Madara Uchiha

Madara Uchiha

Banning stuff is a slippery slope, and if you first allow some things to be banned, the people doing the banning will ask for more, and more, and more. They are not doing it "for the children". They are doing it to control what other people have access to, and rely on manipulating your feelings to get you to go along with it. And once you have gone along with it once, it easier to persuade you to go along with it again, and again, even when it reaches the point where you are no longer sure why the thing they want to ban is bad. You have already given them the power to decide for you, so you have to keep trusting that they know best, right? After all, you did agree that the first things were bad, so surely these things have to be bad somehow as well? And once they get to things you like, you might even be gaslit to feel guilty because you liked it. After all, if they want to ban it, it must be bad, right? Wrong. Don't fall for this. Even stuff you don't like can have value in ways you cannot understand or predict. (If for nothing else than to serve as a buffer to protect the things you do like.) The only way to gain proper insight into a subject is to step outside your echo chamber, and read things you might not agree with. You might still disagree with it after reading it, but your opinion holds more weight because it is now more informed. Don't let other people do your thinking for you.

Hi! RE: your journal about the right for lolicon fiction to exist even if you disapprove of it, would you say it can also exist for titillation purposes, or do you stand by it for artistic reasons, or for the purpose of exploring dark themes only? I always thought you were saying the former, but I just wanted to ask. It's chill if you don't wanna answer this. Have a good day!

Here we are, 15 years on from that blog entry, and I still haven't read any lolicon, I'm afraid, so I have no idea about its themes. The context was whether you should be sent to prison for owning lolicon. What I said back then was,

In this case you obviously have read lolicon, and I haven't. I don't know whether you're writing from personal experience here, and whether you have personally been incited to rape children or give inappropriate hugs by reading it. (I assume you haven't. I assume that Chris Handley, with his huge manga collection, wasn't either. I've read books that claimed that exposure to porn causes rape, but have seen no statistical evidence that porn causes rape -- and indeed have seen claims that the declining number of US rapes may be due to the wider availability of porn. Honestly, I think it's a red herring in First Amendment matters, and I'll leave it for other people to argue about.) Still, you seem to want lolicon banned, and people prosecuted for owning it, and I don't. You ask, What makes it worth defending? and the only answer I can give is this: Freedom to write, freedom to read, freedom to own material that you believe is worth defending means you're going to have to stand up for stuff you don't believe is worth defending, even stuff you find actively distasteful, because laws are big blunt instruments that do not differentiate between what you like and what you don't, because prosecutors are humans and bear grudges and fight for re-election, because one person's obscenity is another person's art.

Because if you don't stand up for the stuff you don't like, when they come for the stuff you do like, you've already lost.

a comic about fix-it fanfics

hashirama & butsuma grave ficlet

I was in a hashirama mood over the weekend, kinda wanted an epilogue ish thing for a fic I'm not gonna write

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"Honourable father," Hashirama greets as he lights the incense and sticks it standing in the tray before the name tablet. He claps his hands together and bows. 

"Hope you're well," he says conversationally as he settles into his seat on the floor cushion to watch the stick of incense burn down. "I tried to get Tobirama to come with me, but he… actually I think it's better if I don't repeat what he said." 

The rising smoke curls around the name tablet. SENJU BUTSUMA the gold lettering declares. 

"You've got three granddaughters now. They're in Uzushio right now— Mito's mother insisted they visit once Mito and the baby were fit to travel, and she adores them so much she won't let them come back just yet— that's why it's just me."

"The village with the Uchiha is going well. Hikaku-san has really settled in and he's a great clan head. Mission death rate is down even more than anticipated with their three-man team system. Illness-related death is record-low as well. Income per capita doubled and peace is. Really good. It's really, really good. There are some things here and there I'd change if I could but overall it's more than I ever dreamed."

His fingers fiddle with the hem of his sleeve, a habit which had gotten him scolded in childhood, which only reappears here in the ancestral shrine.

"I wish you could have seen it," Hashirama concludes as the red ember of the incense stick burns out.

"You always were an angry man, so no doubt you would have found something to be unhappy about, but I still wish you could have seen what all your son's useless dreaming amounted to." 

He stands.

"Anyways, I can't stay," he explains apologetically. "Village to run, clan to lead, all that. It's busy work. I'll be back next year hopefully." 

He bows and steps backwards out of the shrine. 

"Until then, father," he says, and he closes the doors. 

Hour 3: Seeing You (In My Dreams)

Summary:

Madara has always wanted to see his brother again.

He never expected it to happen like this.

Author: @phlebaswrites Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Fandom: Naruto Relationship: Uchiha Izuna & Uchiha Madara, Uchiha Hikaku/Uchiha Madara Word Count: 1,029 (Complete) Warning: Canonical Character Death

Madara grips the shinai in his hand tightly, too tightly in fact, but he can't seem to let go.

He used to spar with Izuna like this, but that was when they were children, true children, long before they began to handle live steel.

Before Hashirama, and the dreams that came with him.

But his hands are the ones Madara sees every day, bearing the callouses of gunbai and kusarigama, and the hair which cuts across his face is long. Most of all though, he looks at Izuna through the red wash of the Sharingan… and his brother is blind.

Because his eyes are in Madara's face.

Read the rest on AO3.