#ENGLISH IS SO RIDICULOUS

[jezebelgoldstone]

source link & id under the cut & in alt.

okay but this begets within me two burning questions:

so like... what do gondi-speakers say? do they say it's neuter or feminine?

WHY THE FUCK DOES DUAL EXIST IN ENGLISH????

[id: screenshot of a page from a book. text reads: "The Noun. Gender.-The masculine gender in Gondi is used simply for the names of males: all other objects may be spoken of as neuter or feminine. It is difficult to decide under which name non-masculine nouns should be grouped; if the language be viewed from the stand-point of its neighbour, Hindi, they should be called feminine, but as one of the Dravidian languages it is more natural perhaps to view them as neuter.

Number.-There are two numbers, singular and plural: dual does not exist in Gondi." end id.]

screenshot from gondi grammar and vocabulary, public domain, .pdf download available here: https://digital.soas.ac.uk/RB00000065/00001

[bloobydabloob]

Please dirkjake… sir… we are starving.. sir… please sir

Yes yes yes… I’m sorry. I haven’t drawn them in forever it’s criminal really isn’t it

[faygos]

Your art style is so cool and fun I love the colors and the silliness that shines through it always makes me so happy !! <3 Thank you for your art

I don't know if you care much for the ship or if you're still doing requests (no worries if not!) but if you are can I put in a request for some dirkjake please (again no worries if not, just ignore this and know your art brings a smile to my face no matter what!)

thank you for your kind message!! i've been wanting to doodle these two. i like to think that dirk is tall and fast, but jake is way stronger and could probably throw him like an orange javelin

[thatsbelievable]

[rubberduckyrye]

Okay so like. I found this and.

This really annoys me. And this is a perfect example of the narrative being biased against Kokichi and it's not necessarily the class who have a biased against him.

So it reads:

The night before, Shuichi and some of the others were forced to stay in the Ultimate Entomologist's lab by Gonta, who was tricked by Kokichi.

This is blatantly untrue, as proven by this post here. This piece of evidence is also not being written by Shuichi, as it refers to him in the third person, so this isn't Shuichi being biased.

This is the narrative just. Blatantly lying to the reader. This is the Narrative showing one thing (Gonta in full agreement to get everyone to watch their motives and Kokichi being 100% honest with him about the motive screening party) and just flat out lying in the next breath (Kokichi tricked Gonta)

Now. You could say that Kokichi "tricked" Gonta in saying that Kokichi lied to him about liking bugs, but. Everyone lied to Gonta about that.

So you either have the narrative just contradicting itself because it can't stand the idea of Kokichi being likable in any way (as that ruins the plot you see!) or just singling out Kokichi specifically for something that everyone does and only punishing him for it. Either way? It ain't a good fucking look.

The bias this narrative has towards Kokichi and how much it wants the reader to believe he's a horrible villain is so fucking jarring when they have proof that he isn't.

I do not like how V3 handled it's writing at all.

[anghraine]

It feels extremely silly that only today did I realize that pantry and panadería are slightly similar-sounding for a reason >_>

(The English word pantry is one of the many, many common modern English words derived from Anglo-French: in this case, panetrie, from Old French paneterie, "bread room" ... Spanish panadería also has a complex etymology, but all are related to Latin panis, "bread.")

[cuerue]

okay but people whining about the inclusion of words “trans” and “non-binary” in veilguard is so annoying to me. why does it bother you that those words aren’t replaced by some fantasy equivalent while words like “man” and “woman” are used all the time in the setting. why is it fine to say “man” but saying “trans man” breaks your immersion. think really hard about that one.

[tress3]

A Tender Kiss

…His hands cupped your cheeks trembling as if they could break. Sensing his fear, you place your hands on his, in hopes to calm him down.

With a red tint on his cheeks, he attempts to talk again “I… don’t know how to do this… dammit… this is embarrassing to admit” his gaze intense over your lips.

You give him a cheerful chuckle, bringing his attention to you again “~Well now, it’s not like I’m going to bite” You bite into the air to complement the joke. Dumbfounded by your action he leans back for a bit, covering his mouth with the back of his hands and laughs. "Such a childish laughter…" you think, you never saw him like this, a welcome and rare change.

“Really? Hahahah! Making jokes at a moment like this? pfff” As he moved a bit and tilted his head, you were able to see his gentle smile. This flustered your heart, you felt proud that your joke helped him ease his mood. Good job! 

As he comes back in place again, you grab his shoulders and press them lightly “It’s ok, we can do this anot-”.

In a quick jolt, he gets closer to you, grabbing your arms as you can sense his breath over your neck. Catching you off guard by the sudden movement “No! I-I m-mean...” He starts to fumble into his words as he frowns his eyebrows and looks to the side, avoiding eye contact again.

With a deep breath he starts talking again “Listen, I do not fear the fire…” You sense his hands squeezing your arms a bit “I am used to my skin being burnt, a-and I don’t mind anymore when my tools fall on my feet” He leans slightly back and locks eyes, in hopes to not break eye contact.

“And yet, I fear this…. I fear you won’t like it and… Hah, I'm so pathetic” He squeezes your arms again, but tries not to be too rough when doing so. It feels loving in a way, you take the opportunity to change the pacing of the topic.

“Huh, I love this pathetic guy you know” He stops, dumbfounded yet again, eyes widened at you, listening attentively to every word. “He has too much confidence in himself, he also thinks he is the best at everything…” You start listing everything about him some good and some… bad, we all know his strange behavior at the beginning when you both met. He had a mixture of emotions listening to all this, he hated it and loved it at the same time. Your unpredicted humor is something he had grown to love, just how much can you do this to him? He doesn’t know, and yet he loves this kind of situation you put him into.

“But this… it’s not a pathetic situation, so don’t say that” You cupped his cheeks and leaned closer, giving him time to reject the gesture if he wanted, you made a tiny detour to his ears and whispered “I love you” You go back to face him again “Being shy over this doesn’t make you pathetic”.

Something changed in his eyes, they were soft and his left cheek was just slightly red. This was such a tender moment, he had no words to answer back, it was so… lovely and warm, that he couldn’t help but give a sincere smile.

“God he is so hot- ok chill chill chill” you think, “Stop being horny right now! Haaaa- this is not the time right now!” you start arguing with yourself, his sudden movement snaps you back to reality.

A kiss, a simple and yet tender kiss, he did it. Something you were both longing for, a genuine love sparkled over your chests as if it was New Year's Eve. You felt you could wake at any moment if this was a dream. He moves his hands, one on the back of your head and the other on your waist. 

With such an abrasive personality, bickering here and there every day, his true feelings flourished at this very moment. The true March you see drunk in the tavern at night, but sober this time.

This was just the start of a long night.

[wonder-worker]

"[Elizabeth Woodville] was the only member of [Crown Prince Edward of Westminster's] original 1471 council not already on the king’s council and her name headed the list of those appointed as administrators in Wales during Edward’s minority. [She remained on the council after it was expanded in 1473 and granted significant new governing and judicial powers]."

"In 1478 Prince Richard married the Mowbray heiress. Like his elder brother he had a chancellor, seal, household and council to manage his estates. His council, like that of Prince Edward, comprised the queen [Elizabeth Woodville] and a group of magnates and bishops, few of whom were Woodville supporters [...] It was Elizabeth who mattered, for Richard resided with her and Rivers treated his affairs as their own."

— J.L. Laynesmith, The Last Medieval Queens: English Queenship 1445-1503 / Michael Hicks, Richard III and his Rivals: Magnates and their Motives in the Wars of the Roses

[hauntingofhouses]

i know I've mentioned my interpretation of mizu's gender a million times on here but i don't think i ever fully elaborated on it.

so on that note i just wanna ramble about that for a bit. basically, it's my reading of the show that mizu is nonbinary, so let me dig into that.

putting the rest under the cut because it ended up being pretty long lol. also here have a cute mizu pic of her being happy and most at ease with herself, symbolised by her letting her hair down. <3 ok let's proceed.

thus, when i refer to mizu as nonbinary, i am interpreting mizu as a woman, but not ONLY a woman. not strictly a woman. she is also a man. she is also neither of these things, she is something in between, while at the same time she is none of these at all. i've said as much many times, but i just don't want people to think that when i say nonbinary, it inherently means a "third androgynous gender" that essentially turns the gender binary into a gender trinary. not only is that going against what the term nonbinary was crafted for (to go against rigid boxes and categorisation of gender identities), but also, not all nonbinary people fall under that category or definition, and that's definitely not the way i interpret mizu.

okay before i go deeper i'd just like to address some important things. first of all, this post is an analysis of canon, and thus everything i am arguing for is about my own interpretation of the show, and not some baseless projected headcanon i am projecting onto the character. please remember there is a difference between an interpretation (subjective; interpretations will differ from viewer to viewer, but ultimately it is firmly rooted in evidence taken from the source material) VS a headcanon (unrelated and often even contrary to what is presented in canon; opinions wildly differ and they cannot be argued for because there is no canonical evidence to back it up).

ALSO please note that nonbinary is an umbrella term. this means that it applies to a vast range of gender identities. other identities that fall under the nonbinary umbrella include agender, bigender, genderfluid, and so on. however, it's my personal preference to use the term nonbinary as it is, simply because i'm not a fan of microlabels (more power to you if you do like them and find they suit you more though!).

also, before anyone fights me on this, let me clarify further that gender means something different to everyone. it's not your biological sex or physical characteristics. but at the same time, gender is not mere presentation. you can be a trans woman and still present masculine—either because you're closeted and forced to, or because you just want to—and either way, that doesn't take away from your identity as a woman. same goes for trans men. if you're a trans man but you wear skirts and don't bind or don't get top surgery, that doesn't make you any less of a man. because gender non-conformity exists, and does not only apply to cis people! some lesbians are nonbinary and prefer using he/him pronouns while dressing masculinely, but that doesn't mean they're a man, or that they're any less of a lesbian. neither does this mean that they're a cis woman.

the thing about queer identities in general is that, like i said, they mean something different to everyone, because how you identify—regardless of your biological attributes and fashion or pronouns—is an extremely personal experience. so a nonbinary person and a gnc cis woman's experiences might have plenty of overlap, but what distinguishes between the two is up to the individual. there's no set requirements to distinguish you as one or the other, but it's up to you to decide what you identify as, based on what you feel. either way, by simply identifying yourself as anything under the LGBTQ+ umbrella, you are already communicating to the world that you are not what a conservative, cisheteronormative society wants you to be.

which is why i find all this queer infighting on labels to be so ridiculous. because we're all fighting the same fight; the common enemy is a societal structure that divides us into set roles and expectations purely based on our biological parts. that's why biological essentialism in the queer community is a fucking disease. because by arguing that women are inherently weak and fragile and soft and gentle and must be protected from evil ugly men, while men are inherently strong and angry and violent and exploitative of women, these people are advocating for the same fucked up system that marginalises and abuses women as well as effeminate and/or gay men.

anyway. i'm going on a tangent. this was meant to be a blue eye samurai post. so yeah back to that— the point i'm trying to make is that there's no singular way to identify as anything, as everyone's views on gender, especially their own, is specific and personal to the individual.

so with that being said, yes you can definitely interpret mizu as a gnc cis woman and that's a totally valid reading of the text. however, interpreting her as nonbinary or transmasc also doesn't take away from her experiences with misogyny and female oppression, because nonbinary and transmasc folks also experience these things.

me, personally, i view her as nonbinary but not necessarily or not always transmasc because i still believe femininity and womanhood is a very inherent part of who mizu is. for example, from what we've seen, she does not like binding. it does not give her gender euphoria, but is instead very uncomfortable for her both physically and mentally, and represents her suppressing her true self. which is why when she "invites the whole" of herself, she stands completely bare in front of the fire, breasts unbound and hair untied. when she is on the ship heading to a new land in the ending scene, she is no longer hiding her neck and the lack of an adam's apple. we can thus infer that mizu does not have body dysmorphia. she is, in fact, comfortable in her body, and relies on it extremely, because her body is a weapon. instead, what mizu hates about herself is her face—her blue eyes. she hates herself for her hybridised racial identity, hates herself for being a racial Other. hates that she has no home in her homeland. thus it is important to note that these are not queer or feminist themes, but postcolonial ones.*

* and as a tiny aside on this subject, i really do wish more of the fandom discussion would talk about this more. it's just such an essential part to reading her character. like someone who's read homi k bhabha's location of culture and has watched this show, PLEASE talk to me so we can ramble all about how the show is all about home and alienation from community. please. okay anyway—

nevertheless, queer and feminist themes (which are not mutually exclusive by the way!) are still prevalent in her story, though they are not the main issue that she is struggling with. but she does struggle with it to some extent, and we see this especially during her marriage with mikio, where we see her struggle in women's domestic spaces.

on the other hand, though, she finds no trouble or discomfort in being a man or being around other men—even naked ones—and does not seem stifled by living as one, does not seem all that bothered or uncomfortable navigating through men's spaces. contrast this to something like disney's mulan (1998), where we do see mulan struggle in navigating through men's spaces, as she feels uncomfortable being around so many men, always feeling like she doesn't belong and that she's inherently different from them. mizu has no such experiences like this, as her very personality and approach to life is what can be categorised as typically "masculine". she is straightforward and blunt. her first meeting with mikio, she tells him straight to his face that he's old while frowning and raising a brow at him. she approaches problems with her muscles and fists (or swords), rather than with her words or mind. compare this with mulan, who, while well-trained by the end of the movie, still uses her sharp wits rather than brute strength. this is a typically "feminine" approach. it's also the approach akemi relies on throughout the show—through her intelligence and persuasive tongue, she navigates the brothel with ease. mizu, in contrast to someone like mulan and akemi, struggles with womanhood and femininity, and feels detached from it.

thus, in my opinion, mizu is not simply a man, nor is she simply a woman. she is both. man and woman. masculine and feminine. she has to accept both, rather than suppress one or the other. her name means water. fluid.

as a side note, while i do believe mizu is nonbinary, i also primarily use she/her pronouns for her, but this is a personal preference. i find it's easier to use in fanfic (singular they is confusing to write stories with, but again, that's just my feelings on it, and this is coming from someone who uses they/they pronouns). i also lean towards she/her because it's what the creators and all the official promotional copywriting of the show uses. and even though i am a "death to the author" enjoyer, i feel that when interpreting things that are left open-ended, it does help to look at the creators' take on things. also because, in general, being nonbinary simply doesn't necessitate the use of they/them pronouns. nonbinary is not just a third gender. it's about breaking the binary, in any which way, and that's exactly what mizu does, constantly.

also, i'd also like to mention that one of show's head of story even referred to her with the term "nonbinary", rather than simply "androgynous" (see pic below). and it's possible this could be a slip up on his part, in which he believes the terms are interchangeable (they're not btw), but regardless i find it a very interesting word choice, and one that supports my argument.

so anyway yeah that's my incredibly long rambling post.

TL;DR nonbinary mizu rights 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻 congrats if you reached the end of this btw. also ily. unless you're a TERF in which case fuck off. ok i'm done.

[soriastrider]

thought about jake making bayonetta cosplay heels and being so proud of them that he just wears them around the house with normal clothes, which then led to the amusing thought of him wearing them with cargo shorts and a hoodie. and so, we have This

[lilyharvord]

To the illiterate people with 0 reading comprehension that I have seen on tik tok today claiming that Maven deserved Mare, that it was stupid and "unfair" that he didn't get her, and that clearly with his trauma and what his mother did to him he deserved her:

I would just like to issue a sincere Fuck You to you and any future illiterate children you produce.

[radlymona]

the whole "jk rowling's names for characters are racist stereotypes" drives me CRAZY because it's the same crowd of people who claim to care about US-centrism and colonialism erasing native cultures, yet when a person part of a racial minority doesn't live in the US and therefore their parents didn't name them Joe or Sarah they freak tf out because those are the only minorities they talk to and the only time they choose to actually engage with anything non-white it's to complain about racist caricatures so their only exposure to non-US culture is racism and they start to associate any non-white non-US names as racist I lose my mind a bit more each time

Absolutely agreed about the point of associating any non-white, non-US name as racist. Like these are just common names from where we come from. In My Big Fat Greek Wedding there's a whole gag about about how Toula has like 80% of male relatives named Nick. And Greek people love this joke, because it's true! And we love to laugh about the endless amounts of toulas, roulas, and soulas which sound ridiculous to english-speakers but as just normal parts of a language that loves to use diminutives. The nicknames we use for each other at home would sound babyish to most english speakers, but are perfectly acceptable among your friends and family.

And like english-speakers being so racist against "ethnic names" (for a lack of a better term) is a reason why so many immigrants drop their perfectly common and acceptable names in their home country/culture and use either an anglicised version or just a completely different english name for convenience. Like yeah you're probably a lot less likely to come across an Italian named Luigi now than say Daniel or some other acceptable male name. Because people stopped naming their kids that are considered funny/stereotypical by english speakers. Almost as if racism leads to cultural assimilation?

But back to JKR. What's more progressive? An awkward attempt at cultural inclusion written at a time in which name databases like nameberry didn't exist (while living in a 90% white country), or like outright ignoring their cultural identity and naming an Indian character "Jane" or smth.

[eternal-moss]

HELPP GERMAN MARCILLE I LOVE YOU SO MUCHHH

My girl cannot function unless she’s following the Schulbuchmethode 💀

“Nein nein nein, so geht das nicht!!!” Girl I think you need to chill out

[chemicalarospec]

There's been enough discourse about the oxford comma. I'm going to end it by bringing us to the next level: it's time we stop using commas in lists altogether.

[perenians]

it is incredibly hard not to grab the wedding rings from the skeletons (both the true love's embrace/caress pair & the worn gold rings that used to have a date on them) & have galecassia equip them. the only thing that's stopping me is that they give no advantage of any sort (warding bond Does Not Help at ALL) so i'm currently making gale carry them around "secretly" like he just slipped them into his pocket while she wasn't looking.

my hc is that when they found either pair, gale watched her eyes linger on the skeletons' eyeless sockets & ever-grinning teeth with an expression of grief & longing & something else he didn't have the words for. he picked the rings up after cassia left them to rest, suddenly reminded of what the dawnmaster said in his final letter. in death, there is new life. these rings are not remnants of love, but rather a love born anew. the rings are representative of finding love in the midst of the shadow-cursed lands, finding hope where there seems to be nothing but despair. like the land around us is rotting & twisted but i can't imagine any place that could turn my heart from you, cursed or otherwise. time is short. i'm in love with you.