Fish-rice integration is exciting. You harvest both fishes and rice on the same land. Do you like it?

seriously

I made this a long time ago and was very nervous about posting it to Tumblr. I can’t really think of a good caption~ everything I wanted to say is in the little blurb at the beginning. 

‘God of Arepo’ Fan-made graphic novel 

Part 1 // Part 2 // Part 3 // Read the Original Story Here

‘God of Arepo’ Fan-made graphic novel part two~

Part 1 // Part 2 // Part 3 // Read the Original Story Here

‘God of Arepo’ Fan-made graphic novel part three (End) 

Part 1 // Part 2 // Part 3 // Read the Original Story Here

They have accepted their fates

Dear Joanne Kathleen Rowling,

I currently have a lot of Jewish mutuals/people I follow and over the course of the last few months, almost Every. Single. One has talked about their mental health declining, that they’re exhausted and terrified, that they’ve become more closed off and lost their trust in people from outside their communities, due to being gaslit and ignored constantly on a society wide scale. Almost all of them have experienced antisemitic abuse or violence personally or had bomb threats to their synagogues and community centres or had swastikas and slurs graffitied on their properties.

The worst thing about this outrage is that none of them are really surprised by it - frightened, sickened, yes - but not surprised. They and their ancestors have had to deal with this shit for thousands of years. And all of them expect - no they *know* - it’s going to get worse.

It’s beyond fucking shameful. We are failing these people on a massive, society wide scale. Again.

So, I NEVER want to see a single one of my fellow goyim say shit like “Jews are just playing the victim,” “the rise in antisemitism is overblown and not as bad as they say because I haven’t seen it,” “it’s just a few extremists,” because NO, IT ISN’T - it’s systemic. Those who aren’t directly perpetrating it are mostly ignoring it. If you won't believe or listen to Jewish voices (if not, why not?) then the cold statistics cannot be waved away.

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-antisemitic-incidents-up-about-400-since-israel-hamas-war-began-report-says-2023-10-25/

https://news.sky.com/story/more-than-4-000-antisemitic-incidents-recorded-by-jewish-charity-in-uk-in-2023-with-explosion-in-hatred-blamed-on-hamas-attacks-13071580

https://www.reuters.com/world/how-surge-antisemitism-is-affecting-countries-around-world-2023-10-31/

Here's the thing about Jareth from Labyrinth right?

He's made up.

That's not necessarily the same thing as not REAL. But he, just like all her friends who show up in her room before her adventure as toys and figurines, exist in relation to her, in response to what she wanted and needed. She told the story and there he was, there he always had been. But she's a teenage girl who doesn't know what she wants yet, and Jareth kind of pays the price.

"but the king of the goblins had fallen in love with the girl, and had given her certain powers." He's an archetypal oxymoron. He's both the dastardly baby stealing villain and the royal love interest trying to relieve the heroine's suffering, Cinderella style. He's fucked either way by being both. She doesn't know if SHE wants to be the villain or the heroine until he shows up and then she decides on the heroine, so he has to sneer and menace and challenge but it's too late for him!! it's too late, The King Of The Goblins Had Fallen In Love With the Girl, he's Cinderella's prince too and he has to try, he gives her a poofy dress and takes her to fucking goblin prom, sweeps her around the room like a music box with perfect posture and room for Jesus.

But it doesn't work buddy, it can't work. You're just a story for a teen girl to grow up in, and as the villain you have to be defeated. He's so complex because his tropes contradict themselves, and he doesn't understand why he has to lose when he was only doing the job he was given. In his last scene he is pale as death with shadows under his eyes, backing away and begging for his happy ending with nonsense mishmash promises that belong to both halves of him.

"I am exhausted from living up to your expectations of me." I'm sure you are, Jareth. No wonder.

Tumblr won’t let me add this tiktok to another post about Jack & Jill dances but I’m full of spite and it’s one of the best things I’ve ever seen so have it anyway, the amazing impromptu Mamma Mia dance 💃🏼

megan thee stallion head president of the sasunaru committee

What a real one

can’t believe this iconic moment hasnt shown up on my dash yet in light of today

et tu

i can’t believe this is real

not the source for the screen cap but here's a WSJ article (sans paywall)

Per previous tags--

In this model of Tesla, apparently—get this—according to the Tesla manual, you do it on a touchscreen.

Did a human being just die because of swiping the wrong way?

...And then, when you're in the water and the car's power systems (which operate the doors, because of course they do) have all gone down, how do you get out?

You partially disassemble the door and pull out one specific wire. The image via Warren Terra at Bluesky.)

...I don't know about the rest of you, but I am never getting into one of these alleged vehicles. Ever.

...you know, we've been saying that these things are deathtraps, but holy SHIT

I feel compelled to point out that the diagram above is for the back door. I still don't know where to find the wire to open the front doors.

This is why anyone who actually works in tech (being a tech ceo does not count as working) is wary at best about making things "smarter". The failure mode for a computerized mechanism should be functioning as a non-computerized mechanism, but very often the failure mode for a fully-smart device is undefined behaviour that the manufacturer doesn't intend for you to ever see. And that means there's no recourse in situations like this.

I'm just going to leave this here, because this woman said what I've been trying to articulate for ages much more effectively and succinctly than I've been able to

Today it’s been 9 years since Terry Pratchett left us…

We miss you 🤍

Every Day.

Midnight Pals: Spicy Stories

JK Rowling: hello children Poe: oh Poe: oh joanne Poe: you're back Rowling: i have concernss Poe: uh we're mostly about just telling stories here Poe: you have your own campfire for your terf stuff don't you? Rowling: yess but they've really been getting on my nervess lately

Rowling: you know how it iss with terf deatheaterss Poe: not really Rowling: alwayss agreeing with everything i ssay Rowling: all "oh yes dark lord" this and "oh spare me dark lord" that Rowling: ssometimess you jusst get tired of hearing "masterful gambit dark lord"

Rowling: i tell you, you don't know how hard it is to run a cult L Ron Hubbard: oh yeah woof big mood Hubbard: people think its all fun, but its actually a lot of work Rowling: I know right????

Poe: regardless, joanne, i'm going to have to put my foot down Poe: this campfire is just for stories Rowling: uhhh actually i do have a new ssstory Rowling: i wass insspired to write after having an argument on the internet Barker: oh damn no shit? Barker: that's wild

Rowling: it's a new harry potter ssstory King: oh man! it's about time, i've been hoping for a new potter story for ages! Rowling: itss about hermione going back in time to help grindelwald, who actually had sssome good points if you think about it

Rowling: i call it Rowling: the time turner diariesss Barker: wow this is not really funny anymore Baker: its like INTENSELY not funny Lovecraft: catchy title tho!

Rowling: i'm retconning grindelwald into a misundersstood idealisst Rowling: who was only forced to make hard choicess because of the unreassonablenesss of decadent weimar society

Rowling: oh also you know that thing where people kept criticizing me cuz technically grindelwald's "evil" plan was to prevent the holocaust? Rowling: well good news Rowling: i've rectified that little mistake

Rowling: like, why would the naziss target transs & queer people, traditionally the most powerful and widely accepted memberss of ssociety? Rowling: would not the naziss, famouss for their love of diverssity, actually approve of them? Rowling: i'm jusst asskin questions

King: actually joanne there's a lot of well-documented evidence Barker: give it up steve King: no no i can fix this King: i'm sure if i just lay out the facts in a logical, well-reasoned manner- Barker: oh god that's so cute Barker: don't you just love him? Poe: that's our steve

King: so you see the nazi book burning of the institute for sexualwissenschaft- Rowling: nope Rowling: didn't happen King: King: well it kinda did, see, as i was saying- Rowling: thiss iss missogyny

Rowling: i don't undersstand you lot at all Rowling: i come into your campfire, i make a sstatement that i really want to be true & you all refuse to accept it Rowling: thiss issn't the way it works over with my terf deatheaters at all Rowling: they love accepting things i ssay!

Rowling: it'ss actually really missogynisstic that you all refusse to accept what i'm ssaying asss truth Rowling: even though you all know how badly i want it to be true King: but joanne, it isn't true- Rowling: ssave it for court ssteve!

Mary Shelley: sup fuckers Shelley: i got here late wot's going on? Barker: joanne is doing holocaust denial Rowling: EXCUSE ME it'ss only holocausst denial if you quesstion the murder of jews Rowling: tho now that i think about it i do have some questionss

Rowling: like, would they not have ussed their goblin magic to essscape? Lovecraft: ya know, she makes a good point Sonia Greene: i'm right here howard Lovecraft: Greene: see, this is why i don't talk much

Not straight, not cis, not allo people, I'm curious:

"I know JK Rowing is a terrible person but her books are so good-"

You sure about that?

I mean, just for a start, have you taken a good look at her fantasy creatures lately? A whole bunch of them are straight-up based on malicious and dehumanizing stereotypes about actual people.

Remember the werewolves? And being a werewolf was made into a kind of metaphor for having AIDS?

And you know how AIDS was first associated with gay men? And how conservatives back in the day were claiming gay men were preying on children in order to convert them to gayness?

Remember how Fenrir Greyback preyed on children in particular? Yeah, she put that subtext in there. She was an adult in the 90's. She knew damn well what she was doing.

Remember the house elves? Remember how most of them loved to serve and needed to have a home and a master or else they just wouldn't know what to do with themselves?

Did you know that's literally what slavers in the American South said about the Black people they kept enslaved? Go look up the happy slave myth.

Do I even need to get into the goblins and the antisemitic tropes they're based on? No, folkloric goblins were not gold-hoarding bankers waiting for their chance to stab humanity in the back.

"But the characters are so good!"

Are you kidding me?

Most of her characters are pretty one-dimensional, including Harry. Her idea of making a morally complicated character is giving a tragic past to a bully. Numerous characters are little more than stereotypes. (Looking at Fleur right now.) Literally anybody, including you, can easily make dozens of characters just as good, if not better. (It doesn't exactly take a lot of character designing skill to go, "hey, actually, having a sad backstory doesn't make it okay to bully children" or "hey, maybe I should not base a character on the first stereotype that pops into my head.")

"But the rest of the worldbuilding!"

Sorry, but her worldbuilding is just as basic as her characters. Magical castles and secret passages are stock tropes. Magical people who keep their true nature secret from humanity is the premise of pretty much every White Wolf TTRPG. Most of her fantasy creatures are just common European fairy tale and folklore creatures with shitty stereotypes projected onto them.

I'm not saying "basic worldbuilding bad." I'm saying, you could do just as good, if not better, with minimal effort.

Also there's her magical bioessentialism, where only Harry's abusive blood relatives could provide him with supernatural protection from Voldemort. Rowling thus effectively declared that non-biological family isn't quite real family, and that abusive biofamily can give you some essential thing that a loving, supportive family that isn't related to you just can't.

The Hogwarts houses are one of the most insidious elements of her worldbuilding. The idea of being sorted gives you a little dopamine hit because wow now you have a li'l niche where you belong!

But the actual function of the houses and sorting system and the House Cup is teaching children to see each other as rivals, and ensure that the most toxic views of the upper class get passed on to every new batch of kids sorted into Slytherin.

Hogwarts effectively prepares children for a dystopia where magic serves to distract its citizens from how nightmarishly awful it is. Economic inequality is so bad that people like Arthur and Molly Weasley can barely afford to put their kids through school, casual sadism is just an accepted norm in everyday society, and non-humans are second class citizens. Rowling sorta acts like she thinks this is a bad thing with certain lines she gave to Dumbledore, but in the end, her special boy protagonist becomes an auror; IE, a defender of the status quo. So.

If you've never seen it, Lily Simpson's video goes into even more detail on how the worldbuilding of Harry Potter is actually incredibly fucked up, and how it betrays small-minded attitudes on Rowling's part. There's no separating the art from this artist, because Rowling's rotten values pour out of nearly every page.

Yes, there are many things in Harry Potter that evoke feelings and inspire people, but there's absolutely nothing in it that this series has a monopoly on. You can find those same experiences in much, much better media.