#(thus the rage-quitting until Days of Our Lives gets here lmfao)

[rushingheadlong]

Okay. So I fell down a rabbit hole of searching for “perfect” citations for another post about Brian and now I’m wondering where exactly we do, or should, draw the line with sourcing Queen stories and facts.

Personally I’m always torn between wanting to make my posts as accurate as I can get them, and recognizing that I’m still a pretty new fan and there’s a lot that I don’t know yet and a lot of sources out there that I haven’t found or had time to review.

One thing I think about is the “Roger locking himself in the cupboard” story, which resulted in a split between people who think Roger locked himself in a tiny kitchen cupboard and people who think the whole thing is fake... and then someone went out and found the original source for the story, and realized that it was about a storage closet (most likely where they kept the master copies of their tapes) and everything made more sense.

If I’m writing a post about Brian’s health problems in 1974, how far do I go to source specific claims that get made? The “Brian almost had his arm amputated” story seems to originate on queenlive.ca, which doesn’t provide any additional information about where that “fact” comes from. Mick Rock describes Brian’s arm as “gangrenous” in his book but doesn’t mention amputation. Is it enough for me to use the limited information I’ve found to declare the story a fake, or at least profoundly unlikely, or do I have an obligation to keep looking for more or better sources?

BrianMay.com doesn’t seem to have it either - but how long do I have to spend searching every corner of his site, before I can comfortably say that the story isn’t told there either?

For that matter, Mick Rock says that Brian collapsed on May 12th but other sources confirm it was May 11th - do I have an obligation to point out this discrepancy, as a warning that other dates he gives may not be 100% accurate? Or is it enough to give Mick Rock as a source and let people draw their own conclusions about the accuracy of his information?

If Brian May says the doctors told him to “go home” after being diagnosed with hepatitis and another article says that he flew back to London against the doctor’s recommendation, it would seem clear that the article is mistaken. But Brian frequently misremembers dates and is obviously not giving a direct quote from the doctor anyway, so should I mention both and let readers draw their own conclusions?

Hell, if I remember hearing Brian tell a story in an interview I listened to 8 months ago that was probably a decade old to begin with, can I retell the story if I can no longer find the exact interview to source it? Can I tell the story with the caveat that the source can’t be found? Am I obligated to omit it entirely to avoid false information being spread, even if I’m providing the information and being explicit about no longer having the source?

I mean, these aren’t questions that I’m actually looking for answers for... mostly because I don’t think there are answers. At least, not one-size-fits-all answers that will work in every scenario imaginable. I think as long as we’re all doing our best, and presenting information in good faith (and with whatever citations we have whenever possible, or at least admitting when we don’t have citations)... I think that’s most we can realistically hope for.

But it is frustrating, at least for me, that there is probably never going to be a situation in which citations and sourcing is perfect. When every story can be traced back to reputable sources, to people who were definitely there at the time, who we can trust aren’t making things up, instead of reaching dead end after dead end of books written by outsiders or websites run by fans with no citations provided anywhere in sight.

It’s just frustrating to spend hours trying to write a post to make sure it’s as accurate as possible, and your accuracy is always going to be questionable at best because there’s nothing “definitive” to be found anywhere.

[doc-boredom]

sorry im kinda new to your blog and i dont really understand this drama or whatever with the people that keep sending you asks? are people mad at you for writing rpf or the shipping or something? i have no context for whats going on

Oh hello friend let me tell you

THE DRAMA

There’ll be a tl;dr at the bottom  but i really wanna tell this story cos it’s so funny to me

also read more because it gets LONG

So once upon a time Natalie got into a group called TWRP. Amazing wonderful LOVELY group of aliens (aliens and robot, technically? lore is silly fun and also part of this story so get ready to return to this) from the future of the 1980s -glorious chorus of heavenly angels in the distance- 

at the same time! natalie was also drafting up the VERY beginnings of her space pirate epic SWIFT LIKE MERCURY, the idea was this: Julian a space pirate, ding dong the reluctant alien space prince, but who would be in julian’s crew!? lots of suggestions were thrown around in YE OLDE DINGDULIAN CHAT back in august and none of them worked. maybe this wouldn’t be a fic, maybe it was all for naught.

and then the sexy sexy cone man hip thrusted his way into her life.

that IS to say I fell in love with TWRP at the NSP show i went to with my best friend. i didn’t know WHOMST the fuck they were so seeing them come out in stage in full costume HIGH OFF MY ASS was probably one of the most memorable things in my life. We drove back to the hotel, DD and Julian were streaming katamari, I bought tickets for ANOTHER TWRP show in my hometown that were twelve dollars and then I found 

THE WIKI

COMMANDER MEOUCH SOMETHING SOMETHING SPACE PIRATE

I was flabbergasted. NOT ONLY was there lore for this amazing band BUT here was the answer staring me right in the face. JULIAN WAS A FURRY, HIM HAVING A LION MAN AS HIS SECOND IN COMMAND WOULD BE PERFECT. i quickly told the chat (to which they all went ??? and didn’t quite take to it at the time) and then promptly CRASHED until the following morning.

so! i woke up, our CO adventure continued (we saw IT) and I started to discuss some plot ideas with the chat. At the same time I started to actually glance at the tumblr fandom. Oh wow! Everyone HAD THEIR OWN IDEAS! It was open to explore! How fun! They created face canons and personalities and stories for the boys and I’d be damned if my crazy plot making ass (who years before had looked at supernatural and said “crowley become the first cross road demon by making a deal with judas which killed judas and brought jesus back to life, thus creating the resurrection story” and was going to write a whole past lives destiel fic spanning back to ADAM AND EVE) wouldn’t take that and run. I made the post. TWRP IS GONNA BE IN MY OP FIC!!! I was so excited to start this, to make something amazing.

“dont put twrp in your OP fic”

I looked at the ask in COMPLETE confusion. wait! they didn’t even know HOW I was going to put them in! they could literally just be playing music in a scene! my petty scorpio ass felt a rage of which i had not felt in months. “fuck you.” it said. “NOW I HAVETO WRITE THE FIC YOU BITCH.”

(spite was one of the biggest driving forces in creating SLM and to me that’s why i think you see the story and the voice of it change over time because it became a thing of love but thaT’S NOT THE POINT)

so here i am having a grand ol’ time and im coming up with my boys and im like YEAH HELL YEAH and all my dingdulian friends are like oh hey i actually LIKE TWRP? and i got a PM from someone who will remain anonymous but who is a close friend of mine now

“hey, loving all the new stuff you’re bringing to the fandom!” they started. there was a bit more conversation and then IT happened.

“Just be careful about shipping.”

I looked at the message and another quickly followed. “nsfw gets weird too”

my scorpio ass, also fueled by love of all things sexual and romantic, looked at this with a growing sense of dread. I HAD ACTUALLY BEEN SETTING UP A SMALL SUNG AND MEOUCH SHIP. WELL SHIT! THAT HAD TO GO APPARENTLY?! I told my friends and we all rolled our eyes but we ACCEPTED IT. That’s what it was apparently.

Until I thought about Havve fucking Ding Dong with his robot dick while Sung held him in place and played up to DD’s praise kink

“oh no.” i said softly because that one fucking day dream planted the seed of needing to do something. sung would be so loving and so wonderful and who was i to let that just slip through my fingers! so i just approached cremedoodle (creator of WW, RR, and FF) and went “haha uh, what about ww chris and sung for a threesome in the fic crazy right”

and it wasn’t THAT crazy

especially when it became just WW and Sung

and god damn it were they in LOVE

“we can’t do this.” i said after a few hours of us coming up with all this ROMANTIC shit and some sexy shit too let’s be honest, it’s me after all. “oh god we’re doing this, aren’t we?”

so we decided to do it. fuck it. all caution thrown to the wind. the moment sung and ww “met” over the vid feed in chapter 6 i got a feeling of intense dread in my stomach. i couldn’t believe it, i was really doing this, they were really going to be in LOVE oh  my GOD.

no comments.

oh.

beach bonfire chapter where julian and dd point out how fucked sung was since he was obviously into ww 

no comments.

CHAPTER WHERE THEY WERE DRUNK AND MAKING OUT.

NO COMMENTS.

In that moment i realized something very sad but also very liberating.

the twrp fans that were all fucking awful weren’t reading my fic.

i wanted them to read it. i had put time into it. i wanted them to see my budding lore and like it, but at the same time the OP fandom was taking to it so well and enjoying TWRP so i said fuck it, ill take it.

We started to talk about Ring Rang and Phobos, sarah and I started talking about Meouch and Liara. it was going to be good, it was going to be fun.

and then i fucked up

that’s right

me

i came home from a crazy trip in MN and I was in a shit mood and I accidentally published Sung/WW fluff drabbles in the tag

I got fucking ripped a new one. i was a piece of shit for even ever thinking that was okay. “YOU’RE BEING DISRESPECTFUL! THEY’RE REAL PEOPLE! DON’T DO T HIS!”

yeah you read that right.

TWRP fanDUMB thinks that my adorable sweet Lepid Phobos, with his big eyes and his missing wings and his penchant for romance novels, my hyperactive sung with his star singing and his empathatic core WERE THE SAME GUYS ON STAGE.

This is literally what all of this drama is about.

It was in that terrible slew of fucking stupidity that I realized I didn’t care. It was TOO late at that point. They should have seen it sooner. They should have gotten me sooner. I had somehow slipped under the radar and I had beat them, in a strange sense, because not only did I care

i was going to keep doing it.

FAST FORWARD TO THIS YEAR (i know, this story is still going) i make a nsfw, i start posting my sung/ww extra chapters there because im too much of a pussy to put them in the fic still. my friend gets me to write a meouch/dd/julian fic. im just about to post a havve/sung thing when IT happens.

The fake screenshot.

a blog that posted jUST this and a post about the device (an album by the band) put this out into the open and deleted IMMEDIATELY afterwards. the fandom went into shitstorm mode. i cried on and off the whole day because i was being harrassed by anons and my friends were too. 

but the more i looked at it

the more i started to REALLY understand how it was fake.

not only does it not have the usual bubble to the right (it should show that twrp has seen the most recent message even if it’s their own) it doesn’t touch on the fact that the OP said something about lore? even to say “hey, lore’s cool! that’s not the problem” would make more sense

also

they never responded to any of my friends

sure they read it, but following a slew of desperate users trying to get answers they never made an official statement so my gay ass pulled out the wine and said YOU’RE GOING TO MOPE AND THEN YOU’RE GOING TO KEEP DOING YOU.

So we’re here now, with the fact that I know things about the band irl and the fact that I have shipping and people are pissed and I really don’t care. the info i know about the band i keep safe and SIMPLY SAYING A GENERIC WHITE DUDE NAME IS NOT REASON TO START A WITCH HUNT (not going to elaborate on this, this is only posted for the sake of anyone who is on the hate train who may be reading this) this is where fiction does not equal reality. i dont  look at havve and go AH YES THERE IS MURDER MAN, IF HE IS NOT MURDER MAN WHEN THEY GET OFF STAGE ILL BE UPSET because thats STUPID? Like literally the IRL band members created personas and lore that they then gave to the fans to expand upon and also sorry guys,,,, it’s the internet,, in the words of DD “it’s weird” but you can’t ask people to stop. it won’t stop. that’ll just fuel the fire

so yes, i like twrp shipping and i like shippng with my ocs and i like writing about how sometimes when you touch sung’s core it turns him on and about how meouch has a knot because im a fucking awful skanko but at least im having fun lmfao

so

TL;DR

shipping is apparently illegal and so is nsfw in the twrp fandom and i do both unapologetically and i hope i inspire  other people to start doing it more often. 

the twrp fandom is not like this anywhere else btw. this is just tumblr being tumblr, as usual. you’re not going to get brownie points because you didn’t let me write sung fucking his hot gf you absolute dumb dumbs, you’re not going to get anything from it except for an inflated ego which you’ll lord over everyone, so do me the favor of expiring in a trench and let the fandom do what it’s supposed to do

HAVE FUN!