The Jewel Box

Art and photo blog of Becca Stareyes.

[lujinarchive]

Baby Gaang 🌪️🌊🔥🪨🪃🪭

• maizulee version

• yue, jin, jet version

[bluerose5]

On the topic of bg3 though, of course there are a million and one reasons why Wyll and Lae'zel deserve more love from the fan base overall (not just in fandom circles) but probably one of my favorites is that THEY DID ALL THAT SHIT IN THEIR TWENTIES!!! What do you mean you saved the world and started a revolution in your motherfucking TWENTIES??? They out here getting shit done, not perfectly, but they're putting in the work. I love them.

[waitingforthet]

inspiration struck in a really, really weird way

[hyperlexichypatia]

IDK I think if cis men are being told that being fat will lower their testosterone and make them Insufficiently Masculine, and cis women are being told that being fat will raise their testosterone and make them Excessively Masculine, and fat trans people are being denied the right to medically transition if they're fat, and thin trans people are warned against HRT because it will make them fat (and this is said about both testosterone and estrogen HRT), and androgynous-presenting people are told that only thin people count as androgynous...

Then maybe...

Maybe...

Maybe the weight loss industry is just using Gender to enforce fatphobia.

[hapalopus]

Goddd, can you imagine this entire scene from Kiru's perspective? She's heard about how much Edrehasivar respects women, so she genuinely allows herself to hope that she no longer has to be content with 'women's work'. Then she meets him and he's incredibly hesitant and her hope flickers. Having a conversation with him is like pulling teeth because of how quiet, observant, and contemplative he is. He needs a full five seconds to consider his next reply. You can't read his face. No one can. But Kiru's time as a csaiveise cleric hasn't been for nothing. She's been working with suffering people for 20 years. And she very quickly realizes that he doesn't so much respect women as fear them and fear hurting them, and he doesn't choose his words carefully for the same politic reasons that Varenechibel did, he's just unbelievably anxious about everything. And he's not hesitant about her because he doesn't believe in her, but because he doesn't believe in himself.

[mzminola]

The bit of fandom I stuck my toe into recently seems to pretty much agree that King Jonathan’s concession to Wyldon, to have Keladry on a probationary year when she began page training was hypocritical & unfair, but also likely politically necessary, that as king he has to make unsavory political choices, that you have to make concessions to advance other parts of a given cause, etc.

I see these points, and now I’m going to list out all the ways I can think of that it was a bad political decision too:

1. Alienated his long-standing allies (was there anyone who trained with Alanna when they were all kids that wasn’t pissed about this choice?).

2. Undermined the other progressive policies; he made the decree that girls could openly try for their shields ten years before First Test begins, the training master at the time agreed to it, and Wyldon accepted the decision when he took the job. Stepping backward as soon as it’s put to the test invites other such decrees and programs to be attacked as well.

3. Insulted the Mindelans, who are valuable diplomats, quite badly.

4. Potentially undermined Alanna in her job as King’s Champion; yes, she acknowledges that people often credit her success to her Gift and being god-touched, but she did go through the same official training as all her peers. To make the next woman knight leap more official hurdles is to throw Alanna’s qualifications into question.

5. Nearly lost them Keladry as a knight. She almost makes the decision to wait a few years and apply to the Queen’s Riders instead, because a probationary year for only her was blatantly unfair.

6. Potentially lost them other knights as well. We don’t hear of any other girls starting page training during the rest of Protector of the Small, which spans over eight years. How many other girls, or their parents, looked at that probationary year, and refused to let themselves be so insulted? How many wondered, if the year was lifted for future applicants, if some other humiliation would be sprung on them instead?

Jonathan could have mitigated some of these problems by having Wyldon place all incoming pages under a probationary year, by officially declaring that this was simply yet another change to the training program they were making. Even if rumor went that this change was because of Kel, without it being officially so, it would be less insulting to her & her politically important family, leave less room for open attacks on the other progressive policies, and not raise the stakes so high for future girl applicants.

But he didn’t. The probationary year was a political mistake, as well as being hypocritical and unfair.

[swimmingblue]

For me, the issue with the probationary year is that it pissed off a lot of people who are more positive towards Jonathan, and didn’t even do much to calm down the people who were against his progressive policies. Because a close reading of the books shows that a bunch of people were pissed off by Jonathan’s treatment of Kel.

We see pretty overtly that Alanna, Raoul, and several other of Jonathan’s contemporaries were upset by this decision. Upset enough to take action on Kel’s behalf, whether directly (like Raoul taking her as a squire) or indirectly (like how Alanna and probably Gary were working behind the scenes to support Kel).

We see that a bunch of other people are pissed by this decision as well. Other people in the palace see that Kel is getting treated unfairly and support her - Duke Baird absolutely helps her out more than he has to, and so do several other people who interact with the pages and squires. And many of the other pages and squires have Kel’s back as well - including Neal, the heir to a ducal house, and Roald, the prince of the realm. Even Duke Turomot the notorious rules-stickler is like “this girl has been fucked over by procedures” and goes to bat for her.

And like … the reasons behind the probationary year didn’t even work. The conservatives were like “ah yes, ofc she passed, it was all a show,” even though it wasn’t. Kel went through hell and it didn’t even help.

[pandaofsecrets]

Probably the funniest take on Ozai is that he's a "master manipulator". Guys, this is the same man who thought asking his abusive father nicely to make him heir would actually work. He's got all the subtlety of a hammer; where do you think Zuko gets it from?

And yeah, I know someone's going to point out how Ozai manipulated his children, but like, that's the thing. They're his children. Manipulating someone who is entirely under your control and does not have enough life experience to see through your bullshit isn't very hard.

[muffinlance]

Absolutely correct Ozai take. Turns out it doesn't take brains to be a monster.

[murglor]

@muffinlance is so right. Except instead of a journalist, it would literally be Sokka sitting at the end of the table for a war council, wearing his fake moustache and calling himself Wang Fire.

[annabelle--cane]

yknow I'm feeling a bit brave so I will venture to say what this blighted essay's pitch actually is: reading project hail mary (novel and film) as a ravishment fantasy. in both main threads of the narrative grace is brought wildly out of his element and pulled into the orbit of a mysterious foreign stranger who is significantly stronger / richer / more powerful than him, forced to accept unsolicited lavish gifts and personal praise despite protests and discomfort, and made to live in isolated locations in extremely close proximity to these people with no say in the matter, all of which are common motifs in ravishment fantasies. on her own, stratt also brings in other common motifs of restraints, drugging, being above the law, multiple kidnappings (I'm doing crazy things with the classical definition of "rape" as in "abduction" and its shared etymology with "rapture" as in "being taken to the heavens"), and the very specific yet still common motif of "otherwise trustworthy partner goes too far and doesn't take 'no' for an answer." rocky on his own brings in the overprotective flavor common to a lot of dark romance novel heroes, i.e. "I make sure you sleep and I like to watch you while you do it, I make sure you eat enough even if you've got baggage about it, I make inhuman displays of strength when you're injured, and as long as I'm around I'll make sure nothing bad ever happens to you ever again."

the issue I was running into with researching this a few weeks ago is that almost all of the scholarly writing on the content of people's forced-sex fantasies focuses solely on women's fantasies and starts with the research question of "why would women enjoy imagining such a horrible misogynistic thing?" despite surveys often showing that men have force-fantasies (where they are the one being forced) at very comparable rates to women. my hypothesis for a bit was "either men's fantasies are exactly the same as women's or they're completely different in [x] way," which was disproven interestingly when I did finally find something about men's force-fantasies: in content they are almost exactly the same as women's fantasies but the emotional motivations are often different in [y] way, which I hadn't expected. and [y] also super applies to my buddy ryland, perhaps even more than my original [x] hypothesis.

my hopes for writing this are twofold: a) to address the question I sometimes see phm audience members come away with of "if grace likes his life by the end and doesn't seem that mad about all of that, is the message supposed to be 'violation of bodily autonomy is good, actually?'", and b) to lightly resist one of the prevailing notions in the study of forced-sex fantasies, that ravishment fantasies are solely abstracted and fantastical and pleasurable and are completely 100% separate from fearful paranoid imaginings of / flashbacks to realistic sexual violence.

[annabelle--cane]

oh also: the most common interpretation of why people have ravishment fantasies is that it allows the fantasist to disavow a desire they feel ashamed of because, in the fiction of the forcing, they don't *want* it at all, they're being made to do whatever it is and can't be considered at fault. as I allude to in my final paragraph of the original post, I think it's a tad more nuanced, but there's definitely a lot of truth to that. grace can tell stratt that he's not smart or important or capable or brave or selfless enough to do what she wants, but she'll ignore it, make him do it anyway, and kit him out with skilled staff members and expensive lab equipment and coffee just the way he likes it. it's a fantasy of being respected and heroic and good whether he likes it or not.

with rocky, the fantasy is of being forced to be loved and protected. rocky decides to initiate contact, he decides that he's moving into the hail mary, he decides that he's always going to watch grace sleep even if grace says he doesn't need it, he decides to gift grace the fuel to get home even when grace pretends he doesn't want it, and he decides he's not going to let grace die to save him even when grace says he's made his choice. the two scenarios allow grace to experience the rewards of being selfless without needing to be so gauche as to ever say he thinks he's that good of a person AND to experience the rewards of being selfish without saying he thinks he deserves to be cared for.

[everbright-mourning]

OH MY GOD OP THIS IS SUCH AN AMAZING THEORY TO EXPLORE. I'm just agog at how much truth there is in this and how I never considered how Grace gets acted upon so much by two powerful people. I'm so excited to see what the full essay argues!!

[ashlgcostumes]

As someone who is both trans and has a child, absolutely hilarious to me that society presents one of these as absolutely only to be done if you are 110% certain and have proved to several people that you want it bad enough and are ready, and the other is like. You might as well everyone else does. Just do it nobody feels ready. You don’t want to? Yes you do

Especially since one of those is pretty reversible if you change your mind after a couple years and the other one, well, technically but that’s pretty frowned upon

[staticbluue]

“People should pass a test before being allowed to have kids.” “Isn’t it scary how white people have this inborn capacity for evil?” “I’ll never pass because males and females have different skull shapes.” “Autistic people have a stronger sense of justice than anyone else.” “I don’t want AMABs in my space because they’re dangerous.” “You shouldn’t have access to hormones if you dress like THAT.” “Anyone who does something that awful isn’t human.” “Some people really shouldn’t be allowed to vote.”

This is eugenics. This is phrenology. THIS IS NAZI SHIT, YOU ARE A LEFTIST BUYING INTO NAZI SHIT. YOU ARE NOT IMMUNE TO NAZI SHIT.

[great-and-small]

As I feel compelled to share any wholesome Sandhill Crane content that I find, I hope you will enjoy this great video from Busch Wildlife Sanctuary. (I added a watermark so hopefully they won’t mind me yoinking this vid to share with y’all here)

The rescue posted that this little family has been spotted several times since the introduction and they seem to be doing great 🥹

Please consider donating to this organization to help fund their efforts in wildlife rehabilitation if you are able!

[naamahdarling]

I have seen human children do this awkward run so many times. 😭

[systlin]

Getting down on my knees and thanking the humans who invented dishwashers and washing machines.

[ihonestlydontknowwhattocallthis]

InsNe that dishwashers are more efficient and easier than just washing them manually but they also use less water. It’s a win win situation

[systlin]

They ALSO sterilize dishes, due to operating at a far higher temperature than human hands could ever tolerate. It's a win every way.

[systlin]

Made this post about 15 minutes after the repair guy who fixed the pump on my dishwasher packed up his tools and left, as the dishwasher was whirring along doing my dishes from that morning.

He said the exact same thing, which I did not know before that, so spreading this knowledge.

[pikoeatsglue32]

Look at my scientists dawg I’m gonna die on mars…

[hateusandseeifwemind]

[pinene]

Can anyone explain wtf is going on here especially a Korean speaker

[tadeadshihamurder]

someone on reddit explained 😭

[no-one-offical]

‎

[desmolbean404]

That is one of the most astronomical fuck up translations I have ever seen.

[teaboot]

Remember! When companies lay off all their staff because AI is cheaper, this sort of shit is what you can leverage for a better contract when they are inevitably forced to hire everyone back :)

[endcrys]

Happy disability pride to dissociative people, those with personality disorders, people with schizophrenia, and everyone elsewise labelled ‘insane’ and ‘crazy’ by annoying assholes. I hope you all have a pleasant & comfortable July and beyond

[not100bees]

The thing about Miss Piggy is that she kind of has a Roger Rabbit comedy superpower where she wins nearly any conceivable fight she's in. But unlike other characters of which that's true, like say, Bugs Bunny, who tend to win because they make the opponent play the game with their rules, Miss Piggy wins because the joke is that she can beat the shit out of literally anybody.

[not100bees]

Bugs Bunny beats Thanos by setting up an airport and making him take off the Infinity Gauntlet to go through the metal detector.

Miss Piggy beats Thanos by karate chopping him in the face and sending him flying.

[bitterkarella]

Midnight Pals: Apology

[mysterious circle of robed figures] JK Rowling: hello children Rowling: finally my evil plan reachesss fruition Rowling: it'ss taken me yearss of careful planning but finally Rowling: finally!!! Rowling: finally we can defeat the sscourge of human rightsss

Rowling: firssst of all i'm not jusst going to sssue amnesty international for money Rowling: i alsso want an apology Kathleen Stock: a just request, dark lord Julie Bindel: no one has been more wronged than you, dark lord Maya Forstater: careful, dark lord! the other viziers plot against you

Rowling: i want you to find the guy who runs amnesssty international Rowling: mr amnessty or whatever hiss name isss Rowling: and bring him here Stock: i don't think its run by a guy called mr amnesty, dark lord Rowling: whatever, you know i don't keep up with thiss human rightsss sstuff

Rowling: i want to ssee amnessty destroyed Rowling: i want to ssee all the human rightss people humiliated, groveling in the mud Rowling: begging for my forgivenesss Rowling: right before the boot comess down on their throat Rowling: i am a beloved national treassssure and i demand my due!

Amnesty: the gender critical movement is fundamentally an anti-human rights movement Rowling: how dare you!!! don't you know how much money i have? Amnesty: Sorry. Im sorry. Im trying to remove it.

Rowling: finally, i will have my revenge! Rowling: you don't remember me do you, amnesty? Amnesty: uh Amnesty: of course i know you, you're JK Rowling, the famous transphobe Rowling: that's not all Rowling: look closer Amnesty: wait Amnesty: wait no Amnesty: it can't be!

Amnesty: you're that junior clerk temp receptionist apprentice part timer that we fired for writing fan fic on the clock! Rowling: HA HA HA YESSSS Rowling: AND I'M BACK! Stock, Bindel et al: She's back! Rowling: and I'm on the prowl Rowling: revenge would taste sso ssweet right now!

[many many years ago] Rowling: [writing] the best kind of wizard is a boy wizard Amnesty Supervisor: joanne do you have that memo about african genocide i asked for Rowling: not yet AS: ok well i need it soon AS: there's a bunch of genocides we need to deal with AS: i mean we're real behind on that

AS: look, i'm afraid we're going to have to let you go Rowling: WHAT!? AS: it's just that i don't believe that you're really taking these genocides seriously AS: since you started working here, we've become really backed up on genocides AS: like, we're never supposed to have this many happening

Rowling: you can't fire me! AS: we'll have some amnesty goons escort you to the door Rowling: jusst you wait! i might jusst be sssome nobody now, but sssomeday i'll be a beloved national treasure! Rowling: like jonathan king or jimmy sssavile!! Rowling: then you'll be sssssorry!!!

[present day] Rowling: that'sss right, i planned it all out Rowling: every night for forty yearsss, i dreamed of thisss day Rowling: and finally!!! Rowling: REVENGE!!!!!! HA HA HA!!!! Rowling: anyway now sssay you're sssorry Rowling: alsso, here, kissss the ring