Blazer-Sharp, Prattle-Ready, Brainless Steel Samurai Banana

This has been sitting in my DW draft window for far too long and I still don't know what to do with it.


On why we cannot have nice things. (and are fat)

...

And for the first time the gender binary and the whole birth control issue are explained to me in a sensical way.

While we've still got a stringent adherence to one man and one woman, not merely one and another, and I can think of a particularly uncharitable and horrible way to interpret the admonishment to satisfy one another, this is a far, far cry from the evil condoms and the quiverings of others who claim Christianity.

The idea that God created human sexual relations only or primarily for procreation denies the special creation of man that separates him from the animals. Furthermore, it makes God the author of evil and a cruel tempter worse than even the devil. It teaches a Calvinistic Orthodoxy and elitism, because, on the one hand, God removes the elect (i.e. celibates) to the cloister and desert, away from the world and the presence of tangible temptation. And on the other hand, He condemns the non-elect and yokes men and women to the grievous burden of living in the closest and most intimate proximity, of being tempted and drawn to one another, but permitting them to come together only for procreation, because the marital act is evil. Because this perverse premise tramples on the words of God and the Apostle, it was condemned by the Apostolic Canons, the First and the Sixth Ecumenical Councils, and other local Councils.

I will not quote from footnote 28 as all of footnote 28, which is quite lengthy, would have to be quoted for effect.

I should stress at this point that I do not necessarily post things and even say they are good because I agree entirely with them. There are many things one would like to be true, and other things that are believed by those who believe the things you are considering or may even already agree with, that are quite something other than true. But at least, as an argument against gender-neutral recognition of marriage, it is something at least a small step removed from the usual garbage-in, garbage-out groundless essentialist categorical denial.

(And of course without limitation I actually agree with footnote 28.)

Which leaves us with this:

1. Homosexuality is a sin because the homosexual act cannot be done in the context of a marriage, which to be blessed requires the union of two persons in Christ as the reconciliation of the two gendered halves of humanity in a way that embodies the unity of all those who would be saved, and without such blessing cannot amount to anything more than fornication.


2. Homophobia is a sin because it divides people against each other, twists men's perceptions of affection, taints all relationships with inappropriate thoughts of sexual domination, isolates its perpetrators and victims in shells of hatred and shame, paralyzes men against any expression of love towards other men (and we're talking about a religion that's all about Love of a God traditionally marked with male Pronouns!), drives people to murder and suicide, and ultimately denies the creation of humanity in the image of the good God.

If one and only one of homosexual and homophobic acts were to be lawfully allowed, which is obviously the more Christian answer?

While browing the RPGnet forums there was yet another discussion about reinventing the "stock" fantasy races - elf, dwarf and orc. This seems usually to take the form of taking something that looks like an elf, then pulling it completely out of the mythical role it had in Middle-Earth and/or D&D.

That gave me another idea: take a bunch of other species tropes and shoehorn them into these roles.


Deathbots

A long time ago the Atlanteans built a terrible race of sentient killer robots to conquer the world. They built very many and they scourged the planet, and Atlantis became the ruler of the known world for centuries. But eventually its expansion had to stop, and as Atlantis teetered between downsizing and stabilizing and collapse from its overreach the deathbots had nothing to do. So they settled down, raised families, and moved off to greener (or in their case blacker) pastures. People say that they fled to the caves and deep underground because humans distrusted them, or that it was part of a great tragic rift between the peoples above and the peoples below that drove them into exile, but really they're just down in the mines and caves and undermountains because that's where the fuel and ores are that they need to live.

Deathbots are stout and stubby, standing about 4 feet tall and 3 feet wide with a body covered entirely in metal with one to six yellow or red pupilless eyes glowing out of some impenetrable blackness within the "visor" of their heads. They can detach and replace parts voluntarily though for more important parts it stings a little as a protective security measure. (They tried making it not hurt at all but people kept disassembling themselves trying to do complex field repairs in stupid places in the remote tunnels and needing to be rescued.) They will very often be seen with only one manipulator, the other arm preoccupied with housing some tool or weapon, which are incidentally famous for being some of the best in the world. (They love making and selling weapons though no deathbot-led faction has started a real war in centuries.) A newly built deathbot AI core can usually last about 80-120 years before wear and tear warrant a permanent decommission.


Treebugs

Deep in the forests of every known world these vast insectoid beings flit silently across the canopies, drinking the dew and light in memory of some impossible antediluvian world. At first glance they appear to be beasts, slipping flawlessly among the leaves and branches, naked as Adam in their peculiar sort of primordiality. But in truth they guard some of the most formidable technologies ever seen on this planet, things that would make the finest machinery of Atlantis seem like the work of impatient children, thinly and perfectly disguised to our crude senses as the essence of nature and life itself.

Treebugs are tall and spindly, standing 6 feet tall with long arms like a gibbon and a long forked tail that acts as two independent grasping limbs. They have small heads with huge compound eyes under heavy eyelids, and they can turn their heads to look completely behind their own bodies. They can change colour at will, but are most often some kind of green and brown, reflecting a thousand blues when the sun hits them at the correct angle. But for the four limbs and lack of a separate abdomen they would appear very much like arthropods, but what at first glance appears to be an exoskeleton is really a pattern of scales and spikes and muscle tone - and equipment. Communications devices, telepathic nodes, medical equipment, cutting implements, wings, extra limbs, things just seem to spontaneously emerge from a treebug's incomprehensibly ornate body as needed. They weigh a fraction of a grown man of similar height, bearing the hollow bones of a bird. No one knows the full extent of a treebug's lifespan, and some purport to have personal recollections of Atlantis in its prime.


Hivers

Vast regions of the world lie barren and uninhabitable by man, overrun with twisted forms of the hives that house these brutish beings. Their ancestors exiled those of the treebugs eons ago, naming them heretics and blasphemers against the the purity of their race and the sacred nature of life itself. Now they spawn by the dozen, cannibalizing each other from birth in a race where only the strong and ruthless survive, to live a short brutish life amidst the decaying land ravaged by their predecessors, or to suffer the stigma of being impregnated and locked up in the centre of a hive, barefoot and perpetually pregnant, every few days birthing another batch of fanged grubs desperate to find a place - desperate to find the top place - in their world.

Hivers are thick and coarse, about 5 feet tall with faces like those of treebugs but thickly muscled, with shaggy feathery manes around the neck and four long razor-sharp tusks sprouting from the mouth - and a pair of slit-pupiled yellow eyes long evolved to bear as much rage and hate and inspire as much fear as possible in the viewer. Their grey bodies bear little ornamentation beyond more shaggy fur in strategic places, and unlike their distant kin are quite visibly clothed and armed with shoddy but effective gear. Aggression and visible wealth are directly linked with status. Sexual dimorphism is minimal between males and virgin females, but once impregnated and enhived the females quickly become obese and hairless and glassy-eyed. Potential maximum lifespan is unknown, though life expectancy is typically around 4-24 years for a male or non-reproducing female (with almost all of these on the high end of the scale bearing a male gender identity) and around 15-32 years for a reproducing female.

Harper government suggests removing sexist language from our anthem in the immediate aftermath of a massive orgy of patriotic anthem-waving tinged with widespread outrage over a previous mangling of said anthem, gets inevitable angry emails enhanced by the usual is-ists who'd have resisted any change ever anyway and the usual shitheads who kneejerk about everything "PC", cancels plan disingenuously claiming that the people have spoken.

That said... it did get me thinking about how the anthem could be improved. So I took the idea and ran with it.

( The O Frankenda )

I sheepishly follow furikku's and lienne's leads, who in turn are following innerbrat's.

That said, unlike those two I will extend the original the other way and be even more figurative in my delivery. I warn you that there may be clichés in this.

( And yes, the term was originally taken from Vampire: the Masquerade, albeit interpreted by someone who's only ever played Kindred of the East. )


[2015-10-07] adding jesus tag b/c gnomic will
[2023-12-02] adding gender tag b/c holy fuck lmao