Talking To Myself @paleokiara - Tumblr Blog

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I recently commissioned some truly amazing #lothcats from the incredible @pomrania They arrived just in time for #RhodeIslandComicCon where they managed to get into trouble everywhere they went, but they were so cute they were readily forgiven! Locally, those of us in the Legions has started carrying in universe plushes in our holsters for events that don't allow us to bring blasters. As you might imagine, we have our fair share of porgs, but being #LothCatan I needed to have #lothcat or two! And @pomrania was able to custom make these little guys which are the perfect size for each and every one of my holsters! I can't wait to bring them to more troops!

#501st #501stlegion #Rebellegion #mandalorianmercs #mmcc #starwars #starwarsrebels

amazingmotionpicture

Heartbreaking scene from the film

Schindler’s List (1993)

fluffmugger

OK LEMME TELL YOU STRAIGHT UP ABOUT OSKAR SCHINDLER. Everyone knows the story, right? His protected workers? How none of his ammo worked? The full story is a lot more complex and a hell of a lot more breathtaking.

He wasn’t a saint. in fact, he was a bit of a douche, all things considered. Whored around on his wife, worked for the Abwehr, he was a member of the nazi party - not a particularly devout follower, but because he was a big fat remora fish who realised this particular shark could give him business opportunities, and if he wined and dined the upper crust that scored him even better ones. He realised very quickly he could make an absolute killing on the black market and dove in headfirst with the profiteering. Hell, he initially hired Jews in his factory because nazi strictures made them much much cheaper labour than hiring normal Polish labourers.

But the thing is, once you start surrounding yourself with a particular, persecuted demographic, you begin to notice things. You hear things, things you aren’t insulated from. You begin to realise something.

And Oskar Schindler began to dimly grasp what was happening and he realised that it was not something he could countenance. And his whole gameplay changed. He no longer wined and dined for business opportunities, but to protect his workers. He went flat out fucking balls to the wall to rescue a group of his workers from the jaws of Auschwitz, and built them a “camp” that offered at least the barest of human comforts, right under SS supervision. He moved his entire fucking factory to save his workers, he realised an SS-provided list of names was left with blank spaces and just started filling in more. He blew everything he had made profiteering and scheming to protect 1200 people because he found that there was a fucking line and it had to be drawn. He arranged for three thousand Jewish women to be moved to textile factories in the Sudetenland to give them a chance of surviving the war. He blew all his money, resources and time on feeding, caring for and trying to protect as many Jews as he could.

After the war he failed every business venture he tried. He became a raging alcoholic, surviving on donations sent by Schindlerjuden. According to some, he traded the ring gifted to him by his workers for Schnapps. He died in relative obscurity, almost penniless.

He wasn’t a great man, or a saint. He was an average schmuck, and spent most of his time fucking around until he abruptly found himself in a situation where he couldn’t. He almost stumbled into his decency. But once he had, he absolutely took hold of it, and directly because of him 8,500 people are alive today.

Never, ever doubt the ability of a single human to RISE.

pengychan

This guy is Giorgio Perlasca.

He started out a fascist. Right from the beginning. He fought in East Africa during the Second Italo-Abyssinian War, and in the Spanish Civil War. He was awarded a diplomatic mission from fucking Francisco Franco.

Then, he starts noticing things he doesn’t like. He doesn’t like how close to Nazis they’re getting. And then, in 1938, racial laws against Jewish people are passed in Italy and that is when he realizes that fascism is a pile of shit, and that he fucked up, but at that point he’s in too deep. He had a duty to his country, he thought, and worked to aid the army. What else could he do?

As it turns out, a lot.

On 8 September 1943, Italy surrenders to the Allied forces. Italians had to choose whether to join the fascist Italian Social Republic or side with the Allies. He chooses the latter and, due to his status as a veteran in the Spanish Civil War, he obtains political asylum at the Spanish Embassy in Budapest, changing his name in ‘Jorge’.

That could have been the end of it for him. He could have stayed safe and comfortable until the end of the war. He did not.

Perlasca worked with the Spanish Chargé d'Affaires, Ángel Sanz Briz, and other diplomats of neutral states to smuggle Jews out of Hungary. The system he devised consisted of furnishing ‘protection cards’ which placed Jews under the guardianship of various neutral states. He helped Jews find refuge in protected houses under the control of various embassies, which had extraterritorial conventions that gave them an equivalent to sovereignty. They could provide asylum for Jews.

When Sanz Briz was removed from Hungary to Switzerland in November 1944, he invited Perlasca to accompany him to safety. However, Perlasca chose to remain in Hungary. The Hungarian government ordered the Spanish Embassy building and the extraterritorial houses where the Jews took refuge to be cleared out. Perlasca immediately made the false announcement that Sanz Briz was due to return from a short leave, and that he had been appointed his deputy for the meantime.

Throughout the winter, Perlasca was active in hiding, shielding and feeding thousands of Jews in Budapest. He continued issuing safe conduct passes (initiated by Sanz Briz), on the basis of a Spanish law passed in 1924 that granted citizenship to Jews of Sephardic origin (descendants of Iberian Jews expelled from Spain in the late 15th century).

In December 1944, Perlasca rescued two boys from being herded onto a freight train in defiance of a German lieutenant colonel on the scene. The Swedish diplomat-rescuer Raoul Wallenberg, also present there, later told Perlasca that the officer who had challenged him was Adolf Eichmann. During 45 days period from 1 December 1944 to 16 January 1945, Perlasca helped save more than 5,000 Jews.

After the war, he returned to Italy and lived a quiet life. He told no one what had had done in Hungary - not even to his wife, who got the shock of her life when a group of Hungarian Jews finally found him in 1987, only five years before his death. When asked why he’d done what he did he just answered - “What would you have done in my place?”

He started out a fascist. He became of one the Righteous Among the Nations.

You don’t have to be a saint. You may have been on the wrong side. You may have made choices that are bad and stupid and just plain wrong. You don’t necessarily have to even be that good a person. But sometimes it comes down to one choice and one choice only and sometimes, despite everything, you just do the right thing.

lauraannegilman

They are called the Righteous for a reason. Not because they were saints (most weren’t), but because they were able to see wrong in the world where others looked past it, and not only refused to be party to it, but opposed it with their lives. We are all capable of Righteousness.

weavemama

PSA: Halloween is pretty much here and it only takes on second to send a sick child in the hospital a Spook-o-gram. The best part about this is that $1 gets donated to CHLA’s Helping Hand fund each time you send one out. So let’s help some kids have a spectacular Halloween by sending them spook-o-grams and helping cause!!

tinyspaceel

This literally costs nothing but your time so please do it, you could make a kids Halloween.

melgillman

Here’s HSTHETE, the 24 hour comic I drew this year! Thanks to everybody who followed along on twitter this weekend as I posted these pages <3

devendaman

ah yes, the beauty of officially licensed comics

manynamedshe

People who perform manual labor should be not only given high and liveable wages, but unlimited access to healthcare and physical therapy to help manage the myriad conditions that come from doing back-breaking work.

Like this is not an absurd concept. It bothers me that people think that it is.

locallovewitch-deactivated20201

hey so uhhh here’s an important update on what’s apparently happening at the border, especially with the use of the old japanese internment camps

all i can say is i’m sickened by this mess, by the atrocities committed against innocent people. and now there will be no surveillance. no one will be able to see what happens to these people. the UN, the media, and any other human rights organizations cannot get into these facilities, either, in order to stop what’s happening. by the way, coast guard members were apparently aiding in this process as well. so now it’s only a matter of time before it becomes a military movement.

no one gets in. no one gets out.

so when are we going to call this what it is? it’s fascism. it’s genocide. and if we don’t stop it now, it’s going to be disastrous.

contact your senators, your representatives, anyone that’s in office that can get off their lazy ass and do something.

locallovewitch-deactivated20201

can y’all please reblog this i’m begging

closet-keys

[image description: series of tweets by @ECMcLaughlin reading:

CBP then transfers these human beings to a facility called “the Dog Pound.” (Here, my friend started crying.) The “Dog Pound” is comprised of cages, outside and on dirt, with no protection from the elements. Don’t look away.

There are dozens of teen moms there. There is no baby food. While there, my friend saw a CBP agent take a baby from her teenage mother, strip the baby of its clothes, hand the baby back to the mother, and send them outside to the “Dog Pound” to sleep in the dirt.

The “Dog Pound” has no running water, no covers, no tarp, no care, no safety from the elements. It is freezing at night, and deathly hot during the day. Everyone is sick. My friend said she saw a baby on this trip that was so sick “I thought it would be dead by morning.”

Toddlers in the “Dog Pound” who had been eating solid food are given only infant formula. Moms are trying to start breast feeding again so their children don’t starve. These moms are dehydrated, sick, & have walked miles through desert with no water. CBP gives them nothing.

It gets worse. Don’t look away. From the “Dog Pound,” these human beings are moved to an area called “The Freezer.“ The Freezer is kept at 55 degrees. Some of the refugees who are moved there are still wet from their journey, and are put in The Freezer wet.

CBP is keeping human beings in “The Freezer” for weeks at a time. WEEKS. Including critically ill people, disabled people, sick children, teenage mothers with babies. The floor of The Freezer is made of dirt or very rough concrete. There are no beds. Keep reading.

From “The Freezer,” refugees are supposed to be moved to ICE facilities that are designed for residential care. They have beds, food, bathrooms. However, (keep reading) THOSE FACILITIES ARE EMPTY. ICE IS SHUTTING THEM DOWN. Don’t look away.

What our government is doing instead is moving refugees to MILITARY INSTALLATIONS. The announcement about Fort Sill, which was used as a Japanese internment camp, is only the start.So why would our government be doing this?

Here’s why: These concentration camps (let’s call them what they are) will be under the control of the Department of Homeland Security, but within the Department of Defense.

Unlike ICE facilities, which allow site inspectors inside, there will be no inspection of military-run camps. The military will be able to deny access to anyone it chooses. No media. No oversight.

Lawyers will not be allowed in. Human rights monitors will not be allowed in. The camps will also be protected airspace, meaning that no drones can fly over them to take pictures of what’s going on inside.

/End image description]

timetoexplorethis

During their detention last month in a U.S. Customs and Border Protection facili...

The Trump administration is facing growing complaints from migrants about severe overcrowding, meager food and other hardships at border hol

demi-chen

“Fairy tales can come true You gotta make ‘em happen It all depends on you…”

unpretty

god i’m not even through one episode of paranormal home inspectors and it rules, this lady thought she was being haunted by the wails of the restless dead but she was just listening to raccoons fuck in her attic

unpretty

psychic: these are hieroglyphics… the spirits are trying to communicate…

home inspector: you put new paint over old paint and now the old paint is bleeding through, that’s why you’re not supposed to do that

unpretty

homeowner: my daughter’s room is always cold… cold like the dead…

home inspector: you put furniture on top of her heating vent

unpretty

business owner: i got locked in the bathroom even though the door has no lock

home inspector: it has a lock. the lock is right there. on the knob.

saawek

Me *driving on the M25 and hating it cause traffic* : Dammit Crowley you bastard

tinkdw

They have an actual advert for Good Omens on the M25.

Amazing 😆

spockvarietyhour

“Hell’s greatest achievement. The M25”

greenbergsays

Aziraphale in the paintball scene, though. I mean, seriously, y’all

Look

this

absolute

nerd

Especially that last gif! This is an angel that is literally thousands of years old, he helped create the motherfuckin’ universe, and he is p o u t i n g at Crowley over some paint on his jacket that he could EASILY remove himself.

But wait! There’s more!

Not only has Aziraphale already shown Crowley the stain, but Crowley has already circled him to assess the damage for himself.

And yet, after saying, “Well, I would always know the stain was there,” with that little pout, he turns to show Crowley the stain again.

And then! AND THEN!!

He gives Crowley this look.

Do you see the little raise of his eyebrows??? LOOK AGAIN

He could very easily get rid of this stain himself, but he is doing E V E R Y T H I N G in his power to get Crowley to do it for him.

“I could do this myself,” he’s saying, “but I’d rather you do it. You can do it better than me, can’t you? Please? Please, won’t you???”

The funniest part about this, fam, is that we all know Crowley needs very little prompting to actually indulge Aziraphale’s whims. He’s incredibly indulgent, anyways, we see ample evidence of that in Hard Times.

But this…I think (?) this is the first time that we see Aziraphale actively seeking out and trying to manipulate his way into getting one of those acts of service that Crowley so does like to give to him.

Like, sure, back during the Shakespeare scene, Aziraphale gives Crowley that very hopeful, “oh, WILL YOU?” look when Shakespeare mentions needing a miracle for Hamlet, but that is so different from this.

This is Aziraphale KNOWING that Crowley indulges and using that knowledge for his personal gain.

AND CROWLEY GIVES IT TO HIM. HE JUST. DOES.

That is the face of a spoiled angel that has gotten exactly what he wanted–a certain demon’s love and attention.

And that look Crowley gives him is just as devastating to me as Aziraphale’s sunshine smile over getting what he wanted.

That is a look of UTTER INDULGENCE.

He absolutely knows he’s been played but is happy to let it happen, because there is nothing quite as satisfying as indulging Aziraphale.

That is a look that says, “You’re so obvious, angel, and it’s adorable.”

He’s made his angel happy, what the fuck does he care?

arsfa

mainflopgirl

sunshinetrooper-deactivated2016

black and asian vikings 100% definitely existed (also, saami vikings)

you know how far you can get into eurasia and africa by sailing up rivers from the baltic and mediterranean seas? pretty fucking far, and that’s what vikings liked to do to trade

then, you know, people are people, so love happens, business happens, and so ppl get married and take spouses back home to the frozen hellscape that is scandinavia (upon which i’m guessing the horrorstruck new spouses went “WHAT THE FUCK??? FUCKING GIVE ME YOUR JACKET???????”)

and sometimes vikings bought thralls and brought them home as well, and i mean, when your indentured service is up after however many years and you’re a free person again, maaaaaaaaaaaaybe it’s a bit hard to get all the way home across the continent, so you make the best out of the situation and you probably get married and raise a gaggle kids

so yeah

viking kingdoms/communities were not uniformly pure white aryan fantasy paradises, so pls stop using my cultural history and ethnic background to excuse your racist discomfort with black ppl playing heimdall and valkyrie

shrewreadings

Also we KNOW they got to Asia and Africa.

Why?

Because Asians, Africans, and Vikings TOLD US SO.

note-a-bear

Also, we know there was significant mercantile trade between Scandinavia and parts of Pakistan, Afghanistan, Northern India, Kashmir, North and Eastern Africa because there is evidence in burial sites.

Check that out: the goods Vikings and Scandinavians were getting from their trade with the rest of the world was so important they buried themselves with it, as part of their treasure hordes.

We KNOW this.

There’s a reason you can still see many of the trade routes from the ancient world etched into the very earth.

prokopetz

Plus, we know that some Scandinavian cultures that participated in Viking raids had established minority communities of ethnically Mongolian folks living among them during the periods when such raids were common, and it’s difficult to credit that none of them would have signed on.

hogna-lenta-deactivated20160930

Islamic Ring in Viking Grave

Vikings in Persia

Black Vikings

Vikings in North Africa

Buddha statue in Viking hoard

Vikings brought Native American woman to Europe

Unflattering texts in Arabic about Vikings

Original text by Ahmad ibn-Fadlan

More about the Islamic World and Vikings (some Vikings converted to Islam! sort of sketchy site tho)

Viking technology came from Afghanistan

More on trade route determination via metallurgy

… is that enough? :)

queer-wizard-dad

Yet another on the pile of reasons why it monumentally honks me off when pusillanimous, pseudointellectual white supremacist scum try to use Scandinavian culture as a crutch for their arguments and act like Norse mythology agrees with their biases. No it fucking doesn’t, bitch. Odin would personally kick you in the dick for being a witless coward and then send your ass to the Realm of the Dishonored Dead.

armory-rasa

I don’t usually reblog stuff, but this thread makes me so happy. See, I love the Viking aesthetic – I love the fusion of organic and geometric in its designs, I love the natural colors, the complexity of textures you get from juxtaposing metal/leather/cloth/fur–

–and I hate how the entire subculture has been so thoroughly co-opted by white supremacists. To the point where I, a person who likes viking stuff, am deeply and immediately suspect of anyone else who likes viking stuff, guilty until proven innocent, cuz that’s what the odds are these days.

Anyway.

As far as I’m concerned, anyone can be a viking, and thus I am so, so pleased to find that the historical record backs me up.

(And amused that Arab intellectual Ahmad ibn Fadlan was so thirsty for vikings.)