Month: April 2016

~ Brin ~ 1 Comment

{{previous post in sequence}}

wirehead-wannabe:

Carson + Paul is obviously the best choice. Heal the world + never worry about being sick or getting STDs + end the drug war. Only downside is spending three hours a day praying, which is honestly the easiest downside to deal with.

Also I think Paul’s running mate bonus is supposed to say “decriminalization” in the last paragraph.

Taken from /u/annextasia at https://www.reddit.com/r/makeyourchoice/comments/4gtu83/2016_gop_nomination_cyoa_oc/

 

psybersecurity:

Kasich is better than Carson I think. If you have a legion of 11 million loyal followers willing to heed your beck and call you could do pretty much anything and it would be a lot more fun than standing around all day touching people and feeling guilty every second that you’re doing anything else

I’m trying to figure out why Ted’s running mate bonus is supposed to be a good thing lol

 

wirehead-wannabe:

I mean you could probably earn hundreds of thousands of dollars a day curing AIDS and cancer if you really just wanted to use it on yourself. Which is arguably just as good if not better than having 11 million loyal followers.

 

socialjusticemunchkin:

Or you could tax the ohioans just a few dollars a day each to earn a hundred times more.

Assuming “Ohio” means the legal state of Ohio, and not “the territory which currently forms the state of Ohio”, Kasich/Paul is totally OP and broken.

First, I legalize individuals and communities choosing which state to belong to democratically. The other states may whine, but governance only with the consent of the governed doesn’t violate basic rights, so with Paul I can totally do it.

Then I end the drug war. In Ohio, because I’ve legalized states setting their own drug laws.

I decriminalize states setting their own immigration rules, and open the borders in Ohio, defining ohioans as “anyone present in Ohio, or who announces their decision to join Ohio, or who has previously fulfilled either condition and has not renounced their ohioanness” (thus, making me immune to assassinations as anyone who would try to do it would have to travel to Ohio, become ohioan, and stop wanting to assassinate me and start wanting to protect me instead).

Then I implement a basic income in Ohio (for those who have been ohioans for a sufficient amount of time, as I have previously suggested). And all the other cool stuff, in Ohio.

Everyone would give anything for the cause, so I ask the people to be excellent to each other, and otherwise be free to do whatever they want as long as they don’t deprive others of the same right (but if they wish to give to charity they really should prioritize EA instead of Make-a-Wish). Crime in Ohio plummets to zero, and so does poverty, deprivation, and coercion. The economy gets an immense boom from the immigrants, and the abolition of zero-sum and negative-sum bullshit games, and all people working together for their prosperity, like a weird libertarian (or, in fact, full-blown anarchist in all but name) version of North Korea’s propaganda films come true.

The obvious consequence is that a lot of people would want to be a part of Ohio. Just as planned. It won’t take long until Ohio has a population of approximately 200 million and covers a vast fractal shape encompassing most of the major cities.

Then I become the president of the US in the most overwhelming election since Washington, seize control of all brances of the government, and turn my Paul powers to international law instead. Rinse repeat with a bit more restraint to not provoke a nuclear war, and I’ll soon have acquired most of the Americas, the major liberal cities of Europe, and vast swathes of territory in Africa as well (I’m deliberately not touching Russia or China because that way lies armageddon), in this only-nominally-stateful community of freedom and dignity.

It’s immune to invasions because open borders mind control magic, it’s immune to terrorism because surely you wouldn’t want to hurt your fellow ohioans, it’s immune to pretty much everything except ICBMs. For ICBMs my policy will be a clear and ruthless MAD if attacked, but otherwise non-interference in the affairs of the other superpower and the little regional Shitholistan with a superiority complex propped up by its ridiculous nuclear arsenal. In fact, I can afford a comparably submissive foreign policy, letting Russia pick the arctic oil and China get whatever gas fields it wants because our anarchist regime is too rich to care about such slim pickings.

We’re going to outer space instead. All the labor and ingenuity currently wasted in pointless things will be redirected in a program of technology and space colonization (and AI research but I’m assuming no FAI because it kind of cuts everything short and turns things boring). We’re going to cure all the diseases, conquer the Moon, Mars, and everywhere. We’re going to win.

A wise man once asked: “Why does everything always end in world domination with you guys?”

The rationalist answered: “Have you ever tried giving us a scenario that did not have world domination built in?”

To the US I came seeking fortune
But they’re making me work til I’m dead
The congressmen have it so easy
The bankers put gold on their bread
The people of the world are so hungry
But think what a feast there could be
If we could create an anarchist state
That cared for the people like me: 

I am the man who arranges the blocks
That descend upon me from up above.
They come down and I spin them around
Til they fit in the ground like hand in glove.
Sometimes it seems that to move blocks is fine
And the lines will be formed as they fall –
Then I see that I have misjudged it!
I should not have nudged it after all.

Can I have a long one please?
Why must these infernal blocks tease?

I am the man who arranges the blocks
That continue to fall from up above.
Come Ohioan! To the every last one!
An individualist regime of peace and love.
I work so hard in arranging the blocks
But the landlord and taxman bleed me dry
But Ohio will rise! We will not compromise
For we know that the old regime must die.

Long live freedom, burn the flags!
We salute the orange and black!

I am the man who arranges the blocks
That continue to fall from up above.
The food on your plate no concern of the state
An individualist regime of peace and love.
I have my choice in arranging the blocks
Under promethean rule, what you say goes.
The rule of the game is our rights are the same
And my blocks can make my own-shaped rows.

Long live Ohio! It loves you!
Sing these words, you know what it’ll do…

I am the man who arranges the blocks
That are made by the men from Shitholistan.
They came two weeks ago and back there they won’t go
Now they’re working to our world conquest plan.
I am the man who arranges the nukes
That will make all the Putin keep away
The hopes have come back, and ‘Murica is Black!
Let us point all our dollars at EA.

We shall live forever more!
We can start an altruism war!

I am the man who arranges the blocks
That are building a highly secret base.
Hip hip hurray for the AS of A!
We are sending our men to outer space.

 

ilzolende:

This is #amazing, you are #amazing, 10/10.

Note to self: Sing this when I have microphone access.

Also, orange-and-black is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutualism_(economic_theory), yes?

 

brin-bellway:

“Every single man, woman, child, and animal in Ohio” (emphasis added)

See the loophole?

That’s right, folks: nonbinary assassins.

(Furthermore, if we’re going to play with definitions as much as “Ohio” has been played with, perhaps the resistance could have elaborate coming-of-age rituals, without which one is not considered to be truly adult, and then deliberately keep binary people in a liminal state where they are old enough not to be children*, but since they haven’t completed the rituals they’re not men/women yet.)

(Might also be able to get some stuff done through gender abolitionism, which I seem to recall Promethea favours? So there could still be some benefit in this from their perspective depending on the resistance’s methods.)

(But nonbinary assassins would still be the quickest and easiest method, because we already have some nonbinary adults readily available and wouldn’t need to spend precious time training people out of old thought patterns regarding the meaning of adulthood and/or gender.)

*For obvious reasons, the definition of “child” should be made as narrow as possible.

 

brin-bellway:

Mind you, it never says the mind-control spell breaks upon the death
of the mind-controller, and the word “permanent” implies it doesn’t.

This makes things trickier.

 

mugasofer:

Wouldn’t nonbinary people still technically be animals, biologically?

I’d say Carson/Paul. Cure all the diseases and become “the greatest doctor who ever lived” (obvious implications for medical and scientific research) and total immunity to disease (which probably means impressive personal longevity.) 

And with Paul’s running-mate bonus, you already control the country (or possibly every country?) Pretty easy to dissolve Ohio by criminalizing it, or direct US forces against the unstoppable armies of John Kasich (if that fails to release to the mind control.) The only issue is what counts as a “human right” in this context – constitutional rights? The UN declaration? Can we experiment on moral law by checking what qualifies as a human right to this power?

“Wouldn’t nonbinary people still technically be animals, biologically?“

Good point. The resistance is clearly going to need more robots.

Tags:

#reply via reblog #fun with loopholes #choice games

~ Brin ~ 2 Comments

{{previous post in sequence}}

wirehead-wannabe:

Carson + Paul is obviously the best choice. Heal the world + never worry about being sick or getting STDs + end the drug war. Only downside is spending three hours a day praying, which is honestly the easiest downside to deal with.

Also I think Paul’s running mate bonus is supposed to say “decriminalization” in the last paragraph.

Taken from /u/annextasia at https://www.reddit.com/r/makeyourchoice/comments/4gtu83/2016_gop_nomination_cyoa_oc/

 

psybersecurity:

Kasich is better than Carson I think. If you have a legion of 11 million loyal followers willing to heed your beck and call you could do pretty much anything and it would be a lot more fun than standing around all day touching people and feeling guilty every second that you’re doing anything else

I’m trying to figure out why Ted’s running mate bonus is supposed to be a good thing lol

 

wirehead-wannabe:

I mean you could probably earn hundreds of thousands of dollars a day curing AIDS and cancer if you really just wanted to use it on yourself. Which is arguably just as good if not better than having 11 million loyal followers.

 

socialjusticemunchkin:

Or you could tax the ohioans just a few dollars a day each to earn a hundred times more.

Assuming “Ohio” means the legal state of Ohio, and not “the territory which currently forms the state of Ohio”, Kasich/Paul is totally OP and broken.

First, I legalize individuals and communities choosing which state to belong to democratically. The other states may whine, but governance only with the consent of the governed doesn’t violate basic rights, so with Paul I can totally do it.

Then I end the drug war. In Ohio, because I’ve legalized states setting their own drug laws.

I decriminalize states setting their own immigration rules, and open the borders in Ohio, defining ohioans as “anyone present in Ohio, or who announces their decision to join Ohio, or who has previously fulfilled either condition and has not renounced their ohioanness” (thus, making me immune to assassinations as anyone who would try to do it would have to travel to Ohio, become ohioan, and stop wanting to assassinate me and start wanting to protect me instead).

Then I implement a basic income in Ohio (for those who have been ohioans for a sufficient amount of time, as I have previously suggested). And all the other cool stuff, in Ohio.

Everyone would give anything for the cause, so I ask the people to be excellent to each other, and otherwise be free to do whatever they want as long as they don’t deprive others of the same right (but if they wish to give to charity they really should prioritize EA instead of Make-a-Wish). Crime in Ohio plummets to zero, and so does poverty, deprivation, and coercion. The economy gets an immense boom from the immigrants, and the abolition of zero-sum and negative-sum bullshit games, and all people working together for their prosperity, like a weird libertarian (or, in fact, full-blown anarchist in all but name) version of North Korea’s propaganda films come true.

The obvious consequence is that a lot of people would want to be a part of Ohio. Just as planned. It won’t take long until Ohio has a population of approximately 200 million and covers a vast fractal shape encompassing most of the major cities.

Then I become the president of the US in the most overwhelming election since Washington, seize control of all brances of the government, and turn my Paul powers to international law instead. Rinse repeat with a bit more restraint to not provoke a nuclear war, and I’ll soon have acquired most of the Americas, the major liberal cities of Europe, and vast swathes of territory in Africa as well (I’m deliberately not touching Russia or China because that way lies armageddon), in this only-nominally-stateful community of freedom and dignity.

It’s immune to invasions because open borders mind control magic, it’s immune to terrorism because surely you wouldn’t want to hurt your fellow ohioans, it’s immune to pretty much everything except ICBMs. For ICBMs my policy will be a clear and ruthless MAD if attacked, but otherwise non-interference in the affairs of the other superpower and the little regional Shitholistan with a superiority complex propped up by its ridiculous nuclear arsenal. In fact, I can afford a comparably submissive foreign policy, letting Russia pick the arctic oil and China get whatever gas fields it wants because our anarchist regime is too rich to care about such slim pickings.

We’re going to outer space instead. All the labor and ingenuity currently wasted in pointless things will be redirected in a program of technology and space colonization (and AI research but I’m assuming no FAI because it kind of cuts everything short and turns things boring). We’re going to cure all the diseases, conquer the Moon, Mars, and everywhere. We’re going to win.

A wise man once asked: “Why does everything always end in world domination with you guys?”

The rationalist answered: “Have you ever tried giving us a scenario that did not have world domination built in?”

To the US I came seeking fortune
But they’re making me work til I’m dead
The congressmen have it so easy
The bankers put gold on their bread
The people of the world are so hungry
But think what a feast there could be
If we could create an anarchist state
That cared for the people like me: 

I am the man who arranges the blocks
That descend upon me from up above.
They come down and I spin them around
Til they fit in the ground like hand in glove.
Sometimes it seems that to move blocks is fine
And the lines will be formed as they fall –
Then I see that I have misjudged it!
I should not have nudged it after all.

Can I have a long one please?
Why must these infernal blocks tease?

I am the man who arranges the blocks
That continue to fall from up above.
Come Ohioan! To the every last one!
An individualist regime of peace and love.
I work so hard in arranging the blocks
But the landlord and taxman bleed me dry
But Ohio will rise! We will not compromise
For we know that the old regime must die.

Long live freedom, burn the flags!
We salute the orange and black!

I am the man who arranges the blocks
That continue to fall from up above.
The food on your plate no concern of the state
An individualist regime of peace and love.
I have my choice in arranging the blocks
Under promethean rule, what you say goes.
The rule of the game is our rights are the same
And my blocks can make my own-shaped rows.

Long live Ohio! It loves you!
Sing these words, you know what it’ll do…

I am the man who arranges the blocks
That are made by the men from Shitholistan.
They came two weeks ago and back there they won’t go
Now they’re working to our world conquest plan.
I am the man who arranges the nukes
That will make all the Putin keep away
The hopes have come back, and ‘Murica is Black!
Let us point all our dollars at EA.

We shall live forever more!
We can start an altruism war!

I am the man who arranges the blocks
That are building a highly secret base.
Hip hip hurray for the AS of A!
We are sending our men to outer space.

 

ilzolende:

This is #amazing, you are #amazing, 10/10.

Note to self: Sing this when I have microphone access.

Also, orange-and-black is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutualism_(economic_theory), yes?

 

brin-bellway:

“Every single man, woman, child, and animal in Ohio” (emphasis added)

See the loophole?

That’s right, folks: nonbinary assassins.

(Furthermore, if we’re going to play with definitions as much as “Ohio” has been played with, perhaps the resistance could have elaborate coming-of-age rituals, without which one is not considered to be truly adult, and then deliberately keep binary people in a liminal state where they are old enough not to be children*, but since they haven’t completed the rituals they’re not men/women yet.)

(Might also be able to get some stuff done through gender abolitionism, which I seem to recall Promethea favours? So there could still be some benefit in this from their perspective depending on the resistance’s methods.)

(But nonbinary assassins would still be the quickest and easiest method, because we already have some nonbinary adults readily available and wouldn’t need to spend precious time training people out of old thought patterns regarding the meaning of adulthood and/or gender.)

*For obvious reasons, the definition of “child” should be made as narrow as possible.

Mind you, it never says the mind-control spell breaks upon the death
of the mind-controller, and the word “permanent” implies it doesn’t.

This makes things trickier.

Tags:

#oh look an update #we *might* be able to simply dissolve Ohio once Promethea’s not in the way #but even if we could pull it off it might not be enough

{{next post in sequence}}

~ Brin ~ 1 Comment

ilzolende:

socialjusticemunchkin:

wirehead-wannabe:

psybersecurity:

wirehead-wannabe:

Carson + Paul is obviously the best choice. Heal the world + never worry about being sick or getting STDs + end the drug war. Only downside is spending three hours a day praying, which is honestly the easiest downside to deal with.

Also I think Paul’s running mate bonus is supposed to say “decriminalization” in the last paragraph.

Taken from /u/annextasia at https://www.reddit.com/r/makeyourchoice/comments/4gtu83/2016_gop_nomination_cyoa_oc/

Kasich is better than Carson I think. If you have a legion of 11 million loyal followers willing to heed your beck and call you could do pretty much anything and it would be a lot more fun than standing around all day touching people and feeling guilty every second that you’re doing anything else

I’m trying to figure out why Ted’s running mate bonus is supposed to be a good thing lol

I mean you could probably earn hundreds of thousands of dollars a day curing AIDS and cancer if you really just wanted to use it on yourself. Which is arguably just as good if not better than having 11 million loyal followers.

Or you could tax the ohioans just a few dollars a day each to earn a hundred times more.

Assuming “Ohio” means the legal state of Ohio, and not “the territory which currently forms the state of Ohio”, Kasich/Paul is totally OP and broken.

First, I legalize individuals and communities choosing which state to belong to democratically. The other states may whine, but governance only with the consent of the governed doesn’t violate basic rights, so with Paul I can totally do it.

Then I end the drug war. In Ohio, because I’ve legalized states setting their own drug laws.

I decriminalize states setting their own immigration rules, and open the borders in Ohio, defining ohioans as “anyone present in Ohio, or who announces their decision to join Ohio, or who has previously fulfilled either condition and has not renounced their ohioanness” (thus, making me immune to assassinations as anyone who would try to do it would have to travel to Ohio, become ohioan, and stop wanting to assassinate me and start wanting to protect me instead).

Then I implement a basic income in Ohio (for those who have been ohioans for a sufficient amount of time, as I have previously suggested). And all the other cool stuff, in Ohio.

Everyone would give anything for the cause, so I ask the people to be excellent to each other, and otherwise be free to do whatever they want as long as they don’t deprive others of the same right (but if they wish to give to charity they really should prioritize EA instead of Make-a-Wish). Crime in Ohio plummets to zero, and so does poverty, deprivation, and coercion. The economy gets an immense boom from the immigrants, and the abolition of zero-sum and negative-sum bullshit games, and all people working together for their prosperity, like a weird libertarian (or, in fact, full-blown anarchist in all but name) version of North Korea’s propaganda films come true.

The obvious consequence is that a lot of people would want to be a part of Ohio. Just as planned. It won’t take long until Ohio has a population of approximately 200 million and covers a vast fractal shape encompassing most of the major cities.

Then I become the president of the US in the most overwhelming election since Washington, seize control of all brances of the government, and turn my Paul powers to international law instead. Rinse repeat with a bit more restraint to not provoke a nuclear war, and I’ll soon have acquired most of the Americas, the major liberal cities of Europe, and vast swathes of territory in Africa as well (I’m deliberately not touching Russia or China because that way lies armageddon), in this only-nominally-stateful community of freedom and dignity.

It’s immune to invasions because open borders mind control magic, it’s immune to terrorism because surely you wouldn’t want to hurt your fellow ohioans, it’s immune to pretty much everything except ICBMs. For ICBMs my policy will be a clear and ruthless MAD if attacked, but otherwise non-interference in the affairs of the other superpower and the little regional Shitholistan with a superiority complex propped up by its ridiculous nuclear arsenal. In fact, I can afford a comparably submissive foreign policy, letting Russia pick the arctic oil and China get whatever gas fields it wants because our anarchist regime is too rich to care about such slim pickings.

We’re going to outer space instead. All the labor and ingenuity currently wasted in pointless things will be redirected in a program of technology and space colonization (and AI research but I’m assuming no FAI because it kind of cuts everything short and turns things boring). We’re going to cure all the diseases, conquer the Moon, Mars, and everywhere. We’re going to win.

A wise man once asked: “Why does everything always end in world domination with you guys?”

The rationalist answered: “Have you ever tried giving us a scenario that did not have world domination built in?”

To the US I came seeking fortune
But they’re making me work til I’m dead
The congressmen have it so easy
The bankers put gold on their bread
The people of the world are so hungry
But think what a feast there could be
If we could create an anarchist state
That cared for the people like me: 

I am the man who arranges the blocks
That descend upon me from up above.
They come down and I spin them around
Til they fit in the ground like hand in glove.
Sometimes it seems that to move blocks is fine
And the lines will be formed as they fall –
Then I see that I have misjudged it!
I should not have nudged it after all.

Can I have a long one please?
Why must these infernal blocks tease?

I am the man who arranges the blocks
That continue to fall from up above.
Come Ohioan! To the every last one!
An individualist regime of peace and love.
I work so hard in arranging the blocks
But the landlord and taxman bleed me dry
But Ohio will rise! We will not compromise
For we know that the old regime must die.

Long live freedom, burn the flags!
We salute the orange and black!

I am the man who arranges the blocks
That continue to fall from up above.
The food on your plate no concern of the state
An individualist regime of peace and love.
I have my choice in arranging the blocks
Under promethean rule, what you say goes.
The rule of the game is our rights are the same
And my blocks can make my own-shaped rows.

Long live Ohio! It loves you!
Sing these words, you know what it’ll do…

I am the man who arranges the blocks
That are made by the men from Shitholistan.
They came two weeks ago and back there they won’t go
Now they’re working to our world conquest plan.
I am the man who arranges the nukes
That will make all the Putin keep away
The hopes have come back, and ‘Murica is Black!
Let us point all our dollars at EA.

We shall live forever more!
We can start an altruism war!

I am the man who arranges the blocks
That are building a highly secret base.
Hip hip hurray for the AS of A!
We are sending our men to outer space.

This is #amazing, you are #amazing, 10/10.

Note to self: Sing this when I have microphone access.

Also, orange-and-black is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutualism_(economic_theory), yes?

“Every single man, woman, child, and animal in Ohio” (emphasis added)

See the loophole?

That’s right, folks: nonbinary assassins.

(Furthermore, if we’re going to play with definitions as much as “Ohio” has been played with, perhaps the resistance could have elaborate coming-of-age rituals, without which one is not considered to be truly adult, and then deliberately keep binary people in a liminal state where they are old enough not to be children*, but since they haven’t completed the rituals they’re not men/women yet.)

(Might also be able to get some stuff done through gender abolitionism, which I seem to recall Promethea favours? So there could still be some benefit in this from their perspective depending on the resistance’s methods.)

(But nonbinary assassins would still be the quickest and easiest method, because we already have some nonbinary adults readily available and wouldn’t need to spend precious time training people out of old thought patterns regarding the meaning of adulthood and/or gender.)

*For obvious reasons, the definition of “child” should be made as narrow as possible.

Tags:

#reply via reblog #fun with loopholes #choice games

{{next post in sequence}}

~ Brin ~ Leave a comment

responsible-reanimation:

Red-blooded Americans, as opposed to Horseshoe Crab Americans,

As a Horseshoe Crab American, I

Tags:

#no but seriously #I *am* blue-blooded in the semi-literal sense the term originates from #I am both naturally pale-skinned and lack a tan #which means my superficial veins are clearly visible as blue lines running beneath my skin #(in that part of spacetime peasant jobs were generally outdoors working the fields and such) #(so not having a tan showed you were rich enough not to have to work a peasant job) #the more you know #reply via reblog

~ Brin ~ 1 Comment

Fun (and useful) fact for the day: you can email a phone number* and text an email address. The message will be automatically translated into the other format.

Does your friend with an unlimited texting plan want to have long texting conversations, even though you don’t have unlimited texting? Email your parts of the conversation to them, and you won’t have to pay for the outgoing texts!

Are you trying to call your ride to come pick you up, only to find that their phone is broken, you don’t have a data plan to email them with, and there are no public Wi-Fi hotspots around for miles? Text their laptop!

(I use those two examples because they are things that actually happened to my mom and me, respectively, and we had to muddle through them the hard way because we didn’t know about email-to-text/text-to-email. Next time, we’ll know better.)

To text an email address, just type the email address into the “send to” box instead of a phone number.

To email a phone number, send the email to [the person’s phone number]@[the email-to-SMS website of the person’s phone carrier; here’s a list I found covering many carriers in many countries]

Happy typing!

*(if it’s a mobile phone, anyway; don’t know about landlines)

Tags:

#the more you know #oh look an original post #I suppose I’ll tag this #Brin owns *two* 2010’s computers now #even though I still haven’t activated my SIM card #(I stumbled across this information while considering maybe actually buying a phone plan) #(turns out mobile Internet is not as useful as it looks at first glance) #(a lot of the things I would want it for I can get done with texting) #(texting OTOH is *more* useful than it first appears for the same reason) #((in case anyone notices the discrepancy in)) #((”I still haven’t activated my SIM card” and)) #((”if I’d known about text-to-email I could have texted my ride”)) #((it’s because I was borrowing my mom’s phone during that incident))

Video ~ ~ Brin ~ Leave a comment

sigmaleph:

someone who knows Star Trek give me your opinion on this

I know a fair bit of Star Trek, but I’m not that great with Star Wars

not sure how well this headcanon actually fits, but it’s beautiful regardless

Tags:

#Star Trek #Star Wars #oh my god #anything that makes me laugh this much deserves a reblog #(the comparison to Left Behind) #(for old times’ sake)

~ Brin ~ Leave a comment

jmkfan:

raptorific:

hufflepuffbeater:

raptorific:

controversial: dumbledore would’ve made the right decision taking the 1991-1992 house cup away from slytherin even if harry and co. hadn’t saved the school and stopped voldemort from returning to power

Can I ask why? Genuinely curious here

Slytherin students didn’t have better academic performance and they certainly didn’t have better behavior than the other houses. What they did have was a head of house who would award his own students points for almost no reason while handing out penalties to other houses like candy. If Draco Malfoy answered a question correctly in potions, he’d be awarded ten points, while Hermione giving the same answer would lose ten points for being a know-it-all. 

That’s the thing, the game was rigged in Slytherin’s favor. Snape set his own house up to win, through absolutely no merit of their own, seven years in a row with no penalty. Meanwhile Dumbledore is made out to be the one who “just hands victory to his own house” after four members of his house put their lives on the line to save the school from a genocidal mass-murderer. 

Gryffindor deserved the house cup because their students saved the school, but even if they didn’t, Slytherin should have had it taken away from them because they didn’t earn it. 

I can’t even condemn Dumbledore for letting Slytherin believe they’d won, sit in a green-and-silver dining hall, and then changing it when he announced they’d actually lost, because after seven years of cheating, it’s not enough for them to just lose. If they’d just lost, they’d think they were cheated out of something that’s rightfully theirs. Allowing them to believe they’d just once again been handed an award they didn’t deserve, and then giving it directly to the house that actually did something to deserve it, teaches a valuable lesson. 

Anyway, if we’re going to criticize Dumbledore’s abilities as a school administrator for anything, it’s how unchecked he left Snape’s treatment of his students. Even putting aside the emotional and physical abuse he inflicted on his students, there should have been some provision in place to prevent his abuse of the points system before he had a chance to hand it to his own students for ONE year, let alone seven. 

There should have been a provision that the current holder of the house cup is ineligible for participation in the next year’s competition. There should be an upper limit on how many points you can take away from another house’s students, and how many points you can give to your own students. Students should be able to appeal unfair penalties to the headmaster. 

Point is, Slytherin shouldn’t get an award just because their head-of-house refuses to play fair

I never thought of it like this before. Thank you so much, OP

Tags:

#Harry Potter #meta #interesting

The Orb of the Emissary

~ Brin ~ Leave a comment

jazzypizzaz:

The Baseball of the Emissary as an important religious icon

–baseball game is how he explains linear time to the Prophets
–how he bonds with his son and his crew, also Kasidy on their first date
–always playing with it when he makes important decisions etc
–probably there’s something meaningful with Buck Bokai? I try to forget that episode.
–leaves it on the station so Dukat knows he’s coming back
–takes it with him to New Orleans when he didn’t know he’s coming back :-(
–rolls off the piano!! how the Prophets regain communication with him!!
–ezri throws it and that’s where he starts digging on Tyree!!

I assume when he’s dead/gone from this time-space (I haven’t seen the last episodes but know vague spoilers), the Bajorans keep the baseball as a Sacred Memento, if not the new improved Orb of the Emissary. People pray to it and hope the Emissary can intercede with the Prophets on their behalf, etc. Bajorans play games of baseball, not for entertainment necessarily, but on the Day of the Emissary in order to contemplate their linear existence and honor the end of the Dominion Wars and all that The Sisko brought to them.

Baseball games as ritual, baseballs as relics. Baseball space religion.

Tags:

#Star Trek #DS9

~ Brin ~ Leave a comment

wholmesianmisfit:

Who remembers

Motherfucking Scholastic

Scholastic Book Sales 1

Book

Scholastic Book Sales 2

Orders

Scholastic Book Sales 3

And then the magical traveling circus of scholastic would randomly show up

at the motherfucking BOOK FAIR

Scholastic Book Sales 4

 

ningcomepoop:

love

 

tessaviolet:

seriously the best ever.

 

italktosnakes:

This was actually my childhood. 

 

carolina-girl:

Wish they had these I high school

 

pinapplecuffs:

I planned very carefully so that I could manage to get my parents to say yes to letting me get something. Though, as good as the day walking through all the stuff was? Delivery day way so much better.

Do I remember these Scholastic sales? Not quite. Homeschoolers do it a little differently.

I looked forward to the Scholastic catalogues, arriving in our mailbox every month or three. Better still, though, were the warehouse sales. Twice a year (though most years we only went once), the Scholastic warehouses opened their doors to homeschoolers (also teachers and their families). As if that weren’t enough, most of the items were half price.

We drove for…I remember it as being a bit over an hour, but I also remember it as being located in Cinnaminson, and Google Maps says that’s only about 15 – 20 minutes away from my childhood home…anyway, we drove to the nearest warehouse and spent a couple of hours wandering the concrete aisles, looking at the books and occasional PC games on the warehouse shelves and some metal racks on wheels (like those shown above), spotting books to patch the holes in series we’d partially read (often out of order), buying things we’d never heard of because they looked interesting. (Every year there was always one book that turned out to be disappointing, but it was worth it to get all the ones that turned out well.)

The checkout line was almost always extremely long, but I didn’t mind, because I could read the books while I waited.

Tags:

#Scholastic #my childhood #nostalgia #(mixed with some pity) #(oh it was joyful at the time) #(but in hindsight it’s kind of sad that little-me’s access to reading material was so limited and luck-dependant relative to me now) #the more you know