#beansprouts commentates

[beansprouts]

I haven't watched the Mighty Nein Animated show yet (partner wants us to finish up TLOVM first) but I have noticed dramatically higher rates of Essek fanart on my dash, so it's already looking promising

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literally just don't be an asshole

Ok, I keep seeing the most baffling takes go by on a certain topic, and it's bewildering to not see what feels to me like the most common sense perspective, so... *swings bat at hornet's nest*

Astrology is a type of spiritual practice. There is no scientific backing for a person's star sign indicating anything about their life... but there's no scientific backing for most other religions / spiritual rituals, and that doesn't mean they are dumb: they exist to help us make sense of questions that humanity doesn't have answers for-- in the case of horoscopes, concepts such as personality or fate, which are either poorly scientifically understood or likely unable to ever be properly scientifically proven or disproven. Similar to any other set of beliefs, if you were to go up to someone who finds solace in these beliefs and tell them this faith is stupid because horoscopes aren't real, you'd be being an asshole.

However, if as someone who believes in astrology you go on to treat people differently because of their star sign, you are also being an asshole. Religious and spiritual views ought to be respected, but most societies agree that that respect ends when people start to objectify others or treat them unequally. Thinking all spiritual beliefs should be respected doesn't equate to thinking it's ok when someone uses a star sign as an excuse to mistreat someone (or let them into a housing situation or, ffs, get a job). Just like any other religion. Nobody has a right to force it on others or use it as a cudgel.

Don't be an asshole because of what you believe. Also don't be an asshole because of what someone else believes.

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The takes circulating my tumblr dash seem to be either "if you like horoscopes you're stupid and I hate you" or "scorpios should be hunted for sport" and I think that surely there's a nuanced happy medium somewhere in the middle where everyone is treated with respect?

[beansprouts]

on Eurovision this year and me as a eurofan

Backstory 1: The Eurovision Song Contest is a yearly music competition held between mostly European states and organized by the European Broadcasting Union. It's a very big deal in Europe. I have childhood memories of my Grandma watching it on TV from when I was a kid.

Backstory 2: I was an active Eurovision follower in 2021-2023, with some lower-intensity participation before that; as a member of the Romanian diaspora living in the US, it became one of the few ways I could actively connect with my community and especially those of a similar age and interest bracket.

Backstory 3: Israel has actively been committing genocide in Gaza upon the Palestinian people. However, unlike some of the other military aggressor countries within the EBU area, Israel has not been banned from the competition.

Backstory 3.1: The primary fiscal sponsor of Eurovision, Morrocanoil, is an Israeli company.

Backstory 3.2: Last year, Israel placed better than expected in the televote, prompting an audit from the two countries who gave them the full 12 points. It was found that Israel (a group within the government itself as well as multiple independent groups) had been conducting significant targeted advertising campaigns (garnering millions of impressions). This is an extension of Israel using the competition as soft power and gaywashing of their ongoing genocide.

Backstory 4: Many people on tumblr have been boycotting Eurovision since 2023, but for the rest of the world, the boycott really picked up this year. Five countries have pulled out of this year's competition: Iceland, Ireland, the Netherlands, Slovenia, and Spain (who is notably one of the Big 5 nations that fund more of the contest, adding more financial power to their boycott). 2024's winner, Switzerland's Nemo, sent their trophy back to the EBU. There's also a petition on Artists for Palestine signed by over 70 former Eurovision participants calling for Israel's removal. After the EBU recently announced that they won't even be voting on Israel's inclusion after all, 7 mods of the very dedicated r/eurovision even resigned.

I have, surprisingly even to myself, gotten back into Eurovision this year. I was not expecting it, because I had fallen out of love with it in the past few years, definitely partially because Israel is still fucking there, but also because Romania's broadcasting company keeps handling it fucking terribly and I'm still mourning the possibility of Malere representing us in 2022. Why the hell has my brain gone back? The US, where I currently live, is in the middle of a fascist government takeover, and my partner and I are actively afraid to leave the country right now. I am severely depressed and unemployed. I think the european energy has hyped me up a bit these past few days.

But, my depression aside, the general consensus is that everyone has an ethical obligation to boycott Eurovision. How do I reconcile these two things?

I've thought about this deeply and I have decided to boycott official participation in the event, while still engaging with the fandom and music. This means I'll return to blogging about it, I'll watch an international stream of the semis and finals with a VPN, and I will not be voting (since there is a "rest of the world" voting bloc as of 2023). A lot of reasons have gone into this, some detailed below.

A boycott serves several purposes. One is to force the target to act by removing sufficient resources that were previously relied upon. The EBU is largely funded by the Big 5 broadcasting networks of Germany, Spain, France, Italy, and the UK. There is nothing I can realistically do to affect Eurovision from this angle.

Another is to send a message through consumer networks by lowering participation numbers, so anyone handling data and marketing can note the lowered voting statistics and prove that the boycott-starting decision had a concrete effect. My lack of voting is for this reason.

To be completely honest, though? I have noticed that much of the loudest and most shaming Eurovision boycotts on tumblr in particular have come from the US and the UK. This sits really badly with me. My fellow Americans, this is not our fucking contest, and this is not our fucking place.

And for the British... in a post-Brexit world, from a country that is known to be hideously racist against my people, I do not accept any fucking judgment on the question of watching an international music contest.

It's so much easier to feel superior about not doing something if you didn't do it to begin with, isn't it? But simply not watching Eurovision, as a member of one of those countries, is not sending a pro-Palestine message. These are already countries that don't consider Eurovision important, and lower viewing numbers will do jack shit to protest the EBU's support of Israel.

Additionally, those of us in rich countries that speak the world's current lingua franca have an overinflated image of our own importance, and of the impact of our consumer choices. For so long we have been sold the propaganda that we can make important changes to the world by what product we consume, down to which music we listen to and which clothes we buy. We desperately want our choice to not watch Eurovision to be a helpful one, because we want to help Palestine, and how easy to do so by simply not watching something!

But that is not actually how many of the world's most important changes happen. What is actually causing the EBU to reconsider their stance on Israel is pressure from the constituent national broadcasting companies. If you are part of an EBU country and want to help, consider contacting your broadcasting country and urge them to join Spain et al. in making their participation contingent on Israel's removal. If the participating countries slowly dwindle down, eventually they will be forced to remove Israel.

Or join a local protest. If I lived in Europe, on the days of the semifinals I would be finding an in-person march against the EBU to demand the removal of Israel. and then probably listening to the songs on my own later

If, like me, you live in the US, stop trying to fight Israel on the Eurovision front and instead join one of the many local movements pushing back against the absurd US military aid given to Israel. It's been heartening to me to see many tech workers fight back within orgs such as No Tech for Apartheid; many of us are being laid off, but the battle is not lost, and the movement is growing in power and impact.

As an aside: I first found out about the conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia on r/eurovision. I had never heard anything about this conflict whatsoever before, regardless of how compassionate so many posters seem to be about stopping international wars. It was humbling to be reminded just how many awful conflicts are constantly occurring that we don't hear about them simply because they are in a country the rich don't prioritize. My heart hurt for the Armenian contestants who have had to compete against their aggressors for years without any care from the global community. I realized that many of the loudest voices in online community spaces probably didn't have enough of a wholistic education on European politics to be as judgmental as they are. I was grateful to have enough of a connection to the European community to be learning more about what is happening there. Returning to the Eurovision fandom in 2026 has returned to me that sense of connection.

Consequently, I personally am going to be watching and fanblogging Eurovision, staying connected to the European (and LGBTQ, let's be real) community, while minimizing whatever tiny monetary impact I have by not voting.

I support all the countries and artists boycotting this year. I will be doing my best to stay connected to the rest of Europe while protesting Israel's participation from within the eurovision fan community.

Did you know that, the past two years, Israel's eurovision performances have have been broadcast with fake audience cheering noises, because the live audiences have been booing? If the EBU is going to censor how the live audience feels, there has to be someone in this fan community online still booing.

[beansprouts]

I feel like I would enjoy a lot of things more if I was a hippopotamus. But not the things that really matter.

[beansprouts]

this has temporarily become a Date Everything! blog... I don't normally get games on release but I am 40 hours in and I genuinely think this is the best dating sim ever made. having extremely nsfw thoughts about Dorian

there will be post spam from the tag below this...

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conjuring a more fucked up version of the Blood of Arlathan (which I really liked, to be clear) where you assume the Dalish were kidnapped but it turns out this particular clan never got (or believed) the memo that their Gods Are Bad, Actually and they have lined up to be sacrificed willingly, and Bellara has to convince them with Rook's help that Elgar'nan is not worth listening to despite all of the centuries of worship

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stop removing Peebee's face paint, she's going to get a vicious sun burn the second she steps onto Elaaden. plz care for your asari gf responsibly.

[beansprouts]

My second biggest issue with Disco Elysium (after the lack of disco music) is not having anarchist gameplay, despite anarchists being explicitly mentioned as an active faction during the turn of the century revolution.

So I have been conceptualizing what an anarchist quest would look like:

anarchists themselves were all supposedly killed at the end of the revolution, and to keep with the lack of self-identified anarchists in Martinaise as-is there are still no anarchist "comrades" per se but you can bond with some more anarchy-sympathetic NPCs. In particular I am thinking Cindy the Skull, Call Me Mañana, Lilienne, the old washerwoman, Noid, and especially Acele.

unique interactions with red paint and graffito

a mix of solidarity and hostility from known communists in the game as befitting leftist infighting

some analysis on the effectiveness of antifascist action and violence vs nonviolence which I am quite frankly not qualified to write, with my minimal expertise in anarchist philosophy

speaking of antifascism, unique dialogues against some of the fascist NPCs

antagonism toward the Coalition as well as the very existence of the RCM as an extension of the foreign state, potentially culminating in you attempting to either quit the force of dismantle it from the inside

I'm undecided on which skill to own anarchy, currently thinking Half Light or Interfacing (the choice will also inform how the quest works too). This will clearly break the one political group per attribute pattern, but I don't see how that can be helped.