Tony at his parents funeral feat. the Winter Soldier
(because my headcanon is that the Winter Soldier attended Howard and Maria’s funeral from afar, even though he doesn’t know why he feels like he needs to be there or who the kid crying in the corner is)
A Christmas Carol is so wild to me because it takes not one, not two, but like four fucking ghosts to convince this dude not to be the biggest douche in the universe. Like, four fucking ghosts came back from the dead, rose from the Goddamn grave to be like, “I came back from the dead because you need to quit your shit.” Fuck. How big of an asshole do you have to be to have four fucking ghosts tell you to stop?
Have you ever met a rich capitalist
Also, one of those ghosts was a rich capitalist douche. He needed to reform Scrooge to work off his own sentence, didn’t he?
Marley’s ghost basically told Scrooge that if he kept being a greedy douchebag he would go to hell and Scrooge still needed convincing and that honestly is 100% believable to me
That an old rich white guy being told “Your going to hell unless you help the poor” would respond by going “I still kind of want to NOT help the poor tho?”
Charlie Dickens knew what was up.
Dickens had to work in a factory hos entire childhood. His father was thrown in a debtor’s prison. Thats why all his stories are about rich fucks getting owned.
And yet Dickens made Scrooge into an empathetic character. One whole ghost is showing how Scrooge got to be that way. You understand the complexity of his motivations and how a life can begin to harden ones heart and soul.
Dickens was not so simplistic as to make a ham fisted “durr capitalists evil” tract. There are hundreds of those. The reason why A Christmas Carol sticks with you is because even the man you’re supposed to hate you leave understanding and even liking.
Also, when we visit Scrooge’s past, we’re shown that he used to work for Fezziwig, a kindly, rich businessman who not only gave his employees the day off for Christmas with pay, but also invited them to his huge, expensive Christmas party, which not only serves as a contrast as to how Scrooge treated Bob Cratchit, but also makes it stand out among other “capitalism bad” tracts by having a rich businessman who was benevolent to his employees as character with quite a bit of significance. It’s also made pretty clear that Scrooge originally went into business so that he make enough money to support his fiancée, Belle, but the problem is that he lost his way and became consumed with greed, and neglected Belle until she had no choice but to leave him.
Another problem Scrooge had wasn’t just because he was rich, but he was rich and cheap as hell. We’re talking about a guy who was so cheap that not only did he refuse to replace the “Scrooge and Marley” sign outside his office building even after Jacob Marley had been dead for seven years, but also refused to furnish or clean up the dingy, old house Marley had left to him even after he moved in.
Edit: I forgot to mention, the purpose of all four ghosts is to show what will happen to Scrooge if he doesn’t repent, show how he used to be and how he fell, what’s he’s missing out on and how others still depend on him, and how he can change his ways.
Marley’s Ghost shows what will happen to Scrooge in the afterlife if doesn’t start looking out for his fellow man.
The Ghost of Christmas Past shows how Scrooge had nobler goals and ambitions before he became a miser, and, as I said before, shows how he should likely emulate his old benevolent boss instead of just being another crass businessman.
The Ghost of Christmas Present shows the joy that Scrooge has been missing out on not only on Christmas, but missing out on life as well. It also shows how there are still people who rely on and even care about him, specifically Bob and his nephew, Fred (Fred because they’re only the family either one has left and Fred knows deep down that Scrooge is just hurting himself, and Bob because even though he’s not paid a lot, he still relies on Scrooge as his employer to pay him in order to feed his family, even going so far as to Scrooge “the founder” of his family’s feast in spite of his crappy treatment).
The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come shows what will happen to Scrooge in the mortal world after he dies (ends up hated, mocked, and barely remembered in death), and how his carelessness affects the other people he knows (Bob Cratchit is out of a job and his son is dead because Scrooge neglected to pay Bob better, and it’s somewhat implied in some versions that Fred may go down a similar path Scrooge went down because they were so distant, and Fred lost the only other family he had left in the world), and this all culminates in Scrooge genuinely seeing the error of his ways, wanting to prevent all of this from happening, and leads him to swearing to “honor Christmas, and try to keep it all the year.”
This is the reason for all for of the Ghosts’ visits, and why Scrooge couldn’t, in his own words, “take them all at once and have it over with.”
YES
The “Capitalism bad” yahoos missed or outirght ignored big important parts of the story to spin it as a simplistic “capitalism bad” story?
I don’t know, but it’s frustrating that most robot detectives are good at their jobs. I want more shitty robot detectives. They’re trying their best but oh my god. Oh my god. Who greenlighted this project?! The programming is dysfunctional… the AI is a mess… the only reason they solve any mysteries at all is because people pity them and just want to help them out…
“God. I’m so sorry. Please forgive the detective – this project was rushed and didn’t get much testing or development. You’re not actually a murder suspect, it’s just decided that the most efficient way to complete the objective ‘identify murderer’ is to accuse absolutely everyone in a 20 mile radius of the crime by the logic that the murderer is probably one of the eight million people living in the city.”
“SleuthBot9000, what are your thoughts?”
“Frequency analysis of online databases suggests that the most statistically probable explanation is that ‘the butler did it’.”
“Slu…”
“Yes, sir?”
“How much did you cost to build?”
“22 million dollars, sir.”
“Jesus fuck.”
“The suspect was found with hundreds of gigabytes of obscene images on his personal computer.”
“‘Slu… these are cat pictures…”
“Like I said, sir. Obscene.”
“SleuthBot9000, I’ve been reviewing your reports. It says here that you’re programmed to meet a quota of 30 solved crimes a month.”
“Yes, sir.”
“It says you have met this quota perfectly since your activation April.”
“Yes, sir.”
“It also says that there has been a single culprit in each case.”
“Yes, sir.”
“It says that culprit is SleuthBot9000. Slu… have you been committing crimes just so you can solve them and meet quota?”
“Yes, sir. It was the most efficient solution.”
“What happened to the robot?”
“SleuthBot9000 has retired from the force.”
“Oh thank god.”
“Yeah uh… turns out trying to solve crimes algorithmically using machine learning was a disaster, and fine-tuning it to think more like a real cop had some, ah, unintended results.”
“Yeah? Like what?”
“Well, within three days it had become a racial profiling machine. We did some experiments and had it watch a basketball game. Every time a white player passed the ball to a black player, Slu identified the orange basketball as a gun and started recommending defensive action. It did the same thing when we showed it a video of a black toddler playing with a toy truck. It finally glitched out when we asked it to identify a black couple holding hands – it got confused because its new algorithm told it that it was looking at a gun paradoxically holding and being held by another gun. It started sparking and babbling incoherent nonsense until Sgt. Delaney shut it down.”
“So that’s the end of SleuthBot9000?”
“Well, yes and no. Internal affairs and the ACLU have requested to review copies of its programming. I like to think that Slu will get a memory wipe and spend the rest of its days peacefully misidentifying flocks of sheep in lush green fields somewhere in the countryside.”
“Captain, is that… is that SleuthBot9000?”
“I’m afraid so, Henley.”
“I thought you said it had retired to counting electric sheep!”
“Yes, well, it’s back and it looks like it’s here to stay. Get used to it.”
“But… why?! It was comically incompetent! It was humiliating to work with… I’m still sending getting angry letters demanding apologies for its behavior and dismal policing. I watched it try to arrest a bronze statue for loitering, Captain! A bronze statue!”
“The one that looks like an old lady with a bag of groceries? Can’t say I blame it – never liked that statue much. The thing is, Henley, you and I both know that it was a bad detective and a joke of a cop. But… believe it or not, it did its job. Not the one we wanted it for, no, but the whole point in automating detective work was to improve policing. According to the sociologists and Internal Affairs, our friend Slu was a goddamn psychology experiment designed to inspire human achievement through relative failure. Statistics show that all departments issued a SleuthBot9000 experienced a dramatic decrease in reports of human misconduct, wrongful arrests, and violent altercations with civilians. Apparently Slu serves as a mocking mirror of our own incompetence and fills us with a desire to be better than we are. The actual damage it has caused is negligible.”
“So. We’re just gonna… let it do its thing? Its horrible, horrible thing? Because we want to perform humanity more gracefully?”
I find that if I’m wearing Real Adult Business Clothes my worksona can do things like call people and check my inbox, whereas pajamas hellen mostly wants to shovel hamburgers into her face and set things on fire.
Over the weekend it seemed like a solid trade agreement – putting the
trade war on hold for 90 days – had been made between the United States
and China. And then Trump couldn’t resist Twitter, where, over a few
posts, he warned that if the deal didn’t happen, he was a “Tariff Man.”
Following his toxic tweets, the Dow Jones industrial fell 705 points, or
nearly 3%. The Nasdaq fell 3.1%.
instead try; I love you *generic keysmash* h OW DA RE *lavish praise* *inside fandom joke* *quote fave part* *more generic keysmashing*
you. i like you
Also, the favorites: 1) DID I SAY YOU COULD HURT ME LIKE THIS?!?;?!; 2) DONT HURT MY BABY WHY WOULD YOU DO THIS 3) why must you hurt me this way 4) WHY IS THIS A CLIFFHANGER?! WHAT HAPPENS NEXT I NEED TO KNOW 5) This made me cry/squeal/giggle/wake the dead with my laughter 6) I almost woke my family laughing at ___ part 7) I DIDNT KNOW I NEEDED THIS AU UNTIL YOU POSTED THIS 8) this is so cute I’m dying 9) and (writer’s name) strikes again! 10) I had to reread this bc it’s so good and I love it 11) I wish I could like/heart/kudos this more than once Like, seriously guys, freak out with us and you’ll have us wrapped around your little fingers.
This is so true! A lot of the time, I get stuck in a writer’s hole. But whenever I get a comment like the above ones, it makes me want to write more!
PLEASE COMMEEEENT
AND REBLOG
All good suggestions! Another to add to the list: don’t insult as a joke.
Even if you’re only ironically saying something like “i hate you” when you in fact loved the fic… we still just read it as “i hate you”. Getting a notif of a comment always gives writers a little thrill, and then seeing something like that in the actual comment… doesn’t feel very good. Remember, the digital medium is not good for getting sarcasm across!
Apart from that, any sincere comment, no matter how brief or jumbled or nonsensical, is always going to make a writer’s day.
Thx for comments suggestions I always get stuck when I want to comment but idk what to write and i just give kudos
Honest to God, I love when people quote my fic to me or leave detailed reviews or scream wildly, but “I really enjoyed this” = A+ comment, will make my day and leave me doing a face somewhere between these three emoticons: ☺️😁😍
Of course writers enjoy detailed, thoughtful, enthusiastic feedback, but what we mostly love is knowing someone read something we wrote and was moved to leave a short comment (that wasn’t “please update” – please update is fine as part of a comment, but on its own it’s kind of dispiriting). I seriously cannot overstate how much even a short little “OMG LOVE” or “I enjoyed this!” or “This made me laugh/smile/cry!” or “This was really good/funny/hot/sad!” means. You don’t have to write Pulitzer prize winning prose to make a writer’s day. Trust me on this!
(And even a like or a kudos is so much better than nothing.)
Writing can be lonely, and fanwriters don’t have Amazon for reviews or get paid. Reviews mean the world to us.
Yes, I am going to continually reblog this. No, I’m not sorry.
I don’t know, but it’s frustrating that most robot detectives are good at their jobs. I want more shitty robot detectives. They’re trying their best but oh my god. Oh my god. Who greenlighted this project?! The programming is dysfunctional… the AI is a mess… the only reason they solve any mysteries at all is because people pity them and just want to help them out…
“God. I’m so sorry. Please forgive the detective – this project was rushed and didn’t get much testing or development. You’re not actually a murder suspect, it’s just decided that the most efficient way to complete the objective ‘identify murderer’ is to accuse absolutely everyone in a 20 mile radius of the crime by the logic that the murderer is probably one of the eight million people living in the city.”
“SleuthBot9000, what are your thoughts?”
“Frequency analysis of online databases suggests that the most statistically probable explanation is that ‘the butler did it’.”
“Slu…”
“Yes, sir?”
“How much did you cost to build?”
“22 million dollars, sir.”
“Jesus fuck.”
“The suspect was found with hundreds of gigabytes of obscene images on his personal computer.”
“‘Slu… these are cat pictures…”
“Like I said, sir. Obscene.”
“SleuthBot9000, I’ve been reviewing your reports. It says here that you’re programmed to meet a quota of 30 solved crimes a month.”
“Yes, sir.”
“It says you have met this quota perfectly since your activation April.”
“Yes, sir.”
“It also says that there has been a single culprit in each case.”
“Yes, sir.”
“It says that culprit is SleuthBot9000. Slu… have you been committing crimes just so you can solve them and meet quota?”
“Yes, sir. It was the most efficient solution.”
“What happened to the robot?”
“SleuthBot9000 has retired from the force.”
“Oh thank god.”
“Yeah uh… turns out trying to solve crimes algorithmically using machine learning was a disaster, and fine-tuning it to think more like a real cop had some, ah, unintended results.”
“Yeah? Like what?”
“Well, within three days it had become a racial profiling machine. We did some experiments and had it watch a basketball game. Every time a white player passed the ball to a black player, Slu identified the orange basketball as a gun and started recommending defensive action. It did the same thing when we showed it a video of a black toddler playing with a toy truck. It finally glitched out when we asked it to identify a black couple holding hands – it got confused because its new algorithm told it that it was looking at a gun paradoxically holding and being held by another gun. It started sparking and babbling incoherent nonsense until Sgt. Delaney shut it down.”
“So that’s the end of SleuthBot9000?”
“Well, yes and no. Internal affairs and the ACLU have requested to review copies of its programming. I like to think that Slu will get a memory wipe and spend the rest of its days peacefully misidentifying flocks of sheep in lush green fields somewhere in the countryside.”
