so on the subject of stolen property, i’ve seen various arguments on this point but it is in fact true that inheriting something from a relative, when you know full well that it was stolen, does not make it yours.

this clearly goes doubly so for powerful magical artifacts, and especially for artifacts which are strongly implied to contain part of their creator’s soul!

you can talk about consequences - maybe the artifact in question has benefits for you, maybe you’re not convinced its rightful owners would use it responsibly - but talking about the consequences doesn’t erase the fact that whatever benefits you think you’re getting are achieved through wrongful means.

which is why i, too, think Frodo should have given the One Ring back to Sauron. thief.

Hahahahaha here comes the law student nerd ready to complicate your wonderful post, op.

(Really this is just pretext for me to study for my property final in a week, so thanks yeah)

Because according to the principles of common property law, the matter of who actually owns title to the One Ring becomes really complicated really fast.

Buckle up babes for the pedantic law lecture no one asked for.

(more under the cut)

Keep reading

I am SO HAPPY that I’m going to law school and can still be a nerd bless u man

I’d like you all to know that “Frodo has current possession of the Ring, and could be rightful possessor depending on the Statute of Limitations in Middle Earth” is now my favourite sentence.

This is a gift that I did not deserve

first, YES SO MUCH THIS

second, would cy-près apply here (assuming we follow the Ring-trust interpretation that ashleynef offers above, which I’m inclined to)? I mean, we don’t have a probate judge (or, really, anyone who could make such a decision, unless one of the Valar feels like it), but is there a case that, the purpose of the trust having been frustrated by Arnor’s failure to keep existing, the trust should be repurposed to prevent its failing? In that case, the nearest beneficiary would be Arthedain, but then it failed to keep existing too. At that point, I think there may at least be an argument that the Ring would now be being held in trust for the benefit of the next-nearest Nùmenorean-descended kingdom. Which, if my hazy understanding of cy-près holds, would mean that the rightful possessor (or trustee, anyway) of the Ring would be the Kingdom of Gondor. (Because, you know, Denethor needs even more problems created by possessing artefacts directly linked to Sauron.)

Cemetery forests would be great, if you could get them to work out ecologically. Not only would you have healthy, sustainable burials with physical markers to mourn at, you’d also inspire emotional investment in conservation and promote old-growth forests. No one wants to chop down great-great-great-grandpa Karkat the oak tree for lumber.

@ask-treekat

you’re kidding me

You want a haunted forest. That’s how you get a haunted forest

Well, better a haunted forest than a haunted useless plot of land filled with concrete and steel and hundreds of gallons of poison that we have to constantly manicure. Haunted forests are classy *and* contribute to the world by absorbing CO2 and producing oxygen, providing shelter for wildlife, and help get goth teenagers to appreciate nature.

I know this is not the point of this post, and I'm pretty much in agreement with the ACTUAL point But "great-great-grandpa karkat" just has me thinking of a really shouty, romcom-obsessed Deku Tree with horns...

“Steve Rogers will have a beard in Infinity War.”

Like the obvious thing to say is "Didn't Cap have a beard in Civil War" And that was what I wrote at first But like... I definitely headcanon Steve as bi. ('Cause, you know, #bisexualsteverogersforamerica) And I can't really reconcile that with immediately assuming that Sharon Carter was his beard. It feels like bisexual erasure to assume that, just because Winter Soldier was largely a romcom between Cap and Sam and a lot of the rest, plus much of Civil War, was Steve/Bucky, he's *automatically* only into dudes and any relationship with a woman is *obviously* a sham. Which means the damn pun doesn't work but dammit I need to find a way to make it work Tl;dr I tried to make a Captain America pun and somehow all this

Emma Donoghue, talking about LGBT history and LGBT historical fiction (via officerhaughtstuff)

This quote was found in Linda Garber’s Essay “Claiming Lesbian History” which is a great read and super thought-provoking. I highly recommend it if you can find it.

(via officerhaughtstuff)

LGBT historical fiction is *so important* you guys It's not just telling the factual stories. It's situating us in history and making it so that "historical fiction" doesn't just mean "novels about straights 100+ years ago". A few recommendations: Donoghue's own The Sealed Letter; it's a little uneven in places but does a really good job of situating (aspects of) queer history in the feminist/suffragist movement in 19th century Britain, without sacrificing character and plot (it's based on an actual case, and most of the characters are historical) Ellen Klage's Passing Strange, which I'm reading right now; it's about lesbian identity and culture in WWII era San Francisco and it's this heady mix of queer and magic and dream Most anything by Sarah Waters (I especially like Fingersmith and Tipping the Velvet); lots and lots of British lesbians in the late 19th, early 20th century The Widdershins books, by Jordan L Hawk; ok, these are gay lovecraftian romance novels, but they're carefully-situated-in-queer-American-history gay lovecraftian romance novels The Song of Achilles, by Madeline Miller; caveat, I haven't actually read this one, but I badly want to (Also LGBT history but honestly a lot more people have that covered.)

dogs-of-peace said: 

____

Ah yes. I had to listen to an “inspirational speaker” whose main message was “exercise and just stop taking pills!!!” a few weeks ago through a work event. Yay. Lovely. 

fixed it

Perfect

fuck you I’m gonna eat a mountain too

an mountain.

take an fucin crunch babes,

CRAVE THAT MINERAL

This post has taken some turns I didn’t expect, but I’m cool with that 😊

Every day I take bupropion, hormones, and an Alp. Two Alps when necessary.

Guys. This is what a national chain store trolling Trump looks like. A bunch of dystopian novels with a sign (I presume) meant for the travel section.

Support your local disgruntled bookstore manager with a dark sense of humor.

Oh my god I made a dystopia display kinda like this (way fewer copies obvs, but many of the same books) for the teen space at my branch But this!! The sign!!!

ugh

guys

Why is this so adorable

Gay lions, guys

It’s a gay pride.

Reblogging for adorable, also that awful, horrible pun.

Fun, but also true fact for the day. Lions are one of the mammals aside from humans that have a high tendency to find a partner of the same gender. Apparently, Gay Lions are not something that is rare. 

Gay pride, omfg.

Just remember. There is no such thing as a fake geek girl. There are only fake geek boys. Science fiction was invented by a woman.

Specifically a teenage girl. You know, someone who would be a part of the demographic that some of these boys are violently rejecting.

Isaac Asimov.

yo mary shelley wrote frankenstein in 1818 and isaac asimov was born in 1920 so you kinda get my point

If you want to push it back even further Margaret Cavendish, the duchess of Newcastle (1623-1673) wrote The Blazing World in 1666, about a young woman who discovers a Utopian world that can only be accessed via the North Pole - oft credited as one of the first scifi novels

Women have always been at the forefront of literature, the first novel (what we would consider a novel in modern terms) was written by a woman (Lady Muraskai’s the Tale of Genji in the early 1000s) take your snide “Isaac Asimov” reblogs and stick it

even in terms of male scifi authors, asimov was predated by Jules Verne, HG Wells, George Orwell, you could have even cited Poe or Jonathan Swift has a case but Asimov?

PbbBFFTTBBBTBTTBBTBTTT so desperate to discredit the idea of Mary Shelly as the mother of modern science fiction you didn’t even do a frickin google search For Shame

And if you want to go back even further, the first named, identified author in history was Enheduanna of Akkad, a Sumerian high priestess.

Kinda funny, considering this Isaac Asimov quote on the subject:

Even Isaac Asimov ain’t having none of your shit, not even posthumously.

You know what else was invented by women? Masked vigilantes, the precursor to the modern superhero. Baroness Emma Orczy wrote The Scarlet Pimpernel in 1905. The character would later inspire better known masked vigilantes such as Zorro and Batman.

Got that?

Stick that in your international pipe and smoke it

I have literally been telling people this for over a year.

the first extended prose piece - ie a novel, was not, as many male scholars will shout, Don Quixote (1605) but The Tale of Genji (1008) written by a woman

The first autobiography ever written in English is also attributed to a woman, The Book of Margery Kempe (1430s).

The day may come when I find this post and do not reblog it, but it is not this day.

Women invented language while men were hunting. I mean…

LIBRARY GOTHIC

Collaborated on this with a friend last night instead of sleeping:

-You need to check out a certain book.  At the counter, they ask for your library card.  You search your pockets, but cannot find it.  The librarian stares at you implacably over their spectacles as your panic grows.  You know the price for losing the library card.

-You look for the book. You know the book is there: the computer told you, in glowing letters on the screen in a hillside. The librarian told you, and told you the secrets of the numbers. The book calls to you silently. The book is there. You know this. You cannot find the book. You will never find the book, though it will call to you for all its life.

-You are using the library computer when you hear the buzzing of people waiting behind you.  Sweat drips from your forehead as you encounter a loading screen.  The buzzing intensifies.  You don’t know how much time you have left.

-You venture into the dark recesses of the stacks. The feeble light of your phone isn’t enough, cannot be enough. In the distance you hear the mobile shelves begin to contract. The sound grows ever closer.

-At the reference desk they tell you your question cannot be answered.  Those dates and places never existed.  You see the desperation in their eyes, and don’t press the issue.

-You cautiously open a book. It isn’t cautious enough. It begins screaming, and soon others take up the cry. At first it sounds like wailing infants. Then, a little more like wolves.

-The sign says, ‘Silence In The Library,’ in tall, blocky letters.  The reading room is quiet.  The stacks are quiet.  The children in the children’s section make no noise.  Even your footfalls seem muffled.  You turn to ask a librarian to help you find a book, but your voice dies in your throat.

-The computers all work, but can only show the library page. When you try to search anything in the catalog, it simply returns 'FORBIDDEN’.

-Your book is overdue.  You hurriedly pack a suitcase and drive to the airport, abandoning your old life in the hope that it throws them off your trail long enough to escape.

-You ask the reference librarian for a book. They check the shelves and it isn’t there. They swallow nervously. You see the fear in their eyes. They reach beneath the desk and draw a sword, then march determinedly off into the backroom. You can see flashes of light, but little more, until they emerge, blood streaming from a dozen cuts, their sword covered in green ichor, and the book in their other hand.

-There are no books in the reading room.  There are people, but no books.  They stare into empty hands, listless and unresponsive.

-No humans are allowed in the reading room. The room causes books to be brought to it. The room reads.

-It’s children’s reading hour, and it’s time to choose a book.  The children clamor for Where The Wild Things Are.  You try to dissuade them, but they are adamant.  You prepare your blunderbuss.

-The book club is meeting. All sound stops. Nothing dares move; they dare hardly breathe. The book club is meeting. You can make out its members by their shadows alone. A junior staff member has fainted. The book club is meeting.

-There is a book signing.  You are holding a copy of the book.  You never bought a copy.  You don’t know this author.  You cannot escape the pull of the queue.

-The reshelving cart holds far more books than it ought to be able to. It may hold ore books than are in fact in the library. This does not faze the circulation tech at all.

-You are waiting to check out a book when you hear the screams from the front.  Someone has tried to return a damaged book.  You withdraw to the reading room.

-The book drop’s maw yawns hungrily. Do you dare approach it? You do not. Another, braver soul drops hers in. You swear you hear a burp as the book disappears.

-You are searching through the stacks, reading the numbers.  There are so many numbers, you are beginning to lose track.  Was your book in the 400’s or 500’s?  You check the number, but the numbers change before your eyes.

Dear future me,

Sorry for not starting that paper earlier. Good luck!

Sincerely, present me

Dear past me, Fuck you. Sincerely, your future

tell me all the gritty plots and auteur ideas you want, but we all know the perfect movie would still be a remake of grease starring kristen stewart as danny zuko and taylor swift as sandy

Oh my god Someone please make this happen

Had to do a political cartoon about a social issue, so i did this. 

"Here’s a cryptic clue leading you to a train with a dead body. Solve the murder and you get the next clue to where the mystery books might be"

THE HORROR BOOKS ARE THE IN BASEMENT OH MY GOD YES THIS BOOKSTORE WOULD BE THE BEST

Life goal: open this bookstore