back when midnight sun was officially announced, i wrote a post talking about my experience as a white fan of the series, back when i was younger and as i’ve grown and educated myself and interacted with the fandom more and more. now that tumblr lets you pin a post, i wanted to make a new post for resources, because the original post is a lot to scroll through and i wanted the links to be more accessible + easier to find.
under the cut is links to learn about racism (both in general and specifically anti- indigenous, as that is the largest issue present in the twilight books), ways to help, and links to check out various indigenous creators that deserve your support. always open to suggestions of links to add, in any of the categories. if i have linked your post/blog/website/etc. and you do not want it linked, please let me know and i will remove it asap. updated often.
most important: the quileute tribe is currently working on their move to higher ground project. many of their lands are currently in flooding danger zones, and this project is (as the name suggests) working to move to safer areas so they can continue to thrive. if you are able, please consider donating to that project here.
great news! the quileute tribe has begun construction on the new school.(x) there are still many phases to this project however, so please continue donating to them if you are able!
please let me know if a link is incorrect, if i made any type of error, or if there is a way this can be easier to navigate!
Because I studied landscape architecture for a while I was curious how many floors the Volturi home could be, considering it’s built underneath the current Volterra city and was started being built in the Etruscan era. Unfortunately I did not have access anymore to arcgis so everything is based on free access maps, articles and pictures of the city. That I went there last may helped too.
The map
There would be three entrances and because of the sewers, the first floor would start at least 3 or 4 metres deep. The soil is mostly clay but the hill is made out of sand and calcarenites. Structures in clay tend to fall apart, so I kind of believe the volturi structure would almost only exist in the sand section. Which is btw still around 75 metres thick... lots of possibilities. I added the necropolis as well because that is where the Etruscans buried their dead. There are also tunnels and tombs there, so why wouldn't the kings have built a tunnel there? If you want to know how Etruscan structures look like underground: I found a website that has pictures. This is where our beloved volturi vampires live.. maybe they structured it a bit more over the centuries. Adding libraries and training grounds with a bit of fantasy. Here is a website that shows how the acropolis looked like if you are interested.
The entrances:
And then I was also looking for good spots for the entries of their home. The palazzo is a tourist spot, a town hall and has no basement, not quite ideal! Here are my suggestions:
Not the main entry but a way for the Volturi lower guards to leave the main area and guard the city easily. A restaurant showcased an archeological site underneath their floor. It’s supposed to be an old path and entry to a house from the Etruscan era. What if several houses are owned by the volturi that have such entries? Guards could easily leave the underground area to guard the city. Most houses had basement floors that were clearly unused. Of course there can’t be too many or they would have a risk with so many entries.
There is an archaeological site on the hill where the remains lie of the acropolis. Many parts were closed off because, according to the information there, you could fall down several metres deep. It’s deep and they cannot explore it because of the vulnerability of the rocks. What if one of these are an official entry for guard duties? They simply need to jump or climb and open it. At night there are no humans around and there aren’t street lamps around either. (Ignore my shoes lol)
Just outside of the walls I found a war monument. It’s a bit of a quiet spot with a beautiful view, you can see a lot of the area there. There is a sewer underneath those tiles and it seems to go pretty deep. I was thinking this could be a modern entry for an older tunnel they had built. And this would be the official known entry for other covens to visit the Volturi. Just like in the books, they would have to walk through a sewer, or climb down a tunnel inside the sewer. Bonus: it’s big enough for Felix to enter :)
Other important notes:
In the books and the movies the throne room is built in the tower. That is impossible if you would use Volterra as how it’s really built. Instead, the throne room would be ancient and deep underground. Etruscan writings on the walls and definitely Etruscan structures. In that case; Bella, Edward and Alice would be led into a secluded area where no light or air would ever come. Aka, Bella wouldn’t be able to breathe there and die before she would even get close to arriving there. Cough, cough, dusty kings.
Same goes for the queens. There is no tower big enough to have a room. You could have them live in one of the houses but I would say the kings keep them in a secluded room somewhere deep underground… poor women.
As for Heidi’s tour: I have found abandoned buildings in the Volterra area. It is technically possible for a tunnel to be built leading towards the city. Several archeologists in articles have explained that the Etruscans were constantly building tunnels of which most are not yet found. Realistically, I would say they have a space built underground just outside the city, leading a tunnel towards that. The humans get eaten there and their bodies are disposed of or destroyed at the abandoned building. No accid needed! In the modern times I would think Heidi has them killed in the abandoned building, has guards put their blood in pretty jars and bottles and then delivers those to every guard and the kings. With so much surveillance and technology nowadays she maybe even just orders blood or they own blood banks..
Additional
There is so much information available about the Etruscans and their structures. I bought books and I haven't read everything yet. Most of the knowledge is gone so there is so much we don't know. Several articles have stated that there are structures beneath the city of Volterra we will never find or get access to! It is super interesting. I haven't even talked about the amfi theatre… If someone wants to add their thoughts or knowledge, please do!
Used sources
My own pictures from my visit there.
Books I bought there:
Volterra miniguide history, monuments and art
Guidorama The Etruscans
Guidorama Volterra
Websites:
Access to the section for consulting the available cartography.
Gemiddelde hoogte: 228 m • Volterra, Pisa, Toscane, 56048, Italië • Visualisatie en delen van gratis topografische kaarten.
Topographic Map of Volterra, Pisa, Italia. Elevation, latitude and longitude of Volterra, Pisa, Italia on the world topo map.
the discovery of a Roman amphitheater in Volterra is getting seriously exciting. here’s the latest news
The excavation works in the Acropolis have brought back to light an area dedicated to religious activities: starting from the 6th century BC
Outside the fortification are the Necropolises of the Main Gate, Badia, Ulimeto and Ripaie, which have been under excavation since the 18th
tbh, New Moon ending with "Edward came back, and i snapped out of my crippling depression :)" feels scarier than actually healing from your severe mental illness. how terrifying would it be to spend six months slogging through hell, then suddenly waking up in your fairytale wonderland like nothing happened? i'd be clawing at the walls waiting for the other shoe to drop. idk how you can look at the love of your life & not wonder whether he was real, or a memory, or a delusion. are you dead? dying? asleep? crazy? if so, to what extent? when he goes hunting, can you be sure he was real? when he follows you to class, does he feel like a ghost? when you dream, do you dream of the real Edward? the past Edward? or the hallucination? where did the pain that reminded you you were alive go? why do you suddenly have an appetite after wasting away to skin and bones? even Bella "I'm good with weird" Swan has her limits, and tbh "my soulmate, who weaponized my worst insecurities & sent me into a psychosis-level depression, is finally back and i am Cured" seems like a mind-breaking denial of reality. her whole life changed overnight in the best way - and she's telling us she has no scars from the dark? hmm
use overdrive, libby, hoopla, cloudlibrary, and kanopy instead of amazon and audible.
use firefox or librewolf (open-source fork of firefox) instead of chrome or opera (both are made with chromium, which blocks functionality for ad-blockers. firefox isn't based on chromium).
use mega instead of google drive
get rid of bloatware
use libreoffice instead of microsoft office suite
get free stuff with the help of r/FREEMEDIAHECKYEAH, r/piracy and r/roms
use trakt (for shows and movies), letterboxd (just movies), or TMB instead of IMDB (owned by amazon).
use storygraph instead of goodreads (owned by amazon).
use darkpatterns to find mobile game with no ads or microtransactions
use mediahuman or cobalt to download music, or support your favorite artists directly through bandcamp
make youtube bearable by using mtube, newpipe, or the unhook extension on chrome, firefox, or microsoft edge
use search for a cause, ecosia, or ocean hero to support the environment instead of google
use thriftbooks to buy new or used books (they also have manga, textbooks, home goods, CDs, DVDs, and blurays)
use flashpoint to play archived online flash games
find books, movies, games, etc. on the internet archive! for starters, here's a bunch of David Attenborough documentaries and all of the Animorphs books
burn your music onto cds
use pdf24 (available online or as a desktop app) instead of adobe
use thunderbird, mailfence, countermail, edison mail, or tuta instead of gmail
remove bloatware on windows PC, macOS, and iOS X
remove bloatware on samsung X
use pixelfed instead of instagram or meta
use project gutenberg for free public domain books, and librivox for public domain books and audiobooks
use the seal app (android only) to download video and audio
use ellipsus instead of microsoft word or google docs
use mastodon instead of twitter
use peertube to create a network of small video hosting providers (disclaimer: not a 1:1 alternative to youtube)
use threema and signal for encrypted communication, on mobile and desktop
use qwant and startpage for secure internet browsers
use syncthing to securely transfer files between devices
learn how to jailbreak your kindle/ereader if you have one (wiki and video walkthrough)
use riseup’s email and VPN for secure communication (aimed towards activists)
use cryptpad and collabora instead of the microsoft office suite
use google takeout to export the data on your google account
use library extension to look for books on online stores and find them at your library
remove paywalls with removepaywalls
install the open-source adblocker ublock origin
install sponsorblock to skip sponsored segments on youtube videos
use bookfinder to look for the cheapest available listings of books, including textbooks
learn a language through mango (duolingo laid off some of its employees and now relies on AI translations) for free with a library card or through your school
edit photos with photopea
edit pdfs with foxit and sumatrapdf
download music with doubledouble
take notes offline and collaborate securely with obsidian
for android tv, use smarttube and cloudstream (ad-free, open-source)
change your OS to linux
changelog:
removed ground news (uses AI to summarize articles)
removed unroll.me (sells your data)
removed proton mail and drive (AI assistant feature, claims of CEO Andy Yen supporting Trump, please DM if you have proof I can add here)
removed NCH suite (only has very basic free features, puts watermark on anything saved)
notes:
this post blew up while I wasn’t looking (the end of my semester was hellish, and i recently came back from a 3-week family vacation). thanks so much for all the suggestions! <3
i included Ecosia because of their financial transparency. It’s physically impossible that they plant a tree for every search, but their profits still go towards projects including reforestation and solar energy. i view their actions as a net-positive
feel free to add more alternatives, resources or advice in the reblogs or replies, and i'll add them to the main post <3
Do you think that the Volturi are the bad guys? I saw the movies and read the books before I was 10 years old and never thought them as such. They have one law: Keep the secret. And our protagonist keep breaking it! Compared to the Romanians and the Egyptians, they are great. No tithes, no virgin sacrifices, no slaves. The Volturi are necessary for the world peace. They are only harsh withe criminals. Though they do seem to turn a blind eye when it comes to the Cullens. Any opinions on that.💬
This is a hard question, but one that I'll enjoy answering immensely.
In the traditional Literary sense of canon lore...absolutely. On the level of plot, the Volturi are an obstacle to protagonist Bella's desired denouement (having power, beauty, and an immortal life with her rich found family/Soulmate (and a baby thrown in as a Bonus)); they nearly kill her boyfriend; they nearly let her and her found family die at the hands of Victoria's newborn army; they nearly have her baby put to death on false charges and (in the Breaking Dawn movie, at any rate) nearly kill her found family--all of which makes them, definitionally speaking, antagonists. That being said, as evidenced by the disproportionately large amount of "nearly"s in that sentence, they aren't incredibly severe antagonists. The Volturi may be villains, but in my opinion they aren't capital-v Villains or The Villains, which I think is an important (and interesting) distinction to make.
In my personal opinion...not really. You could certainly say they're villains in the way that any royal/oligarchical ruling party is villainous ("no regard for human life" is unfortunately not an explicitly vampire :: human political issue :( ), or bring up Aro's murder of Didyme, or argue that his canonical "justice system" is more like a murderous ploy for him to get shiny (err...sparkly?) new toys, but in the larger context of the Twilight-verse? They're arguably the least of many other evils. It's implied that the Cullens are the exception to the rule when it comes to self-control, and that if there were no Volturi to prevent conspicuous, gratuitous killing of humans, the human race would go extinct due to overfeeding. Given how other covens have historically abused their lack of secrecy, I can understand why Aro considers maintaining The Secret to be of the utmost importance. And while Edward doesn't seem to think Aro/the Volturi value human life, I would argue that Aro's policy of secrecy--for selfish or unselfish reasons--is strong evidence to the contrary...far stronger evidence than repeating high school for decades and not donating any of your time/money to actually improving or preserving human lives.
I find it funny how Edward gets on his high horse for 'having regard for human life' when he 1) plotted out the murder of his classmates for an entire lesson 2) seriously considered going on a murder rampage in volterra and 3) would have had an entire town massacred just to die dramatically instead of just getting into a fight with a random vampire!
To recover from the stress of med school (exams in September are a sign of Satan's influence on the world) I've been re-reading some of @therealvinelle and @thecarnivorousmuffinmeta 's brilliant fics (seriously, I spent whole afternoons laughing like an idiot).
To have it set in the muffinelle-verse I used these for the casting:
Carlisle
Renata (with a charming fur hat)
Aro
Here's a some quick paintings of a scene from Nebuchadenezzar's Dream, as screenshots form an hypothetical movie.
(Luckily all other characters don't have any close up shot and can have vague and blurry features.)
Overall it was a fun exercise in working fast and loose and not getting bogged down in the details as I usually do when I work digitally.
I'm utterly beyond words, just thrilled you made this. Thrilled!! This is gorgeous, I love you, love your style, thank you so much! It's so much like how I pictured everything looking, just amazing to see! I love it to pieces.
This is a Breaking Dawn Part 2 inspired chess set I made from polymer clay and two clear Perspex acrylic sheets for the board.
The process took several months both in terms of concepting and actual making 😭 Chess pieces are a pain to make and it’s hard to get them all the right proportions when you’re doing everything free hand.
hey!!!! remember standing rock water protectors and the dakota access pipeline?
the massive, poorly constructed environmental risk that spat all over the Standing Rock Sioux people's treaty rights? that dug up their sacred burial sites? the one where the oil corporation who owned it bought out a private company to do a sham of an "environmental analysis" and never consulted the tribe and STILL didn't actually get approval? the one that's literally operating illegally and without proper permits right fucking now?
yeah, that.
you remember that.
surprising absolutely no one, the army corps of engineers this week (September 8, 2023) released an EIS (environmental impact statement) draft for public comment that takes into account absolutely 0 of the tribe's concerns, and in fact did not consult with them once in the process!
they're going to officially approve the pipeline.
what's the good news?
IT'S A DRAFT. YOU CAN SUBMIT PUBLIC COMMENT RIGHT NOW UNTIL NOVEMBER 13!!!
This link RIGHT HERE (https://action.lakotalaw.org/action/dapl-eis-2023) will take you to a Lakota Law Project page where they've set up a form to make it easy to submit a comment.
All you have to do is add your name, email, and zip code, and it pulls up a form with a pre-written message you can just click and submit, listing the most pressing concerns. You can also personalize it if you want, but you don't have to. This will take you two minutes. Please.
you can also access the comment information on the USACE website here, email [email protected] yourself, or call Brent Cossette, the contact for the draft, at 402-995-2716!!!
you can also donate directly to the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe here.
mini twilight headcanon: vampires DO have fangs but part of the vegetarian diet is that vampire characteristics begin to dull. They are a little slower/weaker, forced to feed more, skin glimmer begins to dim, and sharp teeth begin to dull with time. And while this has an affect on the health, it does allow most to better blend with human society.
This also led to Aro randomly appearing in the library/Carlisle's rooms and asking him to smile as a group of random vampires look on....and he flashes the sweetest, sunniest smile with those less-than-deadly teeth, much to their shock and horror.
another min headcanon: a healthy vampire will not only shine brighter but often have color to them, something of opals. Felix burns like a fire opal, Santiago's dark skin is gleams with gold.
The glow is centered more on their venom-filled veins rather then all across the skin.
