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2024.05.28 20:43 Wow_Crazy_Leroy_WTF What’s the current standing of Austin Film Festival? Have they cleaned up their act?

Hey fam, like many other writers this time of the year, I’m considering submitting a script to the Austin Film Festival. But every time I go to their website, I can’t help but have a feeling they’re scammy. Certainly, their operation is so big that any generalization may be wrong. Selling badges for panels, attendance, and pitch fests seems like honest work; no complaints there.
I also know John August and Craig Mazin like many other big names often go there (which may not be an endorsement, but certainly validates them). However, I do see some red flags in their Screenplay Competition. I will list what I see. Please feel free to defend them or list your own issues.
I’m not here with the intention to tarnish what may be a beloved festival. If anything, I want a fair and balance discussion. But if they have flaws, then I hope they slowly improve their operation so they can only get better and better, year after year.
Some Red Flags with the Screenplay Competition:

First off, there’s way too many categories. Besides the already broad spectrum between Drama and Comedy, Feature and TV, they also accept Podcasts, Digital Series, and Plays. I feel like they’re one step away from accepting Poems, but that would be too transparent.
Secondly, the are too many “side awards”, available for an additional fee, of course. I refer to Horror award by Vertigo, or the Nickelodeon teleplay thing, for example. Have these partners actually found talent and given any AFF entrants a meaningful opportunity in recent years? Or is it just a big jerk circle where they validate each other at the expense of paying writers?
Thirdly, same question for the Josephson Fellowship and the Enderby Award. Are doors getting opened? Enderby, specifically, rubs me the wrong way. When you go to their Instagram, their latest posts is an AFF photo and a NFT movie. Are they legit in 2024?
Finally, wasn’t there a big controversy some years ago? About readers not getting paid or using AI for notes?

I mean, am I overthinking everything? Have they cleaned up their act?
Feel free to push back too. I don’t want this to turn into an echo chamber.
Thanks!

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2024.05.27 05:10 starting_to_learn Taylor Swift and the Confessional Poets Department: An Anti-Hero's Confessional Journey from Midnights to TTPD

Taylor Swift’s music has long been branded “confessional.” When people call Taylor’s work “confessional,” they might mean that her music is emotionally confessional. But when it comes to Taylor Swift, this belief that her music is emotionally confessional is closely tied to the belief that she is delivering an autobiographical accounting of her life through her lyrics. Her music is perceived as grounded in real events and real people, peppered with “clues” that, if followed, will lead you to the True Story she is telling.
Interesting to consider in light of TTPD, the term “confessional” as applied to art actually has its roots in poetry. The confessional poets were a small group in the late 1950s-1960s who changed the face of American poetry, shifting towards a much more personal, autobiographical style. They included Robert Lowell, Anne Sexton, and most well-known today, Sylvia Plath - amongst others. The central breakthrough of their work was in “removing the mask” that had previously hidden the poet from view in their work. The confessional poets grounded their work in their own personal experiences and laid bare the most intimate details of their inner lives, delving into “taboo” subjects like mental illness and childhood trauma. This was seen as a major change for poetry to be so grounded in the poet’s interior life and personal history as the explicit subject. These poets became literary celebrities with much attention paid to the details of their personal lives - or in Plath’s case, her death.
After falling down a rabbit hole learning about the confessional poets, I believe that Taylor drew inspiration from this group on TTPD and crafted the album, at least in part, as a meditation on the concept of “confession.” I think her treatment of confession on TTPD is multi-layered - simultaneously pulling back the curtain towards a sincere unveiling of inner truth, while also, on a more meta level, examining what it means to create confessional art and, more broadly, what it means to confess. I’d argue that TTPD is all at once a personal act of confession, a performance of confession complete with a clue package so on-the-nose People Magazine only needed a day to crack it, and - if you’re keeping an ear out for those red herrings - a subversion of the expectations for confessional art. Which, as it turns out, is not so different from what the confessional poets themselves did.
After examining TTPD through this lens, I also revisited Midnights - and I hear the beginnings of this confessional journey stirring on that album, laying the groundwork for TTPD. Within the 321 “exile ends” countdown theory, this means that she began this confessional journey at 3 (Midnights) and ramped it up at 2 (TTPD). Where do we go from here? She just might be on the road to confessing her truth in swooping, sloping, cursive letters.
So, my fellow Gaylors, if you’d like to join me down this rabbit hole - I stand before you with a ~~summary of~~ long-ass dissertation on my findings!
Disclaimers:

I was inspired to do this research based on initial connections between TTPD and Sylvia Plath I've seen percolating (i.e., these posts), plus the Ted Hughes poem, Red, that Florence posted as "recommended by Taylor.”
I am not an expert on the confessional poetry movement. I learned a lot through my research for this post, and I'm sure I've still barely scratched the surface of this rabbit hole, so I'd welcome anyone with more expertise who can build on these connections!
My main goal in this post is to analyze Midnights and TTPD through this confessional lens. When drawing connections to the confessional poetry movement, I’m going to deal with the movement broadly and focus on how this work was collectively understood, perceived, and talked about - both by the literary establishment and by these poets themselves. Dealing in broad strokes means I’ll be missing nuance in the specifics of each poet, and it is not my intention to mischaracterize any of their work. It’s just the only way to keep the post manageable.

What is confessional poetry?

The term "confessional" was first used to describe Robert Lowell's Life Studies, which was considered a "tell-all" on his troubled youth and ongoing mental health struggles. In his review of Life Studies, M.L. Rosenthal defined confession as an act of “removing the mask.” He wrote, “[Lowell’s] speaker is unequivocally himself, and it is hard not to think of Life Studies as a series of personal confidences, rather shameful, that one is honor-bound not to reveal.” (Source)
Robert Lowell became the top literary celebrity of his time, and the confessional genre the most popular genre of poetry. Sylvia Plath and Anne Sexton were Lowell’s students at Boston University and this group all drew inspiration from one another. While the trope of the tortured artist certainly predates this group, it’s notable that, for these poets, “tortured” was and is a central part of how the public understood their identities as artists. Interestingly, Lowell, Plath, and Sexton were all hospitalized (repeatedly) at the same psychiatric hospital, McLean Hospital in Massachusetts, and wrote about their experiences. Plath wrote of her experiences there in her famous novel The Bell Jar. One of Lowell’s most famous poems, Waking in the Blue, was written based on his experience at McLean. McLean was described as “America’s most literary hospital” in this article from The Atlantic titled "The Mad Poets Society."
There is a complicated legacy to the term “confessional” in art, beginning with these poets. Most of them absolutely hated the term. There was a sense that it reduced their art to a mere regurgitation of feelings without craft. There was a tendency to treat their work as very literal autobiography, to reduce it to a reporting of facts, though these poets themselves repeatedly said that, while their work was grounded in personal truths, it was not necessarily always literally factual. There came to be a mythos around these artists - not on the same scale as the Taylor Swift Cinematic Universe, but the parallels are there.
At the same time as artists resisted the word, the public is undoubtedly hungry for these personal confessions. Today, we need only look at Taylor Swift’s massive star power to see the draw of so-called confessional art.
Note before we move on: I’m going to use the word “confessional” throughout this post because, right or wrong, it’s the word that is commonly used to describe this type of art, and I also think Taylor is specifically playing with different meanings of the word. I don’t mean any disrespect towards the poets who didn’t like the term.

What Makes Midnights and The Tortured Poets Department Confessional Works

MIDNIGHTS: "Meet Me At Midnight"
A return to autobiographical writing was a central part of the sales pitch for Midnights. She wove this message into promotional appearances, for example the Jimmy Fallon interview where she describes Midnights as her “first directly autobiographical work in a while.” The album announcement branded Midnights “the story of 13 sleepless nights scattered throughout my life.” She closes the announcement with “Meet me at midnight.” This return to direct, explicit autobiography, combined with the promise of personal revelations implied in “Meet me at midnight,” places us squarely within the confessional mode.
This messaging is especially interesting when we consider that Taylor’s previous work, with the exception of folklore/evermore, is widely considered to be a faithful autobiographical recounting of events from her life. Fans receiving this invitation to meet her at midnight might ask themselves: But haven’t we already met you? Haven’t you already revealed your innermost feelings and the private details of your life in your songwriting for years? The implication seems to be: no, you haven’t met me yet, but you will. The implication is that she is on the road to revealing herself in some new way that will invite us to truly meet her. This calls to mind the imagery of “removing the mask” from Rosenthal’s review of Life Studies, pulling back the veneer to reveal what is underneath. Pulling back the curtain, perhaps?
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Importantly, it’s not just us, the public, who are implied to have not met Taylor. It’s also implied that she is estranged from herself: “For all of us who have tossed and turned and decided to keep the lanterns lit and go searching - hoping that just maybe, when the clock strikes twelve, we’ll meet ourselves.” Midnights represents her first step down the road towards meeting herself - and an invitation for us to join her.
While we did not meet her on Midnights, the songs on this album did begin to pull back the curtain. The entire concept of this album, exploring things that keep her up in the middle of the night, suggests a new kind of vulnerability. Taylor herself said of Anti-Hero: “I don’t think I’ve delved this far into my insecurities in this detail before…this song is a real guided tour through all the things I tend to hate about myself…I like Anti-Hero a lot because I think it’s really honest.” (Source) We also have Maroon and Hits Different - the two most obviously sapphic songs she’s released that she herself classified as “autobiography.” We have Would’ve, Could’ve, Should’ve, a searing exploration of lost girlhood.
Towards the end of the album and into the 3AM edition, she starts to explicitly grapple with the concept of confession. Interestingly, Taylor has not used the word “confess” that often in her discography. Midnights contains two mentions of the word, the most of any TS album at the time of release.
The first mention comes in Mastermind when she says: “No one wanted to play with me as a little kid / So I’ve been scheming like a criminal ever since / To make them love me and make it seem effortless / This is the first time I’ve felt the need to confess.”
Mastermind closes the standard edition of Midnights on this note - that this is the first time she’s felt the need to confess, signaling a new type of revelation. In this context, she is playing with legal imagery. She’s been scheming like a criminal, and now she is confessing to the “crime” of masterminding her career to make everyone love her.
Then we transition into the 3AM edition, which contains even more themes of confession. We get our second use of the word on Paris, where she longs to confess her truth: “I want to transport you to somewhere the culture’s clever / Confess my truth in swooping, sloping cursive letters.”
Finally, the 3AM edition closes on Dear Reader. While she does not explicitly use the word “confess” here, she is very much operating in the confessional mode. The bridge, in particular, recontextualizes the entire album as an act of confession. She describes the songs on Midnights (“these nights” that she wanders through) as the “desperate prayers of a cursed man spilling out to you for free.” She is spilling confessions out to us on this album in the form of desperate prayers. And then she makes a further confession - “you wouldn’t take my word for it if you knew who was talking.” She begs her audience not to take her at her word, to instead hear her “desperate prayers” and see what she is “hiding in plain sight.” Dear Reader is arguably the most confessional song on the album - and it tees us up perfectly for TTPD, where she will take these confessions even further.
THE TORTURED POETS DEPARTMENT
“Confession” is a word with several meanings. I believe that Taylor is exploring all these different meanings of the word on TTPD:

Most broadly, a personal intimate revelation
A religious sacrament: the confession of sins
A legal statement: confessing to a crime

It’s apt, then, that the term “confessional” was first applied to Lowell because he existed at the intersection of all definitions of the word. His struggles with mental illness were well-known in the literary community. He was a Catholic convert. And he was well-known for having served time as a conscientious objector to WWII. The other poets who came to be dubbed “confessional” tended to share some of these traits with him - a lengthy public struggle with mental illness, a preoccupation with religion, and/or brushes with the law. These subjects were explored in the confessional poets’ work.
I’m going to focus below mainly on how TTPD is exploring these different facets of confession. There are layers to the treatment of confession on this album. I would argue that TTPD is all at once a sincere act of confession; a performance of confession, targeted to the public; and a subversion of that performance in the form of “red herrings.”
She is so productive, it’s an art! Let’s dive in.
CONFESSION AS “REMOVING THE MASK”
The confessional poets pushed the boundaries of what you could say in a poem. Particularly at the time, the topics they were known for writing about were considered quite taboo and improper - and this was part of what made this “breakthrough” new and exciting. Consider this quote from Sylvia Plath, then an up-and-coming poet, and how she describes Lowell and Sexton’s work:

I've been very excited by what I feel is the new breakthrough that came with, say, Robert Lowell's Life Studies, this intense breakthrough into very serious, very personal, emotional experience which I feel has been partly taboo. Robert Lowell's poems about his experience in a mental hospital, for example, interested me very much. These peculiar, private and taboo subjects…I think particularly the poetess Anne Sexton, who writes about her experiences as a mother, as a mother who has had a nervous breakdown, is an extremely emotional and feeling young woman and her poems are wonderfully craftsmanlike poems and yet they have a kind of emotional and psychological depth which I think is something perhaps quite new, quite exciting. (Source)

On TTPD, Taylor is similarly pushing the boundaries of what you can say in a song - and she is certainly pushing the boundaries past what she has previously said in a song. She is delving deeper into the most intimate and painful elements of her interior life, evoking imagery and subject matters the confessional poets are known for with lyrics like:

“I was supposed to be sent away / but they forgot to come and get me / I was a functioning alcoholic / til nobody noticed my new aesthetic”
“If I can’t have him / I might just die, it would make no difference”
“Stitches undone / two graves, one gun”
“I want to snarl and show you just how disturbed this has made me / you wouldn’t last an hour in the asylum where they raised me”
“The hospital was a drag / worst sleep that I ever had”

In addition, Taylor delivers some of her most explicit lyrics on Guilty as Sin. We have unbridled rage in Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me, The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived, even the way she calls out “the most judgmental creeps” on But Daddy I Love Him. We also have a healthy dose of homicidal ideation with lyrics like: “Your wife waters flowers, I wanna kill her” and “I did my best to lay to rest / all of the bodies that have ever been on my body / and in my mind, they sink into the swamp.” “Is that a bad thing to say in a song?” she asks. She says it anyway. The mask is off.
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CONFESSION AS A RELIGIOUS SACRAMENT
Art as a Sacred Catharsis: “This writer is of the firm belief that our tears become holy in the form of ink on a page. Once we have spoken our saddest story, we can be free of it. And then all that’s left behind is the tortured poetry.”
The word “confession” calls to mind the religious confessional, where one confesses their sins to be absolved of them. In the Catholic tradition, it’s only through confession that one can be free of their sins, achieve holiness, and re-establish communion with God. Sin constitutes a separation from God; confession allows for “wholeness.”
The above excerpt from Taylor’s post about TTPD evokes this religious imagery, where writing music is the act of confession. Our tears become holy when we shed them as ink on a page; when we confess our saddest story, we are free of it. TTPD is that act of confession - a sacred catharsis.
She spells this out on the album’s concluding track, The Manuscript, where she describes the catharsis of channeling agony into art. Once she’s confessed this story, she is free of it. It isn’t hers anymore.
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In this religious context, TTPD as an act of confession implies the existence of a sin to be confessed. She explores this theme heavily on the album - what it means to be guilty as sin and what it means to be holy.
Love as Holiness: “What if the way you hold me is actually what’s holy?”
The true nature of holiness and sin is a major theme on TTPD - contrasting traditional notions of holiness and sin against how the author defines these words for herself. While this theme is absolutely rampant on TTPD, it’s not the first time a TS album has asked these questions. This theme blossomed on Lover before reaching new heights on TTPD.
On Lover, her love is positioned as sacred. She sings on Cornelia Street: “Sacred new beginnings that became my religion.” False God expands on this theme by drawing a contrast between this sacred love and the concept of a “false god” - an act of idolatry, a sin. She seems to say: even if they consider this love to be a sin, WE will still worship this love. We will still make this love our religion. “Confession” on False God is the act of making amends with her lover, re-establishing communion between them. “Got the wine for you” calls to mind the act of receiving holy communion, the body and blood of Christ - which, according to Catholic tradition, you are not allowed to receive when in a state of mortal sin. You must first receive the sacrament of confession before you can partake in communion. On False God, this love is her God - and they make confessions to break down the separation between them and achieve oneness.
This contrast from False God - between how others perceive her love as sinful, while she considers it her true religion - carries forward onto TTPD. On Guilty as Sin, she contrasts the “long-suffering propriety” they want from her with “the way you hold me” - and she insists this is actually what’s holy. She takes it a step further on But Daddy I Love Him. Here, she points an accusing finger back at those who would accuse her of sinfulness. She casts the Sarahs and Hannahs as the guilty ones - guilty of hatred, raising you to cage you, “vipers in empaths’ clothing.” They don’t need to pray for her because she is not the sinner. They are. This condemnation carries forward onto Cassandra, where she castigates the pure greed of the “Christian chorus line” who “never spared a prayer for [her] soul.” On The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived, this man wears a “Jehovah’s Witness suit” - a predator peddling a false idea of holiness.
What began on Lover as honoring the holiness of her love transforms on TTPD into a castigation of those who would say it’s a sin. Lover is reverence; TTPD is a righteous fire of judgment sent to engulf a fallen world, a la the End Times.
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So, we know what TTPD doesn’t consider to be her sin. The question remains - if she is confessing, then what is she confessing to? What sin is she seeking absolution for?
The Original Sin: “Forgive me, Peter.”
Peter is the only song on the album where we hear her ask for forgiveness: “Forgive me, Peter.” This evokes the words you would say in a confessional: “Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned.”
What is her sin? Leaving Peter behind - her “lost fearless leader in closets like cedar.” Preserved in the closet where she left him. She asks Peter to forgive her because she didn’t truly want to leave him there: “I didn’t want to come down / I thought it was just goodbye for now.” She believed that Peter would grow up and come find her, that they would be reunited - but it hasn’t happened.
The second and final time she asks Peter for forgiveness comes at the end of the song. She asks his forgiveness for turning out the light: “Forgive me, Peter / Please know that I tried to hold on to the days when you were mine / But the woman who waits by the window has turned out the light.” Here, turning out the light symbolizes giving up hope for Peter’s return.
Her sin, then, is two-fold: leaving Peter behind and then giving up hope that they could be reunited. And I’d argue that this is no ordinary sin - this separation from Peter is the original sin of the TTPD universe, akin to the original sin of Adam and Eve that separates mankind from God - the root of all suffering. On Peter, she compares herself to Adam, missing a rib: “The goddess of timing once found us beguiling / She said she was trying / Peter, was she lying? / My ribs get the feeling she did.” The implication is that Peter is the Eve to her Adam, carved out from her rib - and, in their separation, she feels the hollowness of this missing part of her. The Prophecy evokes this same Adam and Eve imagery: “I got cursed like Eve got bitten. Was it punishment?” This is a direct reference to the concept of original sin and the punishment that followed. The punishment is exile - being cast out of the garden. She can only return there in her mind (“secret gardens in my mind”).
This all gets very interesting and poignant if we posit that she is singing to a lost part of herself on Peter - that she is in exile from herself. (There have been a number of great analyses of this song through that lens; i.e., this one.) Her original sin of denying herself created this rift within her, which caused her suffering. She confesses in order to return to communion with herself. To become whole again. “Forgive me, Peter.”
This calls back to the Midnights foreword, the sense of estrangement from herself and the search to find herself: “For all of us who have tossed and turned and decided to keep the lanterns lit and go searching - hoping that just maybe, when the clock strikes twelve, we’ll meet ourselves.”
Importantly, in the Christian tradition, the crucifixion/resurrection was God’s answer to original sin, building a bridge for humanity to once again be one with God. So, these lyrics from Guilty as Sin are quite relevant here: “What if I roll the stone away? They’re gonna crucify me anyway.” The willingness to be crucified in the name of rolling the stone away - revealing this reborn version of herself - is the answer to original sin. Rolling the stone away is how she meets herself. And, in this context, rolling the stone away is, in essence, confession. It’s removing the mask, revealing what lies underneath. It’s exiting her tomb of silence.
Is TTPD the act of confession that will bring her back to herself and allow her to return to the garden? God, I hope so.
CONFESSION AS A LEGAL STATEMENT
I said earlier that while I think TTPD is a sincere piece of confessional art, I also think that it is intentionally crafted as a performance of confession. By this I mean - TTPD is crafted to give the people what they want and expect from confessional art, particularly Taylor Swift’s confessional art. And what do the people want? They want the scoop. The gory details of her personal life. They want her to name names and tell them exactly what went down. In other words, they want to trace the evidence.
The performance of confession on TTPD hinges on the evidence she feeds the audience and how she directs us to use it. To understand this performance, we have to explore how TTPD navigates the third definition of the word “confession.” It’s time to go to court.
The Hearing: “At this hearing, I stand before my fellow members of The Tortured Poets Department with a summary of my findings.”
Since announcing TTPD, Taylor has been teasing the concept of this album as a hearing. She spoke of “entering into evidence.” She presented the artifacts. And now here she is, standing before the public, making a “plea of temporary insanity.”
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This imagery introduces yet another layer to the concept of this album as “confessional.” Here, we are in a courtroom, and she is confessing to a crime. She is presenting us with the evidence to support her plea.
I think there are two layers to the courtroom imagery. The first is the defendant herself trying to make sense of the losses she has sustained, sorting through the evidence. Hits Different off Midnights introduces this language: “I trace the evidence, make it make some sense why the wound is still bleeding.” This language continues onto TTPD - i.e., in So Long London, she asks, “You swore that you loved me, but where were the clues?” This is in line with how Taylor has spoken about using music to make sense of her life.
But the second layer is that this isn’t just Taylor trying to make sense of things on her own. She is confessing directly to an audience - her fellow members of the tortured poets department, the public. She is again breaking the fourth wall, like on Dear Reader.
Importantly, this courtroom imagery bookends the listener’s experience of the album. It served as the audience’s first introduction to the album at the start of the promotional cycle. And she closes the album with this imagery via the epilogue poem. The whole album is framed as a court hearing.
This is fascinating within the context of the Taylor-verse because this framing directly parallels the way the public engages with her music. Her lyrics are treated as a factual, autobiographical accounting of her life (particularly her love life), which the public scours for evidence in an investigative mission to uncover the True Story she is telling vis-a-vis what we know of her personal life. And her music is, in fact, often reduced to an investigation into her love life. To most media outlets and fans, analysis of a Taylor Swift song seems to mean examining which man the song is about. The lyrics serve as evidence, rather than art.
So, when Taylor tells her audience that she is entering something into evidence, we are primed; we know what to do. Time to pull out the magnifying glass and every pap photo of Taylor taken in the last two years. It’s interesting, isn’t it, that she gave us so much “evidence” to work with over the course of the last year? So many public sightings of her to expertly match up with the lyrics on TTPD. Not to mention the Eras Tour as an opportunity for non-stop Easter egging. She presented her information-hungry audience with a veritable buffet of evidence to pick through and match up with the album.
And the album itself is chock-full of “clues” linking lyrics back to real-life figures in the TSCU. She already knows that her audience will follow those clues; it’s what happens every album cycle. But this time she doesn’t just lay the bait and wait for everyone to take it. She lays the bait and tells us to take it. She says that she is entering this evidence for us to review. She stands before us with a summary of her findings. She directs us to conduct the post-mortem.
When was the last time she so brazenly invited speculation? I’d argue that this brings us right back to the beginning of her career, hiding secret messages in the liner notes and directing her audience to decode the messages to find out who or what the song was about. She said she wanted people to read her lyrics. But the end result was that people read her lyrics without really reading them. Her lyrics that she was so proud of were not treated as art. They were reduced to clues, evidence linking the song to this man or that. And we need only read the Reputation prologue to know how she came to feel about that:
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So, it begs the question - Why is she directing her audience to follow the trail of evidence she laid out? Why evoke the language of the courtroom if she doesn’t want her music to be paternity tested in the court of public opinion? Why enact this performance of confession that seems to play directly into the public’s worst impulses?
Well, you know what they say: if it feels like a trap, you’re already in one.
Red Herrings: “And so I enter into evidence my tarnished coat of arms; my muses, acquired like bruises…”
Along with teasing the concept of TTPD as a court hearing from the very beginning, Taylor also introduced the suggestion of “red herrings” the same day she announced the album. This is no coincidence. A “red herring” is both a literary device AND a rhetorical device used in legal settings to distract or divert attention away from the main issues of the case. (Source) So, red herrings are a perfect fit for an album that centers on confession, playing in sandboxes both literary and legal.
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If you’re in this corner of the internet, you likely believe that Taylor has been using red herrings in her work for quite some time as a tool to obscure and distract from her real-life muses. Naming a song “Style” is a perfect example of how she might very overtly hint at a public-facing muse in order to distract from the true inspiration. But, importantly, no matter how obvious we think these past red herrings were, TTPD marks a first: the first time she has explicitly pointed to red herrings in an album as part of the promotional cycle. The Rep prologue took us halfway there with the assertion that everyone who tried to paternity test the songs would be wrong. But now she’s saying: I am entering this evidence for you to review, but the evidence itself contains red herrings. I am planting evidence that is going to lead you to the wrong conclusion. Again: If it feels like a trap, you’re already in one.
Why do this? Why intentionally misdirect and then TELL us that’s what she’s doing? I can only assume that she wants us to see it. If she directs her audience to trace the evidence and tells us there are red herrings - well, then we will look for the red herrings. Or at least some of us will. And if we look closely enough, we’ll find them.
thanK you aIMee is a perfect example. There are three layers here: First, we have the subject of the song identified as Aimee. Then we have an old-school Taylor “hidden clue” in the title of the song - capitalizing letters to spell out Kim. Everyone sees that very obvious “clue” and pats themselves on the back for “solving the case”: the song is about Kim Kardashian. But then we have this line in the song: “I changed your name and any real defining clues / and one day, your kid comes home singin’ / a song that only us two is gonna know is about you.” Seems a bit contradictory, huh? She says she changed any real defining clues, but surely capitalizing letters in the song title to spell out someone’s name is a pretty defining clue. I smell a red herring. It could be that the capitalized letters are a red herring. It could be that the line in the song about not leaving any defining clues is a cheeky misdirection meant to cast doubt on the “clue” she left. I’d argue it’s probably both. Either way, the obvious contradiction built into this particular song serves to cast doubt on the history of Easter egging song subjects in the TSCU. This song takes us right back to the early days of Easter egging, capitalizing letters in lyric books to spell out secret messages. If this is a misdirection, who's to say there weren't misdirections built into the Easter eggs from the beginning?
The Alchemy is another example. This song falls near the end of the album, the final “muse-coded” song of the standard edition of TTPD. And if you’ve been tracing the evidence through the songs up until now, you’ll find matching “clues” in this song that seem to point at Matty Healy: themes of returning to a lost love, drug references in “heroin but this time with an E.” But wait - now she’s using a bunch of football references? There’s beer sticking to the floor while your friends lift you up over their heads because you just won the big game? The football imagery is so heavy-handed that it took very little time for every entertainment media outlet in creation to post a carousel of TayloTravis images along with lyrics to the song. But if you can keep yourself from getting distracted by the “Tayvis” fanfare, you might ask yourself - what the heck is going on in this song? Is it about Matty or Travis? Is it about both of them? The inherent contradictions point to another red herring, “clues” planted to mislead. And, well, if there are misdirections about the identities of her romantic muses built into this song…then who’s to say there aren’t misdirections built into the others? Who’s to say that anything you think you “know” about the identities of her muses is true, even if she’s the one who planted the evidence? Who’s to say that she is telling you the truth?
This line of questioning cracks open the entire foundation of muse-driven Easter egging in the TSCU. Following the trail of evidence to the red herrings she planted about muse identities will lead you to question the entire enterprise of following the evidence in the first place. And I think that’s precisely the point. You’re in a trap, and she wants you to know it. Because this practice of attaching public-facing male muses to all of her work has Taylor in a trap, too. As she says in Mastermind, she’s spent her whole career “scheming like a criminal to make them love [her] and make it seem effortless.” This is the first time she’s felt the need to confess. She’s copping to the scheming, pointing us to the red herrings. She’s asking us to accept her plea of temporary insanity on account of her restricted humanity. Asking that we understand the plight of the caged beast, driven to do the most curious things.
And if we’re going to understand, then we must understand this: we’re all in a trap. If her fans are going to embrace her rolling the stone away, they have to first see that tomb of silence for what it was: a trap ensnaring us all, limiting her artistic expression, and preventing her audience from hearing the core truth in her music.
https://preview.redd.it/exlv6veusv2d1.png?width=518&format=png&auto=webp&s=660f3e680f1a8403a6406205f9e346e19c63abd1

Confessional Art: How much is confession? How much is art?

So, we’ve established these core precepts of the TTPD Universe: TTPD is a sincerely confessional album, representing a continuation of our anti-hero’s journey towards “meet me at midnight.” At the same time, TTPD is not necessarily based in literal, factual truths - and Dr. Swift has confessed that to us, too.
Is that a contradiction? Do the red herrings she planted exist in opposition to confessional art? I would argue, no, they do not.
The public’s foundational understanding of confessional art is that it is faithfully, literally autobiographical. It tells us the factual truth about the author. But just how true is that? For the confessional poets, when it came to truth in art, facts were besides the point. Consider this quote from Robert Lowell about his artistic process (emphasis mine):

“They're not always factually true. There's a good deal of tinkering with fact. You leave out a lot, and emphasize this and not that. Your actual experience is a complete flux. I've invented facts and changed things, and the whole balance of the poem was something invented. So there's a lot of artistry, I hope, in the poems. Yet there's this thing: if a poem is autobiographical—and this is true of any kind of autobiographical writing and of historical writing, you want the reader to say, “This is true.” In something like Macaulay's History of England, you think you're really getting William III. That's as good as a good plot in a novel. And so there was always that standard of truth which you wouldn't ordinarily have in poetry—the reader was to believe he was getting the real Robert Lowell.” (Source)

Here, Lowell seems to say that a core part of his artistic mission was to write poetry that would be experienced as true. He crafted his poems to deliver the experience and impression of the “real Robert Lowell.” And this is separate and distinct from delivering factual truth. In fact, he “tinkered with fact” as part of this artistic choice - to create a poem that would be experienced as true, even if it technically was not in the strictest sense of the term.
Anne Sexton made similar comments about her poems - that she did not always adhere to literal facts. In one interview, she described these untruths as “little escape hatches” so she would “always have an out.” She goes on to say: “I can tell more truth than I have to admit to because I can tell the truth and say, after all, ‘This was a lie’ or ‘Of course not all of my poems are true.’” These escape hatches, then, opened up room for her to tell more truth. Perhaps not always the literal kind, but the sincere core truth that audiences recognize and respond to as “true.”
The use of “red herrings,” then, is not in opposition to the confessional mode. Red herrings can actually enhance confessional art when changing factual details allows room for the author to share pieces of themselves that they otherwise would not. And, further, the experience of truth for the audience does not hinge on strict adherence to literal facts. The audience needs to feel that they are getting the real Robert Lowell. The real Taylor Swift.
Maybe we haven't met the real Taylor Swift yet. But I think TTPD brought us several steps closer.

submitted by starting_to_learn to GaylorSwift [link] [comments]

2024.05.26 21:27 f3kz Book based in the 60s/70s from around 2010s

I WANT TO RE-READ A BOOK but the problem is i cant for the life of me remember the title I saved in my goodreads but i made my user with facebook and apparantly thats not possible to log in with now and i cant remember the email i used and probs dont have access to that mail anyways anymore either.
BUT i remember some parts of the plot and also the cover, so i hope someone here can help me?
COVER: - the cover is blue like almost a navy blue. It has a photo of a window and a flashlight, and yellow light coming out of the flashlight - im not sure if there also were stars in the cover but i somehow feel like it was

this is very similar to the cover i am thinking of, but its not this book though: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/868490.Flashlight_and_Other_Poems?from_search=true&from_srp=true&qid=83mSZD6mSY&rank=35

THE PLOT: - The plot is based around the 60s or 70s i believe - Its a story about this girl that lives with her mom and a stepfather (??? not sure - but i am sure about the mom). - She has to work and do stuff around the house for the mum, or else she will get hit by her moms bathrobe - She makes friends with another girl i think (or it was her sister?) and they often hide in the cuppboard from the mother - sometimes the girl sat for hours and hid in the cupboard - she eventually used a flashlight at night to send secret messages with to her friend / sister through the window - i think eventually she got away and married some guy ??? or she got a job or smth
maybe the author is british and the surname is something with MC but this im not 100% certain on so dont quote me on this but i read it in english. and it was very like old- english if that makes sense, so a lot of weird words

submitted by f3kz to whatsthatbook [link] [comments]

2024.05.24 21:26 RaphAttack11 What’s the difference between having ghost writers and just having help

First. I understand the competitive nature of rapping and writing your own lyrics. I just wanted to put that out there
So I am an artist, I primarily paint & take photos. I’ve been dabbling with playing guitar and writing poems bc a lot of my friends are musicians.
I go to the studio with them often and I find myself helping them out, throwing creative ideas in to the pot….what would I be to them?
Or even for my paintings, I always look for advice/help from my friends who paint. Sometimes they’ll even paint a little part for me, that gives me inspo and boom I’ve taken my painting down a completely different path…is that ghost painting(funny but serious)
So when it comes to our favorite rappers, Dot, Drake, Cole, Doom, Lupe …etc
Where is the line drawn for the help they get and does that automatically make them a bad artist/rapper if they get help/ are ghost written for
We all know Drake has Ghost writers but is it even that deep because, especially as artists, we cannot create in a vacuum…we need advice and criticism. Case point the fall off of Ye🥲
I seriously doubt Dot writes ALL his shit solo dolo…without the help of those around him…so if an engineer has a suggestion, if keem actually did help him write ‘Sing About Me, I’m Dying of Thirst’, if top or punch disagree with a direction of a song and Dot actually agrees with their input.
Is all of that a bad thing & if not why do we hate on Drake for ghost writers when we don’t really know to what extent they’re actually writing & how often.
This just something I think about. Very much open to discussion
Edit : I also would say I understand how writing credits are attributed to songs on a basic level , so that may add context.

submitted by RaphAttack11 to KendrickLamar [link] [comments]

2024.05.23 21:46 Trash_Tia Every boyfriend I get is brutally dying. Now I know the truth about them…and me.

“It's me, Brianna. Not you.”
That's what my latest boyfriend told me before walking directly into the path of a truck. There was barely anything of him, just enough to peel off of the sidewalk. I thought our relationship was going well. It's not like I'm desensitised to my boyfriend's dying (or ceasing to exist), but it's almost become the norm.
Ben was my first boyfriend in high school, and my longest relationship to date. Fluffy haired Ben with his dimpled grin and freckles. He was the type of guy who should have been popular, but chose to keep to himself.
I met him in the principal’s office. Ben was being lectured for ‘sneaking around’ and I was handing in a late assignment. All he did was wink at me, and I fell.
Hard.
We dated for two years, and I really thought he was the one. Ben told me he loved me, and every Friday he introduced me to a new restaurant. I was in love. I loved *everything about him.
On the night before our senior prom, a drunk driver t-boned my boyfriend's car, killing him instantly. After his funeral, it's like he stopped existing. His parents left town, and every time I mentioned him, my parents would slowly tilt their heads and act confused when I brought him up.
My brother was the worst for it, considering he and Ben were best friends.
But he just looked at me with this weird fucking look in his eye, like his soul had been ripped out. Eyes are the windows to the soul, apparently, and my brother's soul was MIA. “Ben?” His expression crumpled. “Wait, who?”
Alex was my emotional support, who later became someone closer.
Funny Alex.
Blonde-but-not-quite-blonde, Alex.
I met him in group therapy. My boyfriend was dead, and he had just lost his mother. We didn't label it, because he had a girlfriend, and I didn't want to move on so quickly. I think we just found comfort in each other.
Eventually, though, Alex became something I wanted to label.
His sense of humor was a breath of fresh air. I didn't go to college because of Ben’s death, settling for a mediocre barista stop in town. Alex came in every day with fresh coffee and a sugar cookie. I think I loved him. I told him that. Half asleep, I told him I wanted to try and be something more with him. Alex looked taken-aback, but happy.
We spent the night together.
The morning after, I woke to my mother screaming.
Alex was dead in the bathroom, his blood splattering, staining pristine white. According to the first responders, he died of a self inflicted head injury. The exact same thing followed. I attended his funeral, and Alex’s family disappeared.
This time, I went back to his house. But according to a neighbour, his house had been abandoned for ten years. I had eaten pancakes in his kitchen just days earlier.
I broke in to see myself, but my neighbor was right. The hallway was piled with ancient mail and threats of eviction. Alex’s room didn't exist, instead, a storage room filled with boxes.
When I got home, my family had already forgotten Alex’s existence.
The town had forgotten him, and yet his blood still stained my bathroom.
Following Alex’s death, I was terrified of getting too close to people.
But Esme made it hard.
She was my third relationship. We met at a bar. I was extremely drunk and convinced I was cursed to kill all of my romantic partners. Esme. Cute Esme. Crooked teeth and smudged lipstick and warm Esme.
Do you know that person you meet and you instantly connect with them? The person you're sure is your soulmate?
That was Esme.
I told myself I wouldn't get close to her. But I was already talking to this girl, already pouring my life out to her. Esme sat and listened, her chin resting on her fist. She was a first year creative writing student, and she had a cat called Peanut.
I didn't remember much after that. We hit it off, and next thing I know we’re curled up in the back of her car watching Buffy on her iPad. I told her about my exes, and she nodded and smiled, but I don't think she was listening.
I told her all of my exes have died, and then been erased from existence.
Esme called me cute. She wanted to base a story around the concept, sitting up and grabbing her phone.
I have this memory of the girl I fell in love with at first sight.
She's nodding along to a Smith’s song spluttering from my car radio, typing on her phone. I can hear the tapping of her nails, her lips curving into a smile. I can see the exact moment she gets inspiration, pulling her knees to her chest. She's wearing fishnet tights that are torn, and a jacket that doesn't fit her.
She is fucking beautiful, and I don't want to lose her.
Alex was beautiful.
He had pretty eyes and brown curls that I liked running my hands through. Ben was beautiful. He made my heart swim, my stomach swarm with butterflies, when I first met him. Ben was my first love.
The realization woke me up one night, three months into dating Esme.
Both of them were dead, wiped away like they never existed.
And Esme would follow.
At first, I tried to break it off with her without sounding crazy. I told her it was me not her, and I wasn't in the mindset for a relationship.
Esme understood, but her eyes didn't. I didn't want to lose her. Esme lit up every room she entered. Her obsession with thrifted clothes and badly written poems, and her irrational fear of pandas, made her someone I wanted to be with.
So, I stayed with her. I told myself Ben and Alex were just coincidences that were nothing to do with me, and I wasn't indirectly fucking killing the people I fell in love with.
I avoided the ‘L’ word for as long as I could.
It slipped out on my way to work. Esme was driving.
I just said it, and her eyes lit up. She reached out and squeezed my hand.
At work, one of my colleagues, Jasper, caught my eye. When I twisted around to ask him to grab something, I glimpsed his phone screen. It looked like Tinder, though I didn't recognise the layout. It reminded me of Twitter, in dark mode. Jasper was leaning against the counter, his thumb hovering over a photo of Esme, chewing his bottom lip.
I watched his thumb prance across the screen, before he gave up and swiped left.
Finishing up the woman's coffee, I handed it over.
“Uhh, I asked for cream.”
Ignoring her, I sidled in front of my colleague, hyper focused on whatever app he was playing around with. “What's that?”
Jasper looked up, his eyes widening, lips parting, like a fucking goldfish.
“Clearly nothing.” Jasper side-stepped me, opening the refrigerator and pulling out milk. But he already had milk. The bastard was stalling. We had zero customers waiting, so it was the two of us, and a long, dragged out pause.
Jumping up and down on the heels of his feet, he shot me his usual grin, slipping his phone in his apron.
Jasper may have been smiling, though there was something twisted in his expression.
I couldn't stop myself. “Was that a dating app?”
“Dating app?”
“Excuse me, can I get what I ordered?” The woman demanded, waving her coffee in the air. “I asked for whipped cream.”
Jasper saw that as an excuse, an escape, and nodded, fashioning a grin. He saw an opportunity, and took it. “Of course, Ma’am! I'll get that for you!” He said, with a little too much sarcasm. The boy took her coffee with a spring in his step, ducking in the refrigerator for the whipping cream. Jasper added too much whipping cream, dumping the drink on the counter with a little too much force.
It was a good thing my colleague was marginally attractive guy with cropped blonde hair, and a deadpan voice that somehow attracted the ladies.
Jasper could insult someone directly to their face, and they would just blush and get all tongue tied. I had seen it happen in real time. A girl was flirting with him, and used a bad pick-up line, which was something along the lines of, “Did it hurt when you fell from Heaven?”
He laughed, and her eyes brightened. She giggled along with him, nudging her friends.
But he wasn't laughing with her. I saw the gleam in his eye.
He was laughing at her.
Still laughing, Jasper plonked her milk latte down so hard half of it spewed out.
And, with that exact same charming smile, he deadpanned, “Did it hurt when you dropped out of a drainpipe?”
Yeah, my colleague was blessed with good looks.
Otherwise, he would have been punched in the face by now.
Presently, he was being his usual asshole self. “Is there anything else I can get you?”
The woman shook her head, pulling a face.
Jasper had, essentially, ruined her drink. It was more cream than coffee.
When she left the store, I situated myself in front of him when he was counting cash. “What were you just looking at?” I nodded to the guy’s phone sticking out of his pocket. “Was it like… a dating thing you were on?”
Jasper didn't even look at me, his lip curling.
“That's kinda rude,” he hummed, “I don't peek at your phone.”
“Esme Hope.” Was all I could hiss out. “Was she on that dating app?”
My colleague proceeded to stare at me like I'd grown a second head, before his half lidded gaze flicked behind me. Jasper’s expression brightened.
“Oh, Hanna is calling me!” He said, choking out a laugh. Hanna was not calling him. She was in the break room getting high. Jasper slowly backed away, maintaining his smile. “I'll be back in a sec, all right?” He grabbed that same carton of milk with a grin. “Don't you just love when your milk stays fresh?”
“What?”
“Fresh milk!” He grinned. “Mulberry Farm’s finest.”
Jasper was darting away before I could coerce a sentence.
After work, I texted Esme as usual. She was my ride on Fridays.
Esme didn't reply.
I texted her again, a little more panicked.
Hey, are you okay?”
When I called her, an automated voice told me she wasn't available.
Already feeling sick to my stomach, I drove to her place myself. I could see the flashing lights before anything else, blurred red and blue sending my thoughts into a whirlwind. It took me ten minutes to muster the courage to jump out of my car, and ask a pale looking deputy what was going on.
I tried to jump over the yellow tape, only to be politely pulled back.
“Carbon monoxide poisoning,” the deputy told me. “The whole family is dead.” he sighed. “Mom, Dad, and their daughter in college.” I think he was trying to be sympathetic, awkwardly patting me. But I was already on my knees, all of the breath dragged from my lungs. “Luckily, it's just like going to sleep. Monoxide is a silent killer.”
Monoxide is a silent killer.
Was that the same as, “I'm sorry. Ben was in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
And, “Alex was silently suffering. He did what he thought was best.”
I didn't go to Esme’s funeral. Mom and Dad and Will had already forgotten her, just like the others. What I did do, several days later, when her name wasn't even a memory anymore– I bought flowers from the store. Roses were Esme’s favourite.
The seller was around my Mom’s age, a plump looking woman wearing a floral dress, long red hair tied into a ponytail. She was on her phone, humming to a tune on the radio.
The Smiths.
“I hope she likes them.” The woman said, wrapping the flowers in red ribbons. She had a strong southern accent that immediately annoyed me.
I took the roses, stuffing them in my bag. “What did you say?”
The seller cocked her head. “Hmm?”
“How did you know they were for my girlfriend?”
The woman sighed, placing her phone on the counter. I glanced at whatever she'd been so interested in, but the screen was faced down. “Esme came in here a lot,” Her lips broke out into a sad, sympathetic smile. I was quickly growing sick of them.
“Esme. She, uh, she told me you guys were dating. Esme was always buying roses for her room. Sometimes she would stand in here for hours, and just stare at flowers. I think she found comfort in them.” The woman sighed, fixing me with what I could only describe as a pitiful pout.
Urgh.
“I hope you can find the same comfort,” she murmured. The seller handed me an extra rose, and I found myself reaching out for it, my eyes stinging. Fuck.
I hadn't cracked in at least fifteen hours, and that was a record. But now I could feel myself splintering, tears trickling down my cheeks. The Flower lady squeezed my hand. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. If it makes you feel better, it's just like going to sleep. Monoxide is a silent killer.” Her words were familiar.
Exactly what the deputy said. Before I could speak, she dumped weed killer on the counter. “Did you know our plant killer is ten dollars ninety nine?”
Her sudden bout of energy took me off guard.
I tried to smile. “I don't want any plant killer.”
The seller nodded, handing me another rose. “Oh, of course, Darling! But it is five ninety nine! Just for today!”
Something pricked me, and I hissed out, wafting my hand.
Damn thorns. I could already see a single spot of blood.
I nodded, sucking my teeth against a cry. “Thanks. But I'll skip it this time.”
I took the roses to what used to be Esme’s grave. Now, it was an empty headstone with no name, no memories, no flowers, nothing. Just like Alex and Ben, Esme had been reduced to dirt under my feet. I stayed at her ‘grave’ for a long time, long enough for the sky to grow dark, and my thoughts darker. I tried to find a logical explanation for the sudden deaths of the people I got close to, but all I could think of was a curse.
So, I started googling curses, leaning against Esme’s headstone, my knees to my chest. Had I been cursed?
Was my family cursed?
According to Google, a cursed object connected with the curse itself.
Which could be anything. Though I didn't remember visiting any ancient ruins, or an old church. With zero answers, I headed home. I passed a guy playing The Smiths in his car. Then a group of older women wearing ripped fishnets.
Esme was following me. Just like Alex’s smell. Fresh coffee and rich chocolate.
Ben’s cologne filled my car last summer. His favourite band was playing all day on our local music station. I drove around with no destination, listening to each one on repeat, until I was losing him all over again.
The sweet aroma of flowers followed me all the way home, and I was tipsy on the smell, when I found myself face to face with a boy. Under the overexposed streetlight, this guy was almost ethereal, thick brown hair and freckles.
He reminded me of Ben. Which wasn't fair. I thought I was hallucinating him, before he came closer, bleeding from the shadow. I saw more of him, white strips of something wrapped around his head.
Wrong.
The word slammed into me when I glimpsed his clothes. Filthy. The guy was wearing a white button down, a single streak of bright red ingrained into the material. His white pants were torn, glued to his legs.
He was barefoot, the soles of his feet slapping on wet concrete.
I didn't realize he was in front of me, nose to nose, until he shoved me. Hard.
“Josie.” His voice was a whimper, despite his narrowed eyes, his lips twisted into a scowl. He was crying, and had been crying, every heaving son sputtering from his mouth. The boy shoved me again, and I staggered. His ice cold breath grazed my cheeks. “What the fuck did you do to my sister?”
“Sister?” I whispered.
Something wet landed on my cheek, suddenly.
Rain.
I wasn't expecting a downpour. The weather was forecasted to be clear.
To my surprise, the guy let out a harsh sounding laugh. The two of us were slowly getting drenched, but neither of us were making a move to get out of the rain. My hair was glued to the back of my neck, my clothes sticking to me.
But somehow, I wanted to stay in the rain. It was refreshing.
When a thought hit me, telling me to get out of the rain, it was shoved to the back of my mind. The guy spat water out of his mouth, shaking his head like a dog.
“Of course,” he muttered, “Drown me out with the rain.”
I found my voice, my gaze glued to intense red seeping through the bandage stapled to his head. He looked like he’d escaped an emergency room. “I don't know anyone called Josie,” I said, “I think you've got the wrong person.”
The guy’s eyes narrowed. He stepped closer, grabbing my shoulders, and I noticed how hollow his eyes were, empty caverns carved into his skull. Eyes are the windows to the soul, and this guy was completely soulless. “I'm only going to say this once,” he whispered, “What did you do to my sister?”
Before I could respond, the guy was being violently grabbed, and dragged back.
Figures who appeared seemingly out of nowhere.
“Let me go!” He cried out, struggling. “You fucking assholes! Let me go!”
His screaming became muffling, when his cries were gagged.
“You promised!” He yelled, his cries collapsing into a sob. “You said if you took me, she wouldn't get hurt! So, where is she?” he met my gaze, his expression crumpling, something inside him coming apart, splintering by the seams. “You can't take both of us, this wasn't in the agreement!” When he was dragged further back, I noticed a car parked at the side of the road.
The boy was pulled inside. At first, he refused, before an extra pair of hands shoved him. “You fucking– mmmphmmhphmmm!”
I heard his fists slamming into the windows.
“Don't take me back there! Please! Just let Josie–” His cries once again collapsed into angry muffle screaming, and I felt my hands moving towards my pocket for my phone. This was a kidnapping, right? I was witnessing a kidnapping in broad fucking daylight.
A shadow was suddenly in front of me, and I jumped, tearing my eyes from the car. Jasper, my colleague. He was still wearing his apron, and to my confusion, was swinging a carton of whole milk.
“Sorry, Bree,” He winked, speaking in a single breath. “As you can see, our friend here had a little too much to drink.”
I nodded, craning my neck. Jasper stepped in front of me, maintaining a grin.
“Who is he?” This time, I side-stepped away from him, only for him to copy.
“Just a guy.” He said. “As you can see, he's a little…” Jasper prodded his right temple. “Let's just say he's got a few too many screws loose.” Jasper laughed, staying stock still, blocking my way.
When I made a move to counter him, he stepped in front of me, his eyes hardening. “I heard he lost his family a while ago in a…” He pretended to think. “Oh, yeah, a car crash. Maybe a gas explosion, I’m not really sure.”
I could hear the car behind him, and once again I tried to dart past him. But he was quick to block my way. He was getting closer to me, very subtly backing me in the opposite direction.
“Anyway, this guy is kiiiiind of nuts. Dude still thinks he's got a sister.”
When I lost patience and shoved him out of the way, the car, and the guy, was gone.
“See?” Jasper rolled his eyes. He was still holding milk from work. My head spun. It was 8pm, we were in a suburban neighbourhood, and Jasper was holding half a pint of milk. His apron was stained with coffee, and when I really looked at him, I realized he was out of breath.
He was doing a good job of hiding it, exhaling in intervals, swiping at his forehead to clear sweat. When I noticed, he pretended to run his hands through his hair. “I, uh, I feel for him! Like, I'm sorry his family died, or whatever, but attacking random girls isn't cool, y’know?”
Instead of replying, I stumbled home. It was sunny.
At 8pm.
And when I took notice, I wasn't even wet.
Esme was my last straw. I made a promise to myself to not get close to anyone. The guys and girls I met were friends, and nothing more. Weirdly enough, the only guy I was getting close to was my colleague. I don't know if it was brain damage, or I was finally losing the plot.
But Jasper’s shameless cruelty towards customers, and that quirk in his lips when he made them cry, was kind of hot.
However, he was playing hard to get.
And I mean REALLY playing.
I was in storage trying to find vegan milk, and he was suddenly a fucking expert, spewing milk facts.
When I slammed the refrigerator door shut, he was inches from my face.
In the dim light from a single spluttering bulb, his eyes reminded me of coffee grounds. I thought maybe he was going to kiss me, judging from his softening expression. I felt his hands go around my waist, and I felt myself immediately melt.
I don't know what came over me. It's like, one minute I hated him, and the next… I was suddenly hot. Really hot. And I really wanted to take my clothes off. I thought that's what he wanted to do too.
I mean, his gaze followed mine, piercing, fingers playing with the buttons on his shirt. Before he leaned forward, his breath in my face.
“Did you know that Mulberry Farms is an award winning brand of milk in our town and ONLY our town? Mulberry farms was bred and made right here."
And suddenly, I was no longer hot and bothered.
“I didn't.” I said, ducking into a crouch to search the shelves. “Have you seen our vegan milk? We did have some.”
“Three time winner,” Jasper continued. When I jumped up, he stepped closer, and I felt my cheeks spark. His smile was rare. In fact, Jasper was only smiling when he was talking about milk.
“Mulberry Farms have the best pasturization. It's suitable for everything! Coffee, cereal, or maybe you just want a glass of fresh milk to yourself! Perfect for kids, too! Breakfast time is Mulberry Farms.”
“Are you having a stroke?” I whisper-shrieked.
“Nope!”
Jasper twisted around, shooting me a grin.
I left the storage, however, with butterflies in my gut.
There was no way I was falling for my asshole colleague.
Somehow, though, I was.
Just standing next to him filled me with electricity.
The way he talked down to customers, insulting me to my face… I was thoroughly, and disgustingly, in love.
I tried to stop myself.
I showered in ice cold water.
I ate (choked on) a ghost pepper.
I even asked my BROTHER for advice, who told me to go for it.
I told him Jasper had one (of several) flaws, but this particular one was off-putting.
“He’s obsessed with milk.” I told my brother.
Harry lifted a brow. “Is that a euphemism, or…”
He paused, for way longer than necessary. “So, your would-be-boyfriend has a milk fetish?”
I left his room before he could take that conversation further.
I wanted to say Jasper was the only one who acted weird.
But over the next few weeks, I noticed it in quite a few people.
I was having breakfast with Mom, and she lifted up the box.
“Choco Flakes.” She blurted, “Aren't they just the best?”
I nodded slowly. “Yeah, Mom. They're great.”
I prodded the box with a smile. “Only a dollar ninety nine.”
There were so many townspeople on their phones. They walked around with groceries or briefcases, their eyes glued to whatever they were swiping through.
I was serving an old woman, when I caught her phone screen.
I could have sworn there was an image of Jasper.
She swiped right, and I had a hard time looking her in the eye.
The woman was at least in her 80’s. And I'm talking, can barely walk, and needs assistance.
Was she seriously hitting up 25 year old guys?
Walking home, everyone was on their phones.
I stopped at a crossing, stabbing the red light.
It started to snow the second I stepped out onto the road, white flakes dancing in front of me. It didn't even cross my mind that it was almost June. The snow was pretty, accumulating on the ground.
“Oh shit, sorry!”
Lifting my head, a guy was standing in front of me holding an umbrella.
I knew him.
But not from whatever was trying to pollute my mind.
I knew him from a while ago. I knew him from the rain. I knew the bloody bandages wrapped around his head, and soulless, seething eyes I couldn't understand. It was the boy who was dragged away three months prior.
He looked different, his hair was shorter, his face carved into a thing of beauty.
The white strips of gauze bleeding scarlet were gone, his filthy clothes replaced with a white shirt and pants, a trench coat flung over the top. I didn't remember him being this handsome. His dark brown hair had been tamed and curled.
It was his expression that sent shivers sliding down my spine.
His too wide smile and unblinking eyes made me suddenly conscious of two bright lights on the two of us.
So bright.
Something shattered in my mind, and I was aware of a lot of things.
The snow under my feet was too soft.
I glimpsed a single streak of red seeping from his nose, his hands trembling around a takeout coffee cup.
Behind me, people were staring. I could see a group of teenage girls giggling.
“It's him,” one of them squeaked. “It's the new love interest!”
“Bree?” His grin widened, snowflakes prancing around us. His teeth gritted together. I could tell he hated every word. “Holy shit, long time no see!”
He held out his hand, and I could see visible pain contorting in his eyes.
Help me. He was screaming through a twinkling smile.
“Don't you remember me? It's… it's uh, it's Sam!” he laughed. “From eighth grade!”
The lights blinked out, and the thought crashed into my mind. Static images filling my head. I shook them away.
Oh, yeah, it was Sam.
My childhood friend.
But I didn't reply. Instead of saying, “Sam? It's been so long!” I found myself walking, stumbling over to the girls.
Who were rapidly swiping left on their phones.
“What's that?” I demanded in a sharp breath.
I grabbed for the phone, only for Sam to step in front of me. He settled me with a smile.
Behind me, one of the girls fainted.
Sam’s smile didn't waver. Though he did side-eye the girl being carried away. “Why don't I take you out for coffee?”
Apparently, coffee was the code word for hooking up.
Sam dragged me into the nearest coffee store, straight to the bathroom.
When he shoved me into a stall, I didn't know what to say.
“Take off your shoes,” he said in a hiss, and after hesitating, I did.
Sam pulled off his jacket, shook snow out of his hair, and got real close.
“Look up.” He murmured.
I did, my gaze finding the ceiling.
“To your right, a camera is very well hidden, but can be seen with the naked eye if you catch what looks like a red laser,” Sam said. “To your left, another camera, as well as a vent that is currently pumping the stalls with aphrodisiacs. And right now, we are in the red zone. Meaning, you should be conscious.”
He prodded me, and I flinched.
“Mostly conscious.”
His words went right over my head, my mind was foggy.
I couldn't think straight.
I think I asked him what he was saying, but my mouth was filled with cotton.
“Snap out of it,” he said, “Like I said, they're making you feel like this.”
He shoved me against the door, which broke me out of my trance. Slightly.
“I hate what I'm going to say right now,” Sam groaned, tipping his head back. He was sweating, I noticed. Bad. I glimpsed beads of red pooling down his neck. He noticed me staring. “I'm okay, for now. I’m faulty, so the connection is severed. He squeezed his eyes shut. “I…think.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Sex.” He said, blinking rapidly. I wasn't going to comment on his slurring voice.
Sam stumbled, fresh blood dripping from his nose.
“We need to do the sex. Like…” His eyes rolled into the back of his head, but he managed to stabilise himself. “Nooooow.”
“What?!”
“Is everything okay in there?”
The voice was a woman. She knocked on the stall.
Sam’s eyes widened, coming back to life a little. “They're paranoid,” he whispered. When I could only stare at him, he pounded his fists into the door. “They think we’re fucking,” he hissed, “So, we need to make it believable.”
“They?” I mouthed.
He didn't reply, swiping at his haemorrhaging nose. “Just… move around against the door. That'll fool ‘em.”
I did, doing my best to shuffle around, slamming my back against the lock.
When the metal clanged, he shot me a look. “Sex!” He hissed, “Not murder!”
Sam jumped onto the toilet bowl. There was an open window above him.
“That's enough.” He mouthed, hoisting his way through.
He helped me through, and I expected to land on concrete.
What I did land on, however, was something… squishy.
Something wet sliding between my bare toes.
Looking closer, I recognised the beaded anklet.
Fishnet tights.
Something animalistic clawed from my throat. I was standing on Esme. Or what was left of Esme. She was just a torso and legs, the rest of her ripped away like doll pieces. I couldn't see her face. I looked for it, digging through what could only be old flesh and pieces of limbs.
I felt suffocated. I grabbed half of Ben’s face that had been ripped off, and then Alex’s tattooed arm. There was so much of them, piles and piles of the same heads, the same filthy and rotting clothes. I was screaming by the time I shuffled back on my hands and knees, trying to wipe them off of my skin.
They were all over me, staining me, painting me.
Sam’s hand slick with blood gently covered my mouth.
“Stay calm, all right?” He whispered. “I would tell you everything is going to be okay, but the truth is, it's really not, there's like, a 99.9% chance you're going to… understandably freak out.”
He pulled me to my feet, letting out a heavy breath.
Blinking rapidly, I could only see… pieces.
Pieces of people.
Legs and heads and torsos all piled into one mass of gore.
“We’ve got maybe five minutes before they realize we’re not doing the devil's dance,” Sam sniffled, “Maybe ten, before my brain short circuits and I bleed out.”
I didn't know I was hyperventilating, until I couldn't fucking breathe.
Closer towards the door, and I could hear… machinery.
I couldn't stop myself. Even when I was aware I was standing in congealing blood.
Rotten bodies.
The dim light led me into what could only be described as a factory. There were three levels, and we were on the highest. Sam stepped forward, gripping the metal bar in front of us. I felt my legs buckling, a thick, pukey slime filling my mouth.
“Soo, I guess it all started when Brianna Timberman was seventeen years old, and rejected by her childhood best friend, Sam Thwaites.”
Sam’s words collapsed into a low buzzing in my ear.
All I could see was a conveyer belt, filled with… people.
Boys.
Girls.
But most noticeably, Ben’s, Alex’s, Esme’s, and Sam’s.
But they start as Ben’s, Alex's, and Esme’s.
I could see regular people, their hair stripped away.
Their skin sliced into, cruelly moulding them into the exact same four faces.
When a large looming needle plunged into the back of an Alex’s head, I couldn't not watch. I waited for the guy to wake up, but I don't even think he was alive.
He stood, unblinking, letting this thing twist and contort his face. And it was then, when I realized these things weren't even human. I could see the mechanics built under their flesh, both living tissue and metal melded together. “Brianna’s father, who is a liiiitle on the crazy side, with too much cash and not not enough logic, took his daughter’s rejection a little too personally,” Sam continued.
“So, he promised his daughter he would find her the perfect match.”
I started to speak, the words coming out before I could stop them.
“My father would never–”
“I didn't say it was your father,” Sam said. His eyes darkened. “Anyway, as I was saying, the townspeople became unhealthily obsessed with who Brianna would choose. So obsessed, in fact, that the girl’s day to day life was broadcasted across town, while her potential love interests were ranked, week after week. First, there was Ben.”
Sam’s smile thinned. “Her high school boyfriend.”
Sam shrugged. “She grew bored of him. Also, he kinda did something unforgivable.”
He continued. “Then… Alex. She liked him, but sometimes, he was a little too unserious. The guy was a clown.”
I backed away, but he was quick to grab my shoulders.
“Finally? Esme. Who she truly fell for.”
I swallowed. “Esme is–”
He cut me off. “But I didn't mention that they hurt her, did I?”
Sam leaned against the bar. Behind him, I could see a figure in white pushing a gurney with a Ben strapped to it. “Ben tried to rape her, insisting she wanted it. Alex dumped her on her birthday. Esme ended their relationship with a one word text. Goodbye.” Sam mimed an explosion. “That was the nail in the coffin.”
I caught blood sliding down his nose. “You're still bleeding.”
Sam gingerly prodded his nose.
“Urgh. Yeah, it's an effect of the severing. I've been in the red zone too long. I should probably speed this up.”
He talked faster, his voice collapsing into a mumbled slur.
“Brianna couldn't take it. Her best friend was ignoring her. Everyone she had fallen in love with hurt her. Esme wasn't returning her calls. Ben was sleeping around right in front of her, and Alex was still being a clown. Brianna’s poor parents found her hanging from her bedroom ceiling fan.”
I shook my head, my thoughts screaming.
“No–”
He held a finger up to shush me. “Let me talk. Jeez.”
Sam folded his arms. “A grieving father would do anything to avenge his dead child, buuut… Mr Timberman took ‘finding a perfect match’ and ‘the show must go on’ a little bit too literally.”
His sickly smile found me. “Which also means going stark fucking crazy. The town wanted more of Brianna, and her life, so he turned his daughter’s failed love life into a town wide TV show, sending the entire teen and young adult populace into here,” he gestured around him. “To make the perfect suitors. Who wouldn't hurt his new Brianna.”
Something ice cold crept down my spine.
He cleared his throat. “Mr Timberman grew, let's say, obsessed, with getting revenge on these specific four people. So, he started killing them–” He coughed.
“Sorry. Us. Killing us for the funny ha-ha, ‘Look at how many times I can fuck with them!’ bit. And then recycling us into someone completely different. Our names are gone. Then our personalities. Finally, our bodies ripped to pieces and sculpted into Brianna’s exes.” Sam poked me in the cheek.
“The cycle continues. They reset your ticker and the town eats it up. They can bring back Esme, Ben, and Alex whenever they want and add curveballs. Like the bad-boy colleague who becomes the fan favorite.” Sam’s lips curved. “For… some fucking reason.”
His eyes flickered open. “However, Brianna will never find a suitor because her father is a fucking sociopath. To him and the town, his dead daughter’s pathetic love life is entertainment.”
He held out his arm.
“See?”
I tried really hard not to look through the makeup.
At noticeable skin grafts.
“I was a Ben.” He said. “Then I was an Alex, and then I was an extra.” His eyes found mine, sad, suddenly. “But who I was originally is kinda gone. All I remember is a deal to protect Josie. I gave myself up so they wouldn't take her.”
“Your sister.” I said.
Sam nodded.
His earlier words hit me. He was talking like Brianna Timberman was dead.
But I was Brianna Timberman.
I was rejected by Sam, yes, but I found Ben.
As if he could read my mind, Sam shook his head.
“Look at yourself.” He said, his voice shaking.
“And I mean really look at yourself.”
Sam stepped closer.
“Because, underneath all of that make-up and the prosthetics and surgery, and fucked up memories, you're just another recycled lump of flesh.” He prodded my temple. “Who thinks she is Brianna Timberman.”
His voice was slurring again, a fresh stream of scarlet seeping down his chin.
“Don't you want to know?” His eyes rolled to pearly whites.
Before he could finish his sentence, Sam dropped to the ground.
I remember warm arms grasping hold of me.
Shadows with no faces.
They pricked me twice in the back of my neck.
A familiar voice in my ear, almost a hiss.
Jasper.
“You are the worst fucking Brianna.”
When I came to, I was standing up, somehow.
At work.
I am Brianna Timberman.
The thought floated around in my head, my memory hazy.
“Hello?!”
A man was waving his hands in front of me.
“I asked for iced coffee, lady!”
Jasper was serving another customer. “Bree, wake the fuck up.”
They were trying to make me think I was hallucinating.
Which was crazy, because my fingernails were still tinted with Sam’s blood.
The marks he'd left on my wrist when he was yanking me, were still there.
Bruised on my arm.
“Bree!” Jasper snapped. “Snap out of it and make the dude his drink.”
“Right.”
The word slipped out of my mouth.
He caught my eye, winking, and Brianna Timberman internally squeaked.
I half wondered what he was. Was he recycled, or an unwilling performer?
Throughout the day, I was fully aware my words were not mine.
Like I was on autopilot.
But not just that.
My thoughts weren't mine, either.
I spent half of my shift staring at my colleague’s biceps.
During my break, I went into the bathroom and stood in front of the mirror.
I am Brianna Timberman.
But even when I told myself that, my eyes were too blue.
My smile was too perfect.
My teeth.
Too white.
My shaking hands prodded at my face, at someone else's face.
So many faces, so many skin grafts.
The thought was violent, sending tremors through me.
How many people was I wearing?
I started to claw at my arms and legs, my face.
How many fucking people had I been?
I grabbed a knife and tried to slice at my face.
But there was no blood.
How could there be no blood?!
When I got home, I found my family waiting for me.
Mom, Dad and Harry, all of them beaming.
“Bree!” Mom stood up, her lips stretching into a grin.
My mouth was already moving, but they were not my words.
“Mom!”
I didn't know why she was smiling so much, until I saw Sam sitting at our dining room table. His smile was too big. His over-expensive shirt and pants did not suit him, and looked fucking gross, but somehow my brain thought it was hot. The worst part is, I couldn't and still can't tell which Sam he was.
Was he the guy who told me the horrific reality of my existence?
Or was he another recycled, mindless suitor?
“This is Samuel.” Mom said, and Sam slowly stood.
He took slow steps towards me, and kissed my hand.
I saw the slightest smudge of scarlet in his lip, but his eyes were blank.
In the corner of my eye, my ‘father’s’ eyes were glittering.
“Hello, Brianna.” Sam said, and I swore Now that I was awake, the walls were wolf-whistling. Laughing.
"Ooooooooooooooo!”
My town is a blip on the map.
We’re so small, so insignificant, not even a Google search will find us.
I keep thinking if I tear at my skin, I will find who I am underneath. But I'm so fucking scared. I don't bleed. I don't think who I was still exists under so many layers. But even if this is just a cry into the void, please help us.
I don't want to be Brianna Timberman.

submitted by Trash_Tia to nosleep [link] [comments]

2024.05.22 20:48 Unable_Variation_918 Collection of Poems and short stories

Beyond humanities control
Once came a giant Octopus- like monster that took control of a city of arts. Once he reached it’s goal, art became extinct and as a result, there came a mass suicide amoung the people. It became so bad that it had driven humanity insane and into madmen. The scientist discovered that creature in the deep dark sea where nothing existed. No meaning to it. Just nothing. The cancellation of music hints at half octopus half big hairless dog.If there is a river delta, there is no need to cancel the rake.
However, I have no friends.
With that being said, I shall sacrifice myself to the Rake.
He is the rake.
The Scientist:Hi. I am doctor Jennifer Lopez. I live in the 24th street of West Avenue. When the climate crisis came, there came a world leader who put a pan on mental labeling since suffering makes growth. "Let us ban all mental illness! Let's be free!" he said. And so, every psychiatrist was put into camps to live out of. Now, I am secretly studied a 2-year old who has a hard time walking and talking. Once, when a bug nearby went extinct. I heard crying upstairs, and I came upstairs and saw a human baby. I guessed that a clone appeared after a species had gone extinct. I took care of it and it looked normal, but almost robot like. At 2 years old, he was not hitting his milestones, but there was nothing that could be done because of the ban on mental labeling. I so then sent him to military school if that ever would improve, it didn't. He became bullied relentlessly and almost committed suicide. I has enough and protested to the government that he needed help and support. "He is a mad genius." They said. Above me stood a giant beaver that whipped me with it's giant tail to stop labeling it. When he got his doll taken away, he just cried to suicide. I don't know how to end this story, but suffering makes you stronger. But at what costs! I have now woken up covered in blood knife in hand, and I am too afraid to protest against the government now.
Squirrels on the wall
Last night, I woke up and saw squirrels on the wall. So anyway, the squirrels started blasting. Bang bang! I ducked and covered beneath my windows to see a white van with a deformed deer-like squirrel following me.
The Knocks on the window
When I was 6 years old, every time I would pet my cat, I would hear tapping and knocking on the window. I told my parents about it and they told me it and they reluctantly agreed to hear the voices in my head. They said it was probably just a bird or something. I knew it wasn’t though. I distinctly heard a person knocking and tapping on the window. As I've progressively gotten older, I heard tapping and knocking on the window every time I would pet anything virtually soft. Then came the night where everything changed. It was night and I was laying in bed, alone with my thoughts, reflecting on my bed. I was clutching a giant lion, so I anticipated the sounds of tapping and knocking on my window, but I didn’t. Finally, I heard a knock, slow and strong, then a tap. With a giant leap of courage, I pulled open the blinds to my bedroom window, and I saw something that would forever haunt me. It was a man, I don’t even know if I would call this a man, had his face upside down, the lips had the width of an asian giant hornet. The figure’s figures looked like a foam finger, both length and width. It had no eyes, just two gaping black holes. I immediately shut the blinds and ran to my parent’s bedroom, screaming like a little girl. My parents have asked if I had gone completely insane. My parents always thought I was paranoid but after this,I’m sure they thought I was just flat out crazy. They searched around the house to find absolutely nothing. I described what he looked like to them, and I immediately heard their tone of voice change to confusion and concern. Since then, my parents have had me see many psychiatrists. They could never find what was wrong because I know I saw that figure, and I know I will be the only one to witness that thing. Recently, we moved out of that house, and right after the family moved in to our house, the youngest daughter of that family was found in a pool of blood, dead in the bathtub. The head was even hidden. They had to look through the house to find her head and I don’t know where they found it, but they did. I wasn’t allowed to go to her funeral. What kills me the most is that otherworldly evil is lurking and hiding around that house, continuing to do what it does, and whenever I tell people about it, they think I’m crazy! I can’t prove my case, but I know this evil energy around that house.
The abandoned arcade place.
My name will be “Ben” for the story and I am a liminal space photographer. What that is is a photographer that tries to find empty, yet familiar spots to the human eye and mind, and the photographer photographs whatever finds surreal to him. My job has been great, until I visited an abandoned arcade place some time ago, called “Freddy Fazbear’s Pizzeria.” From what I’ve heard, a fox-like animatronic malfunctioned in 1987, causing it to bite out of a child’s frontal lobe. The abandoned place is located just a few miles outside of Richmen Town and into poor man’s land. I stepped inside to this place and I got the most bizarre feelings from it. I was in a place of childhood nostalgia and I am also alone in a dark dark spot of abandonment. The place was creepy as hell, which gave me some perfect opportunities to photograph. I was walking alone in a dark hallway when I spotted a line of dolls based on animatronics. It looked so creepy. They had no eyes, just gaping black holes with spider eggs coming out of them. I heard this faint whisper coming from the very end of the hallway that was too dark to see. I believe it was whispering the words “masking.” I was disturbed enough and ran back into the main stage. The curtains were open and the animatronics were nowhere in sight. Just then, I heard the sounds of pots and pans being fiddled with and jamie. I then saw to the right of me, a rabbit animatronic. I wasn’t even able to let out a scream. I ran into the parking lot and sped home. Out of all places, this was the creepiest, most mysterious, and most surreal place I’ve visited as a photographer. I didn’t take any photos from there, but I’m just very happy I made it out alive. How were these robots able to roam freely? Are they alive? I will never know, and I kinda don’t want to. Hold one, there is a knock on my window. Oh my god! What th-
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The scared gamer
Indeed the gamer became super scared while playing FNAF. “AHHHHHHHHAH! What was that?!?!?!?!” he said. All of a sudden, he heard some knocks on the window. He was the non confrontational gamer type, so he just shut the blinds to tell the pranksters he was not interested. Around half an hour later, he heard the knocks again and this time, it sounded more frantic. Nervous, the gamer did not make a single sound and crept to the window and opened it just a little. That was the biggest and most foolish mistake of his life, because Freddy Fazbear fully pulled the blinds open! Fazbear was pulling on to his arm with a very tight grip. The gamer grabbed the lamp nearby and threw it to Freddy Fazbear. Freddy Fazbear ran into the woods. The gamer has never had a more horrifying experience.
The Book
It was a hot Saturday afternoon. I was reading a book called “War and Peace” when the book opened its eyes and grew its arms and legs. I had to chase the book down, which caused a mess in my kitchen. Eventually, I caught it on the couch and began to shake it like a poodle. That’s when I woke up. I took a giant drink of my coffee and continued to read “War and Peace”. Everything was normal until the words started falling out! I ran to the nearest bucket and all the letters and words fell out! How can this happen to me?! I’ve made my mistake! Again, I woke up and took a giant drink of my coffee. My book was normal, but I saw a giant monkey to the left of me. “OOOH OOOH AAAA AAAAA!” The monkey said. The monkey then proceeded to throw poop at my book. My book was now covered in poop! How can this happen to me?! I’ve made my mistake! The monkey then ripped it apart in two. “Victorious!” he said as if he were Thor. I had enough of this! I strangled the monkey and he strangled me! I was about to die from suffocation, but I woke up in my bedroom! My god! What was that dream! I became absurd by life’s chaos and after that, I fell asleep relatively quickly. The next morning, I realized that I had run out of coffee! I was about to cry, but the monkey gave me a pat on my shoulder and I instantly felt safe and better.
Pet Skateboard
I love my pet skateboard!
It’s alive!
It goes with me everywhere!
I love him!
He has great comedy!
Oh yeah!
It is funny like Guylen!
But what if Conan O’Brian stabbed Jimmy Fallon?
I hate Jimmy Fallon!
I love Conan O’Brian!
Conan O'Brien is much better than Jimmy Fallon!
Jimmy Fallon fake laughs too much!
Perchance Poem
Perchance
Perchance
Perchance
You can”t just say perchance!
Oh that is just a perchance!
FATHERS AND MYSTICISM
Last night, I woke up to see my very own Father staring at me!
He was deformed and twisted!
He looked like a twirl around an angel with no eyes. Just two gaping black holes.
The leg was noticeably bigger than the other.
It’s face, oh it’s face!
My Father had the face of a human, but looked like it was sown onto this thing!
I was about to take off, but he stretched out his long arms and began to strangle me!
“Your writing and your loves are the most worthless piece of goose egg sh@@ I have seen in a very long time!” He said.
He snapped my neck and now I am dead.
I have woken up in the darkness with chainsaws tied to my neck.
A grizzly bear came into the room and said “Obey orders, or you will be a wasp.” He said in a Satanic voice.
“ Nono! P-please don’t do this!”
“Soooooory!”
The bear lifted his chainsaw and into my left arm. I screamed absolute pains of agonizing pain as blood came gushing out of my internal veins!
The last thing I heard before passing out was the horrible sound of my left arm hitting the floor.
I woke up again in darkness. I tried to move, but I made a shocking realization! I am now a yellow jacket. The floating head of my Dad appeared, and he taunted me for ages until he released me into the wild. I have since then been a wasp and the people around my nest treat me as a weirdo. I can’t communicate my feelings to you, nor can you communicate to me. All I know is that I have horrible interests and writings, and everything is my fault, and becoming a wasp has everything to do with my wrongdoings.
The taxidermied human being
The run down house stands the taxidermied human being that does nothing but stand outside of the back door. The squirrels and birds that come and go have to endure the horrible death and decay of humanity.
The poem of nothing
YES
Intrusive Thoughts
There was once a boy in once in a lifetime, imagined visions of his friends being beaten up, and so he did.
Poem dedicated to the top of a mountain
I have finally reached the top of a mountain
As if like a Homer Simpson, He has reached the top
I am an Ubermensch like a flying Eagle
And Darth Vader comes and attacks me.
The Dream
Last night, I had a dream where I was flying over the Texas Desert. Out of nowhere, I saw a group of Kangaroos hopping around. “How can this be? There are no Kangaroos in Texas!” In the far distance, a fire emerged. I woke up and saw fires all around me. Millions of acres were burned for days and I lost everything. I will never know what caused this, but I might be homeless soon.
AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAAHAAHAA GUYLEN IS SO FUNY HAHAHAHAAHAHAHEHEHEHEEEHEHOHOHOHOHAHAHAAHAAHAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAHAHAAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA Guylen is like Conan O Brian AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAEHEHEHEHEHEHEWHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHHEWWEWEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE
The Penguin
There was once a Penguin who plotted against mealworms. Symmetries of color visibly flashed into this Penguins eyes and it went into a state of ecstasy.
The Laughing Poem
HAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHEHEHEHEHEHEEHEHEEEHEHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAOOOOOOOOOO Bro, calm down! HAHHAHAAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAH! Dude! Breathe! HAHAHAAHAHAAAH! You’re literally laughing like a clown!
AHAHAAHAHAHA! I laugh like a trumpet! No one even said anything! Ha!
The Gallery
I came across a gallery of Ancient Poems that consumed me. It greatly consumed and deepen my soul.
The Blazing Trumpets
They go high in the air like a toothpick on a C-Sharp

submitted by Unable_Variation_918 to nhojwriting [link] [comments]

2024.05.22 10:12 FungalInspection Not sure about this

So, ive been in no contact with my ex for around 2 months now, the thing is, we met each other on an online site, not exactly a dating site, more like a forum one, where she posted about a book she is reading (the martian) and i guess thats where we started out.
So obviously, we are long distance, but, ive met her once though, I flew over to her. The thing is, we broke up just a few months after, i wont disclose the details but ill jump straight into the problem.
Ive literally been in no contact with her, through all social media sites, ive deleted her photos, my searches of her name, and ive disappeared and didnt reach out, following the rules of no contact.
Recently, i came back to this forum site where we met, the thing is, just a few days ago, she suddenly became online there again, we both deleted the app more than a year ago after we met so it was strange.
Then, she changed her bio, leaving a poem for me, and so I did the same thing, and we did this back and forth, speaking in poetry, where I asked where there is no reason to trace back an old path you have left behind.
And she responded, and I did too, this happened in around 2 days, with around 2 to 3 exchanges, using our profile bios.
My questions is, am I breaking no contact this way? 😭

submitted by FungalInspection to ExNoContact [link] [comments]

2024.05.22 08:37 YungTiddies [TOMT] Sad Facebook dog post

I am looking for an old Facebook post of an owner taking a photo of his dog walking on a boardwalk; the post was accompanied by a sad poem or something. The photo included him holding a photograph of the exact spot where the dog once was. Thanks

submitted by YungTiddies to tipofmytongue [link] [comments]

2024.05.21 23:49 TwoProfessional4607 I’m insanely obsessed with my English teacher, and iv done despicable things

Lol, I thought this would be funny to write about as a first silly little post as it is the most interesting thing in my life. (Don’t mind any typos)
First of all, to anyone who wants to tell me to stop or get over it or give me any valid reasonable and rational advice,I will not listen so don’t bother.
As these stories go, I 15(f) in love with English teacher 26(f). I’m obsessed with her, and have been for almost msot 2 years, it would have been longer if she had come into my life sooner.
I’m not a love at first sight person, so it took a while for it to come about. And iv always had problems with getting violently obsessed with things, I believe it’s some kind of coping mechanism, you know? If I don’t have something to live for then I fall in love with something, subconsciously of course. First it was cartoon characters then celebrity’s and the for the first time a real person who I know in real life! (Except she’s my teacher and she’s 26) but also the first woman iv ever fallen for (iv always known Im pan so it wasn’t a shock really). I think another HUGE reason I love her is because I don’t have a mother, she was abusive, druggy, alcoholic yadi-yadi-yada, and so I don’t live with her and I don’t like her and she isn’t there for me, and so I meet a kind female adult who I look up to? Obviously I get attached and I see her as a mother figure. I really do, I want to be just like her, I want to make her proud, I seek her validation, i want to fuck her. You know, regular motherly things!
The first day I met her, first day of year 10. From the second she walked into the class I felt her energy and her vibes and I had that feeling where you instantly like someone and want to be friends with them and think they are super cool. Now, she is not hot, like Obviously to me me right now in this moment she’s the most beautiful and pretty person iv ever seen she’s so cute and hot and all that, but Obviously that’s because I’m obsessed with her everything about her is great, but she’s the kind of ugly that when she first walked into the class people snickered.
She has a rash on her chin, a noticeable moustache, she looks at least 30 despite being much younger, her eyes are creepy looking and small, her skin is really red and dry and way too textured, she does weird ugly facial expressions, she has a big nose, her hair is never brushed and always greasy, she has really small eyelashes blah blah blah.. (she obviously has some really nice features as well, but I’m trying to prove i don’t like her for her looks)
Now In her defence I think they were laughing because she has the hugest ass iv seen in my entire life, not cuz of her face. (She wears really tight leggings everyday) But, she is overweight and a lot of people bring her down cuz of it but that has nothing to do with any of it for me obviously, and I obviously didn’t laugh when she walked in.
The point is, I instantly liked her and her personality, she has that school mum vibe, she’s witty she’s confident she’s loud, she’s funny, she’s so weird (like she does and says the weirdest stuff, she’ll start dancing out of no where with no warning, she shortens words all the time and then says them three times like: “fab fab fab” she has just the weirdest tendencies and mannerisms it’s insane), shes always so exited and jolly, she’s like a ball of sunshine yet at the same time she’s so sassy and passive aggressive, when I’m older I wanna be just like her you know!
And that’s how I felt for a long time, I would just enjoy her lessons because of the energy and vibes she’d bring! She makes everything so much fun just by being there, she’s also a drama teacher so she’s great at getting a crowd going and stuff. But it seemed no one else liked her, they either fat shamed her, or said she was a bitch, or found her annoying.
They aren’t wrong she is all of those things, but she’s only a bitch to you if you don’t respect her and then she’s passive aggressive and makes your time in her class hell, and as her favourite student who kissed her ass everyday it was fun for me to watch people get roasted by her and never have to worry about it. She is annoying to a lot of people because she hypes everyone up, and she’s loud and obnoxious and confident, she laughs at her own jokes and she’s giggly and she does stupid accents, she’s the walking talking definition of “QUIRKY” and so 15 year olds find her incredibly cringey and jarring. But as an immature individual my self I found her energy like something I have never seen anyone have so i from the first day thought she was my favourite teacher ever!
I often take the role of like comic relief when it comes to my friends so I often make the joke myself, and once I felt this admiration for my English teacher, and this giddy happy feeling in me when I saw her, I thought it would be a great idea to pretend/ hint to having a crush on her to my friends as a joke so they can make fun of me. It was small things like “oh my english teacher! … oh.. I liiiiikkkee herrrrrrrr~!” Id day when people mention her, no one caught onto the joke for a couple months until one day, after a holiday I had dyed my hair and she walked past me and she complimented it, I thanked her and INSTANTLY MY HEART WAS POUNDING AND I GOT ALL GIGGLING, my friend was next to me and found it funny obviously. And then the more I went to her lessons I couldn’t stop getting all sweaty and nervous around her, and every time she’d do something cute, like squeal when she’s frustrated and make weird noises or do a fake accent, or tell a joke I’d feel so unbelievably happy, and I couldn’t stop talking and thinking about her, but Eveytime I’d think about her or look at her id get a huge ick of like.. but ewww she’s so not hot! I can NOT be in love with THAT.
By summer I was still feeling this Same way, one day she wore a dress and like the dopey idiot she is, she lifted her leg and from where I sat I saw her panties. I WAS DISGUSTED, and looked away. And then looked back.. but then looked away.. and then looked back.. and then looked away.. (and did it a couple more times) but I felt sick in my stomach the whole time! It was not a hot thing at the time.
Then the year ends and it’s the summer holiday, (now up until this point I was quite caught up with my David walliams obsession. yes the 56 year old.. and so I didn’t really care about her all that much. On the first day back, before school started I went to a birthday party and I saw her walking outside of the school, when I saw her my heat was beating so fast, i hadn’t seen her in 6 weeks and I was not expecting to see her then, I said hi to her and i couldn’t stop thinking about that moment so intensely, and every thought I had about her being ugly didn’t matter to me, it’s not like I forgot about it, I know what she looks like, but I just think everything about her is so beautiful, it’s part of her and so its perfect.
That feeling got worse and worse as the year went by, every time i see her I shake, i sweat, I have panic attack like symptoms, but I feel so happy, like manic, I am overwhelmed, I want to punch things, I want to scream.
Then we get to the part where to silence this obsession I did regrettable and wierd things that she will never know about, some of the despicable things iv done in “the name of love” for her include:
Eating her hair Licking her spit of the table Kissing her chair when she leaves the room Following her around school Drawing her Writing poems about her Writing songs about her Making edits of her Taking photos of her Recording her voice when she talks to me Stealing her trash Licking her pens Making AI chat bots with her personality Making a bingo game about her (that one is just funny, and all my friends played it too, during her lessons lol)
And many other things I won’t mention. Obviously I’m not proud of any of this, and I didn’t really need to do it, some of it I did “as a joke” for my friends, some of them I did just because I could.. but the recording her voice one is essential! Anytime we’d have a heart felt convo I’d record it so I can listen to it if I ever loose the will to live (surprisingly frequently).
Now our relationship as student and teacher was/is very good.
We’ve had some lovely moments, she told me she cared about me outside of the classroom.
A personal favourite of mine: One time she was marking my work and it was just us in the classroom and I rested my head on her shoulder as she was going through it with me, and she looked down at me and she smiled and then we stayed like that for ages while she marked my work.
All my friends said I was delusional and that she probably hates me, but she has a huge ego and i believe she likes to keep me around to give it a boost every now and then.
I wore a matching outfit with her once (on accident) and she was very happy about it
Anytime I’d ask her what I can do to improve my grade she’s say to me “oh no! But you’re doing really well! I thought you did great!”
She’d never get mad at me or shout at me for anything, if we are doing a one between two activity she’d give me the only extra sheet in the class
I asked her to sit at the front to her because I “concentrate better at the front” (i only asked cuz i wanted to sit closer to her) she gave me a sly smirk and then the next lesson she moved me to the back of the class, and also moved her self to the back of the class.
We took a selfie together and the whole time she was giggling, I gave her a Christmas card, she lets me follow her around the school, she gave my friends dirty looks when they were being mean to me
I sent her stupid emails of pictures of capybaras (it was an inside joke between us) and she responded with a way to enthusiastic response for such a simple image lol!
I sand “you belong with me” by TS and she stood in the crown and when it got to the “you belong with me” bit I pointed at her and she pointed back! Singing the words back to me
Oh, and let us not forget the amount of eye contact. I never look people in the eye, one of my first exes I barely ever looked into their eyes all the time I knew them, I just suck at eye contact. Until I met her, since I’m so insecure about her forgetting me or loosing me or something I often stare at her when she’s teaching to make sure that she doesn’t forget me. And some how in the last couple of months she stares at me as well.
Anytime she tells a joke she looks straight at me to see how I respond (always with giggles even when it’s the lamest thing iv ever heard. It’s often not funny at all.) and the entire time shes teaching the lessons I will stare at her. IN HER EYES. Like, I’ll often smile calmly, but if she hasn’t looked at me in like 4 minutes then I’ll stare deeper, but she usually looks into my eyes and hold it for a while sometimes she’ll even smile at me and then stutter and forget what she’s saying before looking away and continuing. She’ll stare deeply into my eyes, throughout the lesson, and I also always catch her looking at me first.
Once she was helping me with my work, she got really close to me, and she stared into my eyes and then I see her getting small glances at my lips (with this one I may be a little delusional) she leaned in and she kept getting confused. Like, she yaps a lot, and a lot very loudly. So it was odd for her to be standing there her arm touching mine talking to me and being like “…. Um-.. heh-.. where was i..” and she flicks through my paper and then looks back at me and goes silent and then swallows and then looks down and then flips through it again and then says something small and short followed by more silence.
I also have a theory shes on drugs, for many reasons but one time I needed her to take a photo of my book, and she was acting so weird, tired but like really like dizzy and loopy and breathless. And she went to take a photo of my book, and got behind me and she leaned into my book, and I felt her heavy loud breath on my neck as her stray hairs were tickling the side of my face and her shoulder was touching my back, she she just stood there and stared at my book for ages until i was like “um so.. you can.. take a photo or something..” and then she slowly did it hahahaha!
Obviously it’s now exam time and so school is basically over and I have no more lessons, so I didn’t go into depth about how much she means to me as a person but to sum it up into one sentence; I would want to seriously kill my self with out her in my life.
And so the thing I had been fearing for so long, the last English lesson, the last time seeing my dear beloved. Well obviously it’s life or death so I have to tell her how I feel and get her to stay in contact with me.
The last lesson ends I go up to her after a morning of: pissing my self, shitting my self, throwing up in my mouth, constantly putting on perfume, checking my hair and chewing the mintiest of gums. And I start my speech, I won’t go into it but I told her how I felt about her (minus the being in love bit I played it off as platonic duh, im not fully stupid).
I told her that she means so much to me, and she’s (one of) my favourite people in the world (that’s a white lie she’s my only favourite) I can’t go on with out her, I need her, iv felt this way since the first lesson, your so fun, you mean so much to me! I cant loose you, I don’t know what I would do with out you!!!!
I cried in her arms as she hugged me! And i didnt even need to ask she suggested we could stay in contact, in-fact all i had said was “I’ll miss you so much :(“ and she already suggested we stay in contact, but Obviosuly I still did the whole speech cuz at some point she needed to know. Her response was basically that she already knew, but she was very pleased to hear it, and everything is going to be perfectly okay.
She said we can stay in contact (through email, cuz apparently there is a “legal thing unfortunately” stopping her from giving me her number (yes I did ask for her number, but in a total no homo way.)
She said I can talk to her anytime about anything as much as I like, and that’s good enough for me!
I also gave her a drawing I did of her and me together which was cute, her response to that was “oh very cool! she walks over. she takes it in her hands, very excited to see it. This really throws her confidence off, she’s really not expecting this. OH THIS IS AMAIZING! her voice cracks THANK YOU SOOOO MUCH! this is lovely! thank you, this is soo good! oh-muh-gud it’s SO good! oww I love it! thank you.. I’m wearing the same top as well, how fun~.. HOW FUN!!!! how fun!! … she takes it and puts it in her bag i will prop this up, on my desk! wicked wicked awesome!” (I recorded her reaction so that’s how you know it’s word for word)
In conclusion, im creepily obsessed and its a problem, but I don’t really regret anything cuz it’s all gotten me to this point where I can talk to her when ever I want and that’s all I could ever ask her. Yes I want to fuck her, but that’s not important to me I just need her in my life, she’s my world she’s my reason of living, and I’m so happy things are this way! I’m doing my exams now so I get to see her everyday when I come into school (by see her I mean wait outside the staff room so I can catch a glimpse of her knee). I’m also glad I’m not in her lessons anymore cuz I’d always get so twitchy around her, anytime she’d be near me and I’d be trying my best not to lunge at her, when I see her my mouth waters I just wanna grab her and kiss her all over! Eeek! She’s adorableeeee!
I love herrrrr ❤️❤️❤️

submitted by TwoProfessional4607 to confessions [link] [comments]

2024.05.21 07:20 zaddar1 waterslipt/ a furball/ widening ripples

beauty
which i have now
fades so quick
i can’t even grasp it
actors and actresses
statues looking at you
only the garb changes
one of the strongest emerging social trends that arise as a consequence of increased longevity is a necessity to think about slowing cognitive decline in the over 50’s which means attention to diet and supplements, exercise , general fitness and "wear and tear", alcohol and drug consumption
my feeling is we are going to see sharp divides between subcultures in this respect and a lot of individual variation
also, a lot of the public health advice and cultural opinions are wrong minded or ill-informed, you have to do your own research and experimentation
a way of looking at the covid public health debacle (which continues despite the cardiovascular and cancer risks of boosters) was to trade off a reduced death rate in the elderly for an increased vaccine injury problem for the young
a verse by touzi on #3 of master fushan’s sixteen themes translated by suru
the death within life
birds clench the falling blossoms before the emerald cliffs, every word responds to conditions, spreading throughout — they ask of coming west, pointing to the cypress in the yard, but how could the passage through the lush mountain peaks be shut ?
活中死。鳥銜華落碧嵓前。對境皆言到處傳。人問西來指庭柏。豈關蒼翠嶺頭穿。
my reply:
what cannot be shut
is always open
but to avoid the common herd
it is disguised
why write things people understand ?
they just make your life a misery with their missionizing of a contrary view
to confuse them is better
they can’t target you
no "master"
except the claim
fantasies about reality
seek a center
its doesn’t exist
non-existence or otherwise
ed. zen is full of fake claims to authority by the appellation of "zen master", same with any religion and its "pooh-bahs"
that’s the trouble with writing
its lasts forever
so
necessarily
you are writing forever
i am appreciating the philosopher gilles deleuze more
the untranslated portion at the end goes
so you understand, when you have such an idea, the important is not to know whether it is true or false
the question is to know if it is important, if it is interesting, and if it is beautiful
and it is the same in science, it is the same in philosophy, you know
waterslipt
a furball
widening ripples on
the smooth surface
of a reflective river
a platypus
ed. i was having lunch at a clearing on the bank of the mersey rivestream near the eastern end of bridle track road, the day was amazingly clear and windless and the river smooth and i noticed a platypus working its way feeding on the bottom to surface occasionally for breath then go back down again
this morning i serendipitously put on a shirt and trousers that "matched", i have always been sceptical of the concept, but since there are clothes that don’t match, there must be those that do match, though what constitutes the female sense of this, i still cannot fathom
the abdication of the duke of windsor was in fact a surface effect of a deeper political struggle, would britain become a client state of germany or would it resist ?
the outcome was not as obvious as you might think
taking actors as real
and a set as reality
is it any wonder
the dissembling mess
collapses ?
the circle of the contemporary
rubbish generating more rubbish
stay there at your own risk
sharing the same road for a while
but later
looking at the forks and branches
i realise
we are apart
inscribed on the tower at veneration monastery
in cold spring, a hundred-foot tower
i climb up alone, and then back down alone
who can manage such distances of the heart ?
david hinton
classical chinese poetry
the poet is tu mu (803 to 853 a.d.) with a bio on page 378 of the "classical chinese poetry" pdf link
definitely medieval with the mention of a functional tower
an interesting thing about frieda hughes is she did not have her mother’s talent, of course neither did ted
there is just a remarkable depth to sylvia plath’s work and this was despite all the obstacles, what genetic quirk created her or would , if her parents had more children, they have a similar talent ?
this prosaic world
because its written in prose of course
its not a poetic world
because its not written in poetry
if you take away the "zen master" or saint or prophet as an authority figure, what do you then have ?
Regulus replies:
People acceptant of the existent reality
my reply:
the monk asked zen master regulus "what is required to be enlightened" ?
zen master regulus replied "be accepting of existing reality"
the monk was left speechless
lee smolin doesn’t like jonathon oppemheim’s stochastic gravity approach
its interesting to watch lee talk with the constant gesticulatory body movements, almost tourette's, but he is using them to think, they are part of his cognition process
how simple is the world ?
its not that simple
and certainly not as simple as the way we view it to be
insight
takes you back
and obviates
some future lives
the brain
is
a
quantum
machine
words in a story
believable or unbelievable ?
don’t
be
fooled
.
words in a story
believable or unbelievable ?
don’t be fooled
so much knowledge
everywhere
each branch opens up exponentially
drowning in detail
its pursuer
i guess i have got so interested in hearts because of hunting and looking at them, in one animal, it beat for minutes cut out from the body; never seen any that had human like aging diseases
i think as a society we have lost touch with our own raw "viscerality", i hunt for my own meat; the killing, butchering and eating does bring one back in touch with that, the commonality with our homonin history
heart and lungs animation
the number of people who have no understanding of what even moderate levels of drinking does to their lives and long term health
you have won the existential lottery where the odds are so small of winning, no number covers it and to chip away at brain function with drugs and alcohol like that . . .
you want to experiment with doing some translation yourself with google and you will realise how its possible to construct almost any sense out of the chinese, its actually not meaningful to do any commentary without going back to the chinese, the variance is so large, translators follow their own biases to create a narrative that suits them
“ continuous as the stars that shine and twinkle on the milky way ”
wordsworth’s famous poem which he wrote based on notes by his sister dorothy was in effect co-authored by her
strangers to me
thirty years of no contact
exile speaks
of unwanted distance
.
strangers to me
thirty years of no contact
exile speaks
unwanted distance
ed. looking at a photo of my sister, niece and brother in law who are all very much changed since i last saw them notions of exile are not common in western literature, but are certainly there in the chinese
lost roads
can’t be recovered
what we have travelled
always
takes us
to
a different place
i love a sotherby’s auction , vast sums spent for my entertainment, all free, it don’t get slicker, a living made from networking skills and being personable
i was about to go negative on the painting by lucy bull, but on looking further i quite like her work
you have to be careful, auctioneers like these can talk the money out of your wallet
xu qiyao’s advice to his son on being successful in CCP politics
“ the path of understanding requires objectivity and experience ”
ed. the above is my reworking of the first lines of the xinxin ming which, amongst its more "normal" translations is
“ the great way is not difficult, just avoid picking and choosing ”
the xinxin ming is an abridged version of the mind inscription
心性不生何須知見
“ reality is either itself or not. is there any point to understanding this ? ”
ed. my translation of the first line of the "mind inscription"
"don’t interrupt your enemy when he’s making a mistake" — napoleon
i think in the context of divorce , what people find difficult is the necessity of switching to the extreme mindset of being at war and all that entails because that is what is immediately required
billie and finneas o’connell discuss how they created the "what am i made for" song for the film "barbie"
billie in her own words describes the process
“ Dr. Raszek provides insights from his participation in a comprehensive review concerning the utilization of synthetic uridines in mRNA vaccines (ed. covid) and their potential implications for cancer development
The discussion delves into the intricate mechanisms that could be at play, exploring how these synthetic components might inadvertently suppress the body's innate immune system, induce frameshifting phenomena, and contribute to the production of IgG4 antibodies, all of which could potentially influence cancer growth ”
my comment
i think we can expect an upsurge in cancers, especially amongst the elderly as a result of the misguidedly intensive "booster" campaign, though it may take a while to show
the forward momentum
of habituation
leading
to
habits
that
become
unbreakable
the fallacy of "negation"
its not this, its not that
but its what its not
negation is a stylised buddhist rhetorical technique, nāgārjuna of course and you get it in dogen, they’ll say something then walk it back through its negation
but having walked it forwards, there is a sense in which it can’t be walked back or it could not be walked forwards another way of putting it is there is no ontological unity, everything is constantly splitting apart
zen masters and the authority they carry are literary constructs
buddha is a literary construct
jesus, muhammad and moses are literary constructs
the egyptian book of the dead is a literary construct
does it bother you that your advice is so bad ?
no
the blindness of narcissism

submitted by zaddar1 to zen_mystical [link] [comments]

2024.05.20 17:03 thedevilswolf 22[ F4M] #Romania #Europe #Online looking for a long term relationship!

The only way to mend a broken heart is by allowing it to love again. Therefore I'm in search of a heart, that will beat alongside mine to the rhythm of love.
I'm Laura, 22F, from Transylvania, Romania. I work full time, am trilingual and quite tall ( 5'9 or 175cm). I have brown short hair and brown eyes. And I'm chubby. I have a bubbly personality, when I'm really happy, I'm full of energy and will sometimes act like a little kid. I'd say my humor is, all over the place, sometimes I'll make a dirty joke, another time I'll use some dark humor. I'm really spontaneous and flirty too.
What I'm into: - movies and shows, especially horror and scifi ( best horror movie of all time is the witch , best scifi movie is avatar),writing, mostly poems, psychology,mythology,true crime,music( Ava max, Taylor Swift, Katy Perry, pitbull, alan Walker) ,a bit of gaming even tho I don't really play ( best game of all time GOW!!! ),animals, nature,skincare, fitness
What I'm looking for in a man: - be around my age -be from Europe preferably - be good at conversation/ not be dry - honest, loving - preferably have similar interests - be okay with the distance and comfortable with calling later on!
If I piqued your interest don't hesitate to send me an introduction of yourself! Will send photo of myself if you do too. And don't worry, I don't bite 😄

submitted by thedevilswolf to r4r [link] [comments]

2024.05.20 16:58 thedevilswolf 22F from Romania looking for a [relationship]

The only way to mend a broken heart is by allowing it to love again. Therefore I'm in search of a heart, that will beat alongside mine to the rhythm of love.
I'm Laura, 22F, from Transylvania, Romania. I work full time, am trilingual and quite tall ( 5'9 or 175cm). I have brown short hair and brown eyes. And I'm chubby. I have a bubbly personality, when I'm really happy, I'm full of energy and will sometimes act like a little kid. I'd say my humor is, all over the place, sometimes I'll make a dirty joke, another time I'll use some dark humor. I'm really spontaneous and flirty too.
What I'm into: - movies and shows, especially horror and scifi ( best horror movie of all time is the witch , best scifi movie is avatar),writing, mostly poems, psychology,mythology,true crime,music( Ava max, Taylor Swift, Katy Perry, pitbull, alan Walker) ,a bit of gaming even tho I don't really play ( best game of all time GOW!!! ),animals, nature,skincare, fitness
What I'm looking for in a man: - be around my age -be from Europe preferably - be good at conversation/ not be dry - honest, loving - preferably have similar interests, - be okay with the distance and comfortable with calling later on!
If I piqued your interest don't hesitate to send me an introduction of yourself! Will send photo of myself if you do too. And don't worry, I don't bite !

submitted by thedevilswolf to MeetNewPeopleHere [link] [comments]

2024.05.20 16:51 thedevilswolf 22[F4M] Romania/ Europe/ anywhere... Are you out there?

The only way to mend a broken heart is by allowing it to love again. Therefore I'm in search of a heart, that will beat alongside mine to the rhythm of love.
I'm Laura, 22F, almost 23, from Transylvania, Romania. I work full time, am trilingual and quite tall ( 5'9 or 175cm). I have brown short hair and brown eyes. And I'm chubby. I have a bubbly personality, when I'm really happy, I'm full of energy and will sometimes act like a little kid. I'd say my humor is, all over the place, sometimes I'll make a dirty joke, another time I'll use some dark humor. I'm really spontaneous and flirty too.
What I'm into: - movies and shows, especially horror and scifi ( best horror movie of all time is the witch , best scifi movie is avatar),writing, mostly poems, psychology,mythology,true crime,music( Ava max, Taylor Swift, Katy Perry, pitbull, alan Walker) ,a bit of gaming even tho I don't really play ( best game of all time GOW!!! ),animals, nature,skincare, fitness
What I'm looking for in a man: - be around my age -be from Europe preferably - be good at conversation/ not be dry - honest, loving, good at communicating - preferably share a few hobbies in common - be okay with the distance and comfortable with calling later on!
If I piqued your interest don't hesitate to send me an introduction of yourself! Will send photo of myself if you do too. And don't worry, I don't bite 😄

submitted by thedevilswolf to ForeverAloneDating [link] [comments]

2024.05.19 22:17 No-Ganache5404 I feel like my life just ended

(M19) Tomorrow, I will do my maturita exam. And after that, I dont have any goals because they fell apart last month.
When I was 14, I met a girl in an archery club and I fell in love with her. We started dating but after ten days we broke up. She said she had felt too young for a relationship and I understood it. But she completely cut me off and later I found out that she pretended it so she wouldnt harm me. It was devastating for me and I was feeling depressed for like two years. Because I was encountering her quite frequently and just couldnt get over it. Since that moment, I became extremely introverted, had troubles with trusting people but mostly didnt have any self esteem.
Two years ago, an Ukrainian girl came to uor class (Czechia), she fled from the war. And she was the most beautiful person Ive ever seen. And I couldnt encounter her, I just couldnt because of the past. I became attached to her, I heavily idealized her. She was two months in our class. I had too many negative thoughts, how we wouldnt match, even though I didnt know her. Then Holidays came and I finally decided to encounter her the next school year. But she left to Prague, its on the opposite side of our country.
And since that moment, it was my greatest wish and goal to meet her again. And when I realized that there is a university I wanted to go, my plans began to form. And last summer I wrote her a poem that I would like to meet her. And to my greatest surprise, she agreed. And so I visited her and.. she was better than all my dreams. She was like me. Since that moment, Ive had the happiest part of my life. I visited her on Christmas and it was the best Christmas Ive ever had. I bought her a book and we enjoyed the day. She was visibly happy and I was so happy that we matched together so well.
She was my main motivation to everything, I dedicated my whole future to her. I sent only one application to university. I imagined how we will be together. She was the first girl I started to trust, I overcame all my negative thoughts. I became positive person so much that I convinced myself that she likes me and we will end up together. And in the moment when she sent me her photo sealed it all.
At the start of the last month, she told me that she has a boyfriend. It more than a month and a half and I just cant.. do anything. My greatest wish, my only goal broke. And now I will have to go to study to Prague because its my only choice. It will be painful, everything will remind her.. I wrote dozens of poems about her. I was so happy that it started to fit so nicely together and now.. I dont have anything. And I dont want anyone else, I dont want to be happy without her, I just lost an angel.
I explained everything to her and she understood, she let my to send her all my poems. She was the first one who didnt block me in this situation. She is the kindest person on the Earth. I wrote and sent her a new collection of poems afterwards and it ended there.
I am goind to do my maturita exams, Im one of the smartest students in my school, Im going to study nuclear physics and yet, I hate myself fot being so successful in my school life but I never wanted this. All I want is just love, I dont care if I will have a poor job, or if I will have children, or an expensive house or car, I only want someone who would love me. And all of that I saw in this one girl. And its gone. All my dreams..
My family tried to help me as much as they could.. but they dont know how to help me. I started visiting a psychologist and I take antidepressants. But nothing of it will bring me her back, nothing of it will bring me back the meaning of life, my goals, wishes, dreams.
I dont want to put up with it. I feel like life showed me the best of it and than took it from me. I feel like I wouldnt be ever satisfied with it, like from all the paths that I couldve taken, this one will forever hurt me.
And so, tommorow, my life will just end. And I dont know what to do.
I just so much regret not encountering her while she was in our class. I cant read my poems anymore because its so painful to me.
I worry that I wont be ever able to create such a strong bond to anyone else. Such a strong longig, a desire.

submitted by No-Ganache5404 to AdviceForTeens [link] [comments]

2024.05.19 21:54 No-Ganache5404 My life just ended

submitted by No-Ganache5404 to Advice [link] [comments]

2024.05.19 20:31 imsorrybutareyou My dearest 'Hades'

I'm not over you,
Not in the way I want to be.
My anger seeps into my bones
Down into the depths of my soul
And you, you don't even care.
At least that's what you want me to think.
But I know you hurt just as much as I do.
A twin flame.
A shared soul.
You and I will always be one and the same.
Does my anger fuel you the same?
Am I in every passing thought,
In every waking moment.
Do you open our chats,
Reading through the old poems I wrote you
Stopping only for moments on my photos
Wondering what would have happened if I stayed?
I only left because you no longer wanted me.
Maybe in your soul you did,
But you let your trauma dictate how you live
And you brought me to hell with you.
I tried to find comfort in the dark with you
But you wouldn't let me in.
You wouldn't let me share the darkness.
You hurt me instead.
And now look what you have,
Nothing.
-'Persephone'

submitted by imsorrybutareyou to UnsentLetters [link] [comments]

2024.05.19 08:07 oceanblissed [POEM] - "Les séparés" by Marceline Desbordes-Valmore (English Translation Provided)

Poem by Marceline Desbordes-Valmore (photo of text)
English Translation by David Paley (Another translation to explore is by Louis Simpson)
Les séparés The Separated Apart
Do not write. I am sad and would like to fade away. The fine summers without you are nights without light. I have folded my arms unable to reach you; And to knock at my heart is to beat on my grave. Do not write!
Do not write. Let us learn only to die in ourselves. Ask only of God… of yourself, whether I loved you! In the depths of your absence, to hear that you love me Is to be hearing from heaven without ever ascending. Do not write!
Do not write. I am fearful of you and afraid of my memory That has kept your voice and calls to me often; Do not show me the water that cannot be drunk For your cherished writing brings your portrait alive. Do not write!
Do not write those sweet words that I dare not read any more: It seems that your voice spreads them over my heart; And, as I see them through the glow of your smile; It seems they are stamped with a kiss on my heart. Do not write!
https://preview.redd.it/nfboc8l2rb1d1.jpg?width=700&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=6281eaa6bb17dae221fecc3aefeae5db72386ed3

submitted by oceanblissed to Poetry [link] [comments]

2024.05.19 05:27 Certain-Adeptness-71 Is she cheating?

My girlfriend has been snapping other guys photos of her in a bikini, not rejecting their compliments, and saying she's single to them. They're randoms on snapchat and she used that as an excuse. I found out this morning and immediately left her house. I asked her if I wasn't giving her enough attention and she said I was. Everything else has been perfect and I have no complaints about anything but that. I write her poems, hand make gifts and buy her jewelry, whatever she wants I get her. I really love her but I was warned by my buddy about her cheating habit before we started dating (small town). She hasn't "cheated" yet but I fear it may lead into it. I really want to stay but I'm pretty numb to it now. We've been dating 3 months. I skipped grade 12 and am currently studying an aviation program so she keeps saying that I could do better when I confront her about it. I see her every weekend but not throughout the week. What should I do?

submitted by Certain-Adeptness-71 to LongDistance [link] [comments]

2024.05.17 09:41 dismayed-tumbleweed Light According to Shelley, Fitzgerald, Dickinson, Swift (the multiple meanings of the "Downtown Lights")

So, this got out of hand. This post was originally supposed to be an analysis of light & lightning as symbols in TTPD, and it still is, but it also turned into something else. It also now basically only covers three lines of one song somehow but it's WORTH it, I promise it's worth it. But what happened is over the course of writing this post I also found like my "symbol cipher" holy grail.
I'll link my original post on the symbol cipher in case you want to see, but I will quickly try to explain the theory here! Essentially, I think that the literary allusions on TTPD act as a guide to unpacking the symbolism on the album. The most obvious example of this might be the albatross. Taylor is sort of borrowing symbolism from Rime of the Ancient Mariner and applying it to her own work. With this example, the referencing and the symbol appear on the same track, but I don't think this is necessarily the case for most of them.
In my last post I analyzed the symbol of a kiss. To do this, I found out which of the literary works Taylor references uses “kiss” in a symbolic way. Peter Pan was an easy answer here. In Peter Pan, "a kiss" symbolizes childhood innocence. So, I used the idea of "innocence" to interpret Taylor's use of "kiss" on TTPD. This analysis, along with the similar one I did about the albatross as a symbol, wound up working even better than I had originally anticipated.
Symbol Cipher Theory & Kiss Symbolism
Albatross Symbolism on TTPD
Very sorry in advance for the length. Things just kept happening and I simply don't know how to be concise with all of this. (She says, launching into unnecessary personal narrative--)
It was Monday night. I was more than halfway through my analysis of light-based symbolism on TTPD. I was sorting through lyrics, trying not to feel insane as I oscillated back and forth between symbolic meanings pulled from various works of literature, sometimes layering them on top of each other within the same verse or even line.
https://preview.redd.it/vz1r5b5ixx0d1.png?width=1330&format=png&auto=webp&s=6b2ad17c2ff12be2d6d49df2e8540e90b8da02bb
I’d noted light-based symbolism in 3 of the works Taylor alludes to in her own:

Frankenstein- In Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, light is a symbol of knowledge or enlightenment, while lightning symbolizes the destructive power of ambition and the dangers of pursuing knowledge without considering the consequences.
The Great Gatsby- In The Great Gatsby, the green light is a symbol for the American Dream, and the components of that American Dream, including Daisy. We learn through Gatsby's fate that the American Dream is an illusion, a false promise.
Tell all the truth but tell it slant- This poem by Emily Dickinson uses light as a symbol for knowledge, or truth, as she calls it. This works in almost in the opposite way that Frankenstein does; while Frankenstein's symbolism has to do with seeking out knowledge, Dickinson is referring to the delivery of knowledge or the reveal of truth. "The truth must dazzle gradually," she says, "or every man be blind."

Frankenstein connections in TTPD & Tumblr Post Emily Dickinson "Slant" connections & The poem's double meaning
There could easily be more examples, but I have honestly been too overwhelmed to even consider it. Please! discuss below, I have brain worms now. (Note: I did not count fire, stars, or the sun, because I think they might be treated as separate symbols.)
So to put it in Multiple-Choice Format, Frankenstein’s light is knowledge, Gatsby’s light is illusion, and Dickinson’s light is truth. While I had been trying to keep my focus solely on TTPD, a bunch of this symbolism already reminded me of songs like mirrorball and Bejeweled, which seem to frame truth as reflection or refraction of light.
I went backwards through the tracklist as I did this analysis, which made "Guilty As Sin?" one of the later tracks I took a look at. And I've been looking at it ever since. (sorry, tracks 1-8)
So, when you really look at these starting lines, multiple questions arise. Who is drowning in the Blue Nile? “He” or “I?” It would depend on punctuation, except we have none. Besides those quotation marks, anyway, but hey! Why are those there if that isn’t even the full song title? It’s also by The Blue Nile, so why isn’t the ‘t’ in “the” capitalized? And what does Any of this have to do with Frankenstein?
But let’s start where I started, and maybe we can answer these questions as we go.
So who is drowning? It depends, I think. When I first listened to the song, my impression was that the speaker of the song, the “I,” was the one drowning. In my head, the second line felt almost like an aside or a clarification. "[I was] drowning in the Blue Nile; he sent me "Downtown Lights." So, my first interpretations of this line, through the lens of symbolic light, looked like this:
I was overwhelmed by deep emotion listening to the song he sent me about light because it reminded me of the past.
The symbolism here reminded me most of the Frankenstein interpretation: light as a symbol for knowledge. To me, this little scene does evoke an exchange of both light (a phone lighting up w/ a message) and knowledge (the reminder of the song.) With that in mind, I went a layer deeper.
I was overwhelmed listening to the deep truth she shared with me I had forgotten about them.
Lightning is also a symbol in Frankenstein, of the destructive nature of ambition, and the dangers of pursuing powerful knowledge without considering the consequences. I wondered if the digital (or electric) nature of the exchange could add another layer to our interpretation.
I was in danger out there thanks to the destructive reminder he sent me. I had heard that one before.
After that, I shifted my focus to the other interpretation of the line: "Drowning in the Blue Nile, he sent me Downtown Lights. I hadn't heard it in a while."
In this interpretation, he is the one drowning in the Nile (Blue.) He is the one who's lost in the lights. (hiii MA&THP) So okay, maybe the answer is either or both or, maybe, “those are the same picture.” I was starting to get the feeling that, much like TTPD itself, these lines were meant to be looked at from every angle, that their meaning shimmers, changes depending on how the light hits them.
Lost in the light, he dragged me under it too It was something I knew once, a long time ago (I've been there too, a few times?)
The lights in this interpretation feel like they could be stage lights, which is a reference often made on TTPD, though not in this song (directly, anyway.) Gatsby is the only work on the list which made reference to electric light, instead of light as a sort of natural, cosmic force. In this way, the green light in Gatsby is artificial, which makes sense for a symbol of false promises and illusion.
Covered in well-lit illusion she made me false promises I hear them all the time (or, maybe) I’ve used that one myself?
At this point, I started interpreting the final line here in a sort of ironic or sarcastic way. I know we haven't gotten there yet because we are stuck in the Guilty As Sin? intro timeloop, but the next line is "my boredom's bone deep."
This was where my "dazzle" senses started tingling. Things were going slant. We were talking illusions and how things may not be as they appear in the light! We were deep in double meanings, purposeful cracks, and hidden possibilities. The very idea of these three lines having so many multi-facets almost seemed to perform the act of dazzling gradually, itself!
I also realized around here that I had all but ignored that first Blue Nile reference, the band name. hadn't really known what to do with it. Why would she mention both the artist and the song title? Surely one reference would have been enough, especially given the apparent public knowledge about the associations of that song.
I had first just thought of it as a way to play on the drowning motif and the light motif at the same time, and had used the band name for it's words, thinking of depth and emotion. I had thought of the song itself as in "interpretation of light," but I had not thought of the band as the "interpreters" of light.
Lost in a sea of interpretations, he sent me his own version of the truth. I had heard that that one before. I'm so bored of this.
When I originally googled the Blue Nile, I hadn't known the reference. I had just typed it into google from hearing it audibly. I first read about the River Nile and how there are two parts (ha ha.) Then I ended up finding out it was the name of a diamond company before realizing it was a reference to the band and song. Specifically, its an online-only company that sells diamonds cheaper since they don’t have brick-and-mortar stores. Lots of people use it for engagement and wedding rings. This might seem unconnected, if that 't' were only capitalized!
I think this would allow us to fold in the Emily Dickinson, sequin-stars, mirrorballesque meaning here very well.
This was when I decided it probably didn't really matter who was drowning, that it could be both at the same time, within one interpretation. "[As we were] Drowning in the Blue Nile, he sent me "Downtown Lights."
Drowning in diamonds (the dazzle of light) he told me something I already knew. How Boring.
The meaning of just the three lines seemed endless. But it was all feeling very difficult to prove. Was I going a little too crazy with this? Could all of this be true at once? I'm not Dylan Thomas. She's not Patti Smith! I've never even been to the Chelsea Hotel.
But then, what about the kisses?
At some point along the way here, I had another, somewhat troubling, thought: there was no way I could attribute the symbolism here only to Frankenstein and Gatsby and Dickinson while that Blue Nile reference was staring me right in the face.
I had looked up "Downtown Lights" before, way back when the album first came out, but that initial lyric scan honestly hadn't left an impression while my brain was spinning around like a propeller, focused on nothing but consuming TTPD. Now I knew that (according to the symbol cipher code of ethics) I had to take a look at the specific allusion here and find out how light is treated symbolically within "The Downtown Lights" by The Blue Nile.
Essentially, I was ready to do a lyric analysis within a lyric analysis
I put the song on, then went over to genius and began clicking around, as you do. It did not take long to find literally exactly what I was looking for. I will give you a visual of what happened next:
https://preview.redd.it/sf4p8linqx0d1.png?width=300&format=png&auto=webp&s=0dc47ca9d5efdb366e699f8b6474b0c2cd6e18aa
ego trip 5/13/2024
So as it turns out!! the downtown lights hold different meanings at different points throughout the Blue Nile song! This was very exciting for me. It meant that, yes, light could have alternating meanings at different points throughout TTPD and still maintain the idea of a "symbol cipher.” In fact, Taylor was practically singing to me that it does.
Drowning in the Blue Nile, indeed.
So we know the downtown lights have multiple meanings in the song, but what did they mean? According to Genius, the The Blue Nile song switches between using the downtown lights as a positive, welcoming presence, and as an alienating, lonely sight. I think it's possible that we are touching on both of these interpretations at once here. The first use of "downtown lights" comes in the opening verse "It's alright, can't you see / the downtown lights?" This use reminds me of the idea of "the light at the end of the tunnel."
Drowning in the Blue Nile Overwhelmed by these interpretations of light (relatable)
He sent me 'Downtown Lights' I hadn't heard it in a while He reminded me of 'the light at the end of the tunnel' as if I could have forgotten
My boredom’s bone deep No part of me is interested in this anymore.
This cage was once just fine I used to be able to tolerate these limits
Am I allowed to cry? Am I allowed to be sad about something I chose? (conjecture)
For this last one, I will interpret the lines with the other meaning of “the downtown lights," the distance and alienation, ("Empty streets, empty nights / the downtown lights") I am also going to try to do my best to layer in as much of some of the other interpretations as possible.
Drowning in the Blue Nile Lost and bathed in the illusory, dazzling glow of thousands of reflections
He sent me Downtown Lights He brought up the light at the end of the tunnel, but it only reminded me of the separation that remains between where I am and where I want to be.
I hadn’t heard it in a while As if I needed reminding. I used to use that line myself, but I don’t believe it anymore.
My boredom’s bone deep There is nothing left for me to learn here and I can no longer convince myself otherwise.
This cage was once just fine I used to feel like these limits protected me, but now I feel caged and gawked at.
Am I allowed to cry? Is it hypocritical of me to come clean now? How would they react?
The last use of "the downtown lights" is here: "The neons and the cigarettes, rented rooms and rented cars The crowded streets, the empty bars Chimney tops and trumpets, the golden lights, the loving prayers The coloured shoes, the empty trains, I'm tired of crying on the stairs The downtown lights"
To me, this evokes that sort of overwhelm feeling, when everything gets to be too much; the good things and the bad things, and the ways they overlap and contradict each other, and pull you apart, and drive you crazy, kind of thing. This meaning feels almost like it doesn't even need an interpretation. It's the part of the Blue Nile you drown in.
Um so this ended sort of dark and sad. I didn't think about that when I came up with my clever little bookend format. Luckily, I have just the thing, and it's weird!!
So, somewhere along the way here, I clicked on the username of the contributor who annotated “The Downtown Lights." They're username is Abraxas01.
It turns out "Abraxas" is (ok. yeah. why not? at this point why not?) a word that has multiple meanings, including "the honorable and Hallowed word," (the sacred or holy word) and "the uncreated Father," (not existing by creation : eternal, self-existent) and "the beautiful, the glorious Savior.”
I’m not even going to think about trying to unpack all of that. But Merriam Webster's defines the word as something “used as a charm on an amulet or talisman in Europe, Asia Minor, and North Africa from the second century b.c. until the 13th century," so there's also that.
The word comes from Biblical Greek. Wikipedia says “The spelling of Abraxas seen today probably originates in the confusion made between the Greek letters sigma (Σ) and xi (Ξ) in the Latin transliteration.”
On the profile, I saw a few interesting things, but nothing that seemed as connected to TTPD as the "The Downtown Lights" annotations. At one point I was scrolling through Abraxas01's following list and I noticed that they and another user called perfectrhyme were following each other. This other user has a ton of points on the website, but no real info. Instead, their bio reads "perfectrhyme is keeping quiet for now," which is not, like, an auto generated message from the site, I'm pretty sure, because a bunch of the new users just have blank bios.
This user’s annotations here were much more interesting in terms of Taylor connections. I’m going to include some of the most compelling ones and I need people to tell me what they think because I don’t know what’s going on anymore!!!
The PFP is Chaucer
My town was a wasteland? Jumping off of very tall somethings?
https://preview.redd.it/kgu3iljzlx0d1.png?width=478&format=png&auto=webp&s=6c452696b58e47fbc430019960e871016be9fdff
So much of it is from the balcony scene... swifter??
https://preview.redd.it/j01x0u5fmx0d1.png?width=470&format=png&auto=webp&s=09cbcf1b82bb2003d18aa91b2984e4fda8162d7b
https://preview.redd.it/4rx6vy5fmx0d1.png?width=470&format=png&auto=webp&s=b1b2a06bcaaaea8ce6c0c3372395c9b9d9f05942
I mean
A description of the painting
One last sidenote which I know I am not the most qualified person on this sub to talk about is that the Abraxas01 profile uses a photo of Brian Jones and Mick Jagger that was shot by Linda McCartney, Paul McCartney’s wife. Beatles posters, what does this mean???
Here are some more of my interpretations of light and lightning off of TTPD, including Peter, The Bolter, Clara Bow, and ICDIWABH (they are not all like this one lol)
In general, I need to know other people’s thoughts on all of this pls help me make some sense over here I begggg

submitted by dismayed-tumbleweed to GaylorSwift [link] [comments]

2024.05.16 20:28 SaukstasProto Plate with the bunny

https://preview.redd.it/0manmx7e0u0d1.png?width=1080&format=png&auto=webp&s=80d52d96be09fc55bbad6513791145a296b11ddf
This study took me right back to kindergarten. Our group had one plate with a bunny drawn on it, and others had only stripes. I firmly believe that I could draw it even today, so much time was spent staring at it. During every meal time, it was considered the highest prize. When the plate was full, it was impossible to recognize it. So, every bowl of soup was also a lottery ticket. One who first saw the tip of the gray ear, was a true ruler of the hour.
But this study is not about the bunnies. If the plate has a printed text on its bottom that is covered by the food, then people tend to finish all the food on the plate only because they are curious to see the whole text. The researchers stress that this may help manage food waste. And we may conclude whatever is useful for us. If we need to encourage eating – let’s pick the plates with patterns on them (perhaps someone crafting plates is reading this, and quite soon, we’ll be able to buy plates with poems and fairy tales. Perhaps I’ll even find one with the bunny!). And if we need to limit eating – let’s pick plain plates.
Bon appetit!

spoonfulofreason #psychology #plates #patterns #eating

Photo: Mariakray from Pixabay
Study: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0195666324001910
My name is Monika; I am a health and nutrition psychologist. I help to deal with daily and challenging questions about behaviour, thinking, and emotions. I write, give lectures, and provide psychological counselling. Book my session here: https://calendly.com/saukstasproto/psichologine-konsultacija

submitted by SaukstasProto to spoonfulofreason [link] [comments]

2024.05.16 16:33 clearliquidclearjar TALLAHASSEE WEEKLY EVENTS, 5/16 – 5/22

Y’all, I’m really not sure what’s still around. This list is somewhat edited, but please still make sure to check on all the regular events before you make big plans – I may have missed something.
Events are listed by the day. Events that happen every week appear first, one time stuff after that. If you have anything you’d like people to know about, comment here or message me and I’ll add it in. If you’d like further info about any of the events, look it up! I usually don’t have any extra to add.
Large Scale, Ongoing, and Multi-Day Events

Local Running, Walking, and Biking Info: https://troubleafoot.blogspot.com/
Guided Paddling Outings all around the area: https://www.facebook.com/hsmithoutdoors
Tallahassee Film Society Showings: https://www.tallahasseefilms.com/tickets/
Book Clubs for all tastes: https://www.facebook.com/midtownreadeevents
Live Theater:

Making Light Productions: https://www.makinglightproductions.org/
Theatre Tallahassee: https://theatretallahassee.org/
Mickee Faust Club: https://www.mickeefaust.com/
Monticello Opera House: https://www.monticellooperahouse.org/
FSU School of Theatre: https://theatre.fsu.edu/productions/
Young Actors Theatre: https://www.youngactorstheatre.com/
Quincy Music Theatre: https://quincymusictheatre.com/
Tallahassee Hispanic Theater: https://tallahasseehispanictheater.wordpress.com/

OutdooFarmer’s Markets:

Lake Ella Grower's Market: Wednesday and Saturday, 11am-2pm. You can always find organic vendors, and foragers: The Holistic Cannabis Community, Artzi Farms, Hickory Nut Gifts, and others. Including Pita Queen! Farmer's Market Nutrition Program Coupons gladly accepted!
Tallahassee Downtown Market: Saturdays, 10am-2pm, Park Ave Parks. Vendors display their arts and fine crafts, jewelry, handmade soap, pottery, Fresh from Florida produce, hand-raised beef and pork, fresh baked bread, jams and jellies, and honey. Live music from different local musicians every Saturday.
Frenchtown Heritage Market: 524 N MLK Jr Blvd. Third Saturday of the month 10am to 2pm. Come grow community and support your local farmers and makers, while you get your groceries for the week! Don’t forget! We match SNAP/EBT, so you DOUBLE your money to go towards locally grown fresh fruits and vegetables! If the guy with the pineapple is there, get it. This is currently only happening on the third Saturday of the month for the next few months while road work is completed.
Tallahassee Farmers Market: 2904 Kerry Forest Pkwy, Saturdays, 8am to Noon. Come see us at Tallahassee's longest-running farmers market! We are a year-round market, featuring local farms and vendors that provide the best seasonal produce, meats, baked goods, and more. We welcome you and your whole family (leashed pets included) to come out and meet your local farmers! Ample parking is available between our lot and the shopping center lot next door (by Red Elephant). Come early for the best selection.

THURSDAY, 5/16

The Hub at Feather Oaks: Bingo. 6pm
Dreamland BBQ: Weekly Open Blues Jam. If you'd like to sing, please bring your own mic. 6pm
Honest Living Vape: Chess-Master Thursdays . Beginners and experts, join us every Thursday from 6-9 for Chess-Master Thursdays. All ages. Bring your board or play ours! Tournaments coming soon! 6pm
Lake Tribe: Trivia. 7pm
Takko Market Square: Bingo Night. 7pm
The Getaway Grille and Bar: Karaoke with Jared Walker. 7pm
Amicus Brewing: Trivia. 7pm
Smitty's Taphouse: Trivia Lab Thursdays. Teams of 6 or fewer players can compete for $30 / $20 / $10 Prizes + The Golden MacGuffin prize table! New format! Interactive smartphone answering for your comfort and safety! 6 Fun Rounds - 42 Total Questions. 7:30pm
Studio D: Bachata Fever. We always have a bachata workshop at 8 pm before Bachata Fever. We dance afterwards to the sounds of DJ Bacharod. The class is at 8 pm and Bachata Fever will start at 930 pm. Many times people are learning in class and may feel uncomfortable social dancing while they are still learning moves. We have a welcoming environment so stay and have fun and dance with everyone. That is how we learn. 8pm/Class $5/Bachata Fever $5.
The Sound Bar: Comedy Night. 8pm
Finnegans Wake: Open Mic. 8:30pm
Brass Tap in Midtown: Karaoke with DJ Rah. 9pm
926: Karaoke. 9pm
Bird’s: Karaoke with Nathan. 9pm

Fire Bettys: Slasher Bash. This week we'll be showing: "Zombeavers". Prepare for an evening of horrific hilarity with comedy narration and devilish drinking games!🍻 Hosted by local comedians. 8pm/21+
Blue Tavern: Seep's Gumbo Nation ft. Shanice Richards. 8pm

FRIDAY, 5/17

Blue Tavern: Happy Hour with Steve Malono. 5pm
Lake Tribe Brewing: Flannel Fridays with Live Music. 6pm
Hobbit West: Friday Night Dart Tournament. Anyone can Enter! Sign ups at 7:30, Darts fly at 8:00/$10 entry fee
Ouzts Too: Karaoke with DJ Nathan. Best karaoke DJ in town. 8pm
Just One More: Karaoke with DJ Rah. 9pm-11pm/21+
926: The Hot Friday Night Party and Drag Show. 9pm/$5/18+

The Hub at Feather Oaks: Rachel Hillman. 5:30pm
Lake Tribe: Ben Wentworth. 5:30pm
Amicus Brewing: The Tanglers. 6pm
The Getaway Grille and Bar: One Year Anniversary Celebration Featuring Queen of Hearts Band. 6pm
Southwood Golf Club: The Rhythm Remedy. 6:30pm
Goodwood: The Big Bash Havana Nights presented by Brent Hartsfield. The Big Bash is Big Brothers Big Sisters of the Big Bend's signature fundraising gala of the year and directly supports the agency's youth mentoring programs. Guests will enjoy Cuban Cuisine, champagne mojitos, cigars, flights, classic cars, photo opportunities, silent auction vacation packages, LIVE music and dancing, and an exciting LIVE salsa dance performance from 12 community volunteers! The event is a tremendous networking opportunity for Tallahassee's top business professionals, local community leaders and philanthropists to come together to enjoy an evening to celebrate the achievements of Big Brothers Big Sisters. 7pm
Blue Tavern: Wil Fulkerson Jazz Night. 8pm
House of Music: Belly Dancing: Journey From The Nile To The Tigris. Habibi, join us on a groovy carpet ride across ancient deserts: Disco Iskandar embarks on a voyage of belly dance, folklore, cinema, and history in a theatrical dance production, JOURNEY FROM THE NILE TO THE TIGRIS. Highlighting the prominence of belly dance in films of the Middle East from the 1940s through the 1970s, we present a live showcase exhibiting dances from Egypt, Turkey, Iraq, and beyond. It goes so much deeper than you think. Hookahs! Swords! Rhinestones, literally everywhere! This cross section of entertainment and education is the culmination of years of obsessive learning, two national tours, and travels to Egypt & Lebanon. JOURNEY FROM THE NILE TO THE TIGRIS is a trip unlike any other-- where the Middle East meets Vegas. This show’s cast is Gabi Corazon, Gia Bee, Liz Azi, Olya Clark, Vania Ojeda, director Veronica Lynn, and special guest star Omaris! 8pm/$15/21+
The Sound Bar: The Old Schoolers. 8pm
Vino Beano: Your Scumbag Neighbors. 8pm
The Bark: Medians, No Yeah, Sleep John B, and Cloud Storage. 8pm

SATURDAY, 5/18

Brinkley Glen Park: Invasive Plant Removal. Join Master Gardener Volunteers at this weekly invasive plant removal event. This is a great way to learn to ID our invasive plant species and how to remove them. We recommend wearing long pants and sleeves, closed-toed shoes, gloves, a hat and mosquito spray. Bring gardening tools such as hand clippers, loppers, trowels, etc. if you have them. We are removing coral ardisia bushes and berries, nandina, tung trees, Tradescantia flumenensis, cat's claw vine, winged yam, Japanese climbing fern, skunkvine and more. Directions: The best way to get there is to take Meridian Rd to Waverly Rd, go to the next intersection and turn left onto Abbotsford Way, then turn left at the next road called Woodside Dr. At the stop sign turn left onto Lothian. Lothian ends in a cul-de-sac and there is a sign that says Brinkley Glen Park. 8:30am-11:30am
Gamescape: Saturday Gaming. Gamescape has relocated from Railroad Square to the Huntington Oaks Plaza (Suite 302, next to the Library) at N Monroe St and Fred George Rd. Open gaming tables are available. Noon-6pm
Duke’s and Dottie’s: Line Dancing Plus Lessons. 7pm/21+
Bird’s Oyster Shack: Laughterday Night Fever. * Join us every Saturday at Bird's Aphrodisiac Oyster Shack for a free comedy show!* 8:30pm
926: Latin Night. Dance to the irresistible beats of Zeus and prepare to be dazzled by a spectacular drag show at midnight. It's more than a party, it's an experience. 9:30pm/$10 21+, $15 under 21

Crawfordville: Big Bend Biodiversity Tour. See why our area is so ecologically incredible! Get up close and personal with creatures and plants galore. Join expert guide and outdoor educator, Ryan Means for this limited opportunity to tour the Apalachicola Lowlands Preserve. The day-long trip stops at points along the way to the privately-owned preserve nestled deep in the Apalachicola National Forest near Sumatra, FL. Explore the longleaf pine ecosystem, pitcher plant bogs, ephemeral wetlands, and blackwater streams - home to some threatened and endangered species. Learn what makes the Florida Panhandle one of the five richest biodiversity hotspots in North America. Perfect tour for photographers, outdoor enthusiasts and ecologists. $75 tour fee includes round-trip transportation (from 46 Kinsey Rd, Crawfordville, FL) , complimentary beverages, and supports efforts to preserve the incredible biodiversity of the Southeastern Coastal Plain. Spaces limited. Register here: https://coastalplains.networkforgood.com/events/71083-big-bend-biodiversity-tour for full details. 8am
Dreamland BBQ: Rock Type One to None. Let's rock to find a cure for Type 1 Diabetes! The Unicorn Wranglers are back on Saturday, May 18th at Dreamland BBQ in Tallahassee, Florida for the 2024 "Rock One to None" show. This show is benefiting the Juvenile Diabetes Research Fund (JDRF) and will feature musical guests Midnight Caravan, Fallen Timber, and the Unicorn Wranglers. The show starts at 4 pm and runs until 7 pm at Dreamland BBQ in Music Alley, and is open to all ages. While the show is free, we encourage all rockers attending to donate to the cause. You can contribute at the show by visiting our donation station or by heading over to our online Unicorn Wranglers team page. Together, as one big mosh pit, we can help cure Type 1 Diabetes. 3pm
The Hub at Feather Oaks: Ethan Kyllonen. 4pm
Amicus Brewing: Beza Alford and Rev. Dr. Sheldon Steen. 5pm
Lake Tribe: Flamingo Party. 6pm
The Getaway Grille and Bar: Billy Rigsby Band. 6pm
Vino Beano: Brett & "Dangerous" Dave. 6pm
Salty Dawg: Hot Mess. 6:30pm
La Tiendita: Rhys Bennett & the Gringos as Vontade. Join us for an energetic evening filled with the vibrant sounds of Latin music, Brazilian beats, and jazz rhythms. Our local band, Rhys Bennett & the Gringos, will transform into the versatile ensemble Vontade, treating you to a delightful mix of rancheras, bossa nova, and more! Whether you're a seasoned dancer or a newcomer to the dance floor, you're in for a fantastic time at one of Tallahassee's hidden gems. Immerse yourself in a night of cultural fusion and musical celebration that is sure to create lasting memories! 6:30pm
The Sound Bar: Tillman & Taff. 7pm
Island Wings: Midnight Caravan. 7pm
The Bark: Saturnalia, Brass Wizard, Van Season, and Psycho Tropical. 8pm
Fire Bettys: 80's Video Dance Party. 8pm
Just One More: One Eyed JAK. 9pm

SUNDAY, 5/19

Bicycle House: Sunday Ride. Ride at 10:30 AM from Bicycle House. We will ride the Cascades trail to the St Marks trail and down to Wakulla station and return, about 31 miles. Ride speed is 12 to 14 mph, with periodic regroups. Vernon Bailey is the ride leader. Vernon is a new CCC member who’s been biking for 50 years enjoys riding with small groups and weekend touring. 10am
E Peck Greene Park (Behind the LeRoy Collins Library): Food Not Bombs Free Mealshare. We offer free vegetarian/vegan food, water, coffee, personal care & hygiene products, bus passes, and clothing when we have some available to those in need. Contact foodnotbombstally@gmail.com to find out about getting involved. Noon-2pm
LeRoy Collins Library: Tallahassee Go Club Meetings. Come play the captivating ancient game of Go, also known as Baduk, with some friendly games and discussions. Beginners welcome. Visit https://www.tallahasseegoclub.com for more information. 1pm
Gamescape: Pokémon League. Come learn, play, and trade with the Pokémon Trading Card Game and the Pokémon video games! We LOVE seeing new players, so come learn how to play! We play both the Trading Card Game and the Video Game casually and competitively. The store offers lots of different seating arrangements to meet our group's needs, as well as food, drinks, and Pokémon products for purchase. We are also hold regular, officially sanctioned tournaments for Pokémon Trading Card Game and Video Game Competitions! 2-4pm
The Plant: Open Jam. All instruments, all players welcome. 4pm-9pm
Pedro’s: Mariachi Clasico. 6pm
Fermentation Lounge: Open Mic Night Hosted by Conor Churchill. 7pm

Ology Powermill: Marauders Market. Noon
The Hub at Feather Oaks: The Barber Bros. 1pm-4pm
Goodwood: Ice Cream Social. Get ready for a spectacular day of family fun at Goodwood Museum & Gardens! Treat your taste buds to a family fun day of FREE ice cream, FREE crafts for the kids, FREE activities, and more, all on the beautiful Goodwood grounds. Family-friendly musical entertainment will be provided by The Safari Man, who will have everyone tapping their feet and dancing along to his whimsical tunes. 1pm
Common Ground Books: Contemporary Queer Poetry Book Club: Time is a Mother. This month, we’ll be reading “Time is a Mother” by Ocean Vuong. “In this deeply intimate second poetry collection, Ocean Vuong searches for life among the aftershocks of his mother's death, embodying the paradox of sitting within grief while being determined to survive beyond it. Vivid, brave and propulsive, Vuong's poems contend with personal loss, the meaning of family, and the value of joy in a perennially fractured American spirit. The author of the critically acclaimed poetry collection Night Sky with Exit Wounds, winner of the 2016 Whiting Award, the 2017 T. S. Eliot Prize and a 2019 MacArthur fellow, Vuong writes directly to our humanity without losing sight of the current moment. Bold and prescient, and a testament to tenderness in the face of violence, Time is a Mother is a return and a forging-forth all at once.” 6pm

MONDAY, 5/20

Just One More: Bingo. 5pm-6:30pm
The Getaway Grille and Bar: Margarita Monday, Open-Mic Night hosted by The Saltwater Cowboy. 5:30pm-8pm
American Legion Hall: Cha Cha - Weekly Lessons. 6:15pm/$5
Hangar 38: Bingo. 6:45pm
Vino Beano: Tipsy Trivia. 7pm

TUESDAY, 5/21

Blue Tavern: Happy Hour. 5pm
The Getaway Grille: Tuesday Night Bikes and Trikes. 6pm
Crafty Crab: BOOMIN' Karaoke. 7pm
Gamescape: Hobby Night. Slay the grey together! Join your fellow gamers and turn your pile of grey miniatures into a battle ready army. Need some painting tips? Feel free to ask at hobby night. You can bring any miniature for any game to paint. 7pm
Ology Midtown: Jazz Jam Sessions. 7pm
Island Wings: Trivia. 7pm
Brass Tap in Midtown: Trivia. 1st Tuesday of the month is General Knowledge with rotating themes the rest of the month. 7pm
House of Music: Tuesday Trivia & Karaoke. 7pm
American Legion Hall: Tallahassee Swing Band Tuesday Night Dance. 7:30pm
Fire Bettys: Comedy Night. 8pm
Poor Pauls: Trivia. 8pm/21+
Blue Tavern: Bluesday Tuesday with Bill Ricci. Every Tuesday is Blues Day @ the Blue Tavern and Blues Meets Girl is a Tallahassee favorite. This perfect, intimate venue provides just what you need for both a mid-week break and authentic blues music experience. 8pm/$5
4th Quarter: Professor Jim's Tuesday Night Trivia. Popular for a reason! 8pm
Argonaut Coffee: Trivia Tuesday. 8pm
The Sound Bar: Karaoke. 8pm
Fire Betty’s: Open Mic Comedy Night. 8pm/21+
926: Tacos and Trivia. 9pm

Tallahassee Junior Museum: Basic Blacksmith Skills Program. Light your curiosity at our upcoming Basic Blacksmith Skills Program! Join our resident blacksmith, Michael Murphy, as he shares his history of being a Smitty. Participants will be able to keep the fire going, sling a hammer, and throw knives during this two hour lecture program. This is an outdoor event. Must preregister online at tallahasseemuseum.org/events. This program is free for members and regular admission price for non-members. 10am

WEDNESDAY, 5/22

Sugar and Spice Tally: Game Night. Join us every Wednesday Night for community game night. Bring your own or use ours! Let me know if you need to reserve space for a large group. Free to attend! 5pm
Goodwood: Wonderful Wednesday. 6pm/$5
Level 8 Rooftop Lounge: Trivia. 6pm
La Florida Coffee & Wine: Trivia Night. 6pm
The Great Games Library: Open Game Night. 6pm/free
American Legion Hall: Sue Boyd Country Western and More Dance Class. Session 2 - Beginner 6:30 to 7:45 pm What: East Coast Swing and Waltz. Cost: $8.00 per person. Wear comfortable shoes you can turn in. 7:45 to 8:15 - Practice dance with paid admission. 8:15 to 9:30: Intermediate - 2 Step and WCS. $8.00 per person or $13.00 for both classes. Vaccines are required. Face masks are optional. Changing partners is optional. 6:30pm
Perry Lynn’s Smokehouse in Quincy: Wed Night Open Mic w/ Steven Ritter and Friends. 6:30pm
Hangar 38: Trivia. 6:45pm
Proof: Trivia. 7pm
Vino Beano: Wine Bingo. 7pm
Fermentation Lounge: Trivia. 7pm
Blue Tavern: Wednesday Open Mic with Doc Russell. The open mic night that has run continuously for almost 20 years, once housed at the Warehouse, lives on at the Blue Tavern. Doc Russell continues as the host with the most. Sign up starts at 7:45pm/free to attend
House of Music: Bar Bingo! Free to Play & Late Night Karaoke. 7pm
Fire Betty’s: Karaoke! 8pm/21+/free
Dukes and Dotties: College Night and Line Dancing Lessons. 8pm
Finnegans Wake: Trivia. 8pm
The Sound Bar: Open Mic Night. 8pm
The Bark: Karaoke with DJ Nathan. Best karaoke DJ in town. 9pm
Peppers: Karaoke. 9pm
926: Dragged Out Wednesday. 10pm

submitted by clearliquidclearjar to Tallahassee [link] [comments]

2024.05.15 20:35 eli_ashe The 451 Percenters, Puritanism At The CDC And Other Fascistic Fallacies

Bit of a longer post, sorry bout that, but I felt it was time, perhaps once again, to point out the flaws and limitations in the CDC’s stats on sexual violence, specifically as they relate to the National Intimate Partner Sexual Violence Survey (NISVS), which is the source of all the fun stats on sexual violence that get thrown around by the 451 percenters. Who are the 451 percenters? Those the folks who believe and spread the lies bout sexual violence being endemic to society. Everyone’s a sexual predator! All 451 percent of women are violated, and all 451 percent of men are violators.
TL;DR: An analysis and rebuttal to the CDC and NISVS’s statistics on sexual violence. The CDC uses NISVS to generate the stats on punny sexual violence that make wild claims, like one third of all women, etc… the 451 percenters’ claims bout punny sexual violence. They use a ‘yes means yes’ method of determining what counts as punny sexual violence, which is aesthetics based. Elevating aesthetical concerns to ethically obligatory concerns is fascistic, and a grave moral fallacy. ‘Yes means yes’ is also puritanical, meaning it overly moralizes sexuality. Putting puritanical fascists in charge of determining how many punny sexual offenses are happening is like putting the KKK in charge of determining how many jews are sexual predators. “All 451 percent of them, obviously!”
Body Of The Post
‘Yes means yes’ is an aesthetical ethical concern, ‘Do I want it or not’. This is what the National Intimate Partner Violence Survey (NISVS) and the CDC use and reflect in their stats on sexual violence. Vibes. They are the ‘emmitt till got what he deserved’ crowd. Whistling at a lady is a criminalizable offense to these folks, a ‘punny sexual violence’.
‘No means no’ is an ethically obligatory concern, ‘Did I refuse it or not’. This is what the criminal stats on sexual violence use and reflect in their stats on sexual violence. Hard data. They are the ‘emmit till did nothing wrong’ crowd. Whistling at a lady is at most tasteless, emmitt till could do far better.
‘Wanting’ or ‘Not Wanting’ something does not consent make. I can want to fuck someone, but not consent to do so. I could not want to fuck someone, but nonetheless consent to do so. The former perhaps because I think it is a bad idea to fuck ‘em even tho I want to. The latter, perhaps because I think it is a good idea to fuck ‘em even tho I don’t want to.
The ‘yes means yes’ folks, the CDC & NISVS stats on sexual violence all mistake ‘wanting’ and ‘not wanting’ for ‘consenting’ and ‘not consenting’; these are not the same things. This is deliberate on their part too. They believe that ‘yes means yes’ is what ought to constitute a determination of sexual violence. Regardless of how y’all view that, it is a deeply controversial notion, and not necessarily reflective of what most people think of when they think of sexual violence.
‘Unwanted’ essentially means ‘I don’t like it’. It is a complaint bout the aesthetical qualities of the sexual encounter, not its consensualism. If this is at all unclear, the simplest method to understand why this is so is to note two unrelated aspects.
One is racism. People regularly ‘feel fearful’ of men for no reason at all, but they also feel fearful of men because of racism all the time. That fear factor ™ is what makes the encounter ‘coercion’ or ‘unwanted’. The person literally does nothing wrong, *just exists* and the other person freaks out.
Note in the quoted sections at the end of this post how much of the stats rely on fear and feelings to generate their numbers.
Two is the person came on too strong or in an undesirable way. The person flirts in a normal and perfectly fine way, but the other person freaks out. Think bout it people, for the love of god think bout it. ‘Coming on too strong’ and ‘an undesirable flirtation’ are being counted as ‘punny sexual violence’ in these stats.
It’s entirely puritanical, and entirely a concern bout aesthetics.
There are other sorts of coercive methods, but the point here is that the terms ‘unwanted’ and ‘coercion’ only really cash out as ‘I don’t like it for some reason or another’ in the CDC’s and NISVS’s stats.
When you see that lady spouting off bout her fears of mexican rapists, she’s reflected in these stats folks. They’re just surveys. People who lock their car doors in ‘bad neighborhoods’ are reflected in those stats.
These all translate to ‘I felt threatened’ (big black boy vibes) or ‘felt pressured’ (scary white guy vibes), or ‘felt in danger’ (native american coming to get you vibes), or ‘felt uncertain if you wanted it’ (arab terrorist vibes) or 'felt like I was being manipulated' (angry asian martial artists vibes) . Doesn’t have to be racism at play here either, women can be irrationally fearful of any man. Vibes.
The actions themselves are not criminalizable.
Non p-hacked stats try to avoid these kinds of obvious ambiguities in the language used to generate the 451 percenters’ stats. These folks however lean into the lies and deceptions, and deliberately use language designed to deceive people reading the stats into thinking that people have been harmed. They take language that means literally ‘I like or don’t like it’ and translate that to mean ‘I was sexually harassed, sexually assaulted, or even raped’.
This is how they inflate the numbers, so we get to the 451 percenters’ wacky ass beliefs; ‘451 percent of women will suffer egregious sexual violence to them at least fifty times in their lives’. All this means is vibes. 451 percent of women get some bad vibes bout some dudes.
You can hear it echoed in the bear or man discourse. Why do women choose the bear? Vibes and irrational fears. ‘We choose the bear because we don’t feel safe!’ translates directly to ‘Emmitt till whistled at me, and he’s a big black boy, that’s scary’ and ‘the mexican rapists are swarming over the border to get me’.
These are the stats that people point to when they try to justify their misandristic hot ass takes. They are self-referential to that same fear based aesthetic the stats are. The stats are reflective of peoples’ irrational fears, and people use those stats to justify their irrational fears, and people spread those fear based stats thereby spreading their unjustified fears. It’s a circle rub.
To criminalize these kinds of things is to be fascistic (treating aesthetics as if they were of obligatory concern), to believe that they are morally reprehensible is to be a puritan (overly moralizing sexuality).
The folks deriving these stats translate ‘unwanted’ (aesthetical ethics) to ‘sexual assault’, ‘sexual harassment’, or ‘rape’ (obligatory ethics), then lump everything together as ‘punny sexual violence’ to get the big numbers used to scare people and terrorize men. That’s called fascism.
“[T]here remains a likelihood of underreporting due to the sensitive nature of SV”.
This justification means that they do not trust people to report SV, ‘don’t believe women when they say they haven’t suffered any SV, manipulate the questions so they say yes to something they don’t think is SV, or which simply isn’t SV, and we’ll just call it SV of this or that sort. Later we’ll propagandize people so they too come to believe our puritanical misandristic hot ass takes.’
There is no lie nor hyperbole in what I am saying here. That is the rationale and the method. If you bone up on your academic lit in the topic, this is, well not verbatim what they say, I am lambasting them here, but this is the crux of what their argument and justifications are, and they explicitly hold that they ought be propagandizing people to their puritanical beliefs.
They push the fascistic (aesthetical ethical) and puritanical (overly moralized sexual ethics) discourse into the public by presenting stats that merely reflect fears and pretend that they are reflective of sexual violence. People then come to believe that those kinds of fear based concerns are actually sexual violence. An ‘unwanted flirtation’ becomes in their minds and only in their minds a sexual violence.
Emmitt till got lynched for whistling at a lady. They only disagree bout the racism, but he definitely deserved to be punished in some way like all men do for whistling at someone they think is hot af. Puritanism.
All just vibes, all but aesthetics, and all fascistically raised to a level of ethically obligatory concern.
“Just as SV is not limited to physically forced penetration, its perpetrators are not limited to strangers. Indeed, perpetrators of SV are more likely to be someone known to the victim. Sexual violence is a problem embedded in our society and includes unwanted acts perpetrated by persons very well known (e.g., family members, intimate partners, and friends), generally known (e.g., acquaintances), not known well or just known by sight (e.g., someone in your neighborhood, person just met) and unknown to the victim (e.g., strangers). “
Be afraid of everyone, any man out there could be your next rapist! That’s right ladies and gents, you’ve been raped several times already, you just didn’t know it. But don’t worry, the statisticians know better. They asked you an unrelated question you said yes to since you were too dumb to know that you were raped, and counted it as rape. Then they informed you that you ought be afraid of everyone in your community, lest they also rape you, unbeknownst to you of course. But again, don’t worry, the statistician will count those too.
As a measure of fear the 451 percenters capture, well or worse who knows, all the racism, sexism, bigotry, and various phobias in the society, and how those fears are transferred onto masculine bodies as imaginary perpetrators of punny sexual offenses. None of it is real, there are not 451 percent of sexual violences happening, 451 percent of men are not sexual predators, and 451 percent of women are not victims of sexual violence.
‘Safety culture’ mostly reflects irrational fears.
Ask the kkk how many black people are rapists, you’re gonna get a high number. Ask puritans how many people are punny sexual offenders, you’re going to get a very high number. Such is the most tame interpretation of what is going on. The 451 percenters are puritans, they’ve overly moralized sexuality, counting offenses to their sensibility rather than criminal actions.
Puritans informing you how ‘vile and wicked’ your sexual ways are; advocating to make their puritanical beliefs bout punny sexual offenses into legally enforceable laws. These are the same kinds of concerns bout a someone dressing too provocatively, such is a ‘punny sexual violation’ to the sensibilities of others.
The less tame version of this is that it is exactly what fascists do. Lie to people especially bout punny sexual offenses in order to ratchet up the fear levels in the population, so they run to them to solve the ‘problem’.
Could be both tho.
Either way, their misandry murders little boys. They celebrate terrorizing men, and rejoice in lynching folks. They’re despicable people.
Solutions?
Ruthlessly love them. Write them love poems, show them kindness and generosity of spirit, but give them not a dime in money, nor ever relent to their irrational fears. Extol their beauty and virtues, make love with them, utterly ruthlessly. Be overtly sexual bout it, in this give them no quarter, bring to an end their puritanism by giving them no plausible cause to be thus. No one under the duress of loves’ enticements and sexual pleasures be puritans. Be relentless, show them masculine sexuality; give them nothing to complain bout, but give them masculine sexuality. Don’t fall for their puritanism, be the boys of summer.
Respect a ‘no means no’ ethic as a code of obligatory actions. Use aesthetical ethics towards good sex with mutual respect given; don’t ever take that as a one way thing. Do not conflate the aesthetics of good sex, 'enthusiastic yeses’ with those of the ethics of obligation ‘no means no’. Don’t be puritans, don’t be fascists, be sex positivists.
Call out the stats when folks bring them up, refer people to these points, feel free to refer people to this post and/or the attached video. ‘But the CDC said’ is not a valid argument; they have put puritans in charge of determining punny sexual offenses. They find punny sexual offenses everywhere they look.
If you’re super coolio, start advocating against the CDC’s use of NISVS to determine what constitutes sexual violence. It doesn’t match with criminal data’s methods, it doesn’t utilize the metrics of ‘no means no’ which are the proper metrics to use, instead it utilizes what amounts to peculiar beliefs bout the aesthetics of sex as a means of measure for punny sexual offenses.
They are spreading a puritanical belief system bout punny sexual offenses, nothing more, and they are causing public health problems by spreading their lies. They are not counting sexual offenses, they are not a criminal justice system, they aren’t technically even in the business of understanding sexual violence. They are the Center For Disease Control, not the ‘center for social engineering sexual practices control’.
Original video on the topic, with some additional resources for understanding these issues in the description.
The Rest Of This Post Is References To The CDC, NISVS, And Crime Data Reports, Along With Some Quotes Thereof With Short Specific Retorts Highlighting The Relevant Info In The Quotes As It Pertains To The Post. This Is But A Small Sample Of How They Use Language Of Aesthetics To Make Their Ethical Claims, And How Their Language Is Misandristic.
sv_surveillance_definitionsl-2009-a.pdf (cdc.gov)
Fast Facts: Preventing Sexual Violence Violence Prevention Injury Center CDC
Key Terms & FAQs National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey (NISVS)Funded
Programs Violence Prevention Injury Center CDC
Some key quotes from this, Bolded text hereafter are coded for ‘yes means yes’ methods of understanding sexual violence, and sometimes misandristic language. Italicized text are quotes from the sources:
“Rape is defined as any completed or attempted unwanted [unwanted is an aesthetic criteria, not a consent criteria which is ‘a no was stated’ attempted while a real thing allows for further insertion of scary vibes to pad the stats, e.g. the blackness of the lover] ...includes times when the victim was drunk, high*, drugged, or passed out and unable to consent.* [puritanical belief bout drinking and drugs, e.g. one cannot consent if drunk or high. Note that it is separate from being drugged or passed out and unable to consent, and that criminally speaking being drunk or high is not indicative of a lack of capacity to consent, also note this is de facto applied to women only].
“Sexual coercion is defined as unwanted sexual penetration that occurs after a person is pressured in a nonphysical way. In NISVS, sexual coercion refers to unwanted vaginal, oral, or anal sex after being pressured in ways that include being worn down by someone who repeatedly asked for sex or showed they were unhappy; feeling pressured by being lied to, being told promises that were untrue, having someone threaten to end a relationship or spread rumors; and sexual pressure due to someone using their influence or authority.”
Unwanted is an aesthetic category, not a consent category. ‘Sexual coercion’ is not a criminal offense either. It is a puritanical belief bout sexuality that is based on a sex negative view, e.g. that sex is a bad unless and until magical words are said to make it into a good. Calling it ‘sexual violence’ is just lying. Coercion is defined misandristically to only be bout penetration, which precludes all the ways that women use sex and sexuality to manipulate, use, abuse, and harm people; note that there are essentially zero surveys done that include some ‘feminine coded coercive behavior’ into these stats. That is by design. Including not incidentally the way that women have historically and currently used irrational fears over their sexuality to terrorize men and get people murdered.
“Unwanted sexual contact is defined as unwanted sexual experiences involving touch but not sexual penetration, such as being kissed in a sexual way, or having sexual body parts fondled, groped, or grabbed.”
Unwanted is aesthetics, not consent. Also this literally describes flirting. I know they want to try and capture some other sort of notion, grossy mcgrosser pinning someone down and groping them, but all this describes here, and all the stats can possibly reflect, is flirting.
“Non-contact unwanted sexual experiences is defined as those unwanted experiences that do not involve any touching or penetration, including someone exposing their sexual body parts, flashing, or masturbating in front of the victim, someone making a victim show his or her body parts, someone making a victim look at or participate in sexual photos or movies*, or* someone harassing the victim in a public place in a way that made the victim feel unsafe.”
This category is quite broad and puritanical in its disposition, as it assumes there is something wrong with seeing naked images unless and until expressed verbal consent is given, and undoubtedly ignores the en masse flood of naked images of women online to which basically every guy is exposed to. Compare again to people who claim that women ought not be allowed to show their ankles as it causes a ‘harm’ to those who are ‘forced’ to see it. Exact same shite. Aesthetical concerns of wanted or unwantedness, and also notice the expressly stated vibes check ‘victim feel unsafe’. Look out for the black boys, they make them feel unsafe!
Crime/Law Enforcement Stats (UCR Program) — FBI
Quick Facts on Sexual Abuse Offenses (ussc.gov)
It’s worth mentioning that statistically speaking, if one uses the stats derived from crime data as opposed to statisticians making numbers up, the percentages of men who do sexual violence, depending a bit on how you count it, are: 0.0516% or .478% or .0957%. Although the video goes over this all in pretty good depth, just do a little sniff test here; are .478% of the male population sexually violating a third of all women, 55.5 million women?

submitted by eli_ashe to LeftWingMaleAdvocates [link] [comments]

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