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Loving Ourselves

/ toseealife / Leave a comment

Well my last post seems to have gone over well, so I trust I’m striking a chord with some people at least.

I talked a lot about being arrogant in that post.

What I don’t want to do is come off like I’m blaming Gen Z and Millennials for this.

While I do blame them in some capacity for making their own decision to embrace all this insanity, I can’t say they’re particularly stupid or evil compared to the rest of humanity.

It’s been pointed out by smarter people than me that the age of Moral Standards we’ve lived in for the last 200 years in the West, give or take a few decades or centuries depending on the country, was not a usual thing for humans. It’s the anomaly.

From the Middle Ages to the Renaissance to the Revolution era, it was a very unusual period in history compared to before, especially the pre-Christian era.

Up till then, the general consensus from all people’s was that everyone else was corrupt, and only their culture stood out, and some of them didn’t even go that far.

If you read what the Bible describes people doing, it would shock you how sick it was. Even now, we haven’t gone that far–as a whole–though some of us have.

And God somehow still had hope for those people. It boggles my mind. But He was always looking for the Remnant.

What big movement preachers tend to overlook, though they mean well, and I wish what they talked about was more frequent than it is–is that Positive Change, as well as Ethics being Preserved, is usually the work of small amounts of people.

A few thousand out of many thousands, is usually the biggest amount of people who work together on it.

It can be as few as 8, like the story of Noah (the legend is found in almost every culture in the world by the way, often with the same number of people surviving as the Bible says.)

God has His eyes always on the few.

Jesus even told us “Straight is the gate and narrow is the way to Life, and few will there be that find it.” (Matthew 7:14)

Which seems harsh…but Jesus is just telling us how this works.

The Masses of people are not concerned with morality that much, and if they ever are concerned about a few things in general, it was the phenomenon of the past thousand years to see that, it wasn’t common before.

That’s why some historians have the idea that Man’s Consciousness is evolving. They look at our moving toward higher and higher ethical standards, and or at least more discussion about them, and they say we improved.

But if you look at the bare facts of history, you’ll see each age has its own problems, and they repeat. We’re not smarter as a whole, it’s isl that those of us in each generation that do See Clearly, see a little more, because wise men learn form history and they build off of it, but foolish ones ignore it and they always have.

That was part of the thought that’s been rolling around in my head for several months, which is just this:

Things that people predict will happen if a country doesn’t change it’s course always do actually happen.

And no one listens because no one ever has listened.

You see, a lot of social commentators say that the problem is people just don’t realize what is happening.

But that is not true.

Sure there’s secrete scandals still, there probably always will be as long as mankind is in power.

But the problems that are eating away at us are ones people predicted and called to attention for years, and decades, and even centuries.

Just like in the Bible the Prophets told the Israelites what was happening. And the Israelites didn’t listen.

It’s so hard for us to admit this, isn’t it? That we do what we do, knowing exactly what will happen, and we do it anyway.

Example:

If you got any person to answer you honestly on the subject of depicting violent in movies directed at kids as much as we do, they’d have to acknowledge that statistics do point to violence in entertainment having a bad effect on kids and their development.

[See articles here: https://www.aacap.org/AACAP/Families_and_Youth/Facts_for_Families/FFF-Guide/Children-And-TV-Violence-013.aspx#:~:text=Extensive%20viewing%20of%20television%20violence,to%20imitate%20what%20they%20see.

https://www.bartleby.com/essay/effects-of-tv-violence-on-children-F3CEVXSZTC%5D

But would they stop promoting that stuff by watching it, talking about it, reviewing it, and in many cases, showing it to their own kids.

My father did, and he’d be one of the ones to say it was a problem.

You see? We know…we just don’t care.

That’s always the way.

I’m glad that my faith was never in humanity to begin with, because living in a world where everyone’s corruption is exposed so much via internet would kill anyone’s faith in humanity.

We hope for the best from people, but we cannot depend on it, unless we know them very well.

But that’s not really mean to be a depressing thought. The Bible has said that for years. All these angsty pop culture hot take people are just agreeing with an old teaching, that’s all.

It’s like G. K. Chesterton said, if we try to hit on anything original an good, we’ll only find it was Orthodoxy the entire time.

Even the idea of Self Worth is Christian, though it’s been taken way, way out of it’s proper context, as always.

I don’t know if there’s a better or worse thing to worship other than God. One could make the case for it, but it’s kind of a matter of opinion whether the worship of success and domination of a few hundred years ago is really better or worse than the worship of tribalism and self fulfillment is now. Often both at the same time.

Humans are not better or worse than we’ve been in the past.

But we are regressing out of the progress the last centuries brought us in at least realizing how messed up we were.

People used to admit that there was a lot wrong with human nature, even if they didn’t see it in themselves.

But now we’re really trying to deny that Human Nature is corrupt.

Telling people to “Be themselves” no matter what.

Yes,the message to be genuine is a good one.

But predictably, since other messages were neglected, it’s become “be yourself even if that you is a terrible person.”

Women will admit to be aggressive b—-s publicly now. Like ti’s something to brag about.

“I’m so mean, yay!”

Or “so evil” I hear that one a lot.

“I have no soul” guys say that one too.

“no heart.”

Wow, so brave of all of you to admit to being inhuman. Hip hip hurrah.

I think actual people who are jerks have always been proud of it, if they weren’t arrogant, they probably would be jerks.

But at least it wasn’t approved of by the entire culture before, not for a long time, but we’re swinging back that direction.

Let’s just remember that in Greek Culture, which is where we get a lot of our ideas, rape and kidnapping were normalized parts of their mythology that no one thought twice about. It’s possible to be completely blind to the obvious.

Actually we’re blind to the obvious most often, because we just don’t want to see it.

2 Timothy 3 says this about it:

“But know this, that in the last days perilous times will come: 2 For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, 3 unloving, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, 4 traitors, headstrong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, 5 having a form of godliness but denying its power.”

Even if we ignore the ones I didn’t emphasize, though they are still prevalent, look at how much those words sum up not just our complaints at a culture, but the things we actually praise.

Romans 1 says that people, known such thins are wrong, not only practice them but approve of those who do.

In 2000 years, nothing has changed.

Ecclesiastes says there is “nothing new under the sun.”

It’s been dawning on me that while I appeal to people’s desire for morality when I debate them, I am assuming they care at all.

But I think less and less of them do.

Aside from the SJW crap that they are programmed to react to, without understanding it at all, they really don’t care about higher thought.

These things have no value to them. They live for entertainment and pleasure. For Self. And no one tells them this is unacceptable.

It’s not a mystery why the Media promotes this. Selfish people buy more things, and care less if you exploit others to provide them with those things.

But it’s sad how the schools and churches have promoted it so much also.

They have us so much under their spell, the Overlords’, that we can be told this point blank, even by our own commercials on TV, and we simply don’t care. Just keep distracting me. The world is a dark place.

Well in Quasimodo’s words to Frollo “Well now I see the only thing that’s dark about it is people like you!”

See, the people who tell us to stay away form the world because of its evil are the same ones making it evil. They don’t want us to catch on, do they? Called Gaslighting.

Because if we did catch on, we might stop them, and evil men fear having their deeds exposed, don’t they?

They hate and fear those of us who know better and have pure hearts. And like Fagan from Oliver Twist, they want to make sure anyone who does is corrupted.

A lot of anime has this theme also. What is Japan trying to tell us, huh? That people who are naturally more inclined to do good than the rest of us are feared the most.

Don’t you fear someone who seems like a better person than you, sometimes? I know I have.

I’ve mostly given up thinking of it that way, we’re all human. But I can do that because I have grace, the people who don’t are still afraid, we remind them of their own death the Bible says.

People have accused Christians of that ever since they first appeared.

I have to recognize as I write this that a lot of people may not even be ready to hear what I’m saying.

They may not even be to where they see a piot ot all this.

I can hope it resonates with someone who is ready, who needs it.

Like “wow I’m not crazy!”

My advice, if i’m qualified to give it, is if you have found yourself noticing all these problems, don’t waste time being chocked by them.

Try to find that remnant of people who still believe in the old values, and stick with them.

And reach who you can. There’s always some wheat among the tares of each generation, perhaps more than we realize, since many of us give up trying to reach them.

It’s not our job to decide who can receive truth and salvation, we are supposed to shoot our shot, and let God choose how it lands.

I don’t know what all our fates will be, and I ‘m not suppose dot know, but I know that we can’t control destiny, only how much we want to take an active role in it. There are still things that will happen no matter what, but there’s a lot we can change also. So we are still supposed to try.

That said, for now I’m done, so until next time, stay honest–Natasha

Content With Singleness

/ toseealife / Leave a comment

Wow it has been a while.

I’ve been working on other stuff, so I kind of neglected this blog for a bit, but, it has given me time to think about some new topics of conversation.

Like for example:

Isolation.

So I like to write about relationships, as you know if you’ve been here a while, and I like to write about the nature of love, fear, and so on.

But with all this, the global spy search engine tends to recommend me videos of people talking about their opinion on relationships.

I might think they were outliers, except that even in my own college classes people express the same views.

In my last class, I heard people talk about how being in committed relationships was hard, expensive and so on.

In the same class, a guy also asked some of the girls in the back row if they’d ever consider getting a Sugar Daddy (not him, he was just weird and the topic had come up in the lesson for whatever reason).

On said no way, it would be too awkward, even if it was just to fake date.

The other said she’d do anything for the right amount of money.

I thought “I can’t believe I’m listening to this conversation in the middle of a class.”

What happened right?

I blame the internet mostly.

To use the clice phrase, we’re at a point wehre this is reality? MEn think it’s too much effort to commit, and women think they’d do anything for money in some cases.

Now sure, that’s just one girl…but her attitude is becoming more prevalent.

I don’t know how this happened, where we’ve taken the shame of the diea of doing sex for money.

People call that “slut shaming” now.

Liek being alsut is someting to be proud of.

Even if you had no moral obligations, i’s apoor healthy chioce at the very least, so that’s like saying peope should be proud of smokin gor drinking ro drugs.

That’ll be it next, watch. “Junkie Shaming” the new crime.

IT always baffles me how poeple never stop to think that the reason orgarian might be pushing for this “no shameing our poor decisons” is because they make money off our addictions.

Anyone notice those ads that are oopenly mocking us for our addciotn now?

The ones that are like “You can seek social validation wihtout lagging out.”

“You can game all night etc.”

“Lose to a 12 year old.”

Ha, ha, ah.

Why don’t they just say:

“We know you have no self respect, no purpose in your life, and no value as anything but a consumer to up our numbers, please keep paying us to feed your addiction to screens so that you never think about the world outside your little bubble that might actually have real problems.”

You know in the classic “Fahrenheit 451” the people live in houses where the walls are TV screens, and some you can interact with, making your life more and more into a work of fiction, till they can’t even understand the format of a book, or have a real conversation with a real person anymore.

In an anime of all things, “Darling in the Franxx” People replace real human relationships with a machine-forged connection, and replace sex with happiness stimulation, and food with this weird energy they input into their bodies directly.

They become immortal…but at the price of ceasing to be human beings. At the end they all turn into pure spiritual mental energy and become part of the hive mind. [Sorry for Spoilers, but I doubt anyone reading this would care about those.]

The show isn’t that good at exploring the concept intellectually, but it’s certainly unnerving.

It used to be a joke that we were becoming like machines, but, now people are really starting to just take that seriously.

At least here, to be fair, it’s not global.

But I’m talking about the West, were I live, naturally.

You don’t need me to tell you this, though, you can see it yourself.

If you watch our shows now, even actors are becoming more robotic and fake in their delivery. The goal isn’t to come off as a real person anymore, it’s to be quippy and mock modern culture.

It’s actually become modern culture to mock ourselves, anything and everything, and nothing can be taken seriously.

I listen to people talk sometimes, and it’s like they don’t even know how to be serious at all.

Their tone, their facial expressions, they seem devoid of real purpose…you wait for the joke to be over, but it’s like it never is…until you offend them, then no one has any sense of humor.

I’m not sure how we compartmentalized our lives to this point, it seems like someone took great care to ensure that we did, however.

I can feel the draw myself too. I live in this culture, and I’m tempted by it, same as everyone else.

But at least I still know I’m tempted. As C. S. Lewis pus it, if you can feel the spell working, then you’re not fully under it yet.

Which is found in the Silver Chair, which is actually a book that coves the temptation of distraction and dulled senses a lot. I never liked it, it was unsettling, probably because it hit too close to home.

Actually Prince Rillian in that book acts a lot like people do now. Unable to take anything seriously, unless it’s an insult to the very witch who’s keeping him under her spell. Then he becomes very angry.

He’s easily distracted. Flippant.

But when he breaks free of the enchantment, he becomes clear headed and implores them to help him.

Later the witch tries to re-enchant them all, dulling their minds again, but their friend Puddleglum uses pain to clear his head, and tells her off. Freeing them all finally so they can kill her.

The moral of the story?

Real sensations are what block out the fake ones.

All of us can go along the way we do, until something truly bad happens.

But it seems the Overloads known as the entertainment industry are trying to take great care to tell us that suffering in the land can be remedied only with more distractions.

How many people got movie streaming services during COVID?

A lot of us realized the value of real interactions, but a lot of people, especially younger ones, fell more deeply under the spell of using screens for everything. (I say with irony, because I’m using one right now.)

So let’s talk about this: Why did this happen?

How did we become so distracted?

I think we all know how it slowly became more and more normal to stare at screens.

But let’s talk about the real reason it’s so appealing.

People now use the excuse that they have too much social anxiety to want to make friends, leave their house, and try anything really.

But that’s not it.

I’ve no doubt that many people do have anxiety, but most of the ones I talk to don’t really have anything that crippling, they just have insecurities, and we all have those.

If you can talk and read emotional cues like a normal person, I wouldn’t say you have anxiety, per sec.

But I don’t believe even the insecurities are the real reason.

To put it in blunt language, people of the younger generations–which is starting to see anywhere form 12-40 years old, who voice these views, are often arrogant, self absorbed twits.

It’s not really that we’re afraid to socialize, it’s that we’ve decided three fundamental things.

1: Other people are a lot of work

2: Other people are annoying, and they sometimes find us annoying,

3: Other people are just not worth our time.

Why is everyone we don’t like toxic now?

You notice that?

Some people are toxic, but we’re slapping that label onto every single flaw.

Throughout human history, many individual have not particlayr liekd ohter humans, that’s not new.

What is new is broadcasting that fact with so much flippancy, and so little remorse for it.

I mena, there’s been many cruel societies, but they had families, they had gatering to celebrate, and not showing up still made you kind of an oddball.

Now u can laugh it off.

What I find particualrly delusional about this new way of thingkin is taht poepel ac tlike it’s speical.

Like, “oh wiat, human interaciton is hard? Who knew? It’s not liek we’ve writtne, sung, and performed aobut htat for hundreds of years.”

Yeah, it is hard.

Everything worth doing is hard.

But you don’t duck out of doing it just because of that.

See, we’re not shying away from each other because we’re scared–we’re doing it because we’re spoiled.

We can have a fake form of humanity projected into our homes at any minute of any day at any given time.

We can have porn, and pay for sex if we want the real experience (real being subjective there), so we don’t need to commit to a willing relationship. It’s normalized now to pleasure ourselves if nothing else.

You know. I don’t do any of those things…and I don’t feel I’ve lost anything in my life. I’m kind of glad actually, I feel like they create weird habits.

I guess I’m writing this because I think the real wake up call we need might not just be about politics and religion.

To even get there, we need connection.

The Bible says that God Himself said, even before there was sin, there was one thing that was not good.

And that was: “It is not good for Man to be alone.”

God said man needs help. A supporter. A life saver. Something we need desperately.

Man wanted companionship, but he also needed it.

Don’t we all want that? Most of us don’t admit it, but just being wanted can feel cheap. We want to feel we contribute something also. But just being needed can feel hollow. We feel like it should be both. And it was supposed to be both.

As always, we’re ever rebelling against our Creator.

One would think that we’d at least want to be around each other.

But we should remember that Adam and Eve turned on each other immediately after they turned on God.

People ask sometimes how Christians can believe something that sounds that much like a fairy-tale. The fruit, the trees, the snake.

I don’t find it so hard to believe, because I see all this played out all the time, every day. Even if the facts weren’t true, the principles are on point.

The story of Ed gen isn’t actually about knowledge being a bad thing, like some people say.

Ir’s about trust.

Do you trust God, or the devil?

Do you trust your spouse? Or God?

And when you break the trust of God, and your spouse, guess who wins? Not you. The devil.

Love is about trust. You can’t have love without trust.

And we are so determined not to trust anyone now.

I watched one video, where a woman said she got divorced after 5 years.

I’m thinking “Five years? Unless he was a deadbeat, a cheater, or an abuser, what problems would you have in 5 years that couldn’t be worked out if you were willing to grow?”

You can grow out of a lot in 5 years, so if things weren’t working out, the problem was probably one or both of them didn’t want to change at all.

And what is the idea with expecting to get married, and not have to change anything about yourself?

The idea we’re fed is that people who love you accept you the way you are.

Well yeah, they do.

But that doesn’t man you wouldn’t have to change.

You may put up with someone’s flaws, out of love, but that done mean you like it, or that you should. Flaws often hurt us more than anyone else.

And then there’s the things that aren’t sin, but you still need to be able to let them go.

For example, what if you’re allergic to a food? Should your spouse eat it in front of you? Maybe if you’re okay with it…but what if you aren’t? It’s not a flaw to eat food…but it can be a point of contention.

I’m just using this to illustrate. And yeah, I’ve seen couples fight over things that stupid. Who hasn’t?

I’m not saying someone should be telling you how to change. But if you annoy them…you might want to think about compromising.

And you now…not all of our personal habits are worth hanging onto.

We’re told now that “Self” is the most important thing.

There’s fear at the base of that.

“I can’t trust anyone else to love me, so I have to love me.”

My therapist once told me to try to give myself the kind of parental validation I didn’t get.

That didn’t work. It did work when God helped me.

It’s a self fulfilling prophecy. If everybody out there is so busy loving themselves, they won’t try to love you.

Someone has to be willing to be different. But more people were willing to in the past, when an relationship based on helping each other was considered normal and healthy.

Now people say you shouldn’t need your partner.

And then it’s okay to bail on them. Because you don’t need them anyway.

Like…you can need someone and still learn to live without them. If they do leave, or die perhaps. Things change. But then you learn to need someone else. We’re not made to not need each other. Literally.

And if you don’t see why you need other people…That’s proof that you do.

Anyone who is arrogant enough to think they are doing fine on their own already needs others way more than they realize. It’s just insane to not need anyone.

I’m not here to say you can’t live alone, sure, you can live alone in a house, or apartment. That doesn’t mean you’re alone all the time.

Being alone is supposed to be a punishment, in the prison system. It sounded like a lot of people wouldn’t even mind it, if they had WiFi.

Ugh.

I’m so sick of this.

You know, I consider myself an independent woman. I don’t let other people make my decisions for me.

But I rely on my family all the time for things.

I don’t mind relying on men either. Not for everything, but it’s reasonable for some things.

And I really, really don’t see what the big deal is about it.

Why is it so bad? We’re all born needing everything done for us. All we can do is relieve ourselves, which is a metaphor in of itself.

And we learn our whole life to do more things for ourselves, but we do them with other people. If we stop learning form others, we’re saying we arrived.

I think in marriage you have to learn from each other. That used to be the philosophy of a lot of people. You can’t remake your spouse (at least not without breaking them) but you can teach them, and any decent person was expected to learn.

Not now.

And it’s not good for us.

Depression is at an all time high, mental illness of every kind, low self worth.

But our arrogance is through the roof.

You can be arrogant and still have low self worth. You have an elevated idea of your own rights, but a low idea of the value of you even existing to exercise them.

Figures, as soon as we believe we’re the only ones who have any say in our lives, we feel like they have no meaning.

Men especially need other people to feel like they have meaning in their lives. Women do better amusing ourselves even with indirect contact, and having hobbies, but we still need other people too. I do think we tend to cut ourselves of from them less in general

Also, little tip ladies. if you’re gong to complain about the bar being low for men, maybe you should make sure you’re giving them something to actually impress anyone for. Do you really want it to just be about sex?

I have high standards because I have high ones for myself.

This is what I aspire to be:

  1. Kind
  2. Honest
  3. Smart
  4. Interested in His ( and other peoples) interests, at least enough to be supportive.
  5. Brave enough to confront a problem and also to admit when I’m wrong.
  6. Humble enough not to take myself too seriously.
  7. Confident enough never to not value my part in a relationship or my worth as a person
  8. Determined enough to always try to find solutions, not just gripe about problems.
  9. And relaxed enough to let stuff go that doesn’t really matter.
  10. Not ever thinking I have all the answers, or that I have none of them.

This is just the short list.

I am not all of these things all the time, but I do try to be them.

I’m not expecting someone else to always be like this, but I do expect them to think values are important, and to act be trying to meet them, even if they have slip up.s

I’ve seen enough of people claiming they have values and then not doing jack to fulfill any of them.

And I’m even more scared by people who now don’t care, and don’t think they need values. Except spitting out the SJW programmed ones.

I wouldn’t even mind as much if most of them were honest about it.

Like, I’d rather have someone who is fully convinced that Pride is a moral cause, but at least really believe that, then the many people I know who just say it because it’s what everyone says, they don’t know why they believe it, they don’t care either.

Someone once asked a man on the street what the two biggest problems in our society were:

The man answered “Don’t know, don’t care.”

The questioner said “You’re right, those are the two biggest problems.”

And they are.

We don’t know what’s happening, we don’t know the facts, we don’t know each other.

And when you don’t know, you can’t care.

And we choose not to know, and we choose not to care.

So if I have anything to add to this, it’s that there’s only one solution.

Make a different choice.

That’s literally all you can do about this.

Then teach others to do the same.

We may not stop the culture from doing this, but we don’t have to do it ourselves.

As an aside, i found an article while I was trying to find the quote for this chapter that sort of confirms what I was saying about trust, if you want to check it out:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1996/01/28/americans-losing-trust-in-each-other-and-institutions/35525131-ce9b-4815-81a4-cc7a6ab2aebc/

Until next time, stay honest–Natasha

Leave Will Smith Alone, gosh!

/ toseealife / Leave a comment

Look, I think this whole thing around Will is none of my business, so I’m not going to bother talking about what he did and how he did it.

In fact, I don’t want to dedicate a lot of time to this at all. I just have a few things to point out:

However he did it, the fact that a man defended his wife is being made into a public spectacle.

Can you imagine this happening 100 years ago? I can’t. Probably no one would have thought twice about it. And if there was a little hot temper involved, oh well, people knew you didn’t say things about other people’s wives in front of them. In fact, you didn’t make personal remarks at all, you know why? Because even if it seems like a joke, some people are going to use it to mock them, and it’s not funny then. IT was just a rule of polite society not to open people up to public mockery, and I frankly miss that rule. I have never seen it end well when it’s discarded at churches, schools, or anywhere else.

2. Whatever happened, how is it any of our business?

Think about it, are we going to make Will Smith regret his actions? Probably not. Are we making what the guy on stage said okay? No one’s talking about that?

What exactly are we getting so worked up about anyway? That our peer pressure can’t micromanage every actor in the world into the small little bubble of acceptable behavior that one of us can agree on anyway?

Yeah, so much for freedom of expression. I guess not if you’re a celebrity.

I mean, no one’s asking if the dude who said the thing should have the freedom to make such jokes about people just because he’s a comedian. I’ve never found it funny anyway. Maybe because I got made fun of for things I couldn’t help about my appearance when I was younger. Or maybe because…it’s just not funny. What exactly is so funny about people’s looks, unless they are deliberately trying to look silly? Think about it.

3. Are we all qualified to pass judgement?

How many of us are going to be in Will’s position, where our SO is being humiliated in front of other people and we have to make a judgment call about it?

Would we have the guts to defend them in any way, let alone the right way?And how many men would have kept it chill at that point?

Is Will Smith above being human, now? Is he somehow not subject to anger or embarrassment or guilt?

I’m not saying it was good or bad, again, just asking why we all think we should just say this?

Because, slapping someone is not a crime. Sorry. Maybe it’s not good…but there’s not exactly a rule book for it, is there?

4. People think it was unprofessional.

I totally agree, it’s better to be real classy and ignore your wife’s feelings being hurt so that the dude talking about it has the green light to do it again.

Again, maybe there’s another way to handle things, but we can’t always pick and choose our spotlight. Would it be right if it was in private?

And maybe the comedian just shouldn’t be allowed to say things like that, again. Isn’t that inappropriate also?

So yeah, I guess that sums up my thoughts on it.

It’s true, maybe no one cares about my opinion either. But then why should any of us care about theirs? And why should Will Smith?

I’m making a better case for leaving it alone than anyone is making for gossiping about it, which, by the way, if you are a Christian, gossiping is unbibilical. And so is publicly harming people in this manner.

I’m not standing up for Will Smith so much as decrying the whole cultural concept that thinks this is okay, it’s disgusting. And he’s just one instance of it. It bothers me in politics as well as with other public figures. Ew.

Of course I open myself up to the same treatment by putting myself on line, but that’s kind of lie the argument that women open themselves up to being assaulted by stepping outside their doors without a man.

They both have to do this to do their jobs, usually, and, just because we have to take the risk doesn’t make the jerks who take advantage of it not guilty. That sounds like something guilty people would say.

So yeah, anyone who uses the excuse that Will is a celebrity and so has opened himself up to public scrutiny as an excuse to publicly flog him for this…you’re basically using the same loci as those jerks who say women’s clothes make it okay to harass them. Hope you’re proud of yourselves.

And if that offends you…

Uh…why should I care? I’m not a celebrity.

And that’s about all I have to say about it. My biggest hope from this post is just that I got someone to think twice about why we do this, and if it’s really okay, I’m not expecting to get a whole movement going here.

After all, I’m not ABC news.

Signing off, and stay honest– Natasha Queen.

So I watched Encanto…

/ toseealife / Leave a comment

One of the unsung perks of babysitting in this country is that you get to use people’s streaming accounts even if you don’t have them. I’ve watched a crap ton of Netflix and Disney Plus because of babysitting.

That’s how I watched Vivo…which is a better movie than Encanto, bite me.

Funny because Lin Manuel Miranda worked on both, I just think Vivo’s plot and themes suited his talents better than a Disney Girl musical (since now we aren’t even pretending they’re princesses…although this movie might as well have been about a princess.)

I’m not going to hate on Encanto, it was an enjoyable ride, but after watching it, I do think it is inferior to its predecessors.

I’m sure all of you are too nice to hate on me for saying that, but if I went on a different platform, I think I’d start a riot. Everyone seems to love this movie.

Well, it’s mediocre, sorry, not sorry.

I won’t deny the animation was gorgeous, a joy to watch. The songs were…predictable. The only one I thought really stood out as creative lyrically was the “Pressure” one. Then, Imperfect was okay, and “WE Don’t talk about Bruno” was impressive editing-wise, but lyrics were a little weird, I thought.

But I’m not much for modern musical movies, to be fair. I like old ones better.

i have before unashamedly said that I like Disney movies–some of them–and that Frozen is actually my favorite movie, for personal reasons. See: Why a DP movie is my favorite. Why a DP movie is my favorite part 2. I don’t think it’s the most amazing movie ever made, but it stands out form other Disney films, I’m not the only one who thought it has a different vibe, wrapped up in a Disney package, it still somehow felt unique. Thought he haters will never admit it.

Encanto is a beautiful mess, that is my honest opinion. I was interested in the plot while watching it, and the 3 year old I was watching it with loved the music. But I kept waiting for the movie to make its point…and by the end I was just…non plussed.

Encanto basically has two or three over arching themes, and it tries to bring all of them together at the end, but it doesn’t finish any of them. The ending was one of the most rushed I’ve seen in a Disney film, and the characters were not well flushed out. We only get depth on Luisa and Isabel, and it’s dropped after one song.

Abuela’s character being the cause of the magic disappearing was predictable, I called it form the beginning. But that wouldn’t have been bad. I thought it actually added to the idea that families often miss the obvious when it comes to their problems. It’s true in my family, for sure.

I actually thought they were going to do a Brave thing, and make it both the older and younger women had pride and selfishness, and that was the cause of the rift. And the magic of the family was tied to their unity.

The movie implies this, but doesn’t say it.

I could put that down to a wish for subtlety, except every other theme in this movie is blatant and shoved in your face, as with most kids’ movies, so why they would hesitated to spell it out for us, if they actually intended it, I don’t know.

I don’t necessarily mind blatant messages, I think kids need things to be spelled out for them, and adults who watch kid content should be prepared for that. But I think you can do it tastefully and creatively. Just singing it to save time is not tasteful.

The imagery in this movie is probably its best feature. The lights, the candle, the sand, the cracks.

I kind of thought Bruno’s character was less impressive than he could have been, he was exactly what I expected, and the goofy, kooky character seeing the future and then hiding…well, it’s a little old. But it’s not bad, so it’s more of a personal wish than a criticism.

What actually made me mad about this movie was the ending. The first half was quite good, but it was like they ran out of run time. Isabel and Mirabel get over 20 years of disagreeing, (or 18, or whatever it was) and it takes 2 minute of one song for them to suddenly understand each other?

I was the scapegoat and my sister was the golden child, it took us months of disagreeing, and years of tension before that, to work out our differences. Especially when our dad poured gasoline on the fire.

And another thing, I found it stupid that only Mirabel was yelling at Abuela at the end. If Luisa and Isabel were really that miserable, seeing Mirabel do that should have just burst the dam. Especially for Isabel.

Also the magic was so poorly explained.

I know that magic does not always need to be explained in a story, I actually don’t like it when it is, like, We didn’t need an explanation for Elsa’s magic–and the one we got made no sense.

But in this movie, the magic disappearing is the whole point, so that is the time to explain how it works, the entire point of most of the film is Mirabel trying to understand the magic, so explaining it was totally necessary.

And what is explained…nothing!

I mean, I guess the magic relies on the family’s…bond? But then why doesn’t it crack every time one of them fights? The one lady with the weather powers should be having cracks every 10 minutes. Isabel and Mirabel should have been causing issues all along. Then Abuela’s obsession with perfection might actually make more sense.

Or how about this, make the fact that Abuela herself actually has no gift, and just guards the candle and house the reason she doesn’t like Mirabel. Mirabel reminds her of her own mortality, and humanness, and we tend to project our insecurities onto other people. So when she’s yelling at Mirabel, she’s really upset at herself. And Mirabel annoys her by not being as stressed about it as she is. I’ve known that to happen to many people in real life, myself included. Misery loves company.

This is almost implied in the movie…but never enough to be sure it’s actually what it’s saying.

Also, the conflict of this movie is set up poorly.

We’re supposed to be wonder why Mirabel has no gift, right? Well that question is never answered. Ever.

Then we’re supposed to wonder if the gift is becoming a curse…

But the thing is, Mirabel’s mom is a really nice lady, and supportive of all her daughters, and so is their father. Isabel is so driven to be perfect…why?

I can’t recall her ever actually being told she was doing something wrong. Maybe she just wanted to avoid it ever happening, but most people aren’t afraid to fail until they have failed in a painful way, and we never see her do that. Perfectionism comes from not being able to control things when you were a kid, but we get no such story with Isabel.

We never see Luisa told it would be selfish to take a break. She just assumes it.

We’re meant to think Abuela made them think this way just by her example…but even if that is true, no one ever questioned it before? And why do none of the men feel this way? They seem carefree, and happy-go-lucky. No pressure there.

And while the townspeople take advantage of the family’s gifts, they aren’t ever pushy about it.

So why are these two girls so driven? Isabel says she was going to marry the guy for the family…but they never push her to do it, they just assume she wants to marry him. If she’d ever spoken up about it, I’m sure they’d have been happy to push Dolores forward instead. Why does it need to be Isabel?

And by the way, Dolores character had the potential to be so much more compelling. Imagine if you could hear everything? Everything anyone ever said about you? That sounds like a curse to me. Maybe that’s why she tries to be invisible, so people won’t talk bad about her.

Would make relationships difficult, and relaxing. She’s shown to be jumpy, but she doesn’t get her own song, and she doesn’t ever get a moment to explain it. A total waste of potential. I’d say her life is way harder than Isabel’s.

I mean, when the main conflict of your story is your MC just isn’t special enough….what the heck movie? Is that what counts as drama these days? Her family loves her, and the one person who actually is hostile to her, Isabel, is not even in most of the movie, and resolves the conflict in 3 minutes…yay!

Mirabel is all like “I can’t embrace Isabel!” and then 5 minutes later “Oh my gosh, I was so wrong about her!”

Uh…you weren’t really, you just didn’t know why she acted that way, she still acted like a b-word. And perfectionism is no excuse to bully your sister, Isabel. How about an apology?

Nope…nothing.

I mean Isabel could have said she envied Mirabel her freedom to do whatever she wants. Built on the trapped by your gift thing…but nope.

And another thing, if Isabel is so stuck…why doesn’t she want to try something other than growing flowers? Her whole rebellion is spraying herself with colors and growing cacti…who in the heck said she couldn’t grow cacti? Cacti are useful, heck her mom could use aloe to cure people, everyone would be all over that. And she has a whole room to experience with crazy flowers in, and no one else seems to care…what exactly is holding her back?

I mean, Abuela only cares when it becomes convenient for the plot, she never reprimands Isabel before then.

Movie, stop expecting me to assume domestic abuse, actually show it if you want to use it, you coward!

You now that just ticks me off about this film, and every other kids’ media I watch these days. Domestic problems are assumed. No on’es family is actually good, no one is actually happy, it all hast o be fake. You can bet if I see a nice character, I’m going to find out they have skeletons in their closet later in the story.

And while no human is perfect, not all of us are as royally fricked up as the movies imply. Sometimes we just get frustrated once in a while, and guess what, we move on! Some of us actually deal with it in a healthy way. Geez! What is the problem Hollywood?

I think it’s on purpose, the idea of contentment just doesn’t sell, so every character has to have a dark side.

Frozen kicked off this trend–but you know how Frozen made it work?

Because we actually see Elsa’s powers backfire, we see her parents tell her bad advice, we see her fear of herself grow–the movie accomplishes this in 10 minutes. We all perfectly understand why Elsa is afraid, how it affects her, and that Anna is unaware of it.

Then when Elsa goes berserk, we know why. It’s not random, we see the causes.

And her problems instead of being over in 5 minutes, take a whole movie to work through. And are revisited in the shorts and the sequel–which are not great, but at least they aren’t delusional enough to say Elsa is never going to doubt again. Of course she will, but she now lets herself be helped, that was the difference.

Where is this in Encanto? Or should I say Donde esta en la cinema Encanto? (Pretty sure I said that wrong, but my Spanish is not great, and the constant switch in the movie was not as charming as they thought it was. I was just left feeling like the whole thing should have been in Spanish, or English, pick one.)

Nada! Nunca! It’s not there. You won’t find any deepening, or further introspection of any of these characters. One song, that’s it.

That’s one of my problems with the movie.

The other one is the Magic itself, and the Miracle. It’s never explained.

And why Mirabel does not have a gift. She wanted to know.

I think the movie’s biggest mistake here was that when Mirabel went to get her gift, the door began to form…but then it stopped.

If she was truly just not meant to have one, fine. But then why did she start to get it and then it stopped? The candle changed its mind? Hmm?

Sure seems like something went wrong, not looking at Bruno’s excommunication or anything.

And if the family splitting is what lead to the magic cracking, than it would have made perfect sense that Mirabel’s lack of gift was because it weakened after they sent Bruno packing. Like, it literally seems like that’s what they are implying.

Mirabel even sees the same cracks as Bruno. Which could have been taken as maybe she was going to have the same gift as him, because he wasn’t around, but because he still is, she couldn’t get it, and it broke.

Then restoring Bruno the family, and fixing the house should have fixed her problem. But she still has no gift at the end…even though she restore the magic, so she has magic, but no gift….because logic….

You have all the set up to make this make sense…but no pay off? Nothing.

Because oh she’s just special enough without a gift…

(How can not being special be what makes you special? It’s a logical fallacy.)

Well if that’s true, why restore the gifts at all. If it really had become a burden, then just let it go, accept change.

Wasn’t that the message? If you hold onto the past too tightly it crushes the very people you were trying to protect…I thought that’s what they were saying.

But I mean, i’s Disney, so of course the Magic shouldn’t have disappeared at the end…but Mirabel still can’t have a gift because reasons.

Even though it clearly show she didn’t get a gift because something went wrong, setting it right doesn’t give her one…why? She doesn’t want one anymore?

I fail to understand you movie.

I thought they all should have either lost their gifts for good, or never lost them at all. Maybe they just could have corrupted, been twisted, like in Frozen. Because they were used wrong. That’s more true to real life anyway. We don’t lose our talents because of stress, but they do become less pure.

So in the end, this movie has two messages. Or three really. 1. You don’t need a gift to be special, because not being special is what makes you special. (Cure the Incredibles rant about celebrating mediocrity) 2. If you put yourself into one box, it will crush your spirit, it’s okay to have more than one interest and to take a break. 3. Holding onto the past is bad. Embrace the future. (As long as you do it by not forgetting what made your family special in the past and reigniting that flame….get it? Because it’s a candle, we’re so clever).

How did anyone like this movie’s ending? I get liking the songs and story, but the ending? It makes no sense. None few these three messages is finished. Nothing is explained, and there is no truth. Everything goes back to being exactly how it was, except that Isabel goes disco tech, Luisa takes naps, and Dolores gets with the guy who’s about as deep as a kiddie pool.

Mirabel is not a different person than before. And the town is the same…so yeah…

I really thought there could have been something really good there. Heck, even all three of those message together would have been okay, if they were finished. But they aren’t. There is no point of resolution.

An apology is not a resolution if the problem is that complex. That worked in Brave because the mother -daughter conflict is present in the whole movie, shown to be the core of its problems, and is explained as the way to resolve them. Merida humbling herself makes sense, because Pride was her problem.

But the whole family conflict in this movie is so shaky. Not everyone is unhappy. The problem are so minor that literally two conversations fixed them, and Bruno comes back with no fanfare whatsoever, and Mirabel isn’t even the reason.

Mirabel was actually mostly useless, she spends most of the movie making the problem worse, and in the end is the reason the magic goes out…so way to defy negative expectations there, movie.

Guess she really was the bug in the system…and maybe it deserved to crash and burn…so show that. Don’t just make it all go away because apologies!

Ugh…

Perhaps I am oversimplifying. But it was still poorly done.

Encanto is, in my opinion, a product of our culture.

Fewer and fewer movies and show have any definite meaning now. And fewer and fewer people seem to notice it. We are becoming incapable of discerning structure and payoff in a story.

As long as the label diversity is stamped on something, we swallow any amount of lazy writing, and Hollywood knows we will.

Encanto is a badly written movie that would not have stacked up to a 90s Disney Movie, and they have very weak conflicts usually, but at least hey are clear. Ariel may be kind of a bratty teen, but at least I know why. I know why Aladdin wants to be a prince, even if he’s a liar. I know why Mulan is going to war ( and that is one of the best Disney movies there is).

I don’t know that with Encanto. It would have taken like 1 extra song, and 5 minutes to explain, but it’s not there. They could have cut the unnecessary songs and put in actual story, they could have not rehashed the begging like 3 times for padding. It was fixable. How did someone not say “Uh guys, we didn’t answer any of our own questions in this script…can we like…fix that?”

But no one cars, becuase diversity!

I can’t say I see what a magic house really has to do with Columbian culture. Or how themes that are so clearly modern are really representing what makes it special. Kind of the running joke of representation in Disney is that it’s…you know, based in fictional countries, so you can’t really represent real ethnic groups…

I mean, people complain about how all the old movies had white characters…but they were stories form Europe, of course they could have white characters. Whenever the movie were set in other countries, they changed the ethnicity…I never really saw the issue. People just like to complain.

And I don’t mind if a movie is set in a Mexican, or Colombian culture, if it’s good. I enjoy movies like that.

But I won’t approve bad writing just because it was packaged in a nice look, and fun songs.

I’m sure it would be fun to watch Encanto, but it has no meaning. It is gutless, it doesn’t commit to any one message, because it doesn’t have to to be liked, and the creators knew that.

But I think this in underminding our chilrend’s abilty to tell when there even is a emssage in osmeitng.

Implied messages that are not stated are usually called propaganda. Subtle, but propaganda. When a message is boldly stated, it opens itself up to criticism.

But if it’s vague, you can’t really criticize it. So it is gutless, but the implicates are enough to squeeze it by the virtue signalling SJWS, so they think it has meaning.

If you still think I’m being too harsh, I challenge you to take Encanto, Raya and the Last Dragon, and Moana, take a pen, and write down each main element of those movies. each character’s conflict…and then how the movie resolved it.

I defy you to find a way it really was fleshed out. It’s implied, that’s all. Implications don’t help us in real life. People need actual ideas if they will change.

But if you can feed yourself with colorful, but empty visions of meaning, you can fool yourself into thinking you’re being cultured, but you are really being conditioned.

Encanto is not evil or bad in of itself, so much as it is just lazy, but what scare me is it never would have been praise so much a few decades ago, and now it’s haled as top tier.

A Goofy Movie did family conflict better, sue me.

Well, I think I have ranted enough, this movie is not horrible to watch, but I can’t endorse anything it says, as it says nothing whatsoever. That’s my verdict. Watch it for a good time, but don’t expect any substance, and you’ll be fine.

Try Brave or Frozen if you want the exact same message but with an actual message. Or any of the renaissance era movies.

Until next time, stay honest–Natasha.

A gamble–analysis of Gambit’s character in X-Men

/ toseealife / Leave a comment

Someone actually requested I write this, that’s a first.

And I’m happy to oblige.

Like I said in my post about Rogue, check it out here if you haven’t: When you know you’ll hurt people who love you…, I hadn’t heard of Gambit before watching this show.

At first I didn’t think I’d like him, I’ve seen the flirty, player boy character one too many times on shows and movies to really be into it anymore.

But as with the other characters, this show surprised me by making him seem real, and likable, and he’s actually my second favorite male character.

I’d have to rank the characters as:

Rogue

Wolverine

Gambit

Storm

Beast

And of course, Nightcrawler holds a special place in my heart as the two time side character. It’s impressive how characters that show up only twice in the whole show were still iconic to fans, that’s some good writing.

Suck it Avatar. We don’t need to make them almost die to be relevant.

(Kidding, I like Avatar too, guys. I just don’t like Jet…)

Anyway, so about Gambit.

Full disclose, I’ve never read any X-men comics, I honestly probably won’t just because there’s so many comics, I wouldn’t know where to start to get the really good versions of them and I can’t spend that kind of money hunting through it all. Spiderman was my peak comic book experience. Nothing else has really felt as cool since.

So I have only the show’s limited focus on Gambit to go by.

But the show does a good job with the other characters, so I’m going to assume he’s depicted pretty accurately and analyze him.

I was asked specifically to talk about his hang ups.

Now that be a tricky question, no?

Forgive my poor Cajun accent in writing.

The fact is, like many characters, Gambit is not much for talking about his issues. I think he thinks he’s the strong, silent type.

I actually like that it’s not exactly true, and his idea of himself is probably not actually his character.

Gambit turned out to have a surprisingly soft, compassionate side, even from episode one where he takes it upon himself to protect Jubilee after only just meeting her. He can be a bit too flirty and rude at times to Logan and the others, but he’s always there when they need him.

Ironically, Logan complains about Gambit’s attitude, but acts the same way, must be one of those like forces repel things.

The show doesn’t hint at any thing between Gambit and Rogue until the episode “The Cure” where Logan drops the bomb that Rogue kind of likes him.

Could have fooled me up till then…the show kind of just threw ships at us, but luckily, they were usually likable…usually *cough, JeanxScott is the worst ship *cough.

Well, naturally, Gambit takes that as an invitation to start flirting with Rogue every single scene they’re in together.

Of course she finds it annoying, but secretly charming, because he’s not afraid of her.

I mean, sure, she wants to slap him in that over-confident face sometimes, but, it’s refreshing.

And of course, it leaves us more mature audience members asking ourselves “But why isn’t he afraid?”

It’s not even that Gambit is impervious to the dangers of Rogue’s power, he gets zapped one episode and is kind of mad about it, but it doesn’t stop him from hitting on her afterward.

Oddly enough, he seems to drop the whole issue of being able to touch her at all, and just keeps pushing for a relationship of some sort.

I don’t know if this was stupid or genius on the show’s part, sticking the flirty ladie’s man with the untouchable woman, and saying “hey, this is a great idea!”

My sister says they are kind of a thing in the comics too…I’d say the same irony is there.

I think that some of the appeal to Gambit, might very well be the danger. He seems like that type of guy. Other girls are too easy for him to get, Rogue’s a challenge, both with her power, and with her constant rebuttal, but not quite refusal.

And some men like a challenge, right?

(Wish I could find one)

I think I said this before, but how funny is it that his name is Gambit, and it’s a gambit to try to be close to someone like Rogue.

She’s got a lot of baggage, even if her power wasn’t an issue.

They do get one kiss one time when her power has been neutralized by some device, (it doesn’t last), and Gambit says he loves her, something he never told anyone before, according to him.

This is an interesting detail.

In his backstory episode, some blond b-word claims that Gambit has been with a lot of women

(To which we all say “we know!”)

But “loves only her”…which is not true, but okay, they were engaged once…given that Gambit left her at the alter and ran away, I guess it wasn’t that real.

Maybe he did lover her in a way, but in his words, they were both young, and he was scared.

Well, he sure stepped it up, huh? Went form crazy blond woman to country girl who’s not able to touch people…don’t know if that’s brave or delusional.

I do ship it, for the record, but I mean, anyone ever wonder how in real life this stuff would work?

Gambit at least seems to think that whatever he’s got with Rogue is special.

Rogue however, doesn’t really seem to trust his words. As she continually rebuffs any attempt to get closer to her. She’s willing to sort of date at a distance, but not to commit.

You’d think Gambit would be the one who could commit, but honestly, he seems pretty devoted, all things considered, she’s the one who can’t settle down with the idea.

Gambit lets Rogue have her space, because being a stalker wasn’t cool in the 90s, I take it. But he’s still persistent.

So the question for all of us is, how serious is this guy?

That’ the question about Gambit at all times though. No one in the X-Men really seems to trust his intentions. They all turn on him as soon as Bishop accuse him of assassinating someone. Though Gambit clearly had no plans to do so, and was framed. But the others seem to feel their suspicion was justified, even so, since he never tells them anything about himself.

I mean, if my life history was being part of a gang war/cult that worshiped some forest goddess and paid a weird tithe to her, and almost married the opposition gang’s nut job…I might hesitate to explain that to the X-Men, too.

Though Storm would probably get it, she was worshiped once. Actually, she says she knows Gambit the best, maybe that’s the reason. She feels normal to him.

Rogue stands up for Gambit, but is not especially confident in him.

Gambit is kind of hurt by this, but doesn’t seem to hold it against her so much as he just accepts no one will trust him and he’s on his own.

Actually, Gambit believes in no one and nothing, and doesn’t trust people, as Logan says, or Scott, I forget who was being the biggest prick in that episode.

In the episode with Nightcrawler (which is by far one of the best in the series, I unbiasedly think), Gambit professes that there’s no God and nothing out there for anyone.

I find that funny since he used to pay tribute to a goddess, but then again, maybe he thinks God is indifferent because of that weirdness. That spirit kept them warring against each other, and hurting each other, maybe they’re better off on their own, in his mind.

It’s kind of sad really. Gambit has been burned by his family, as his brother betrayed him and jumped him into the gang. His ex was nuts and tried to off his friends and his brother, and their deity was kind of vindictive…

And then the X-men are suspicious of him too.

Maybe his perspective that he’s a loner makes sense.

So why does he pursue Rogue? Is it because he knows it won’t happen, so he’s essentially alone still?

My theory is that at first, yeah, that probably was it. It was exciting, and there was low emotional risk in his mind because of her “issues” with being close to someone.

I’m trying to think of a PG way to say that they can’t have sex…and I can’t, because I know everyone is thinking it even if I don’t say it.

It is kind of a roadblock though, what is marriage without sex right? And romance for most people has to involve it at some point.

However…

I think Gambit actually fell for Rogue for real along the way.

She is pretty easy to love, even as a fan. I mean, she’s sweet, feisty, and caring, what’s not to like about Rogue. Her crippling insecurity is her biggest problem, but it is understandable, and she’s not what I’d called Toxic over it. Just confused and scared and sad.

I’m surprised Gambit was the only one, honestly, but I guess the show thought Jean was the one who’d have multiple men after her…because she’s got the personality of your average pick me girl in a Wattpad fic…or nay other rom-com…

Go figure.

Actually, it is harder to write a triangle around a girl who’s actually got a personality, because it’s easier to see who’d be a bad match for her, people won’t get behind a ship so easily if the chemistry is in questions. Look at Avatar. The only thing fans complain about is how that show did ships. (For good reason, not a single one has chemistry except possibly Sokka’s.)

Gambit probably just flirted with Rogue at first because, well, that’s what he does. But sometimes you pretend something long enough, you do it for real. Rogue is just easy to like…and then before he knew it, it was real.

That’s my guess as to why he didn’t get bored of it.

I mean think about it, she’s fun to tease, but any man who didn’t really like her would get tired of teasing a girl who he’s never going to be able to get in the you-know-whats of.

But no, it just goes on forever, apparently.

And one has to wonder what point Gambit sees in it, honestly.

I’m not sure he really thinks that hard about it, actually. He seems like a guy who acts more on impulse most of the time, and habit. I get the feeling that in his mind, he likes who he likes, and it don’t matter really what the obstacle or realistic expectations of it are.

But there are moments where he shows a bit more real emotion about Rogue, that indicate he’s not just kidding.

He’s quick to worry about her, quick to notice if anything is bothering her, and quick to get jealous.

Jealous of what, really, what can she do? She can’t cheat on him.

But he seems actually jealous of her affections and attention.

I think it’s interesting.

Rogue raises all kinds of issues about our own insecurity, if we pay attention to her character. And that’s cool, I really like that.

But Gambit raises the question of what really is and isn’t love. What are we really in a relationship for?

You know, the Bible doesn’t give sex as the first reason to institute marriage. That sounds kind of wrong, actually.

I mean, who gets married just so they can have sex.

I really hope no one reading this answered that in the affirmative…

Sure, sex is nice, and important…but it’d be a stupid thing to base your relationship off of.

Honestly, I think it’s great being a virgin and just not having the whole sexual compatibility thing on the table, I get to focus on what really matters, not just hormones.

I’m sure none of us believe Gambit is in that exact position.

But who knows, maybe he’s had enough of superficial relationships, and is realizing they just don’t make you happy, they aren’t real, they don’t satisfy.

Rogue is too much of a challenge to have it not be real, if your’e going to keep pursuing her. Maybe that’s the appeal.

Maybe he likes the idea that someone has his back. It’s rare to find any friends as devoted as the X-men, and Rogue in particular never would abandon a friend. Sometimes to her own detriment, but there it is.

We all like to feel special, Gambit may also find it flattering to be preferred by someone who has no reason to impress anyone. I mean, I can’t lie, it would make me feel pretty special too.

To be honest, I think what makes the ship so interesting is simply that’s it’s not that easy to figure out.

I think that it’s more real, because there’s probably so many factors that could go into it.

The thrill seeking aspect of it is balanced out by there also being a trust aspect.

One line Gambit does say to Rogue that’s interesting is early on when she reminds him, none too politely, that she put someone in a coma the last time she kissed them:

“Maybe it’s worth it, no?” He says, with a very punch-able face, I have to say.

I can’t really blame Rogue for going off in a huff after that.

Still, if you unpack it, isn’t that the question?

Rogue has no self worth whatsoever when it comes to love. She believes she’s not worth anything, no risk, nothing.

I have to wonder, even if she lost her power, would she accept herself? I think she’d still push people away. She’d find some new reason.

I did the same thing. Without my father around to bully me, I found other ways to look down on myself.

Gambit seems like the last person to take love seriously out of the team, but maybe, just maybe, he’s kind of hit on something.

Maybe it is worth it.

He might be cocky, arrogant at times, and often stubborn…but, love isn’t really about being perfect.

It’s not always the most innocent people who actually understand love the best, sometimes if you’re too nice, you can’t accept other people have flaws, and you don’t know how to love them.

Church people know this struggle.

But on the other hand, if you’ve hit the branches on the tree of poor life decisions…then maybe you’re a little easier on people.

I think the show raises the same question to the fans as Rogue has.

Can we really trust Gambit? Is he for real? Or is it just some joke.

Rogue seems convinced she’ll wake up from it one day, and will look foolish for ever trusting it.

Sure she likes him, but she doesn’t want to love him, because she gets hurt then.

But it also hurts to be strung along. Gambit is not one to complain, but…

Come on, it would bother anyone.

It’s sort of like Rogue is saying that just love is not good enough, she won’t be satisfied without the touch aspect being resolved. Though she claims to be okay wither herself, we all know it’s not true.

Like I said in her post, how important is touch to a romantic relationship?

After I wrote it, I was reminded of the stories I know about people who are paraplegic, some all over their body, and who are still married.

People who have cerebral palsy, or some other disease, often can’t move normally.

There was that famous guy who had no legs and no arms, but got married and had a kid.

I’ve heard that Franklin D. Roosevelt and his wife weren’t able to be intimate after a point because of his disease, and Eleanor said that there was still love even without that.

Hormone driven fans are often obsessed with sex and kissing and touching in shipping. Rogues’ a real challenge, most people probably just prefer to fix her problem, in fan fiction, and not deal with it.

I think that her problem is probably fixable, based on the show’s logistics.

But I think that’s not really the point.

Rogue is not going to get love just because she can be touched. If someone can’t love you without that, they don’t really love you. That’s the hard truth.

Sure, they might like you and want to get with you, but that’s not love.

In our over-sexualized, lonely culture, it’s hard to imagine any love without sex.

Or some form of touch.

Anime kind of has this stigma both about kissing and being intimate until the relationship is further along, and also about even using the words “love” and showing care for someone.

We’re left starved both emotionally and physically from watching it. I think that’s why fans rush to the perverted side of it so quickly.

Where you have no emotional connection, the sexual seems like an appealing substitute…but it’s empty too.

Love is not about sex, and it’s not about giddy feelings. That’s a nice part of it, sure.

But I kind of like that with Gambit and Rogue, it really can’t be about that. Even if, someday, her problem was resolved, it still couldn’t have been about that.

If Gambit showed hesitancy, we’d all have to hate him, even if we understood it. Not many men, or women, would want a part of that.

And it is sad…but, as I said, real life couples have to forego physical intimacy sometimes.

It’s almost a crime in people’s eyes now to suggest that maybe, just maybe, it’d be okay not to have that.

I mean, if you met the love of your life, they suited your personality, they were loyal, caring, and funny…but they just couldn’t have sex…or touch you…would you abandon them?

I remember story I heard on reddit of a guy who married a woman who was asexual…that is, she could have sex, but didn’t enjoy it the way other people do.

He said it was almost a deal-breaker, but he was glad he stuck with her. They had a great relationship, and she’s a loving wife…that aspect is just not as prevalent, but he’s learned to live with it. She has to make sacrifices too.

I’m not saying I’d choose it on purpose, but you know, maybe it’s is worth it.

It would be weird to want that, upfront, but it’s not weird to accept it, if you love them.

I’m not sure I can say for sure if Gambit is deep enough to think that out, but he does hint at it.

The guy who does’t trust anyone is still willing to gamble with love.

I feel like he’d be the most shocked if it ever worked out.

In the end, Gambit and Rogue are too similar. They are drawn to each other because they both think no one will love them.

What keeps them hooked is that the other person never quite ruins it. They rebuff, and argue, but they stick together, and drop hints, and there’s something deeper there.

It’s not really the tease of romance so much as it’s the draw of being loved itself that has these two caught.

It’s like “what if they did love me?”

It seems like a 10 to 1 chance against it, that it would end well.

But Gambit is willing to roll those dice, because really, what does he have to lose? The X-men only get a few chances in life for some things, you’d better take them.

Rogue maybe doesn’t see it that clearly, but she’s still pulled in by it.

They are also opposites, Gambit is willing to risk it all because he sets little value in his own safety, Rogue is not wiling to risk anything because she exaggerates the importance of her own danger to others, and thinks she’s worse than other people.

Sticking them together was a crazy idea because they repel with their hangups, but they also attract.

And, it’s a gamble, really, trying to see how it would end.

I tend to always think erring on the side of love is better. If we don’t have love, our lives are empty anyway. Love is risk, but it’s more of risk not to have it.

But some people don’t feel that way.

I think the show itself couldn’t commit for that reason, and I don’t know if the comics ever did.

Superhero fiction tends to be afraid of committed love, something about it seems alien to superheroes, their lives are dual, masked in deception, usually.

The X-Men were always an oddity in Marvel, because they didn’t hide their identities, and live regular lives managing their powers. I don’t think there’s a DC parallel to it.

The X-Men could have relationships because they acted more human. Superman needs no one, Batman refuses to need anyone, and many others just have too many issues and bad luck.

X-men can have diversity in how tragic their stories are and how hopeless they seem, so you can root for them with more hope.

But in the end, it’s still a superhero show.

The main thing is how we’d answer the question ourselves.

What part of love do we value the most? Why do we want companionship?

How we answer that is what makes for a good foundation for romance.

Less of a buzz maybe, if you pick true companionship, but it lasts longer. And it helps more.

And with that thought, I think I’ll end this, until next time, stay honest–Natasha.

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What I learned from Fasting

/ toseealife / 1 Comment

It’s the new year everybody!

Yay!

I haven’t made my list yet, not sure what I want to happen this year.

But my church always does a 21 day fast at the start of the year.

I don’t really fast food, I think I might be hypoglycemic, not eating makes me feel really sick, really fast, and no sugar will have a weird effect on me too.

I’ve tried food fasting in the past and never got beyond 1 day at most, and that was torture.

Sometimes I fast a particular food instead.

But after my scare last year of dropping 15 lbs, and thankfully, gaining them all back, I have decided to just be happy to eat normally.

So, I tend to fast things like movies, TV shows, or writing too much.

Fasting could really just be called abstaining since it’s not always about food and water.

While it’s gotten a bad rap thanks to the rise of bulimia and Eating Disorders, fasting isn’t unhealthy when it’s done in the right proportions. It cleanses your system, uses up excess sugars, and for most people, won’t make you feel all that bad. (I’m an unfortunate exception.)

While fasting is not commanded per sec to Christians, Jesus said that his followers would fast when he was no longer with them. Which would be now.

Not every godly character in the Bible fasted, but many prophets, kings and judges did.

While I have no fasted food that often, I have learned somethig just from what I do fast.

And I thought it might be worht writing about.

True Confession:

I’ve alwas been terrible at the prayer and worship part of fasting. I’m told that’s why I haven’t had better success with it.

I used to try it and felt no different, so I didn’t bother.

I’m one of those people who doesn’t like to be demanded to do things. So my relationship with Spiritual Discipline has always been tempestuous. Either I got carried way denying myself because it was so counter-intuitive, or I didn’t do it at all.

I still struggle with that.

Spiritual Discipline has been neglected a lot in the Western Church. My church does practice it and encourage a handful of them, but there’s a bunch we don’t really address either.

I hear Catholics do some, but most Catholics I’ve met weren’t serious enough about the faith for me to ask them about it.

I know that one discipline is silence and another is solitude. That’s hard now. We almost never have to be alone with our thoughts.

Actually that’s where I found fasting things like TV and movies to be helpful.

I have images and sounds playing through my memory all day, every day.

I had that before I had TV, honestly. The same things used to happen with books. We have to have something to fill up our thoughts.

Better that then anxiety. I suffered from anxiety so much in the past, even as a kid, I used to use books to escape, then I used TV. Now I use writing as well.

None of those things are bad, but you get to rely on them too much. They aren’t perfect substitutes for God. But they do distract you.

When you give that up, even for three days, the difference is immense.

24 hours without TV and I feel like a different person usually. A whole week, and it’s like I’m more clear.

Already, in the last three days, I’ve been bored, listless, and blue ( not fasting TV, but I don’t think yo all need to know what I’m giving up. It’s a private matter, I’m just using TV as an easy example.)

I fill up my days so much with this thing, I don’t know what to do without it. I push aside prayer, worship, and even physical exercise because I do it so much.

It’s too much and I know that, but I don’t want to stop.

Fasting can be like a self chosen intervention.

It’s never easy, but because I have been doing it for years, I do escape the lie many people believe, which is that it’s not possible.

I learned at a young age to use self control because of fasting. Not perfectly, but at a level most kids don’t reach. Most adults don’t either. How many of us really try to control ourselves from giving into urges.

Heck, they tell us that’s unhealthy now.

It’s really not. Most doctors would probably tell you you should not give in to every urge you have all the time. Especially if you’re an addict.

I was watching a YT video last week “Why you’ll marry the wrong person” and this man was saying that we’re all addicts to something, whatever we use to keep from being alone with ourselves.

I felt a little called out, to be honest.

I used to be okay with being alone with myself, but it got to where I had anxiety every time I was alone with my thoughts.

But then again, that could be just a result of overstimulating myself so much to begin with.

Our brains get addicted to screens, and if we get off them for a brief time, we can feel withdrawal. We’re not necessarily depressed, so much as we’re empty.

You can tell because the depresison goe waway while you’re on the screen, but ocmes back once you’ve been off for five minutes. That’s addiction.

Some addiction to screens is inevitable for us, like some dependence on sugar is.

But there is a way to cut down on your absolute dependence it, and for that, fasting is ideal.

Also turn on the blue light filter on your screen if you have one, that helps, the blue light is addictive and stressfull.

I used to be very judgmental of people who were on their phones all the time, till I got a smartphone. Then I understood.

I don’t play games on mine, in an effort to stay on it less. But I do edit, and read web comics on it. I do use it to play music. And I’m not even as bad as I used to be.

Cutting back on it is hard. And if I’m not on my phone, I’m on my laptop, like I am right now.

I still read real books, though, and it’s amazinghow revitalized your brain feels after a few chapters if you stick it out.

Since I started this fast, I’m both more tired at night, and more ready to go to bed on time. Less stimulation to keep me up. My sisters too. We’ve gone to bed at 1 AM for months, but since I started this, we’ve been going to bed by 12 am or even before 11 pm. Go figure.

I’m not anti-screen. I do like moives, and I like being able to write faster and edit faster on a screen. It’s a nice thing.

But I am against being mastered by anything, as Paul or Peter wrote in the bible. All things are lawful for us, but not all things are helpful.

My family has always been against a lot of technology in our lives, my mom didn’t all of us to have a TV. And she was against having a computer that played movies for years.

I can see why, my Dad got addicted to it as soon as we got it, and to video games.

I almost ended up that way too.

But when I was 13-14, I started fasting. Actually I think I started at 12.

I didn’t know what I was doing at the time, and some stuff makes me cringe now, but the effort was there. And when I did that, I learned to control myself and my urges to play on that computer.

Also seeing my dad’s addictive behavior scared the crap out of me.

Years later, it’s still a temptation, but it’s not as big of one. I can abstain if I want to. It’s good to refresh that every once in a while.

I worked it out.

I think God put me on the path just for that reason.

And while my mental health is not always as good as I wish, it’s much better than most of the people I know, and they don’t all have that practice. My critical thinking ability is also far better, as is my reading comprehension.

I don’t believe this would be so rare, if we had more limits to our screen time. The kids I know whose parents limit their screen intake a lot are much smarter and usually better behaved. I know my sisters and I were better behaved for our babysitters as kids.

It is what it is.

Fasting taught me to set rules for myself even if my parents no longer did it for me. I think my mom taught me restraint, having limits to desserts, TV, and game time. And in turn I learned to employ it on myself.

With lots of prayer also.

It’s now been almost 2 weeks of my fast, (this post is late because I got sick), and so far, it’s not yielded miraculous results.

But you know, I don’t really think it needs to. I used to think that fasting would always be like the big ones in the Bible. Spiritual awakening, breakthrough, seeing visions, or whatever.

It’s easy to forget that fasting was regularly practiced as a reminder to focus on God, and things that are more important than our physical comfort.

For me, sacrificing just one of the many distractions I fill up my time with, reminds me that I can live without that thing.

We have a very desperate culture now. People often “jokingly” say that they won’t kill themselves just so they can find out what happens next in their favorite anime, TV show, or web-series.

I knew MHA was becoming a little too important to me when the news that season 5 would be delayed made me feel suicidal for a second. I hadn’t realized how contagious that way of thinking is.

And we should call it what it is, idolatry. We’re worshiping these shows.

Some people aren’t even subtle about it, they call the creators their “lord and savior.”

Is it supposed to be a joke? Maybe.

Ever notice that some things can be a joke, but still totally serious also.

See, worship isn’t always about thinking something is worth devoting your life and purpose too.

The Bible mocks and reproaches people who bow to wood, and stone, and gold gods. Saying that they will use half a block of wood to burn, but the other half to make a god, and will bow to it.

God apparently finds this ridiculous. And so do we, on paper.

But we’ll devote endless hours of time to 2D characters and mediocre story writing, just because it’s our crap, you know…and we know it’s crap, or it’s not real, but we don’t care. How is that really different from burning half the material we made our god from?

You can use firewood and not worship it, and you can watch shows and not worship them–but, if you’re surrounding yourself with people who do, it’s so easy to become twisted by that. I know plenty of Christians who compromise their morals for shows.

And maybe I have t oo, much to my shame.

I’ve cut way back on my anime viewing, I think my craze is dying down. I still enjoy a few, like any other medium. I did the same with Webtoon. I read it like crazy at first, but inevitably, it didn’t satisfy me, and now I just read a few episodes on an average day, sometimes none at all. Take me maybe 10-20 minutes. That’s probably harmless.

I confess, I make the same mistakes as everyone else. I think that my need for emotional fulfillment can be met by fiction. Even in creating my own.

And what is an idol, but fiction? It’s a fictional god, isn’t it? Back before we had common forms of entertainment, worshiping an idol was a nice distraction…people used to worship idols by having sex, did you know that? Not too different from anime and it’s fan service, and husbands and waifus, now is it?

Except you can’t actually have sex with an anime character, so we’ve traded something that was at least partially real, for an even more twisted version of it.

I mean, having a crush on a fictional character is normal, but…the kind of stuff people do to fetish-ize it…that’s not normal (and I don’t crush on fictional characters as it is.)

What I’m saying is that, when you get caught up in this temptation to worship and go after other things, a fast may be the best way to recenter yourself.

Mine hasn’t changed my whole life, but it changes a small part of it. I have to think about God a little more, and remember that what I’m fasting was not enough for me anyway.

And while I may not feel high off of God’s spirit right now, and fasting doesn’t always make me feel closer to God, I have learned that it’s not necessarily the purpose of fasting to do that. It can, and I have seen a slight improvement from it…but fasting is to re-evaluate priorities, and realize your mistakes.

I realize, I have mistakenly made certain things too important in my life. I realize that I need to think more about how I spread God’s word, and His message.

I realize that the ways I do it, like through writing this blog, may not be how I wish I could (I love writing, but I love interacting with people in person also) but it is available to me.

I may never know if it really helped anyone or not, but I can put it out there, that’s all we can do.

I am reminded that whatever else changes in my life, God is my constant.

And, I am reminded that all the things of this world are temporary.

Time was that the thought of losing one of my distractions would give me a panic attack.

And I own’t say I wouldn’t be upset now, but now I do stop myself and think “But if that happens, I still have other interests, and God can still use me in other ways, and I’ll get through it. It won’t be the end of me.”

I realize I am unique in having this understanding, not because I am especially good or free of temptation, but because I made it a practice to go without things for years, and to learn that I could bear not having them. You can live without anything, just about.

And I guess that is what I learned from fasting, to sum it up.

I hope this was interesting or even helpful to you.

If you now feel like you may want to try fasting yourself, I am no authority on it, but I do suggest starting small. Try 1-3 days of fasting a food or item or hobby.

If you think you can, try a week or even two weeks of no TV or whatever your addiction is.

You can also set aside one day to not watch TV or be on your phone, I’ve done this, with pretty good results. Brain break, right?

Another thing to try is setting aside an hour or half an hour each day to just not be on your phone, and to have fewer distractions, quiet time.

If you can get up to a month or even more than that, that’s about the Bible’s usual limit, 40 days. Anything longer than that is more of a lifestyle change than a fast, but a fast is a great time to ask yourself if you do need to make this a permanent change in your life.

And don’t brag about fasting, Jesus warned us not to do that. Only tell people who will need to know just so they know not to tempt you. Like I may refrain form making cookies while my sister or mom is fasting sugar, or I may not talk about shows or YouTube vids if they are fasting that. It’s different for everyone.

If you can, fast with your family, makes it easier to stick to it.

Remember also, something doesn’t have to be a bad thing if you fast it, it just has to be a problem for you. Don’t preach at other people that they shouldn’t partake of the thing you’re fasting from, unless they are rubbing it in your face, it’s really none of your business what they do.

Other than that, the rules are up to you and God. I’m just laying out the groundwork for how the Bible says to treat fasting. Not to be depressed about it.

Really, God would rather us not fast at all it would seem if we can’t do it with a good attitude. Repenting during a fast is okay, normal and expected. But whining about it is just annoying.

(And I need to watch myself for that too, I’m realizing. Wry comments can so easily become complaints.)

With that, I think I’ll leave you to decide, until next time, stay honest–Natasha.

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