lyalii

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mood

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I noticed you havent said anything about my new wound

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now that i think about it what the fuck actually happened in 2023

part of my lore is coming on here every few months and seeing my posts and just being like "wow. i am now unrecognizable to the person i once was. and not necessarily in a good way."

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part of my lore is coming on here every few months and seeing my posts and just being like "wow. i am now unrecognizable to the person i once was. and not necessarily in a good way."

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I used to work for a trade book reviewer where I got payed to review people's books, and one of the rules of that review company is one that I think is just super useful to media analysis as a whole, and that is, we were told never to critique media for what it didn't do but only for what it did.

So, for instance, I couldn't say "this book didn't give its characters strong agency or goals". I instead had to say, "the characters in this book acted in ways that often felt misaligned with their characterization as if they were being pulled by the plot."

I think this is really important because a lot of "critiques" people give, if subverted to address what the book does instead of what it doesn't do, actually read pretty nonsensical. For instance, "none of the characters were unique" becomes "all of the characters read like other characters that exist in other media", which like... okay? That's not really a critique. It's just how fiction works. Or "none of the characters were likeable" becomes "all of the characters, at some point or another, did things that I found disagreeable or annoying" which is literally how every book works?

It also keeps you from holding a book to a standard it never sought to meet. "The world building in this book simply wasn't complex enough" becomes "The world building in this book was very simple", which, yes, good, that can actually be a good thing. Many books aspire to this. It's not actually a negative critique. Or "The stakes weren't very high and the climax didn't really offer any major plot twists or turns" becomes "The stakes were low and and the ending was quite predictable", which, if this is a cute romcom is exactly what I'm looking for.

Not to mention, I think this really helps to deconstruct a lot of the biases we carry into fiction. Characters not having strong agency isn't inherently bad. Characters who react to their surroundings can make a good story, so saying "the characters didn't have enough agency" is kind of weak, but when you flip it to say "the characters acted misaligned from their characterization" we can now see that the *real* problem here isn't that they lacked agency but that this lack of agency is inconsistent with the type of character that they are. a character this strong-willed *should* have more agency even if a weak-willed character might not.

So it's just a really simple way of framing the way I critique books that I think has really helped to show the difference between "this book is bad" and "this book didn't meet my personal preferences", but also, as someone talking about books, I think it helps give other people a clearer idea of what the book actually looks like so they can decide for themselves if it's worth their time.

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Kasamatsu Shiro

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Jaron Nix

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women in STEM. women in BRANCH. women in LOG. women in TREE. women in BUSH (both kinds.) women in FOREST CLEARING. we’re everywhere these woods are ours

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Listen I know she is unhinged, responsible for multiple atrocities, and a danger to herself and others. But have you ever considered that she is tiny and sad and I love her?

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"Immature people crave and demand moral certainty: This is bad, this is good. Kids and adolescents struggle to find a sure moral foothold in this bewildering world; they long to feel they’re on the winning side, or at least a member of the team. To them, heroic fantasy may offer a vision of moral clarity. Unfortunately, the pretended Battle Between (unquestioned) Good and (unexamined) Evil obscures instead of clarifying, serving as a mere excuse for violence — as brainless, useless, and base as aggressive war in the real world."

Ursula K Le Guin at it again, being right as always

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@witchothewest the dorky classics professor kind

maybe if you thought about Cassian wearing glasses you would feel better :/

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What's your opinion of the Prince of Egypt movie?

i sent a pestilence a plague into your house into your bed into your streams into your streets into your drink into your bread! upon your cattle, on your sheep upon your oxen, in your field into your dreams into your sleep until you break until you yield! I - sent - the - swarm - I - sent - the - hoard - thu'saieth the looooord 

once i called you brother, once i thought the chance to make you laugh, was all i ever wanted (ISENTHEFIREFROMTHESKYISENTTHEFIRERAININGDOWN.) and even now, i wish that god had chose another, serving as your foe on his behalf, is the last thing that i wanteeeeeeeeeed (I SENT A HAIL OF BURNING ICE ON EVERY FIELD ON EVERY TOWN!) THIS was my home, all this pain and devastation, how it tortures me inside, all the innocent who suffer, from your STUBBORNNESS AND PRIIIIIIIIIIDE (I SENT THE LOCUSTS ON THE WIND SUCH AS THE WORLD HAS NEVER SEEN FROM EVERY LEAF ON EVERY STALK UNTIL THERE’S NOTHING LEFT BUT GREEN!) I - sent - my - scourge - I - sent - my - sword - thu'saieth the looooord you who i call brother, why must you call down another blow, is this what you wanteeeeeeeed I - sent - my - scourge - I - sent - my - swoooooooord LET MY PEOPLE GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO (THUS SAITH THE LORD) THUS SAITH THE LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOORD 

you who i called brother, how could you have come to hate me so, is this what you wanted  I - sent - the - swarm - I - sent - the - hoard - then let my heart be hardened, and never mind how high the cost may grow, this will still be so. i will never let. yoooour peeeeeeeopleeeeeee go. (THUS SAITH THE LORD) thus saith the looooooooooord i will not let. (let) your- (my people) gooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

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Igor Sid

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animators fuck me up. if you asked me to draw something it would take every ounce of my life to complete this task. if you then asked me to draw it again a little to the left I would die