#things that make me sound like a conspiracy theorist | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

luveline · 7 months

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Hiiii I’m new to ur page but such a huge fan of ur writing already, ur so talented. Could u maybe do one with Spencer where he thinks reader doesn’t fully understand how much he loves them so he goes on a rant about how deeply connected he feels to them, and how he pictures life with them etc??

Pls forgive me if this is a weird ask, I’m slightly new to fanfic culture lmao

thank you! ♡

"It's not a small thing," Spencer's saying.

Honestly, you've been half catatonic against his side for an hour watching Ancient City reruns while he fact checks the conspiracy theorists —nothing feels big now besides the urge to nap on him. You already knew that the pyramid wasn't built by aliens, and Spencer has the facts to prove it.

He's quite passionate about it, apparently. "You know what I'm talking about, don't you?" he asks.

"Yeah," you mumble, digging your face further into his arm. Comfiest boyfriend ever. Spencer's arm tugs up and over your shoulders to hug you closer, your eyes shutting of their own accord at the increase in cosiness. "I do. Promise"

"Good! Because I worry sometimes that you don't get it."

"Of course I get it, angel," you say, wrapping your arm across his stomach. Exhausted, you lift yourself up to press a quick kiss to his chin before giving in to fatigue and squishing your face against his shoulder. "It's the Egyptians, we did this in middle school."

He doesn't hear your mumbling, far too wrapped up in his rant. "Everyone says that nothing else compares, and you believe them, but you don't really get it until you're there. Until you're actually feeling it."

"You've been to the pyramids?" you ask, more to yourself than him.

"Beauty's just one fraction of it, too. It's a nicely sized fraction, I promise, but when you compare it to everything else… there's just so much there. I feel it in my chest sometimes when I'm talking to you, it honestly makes me feel a little sick, but in a good way?"

You hum appreciatively, murmuring, "It's a beautiful place. So much culture and history."

"It's like we're connected, like we're magnets. It's a pull." Spencer rubs the place between your shoulders exactly the way you like. You'd fall asleep from his loving ministrations, but he's starting to sound super intense, almost too intense, a hair's width from stressed.

You had no idea Spencer was this passionate about Egyptian landmarks.

"That's nice, honey," you say, trying to mask your apprehension.

Spencer cups the back of your head, the scratch of his stubble catching your softer skin as he talks, "I think about you and me and it feels right. I picture our life together automatically, there's no other possibilities for me. I love you so much and I know you said you get it, but I don't think you do. It doesn't feel real to me how much I care about you."

There's a subtle roughness to his voice as he hugs you.

You weasel yourself backward in the circle of his arms to look him up at his pretty face, perplexed. "Are you talking about me?"

"Yeah. Of course I am. Who else would I be talking about?" he asks, mirroring your frown.

You glance at the TV. It's on mute. "I thought you were still talking about the pyramids, Spence," you say, turning back to him. "You were really talking about me?"

"You'd hope," he says, twisting his finger into your shirt sleeve. Spencer laughs, a belly of a sound with shaking shoulders and bouncing curls. "Can you imagine if I felt that deeply about the pyramids? I mean, they're really interesting. They're still uncovering secret tunnels inside Giza with no clear openings or exits, believed to lead to hidden rooms." He squeezes your arm. "That would be a really cool place to vacation."

You take a moment to stare at him. You don't really get it until you're there. Until you're actually feeling it. It's like we're connected, like we're magnets. It's a pull. Spencer's been penning a love letter to you for the last five minutes and you were too dozy to get it the first time.

You cup his face in both hands, your fingers perched against high cheekbones, threading into soft curls as you brush them from his face. "I love you that much, too," you say softly.

"I know that. I was making sure that you knew it was mutual. I'd build pyramids for you." He pulls your hands from his face to hold. "You're way more tired than I thought."

"'M not that tired," you lie, settling back into his chest. Your voice is imbued with a sickly, almost smug type of love. "You're just comfortable."

#spencer reid #spencer reid x reader #spencer reid x you #spencer reid x y/n #spencer reid imagine #spencer reid fluff #spencer reid fanfic #spencer reid oneshot #spencer reid scenario #spencer reid drabble #spencer reid fic #spencer reid fanfiction #criminal minds fanfiction #criminal minds #criminal minds fic #criminal minds x reader

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caffeineandsociety · 1 year

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There's a specific genre of shitty antisemitic joke that I have seen fly under the radar (as it was designed to) a LOT more often lately - especially since Kanye started going full mask-off nazi - so I feel the need to issue a warning about it. Namely, the genre is jokes that get spread around by people who aren't willfully antisemitic because outside of conspiracy brain rot land, it appears that the point of the joke is absurdism.

As an example, let's examine the 23-and-me lizard DNA test that I've sadly seen floating around unquestioned.

Because, see, to the average person who isn't willfully antisemitic, this genre of joke comes off as nonsequiturs, or hilarious mistakes - you, as a person with some level of basic observational and critical thinking skills, living on Earth and not in whatever batshit mirror dimension conspiracy theorists think we live in, might very well end up getting a giggle out of it because, HAH, we KNEW those DNA ancestry kits were a scam! If you're not a deliberate antisemite but not really up on the dogwhistles, it doesn't scan as anything awful because you're put in mind of things like feeding a photo of something decidedly not human into that one selfie-to-anime neural net, which sometimes works and produces interesting results because the thing is looking for specific patterns and trying to make anything fit - not things like blatantly lying about doing something like that in the hopes that normies who see the absurdity and want to have a laugh at a scummy company's expense will pass it along to people who unironically believe that Jewish people are actual literal lizard aliens and the test proves it.

This is the same strategy that guy at the game awards pulled. You, a person living in reality where the main source of political corruption is just the basic consequence of an economic system that makes power pool in the hands of anyone willing to exploit enough people, a world of banal mundane evil, know damned well that QAnon-pizzagate-satanic ritual abuse cult conspiracy bullshit is, well, bullshit, if you're even familiar with the details of what they believe at all. When someone crashes the stage and thanks Rabbi Bill Clinton, you may very well laugh because to YOU it is a blatant absurd nonsequitur.

Problem is that to someone else, someone who's deep into that shit, it's either someone letting the truth slip, or someone backing the deep state into a corner - whichever is more convenient to believe.

This is one form of how the far right uses memeification (CW: the example discussed in the link is a rape "joke") - it means something totally different to the in-group than it does to the out-group. To you, it's funny because it's nonsensical; to them, it's fun because they think they're onto something huge and they're about to blow this shit wide open and it's going to be their great moment of triumph.

I cannot stress enough that no matter how absurd an antisemitic conspiracy theory sounds to you, there are people who believe it, unironically. There are people who unironically believe that Jewish people are very literally not human and no amount of evidence to the contrary will ever change their minds. There are people who believe that we're born with horns and tails and pointed ears and have them surgically altered to fit in with good Christian humans like some kind of extremely high-stakes game of Among Us. There are people who believe that we steal, ritualistically abuse, and kill Christian babies. These beliefs, while fringe enough that, yeah, most of you who this post is aimed at have never heard them in the wild before very recently, are not nearly as fringe as you probably think they are. Just look at fucking Kanye. This asshole has more fans than there are Jewish people in the world.

So I'm begging you to please, bare minimum, be careful of "absurdist" jokes about Jewish people, especially if they reference lizards, money, banking, or government power. Also, you may see Jewish people debating how religious laws may apply to fictional creatures, but outside of that context you should also be wary of any time Jewish people are mentioned in the same sentence as vampires, dragons, goblins, zombies, fantasy demons, or any number of other fantasy creatures known for greed, feeding on humans, or both.

If the reason it seems funny to you is because you'd have to be really stupid to believe it's true or makes any kind of sense - it's probably looking for you to spread it to people who are, in fact, that stupid.

#antisemitism #psa

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lunamugetsu · 1 year

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I see a lot of people going with the idea that if Danny were to be captured and tortured by the GIW, that the main people that would find him are Young Justice, Teen Titans or the Justice League main heroes.

So I raise you this idea.

The one who finds the GIW facility that's keeping Danny prisoner is The Question. The resident faceless conspiracy theorist hero that works for the Justice League. (the one I'm thinking of is the guy from Justice League Unlimited. The one that got together with Huntress. You can imagine this with the Renee Montoya version if you want, but I'm just thinking of the guy Question)

Now hear me out. The Question is known for having crazy conspiracy theories and in the the cartoon, Supergirl asks Green Arrow why they have the Question on the roster for the Justice League since he has such crazy theories, he must be insane. And Green Arrow replies with that some of his theories have actually turned out to be true.

So couple that with how The Question gets crazy theories and he does investigate them on his own time. It wouldn't be a stretch that he finds out that there's an obscure government agency that he instantly starts getting suspicious of as there's very rarely any documentation he can find about it. But what hammers his suspicions in is the obscene amount of money that's being pumped into that agency and a serious of facilities that somehow exist and yet also do not exist but he knows it's real because some of them required a humongous power grid to be able to have the facility function.

The Question starts investigating the facilities. Going undercover finding obscure ways to get into the building. He gets in finds a super secure, heavily fortified area that he could tell where most of the energy is being powered to keep locked. He finds the lab areas where he can see the autopsy tables all with machinery that are definitely raise some eyebrows. He starts downloading information about the facility from their servers and finds that the codes to unlock the area that was blocked to him before.

He goes to investigate that area and low and behold, who does he see but an imprisoned Danny who has clearly been tortured. The Question would then go "well I'm breaking him out" and just does an impromptu jail break and takes the kid which sounds the alarm. They're getting the heck out of there. The Question contacts the Justice League gets him and the kid to the Watchtower.

Later on Danny is staying with the Question, because Danny need a place to stay and he's cool with the faceless dude that saved him from his prison. The dude is like super chill with all of the stuff he talks about and actively listening to everything he talked about. Even adding comments of his own like

"I knew it! Lunch Ladies are connected with creation of the mystery meat! And they're funded by the government so they can use it as a brain control weapon to control the future generation!"

"The politicians of today could possibly be possessed by the ghosts of the past. They're unwilling to relinquish any power they possessed even in the afterlife!"

Plus, Danny's like completely cool with making food and cleaning up after Question. Because one, the food doesn't come to life and try to attack him like it does at home. And two, the man keeps all of his conspiracy stuff pretty organized so there was hardly anything for Danny to clean up. And sure the guy has a weird lifestyle with things such as brushing his teeth with baking soda because he says fluoride is used by the government to be able to see the people better from their satellites. Or that he'll look through everybody's garbage and would sometimes drag Danny with him to help, which he later learns is a great way to gather information about someone. And having conversations with the dude is kind of creepy when he can't see the dude's face, but he gets used to it and then starts practicing his shape shifting to see freak out the other heroes when they see he has no face.

Meanwhile The Question would have moments while working where he's like "Wait! Did I feed the kid this morning?" also Huntress is there because she doesn't trust her boyfriend at keeping a human being alive, even if they are half dead.

#Danny phantom #DC #DP x DC #dp x dc au #dp x dc crossover #Justice League #Danny phantom x Justice League #question #Danny Fenton #dpxdc #dp x dc

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georgiapeach30513 · 2 months

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I'll be honest, while Deuxmoi always and still does post a ton of BS, thanks to the development of this never-ending saga...I'm starting to really feel like she's been used intentionally to push this narrative along all the way from the very beginning. Aka 2021.

A very out there theory but hear me out: Early on, the fandom had the general consensus DM was BS. Especially in regards to CE. Because DM was the one that first started spreading his super secret GF nonsense back in 2021, right before the introduction of Soba Saga. Her almost nonsensical rants about her having legit sources on this secret GF - while doing weekly podcasts where she insisted she never got any intel on him because his circle was so tight knit (interesting how that suddenly changed out of nowhere when someone showed up) - just made her seem like crazy cat lady gossip conspiracy Marjorie Taylor Greene on steroids.

She was the first to post that "dating Soba for over a year and everyone in PT/her circle knows about it" in early 2022.

They go public in late 2022. 2023 There's some Sunday Spotted (I could be wrong) vDAY post about CE and "fiancé" being seen in town at dinner (sounds very similar to the most recent vDay sighting). That was about 10 months before the super secret wedding and there had been no announcement of being engaged, minus the Tumblr blogs and random third rate tabloids and troll twitter accounts passing on the rumors. DM starts spreading around the same time some Tumblr blogs get the intel about secret engagement, wedding, rift in the family, people on his side not liking Soba, etc. Eventually it is revealed DM was right all along???? In a complete turn of events her credibility goes from zero to 1 (grudgingly of course, while she continues to spill BS daily)

Meanwhile, DM gets the first RPatz sighting with Scarlett and crew at dinner. Nobody believed it - as Nancy mentioned, it just seemed too farfetched with the way that restaurant was set up.

Then in early 2024 we get an actual RPatz sighting with with Soba/CE, and separately, sightings with Scarlett and Colin. Now there's more "credibility" to that random other sighting even if it still can't be proven.

Now...possible project with RPatz and CE's name circulating. Maybe just gossip fodder, maybe some truth to it. Time will tell. Coincidences once again.

DM gets the sighting of CE in LA with Russos. He actually confirms that one himself a month later.

Simultaneously, DM gets random sightings of CE doing other stuff where soba is not mentioned. Nobody knows really what to believe anymore.

But for every 15 BS things she posts, she actually gets 1-2 right. It starts to completely make her a hit or miss source but enough to get people riled up and worried if/when she gets something related to CE/Soba.

In a way, this strategy, if it were to have any salt to it, is kinda interesting. It also sort of enforces the idea of possible foul play. Because if CE is truly in such a happy, private, loveful relationship, why use somebody as uncouth as DM to throw out breadcrumbs? Especially since, in the past, his fanbase and most Tumblr blogs believed it was only legit if it came from someone like People Mag (his team's go-to). Ironically, Page 6 has been getting most of the exclusive scoops this time around, in addition to weird low rate tabloids that eventually make its way to the top.

I know I sound like crazy qanon conspiracy theorist, but I guess people see what they wanna see. But for the people who believe this relationship isn't as genuine as some want to believe, it kind of tracks that somebody's PR team pushing this out in ways to sort of make you wonder, question, and push back on the validity. Just enough to make you think, maybe, maybe there's something going on BTS that they're not saying but they're kinda telling. But you'll never know what the truth is. At least not for now.

I do find DM’s role since 2023 to be very interesting indeed. You missed nothing. Not one thing. She’s made herself be credible enough during this, but also, she’s questionable. So of course, take everything she says with a grain of salt.

I made this comment a bit ago to someone else, he still uses People. Who got the Jinx articles first. Think about that for a moment. He. Just him.

As far as the last paragraph, what I will say is celebrities need to be talked about. Good or bad, they need the press. They need to be in the front of people’s minds. What better way to have them in people’s minds, and to have fans talk about something long past their expiration date than by playing a game. PR has become such a hot topic word, and I think very few people even understand it. But to me, if you’re having to play so many games, what really is real? Live your life. Isn’t that what we continue to be told they’re doing?

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stupid-sloot-headcanons · 28 days

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Amai Mask/F!Darling: Lucky (1/)

If you were anyone else, you'd be wondering how you were fortunate enough to spend most of your life in Amai Mask's penthouse. I mean, he's at the top of every "Top 10" list for Heroes, pop stars, models, and singers. Bad lighting doesn't exist for him. And his body looks like it was carved from marble. He had so many fans that would kill to live with him.

And yet, the "lucky" one was you, and all because you had the gall to criticize him. To refuse him.

You were dragged to a dumb concert by a friend who'd won two tickets, and you had the nerve to open your fat mouth while waiting in the backstage line. That was the crime that warranted you being kidnapped, imprisoned, and hurt in ways you never imagined.

"Look, I have celebrities I crush on that you don't think are attractive, and this guy is yours," you'd said diplomatically. "I just don't get the appeal of a guy who's so dedicated to a facade that he named himself after it."

"Oh, come on," your friend groaned. "His name is about his appearance! Like, he looks so sweet, but it's a mask to hide how badass he is and how violent he gets with monsters."

"Yeah, I'm sure he can punch monsters real good," you replied sarcastically. "Plenty of Heroes punch monsters without turning their job as a civil servant into an entertainment career. Doesn't that make you feel...weird? It's like if a K-Pop idol was also in the milit--"

"Compulsory service is a thing in South Korea," your friend quipped.

You crossed your arms. "Okay, bad example. Imagine if a K-Pop idol was a firefighter, or a cop, or a fed. Which he is, technically."

"Gawd, I'd kill to see him in a uniform," she sighed. "Can you imagine? Holding those cuffs..."

"I'm sure the guy who beats criminal Monsters to death would show restraint and use nonlethal force like handcuffs. Well, if you're a human, he probably would. Though if you're not hot by typical standards I could see him being rough, just because you're not quite as human as the Pretty People."

"You say that like it's a bad thing. Getting roughed up by him after he cuffs me? The crime rate would go wayyy up just for people dying to get that chance~"

You rolled your eyes. "Can anyone in this line explain to me how this guy is hot in a way that's totally distinct from every other idol? Apart from the fact that he has a different serial number from the others that came from the same entertainment industry factory?"

"Okay, Daria," your friend said with a smirk. "Just because you're too good to be into idols doesn't mean we aren't."

"I'm fine with idols, just not ones like...him," you retorted. "Either be an entertainer or be an enforcer of the government. I'm not a conspiracy theorist but with his influence, he could get away with all sorts of dirty shit. And he's probably done way worse than the typical police brutality against Monsters." You crinkled your nose at the countless posters, CDs, t-shirts, figures, all bearing his aesthetically perfect and boringly pretty face. "He just seems so hollow, you know? I almost feel bad for him."

Your friend snorted. "You sure sound like it."

"Look, let's say for the sake of argument that he is using a persona all the time. He's an agent of the federal government AND an idol, both being industries that exploit the shit out of everyone inside. And he's so stuck inside that he can never express any genuine emotion that doesn't look good. Imagine not being able to feel or express shit that everyone else on the planet gets to: you can't feel anything without immediately wondering what you look like and adjusting so you don't look ugly while you feel it."

"So you're saying he self-monitors as much as your average woman?"

"In a Naomi Wolf sort of way, yes," you replied with a smirk. "Even if the guy is annoying, I also feel bad for him if that's how he lives. Imagine having such a complex that you think being ugly is the worst thing in the world. I'm not a prize, but your average ugly person probably hates themselves way less than he does when he's alone." You felt a smile creep up on your face. "Wouldn't it be the dumbest and most delicious bit of irony if he hated Monsters so much because they don't hide their ugliness as well as he does? Like a Japanese Gaston."

Your friend pouted. "Aww...you're just making me love him even more. Maybe he just needs someone to see the real him and help him love the real him. Someone who's an armchair psychologist like you!

"And now, the Armchair Psychologist is noting that we've moved to the classic I Can Fix Him route. My non-professional advice is to just ogle him with detachment and not think too much, lest you get too depressed and ruin the relationship between fan and idol-cop on a pedestal. No guy is worth it, especially him." You suddenly hear a chorus of screaming around you that makes you wince. "Goddammit! He isn't worth this tinnitus either!"

Your friend giddily jumped up and down to get a better look at Amai Mask waving as the line started to move again. "I beg to differ," she sang. "Ooh, he put his hair up in a little man-bun!"

Amai Mask took the mint-infused water bottle that an assistant had given him with a smile; once they'd turned around to scurry to the next task, he dropped it immediately and sipped it. Just two more hours and he could go home and rest for a bit before meeting with his management crew to plan everything for next month: tours, photoshoots, a briefing with the other Top-Ranked Heroes at the Association...

He sighed and dabbed at the bit of sweat forming on his brow with his neck towel. He loved pleasing his fans with an appearance, but even he needed to rest sometimes.

"Five minutes," his manager warned. "You need anything before you head back out there? I can push it back if you want hair and makeup to pop in."

Amai shook his head and set down the water bottle to put his hair up into a loose bun, carefully letting a few pieces fall to frame his cheekbones. "No, just this," he replied, frowning at his manager. "You should know by now that I don't like that level of prep for autograph signings. They want something intimate and personal, something casual." He applied a bit of tinted lip balm to complete the look. "This should be perfect."

"When are you not?" His manager smirked and checked his watch. "See you out there."

Amai heard him walk off and leaned against the barrier separating the queue from the behind-the-scenes area, closing his eyes. For a man as busy as him, these brief little moments during the day were the closest he got to relax when he had a tight schedule. Plus, the chatter of people made for a nice background noise.

"I've streamed his new album, like, a zillion times--"

"Did you see the pics of him from that charity gala? His suit was so--"

"Is it too much if I ask him to sign my dakimakura?"

He covered his mouth to hide how his face crinkled as he snorted. That wasn't even the weirdest thing he'd signed this month from a fan.

"I just don't get the appeal of a guy who's so dedicated to a facade that he named himself after it."

He raised an eyebrow. Someone like that was at one of his events? Normally he heard these things from random drama videos or read them online. The more vitriolic, the funnier it was to see how much they seethed over his success and talent. Hearing it in person wasn't that rare, but it was a small surprise; normally they didn't pay for his concert tickets.

He heard a woman next to them speak up in his defense, obviously a fan. Ah, he understood it now--the first voice was someone dragged here by a friend. He tried to imagine what the two of them looked like: the fan dressed in a concert t-shirt, maybe some merch as accessories, and the cynic in drab shapeless clothing, maybe a shirt depicting a musician they thought was sooo much deeper than his music. A wardrobe that came out of thrift stores and secondhand shops, complete with an imaginary pat on the back for being oh-so ethical in their nonexistent fashion.

The more they talked though, the more he was dragged out of his little 5-minute meditation. The background noise of the others melted away as he found himself focusing on what these two were saying. It was annoying, but nothing he hadn't heard before from his critics.

"He just seems so hollow, you know? I almost feel bad for him."

His eyes shot open. Suddenly he found himself staring at the mirror he'd just used to put his hair up. Every other jab stung, but just barely. Why was he even listening to this nobody? They were pretending to feel bad for him, just as hypocritical as they said he was. He took another sip of water and massaged his temples when he noticed he was narrowing his eyes into near-slits in the mirror. Shit, he didn't want to look wrinkled and stressed during the signing. He had some eye cream in his bag; he just needs to ignore them, dab this on, and relax for the rest of his--

"He's so stuck inside that he can never express any genuine emotion that doesn't look good."

The hand that was reaching for his bag's zipper froze. He bit his tongue and felt a pulsing in his temples. Shit. SHIT. If he felt that, then that meant--

He willed himself to look into the mirror and fought the urge to vomit as he saw a small vein starting to rise next to his left eyebrow. This stupid, ignorant bitch was actually getting to him. Why? Why? He can just ignore them.

"I also feel bad for him if that's how he lives. Imagine having such a complex that you think being ugly is the worst thing in the world. I'm not a prize, but your average ugly person probably hates themselves way less than he does when he's alone."

He had to clench his fists to keep from punching through the barrier and crushing their skull to shut them up. Someone like this had NO right to feel pity for HIM. No shit, they weren't a prize. Being ugly on the outside and inside, and that smugness, that audacity to pretend they feel bad for him--HIM, their better in every possible way?

"Wouldn't it be the dumbest and most delicious bit of irony if he hated Monsters so much because they don't hide their ugliness as well as he does?"

His hands tightened to the point that he felt like his bones were about to pop through his skin. The pulsing in his temples was unbearable, but he couldn't bear to look in the mirror to see how bad the vein had gotten. He had to get away from them. He had to shut them out, to be better and ignore them. He took another swig of his drink and headed back to where he'd left the signing table, massaging his temples with a bit of medicated cold-pressed cream. Soon he felt the pulsing subside, and after a few minutes of breathing, he was back to normal.

He came out again and felt a wave of comfort as he heard his fans screaming for him. This was his comfort zone, exactly where he was supposed to be. He was in his element. That little worm was in his world, and while he had to fight the urge to scan the crowd for them, he suppressed a chuckle at the thought of them feeling so out of place and uncomfortable among the throngs of screeching fans surrounding them.

"Thank you for waiting," he said with a warm smile. "Sorry for the long break, but I can't wait to meet the rest of you all!"

Another round of screams rang out as he settled into his chair and chatted mindless pleasantries and feigned intimacy with the fans at the front of the line, signing things so quickly and expertly as if his hand had a mind of its own. As the line progressed, he tried to listen for the voices of that particular duo to see if his image of that nobody were accurate.

When he spied a woman in a t-shirt from last year's concert standing next to a more subdued one in a flavorless top and jacket, he knew he'd found them. Once they finally reached the front of the line, he made sure to give the fan a sweet smile and take their hand as they handed him a film poster with shaking fingers. "Thank you so much for coming," he said kindly. "Ooh, this poster takes me back. I had a lot of fun filming this one. What's your name?"

"You touched my wrist," the fan whispered. She shook her head. "I mean, uh, that's not my name. Not Wrist. It's, um...oh God, uh--"

"Shizuka," the Cynic interjected. "Her name is Shizuka."

The fan nodded eagerly. "Yep! That's it."

Amai Mask smiled and signed the poster. "So, did you enjoy the concert, Shizuka?"

"Ohmygod-you-said-my-name--I, um, yes! I went to one last year but this set had all my favorite songs, and it was just so...Wow! You're a natural onstage, like...a real showman, you know?"

"People say that a lot," he replied with a hint of feigned humility. "I'm just grateful that what I'm good at coincides with my job. I love performing for everyone, especially fans like you that tell me how you enjoyed it."

The Cynic struggled to roll her eyes as her friend fawned over him. He turned his gaze to them and smiled, holding his pen up. "Did you have something for me too, Miss...?"

"____. And no thanks," she replied awkwardly. "I just came with her since she won an extra ticket. But like she said, you're a uh...real showman." She tried to sound somewhat enthused, but she wasn't as good an actor as he was. "You must have down a couple litres of water in between songs with everything you do up there. I was exhausted just watching you do your thing up there!"

More false concern and acting like she's so cool and detached. He let out a small chuckle. "I like to think I get energy from my fans, but the water and electrolyte drinks in between sets help too." His golden eyes shone strangely for a moment. "I do feel bad that you came all this way and waited in line just to walk away with nothing special, though."

He stood up and to the delighted and surprised screams of the crowd (and Shizuka), he took out his phone and handed it to his assistant before putting an arm over each of the duo while he posed in the middle with a dazzling smile. The assistant snapped several pictures and immediately chose the best looking ones to post to Amai Mask's promotional account for his concert tour. "Once you see this online, could you comment on the post and let me know you saw it? That way I'll know your usernames!"

Shizuka nodded furiously, trying not to cry too hard from joy as she felt Amai Mask's hand on her shoulder and imagined how perfect they would look in a picture together side-by-side. ____ felt Amai Mask tilt his head and whisper something into her ear that made her blood run cold.

"Thanks for coming, Armchair Psychologist."

#.opm #yandere opm #.amai mask #yandere amai mask #fem darling #.myshit

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odinsblog · 9 months

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I was stunned to find the number of people in the tech industry who are all-in on the theory of scientific racism and eugenics. They've been out about that for years, though.

There's a sort of complex where this was the birth of, whether you want to call it the intellectual dark web, I think that was the moment there. They've sort of been radicalized gradually, as happens with these things, where they started with, like, Slate Star Codex was a really big key central point for them to gather and sort of say, well, we have to interrogate and question a lot of these (egalitarian) assumptions. They were very actively courted by the neo-reactionary movement.

So you have things like Peter Teal holding dinner parties with the founders of the movement, and sort of people who have explicitly endorsed slavery, explicitly endorsed disenfranchising women, and people of any non-male gender from being able to vote.

And I always resent it because I sound like a crazy person by just merely accurately describing what they have publicly said. I sound like a conspiracy theorist who's pinning up red strings on a cork board by literally being like, “This is a thing they said out loud, in public, multiple times.” And people are like, “There's no way.” And I'm like, I don't know what to tell you, but it's all out there. We have receipts for ten years.

They are way out there, and they have an explicit agenda of normalizing, really radical, really hateful agendas.

And for me, it's like, it's just a very simple thing.

It's like I have to care about my kid’s safety. I have to care about my friend's safety, I have to care about, you know, basic moral values that we used to agree on.

And that's the other thing too, is because I knew these people 10 and 20 years ago. Like the first blog that Marc Andreessen ever had, I set up. It was on a platform I helped build. So I know that there was a point in which, at least from the public visible face, this was once a reasonable person. And for them to embrace the sheer intellectual dishonesty, along with the hatred… the fact that they're just like, they don't care that they're lying because it's an effective tool to get what they want.

That stuff is… I don't know.

It really soured me on the traditional tech industry.

This is what their tech is for. The things they fund are meant to carry out their agenda.

Let me give you a clear example: To the people who believe in this extremist racist ideology, Elon Musk being willing to lose tens of billions of dollars in value of his own money, presumably, in Twitter, turning into “X,” is a principled person who puts his values ahead of the dollar. He is so committed to advancing this reactionary movement that he's willing to forego tens of billions of dollars of personal wealth in order to advance it.

And what rational people see as the destruction of Twitter is rather, the destruction of the ability for anybody to ever again make a Black Lives Matter hashtag, or to make a Me Too hashtag. And that is because he's not a dumb person. Like the thing that a lot of progressives and reasonable people want to just say, well, he's racist and evil, so he must be dumb.

He's not a dumb person.

Peter Thiel's not a dumb person.

So if we assume they're smart people who understand how systems work and have virtually unlimited resources, then why would they choose to do this?

Well, there must be a reason.

And there is a reason.

It's just one we don't like to confront.

Even more insidious is the fact that these tech moguls own huge companies with enormous influence, and wielding that kind of power over their employees creates a herd mentality within their workforces.

So if, for example, Facebook's board includes both Peter Thiel and Mark Andreessen. They don't have to give somebody an order to say what kind of content they want to promote on the newsfeed, on Facebook.

Everybody who works there knows this is who our bosses are. This is what we got to do, because they're smart. Everybody's smart, everybody's very reasonable.

And so you don't have to imagine, like I said, I don't have to be a conspiracy theorist that's putting up some red strings on a cork board to connect the dots and whatever. You're like, “Oh, I'm a midlevel product manager at a company. I'd like to make a name for myself and make the share price go up. And I know the boss's boss has been on every podcast in the world saying we need to promote more voices that are calling for ethnic cleansing,” okay?

Message received.

That's what a person who has no moral context would do. And there are a cohort of people in the technology industry that have come up entirely consuming media owned and created by these people, because they know the programming site Hacker News, which is owned by a venture capital firm and run by Paul Graham, is one of these guys.

They read blogs written explicitly by these guys. They consume it. They were on clubhouse. They're in a Discord chat with others that are sort of buying the stuff. They have a full wraparound media bubble. If they just read substacks and listen to the blog posts or read the blog posts from these folks, you can have what feels like an entire media diet shaped solely by this dialogue.

And this is why they're trying to own the media outlets and the distribution, like Twitter, alongside owning the platforms. And the fact that they can control more parts of society, right? The leverage of owning the distribution networks, the leverage of owning media outlets, the leverage of owning the platforms is very, very different, because we do have a lot of historical precedent.

If we go back 100 years ago and we say you're reeling from coming out of a pandemic, you are reeling from economic precarity and inequality at unprecedented levels, and you see the rise of, again, a direct parallel, virulent antisemitism. And you have things like the oil barons giving way to the Henry Fords of the world, the labor crackdown of the Pinkertons, Ford's embrace of, you know, to the point where he's pen pals with Hitler, and IBM building the technology.

The first person that ever asked me to do technology work for him was a neighbor of ours, and he had a tattoo on his wrist. And I was a little kid and didn't know what it meant. And I asked him what it was. It was his concentration camp tatoo. And what people don't realize is those are database entries in an IBM database.

And IBM's stance at the time was that they were neutral.

This is what technology does to enable the rise of fascism and victimization around the world. And we have a direct precedent less than 100 years ago, of how these technologies are used.

And I don't say that lightly.

I'm not saying we're there yet, but that is how you get there. And I would be surprised if the pattern doesn't play out in some ways, in terms of if you have tycoons of industry at a moment when the world is reckoning with massive social change, cultural change, along with recovering from things like economic destruction, inequality and pandemics… And you have rising military threats around the world.

That is exactly where we were a century ago.

—ANIL DASH shares his thoughts and experiences on Richard Hanania and rampant neo-fascism in Silicon Valley

#anil dash #richard hanania #peter thiel #elon musk #silicon valley #eugenics #fascism #twitter #white supremacy #antisemitism #racism #anti blackness #misogyny #transphobia #homophobia #conservatism #libertarianism #libertarians

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mrsmarlasinger · 10 months

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The surreal thing about the Titan submersible: unless someone pulls off a miraculous last-minute rescue, when we all wake up tomorrow, those five men will be dead.

I mean, assuming they haven't already hyperventilated the last of their oxygen or imploded in a hull failure event.

It's currently June 22nd, 1:48 AM, MDT. If they're still alive, they will not be within the next...what, three hours? Give or take. And it would take hours to get the sub to the surface if it were found miles underwater, so if it's at the bottom of the sea, that really gives the rescuers...I don't know, like, maybe an hour to pull off the impossible?

These men are about to cross the event horizon.

When the banging sounds were first reported, it blew my fucking mind. I'd been certain that they were dead already, or that if they weren't, they would be soon. Without question. Then came this bizarre, impossible glimmer of hope. And I thought, if those sounds really were occurring at thirty-minute intervals, if it really was the Titan passengers, then maybe—maybe—they had a chance.

But they just...don't. Let's be realistic: they're about to die. We know this. We know for a fact that their time is about to run out.

And I know people are angry about the Missing White Woman Syndrome feel of it all. It would make for such on-the-nose satire. Five wealthy men have the world on pins and needles; where was that energy when hundreds of refugees drowned off the coast of Greece a week ago?

It frustrates me that I'm so invested in the Titan sub. It's like the entire incident was orchestrated for the sole purpose of grabbing attention (of course I don't believe that's the case). The very premise of the sub is tauntingly ridiculous—so very blatantly an expensive suicide. I saw someone compare it to an Onion article, and it IS.

The shitty video game controller, the ominous waiver, Stockton Rush's portentous comments (hell, even his name), the toilet sat right in front of that tiny dollhouse window. The absurd price tag paired with a history of failed dives and an OceanGate employee fired and sued years ago for raising safety concerns.

God, it's so dumb. It's so so fucking dumb. In real life, what we'd call "foreshadowing" is really just actions→consequences. But still. Still. It reads like sitcom writers setting the dominos for a season finale, tirelessly working to maximize memeability so we can all point and laugh with our popcorn.

The sheer pointless, brainless, wasteful extravagance of it all makes it easy to forget how horrific and tragic the ordeal really is. It grants us some strange permission to rubberneck.

And, well, who wouldn't want to rubberneck? The drama. Horror movie levels of repulsion. Any fear you can imagine—the dark, the cold, the ocean, suffocation, confined spaces, death—all wrapped into one perfect, cinematic nightmare. It's a black comedy: dumbassery punished by a fate we don't, shouldn't, wish even on billionaires.

Then, of course, there is the deadline. Pun not intended.

That, I think, is what's really gripped us. The limited oxygen supply is a countdown, a ticking time bomb. Ten minutes left in the movie—can the protagonist pull off a daring escape in time?

God, I know I sound like one of those crisis actor conspiracy theorists, but you couldn't manufacture a more gripping story if you tried. That hard figure we've seen in every news article: 96 hours. Ninety-six hours to save the day.

Can you see the Netflix docudrama now? The cuts to a black screen with the remaining number of hours emblazoned in the center? "If we don't find that sub tonight, those men are dead," some intrepid rescuer says...a split second of grave silence...then the scene goes black, except for a line of heavyweight white text that reads, in all caps, "SIX HOURS REMAINING." Next we'll see a heart-wrenchingly candid conversation between the passengers, for character development.

You know Channel 5 is airing a documentary about the Titan in the UK tomorrow. Tonight, actually, since I guess it's technically Thursday morning. The countdown was so hard-set, ITN calculated the exact hour at which they could broadcast their production. The perfect moment for them to capitalize on that post-curtains melancholy we all get at the end of a movie.

It's crass, but fascinating, too. Is ITN going to acknowledge their production timeline by leaving the documentary's ending ambiguous, a choice which will ring bittersweet when aired in the aftermath of the inevitable deaths? Will they scramble to concoct an ending in those mere hours after the passengers asphyxiate? Have they already made two endings: one in case of a miracle, and one in case of a tragedy? Any answer is soulless.

But all of this is soulless. The Titan is our gladiator fight, our bread and circuses. Still, I can't stop staring, because I cannot wrap my head around it. It's 3:30 AM now. Within hours, they will be dead, sure as an execution.

Few news stories come with such a grim deadline. Almost always it's a nail-biting rescue whose twists and turns we follow until some hitherto-unpredictable endpoint; or a sprawling clusterfuck of tragedy trailed by aftermath upon aftermath; or a search for a missing person that eventually meanders into a quiet presumption of death.

The certainty blows my mind—the finality of it, the tragedy of it, is incomprehensible. It doesn't feel real. Why do I care so much? Those men were dead from the start (if not literally, then certainly figuratively). Why do I keep reading about it, posting about it? Why can't I stop watching the car wreck smolder? What am I doing still standing in the street?

I hate that I fell prey to the submarine story like everyone else with an internet connection. But whatever deity may or may not exist got bored, I guess, and crafted the dramedy-action-horror hybrid of the year. Even wove in little cliffhangers (the banging! On the sonobuoys! There's still time!) to string us along like a damn HBO producer.

It gets me, man.

It's 4:00 AM, MDT. I guess it's really over, huh? I know 96 hours was never an exact deadline, but let's not be idealistic here.

I hope it was quick. I hope they imploded in a single terrible instant.

I hope the next sunken boat of six hundred refugees wins as much attention as the Titan did.

I hope Netflix doesn't make that docudrama with the black screen and the all-caps line of heavyweight white text.

I hope we sleep. I hope I sleep. I hope we all can sleep.

#titanic #oceangate #titanic submarine #titan submarine #titan #ocean gate #missing submarine #submarine #death #june 2023 #current events #suicide mention

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annabelle--cane · 8 months

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at the risk of sounding Really Bad and with the caveat that I mean this in the most pro vaccine pro taking Covid extremely seriously way possible. I think conflating mental health/personal hobbies and habits with physical health and wellness in the time of a literal plague is actually part of why we are where we are. The example of opting out of treating a broken bone that you used is the perfect metaphor because that’s something that mostly effects the person with the broken bone. But if you’re treating every goddamn thing a person can do like it’s potentially viral it makes it easy to sound reasonable to advocate for a lot of vigilance against individual choice. Is this totally off base? do I sound like a reactionary dipshit conspiracy theorist right now? Just… there’s something here right??

even if that isn't the total root cause, I definitely think you're onto something. covid is literally a deadly and disabling viral disease, so the logic of "your actions regarding this impact others" makes total sense, but I think a lot of people took that language and framework and just ran with it, hoping that alluding to a deadly and disabling viral disease would lend credence to their arguments about mental health and personal decisions.

for example, I am constantly thinking about this take I saw on a post about drug decrim in december 2021. it's so special and dear to my heart, it makes no fucking sense at all. the only copy of the screenshot I still have saved is just the tail end of it and it has my annotations, so bear with me.

first, just for a moment, I love the complete breakdown of internal logic. we need to end the stigma around drug abuse but I think using heroin is exactly like being anti-vaxx. we should decriminalize all drugs but you'd have to be craaaazay to think that legalizing them is okay. wait until this person learns that some addiction treatment programs include prescribing opioids as a harm reduction measure.

second, using heroin is in no way like being anti-vaxx oh my god, and this person just can't tell. they are explicitly applying viral disease logic to mental illness* and choices about individual bodily autonomy. I don't want to minimize the pain and distress that can come from having a loved one with a substance use disorder, but in no world is it the same thing as refusing to go to cvs a few times to get a free vaccine against, once again, a deadly and disabling viral disease. groundbreaking leftist take: drug use makes you a hazard and drain on society and honestlyyyy you should think about the consequences of your actions before choosing to become an addict :/

I don't have screenshot for this next example, but I've also seen this language and mindset particularly come up a lot in discussions about "bimboism," makeup, and cosmetic surgery. I've seen several discussion threads where a woman finally just says "look, I'm adult, I've thought about this, I've interrogated myself, and ultimately I still want to do it and I can do what I want with my body" and the comeback to usually is "are you stupid? this isn't just about you, you're a member of a society who inherently expresses your ideology through your choices. the personal is political, stop being so individualistic. what will young girls think when they see you in a miniskirt calling yourself a slut?"

again, the final point that's meant to win the argument is that your choices about your body aren't fundamentally your own but Society's, because other people can look at your body and have feelings about it, they may even want to emulate it. for an added bonus, this one doesn't just use viral disease logic, but also borrows heavily and directly from the really basic conservative idea that women are less people and more living mannequins that you can dress up and use to show off the ideals of your social group. you can't wear that, men might see you and think you're a hussy and then it'll be your fault when they harass other women, little girls might see you and copy you like mindless drones.

*obligatory asides that plenty of people can recreationally use substances without being addicted and they're also fine + I know that classifying addiction as a mental illness is a hotly debated topic, especially in antipsych contexts, but that's a whole different can of worms to the topic at hand.

#answered #anons #id in alt text

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love-is-a-pearl · 12 days

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Watching Pokemon mezamas for the first time because I can't binge DP rn orz

If you wanna see me ranting and reacting, I'll leave things under the readmore >w<)b

Starting with ep 1 and 2! Cause I dont have as much free time as I wish I had so I'm doing 2 episodes per day till friday.

Winds of Beginning! The Endless Road!!

It's just me or the music at the beggining was Alola music? If yes.. That's just the cutest. Alola music as Ash's music QAQ

The best part of the episode was the 5 minutes we spent with Ash and Pikachu before the stupid Latias appeared. Add that one to the pokemon I now hate because of the anime..

Man, I'm still bitter those 10 episodes weren't focused on Ash and his Pokemon only. It would've been the absolute best way to use those 10 episodes (and still reach the same conclusion Mezamas as it is reached), why couldn't Ash ever be alone with his mons? He can be enjoyable if the writers tried. Sigh

At least Buizel is here ♥ Also it was adorable to see Noivern and Sceptile in security duty while everyone else slept! Babies! However I'm sad Buizel and Donphan didn't go to cuddle with AshPika and Latias ù3ú

What was the point of all the drama about "Ash's pokemon not being able to attack TR because it could hurt him" when... Pikachu just went and... did just that? (also, Noivern going there and breaking the glass would've hurt Ash less??????) I get they needed "Ash suicidal tendencies make him likeable" moment but gosh, it could've been done better, for sure.

And you know, mandatory Dawn mention, but it's kinda poetic that both Ash and Dawn got done dirty in their final moments because of some stupid legendaries. They're trully one and the same. Even in shitty writing decisions from anipoke staff LMAO

Satoshi VS Kasumi! Seaside One-on-One!!

I know that Misty's metaphor about how her and Clauncher are meant to be is an obvious Pokeshipping hint, of course it is! I know that! but...

Not to sound like a conspiracy theorist but the fact Pikachu ignored Psyduck for Misty, and Clauncher didn't seem at all to reciprocate Misty's feelings is... interesting... Added to that how Ash just replaced her lure with Cilan's is.. Almost like adding to her own metaphor, that while Misty still has feelings for Ash and believes that they're meant to be, because of fate, because she is the "OG twerpette" like TR called her, Ash himself is like.. Pikachu to Psyduck and Clauncher to her. Neutral at most, and with someone else having their favoritism.

And y´know, it's even more interesting that at the beggining of Sinnoh Ash still had her lure (and was protective of it) and immediately after Sinnoh he changed her lure for Cilan's. I sure wonder what happened between those events for him- It's Dawn! its Dawn that happened!

Dont judge me I can make anything be about pearlshipping if I try hard enough.

Shipping aside, I adore seeing episodes with the general same plot but with different characters. Compare this to the Buneary catch and it's really interesting to see just how different Ash acts with Misty and Dawn about the same thing. Him and Misty have a battle about who is gonna get it, which does makes sense, they will resolve all their arguments with battles instead of actual talking and I adore that trait of their relationship~

And even Misty's disappointment at the end, that Clauncher still likes hanging with Corphish is very different than Dawn bringing up her closeness with Ash to win Buneary over. I love those sort of similar episodes, it's great to understand how each character thinks.

Gosh, even comparing to Totodile's catch shows how Misty and Ash themselves have become closer and more understanding of eachother! In here they make rules about how to catch Clauncher instead of fighting the whole time, it's a nice showcase of how they've grown! I'm just sad that Totodile was in this episode and no one mentioned the similarities :T

Also I will never get tired of Pikachu's "Pikachupi"! Ikue Otani does it in the cutest voice and I just want to squeeze the rat's cheeks every time he says it!!!

Speaking of Pikachu, I love that at the very least in those 10 episodes he went back to having some hint of a personality since he hadn't shown much of it for... a long time before it (and remembered the names of the people he cares for. I was so angry at the lack of "Pikapi" in Alola).

Same goes for TR, is nice to see their motto being animated instead of some re-used footage. One of the things that made their apparitions enjoyable in OG-DP was that they always added some personality to it. That was fun to see again.

---

And that's it for today.

#|→ not not #mpm liveblogging #me waiting till the anniversary of ash's retirement to actually watch his last moments in the anime?#is more likely than you think #im slow watching shit

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mariacallous · 5 months

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(JTA) — It was a slow trickle, each long press of the finger and ensuing quick tap was days and sometimes weeks apart (it’s hard to comprehend that a whole month has passed since Oct. 7), but I am here to tell you that I — a former social media manager — have removed each and every social media app from my phone.

In fact, as I was writing this very esssay, I realized I still had Threads downloaded, opened it for a minute, saw a Thread that said “Zionism is antisemitism,” and promptly deleted that, too.

I have zero desire to restore a single one of them.

What happened to me has probably happened to you, too. I saw a Tweet, a TikTok, an Instagram Story that filled me with such fury and indignation that I spent hours — sometimes days — formulating and reformulating an epic, fact-based, emotionally charged, imagined response. Imagined, of course, because I knew I’d never post it. I’ve seen so many celebrities and random acquaintances do such utterly embarrassing and harmful and reputation-destroying things in the last weeks to even dare to try.

And to be clear: I would try if I thought I could change someone’s mind and force them to see my humanity, but beyond the small, intimate, personal conversations that I can have off the apps, I feel like these enraged indignant responses only seem to silo people further.

I’ve worked in social media since 2014 — in the Jewish realm of social media, specifically. That means I’ve seen a lot of awfulness, gas chamber memes, overt antisemitism and Islamophobia. I’ve personally been told many times to go back where I came from (which, yes, is Israel, and that feels grimly funny now). Yet I’ve also believed in its power to heal, to make people feel seen, to energize activism, to educate.

I still believe that — kind of? But I’ve also never seen it this awful, this polarizing, this … honestly, unhinged. An unscientific poll of people I know seems to indicate the same thing: Social media is the worst it’s ever been, maybe because the Israel/Palestine conversation has always been so impossibly polarizing.

People are so stuck in their “side” and binary that they’re willing to share anything — without fact-checking, without making sure they’re not getting in bed with people whose worldview is dangerous, without asking themselves for a small second, wait, is this Islamophobic? Antisemitic? Completely detached from reality? Without wondering if they sound like a conspiracy theorist, or if they’re just being cruel for cruelty’s sake.

And the amount of words wasted on misinformation and meanness doesn’t even compare to the number of words some people insist on putting into other people’s mouths (or keyboards, rather) when their statement doesn’t 100% pass whatever standards they’ve arbitrarily decided it must. Beyond Israel and Palestine, we’ve been tearing ourselves apart inside our Jewish community, and that also breaks my heart.

I understand the deep grief and rage behind most posts. I’ve been enraged and grieving myself. I’ve been scared too: Of the growing antisemitism. Of the people who tell me that I and my family, because we were born in Israel, can’t be innocent civilians, that we all deserve the horrors of Oct. 7 to befall on us.

I’ve also been scared for the life of every innocent person lost and about to be lost. Around 1,200 Israelis killed, 300 kidnapped, over 10,000 Palestinian lives believed to have been taken, all unfathomable numbers. And I’ve been scared about the cycle of rage and violence and siloed indignation that removes the humanity of a whole swath of people. Because I do believe that that’s part of what got us here. And I keep seeing it evinced, over and over again, on social media.

I am — unlike many “experts” newly minted by numbers of followers or magnitude of chutzpah — not an expert of Middle Eastern politics, despite being Israeli and working in Jewish media for almost a decade. I know a lot, but I am not a politician or historian. And yet, to the extent I believe that there is a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, I believe that it has to be one that takes into account the inherent humanity of all those involved. I believe that it will be human and imperfect.

I’m awed by the people who are still managing to use social media for good right now, the little spots of light — people who parse through history and reality with wisdom and empathy, well-educated veteran observers of Israel and Palestine, academics, journalists, fierce activists, who, through immense pain, still manage to retain their humanity.

Yet for me, I’ve realized being on social media is doing more harm than good. It’s keeping me further away from solutions and useful action, and closer to rage and fear. So for now, I can’t stay there.

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creature-wizard · 3 months

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What do I do if my friend is a New Age conspiracy theorist who believes in reptilians, uses ChatGPT to write spells, and claims to be Cherokee? I tried directing them to this blog already, and they thanked me for giving them stuff to talk about with their friends in the alien club. I'm not sure what to make of that.

Unfortunately, getting people out of conspiracy theories is often very hard, because conspiracy theories appeal to people on a very deep emotional level. Like it's not necessarily that they want an ancient cult of blood-drinking lizard aliens to exist, but when you're constantly beset by socio-economic problems and seeing so many horrible things happening in the world, it's the kind of thing that can feel true. And moreover, it gives people a sense of hope by telling them that the bad guys can be easily defeated.

There are things you can try, but there are no guaranteed solutions. Conspiracy theorists are, after all, taught to distrust anything that runs contrary to the conspiracy theory - "oh well that's just what the conspiracy wants you to believe!" (Same exact brainworm as when fundamentalist Christians think everything that runs contrary to their teachings is just what Satan wants them to believe.)

Here are some links:

The ironclad logic of conspiracy theories and how to break it

How to talk to conspiracy theorists—and still be kind

The most effective ways to support a loved one who believes in QAnon

'Facts aren't feelings': How to handle QAnon supporters in your mom groups

Conspiracy Theories: What Can I Do to Stop Them?

Something I've used on a few people that got them thinking a bit differently is pointing out similarities between what they currently believe, and the stuff people they know were fucked up went around saying. Like for example,

"That sounds a lot like the stuff Nazis were saying about the Jews to justify the Holocaust."

"That sounds a lot like the stuff Christian Evangelicals are saying about gay people to justify homophobia."

"That sounds a lot like the stuff far right Christians were saying during the Satanic Panic, which targeted basically anybody who wasn't a conservative enough Christian."

"That sounds a lot like the stuff witch hunters were saying about the women they targeted during the witch hunts."

Of course, each person is different and there's no method that's definitely going to work on everyone, and some people are more attached to believing in conspiracy theories than others. You gotta consider your friend's personal motivation and investment here and take that into account when talking to them.

Good luck, anon!

#answered #conspiracy theories #conspiracy theory #conspiracism #conspiracy theorists #conspiracy theorist #resources

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larentsbabie · 6 months

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Okay, so I have a lot to say about Louis’ little “chat” and I'll start with a bit of a recap.

A few weeks ago, there have been articles that said Louis is single and doesn't have children. Granted, the articles were not credible enough as it is an obvious lack of basic information since Louis Tomlinson has a son named Freddie and it's all over Wikipedia just a click away. But that just means that the general public has no idea that Louis Tomlinson has a son without googling about the information.

Then the LATAM tour was announced. Louis said it himself that he was offered the rooms of same size as the last tour but he wanted to go big and bold so he chose stadiums. To get the general public interested in an artist, the very common thing to do is to bring them into news, and negative publicity gets more clicks. People will click away to see a celebrity be ‘rude' or 'fight' someone for not respecting their space cause tell me how many of y all not love drama. It's tea, right?

Another way to get into public's eye is by getting into a new relationship. Which is what I've been predicting for Louis for a month now. So, imagine my shock when he went and said "NO" to a "stunt" and instead just took a simple path of bashing fans.

This is not the first time Louis has done this.

I've more to say, so read it all before you come after me for disagreeing on something.

I'll spell it out for y'all!

We should all be very thankful that Louis just got the stunt done with a simple foolish reply to a tweet that was totally unrelated rather than going out hand in hand smooching the face off of another girlie.

Because if that had happened, the media would've been out like crazy about that and it'd have gone on for we don't even know how long.

To me, even a 2 month stunt sounds long ass at this moment cause I can't deal with that shit!

Secondly, remind me of all of those times when Louis intimated us prior of a "chat", like proper

"announced" and "invited" us to chat with him with an hour of replies to our tweets. But he did that on Monday. He wanted all of our attention on his replies yesterday cause he wanted the attention to his stunt. If that doesn't tell you something's fishy- there's more.

Half the tweets Louis replied to yesterday seemed hand-picked. Call me a conspiracy theorist but the conspiracy theories aren't just born out of no where. Where there's smoke, there's fire. If he hadn't given us something to build our theories on, there would've been no theories at all. But ALAS!

If he wanted to deny the conspiracy theories of conspiracy theorists as he names it, he would've found hell of a lot of tweets. There's never any scarcity of Larry tweets or posts on any platforms. But no, he went and made a fool out of himself by denying Larry on one tweet where there was no relation to Larry at all.

And if you think he was actually foolish in doing that, you're absolutely out of your mind. That man is a bloody mastermind who destroyed a man like Simon Cowell one step at a time.

Louis would NOT go so unrelatable on replies for no reason at all. He HAD to deny Larry one way or the other. If it hadn't been over "chicken parmesan", it'd have been over something more serious that would've actually hurt us all. So, y'all should be thankful that THAT man was willing to make himself look "confused" while he denied it rather than make us all question ourselves over other sensitive topics.

Now, about "chicken parmesan". My man Louis William Tomlinson got so off the track- it gave me major second hand embarrassment. Like, babe, Louis, I love you.

We will hand craft tweets for you to deny Larry the next time, just let us know beforehand. We'll hand craft tweets in a way that none of us look foolish and the public gets the message, too! What you did yesterday was hysterically funny!

Like, sir, think about it a minute.

You mentioned all through your career of that ONLY DISH you've ever cooked driven by pure romance for the love of your life. The infamous, chicken stuffed with mozzarella cheese wrapped in Parma ham with a side of home made mash.

Not to mention that you used to bring it up every chance you got ALONG WITH the crazy hand gestures. Ooofff!!! And you'd think it's an old story, one he used to tell 8 years ago while in ID. But oh, may I tell you how wrong you are? The latest he mentioned that was in 2019. One would think he'd forget it after all those years but my man always bragged about his one time in kitchen every chance he got even almost a decade later. He even mentioned that he cooked it out of love for his girlfriend. Sure, sir. I mean why not a girlfriend who at the time was vegan? But I'm not gonna question it at the risk of looking like a conspiracy theorist. Absolutely not. Can't afford that.

But when a fan asks for the recipe of a dish WHICH IS NOT EVEN THE SAME ONE HE COOKED AND BRAGGED about every chance he got for a decade, he flips it over and calls them a conspiracy theorist. Sit your ass down, sir. This is a pr nightmare as it is. Like look at that!

If y'all ever need a reason to laugh in life, this should be it.

I have many serious questions but I'll only ask one.

When the fuck did we let you in on our conspiracy theories about your beloved dish? If you know about the fandoms deepest darkest theories, that only means that you go lurking to dig them up for yourself.

And if you're so interested in the theories themselves, that only means that you care about them all cause they are not just theories but the truth of your life.

For someone who says, "I've never been asked about it directly. It's funny. I mean, PEOPLE CAN BELIEVE WHAT THEY WANT TO BELIEVE but it's comes across SOMETIMES a little bit disrespectful to not me but) my girlfriend. Like genuinely, if you google a conspiracy on iPhones, you'll get a conspiracy you know what I mean?" when asked to make a comment to deny Larry, it sounds an awful lot like you know every thing we talk about cause you are interested to know. And to be fair, we know that you care and we know that you know. And we know that you want us to understand and not give up. And we know that you trust us to not give up. So, we'll be here.

And can I take this moment to remind you all of the fact that Louis, when Dan Wootton put him on the spot to deny Larry, has not once made proper eye contact with the camera and fidgeted like crazy while talking about google, iPhone conspiracies and saying obviously, genuinely? And may I also remind y'all that he made Dan fucking Wootton take that interview down very soon after it was released? They LEGIT had to take that interview down cause Louis couldn't handle denying Larry in front of the camera like that!

So, if he had to put a rock on his heart all those times he had to deny Larry through tweets, I'll fucking understand his struggle and be happy with the outcome, no matter what!

In conclusion, I know that was a lot to read so for those who skipped. What Louis did was for the best.

Him denying Larry specially through that one tweet that's totally unrelated was very much his plan.

He wanted to get his job done as his management wanted him to but he simultaneously failed them very willingly and made a mess for them to pick up after him.

That man is a genius and doesn't do things for no reason. It is what it is. Laugh at it while you can and move on!!

#chicken parmesan #Louis Tomlinson #Larry stylinson #conspiracy theorist my ass #parmagate #chicken stuffed with mozzarella wrapped in Parma ham with a side of homemade mash

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