oh. Oh, no. That’s meant to be a line to show where the tail begins. Oh no, now I look like some weird prude.
Yeah, that’s meant to help people grasp the anatomy and visualize how small the tail is in relation to the torso. Not meant to be some kind of weird snake privacy screen
We CANNOT have snudity (snake nudity) on this webbed site
in middle school during my Intense Greek Mythology Phase, Artemis was, as you can likely guess, my best girl. Iphigenia was my OTHER best girl. Yes at the same time.
The story of Iphigenia always gets to me when it’s not presented as a story of Artemis being capricious and having arbitrary rules about where you can and can’t hunt, but instead, making a point about war.
Artemis was, among other things–patron of hunting, wild places, the moon, singlehood–the protector of young girls. That’s a really important aspect she was worshipped as: she protected girls and young women. But she was the one who demanded Agamemnon sacrifice his daughter in order for his fleet to be able to sail on for Troy.
There’s no contradiction, though, when it’s framed as, Artemis making Agamemnon face what he’s doing to the women and children of Troy. His children are not in danger. His son will not be thrown off the ramparts, his daughters will not be taken captive as sex slaves and dragged off to foreign lands, his wife will not have to watch her husband and brothers and children killed. Yet this is what he’s sailing off to Troy to inevitably do. That’s what happens in war. He’s going to go kill other people’s daughters; can he stand to do that to his own? As long as the answer is no—he can kill other people’s children, but not his own—he can’t sail off to war.
Which casts Artemis is a fascinating light, compared to the other gods of the Trojan War. The Trojan War is really a squabble of pride and insults within the Olympian family; Eris decided to cause problems on purpose, leaving Aphrodite smug and Hera and Athena snubbed, and all of this was kinda Zeus’s fault in the first place for not being able to keep it in his pants. And out of this fight mortal men were their game pieces and mortal cities their prizes in restoring their pride. And if hundreds of people die and hundred more lives are ruined, well, that’s what happens when gods fight. Mortals pay the price for gods’ whims and the gods move on in time and the mortals don’t and that’s how it is.
And women especially—Zeus wanted Leda, so he took her. Paris wanted Helen, so he took her. There’s a reason “the Trojan women” even since ancient times were the emblems of victims of a war they never wanted, never asked for, and never had a say in choosing, but was brought down on their heads anyway.
Artemis, in the way of gods, is still acting through human proxies. But it seems notable to me to cast her as the one god to look at the destruction the war is about to wreak on people, and challenge Agamemnon: are you ready to kill innocents? Kill children? Destroy families, leave grieving wives and mothers? Are you? Prove it.
It reminds me of that idea about nuclear codes, the concept of implanting the key in the heart of one of the Oval Office staffers who holds the briefcase, so the president would have to stab a man with a knife to get the key to launch the nukes. “That’s horrible!,” it’s said the response was. “If he had to do that, he might never press the button!” And it’s interesting to see Artemis offering Agamemnon the same choice. You want to burn Troy? Kill your own daughter first. Show me you understand what it means that you’re about to do.
Not oblivious at all! (positive, about to excited infodump) Biff knew something was up the minute he entered the room, but also that his humans were happy and excited. After a thorough sniff of the toy near the door, he made a beeline for where she was hiding without making it look like he was pursuing or hunting her. When he gets around the couch, he looks right at her, but shows no surprise or tension, just that friendly, gentle curiosity. He then IMMEDIATELY breaks eye contact, turns partly away (but not fully so she can still see his face) and starts sniffing the toys, and then again doesn’t show any signs of surprise or tension that might get misread as aggression.
That’s not an oblivious dog. That’s a dog who knows that his humans are happy and excited and that the room smells like puppy, recognizes that the puppy is clearly supposed to be there, and is on his best “reassure the puppy that he is friendly and nonthreatening” behavior. That is a dog who is actively being careful not to scare her and is inviting Ducky to come out and say hi and maybe interact at her own pace.
In short, that is Biff being SUCH A GOOD BOY. BESTEST BOY. SWEETEST BIG BRO. GOOD DOGGO. 😭
Not oblivious at all! (positive, about to excited infodump) Biff knew something was up the minute he entered the room, but also that his humans were happy and excited. After a thorough sniff of the toy near the door, he made a beeline for where she was hiding without making it look like he was pursuing or hunting her. When he gets around the couch, he looks right at her, but shows no surprise or tension, just that friendly, gentle curiosity. He then IMMEDIATELY breaks eye contact, turns partly away (but not fully so she can still see his face) and starts sniffing the toys, and then again doesn’t show any signs of surprise or tension that might get misread as aggression.
That’s not an oblivious dog. That’s a dog who knows that his humans are happy and excited and that the room smells like puppy, recognizes that the puppy is clearly supposed to be there, and is on his best “reassure the puppy that he is friendly and nonthreatening” behavior. That is a dog who is actively being careful not to scare her and is inviting Ducky to come out and say hi and maybe interact at her own pace.
In short, that is Biff being SUCH A GOOD BOY. BESTEST BOY. SWEETEST BIG BRO. GOOD DOGGO. 😭
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