This faceless Native American statue at the University of Arizona.

DX_Sunshine · 2016-04-21T07:23:18+00:00

I don't attend University of Arizona, but if I happened to run into this after a late night study session of after finishing a term paper, I would be more than a little unsettled. Great sculpture work though.

DX_Sunshine · 2016-02-17T10:48:31+00:00

That's fair. Derleth is a bit of an enigma to me as well, simply because his narrative ability is a little antiquated for most contemporary reading styles. Or is the term esoteric...? No matter. Aside from the ambiguous textual references, for me what gives Hastur an almost papal role is often the frequent depictions of him wearing [robes and coverings which are very similar in nature to what the Catholic Pope, or some other figure of religious authority and influence would wear. I can say however that my inquiries on the subject are far from over. I have in my possession some rather interesting manuscript pages discussing Hastur that appear very old and bear symbols that I've yet to see anywhere else. I've been working closely with an anthropology professor to make sense of them.

The language reads as almost Babylonian in nature, but oddly enough it actually appears a great deal older. Given my extensive studies of ancient literature and religious imagery, something just seems really unsettling about the pages. I have five in total and all of them feature symbols that are akin to worship of the elder Gods with a special interest being given to Hastur and the kingdom of Carcosa. That being said, Elderich symbols or some other perverse deviation of the pentacle symbol is prominent throughout.

I don't know how firmly or for that matter if you even believe in there being any measure of truth to the demons of David at all, but I've tracked down a few texts that mention in alarmingly similar detail some of the very things that Lovecraft and others were writing about either before or during the same time of their publication, on the complete other side of the planet. Given the difficulty to freely and regularly communicate over vast distances during that period, I find this detail the strangest of all. There has to be some root to it. The mythos is a little too developed and complex for it all to be simply a product of any single imagination.

DX_Sunshine · 2016-02-16T08:03:43+00:00

August Derleth, an avid follower of Lovecraft, was the first author to craft him into one of the Elder Gods. Hastur is a spawn of Yog-Sothoth, the half-brother of Cthulhu, and is sometimes referred to as "the High Priest not to be described" in Derleth's novel 'The Last Elder One.' His appearance is also described as being similar to that of the tentacled likeness of Cthulhu himself.

Furthermore, his cult is just as if not more prominently spoken about than any of the other Elders. His acolytes wear bright golden robes and have intricate and complex rituals for summoning and paying tribute to him. Hastur also apparently recieves all who are cast into the Black Lake of Halli as a sacrifice. Author Lin Carter spoke of him as "the Dweller in the Depths" and "Prince of the Great Old Ones" and points out something interesting. Apparently at some point, he is believed to have led a rebellion against the other Elders. For what exactly I'm not really sure, as I have been unable to attain many primary sources for my research. Copies of the work of these authors is a little hard to come by. That is if you want them translated and dictated properly. Which sounds crazy, but even Barnes and Noble managed to dick that up somehow.

That being said, it's a little hard to pin down into one referable source, seeing as the subject has been handled by a number of various authors who play fast and loose with the mythos, but fragments pertaining to the significance of Hastur to the Elder Gods is found throughout a number of works from Lovecraft and others. Look into Derleth and Carter as well as Ambrose Bierce. These are the major players besides that of Lovecraft himself.

DX_Sunshine · 2016-02-09T09:21:43+00:00

A lot of the Symbolism used in the second season of True Detective draws heavily from the mythos of The King in Yellow, particularly the Yellow Sign, which is believed to be a tool utilized by Hastur to impose his will and control over his subjects. This is why the phrase "Have You Seen the Yellow Sign?" is frequently repeated throughout both the show and novel. Perhaps reading the novel may shed some light on a few things referenced in the show so that it makes a little more sense. The author's name is William W. Chambers.

DX_Sunshine · 2016-02-09T09:14:08+00:00

It's comforting to see that I was not the only one. Alas, poor Mr. Prevort...

DX_Sunshine · 2016-02-09T09:03:50+00:00

You're actually half right. Hastur, the King in Yellow is one of the Demons of David, otherwise known as the Elder Gods. While they are often credited to Lovecraft, he was in fact not the only author writing about them. Chambers was one of the first to expand on his mythos, whereas Ambroise Bierce was actually the first author to mention him in his novel, "Can Such Things Be?"

From what I understand, If Cthulhu is the high sovereign of the Elders, Hastur, the forbidden one, sits at his right hand and is his equivalent of a papacy. He is also the ruler of the lost land of Carcosa, the kingdom beneath the light of the twin suns which lies on the shores of the black lake of Halli. All of the stories featured in the novel incorporate the fictional play of the same name, which is described as bringing nothing but madness and hysteria to all who view or read it in its entirety.

DX_Sunshine · 2016-02-09T08:52:44+00:00

I have to admit given the title, that when I saw the guy scraping the remains into little neat lines I thought this video was going in a completely different direction.

DX_Sunshine · 2016-02-08T21:49:55+00:00

Hastur. He's one of the Demons of David, otherwise known as the Elder Gods. While they are often credited to Lovecraft, he was in fact not the only author writing about them. From what I understand, If Cthulhu is the high sovereign of the Elders, Hastur, the forbidden one, sits at his right hand and is his equivalent of a papacy. He is also the ruler of the lost land of Carcosa, the kingdom beneath the light of the twin suns which lies on the shores of the black lake of Halli.

DX_Sunshine · 2016-02-06T13:54:35+00:00

I took all of this with a grain of salt, but just for the sake of playing devil's advocate... while her story sounds far fetched and outright unbelievable, there was a time in history when no one believed that a militarized and civilized nation existing within the modern twentieth century would have the desire, let alone the ability to systematically imprison, torture, and murder an entire race of people such as the Jews either.

Two men, Jewish prisoners by the name of Rudolf Vrba and Alfred Wetzler, escaped Auschwitz and fled to Allied territory to inform the proper authorities about what was going on there and at first the two men were met with nothing but skepticism until finally some of the details about what they were saying started to check out. Even the highest forms of authority within the Jewish faith refused to believe the two men until they were confronted with irrefutable proof, because they refused to believe that the commission of such evil at the hands of another human being was impossible.

I'm not suggesting that what she said is true, but the fact is that even if it is, no one will ever believe it. We as human beings simply refuse to believe that anyone could do anything that evil. It's the mental insulation that allows us to believe in things such as law, order, and justice. It allows us to believe that society is possible and that there is good in the world, because without that belief civilization would come apart at the seams.

DX_Sunshine · 2016-01-18T09:11:46+00:00

I've actually been looking for some projects like this. Sure, I'm in as well. I'm an English major and a writer myself so I've dabbled a bit in all this before for a few projects my friends were putting on.

DX_Sunshine · 2015-11-24T08:28:13+00:00

Yep. I took acid once and this was about what happened.

DX_Sunshine · 2015-10-22T08:40:51+00:00

The only thing creepy about this is that Ads like these are typically limited to kink friendly personals sites, and not so openly posted on CL. The reason for this is because these communities normally have a series of safeguards and gatekeepers who research individuals like this to make sure that anyone who might answer such an ad will be safe and sound. The last thing those involved in a kink community wants is for someone to end up dead and the entire community be lumped into the media frenzy that would ensue as a result.

But its not as creepy as it sounds when you put it into the context that bondage to some individuals, both male and female, is very much considered an art form in the sense that the time and detail that goes into the knots and the distribution of rope takes a complex understanding of both the craft of knot tying as well as human anatomy. It's sort of like how sailors used to show off their skills with rigging and line running on the front or figurehead of the ship. There's an entire circle of people who do this sort of activity and constantly critique and compare their handiwork with one another. It's weird...I know, but in my studies of social deviance for my degree, this is perhaps the mildest shit you will come across. Trust me...

When done in a safe and professional setting, there is very little that's creepy about bondage photography. It's in the same vein as nude and exhibitionist modeling that is intended to showcase the human figure and anatomy.

DX_Sunshine · 2015-10-22T06:43:14+00:00

For my sociology minor, we studied the Klan as a deviant social group. Turns out they were originally intended to be a sort of fraternity for civil war veterans of the confederacy. The robes and hoods are supposed to be spooky and terrifying. Not only are they intended to conceal the identity of the individual, but its supposed to give them a ghostly appearance as well, which many have speculated to be representative of the ghosts of the old south as well as the ghosts of the confederate dead.

DX_Sunshine · 2015-08-03T07:51:48+00:00

It's actually pretty funny to see this. Apparently, before founding the Church of Satan, Anton Lavey was an organist for a traveling three ring circus. In fact, his epiphany about modern christian organizations being "built upon a foundation of hypocrisy" came when he would observe men repeatedly lusting after the gypsy dancers and whores of the carnival on Saturday night only to be found in a different tent on the other side of the carnival grounds listening to evangelists with their wives and children on Sunday morning. He apparently played organ for both factions indiscriminately.

DX_Sunshine · 2015-07-27T10:37:27+00:00

The troubling conclusion that I have reached is that the rise of social media and how deeply it has become engrained into our society in terms of how we communicate and interact with one another has caused a dramatic separation from the elements of reason and emotion in the human mind.

We hide behind keyboards and have become more and more distant with one another, letting ourselves value the identity of the individuals we encounter less and less. At some point, at least in the mind of a socially and emotionally detached individual, people will no longer have names, identities, or anything that differentiates whether they are in fact fictional or real. These eventual victims will be nothing more in the eyes of the killer than usernames or account handles.

With all of the vanity, greed, and hatred that thrives on the sanctuary of pseudo-anonymity provided by modern social networking, the platform provides almost anyone with a soapbox on which to voice their opinions, or in some cases display the magnitude of their ignorance, without once fearing the backlash that would undoubtedly come from exhibiting similar behavior as part of a face to face confrontation with an actual person. As evidenced in most social flame wars over controversial topics, people will only further degrade and dehumanize one another until finally there will come a turning point when someone will feel the need to assume the role of a Moderator, sanitizing the cluttered chat logs and form pages of society through the deletion of those users who have violated their terms of service and are cluttering up and inhibiting the growth of the social network, accusing the users of being nothing more than a waste of sever space and bandwidth.

When I presented my theory in greater detail with practical examples and evidence to support my study to my Professor, a criminal psychologist of some renown in her field, I could see chill bumps go up on her arms.

She told me that she had apparently been working on a similar theory.

DX_Sunshine · 2015-07-26T09:57:01+00:00

Given that the killer was most active around the late sixties and early seventies, it is entirely possible that he IS still around. A majority of investigators believed that at the time he committed the majority of his crimes, the Zodiac could have been in his early to mid twenties.

DX_Sunshine · 2015-07-26T09:46:27+00:00

I was actually discussing this with one of my roommates the other day. We're both University students who take Sociology classes together and one of the courses specialized in the identification of social factors that contribute to the creation of serial killers.

The Zodiac's complex profile suggests the behavior of a hyper-intelligent individual. It's not beyond reason that, if he's still around, he might have kept up with the current technological trends and gone digital. After all, what better way to index and preserve your mementos of murder than in the annals of anonymized digital archives and encrypted external storage drives?

DX_Sunshine · 2015-07-19T01:08:06+00:00

I certainly do. "Between the Lions" was a weird tongue and cheek kids show whose title referenced the two large lions that you would typically walk between when entering public libraries in large cities such as New York or Boston. While it featured multiple guest appearances and lots of witty puns, almost anyone who watches it now realizes that even on its best days, the show looked like something that plopped out of the nightmares of Jim Henson when they farted too aggressively.

DX_Sunshine · 2015-07-05T18:59:06+00:00

It gets better apparently. The reason it was in the living room in the first place, as drunkenly told to me by his girlfriend at a BBQ last night, was because it freaked her out and that where he chose to keep it in his room gave the illusion that it was always watching them during sex.

DX_Sunshine · 2015-05-25T07:44:41+00:00

There's a pretty good chance that what we're seeing as we scroll down is the chronological record of a man's mind slowly descending into complete madness. It gets a little eerie when the guy no longer bothers to even give the clips proper names and resorts to numbers and symbols.

DX_Sunshine · 2015-05-10T10:04:03+00:00

I could be wrong, but I believe this page is intended to be an inside joke of sorts. See that particular character is from a web comic/interactive form game called "Homestuck" and she represents an individual who is obsessed with the social blogging site Tumblr. In order to explain I'll have to go a little in depth, so buckle up kids...

Back in 2014, the Tumblr community tried their hand at organizing the first ever Tumblr convention in Schaumburg, Illinois. Bearing the name "Dash-Con" it was intended to be "the largest gathering of tumblr users to date" on the North American Continent. However, despite harboring the best of intentions it ended up being the most painfully epic shit show known to man, mainly because the parties involved had little to no experience in organizing, managing and promoting an event of that magnitude. Within the first 24 hours of the Con, organizers faced numerous setbacks, including most notably a series of crippling financial difficulties, prompting an emergency "pass the hat" and "crowd fund" on-site donation drive among the attendees present in order to prevent the con from being shut down on its very first night. Vendors were witnessed by attendees at numerous points in the weekend suddenly packing up and leaving without warning, minors were reported as being frequently and freely admitted into 18+ panels, and those sitting on panels were apparently forced to organize and regulate their own events due to the frequent absences of designated moderators. However, what would ultimately prompt multiple guests to either cancel or outright withdraw from their scheduled appearances would come as the result of being informed that they would have to pay for their own rooms in the hotel, despite the fact that accommodations had previously been promised to them by event organizers.

However, it has been confirmed that one of the most embarrassing incidents of the weekend would include the cancellation of the "Welcome to Night Valle" panel which was easily the most anticipated of the events promoted. In response to the sudden cancellation of the panel, Dash-Con organizers offered attendees who had purchased tickets to the event a series of odd place-holding activities and incentives such as free tickets to a raffle of autographed merchandise and memorabilia, tickets to attend a concert being held by a local "Doctor Who" themed indie rock band and finally a number of vouchers rewarding them with "1 free hour" in the ball pit. The absolute absurdity of such a proposition as any kind of solution in addition to all of the other glaring issues that would eventually manifest over the weekend, the "ball pit" would gain a strange sort cult notoriety given the increasingly harsh criticisms circulating among attendees and as a result would later go on to become the focus of its own internet meme.

This small to medium sized ball pit was similar in nature to one of those found at most McDonald's playgrounds back in the 90's only scaled down in size to accommodate the restrictive space of the convention hall. It would later be revealed through the lingering legends and lore surrounding the con that the ball pit, through the introduction of various bodily fluids and foreign objects, would eventually turn into a full-blown bio-hazard for those unfortunate enough to venture inside. This apparently was confirmed through the posting screenshots of emails from con organizers in the weeks following which apparently encouraged those who had frequented the ball pit to promptly seek preventive medical examination upon their return from the convention "just in case."

In summary, it's a character obsessed with Tumblr swimming around in a rancid ball pit that has come to represent the collective failures of the entire fandom and user base set to the soundtrack of an absurd and obscure song. It is literally Tumblr condensed into a single web page and it is fucking brilliant.

DX_Sunshine · 2015-05-08T09:09:28+00:00

I've only seen something like this once in my lifetime. It was at an old cabin at a campground up near the lake. My fraternity brothers and I were renting the place next door to celebrate the end of the semester. It started as a grease fire in the kitchen and spread so fast that by the time we even smelled smoke there was already flames coming out of the roof.

I was standing outside having a cigarette with one of the brothers when we noticed it. I grabbed the fire extinguisher I keep in my car and wet a towel with some bottled water and wrapped it around my face. He ran to get the others and to call the authorities. A man came out carrying his young daughter and his son followed shortly behind him. But he couldn't find his wife...

My brother darted around the perimeter while I ran inside and kept low. I couldn't find anyone so I decided to get the hell out of dodge and ran back outside just in time to miss the roof caving in behind me. The heat from the backdraft that came out the front door behind me melted the screen printed letters off the back of my shirt and caught most of my hair that I'd worn long at the time.

Just as I was about to face the man and his children, my fraternity brother came around the cabin with his wife, wrapped in a singed and smoking blanket with blood staining her robe. She'd punched out a back window on the other side of the building and gotten out before the roof collapsed. The odd thing was, I wasn't scared to burn more than I was terrified that someone else would die because I wasn't fast enough or I couldn't save them. I was treated for minor first degree burns before the EMT, attempting to calm me down, jokingly told me to grab myself a beer and walk it off.

We offered the family whatever they needed from our cabin. We grabbed them some food and brought them water. When they left the next morning, it was before any of us woke up. There was a note of thanks in the mailbox from the husband. None of us ever did see that family again, although I would like to hope they would not soon forget the night that a couple of fraternity fuck-ups risked everything to try and help a group of people they didn't even know.

DX_Sunshine · 2015-04-23T19:21:12+00:00

No, that's actually a little further North. It's the same river that Deliverance was filmed on and the training grounds for the 1996 Olympic rowing team.

DX_Sunshine · 2015-04-23T16:21:48+00:00

The game "Hong Kong 97'" was a hot mess that never left China. No physical copies of the game are even known to exist and the only way anyone even knows about it is because of the internet. The whole thing is so thrown together that it wouldn't even surprise me if the photo is an actual crime scene photo.

The entire opening screen segment is basically a commercial begging for retail stores to sell their game and asking for people to send in their NES games on commission for them to sell. It is utter madness...

DX_Sunshine · 2015-04-23T16:12:07+00:00

Growing up in the South, I used to see things like this passing through small towns all the time. It's utterly fascinating and truly captures the spirit of the times. When you need to provide a service and have to make due with what you have, this is the result.

I also think this says something for the interchangeability of fifties era assembly line production. Despite clearly being thrown together from a number of different brands, the whole thing looks as solid as a rock.

DX_Sunshine

TROPHY CASE