The Art of Peace; Thursday, Third Period [09/22]

[sake_shinigami]

When the students came into their classroom today, they'd find some books piled up beside the teapot at the center of their cushion-circle. "My duckings ♥," Shunsui said with a pleased smile once everyone got settled, "Today, we are going to be beginning a small little unit on one of my favorite pieces of literature, besides, of course, my own book ♥, that has quite a lot to do with the prevue of our class ♥! Written by a very smart and clever Greek by the name of Aristophanes, this play is a political satire against the Peloponnesian War of Ancient Greece, where the illustrious woman of the play's title comes up with a most intriguing solution to peace: she rallies up the women of the Grecian world to form a pact to finally bring an end to the war by withholding sex for their husbands, lovers, and soldiers. Devastating, I know ♥! But incredibly effective; as the play itself points out, a man cannot concentrate on swinging his sword when his other sword needs swinging ♥.

"It's a classic example of the 'make love, not war' philosophy that had such vital life in the 1960s ♥. It was the Vietnam War rather than the Peloponnesian War, then, and it was an actual movement instead of a parody play designed to make a point, but the idea is the same: it is much better to offer our fellow brothers and sisters love rather than war ♥.

"Naturally, thought the play is short, I cannot expect for you to all have it read by the end of the class and still have time to discuss it, so I have given you each a copy to take home and read over the week. We will discuss the idea of love over war today, and then again next week after you've had a chance to read through the text and see if it manages to influence your opinion any ♥. Today's discussion, then, shall be a broader one: does love have any place in war? Is it necessary to have love to keep a war humane? Or is there no such thing as humane war, and therefor, love could only interfere with the success of a war? The play was written to make people laugh, but it suggests that the world is a better place when people spend more time with each other than with their weapons ♥. The war is a senseless waste of time, money, and resources, when peaceful times are spent building the nation; wars not only break the nation, but it also disturbs families and relationships. And, of course, in unity, there is strength ♥. This could be said for either side of the coin, but isn't it much better to have that unity in peace rather than war ♥?

"When the Chorus of Men claim, 'There is no beast, no rush of fire, like woman so untamed. She calmly goes her way where even panthers would be shamed,' the Chorus of Women proclaim in response, 'And yet you are fool enough, it seems, to dare to war with me, when for your faithful ally you might win me easily.' Perhaps it is just me, but it seems to ask, Why go into war when peace could easily be an option ♥? Or is it not so easy? Is holding back something...anything...that the other party might need, be it sex or be it goods or resources or hostages or treasures, and refusing to give it back without the promise of peace a nefarious course of action ♥? Or is any means of achieving peace through acceptable means ♥?

"'We love peace, but not peace at any price,' says Douglas Jerrold, and Marvin Gaye, another personal favorite, informs us that 'War is not the answer, because only love can conquer hate.' But where do you stand on the place of love in war ♥?"

Library, Thursday 9/22

[noonedecidesmyfate]

Where had the portable screen in the library today come from? How had the squirrel standing in front of it made a presentation?

"Right to Know?" Belle asked, curious. The squirrel chittered in a vaguely annoyed fashion and gestured for her to have a seat.

"I'm meant to be working," she protested. The porg patted the chair next to him and the squirrel at the front tapped the screen where it said "MANDATORY TRAINING."

Intro to Palaeontology - Thursday, 1st Period

[itsananomaly]

“This week we’re going to be exploring the last era of the Age of the Dinosaurs and that is the Cretaceous Period,” Cutter began that week’s lecture, handing out his normal stack of notes. “As we did last week, we’ll start with our reports on the animals from the Jurassic Period that I asked you to prepare last week,”

Once the last report had been presened, Cutter resumed his lecture.

“The Cretaceous Period also happens to be the longest of the previous periods and covers a span of 79 million years, lasting from 145 million years to 66 million years ago,” there was a pause, “the Cretaceous Period is known for being much warmer in terms of climate - specifically warmer ocean currents, unfrozen poles and relatively higher levels of CO2 emissions,” he explained.

“This is the era where you have some of the more well known dinosaurs such as the Tyrannasaurus Rex, Velociraptor and the Triceratops,”

“I mentioned at the start of the lecture that this period is the last era of the Mesozoic Era,” Cutter continued, “so what happened to the dinosaurs? Sixty Six million years ago an asteroid caused the chain of events that led to the mass extinction of the dinosaurs, with the exception of the avian dinosaurs, since the avian dinosaurs lineage now survives today in modern bird species,” he paused, “and this is known as the Cretaceous-Paleonge Extinction Event, which also happens to be the last of the five major extinction event that the Earth has experienced - we will be covering these events later on in the semester but we’ve briefly talked about two of them during the last couple of weeks covering the Mesozoic Era - the Permian-Triassic Extinction Event and the Cretaceous-Paleonge Extinction Event ”

“Next week we will be moving on to a different topic but I would like you to write a report on an animal that lived in the Cretaceous period to present next week,”

Sexy Crimes, Thursday, Period 2

[wrongkindofsith]

"Sometimes," Jaskier began once the glass had arrived. "Sometimes it isn't enough to be ridiculously attractive to avoid being in trouble for a crime. Shocking, I know. But these things happen!"

"Which means that you can't just rely on your good looks, but need to develop other skills," Cara added.

"Such as friendships!" Oh yeah, that was how Jaskier got out of many a tight spot.

"Or talking or punching your way out of trouble." Guess which Cara used to get out of tight spots, go on.

"And sometimes those intersect," Jaskier added. "So. What will you do to get out of a tight spot?"

"There are some wrong answers, but less than you'd think." That was almost encouraging!