I’ve always wondered why people were so ready to convert. Like, if I was some ancient Roman and some guy came up to me offering a new god that’s even better than the old ones and much easier to worship, I wouldn’t just immediately fall for it. It just seems like a scam.

It’s not this one, is it?

I miss him. We could all do with some more hatred for mainstream popular culture. Otherwise, what’s even the point of being a communist?

If I had some time, I’d try and find out where our “common sense” notions of art come from. Like art being subjective, which is taken to mean that it is something like a kaleidoscope where no two people can be sure to see the same thing in it and every statement about it is just based on fleeting, un-shareable impressions. Obviously that’s nonsense, but if you try debating people on the internet over whether something is well-written or if it negotiates a certain theme, they bring out clichés like this. Or the idea that art is produced by an individual in a semi-mystic, almost unconscious act which broods no further analysis or introspection – though just as often you see this as a strawman attributed to an author’s opponents. In any case, I assure you that no notable Romantic ever believed this and that the concept of “genius” has never meant this in any serious author. These are just common sense clichés that come from nowhere and are seemingly everywhere.

I was about to say that this account cannot be real, it’s obviously fake for hitting so many stereotypes and controversies at once, and then I saw that she’s posting videos and everything. Sometimes reality is crueler than our imagination.

I hate you for showing this to me

Once again Substack provides space and publicity for the meanest kind of Internet bigotry. I don’t know why anyone would want their writings to appear next to this trash.

New rule: You don’t get to talk about the deleterious impact of Calvinism if you can’t explain what “sola gratia” means. We’ve got to take at least this one word away from the Internet atheists

Incredible. The future. I will pay 10 billion dollars to replace my company with this picture.

12 o’clock is not early. Check your watch

There is literally precedent that the president can just order the killing of anyone in the world if it’s for “national self-defense”. The democrats’ attitude of despair just isn’t matched by the actions taken by their leaders.

Is it wrong to say that gamma male can get it

Any chance you’re on iOS? That’s where the bug mostly happens, but no one knows why. I can recommend using next.hexbear.net for now.

Edit: Yeah, I’m also on Firefox. I wonder why it works fine for everyone else.

I find it really mean when the fly is constantly circling and landing on me instead of the amply provided garbage. It’s like, are you really saying I’m the biggest piece of trash here?

It’s a nice addition to the weekly /r/curatedtumblr transmisogyny post

I believe character descriptions became a big thing in the time of physiognomy – when Balzac narrates someone’s physical appearance, he wants you to extrapolate the character’s personality from that. Physiognomy fell out of fashion and if there is no other motivation to provide a description, like signalling someone’s class position or injecting a bit of lyricism, it’s simply economical to leave it out. To provide a counter-example, Mary Gaitskill always writes exactly one paragraph of description in her short stories which you can just skip because it’s not properly integrated into the story as a whole.

Exactly! I think part of it is a, in my view, mistaken historical realism where authors think fantasy should be based on the middle ages when, in reality, the better part of our modern fantasy genre derives from post-1600 literature. Like, the rise of the bourgeoisie and decline of feudalism is the primary social context for all of this, I think.

Any representation of feudal ruling classes. Maybe I’m overdoing it with the class hatred a bit, but I can’t watch nobles cavorting around and not feel an instinctive revulsion. It’s even worse when, in fantasy, we’re required to care about the machinations of court intrigues as if that’s a real form of politics. One thing I do like about many standard fantasy settings, like that of Pathfinder, therefore is that they usually have a modern conception of class and an abundance of republics; especially the whole idea of adventurers as individuals outside of society but still integral to it has a lot of potential I feel. Basically, I just don’t want any more fantasy stories about good kings and evil kings.

I didn’t know they had a foundation. Turns out they’re even renting a unit (probably just a mailbox) in a nice, modern office complex. Somehow, it nevertheless reminds me of those photos of the Something Awful offices…

What, do you have something against homosexuality?