fandomhigh | Practical philosophy, Wednesday

"First of all," Ender began, "I want to invite anyone who wants to do so to talk about the weekend. Sometimes Fandom draws us into strange versions of ourselves that do terrible things, and sometimes the best way to process it is by talking about it."

For him personally it hewed a little close to home, but he wasn't going to deprive them of the chance to talk about it.

"Otherwise, let's draw this on a broader scale. From what I can tell, last weekend fell within the bounds of certain movements in fiction. Usually these movements are born at a time when reality itself seems bleak. When it seems like you can't trust anyone, that the world can at any point come down on you as a pile of bricks and crush you. Is there any value in that kind of cynicism, in that sort of negativity? You could argue it's a good way to protect yourself - but for how long can you do that?"

He smiled briefly. "Or maybe that really is reality, and our conception of everything else is... overly optimistic. Maybe thinking in any other way is a foolishness, a blanket we tug over our own eyes so we don't have to deal with the reality of it all."

He paused briefly, then shrugged. "Or maybe the island's just mad," he said, "and so are the writers and filmmakers it tries to imitate."

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Noirily! One more time!

Brief as it is. There's still sunshine and sandwiches.

About the weekend, or about hardcore pessimism in general.

Who's probably in a fantastic mood after all that drinking.

If you still want to after class.

Be less of a dick, connection.

Evan Sabahnur

"I kind of missed the weekend," Evan noted, blinking. Staying home and reading had done him some favors this time around, it seemed, "but I've toyed with that 'trust nobody' mindset, and it was at what was easily the darkest moment in my life."

He frowned a little, and then shrugged his shoulders and soldiered on.

"But there are still good people in the world. There are still heroes, even if they're the ones you'd least expect. A hundred, two hundred people around you might be evil, but sometimes all it takes to make a difference is one person standing up to do the right thing. It made all the difference for me."

And now Wade was doing important things like teaching Evan how to swear and encouraging him to read adult magazines. Er. Well. At least Evan was still around to be encouraged into these things.

Paddra Nsu-Yeul

Kathy Li

Kathy normally ate a few sandwiches every class; her super-speed apparently affected her metabolism, too. Today, however, she was eating hers with a kind of single-minded determination, like maybe if she ate enough, she could somehow ignore everything else.

This weekend had been pretty tough on Kathy and she wasn't sure if she wanted to talk about it incessantly until she felt better or ignore it forever in hopes that it would go away.

In the end, Kathy didn't have to wrestle indecision for too long. Mr. Wiggin had told her to try to take up room in every class, and that meant talking.

"I think I like the madness option," Kathy said, staring at the grass like it had personally offended her. "Then there's no rhyme or reason to what it does or why and no sense looking for any."

Don't drink for two days straight, kids.

Cade hated everything, but especially the sun. Fuck you, sun.

"So does that mean caution?" Ender asked. "Or are you willing to open up and deal with the not-so-good for the off-chance of experiencing the good?"

"Why?" Ender asked. Predictably, he felt, but it was necessary.

"Why what?" Kathy asked, looking confused.

Sorry, Ender. She was in the depths of teen angst and wasn't really firing on all cylinders.

"Caution," Evan agreed, "but not just completely giving up on people, either. I don't think I'll ever be able to just blindly trust anyone again. I've been lied to too much for that... but I have the least likely hero in the world. I still have to assume that people are capable of some good, even if they never let it show."

"Never an easy path," Ender said, "But usually the most sensible one."

"Why," Ender repeated, "Do you think that?"

Evan shrugged his shoulders a little bit.

"Cynicism isn't a good look on me. And I've been surprised by people a lot in the time I've been around. For better or worse."

"What do you judge people by?" Ender wondered. "When is it a good surprise, when is it a bad one?"

"I'm still kind of learning what to go by," Evan admitted. "It used to be enough for me that people would call them heroes. But even heroes lie and hurt people."

Deep breath. He'd learned that one the worst way possible.

"That would be the bad surprise," he added. "When people who are supposed to be the ones you can trust the most are the ones that hurt you the hardest, when it's people you look up to, who you want to be more like, and it turns out that they're not better than the ones who set out to destroy what's good in the world."

Repeating yourself was not helping Kathy any, Ender. But she was going to take a stab in the dark (too soon!) and try to answer you anyway.

"Well, if it's crazy, then you don't need to look for rational sense or explanations. There may be some kind of internal consistency that makes sense to it, but that doesn't necessarily reflect on you."

Ichabod Crane

"I'm not entirely sure what went on this weekend," Ichabod said. "The weather was quite bad and I was immersing myself in studies. What did I miss?"

"Then what do you do?" Ender asked.

"So you'd say you prefer to look at the world as something you might be living in, but you're under no obligation to make sense of, because there is none?" Ender said, trying to parse it.

"People behaving in ways contrary to themselves, is the best way to sum it up," Ender said wryly. "It happens every now and again."

"When I'm faced with one of the bad surprises?" The corner of Evan's mouth twitched a little. "That's... when I get angry. It's hard not to, when I find out that my heroes have been lying to my face."

"I'm talking about the island," Kathy clarified. "So, if the island makes you a bad person for the weekend, it's only because the island is crazy, not necessarily a reflection on you."

Practical philosophy, Wednesday

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