gonna hear a lot of fingerwagging about how yet again all the losses are the fault of an apathetic voter base or whatever and to every single one of you that gets out of bed ready to die on that hill of condescending arrogance:
run these numbers through whatever fuckbrain filter you use to interpret statistical data and explain to me in plain english how “people didn’t vote” explains the results of an election with numbers like this.
because you gotta be some galactically endowed genius to somehow think that’s how numbers like that could happen.
We took the House, held our losses in the Senate in the worst damn map imaginable, won seven governor’s mansions, picked up quite a few trifectas and flipped some legislative chambers even where we don’t have the trifecta, expanded Medicaid in three states (and with the governors’ wins we’ll get Kansas and Maine on top of that), won a ton of criminal justice and voting rights reforms.
It wasn’t a perfect night. There were some real disappointments. There was some truly ugly fear-mongering and disenfranchisement, and the rules of the game are tilted such that a 9% popular vote margin, one of the biggest in the history of midterm elections, didn’t feel quite like the wave that it was.
But even in our disappointments, we made critical gains that will change things in the future: Beto didn’t win, but running a competitive race in Texas helped several Democrats over the line in the House and in the state legislature which wouldn’t have happened otherwise; Florida was a disappointment for the Senate and Governor’s races, but the passage of Amendment 4 means that the next election in Florida won’t have 10% of the population disenfranchised.
So take the win, even though it’s not perfect.
To quote Max Weber (and apologies for his 19th century language here):
Politics is a strong and slow boring of hard boards. It requires passion as well as perspective. Certainly all historical experience confirms–that man would not have achieved the possible unless time and again he had reached out for the impossible. But to do that, a man must be a leader, and more than a leader, he must be a hero as well, in a very sober sense of the word. And even those who are neither leaders nor heroes must arm themselves with that resolve of heart which can brave even the failing of all hopes. This is necessary right now, otherwise we shall fail to attain that which it is possible to achieve today. Only he who is certain not to destroy himself in the process should hear the call of politics; he must endure even though he finds the world too stupid or too petty for that which he would offer. In the face of that he must have the resolve to say ‘and yet,’—for only then does he hear the ‘call’ of politics.
for a quick change of pace–i know we’ve all seen a thousand posts about voting, but what i haven’t seen (not yet) is one saying thank you.
thank you for those who made it out in the rain and the cold, who organized and canvassed and took on the onerous task of working with non-voting & conservative friends/family to change their stance if at least just this once. thank you for those who stood in line for hours, who had to travel because your voting place was moved, who had to jump through ridiculous fucking hoops to register, who weren’t inspired but showed up anyway for the disenfranchised and the greater good. thank you as well to everyone who voted early, absentee, and provisional.
yknow the more jk rowlings world falls apart in america (race relations, international history, population, etc) the more i like to think that america just straight up doesnt have the statute of secrecy. european countries are falling over themselves hiding magic but come to georgia and theres a drunk redneck wizard wingardium leviosa-ing the shit out of a tractor to the delight of his drunk redneck muggle buddies in a walmart parking lot.
wizard on muggle violence is prevented by virtue of there being like a 50/50 chance that muggle is packing heat. muggle on wizard violence is prevented by knowing that wizard can give you boils spelling LIL BITCH on your forehead if you try to start something.
america is the weird redheaded stepchild of the magic world.
im not gonna stop reblogging this until this is the next Hot Fanon
english muggles come back to england and suspicious wizards meet them at the airport.
‘did you witness any strange or inexplicable acts while you were in america?’ they demand.
the english muggles just laugh in their dumb fucking faces. mate, it’s america.
what’s the difference between a werewolf and an animagus?
english wizard: *two hour lecture on legal history*
american wizard: six beers
@jumpingjacktrash congrats ive read hundreds of comments on this dumpster fire of a headcanon and yours is the best
thank you my patronus is a monster truck
I have reblogged this I don’t even fucking know how many times but I still completely lose it every time I see the words “My Patronus is a monster truck” because that is the most AMERICAN thing I’ve ever seen in 29 years of being ‘merican.
Variant: What with the International Statute of Secrecy being an international law, the American magical community suffered quite a bit at the hands of forcible attempts to make everyone conform to it, until anti-seclusionist magical forces got their hands on the sort of magics being used to hide the wizarding world from nonmagical society, and hid themselves and their communities from the magical government and its institutions.
That’s why Ilvermorny is “the only American wizarding school.” That’s why the American magical population feels like something the size of the British one pasted on something a couple orders of magnitude bigger. That’s why Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them is so white. That’s why nonmagical people have a persistent quiet willingness to believe in magic just enough to allow for the possibility of its existence, and fill their stories with it, and readily interact with the idea of it. It’s an elaborate homegrown smokescreen to hide hundreds of integrated magical communities from the magical community that demands magical communities keep themselves secret.
The forces behind the International Statute of Secrecy made themselves such an absolute nuisance that some 95% of the magical population of America stole their hide-from-the-muggles spells and locked them out of knowledge of their existence.
The International Wizarding Community: “You are now forbidden to let any nonmagical people know you exist.”
Six Gazillion American Wizarding Communities: *Jedi mind trick hand motions* “Fuck you, we don’t exist. Nothing to see here.”
The International Wizarding Community: “Looks like the problem’s been solved, I guess. Pip pip cheerio.”
Six Gazillion American Wizarding Communities And Their Muggle Friends: “OK I’mma cast Engorgio on my tires and invent Monster Trucking, hold my beer.”
You’re comparing highly polished mainstream examples of iconic Japanese media to low budget, indie, and amateur american works. If you wanted to be fair the second image should look more like this:
The cultural exchange between American and Japanese art, particularly in animation, is hardly a one way streak.
Here we have Panty and Stocking, which boasts an artistic style that draws heavily upon modern western animation with it’s hard outlines and comical proportions. Shows like Dexter’s Laboratory barrow dynamic posses, dramatic framing, and highly expressive faces form anime and manga. Early anime and manga developed it’s distinct big eyes and childlike features by taking cues from western animation of the 20′s and 30′s
Betty Boop, in particular, was immensely popular in Japan. Her creators even made this short in appreciation of her Japanese fan-base.
WAIT I CAN ADD TO THIS ALREADY OBSCENELY LONG POST.
The entire Magical Girl genre is a big example of Western (primarily U.S.) and Japanese cultural exchange!
BeWitched (which was inspired by the 1940′s American movie “I Married a Witch”) was incredibly popular with young girls! This prompted the creation of the first popular Magical Girl Sally the Witch.
When the “Little Witch” Subgenre was big in the 70s the U.S. countered with animated Sabrina (from the Archie comics) which followed the same formula albeit with an older girl.
The 80s we start seeing more “flash of light” henshins/transformations being utilized along with the rise of the “Magical Idol” sub-genre in Japan it gave birth to shows like Creamy Mami and Magical Emi, in the U.S. it made way for Jem and the Holograms and She-Re Princess of Power (not a magical idol but still uses “flash of light” transformations). Jem was even a collab with U.S. doing the writing and Japan doing the animation!
The “Magical Warrior” sub-genre emerges in the 90s (even tho it has roots in the 70s with shows like Cutie Honey). This doesn’t catch on in America until the early 00′s with Atomic Betty (Canadian creation) and The Life and Times of Juniper Lee but we did see the start of it with the Canadian/Argentinian collab called Cyber Six. We also get W.I.T.C.H. and WINXClub in the early 00s from Italy which are both probably the most heavily influenced from Japan’s then current MG show structure.
Today we have Steven Universe, Bee and Puppycat, Star vs. the Forces of Evil, Lolirock, The Miraculous Ladybug, and if it gets picked up Twelve Forever which are all great Western MG shows that are influenced by Japan!
I could go on, I haven’t even scraped the ice berg on this! I have a whole hour panel I run on this subject called “Magical Girls from Around The World”
The point is the Magical Girl genre- and tbh animation in general- has been Japan and America (with some other Western countries thrown in) talking back and forth since the 60s. I leave you with probably the most direct influence:
can I add to this that Osamu Tezuka aka “the God of modern Manga”
was inspired by Bambi
into deciding to give big eyes to his drawings so that they would look more expresive. He also remained a big fan of a certain Jewish American animator until his death, oh yeah this guy
Walt Disney himself was also intrested in Tezuka’s work, with Astroboy being one of his favorites. A similar case exists now between John Lasseter (Pixar and Disney fame) and Hayao Miyasaki (Studio Ghibli) who are big fans of each other’s work.
Japan and America are less of a competition to those who work on it and more of an inspiration, it is very often the fans and not the creators who create rivalries between people that would be friends in real life.
it’s all you americans talk about… liminal space this… cryptid that
america is big, we got.,.,.,. its a lot happening here
It’s at least 3,000 miles just from the East Coast to the West, depending on where you start.
If I try to drive from here in Maine to New Mexico, it’s 2,400 miles.
From here to Oregon, 800 miles from my current residence to my relatives in NJ, then another 3,000 miles after that.
A brisk 8 day drive that meanders through mountains, forests, corn fields, dry, flat, empty plains, more mountains, and then a temperate rain forest in Oregon.
The land has some seriously creepy stuff, even just right outside our doors.
There is often barking sounds on the other side of our back door.
At 3 am.
When no one would let their dog out.
It’s a consensus not to even look out the fucking windows at night.
Especially during the winter months.
Nothing chills your heart faster than sitting in front of a window and hearing footsteps breaking through the snow behind you, only to look and not see anything.
I live in a tiny town whose distance from larger cities ranges from 30 miles, to 70 miles. What is in between?
Giant stretches of forests, swamps, pockets of civilization, more trees, farms, wildlife, and winding roads. All of which gives the feeling of nature merely tolerating humans, and that we are one frost heave away from our houses being destroyed, one stretch of undergrowth away from our roads being pulled back into the earth.
And almost every night, we have to convince ourselves that the popping, echoing gunshot sounds are really fireworks, because we have no idea what they might be shooting at.
There’s a reason Stephen King sets almost all his stories in Maine.
New Mexico, stuck under Colorado, next to Texas, and uncomfortably close to Arizona. I grew up there. The air is so dry your skin splits and doesn’t bleed. Coyotes sing at night. It starts off in the distance, but the response comes from all around. The sky, my gods, the sky. In the day it is vast and unfeeling. At night the stars show how little you truly are.
This is the gentle stuff. I’m not going to talk about the whispered tales from those that live on, or close, to the reservations. I’m not going to go on about the years of drought, or how the ground gives way once the rain falls. The frost in the winter stays in the shadows, you can see the line where the sun stops. It will stay there until spring. People don’t tell you about the elevation, or how thin the air truly is. The stretches of empty road with only husks of houses to dot the side of the horizon. There’s no one around for miles except those three houses. How do they live out here? The closest town is half an hour away and it’s just a gas station with a laundry attached.
No one wants to be there. They’re just stuck. It has a talent for pulling people back to it. I’ve been across the country for years, but part of me is still there. The few that do get out don’t return. A visit to family turns into an extended stay. Car troubles, a missed flight, and then suddenly there’s a health scare. Can’t leave Aunt/Uncle/Grandparent alone in their time of need. It’s got you.
Roswell is a joke. A failed National Inquirer article slapped with bumperstickers and half-assed tourist junk. The places that really run that chill down the spine are in the spaces between the sprawling mesas and hidden arroyos. Stand at the top of the Carlsbad Caverns trail. Look a mile down into the darkness. Don’t step off the path. just don’t.
The Land of Entrapment
here in minnesota we’re making jokes about how bad is the limescale in your sink
pretending we don’t know we’re sitting on top of limestone caverns filled with icy water
pretending we don’t suspect something lives down there
dammit jesse now I want to read about the things that live down there
meanwhile in maryland the summer is killing-hot, the air made of wet flannel, white heat-haze glazing the horizon, and the endless cicadas shrilling in every single tree sound like a vast engine revving and falling off, revving and falling off, slow and repeated, and everything is so green, lush poison-green, and you could swear you can hear the things growing, hear the fibrous creak and swell of tendrils flexing
and sometimes in the old places, the oldest places, where the salt-odor of woodsmoke and tobacco never quite go away, there is unexplained music in the night, and you should not try to find out where it’s coming from.
The intense and permanent haunting of a land upon which countess horrors have been visited, and that is too large and wild for us to really comprehend is probably the most intense and universal American feeling.
it’s all you americans talk about… liminal space this… cryptid that
america is big, we got.,.,.,. its a lot happening here
It’s at least 3,000 miles just from the East Coast to the West, depending on where you start.
If I try to drive from here in Maine to New Mexico, it’s 2,400 miles.
From here to Oregon, 800 miles from my current residence to my relatives in NJ, then another 3,000 miles after that.
A brisk 8 day drive that meanders through mountains, forests, corn fields, dry, flat, empty plains, more mountains, and then a temperate rain forest in Oregon.
The land has some seriously creepy stuff, even just right outside our doors.
There is often barking sounds on the other side of our back door.
At 3 am.
When no one would let their dog out.
It’s a consensus not to even look out the fucking windows at night.
Especially during the winter months.
Nothing chills your heart faster than sitting in front of a window and hearing footsteps breaking through the snow behind you, only to look and not see anything.
I live in a tiny town whose distance from larger cities ranges from 30 miles, to 70 miles. What is in between?
Giant stretches of forests, swamps, pockets of civilization, more trees, farms, wildlife, and winding roads. All of which gives the feeling of nature merely tolerating humans, and that we are one frost heave away from our houses being destroyed, one stretch of undergrowth away from our roads being pulled back into the earth.
And almost every night, we have to convince ourselves that the popping, echoing gunshot sounds are really fireworks, because we have no idea what they might be shooting at.
There’s a reason Stephen King sets almost all his stories in Maine.
New Mexico, stuck under Colorado, next to Texas, and uncomfortably close to Arizona. I grew up there. The air is so dry your skin splits and doesn’t bleed. Coyotes sing at night. It starts off in the distance, but the response comes from all around. The sky, my gods, the sky. In the day it is vast and unfeeling. At night the stars show how little you truly are.
This is the gentle stuff. I’m not going to talk about the whispered tales from those that live on, or close, to the reservations. I’m not going to go on about the years of drought, or how the ground gives way once the rain falls. The frost in the winter stays in the shadows, you can see the line where the sun stops. It will stay there until spring. People don’t tell you about the elevation, or how thin the air truly is. The stretches of empty road with only husks of houses to dot the side of the horizon. There’s no one around for miles except those three houses. How do they live out here? The closest town is half an hour away and it’s just a gas station with a laundry attached.
No one wants to be there. They’re just stuck. It has a talent for pulling people back to it. I’ve been across the country for years, but part of me is still there. The few that do get out don’t return. A visit to family turns into an extended stay. Car troubles, a missed flight, and then suddenly there’s a health scare. Can’t leave Aunt/Uncle/Grandparent alone in their time of need. It’s got you.
Roswell is a joke. A failed National Inquirer article slapped with bumperstickers and half-assed tourist junk. The places that really run that chill down the spine are in the spaces between the sprawling mesas and hidden arroyos. Stand at the top of the Carlsbad Caverns trail. Look a mile down into the darkness. Don’t step off the path. just don’t.
The Land of Entrapment
here in minnesota we’re making jokes about how bad is the limescale in your sink
pretending we don’t know we’re sitting on top of limestone caverns filled with icy water
pretending we don’t suspect something lives down there
just moving along like everyone else 