chameleons-dish

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i've been reading a lot of het romance in the past year (here distinguished from m/f as a whole because i want to speak specifically to how straight people write*) and i really, really need straight romance authors to read how gay people talk about the people they're attracted to and learn from it.

(*which doesn't mean i think 'they're both bisexual' inherently makes an m/f couple more interesting but that's another post)

there's this way of writing that like, is very clearly making sure the characters actually Like each other and Enjoy Being In Each Other's Company which is fantastic i do love that. But, there's a real training wheels set of tropes to writing attraction between these leads that always highlights the same features (i don't have to enumerate the fixation on men having broad shoulders we're all familiar) without any sense of specificity. i do not care about this man being generic brand hot, i wanna know what insanely granular detail only our heroine has noticed that shuts off her higher brain functions.

now i appreciate that i, as a lesbian, am not the target demographic of het romance--but i also know that my mom (a certified 100% heterosexual) has been complaining about the protagonists of romance novels being generic brand hot for years. even As A Dyke, if you write with enough particularities about what your heroine is into about this man i should be able to see what she sees

specificity is the key to eroticism!!! straight authors need to be writing their characters like horny posts about alfred molina and i'm NOT kidding

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shorthands for dumbassery that i have grown to love deeply

"how dare you say we piss on the poor" in response to someone misinterpreting your post

"_ isnt gonna fuck you" for suck up behavior

"woah. should we tell everyone? should we throw a party?" for who the fuck cares

"and what if the world was made of pudding" for when would this ever matter.

"and sharks are smooth both ways" for a group of people heatedly arguing with 1 guy who is fucking with them all

".. but its about a witch in the alps finding her lost cat" for someone trying to sanitize something to the point of absurdity

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Recycled tumblr humor

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*repeating crossbows not included in crossbows

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themes commonly found in international friendships

- ‘u dont have (insert food/music/restaurant here) over there??’ - ‘wait what time is it. shouldnt u be asleep’ - alternatively: timezoned/clockblocked again - ‘do u need a hug. have a virtual hug’ - weird slang terms - ‘i will fight everyone thats mean to u. i will fight them rn’ - vague embarrassment regarding ur accent - ‘dont maKE ME COME OVER THERE’ - ‘oh yeah i have a friend who lives in (insert country here) and apparently’ - no real hugs :(( - suffering - fahrenheit vs celsius - the measuring of things in feet fucks one of u up, probably

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Fanfic tiktok is wild... I see so many people saying shit like "I could never read anything below 60k!!", or "What story can you even tell in under 5k words?" or "A oneshot below 10k isn't even a story!" or "I always filter completed fics by 100k< only!"

And I'm like...

A) which fandoms are you reading fics for where you have this kind of offerings on the regular?

B) have you heard of short stories? If you truly think every story NEEDS to be longform to connect with people, I sincerely feel sorry for you.

C) Average novel length is between 50k to 100k. I'm sorry, but CONSISTENTLY demanding fic writers to push out fics of that length is insane. Just think about it: YOU DEMAND AUTHORS TO PUT OUT FICS THAT COMPARE TO COMMERCIAL NOVELS IN LENGTH (AND QUALITY) AS A BASELINE.

Yall are wilding.

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Stan was given a deck of cards

Dipper just has them all memorized

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These posts are cousins to me.

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on the question of lily evans’ intelligence… she was never mentioned to be the ‘brightest witch of her age’. hermione was, and even that didn't actually mean she was the brightest witch in her generation or anything, just at hogwarts in her year. slughorn mentioned that lily was exceptional in potions, which implies she was smart or at least her at following instructions. other than that, her intelligence wasn't particularly mentioned. he did say she was vivacious and quite cheeky, and we see this in many of her scenes, but it isn't implied that she's this genius or even necessarily at the top of all her classes. i'm sure she was bright, that much is sure, but she was not the top student in her year.

now, sirius and james were known as two of the smartest students at hogwarts, not just their year, while her intelligence is never commented on in that way. she is never even called the brightest witch of her age, much less the school. the lack of comment compared to the canon info about them implies that her intellect is not as exceptional as theirs.

acknowledging that sometimes JKR’s female characters are less fleshed-out than her male characters, we can bring up hermione granger, ginny weasley, and dorcas meadowes. hermione was canonically the brightest witch of her age, ginny was a terror with magic and very bold, and dorcas was a big enough threat for voldemort to kill personally. the fact that some are not well fleshed-out actually makes my point more valid, not less, as it means these qualities were deemed most important about them. so if lily was known for her cheekiness and skill in potions, the exclusion of intelligence from that list implies that it was not one of her most exceptional traits.

now, to say she isn’t the most intelligent witch in her year is not to say she is not bright! it also is not to say she was not magically powerful! she certainly seems to be a competent fighter and dangerous enough. after all, voldemort tried to recruit her and james. i’m just saying it is unlikely that she was the prodigy in terms of intelligence that people often try to frame her as. i think she was actually quite intelligent. i just don’t think she was this natural academic weapon.

for more extensive insight into her personality, not just her intelligence, see this post i found which analyses almost every single lily reference in the books. DAMN. good stuff.

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Becoming a writer is great because now you have a hobby that haunts you whenever you don’t have time to do it

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“on sokka’s seventeenth, looking at the moon hurt. so, he looked at zuko instead.” - breakable heaven, ch. 10 by @sokkalore

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yes yes i’m hypercritical but you’re not special here. i do that to everyone. i do that to me. especially to me. you’re getting off easy actually. would i hold myself to this standard? no. my standards for myself are MUCH higher. do better.

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they say dress for the job you want but if you wear white to a wedding

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no because what do you mean charlie and alan hate each other but are the only ones who could tolerate each other and they cling to each other. what do you mean they have a subconsciously incestuous relationship with each other and their mother. what do you mean their mother was neglectful and manipulative and constantly made them feel worthless and ashamed. what do you mean they both have oedipal complexes that affect them in almost opposing ways but always result in them having terrible relationships. what do you mean they never had a father figure who lasted long enough with their mother and it permanently affected how they view relationships. what do you mean charlie was a victim of csa and it’s basically never mentioned again. what do you mean

comedy show try not to have more devastatingly awful and weird characters than your average tragedy challenge. level impossible apparently