Ch 14— Valentine's Day Shenanigans ;)

Michigan just gave us the rhetorical weapon that could push Biden and the DNC to turn their backs on Israel.

Okay so this is amazing news. Michigan was going to be a key state in the push to get Biden, and the DNC as a whole, to start pressuring Israel, and they have just proven that they have that power.

Background: Michigan is a swing state, and it has 16 votes in the electoral college. Winning Michigan was a major factor in Biden's win back in 2020, and much of that rested on the Arab-American vote. It was also a major factor in Hillary Clinton's loss to Donald Trump in 2016. She lost the state by ten thousand, seven hundred votes.

Praxis: For obvious reasons, Arab-Americans are incredibly upset with Biden's support for Israel, and support in that demographic has gone from 59% in the 2020 election to less than 17% now. As a form of protest, Arab-Americans in Michigan started a campaign to get voters to check "uncommitted" in the Democratic primary. This is an actual box that can be checked, though some less-organized pushes also suggested writing in 'ceasefire' like New Hampshire primary voters did.

The goal was to get at least 10,000 'uncommitted' votes, as that is how many Hillary lost by.

As Dearborn Mayor Abdullah Hammoud, the first Arab mayor of this majority-Arab city, said:

"We're not sizable enough to make a candidate win, but we're sizable enough to make a candidate lose."

(Source: NPR, 2/25/24)

Result:

As of 10:49 PM EST, 2/27, there are thirty-nine thousand uncommitted votes, according to CNN, which is doing live coverage.

NPR was reporting 30k at 10:14.

As a caveat, New York Times is saying that each of the last three Michigan Dem Primaries had about 20k uncommitted votes, so the 35k isn't all the push for pro-Palestine stances in Congress, but that's still a jump of almost 20k, which is way, way more than the goal.

And they aren't done counting the votes yet. Barely 30% of votes are in. The goal has been blown out of the water.

Other states are reaching out for advice on how to replicate the results.

This is big news.

So can we relax?

Fuck no.

Do what Michigan did. Vote in the Dem primary, and vote uncommitted or write in "ceasefire."

But on a more daily basis, if you have a Democratic candidate, lean on this.

Tell them it will be repeated elsewhere.

This could very well lose the election for Biden and more. The Democrats can't afford another four years of Trump, and they know it. The loss of Michigan can and will tank this election for them, especially since other states that helped Biden win, like Georgia, were also won on demographics that are growing increasingly upset by the situation in Gaza.

Go to the Michigan section of this post and use that in your calls and emails.

But remember. Call your reps. Call your senators. Call your governor, if you'd like. And if they're a Democrat, you bring this up. Be polite, the staffer isn't making these decisions. They might just be an intern. But bring it up and tell them that we are going to lose the presidency if we do not sanction Israel and actually pressure them into not only pulling out of Gaza and the West Bank, but paying reparations.

fic update!

pssssstttt chapter 10 drop! highlight reel includes: adam pov, adashi moments, ouija board shit, beach filler episode, and klance development!

I swiped my credit card on this vending machine and it said “no sale” and just spat out a dollar bill at me??

Lance looks through the binoculars again and finds Keith at the same time Adam calls Keith’s name and points at where Lance is standing. The other boy glances up, caught between a laugh from watching Pidge and Hunk write a lewd message in the sand. He flips him off and Lance’s hand-painted skull grins back at him. Keith’s cheeks are pink from the chill, his eyes bright and mischievous as the wind catches on the edges of his hair.

Lance mechanically waves back as he pulls away from the binoculars, Keith becoming a tiny figure against the sand as a blush begins to stain Lance’s cheeks. He hikes the collar of his jacket up, glancing furtively back at Shiro and then down at the shore below. 

Oh.

Fuck.

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this was an excerpt from chapter 10 of my fic! here's some more info if ur interested:

title: looking out for you

platform: ao3 only

rating: t

genre(s): slice of life college au

ships: Keith Kogane/Lance McClain, Adam/Shiro

words/chapters: 187k/18 chapters

status: completed

summary/elevator pitch: wholesome queer vibes and healthy communication a la voltron. found family shenanigans include: paintball, halloween parties, laundromat trips, beach episode, family dinners, video game tournaments, awkward confessions, grocery shopping, and some good old angst and character development. also, lance may or may not get possessed by a ghost but it's not pidge's fault.

i was reminiscing on this fic and decided to just promo it bc why not? drop me a comment/kudos if u check it out and like it!

for anyone who has already read it or is planning on reading it, i've done faqs between the three acts. i recently updated my faq here for act iii if anyone is interested (i finally got around to putting in some more details!)

skam, season three + purple & pink

act i behind the scenes

hi hello, welcome to a little bts for my voltron college au fanfic, looking out for you on ao3!

favorite scene: the ending of chapter 5, actually! i remember i was typing as fast as i fucking could to try and get it done and sent to my beta (i was also holding my family up for dinner lmao). the last few paragraphs where keith reflects on how far he's come and lance catching him in his own head— that just kinda poured out of me and after going back and rereading it, i don't think there was ever a different way to end the chapter.

favorite character: copout answer but i dont have a favorite character to write. i have a huge soft spot for canon lance and pidge but in the fic, i love the small moments where lance or keith are interacting one-on-one with each other or with other people. i feel like i can really dig into the characterization there. hunk and lance's dynamic has been really fun for me to write because i am so soft at the thought of childhood best friends who have seen each other in almost every version of themselves and know each other in and out. i think hunk and lance stabilize each other pretty well, and they just seem to exist as two sides of the same coin. i also really enjoy pidge's dynamic with lance because it reminds me of two of my friends who were essentially brother and sister and argued all the time and made fun of each other. but ultimately, they'd fight to the death for each other. shiro and keith's dynamic is fun because i like being able to get in keith's head and write a shit ton of his inner monologue but then what comes out is like three sentences while shiro just patiently waits for him to spit it out. i also have been hinting (which ill be deepning later on) that even though keith and shiro love each other and are close, there's some distance between them that's built over time. i think it's natural, especially when keith still hasn't fully come to terms that someone he perceives to be a hero would ever take a chance on him. when shiro, the gay depressed bitch that he is, goes to college and experiences the sanctity of forming your own community and meeting people who really truly get you, ofc he's going to constantly want to go back. i think that yearning definitely scares keith and thus leads him to distancing himself as a means of self preservation. and ofc, shiro sees keith pulling away but isn't sure what to do because keith won't talk to him so there's gonna be some underlying tension. can't wait to unpack all of that! i love u space dad i love u space emo.

least favorite scene: i fucking hate action oml. i don't mind reading it but i cannot stand writing it and that's mainly because i have such a rotten little brain that has a hard time processing shit and so the pacing is really difficult for me. (thank u to my beta for suffering through my constant questions). all the paintball scenes in act i weren't my favorite because i had to constantly map out where all 12 characters were on the field at all times and how they were moving and where they were moving. that being said, i do think the paintball scenes were valuable because i got to explore how each individual member would act separately and then as a group. i am v happy that there will be no more paintball after this, tho. (i have never played paintball before in my life). character's ethnic identities yeah so i made a note around chapter 2? i think? that i wanted to incorporate the lived experiences of 1.5, second, and third generation immigrants because this is a fanfic but also i wanted to ground it in reality a little. as a person of color, going to college i had the freedom to explore my identity and also reconcile notions of home and tradition with an entirely new group of people. im a huge sucker for language and it was important to me to incorporate various degrees of bilingualness because that's how i saw other people from multicultural households talk.

i couldn't really include keith being half-galra in a college au but i did see potential to have him go through an identity crisis about being half-korean (asians being forever foreigners, aliens, immigrants). since krolia wasn't there to see him grow up and help him connect with his korean heritage, i think that definitely contributed to keith's anger and trauma of not having the one person who could understand what he was feeling. as someone who grew up not knowing their biological family, i can understand keith's reluctance to even attempt to dive into his heritage and so he's just stuck in this liminal space where he's half-korean living with two japanese people. i created a somewhat elaborate backstory for him and i have big plans for his identity exploration further on so im very excited to project write more.

this has been a short but sweet bts of looking out for you! get excited for act ii! there will be more klance(!!!) and relationship development among the other characters (keith & allura, lance & allura, lance & adam!)

Reblog the fundraisers you mfs!!!!! I don't know why you all skip those to reblog some pic of a banner saying "FREE PALESTINE" or of news from Columbia University! Literally these people from Gaza have made an account on Tumblr and is writing in english to communicate what they need and you all are coming onto my blog or on the tag and not reblogging their posts. We have people both Palestinian and non Palestinian vetting the fundraisers! I mean more the reblogs, more the chance of the fundraisers gaining momemtum, the more there would be a chance of a donation. Please donate if you can and reblog!!! and follow them if it is possible.

@/mohammedayesh has posted getting leaflets telling them to evacuate Rafah. They are very low on funds. Go follow them and reblog their posts and donate if possible.

gofundme.com

Donate to Support My Journey to a New Start, organized by Mohammed Ayesh

‏Hi my name is Abed im making this account on behalf of my friend Muhammad Saeed Ayes… Mohammed Ayesh needs your support for Support My Jour

We have @/haneenatya too whose mother is suffering from eye stroke and need to evacuate. Please I have been following them for some days and it doesn't seem their own posts are getting much attention.

gofundme.com

Donate to Help my family out of Gaza, organized by Suheir Hojok

I am reaching out for your support to help my family get out of Gaza. Ever since October, the… Suheir Hojok needs your support for Help my

Follow them! They are on tumblr. Reblog their posts and donate. The protests in universities are being done on account of them. They should be our focus.

chapter 5 update!

heyoooo icymi chapter 5 is up! i have this fic split up into 3 acts in my mind so far and we have reached the end of act i. i was gonna go a behind the scenes today but uhhh im gonna be at the mechanic's for a good chunk of tmrw (im going off EST) so it might be a little later in the evening tomorrow.

anyway yeah im gonna be talking about my inspiration for the specific characterization and ideas i have for the progression of the klance relationship. <3 thanks for checking it out!

I’M FUCKING DEAD Johnny did Agape holy shit