Last post on this topic for a while…
I’ve said most of this before, but maybe I used too many words or something. Let me be succinct:
BUT HOW COULD A FEMINIST POSSIBLY LOVE ROSE?!
* Falling in love doesn’t make you less of a person.
* Choosing what you want to do with your life, knowing how you want to live, is not a weakness. Yes, even if what matters most is to be with the person you love. It takes strength and courage to fight for the life that you want, against all odds, against the expectations of family and society. The ability to buck tradition and follow your heart is a sign of a strong character, not of childishness or immaturity.
* Being sad when you lose someone you love is normal, not pathetic. Doing everything in your power to get back to them, and succeeding against all odds, is fucking awesome. “Moving on” and “getting over” the love of your life is not superior to fighting your way back and refusing to give up.
* Battling Daleks, killing Satan, and repeatedly helping to save the universe is also awesome. It’s not invalidated just because you happen to be in love while you do it.
* A couple in love is not limited to a lifetime of domesticity. Personally, my human!Doctor and Rose are defending their universe and building their own space-time machine. Or possibly being DEADLY ZEPPELIN AIR PIRATES. Whatever. Continuing adventures, people, not the end of adventure.
By no means am I saying that everyone has to agree (*waves to the nice non-Rose fans on my flist*), but it’s not anti-feminist that I like something you don’t in a fictional story. You might see something completely different and hate it, and we can both still be feminists. Because stories have multiple interpretations! It’s okay! Really!
Current Mood: 
bored
43 Responses to “Last post on this topic for a while…”
a_white_rain on July 8, 2008 5:27 pm | Link
Agreed!
However. I resent having you friended. Because now you’re making me start to like the finale and I desire to write/read fics where alt!Ten and Rose are air pirates and alt!Ten frets about Rose having a gun and they meet up with alt!Donna and alt!Wilf and start a pirate crew. \o/
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 5:40 pm | Link
YES. That’s the fanfic I want. >:)
(BTW, Circe wrote one! It’s very dark, though.)
The more I think about it, the more pissed off and frustrated I get with our Ten, and the more I want to hear about the continuing adventures of human!Ten and Rose instead. They’ve got all sorts of issues to work through and all sorts of adventures to have.
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a_white_rain on July 8, 2008 5:44 pm | Link
I’m very very tempted to write it. I kinda also want to bring in Martha, but I think she’d be the only one with some common sense.
(Thanks! I’ll read that when I’m in the mood for angst over crack.)
I… I want to think less about our Ten. He’s too broken in the wrong ways for me to analyze. Instead, I will ponder all the adorable and fucked up adventures alt!Ten and Rose will have.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 5:46 pm | Link
PLEASE WRITE IT. *g*
Yes, I’d like to see Martha in that context. And Jake and Jack and Sarah Jane and all of them! Being heroes without the stupid angst for the sake of angst. :P
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a_white_rain on July 8, 2008 5:48 pm | Link
HAHA I THINK I WILL. I will have Ten wear an eye patch! Though I’m unsure how to bring Jack in? Maybe I’ll have them build a Time Machine and track him down. After Rose gives him a long long lecture about lying to her about Jack being dead.
Also I need to bring in Jackie somehow.
I AM DONE WITH ANGST. I WANT CRACK.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 6:07 pm | Link
I think I’m out-angsted too. The Doctor loses his best enemy, daughter, two true loves, and best friend, all in a row?
I’LL TAKE THE CRACK, PLEASE.
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a_white_rain on July 9, 2008 3:55 am | Link
The most I can do is wonder what RTD will do next? Give Jack another One True Love?
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butterfly on July 8, 2008 5:39 pm | Link
Yes! I don’t know why there’s this pervading assumption that being in love automatically makes you a weaker character, but I find it so baffling and so contrary to what we are actually shown on-screen. Rose does some pretty impressive things. They are not invalidated because she’s also in love.
I mean, we already know that Rose has helped build a time machine. And… we’ve met the Doctor and Rose. They are total freaking adrenaline junkies. They like being in danger and running for their lives and saving people. They are not going to live a quiet suburban life with a dog, 2.5 kids, and a white picket fence.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 5:44 pm | Link
I think it’s that people are used to seeing sexist portrayals of women in love who are weak and helpless and focused only on men. They’re so wary of the sexist stereotype (legitimately!) that it’s all they can see here.
And it’s really sad, because Rose isn’t weak or helpless or focused only on her man. Rose takes care of herself, saves him as often as he saves her, builds a time machine and a dimensional hopper, fights for the universe, discovers her own potential for heroism, adores travel and adventure… she has her own character arc that’s all about her. And she’s in love. One doesn’t take away from the other.
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butterfly on July 8, 2008 5:49 pm | Link
Yeah. I see that. It’s just so… frustrating to see this amazing example of a woman who has such a strong character arc and have her get called weak because she’s in love and people make assumptions about what that means.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 5:56 pm | Link
Well, y’know, and she’s blonde. All young blonde women are bimbos. (Wait, who’s being sexist again? :P)
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shipperx on July 8, 2008 5:59 pm | Link
I guess I never understand why so many people assume that Rose in the AU defaults to domesticity. Isn’t she in alt_torchwood? I don’t think that 10.5 and Rose will buy a cottage in the Cotswalds and pump out munchkins. I figure that they’ll go on to other adventures. I in no way discount the liklihood of their building a spaceship or a time machine (10.5 does have 10’s brain, so while there being no TARDIS is an obstacle, it’s not as though he’s completely out of options). Basically, I never quite understand why fandoms default to the concept that it’s all about buying a house, paying a morgage, and having kiddies. There are other options and none of that is precluded by what’s happened in the show.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 6:12 pm | Link
BECAUSE SHE’S A WOMAN AND ALL WOMEN WANT BABIES. Doesn’t matter how much she natters on about travel and adventure and making a difference. All she really wants is to rope a man into marriage and to breed.
(Hey, no wonder the Rosehaters love Steven Moffat!)
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shipperx on July 8, 2008 10:13 pm | Link
Those are pretty appalling quotes. However, isn’t he the writer of Coupling? If so, then I suspect that he isn’t as misogynist as it sounds. (Maybe it’s because I keep hearing it in my head in Coupling’s Steve’s voice and knowing that Susan would rightfully smack him around a bit).
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 10:21 pm | Link
Yeah, he’s the writer of Coupling. I think there may be more layers to his feelings than expressed in those quotes, but the mere fact that he said them semi-seriously creeps the hell out of me.
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Paratti on July 8, 2008 6:06 pm | Link
Exactly.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 6:14 pm | Link
This fandom makes my head hurt. >:(
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katesutton on July 8, 2008 6:13 pm | Link
I know there are plenty of bad stories out there, where the woman’s characterization pretty much exists around how she wants or needs a man(why hello there, Tosh! Er, I do like her, though..). But you really have to ignore, like, all of season one and a freaking big chunk of season two to say that Rose is just about the Doctor. I get that season three Doctor and Martha and all that jazz made some fans resentful, but you see, that’s not Rose’s fault.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 6:21 pm | Link
Logic and Doctor Who fandom are not mixy things. :(
See, to me Rose’s story was about choosing her own path. She had society, Mickey, Jackie, and the Doctor all telling her what she should do, and she made her own choice to defy them all and go after what she wanted. Travel, adventure, the ability to make a difference, and life with the Doctor.
And the thing is, she wasn’t reduced to a romantic interest. If that’s all she was, we wouldn’t have gotten hero!Rose with her big fucking gun, blasting away Daleks, advising AU!Donna, building a time machine and a dimension hopper. It was just as important for the conclusion of her story to show that she was living her life as a universe-saving hero as it was to show that she’d never given up on finding the Doctor.
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redeem147 on July 8, 2008 6:18 pm | Link
I think, given the Doctor’s feelings of being cut off from his people and Rose’s happiness at Jackie’s pregnancy, children could well be in their future. Procreation doesn’t negate feminism either.
Babies strapped on their backs as they trek through the universe. Maybe being babysat as their parents fight the zeppelin pirates, though.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 6:24 pm | Link
Oh, they certainly could procreate. The new human-Time-Lord Empire! Imagine the universes colliding a thousand years from now and our Doctor meeting his universe-defending AU!descendants.
I’m just saying that they don’t have to breed, and that it’s highly unlikely, based on their personalities, that they’ll ever “settle down” and give up their adventures.
Babies strapped on their backs as they trek through the universe.
Yup, that’s how I’d picture it. :)
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orange_crushed on July 8, 2008 6:28 pm | Link
WHY DOES FANDOM KEEP MAKING IT NECESSARY FOR ME TO PUT A FOOT UP ITS ASS ?
Rose is a hero. In case that wasn’t clear enough from the first two seasons, her return was all big-guns-blazing, Dalek-exploding, time-machine-building, epic-running, universe-saving goodness. She was incredible. It was like Rose For Dummies: See Rose Run. See Rose Save the Universe. See Rose Laugh and Be Full of Win.
How sexist idiots can keep harping on the “she wants timebabies” rubbish, I’ll never know.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 6:45 pm | Link
I know!
For a minute there, I saw a lot of haters going “Hmmm, Rose isn’t so bad.” AND THEN SHE SMILED AT THE DOCTOR AND IT WAS ALL OVER.
*sigh*
And, yeah, I am usually the first one bitching when a female character is written in a sexist way. BUT DAMMIT, ROSE TYLER IS FUCKING AWESOME.
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Yonmei on July 8, 2008 6:39 pm | Link
After all our disagreements over Donna, I’m glad I can wholeheartedly agree with all of this.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 6:43 pm | Link
Cool. :)
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trepkos on July 8, 2008 7:10 pm | Link
I haven’t hated any of the (new DW) companions – I liked all of them in fact.
Seems like that’s pretty odd.
None of them seemed anti-feminist …
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 7:12 pm | Link
A VOICE OF REASON.
Yes, when I explain this nonsense to viewers not in fandom, I tend to get a lot of dropped jaws in response!
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justhuman on July 8, 2008 7:34 pm | Link
Agreed!
(Well, with reservations about the settling down bits as we’ve discussed at length before ;-) — Romance good, marriage the death of adventure. Well, that’s not exactly true either depending on the couple, but babies definitely are.)
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 9:42 pm | Link
Thanks! :)
I just can’t picture the Doctor and Rose ever settling down. They are all about adventure and new experiences and being heroes. That doesn’t change just because they’re in love.
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Kita on July 8, 2008 8:11 pm | Link
Are you trying to say that Teh Penis does not automatically degrade everything it touches?
BECAUSE THEM’S FIGHTING WORDS.
[Translation: oh god oh god we agree on something else oh god.]
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 10:00 pm | Link
How dare we not hate all men? Any woman who falls for them is obviously TAINTED AND CORRUPTED.
It’s funny how one minute I’m too radical, and the next minute I’m not radical enough. Make up your minds, haters!
(*checks for universe explosions* Haha, I guess the universe is getting used to us!)
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cindergal on July 8, 2008 8:56 pm | Link
Why do some women think that feminism = hating men or romance or love or some such nonsense? Does not compute.
Also, may I point out that we breeders can also be, you know, interesting people. ;-) (I know that’s not what you mean, hee!).
And speaking of, you really must watch Farscape. Why have you not seen Farscape? I will bribe you with AltTen!/Rose fic if I must.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 10:10 pm | Link
Why do some women think that feminism = hating men or romance or love or some such nonsense? Does not compute.
It really doesn’t make much sense. I get the wariness toward the sexism when a woman’s story is all about romance, but this one wasn’t. How could you miss the repeated universe-saving?!
Also, may I point out that we breeders can also be, you know, interesting people.
Haha. I tried to phrase this as diplomatically as possible, honest. They might have kids, they might not, whatever, their choice. But based on their personalities, they’ll never stop having adventures and being heroes.
Farscape’s at the top of my Netflix queue! I just haven’t gotten a new DVD in, um, six months? Oopsie. Been busy with Doctor Who!
I will watch it. I will. I swear! I want to finish Due South first, though. Farscape’s next!
(Although if I watch it, I now expect AltTen/Rose fic for my trouble! :P)
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bubonicplague on July 9, 2008 12:53 am | Link
ITA, actually. I know we disagree on the finale (and really, I shouldn’t talk so much shit when I haven’t watched it), but I do have a problem with the Doctor making decisions for other people. Donna, Rose, Jack, Sarah Jane…Ten’s beat them all with the “I know better” stick. I do see a bit of sexism in TWO strong women now being overpowered, essentially, by too much knowledge, but I don’t think Rusty is intentionally sexist. Still, it grates on me.
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rusty-halo on July 9, 2008 1:12 am | Link
I shouldn’t talk so much shit when I haven’t watched it
I was going to say that, but I didn’t want to piss you off. *hides*
I have a major problem with the Doctor making decisions for other people, too. Although he also does it to Jack: leaving him on the satellite, telling him not to use his gun, disabling his vortex manipulator twice. I think we see him doing it to women more often simply because there are far more female characters, on account of needing a female companion to keep the genders balanced. But he does it to humans indiscriminately of gender, which is still screwed-up, but, um, speciesist rather than sexist?
Also, I’d have more of problem with the Doctor making decisions for other people if it was presented as a good thing. But I think the narrative is pretty clearly showing that he’s wrong and is being kind of an idiot.
The narrative shows us that the Doctor’s companions become better people because of his influence. They learn to be heroes, to stand up for what’s right, to protect the people they care about. But all the Doctor sees is that he destroys his companions. Astrid, Jenny, River, and Harriet Jones die for him; Martha’s ready to annihilate humanity; half the single-episode characters he meets end up dead. He absolutely takes Davros’ words to heart, that he’s a “destroyer of worlds” who turns his companions into weapons.
And that’s epitomized in Donna’s story. Because we see how amazing she’s become, but all he sees is her dying for him, and he’d do anything to undo it. And it’s the same for Rose. It’s arrogant and horrible for him to send her away without even talking it out, but it’s because he loves her too much to watch her destroyed because of him, to see her turn into a killer or a martyr.
So… yeah, I think it’s really obvious that the Doctor is wrong. Especially with Donna, where we all know she’s better for having known him, but he hates himself so much that he’ll gladly wipe his entire existence from her mind.
He’s such an ass. And kind of a pathetic one. But with the best of intentions. And, yeah, the point being that I don’t think the text shows his behavior in a positive light at all. He’s an idiot and he ends up alone in the rain because of his own damn stupid choices.
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bubonicplague on July 9, 2008 1:28 am | Link
That’s the thing…everyone likes some Doctors and dislikes others. Not even Ten can come close to my loathing of manipulative, asshole Seven, for instance, and some people adore the concept of a master chess player manipulating humanity to some vague purpose. This all might be in line completely with Rusty’s vision of a flawed Doctor (which all are), but I don’t get the impression – and here’s where he goes wrong – that we are meant to think of him as anything but perfect and right. He glorifies Ten in such a way as to make us think…well, essentially that those who don’t care for him or find him condescending to humanity in a way that Five or Nine never would have been, despite their halfassed insults…are not fans anymore.
But I like fake Ten. Did I mention I like fake Ten?
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rusty-halo on July 9, 2008 1:34 am | Link
Hee! I think I like fake Ten better, too. Even I’m getting sick of our Ten’s emo.
I disagree about RTD, though. I think he portrays Ten in an epic way, but he portrays him as both epically amazing and epically fucked-up.
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bubonicplague on July 9, 2008 1:58 am | Link
*snicker* Or epically self-indulgent. It just all gives me bad flashbacks to Buffy season six, you know, when we all got sick of her whiny shit and they still all expected we’d worship her?
Fake Ten is ultimate win. Well, from what I have heard, and yeah, I am downloading….episode one of the season. Just so I can back up me being a dick about all this. Gonna watch the WHOLE SEASON just to spite people. ;)
I want to write fic about him. Talk about being fucked-up.
But kinda kickass.
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rusty-halo on July 9, 2008 2:06 am | Link
Gonna watch the WHOLE SEASON just to spite people. ;)
Ah, it’s like the epitome of you. *g*
I WANT TO READ YOUR ALT!TEN FANFIC. Pleasepleaseplease. Now that you’ve mentioned it, it must be written. ;)
I’ve seen Ten compared to both Buffy and Angel a lot lately (self-indulgent emo, arrogance, thinks he knows best) and, yeah, I see it. Him sending Rose away pisses me off, and not in a squeeful angsty way. But I still like him way better than Buffy and Angel, because he’s got lots of Spikish qualities to make up for it (defiance of authority, emotional neediness, joie de vivre, sense of humor). Although I admit that lately I’m seeing less of what I love and more of what annoys me.
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bubonicplague on July 9, 2008 2:23 am | Link
I have already promised Lisa an Alt!Ten fic, so I am so almost on it. The “almost” part being that pesky actually watching thing. So, at least tell me that there is something this season to make me squee a bit? I don’t think there’s a Blink in there, but I have heard good stuff about the Library two-parter thingy.
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rusty-halo on July 9, 2008 11:22 am | Link
Woohoo!
I mostly loved this season, but apparently I’m strange. Ironically the Library two-parter is the main thing I hated.
I’d say:
* Partners in Crime – Okay, funny, Donna rules.
* Fires of Pompeii – One of the best of the season, well-written, slightly cheesy, Donna rules more.
* Planet of the Ood – I love it for the animal rights parallels, but lots of people think it’s cheesetastic.
* Sontaran two-parter – Martha Sue is awesome! Look how awesome Martha is! Awesome awesome awesome!
* The Doctor’s Daughter – You’ll hate this one. It’s cheesy and all about the Doctor’s emo man!pain.
* The Unicorn and the Wasp – I love it. It’s hilarious and the performances are wonderful. And Donna continues to rule.
* Moffat two-parter – Lame, lame, lame. The Doctor gets a Mary Sue future wife who has no story arc or personality except in relation to him, and fobs her off to live a fake life caring for children, which seems to make her happy despite her having supposedly been a badass adventurer in life. Also Donna has nothing to do and all she really wants is a man and children!
* Midnight – Best of the season and maybe the series. Psychological and dark and brilliantly written and acted.
* Three finale episodes – Wonderful. RTD goes out with a bang, brings everyone back, and wraps up all the story arcs.
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Kari on July 24, 2009 2:33 pm | Link
I hope I’m asking this in the right place…
How do you feel about how Rose was treated in Bad Wolf Bay this time round?
I did not like the way that the Doctor just sort of decided for Rose how things were going to go down. I realize that RTD had a million plates spinning in the air, but I really do not like the way that Proper Doctor just decided that Rose was going back to the parallel world with Other Doctor. I realize that Rose had to leave at the end of the episode, but by the end there, with Proper Doctor just deciding the fates of Rose and Donna for them it left a really bad taste in my mouth.
Seems to me that it would have been far better to give Rose a scene or two with Other Doctor, where she could work out the fact that he only had one life, had nowhere to go, and that yes, he really was the Doctor too. I think if Rose had been given the opportunity to actually all feel this (rather than just having it hastily told to her by Proper Doctor) she very well might have asked Other Doctor to come with her, rather than being told by Proper Doctor that this is how it had to be.
Yeah, I know, Journey’s End was ridiculously long, and I don’t entirely know what scene I would cut in order to fit that in, but I think that the characters and the story would have been better served if it hadn’t been turned into Companionfest 08. (Companionfest 09 in Canada. Bloody CBC!)
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rusty-halo on July 24, 2009 2:44 pm | Link
I definitely would have liked it better if Rose had more agency. I think that they were trying to imply that she did make a decision, but they were crammed for time and that the scene was awkwardly written, so it didn’t come across clearly. But I think she does make her choice when she asks them each what the Doctor was about to say to her at the end of “Doomsday”–she chooses the one who is able to admit that he loves her.
Which… I actually really like as a feminist statement. She chooses the one who is emotionally capable of satisfying HER need to be loved openly in return, rather than tagging along to support the one who is still too emotionally damaged to be honest with her.
But I agree, it would’ve been even better if we’d seen her interacting with Ten II specifically (although I don’t think it’s entirely necessary since we’re meant to think that he IS the Doctor). And the show is ultimately about the Doctor, so we saw everything in relation to how it affected him rather than in relation to Rose and Ten II (which, you can definitely make an argument about the inherent sexism of yet another show with a white male lead, but that’s a whole nother issue beyond just this part of the story).
I loved the returns of the companions, but they should have expanded the length of the episode to fit everyone in without it seeming so rushed. A lot of the things that fans are upset about could’ve been easily resolved with just a bit more screentime to deal with them.
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