My Fannish Heart

So when I was sixteen I worked in a Dairy Queen in a mall (which was as awful as it sounds) and during prom season we had people that’d walk around in prom attire to kill time before the dance started.

You also need to know that among those suits in boxes you can buy at Macy’s is a three-piece American flag suit. I’m not joking.

So imagine, if you will, six white guys who were fuck-you tall all walking around the mall in this exact suit and matching white cowboy hats. Hilarious in and of itself, my coworkers and I were all cackling.

BUT THEN

My mall also had these motorized animals you can ride, they were marketed towards kids but there’s no way they’re gonna say no to an adult willing to pay $14 to ride on an elephant for half an hour

So like ten minutes after we see them, all of them come

RIDING ALONG IN A FUCKING CONGA LINE

Just these six identical cowboys each on their own animal, each animal blaring it’s own rendition of B-I-N-G-O, and I basically nearly burst into tears.

“Hope you’re a harvest god,” Arepo said, and set up an altar and burnt two stalks of wheat. “It’d be nice, you know.” He looked down at the ash smeared on the stone, the rocks all laid askew, and coughed and scratched his head. “I know it’s not much,” he said, his straw hat in his hands. “But - I’ll do what I can. It’d be nice to think there’s a god looking after me.”

The next day he left a pair of figs, the day after that he spent ten minutes of his morning seated by the temple in prayer. On the third day, the god spoke up.

“You should go to a temple in the city,” the god said. Its voice was like the rustling of the wheat, like the squeaks of fieldmice running through the grass. “A real temple. A good one. Get some real gods to bless you. I’m no one much myself, but I might be able to put in a good word?” It plucked a leaf from a tree and sighed. “I mean, not to be rude. I like this temple. It’s cozy enough. The worship’s been nice. But you can’t honestly believe that any of this is going to bring you anything.”

“This is more than I was expecting when I built it,” Arepo said, laying down his scythe and lowering himself to the ground. “Tell me, what sort of god are you anyway?”

“I’m of the fallen leaves,” it said. “The worms that churn beneath the earth. The boundary of forest and of field. The first hint of frost before the first snow falls. The skin of an apple as it yields beneath your teeth. I’m a god of a dozen different nothings, scraps that lead to rot, momentary glimpses. A change in the air, and then it’s gone.”

The god heaved another sigh. “There’s no point in worship in that, not like War, or the Harvest, or the Storm. Save your prayers for the things beyond your control, good farmer. You’re so tiny in the world. So vulnerable. Best to pray to a greater thing than me.”

Arepo plucked a stalk of wheat and flattened it between his teeth. “I like this sort of worship fine,” he said. “So if you don’t mind, I think I’ll continue.”

“Do what you will,” said the god, and withdrew deeper into the stones. “But don’t say I never warned you otherwise.”

Arepo would say a prayer before the morning’s work, and he and the god contemplated the trees in silence. Days passed like that, and weeks, and then the Storm rolled in, black and bold and blustering. It flooded Arepo’s fields, shook the tiles from his roof, smote his olive tree and set it to cinder. The next day, Arepo and his sons walked among the wheat, salvaging what they could. The little temple had been strewn across the field, and so when the work was done for the day, Arepo gathered the stones and pieced them back together.

“Useless work,” the god whispered, but came creeping back inside the temple regardless. “There wasn’t a thing I could do to spare you this.”

“We’ll be fine,” Arepo said. “The storm’s blown over. We’ll rebuild. Don’t have much of an offering for today,” he said, and laid down some ruined wheat, “but I think I’ll shore up this thing’s foundations tomorrow, how about that?” 

The god rattled around in the temple and sighed.

A year passed, and then another. The temple had layered walls of stones, a roof of woven twigs. Arepo’s neighbors chuckled as they passed it. Some of their children left fruit and flowers. And then the Harvest failed, the gods withdrew their bounty. In Arepo’s field the wheat sprouted thin and brittle. People wailed and tore their robes, slaughtered lambs and spilled their blood, looked upon the ground with haunted eyes and went to bed hungry. Arepo came and sat by the temple, the flowers wilted now, the fruit shriveled nubs, Arepo’s ribs showing through his chest, his hands still shaking, and murmured out a prayer. 

“There is nothing here for you,” said the god, hudding in the dark. “There is nothing I can do. There is nothing to be done.” It shivered, and spat out its words. “What is this temple but another burden to you?”

“We -” Arepo said, and his voice wavered. “So it’s a lean year,” he said. “We’ve gone through this before, we’ll get through this again. So we’re hungry,” he said. “We’ve still got each other, don’t we? And a lot of people prayed to other gods, but it didn’t protect them from this. No,” he said, and shook his head, and laid down some shriveled weeds on the altar. “No, I think I like our arrangement fine.”

“There will come worse,” said the god, from the hollows of the stone. “And there will be nothing I can do to save you.”

The years passed. Arepo rested a wrinkled hand upon the temple of stone and some days spent an hour there, lost in contemplation with the god.

And one fateful day, from across the wine-dark seas, came War.

Arepo came stumbling to his temple now, his hand pressed against his gut, anointing the holy site with his blood. Behind him, his wheat fields burned, and the bones burned black in them. He came crawling on his knees to a temple of hewed stone, and the god rushed out to meet him.

“I could not save them,” said the god, its voice a low wail. “I am sorry. I am sorry. I am so so sorry.” The leaves fell burning from the trees, a soft slow rain of ash. “I have done nothing! All these years, and I have done nothing for you!”

“Shush,” Arepo said, tasting his own blood, his vision blurring. He propped himself up against the temple, forehead pressed against the stone in prayer. “Tell me,” he mumbled. “Tell me again. What sort of god are you?”

“I -” said the god, and reached out, cradling Arepo’s head, and closed its eyes and spoke.

“I’m of the fallen leaves,” it said, and conjured up the image of them. “The worms that churn beneath the earth. The boundary of forest and of field. The first hint of frost before the first snow falls. The skin of an apple as it yields beneath your teeth.” Arepo’s lips parted in a smile.

“I am the god of a dozen different nothings,” it said. “The petals in bloom that lead to rot, the momentary glimpses. A change in the air -” Its voice broke, and it wept. “Before it’s gone.”

“Beautiful,” Arepo said, his blood staining the stones, seeping into the earth. “All of them. They were all so beautiful.”

“Oh, poor god,” she said, “With no-one to bury your last priest.” Then she paused, because she was from far away. “Or is this how the dead are honored here?” The god roused from its contemplation.

“His name was Arepo,” it said, “He was a sower.”

Sora startled, a little, because she had never before heard the voice of a god. “How can I honor him?” She asked.

“Bury him,” the god said, “Beneath my altar.”

“All right,” Sora said, and went to fetch her shovel.

“Wait,” the god said when she got back and began collecting the bones from among the broken twigs and fallen leaves. She laid them out on a roll of undyed wool, the only cloth she had. “Wait,” the god said, “I cannot do anything for you. I am not a god of anything useful.”

Sora sat back on her heels and looked at the altar to listen to the god.

“When the Storm came and destroyed his wheat, I could not save it,” the god said, “When the Harvest failed and he was hungry, I could not feed him. When War came,” the god’s voice faltered. “When War came, I could not protect him. He came bleeding from the battle to die in my arms.” Sora looked down again at the bones.

“I think you are the god of something very useful,” she said.

“What?” the god asked.

The god sat in his peaceful home, staring out at the distant road, to pedestrians, workhorses, and carriages, raining leaves that swirled around bustling feet. How long had it been? The world had progressed without him, for he knew there was no help to be given. The world must be a cruel place, that even the useful gods have abandoned, if farms can flood, harvests can run barren, and homes can burn, he thought.

He had come to understand that humans are senseless creatures, who would pray to a god that cannot grant wishes or bless upon them good fortune. Who would maintain a temple and bring offerings with nothing in return. Who would share their company and meditate with such a fruitless deity. Who would bury a stranger without the hope for profit. What bizarre, futile kindness they had wasted on him. What wonderful, foolish, virtuous, hopeless creatures, humans were.

So he painted the sunset with yellow leaves, enticed the worms to dance in their soil, flourished the boundary between forest and field with blossoms and berries, christened the air with a biting cold before winter came, ripened the apples with crisp, red freckles to break under sinking teeth, and a dozen other nothings, in memory of the man who once praised the god’s work on his dying breath.

“Hello, God of Every Humble Beauty in the World,” called a familiar voice.

The squinting corners of the god’s eyes wept down onto curled lips. “Arepo,” he whispered, for his voice was hoarse from its hundred-year mutism.

“I am the god of devotion, of small kindnesses, of unbreakable bonds. I am the god of selfless, unconditional love, of everlasting friendships, and trust,” Arepo avowed, soothing the other with every word.

“That’s wonderful, Arepo,” he responded between tears, “I’m so happy for you—such a powerful figure will certainly need a grand temple. Will you leave to the city to gather more worshippers? You’ll be adored by all.”

“No,” Arepo smiled.

“Farther than that, to the capitol, then? Thank you for visiting here before your departure.”

“No, I will not go there, either,” Arepo shook his head and chuckled.

“Farther still? What ambitious goals, you must have. There is no doubt in my mind that you will succeed, though,” the elder god continued.

“Actually,” interrupted Arepo, “I’d like to stay here, if you’ll have me.”

The other god was struck speechless. “…. Why would you want to live here?”

The most recent Sailor Moon musical, Le Mouvement Finale, is being screened in select Event Cinemas in New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, and Western Australia for one day only - Thursday the 5th of April! You can view session times and book your tickets at the Event Cinemas website.

Holly Maniatty, a certified sign language interpreter upstaged hip-hop icon Snoop Dogg with her enthusiasm during his concert at the Jazz Fest in New Orleans. Maniatty has worked numerous festivals and concerts with well-known rappers including Beastie Boys, Wu-Tang Clan and Killer Mike and this isn’t the first time that she has stolen the show with her major skills.

This looks like some special type of sign language that assists people with understanding the beats and innuendo along with lyrics.

One bizarre thing I noticed was how all the outlets reporting on Maniatty’s gone-viral performance was the language they used to describe it. They say she “upstaged” Snoop Dogg, that she “out G'ed him” or “stole the show,” and I think they all profoundly missed the point, even if the word choices were subconscious. Look at the OP for this post, it says she “upstaged” him and regularly “steals” the attention. It’s not like she’s a random dancer or attention seeker: she’s hired by the performers to make their performance accessible! This is her job, and she was specifically chosen and invited by the performer to be there. She isn’t stealing the show, she is charged with making it accessible to a Deaf and HoH audience.

And instead of a literal translation of the lyrics (which often doesn’t really work with hip-hop, because a lot of the cleverness/entertainment is in secondary meanings and rhythm) she’s trying to express the intention. I bet the performers who choose her are super glad they did, since she studies them so carefully, and tries to put their stage personalities across in sign! So many more of their fans are getting their money’s worth! She’s not doing it for parody, she’s doing it to serve the audience. If she was a threat to the performance, if the value she’s adding is distracting or “upstaging,” then PEOPLE WOULD USE A LYRIC MARQUEE INSTEAD. Basically live closed-captioning for events. But they don’t, because the whole-body human interpretation is what actually transmits the meaning, and artists want the audience to appreciate then meaning.

So it’s very weird to see so much language in these articles/posts crowing about how this (brilliant, master-of-her-craft) white woman “stole” the show and “did better at it” than Snoop Dogg. A lot of weird intersectional stuff to think about there.

 See how the criticism is bracketed with a friendly start that recognizes the good points of the post, and ends with a self-deprecating and positive ending for people to reblog from? That’s my favorite way to offer critique, because it raises the level of the conversation, keeps the OP in good faith, but still points out the flaws; the OP can’t really say that you’re being nasty and hateful and singling them out personally, if you sympathetically agree that they’ve done the best job that they could. 

And it deliberately changes the direction: from the negative narrative of one performer “upstaging” another, to the positive “two performers creating a unified performance.” So the OP can’t really argue: they’ve been wrapped up and redirected, and they either have to ignore me or agree with me. 

Obviously, I can’t claim that this was a long-term political plot, I just did this because those two words (”upstage”/”stole”) in the OP annoyed me viscerally, and I am very pedantic and mischievous. 

The OP of this post (the-real-eye-to-see) is one of the accounts charged with spreading belonging to a troll farm and being used to spread disinformation. Tumblr has allowed posts with reblogs to stay up, as they are often “often challenging or debunking the false and incendiary claims in the IRA-linked original post". The official Tumblr statement is here. A BBC article (that I found a bit more clear) is here. And the Guardian’s rather enjoyable headline, “Tumblr says Russia used it for fake news during 2016 election.”

There has been a lot of buzz in the news this week about “troll farms,” and how they aim to influence people’s opinions, with an eye towards changing election outcomes. They don’t do this by shoving Enemy Propagandas into your face. They do this by showing you some content that will appeal to you, and manipulating your feelings about it. “Fake news” is a large part of this, but there is also the deliberate fragmentation of communities, the sowing of suspicion and apathy. And discouragement! Discouragement is a brilliant tool, creating annoyance and a negative approach to problems (“Ugh, look at that bullied child, humans are so awful, there’s just nothing we can do about it”) rather than good attitudes that could encourage social change ( “oh, that poor bullied child! How can I help?”). Discouragement is brilliant, because it’s so wonderfully simple! It’s such an easy way to stop people from taking an interest in politics or even voting. You don’t have to convert progressives into conservatives to “win.” You just have to stop them from voting. And who wants to vote to benefit someone who attacked you in an internet fight?

The two words in the OP that annoyed me enough to deconstruct ( “upstaged” / “stole”) were probably a rather good piece of constructed, deliberate rhetoric. @damnfool-of-a-took explained it much better than I did here:

It’s this kind of bullshit that is really well designed to snipe discourse-inclined folks on Tumblr and get them riled enough to not realize the reason they’re fighting is disingenuous commentary making a story that’s actually kinda cool into a chance to align yourself with antiracism or antiableism, like you have to pick one. 

i am going to read it of course but i need to make it a Thing, you know, i need to have at least like a whole afternoon available and a lot of candy for this

A boy who was seen tearfully hugging a police officer at a protest in a viral picture in 2014 is believed to have died along with his entire family after the SUV they were traveling in plunged off a 100-foot cliff on the California coast.

The vehicle belonging to Jennifer and Sarah Hart was discovered Monday afternoon at the bottom of a cliff near the Pacific Coast Highway in Northern California, said Mendocino County Sheriff Tom Allman at a news conference. The Harts were parents of six children, including Devonte Hart, who appeared in the photo from a protest in Portland, Oregon, against police violence.

Allman said “we have every indication to believe that all six children were in” the vehicle that drove off the cliff, though authorities have only recovered the bodies of the parents three children. The bodies of Devonte and two other children were still missing Wednesday evening.

“An entire family vanished and perished during this tragedy,” Allman said, though he added that it is still also possible Devonte and two other children had been left behind with someone and weren’t inside the vehicle.

Authorities first learned of the crash when a passerby noticed the vehicle lying at the bottom of the cliff near the Pacific Ocean at the northern end of Mendocino County. The engine was cold when searchers reached it, and Allman said that authorities still don’t know exactly when or how the SUV drove off the road. He described the scene as “confusing.”

“There were no skid marks, there were no brake marks, there was no indication why this vehicle traversed approximately over 75 feet of a dirt pullout and went into the Pacific Ocean,” he explained, adding later that “we have no evidence and no reason to believe this is an intentional act.”

The family lived in Woodland, Washington.

Devonte, now 15, had become the best-known member of the family after he attended the November 2014 protest in Portland with a “free hugs” sign. Portland Sgt. Bret Barnum, who is white, reportedly saw the sign and noticed that Devonte, who is black, was crying. Barnum asked for a hug after Devonte said he was emotional over the level of police brutality facing black kids.

The image of the hug, in which Devonte is still visibly emotional, was shared thousands of times across various social media platforms. The moment also happened just months after a white officer shot and killed black teenager Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, kicking off months of protests and the Black Lives Matter movement.

Devonte and his five siblings were adopted by Jen Hart and her wife Sarah. Jen said it was a frightening experience: “That night, after we finally got him to sleep, I cried harder than I had ever cried in my life,” she said. “I felt like there was no way we could raise this child, and the five others we had adopted.”

After Monday’s crash, neighbors of the Hart family told the Associated Press that they had called child welfare officials on Friday after becoming concerned because Devonte came to their house too often asking for food. The neighbors, Bruce and Dana DeKalb, also reportedly said that last year a girl from the family knocked on their door at 1:30 a.m. and said that “we needed to protect her. She said that they were abusing her.”

Clark County sheriff’s Sgt. Brent Waddell told the AP that Child Protective Services had recently visited the family.

Allman called the crash a “tragedy” Wednesday and showed reporters a photo of the family together and smiling. He said that the investigation was ongoing and authorities hope to piece together exactly what happened.

“Bruce and Dana DeKalb, who lived next door, said they rarely spoke with the family, which about 10 months ago moved to the remote wooded area in northern Clark County.

Dana DeKalb said Devonte (the boy in the “hugging” photo) had come to their home a dozen times to ask for food, saying his parents had withheld it as a form of punishment. The teen would ask the couple to leave the food by the fence they shared so his parents wouldn’t know, she said.

Such interactions prompted the DeKalbs to contact authorities, they said Wednesday outside their home.

A Clark County deputy accompanied Cowlitz County Child Protective Services to the Hart family’s home Friday but nobody answered the door, Sgt. Brent Waddell, a Clark County Sheriff’s Office spokesman, told The Oregonian/OregonLive on Wednesday.

The family and its SUV were gone the next day, Bruce DeKalb said.“ [Source]

The cropping of an image is everything when it comes to its subjectivity and the way ideas are projected unto it.

Every picture I’ve seen of this crops out the circus of photographers that surrounded these two creating a captive audience. With such a captive audience I can’t really say that the officer did anything that his superiors wouldn’t have told him to do. They were there just as much for public relations as to keep the peace otherwise the dept. wouldn’t have sent every queer looking, POC and female cop on the force.

The way this image has been propagandized is highly disturbing to me because it distracts from the real issues. This has never been about the relationship between individual officers and young Black men, but about the way in which our institutions and society protect cops, granting them license to use lethal force in ANY circumstance. Whether they do use it or decide to demonstrate “love” is irrelevant.’

I would like to add that Devonte was crying before approaching the officer while he was talking to his guardian, presumably because he was terrified. This brings the question of coercion to my mind, but I’ll let ya’ll debate over it.”

Bill Groener, 67, was a next-door neighbor of the family when they lived in West Linn, Oregon, and said the kids were home-schooled.

“They stayed indoors most of the time, even in really nice weather,” Groener said.

He said the family didn’t eat sugar, raised their own vegetables, had animals and went on camping trips.

“There was enough positive there to kind of counteract the feeling that something maybe wasn’t quite right,” Groener said.

also, they had a long history of taking their children to different social justice events, having them hold signs, and taking pictures that look like viral attempts. they joined bernie sanders on stage at one point at a campaign rally. the fact they were pretending to be activists while abusing their children says a lot.

Women have always been at the forefront of literature, the first novel (what we would consider a novel in modern terms) was written by a woman (Lady Muraskai’s the Tale of Genji in the early 1000s) take your snide “Isaac Asimov” reblogs and stick it

even in terms of male scifi authors, asimov was predated by Jules Verne, HG Wells, George Orwell, you could have even cited Poe or Jonathan Swift has a case but Asimov?