#with all that colonization and conquering
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I FIGURED IT OUT FUCKING FINALLY
thanks @ae-neon
eyllwe = ethiopia
fenharrow = greece
melisande = italy
anielle = france
adarlan = england
terrasen = ireland (irish gaelic/gaeilge)
the frozen wastes = scotland (scots gaelic)
the western wastes = germany
the witch kingdom = wales
white fang mountains = gaul
the deserted land = mughal
the khaganate = mongolia
wendlyn and doranelle = aboriginal australia
#tog#fucking hell that difficult#adarlan's gotta be england#with all that colonization and conquering#tog era
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Florida!!! by Florence + the Machine and Taylor Swift, Daytona Sand by Orville Peck, Spanish Moss by Against Me!, White Crosses by Against Me! //Pictures: map, surfers, post card, fountain of youth; plus my own photography // The Truman Show (1998) // Sunny Side Up by Jennifer L. Holm and Matthew Holm // Wikipedia
#don’t actually know what to tag this post but um. please reblog it <3#actually I made this mostly for myself anyways but I did spend a bit of time on it#web weaving#parallels#idk I was thinking about heartbreak and aging and youth and ghosts and haunting and nature and beauty. florida!!#I think it’s ironic in a really intriguing way how the state now has a reputation for being where old folks come to retire#whereas the Spanish colonizers arrived in florida looking for the Fountain of Youth#in your quest to cheat death you brought violence and destruction but in the end you can’t conquer your way out of the inevitable#you can’t conquer age and you can’t conquer time and you can’t conquer death and you can’t conquer the ghosts that haunt the peninsula#aging is nature death is nature and that will always overpower you in florida#from hurricanes to alligators to Spanish moss to the brilliant shades of green all around#accept nature + accept death + accept aging + accept heartbreak. in florida.#I only have this many thoughts/feelings about it bc I grew up here#& when you grow up in florida your whole life it’s very easy to fall in love with the Spanish moss and alligators and oranges#and the way everything is in shades of Green much prettier than you’ve seen anywhere else#photography can’t do it Justice the landscape here can really take your breath away#Bandit.txt
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ffxiv garlemald discourse is so funny because people will go "ugh people just cant stand it when things aren't black and white" and then you look at how the empire are portrayed in stormblood and shadowbringers and its like hm. that seems like a pretty intense and accurate display of violent imperialism to me! Wow I wonder why people in this day and age may find it hard to feel sympathy for them or even hate them on principal. god its such a mystery.
the games like 50/50 to me on how it tackles these themes because I actually like the garlemald arc in EW, I think it has a lot of horrific and powerful scenes depicting how self destructive fascist propaganda and beliefs are, but I also think it doesn't go far enough on some fronts. the garleans' xenophobia is most notably and obstacle to getting them to accept the contingent's help, which is what they're there to do,
but there's never an admission of harm from any garleans on the uuuuuuuuh massive amount of war crimes the nations around them are still suffering from they're just kind of like "we misjudged you...but you actually wanted to help us all along" like yeah thats great now can we get you all some deprogramming because you keep talking about returning to your prime and glory days and I think we need to unpack some stuff you really SHOULDNT return to. im not even really talking about EW proper but the patches where things are a bit more chilled out and people are recovering.
It feels like they wanted to have their critique of imperialism and also have things end with the beauty of human connection and reaching out and these things just don't mesh well because hey a lot of your modern day audience is not gonna like having to treat people yelling xenophobic things at the cast and your character with kid gloves after you showed them hours and hours of the awful things these people's beliefs have done. especially in the present day hoo boy.
#im kind of torn between 'no characters dont need to be 'punished' to be redeemed but also the characters just being so lenient with the#colonizers after we see far too many people being lenient if not supportive of the colonizers irl. well. it really blows afslkjfalkf and#yeah you can argue if they'd gone through with the garlemald expansion they would've had more time to go into this but the fact is that its#absent from what they did do and I especially think the patches when we go to garlemald and the EW role quests going 'hey maybe the#provinces can help us rebuild' as if they'd have any goddamn right to ask that just make me feel like they didnt stick the landing#seeing all the characters who have suffering time and time again bc of the garleans or seen the results of their actions having to clamp#their mouths shut every time someone said something xenophobic in EW isnt satisfying and it leaves so much unsaid!#also some people feel like the narrative didnt blame emet enough but ngl I think thats reductive even with his micromanaging scheming littl#ass and the intention of garlemald turning out a shitshow that doesnt make anyone else less complicit. most governments like this exaggerat#and lie and spread propaganda but I dont think most people here excuse the actions of a bigot because 'they were raised that way'#this is also my issue with gaius' writing. hes primarily upset that ascians were behind what he thought was his good old fashioned natural#conquering ideology :( and doesnt it suck so much he killed people for it. like yeah he seems pretty aware what he did was wrong but his#ideology remains bizarrely intact and unchallenged by the characters around him. no dude it wasnt just the ascians the system is a lot more#complex than that by this point aaaaaugh#final fantasy xiv#ffxiv#siren says#I hope people are nice to me about this I dont think I said anything particularly controversial to the Tumblr crowd (twt maybe but fuck em)#ig my main point with this post is that the game isnt perfect at writing this and also that look. I actually liked the main arc in EW and I#like quite a few garlean characters but I completely understand why others didnt like it or any garleans esp if they have their own persona#experiences with colonialism and I dont get to tell them they're invalid for that. too many people get judgmental about this understandably#upsetting topic and you just gotta accept that this is a big line for many people
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anyway i know people don't like to hear it because of the whole 'sic semper tyrannus' vibe of it all but the modern day equivalent of the ides of march would be if all those senators who've been in office since the 50s and were getting busted for insider trading in 2020 got together and stabbed bernie sanders to death in the capitol rotunda. i'm not even kidding.
#personal#ides of march#like let's be clear this wasn't the oppressed masses rising up against a tyrant#it was a bunch of aristocratic nepo babies who were the wealthiest and most elite of roman society#deciding that they didn't like This One Guy's Ambition and deciding to perform extrajudicial murder#and then utterly failing to plan for after that#given that this guy had a reputation as being 'a man of the people' and created a lot of infrastructure to help the plebes and the masses#so you know the actual people and not just pseudo-royalty of the time were really fucking pissed about the whole thing#and because the conspirators were apparently fucking DUMB they didn't have contingencies and basically hastened along roman autocracy#by thrusting the infinitely more ruthless and bloodthirsty octavian into power during a time that demanded ruthlessness#like caesar was a tyrant in the sense that he went around the countries that weren't his conquering and killing and colonizing#but like the senate didn't give a shit about any actual atrocities he might have committed against other peoples as he subjugated them#cuz they were all for that subjugation!#their grievances were just the most upper echelons of society deciding they knew best and being dumbasses all the while#sorry to burst any bubbles#(also very funny that sic semper tyrannus gets thrown around a lot as a thing for pro ides people)#(cuz the most famous moment where someone said that was when pathetic racist asshole john wilkes booth said it after shooting lincoln)#so you know. shrug dot emoji on that too
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also thinkin abt writing a post-mea fic where i get to write everyone at a nexus gala. i think itd be funny lol
#andre plays mea#i just like to play with politics#where theres usually no good answer#but andromeda is so much untapped potential#i mean i love pissing off tann#but realistically regardless of how pretty the angara are#our first contact would not have been as smooth as it was getting them on the citadel#‘but we’re all explorers!’ does not change the fact that the kett were our first alien species here too#and look how that went down lmao#plus the krogan tensions still going down that are so fuckin reductive#like logically the nexus should be in shambles politically#or at least there are very very thick lines drawn between parties#you think there arent people who are human extremists out to conquer andromeda?#or people who want to steal the angaran homeworlds for themselves?#and this honestly could apply to other races too#more likely the asari honestly#their holier than thou attitude defs extends to their colonizing efforts#is cooperation and friendship good?#hell yeah and im glad most of the game is that lol#i wouldnt like it so much if the angara werent cool n open to ryder after a while#but id like it acknowledged more often that originally they have zero reason to trust anyone but ryder#and ryder’s original allyship was transactional anyway!#(wild mumbling)#i need to either discuss this in a server#or make a separate post
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adlfjaldjslkdfjsk tell me TELL ME that no one called zuko and katara a "colonizer/colonized" relationship i'm in so much fucking disbelief
#okay but like honestly zuko and katara weren't set up as a couple by the writers which was super clear and like they could have had more#development but i'm- how the hell is he a colonizer his parents were the one doing all the conquering and imperialism#he hunted down a twelve year old boy because he was manipulated into doing so by an abusive father which he didn't let justify his actions#but like he was literally a teenager himself as aang pointed out in what the second ep of the show?!#and he never had any kind of power imbalance over katara long term or otherwise that implies anything NEAR colonizer for him lafnfbskdkdkdk#he was destructive yes but he clearly had the respect for other nations that his father obviously didn't like#the one time he did something fucked up to a village was when he burned suki's home in his hunt for aang which there is no justification fo#for*#that was nothing compared to what his great grandfather did like i just. fuck whoever said this bullshit#context is important here but like he clearly had great respect for other people despite the toxicity of his upbringing and his father's#messaging/teachings#siiiigh#atla for ts
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Controversial opinion among Dune book fans maybe, but I loved the changes they made to Chani's character. Making her a fedaykin who is already an experienced fighter before Paul arrives was a brilliant choice. Dune Part Two is a war movie, and this puts her at the center of the action, side by side with Paul, and gives her a much more active role than she has in the book.
We got a hint of where things were going in the beginning of Dune Part One. The first thing we ever know about movie Chani is that she's a fighter. She serves as a voice for the Fremen, telling us the story of their struggle from her point of view. I wrote here about the difference this change makes compared to other adaptations of Dune, what a perspective shift it is to have the world of Arrakis introduced not by an outsider, describing it as a dangerous but valuable colonial prize, but by one of its native inhabitants, who tells us before all else that it's beautiful, her home that she's fighting to liberate. I am so, so glad that the second movie followed up on this characterization.
I never found Chani and Paul's love story in the book particularly convincing, because why would this woman, who already has a prominent and respected place in Fremen society, even give the time of day to her deposed would-be colonizer, let alone fall in love and have children with him? Without a compelling reason for Chani to love Paul, she ends up feeling like a prize to be won, and "indigenous culture personified as a woman to be wooed (or conquered) by the colonizing man" is a trope we've seen and don't need to repeat.
But as soon as you tell me it's a barricade romance I get it. Cool cool cool, I know exactly what this relationship is now and it makes sense. Movie Chani doesn't respect or even particularly like Paul when she first meets him, and she doesn't think he's the fulfillment of any prophecy. She comes to respect him, and eventually love him, through his actions. He's brave--sometimes recklessly so. He fights well. He's willing to stick his neck out on the front lines with the other Fremen fighters. He can (after a little help) hack surviving in the harsh desert environment. He's not too proud to learn from others. He seems to genuinely want to be her equal in a common political struggle. All these qualities make sense as things she values.
Fighting side by side as equals is just about the only way I can see movie Chani falling for Paul. And it fits perfectly with the film's pattern of reversals that Paul's capacity for violence would initially be one of the things Chani likes about him, only for her to be repelled later when she sees what he becomes.
And as for Paul, well, he's had people deferring to him his entire life. Someone who doesn't take any shit from him is probably refreshing. He seems to like people (Duncan, Gurney) who challenge him and engage in a little friendly teasing--and aren't afraid to go a few rounds in the sparring ring.
It's easy to speedrun a romance when you're spending all your time together in mortal danger fighting for a shared political cause. Especially if you then start winning in a war your people have been fighting for decades. Are you kidding me? That is the perfect environment for intense battle camaraderie to turn into romantic love, and lust.
It makes sense that this version of Chani never believes Paul is any kind of messiah. Of course a character like movie Chani wouldn't believe in or trust some outside savior to liberate them. She's been working to liberate her own people for years. The more Paul invokes the messianic myth, the more he starts sounding once again like someone who plans to rule over them, and the more uncomfortable Chani becomes. In this way she becomes a foil to Jessica, the two of them representing the choices Paul is pulled between. It's a great way of externalizing the political and philosophical debates that often happen within characters' heads in the book.
And of course this version of Chani would leave Paul at the end of the film. It's not just the personal, emotional betrayal--although that stings. What common cause does she have with someone who just declared himself emperor and is sending her own people off in a war of conquest against others? Given the important role she plays in Dune Messiah, I am super curious to see how they get her back into the story, but girl was so valid for being willing to just gtfo. Given that she has the last shot of the whole movie, I'm sure she'll be back somehow, and I can't wait to see what they do with her character in any future installments.
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you know what, this makes sense
#ok so like in thailand the ethnic chinese population has heavily assimilated into thai culture#like its a thingTM for some of them to just identity as thai in pretty much all situations#then u have malaysia which literally borders thailand where the politicical landscape often falls along racial/ethnic lines#and like thailand was never colonized but malaysia was#like it makes sense for thai kings to promote national indentification over ethnic identity when thailand is surrounded by colonial states#and it makes sense that an ethnically based divide and conquer strategy still infuences the politics of a former colony like malaysia
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Someone on Reddit made the mistake of saying, "Teach me how this conflict came about" where I could see it.
Let me teach you too.
The common perception is that Jews came out of nowhere, stole Palestinian homes and kicked Palestinians out of them, and then bombed them for 75 years, until they finally rebelled in the form of Hamas invading Israel and massacring 22 towns in one day.
The historical reality is that Jews have lived there continuously for at least 3500 years.
There are areas, like Meggido iirc, with archeological evidence of continuous habitation for 7,000 years, but Jewish culture as we recognize it today didn't develop until probably halfway through that.
Ethnic Jews are the indigenous people of this area.
Indigeneity means a group was originally there, before any colonization happened, and that it has retained a cultural connection to the land. History plus culture.
That's what Jews have: even when the diaspora became larger than the number of Jews in Israel, the yearning to return to that homeland was a daily part of Jewish prayer and ritual.
The Jewish community in Israel was crushed pretty violently by the Roman Empire in 135 CE, but it was still substantial, sometimes even the majority population there, for almost a thousand years.
The 600s CE brought the advent of Islam and the Arab Empire, expanding out from Saudi Arabia into Israel and beyond. It was largely a region where Jews were second-class citizens. But it was still WAY better than the way Christian Europe treated Jews.
From the 700s-900s, the area saw repeated civil wars, plagues, and earthquakes.
Then the Crusades came, with waves of Christians making "pilgrimages to the Holy Land" and trying to conquer it from Muslims and Jews, who they slaughtered and enslaved.
Israel became pretty well depopulated after all that. It was a very rough time to live there. (And for the curious, I'm calling it Israel because that's what it had been for centuries, until the Romans erased the name and the country.)
By the 1800s, the TOTAL population of what's now Israel and Palestine had varied from 150,000 - 275,000 for centuries. It was very rural, very sparsely populated, on top of being mostly desert.
In the 1880s, Jews started buying land and moving back to their indigenous homeland. As tends to happen, immigration brought new projects and opportunities, which led to more immigration - not only from Jews, but from the Arab world as well.
Unfortunately, there was an antisemitic minority spearheaded by Amin al-Husseini. Who was very well-connected, rich, and from a politically powerful family.
Al-Husseini had enthusiastically participated in the Armenian Genocide under the Ottoman Empire. Then the Empire fell in World War One, and the League of Nations had to figure out what to do with its land.
Mostly, if an area was essentially operating as a country (e.g. Turkey), the League of Nations let it be one. In areas that weren't ready for self-rule, it appointed France or Britain to help them get there.
In recognition of the increased Jewish population in their traditional, indigenous homeland, it declared that that homeland would again become Israel.
As in, the region was casually called Palestine because that was the lay term for "the Holy Land." It had not been a country since Israel was stamped out; only a region of a series of different empires. And the Mandate For Palestine said it was establishing "a national home of the Jewish people" there, in recognition of "the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and to the grounds for reconstituting their national home in that country."
Britain was appointed to help the Arab and Jewish communities there develop systems of self-government, and then to work together to govern the region overall.
At least, that was the plan.
Al-Husseini, who was deeply antisemitic, did not like this plan.
And, extra-unfortunately, the British response to al-Husseini inciting violent anti-Jewish riots was to put him in a leadership role over Arab Palestine.
They thought it would calm him down and perhaps satisfy him.
They were very wrong.
He went on to become a huge Hitler fanboy, and then a Nazi war criminal. He co-created the Muslim Brotherhood - which Hamas is part of - with fellow fascist fanboy Hassan al-Banna.
He got Nazi Party funding for armed Muslim Brotherhood militias to attack Jews and the Brits in the late 30s, convincing Britain to agree to limit Jewish immigration at the time when it was most desperately needed.
He started using the militias again in 1947, when the United Nations voted to divide the mandated land into a Jewish homeland and a Palestinian one.
Al-Husseini wouldn't stand for a two-state solution. He was determined to tolerate no more than the subdued, small Jewish minority of second-class citizens that he remembered from his childhood.
As armed militias increasingly ran riot, the Arab middle and upper classes increasingly left. About 100,000 left the country before May 1948, when Britain was to pull out, leaving Israel and Palestine to declare their independence.
The surrounding nations didn't want war. They largely accepted the two-state solution.
But al-Husseini lobbied HARD. And by mobilizing the Muslim Brotherhood to provide "destabilizing mass demonstrations and a murderous campaign of intimidation," he got the Arab League nations to agree to invade, en masse, as soon as Britain left.
About 600,000 Arabs fled to those countries during the ensuing war.
Jews couldn't seek refuge there; in fact, most of those countries either exiled their Jews directly, confiscating their property first, or else made Jewish life unlivable and exploited them for underpaid or slave labor for years first.
By the time the smoke cleared and a peace treaty was signed, most of the Arab Palestinian community had fled; there was no Arab Palestinian leadership; many of the refugees' homes and businesses had left had been destroyed in the war; and Israel had been flooded with nearly a million refugees from the Arab League countries and the Holocaust - even more people than had fled the war.
That was the Nakba. The one that gets portrayed as "750,000 Palestinians fled or were expelled!" in the hope that you'll assume they were expelled en masse, their beautiful intact homes all stolen.
Egypt had taken what's now the Gaza Strip in that war, and Jordan took what's now the West Bank - expelling or killing all the Jews in it first.
(Ironically, Jordan was originally supposed to be part of Israel. Britain, inexplicably, cut off what would have been 75% of its land to create Jordan.
Even more inexplicably, nobody ever talks about it. I've never seen anyone complain that Jordan was stolen from Palestinians. Possibly because Jordan is also the only country that gave Palestinian refugees full citizenship, and it's about half Palestinian now.
Israel is nearly 25% Arab Palestinians with full citizenship and equal rights, so it's not all that different -- but the fundamental difference of living in a country where the majority is Jewish, not Muslim, probably runs pretty deep.)
Anyway: that's why Palestine is Gaza and the West Bank, rather than being some contiguous chunk of land. Or being the land set aside by the U.N. in 1947.
Because Arab countries took that land in 1948, and treated them as essentially separate for 20 years.
Israel got them back, along with the Golan Heights and the Sinai Peninsula, in the next war: 1967, when Egypt committed an act of war by taking control of the waterways and barring Israel from them. It gave the Sinai back to Egypt as part of the 1979 peace accords between Egypt and Israel.
Israel tried to give back the Gaza Strip at the same time. Egypt refused.
Palestine finally declared independence in 1988.
But Hamas formed at about the same time. Probably in response, in fact. Hamas is fundamentally opposed to peace negotiations with Israel.
Again: Hamas is part of a group founded by Nazis.
Hamas has its own charter. It explains that Jews are "the enemy," because they control the drug trade, have been behind every major war, control the media, control the United Nations, etc. Basic Nazi rhetoric.
It has gotten adept at masking that rhetoric for the West. But to friendlier audiences, its leaders have consistently said things like, "People of Jerusalem, we want you to cut off the heads of the Jews with knives. With your hand, cut their artery from here. A knife costs five shekels. Buy a knife, sharpen it, put it there, and just cut off [their heads]. It costs just five shekels."
(Palestinians were outraged by this speech. Palestinians, by and large, absolutely loathe Hamas.
It's just that it's not the same to say that to locals, as it is to say it where major global powers who oppose this crap can hear you.)
Hamas has stated from the beginning that its mission is to violently destroy Israel and take over the land.
It has received $100M in military funding annually, from Iran, for several years. Because Iran has been building a network of fascist, antisemitic groups across the Middle East, in a blatant attempt to control more and more of it: Hezbollah in Lebanon. The Houthis in Yemen.
Iran has been run by a very far-right, deeply antisemitic dictatorship for decades now, which pretty openly wants to take down both Israel and the U.S.
Last year, Iran increased Hamas's funding to $350M.
The "proof of concept" invasion of Israel that Hamas pulled off on October 7th more than justifies a much bigger investment.
Hamas has publicly stated its intention to attack "again and again and again," until Israel has been violently destroyed.
That is how this conflict came about.
A Nazi group seized power in Gaza in 2007 by violently kicking the Palestinian government out, and began running it as a dictatorship, using it to build money and power in preparations for exactly this.
And people find it shockingly easy to believe its own hype about being "the Palestinian resistance."
As well as its propaganda that Israel is not actually targeting Hamas: it's just using a literal Nazi invasion and massacre as an excuse to randomly commit genocide of the fraction of Palestine it physically left 20 years ago.
Despite the fact that Palestinians in Gaza have been protesting HAMAS throughout the war.
#free palestine#free gaza from hamas#free everyone from hamas it's awful#we want to live movement#free gazans group#center the people directly affected#Ironically it's almost exclusively zionists who know about and support the actual activists in Palestine#because Zionism is a real Jewish term for self-determination not something you can redefine to demonize us#and the pro-hamas movement is inherently both antisemitic and anti-Palestinian#wall of words#jumblr#jewish history#palestinian history
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When I was last on tumblr, it was ten years ago and one of the biggest faux pas you could commit was incorrect tagging.
It was Literally Colonialism to use a tag that was For Certain Oppressed Groups. The actually-autistic tag was created because allistics "took over" the autism tag, and this/other tags became heavily policed by users to make sure they remained a "safe space".
I remember seeing countless posts about how autistics would never be safe if we didn't have a bubble to protect us from interacting with allistics. The same went for tags about transliness and queerness. The going approach used militarized and hyperbolic language to characterize and other folks who weren't in the community: autistics (the group I had the most direct experience with) were attacked by allistic invaders who violated and conquered autistic tagging systems.
The "Literally Colonialism" isn't a joke. I saw plenty of suggestions that to even use a tag which was perceived as being "not yours" was colonization of ideas and thoughts. To be allistic, have an opinion on autism, and tag it as "autism" was held up as being exactly the same as the behavior of empires and nation-states.
Obviously, I don't entirely agree, and don't think this particular hyperbolization is helpful for advocacy or for dialogue. But I do find it interesting how, in the decade since I was last here, it seems to (mostly) still be true that you should only use certain tags if you have a particular identity...
... unless you're not Jewish, in which case feel free to use any and all Judaism-related tags and break the system's meager functionality for Jewish people.
As someone who is using Tumblr to connect to online Judaism, it's daunting to see how many posts under "judaism" are by non-Jews screeching about Israel. Seeing non-Jews openly talk about they tag their posts with gore, rape denial, Holocaust denial, October 7 denial, and other deliberately-triggering material with Jewish-themed tags specifically to make Jewish users of Tumblr feel unsafe. Reading them telling each other about how this is advocacy, this will absolutely win the war for Gazans, and how anybody who blocks them (in order to make sure the tags can actually work as intended) is a genocidal coward. Using that self-same militaristic language to describe their activities, only instead of criticizing, they're bragging.
It's, uh, kind of fucked up.
Imagine going to the actually-autistic tag and finding nothing but a wall of allistics claiming that they've victoriously conquered the tag from those inhuman monsters pretending to have problems when other Real People are the ones who are suffering. I think we would all intuitively understand that this would be Wrong. Even if there was some supposed outward justification for being mad at certain autistics, we would understand that holding all autistics everywhere responsible for it is wrong. That breaking a community's ability to talk to each other is wrong. That trying to trigger people and then telling them to commit suicide is wrong.
And we'd also understand, or come to, that the very action of going "This community I'm not part of doesn't deserve to have this tag, I'mma take it back, or at least ruin it so no one else can have it" is an expression of privilege. It is wrong, and it is immature, and it is cowardice.
These smug, self-involved, active attempts at causing harm make no sense at all if seen as advocacy; they help no one, advance no cause, stop no Zionists (whatever that means) from expressing themselves online.
They only make sense when seen as Jew-hate.
#judaism#jumblr#antisemitism#jew hatred#leftist antisemitism#antisemitism on tumblr#guess i'm ready for the anon hate to come rolling in#is-the-fire-real original#jew by choice
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Arab colonialism generally adheres to the same blueprint of land theft, displacement, and genocidal violence. When Islam plants a mosque somewhere, it believes this is conquered land and it's theirs forever, no matter what Temple or Church it builds on top of.
What sets it apart, however, is that it also attempts to project its own abuses onto its victims.
Rather than acknowledge their glaringly obvious 1400-year uber-colonial history, they will invert perceptions of history and reality in an attempt to self-indigenize.
They then usurp the cultures, stories, and legacies of indigenous peoples for themselves (but only the convenient parts - you'll never see Palestinians claim Judas) and disenfranchise the people they stole it from.
They will furiously deny that their ancestors were, in fact, colonizers who conquered their way on land on which they now occupy. Instead, they will frame themselves as native peoples who simply embraced Arab identity/converted to Islam, while the actual indigenous peoples are framed as nothing more than a pathetic band of rejects and cosplayers whose ancestors either never lived on the land to begin with, or were rightfully cast out (or have been cast out for so long that they have lost all right to return).
I can think of few other colonizers that do this. And because this behavior deviates from what we typically understand as "baseline colonialism", it becomes immeasurably harder to identify and more complex to counter.
#secular-jew#israel#jewish#judaism#israeli#jerusalem#diaspora#secular jew#secularjew#islam#destroy hamas#hamas is isis#Arabs are the colonizers#Arab colonialism#Islamic colonialism
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Me: I don’t deny your identity. I acknowledge Palestinians exist today.
Them: Jesus was a Palestinian, not a Jew!
Me: Well, no - he was a Jewish rabbi. He had a bris, kept Shabbat, kept kosher, & his “Last Supper” was a Passover Seder. Besides, nobody would be called “Palestinian” for ~1,900 years after #Jesus died.
Them: Jews are #Khazars with no history in Palestine!
Me: Well, no - millions of DNA samples have now scientifically proven that Ashkenazi Jews (like their Sephardi & Mizrahi brothers & sisters) originate from the Levant (Israel).
Ashkenazi Jews migrated to the Rhineland (western #Germany) between 800-900 CE.
#Yiddish - the language spoken by #Ashkenazi Jews for a millennia - is a mixture of Jews’ original Hebrew & adopted #German.
Meanwhile, there is no evidence of any Khazar influence on Ashkenazi customs, language, or culture.
The #Khazar tale (claiming some or many Turkic Khazars converted to #Judaism), while interesting, is not supported by any archeological evidence, and can be considered nothing more than a story.
Besides, it’s unassailable that the Ashkenazim were living ~1,500 miles from the Khazars, which may as well have been on the moon in the Middle Ages.
Them: Palestinians are Canaanites, the original inhabitants of the Land!
Me: Well, no - there’s zero evidence the Palestinians are Canaanites. This theory followed other similarly false claims over the past several decades that the Palestinians descend from the Philistines (an ancient Aegean Greek “sea people”) and even the Jebusites - a people for whom there is no evidence outside of the Bible of their having ever existed (if they did, they have been gone for at least 3,000 years).
One thing is clear, all of these recent tall tales about Palestinians’ ancient roots in “Palestine” were created in an attempt to delegitimize the State of Israel & not as some academic attempt to find Palestinian roots.
The #Canaanites (who spoke a language similar to #Hebrew, not #Arabic) have been extinct for more than 3,000 years; and there are no #Canaanite influences in any modern Palestinian language, culture, cuisine, customs, or religion.
Furthermore, DNA studies now prove Canaanites are closest in descension to modern-day Armenians & Western Iranians - but, culturally, there has not been a “Canaanite” people in ~3,000 years.
Meanwhile, there is a practically infinite amount of archeological, biblical & non-biblical text, and architectural evidence proving beyond any doubt that Jews lived in the Land of Israel continuously for more than 3,200 years.
Arabs only started arriving in Eretz Israel in significant numbers during the Arab Imperial conquest out of the deserts of the Arabian Peninsula in the mid 7th century CE when the Land was still majority-occupied by ~350,000 Jews.
Arab conquerers #colonized the Land of Israel & subjugated the Jewish majority.
That’s right, the Arabs were the #colonizers - this is historical fact no matter how much that might make your head hurt.
Them: The Jews are foreigners who stole Palestinian land!
Me: Ok, now you’ve officially ticked me off by repeatedly denying MY identity - one that was OBVIOUS to everyone before the last ~55 years when KGB-inspired propaganda went into mass effect in an effort to delegitimize Israel.
Can’t say the same about your identity … even though I keep trying to offer to respect it!
The Arabs only ruled Eretz Israel after conquering it in the 7th century & until they were kicked out by the Seljuks ~400 years later. Never during that time, did they even attempt to establish an Arab or #Muslim state or capital anywhere in Eretz Israel (Jerusalem is never mentioned in the Koran, and while the city is holy to Sunni Muslims, it is not holy to Shia Muslims).
And during the time of Arab rule, there was obviously no state or country called “Palestine.”
Then, during the 400 years before the start of the British Mandate around 1920, the Land was a distant & severely neglected province of the Ottoman #Turkish Empire.
In fact, in the late 19th century, as Jews began moving back to their homeland in larger numbers, there were only ~200,000 people living there (mostly a sparse, nomadic population), and Jews were the majority in #Jerusalem.
Post-WWI, the League of Nations (the precursor to the UN) legally granted Britain a "sacred trust" called the Mandate for Palestine (a name given to the land by Roman Emperor Hadrian in 135 CE).
The Mandate for Palestine was the least controversial of the 15 post-WWI mandates because everyone KNEW Jews were from “Palestine.”
So the Mandate for Palestine, which included the legal requirement for Britain to aid in the establishment of a Jewish National Home, passed unanimously by the League of Nations.
Among other things, the unanimously passed & legally-binding Mandate recognized “the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and to the grounds for reconstituting their national home in that country.”
Besides, before the Jews started returning to the Land in large numbers in the late 19th century, it had become almost entirely war-torn ruins, arid desert & malarial swamps.
But the returning Jews were determined to rebuild their homeland; and the evidence is undeniable that Jewish labor & the Western technology they brought along helped to make the desert bloom again.
The result of a new booming economy in the midst of mostly rural, undeveloped land is no surprise; and hundreds of thousands of Arabs from neighboring lands immigrated to Mandate Palestine in the early to mid 20th century.
In fact, once Arabs began to rebel against the Jews (with pogroms & full-blown barbaric massacres on a particularly wide scale in 1920, 1921, 1929, and in 1936-1939), they made extremely clear to the British that they resented the name “Palestine,” which they claimed (incorrectly) was a modern Zionist invention.
For example, at the British Peel Commission in 1937 (looking into Arab riots from the year before), local Arab leader Audi Bey Abdul-Hadi testified that “[t]here is no such country [as Palestine]! Palestine is a term the Zionists invented!”
Again, during the 1946 Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry that was set-up to make recommendations for the territory, Arab-American historian Philip Hitti testified, “There is no such thing as Palestine in [Arab] history, absolutely not.”
The Arab position was not particularly surprising, as "Palestine” is not an Arab word (Arabic does not even have a letter “P” or a sound for “P,” which is why you often hear Arabs today pronounce it with a “B” as “Balastine”).
The Arabs in the Land at that time mostly identified with their local clan & otherwise considered themselves “Arabs” of “Southern Syria.”
In fact, just about anyone who was called a “Palestinian” pre-1948 was a #Jew.
This is why nobody made any attempt to create a “Palestinian state” during the 19 years between 1948 and 1967 in which #Egypt occupied #Gaza & #Jordan occupied the “#WestBank.”
The hard truth - even though I’m still acknowledging a #Palestinian people exists today - is that an Arab “Palestinian” identity was created for the first time in any signifiant way at the height of the Cold War in the mid-1960s & at the behest of the #Soviet#KGB, which wanted to expand its influence in the region, undermine the only democracy in the Middle East, and which had been repeatedly embarrassed by Israeli victories over invading Soviet-backed & Soviet-armed Arab states.
So the KGB wrote the ridiculous “Palestine Liberation Organization” (PLO) charter & molded Yasser Arafat at what was known as “KGB U” in #Moscow to use #terror & #propaganda to destabilize Israel.
Over the decades since then, many Arabs in the Land have come to self-identify as “Palestinians.”
Even among Palestinians today, however, many still identify with their clan over a separate “Palestinian” nationality (e.g., the clans do not intermarry & many are constantly engaged in some degree of violent conflict).
And the 2 million+ Arabs citizens of the State of Israel (who have equal protection under the law & more rights & privileges than they would have in any Arab and/or Muslim country on Earth) almost exclusively identify as either #Israeli-#Arabs or as simply #Israelis - not as #Palestinians.
Them: #Jews … I mean #Zionists … are bad, ok? Just ask the UN.
Me: Right. Just ask the #UN
Captain Allen
@CptAllenHistory
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Imagine that a century or two from now, the eastern half of the United States is conquered by the Canadian Empire, its intelligentsia deported, its land colonized by Canadian immigrants, and its remaining people mostly gradually absorbed into a Neo-Canadian identity. The West reorganizes, developing a new political and cultural center, and comes to regard itself as the "true" United States, with the remnant culture of the East (by now much changed by Canadian rule) as representing an unchanged tradition stretching back to the time of George Washington. The holdout western half is subsequently conquered by the Reformed Mexican Empire, and while most of the population remains in situ, its elite is taken to Mexico City. There, for three or four generations, they do their best to maintain their distinct American identity, focusing on the American "civil religion," the distinctive political ideals and cultural features that mark them out as Americans, and come up with a new way of interpreting their history that allows America to be a perennial idea, something not directly physically tied to the territory of the United States, which no longer exists. They compose a body of historical works based on Washington Irving's rather fabulistic approach to early American history, the half-remembered popular versions of the stories of Columbus and the Pilgrims, the First Thanksgiving, even the Revolutionary War. They don't have access to the original texts anymore--let's say this is all taking place in a post-Collapse North America where long-range travel and communication is difficult and a lot of history has been lost--but they do their best. They append to these books, or include in their text, of history a copy of the Constitution, big chunks of the United States Code, and Robert's Rules of Order.
Subsequently, the Empire of Gran Columbia invades, conquers southern and central Mexico, and its Emperor lets the captive Americans go home. They return north, mostly to California, find that the version of American history and civics that is remembered there isn't the same as the version they have (not that the Californian one is correct--the Mexican Empire has suppressed English-language education and high culture in its Aztlani provinces), and set about reforming and reorganizing the Western States (as they're now called) to be more in line with the forms they brought back from the exile. In the meantime, other bits of important literature start being kept in libraries next to copies of the received histories: some bits of early American literature, like Hawthorne, the Song of Hiawatha, some highly abridged Herman Melville, Thomas Paine--heck, even some John Locke, and quotes or fragments from Shakespeare. Some traditionalists now argue the capital of the United States has always been located in San Francisco, and that Washington, D.C. only because the capital later, under the influence of Eastern heretics.
In the following centuries, the Western States retain their independence for a time, but eventually become a secondary battleground for a lot of other empires--the Mexicans, the Canadians, the Pan-Pacific Federation, and so forth. American culture remains distinctive, insulted in part by its unique traditions, though now everybody speaks Future Spanish, and only learns English to read the old texts. In this period additional material, including later compositions, continues to accrete, forming a distinct body of sacred American scripture, although it does not exist in a single canonical form. Attempts to reconcile distinct sources, like more literal and historically-grounded accounts versus the simplified narratives of figures like Irving, produce hybrid texts that sometimes are full of internal conflicts.
Oh, and through all this, some institutions of American government like the Supreme Court still function, although their rulings only apply to Americans, and there isn't much in the way of a federal bureaucracy.
Finally the Great and Sublime Brazilian Potentate conquers most of the Americas, sets up an American client state that roughly coincides with the heartland of the old Western States (California, Oregon, most of Washington and Nevada), and allows the Americans to elect their own President (subject, of course, to Brazilian approval). During this period, an apocalyptic street preacher from Los Angeles claims to have inherited the authority and power of George Washington, and is executed by the Brazilians; his later followers point to the prophecies of Emperor Norton, and out-of-context bits of a Quebecois translation of Moby-Dick and some Mark Twain stories to say no, really, he was George Washington. Inexplicably, a version of this religion becomes the dominant faith of the Brazilian Empire before it collapses. But long before then the American state in California fails, crushed when it tries to revolt against Brazilian rule; the remnant Easterners likewise dwindle down to only a few hundred souls living in a village in Alexandria, Virginia. Centuries from now, as the descendants of the descendants of the Brazilians colonize Mars, they will point to the sacred Americanist scriptures, the Neo-Americanist narratives of their prophet's life, and the letters written by the early leaders of Neo-Americanism, and say, "all of this was written by the spirit of George Washington, and is free from contradictions." Meanwhile the remnant Americanists, who have been writing about Americanism and how it applies to their everyday lives in the centuries since, and whose commentary has formed around the copies of the last editions of the U.S. Supreme Court Reporter (SCOTUS managed to outlast the final American state by a hundred years or so) plus the thoughts of the remaining Americanist community in Mexico, continue to regard their traditions as the unbroken and unaltered practice of American culture, politics, and ideals as they existed since the Revolutionary War.
This is, as far as I can tell, approximately how the Bible was composed.
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Iridiscent
PirateAU! Miguel x Mermaid! Reader
Thanks to @sarapaprikas-blog for the idea ❤️✨. Been loving to experience with different AU'S lately ✨. Hope you like!
Warnings: Mild angst and historical figure mentions, implied mysticism ~
Prologue ✨
Pt. 2
As far as history was told, the sea had been the biggest grave in the world. Countless men, nations and civilizations perished under the might of the ever infinite sea. Not many dared to venture, after all, the stories of countless ships sunk under behemoth waves reached through all dry land known.
But that didn't stop the greatest empires to expand and colonize newly discovered lands thanks to years of observation. Many thought of the sea a living being, a being that could be tamed or at least controlled enough to small civilizations to be born in lands people only dreamed of.
However, as the sea earned it's title of a living creature, the mysticism around it grew. Many believed the sea was a she, and bringing a woman on board only made her jealous. A common belief among outcasts and pirates. Something that was debunked as the golden age of piracy advanced.
But even so, the word spread around was that the sea favored female pirates better than men. Lagertha, Mary Read, Anne Bonnie, Zheng Shi, Grace O'Malley, to name a few of the most iconic pirates that against all, conquered, navigated, commanded and plundered at their contempt.
Many believed that they had done a pact with the devil himself, but others strongly believed that there were creatures below that left no trace once the women settled for a target. Mermaids.
Creatures often described as the beauty of death itself embodied. Beautiful women luring men to their inevitable deaths. Something, that some men longed for, and feared by others. The rumor was that if you caught a mermaid alive, the creature was bound to grant you a wish.
But for Miguel, they were nothing but myths and lies. A once young and naive self had ventured in the sea to find one, so he could cure his daughter once the land medics had abandoned all hope. And so he did, once his little girl had closed her twinkling innocent eyes, full of dreams, forever.
He was a changed man after that. He didn't allow his men to talk about such nonsensical things in his ship, Reina Gabriela, and poor of the man that was caught red handed. Reason had gotten him where he was, a feared outlaw among the Spaniards and English folk alike. Not by his overall intimidating looks, but the ruthless and cunning of his attacks.
The Red Eyed Demon, they called him.
------
Miguel had settled the route towards an island that promised a proper restock of his resources. He would let his men unwind, he'd probably spend the night away with a well prepared courtesan. The type of woman that knew how to entertain him beyond the physical ways, once they were on land.
By sunset, he would be landing. The island itself wasn't a problem, the inhabitants of it were. At least for him, full of highly superstitious people, that were always showering him in foul smelling concoctions, lung itching fumes and heavy charms of protection to "cleanse the spirit of anything that could drag you and your ship down".
Isla del Sol, or Sunny Island as many called it, was like a secret hideway-paradise for Pirates that stopped by to rest. Opposite from what the Spaniards and English believed, the Island was run under the command of a council of five.
A retired English commander that did better as a pirate than a law enforcer named Edward, A Spaniard pirate well versed in the arts of administration named Xavier, A jamaican man which eloquence only rivaled the Queen's erudites themselves named Toussaint, An asian woman trained in the arts of killing and weaponry named Sheng Hyun, and a white haired chaman whose wisdom was often seeked by the rest.
So far the island had worked and thrived under their command. They had even asked Miguel to join them, because of his strategic and cunning mind. But of course, he refused. A man like him wasn't easily bound to bureaucratics, even though, ironically he had strict rules in his ship.
His men were loyal, after all, Miguel took proper care of his crew. Well fed, healthy, well armed, and now, well rested. Reina Gabriela approached the docks and soon the men worked. Some put the extended sails away, others put the weaponry in their place, others cleaned and so on. Everyone had a role aboard, and Miguel made sure for them to accomplish it.
He threw a small pouch of gold to a nearby man to watch over his ship as he was out. The island felt like another city, but difference was, that inside land there were no guards, no laws that didn't benefit them. And if anyone caused a ruckus, Sheng Hyun was sent to deal with it, personally.
His men scattered around, except for the quarter master, the cook, weaponry master, Navy Engineer and doctor. They discussed briefly the upgrades for the ship, new dishes to the menu, and new places to get weapons, medicines and sturdier woods from. He dismissed them once everyone had their list, then he was alone.
His feet took him nearby the merchants as they exposed their goods to everyone passing by. Guards uniforms, royal weapons and wax seals perfect for an unsuspecting ruse, medicines, a new type of powder that was a bit more waterproof, Chinese explosives, sedating darts, portraits of naked royal women, some gemstones, and of course, luck charms and talismans.
He scoffed as his eyes rolled at the various trinkets. He had to admit that whoever came with these ideas had found a gold mine that relied in people's blind faith, probably would shake their hand if he ever knew who it was. One trinket stood out from the rest.
It was an iridescent pearl, a quarter size of his palm, along some black and pearly scales protuding ontop. There was no chain around it to be worn, the merchant noticed him staring at the trinket and smiled.
"Good if y'wanna catch a mermaid. They love shiny things."
Miguel looked at him with an eyebrow quirked and a skeptical look.
"You seem confident enough to sell these... crafts."
"Ah, another nonbeliever. Tis'fine mate. I've dealt with so many like you before. Mostly of the non believing part roots from something denied to you in the past. Am'i'rite?"
Miguel's jaw clenched softly at the boldness of the man. He looked like the typical merchant with shady business on the side.
"Leave this man alone, Joseph." The chaman of the council spoke behind Miguel as she took the pearl in her old, wrinkled hands.
"Come" He motioned Miguel to follow. Despite being a highly spiritual woman, the council's chaman did not pressure him into believing, but rather spoke to him sometimes in riddles. Riddles that he grew tired of eventually. He followed.
"A surprise to find you watching these sort of trinkets, Miguel."
"Hard to not when they get stranger and colorful each time I come here."
The elder lady hooked her arm on his as she supported on Miguel, that secured her as he walked next to her.
"I'd be grateful if you wouldn't speak about anything mystic tonight."
"Wasn't my intention, boy. But I must say, you've got quite the eye for these things. It's a real pearl, if you wish to sell it."
Miguel kept walking, being led by the chaman.
"Or I could gift it to a mermaid" Miguel chuckled and the lady looked at him with curious eyes.
"Well, to do such thing, you'd have to find one first."
"I won't, cause they're not real."
The chaman smiled smugly at him.
"What would you do if your homeland got infested with rotting bodies, blood and so many other unpleasant things continuously?"
"I'd look for a new home." he humored, but the lady only nodded in approval.
"And what kind of home you'd look for?"
"One that wasn't near the cities or civilization. Probably a secret manantial or even a virgin island"
The lady smiled
"Congratulations, Miguel. You now have the first lead into finding a mermaid."
"You can't expect me to believe such things."
"No lo espero, pero sé que tu curiosidad por dichas criaturas ha aumentado. ¿Qué es lo deseas tener?" (I don't, but I know for sure that your curiosity for such creatures have peaked your interest. What is it you long for?)
Miguel looked down at the lady, wistfully and she rubbed his arm comfortingly. Like a grandma would.
"My dear. Mystical creatures can only do so much, Miguel. Sadly, bringing back the dead isn't something they can do."
"No sabes de lo que hablas. No me conoces" (You don't know what you are talking about. You don't know me)
He seethed the last words as his grip abandoned the lady. His body tensed when the chaman reached out again to take his large hand.
"Loss is part of our lives, Miguel" Her wrinkled hands put the pearl in his hand, hers covered his warmly, pushing the trinket further in his hands, "And we all move on eventually. Life is full of wonders, and who knows, maybe what you find ahead in your path is exactly what you need"
He nearly growled as another riddle was added to the list.
"Te dije que te dejaras de-" (Thought I told you to quit the-)
His mouth gaped slightly, the lady was gone. He was left alone with the pearl in his hand, "Acertijos..." (Riddles...) he sighed and stared at the pearl, to then tuck it back on his pocket.
What was he longed for?
#miguel o'hara#miguel o'hara x you#miguel o'hara x reader#atsv miguel#pirate au#mermaid au#spiderman 2099 x reader#spiderman 2099#female rader
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"In a recent Harvard-Harris poll, 53 percent of Americans between 18-24 said that October 7 was justified by Israel's wrongs torward the Palestinians.
Those most likely to say so were also the most likely to know nothing about the history of Israeli-Palestinian conflict: e.g. that Gaza has not been occupied since 2005; that it is Hamas, not Israel, that limits the import of food and medical supplies; that far from committing genocide against Palestinians, the Palestinian population grew rapidly under Israeli rule, with life expectancy skyrocketing and infant mortality plummeting; that the Palestinians have been repeatedly offered a state since the original UN Partition in 1948; that far from being colonizers, Jews are indigenous to Israel, and purchased, not conquered, all the land on which Israel was originally founded; that at the time of the Second Aliyah of Jews, the land was desolate and largely unpopulated, and only when the Jews had drained the swamps and caused the deserts to bloom was a large Arab population attracted to live there; and that most of Israel's Jewish population today is descended from Jews of color ethnically cleansed from Arab lands."
-Yonoson Rosenblum, Mishpacha Magazine, Issue 993, page 38, January 3, 2024
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Shit... here we go again...
It's okay, buddy, you can hate us while we don't care.
But let me break it down for you...
Threatening a village itself is actually not a form of colonization... it's just making people fear you if you don't do what they want. That is called intimidation. Not colonization.
Colonization is when you come in, change laws, takeover land, and force the natives and non natives to uphold your standards, traditions, culture etc... which is also eerily like subjugation. But I mean, who is really paying attention here.
As far as Ozai goes, yeah, he was definitely a tyrant and a conquer that practiced Genocide. Genocide is not colonization either, by the way. It's murder of an entire culture and their people because they either pose a threat or they are in the way, but you don't seem to know the difference on that either.
But back to Zuko.
Zuko, who only threatened but did not try to take over the water tribe because he wanted the Avatar. Again... Zuko didn't hurt anyone. He threatened, got the Avatar, and left. No one got hurt (maybe Sokka, but that's because Sokka put himself in the position to get hurt), and that's that. Actually, I can count on one finger all the times that Zuko actually hurt anyone physically. Intentionally or not. I may be overlooking some things, but I have to go back and watch the whole series, and I really don't have time right now. Got a festival to get ready for, ya know?
Anyway, yeah, you seem to be confusing things yet again. Please, do the world a favor. Open a history book or maybe even a dictionary.
Sincerely,
A Historical Fiction Writer who does a heck of a lot of research on this shit and has a degree in English.
Make it make sense.
#i swear this is still the dumbest argument ive ever seen come from the other side#they must all be young and impressionable#or just... confused#zutara#pro zutara#learn the difference
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