Notices by Venial Trinities (intransitivelie@beige.party)

As the Gaiman stuff is going 'round again (and hopefully reaching more people this time) I'm thinking again about the need for a way to mourn the loss of something without condoning the actions of the creator. Gaiman wasn't a formative influence of mine, but I've had similar losses. And they are losses, even were I to decide that one can separate art and artist. I will never be able to experience certain things again without a voice in the back of my head reminding me that there be monsters.

But all too often, mourning those losses centers ourselves at the expense of the actual victims of great men (and yes, sometimes not men, though unfortunately we must acknowledge that men are the foremost) who have caused great harm. We blame the victims for coming forward, because if they hadn't, this terrible knowledge that we can't escape would never have burdened our enjoyment of things, would never overshadow our childhoods, our joys, our first experiences of being known by someone outside ourselves.

Some people go further, unable to handle the loss at all. They refuse to believe. They go on as if nothing has happened. I think it's whistling in the dark, myself, as it often seems like they are too quick to jump to the defense. They know, deep down, but they can't let that knowledge out.

And there are those who, unfortunately, view anyone who was taken in by a monster as monstrous. Oh, you loved those books? Why didn't you see that it was all artifice? Why didn't you hate him from the start? It was clear all along that he was no good. So to attempt to mourn is, to them, an admission of one's own guilt.

But just as our society has a problem with death, so too we have a problem with the loss of innocence. We're all holding on to childhood so tightly that we can't cope when the edifice shatters. We don't know how to talk about death, or loss, or failures, or human imperfections.

And so, yet again, there are only two ways to be. Either you must cast down the Devil and his works, or you must be consumed by them. No middle ground. No acknowledgement that the man was great even as he was monstrous. No mourning, because to mourn is to admit that it was worth mourning.

Until the next one. And the next. Until finally we grow so cynical that we can never have an experience of artistic connection again, or we become so crushed by loss that we can't bear another and we sell our souls and stop believing the victims.

If you loved Neil Gaiman and his work, you're not a bad person. His actions are his own. Don't carry his weight for him. And you should be allowed to mourn that this man has taken so much from you. Not his victims. Not "cancel culture" or "political correctness" or whatever bullshit buzzwords the people who refuse to believe in consequences are peddling these days. Neil Gaiman stole his work from you. It's okay to be angry about that too, even as you're angry at him for being a horrible person.

And it's okay to still be shaped by his work. You can't stop that. You didn't seek him out knowing he was a horrible person. His work was and is worthy of acknowledgement, even as we can't avoid that it was created by a horrible person. It's up to you as individuals how that asterisk affects your relationship with his work, but however you decide, the work exists and you can't remove it from your life any more than you can remove trauma, grief, loss, or any other negative or positive influence.

And it's not selfish to have feelings about this. You may have never met the man, you may have had no idea until just now that anything was amiss, you may have previously been skeptical but now convinced, whatever. No, you shouldn't center yourself in others' discussions of the harm he caused. But in your own life, it's okay to be affected. It's okay to feel that loss.

Personally, I will say that I liked what of Neil Gaiman I knew. He took me in, if one can say that. I'm not sure, honestly. There will be people who say that he was playing a feminist and a nice guy to fool people, to make it easier to be monstrous behind the scenes, but if so, he played the part extremely well. At some point it will probably come out that he's stopped pretending and has shown his true colors. Scratch him and maybe he'll bleed fascist, for instance

But there's always the chance that he contains multitudes. How can he rationalize his private actions with his public statements? People are good at rationalization. If he's simply a soulless pursuer of power, he'll jump ship to whatever will get him that, but as hard as it may be to admit, there are plenty of people who truly believe that they're good people, truly believe their statements which we understand to be good, and yet are flawed? That seems dismissive. They're not good people, but they're not entirely bad?

Gaiman's sexual proclivities might be entirely squared in his mind with feminism. After all, feminism is about a woman's right to choose, and he may think that these women chose. I won't go into details here; you can read about them easily if you want. But a failure to understand consent isn't unique to awful people, and a failure to understand power imbalances isn't either. Maybe Gaiman genuinely thinks that he's done nothing wrong. Maybe he feels bad that these women obviously didn't have a good time, but that's the end of it.

That in no way excuses his actions. Period, full stop. But it might explain the trajectory. And it might explain how he could have been so convincing. I say all this not to make you feel better about him but about yourself if you feel taken in by him. You weren't a sucker. It's not your fault.

But it's just as likely that he was just a really good liar. The Scientology stuff, which hasn't been as widely circulated, suggests a more sinister Neil Gaiman. And that's not your fault either.

I suspect that it's a mixture of the two, really. He can contain multitudes, and some of them can be horrible. I was taken in. I can't help but feel a little bad about that, but such is life.

As a tangent and I guess an opposing example, I never liked Harry Potter. I've never read the books or seen the movies and I never thought much of Jowling Kowling even before she exposed her true colors. And it would be very tempting of me to bring that up when people talk about how much her work meant to them and how her reveal has affected them. It would be gratifying to say, "See, told ya so, I knew it all along."

But I didn't. I didn't read the books because I was too old to get into them as a child but not old enough to get into them as an adult. I rejected them because they were popular and I was tired of hearing about them. Had things been just a little different, I could easily have been very into Harry Potter and find myself in the position that others do. I'm not special, I'm not smarter, I'm just lucky and perhaps a bit too contrary for my own good, really.

I'm not going to exhaustively enumerate my failures, but Bill Cosby's standup was formative to my sense of humor. I used to joke that, if I were forced to pick a male movie star to have sex with, I'd go with Kevin Spacey (and I didn't even know he was gay at the time). I love Firefly even though I wasn't an early adopter. I enjoyed Louis CK's comedy. I've read and enjoyed all manner of books by problematic authors, some of them after those authors' problems were widely known. Believe me when I say that I'm no wizard when it comes to avoiding art by terrible artists.

That's part of this too. You can't beat yourself up about enjoying something if you didn't know. And yes, that includes if you could probably have known if you looked into it. Cosby has been an open secret for way, way too long, for example. I could plead all sorts of extenuating circumstances, but at the end of the day, the best thing to do is take the knowledge and act on it, then try to be more aware in the future.

Even with the internet making everything everywhere all at once, a lot, I mean a LOT of people don't hear about things. The terminally-online are no exception. And the system is designed to let these assholes get away with it by memory-holing their crimes. Never forget that either.

I guess all I'm saying is that you can strive to do better without either being a joyless cynic or beating yourself up about your failures to the point that you stop learning from them.

"All we have to do is stop working!" Yeah, and how do we eat during the period where we're not making any money and no one is working in the food supply chain? How do we wait out people who have more money than God?

#subtoot

No, but it seems like the plan that people have for a general strike is that a bunch of people stop working, then question mark, then profit! The only way I see it working is that a bunch of people stop working, which pushes the United States into revolution and anarchy (not the kind you want) sooner? It's accelerationism and it's blinkered at best. How do you convince the rest of the country that their problem is rich people and not the minority who are participating in the general strike? Because I'm here to tell you, there are plenty of people who aren't overt fascist bootlickers who will still blame strikers for disruption.

I have no idea what to do, but I do know that I can't afford to stop working because I will starve. And I'm hardly in the worst position. It would be nice if the management classes were interested in going on strike, but they won't be. Plus, I'm not sure that if the management classes went on strike it would move the needle. I don't know.

I'm tall. I have been asked innumerable times to help a stranger get something off a high shelf in a store. I've even offered to help once or twice, though I only do so in dire circumstances. Usually it's something right there, but occasionally I've been summoned from another aisle. This is the code of the tall person. I am bound to help you by my giant blood, in payment of some long-past debt of my people to yours. Don't worry. The pact will always be honored.

You know what? Smoke alarms should be free. CO2 alarms should be too. Radon, ditto. Gas leak, ditto. Basically, the government should pay somebody to come to every building in the country and install basic safety alarms. #FlamingHotTake

My "actually tax the rich" plan is often criticized by people who don't understand taxation. See, they think, "If you tax the rich at a top marginal rate of 95% then after a couple of years you won't have any rich people anymore," because they've been getting AIE's mailers. No, you simple people, if I tax the rich at a top marginal rate of 95%, they just won't get richer quite as quickly because, all together now, INCOME TAXES TAX INCOME NOT POSSESSIONS. It's right there in the name.

We could tax the ever-living fuck out of rich income and those bastards would still be just as rich as they always have been. In fact, since, repeat after me, THE TOP MARGINAL RATE ONLY APPLIES TO INCOME WHICH EXCEEDS THE TOP MARGIN, their total income wouldn't even be taxed at that rate, which is, again, literally in the name. So they could make a buttload of money which would be taxed at a lower rate, and only income which exceeded a fairly ludicrous amount would be taxed at close to but not 100%.

How is this even something that I keep having to debate with people who are in so little danger of having their income taxed at that rate that they might as well be just as poor as I am for all the effect it'll have on their lives? I promise you, the ultrawealthy are not going to pay you to defend their wealth. You're not a tax lawyer or politician.

Now, I also happen to believe that we should seize rich people's property and distribute it to the poor, but that's not a tax plan and that's basically what you fucking temporarily-inconvenienced millionaires are forcing me into because you don't want a fairly modest proposal with regard to income taxes. Seriously, I get that you think I'm being unreasonable, but it's getting to the point where it's my plan or guillotines. I'm not advocating guillotines, but you're forcing the issue.

Meanwhile, the ultrawealthy are laughing their asses off at you. You don't even understand how taxes work. You're not going to get rich that way. And you should probably look up what happened to the middle class after the Russian Revolution. I'm not threatening you, I'm warning you: people don't stop eating the rich once they get a taste for it.

Oh good, he's going to give Cheney a medal. Just what everyone fucking wanted. Dipshit.

So there's absolutely no reason to believe 2025 will be happy at all, but I still wish it for you. I wish your coming year a surfeit of joy such that you require no more and can give your surplus to others. I wish you an end to suffering and a bright dawn. If I wish it hard enough, maybe some small fragment of it will come true for us all.

I'm typing this one-handed not for lewd reasons but because Poffenberger requires my other hand to be constantly petting her or she will claw me. Send help. If you run out of help, send nudes I guess, I'm not your mother.

Hey, reply guys and clout chasers and other people who get told they're not welcome by everyone they talk to: I'm right here. I'm here for you. Leave that marginalized person alone and come to my replies. I've got enough followers that it's highly likely someone will see you.

Or do you only get off on it when it's unwelcome?

Oh.

Yeah, I thought it might be that. Carry on then, dipshits.

Ronald Reagan is still dead. So there's that.

Look, if your choices are between two things, both of which are bad for some people, one of which is less bad for you personally, yeah, it's selfish to go for the one which benefits you, but for the people for whom it's bad, there's no difference, so kicking yourself in the face isn't going to make it any better for them.

There are lots of things America needs. It will not get them. #subtoot #ButNicely

I wish we could divorce Christmas from Christianity. I largely have. I know that for many people it's impossible, and I totally respect that, but we need a holiday in the middle of winter to help keep out the cold. We need to give gifts and spread good cheer and feast. It's not Christian to want those things, it's just human.

I'm not sure that December 25 is really the ideal date for it, at least in the US. It seems like the end of January is where we need a holiday, but that's probably because Christmas exists; if it didn't, I'm not sure when the ideal holiday time would be. And in the Southern Hemisphere, having a holiday in the middle of summer is maybe not ideal either.

I don't know. I don't like that Christmas is Christian, but all the other winter holidays are religious too. Rampant commercialism isn't great either. Maybe we should just celebrate State-Mandated Winter Holiday by eating an extra ration of gruel today. There's no joy left. We're all just alone in the cold. Sigh.

I am definitely one of those people who reach for the garlic for nearly everything. I think I've only ever once had a dish which had too much garlic in it, and that was because the garlic hadn't been tempered at all so the dish essentially tasted like chewing garlic cloves. Which I've done. This was almost spicy, it was so garlicky. It made my tongue hurt a little.

Anyway, if a recipe calls for two cloves of garlic, I'm more likely to add half a head, particularly if it's going to be cooked for a while. I appreciate subtle flavors, but I like taste, and there's usually room for more garlic. I use garlic powder too. I'm not proud. Occasionally I'll add fresh garlic, canned garlic, and garlic powder to a dish because each of them brings a slightly different taste to the party.

I probably overspice things I cook. I like bold flavors. And I'm whiter than rice in a snowstorm, so I'm probably not the best judge of when things are flavored enough. I can't handle spicy food, as in food with a lot of capsaicin, well anymore, but I make up for it by adding a lot of mild but still flavorful spices. My spice cabinet takes up two cabinets. I wish I had more room for spices than I do.

My tongue gets bored easily. I think that's the best way to describe it.

I want to play a video game where I have a bunch of cats and that's it. Cat Herder Simulator. No objectives, no puzzles, just me and a simply irresponsible number of cats. I would like to be able to name them, but that's a nice-to-have, not a load-bearing feature. Maybe I can pick them up and move them around, even though they might get up and move back. Basically I want to be able to mildly bother a myriad of cats, maybe whom I can name.

@wendyg
Someone else mentioned this, so clearly I have to do my research and watch the video when I get home.

Early results are extremely disappointing. Come on, people. There's a right answer to this one and everything.

The point of A Christmas Carol isn't the salvation of Scrooge's soul. That's secondary. Frankly, we don't know what happens to Scrooge's soul. It might be that the chains you forge in life remain with you always.

The point is that Tiny Tim doesn't die.

That, in microcosm, is the difference between the religion practiced by many people and truly living a good life. You'll notice that Dickens doesn't send Jesus to Scrooge to tell him he's being a bad man. There's not much about Christianity in A Christmas Carol, really. The Spirits aren't angels. And they don't show Scrooge that his place should be giving his money to the church and praying for salvation.

A Christmas Carol is a worldly tale of what might happen to Scrooge in this life, not the next. His salvation, if it can be called that, is found not in faith but in action. We're never treated to a homily on the true meaning of Christmas being a baby in a manger. We see Christmases Past, Present, and Future as people observe them. The future for Scrooge may be bleak, but it is still Christmas. In fact, one could make the point that only by showing Scrooge the real-world consequences of his actions can his actions be changed. If he needed to hear about the Hell that awaits the rich man, Marley told him that at the outset.

But why save Scrooge? A wretched old miser if ever there was one. Sure, the story is directed at people who are in similar need of salvation, but the end of the story doesn't make it clear that Scrooge achieves salvation. He just doesn't die hated and alone.

No, the Spirits change Scrooge not for himself but to save Tiny Tim, and by extension the Cratchits as a family. And then, by further extension, all the other poor people who will be saved by Scrooge's change of heart. But Tiny Tim is the start. To save even one life is blessed.

So when people ask why the Spirits put so much effort into changing Scrooge, who doesn't deserve it, remember how the story ends. Tiny Tim doesn't die. Dickens wants you to know that in no uncertain terms. He stresses it. Tiny Tim, who did NOT die.

The lesson you should take from A Christmas Carol is to keep your Tiny Tim alive however possible and worry about theology later.