small bitter triangle

White. Aquarius. Dresden Files critical blog.

[romcommunist]

i think minimum wage should be 800 dollars an hour plus the drug of your choice

[purpledumbass69]

If you worked at this wage for 40 hours a week, it would still take you 601 years to aquire 1 billion dollars

[kaizokuou-ni-naru]

so a friend of mine is liveblogging her reread of dressrosa on discord, and she posted this panel of luffy, and i was like “wait... that looks familiar.”

anyways. parallels

[otterlyart]

🖤🤍💜💚🤍🖤

[systlin]

I'm a relatively new follower and I noticed you're talking about the Dresden Files today. I also can't stand them. Have you read any of the Harrietta Lee series by Stephanie Ahn? They're everything the Dresden Files should be. The first one is called Deadline.

You have my attention and interest

[badass-at-cuddling]

Harry is Korean, butch, disaster lesbian and magical PI! There’s many other queer characters of color! She struggles to make rent and has a fire familiar named Tinkerbell! No Christian supremacy! Here is the blurb for the first book:

“Disgraced witch Harrietta Lee has made a lot of mistakes in her life; there’s a reason she’s got a sizable burn scar slapped across the side of her neck and a formal letter of excommunication from the international underground magical community. But who has time to dwell on the past when you’re trying to make rent in New York? Things are mostly clean and simple, until her next odd job is brought to her by the representative of a powerful corporate family—a family she once had close personal ties to. As she unwillingly digs through six years’ worth of personal baggage, she’s also got to contend with an inhuman admirer shadowing her in the street. “But hey, maybe it’ll be worth it for the beautiful women she gets to kiss…”

https://www.amazon.com/Deadline-Harrietta-Lee-Book-1-ebook/dp/B07D3T81NX

[systlin]

I can’t believe you’ve forced me to buy this book right now immediately.

[systlin]

Folk’s it $2.99 this is a steal

[systlin]

Anyway if you want some Excellent fantasy that blew me away with their worldbuilding and gods and magic systems and just sheer solid gold writing, you should go read everything N. K. Jemisin wrote right this moment.

[karama9]

*takes note*

I feel silly for even mentioning it but JUST IN CASE it slipped by anyone, a really good series to check out if you enjoyed the modern world meets the supernatural or the magical investigations and crime solving aspects of the Dresden Files but eventually lost patience with Butcher, is the October Daye books by Seanan McGuire. They are absolutely wonderful, and as far as I can tell, don’t particularly favour the Christian faith: they’re really centered around fae. I’m only a few books in, but I adore it so far.

And while you’re at it, read the Wayward Children series. It’s basically among the best things ever.

And Middlegame! Pure Awesome. So. Much. Awesome. It feels like it pluck the weirdest part of my brains and illustrated to me that they weren’t weird enough yet.

I’m sure I’ll recommend everything else she ever wrote once I’ve had a chance to read it myself too.  

[systlin]

Really anything by @seananmcguire is great!

[thatsbelievable]

[penandwind]

This just gives me a great idea.

So like homeownership is out of reach for our generation due to prices, so what if people did stuff to make houses seem haunted to drive down property values into more affordable and liveable rates.

Yes people, I am proposing we Scooby Doo our housing crisis. Honestly it seems like the situation most likely to work. I mean, major capitalism reform? I’ll be long dead before that happens, but I can get a ghost costume, some glow in the dark paint and chains in a single day trip.

[sachinighte]

This would probably work. In a lot of places—at least in the states, idk about other countries—the real estate agent is required to let people know about a supposed haunting or if someone died in your new house, and that does tend to drive down prices.

Also the idea of a Scooby villain that the gang would actually agree with tickles me greatly

[penandwind]

That last sentence of yours reminded me of this comic from @smbc-comics​

I think we need to make this a big organized effort betwen a lot of us. Get the cosplay crowd to help with costume/makeup. Get the occultist crowd to lend credence to the “hauntings.” Modern problems require solutions from a 60′s cartoon it turns out.

[gehayi]

Hey, a fictional solution made the Amityville Horror profitable.  And the fact that it’s a) an actual murder house b) that’s supposed to be haunted hasn’t driven down its price once since the Lutzes owned it. 

So maybe fake hauntings are the wave of the future, as far as realtors are concerned.

[systlin]

Y’know while I’ve read and enjoyed the Dresden Files, there are things about them that bug me, and a big one is the way that Jim Butcher is absolutely steeped in Christianity.

Like, other gods exist. Harry’s met them. Like face to face met them. And yet, the ACTUAL big boy power in the universe above all others is the Christian god, and Jim has never seemed to even question this arrangement, nor do any of his characters. 

It’s just so very Christian of him, and I suspect he’d be just sorta confused if this was pointed out to him and utterly not grasp just exactly how fuckin fucked up it is to have Kusanagi reworked in his mythos into a Christian artifact or have pagan gods be subordinate to his god.

[athingofvikings]

Seconding this; the whole “Jewish Knight of the Cross” thing makes me… very uncomfortable, to say the least.

[systlin]

Right? And I know fans have pointed that out to Butcher, and he just sorta…brushes them off and ignores them.

[jewish-alderaanian-princess]

Sorry the Jewish what of the what???!!!!

[systlin]

Yeah he had Waldo Butters, a Jewish character, become a Knight of the Cross, AKA a wielder of a sword forged with a nail from the true cross. 

For extra spicy offensiveness, that sword is supposed to be the aforementioned Kusanagi, a sacred sword in Japanese Shinto.

He does not seem to realize how exactly this is offensive, because he is a white dude, and he actually gets all pissed off about people pointing out that there’s an awful lot of capital letters White Christian Man in his books and that some of the things he’s written are offensive.

[eternalsongbird]

I’m sorry, the Christian sword is supposed to be Kusunagi? Of Shinto lore?????? I- that is literally offensive to just about the ENTIRETY of Japanese people???

I spent a WHOLE ASS YEAR deep diving research about Shinto for university, which, is INCREDIBLY difficult with Western devices because it’s so repetitive in just basic facts and just a whole bunch of ethnocentric explanations/retellings. It’s not really even a religion, a set of rules/guidelines doesn’t really exist and is, in fact, pretty goddamned transcendent in definition. It just IS the life of the Japanese people - the very core of their existence rooted so deeply within them that they just have a certain resonance with the world around them that many other civilizations don’t have - massively in part due to the folk tales that were passed down the generations.

And you’re telling me that this asshole just…appropriates and warps an important icon that not only is so far fucking removed from Christianity/Judaism/Islam, but also PREDATES all that in the first place…and bastardises it TWICE by making it a Christian artifact, and then forcing a Jewish man that has ZERO ties to the lands of where it came from to wield it???

I’m going to have a stroke.

[systlin]

Yep! That is literally what I am telling you! And the reasoning seems to be “Because katanas are cool, and it’s the Coolest Katana, and therefore it has to be in my books! I did ZERO research on this and don’t care!”

[thekeeperofthesilence]

It gets worse in Day One. Gehayi did a review of it here:

[aquilaofarkham]

no more dracula adaptations where dracula falls in love with mina or lucy we need more adaptations where dracula and van helsing were past lovers but now they’re petty old exes

[phedre13]

And Dracula’s new love interest, Jonathan Harker, fled after a silly argument about the Brides and he must win him back…

[prophetofthesufferpuppets]

SOMEONE GET KEANU AND HUGH JACKMAN ON THE PHONE RIGHT NOW.

[marzipanandminutiae]

Mina and Lucy are in love, and Lucy’s “suitors” are her Obligatory Lesbian-Adjacent Himbo Squad

[nealashitposts]

There’s a lot of accidental anti-semitism in the world , but sometimes I come across the deliberate and malicious anti-semitism im DND and I’m just reminded that no matter how much I love this game it does not love me back and the original creators never wanted me to play it.

Today’s example is: Phylactery

In d&d:

In real life

That’s right. they named the evil artifact that the evil undead spellcaster hides their soul in after a Jewish ceremonial object.

[nealashitposts]

Actually I want to add something because the genius of this particular kind of anti-semitism is that most gentiles won’t know what a Phylactery really is, The only people who will notice are the Jewish players. Making them instantly feel isolated, alone, and unsafe in their d&d group.

when you come across that you should at the table paralyzed wondering

Do my fellow players know this is anti-Semitic?

If they don’t know and I bring it up will they be mad at me for ruining the fun?

If they do know and I bring it up will revealing myself as Jewish be dangerous?

It’s a tactic to deliberately push Jewish people out of the game. and nobody jump up to tell me it was an accident because it fucking wasn’t. Before d&d Phylactery only had one definitionand I find it impossible that they would know the word without knowing the meaning. Or at least knowing it was Jewish.

[bluenos3]

Holy shit can this post fucking disappear from my dash please!

Attention goyim: Jews don’t use the word phylactery. That’s stupid and greek. They’re called Teffilin.

I don’t know why articles everywhere say that this is what The Jews™ call their Weird Little Prayer Boxes, but we don’t say that, and it’s not even a super common aspect of prayer (at least where i’m from) and i wish y'all wouldn’t pretend to be offended at this. No jew calls Teffilin phylactery, when i first saw this post i even tried finding out if anyone i knew said phylactery, and they all looked at me like i was a dumbass. We don’t need your fake outrage, and I SEE YOU FUCKIN GOYS IN THE NOTES PRETENDING TO BE JEWISH AND FEEL ALIENATED! GROSS! This is a non issue, dispel it from your mind and stop spreading this horseshit!

[aintlikethatnow]

I was going to let this slide as someone making an honest mistake, and that you can never be too cautious around antisemitism, but then I find out that OP lied about being Jewish for this post and frankly that’s just pathetic to the point of hilarity.

[literallymechanical]

(Image sources: https://projects.mcah.columbia.edu/treasuresofheaven/)

Also op’s insistence that “before d&d Phylactery only had one definition” is just an outright falsehood.  A phylactery is a fancier word for a reliquary, which is an ornate sealed container that holds a fragment of the mortal remains of a Catholic saint, usually a bone.

Gee, what magic item could that have inspired in D&D? Hm?

(Gentile followers, feel free to reblog this not just for the educational aspect, but also for the unexpected faint echo of tumblr bone stealing witch drama)

[bogleech]

I was seeing this post for days and I knew it couldn’t be quite right. I was already sure “phylactery” was just a more archaic way of saying “amulet” but I thought maybe I was just a big dummy because I’m not Jewish, OP was so sure of themselves and anybody questioning them was just getting EVISCERATED. Now that the notes are like 200 real Jewish people saying “excuse me, what the FUCK???” It feels safe to mention that whatever OP’s intentions were, misinformation like this tends to be used by certain people to further push their “SJW Socialist Jewish Elites” conspiracy theories.

(Some have pointed out that the one nugget of truth is that 3rd edition portrayed a phylactery exactly like a teffilin, but that doesn’t seem to be what OP was arguing)

[systlin]

I saw your ideas for rewriting the Dresden Files and I love it! Do you mind making it so the female characters are a bit less killed-off-for-man-pain? I have specific examples, but I do not wish to spoil others on this hell site.

Literally all the women survive. There’s a line for beating Harry’s dumbass over the head with a large stick.

[krel-tal]

Every time Harry tries to step in and “help manage” the queue, everyone gets a free for all 5 minute bonus round on him.

[systlin]

Petition for Systlin to challenge Jim to single combat for the right to author all future Dresden Files books and Retcon out the Christian Bullshitery

PLEASE

Lord tho it’d take me three books just to unfuck some things

[karama9]

Darling, it’s called fanfic. You know this, you’re GOOD at it. 

[systlin]

TBH one of the best Dresden fanfics I’ve read is someone going “FUCK U JIM BUTCHER” and re-writing all of “Changes” and the Red Court to not be flamingly racist against indigenous people.

[systlin]

https://archiveofourown.org/works/23434963/chapters/56170678

I want to note that the author looked at Harry, went “Nah”, and threw him in the trash and instead the protag is indigenous and thinks that Harry Dresden is a huge self-important asshole. (They are of course correct.)

[systlin]

I lied it’s around Turncoat, forgot the order of titles in the series

[systlin]

Y’know while I’ve read and enjoyed the Dresden Files, there are things about them that bug me, and a big one is the way that Jim Butcher is absolutely steeped in Christianity.

Like, other gods exist. Harry’s met them. Like face to face met them. And yet, the ACTUAL big boy power in the universe above all others is the Christian god, and Jim has never seemed to even question this arrangement, nor do any of his characters. 

It’s just so very Christian of him, and I suspect he’d be just sorta confused if this was pointed out to him and utterly not grasp just exactly how fuckin fucked up it is to have Kusanagi reworked in his mythos into a Christian artifact or have pagan gods be subordinate to his god.

[athingofvikings]

Seconding this; the whole “Jewish Knight of the Cross” thing makes me… very uncomfortable, to say the least.

[systlin]

Right? And I know fans have pointed that out to Butcher, and he just sorta…brushes them off and ignores them.

[jewish-alderaanian-princess]

Sorry the Jewish what of the what???!!!!

[systlin]

Yeah he had Waldo Butters, a Jewish character, become a Knight of the Cross, AKA a wielder of a sword forged with a nail from the true cross. 

For extra spicy offensiveness, that sword is supposed to be the aforementioned Kusanagi, a sacred sword in Japanese Shinto.

He does not seem to realize how exactly this is offensive, because he is a white dude, and he actually gets all pissed off about people pointing out that there’s an awful lot of capital letters White Christian Man in his books and that some of the things he’s written are offensive.

[wakewithgiggli]

And there I was thinking the only thing wrong with Dresden Files was the rampant sexism and misogyny.

[systlin]

OOOOH lemme find the angry peeved rant I found on a usenet forum some moons ago that Butcher posted when he found a thread where a user asked quite innocently “So did Jim Butcher find religion or something just before book 3? Because there seems to be an awful lot of Christian iconography in the books all of a sudden starting there and some bits almost read like a religious tract.”

(5 minute pause)

FOUND IT copy pasting word for word;

Clearly, Johan, you haven’t actually read all that many religious tracts.  Their special effects budgets are usually a lot lower.

I’m sorry if the book walked on your personal prejudices against faith–wait, no I’m not, particularly, since I wasn’t aiming it at you in particular–but I’m writing fantasy novels, and fantasy novels kinda traditionally deal with some fairly large issues.  You may have heard of it, the struggle of Good versus Evil?  And since I’m setting the books in a world that’s intended to more or less be our own, I’d be a frickin’ idiot to simply /ignore/ the issue of faith and belief in relation to that conflict, wouldn’t I?

Other belief systems get some air time as well, including various neo-pagan beliefs, Bhuddism, agnosticism (kinda ridiculous in the Dresden book world, but there it is) with others to come.  So if you’re just down on religion in general, do yourself a favor and stop reading the books.  Faith is a huge part of the human condition, a dominant factor in our history, and I tend to write about, well, people.  I’m not going to shove any one belief down anyone’s throat, but I’m not going to ignore the issue of belief, either.

But let me drop you a quick thank you for speculating about my personal life based upon the contents of a fiction novel.  All authors just love it when readers do that, let me tell you.  It’s understandable.  After all, it’s so difficult to find out any information at all about big time inaccessible author figures in today’s information society.  Two or three minutes of research on Google is utterly unreasonable to expect of anyone.  It’s only natural to move straight from that to public speculation.

Maybe in the future, you could phrase an issue like this in slightly less personally oriented terms:  "Hey, what’s up with the sharp increase in religious material between books 2 and 3 of such-and-such series.“  You stick to the written material, see?  It’s an objective discussion, and way more appropriate than “Hey, I wonder if we should stomp around in someone’s extremely personal private life, drag it out in a disdainful fashion, and then insinuate that he lacks professionalism by letting it dictate the course of his work.”

Here’s a thought.  Maybe the state of neglect, or lack thereof, of my soul/chi/katra/whatever really isn’t any of your BUSINESS, Johan.

Sheesh.

Jim Butcher

https://groups.google.com/g/rec.arts.sf.written/c/xSsVZzM6LCM

(The rest of the convo is some people pointing out that none of those other things get quite equal billing and that media is open to criticism, and a bunch of people defending Butcher’s poor hurt feelings because THEY don’t see anything wrong of course.)

[bandersnatchcrumplesnort]

I don’t even know who Butcher is, have never read the Dresden files, and probably never will at this point, given this thread. That’s a wild and uncalled for rant given that the question really was not particularly person/intimate or rude.

[askjaelyn]

It gets worse, actually because he also white washed Chicago removed any black people in it except for two and described a thriving black neighborhood as a gang infested drug den and when actual chicago black natives got upset by this and told him to fuck off, he proceeded to ignore them, and focus on how “Why are you so mean and saying the F word to me, it’s a complete AU setting where black people don’t exist, what’s wrong with that???”

[out-there-on-the-maroon]

More horrible things about the sword situation: a faithful Catholic woman, using the sword to defend her friend from a literal fallen angel … breaks it because of her Silly Feminine Emotions. Later, a man repairs it via his love of Star Wars. I’m not kidding. Butcher is steeped in Christian-centricism for sure, but even that takes a backseat if he can humiliate and depower a female character in favor of a male character. 

I remember a few years back people were pointing out stuff like “hey it’s really weird that he’s writing Chicago as so white when 90% of the books take place there” and “the way he writes bisexuality is gross” and “the way he describes women is deeply uncomfortable” and the mods of the main Dresden Files tumblr on here shut down any conversations about that and also supported fans voicing their desire to physically harm people bringing up these topics. That was about when I soured on the fandom and books for good. 

[thekeeperofthesilence]

For added, added grossness:

Each of those Swords is basically (as we learn in Peace Talks) the Pokeball of an actual angel, judging when and how to let the humans wielding the Swords use the Swords' powers- or not. So Murphy broke a literal angel Pokeball with her Silly Women Emotions. Even tho the person she was using the Sword against absolutely deserved it, because he basically swore he'd NEVER do evil again... and then went right back on that word and continued doing it. Which, somehow, Murphy was wrong for calling him out for and trying to stop him from ever doing again.

Would also like to mention that saving a victim from their abuser/someone planning to do horrible things to them is also apparently a big No, by the Swords (God's) rules, if said victim made a promise to their abuser. Even under duress. It's some straight up Calvinist bullshit.

We see this in Grave Peril. Gehayi goes over how fucked it is here:

[nodded]

Choose: would you want normal fire or blue fire if your were a firebender? asked by @avatarshavearrows ↳ blue fire

[mysterymellie]

[primordial-fungus-monolith]

Really hope I don't have to do a fundraiser for my wheelchair...

[primordial-fungus-monolith]

Just realized medicare doesn't cover wheelchairs for like outside so 🤪

[primordial-fungus-monolith]

I'll do a real post about this on main when I'm done with my current issue but if anyone cares to help

Help Ren Get Around!, organized by Ren Farrell

Hi, I'm Ren/Agent, I'm a trans woman with chronic pain. My mobility has become severely impacted by m… Ren Farrell needs your support for He

[e-seal-deactivated20210319]

This post got more traction than the one I made on here so rbing...$221/$3200 raised

[lovecorenaruto]

#KillHiashiHyuga2k20

[catchymemes]

[radical-eirini-deactivated20210]

this was made by some kind of clueless zoomer right? This is why you had a big stack of magazines in the bathroom before phones were a thing.

[anarchapella]

Nope, my family didn’t have magazines (too poor) and I used to read shampoo bottles

[cowthropologist]

My family kept a bunch of books in the bathroom and I STILL read the shampoo bottles

[melifair]

Pronouncing all the chemical ingredients under your breath

[caitlinfaith]

I used to “read” the side printed in spanish or french and try to get the accent right.