Embrace your inner purple

Feminism, history, random facts, comics, cartoons, social justice, sporking and anything else that catches my attention. My religion teacher used to use "purple" as a word to represent anything that set a person apart, that they hated about themselves and wanted to hide. Then she'd smile and say not to hide or hate yourself for being different. I agree. Embrace your inner purple!

[powerpuff-man9895]

Heartwarming, isn't it?

[anitoonzforever]

Awww!! The girls reunited with the professor! How sweet!! 🩷🩵💚

[blenderbender1811]

Westeros Beauty Standards - Men Edition

Second verse, same as the first. Focused on noble men this time.

Jon Arryn - Said to look like Harrold Hardyng in his youth, who has sandy blonde hair, blue eyes, and an aquiline nose. Jon has broad shoulders.

Joffrey Baratheon - Tall, strong, blonde curly hair, deep green eyes, pouty lips.

Renly Baratheon - Powerfully built, lean, lithe, clean shaven, tall, broad chest, easy smile, thick fine and straight black hair kept clean and combed, either shoulder length or cut short. Laughing blue-green eyes.

Robert Baratheon - Black hair, blue eyes, very tall. When he was younger he was clean shaven, with rough and hard hands. Strong, powerful build and muscled 'like a maiden's fantasy'.

Daemon I Blackfyre - Tall, powerful, broad shoulders, muscular arms, flat stomach, deep purple eyes, long silver-gold hair, always went clean shaven.

Daemon II Blackfyre - Lean, lithe, clean shaven, fine featured, collar length silver-gold hair, sparkling dark purple eyes

Baelor Blacktyde - Smooth faced

Tristifer Botley - Messy brown hair, large eyes.

Criston Cole - Coal black hair, pale green eyes, charming.

Lyn Corbray - Slender, shoulder length brown hair, a hard mouth, restless eyes and a wicked smile.

Gerold Dayne - Clean shaven, aquiline nose, high cheekbones, dark purple eyes, strong jaw, collar length thick silver hair with a midnight black streak

Beric Dondarrion - Slight build, red gold hair.

Gerris Drinkwater - Tall, lean, blue-green eyes, sandy sun streaked hair.

Androw Farman - Pale blue eyes, long flaxen hair.

Euron Greyjoy - Pale skin, black hair, a neat black beard, one smiling blue eye and, rumoured, a black eye under his eye patch.

Theon Greyjoy - Lean, black hair, lean and dark face, cocky smile.

Victarion Greyjoy - Broad bulls chest, a 'boy's' flat stomach, huge hands, hair flecked with grey.

Harrold Hardyng - Sandy hair, deep blue eyes, dimples when he smiles, aquiline nose, good teeth, tall, clean limbed, well muscled

Jaime Lannister - Tall, curly gold hair, flashing cat green eyes, and a smile that cuts like a knife, muscular

Jason Lannister - Tall, gold haired

Lancel Lannister - Thick sandy hair, green eyes, a wisp of a moustache

Tyland Lannister - Tall, gold haired

Tymond Lannister - Long gold mustachios and hair, lithe, slender

Tyrek Lannister - Long golden curls

Jason Mallister - Tall, lean, brown hair mixed with white, fierce blue-grey eyes, gaunt and chiseled face, high cheekbones, clean shaven

Justin Massey - Large and fleshy with loose limbs, pink cheeks, blue eyes, a tangled mop of thick and straight white blonde hair, a ready smile, a neatly trimmed blond beard

Arys Oakheart - Light brown hair

Eustace Osgrey - Tall, broad shouldered, big boned, barrel chested, strong sharp features, thick moustache and close cropped hair, pale grey eyes

Robar Royce - Pale eyes

Waymar Royce - Graceful, slender, grey eyes

Barristan Selmy - Tall, sad pale blue eyes, blond when he was young and now turned white haired, strong, graceful

Brandon Stark - Grey eyes

Eddard Stark - Dark grey eyes (which, if they're like Jon's, are almost black), long face, long brown hair with a beard beginning to grey. Ned was. considered less handsome than Brandon.

Lucamore Strong - Broad shouldered, blond, large build

Balon Swann - Big across the chest, arms thick with muscle.

Aegon Targaryen (son of Aenys I) - Lean

"Aegon Targaryen" (young Griff) - Lithe, lanky build, purple eyes that can appear blue, dyed blue hair, tall.

Aegon III Targaryen - Dark purple eyes that are nearly black, silver hair so pale it's nearly white, lean face and body, tall, short beard

Aegon IV Targaryen - Small mouth, large beard

Aegon V Targaryen - Large deep dark purple eyes that could appear blue, silver gold hair that he wore to his shoulders as an adult, tall, slender,

Aegon II Targaryen - Sullen eyes, pouty mouth, wispy moustache

Aemon Targaryen (son of Jaehaerys I) - Lilac eyes, white gold hair, tall

Aemon Targaryen (The Dragonknight) - Large

Aerion Targaryen - Slim, average height, curly silver-gold hair, deep violet eyes, pale unblemished skin, sculptured and imperious face with a high brow, sharp cheekbones, and a straight nose

Aerys II Targaryen - Purple eyes, gold-silver hair

Daeron Targaryen (son of Viserys I) - Silver gold hair, purple eyes

Daeron I Targaryen - Clean shaven, long hair

Jaehaerys I Targaryen - Purple eyes, gold-silver hair, worn in a braid down to his waist, beard and moustache, moves with easy grace, nice smile and intimidating frown

Rhaegar Targaryen - Deep purple indigo eyes, long elegant fingers, tall, silver gold hair, an iron toned voice

Valarr Targaryen - Shorter, more slender than his dad, light brown hair with a silver gold streak, blue eyes

Viserys II Targaryen - Long silver gold hair, clean shaven, prominent nose, bushy eyebrows, shrewd and calculating look

Terrence Toyne - Tall and dark

Garlan Tyrell - Brown curly hair, light golden brown eyes, tall, broadly built, with a beard

Leo Tyrell (son of Moryn) - Sly hazel eyes, ash blond hair that falls over one eye, pale skin, soft sly voice

Loras Tyrell - Lazy brown curly hair in ringlets which tumbles over his eyes, big intelligent and lively light golden brown eyes, lithe, graceful, slender frame

Mace Tyrell - Curly brown hair, a beard with white and grey bits in it and cut into a triangular shape, red faced. He is fat now but looking at him you can tell he used to be powerfully built.

Jacaerys Velaryon - Brown hair, brown eyes, pug nose

Joffrey Velaryon - Brown hair, brown eyes, pug nose

Laenor Velaryon - Purple eyes, silver-white hair, aquiline nose

Lucerys Velaryon - Brown eyes, brown hair, pug nose, strong

Monford Velaryon - Long fair hair

Aurane Waters - Lean, silver gold hair, grey-green eyes, cleft chin, beard, narrow face, wicked smile.

So! Overall

Unblemished skin (including freckles)

Big eyes

Long hair, especially curly

Either lithe and lean or big broad builds

Being tall and muscular

Seems like they generally prefer men clean shaven? I mean, beards clearly aren't deal breakers but most of the guys described as handsome are clean shaven.

[just-another-cat-blog]

pride month!!!

[lemonsharks]

Is that a miette?

[jeanjauthor]

Pride for you!  Pride for a thousand years!!

[lost-and-cursed]

you COME OUT to miette? you come out to her as queer? oh! oh! pride for mother! pride for mother for One Thousand Years!!!!

[sugerberry]

Anyone else binge watching The Weekenders?

[disneystheweekenders]

meeee ^^

[cheaphalloweencostume]

i need to come up with a way to say “i mean like, movies for grownups” that doesn’t make me feel like a villain

[blenderbender1811]

I don't think that sounds villainous at all. As a huge geek who does enjoy kids/YA stuff sometimes, I recognize not everyone does and even people who DO don't enjoy it all the time. I don't either! Sometimes you just wanna chill and watch Game of Thrones or Call the Midwife, y'know?

Two questions (100% in good faith, I understand that your notes have not always been in good faith)

1 - Does the rating of the movie matter or just the intended audience? I'm thinking of movies that may have been made with adults in mind but don't really contain anything objectionable for kids, like a lot of older classic movies.

2 - You mentioned Mulholland Drive in the notes. Is that indicative of your genre/plot element preferences or was that just a random example?

I'm asking because I genuinely want to make good recommendations and my librarian mode activated.

[ebonykain]

“The day after Columbine, I was interviewed for the Tom Brokaw news program. The reporter had been assigned a theory and was seeking sound bites to support it. “Wouldn’t you say,” she asked, “that killings like this are influenced by violent movies?” No, I said, I wouldn’t say that. “But what about Basketball Diaries?” she asked. “Doesn’t that have a scene of a boy walking into a school with a machine gun?” The obscure 1995 Leonardo Di Caprio movie did indeed have a brief fantasy scene of that nature, I said, but the movie failed at the box office (it grossed only $2.5 million), and it’s unlikely the Columbine killers saw it. The reporter looked disappointed, so I offered her my theory. “Events like this,” I said, “if they are influenced by anything, are influenced by news programs like your own. When an unbalanced kid walks into a school and starts shooting, it becomes a major media event. Cable news drops ordinary programming and goes around the clock with it. The story is assigned a logo and a theme song; these two kids were packaged as the Trench Coat Mafia. The message is clear to other disturbed kids around the country: If I shoot up my school, I can be famous. The TV will talk about nothing else but me. Experts will try to figure out what I was thinking. The kids and teachers at school will see they shouldn’t have messed with me. I’ll go out in a blaze of glory.” In short, I said, events like Columbine are influenced far less by violent movies than by CNN, the NBC Nightly News and all the other news media, who glorify the killers in the guise of “explaining” them. I commended the policy at the Sun-Times, where our editor said the paper would no longer feature school killings on Page 1. The reporter thanked me and turned off the camera. Of course the interview was never used. They found plenty of talking heads to condemn violent movies, and everybody was happy.”

— Roger Ebert (via flowersofthecity)

[iconuk01]

I always applaud the stance taken by Jacinta Adern in New Zealand after a white supremacist attacked a mosque in Christchurch

She said: “I implore you, speak the names of those who were lost rather than the name of the man who took them. He is a terrorist. He is a criminal. He is an extremist. But he will, when I speak, be nameless.”

[chelonianmobile]

#starve such people of the oxygen of publicity

[blenderbender1811]

Some Asshole initiative.

[stealthwitch]

Diary of a Redwall Mouse

July 22nd: breakfasted on a lovely array of fresh strawberries and goat’s cheese with honey, oat cakes and barley porridge. For luncheon we feasted on a catch of smoked trout, vegetable stew, and of course a couple of flagons of October Ale

July 23rd: countless deaths

[ahsoka-in-a-hood]

You know how when the zygerria arc comes up theres always a bunch of people saying things like why would you allow a former slave go on slave ring busting mission, Anakin has slave trauma he shouldn't be fighting slavery? Idk exactly what that says about The Culture (as in our culture rn) and attitudes towards trauma and the survivors of violence, but i think it says something.

As far as I'm concerned, Anakin expressed one motive for joining the jedi as a child, and that was freeing slaves, and the fact that a galactic war broke out and he spent his short career as a soldier instead of carrying out a hundred zygerria missions- that's a tragedy, actually.

[blenderbender1811]

See, I want Anakin to be able to free more slaves, but the Zygerria arc also demonstrated to me that for Anakin, a lot of the time his vengeance and anger comes before the ostensible lofty goal he has. Like, with Zygerria, to me, he was way more focused on hating the Zygerrians than he was on helping the Togruta.

I wish he got to do more slave busting missions but I also question how good he'd actually be at them.

[divorceddadrock]

The problem with being a Star Wars fan who actually reads the books is not every Star Wars book is good. Like some of them are really great but some of them are really boring and a chore to get through. Like normally if you're not into a book you can just not finish it but if it's a Star Wars book you feel obligated to finish it if for no other reason than to build your nerd cred. Like fandom homework.

[divorceddadrock]

I must force myself to give a shit about this author's OCs so I can get a good grade in Star Wars fandom, something that is normal to want and possible to achieve.

[magnetarbeam]

[haven-of-dusk]

I was rewatching RotS the other day, because I'm guilty of it being probably my favorite Star Wars movie, and one scene in particular struck me in a way I hadn't really thought about before.

Order 66 is already an incredibly tragic scene, with a fantastic score, that never fails to give me chills, but in this case I was particularly hit by the short sequence where Zett Jukassa is killed by the clones right in front of Bail Organa.

At first glance, it's just a fun way to do a cameo by George Lucas' son, and that's likely all it was intended as, without an additional thematic meaning. But the structure of the moment does say something about the Jedi that I think is important.

When Zett appears, he's clearly making a break for Bail's speeder, seeing it as a means of escaping the massacre and inferno inside the temple. Given his youth, it's entirely possible the lightsaber he's holding isn't even his, it might've been his master's, or just one he grabbed from a fallen Jedi to defend himself as he fled. But with the brutal efficiency of Order 66, he's probably seen a lot of people he knows and cares about slaughtered by the clones already, and is more than likely aware of the risks involved in engaging any clones in a fight.

Yet despite all of that, when the clones open fire, Zett's first instinct isn't to duck and hide in the speeder or get himself out of danger, it's to plant himself between Bail and the hail of gunfire and try to protect Bail. It's entirely possible Zett has no idea who Bail is, and at most he probably just knows him as a Senator and occassional visitor to the Temple, but it doesn't matter. When faced with danger his first instinct isn't to protect himself, it's the selfless instinct to protect others. And it cost him his life.

(I had a paragraph here talking about the plot of 'Padawan Lost' and its relation to this moment, but this post is long enough already so I might make a separate post about that).

The reason I find this moment so impactful is that it represents the type of 'light' Palpatine wanted to eradicate. Selfless good, protecting others and putting them before yourself, self-sacrifice, they're all values the Jedi represent, and they're all values Palpatine needs the galaxy to lose hold of if he wants his grip on power to remain.

It's a running theme throughout the OT, Andor, the Clone Wars, and more, that fighting FOR others gives people a strength they wouldn't otherwise have. Han chose to come back and help the rebels in A New Hope, Luke and Anakin defeated Palpatine because they were fighting for each other instead of for themselves, etc. Tyrants like Palpatine thrive when people distrust each other, when they're driven to look out solely for their own interests, because it keeps the people separated, oppressed, and severely lacking in morale.

Palpatine didn't just kill the Jedi, he symbolically slaughtered the galaxy's hope and selflessness, setting the perfect stage for his own power. And to take it even farther, he framed the Jedi as dangerous traitors. The symbols of good were, if one believed his words, revealed to be crafty villains who had fooled the Republic into trusting them just so they could gain power. He framed the Jedi as doing the very thing he did, so that he could be the galaxy's hope, putting a stop to the 'threat' and protecting the Republic. But if you can't trust the Jedi, who can you trust? Your neighbors? Your friends? Your senators? It's terrifying how Palpatine successfully generated the environment of fear and paranoia that would keep him in power while exterminating the organization representing everything that would ideologically undermine him.

And it's even more terrifying that some viewers of Star Wars have essentially bought Palpatine's lies and uncritically act as though the Jedi were some ultra-corrupt, morally reprehensible organization.

[kimyoonmiauthor]

US Book ban on LGBTQIA books

The Nationwide Book Ban Bill Moves to the House: How to Take Action Now

The nationwide book ban bill, HR 7661, has progressed out of committee and into the House. Here's what you need to know to take action.

At least hit the shiny repost button if you're going to do nothing else. This should not stand.

Stop the bill dead in its tracks. LGBTQIA people have a right to be represented in books.

[prismatic-bell]

GovTrack shows a 21% chance of passing.

That's hopeful, but not good enough. Make those phone calls, folks.

[aluox]

There’s probably more but these are the ones I can think of at the moment! Please be considerate and don’t play pranks at other people’s expenses!

Have fun everyone!

[blenderbender1811]

I had an eighth grade class yesterday pull a cute prank on their teacher. One student asked to go to the bathroom and when he said yes, they all left and came to my library to 'hide from their teacher'. He came in like two seconds later and saw them immediately and said it was a good one because there was no potential for anyone to be hurt by it.

[selfgoals]

If you can’t reblog this, unfollow me now.

[sunkissedspider]

it’s fucking disgusting that i just lost 6 followers

[hotel-firingsquad]

[shirzan140102]

CHILD SOLDIERS: Another Humanitarian Crisis in the Making in Iran

There are reports that that IRGC is trying to recruit children as young as 12 years old into its ranks for suppression and surveillance. Keep in mind that while they're not being overt in the marketing of this opportunity, they're going to arm and militarize these children. They want to get kids involved in their operations and their fight not just to bolster their numbers but also to create human shields. And if these kids somehow end up killed because they're caught up in the crossfire, they'll be passed off as martyrs and victims.

If anyone doesn't believe that this is their MO, I urge you to look into their use of child soldiers during the Iran-Iraq War. They have a history of this behavior.

The safety of children means nothing to them. These children are tools for propaganda, whether it's through making it seem like they have more support and having more tools or through having more sacrificial pawns whose deaths can be used to spread a distorted message.

This is absolute evil.

SOURCE: https://www.iranintl.com/en/202603265637

[insert-some-url]

If you were vocal about schools getting bombed but stay silent over IRGC’s war crimes you don’t care about Iranian lives. Period

[pedro-friedeberg]

Child soldiers:

Child marriage:

Child rape:

Murdering children:

Iranian children and teens say they hate the iri: WELL they’ve clearly been brainwashed to parrot western zionist propaganda, anything less than fawning adoration for the evil theocracy ruling over them with an iron fist is due to nefarious (((outside interference))), and besides their lives hold worth inasmuch as they exist purely for the mullahs’ benefit and the occasional pro-regime photo op for western revolutionary comrades to circulate on social media (but never ever talk to those children face to face of course)

[blenderbender1811]

If you're Canadian, War Child Canada works to help child soldiers and they work in the region: https://www.warchild.net/research-and-development/child-soldier/

If you're American, so does Save the Children: https://www.savethechildren.org/us/charity-stories/child-soldiers

[mycroftrh]

hot take here but the way people talk about “redemption arcs” and how they require that the sinner repent, debase himself, and then atone for his sins in order to be accepted back into the warmth of readers’ love, but there are some unforgivable sins for which no atonement is enough

is INCREDIBLY culturally christian

[viridianmasquerade]

Can you give some ideas of what a redemption arc rooted in a non-Christian framework might look like?

[mycroftrh]

[I wrote a whole-ass essay with citations here I’m sorry]

[Also, if anyone has better/other examples (or any other input!) I very much welcome discussion and contribution.  I’m working from an extremely limited point of view myself, here, and I’m very aware of that.]

There are potentially infinite ways to write a narrative arc that takes a character from antagonist to protagonist, just as there are potentially infinite ways a religion or culture can align its values.  And I am way too long-winded to be allowed to just keep talking indefinitely.  So I’m going to limit myself to two topics:

Option 1: get rid of “sin is in the heart, not in the deed”

“No matter how clean we are on the outside, if the inside, the nature, the heart, remains unchanged… we will return to what we came from and once more be filthy both inside and out.” - 2 Peter 2:20-22

“I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” - Matthew 5:27-30

This is a general Christian concept: an evil thought is as bad, and as tainting, as an evil action.  A Christian-based antagonist-to-protagonist arc, then, will typically focus far less on good actions than on good thoughts.  But this isn’t true for all cultures - and is frankly a minority view!

Let’s look at, hmm… Loki.  A huge portion of myths with Loki in them follow a very specific arc: Loki does something dodgy; it causes problems; Loki fixes the problems, not only saving the day but leaving everyone far better off than they were at the beginning of the story.  Did Loki have a change of heart?  Nope!  They’ll be the exact same trickster bastard in the next myth.  But at the beginning, they were the one causing problems (antagonist/villain).   And at the end, they were the one actively improving things and saving the day (hero).

Loki’s a particularly useful example, because a) this is a very standard arc for a trickster deity, which exists in darn near every polytheistic religion and b) we can specifically see what happens when Christians interact with this sort of narrative.  They recast Loki - who normally ends up helping people, and in some myths is just straight-up benevolent beginning to end - as their “Satan” equivalent.

For a pop culture example of “was doing bad deeds, now doing good deeds” as an antagonist-to-protagonist arc, I suggest Spike, from Buffy the Vampire Slayer.  [We’re going to ignore the end of season 6 and all of season 7, because things went off the rails there.]  Spike’s arc was: super evil villain; villain who helps the heroes a couple times for selfish reasons; villain? who is physically prevented from villainous actions; villain?? who starts doing heroic actions purely as an outlet for violence; villain??? who protects specific innocents because he cares about them as individuals; villain???? who does heroic things because he doesn’t want people he loves to hate him/ be disappointed; hero who’s willing to sacrifice his own life to save others because, darn it, he’s in the habit now.

He didn’t have a ‘come-to-jesus moment’ where he regretted the centuries of torture and murder and then mope about in self-flagellation and do metaphorical Hail-Marys to pay for his crimes.  He did go from the primary villain of the series at his introduction, to a primary hero by the end, over a period of several years with intricate and engaging character development all the way through.

Option 2: Rehabilitation, not Retribution

“Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation.” - 2 Corinthians 7:10

“When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, ‘Brothers, what shall we do?’  Peter replied, ‘Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins.’ ” - Acts 2:37-38

“If we don’t feel some sort of immediate guilt, then our hearts are not sensitive to what God desires from us. If we just move on with no second thought then it is likely that we are seeing grace as a license to sin.” - pursuegod.org

“I will speak of that second region, where the human spirit is purged, and becomes fit to climb to Heaven.” - Dante’s Purgatorio, Canto I

“The biblical approach of equivalence (lex talionis) and nineteenth-century British theories of intolerable wrongs, deterrence, and retribution (vergeltung) form the dominant theories of punishment in Canadian society.  They try to ensure that certain individuals physically suffer for their human weaknesses, conduct, and mistakes… Most Aboriginal peoples have never understood the exotic passion of Eurocentric society for labeling people as criminals and then making them suffer.” - Justice As Healing: Indigenous Ways, which looks like a spectacular book

The character suffering is a primary feature of the “redemption arc” as characterized in my original post.  They should be absolutely miserable from the inside out - “cut to the heart;” full of “godly sorrow”.  And then they should suffer from the outside in, as payment for their crimes.

Normally, of course, a villain should end the story “in hell”.  (Dead, imprisoned, fate-worse-than-death - somehow punished.)  So in order for that to not happen, our aspiring ex-villain must go instead through Purgatory.  I’ll use the visual from Dante: his Purgatory is an near-infinitely-tall mountain up which a sinner must climb.  The sinner’s labor and suffering as he climbs cleanse his soul, leaving him worthy to enter heaven.

Likewise, in the Christian-based “redemption arc”, the ex-villain needs to not only want to do good things now, and not only regret having done bad things in the past, but to pay for having done bad things in the past.  The priority is not so much that there are good people doing good things; it is that people who have done bad things get punished.  (This is of course manifested in many ways IRL.  For example, the most statistically-proven-effective way to reduce the number of drug-related offenses isn’t to put addicts in prison, it’s to put them in rehab; but that’s not a punishment.  The most statistically-proven-effective way to reduce the number of abortions isn’t outlawing abortion, it’s comprehensive sex ed; but that doesn’t punish the sin of promiscuity.)

The point being, if you take out the need for Godly Sorrow followed by Purgatory in order to achieve Salvation from your narrative: you open the option for narrative arcs where the focus isn’t on people being punished for the bad they did before, but the good they do now.

Let’s say we bring back the “change of heart” that we largely dropped in the previous option.  Now we have space for an arc that is about why they choose to change.  What causes them to realize what they did before was wrong?  What causes them to want to do something different?  And then what keeps them compassionate, when not caring hurts so much less?  What keeps them from lashing out again, when lashing out relieves their anger and hurt?

Or - what if we made our arc about healing?  Remember that bit about putting addicts in rehab - focusing not on punishing them, but on helping them recover from the pain and illness that caused them to do illegal things?  What if we do that?  Fictional villainy tends to come from pain; so what if, instead of causing them more pain, we help them heal from it?

The majority of indigenous cultures take this approach IRL: justice is focused around healing.  The goal is to heal both the person who acted out of pain or foolishness or simple human frailty, and the society or victim which that person has harmed.  

Honestly, in terms of accessible Western media?  A lot of the best examples of this are in fanfic.  In terms of published media, though - with less of a focus on healing, superhero media do get a lot of “villain changes heart and becomes hero, focus is that they are now doing good things and another person doing good things is good, not that they should be hurt for having been bad” storylines.  It’s most common with team-based stories.  The X-Men, for instance, swap sides pretty regularly, but the important thing when they’re saving the world is that they’re saving the world now.  Not what role they played in last year’s crossover event.

For a movie example, though not a great one, see Magneto at the end of X-Men Apocalypse.  He realizes that continuing to do evil will result in the deaths of the only two people he still loves; has a change of heart; assists in saving the world; and then is brought home to help rebuild.  No retribution necessary.  His former partner/recent enemy is mostly just really delighted that Erik’s back, and that he’s happier now.  In Dark Phoenix, we learn Magneto’s spent the intervening time building a safe haven for persecuted mutants, complete with recycled building materials and community gardens.

In Conclusion

It may sound like what I’m doing here is just a lot of “take that out”.  If you just take out half the elements of a “redemption arc”, doesn’t that automatically make it less complex and interesting and, y’know, good?

But what I’m saying is not to take out elements.  It’s to ponder the necessity of requirements.  Give yourself - and others - more room for narrative freedom.  If you don’t have to fit the extremely restrictive godly sorrow-repentance-purgatory-salvation formula, imagine what other aspects of the character and the narrative you can get a chance to explore!

[blenderbender1811]

I would argue the first one isn't really a 'redemption' arc though. Most cultures ideas of redemption I've seen do entail you actually needing to be sorry and have at least some way of trying to address what you did, even if it can't be fixed. That's not the same as grovelling or punishing or debasement. It's literally just 'Oh, shit, I was doing something awful'. It's normal to feel bad about that but that doesn't require them, IDK, falling at people's feet beating themselves up over it. If you don't feel like you need redeeming for something, can it really be a redemption arc?

That's not to say you can't have an antagonist become a protagonist but I'd argue that's not really the same thing. You can swap sides without being sorry for the things you did before - wrestling characters do it all the time. Hell, a lot of heels (bad guys for those of you who don't know the wrestling lingo) show up, save someone and do good with absolutely no viable explanation beyond 'I felt like being the good guy now' and everyone else just goes 'seems legit' except for a couple people who might have specific beef with them over past incidents. Spike's a pretty good example of that. Negan's another one. I wouldn't say any of them have a 'redemption arc' though. I call them 'face turns' or 'changes of heart'.

Those can still be good if done right. I'm not saying don't ever write them. I don't consider those redemption arcs though.

[yesornopolls]

Can you name more than 15 African countries?

Can you name more than 15 African countries?

Yes

No

Voting ended onMar 25

[blenderbender1811]

Off the top of my head, no googling

1 - Egypt

2 - Mali

3 - Eswatini

4 - South Africa

5 - Rwanda

6 - Senegal

7 - Algeria

8 - Namibia

9 - South Sudan

10 - Malawi

11 - Lesotho

12 - Botswana

13 - Ghana

14 - Guinea

15 - Burundi.

[disfiguredgrace]

i think the pro palestine movement is dealing in actual collective psychosis. like is the ongoing genocide in the room with us right now

[disfiguredgrace]

the war is over. like actively right now the ceasefire holds and the war is over. what the fuck are y’all on about. do any of you, does a single blessed one, actually know the mechanisms of a genocide? i don’t think so!!!!!!!!!!

[jraker4]

According to that lot, Palestinians have been subjected to seventy years of one of history’s worst genocides. This? This isn’t even heavy rhetorical lifting for them.

[the-library-alcove]

On top of that, as accurately summed up by @a-s-fischer in the comments:

[themodernmaccabee]

Hence why they hammer "the occupation" into any conversation they can.

[h4ganah]

Hence why they'll claim that "Israel has been committing genocide since 1948 and then just Not Elaborate

And when you start talking to them about "the occupation" it inevitably clear thar they are NOT talking about the West Bank

[biglawbear]

This is the logical endpoint of the leftist/progressive/woke/whatever viewpoint. It deals in maximalism and extremism.

Like, fifteen years ago I was hearing things like "a white person's presence is a threat to all Black bodies in the vicinity" and "a man's presence is a direct threat to any woman." No nuance.

If someone's mere existence is an explicit threat to you, then it gives you license to commit violence.

[afurioushawk]

This is also white supremacy's exact belief, verbatim: any Black person's presence is a direct threat to white safety.

Leftists took what were some reasonable requests (Black people want spaces where they don't have to deal with white supremacy, women want spaces where they don't have to deal with men, etc.) and took that to their most extreme.

Which is why we also have racist leftists adopting other white supremacist beliefs like anti-miscegenation.

[queermarzipan]

this is part of the issue: "women wanting spaces where they don’t have to deal with men" isn't reasonable. men are not a monolith of misogyny. this statement is not on par with "spaces where femininity is celebrated" or "spaces which have anti-misogyny as a policy" - it's policing identity. not behaviour, and not culture.

the presence of a person with [x identity] is never an explicit threat to you unless said identity is political.

[blenderbender1811]

Yeah, no. Wanting spaces where you don't have to deal with men isn't a problem, any more than a space for members of a certain culture to meet or spaces that are strictly for LGBTQ+ people or disabled people. There are groups based around identity that meet to discuss issues related to that identity all the time. That's not a slam against people outside that identity or saying they're some sort of threat unless you take it that way.