Reasons I believe my friend is secretly some kind of deity
1) First time we spoke was a week after the beggining of freshman year she summed up my entire character and most of the events of my life Sherlock style. I asked her how the hell she knew all that. She just shrugged and said she figured out our entire class already.
2) The one time we had religion class instead of ethics she listened to the teacher for a few minutes, laughed and told me:
“Humans have wished to be gods so much they’ve forgotten they have to ability to create them. Imagination has truly suffered from this ‘monotheism’ stuff.”
I was confused and asked her if she was an atheist. She rolled her eyes and said:
“Oh I believe in god alright. I just don’t think the bastard deserves to be worshipped.”
3) Out of nowhere she gave me this advice:
“The only truth a liar ever told was that lies weren’t going to save you. Don’t become the liar who has to pass that wisdom on, because they speak from experience.”
4) To this day, she has one of those old-timey phones with buttons she only uses to ocassionally call someone. When I asked her why she never got a smartphone she got pouty:
“I hate social media. On Facebook they talk a lot but never say anything. If I wanted to listen to people moan about their problems and ask for help they don’t expect I’d listen to their prayers.” (Notice the choice of words)
5) I noticed she was stiff and I offered her a massage since I’m really good at it but when i started kneading her back I swear to this day those were not muscles I felt. I asked her what she did to turn her muscles into rocks covered with a thin layer of skin and she kinda froze then shrugged and said she was just really, really stiff. My hands hurt after ten minutes when I can usually go for an hour. Next time I offered she seemed surprised and laughed. She still has rocks for muscles.
6) We were having a debate over the way neural pathways are formed (I study biology and she forensics) and I jokingly asked if I could have her brain for study when she dies. She laughed.
“Sure, if you find a way to kill me you can have it. I’m actually curious what you’re gonna find.”
7) One time she was tired and miserable and I tried to comfort her. We both have really dark sense of humor so I told her she could scare the dead out of their graves with that glare. She told me the dead can’t come back and I rolled my eyes and said ‘obviously’ but she continued:
“When you die you descend to the underworld with nothing to lose. To keep you, they give you something to lose. When you want to return, they will demand it back. That’s why nobody ever leaves. The only way out is to never enter.”
8) One day she just came up to me with a disappointed look on her face. When I asked her what was wrong she was quiet for a few seconds and then just told me:
“Betrayals committed in good intentions are still damning. Just… keep that in mind.” Then she left and didn’t speak to me for three days. I still don’t know what she meant but even three years later I haven’t forgotten it.
9) We were casually sitting on a bench when, out of nowhere, she asked me: “Is it just me or have humans gotten dumber? Or have they always been this stupid and I just haven’t been paying attention?”
10) She asked me if I ever wondered what it was like to die. I said no but told her I would tell her when I found out. I meant it as a ghost joke but she smiled at me and said:
“Great. I’ll wait for you to come back. Maybe you’ll even remember me.”
In conclusion, she is some kind of low-key god and she lost her faith in humanity even before we lost our faith in her but she’s stuck with us because immortality is a bitch.
P.S. I just remembered her name is a variation on ‘Eve’. Maybe I should reconsider my atheist status?!
Honest I had this comic growing up and I had to sit through like seven tv shows and movie reboots about Spider-Man’s origins knowing they couldn’t top this but they kept trying
There was supposed to be Doomfist too but I didn’t have any good ideas.
Like, stormtroopers’ general is too simple and doesn’t fit him. I feel like he should be from some tribe on planet occupied by empire that made him join or smth. Dunno
i have been fucked up ever since i took a mythology class in college and learned that the greek mythology we know today is not only deliberately patriarchal (i mean duh) but was put in place specifically to abolish the matriarchal religion that came before it, nearly all traces of which were systematically erased. AND, the reason the modern west is so obsessed with greek mythology specifically is that it aligns so closely with our own patriarchal values. like we are literally taught greek mythology IN SCHOOL, that’s how hugely important it is in our culture. (i mean think about it… there is no real benefit to placing that much emphasis on greek mythology specifically over any other part of history)
learning this literally ruined greek mythology for me lmao
artemis and aphrodite are the classic madonna (virgin) and the whore
athena is deliberately stripped of her femininity in order to be goddess of wisdom, springing fully formed from zeus’ head instead of being born from a woman
hera is the jealous, vindictive ball and chain, etc etc.
and the kicker? pandora was a revamped character from an older myth, in which she created every single thing in the universe, good and bad. she didn’t just open a box and ruin everything by not being able to follow orders. pandora literally means “all-giving”. and in the greek mythology we know today, she’s the first woman on earth and manages to fuck things up for everyone. sound familiar? like eve, maybe?
i don’t have sources because i learned this in a college class like 3 years ago but if anyone has access to their college’s academic database and wants to source this for me that’d be awesome. i haven’t tried but i’m guessing you’d be hard pressed to find info about it on google.
here’s a book i’m reading abt it that i picked up at a half-price bookstore. it’s a bittersweet read. there’s references inside the front cover, too, for further reading.
What version of the greek mythology did you learn? Because we barely ever had a greek class and not once when I went to educate myself on it did I ever perceive Hera to be shrill? The obvious asshole is Zeus and some of his sons. I also really liked Hades having more personality then just being the evil brother that Lucifer is told as honestly it’s more realistic and relatable. I don’t doubt Greek Myths have been revamped as most of the stuff was when the Romans started to vye for power. They have conveniently fucked up every religion but Christianity and any former power women have ever had which speaks volumes. Plus I bet the original myths were in the library of Alexandria which is why we don’t have them and why it was burned. It shouldn’t really be shocking that everything we learn about the past shouldn’t be perceived as the full truth but I guess everyone starts learning that somewhere so I’m sorry.
I mean, Zeus is the asshole as far as I’m concerned too, but Hera is frequently portrayed as vengeful, jealous, and possessive. Also she usually takes it out on the subject of Zeus’ affection and not Zeus himself. Here’s an article called “An overview of Hera’s acts of revenge”.
Greek mythology was pushed pretty hard in my middle school. Fifth grade history was devoted entirely to Greek culture and mythology (except the first two months which were devoted to Egypt) and we reviewed it again in seventh grade before learning about Rome. It was taught in my high school too, but my high school was weird as fuck so idk the significance of that really. Either way it’s pretty common to learn Greek mythology in school across the US. It wasn’t until I took a college course on mythology that I learned all that ^ about it.
The thing about the Greek Gods is they’re supposed to have strengths and flaws like humans. It’s just that their strengths and flaws are inherently sexist (I mean Zeus’ flaw is that he can’t stop fucking and Hera’s is that she’s spiteful. Sounds familiar).
THIS ^^
In my childhood, the greek myths were like the M rated versions of fairy tales and that’s how I encountered them by elementary school. Obviously, having goddesses 💜 was already a huge step up from a protestant background, even though their domains were small and hardly elaborated on (as it was “women’s work” 🙄). I have stuck to these wildly misogynist “classics” mostly BECAUSE their are still signs of what the goddesses were before the cover up.
Prof. Maria Gimbutas wrote “The Goddesses and Gods of Old Europe” about the original matriachal society and how their goddesses (Hera, Athena, Demeter, Artemis) were split and stripped of their power by (literally!!!) marrying them off to the new Indo-European patriarchs: Zeus, Poseidon, Hades etc. (hint: this is still the function of marriage, to this day)
Further insight into goddess symbolism and her recovery in this programm, starting with Maria Gimbutas herself:
These are some of my Captains for my Bleach AU. You could call this ‘part one’ of my cast. They’re a varied bunch. Granted, I made them quite a long time ago, and I didn’t realize just how underrepresented I made the female gender. I did much better when creating the other units for my cast, thankfully. That being said, some of these were my first ever character ideas!
Please visit my Deviantart page if you want to learn more about these characters: nexusyuber.deviantart.com
If you like the artwork, definitely check out the commissioned artist: sideburn004.deviantart.com
Once upon a time, there was a city ruled by three sister princesses. They were much-loved in their kingdom- the eldest with eyes of brightest blue, the middle with lips of sweetest pink, and the youngest with hair of deepest red. They were incredibly close, acting as each other’s friends and confidantes. They were just, and kind, able to balance the people and keep the peace in their land.
For a time, all was well.
And then it wasn’t.
Mother?
Shh.
A neighboring kingdom, jealous of this city’s prosperity and peace, sought to disrupt it. They dragged to its gates hideous war machines, made of magic and steel and human skin. The king, a man of great magical learning and power, demanded the princesses surrender their city to him, and if they did not, he said, he would raze it to the ground.
Mother, I’ve never heard of this story.
Then listen when I tell it to you.
The youngest daughter, when she heard, did up her deep red hair, put on a delicate crown, and clothed herself in a beautiful dress. “I will offer him an alliance,” she told her sisters. “I will give him my hand in marriage for our kingdom’s safety.”
The other sisters wept, understanding the sacrifice that their youngest was making, and held her close until dawn. They saw her off at the castle gates, and watched until she disappeared into the still city.
When the youngest daughter reached the enemy’s camp, she stood tall, and did not show her fear. She spoke kindly to the weary soldiers, curtsied before the cruel sorcerer-king as custom demanded. She was brave, oh, my darling, she was so brave.
And the king spat at her fine words, and spoke the words that drew all the light from out of her, until she went mad with despair. As the sun set on the day, and on the youngest sister, who lay despondent in the middle of the camp, a soldier came upon her, and killed her in a fit of mercy.
But you said that she was brave.
Yes. She was.
When the other sisters heard, the middle sister donned silver armor, borrowed from the guards in the castle, and took up a crossbow. “I go to kill the king,” she said. “I go to avenge our youngest.”
And the eldest held her close, and wept, until she let her go and watched her disappear from sight into the streets.
When the middle sister arrived at the camp, she moved quietly, looking through the tents with eyes and a heart made cold with fury and grief. She reached the king’s tent- asleep, inside was the enemy, and she raised her crossbow to finish the job. And she would have, darling, she would have, had she not seen, hanging from the post of the kings fine bed, her sister’s delicate crown.
The king awoke when she sobbed at the sight of it, and spoke words that caused her to wither and decay where she stood, crumbling to rotted remains inside a suit of armor.
Mother, I don’t like this story.
You must hear it.
The eldest sister heard the news and she did not weep. She drew her courage about her, and set off into the forest to find her and her sister’s mother, who was a powerful witch.
Her mother answered the door and bade her come inside, offering her condolences about her sister’s fates. Once the door had closed, her mother hesitated, then spoke.
“I left you in that castle long ago, and I will give you your answers, and then I will give you your vengeance against the king.”
And so the daughter listened.
Mother, I don’t want to hear this.
Listen, daughter.
Long ago, there had been a queen with great magickal abilities, but she was never able to find a love, so she used those powers to create three daughters.
One, she formed from a bottle of light captured at the sun’s violent surrender to night. It woke last, a child with beautiful red hair, and so it was the youngest.
One, she shaped from a gentle pink anemone, the last in her castle’s courtyard to survive winter’s onslaught. It woke second, a child with curved pink lips, and so it was the middle.
One, she carved from a piece of sapphire the size of her fist, and as she did, she cut her finger with the blade, so it was made with blood, as well. It woke immediately, with bright blue eyes, so it was the eldest.
The sun took her first child home, she told the sapphire-girl. Her body turned to light, and then to nothing, what it always was. The body of her second daughter rotted in the encampment like a flower decayed beyond its lifespan. “All the king can do is turn you back to what you were before,” she told her daughter. “He will turn you back to stone if you are unprotected.”
She gave her daughter a vial full of black liquid. “This will turn your heart forever to sapphire. The king will be unable to change you- but you will never feel again. No blade shall pierce your skin, but no joy or grief will stir within you. You will never be warm, or cold. I offer you not immortality, but a half-life of invincibility.”
The daughter regarded the vial, and uncorked it. She brought it to her lips, but before she drank, she asked her mother, “Why did you leave us?”
And then she swallowed, so she would not care about the response, and she left her mother in her home before she found the answer.
But why did their mother leave them?
Because she knew, daughter, even then, that her eldest child was capable of committing this act, and she was afraid.
The eldest daughter marched to the encampment, and to the kings tent. She was attacked, but nothing drew blood, and so she went forward. The king, upon seeing her, spoke the words that would have crumbled her to so many sapphire shards, but nothing happened.
She pulled out the king’s heart through his armor, and she felt no relief at having killed him.
She felt nothing.
The end.
Mother?
Mother, that can’t be how the story ends.
Mother, that is not how the story ends.
Do you want another ending?
Yes.
Very well, then.
The people saw what their queen had done, and began to fear her. The queen, unable to feel love or even affection, went back to her mother to find a way to make a child that her people would adore, because, without emotion, she saw that that was what they needed.
The child was made of ice over a pond, and her hair was the orange-white color of the fish, still alive in the cold.
And the queen raised her daughter to love the kingdom, to rule well, and to one day overthrow her mother.
Fun statistical fact: Cows are about 300 times more likely to kill you than coyotes.
Minor sidenote to statistical fact: If it was common for people to keep several hundred coyotes on their property and routinely chase them into a corral and handle them, this statistic would be different.
this is a great summary of ‘conditional probability’, a statistical property many people grapple with
…I feel like this post just made me realize that both coconut trees and vending machines, items often quoted in wacky death statistics, are both things that people shake vigorously often.
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