Isabel born in the mid 90s white | Jewish Moash Apologist Aromantic Grey-ace Ruler of FMK hell she/they pronouns (cis woman) INTP Gemini Born September 27 because astrology is a punk ass bitch hedonistically pretentious
Secret of a good mind control story is to engage with the interiority of the mind controlled person. Sebastian Stan made sure to portray the Winter Soldier as a being that was having experiences and it fed us for years.
I know you’re not supposed to show what Death 2 is, but if you have to pick something I don’t think anything beats a good mind control. The angst potential, the paranoia, the horror that your friend is not your friend anymore, but with just enough hope that they can still be saved. Serious contender for best trope out there.
“I Know You’re In There Somewhere” Fight: Great Trope
“I Know You’re In There Somewhere” Fight but it doesn’t work: Devastating (here’s to you, random side character in The Dalek Invasion of Earth whose brother was turned into a Roboman.)
Proposing a variation where breaking mind control is possible but there’s a long process to it. Simply invoking The Power of Love isn’t enough, you have to use long term care, you have to think about it, you have to give something up.
Imagining what it’s like to be released from mind control before the guilt over what you’ve done kicks in. Being able to feel your real feelings again. Getting hit with all your old complex thoughts. Realizing that that’s something you can have again. If you’ve been under for a short enough time it would feel euphoric I think. Longer and it would be terrifying.
Or what about when you can release your friend from mind control, but there’s just this twinge that you’re just repeating the same violation in the opposite direction. And it’s silly. The real them doesn’t want to be like this. And by all accounts being mind controlled isn’t even a pleasant experience. And if the right person ordered them to stand down and stop begging they would do so in a second, without question or doubt, without even the capacity for those things. They don’t want freedom because they can’t want freedom because the ability to desire freedom was deliberately taken from them. But they still want. Even though their current desires were put in there by your enemies they still have them. And what can you do besides deny all those experiences? You know what’s best. You whisper an apology. You don’t want it any other way.
People telling you not to eat FRUITS because they have “natural sugar” is all the proof you need that diet culture was never about health and just exists to make people miserable
I’m diabetic. I do have to keep an eye on my fruit intake, particularly fruits like mangos, pineapples and grapes (all of which I adore, but have to enjoy in moderation now).
But most of the population of the world is not diabetic. Eating fruit is far healthier for the average person than eating highly processed crap. Even for a diabetic, a doctor would probably choose me eating a whole mango over eating a Big Mac and fries.
Fresh fruit and berries are some of the great food experiences out there. Don’t cut yourself off from them because you’re petrified of the natural sugars that make them taste good. You’re allowed to eat food that tastes good. And even if you’re diabetic, that’s not the end of the world. You can usually enjoy almost all fruits as long as you’re careful about portion size.
Don’t be scared of fruit! Next thing you know, they’ll be coming for vegetables.
The reactionary backlash to media analysis is a natural part of the wider “fascists hate anything intellectual” phenomenon, btw.
Wanting you to ignore the politics of Star Wars comes from the same exact place that wants you to substitute the germ theory of disease with the ‘sickness comes from failure to be a good christian and most people who claim to be sick are just faking anyway’ myth.
They don’t want these complexities to exist, and by talking about them, you make them exist. It’s a form of magical thought. Talking about police brutality wills police brutality into existence. A disruption of the status quo is seen as a disruption of the natural order. The problem they see is that no-one has made those people shut up. That is what they want: someone to come in and make those people shut up and go away, to put things back “where they belong.”
[…]
Their will is a hammer that they are using to beat reality itself into a shape of their choosing, a simple world where reality is exactly what it looks like through their eyes, devoid of complexity, devoid of change, where they are right and their enemies are silent. They are trying to build a flat earth.
this is literally what triumph of the will was referring to. as fascist movements gain power and build their crank coalition, they smooth out the contradictions inherent to making a mass movement out of privileging a minority by elevating magical thinking to a mass social ritual.
total war as practiced by the soviets and allies was an economic program of subordinating productive capacity to national requirements, because the people running the show were fundamentally rational. you did aluminum drives because you needed more planes than refining could provide, you dug victory gardens because farm workers were being drafted, war bonds was understood as a method for the government to finance the war. you made sacrifices because the government outlined what they were for and why they were needed.
total war as envisioned and practiced by the nazis was essentially a spiritual affair. 'wholly mobilizing the populace’ was an obsession, because there was this belief that the material needs of the war effort could be overcome passively by a sufficiently motivated population, one would would dynamically make all necessary sacrifices and thus naturally overcome limitation. they genuinely, genuinely believed that victory was assured against any odds because sufficient willpower would overcome anything.
the nazi obsession with superweapons was a direct manifestation of this; as the war became more dire and it became clear nothing short of a miracle would salvage it, it became the doctrine of the nazi party that this miracle would be manifested by the brilliants and determination of the german people, as missiles and jet engines and radar death rays or whatever, and it was a thing people believed even as artillery shells were coming down on berlin.
this form of thinking recasts everything into a simple binary functioning on a single factor; there is success, which comes from sufficient willpower and belief, and there is failure, which is always the deliberate betrayal of a coward.
and it fucked them constantly. they made non-stop errors predicated on the belief that doing the same thing again but even harder would eventually work because it had to, it only failed the last time because the people who did it were weak-willed. they started the largest war in history because their strategic thinking all eventually boiled down to 'only bitches lose’
you can already see the trump administration doing this exact thing. the shamelessness it enables is how they make early progress; their refusal to back down lets them bully their way through systems that function on norms and mutual agreement, they score victories by doing the kind of shit that every right-thinking person thinks would be too stupid to try, and it convinces them they’re invincible. but sooner or later, they run out of road, and will grind themselves down to nothing trying to smash reality into the shape they desire.
we have to stop them as soon as possible, because they will take us all with them if they can.
It is so disheartening how many special education programs use ABA. I wonder how many autistic people would love to become special education teachers but don’t because they don’t want to inflict ABA on children.
“Friends outside of Minnesota please read. I’m sharing a post written by a personal friend and medical doctor: Friends outside MN, you need to know what is happening here. Everyone knows that ICE shot and killed a woman here on Wednesday. But that’s not the only thing that’s going on:
ICE agents are cruising areas with immigrant-owned businesses, and kidnapping patrons and employees alike. Yesterday they abducted two US citizen employees at a suburban Target, one who was begging them to allow him to go get his passport to show them.
ICE is going door to door in immigrant-heavy neighborhoods, asking residents where their immigrant neighbors live. Read that again. If it sounds like something out of your high school history textbook, that’s because it is.
ICE is targeting schools and school buses. They pepper sprayed teenagers and abducted two school staff members at the high school up the street from me on Wednesday. Police are literally escorting school buses to ensure children can get to school and home safely. The Minneapolis Public Schools have moved to virtual learning for the next 4 weeks because it’s unsafe for children or teachers to physically come to school.
They are targeting hospitals and clinics. Patients are scared and are cancelling their appointments or just not showing up. Kids are missing their checkups and vaccines, folks aren’t getting their cancer care, etc.
They are smashing windows in cars and homes.
ICE is increasingly picking up Native Americans—again, targeting folks based on skin color alone.
They are arresting and beating legal observers. A friend of a friend had her arm broken yesterday. Folks are showing up at local hospitals, brought in in ICE custody, with severe injuries that are absolutely inconsistent with mechanism of injury reported by ICE. (Think: patient appears to have been beaten unconscious, while ICE agent says he slipped and fell.) I can’t emphasize enough that these ICE agents do not have warrants. There are 2,000+ agents here and they are simply hunting for anyone that’s not white. It doesn’t matter if you’re a citizen or a green card holder, they will kidnap you first and ask questions later.
But the community is fighting back.
Protests are happening every day.
Community groups have been leading know-your-rights sessions for months, often to packed venues.
Whistles are being distributed by the thousands, carried on keychains and worn on coat zippers, always at the ready to be blown in warning if ICE is spotted.
Drivers are following ICE vehicles, blaring their horns in warning.
Businesses are locking their doors even while open to keep employees and customers safe. As I type this, I’m standing guard at the locked door of our neighborhood burrito joint while I wait for my takeout order, so the employees can focus on their jobs. The place is packed with neighbors supporting this small business.
Anti-ICE signs are posted everywhere. The community is making it crystal clear that ICE is not welcome here.
Parents and neighbors are standing guard outside schools, organizing carpools, and escorting kids to and from school on foot.
Parents of kids in Spanish-immersion daycare (there are a LOT of these daycares here!) are keeping their kids home so the teachers don’t have to take the risk of coming to work.
Churches and community groups are holding fundraisers to buy and deliver groceries to families who don’t feel safe leaving home.
Mutual aid money is going out to folks who can’t make rent because they can’t work or because a breadwinner was abducted, or who need a warm place to stay after their home’s windows were smashed.
THAT is what is happening here. This fight is ongoing and it’s horrifying to watch. But we are not backing down. To my friends in other cities and states, don’t think for a minute that this won’t happen in your town. It will. Be ready. Learn from us, as we have learned from Portland and Chicago and New York. Fight back. Don’t let us get to the last line of Martin Niemoller’s poem.”
