#Healthy Skepticism

[impulsivelycontentious]

WHY IS IT PEOPLE TAKE PERFECTLY ORDINARY ANECDOTES OF PEOPLE DOING ORDINARY BUT FUNNY THINGS AND ACT LIKE IT COULDN'T HAPPEN? Why are you like this? The story isn't even improbable. What the actual fuck. Did you not yet learn that fiction has nothing on reality? Does being mean spirited feel good to you? The story asks nothing of you, has no morals. It's just someone's story. Do you act this way ahen people give anecdotes in person? Have tou forgotten Internet people ARE people?

Healthy scepticism is good online. HEALTHY. As in you look at what it asks of you and what it tells you about the world and consider that carefully. Not 'everything online is fake'. That's not healthy! That will rot your brain! Consider that if it doesn't matter if it's real or not it doesn't need your input about it beinf fake simply because it'a a humorous anecdote online! And that you need to get a hobby that helps you meet people and actually TALK to them so you can remember how buck wild reality is.

Fun family story: when my aunt was marrying her wife everyone was really excited but also dreading it because my aunt is known for her insanely long speeches so everyone knew her vows would be like 9 hours long so when it came time for her to say her vows she had a shit ton of cue cards in her hands and even her wife started groaning and my aunt took a deep inhale and then unravelled all the cue cards which were taped together and they all just read ‘HOT DAMN’ in giant letters and those were my aunts vows.

[sohannabarberaesque]

This I bring up as a sort of insight to a Fanfic Friday piece some while back as found Peter Potamus somewhere in the uncharted reaches of Polynesia discovering a sacred tiki statue underwater supposedly ejaculating out of nowhere; such being inspired by reports about supposed "miraculous" shedding of blood or tears from crucifixes or statues of Our Lady, and such bound to raise skepticism as to their sincerity.

[alohapromisesforever]

Thought For the Day: The Wisest Man Is He Who Does Not Fancy That He Is So At All

“The wisest man is he who does not fancy that he is so at all.” – Nicolas Boileau-Despreaux, poet and critic (1 Nov 1636-1711), in Satires, also known as Satire 4 (1716) The most authentic wisdom is humility, which recognizes one’s limitations and the limitations of others, too. In these days of instant social media access, arrogance is a blinding factor. The humble remain open to gaining new…

[fivecornerroom]

Watch what they do, NOT what they say.

[zrribbonz]

This fellow and his team ROCK.

i do think theres something sad about how largely only the literature that's considered especially good or important is intentionally preserved. i want to read stuff that ancient people thought sucked enormous balls

[jesncin]

Hi, I did an ask a while back, and I don't think I got the point across that I was trying to (which is my fault, I wasn't sure how to explain it so it ended up being convoluted). I was not asking about which name suited Clark/Superman/Kal-El best (all the names are his and are true to him). I was asking about his personality. What is your Clark's personality like?

I'm asking because depending on what media you consume Clark can either be super outgoing, fun, bold, and closer to what we associate with Superman's personality (like in Birthright). Or he can be dorky, awkward, shy, which tends to be more associated with Clark Kent Daily Planet reporter (like in MAWS). Obviously Superman and Clark are one in the same (and these personality traits can coexist), but he presents himself differently depending on who is watching.

So my ask is basically who is your Clark Kent when nobody is watching?

Ah okay! The use of all the different names was confusing haha. So here's another go! I know the spectrum of his personhood as Clark Kent goes from "himbo -> bumbling reporter -> mild-mannered reporter" I prefer "mild-mannered reporter" for the same reasons most modern versions gravitate towards that characterization: to show that while Clark is soft-hearted he's still an exceptional reporter. Himbo characterizations (like MAWS) tend to go overboard to the point of incompetence. Unless it's for comedy, I think that's antithetical to "immigrant trying to assimilate by being a model minority" part of his identity and it also flanderizes him.

But if I had to thoroughly answer "who is Clark Kent when nobody is watching?" I would say: that's one of Clark's perpetual internal struggles that he doesn't have an answer to either. If we whittled down who Clark feels most comfortable with right down to his adoptive parents:

There are times Clark puts on a face for them too. And that makes sense, they might be his parents but they're still human- so there's a distance between them. When he's constantly anticipating how others perceive him, it's hard to know what's fabricated and what's real about himself anymore. Especially when he has no other Kryptonians to look to as reference outside of archives. And even with Kara coming around eventually, they don't share the exact same diaspora experience.

I think it's the questions a lot of diaspora ask themselves "who would I be if I didn't have to worry about what others think?" and "is that version of me even possible when I'll always be subject to others' perceptions of me?"

Under all that code-switching, assimilation, model minority over-achieving, and making himself less threatening, who is Superman? He doesn't know either, and I personally like stories where he comes to peace with that. To be okay with making it up as he goes.

[evenstarfalls]

WE ARE SO FUCKING BACK

[kindred-spirit-93]

What is YOUR favorite disaster in history? Mines pompii ^^

OMG THANK U FOR ASKING. THE BLACK DEATH IS MY JAM!!

was thinking about the history (heh) of my hyperfixations, obsessions, and phases a while back (like in school everyone had an egyptology phase, or an archeology and dinosaurs one, all of the above etc) and mine was the bubonic plague lol

back in ye olden days i went to afternoon arabic schools when i was younger (they were typically held in highschools after hours) and the class i was in had a bunch of books on the shelves, one of which was a history book, and while flipping through i was instantly intrigued.

fair warning the pictures can be quite graphic, but to baby me i was never more morbidly (and medically) curious about the how when and why of it all.

i desperately wanted to know everything, but alas i never really got the chance. i never found the book again, was too young to look it up on the interwebs and it never came up in school. and so that was the end of that

till a few years ago i caught a glimpse of a book in my grandfathers office library, somehow very surprised hed have a book on the black death (he was a microbiologist lol) and asked to borrow it.

unfortunately it sat on my shelf and the years passed without so much a glance from me in its direction. just last week i randomly remembered and decided to dig it up. placed it next to my bedside.

the pages are now amber and carry the faint and quaint scent old books so often do. really looking forward to reading it at long last :')

--

my favourites i have on my phone lol (credits to rightful owners!!)

kindred core [│87

[troncelliti]

@scamarchive thank you for shedding light to all of us here on @tumblr i thought she was being genuine. @support @wonderflyers

Capture of the scam blog 'wonderflyers / wonderflyby' and its pinned post.

Scam evidence in capture:

The Paypal thru-link says 'PH' for Philippines (where Philippine Pesos are used), despite the post being in USD/CAD

The post asks people to send money through Paypal's 'friends and family', because it doesn't have scam protection

The paypal, jamiej425, is reused from multiple previous scams (each word is a different link)

The avatar/icon is reused from at least one of their previous scam blogs

You can report this blog with 'report something else', 'unlawful uses of content', then 'phishing'. For a comprehensive rundown on how to identify a pet scam blog, read this post.

[hurlumerlu]

Anyway so many Not Me hills I would cheerfully fight on but "Yok is smart" is probably the biggest one.

[boinin]

i need to take a walk after this did they do this before each and every match. that boy is traumatized TRAUMATIZED i'm gonna start filling in a lawsuit - @bluelokk

Volunteering to help with the research for your suit 🥲🥲🥲

Ramble time. For me, Blue Lock is mostly a funny, silly action manga. It generally isn't that serious. The few times it tackles dark themes, it's a punch to the gut. But I'm normally cool enough about it. Hiori's backstory or the story of Snuffy & Mick are the ones that impacted me most.

Anyway, today I've witnessed my favourite character be utterly dehumanised by the coach he is under the care of, told to throw his own ego away—repress himself—be a worse athlete, for the sake of fulfilling Ego's sick experiment. Not even for his own sake—but to egg his fellow players on.

Ego did all of this to Kunigami, without ever believing him capable of emerging as the best striker.

🙃

So, not the usual funny, silly leaks day. But I am intrigued to see where they're going with Kunigami's arc, and whether Ego will ever face consequences for Wild Card.

tl;dr

fuck this guy and his blasé noodle slurping

[vinelark]

wait did they really kill jason again???

[spoilers] someone somewhere on the internet posted pictures from the upcoming batman #148 that seems to imply jason dies in the issue; that's about all i know! i've been mostly following this arc and immediately have like two different theories on how it could be a fakeout of some sort, but no idea yet til i read the full issue, or possibly the one after depending on how long they stretch it out. (either way it'll take a lot for me to buy it being a real or lasting death, considering [waves at dc canon], but also who knows with them. maybe they think it'll stick this time.)

[jankwritten]

i think one of my biggest gripes with TSATS is the sentence structure and the way that things are phrased.

Sentence structure: the book is CONSTANTLY using ", and", or "then", or "but" instead of splitting up a phrase into two separate sentences. Once I noticed it, I couldn't stop noticing it. In some places it works fine, but right out the gate, as the first line of chapter one, it 1) caught my attention in a negative way and 2) felt immediately clunky and awkward.

The way that the book demonstrates action also feels unnatural and doesn't flow as well as it could. Things are described as happening "now", such as when Kayla takes her lolipop out of her mouth and holds it at her side, the book narrates it as "now holding the lolipop at her side". We didn't SEE that action occur, we're just being described the RESULT of the action, does that make sense? As a reader, you want to SEE the action, you want to SEE her tug the lolipop out of her mouth, see her hand hang by her side as her expression pinches with anxiety over the discussion. We don't want to just be told that "now" her lolipop is out of her mouth, y'know?

There are also sentences that just feel flat out unedited, phrases that have too many words for what they want to accomplish, or with a structure that doesn't make sense - like on page 56, the sentence "They raced up the steps to the platform, Nico easily outrunning his boyfriend, though that was mostly due to Will having to get his land legs again."

First of all - why are they running up the platform? In the previous line, where we're told their cab driver got them to the station with 6 minutes to spare, the specific choice of saying "to spare" makes it sound like there is plenty of time to make it to their train. In the sentences after, we even learn that Nico and Will wound up waiting for their train anyway, so, the fact that they're running when Will feels sick reads...weird, to me. If I was car sick, and then somebody forced me to run for no reason, I would not be a happy camper.

Second of all - The addition of the final third of the sentence, after the second comma, should be it's own phrase. It should be given it's own space, like "(though that was mostly because Will didn't have his land legs back yet)." because it's not important information, just an offhanded comment Nico is making.

Third of all - "though that was mostly due to" and "having to get his" are clunky and wordy. It could've just been "Nico easily outrunning his boyfriend, who didn't have his land legs back yet." It's a smoother sentence that doesn't get bogged down by the extra words.

And that's just one instance. This book is LOADED with moments like this, where action will get lost in a sentence's wordiness. The book tries to be quick and snappy, in Riordan's style, but it fails because it can't quite nail down the phrasing.

There are also moments where the only thing the characters are interacting with is each other, only grinning, grimacing, sighing, glancing at one another, etc etc, instead of doing actions while they speak. Fidgeting with their hands, shifting from side to side, looking away at their surroundings, that kind of stuff is how you convey a MOOD. Body language is important when writing character conversations!! Is somebody relaxed, or are their shoulders tensed up, arms folded across their chest with their muscles flexed, leaning back on one leg with their body halfway tilted away, as if they were ready to flee at a moment's notice? These are the kind of details that I'm missing in TSATS, the kind of things that feel like they're missing.

I also have a lot of gripes with the dialogue itself.

People don't talk like they do in TSATS. The content of what they're saying is realistic enough, sure, yeah, but the specific way that a lot of the dialogue is phrased? It doesn't feel natural. Try reading some of the sentences out loud without editing any of the words. It doesn't sound the way a human being SPEAKS.

THAT'S what I mean when I say these characters are OOC. The way that they're speaking is uncomfortable and feels as if they're being used as a puppet, or a mouthpiece for what somebody ELSE wants them to say.

[bigtimefreq]

ok hiiiiii i discovered a few things

the address listed for parker leads to a gas station called "parkers"

interesting to note "friend" as the relationship between parker and charlotte

charlottes marked address isnt a real address

charlottes instagram account does lead somewhere (@cstern35 instagram) and it was made 1 day before the image was posted, it also seems to be fanmade but the timing seems too good to be a coincidence

on the instgram page (posted before the image) is a black screen that says "ONE season 3 16 June 2024." in dark grey text

also side note: brace yoruself before looking at that instagram page

bcs of the distance between contestants, the missing person report and the interview r prob unrelated

thank you for coming to my ted talk

HOLY SHIT??

i did notice the "friend" relationship but i didn't address it because i figured it was a given! i could be misinterpreting your point but i guess it's nice to know that parker still cares about her despite her major fuck up lol

charlotte's address being fake but parker's actually leading to somewhere is interesting to me too. maybe cheesy saw the opportunity for parker and took it, idk

also, now i know what you mean by "brace yourself..."

i agree that that the missing report and the interview are unrelated. i think cheesy is just putting out more lore about the side characters. but in my heart i like to that somewhere out there is a conspiracy nut who looks up cold cases and is like "whoa! these all happened on the same day!" and goes ham even if there's no real discernible connection coughs my oc coughs my friends oc coughs

[theyarebothgunshot]

.

[spookyeagling]

I do suspect I know a lot more about people than they might like me to by way of simple deduction and I do feel it when Elementary Sherlock is like "ugh what a drag it is to be able to figure shit out its a shame im not allowed to do heroin about it anymore"