#straw men

[swagglessmoth]

WIP inspired by Straw Men that looks pretty cool atm. Idk how to render tho so I might leave it like this

(I kinda like the unfinished look hmm)

READ SHADOWS BLINDING BY @pestoast READ STRAW MEN BY @pestoast OOO 🌀🌀🌀

Progress pics bc I like them

[pestoast]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

Hey, it's been a while! For all of you who have been very patient for the sequel to Shadows, Blinding, I'm happy to announce that chapter one is up! I'm going to be making a post soon about the fic and it's future, but for now, please enjoy! I hope you're as excited for this as I am. Thanks for sticking with me!

[smallgodseries]

[image description: The disconsolate Scarecrow sits on a 3-legged stool in front of a glowing orange moon. Straw is visible from his twisted knee joints and waist and 4 mocking crows stand on him. Text reads, “61, Heywood Bale ~ Small God of Straw Men” 2020, after the Great John R. Neill, 1915]

For most of human history, he’s been a god of effigies, of friendly faces stationed in the fields to keep the birds at bay. He’s not always good at his job, but he’s here to help, an assistant in burlap and silent smiles. He stood in wheat fields before he stood in cornfields, he stood among barley and hops and grape vines. He protected the harvest. He did his best, and he only asked that those who chose him as their patron do the same.

He only did his best.

And then people began to speak his name with a more sinister purpose, began to twist and pervert the intention behind his stoic silhouette. He had always been a man of straw, an empty set of clothes that could only stand and watch, and struggle to protect, but in these new mouths, in these new voices, he became an edifice to rage against, distracting and deflecting from the true matter at hand. People raised up armies of flame against him, indulging in their senseless wars of fire and straw, and everything burned. Everything was smoke and ashes, and no harvest at all, not for the fickle and not for the faithful.

When the strawmen burned, the harvest failed, and the world began to starve.

He still stands, torn now between two tenants. He yearns to protect, to serve, to do his best; he also burns with the embers of arguments unwon and unwinnable, the need to prove himself right above all else, even if it burns the fields to ashes in his wake. He can’t reconcile the two sides of his nature. He can’t deny what faith has made of him. To be remembered is to be remade, and that, alone in all the world, is a fact that he can’t argue with.

......................

Artist Lee Moyer (13th Age, Cursed Court) and author Seanan McGuire (Middlegame, Every Heart a Doorway) have joined forces to bring you icons and stories of the small deities who manage our modern world, from the God of Social Distancing to the God of Finding a Parking Space.

Join in each week on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for a guide to the many tiny divinities:

Tumblr: https://smallgodseries.tumblr.com/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/smallgodseries

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/smallgodseries/

Homepage: http://www.smallgodseries.com/

[acti-veg]

What do you think about vegans who hold the position that we should not only seek to end animal exploitation but should also try and reduce animals' suffering in nature, too?

Veganism is a specific position on a specific issue, which is animal exploitation, not necessarily animal suffering as a whole. That said, I think that suffering is inherently bad and should be prevented or minimised, so I agree that reducing suffering in any context would be a desirable outcome as a whole. Given that much of the suffering of non-human animals takes place because of our actions, it is entirely within our power to drastically reduce the suffering of wild animals. In fact think we have the moral obligation to do so.

The only reason this position is the subject of so much mockery is that anti-vegans wholly misrepresent our posituin. They resort to a transparent reductio ad absurdum by extending our premise that animal suffering should be reduced or prevented, and concluding on that basis that we must also want to turn all natural predators into vegetarians. That isn’t something I’ve ever seen any vegan seriously advocate for, in fact the only time I ever hear anyone say this is when anti-vegans are pretending that it is what we seriously believe.

[registoetransicoes]

[thebristolboard]

Straw Men by Farel Dalrymple.

[smallgodseries]

For most of human history, he’s been a god of effigies, of friendly faces stationed in the fields to keep the birds at bay. He’s not always good at his job, but he’s here to help, an assistant in burlap and silent smiles. He stood in wheat fields before he stood in cornfields, he stood among barley and hops and grape vines. He protected the harvest. He did his best, and he only asked that those who chose him as their patron do the same. 

He only did his best. 

And then people began to speak his name with a more sinister purpose, began to twist and pervert the intention behind his stoic silhouette. He had always been a man of straw, an empty set of clothes that could only stand and watch, and struggle to protect, but in these new mouths, in these new voices, he became an edifice to rage against, distracting and deflecting from the true matter at hand. People raised up armies of flame against him, indulging in their senseless wars of fire and straw, and everything burned. Everything was smoke and ashes, and no harvest at all, not for the fickle and not for the faithful. 

When the strawmen burned, the harvest failed, and the world began to starve. 

He still stands, torn now between two tenants. He yearns to protect, to serve, to do his best; he also burns with the embers of arguments unwon and unwinnable, the need to prove himself right above all else, even if it burns the fields to ashes in his wake. He can’t reconcile the two sides of his nature. He can’t deny what faith has made of him. To be remembered is to be remade, and that, alone in all the world, is a fact that he can’t argue with.

…………………………………

Artist Lee Moyer (The Doom That Came to Atlantic City, Starstruck) and author Seanan McGuire (Middlegame, Every Heart a Doorway) have joined forces to bring you icons and stories of the small deities who manage our modern world, from the God of Social Distancing to the God of Finding a Parking Space.

Join in each week on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for a guide to the many tiny divinities:

Tumblr: https://smallgodseries.tumblr.com/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/smallgodseries

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/smallgodseries/

Homepage: http://www.smallgodseries.com/

[spacecasepc]

oh sure, blame the guy whose straw it is