Rise Up, Oh Heart, For There is Another Battle to Win

parvasilvi:

The painting of old Nate had started out as a joke, but after he’d finished it, Hardison found he couldn’t just stop there. He needed to have the whole set. So he painted them all; stunning Sophie, powerful Parker, enigmatic Eliot, even Hardison himself. Old Nate was blown up, but the other four portraits are still kept safely in one of Hardison’s safehouses.

Sophie’s portrait is the busiest, but your gaze is drawn immediately to her dark, smoldering eyes. She holds your gaze there despite the many paintings that hang in the background behind her, despite the expensive vases on delicate antique tables. It takes more willpower than you can explain to avert your gaze and take in the rest of the painting. She’s seated on a dark-red settee, twisted slightly to show off the curve of her body, her hands on her knees. At first, you think the glittering golden fabric covering her is a dress, but you notice her legs end in a fish’s tail, and you realize they’re scales. The portrait is titled “Siren Sophie”.

Parker’s portrait is much starker, almost empty compared to Sophie’s. In a silver rectangular frame, it’s background is completely black. Cutting through the darkness are bright white lasers, spreading out from the centre in a web-like pattern. At several places, a small origami fly is trapped in the web. Upon looking closer, you see they’re folded from 100 dollar bills. In the dead-centre of the painting is Parker, hanging comfortably from her rig. Her legs are bent underneath her, one hand on a thigh, the other wrapped around the dark chord above her to keep herself steady. She’s looking out at you with a half-grin on her face, like you’re just another 100-dollar fly she’s about to ensnare. A circular sign at the top of the frame reads “Spiderwoman”.

Eliot is the only one of the group who is not centered in his own portrait. Instead he stands to one side in his usual hitter-pose: arms crossed, feet firmly anchored, an unimpressed scowl on his face. What isn’t usual is his clothing: he’s wearing a long, dark golden cloak. A matching circlet is in his long, loose-flowing hair. He’s standing in the middle of a yellow desert, impossibly blue sky above him. In the centre of the painting is a huge pyramid, with two more in the background. The title is carved into the simple dark wood frame: “Sphinx Eliot”. You wonder idly what kind of riddle he would pose.

As weird as the first four paintings were, Hardison’s is the most unexpected. You’ve come to expect overconfidence from the boisterous geek. Maybe “Hero Hardison” surrounded by his favorite tech gadgets. You’re unprepared for the honesty you find in the hacker’s self-portrait. The painting looks like you’ve just thrown open the door to go outside. On the doorstep is a young, curly-haired boy that you hardly recognize as Hardison. The boy, dressed in a suit and bow tie, stares up at you with wide eyes. In one hand he holds a worn little suitcase. In the other is a slip of paper that reads: “Please take care of this boy”. The title is written on a similar, slip of paper pinned to the top of the simple frame: “Alec Paddington”.

guiltyhipster:

“I enjoy that villain as a character, but their charm doesn’t excuse their actions and neither does their tragic backstory.“ 

“Poor misunderstood baby!”  

mindcrankismycommander:

quixotess:

smallapplegoat:

cupcakeinatorellie:

denyselfandfollowchrist:

cupcakeinatorellie:

Hey

Psstt

The guy who invented the theory that vaccines cause autism had his medical license revoked for it

thats ridiculous

they took it away because he came up with a seemingly plausible theory?

They took it away because other scientists have been unable to reproduce his results, his results were made up, he didn’t even get approved by an ethics committee, and now he’s risking the health and lives of a whole bunch of people

It’s not just that he came to incorrect conclusions, he falsified data on purpose, apparently because he had patented a related medical test and stood to make a lot of money off people using his test instead of vaccinating.

It’s crazy how this one person, in a study of only twelve children, gained so much traction in the world. He put this lie out there—and it was a lie, not just interpreting data incorrectly—and now it doesn’t even matter that he’s been proven totally false. Years of effort to reestablish the truth can’t undo the lie once it’s out there in the world. Hundreds of thousands of people believe that lie, and actual children are getting sick and dying because of it.

This is a really troubling aspect of how human minds work, and it’s something conservative politicians take advantage of on a regular basis. If you just say that “well over 90% of what Planned Parenthood does“ is provide abortions, it doesn’t matter how often people recite the objective truth that abortions are a tiny fraction of Planned Parenthood services. You can say the truth 1000 times for every one time the lie is repeated, and thousands of people will still trust the lie.

I’d never heard this before, and it’s actually really helpful information to have, so thanks. Here is a scientific article by the American Academy of Pediatrics explaining the flaws in Wakefield’s research and briefly summarizing four studies that refuted the fraudulent claims. Here is an article by the editor-in-chief of the British Medical Journal calling him a fraud in no uncertain terms. Here is the first part of a nine-part investigative journalistic series, published in the BMJ, uncovering his fraud.  And the General Medical Council conclusions that stripped Wakefield of his clinical credentials can be found here.

I’m honestly so mad right now reading about this guy. People are dying of measles right now because vaccinations fell off so sharply, and those deaths can be laid at the door of this man.

When the apocalypse comes, pestilence will ride wearing Wakefield’s face

hailedloco:

maccabeez-eh:

hailedloco:

can we just like, all agree to boycott tumblr for 24 hours to show the staff that we’re pissed about the update? because they have to track usage and stuff like that, and I feel like it would send a pretty big message if enough people did it. like nothing fancy, just don’t use tumblr from 12:00am to 11:59pm, one whole day of nothing, not even mobile blogging. maybe set up one queue’d post explaining why you’re boycotting (so anyone that doesn’t get the memo would know what’s up) but other than that maybe even stop queues (just for the day) to help send the message.

I’d propose Wednesday, September 9th as the day. That’s one week after the update, one week to give it a try, one week to show the staff that we’re not just overreacting to change (the way people are apt to do on the internet) but are serious about not liking the way they’ve changed our blogging experience. That also gives us a week to get this post around the site: long enough to spread it around, but not so long that people forget that we’re going to do this. Maybe set a reminder on your phone or computer so that you don’t forget. I’ll be posting in the tag #updateboycott throughout the week for general reminders and to answer any questions/suggestions.

And please, reblog this. The only way this will work is if enough people see this post and participate to make a difference. 

so tl;dr: hate the update? join the boycott of tumblr on Wednesday, September 9th from 12:00am to 11:59pm by just not using tumblr that day. 

Thanks.

also: different timezones are a thing, so wouldnt it be ultra cool if we all agreed on 24 hours in the same timezone? so it really makes the biggest possible impact?

I realized that after I made the original post. The boycott will begin at midnight on the american east coast, which means:

9pm Sept 8th PST (US & Canada West Coast)

10pm Sept 8th MDT (US & Canada Mountain)

11pm Sept 8th CDT (US & Canada Central)

12am Sept 9th EST (US East Coast)

5am Sept 9th GMT (England)

6am Sept 9th CET (Central Europe)

1pm Sept 9th JST (Japan)

3pm Sept 9th NZST (New Zealand)

1pm, 2:30pm, and 3pm Sept 9th (Australia)

thanks to everyone who’s pointing this out, please try to reblog this with the times on it!

sonneillonv:

stitch-n-time:

they-better-be-mysterious:

behemothblogging:

satanstrousers:

Does anyone else have that friend where it’s just like “Literally nothing you say can shock me anymore. We have said the worst possible things to each other in the form of sarcastic banter to the point that I have become numb to the moral reality of this world.”

#sometimes it’s not sarcastic banter sometimes we’re just amoral sonsabitches

behemothblogging I would tag you except I’m reblogging it from you.

cricketbug

notenoughthyme

TARIN

primarybufferpanel:

bonehandledknife:

yohunny:

bassfanimation:

flamethrowing-hurdy-gurdy:

primarybufferpanel:

bassfanimation:

primarybufferpanel:

bonehandledknife:

mazarinedrake:

bonehandledknife:

I randomly want to see groundhog day fic in Fury Road but have no idea what that would even look like.

oh my god, here’s an idea: the events of the movie are the final day in a Groundhog’s Day loop…FROM CHEEDO’S PERSPECTIVE. 

She broke the loop by helping Furiosa up onto Joe’s car. 

how many days did she spend trying to save angharad?, how many times did she make it to the green place?, fuuuuuuck i NEED to write this. (via mazarinedrake)

OMG YOU REALLY DO

Also?

#SCREAAAAAAAAAMINGGGGGGG

Oh my god THAT’s why she’s willing to sacrifice her crew, because she’s tried any variation of telling them, of asking their help, and there’s always somehow a weak link, they’re not good at secrets, at acting. They don’t even come away from the Citadel, or her crew is suddenly replaced by Joe, or she’s taken off the War Rig, or– In desperation she tries not telling them one time, and it’s gut-wrenching, but then she gets much further, and now she has to get them killed over and over again, punch Ace off of her running board like he’s one of the Wretched over and over again–

She only ever reaches the other Vuvalini once, on their final run, which is why it was so crushing when she found out that there were only a few left, and that her home was gone.  The run through we saw was the furthest she ever got, after hundreds of times watching her crew and the sisters die in different ways.  Maybe she even killed Max many times before, or left him to die in the desert.    

STOP THAAAAAT

*claws at face*

And he never once told her his name.

#mad max: fury road#holy shit#like this is so good#and furiosa definitely has to be the one relieving it#its why when she asks max about angharad she keeps going#because she keeps a running tally in her head#how many lost#how many down#maybe its like the edge of tomorrow#every time she dies its resets if she doesnt hit a certain point time wise#and so sometimes she just spends literal days doing nothing#runs out into the desert and screams and kicks and cries#shoots joe in the face with a shotgun only that restarts things sooner#sets the citadel on fire#sometimes she just sleeps#days at a time#because who cares really#and then sometimes its days of the same thing over and over#she convinces max 100 times to let them back in the rig#sometimes shes so tired she cant remember which ones work and which ones dont#god this is amazing you people are the greatest fandom ever#just when i feel tired this shit renews me (fuckyeahisawthat)

Graphic descriptions of violence and a ton of angst under the cut and holy shit I should not be allowed to write:

Keep reading

Oh my goddddddddddddd ilu

*helplessly raises hands into the air*

YESSSSS

ojiisanholic:

facingthewaves:

“I want to speak to a manager,” the middle-aged woman said in her stern I-used-to-be-a-soccer-mom-ten-years-ago voice, looking down at me over the top of her Gucci reading glasses.

A wicked grin split across my face and the gates of Hell opened up behind me, releasing a gust of hot wind that whipped my apron around my body and forced the woman to shield her face. Demons came forth, dancing around in flames with songs of, “She wants to speak to a manager. Did you hear that? She wants to speak to a manager!” before erupting into earsplitting shrieks of laughter, none louder than my own cackling.

I took in the woman’s look of utter horror before my eyes rolled back into my head and I growled,

“I am the manager.”

a thing for one of my favorite posts on this site

clockwork-mockingbird:

bookwyrmshoard:

miraniel:

Okay, staff, I am super freaking pissed about the update and here’s why. 

I cannot read your new format. 

I’m not trying to be whiny or nitpicky or over-dramatic. I can appreciate that you were attempting to make things look more organised/less confusing/whatever. I also expect the new format is a great improvement for people who have screen readers. That’s great. That’s fine. 

I just cannot freaking read this. I have dyslexia, and my dyslexia is set off by pictures, bold, italics, anything that is more “interesting” to my brain than plain, unadorned text.

Like this monstrosity:

Look at it. Just look at it. The pictures get in between the lines of text, there’s distracting colors and pictures everywhere. The names are bolded when they’re really not the most important thing. Looking at this, I see everything except what I’m supposed to see, that cheesy series of puns. (No pun intended.)

You literally couldn’t have made a worse format for me if you’d tried.

The thing is, your format was what made me really like Tumblr in the first place. It was super clear who was writing something new, because look, there was a freaking line pointing right to it. Unless someone started writing in all caps or bold or whatever, all the text in a post had the same amount of emphasis. Finally, SOMETHING ON THE INTERNET I COULD READ.

And now, now I can’t read any of it at all. 

So yeah, I’m pissed. 

Like, I know that you’re not going to change it back, because you never seem to listen when anyone on your site complains about anything. I’m not sure why I bothered writing this to you guys, given your track record. 

But now’s your chance to prove me wrong. Seriously, the least you could do is give us an option here. You’ve still got the old code. Just stick a button somewhere to revert to the old format so I can enjoy my text posts in peace. 

Sincerely, 

Dyslexic Blogger

SIGNAL BOOST because I really hope Tumblr pays attention to this. I’m sure Miraniel’s not the only Tumblr blogger/reader in this position. 

*raises hand* yes hello I have this issue as well. thanks.

someonesavedwillgraham:

notcuddles:

Since I know there’s probably a fair amount of you out there who haven’t seen the first three Mad Max movies, I’m here to tell you a li’l secret about them:

All the people complaining about how Max “isn’t the main character” in Fury Road are big ol’ Fake Fanboys cause Max’s primary character trait in literally every movie is “I hate this, why is it happening, please leave me alone to brood in the desert in peace”. 

He’s much more the central focus of the plot in the first movie but in Road Warrior and Thunder Dome he basically just gets kidnapped or beat up by wankers in weird bondage outfits and spends the rest of the movie trying to leave as soon as possible while other people are like “please solve our absurd post-apocalyptic problems”.  There is not one single point where Max actively seeks out being a hero until it is forced upon him.  He ACTIVELY TELLS PEOPLE WHO ASK HIM FOR HELP to take a hike.

Mad Max himself would like nothing better than to never, ever, ever be the main character.

He would also like for people to stop stealing his fucking car.

someonesavedoctorlecter

loooska:

*tries to reblog a post*

*accidentally ends up creating 2 new blogs, unfollowing 5 people, following 2 other people, buying a piece of land in antarctica, and causing a global power outage*

showgirlsteve:

fairy-trash:

as tomorrow is september first id like to make sure everyone remembers not to make jokes about Wake Me Up When September Ends

to clarify if you don’t know:

-the song is about Billie Joe’s father’s death

-he has repeatedly requested that people leave it alone, and yet people persist in joking about it, including tweeting directly at him about it

-don’t be an asshole and make jokes about it

-September 1st is the perfect day to make hogwarts express jokes instead!

watsonshoneybee:

congratulations to Minerva McGonagall on her pending retirement today, who is going to look down at her list of first years and see “James Sirius Potter” and just call it a fucking day

hedonistbyheart:

Alright, look, all the remus is half French/Italian/Spanish/etc. Headcanons are cute and all, but guys, GUYS!
-he’s canonically half Welsh already! WELSH!

I honestly feel like this isn’t appreciated nearly enough.

*dreams of a Remus with the cutest twang of a welsh accent*

- Imagine Hope teaching him the language on the days of the moon so his little mind will be busily occupied while her hands shake unseen in her lap with fear and sympathy for her little boy.

-imagine Remus being startled into swearing in Welsh the first time he is pranked by his new dorm-mates.

-imagine their faces splitting into delighted grins and the following hours of swapping increasingly outlandish swears (Sirius knows some wild ones in French himself).

-imagine Remus studying Welsh magic, knowing that it’s supposed to be very potent.

Just, Remus Lupin and Welsh, guys.

frillious:

frillious:

reblog in the tags with who or what youd rather have president than donald trump

these tags are pure gold please keep adding

sararye:

every 1st september we joke about getting ready for hogwarts to cover up the very real and very very deep scars of never getting our letters

lupinatic:

oodlyenough:

something that stood out to me rereading prisoner of azkaban this time was how remus is also 100% ready to kill a bitch once he learns what has really happened

he’s so often characterized as a huge softie and/or the morality pet in fic but at the end of POA he’s even more ice cold about this revenge murder plot than sirius; lol he literally just rolls up his sleeves and is like “well peter, time for you to die”

this is the same remus who berates harry for not being willing to kill death eaters in DH this is a man who grew up in a warzone who did everything he could to not be the monster that society said he was so he became a soldier instead there are worse things than killing just as there are worse things than death this is one of the reasons why I have an issue with AK being one of the ‘unforgivable curses’ you ask me a quick painless death doesn’t compare to mind-control or torture and there is no way that death eaters were the only ones using killing curses during the first war peter wouldn’t have been the first death eater that remus had killed and I don’t think he would have seen the execution style of it as being any different to killing in the heat of battle or in self-defence this is the man who killed his best friends; harry’s parents; who was responsible for sirius spending 12 years in azkaban this is no different to if sirius had managed to kill peter when he tracked him down the day after james and lily died they were just 13 years late

This. It’s worth noting that Remus is strongly implied to have a huge problem with the Dementor’s Kiss - he asks Harry if he thinks that anybody really deserves it, even believing at this point that Sirius killed the Potters. Remus is not a fan of inhumane punishments or unnecessary cruelty, but he clearly believes quite firmly in the necessity of taking a life at times, especially when it’s a case of either self-defense or justice.

I also think that Remus was even madder at Peter then he ever was at Sirius, because Sirius had actually endured a consequence to his betrayal and Peter had not - in fact, he’d successfully passed off both the blame and the consequence onto Sirius.

mymissus:

capricornrainstorm:

astrologysecrets:

Sagittarius, Pisces, Capricorn, Gemini, Scorpio, Aries

Also known as “you told me to do it and now I won’t to spite you club”

The truest.

noprincenorape:

There’s something about Sense8 that you will only notice if you are actually familiar with all/most of the original languages that should be used and that’s the way the narrative is written is completely based in the original language. I have seen a couple of post about how Lito or Sun’s dialogues were weird or too artificial and that’s because it’s a direct translation of their natural speech.

It’s probably less strong in Lito because he lives in a world of Soap Operas, he lives and breath dramatic characters so his character is overdramatic and fake (something he totally owns and accepts) but when you listen to Sun, especially pre-jail Sun, you can see that her English is a direct translation of her Korean. The way the sentences are constructed, the emphasis and tone… she is not a Korean woman living an American life, she is a Korean woman living a Korean life in Seoul with the not-so-uncommon problems in the Korean chaebol sector. If you know a lil bit of Korean you are able to translate every single one of her sentences to Korean and they look authentic, the same way Lito’s sentences half the time would work way better in Spanish that they do in English.

(Edit: several rebloggers have confirmed that, indeed, Wolfgang also talks a translated German, which only confirms the theory. All of this also explains the fact that every single actor comes with their original accent, they don’t try to mimic American/British accent but they have kept the accent they would have if they were talking in their original language and we were only listening to their English because we are connected with the Sensates. Sense8 tries to turn the viewer into another Sensate, in some sort of Jonas. I would very much appreciate if someone can shed some light about the Swahili and the Hindi, though)

(Edit2: Thanks to r-ed​ we have confirmation that Kala’s English is also a translation from the original Hindi. As it happens with Korean, and probably Swahili too, these languages’ structure are pretty different from English, while German and Spanish have more similarities structure-wise) so the translation has been enriched to be understandable, but the basis of the Hindi language as well the accent has been respected. As I commented on an earlier post, the writers have understood that language/accent is part of the characters, but adapting their language to English they would have erased this side of them that is as important as their cultural inheritance, so it’s important that they only translated the language into a more understandable language, considering they interact with each other in a mental wave length, making it possible for each one to understand the other without the need to use the same physical language).

Michael, Lana and Andy  have done an amazing research work and even though I’d be forever happy to see them talk more in their own languages I am so satisfied with the way the have handled the language issue.

alder-knight:

cosetties:

i really like the advice “write marginalized characters but don’t write about marginalization unless you experience it” 

absolutely i think cis people should expand their horizons and write trans characters, but they shouldn’t write stories about being trans. likewise i think allistic / NT authors should write about autistic characters! but not stories about being autistic. 

represent us. absolutely. but don’t tell our stories. let us do that.

YOOOOOOO. This is an excellent distinction!

bifacts:

doomsday-kitten-attack:

Trying to prove a point to someone who says “it’s just a phase, your mind is made up after high school”

Bisexuality isn’t a legimate sexuality though, it was invented by the CIA in the late 1980s in order to distract the general public from the wizard uprising.

satanismy-bitch:

vintage-kisses:

Sometimes I really don’t feel like existing like not in a suicidal way but I just wish there was a way of pausing life so that I could sleep for a few weeks and figure some stuff out and then not have to feel guilty for missing loads of stuff because really no time had passed at all

ITS IN WORDS

resplendeo:

let’s play another tag meme thing! put each word into your tags and see what pops up:

pretty, head, why, when, where, shit, you, stop, how, for, they, super