost unlimited.

Seeing him stop, a group of servitors suddenly became excited and the baby-like cries they made reached the heavens. A girl in a black outfit and a gauze mask appeared in front of him, a ninja.

- How did you know I was here?

- I have a radar for pretty girls... Can you handle that many servitors?

Mai Sakatoku drew two small blades.

- Those are too many, I'm specialized in assassination, not group combat. It's a pity that the other two girls are not here...

- Then I hope I can help.

He had a sword in his hand, the mirror-like Murasame suddenly turned black, the black blade light soon extended all the way to his body and the rain around it evaporated. Mai was surprised by the brutality of the sword, but Finger remained indifferent.

- What kind of sword is that?

- Murasame, have you never heard of the Dragon Slayer of Fire? Then you are really kind, but a bit ignorant, my friend!

After saying that, he jumped and cut off the elevated road.

#dragon raja #dragon raja novel #luminous #nono #ming z lu #finger von frings #johann chu

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huffpuffgirl18 · 4 years

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So because I stumbled upon a video talking about magic as a gene (which I firmly believe) and because YouTube won’t let me post my full theory (which it is driving me INSANE) I’d thought I’d post it here. I’m but a wee baby biologist learning her craft so be kind. 🥰

Anyways on to the theory

I LOVE the thought of magic being a gene that because I've been saying this for years. As a biology major it makes a lot of sense. Note, I think that magic is a dominate gene and non-magicalness is a recessive gene and that it probably is a series of genes (each with two alleles) and not just one gene. So you have to have all genes possessing the dominate alleles for you to possess magic, and not just one gene possessing the dominate allele.

I'll touch on the allele reasoning first because its something that maybe a not a lot of people know of since genetics is tricky and I won't go too into depth but when we look at things like eye color, hair color, skin color and other phenotypical expressions the genes that dictate these outcomes usually are more than one. Eye color specifically has about 16 genes (i'll have to double check) that dictate what color you will have (and that's not going into things like incomplete dominance or co-dominace, we'll leave those out for the discussion of magic). So say magic has like three genes, and for each gene you have two allele one you get from each parent. You would need all three of the dominate pair of this allele in order for you to possess magic. So if you have a pair of alleles, they can be as follows hetero-dominate, homo-dominate, homo-recessive. This is crucial for when you think about how muggleborns come into play, and when you think about the inheritance of magic, think of it like this you need at least all three functioning (dominate) alleles in order for you to get magic.

When squibs are born, they are born from magical parents who are hetero-dominate, meaning one of the alleles is recessive from both ends of that parent on the same gene. Which is then passed on to their child who now has a gene with only homo-recessive on it, and since that child doesn't have all three dominate genes for magic they are born a squib. Remember, there are six alleles since there are three genes and since alleles come in pairs they need 3+ dominate ones. If they have a gene that has alleles that are homo-recessive (two recessive alleles) they will not have magic. So in order to have magic they can be as follows on any of the three genes, hetero-dominate or homo-dominate. They cannot possess homo-recessive alleles on a gene because if they do they will be a squib and won't have magic.

They (squibs) still carry within them two out of three genes (because remember there are three genes for magic in this scenario) for magic but they are missing one. So they can pass on those two out of three genes (with dominate alleles) to their children but until they meet someone who has that allele they are missing their kids will also be muggles or without magic. But once their descendants meet another group of muggles who also has the allele that they are missing (the dominate version of that allele because they have the recessive version) a muggleborn child is born. (pictures would be so helpful, i know).

The reason that I believe that magic is dominate and not recessive is because we see muggle parents get together with a wizard or a witch, it almost always results in a magical child. Which is an indicator that magic is technically the dominate gene. However, just because a gene is dominate does not mean that it is going to be more prominent in the population. For example, dwarfism and having six fingers are both dominate genes however in most populations average height and having five fingers are more prevalent. The same can be thought of with magic. While it is the dominate gene, it is not the most prevalent in the population which has lead to the pure blood people believing that it must be preserved which is far from the case. In fact one can argue that they are effectively harming their genetic pool and creating the possibility of mutations and more damage to the genetic line due to inbreeding which can cause insanity, physical deformities, and infertility. Inbreeding which is what most pure blood families practice, causes harm to the genome or essentially damaged it.

Evidence of how magic is a dominate trait is the black family tree, where we see a lot of squibs in the family line although they only marry pure bloods or inbreed within the family tree. That tells you that the magic gene is heterozygous or else squibs wouldn’t arise and if they did arise its from a mutation of the dominate allele due to inbreeding

The more frequent inbreeding occurs the more damaged genes are introduced to the genetic line without a chance to introduce new genes to “repair” the genetic line. Thinking like this, Tom Riddle (Voldemort) own genetic line was “repaired” by his muggle father who potentially introduced new genes into the Guant family line which was plagued with problems due to inbreeding. So while he inherited the dominate alleles for magic from his mother, he probably also inherited more stable genes from his father.

And if we go off of the premise in the last few lines concerning inbreeding, the best way for magic to live on and thrive would be to have a more diverse gene pool and that would be essentially mixing with muggles more often. If magic is indeed the dominate gene, more half blood or muggle born children would increase the gene pool and stave off things like insanity, infertility, and other genetic mutations that arise from having genes that are too close together. Long story short, the pure bloods are essentially killing their own community when they think they are preserving it because they are creating a more harmful genetic pool and as nature shows us diversity is what helps populations thrive (in terms of genetics).

Thinking about magic this way, germ-line editing could potentially be used to turn the future offspring of muggles into wizards by editing their germ-line. Or for squibs the CRISPR-Cas method of gene editing could potentially work for them if they are missing one allele pair (I don’t know about two) to potentially give them magic.

I know this post was rather long and probably really confusing for some. So I made pictures to illustrate my point since I love applying science to fantasy.

These are punnet squares to demonstrate my point.

So in photo one labeled P1 this is the parent generation and as you can see they are heterozygous dominate wizards. The white is all their wizarding children. The pink is all the possible squib children (the possible genotype outcomes) that are just missing one gene (they have a gene with Homozygous recessive alleles) and the orange is the possible squib children missing two genes (they have two genes with homozygous recessive alleles). The blue in the corner is the chance they get a squib child with all homozygous recessive alleles for all three genes. Which means that child in blue will have ZERO chances of passing on magic to their children.

Now in the second picture, should’ve been labeled G1 for generation 1 but that got cut off anyways, the squib goes off and gets together with a muggle this is generation 1 (G1) and as you can see all their offspring are carriers for the magic gene but none of them have magic. The pink is missing one gene (has one gene with homozygous recessive alleles) and the orange is missing two genes (has two genes with homozygous recessive alleles). None of their children will have magic, but all of them will be carriers for the gene.

In the third picture (labeled G2 in the corner) this is generation 2. The squibs offspring goes off and has children with another muggle. Some of these children are carriers while others do not carry any genes for magic. The pink is missing one gene (has one gene with homozygous recessive alleles) and the orange is missing two genes (has two genes with homozygous recessive alleles). None of them will have magic but all of them will be carriers. The blue highlights the potential that none of them carry the genes for magic and thus cannot possess magic nor pass on the potential to possess magic.

And the last picture... *drum roll please* is our generation 3 or G3! aka Hermione and Lily generation 🤩🥳 Both parents are carriers for the magic gene but neither one of them posses magic. The pink is missing one gene (has one gene with homozygous recessive alleles) and the orange is missing two genes (has two genes with homozygous recessive alleles). These potential offspring will carry the gene but will not possess the ability to do magic. The blue highlights the potential that none of them carry the genes for magic and thus cannot possess magic nor pass on the potential to possess magic. And lastly the green highlights are our Muggleborns! Where they possess magic and have at least one dominate allele in the pair so that they can do magic.

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96thdayofrage · 3 years

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Not only is white supremacy the root cause of all anti-Asian attacks, we are told, but the very mention of black assailants serves to bolster an illusory or harmful trope. Examples here include “Stop Blaming Black People for Anti-Asian Hate” (Newsweek), “Old tropes of Black-Asian conflict rear up after NY assault” (Chicago Tribune), and “Why the trope of Black-Asian conflict in the face of anti-Asian violence dismisses solidarity” (Brookings Institution).

On #StopAsianHate, a piece titled “The ‘Black-Asian Conflict’ Is a Problematic Trope—and It’s Time to End It” informs us that any anger directed at black assailants is a mask for “White establishment anxiety.” At Mic, Melissa Pandika argues that we should refrain from posting photos of suspects in anti-Asian hate crimes—but only if those suspects are black. “Posting photos of white suspects,” on the other hand, “can help counter the narrative that the majority of anti-Asian attacks are perpetrated by Black people, and convey what the research actually finds: White people are more likely to commit anti-Asian hate crimes.”

This brings us to the issue of crime statistics. Pandika bases her claims on a University of Michigan Virulent Hate Project study of news articles that describe incidents of anti-Asian racism. “In the 4,337 news articles that we reviewed, we identified 1,023 unique incidents of anti-Asian racism that occurred in the United States between January 1 and December 31, 2020,” the authors reported. And while “only a small fraction of news articles explicitly identified the race of the individuals who harassed or discriminated against Asian and Asian American people … in the few harassment incidents for which the news media explicitly stated the race of the offender, the majority of perpetrators of anti-Asian harassment were reported to be male and white.”

On page 14 of the study, we learn that the race of offenders was explicitly identified in only 57 anti-Asian harassment incidents. Of these 57 incidents, white individuals were reported as perpetrators in 44, Blacks in six, Hispanics in four, Chinese in three, Vietnamese in one. “The information that we have,” the authors conclude, “while limited and imperfect, does not support the common claim that Black hostility is driving the current epidemic of anti-Asian racism and violence.”

There are a few problems here, however. The first is that the data isn’t comprised of actual crime statistics, but just information gleaned from news articles. And even within those news article, only a tiny minority mention the perpetrator’s race. As the authors themselves note, “reporting practices might differ by the race of the perpetrator, and it is not clear how news outlets and individual reporters chose to navigate the complex issue of racial identification in its coverage of specific incidents discussed in the articles we reviewed.”

More importantly, the University of Michigan study groups together vastly different forms of behaviour, from harassment and vandalism down to “stigmatizing and discriminatory statements, images, policies, and proposals.” Among the 184 total incidents in which race is identified, more than two thirds consist of “stigmatizing statements and actions by politicians.” And even the category of physical harassment and violence groups together getting spat at and being assaulted with deadly force.

In regard to actual hate crimes, as that term is defined by the FBI, Voice of America has reported that “only two of the 20 people arrested last year in connection with [New York City anti-Asian hate crime] attacks were white, according to New York Police Department data analyzed by the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism. Eleven were African Americans, six were white Hispanics and one was a Black Hispanic.” According to the reporter, Masood Farivar, “most police departments do not publish this kind of data, but anecdotal evidence suggests the pattern seen in New York has emerged in other cities, as well.”

My intention here is not to perpetuate stereotypes about black people. Crime is perpetrated by individuals, not whole races. Moreover, to the extent that black people are overrepresented as assailants in this (or any other) kind of crime, it’s useful to note that crime often is linked to poverty and disadvantage, which disproportionately afflict American black communities. But that said, it is intellectually dishonest to ignore or deny the identity of real crime suspects in the service of protecting a certain kind of ideological narrative.

Even Asians themselves are being pressured to frame the attacks against them in this ideological context. UCLA lecturer Manjusha P. Kulkarni, the aforementioned co-founder of Stop AAPI Hate, has admonished Asian Americans for their anti-black and “white adjacent” attitude. “Sadly, immigrants come to the United States often and understand right away the racial hierarchy that we have in our nation,” she states in her widely circulated video. “And so they know that if they want upward mobility, they want economic security, they need to align themselves with whites, essentially. And so you see a lot of that white adjacency in our community or efforts to strive toward white adjacency.”

Such language channels the idea that, as recently described by Quillette contributor Kenny Xu, the success of Asian-Americans can be traced to their “proximity to whiteness.” Seen through this lens, even when Asian Americans feel themselves under threat of physical attack, they bear a special moral responsibility to ensure that their response is ideologically onside with the fight against white supremacy.

What does this mean in practice? According to journalist Kayla Hui, this means that Asians must resist endorsing the most obvious source of relief from street crime: the police. “Policing only catalyzes racial tensions between Asian and Black communities,” Hui writes. By way of alternative, Hui urges “bystander and de-escalation training to learn how to intervene when anti-Asian hate and harassment occurs.” And in the long run, “Asian solidarity with Black and brown communities [would serve as] a catalyst for tackling white supremacy and the systems that continuously uphold and enable racism.”

Cat Brooks, co-founder of the Anti-Police Terror Project, a black-led organisation based in Oakland, says that instead of funding increased policing as a means to prevent anti-Asian violence, money should go toward “groups that are doing this work anyway,” such as local community patrols. And in an NBC News article “Critics fear NYPD Asian hate crime task force could have unintended consequences,” reporter Kimmy Yam leads with the statement that “The New York Police Department’s new anti-Asian hate crimes task force could inadvertently put Asian Americans in opposition to other communities of color, some activists fear.”

In response to the recent spate of anti-Asian attacks, the US government has enacted the COVID-19 Hate Crimes Act, which promotes the reporting of hate crimes at local and state levels. One might think that Asian groups would welcome the move. Yet a coalition of over 100 Asian and LGBTQ organisations have opposed the law, on the basis that the mere collection and reporting of hate-crime data “contradicts Asian solidarity with Black, Brown, undocumented, trans, low-income, sex worker, and other marginalized communities whose liberation is bound together.” The idea here is that police should be removed from “communities and neighborhoods” altogether; and that the security of the population should instead rest on such “community alternatives” as “non-coercive mental healthcare infrastructures, neighborhood-based trauma centers [and] community food banks.”

The signatories believe that collecting crime statistics and empowering the police more generally fails to address “the structural conditions that lead to violence against marginalized communities.” Obviously, they are free to argue for such a wholesale reorientation of American public policy (even if it flies in the face of recent evidence). But it is disingenuous to pretend that they are doing so in the service of protecting Asian people from physical attacks, or protecting the interests of Asians more generally. From first to last, this manifesto reads as a defence of a certain ideological stance. And to the extent that Asians are treated as autonomous political actors, it is on the expectation that they will play their assigned role in expressing “solidarity” with other groups.

Indeed, one wonders what the true goal is here. Advocates will tell you that their fight against white supremacy is a means to protect hate-crime victims. But often it seems that means and end have become reversed, and that these crimes now serve as a prop in the larger ideological campaign against our supposedly white-supremacy-saturated culture—a campaign that Asians themselves are now being pressured to join. Whatever you may think of this ideology, it seems doubtful that its champions are motivated primarily by the need to protect Asians from violence.

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