@starskysredlongjohns / starskysredlongjohns.tumblr.com
another reminder to stop buying/watching/reading anything JK Rowling associated
I cannot stress enough she is a primary funder of transphobia. She is not just someone with bigoted views you can seperate from her work, her work funds the bigotry.
This has to have been posted but i cant find it so
I legitimately do not understand people who do this kind of thing. How do you just….IMAGINE that? Out of thin air? The actual drawing part takes practice to do cleanly, but a lot of it is just geometry. I get that part. Impressive, yes, because they took the time to learn the skill, but it’s also a skill (almost) anyone can learn with enough time and patience.
But to sit there and just. DREAM UP this elaborate pattern, and know it’s all going to look good together, and VISUALIZE how it works—how?! How do you do that?
when christian artists change the line in hallelujah from “maybe there’s a God above” to “I know that there’s a God above” >:c
it’s also because Leonard COHEN (!) was Jewish and this is a quintessentially Jewish line, and changing it to that level of Annoying Certainty is stripping it of its Jewish meaning and imbuing it with that particularly American smug evangelical Christian attitude that makes me tired, so very tired
THAT IS EXACTLY WHY
I don’t think I’ve heard any cover artist sing my favorite verses You say I took the name in vain I don’t even know the name But if I did, well really, what’s it to you? There’s a blaze of light In every word It doesn’t matter which you heard The holy or the broken Hallelujah I did my best, it wasn’t much I couldn’t feel, so I tried to touch I’ve told the truth, I didn’t come to fool you And even though It all went wrong I’ll stand before the Lord of Song With nothing on my tongue but Hallelujah
um woah
I will always hit the reblog button so hard for Hallelujah but ESPECIALLY mentions of the elusive final verses which are just about my favorite lyrics ever. Why do people always omit the best part of the song??
In Yiddish
In Hebrew
In Ladino
Yeah, I wonder why the verses that reference specific Jewish mystical and chassidic concepts that aren’t readily understood by American “I love Jews, you know, Jesus was Jewish!” Christians never get any airtime. Funny that.
You say I took the name in vain I don’t even know the name But if I did, well really, what’s it to you? There’s a blaze of light In every word It doesn’t matter which you heard The holy or the broken Hallelujah
These are specifically about Chassidic Jewish theories of the holy language, how each letter and combination of letters in Hebrew contains the essence of the divine spark and if used correctly, can unlock or uncover the divine spark in the mundane material word. And of course, there are secret names of God which, when spoken by any ordinary human would kill them, but if you are worthy and holy and righteous can be used to perform miracles or even to behold the glory of God face-to-face. The words themselves have power. Orthodox Jews often won’t even pronounce the word “hallelujah” in it’s entirety in conversation, because the “yah” sound at the end is a True Name of God (there are hundreds, supposedly) and thus too holy to say outside of prayer.
None of this is to mention how David’s sin in sleeping with Batshevah (the subject of much of the song, with a brief deviation to Shimshon and Delilah) is considered the turning point in the Tanach that ultimately dooms the Davidic line at the cosmological level and thus dooms Jewish sovereignty and independence altogether. From a Christian perspective this led to Jesus, the King of Kings, and that’s all very well and good for them, but for the Jews, the Davidic line never returned and is the central tragedy of the total arc of the Torah. Like, our Bible doesn’t have a happy ending? And that’s what this song is about? There’s no Grace - you just have to sit with the sin and its consequence.
Of course, Cohen is referencing all of this ironically, and personalizing these very high-level religious concepts. Like the point of this song is that Cohen, the songwriter, is identifying with David, the psalmist, and identifying his own sins with David’s. The ache that you hear in this song is that the two thousand year exile that resulted from one wrong night of passion and Cohen feels that the pain he has caused to his lover is of equally monumental infamy. Basically, in a certain light, the whole of Psalms is a vain effort for David to atone for his sin and I think Cohen was writing this song in wonderment that David could eternally praise the God who would not forgive him and would force him and his people into exile. But he ultimately gets how you have to surrender to the inexorable force of God in the face of your own inadequacies and how to surrender is to worship and to worship is to praise - hence, Hallelujah. You can either do the right thing and worship God from the start, or you can fuck up, be punished, and thus be forced to beg for His forgiveness. It’s the terrible inevitability of praise that’s driving him mad.
Like honestly, I identify with this song so strongly as an off-the-derech Jew, I sometimes wonder what Christians can possibly hear in this song, as it speaks so specifically to the sadomasochistic relationship that a lapsed Jew has with their God. It’s such a different song from a Christian theological perspective it’s almost unrecognizable, man. This song continues to be a wonder of postmodern Jewish theology and sexuality from start to finish. Don’t let anyone give you any “Judeo-Christian” narishkeit. This is a Jewish song.
(Sorry about the wild tangent it’s just 2AM and I love this song so dang much, you guys.)
holy shit. woah.
This.
I … I am finding myself having some very powerful and inarticulate Feels about @dduane reblogging this whole thing with the tag #Young Wizards meta.
It’s also…all of the Jewish erasure and appropriation is awful, what I’m about to say isn’t meant to be on par with it. But to take a brilliant, shining piece of art-any art, really!-and then to just ‘well, naw, this is better’, and then to perform the edit without acknowledgment. To behave as though the ‘right’ message was there all along…
Who the fuck are you? And in case anyone was going to flip their lid, that doesn’t mean they should be *stopped* from doing so. But it’s just so fucking disrespectful. And for what? Because you can’t hear a piece of music that makes uncomfortable statements without having to ‘fix’ it?
Nothing says ‘strong faith’ like ‘intense fragility’.
Oh thank fuck, you’ve all unbroken this song for me. The only “analysis” I’ve heard for it was that it’s an extended double entendre, which to me felt like such a senseless waste of symbolism. It’s been years since I could enjoy it at all. To know that it IS actually about the writer’s experience with religion makes it so much more sincere
My butch and I are both lesbians. We are, neither of us, men.
But I call him my boyfriend. I call him my boytoy, my boy, sir, Mr., guy. Cause this language makes him happy. It supports his gender and expression, and it makes him happy.
Butches of all flavors and types have been using he/him pronouns and masculine language forever. Butches have been called boy, guy, boyfriend. Butches have used "traditionally masculine" names like Mitch, Ed, Mac, Joe.
Cause guess what?
Language is fake! It's all made up! If it makes you happy, use it! Wanna call yourself "boy," even if you're not a man? Do it! Wanna be called "boyfriend," even if you're not a guy? Go for it!
official anti terf post
It's so fucked up that digging a bunch of holes works so well at reversing desertification
I hate that so much discourse into fighting climate change is talking about bioenginerring a special kind of seaweed that removes microplastics or whatever other venture-capital-viable startup idea when we have known for forever about shit like digging crescent shaped holes to catch rainwater and turning barren land hospitable
i’ve seen a lot of really messed up images in my time on the internet, weird fetish shit, even a few IRL gore images but nothing. NOTHING evokes such a deep seated, gut wrenching fear in me like this image of the fucking water slide from Action Park with the loop in it
hey what the fuck
Action Park baby.
It had teeth
“If you have time to watch Netflix you have time for a side hustle” my side hustle is relaxing so that my body and brain can heal from by this nose-to-the-grindstone bullshit. I refuse to feel guilty for being a human with the need to relax sometimes. my side hustle is no.
whenever i hear about hustle culture i always think about this post on r/antiwork
thinking about fleetwood mac and how they actually sang songs about each other. and performed them. about how much they loved or hated each other like what the fuck how
I mean can you imagine. singing about how somebody broke your heart and they're literally harmonizing. they're right fucking there. they're in touching distance. insanity! complete insanity! I would either break down crying or fully snap and break their neck
fucking. silver springs!!! 'you'll never get away from the sound of the woman that loves you!' no fucking kidding he won't stevie he's literally behind you playing the drums! absolute madlads
Not to free-associate to another of my mum’s fave bands or anything, but this is also why I lose my mind over ABBA’s The Winner Takes It All. Björn, recently divorced, writes a song about a divorce with his writing partner Benny, then records it with his recent ex-wife Agnetha singing lead vocals.
Even if you believe them when they say it’s not about their divorce specifically, that’s a wild as fuck thing to choose to do.
Shout out to Richard and Linda Thompson.
thinking about fleetwood mac and how they actually sang songs about each other. and performed them. about how much they loved or hated each other like what the fuck how
I mean can you imagine. singing about how somebody broke your heart and they're literally harmonizing. they're right fucking there. they're in touching distance. insanity! complete insanity! I would either break down crying or fully snap and break their neck
fucking. silver springs!!! 'you'll never get away from the sound of the woman that loves you!' no fucking kidding he won't stevie he's literally behind you playing the drums! absolute madlads
Not to free-associate to another of my mum’s fave bands or anything, but this is also why I lose my mind over ABBA’s The Winner Takes It All. Björn, recently divorced, writes a song about a divorce with his writing partner Benny, then records it with his recent ex-wife Agnetha singing lead vocals.
Even if you believe them when they say it’s not about their divorce specifically, that’s a wild as fuck thing to choose to do.
Shout out to Richard and Linda Thompson.
So I've been researching early Christian schisms again, and I'm obsessed with this website. The phrasing is impeccable. Jesus was simply a creature
I think I’m going to think about this youtube comment forever
LIL TAY??????
So… did anyone have Lil Tay being incredibly based on their 2024 bingo?
Honestly bless her - I'm glad she got out from under her parents' thumb, being a child social media star can be even worse than being a child actor
😳SCARLETT JOHA- oh wait no nvm it’s someone else
I love these characters sale sale and sasa lele
