The Jewish Pain of Crowley in Good Omens 2

Spoilers. Spoilers everywhere. S p o i l e r s.

Alright let's dive in. So, it's even clearer in s2 that Crowley is the Jewish Representative in the Christian World ->

remember that Good Omens is essentially a world where Christianity is, with some modification, True. Classic Christianity. With the 7 days of creation and the hierarchy of angels and everything. (the exceptions are that its not patriarchal or queerphobic, but I digress)

in christianity, Jews are one of two things: - misguided fools (bc they don't realize Jesus is the messiah) - evil liars (bc they keep saying Jesus isn't the messiah)

-> making it obvious why the Jewish Rep, Crowley, is a demon. In Christianity, Jews and Judaism are at best treated like ignorant children, at worse treated like the agents of Satan.

All Crowley ever did was ask questions. Question the internal lack of logic within Christianity. Why make everything for it to end in 6k years? Why make people just to have them die in an apocalyptic battle? Etc. That is Crowley's Jewishness in action. Not only because he's asking questions, the Big Thing Jews Love Doing ->

-> but also Because Judaism is, essentially, a religion of celebrating life and humanity. Our books start with the creation of everything, not just Jewish people (which, at the time of writing, was extremely novel). We are a "nation of priests" in order to show the world a lifestyle of goodness we can all strive for. Not everyone has to be Jewish to have a good life or afterlife, we do not proselytize.

And, as such, Crowley - the token Jew - celebrates the world and humanity for what it is. His temptations are usually just encouraging humans to be human. He sees the beauty in the world they all created and he wants that beauty to continue.

Now, because Jews don't proselytize, he never really tries to get Aziraphale to join him in the questioning everything thing. He knows that asking questions would give Aziraphale the anxiety sweats. He doesn't really push him into do that.

All he does - throughout both seasons - is gently nudge Aziraphale into seeing how beautiful this world is. From the food and drink to appreciating humans, and then their art, and nature around them. Gentle nudges into realizing that this is a wonderful world worth preserving.

Which makes Aziraphale reject the Death Cult that is the Christian World (I'm reminded of the statement by Beezlebub "All my demons live for armageddon... if you can call that living") but not the hierarchy and fucked up toxic power structure that inevitably leads to that death cult

so Crowley thinks he's managed to persuade his Christian Friend to see the error of his ways, the error of Christianity. Aziraphale doesn't believe in the death cult anymore! perfect! now crowley and aziraphale can coexist and be a couple. Now they can be an "us".

That's where we leave off at the end of s1.

In s2, we see how still believing in that hierarchy (constantly referring to heaven as the "good guys" is a big key) holds Aziraphale back. Crowley, however, is blind to that, because he's singularly focused on making sure that his fragile peace with Aziraphale is protected.

He thinks that convincing Aziraphale that the death cult was bad would be enough for Aziraphale to realize that the Toxic Hierarchy is *also* bad.

But the Toxic Hierarchy keeps its hold on people the same way Christianity does in our world - by convincing people it has a monopoly on holiness, goodness, and right action. And Aziraphale is still convinced of that.

To those of us outside that system, its obvious that a Death Cult could not *possibly* have a monopoly on goodness/holiness/whatever. But inside of it, it's impossible to tell, because they've convinced you that they have that monopoly, and if you reject them you'll be doomed forever, and no one wants to risk being doomed.

This is where the Jewish Grief of Crowley comes in. Because Crowley, like many of us, is in a friendship with a Christian, who - because they are Christian, and you are Jewish - still thinks of you as a "demon", or a "foolish misguided". They're just polite about it.

(note, not all demons are Jewish in Good Omens - in fact, I'd argue that most of them are just as Christian as the angels, because they believe in the hierarchy and the death cult. I digress.)

When Jewish People are friends with Christians, we know that there is a potential bomb on the friendship. At any point, the Christian could reveal that the whole time, they were just trying to convert us to Christianity, because they see us as the "foolish misguided" Jew instead of the "demon" Jew. Yes, there are the isolated Christians in the real world who are able to see Jewish folks as something separate and worth preserving, but they are the minority; and in the world of Good Omens, they just can't exist, because the physical proof shows the Christian world as Real. At the very least, Aziraphale could never be that person.

Crowley was hoping he had managed to convince Aziraphale that Christianity is bogus, so they could remain friends without Aziraphale trying to turn him into something he's not. Aziraphale thinks that he's doomed, because he rejected the Hierarchy, and is constantly doubting himself and his own worth without his codependent relationship with the hierarchy

This brings us to the end of the season. When Crowley sees that Aziraphale never really left Christianity at all, that he was just waiting to come back to it, that is a grief that many Jewish people have felt in their life when a friendship with a Christian comes to a head. Aziraphale offering Crowley a second chance at angel-hood, and to be his "second in command", is essentially Aziraphale trying to convert Crowley to Christianity.

Trying to Erase Crowley the Jew.

In real life, when this happens, Jewish people become heartbroken regardless of the nature of the friendship. The person they thought was their friend was, this whole time, someone who saw them as foolish and misguided, someone who saw them as damned and thus lesser. It was never a friendship. It was a trap.

And for this to happen between Crowley and Aziraphale, not only leads to the deep grief of losing a friend, but the deep grief off realizing that friendship - and the love that Crowley so desperately wished to finally access - was all a lie. A trick. A trap.

It's not just that Aziraphale didn't understand, or that he went back to the toxic relationship. It's that all of Crowley's memories - all of his time with Aziraphale - is poisoned now. Because he can't see it as anything other than Aziraphale trying to turn Crowley into someone he's not.

They talk so much about temptation, but in the end, Aziraphale was the one trying to tempt Crowley into self-destruction, and not the other way around. And realizing that broke Crowley's heart more than anything else could.

The kiss? A last ditch attempt to try to get Aziraphale to realize what he was doing. What he was giving up by buying into the toxicity and the hierarchy. But toxic relationships brainwash you. It was never going to work.

The only way they can come back together now is for Aziraphale to realize that Crowley was right all along. He has a lot of growth to do. And Crowley has a lot of pain that is definitely going to get in the way. He spent 6k years thinking that Aziraphale saw him as an equal, when he never once did.

How could Crowley ever trust Aziraphale again?

Corporate America greed, writ large.

shit. I just found a website that collects letters from environmental scientists describing the emotions they feel about climate change. as you can imagine it is not a fun read whatsoever. but this one in particular is killing me right now:

“Few scientists in my field are still seriously considering avoidance of environmental collapse; instead, the dominant discourse is centred on damage control. Once one accepts that catastrophe is inevitable, it brings a certain clarity that fury cannot.

As a result, I have shifted to a state of deep melancholy surrounding my resentment, but it is melancholy with a purpose—I will devote the remainder of my career and life to repairing as much of the damage as I can, while literally admitting that for the most part, I will fail.”

an excerpt from the same professor’s other letter sent five years earlier:

“Mark my words, you plutocrats, denialists, fossil-fuel hacks and science charlatans—your time will come when you will be backed against the wall by the full wrath of billions who have suffered from your greed and stupidity, and I’ll be first in line to put you there.”

excerpt from another letter,

“I feel so lost. Some days I feel like I need to scream at the top of my lungs, ‘JUST DO SOMETHING!!’, but I am running out of energy. I don’t want to give up though, and don’t worry, I won’t. I’ll continue my work, I’ll continue fighting for her. Because if we don’t, who will?”

alright, concluding this here before I totally lose it. one final excerpt:

“I feel unspeakable joy at the news I am to become a grandfather for the first time, but fearful of the world my grandchild will grow up in.

I feel relieved that when my grandchild grows up and asks me why we did nothing to stop climate change I can at least say I did my best.

As I sit writing this on a bench looking over the moors I feel uplifted that despite everything the world is still the most beautiful place.”

It’s not a Discworld joke unless you read it, don’t parse it as a joke, and then carry on with your life for ten years until someone stops you to say something like “It’s a pavlovian response because the dog ate a pavlova” and you scream Terry’s name with enough indignant rage you hope it rattles the pillars of the multiverse so wherever his soul is he’ll hear it.

#i don’t think this is what pterry meant by ‘a man’s not dead while his name is still spoken’

I absolutely think it is

I read Jingo for the first time when I was 13.

I’m 33 now, and I still discover a new joke every time I reread it.

Terry was a comedic genius

It’s Calvinism.

I keep telling people this, but SO much of American culture and particularly the ‘Protestant work ethic’ is derived from Calvin’s view that everything in life is predestined by God - that winners and losers are already chosen.

Those Puritan pilgrims who came here seeking ‘religious liberty?’ Hardcore Calvinists who were so obnoxious they were kicked out of their home countries.

And they use this belief to excuse the worst behaviors in American history: Racism, colonialism, genocide, segregation, patriarchy, prejudice against minorities, slavery, economic disparity, low wages, no public healthcare, systems that punish the poor and disabled while rewarding the already wealthy; attempts to impose theocracy and infiltrate democratic institutions to wreck them from within; the constant stream of made-up moral panics; the parochialism and fear of outsiders.

The belief, common among many conservatives, that humans are inherently evil, is why they distrust anything from government that advances the common good and instead praise church-based charity.

I could go on, but just read this.

i was literally about to say this. this shit isn’t new by any means

i hate how capitalism and 2010s-20s minimalistic designs took away creative and colorful designs. i miss how mcdonald’s used to look when it had the red tile roof and when they had chairs in the dining room molded after their characters. i miss when storefronts would have colorful cartoon art on the walls and windows. i miss how hot topic used to look, when it looked like it’d be scary to walk into when you were a kid but after you got in and saw all the invader zim merchandise it was okay. or how malls used to have so much color, from the tiles to the walls to the ceiling. i hate the bland minimalism we have now. i hate the beige and silver design that every store has now. i hate it.

In case you are wondering "how did we get here exactly?" Let me outline some things.

Playgrounds and play areas in fast food and malls required more employees to keep them clean. People (fairly) didn't want to do that work for minimum wage on top of their normal restaurant duties, and stores wouldn't hire enough people to not have to split work between the kitchen and cleaning. So the play areas were closed off and then torn down.

Then, apple came in with their empty white box stores, and suddenly everyone wanted to look like them (because they had a massive hit product that was also a status symbol and people want to feel like they have status even if they don't) or like a luxury brand store (again, false status). Bright white, extra white LED lights everywhere (nice in some ways, but blinding in others), fewer items stocked on shelves and then in general in stores. Apple had that design in part because they had relatively few products to display relative to store size, same with luxury brands. It makes more sense for each item to be on a pedestal when you only sell a handful of products. It doesn't when you have dozens of products.

At your more "middle class" stores, part of shift to stocking less is false scarcity - they want people to feel like they have to buy an item now or risk not getting it, and so people can't wait for discounts. Part of it is that with the new displays that hold fewer items but make things look more "boutique," keeping the shelves stocked and things moved from the back requires more employees than they are willing to pay. My local target, which is undergoing renovations to better fit their "Target Boutique" look, has had chronically empty shelves in some areas due to understocking and not having enough staff to replenish stock in all areas. Now they've added more self checkouts so they can cut back on cashiers and move those jobs to stock. Some places that haven't gone as "minimalist", like Walmart, have also shifted their employment focus from cashiers and stock to mainly stock by switching to primarily self checkout in efforts to maximize profits by reducing labor costs.

Part of getting rid of fun, unique designs was also reducing costs to make profit rather than innovating or drawing more customers to increase revenue. Custom molded seats with several different designs cost more than a minimalist set of identical chairs. Anything that children can play with or play on will break eventually and need to be replaced, so it's cheaper to just not have those things and not have to spend money on them. Unique roofing and siding costs more money to replace, so it was swapped for generic stock. If it can't be pressure washed or painted over, then it's also out because those are the cheapest ways to clean or refresh the storefront. Fountains break down, so rip them out or don't have them to begin with. Landscaping requires maintenance, so just leave it plain concrete and don't bother with planters. If there are plants, they will be knock-out roses, box hedges, and maybe some small cheap annuals because the former require next to no maintenance and are disease, pest, and pollution resistant, and the later just get replaced with other cheap annuals the next season. In the name of profit, everything looks bland and repetitive.

In the 90s and early 2000s, the middle class has more spending power to balance out the costs of fun and family friendly things in public spaces, but also percent profit hadn't needed to grow as much for a company to call itself successful. Because total profit isn't what matters, what matter is percentage profit growth. When you want your profits to grow exponentially, you have to minimize costs exponentially also - which, eventually, will lead to a collapse because there is a minimum you have to spend to operate and have people willing to work and want to pay for your product.

(There is also a back-and-forth relationship between residential and commercial design, outside of just where mandated by towns, where commercial mimics residential in an effort to feel "homey" and "inviting" and then people go "ew, that house has the same exterior as the mcdonalds. I don't want my house to match fast food," so the housing shifts to something else, and then the commercial design shifts again, and this goes on forever and no one learns to just make the businesses unique because that would impact their profit growth)

The "boutique" look of stores also serves another purpose. By having some items scattered in various sections (accessories being mixed in with the clothing sections rather than in a separate accessories/jewelry section, some pet goods are in the pet section, others are in seasonal or sport or housewares, etc.) you force people to walk through areas they normally wouldn't in order to find a specific item they are looking for. If I want a sun hat for my beach trip, I can't just go to hats, get the one i want, and then be done. I have to walk through swimwear where they've also placed some beach towels and pool floats and water bottles, because they hope I will impulse buy the other things if I'm there for only one of them. This is the same reason the grocery store keeps getting seemingly arbitrarily rearranged every 6 months. It is arbitrary, and it's because they want people who have a routine of shopping for their staples and know exactly where they are, thus overlooking other items, to have to look at the shelves more closely again, which makes them more likely to make impulse purchases.

Anyway, as usual, the question of "why does shit suck and why is nothing as fun as it used to be" is answered by "capitalism."

people trying to insist a fandom is tiny when it /only/ has a few thousand works on ao3 meanwhile my current fandom is a sixteen book series and has several hundred fewer works than goncharov, a movie that, and i cannot stress this enough, doesn’t even exist

#measuring the size of fandoms based on their goncharov index#this has been a useless text post you may now resume your normal programming#rote has a goncharov index of 0.63#for perspective ofmd has an index of 26.5#spn’s is 360.8#the cosmere is 2.26 for a fantasy book comparison#i am very normal

The Goncharov Index, everyone.

Antarctic sponges live on a time scale we can barely comprehend. 

UPDATE: WHAT THE FUCK

old boys

it took me 3 times reading this post to realized that (wild) meant living in the wild and wasn’t just a casual remark on the longevity of these organisms

Maximum longevity: 15,000 years (shit dude)

Can you even imagine being the poor alien sod responsible for auditing an earthling spaceship’s spending allowance? Like: 

“I see, and why do you require many tubes of white plant flavoured paste?” 

“Oh well, if we don’t rub that on our teeth twice daily the bacteria living in my mouth will begin to devour me teeth.” 

“…Noted.” 

“I have also noticed several large shipments of specific medications, and a variety of individually packaged absorbent material - however injury records do not show sufficient numbers to justify these recurrent deliveries.” 

“Ah, yeah, it’s not really an injury per say. As part of our natural reproductive cycle approximately half the population will shed the lining of one of their internal organs and expel it.”

“…that is the most horrifying thing that I have ever heard.”

“Yeah.”

“Does such a process not hurt?”

“That’l be what the medication’s for. Pain killers for the cramps, birth control to stop the process.” 

“…and your reasoning behind the fully functional, high-tech entertainment system?” 

“Okay, that we could probably do without. But in our defence that was actually insisted on as a standard feature of all fleet-ships expected to encounter Terrans. Admiral Plo’Kaght insisted on it. Something about bored humans and a an illegal betting ring featuring a cleaning robot with a knife strapped to it going up against a human with a mop?” 

“…I believe I should speak with my superiors.” 

I love how Stabby the Roomba has become such a consistent in-joke among these sorts of blogs.

Galactic hero stabby the roomba: his legend continues

Do you KNOW how many leaders of Federation Enemies Stabby has Assassinated? A PERFECTLY innocuous Cleaning Robot rolling into the Quarters of some Galactic Despot? NO BEING even NOTICING it’s got a knife until it’s FAR to late?

‘Stabby’ is one of the MAIN REASONS Humans were even ALLOWED to join the Galactic Federation, in the FIRST place. That, and the Great Wuillex philosophy of- ‘Keep your Allies Close BUT… Keep the REALLY FRIGHTENING ones, CLOSER… As in: Close enough to lay Envenomed Mandibles on if necessary!’… Oddly enough? Apparently Humanity has history of a VERY similar philosophy…

Listen my dudes Ancient Egypt existed for a really fuckass long time. Literally just Pharaonic civilization lasted 3,000 years. That’s not even including predynastic civilization and Roman rule. If you lump that in you’re looking at more like… 5,000 years. Like. If you want a comparison of how long that is: THE YEAR IS CURRENTLY 2018. TWO THOUSAND. TWO-THIRDS OF ANCIENT EGYPTIAN PHARAONIC CIVILIZATION HAVE HAPPENED SINCE THE ‘BIRTH OF JESUS CHRIST’ We comparatively just entered the Third Intermediate Period. The Greeks will not take over for another 700~ years. Cleopatra will not be born until the year 2931.

It’s a really long time guys.

Anyway look. Listen. I sat my ass down and wrote out a timeline of “when shit happened if you started at 1AD” because I know backwards numbers are hard to process but here’s an abridged version. If the first Egyptian Pharaoh came to power in 1AD then…

300: step pyramid built 450: Great Pyramid at Giza built 815: Pepi II dies and civil war breaks out 950: Egypt re-unified 1350: Middle Kingdom ends 1450: New Kingdom begins 1520: Hatshepsut is on the throne 1650: Ahkenaten switches to monotheistic religion and builds a new city 1680: Tutankhamun dies 1720: Ramesses II ‘the great’ ascends to the throne 1740: World’s first peace treaty signed 1790: Ramesses II dies leaving way too many children 1920: Egypt breaks into 2 states again And now we get to ~~~~the future~~~~. If we started at 1AD all of this stuff hasn’t happened yet 2050: Briefly re-united as a single state 2180: Civil war 2250: Nubian kings take over 2335: Assyrian conquest 2665: Alexander the Great conquers Egypt 2930: Cleopatra VII born 2970: Cleopatra VII dies. Egypt falls to Rome. Fin.

And that’s just starting with the Pharaohs. If you wanted to start with Predynastic Egypt, you can go ahead and ADD ONE THOUSAND YEARS to all of those dates

I hate that this is still getting notes but that it’s getting notes *without the timeline addition* like c’mon, man. I had to do MATHS for this. I DID MATHS FOR YOU PEOPLE AND ALL I GOT WAS A BUNCH OF RACISTS

losing my mind over this list of 17th/18th century quaker names

PEACE LOVE ON PLANET EARTH

tag yourself i’m Experience Cuppage

Is there anything sadder than the little chunk of Kikis Delivery Service when Kiki says “I used to really like flying before it was my job” and then gets so burned out that her magic stops working and she cant talk to Jiji anymore and she tries so hard to FORCE the magic that she breaks her mothers broom and stays up all night, alone, trying to make a new one and crying?

And I know it is all ok in the end- Kiki has friends who look out for her and she takes care of herself and finds her place.

But fuck, those 20 minutes just hurt my heart so much.

another heavy handed symbolism moment: my mom has a potted sunflower in the kitchen. because it is a sunflower, it keeps turning towards the light from the window. my mother keeps rotating it so it faces inward because she wants "to see its beautiful petals and have it really brighten up the space!" . the sunflower is visibly wilting .

not reading wips feels anti-fanfiction to me. and i don't mean that in a "so you're a bad person if you don't read them" kinda way. do what you want. but i also feel, that you are completely missing the point. with fanfiction you're supposed to come along for the ride. the epic highs and lows of highschool football. the comment sections. the conversations. the theories. the "sorry i didn't update last week i was abducted by aliens and then my cat got stuck in a tree." LIKE. if you just want a story that's fully finished and polished go to a bookstore. fanfic is an EXPERIENCE. and ALSO. participating in the process is part of the way you make fanfic writing worth while. it's part of how you thank authors. like why would anyone write fanfiction if no one was going to interact with them until it was done? it again feels like a way that fanfiction is being eaten by consumer culture. you're waiting for your product. but this is supposed to be a club. you don't turn up to drama club like "where's my play bitch?" NO ma'am. we're supposed to paint these cardboard trees together. ok. i may have lost control of this metaphor. BUT YOU GET IT.

why do they let the worlds most boring people direct movies

They explain this in the tinkerbell movies. The light comes from the pixie dust covering every faries wings. This guy hasn’t even seen the tinkerbell movies

I was reading one of my childhood diaries the other day and there was a whole paragraph saying how hopeful I was that my writing will help the archeologists in the far future. Then it proceeded to describe my lunch that day and how my dog was probably secretly able to talk. 

#it IS of historical value#children's experiences are underrepresented in historical sources#it doesn't need well written or profound to be of historical value#comic#funny#art

I mean we love when we see that post about a kid doodling on their maths homework

when people try to make some kind of conspiracy theory out of the AO3 donation drives

Not to cast suspicion or anything, but like, what DOES the extra money go towards? AO3 garnered around 100K more than they asked for when I last looked. Does the excess just go on running the server for even longer?

Basically ao3 donation drives are for the bare minimum amount of money they need to keep the site running

Most of the extra money goes to upgrading the servers

Here's an ao3 staff member on Reddit explaining more thoroughly:

The discovery that we had it backwards and that more realistic cave paintings are generally older than more abstract ones is exciting from an anthropological perspective, because it demonstrates that art movements have existed for as long as art has, but I have to imagine there’s some poor biologist out there somewhere going “you mean to tell me that our Paleolithic ancestors had the ability and means to record realistic, highly detailed depictions of contemporary flora and fauna the whole time and simply chose not to?”

Well everyone knows what these things LOOK LIKE, Thag, why would you just COPY them? 

Surely the trick is to evoke what they are at SOUL, Thag. If I want to look at a mammoth I can just GO FIND A MAMMOTH. DUH. 

A scorpion, not knowing how to swim, asked a frog to carry it across the river. “Do I look like a fool?” said the frog. “You’d sting me if I let you on my back!”

“Be logical,” said the scorpion. “If I stung you I’d certainly drown myself.”

“That’s true,” the frog acknowledged. “Climb aboard, then!” But no sooner than they were halfway across the river, the scorpion stung the frog, and they both began to thrash and drown. “Why on earth did you do that?” the frog said morosely. “Now we’re both going to die.” 

“I can’t help it,” said the scorpion. “It’s my nature.”

___

…But no sooner than they were halfway across the river, the frog felt a subtle motion on its back, and in a panic dived deep beneath the rushing waters, leaving the scorpion to drown.

“It was going to sting me anyway,” muttered the frog, emerging on the other side of the river. “It was inevitable. You all knew it. Everyone knows what those scorpions are like. It was self-defense.”

___

…But no sooner had they cast off from the bank, the frog felt the tip of a stinger pressed lightly against the back of its neck. “What do you think you’re doing?” said the frog.

“Just a precaution,” said the scorpion. “I cannot sting you without drowning. And now, you cannot drown me without being stung. Fair’s fair, isn’t it?”

They swam in silence to the other end of the river, where the scorpion climbed off, leaving the frog fuming.

“After the kindness I showed you!” said the frog. “And you threatened to kill me in return?”

“Kindness?” said the scorpion. “To only invite me on your back after you knew I was defenseless, unable to use my tail without killing myself? My dear frog, I only treated you as I was treated. Your kindness was as poisoned as a scorpion’s sting.”

___

…“Just a precaution,” said the scorpion. “I cannot sting you without drowning. And now, you cannot drown me without being stung. Fair’s fair, isn’t it?”

“You have a point,” the frog acknowledged. “But once we get to dry land, couldn’t you sting me then without repercussion?”

“All I want is to cross the river safely,” said the scorpion. “Once I’m on the other side I would gladly let you be.”

“But I would have to trust you on that,” said the frog. “While you’re pressing a stinger to my neck. By ferrying you to land I’d be be giving up the one deterrent I hold over you.”

“But by the same logic, I can’t possibly withdraw my stinger while we’re still over water,” the scorpion protested.

The frog paused in the middle of the river, treading water. “So, I suppose we’re at an impasse.”

The river rushed around them. The scorpion’s stinger twitched against the frog’s unbroken skin. “I suppose so,” the scorpion said.

___

A scorpion, not knowing how to swim, asked a frog to carry it across the river. “Absolutely not!” said the frog, and dived beneath the waters, and so none of them learned anything.

___

A scorpion, being unable to swim, asked a turtle (as in the original Persian version of the fable) to carry it across the river. The turtle readily agreed, and allowed the scorpion aboard its shell. Halfway across, the scorpion gave in to its nature and stung, but failed to penetrate the turtle’s thick shell. The turtle, swimming placidly, failed to notice.

They reached the other side of the river, and parted ways as friends.

___

…Halfway across, the scorpion gave in to its nature and stung, but failed to penetrate the turtle’s thick shell.

The turtle, hearing the tap of the scorpion’s sting, was offended at the scorpion’s ungratefulness. Thankfully, having been granted the powers to both defend itself and to punish evil, the turtle sank beneath the waters and drowned the scorpion out of principle.

___

A scorpion, not knowing how to swim, asked a frog to carry it across the river. “Do I look like a fool?” sneered the frog. “You’d sting me if I let you on my back.”

The scorpion pleaded earnestly. “Do you think so little of me? Please, I must cross the river. What would I gain from stinging you? I would only end up drowning myself!”

“That’s true,” the frog acknowledged. “Even a scorpion knows to look out for its own skin. Climb aboard, then!”

But as they forged through the rushing waters, the scorpion grew worried. This frog thinks me a ruthless killer, it thought. Would it not be justified in throwing me off now and ridding the world of me? Why else would it agree to this? Every jostle made the scorpion more and more anxious, until the frog surged forward with a particularly large splash, and in panic the scorpion lashed out with its stinger.

“I knew it,” snarled the frog, as they both thrashed and drowned. “A scorpion cannot change its nature.”

___

A scorpion, not knowing how to swim, asked a frog to carry it across the river. The frog agreed, but no sooner than they were halfway across the scorpion stung the frog, and they both began to thrash and drown.

“I’ve only myself to blame,” sighed the frog, as they both sank beneath the waters. “You, you’re a scorpion, I couldn’t have expected anything better. But I knew better, and yet I went against my judgement! And now I’ve doomed us both!”

“You couldn’t help it,” said the scorpion mildly. “It’s your nature.” 

___

…“Why on earth did you do that?” the frog said morosely. “Now we’re both going to die.”

“Alas, I was of two natures,” said the scorpion. “One said to gratefully ride your back across the river, and the other said to sting you where you stood. And so both fought, and neither won.” It smiled wistfully. “Ah, it would be nice to be just one thing, wouldn’t it? Unadulterated in nature. Without the capacity for conflict or regret.”

___

“By the way,” said the frog, as they swam, “I’ve been meaning to ask: What’s on the other side of the river?”

“It’s the journey,” said the scorpion. “Not the destination.”

___

…“What’s on the other side of anything?” said the scorpion. “A new beginning.”

___

…”Another scorpion to mate with,” said the scorpion. “And more prey to kill, and more living bodies to poison, and a forthcoming lineage of cruelties that you will be culpable in.”

___

…”Nothing we will live to see, I fear,” said the scorpion. “Already the currents are growing stronger, and the river seems like it shall swallow us both. We surge forward, and the shoreline recedes. But does that mean our striving was in vain?”

___

“I love you,” said the scorpion.

The frog glanced upward. “Do you?”

“Absolutely. Can you imagine the fear of drowning? Of course not. You’re a frog. Might as well be scared of breathing air. And yet here I am, clinging to your back, as the waters rage around us. Isn’t that love? Isn’t that trust? Isn’t that necessity? I could not kill you without killing myself. Are we not inseparable in this?”

The frog swam on, the both of them silent.

___

“I’m so tired,” murmured the frog eventually. “How much further to the other side? I don’t know how long we’ve been swimming. I’ve been treading water. And it’s getting so very dark.”

“Shh,” the scorpion said. “Don’t be afraid.”

The frog’s legs kicked out weakly. “How long has it been? We’re lost. We’re lost! We’re doomed to be cast about the waters forever. There is no land. There’s nothing on the other side, don’t you see!”

“Shh, shh,” said the scorpion. “My venom is a hallucinogenic. Beneath its surface, the river is endlessly deep, its currents carrying many things.” 

“You - You’ve killed us both,” said the frog, and began to laugh deliriously. “Is this - is this what it’s like to drown?” 

“We’ve killed each other,” said the scorpion soothingly. “My venom in my glands now pulsing through your veins, the waters of your birthing pool suffusing my lungs. We are engulfing each other now, drowning in each other. I am breathless. Do you feel it? Do you feel my sting pierced through your heart?”

“What a foolish thing to do,” murmured the frog. “No logic. No logic to it at all.”

“We couldn’t help it,” whispered the scorpion. “It’s our natures. Why else does anything in the world happen? Because we were made for this from birth, darling, every moment inexplicable and inevitable. What a crazy thing it is to fall in love, and yet - It’s all our fault! We are both blameless. We’re together now, darling. It couldn’t have happened any other way.”

___

“It’s funny,” said the frog. “I can’t say that I trust you, really. Or that I even think very much of you and that nasty little stinger of yours to begin with. But I’m doing this for you regardless. It’s strange, isn’t it? It’s strange. Why would I do this? I want to help you, want to go out of my way to help you. I let you climb right onto my back! Now, whyever would I go and do a foolish thing like that?”

___

A scorpion, not knowing how to swim, asked a frog to carry it across the river. “Do I look like a fool?” said the frog. “You’d sting me if I let you on my back!”

“Be logical,” said the scorpion. “If I stung you I’d certainly drown myself.”  

“That’s true,” the frog acknowledged. “Come aboard, then!” But no sooner had the scorpion mounted the frog’s back than it began to sting, repeatedly, while still safely on the river’s bank.

The frog groaned, thrashing weakly as the venom coursed through its veins, beginning to liquefy its flesh. “Ah,” it muttered. “For some reason I never considered this possibility.”

“Because you were never scared of me,” the scorpion whispered in its ear. “You were never scared of dying. In a past life you wore a shell and sat in judgement. And then you were reborn: soft-skinned, swift, unburdened, as new and vulnerable as a child, moving anew through a world of children. How could anyone ever be cruel, you thought, seeing the precariousness of it all?” The scorpion bowed its head and drank. “How could anyone kill you without killing themselves?”