Enjolras had noticed the old man who had joined them at Rue Lesdiguières almost immediately: his white hair and uneven walk had made him stand out even in the ragtag group they had gathered over the course of their march from the other side of the river; and his silent vigil at the wineshop counter, once they had secured their position on rue de la Chanvrerie, had drawn the concerned attention of more than one insurgent. However, Courfeyrac had seemed to know him, had been speaking to him, so Enjolras was quite sure that the old man’s choice to remain with them had been made in full knowledge of their intentions and the danger such choices presented. If he refused to withdraw, even after being urged to do so several times, it was only to be assumed he was quite firm in his convictions, whatever they were.
As for the rumors he had heard passed on in whispers during the march and the construction of the barricade… well, that a member of Convention, particularly one who had voted for the king’s death, could live in Paris, unknown and undisturbed, defied credulity; and the idea that he was a scepter of one of those great men, coming back to exact justice for his fallen Republic, even more so. But the awareness of the facts had done little to deter insurgents in desperate need for hope and inspiration and Enjolras couldn’t see any sense in trying to shut down such speculations. After all, the spirit of 1793 reached far beyond the handful of men who had wielded power on the convention floor, and there was nothing to scorn in a support of any man who had served as an eyewitness to that great and terrible epoch.
But a regicide or not, a scepter or not, there were some things owed by the young and hale to the old and frail, in this place of fraternity more than anywhere else. Their freshly minted barricade was as prepared for an attack as they could make it. The red flag was secured on an ombnibus pole, illuminated by the torchlight in a mournful prediction of inevitable bloodshed. Enjolras checked and rechecked all the defenses, before quietly asking Combeferre to take over the guard duty for a few minutes and made his way inside the wineshop, where Jean Prouvaire had taken it upon himself to keep the spirits up.
The old man sat alone at the counter, seeming completely unaware of his surroundings. Enjolras approached slowly, taking care not to startle the man. He stood beside the counter for a moment: when no acknowledgement of his presence seemed to be forthcoming, he seated himself and waited, until eventually it seemed to him that something had flickered in the older man’s expression.
“Is there anything you need, citizen?” he asked, taking care to keep his voice quiet. “We’re already out of food, I’m afraid, but there is wine, or water if you prefer.”
Slowly, very slowly did the white head rise for a fraction and the pair of watery blue eyes, dulled with unspeakable grief, met his own. The old man shook his head slowly, before lowering his glance. For a moment it seemed that was going to be his only response, but eventually the man spoke, his voice thin and soft, with a hint of bewilderment underlying the obvious pain.
“I’m terribly sorry, but I’m afraid there is nothing anyone here can do for me,” he said, then hesitated for a moment, as his voice took on a tone of pained confession. “Not any more. I have sold all my books. You see?”
“I see,” Enjolras confirmed, honestly enough. The exact circumstances of the old man’s tribulations were unknown to him, but the tone of his loss, the confused pain of grief was all too common; something he had heard several times over this day of insurgency and weeks, months, beforehand. We had to sell every-thing we had. Our home, they took it. They took our jobs. Our freedom to speak, to gather. Our words, our works, our dignity, our lives, our freedom, they took it all.
“I sold them all, one by one.” The sense of urgency in the old man’s voice now would have seemed impossible even a minute ago. The words blurred into each other, tumbling out with uneven speed, as if a great dam had been unleashed. “My own Flora of the Environs of Cauteretz, my life’s work. I sold the texts as waste paper and pawned the plates. They were sold to some copper-smith, who melted them down for stewpans.” Enjolras winced. “Then I sold my other books – Les Quadrins Historiques de la Bible, edition of 1560; president Delancre's De l’Inconstance des Démons;Florilegium Rabbinicum of 1644; a Tibullusof 1567 – all of them rare copies, for twenty or thirty sous a piece – but what can you do? Then my Diogenes Laertius ” His voice broke a little. “I never meant to sell it at all. What difference does it make, to die now with one book, or in a few weeks with none at all? But my poor Mother Plutarque… My poor mother Plutarque was terribly ill, so I sold it. I brought her the money and the medicine. Then I came here.” He fell silent for a moment, his eyes suddenly focusing on Enjolras, as if truly noticing his presence for the first time. “Books are important,” he whispred, his voice low and urgent and for a moment it seemed to Enjolras that he truly carried the full weight of the old Republic in his words. “But people are important too.”
Enjolras could only nod, unable to bring himself to say anything that might break this moment of great clarity.
Nevertheless, the old man seemed to lose some of his urgency, but he remained far more focused on his surroundings, looking around the tavern room and through the open door, with something almost like curiosity. “Is this why you are all here?” he asked, gesturing towards the general direction of the greater barricade “For the people?”
“For the people, always,” Enjolras answered and thought of Combeferre’s fervor on the subject of general education, of Feuilly spending his rare free hours making the best use of his hard-won literacy. Of his own uncle, the way his brow furrowed when yet another censorship law chipped away on what little freedom they had gained from the last revolution. Of the pamphlets printed in the dead of night and passed around in secret, of Jean Prouvaire and his words echoing even now between them, in this moment of silence Et que, dans notre humble et petit ménage,Tout, même l’hiver, nous était printemps? “and perhaps a little for the books too.” For the abaissé and for the ABC.
Perhaps… if they all survived this fight, something could be done for the old man and his lost books. He hesitated from bringing up the possibility - after all, the books might very well be gone forever, and it would be both foolish and cruel to offer false hope before investigating fist. But Enjolras wasn’t fighting for a future that would forget the little tragedies of its champions the moment it didn’t need every available body to man the barricades. He would at least try.
The old man was looking at him with something akin of wonder, as if he hadn’t been expecting such answer. “And indeed why not,” he mused. “People have a need of books, to be sure. What about gardens,” he asked, suddenly. “Will there be gardens in this future of yours? It is well not to starve, but the people have a need for flowers.”
Enjolras gaze wandered back to Jean Prouvaire, thinking about the pot of flowers his friend had inexplicably decided to bring with him to the barricade, now tucked safely under the main table, out of the way of the construction efforts and fighting.
Nos jardins étaient un pot de tulipe; Tu masquais la vitre avec un jupon;
“Yes,” he admitted, biting back a smile at the literal nature of this promise. “We fight for flowers too.”
The old man smiled suddenly, a fleeting expression tinged with melancholy, but genuine, and touched with wonder and something akin of hope. “This future of yours, my friend, sounds the most splendid.”
“Our future,” Enjolras answered. “And yes. It will be.”
The other shook his head, knowingly. “I won’t hold you to that. But the rest of it, yes. People and books and flowers. Yes.” His gaze turned back to the tabletop, lost in thought. He said no more.
(Yes, the Bread and Roses reference is intentional. So is the reference to the mômes in Luxembourg. Prouvaire’s Battle Plant comes, of course, from the Oslo production of Les Mis.)
Time for some extremely funny news that feels fake but isn’t! In case you missed it:
Today on the almost-anniversary of the rebellion featured in Les Mis, the official Les Mis musical twitter account decided to celebrate by…….tweeting an enthusiastic endorsement of the Queen. This is despite the fact that the primary goal of the rebellion in Les Mis was to eliminate monarchy. Despite the fact that all the rebels in Les mis despise monarchy as an institution and consider it inherently evil/useless/tyrannical.
It feels like satire! The fact that they used an illustration of a poor starving child who in the novel symbolizes the Suffering of the French People under tyrants and tried to turn it into a piece of unironic pro-monarchy art is just? (???)
There’s something to say here about how everything political in Les Mis gets stripped away when it becomes a product for mass consumption, including the now relatively popular political belief that monarchy is a Bad form of government. Like the original novel DOES have issues with being overly middle-class/moderate at points— but there many aspects of the book that are radical and anti-authoritarian, and those aspects are always the first things to get sanded away. (See also: the way Les mis adaptations often portray police as Good Heroes fighting for Justice, which is the exact opposite of the ACAB point the book was going for )
But even putting aside all the political stuff—— the reason this fails is also because it’s Bad Branding? XD. If we’re gonna treat Les mis as a brand (ugh), then that brand is not about licking the monarchy’s boots. Les Mis’s brand is about the exact opposite of that. The kind of Jubilee joke I’d expect from a big corporate Les mis twitter account that understood its brand would be something like “Looks as if we haven’t got around to overthrowing that monarchy yet! But there’s still time!. ^_^ come see our next performance in {touring location}”. You know— a lighthearted toothless Revolution joke.
But we don’t even gET lighthearted toothless corporate Revolution jokes!
Instead we get this bafflingly sincere “I want to buy a queen plate with a picture of a starving child suffering under a tyrannical government on it.”
But YEAH my favorite thing about this tweet is the way everyone unanimously mocked it:
The Old Guard is a great fandom for learning old shit like Latin. Do y'all know what “ad hominem” means?
I’ve seen the exposé going around of a well-known TOG fan who frequently writes about antiracism. Rather than going after her arguments on that, they’re attacking her identity as a POC and member of marginalized groups, claiming that she’s faking oppression for clout and is actually a horrible person.
And you know, normally I’d just be like, “Not sure I agree with all your conjectures there, but anyway, yikes overall, rip to people who liked her,” and move on because it has nothing to do with me. Except apparently, the point of the exposé isn’t actually “she’s a horrible person”.
Somehow the point people seem to be taking away from the exposé is, “And therefore all antiracism in TOG fandom is made-up, malicious nonsense.”
Uh… sorry, what?
I’ll be honest: I disagree with a lot of what the exposé’s subject says on a regular basis. Not all the time, but there are some important issues that she and I have night-and-day different opinions on. So I’ll admit that I was very willing to believe bad things of her, and yet I came out of the callout going, “Okay, and???”
The exposé’s strongest point is, “Her Internet persona now is inconsistent with her persona 5-10 years ago, and back then she tweeted some TRULY shitty beliefs.” If that means all the things they conjecture it means, that still doesn’t address whether her arguments about racism hold any water. And it doesn’t reflect at all on the people in fandom who agree with her about racism! “Someone stood next to this person, who we have now revealed is Bad, so they are also Bad,” is a deeply nonsensical argument.
Although, well, a lot of people who hate TOG’s antiracism movement seem to think “Calling me racist makes me feel bad, therefore you’re completely wrong about racism” IS a valid argument, so um…
So yes, for the record, denying genocides like the Ukrainian Holodomor is absolutely bad. But I encourage all you history buffs out there to go learn about Stalinism, which will teach you about that genocide AND why expecting people to instantly denounce their colleague and friend for fear of guilt by association is a Bad Plan. I imagine some of the people whose ~silence~ has been ~noted~ over the issue have pulled their friend aside to privately say “WHAT the FUCK” before posting to Tumblr about it.
There are so many issues I do believe there’s room for debate on in TOG fandom, like how to treat people whose takes you dislike or what circumstances under which it’s okay to single someone out as problematic. (Apparently it’s not okay to list someone’s fic as containing a problematic trope, but it is okay to expose someone’s personal info and then pretend you’re a super good person for not sharing their legal name and the names and employers of their family members? Make that make sense.)
There are also real ongoing problems that have poisoned fandom profoundly, like the year-long plague of shitty and abusive messages sent to people on all sides of the debate that suddenly disappear when people disable anon asks. That’s an issue reported so universally by everyone, antiracists and… not antiracists? alike that I would require exceptional amounts of proof to believe that any given person or “side” is responsible, and no such proof has tied her to that.
But “ad hominem” means an argument “at the person”. It means to argue that because a person is bad, their argument is bad. And that’s a logical fallacy, babes.
Writing about a child rapist did not make Vladimir Nabokov a child rapist.
Writing about an authoritarian theocracy did not make Margaret Atwood an authoritarian theocrat.
Writing about adultery did not make Leo Tolstoy an adulterer.
Writing about a ghost did not make Toni Morrison a ghost.
Writing about a murderer did not make Fyodor Dostoevsky a murderer.
Writing about a teenage addict did not make Isabel Allende a teenage addict.
Writing about dragons and ice zombies did not make George R.R. Martin either of those things.
Writing about rich heiresses, socially awkward bachelors, and cougar widows did not make Jane Austen any of those things.
Writing about people who can control earthquakes did not make N.K. Jemisin able to control earthquakes.
Writing about your favorite characters and/or ships in situations that you choose does not make you a bad person.
It’s a shame that in this day and age these things need to be said.
Or, in short: the narrator =/ the author.
You know what else is a shame? This nowadays tendency of putting on the author the responsibility of teaching their readers morality.
Authors are allowed to write morally ambiguous characters.
Authors are allowed to write downright despicable characters - and guess what they are even allowed to make despicable characters charismatic and likeble and the protagonists of their stories if they wish - because absolute monsters exist only under the bed.
It is not up to the author to spoonfeed the readers about morality and Yes I know this character did a bad thing and I am going going to show it in the story and make other characters call them out of it and–Bullshit.
The authors should be able to write what they want without having thousands of people jumping and their throats claiming to know them, their ideas and their morality based on what they write.
It’s not up to the author to teach you about what is right and what is wrong.
It’s not up to the author to teach you about what is right and what is wrong.
(Click for better quality, zoom for gay shit in the background in the first panel :3)
Birthday Boy; Second Birthday Origins
I AM SO SORRY I AM UPLOADING THIS ESSENTIALLY A DAY LATE!! I was in classes all day yesterday and I didn’t have time to finish it in time DX either way here it is! Imma go crawl back into my lair now. Enjoy!
Happy Pride! I have over 80 books in my “sapphic” goodreads list and these are my personal favs…I don’t have the energy to type actual descriptions but here are the first things that came to my mind with some of them. enjoy. or don’t. to be clear most of these are NOT romances. that’s a different genre and I feel like sometimes ppl get annoyed that the queer sci fi book had more sci fi than romance…but it’s just how it is. ** **
Literature/misc
Stone Butch Blues - Leslie Feinberg
REQUIRED READING FOR ALL
fictionalized history of a working class jewish queer person and their experiences with lesbian bars, transitioning, unions, and more!
extremely heart breaking but I learned a lot of history I didn’t realize I didn’t know* **Last Night at the Telegraph Club-Malinda Lo **
main character is a chinese-american lesbian coming of age in the 1950′s in san francisco
she forms a sort of relationship with a girl in class and they go to a lesbian bar secretly
can’t recommend enough!
Her Body and Other Parties - Carmen Maria Machado
Carmen Maria Machado is the GOAT. Her writing is just incredible and some of these stories are haunting.
single handedly made me like short stories.
both Lucy Dacus and Phoebe Bridgers listed it as one of their favs. I Know the End is based on a story from this book.
contains a Law and Order: SVU fanfic which HAUNTS me*
In The Dream House - Carmen Maria Machado
a genuinely heartbreaking book about abuse in queer relationships
semi autobiographical/looking at histories of abuse
Everyone in this room will someday be dead - Emily Austin
if you struggle with anxiety or/and depression and a fixation on death and/or illness, boy do I have the book for you.
Painfully relatable but also very funny. in a laugh at your own pain kinda way. and the main character is a lesbian in a relationship. I truly love this book and highly recommend.
I had it on my tbr for a year and when I finally started I finished it in one sitting.
No One Belongs Here More Than You - Miranda July
definitely an acquired taste but one of my favorite books of all time.
I also feel like talking about how Booktube and other forms of social media book blogging have (unintentionally) helped devastate the YA book category by overturning one of the main natural selection processes of YA books
Let’s talk about book reviews
First of all, the atmosphere of YA book reviews used to be a lot more snarky and critical. People would be outright VICIOUS about books, going on at length about how much they loathed a book and how much it needed to be set on fire. (Does anyone remember what TSTL stands for, in reference to main characters?) This brutality is, I suppose, not necessarily a good thing, but it has completely changed.
If you look at the Goodreads reviews for more recent YA books, there are a LOT of reviews by bloggers, youtubers and other YA authors. There are book bloggers that link their social media, such as Instagram, to their accounts.
Also: the entire first page of reviews is often dominated by reviews from bloggers who received an Advance Reader Copy, often over a year out from the actual release date. Sending “big” reviewers early copies of YA books so they can write reviews is an even bigger thing than it was in the past. It’s a huge part of securing sales for books.
Supposedly these reviews are “honest,” but…if publishers thought the reviewers would bash the books to hell and back, would they send the ARCs? Absolutely not.
I also think that youtubers and instagrammers who make content about books will be, in general, more successful if they aren’t picky and negative, just because fewer people want to “follow” or subscribe to someone who keeps shitting on books they like. Social media generally rewards palatability. People who consistently have barbed and critical things to say about the thing their audience loves are…not that. So in those ways, people who are more likely to be positive and uncritical about books nowadays will likely have more popularity, and that means their reviews will be more dominant.
This is what we can observe: the popular reviews of YA from the past couple years are, in general, just WAY more unilaterally positive, and when they are negative, they are really meek and apologetic about it. “I’m sorry, this book just wasn’t for me, but maybe you will like it?” Unfortunately, the “nice” negative reviews are often vague, whereas the “mean” reviews of the past are often viciously, scathingly specific.
So, I was looking at YA from over 10 years ago, and back then, a larger proportion of the top reviews seem to be from random people. For instance, the top review for The Maze Runner on Goodreads is written by someone who has only written 4 reviews in total and doesn’t even have a profile pic.
This isn’t true anymore. For one thing, getting a review out early means it will be more likely to gather more likes and comments, meaning ARC-havers have the advantage. For another, book-blogging has turned into yet another venture of relentless self-promotion, instead of a relatively quiet hobby of people who often aren’t even very internet literate.
What does this mean?
Well, for one thing, it means that when I look at reviews for YA books on Goodreads, I have no idea how to select a book that is probably better than the others. Because all the reviews say the same thing. They are typically a relentless wall of praise broken by occasional “hmm, sorry, but this just wasn’t for me!” …instead of long, vitriolic, rage-fueled rants pointing out every single tiny detail that the reader found to be infuriating. The negative reviews of now don’t give enough examples of what the reviewer didn’t like.
And of course this makes sense. I would not feel as comfortable saying something downright mean about a book if a person reading it could click a button and learn everything about me, what I look like, how my voice sounds, where I live. If I could be harassed for it through multiple social media outlets by strangers who know my real name, who have seen my real face, and who can intentionally do real damage to my reputation and future, I would be more reluctant to be scathing.
This is not even getting into the incidents where fans or even authors have instigated harassment against people who didn’t like a book.
Here is what I am asking now: Is it possible that the mean-spiritedness fostered by internet anonymity is not always a bad thing?
I think we should be kind to each other, but a book is not an “each other.” It’s a piece of art, not a person. And angry, ruthlessly critical book reviews have many times guided me away from picking a book I later learned more certainly that I would have hated. They are detailed and specific and often thoughtful and articulate through the swearing.
And ultimately, if someone else’s opinion upsets us, it is just an opinion and we don’t have to look at it.
Maybe we have lost something important in losing the ability to be critical and pissed off about something that ultimately hurts no one, and not face consequences for it? Maybe there are spaces where it’s bad that you can face “consequences” so easily?
@cobstraverse Is it old-fashioned of me to say that writers aren’t even supposed to be looking at their reviews in the first place?
Those are for other readers, not the writers. And reading them is, as you say, not going to do anything but upset you.
@sexwizard Scathing reviews and harassment are two completely different things, and this whole problem I’m talking about is related to your objection—something is now far, far too public about online discourse (using this word in the normal way, not the tumblr way) regarding books.
If I write a review, I am not having a conversation with the author. I hope the author doesn’t see my review, probably. The author as a person and me as a person shouldn’t even come into the picture here. If I say to another reader, “I hate X book,” this isn’t a personal dispute because the extent of our relationship with the author is having read a book by them.
A good negative review includes things that probably would be hurtful if they were said by a friend, but it is very important that I and the author of a book are not friends. If I wrote such a thing, I would want to be no more than an anonymous stranger. A reader, in a reader-oriented space, bitching to other readers.
If people take that as an invitation to leave the reader-oriented space and harass the author of the book, that’s a huge problem.
I get so fucking frustrating reading posts like these.
Say what you want but I think that depriving cats of their natural environment is he same thing as letting them out and having a hunting problem. Except you can easily solve the hunting problem by sticking a bell on the cat, or letting it have supervised outside time. If you’re worried about your cat running away from you, then, spoiler alert, you aren’t a good cat owner. Another pro is that having your cats acclimated to your neighborhood prevents them from getting lost if they do get out. I hate this ‘issue’ and I hate people on both sides who seem to exist only to call their opposition terrible people. The comments on this post are just full of people willfully ignoring the other sides points and calling them names and generally being assholes. There are valid points on both sides, and context is so important. If you live in the middle of a city, yeah, leaving your cat outside is irresponsible and dangerous. But if you live in the countryside without busy roads and have a cat that works to catch mice and other pests, then let them do that. There are so many subtleties to this debate and I’m so tired of all the people straw manning the other party.
There are no “subtleties” in this issue. You don’t say there are “subtleties” to letting a small child run around outside without supervision, or leaving a short haired dog outside in the snow with no shelter, or letting your dog terrorize and eat your neighbor’s chickens, or other forms of neglect and poor animal husbandry. Bells do NOTHING to inhibit a cat’s ability to hunt. They are capable of hunting even with a bell. The country still has dangers to cats. I see more roadkill cats in the countryside than in the city, and you have more predators that will eat cats, and there are still free roaming cats and dogs that will maim your animals. I see SO many outdoor cats whose owners live in the country come into the vet clinic with swollen faces and broken bones and respiratory disease and oozing wounds. The vast majority of emergency cat cases that require intense care and oftentimes EUTHANASIA are country cats. Stop trying to see “both sides” of a topic about objectively shitty animal care that is backed by science and statistics
Cats were bred not necessarily domesticated to be pets, for most of history, they have been used to hunt pests and be working animals. I have seen so many statistics for both sides of this issue, and I am so tired of arguing about it. There are ways to supervise your cats time outside and I have known so many cats in my (small, relatively secluded) neighborhood and I have never, not once seen a cat killed by any means that you have mentioned. My cats are indoor and outdoor animals and I am honestly very offended by the notion that I do not love or spend time enriching my cats lives just because I let them out. My cats enjoy going out. They follow me on walks and stay clear of roads and only ever hunt mice. They also love being inside, played with them cuddled and pampered. There are environments where cats cat thrive outdoors. There are also environments where it is dangerous.
Also please stop comparing cats to other animals and especially small human children. Cats posses countless evolutionary instincts and advantages that human children do not possess and it is a completely different matter. But on that note, children are capable of playing outside without getting harmed? I was always going in the woods when I was a relatively young child. I was perfectly safe and immensely enjoyed those experiences.
Cats have the reasoning power of a *toddler*. This is an animal that will not use a litterbox to pee in of it has a uti because it begins to associate the box with the pain as in “box makes me hurt.” they are not creatures with large abilities to reason or find the true correlations between things. cats happily munch on toxic plants all the time. They get eaten by neighbor dogs all the time. They get run over all the time and every cat that was run over was “smart enough to avoid cars” until that one time it got turned into hamburger.
If your cat is ever out of your direct supervision while uncontained outside you cannot claim that they never go in the street. You cannot claim that they only eat mice and never lizards or birds.
Congrats that you’ve not seen any of this. I’ve never seen anyone die in a car crash, therefore car crashes and driving safely aren’t important because they don’t happen and can’t possibly happen to me or anyone I know.
If you want your cats to spend time outside, build a catio or leash train them. Then everyone is safe.
My cats bring home everything they catch and are never far from the house, so it stands to reason that they only catch mice because they have never brought anything else. I am outside a lot, I observe my cats, very rarely do they approach the road (one doesn’t go near it at all) the vast majority of their time is spent lounging in the sun. Your logic of car crashes does not really apply, it moreover just proves my point that some places are safer than others. Car crashes are less common than cats getting hit. Also as a vet tech, have ever considered that maybe you see injured outdoor cats very often is because… that’s why you bring them to the vet.
I am all for keeping cats inside, I don’t really approve (in most cases) of leaving cats outside unsupervised 24/7 but my cats without fail come when called, and it never takes them more than a minute or two. Most of the time when I look outside I can see them perfectly.
Also, I am not trying to say that cats are by any means smarter than human children. They simply possess instincts and abilities that human children do not, because they are animals that have survived and evolved that way, whereas human babies live much more sheltered lives.
Also would like to note that a fair amount of people do not get cats because they want a cuddly lovable pet, they get a cat for pest control
Working animals don’t get to do whatever they want either. Terriers were bred to hunt small animals, that doesn’t mean its ok for them to run around mauling whatever they please. Working animals still need human supervision! Working animals stay in a specific space where they work. What kind of dumbass are you to think that being a “working animal” means just leaving it to its own devices? Not to mention cats were not purposefully bred to be pest control, they were animals that liked to hang around people because there was food and ended up somesticating themselves. But even so, cats make shit pest control. This is documented and studied. The harm they do to native species outweighs their rodent control.
And, dude, I’m sorry but “they have evolutionary instincts” is one of the dumbest arguments I’ve ever heard. There is no evolutionary instinct to look both ways before crossing the road. Theres also no evolutionary instinct to not fight other cats because they do that ALL THE TIME. Or one to know when a mouse they’ve hunted has ingested rat poison and therefore ingested it themselves. And also, sheep have evolutionary advantages to avoid predators, that doesn’t mean I’m going to let a wolf in sheep pasture.
And also, you have NO IDEA that your cats bring you everything they catch. You have NO basis to say that. Cats don’t bring home everything they hunt. Sometimes they eat it themselves or just leave a headless body where they killed it. Cats kill a LOT of animals because they hunt for sport. It baffles me that you guys claim to know whatever your cat does outside when it’s not where you can see it. You’re like weirdo parents that claim to know everything about their kids and there are no secrets. You don’t. It’s dumb as hell to claim so.
I still have yet to see an even slightly reasonable argument from outdoor cat defenders. Everything is just the most wackadoodle shit that’s just reaching for a justification and ignores everything we know about animal care and treats cats like some magical exception. Every outdoor cat owner thinks their cat is so special. When your cat gets hurt or sick or killed because of something that happened while it was outdoors you will have NO RIGHT to be upset because people warned you and you didn’t listen but instead created a fantasy full of excuses. Don’t you dare cry. You willfully chose those risks when you didn’t have to
i guess ive never written done much about Aloina ever, building in my head all these years i guess its time to write it down! Please note that some of the lore could be incorrect, since blizzard does have a habit of recont and im been using out dating wikis hahaah
- Aloina’s story is basically that she starts off being very selfish and self centred, her world was basically Silvermoon (until lich king come knocking on their door) and well since she is a blood elf and takes such pride in her people, that she basically saw every other race kind of below her. (lowkey racist) That was until she become adventurer, with her adventurer, she meant many different people and races alike. She watched many different races go through sacrifices themselves and really challenges themselves, so many of them go through hardships and different times, some of them gave up and others keep going with a fighting spirit but this made Aloina really reflect on who she was and what she was. Doesnt mean she cant be a little bit of a bitch (sometimes) but as of Legion, Aloina is much less self centered and is all about working for the common goals of the Horde or for the good of Azeroth.
- Aloina is like any blood elf, prideful of her people, still can be arrogant at times, a little bitchy as well, but if you can get thru her tough front and gain her trust, she can be a lot more softer and kind. Its all just how you apporah her on things! “Heyyyy Aloina!! Your hair looks so good today, would you know give me a port to Shattrah please!” Can get you a lot more then “Oi, mage port to Shattrah!” its all about how you approach things with her! Her Softer side is much nicer then her angry side. Even if she isnt the most friendly (on the outside) She can be at least civil to most people she has meet. (unless you are an Tauren, she has a soft spot for them which i will explain later why) she generally isnt as hostile to strangers as she used to be. Over time she has learnt that being nice to people gets her a lot more then being hostile. Sometimes her arrogant will show through, but she is honestly a lot less softer then her younger days, especially when it comes to being a mage, lmao she thinks she is the best, but in reality, as a Archmage she still has a long way to go. Her Hypocritical is another one of her faults, she has a habit of saying one thing and doing another thing, easy to call her out on it tho. (she will super flustered about it tho) tl;dr she is a little messy and kind of rough of the edges, but under it all means well and kinds to people she trusts.
- Aloina Evenkind was born as High Elf in SIlvermoon City, her family lived on the outskirts, with her mother a Lieutenant in Farstriders and her father a healer. She always had a close relationship with her brother, Haydel, as there had 5 years gap and Haydel always felt responsibility for looking after her. Her happy childhood ended the day that Scourge ruined Silvermoon and the Sunwell, Aloina and Haydel somehow survived for 4 days under a street cart hiding from the Scourge and were rescued. Unfortunately there both lost there parents that day. Aloina become very reserved and does still suffer PTSD to this day from the events. Haydel upset and wanting to revenge for what happened to his home and his parents, and still could not be satifsy with sitting home and sitting in the ruined city. Left young Aloina in Silvermoon and joined Kael’thas’s army in Outland. Aloina would for many years think her brother was dead until there meet again during Burning Legion’s invasion of the Broken Isles. She would prefer never to talk about him and still reminds distance of him, as he now is a Demon Hunter.
- Once Aloina’s magic abilities started to show and not wanting to become a wretched like many of her fellow mages before her, she decided to become a adventurer, mainly to save her people and the sunwell. Not that she realise that her quest would be really discover who she was truely meant to be.
Season 2 of Sanders Sides has been paying a lot more attention to wardrobe and c!Thomas usually wears something to reflect what is going on in the episode. If he’s wearing dark colours, usually a dark side will appear. He’ll also sometimes wear colours to represent the sides he’s talking to the most that episode. Christmas episodes he’ll wear seasonal colours.
SO LETS GET INTO THESE OUTFITS ALREADY YEAH?
Both Christmas episodes he chose red and white shirts. Though I’m guessing it was more in the spirit of the season than to represent Roman, though Roman led the 12 days of Sanders Sides episode, so that is just a double whammy right there heh
Both back-to-back Roman/Logan episodes he wore both their colours to represent both sides equally. The black shirt (Logan) with red flower (Roman) from WDWGOOBITM has both sides in favour. And the Crofters episode has both their colours, though blue is over top red, and I think that meant Logan sort won over
And also it’s definitely Logan’s blue shirt, as proved by the same shirt in this picture
Can Lying Be Good has the absolute perfect shirt. With the split skull he even put the skull pattern on the same side as the scales on Deceit’s face. When Deceit reveals himself, all it’s skull, and when he leaves, it’s all flowers. The brilliant part is you never see Thomas changing the design, it’s like it’s part of the mindscape, he shapes his reality with his thoughts. As his thoughts change, so does the pattern.
And with SvS, DWIT, and SvS Redux, c!Thomas wears the same brilliantly similar colour scheme in each episode because:
1. It ties the 3 episodes together as a sort of trilogy, and
2. Wearing prominently dark blue over white symbolizes his struggle with the darker parts of himself.
Theblack and white wedding tie represents his ‘black and white’ way of thinking and how he needs to change that. Nothing can be morally right or wrong, black or white, there are always nuance, or shades of grey, to every decision made.
Also note the shirt pattern in SVS carrying over to the tie in the mindscape courtroom. His dark shirt indicates a dark side influence, but the colourful flowers represent that hope is there for Thomas to do the morally right thing (even though we later learn this wasn’t a good decision).
In ATHD, Thomas obviously dressed in Roman’s colour to be bright and outgoing, and possibly look for love when going to this party. But underneath he’s wearing Virgil’s colour, indicating his fear driving him to stay home instead of facing Rico or his friends for the fight they had earlier.
Finally, the wardrobe change during WTIT is significant. Logan’s influence had him wearing a dark blue hoodie over a space shirt, which is very casual Logan, indicating Thomas would stay home and work as Logan wanted. But crazily enough, when he went to meet Nico, he didn’t wear red or light blue indicating a Roman or Patton (love or happiness) influence. He wore GREEN. Now it’s a very faded green with flowers over a grey shirt, indicating some fancifulness and a neutral stance. But the green from Remus symbolizes that Remus affected him a lot this episode. Even though c!Thomas didn’t once acknowledge Remus himself (he didn’t! go back and check for yourself, Thomas didn’t talk to or refer to Remus once, only Logan did), Logan telling him that he was experiencing intrusive thoughts was enough to affect his character.
I’ve noticed that Thomas in general is collecting more floral clothes (fanciful/fun), skulls (dark sides), and space shirts (logic). So if any of these clothes make the cut for the season finale, it may give you a hint what the episode will be about before they get into the story.
Like if you see him wearing this shirt in the season finale… DANGERDANGER ⚠️☣️⚠️☢️⚠️
((Okay after tumblr DELETED this post, I guess I’ll try doing this again.))
Something that I’ve been reading a lot in some discussion posts about Logan and that “he’s not ignored– he’s been so important to Thomas and the others and he’s been thanked and stuff why is he so mad?”
I think I can clear that up for you. But let’s review a few things:
So Logan has been the definitive mediator throughout most of the previous episodes. He was the stage director for CYBG where he was thoroughly listened to; LVP was all about Thomas learning to listen to both of his most dramatic and loud sides aka Logan and Roman and how they can work together; LNTAO is a bit of a setback for Logan but it is his understanding of how the song fit into the conversation, as well as the puppets, that caused Thomas to have his eventual epiphany about his issue going into the episode; in EP Logan is the overall narrator, explaining how all these things that Virgil finds embarrassing were actually very needed in his overall development as a child and a teenager.
SVS has a very important Logan scene that does point towards my whole point:
Logan is quick to say that it isn’t working out. This is presumably obvious by the audience. Thomas is always scatterbrained, late to things, and obviously not looking at the calendar Logan has made considering the only thing on the calendar for April 13th is the callback and not the wedding. If Thomas had been listening to Logan on a normal basis, he would’ve known that but when it’s revealed, even Thomas himself seems a bit surprised immediately jumping to that Janus is lying and must have tampered with it. The rest of the episode goes on and Logan is given the benched seat but still has his opinions put out there for everyone as Patton calls on him a time or two.
DWIT is where Logan shines. He constantly puts Remus in his place throughout the episode also while proving the point that logic is the only way to work through intrusive thoughts, and that Remus is necessary to some extent. This is also an episode that I think Logan thinks was a turning point in his relationship with Thomas. Thomas sincerely thanks him directly and calls him cool. Logan is not used to that emotional kind of sincerity from Thomas directly and I think it affected him in a way that made him proud of the work he does, more than he would normally be. Logan now realizes that maybe Thomas will listen to him a bit more.
And by listening to him, he means allowing him to serve his true function. Logan, as logic and basically organizer of all of Thomas’s mental notes, likes diligently planning things and keeping order to Thomas’s life to help him live the best life he possibly can. Logan thinks now will be the time that Thomas actually chooses Logan to be the lead side in his life. Maybe for the first time.
Logan had already been pushed to the side once when Thomas decided he wanted to quit his education to become a Vine Creator/Youtube Personality. Roman became center stage but with so much pressure on Internet Celebs, Patton and Virgil also became pretty important. Logan was last on the priority list and as a side, his wants for Thomas have been last on the totem pole so to speak. So now that Thomas has seen how cool Logan is, Logan believes he can finally get some organization and stuff done in Thomas’s life and finally be listened to for what he wants, not just what he can give.
But then, POF happens. Logan is once again pushed out of the conversation and the more important things are emotionally driven, which focuses again on Patton and Roman, with a bit of Janus included. Logan also takes offense to the fact that nobody noticed he was missing and leaves after he done doing what he always does, bringing reason to the situation at hand. I mean, that’s all he’s good for right? He can’t help Thomas in any other way apparently. All of his other attempts have failed so why bother sticking around and hoping Thomas listens to him?
Then we fall on WTIT, Logan looks so happy upon first showing up to Thomas when he wakes up. We learn later that 5am Thomas made a lot of promises to Logan about getting lots of chores and things done today. Logan is happy because Thomas is gonna listen to him and we all know how Logan feels when deadlines are met and projects get completed.
But then Remus comes into play because Thomas is distracted by Nico not responding to his text messages from 4am. Logically, most people are asleep at that time of night so worrying about someone not answering around then would be kind of silly. Logan doesn’t seem to know about Nico not responding or at least he hasn’t noticed directly what’s troubling Thomas. We know he sees everything Thomas does to an extent because of a previous episode (“Have you seen the Office bloopers?” “Yes I have seen them 15 times because I am a part of you!”) so it makes sense to assume that Logan should know about the messages.
Remus is able to keep distracting Thomas because he’s so focused on why Nico hasn’t responded to his message yet and in this way, he’s able to keep Thomas from doing what Logan wants him to do. Over and over and over again. He’s unable to eat, he’s unable to do the dishes, he’s unable to clean up the litter everywhere—Logan increasingly gets more frustrated at the fact that Remus won’t leave them alone so maybe Thomas can get something done. However, Logan is going against his own logic here.
If we call back to DWIT, Logan explicitly says:
And yet, that’s what Logan is doing here. He’s trying to stop Remus instead of finding out what the real problem is. In an attempt to finally get Thomas to listen to him and do what he wants, he’s ignoring Thomas’s actual problem: the messages from Nico.
Also something very important in this scene here when Logan is trying to get Remus to stop or just listen to him:
Thomas is looking at his phone again and we’ve gone from sad that Nico is ignoring him to anger. His eyebrow furrow in frustration and his nose twitches like his breathing has gotten faster. Then it snaps back to Logan who finally snaps:
“STOP IGNORING ME!”
The thing is, I think Logan says this without realizing exactly what he’s saying or what he’s feeling at the moment because while some of his feelings are his own, some of them are Thomas’s feelings at Nico for, as far as Thomas knows, ignoring his text messages. As seen here:
He really was taken aback by how angry he really is. Because Orange is clearly affecting him here, but I think he was using Logan to affect Thomas too.
We know that Thomas doesn’t normally get mad at anything within canon; he’s pretty passive and usually let’s things roll off his shoulders. But today, the fact that his house is a mess, he can’t seem to get anything done, Nico ignoring him, and the constant intrusive thoughts that just won’t go away and keep messing with him… it’s become too much. He actually was about to explode, which is what happened to Logan. It only didn’t happen to Thomas because Nico called him just before so crisis averted in that regard.
Remus is pleased to finally see some emotion out of Logan and responds with: “But who do you really want to scream that at?” as he sinks out, seemingly referencing the fact that Logan is upset with Thomas constantly pushing his needs as a side away.
Nico then invites Thomas out and of course Thomas immediately accepts which Logan is surprised at which basically confirms he did not know about Thomas’s Nico problems that had been bothering him all day. The conversation downstairs is the culmination of Thomas and Logan’s relationship. Thomas throws on some clothes to leave and Logan asks him about his needs, the plans they had made that day. Thomas says he will get to it eventually and even makes a joke about tomorrow Thomas or whatever before blurting out: “This is just really important.”
That is an image of a side who realizes that to Thomas, his needs are not important. What’s more important is something else… again.
As he sinks out, Logan hugs his planner. That is what is important to him, but it was made pretty clear that just because it’s important to him doesn’t mean it’s important to Thomas.
In the end card, Logan spends most of it with his arms closed tightly around his body, as if holding onto himself in the same way he did his planner. He also seems rather quiet—he speaks but his words aren’t full of that proud tone he usually carries. It’s soft and weak, or rather timid. He is happy for Thomas but he’s also upset.
The way I see it is that while Thomas and the other sides do take advice and learn from Logan all the time on his knowledge, that’s different than actually listening. Logan’s needs as a side, his organizational and planning work, is ignored all the time. Let’s put it into a different perspective.
Let’s say you had a friend. They are so important to you and you all hang out together all the time. However, the friend begins to focus on something else more and you begin to drift apart. You don’t really understand this new thing your friend loves but you continue to help them anytime something goes wrong with this new endeavor, because you love them. They come back to you time and time again for more help and while you don’t mind helping them, it would be nice if they could do something you enjoy too instead of it always being about them. You don’t say this, but it’s something you feel inside. Then one day, your friend calls you. They’ve planned all day around spending time with you! You make plans and you’re so excited for them to come over and hang out. But as you begin to do something, their phone pings. They apologize but have to respond. It’s for that other focus. You understand but it keeps happening and eventually they’re called away from hanging out with you. Neither of you have really done anything that day because of the constant distractions taking your friend’s attention away from you. At this point, you’re upset and say “but I had a whole day plan of things for us to do.” “And we will, I promise. Maybe next week. This is just really important, okay?” The friend points to the phone and then excuses themself and leaves your house.
That is the situation with Logan and Thomas.
Getting complemented for your knowledge and smarts, and getting thanks for helping in situations is great and all, but meaningful reciprocation of that same time and energy from the other party means so much and if you keep giving and giving, eventually you have nothing more to give. You feel used and useless.
Tl;dr: Logan wants a more meaningful relationship with Thomas where not only can he teach Thomas things, but also make life better for Thomas but Thomas keeps pushing Logan away in that aspect, claiming that things are just more important than what Logan needs as a side.
(This is 2000 words… I’m gonna go think about something else for a bit LOLOL)
Also note this:
Thomas is standing in front of the letter O. O for ORANGE MAYBE HMMMMMMM /jk i honestly don’t know but I find it funny out of all the letters in the words, he’s standing in front of the only O.
Here’s our list of fairy tales, fables, ghost stories, myths, legends, and sacred tales, classified according to land of origin. Many of the stories are available online; others can be found in folktale collections in libraries. Feel free to use these, or any of your own choice outside of this list.
This is a collection of Asian folktales, fairytales, myths, and legends. Good for mixing things up from the usual Greek and Roman variety. I would personally recommend Siti Zubaidah, the Chinese creation myths (Pan Gu and Nü Wa), Journey to the West, the Japanese creation myths (Izanami and Izanagi; Amaterasu and Uzume), Tokoyo, and Kiyohime.
The original post only listed all of this, so I added links for almost all of them (some I couldn’t find resources for). Found this while I was looking at a Singaporean indie publisher.
