calliophile.

Matsuda-machi, Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan

She says that people who from a young age were made to feel like they kept doing things wrong - people who’s parents had impossibly high standards for them, people who were bullied, people who have special needs, people who didn’t develop crushes on the “right” people, people who didn’t act like the “right” gender - basically ended up being made to feel guilty so much that guilt became their default response to everything. Guilt became the emotional response to anything which the person didn’t already have a set emotion for.

First, Aziraphale floats Mephistopheles, the demon in the Faust legend that brokers souls and deals as an agent for the Devil. It’s fascinating to look at, to draw a few slight parallels. If we consider that Aziraphale is already realizing the nature of his desire for knowledge and experience (and how he feels for Crowley), we can parallel it slightly with Faust’s similar desires for knowledge. You see, while Faust was grappling with his wants, an elegant demon named Mephistopheles appeared to him. 

In the stories, Mephistopheles has always been more human-looking and attractive than the other demons of Hell. In classical depictions, he’s usually dark-haired and pale, with pointed or sharp features. Angular, edgy. Dressed in black or red. In most versions, Mephistopheles is a fascinating creature because he doesn’t attempt to tempt Faust, instead, he had simply happened to be passing by when he had felt that Faust was already on the verge of ruin. He instead chooses to warn Faust of the nature of Hell, describing his own personal Hell that he exists within. He never appears to enjoy his work (he’s a bit of a terrible demon there).

Faust and Mephistopheles eventually strike a deal where Faust is given all the knowledge and pleasure that he can absorb for the next twenty-four years before ultimately falling to Hell. There’s a key difference in a few of the stories. Marlowe’s version (Doctor Faustus) has Mephistopheles as incredibly reluctant to make the deal. He squirms against it, clearly finding it unpleasant. It had been Faust’s idea and he finally, due to what he is and what he must be, grudgingly accepts. (It’s a bit different later, once Goethe gets ahold of the legend and writes Mephistopheles as having come up with the deal and as far more keen to accept.) 

Let’s look back. Look back at an angel that cannot keep his too-curious hands off of pleasure and experience. Who wants to experience everything, eat everything, drink everything, read everything. He squirrels away books and refuses to sell them, devours prophecies for breakfast. And then there is an elegant demon in black, not quite tempting, never wiling, but always there. Always present. His very presence is so much, as it is in the Faust story. He’s a warning and strangely elegant and compassionate. Yet also his every existence is a temptation, simply because of what he can offer. 

For Faust, it had been human knowledge and pleasure. Experience too. For Aziraphale, it’s the sheer nature of his growing feelings for Crowley. To Aziraphale, especially here at Golgotha, to admit anything of that or to process these feelings for a demon is to be damned. To be cast out, to Fall to Hell. He is incredibly and uncomfortably aware. 

It will take millennia before he learns otherwise. 

As for Asmodeus, I’ve seen it touched on before, but he is one of the Seven Princes of Hell. Each of the Seven Princes represents one of the Seven Deadly Sins.

Like, one that always comes up in the gun control debates in the US is that African-Americans are more likely to be shot by the police for having guns. But then does that mean that they should be allowed to carry guns with as much impunity as white Americans, or does it mean that everyone should be shot by the police for carrying guns because you shouldn’t be doing that in the first place?

Or how about the thing where women have to put more work into their appearance to be considered socially acceptable and non-sloppy. Does that mean that they shouldn’t have to do that because it’s onerous and objectifying, or that men should be held to the same standards because making yourself look nice for other people is just common courtesy?

Or how about the way that trust-fund kids never have to experience financial hardship because they inherited a deluxe safety net? Does that mean that they should be part of the same rat race as everyone else and made to prove their worth or starve, or that welfare should ensure that everyone has the same safety net as a trust-fund kid?

Those are arbitrary examples, but it seems like nearly every double-standard argument has this kind of split lurking under the surface. The problem is that even if you get a large majority of people who agree that the double standard exists and is a problem, that’s not actionable by itself, and it’s really hard to then get a majority who also agrees how to solve the problem. The big “let’s notice that this is a thing” coalition usually disagrees sharply about whether the solution is “don’t do this to anybody” or “do this to everybody”, and people usually don’t consider the “wrong” solution to be any improvement over the status quo.

My feeling is that when you want to address a double standard by mustering majority support for a specific policy measure, you usually need to pull in reinforcements from people who don’t think the double standard exists (or at least don’t care about it), but are in favour of that policy for its own sake. Otherwise you end up splitting the public opinion into quarters and trying to build majority support out of just one quarter, which is really hard.

hello, first of all.. I “M SORRY FOR TAKING ALMOST THREE YEARS TO REPLY BACK TO YOU. I really love your massage so much that I actually have no idea how to reply back to you to say that I really appreciated it. I spent a long time perfecting that drawing that I’m really happy somebody love it. I kept bothering my friends for their opinions because I really want it to be the best. the pose and composition was so advance (for me at least) I have no idea where on earth did I find all the energy to work on that piece for almost two week. but I’m really proud of it, not because it the best or anything, but it was in a way a thank you to everyone in the stony fandom, they brighten my days with new contents and post. 

anyway, here is a process of it as an apology I hope you see my post >