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Oh yeah, Hoshin Engi https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoshin_Engi

"Taikoubou's spirit beast who has the appearance of a white hippo (his original design was more like a dragon). Suupuushan uses the inflection "~su" at the end of sentences. He has adult-like and serious personality. Originally, he lived in his birthplace in the Suupuu valley in Northern Europe with his parents, Suupuupapa and Suupuumama" yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah

this anime with just straight up unauthorized moomins in it not even trying to hide it like the creator literally wanted moomins to be part of this setting and apparently couldn’t be stopped

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Those “talent doesnt exist” comics are bs. Some people just get gifted, that is how it is.

Talent does exist. I’ve seen it.

I have an accuantancie who doesn’t draw. Literally, they draw once every few months whenever they feel it but normally they don’t, they say they are too lazy to do it. That is fine.

They draw better than I do.

I draw and practice daily for crying out loud! And they can do in a blink what took me months to nail down. I worked my ass off for my art and they don’t have to. Talent does exist kiddos, don’t let no one tell you otherwise. Some people are born gifted and ‘not all men are created equal’. Some of us will forever deal with the disavantage.

And just for the sake of not ending in a sour note. Tell you what… If you work hard enough talent is not gonna matter. Like I said. I can catch up if I practice non stop, which I do. So can everyone. It is a hard road but worth it.

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What did Hanna Is Not A Boy's Name do to scam and manipulate people? I remember seeing it advertised at conventions, so now I'm curious...

Oh gods.

Ok lemme see if I remember this all correctly. 

Hanna Is Not a Boy’s Name was a beautiful urban fantasy webcomic with unconventional panel designs and skinny white men being homoerotic with each other.  

It was very popular. Like, goddamn, it was everywhere around 2009-2011 as I remember. 

And then the artist Tessa Stone just … vanished. Without a word. No updates, no contact, no nothing. Not even a message saying “hey I’m going on hiatus.” After a year, people were holding fucking vigils for her on her deviantart page, thinking she was gravely ill or possibly dead. Rumors flew. Her publishing company was accused of shady dealings. People who’d ordered custom sketches never got their sketches, or their money back. I think there was a fundraiser for a book release that people donated to, and that never materialized. Eventually the publishing company paid the angry fans back for the books that never materialized. Tessa didn’t pay them back with the money they’d sent her, the company paid back her fans back with the company’s money. 

This absence went on for FOUR. FUCKING. YEARS. (… was it five?!)

Then all of the sudden Tessa went on to work for a new company and make a new comic for them. Her fanbase largely followed her, overjoyed that she was ALIVE … but confused about what the hell had happened. 

Understandably a lot of fans felt rather upset by all this, burned, confused, or scammed. There has never been closure, no statement, no nothing. There were rumors of some kind of lawsuit between Tessa and her original publishing company, but that was disproven. For a lot of fans, who were rather young, this was a very exciting and cool series, and then all of the sudden it just … stopped. Some had their money taken, no explanation. That’s hard enough for anyone to deal with, but especially so for a bunch of teenagers new to fandom and fandom life. 

I mean, it’s not Dashcon levels of illegal but I’d call that a fucking scam. And she got away with it too! She has a career, a fanbase, never had to pay anyone back the money she took in exchange for the promise of sketches and books down the line. 

So … *shrug* I was quite upset at the time. I remember seeing this unfold and thinking “wow, I’m glad I never sent her money” because there’s a good chance I’d have never gotten it back. It’s a shame the story itself never got resolved, it ended in the middle of a very tense situation, and lots of future plot elements had been teased. I’m more annoyed that she basically stole from her fans, many of them young, left them thinking she was sick or dead for years, and has yet to release a statement explaining what on earth happened. 

tl;dr: webcomic artist takes money from fans for the promise of future art and books, vanishes off the face of the Earth for years, reappears at a new company with a new comic, never pays back her fans, never explains wtf happened, did not let them know if she was alive or dead for years. 

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How was squick used? Like would you tag something you didn't want to see or comment "X is my squick because of Y"?

For the original ask, requesting the definition of squick, please see this post.

Squick is a fun term that was often used as both a noun and a verb. Either X was one of your squicks, or X squicked you, or squicked you out, or squicked you hard.

It was often used in fic exchanges. They would ask for a list of your squicks so that the gifting author would know not to include any hint of them. It was also used in casual conversation with fandom friends, authors, artists, etc. It could be left in comments, or as a reason you just didn’t read your best fandom friend’s latest fic. “Sorry, bff, you know I love your writing, but you have X tagged at the top, and that just squicks me out.” “Hey, no worries, best reader friend! I totally get it. Give this one a pass, but I’ll send you a note when I post my next one! I promise it will be totally X-free!”

Here’s the thing though. In your example, you explain why X is your squick with Y. But the beauty of squick was that (at least in my experience) no explanation was necessary. Not only was it not necessary, it was rarely asked for. A squick is a squick, and there doesn’t have to be any rhyme or reason. In fact, why would you have a rational, bullet-pointed, well-thought-out argument as to why something squicked you out? Very often it’s a visceral reaction, and if you don’t like the thing, you’re likely not going to sit and do deep meditation on why not.

Squicks were respected by fandom. You don’t like the thing, okay, we will tag the thing appropriately, you do not have to read the thing, no judgments on either side. There was no fandom policing, only respect.

And this, I think, is super important, because fandom policing is a problem, especially when it comes to triggers. “Trigger” has become so overused, so all-encompassing, that people feel they have to defend their legitimate triggers. If X triggers you, it triggers you, and you DO NOT need to provide an explanation. But because “trigger” is so often used in place of “squick,” some people feel they have the right to “call out” those who use the word. They want explanations, they want you to tell them what that triggering concept does to you, so they can call bullshit and feel superior. You don’t have to explain either your squicks or your triggers, but using the correct word stops the fandom police from feeling as though they have the right to ask.

Bring “squick” back, people. Don’t devalue triggers, which are horrible, nasty, dangerous things.

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what IS the correct reaction to learning a friend is a sexual harasser? I'm not trying to be rude I want to be able to do better as a guy. after you believe the victim, what comes next ?

Honestly in my “perfect world” the first thing I would want to happen is that the person being told thanks the accuser for trusting them enough with that information. It’s not easy to come forward about that, especially if you don’t have a lot of “proof” or that the person is more well-liked than you. It took Bill Cosby something over 40 women coming forward and him admitting to his crimes for people to actually take it seriously. When the Sandusky thing hit the news the majority of the public dismissed it, or thought that him being such an important figure for his sports team should negate the harm he did.

Secondly, the person being told should actually sit down and do some serious introspection about this. Instead of spending 20 minutes to write up a rant about how you “don’t think he’s that much of a creep!” or “the accuser is just mentally ill!” to reject the claims, actually sit down and self reflect. Are there times you have seen this person act inappropriate or say things that are not okay about people of that gender? Have you ever seen people they were interested in leave the group, with a pattern of things happening over the last few years/months/whatever time period where people have expressed they’re uncomfortable with them? Have they done things that were inappropriate but they blamed on being “too drunk,” or “too lonely” or whatever that you gave them a pass for? (edit accidentally hit enter here whoops) Actually talk to some of the people in the group privately and ask them “Hey, have you ever had any issues with X person? I’ve been told some pretty disturbing things about them and I wanted to make sure they haven’t done this to anyone else.” Then you support the person making the accusations the best you can. This doesn’t mean you have to believe them 100%, that the victim must always be right and everything they said happened as they said it happened. But you should respect that from this point on you should not be inviting both people to be around each other, and that from that point on you should be keeping an open mind and eye out to see if this person is actually acting the way they’ve been accused of. And it doesn’t have to be just men - I’ve called out predatory women and lgbt people before. I’ve had friends tell me about how they don’t go public with their abuse stories because in one case a male friend was abused by his older (hot) sister and everybody thought he should be “grateful” he got to “fuck such a hottie” when he was under the age of 10 and she was college aged. Or another person who was a sex worker so people thought “oh it’s not rape because you’re a whore” sort of thing. If you actually try to keep an open mind about this and try to investigate it yourself you might actually see these things happening instead of pretending everything is a-okay or not realizing what’s going on (there’s a theory called “The Missing Stair” you should look into for why this shit keeps happening in certain groups and what to do about it).

And lastly, once you know it you can’t unknow it. Whatever you choose to do, whether you stop being friends with the accuser or defend the accused, you’re going to have to live with that. If more evidence comes out that what they said was false or was actually true you’re going to have to re-evaluate your original decision on this. If you know this person is a creep you have to take steps to make sure they can’t hurt your other friends, and you have to confront it. The person doing the accusing rarely has any power in this situation, and from shit like Srhbutt’s whole pedo-fuck logs there will literally be people who are never satisfied with evidence, no matter how much of it exists, because they’d rather feel “right” than “do the right thing.” 

But for fucks sake don’t take less than 20 minutes to scream “you’re just crazy and damaged!”, try to pull some emotionally manipulative bullshit about how bad you feel before fucking off and pretending everything is okay DESPITE being told by several other people it’s been a fucking problem with that friend. Because then you’re just another “feminist ally” who’s doing this because you want that sweet sweet virtue-signaled pussy instead of actually being a feminist doing what you believe in.

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When Whimsical Wildlife Photography Isn’t what it Seems

The Newshour team posted a “Photo of the Day” last Thursday of a frog riding a tortoise. But the photo raised suspicions from the science desk. Read more on PBS @newshour. (Special thanks to @franzanth for translating the interview for this article!)

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Hi Alice, odd question but: Do you believe asexuals belong in the LGBT community? I have a friend who identifies this way, but as a trans girl, I'm struggling to understand how she has to go through the same things as an LGBT person by being asexual. And struggle aside, I don't even see how asexuality is THAT different from heterosexuality, just with more... hesitation!? Maybe this sounds rude, but I know you've written about asexual people etc, and I wondered what you thought. No shade intended

Hi there. I’m glad you reached out to me about this because you must have really upset your friend by saying stuff like this to them.

It’s easy to see why not only cishet people, but also LGBT+ people, think that asexuality is fake. The world is awash with sex and sexual attraction. It’s everywhere. And everyone is supposed to want it and feel it. It’s so extremely normalised that the idea that someone could be literally UNABLE to feel sexual attraction is, to many people, absolutely bizarre and a joke.

Even if you acknowledge that asexuality is real, it’s also easy to see why you would be so quick to reject and get angry at asexual people who call themselves LGBT+. Because asexual people are not like you, are they. Unless they are trans, asexuals don’t have gender troubles, and unless they experience same-gender romantic attraction, asexuals don’t experience same-gender attraction! Lesbian, bi, gay etc people can all be joined together in their experience of same gender attraction, and all trans folks, binary and non binary, can be joined together in their experience of feeing a disconnect from their assigned birth gender.

The result? No one wants asexuals near them. People can’t relate. No one else feels the way asexuals do and people don’t think they should be part of the group. They’re not the same as you.

But oh god, they are not allowed in the cishet club either.

The first thing you need to try and unlearn is that asexuality is in any way similar to heterosexuality. It’s not. It’s so, so fucking not. It’s painful how different it feels to be asexual compared to being heterosexual. Telling an ace person that asexuality isn’t ‘THAT different from heterosexuality’ is about as accurate as saying being gay isn’t ‘THAT different from heterosexuality’. Being asexual means you do not experience sexual attraction, ever. EVER. And while that might seem easy to you, it’s an extremely painful and terrifying thing to learn about yourself, in a world where everyone is expected to have an array of sexual experiences, fall in love, get married, and anyone who doesn’t do that is strange and a freak.

Learning you are asexual can be terrifying. When you realise you’ve never had a crush, when all your friends have had ten each, you are terrified. When you pass the age where people have started dating and having sex and you still feel nothing - NOTHING - you are terrified. When you think about ever falling in love and the idea disgusts you, or you think about falling in love and you crave it, god you CRAVE it, but you know you can’t ever feel that, you are terrified. When you realise you will never be able to enjoy a normal romantic/sexual relationship, the ones full of passion like you see in the movies, and people will reject you because you can’t fancy them in that way, and there’s a higher chance for you than anyone else that you will simply die alone, without love, without children - you are terrified.

You think being ace is the same as heterosexuality? You think it’s an easy thing to learn about yourself? Explain the terror, then. I’m all ears.

The fact you see asexuality as ‘hesitation’ is really horrifying to me. Asexuals aren’t attracted to the opposite gender but ‘hesitant’ to act on it. Asexuals DO NOT feel attraction. To anyone. It’s not a choice. It’s not a way of life. It’s not the same as celibacy out of choice, or being a ‘prude’, or waiting till marriage. It is ingrained in you, just like being gay is, just like being trans is. It is a part of you that no matter how hard you try to will it away, no matter how hard you try to persuade yourself otherwise, you cannot help it. You DO NOT feel attracted to ANYONE.

And in saying all this, I fully acknowledge that asexuals do not experience the extent of oppression that other LGBT+ folks do. There are no laws regarding asexuality. Lesbian, gay, bi, trans, and other LGBT+ folks no doubt experience a higher level and intensity of systematic oppression to asexuals, more frequently go through hard experiences due to their orientation or gender. But since when did being LGBT+ become a competition for ‘who’s the most oppressed’? Is that what LGBT+ is? You’re only allowed in the club if you’re ‘oppressed enough’? If you’re ‘gay enough’? If you’re ‘trans enough’?

If you need persuading that asexuals do experience their own form of oppression, though, consider the number of asexuals who are coerced into sex in order to ‘fix’ them. Consider the emotional pain that I have already discussed, of feeling that there is something fundamentally wrong and gross about you because you feel attracted to no one. Consider the number of asexuals who are hounded or emotionally abused by their families for failing to find partners. Consider the number of asexuals who force themselves to have sexual experiences, because it is the norm, because they don’t even know what asexuality is, because THEY think that they are just ‘hesitant’, despite finding sex disgusting and feeling no desire to do it. Do you really think asexuals are just running around, free and happy and content in who they are? They aren’t. I’m not.

So go ahead. Cast aside asexuals if you want. Call them attention-seeking, call them special snowflakes. Ignore the pain they feel. Make them go through it alone, in pain, terrified of what they are. Why on earth would the LGBT+ community be a place to support people like that!?

Messages like the one you have just sent me gives me further reason to never talk about that part of myself. To just sit and cry about it at home day after day because I do not like myself. Because I feel that nobody will accept me or understand who I am. I could list the number of things people have said to me to discredit and laugh at this part of myself, but it’s people like you who make me embarrassed to talk about it, too scared to own a label and talk about it freely and openly.

I thought, going into this, that the LGBT+ community was one of total respect, understanding, and empathy. I learnt pretty quickly that it is not.

I send love to your asexual friend. I really, really do.

Disclaimer: I am very aware of the nuances of asexuality, of the differences between romantic/aesthetic/sexual attraction, but sadly it seems that many people can’t even grasp the basic concept of asexuality, so I don’t quite think they’re ready for that yet.

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The “I Probably Shouldn’t Have Pets” Starter Pack

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Hey ya’ll. Got something serious to talk about. Here’s a copy paste:

Imgur links to screenshots here http://imgur.com/a/LEIid

If you haven’t guessed I’m the guy (afab transman) who worked with Hbomberguy on some of his videos late last year… until I sat in his stream and suddenly realized that his best friend there was the same guy in our friend’s group years ago who lives in my city that threatened to rape me. We agreed to meet up and then he pulled all the stops on being creepy as hell in private messages - even going as far as calling it a “date” and that he would take me back to his mom’s basement to drink until “I couldn’t say no to him.” When I finally cancelled and never showed he bombarded me with tonnes of “fucking bitch/whore/slut” type messages. I blocked him and tried to move on. I couldn’t with all the shit going on in my life at that time though, so ended up telling Hbomberguy and this is what he replied with.

I’ve been sitting on this for a while, faffing about whether I should post it somewhere or not, for a lot of reasons (including that my reputation will be shot to shit now, everyone will know I’m transgender and some of my history of sexual assault).

On the other hand, Hbomberguy is making his career off being a “sjw feminist” when he has the balls to say shit like what he did. It infuriates me to know that he still not only is friends with a guy he has outright admitted is a fucking creeper but has him contribute to his videos and moderate his livestreams. I’m fucking furious that I only feel I can post this because I’ve left the gaming industry all together and “have nothing to lose” mental-health wise because otherwise I’d be fucked out of a career when my real name is attached to this, whether by his supporters or anti-feminists who can’t wait to see another person like me destroyed/kill themselves for speaking up.

What I want from posting this is that everyone starts holding him accountable for this bullshit. I want people to know that when it comes time to actually put his feminism into practice, he’s shit the bed. People need to hold him to his word and he needs to actually demonstrate he isn’t just another white cis man making money off repeating what everyone else around him is saying while doing the same shit anti-feminists are doing. I do want him to actually get better and grow as a person - I just don’t want it to have to get to this point where it’s at my fucking life’s work and career’s expense.

Happy International Woman’s Day everyone, and Fuck You Hbomberguy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LeYn_W14zTU

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I… I dunno what happened here but it was beautiful

I even got a gif and a video of it.

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Van Cleef & Arpels unveil its first Extraordinary Object: the Automate Fée Ondine

The fruit of long years’ work and an intense collaboration with automaton maker François Junod. 

via Luxury-Design

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pictured: Poly

summerspurplerose a réagi à votre diaporama:there it is : the most embarrassing and yet the…

I’m so happy you introduced me to this pairing.

I didn’t “introduce” you to it, I coerced you into it.  ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

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Smooth

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Longwood Gardens

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Laurent Parcelier,  (French, 1962~)

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“A Night To Remember” ~  Photo: Arild Heitmann