#I don't blame people for forgetting that it exists since it's only implied in a throwaway line during a random encounter in Snowdin

[romans-empire]

A Clover trait that I haven't seen anyone mention is that they actually have a good or nice singing voice according to Insomnitot. Adding to this, from the Lucky Patch teaser we could assume that they also know how to play the harmonica. What I'm saying is that Clover is, on some level, musically talented.

And if we take into consideration what Martlet says during one of her team talk dialogue about the boss themes (OSTs), music (at least in UTY canon) is a way for monsters to express themselves. It's a natural occurrence formed by the magic of the monster you are fighting. So therefore, music would be connected to identity and expressionism in the Underground.

So, do you think while traversing the Underground Clover would hum little songs to themselves? Do you think Clover would play the harmonica for Dalv which inspired him to create a new music piece? Do you think while in the saloon, Clover and Starlo would sing a duet together or play the harmonica for him? I mean it is implied that Starlo inherited his mother's voice and that Crestina is good at singing.

Do you think while traveling through Steamworks, they would tap on the metal to the rhythm of songs they like while Ceroba watches on? Do you think while traveling with Martlet they would sing a song with her as Martlet fumbles through the lyrics?

Do you think that in every timeline Clover plays something or sings something for Flowey, sometimes making fun of him but other times in a genuine way to express how much they are thankful for his company? Do you think that in every other universe, Flowey tries to play the harmonica with Clover teaching him and he's so bad at it that Clover makes fun of him? Do you think that as he resets more and more, going through timeline after timeline, he slowly gets better to the point he finally learns the song that Clover was teaching him?

Do you think that that timeline was the last time they will ever play the harmonica or sing for him and he didn't realize it? Do you think that long after Clover's sacrifice, he finds himself humming the song subconsciously only to forget the next part and look to the side to ask Clover only to remember that they're gone? Do you think he sometimes still hears them humming along?

[pinkandpurple360]

Response to your post (since I'm having a glitch on my side of Tumblr I can only ask, like, and reblog):

The crazy thing is, Sarcastic Chorus just goes from being a critic to defending Stolas/his "diehard ship" like nothing ever happened.

I'd also blame Cash Buckzo and the whole circus except for Tilla, Idk about Fizz since we don't have enough flashbacks to see him defend Blitz from the ringmaster, all we do get is Fizz being the golden goose, same with Barbie but it's implied Cash fed her more believable lies to keep her away from Blitz.

Why do both fans and critics not blame Cash enough?! ;-;

I get that what he did to Blitz "doesn't excuse" what he's doing to Moxie at the beginning of S1 but I pass it off as BAD WRITING from the crew, we all forget that Blitz is Brandon's self-insert, not his own character... and while Brandon is better than Viv or Adam, he can't save the show, the only way is to restart S2 entirely.

Yeah he has the same irrational obsessive attachment to a show-ruining “ship” that he has criticised other people for having. He knows how shipping ruins entire franchises, but his fixation on this deeply creepy one, clouds his vision. Stolitz exists mostly for the purpose of 🌽 for women and wish fulfilment for lonely men who hate women and enjoy stories where they are uniquely wholly evil. Both of these things have a euphoric effect on the mind.

While the whole thing is sinking he’s the one saying it’s all fine because at least sad pretty boy got to kiss mean grouchy boy.

Cash and Stolas are both miserably greedy drunks who trade love and affection for favours in return from blitz. Nothing showcases that more than this scene:

blitz is the one who must be psychologically reevaluate himself however. And gaslight himself into thinking gift giving and grand gestures from stolas undermine all the pain and grief he’s constantly caused him.

Follow me and ravish me imp, what if we worked out an exchange- enticing favours for favours, I have a special request I’ll pay you, I have the book itty bitty imp so you have little choice but to join me at the festival, are you alright? Good because If you get in trouble I get in trouble we don’t want that, my daughter isn’t home today so we can get drunk, where am I supposed to find my daughter, I think you should come save me. I’m giving you this gift because I want you to stay here with me because you want to, and I want you to look at me and think “well you’re the only one I want”.

- who is making every last thing about transactions and fulfilling his own wants?

[whenthechickencry]

Last Note of the Golden Witch Part 2

Piece gives away more of her heart, she starts talking about how of course she didn't know who Ange is, how she had so many lovely conversations with Sayo and Battler. Battler starts crying and bawling from not having it figured it out earlier, I was going to give him shit if he didn't realize it after all her hints, I am not going to lie, so I am glad he did... it seems Asumu was at the end of her patience as well as that monologue seems to be flipping between Asumu and Battler (I assume since Battler wouldn't say do you not know who I am, so I assume statement 3 and 5 are made by Asumu)

Ange wants to be able to understand everyone in the Ushiromiya family as part of her role as the witch of the future, haha...

I figured Ange was brought here in order to be mean to her, I mean, she's a complete stranger to Asumu otherwise... It's interesting how we are both seeing the good and the bad simultaneously, from a character we were usually only allowed to see the perspective of people who think she's all good or all bad.

The act this arc allowed Ange to understand and love someone who wasn't a part of her life at all, and if she was she probably would have hated her, anyways, is really cute.

I have noted the translation seemed kind of... not great at times but this line made 100% it was a cleaned-up machine translation, so I looked up who was the translator and, lmfao?

Of course, Kinzo wouldn't approve of cheating, he is an upstanding man of good values.

Of course, this is a bit of a self-important fantasy, reality wouldn't have been that simple even if she had stayed alive. But she wanted to write a tale where her being part of the family left to a far better future than when Kyrie did, affirming that she was a better person than the person who (she blamed) for making her life shitty (it was actually Rudolf really, but).

The fact Ange was brought in the first place in order to hurt her and then she's frantically trying to make it NOT hurt her is very interesting. Makes me kind of imagine Asumu as someone who heavily tries to suppress her bad sides, which would line up with Battler and Rudolf thinking she's an innocent, naive, innocent flower.

Battler doesn't want to accept that her mother wanted to hurt Ange but also like, Battler how happy do you think Asumu would be about being replaced in her family by someone who literally had plans to murder her? Of course, Ange doesn't have anything to do with it, but Asumu knows that too! She hates herself for feeling like that, too! Even though it's perfectly understandable.

"Spit on and forget about me"... I don't know Piece, I think Ange can acknowledge your existence and your pain while not having to do that.

Asumu solves this whole thing by literally erasing herself, by erasing memories of her, by eating herself alive in order to ensure the happiness of Battler and Ange, and... I can't help but find this ending extremely tragic. Piece erased herself, thinking she was an evil monster for the thoughts she had, even as she was fighting those thoughts the entire time and before they were even revealed she was trying to make sure they wouldn't hurt Ange...

Battler is grumpy about the fact he didn't get the fun the Higurashi cast had, haha. Unfortunately, I don't think those kinds of tea parties would fit the atmosphere of Umineko, really. I wonder if what Battler is saying is implying that r07 originally planned for something like that.

Erika is fucking DEAD.

I remember Virgilius but they mentioned they are 3 and I don't remember the other 2, actually..

No. 1

Oh that's the original form of the goat servants, haha. Making them headless is kind of interesting...

Bernkastel and Beatrice make fun of Battler for being too horny, but it's kind of funny to imagine making characters just having a fuck golf club-sized crotch, haha.

I can see Natsuhi fitting the image of a mistress, but it's a little hard to think of her as a witch roaming the halls, haha.

Lambda agrees! Haha.

I think you are your own witch with your own magic already, Natsuhi.

That line huh.... I guess it is a line that is extremely significant to Beatrice as a character, so it makes sense to make someone trying to play the role of Beatrice to try it out.

Virgilius is the other one, though Beato mentions she actually hadn't designed anything more than a couple sketches.

Virgilia does the opposite of this, funnily enough... you can tell why R07 rewrote having a character meant to mislead you to be introduced in ep3 when a lot of people gave up on ep2, it's kind of unfortunate, but Virgilia is cool as well.

That's what Erika does in EP5, mostly, but in further episodes her role and character drifted in other directions, I feel.

It's kind of funny because like. I think EP1 is a harder Episode than Ep2 to solve? Eva's involvement is a lot less obvious than Rosa's, and Kanon is more obviously suspicious in ep2 than Shannon's death was in Ep1

Wow, that's rude Lambda, I think Erika's post-5 character is actually more and more interesting every ep.

I am not really sure what exactly they were referring to here, from all the post-Umineko WTC projects, I haven't read any so ...

Anyway, I really liked Last Note. The mystery was a little simple, but I did enjoy having to revisit another character Battler had written off as more simple than they were. The ending felt a little rushed, I would have liked it if the episode had been a little longer. All the characters had really strong moments so I would definitely recommend to read this one! Asumu was an interesting character to explore in more detail, especially since all the information we get from her in the main story are from very biased sources. This also served as a showcase for how Battler, Ange, and Beatrice would act after their EP8 development which is very neat to see. Overall I really enjoyed it. I wish the translation was better, hope to finish learning Japanese at some point to read it like that.

[aeoki]

Blackjack - Miracles Don't Exist: Chapter 1

Location: Yumenosaki Student Council Room Characters: Touri, Shinobu, Souma, Mao & Yuzuru Season: Winter

ㅤㅤㅤ< Fast-forward in time, day of “Star Fest”. Yumenosaki Academy – Student Council Room >

Souma: Merii kurisumasu ♪

The day of “Star Fest” is finally upon us, my fellow Student Council members! Are you all ready for the festival!?

Mao: …………

Touri: …………

Souma: What is with the dark atmosphere!? W–What has happened to you all? I suppose it is right after the “SS” Qualifying Rounds so could it be that you all be quite exhausted?

Touri: There’s that too… In my case, I’ve got other work I’ve gotta do too.

Souma: Ohh, in “buranco”?

Touri: Yup. The “SS” Qualifying Rounds were pretty easy, of course. “Fine” is the best of the best, after all – no one can win against us.

Yuzuru: Hehe. Even so, it seems the Young Master is quite exhausted mentally.

He doesn’t have a lot of stamina to begin with – It appears he has reached his limit after all the battles and his work.

Souma: I see… I am full of energy, though.

Yuzuru: You are someone with a ridiculous amount of stamina, after all.

Souma: That goes the same for you as well. Sengoku also seems to be tired but he is still physically growing – It would be natural for the young ‘uns to be exhausted.

Shinobu: In comparison, your speech and actions also appear slower than usual, Kanzaki-dono.

Souma: Hehe. “AKATSUKI” was sent out to Okinawa and it was quite a competitive battleground. It was a fierce battle – a struggle to the death.

Perhaps my exhaustion has also caught up to me more than I had expected.

But even so, we have overcome the harsh Qualifying Rounds and are in a period of rest. I believe it would be best to forget about “SS” and enjoy “kurisumasu” in a carefree manner with a smile on our faces.

…I’m sure that is what the individual who is in charge of “sutaa fesu” – Anzu-dono – would want.

Touri: Don’t say that with such a distant look in your eyes… It’s like you’re implying she’s dead.

Mao: She’s really gone missing, though… Oh, geez, where the heck did she go off to?

I know it seems she’s been placed under house arrest by that “Gatekeeper” person.

But we don’t even know where she is and it’s worrying since we don’t know how she’s faring.

We were also sent out all over the country during the Qualifying Rounds and we went around looking for information on her, though.

Touri: Yeah, I heard. “Trickstar” gave up their Seed Rights and went on a rampage around the country, huh.

You guys can’t live a single day without causing trouble for others?

Mao: Uuu~... I do feel bad for what we did – People told us off during the Hokkaido Qualifying Round and we’ve learnt our lesson.

It looks like the reason why Anzu’s in such a difficult situation is because of us. If we really don’t learn our lesson, then we’ll just be idiots.

Touri: Hmm… It’s fine if you’ve learnt your lesson but don’t blame yourselves too much. “Trickstar” is always smiling brightly like fools, right?

I took a small glance at Akehoshi-senpai’s face during “SANCTUARY”, but he looked so pale. Is he okay? Take care of him, alright?

Mao: I’d say the same to you – make sure you’re keeping Tenshouin-senpai in check. I was pretty confused when I heard he built an amusement park out of the blue.

Touri: Heheh, you’re not the only people whose speciality lies in surprising others ♪

Mao: You guys are always doing things on a whole ‘nother scale – I was also surprised when ES appeared in sprin–

Souma: My fellow members, are we here to chit-chat?

Mao: Oh, right, sorry.

I’ve said this a lot but the Student Council will just be helping out behind the scenes for “Star Fest”. Maybe not even that – we’re just the investor.

The “Producer Course” will handle the venue prep and other stuff.

Touri: They’re surprisingly more reliable than I’d thought.

Mao: They’re just enthusiastic because Anzu isn’t here right now and they see it as an opportunity to sell themselves.

Shinobu: Hmm~... That’s said in bad faith, right? Aren’t they thinking they have to work hard by themselves because Anzu-dono isn’t around?

Just like how Tetora-kun felt when Morisawa-dono and Shinkai-dono graduated.

Mao: You see others with an optimistic lens, huh, Sengoku. Yeah, it’ll probably be better for us mentally if we think of it that way too.

Anyway, this means that we can focus on our idol activities for “Star Fest”.

They might call for us if they run into trouble or don’t have enough hands, though. Help them out if they do, alright?

Touri: Hmph, you think members of the Student Council don’t have that in mind already?

Mao: Ahaha. Yeah, we’re just a whimsical bunch who wanted to get the short end of the stick.

And in my eyes, you’re all excellent and talented individuals who can shine bright as idols no matter what.

This year’s “Star Fest” is individual participation. There won’t be any battles and our top priority is to hype things up for Christmas.

Let’s shine bright as much as we want and as brightly as we can.

Just as bright as the twinkling stars in the sky.

“Starlight Festival” begins now!

Touri: That smug look you’ve got after saying all those cool things annoys the heck outta me.

Yuzuru: Hehe. Isara-sama is becoming more and more similar to Eichi-sama ♪

Mao: Don’t make fun of me! I’m getting embarrassed! Anyway, let’s hurry and get to the stages!

Souma: Understood. …Sengoku, I have something I must speak to you about – is now a good time?

Shinobu: Huh? Me? What is it, Kanzaki-dono…?

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ← Previous Chapter ᠂ ⚘ ˚⊹˚ ⚘ ᠂  Next Chapter →

[tuiyla]

"idk if anyone watched that “Ryan Murphy is problematic” video on youtube but tell me I’m not the only one who found it an unfair and lacking in nuance take" can you expand on your problems with that video? 🤔

Okay so it's a half an hour video, available here, so I won't touch on every single point they bring up. From the get-go, my problem is that the vast majority of the talking points are based on nothing but conjecture and what Ryan Murphy is supposedly like as a producer but also more so as a person. I get that producers work with and are in charge of people but I find it inherently, hmm, well, let's repurpose the word "problematic" to try and draw conclusions about people based on their work, rather than just examining their work. I'm all for criticizing Ryan Murphy's work, and yeah sometimes we speculate what personal agendas or even vendettas could have been influencing said work, but this whole video simply doesn't justify its existence to me. There's simultaneously an aversion to drawing any sort of conclusion, since it is just a summary of rumours and allegations, but also a clear judgement in the way these rumours are presented.

Like I said I don't wanna touch on everything but just a few moments in particular to get a sense of what I mean:

The two sections on RM "hating" Chris Colfer and Dianna Agron. Sometimes I think the Glee fandom gets so immersed in its own mythology it forgets that so many of these universally agreed-upon truths are just rumours perpetuated by tabloids and tiktok teenagers. I've had an ask about that Rolling Stone interview sit in my inbox for a while so maybe one day I'll dissect the Dianna of it all, but the way this video uses pure conjecture to speculate even further just creates more and more unsubstantiated claims. The dots connected between Ryan's tweet about "Quinn" filming in Europe and the New Normal stuff is like, come on, where do we draw the conspiracy theory lines. And as another example of trying to substantiate conjecture with more conjecture, the Ashley Fink rumours coupled with the Lea Michele ones. I won't get into it here, it's in the video presented in such a bizarre way, imo. "Here's this malicious rumour, I know we have to take it with a grain of salt so here's another rumour to back it up." That's not how it works. But it is the nature of videos like this that they can't bring anything new because we don't have the facts, so they just regurgitate decade-old rumours and try to pass judgement on people we do not and never will know. Adding "...allegedly!" at the end of claims does not make the framing of this any better.

The biphobia section, which is so emblematic of Gleeks being ultra ready to blame everything wrong with Glee on Ryan Muprhy - and sometimes give him all the credit, too, which just does not work on any TV show, let alone one with three showrunners. Now, we won't get into the actual biphobia of it all because I'm sure I've spoken about it somewhere and I don't think whether Ryan Murphy is biphobic is the point. The point is that you can look at the text, Glee, and criticise its approach towards bisexuality and you'd be right to do so. But you can't just imply or outright say that this one writer out of three main ones, or later one of many, is responsible for it all, much less say that it reflects his personal beliefs. It's also wild to speculate on whether Brittana would have happened if it was only up to Ryan; credit Brad Falchuk (and Naya) by all means but it's just really running with conjecture to imply that Ryan himself never would have made Brittany bi. We just don't know "what if" and what's the point in trying to say stuff like "Ryan agreed, but WHAT IF Brad wasn't there" like come on, how is that a valid claim against Ryan Murphy. I certainly don't think it is in the way it's presented. Again, Glee's biphobia is fucked up. Again, I actually do have beef with RM regarding biphobia in particular. But this is all presented in such a tabloidy gotcha way and that doesn't sit well with me.

In general it's a lot of "maybe this doesn't mean, a grain of salt, BUT have you considered this other rumour and how it all adds up?" And no, I don't think it does and I don't like the way all of this is framed, where you're encouraged to make of it what you will but there's a very clear direction in which you're being steered. Which makes sentences like "I do normally try not to bring up things that are purely speculation" w i l d because, to me, so many of these are. Based on a kernel of truth or twisted from something factual, sure, but twisted nonetheless and the conclusions drawn can in no way be definitive. Just because these are all widespread rumours that doesn't make them not rumours.

There are other things like trying to use Naya's dad's tweets as a source and a, idk, gotcha moment against Ryan Murphy. "Still heavily questioned whether or not that's true," they say about Ryan's statement, but that short section becomes emblematic of the whole approach. Take Ryan's statements and defense with a heavy dose of skepticism but imply that claims against him are somehow more substantial. I just don't like the bias, the lack of true nuance, the lack of a point, really. And again blaming everything that happened on Glee, even stuff he didn't actually write on Ryan Murphy is just grasping at every possible straw to round out this video on him being "problematic". Still hate that word.

To be perfectly clear, this is not me coming at the person who made this video, I'm sure they're lovely and are just doing their thing on youtube. I just don't find it any more substantial than a buzzfeed article listing all the Glee bts rumours relating to Ryan Murphy. (I didn't touch on Dahmer simply because I can't and don't care to, plus most of the video is Glee-related anyway.)

[lastthroes]

and now that i'm actually on (o)shi no k(o)

read more for spoilers for the latest chapter, aka 165. it's been leaked: officially it's not released yet. warning for extra salt if you don't want to read that

if it wasn't because there is only a chapter left (i've been running on the sunk-cost fallacy for a while now), i would have dropped this. if i knew beforehand that i would be sitting through several chapters of the mc's senseless and agonizing death, i'd have never picked it up for starters

not only aqua's death solves nothing, and if anything feels conflicting with how the manga wanted him to live instead of giving in into his suicidality (which apparently it's okay now if it's an "heroic sacrifice"). but jesus. was it really necessary to drag it on like this?

i don't even understand what's the point. it would be fine if this was that kind of manga, but it never was, so it comes really out of left field. ai's death shaped this manga entirely, and it never treated her death like this. whatever self-awareness that there was in aqua wanting to keep ruby from seeing ai's corpse? yeah, that's gone now

everything in these last chapters is morbid in the exact way a fourteen years old being edgy would make it and think it's deep. this conclusion in itself feels like nothing but bland shock value, throwing away any semblance of tying hanging plot threads together or keep any theme consistence (i'm forever mourning how much the manga said that ruby shouldn't just be ai's copy, just to make her become exactly that. she's even the focus of her former band now. give me a damn break). i know it went off the rails long before the ending, i actually found it a chore and stopped reading for a good while since the point about finding ai's killer and the revenge, and even the critique on the idol industry, became secondary at best. when it became some harem-lite amalgamation, slowly killing whatever interest i had. can't even blame the fandom for being nothing but ship/waifu warring when it feels that's what the manga most cared about through a good chunk of it

and then coming up with these "twists" that are impossible to believe, like ruby's fake death plan somehow being a success, or aqua's supposed master plan… he's a doctor. are you really going to tell me he doesn't know that forensic agents can tell what's a self-inflicted wound from one that isn't? what about the fingerprints? and why does this manga pretend he's right? am i supposed to feel sad at kana slapping aqua's corpse? because i don't. it's pathetic, and not in a good way. i don't even think drown people will look as nice as aqua does

this made me dislike aqua in the end, as well as probably the manga as a whole; my favorite character, that also happens to be one of the most underutilized parts in this story, also becomes a complete shut-in surrounded by trash bags after deluding herself with talking to goro by putting his glasses on a ball. what's this, the 'cast away' movie?

i know the manga implies ruby eventually picks herself up so aqua still "saved" her future as an idol (another excuse for drama that really did not make sense, but regardless, i'm sure what ruby's choice would've been if she had to choose between being an idol or having her twin brother), but i honestly really do not care anymore. fifty pages are not going to make justice to ruby recovering from all of this, and even if it did, everything's already too wrecked as an ending. and, as i said in the previous post, aqua's whole reason to exist and die being "protecting ruby" simply doesn't land in the same way it would have had they actually build up on this bond as twins instead of wasting pages into turning aqua into an attempt of an oblivious harem protagonist and then forgetting about said bond

and of course a certain subset of shippers are treating aqua killing himself for ruby as some kind of win, for "being who aqua loved most". what kind of win is this? that ruby had to stare at aqua's corpse (and apparently his family learned of his death once he was identified on the damn news of all ways? really, where was the realism left in this story?) when she had already lost goro and ai, not to mention the familial abandonment she suffered as sarina (which is probably the reason she latched so hard on goro for starters) and her own life and death? when the story has confirmed her fears about causing misfortune to anyone who gets close to her?

[lastoneout]

See I kinda get where this is coming from in some regards, but the inclusion of ADHD amongst the ways people are apparently "self-infantilizing" with the use of "therapy/social justice language" makes me hesitant to take anything else it's saying seriously.

It's kinda funny to see this author, at the end of the article, claim to care about disabled rights while repeating some absurdly ableist stereotypes and talking points? There is a long history of able-bodied neurotypical society infantilizing people with disabilities, and this article points that out, but STILL not only repeats that by implying that people with ADHD are idk, what? Lying? Making excuses for ourselves? Because babies have object permanence so surely we couldn't possibly actually struggle with something like that, but goes so far as to insinuate that said societal infantilization is OUR OWN FAULT somehow and/or we're weak for complaining about our symptoms.

ADHD is a disability. Literally, it is a medical condition that severely impairs one's ability to function from day to day up to the point of literally ruining lives. And one of the most common ADHD symptoms is memory problems. And it's not just "forgetting to text our friends back", though trust me that happens, it's forgetting to pay rent, forgetting to turn the stove off, losing very important things we need for work or school, not locking our door when we leave, fucking up our taxes, missing doctors appointments and medication refills, it is not "uwu I'm a child who can't remember stuff oops" it's "oh fuck the water got shut off because I forgot where I put my mail" and "I lost my job because I forgot which day my shift was for the tenth time".

And imo there's a pretty big difference between that and not having object permanence?? I mean I know people often describe ADHD memory problems as akin to a loss of object permanence but people with ADHD aren't babies. We understand that things exist when we can't see them in a way that infants don't, we just struggle to remember things if we can't see them. Like I know that my birth certificate exists, I just cannot fucking remember where it is right now. That's why it helps to take our cabinet doors off or make magnets for our fridges so we can SEE what we have to eat. Making more of our belongings visible is a legitimate way to manage our symptoms.

Tbh it's incredibly cruel to insinuate that people with ADHD are lazy or making excuses for themselves or literally stupider than a baby because of their medical condition. People with ADHD go our entire lives being told we're faking or we could remember things if we just tried harder and since we didn't we must not care and that we're lazy and stupid, there's no goddamn reason to repeat those ableist lies and pretend they're a hot take. A disabled person struggling with their medical condition is not inherently immature. Disabled people are not immature. We are adults. We have been BEGGING for YEARS to be treated like adults and it is NOT our fault that society continues to deny us that BASIC courtesy.

(And like again at the end of the article the author SAYS AS MUCH but like?? But they keep looping back around to claiming it's still our fault?? Like please explain to me how people with ADHD and disabled people giving into our own oppressors by *checks notes* talking about the very real and debilitating symptoms of our medical conditions?? This whole thing is coming so close to making a solid point but keeps switching its blame to things that are confusing at best and literally ableist at worst. I mean hell, they say being an adult is about being kind and taking care of yourself while using a common ADHD symptom as an example of a person not acting like an adult so like, are you also saying we can't be kind or take care of ourselves unless we overcome our disability?)

And that all brings us to the main problem with this article. I like to give people the benefit of the doubt, so I could believe the author just included ADHD on a whim, or didn't mean to imply all of this, but that means they weren't thinking all that hard about what including ADHD actually MEANT or how it twisted their argument, and that makes me wonder how much they were thinking about anything else they wrote. You aboslutely need to consider what you're saying when it comes to topics like this, especially if you are later going to say you care about disability rights, and because this author didn't do that they ended up repeating a lot of ableist bullshit, intentionally or not.

As for the argument that this article really is too "simple" to get into detail about something as complex as disability and ableism, well, then it just shouldn't talk about ADHD at all. One of these things is not like the other, and if they aren't going to give it the care and consideration it deserves then they should leave these topics to the people who will.

This was an interesting article to read. I think it's a little simple but still fun to skim thru.

[rufusx2]

dear anon (though i do know who you are, so i'm writing this with you in mind):

this is true, nothing you have said is something i would necessarily disagree with. the post is satirical and the longer work is about my own flawed thinking (though i will likely not post it in it's entirety until it is done, all of my meowing is just for snippets, though i understand that it can come across as strange or concerning if you are unaware of this as i have not posted my blog organization anywhere. in fact, the on;y posts of mine UNRELATED to my main bodies of work, my songwriting, are the photo posts organized under "#blinks").

this is the purpose of using language like "flawed in the right way"- i know my own lines of thinking are most definitely caused by societal problems, and they are not productive nor based in logic. even my blog header ("you delicate, precious, dying thing!") is supposed to bring to mind the "ideal" female body as being delicate and starved (which is a bad thing for people with a brain... but not for the narrator!). being born "right" (or "rightwrong" as i tend to refer to it, which is just a heavyhanded way of pointing out that calling yourself "born right" is flawed thinking) is not an actual thing, though i cannot help but loop back into this logic of "if only i had been born as somebody else" forgetting, of course, that i will only ever be myself. i focus on my own female form (and wishing to have been born differently) as a manifestation of poor body image (weight related) and self hatred (in terms of personality). if i had the power to be born differently, a "better" person, my brain (or i guess *I* would, i use "my brain" as a way of distancing myself from my own bad thoughts which is probably not helping the problem) would make this person male- the point is that not only is the premise impossible, but being a "better" person is impossible if you completely change yourself, and using this line of logic we can see that the CONCLUSIONS myself, or rather, the narrator of the piece of writing, (if i'm to be neutral and detached and pretend that it's NOT me saying all this), are also incorrect, and impossible regardless which makes dwelling upon them pointless in the first place. it's a futile line of thinking, and every word is clouded through a thick layer of rosy haze. i would even be inclined to at some points call it christocentric... this is why i used "wwjd" in a sarcastic way in some of my posts (that may or may not be publicly visible yet due to my queue system). take that how you will.

calling the female form flawed was not a way of thinking that the reader/listener is supposed to agree with (though again, it is a disembodied snippet, so of course you wouldn't know this upon reading so i don't blame you for not picking up on it. i am fine! i know there is nothing wrong with my body. and yet... i feel my own mind needling at me). i wouldn't exactly say that my writings are explicitly feminist, because that implies a conscious agenda and explicit political messaging when really it's all just personal anecdotes, but since i would describe myself as being a feminist i think the undertones bleed through. or at least, i hope they will when i do eventually release more.

i know i can never have what i want, and i know that what i want is NOT rational, or good, and is entirely based in heteropatriarchal ideas, but i can't help myself and i need to confront that desire frankly in order to identify it. you can't exactly get a good look at yourself if you close your eyes when you approach the mirror, and this is how i feel about ignoring these thoughts. i cannot pretend that i do not feel this way, and i dont really think it services anyone to pretend i always feel positively about my body. wallowing in them isn't always helpful for the wallow-er, but it perhaps CAN be for a witness who doesn't realize that they are not alone in their way of existing. there are many ways to be, in this body, and others like it, and while negativity is a symptom of a larger problem i have to be honest about it.

[sparkbeast20]

Your Past doesn't scare me (First, Second, and Third Brothers)

Summary: The biggest sign for a Demon to trust anyone is to let them hold and even read their grimoire, however since you're human and The brothers are high ranking demons. He scared of you seeing what his past is.

This Idea came from one of the lesson in season 3 and the sign of trust thing is from @inhuman-obey-me post of Devildom Courting - part 2! specifically Simeon's part.

Warning: Mention of past misdeed, Corrupting people, Killing, Demon being Demons and Implied Sexual Content.

Lucifer

Lucifer waits in his room, watching the flames burn the wood. And Concern fills his mind.

He knows that humans find it hard to win their trust back once the person they hold dear reveals a part of their lives that has long been forgotten.

But he's a demon. As such he has done things that humans will not forgive that easily.

He has corrupted humans in power to lead them to their downfall, killing humans that we're posing a threat to Diavolo and his brothers.

And all that he sees is him being a demon... No The Avatar of Pride. A being that will destroy human lives and bring their souls to his domain.

But now he's a demon who has fallen for a human, the very same being he killed and eaten at some point in his existence as a demon.

Now he waits for you to read and witness what he has done. An important part of a demon courtship is to trust your partner with your grimoire. However, since you don't have a grimoire. You are the only one out of the two of you to read the content of his grimoire.

He might show it, but he is afraid of what you are going to uncover. What if you can't see past his bloody history? Will you leave him....

Then the door of his room opens, making him look up to see you with his grimoire in your arms.

"Did you read all of it?" He asks with a hit of worry in his voice.

"Yes...." You slowly walk over to him. "As much as you and your brothers look like you are in your 20's to 30's I always forget that you are all hundreds even thousands years old.... And you witness, and even take part of history's worst parts....."

All he can do is nod.

"And you have eaten and killed humans just making a point."

"Yes...."

"Do you still do that?"

"At most parts..... It's rare now since the program. But when a human poses a threat to Diavolo's goal. I will not hesitate to take action."

"Will you or have you been corrupting me ever since I got here?"

There it is, the doubt of a human, he can blame you for being paranoid now.

"At times.... Yes... When you start to poke your nose into my family's relationship. I wanted to make you stop. But Diavolo has made a point we aren't allowed to...."

You set the book on his lap as he looks at you. "How can I trust you now, Lucifer....." You looked away, but he stood up and placed his grimoire on the table beside him. And place a hand on your face making you look back at him.

"I know that I brought you harm numerous times during your first year here. However know that I didn't know you well back then, and all I saw was a human who is part of Diavolo's mission to unite the three realms." He uses his free hand to grab yours, gripping it tightly. "But now I see you as a being that is more than a soul to collect. I see you as a being that brought my family back together. Who saw me more than I demon who lost his soul once he fell from his grace. No amount of power can ever repay what you have done for me and my family. If I have to ask my father for forgiveness just to earn your trust . If I have to go through the fall I would. If I have to pledge my loyalty to Diavolo again I-" He was cut off by you pulling him in a warm embrace.

"No more, you said more than enough Lucifer. Even though I read your past.... It doesn't scare me.... In fact I'm so happy how far you have come from it. You change for the better, even if I wasn't still in the picture. That all that matters" He slowly wraps his arms around you holding you tighter. Burying his face into your shoulder as small tears appear in the corner of his eyes.

"Thank you.... Thank you for still having trust in me, love" He slowly changes into his demon form as the flame that lit the room slowly dies down. "Now let's move on to the next step of this courtship." You nodded, already having discussed this step with him about this step. As he slowly wraps his wings around the two of you. Beginning the long night ahead of you and your demon.

Mammon

"So.... Mammon.... What are you doing in my room, and why are you holding your grimoire?" You look over your shoulder, seeing a flustered Mammon with his grimoire in his arms.

"MC.... I... Want ya to read my grimoire, they say that it brings good luck to a demon if a human they trust read it." He tries to not make it seem all important, since he doesn't want to overwhelm you with the gravitas of this courtship. And he wants to know how you genuinely react.

"Sure! You want to read it together?"

"Nah, I need to see my bets happening in my room. But once yer done reading. Go immediately to my room, got it!" You gave him a playful salute with your tongue sticking out. His face start turn red, and he quickly shove the old book to your arms and run out the room, shutting the door behind him. And he made a mad dash to his room, locking himself in and waiting for you to finish reading his grimoire.

After three hours, Mammon fell asleep while waiting.

Just then, the lock clicks and the door opens, as you come in with the grimoire in your arm. You saw Mammon sleeping on his couch.

You sigh then walk down the stairs and sit on the couch with a space between you two, as you set the book on his table.

"I always forget that you're a demon...." Mammon snorted before opening up his eyes and saw you at the end of the couch. "And you weren't lying about you eating humans......" his heart sank as he heard you talk. "Tell me the truth.... If Lucifer didn't force you to watch over me.... would you have corrupted me into turning me greedy like the other humans you fooled or tricked......"

He wants to lie, he wants not to tell you no.... But he wants to be honest with you, even if this will end all of this....

"Yeah..... All I said the first time we met, was all true..... But!" He moves quickly to sit beside you and hesitantly place his hand over yours. "But all the other times I told you that I don't care whatever happens to ya are all lies!" He tries to fight the tears as he places his head on your shoulder. "I know that I was F-ed up in the past. And the first time we met. But-But! I can't imagine doing all those things to ya now. Just thinking about it just makes me want to kick my old self ass! You're too important to me and my brothers. I'll promise ya that you will never see that past me! And I will make sure of that!!" He starts quietly sobbing into your shoulder as silence fills the room.

After what seems like forever, you adjust your body for you to hug him. "You might have been a horrible demon back then, and maybe you still are.... But you were one of the nicest demon I met and you are so different from that, Mammon. That Mammon would not have cared what happened to those people, and just stole everything they had and laughed his way back home just to gamble all of it away. That Mammon wouldn't be this nice to a little human girl and even go so far as to make a deal with a witch just to give her a better life.... " You pulled back far enough to meet Mammon eye to eye. "I'm scared of that Mammon.... I'm not scared of you, Mammon." You lean in to kiss him on the lips, as he does the same.

He moves his free hand to the back of your head running his fingers through your hair. "I love you so much treasure, more than anything...." He pulls back, that's when you realize that his shifted into his demon form. "You trust me right?" You hum in agreement, he smirks and brings closer to him as his wings spread wide before wrapping you two within it. "Good, cause this Mammon will make sure that you'll never doubt him" He whispers into your ear as his free hand grabs the remote and closes the light of his room.

He hopes that this courtship isn't on a school night.

Leviathan

Levi lay on the couch with his handled console trying to destruct himself from unbearable agony of waiting for you to finish reading his grimoire.

He can't even focus on his game as he waits in the common room. All his focus goes on you in his room reading all the things he did in the past, as the avatar of envy and the admiral of devildom.

The moment he asks you to read his grimoire, he instantly regrets it. He shouldn't have listened to Asmo when he told him that you and him are ready for the next step of this relationship.

With all the anime that Levi watches, all of them made this courtship thing easy.

He groaned in annoyance and turned his console off, set it to the side and pushed his face into the palm of his hands.

All the memories of him at his prime as a demon to be feared and respected. All the ships he sank! All the pirates, voyages, sailors and soldiers of war he killed at sea.

Then his D.D.D, startled him enough to make him jump off the couch. He sat up, and quickly grabbed his phone out for his pocket. And he dreads this message.

MC: I'm done.

He swallows his nervous lump in his throat, before getting up and heading straight to his room.

He slowly opens the door, closing the door behind him. He took a deep breath, his hand started to tremble but he steels himself and turns around to see you in his tub/bed watching Henry swimming in the tank. With his grimoire on your lap.

"Do animals feel jealousy?" You ask not to take your eyes off the tank. "How did you use a Sharks, Barracudas, and dolphins to drown 100 men..." He turns his head away, nervous of answering your question.

But he needs to answer it.

"It's not a sin... Its my ability of being aquatic demon... I thought it would be more of a challenge versus an idea I had at the time. On which sea animals can-can kill more humans." God he feels sick just saying it out loud.

"Do you miss your days as the admiral?"

He bit his lip, wanting to say no, but in truth...

"Yeah, sometimes... But the killing, torturing, and taking souls isn't one of the reasons!" He clench his hands into fist digging his claws in his palms. "I miss being an admiral because that's when I was useful and have the confidences to do anything I want without having second doubts"

He didn't see you getting out of the tub and walked over to him.

"Levi" He gasps then, looking back in front of him seeing you with his grimoire on hand. "You don't need to be an admiral to be useful or have confidence. You already had that the first time we met." You spread your arms wide and brought them around Levi putting him in a hug, with your forehead resting on his chest, you can hear his heart race. "You're a demon, even if I met you back then. I can stop you from being what you are. But now seeing you and reading your past. I can say this in confidence that I am so happy how you've changed, and for the better. Most humans can't, but you, a demon, change so much." You gave his chest a small but warm kiss.

His breathing became rapid, before he steady it. And return the hug burying his face on your hair, he stutters thanks.

Suddenly you felt something wrapping around your waist. At that moment you knew that was his tail. And that you and Levi are going on to the next step of the demon courtship.

He doesn't need to say anything, making you follow him to his bed.

"I hope you're ready my Henry... Because you and I are going to do battle." he sounded more serious.

This will be one of those nights. But more intimate than ever.

Note: I had this in my draft ever since I read the post by @/inhuman-obey-me. And I just had the motivation to write and finish this.

If there's grammar or spelling error, please let me know.

[stellocchia]

I think it's been more than two months since I pushed my "Wilbur is remembered far more competent than he is" agenda in your asks.

So let's rectify that, shall we?

Wilbur is pretty fucking incompetent. He's never been that amazing charismatic smooth talker we characterize him as (not that I'm not absolutely behind that too)

Like. Who did he ever successfully smoothtalk? The Lmanbergians? None of them were ever hesitant to join from the very beginning and Eret betrayed them pretty easily when Dream manipulated them.

Techno? Techno wanted to join them, he was the one who reached out to them. There was no convincing needed and Wilbur never convinces Techno of anything Techno wasn't already willing to do by himself.

Dream? Definitely not during the revolution and Dream's support during Pogtopia was Dream following his own agenda, not being influenced by Wilbur in any way.

He couldn't even get Quackity to let him into Las Nevadas.

Nah, the only person Wilbur ever smooth talked is TommyInnit. The fucking powerhouse of this cell. And even that's not completely true. Tommy hasn't been convinced by Wilbur of anything since the very beginning of the Lmanberg revolution. Not during Pogtopia. And not even now (it's not smooth talking if it's just exploiting mental exhaustion and trauma and all that. Tommy isn't convinced of what they're doing.)

Really. Not even Tommy, per se.

He just got Tommy extremely loyal and attached to him.

And honestly, that's all he needs.

You don't need to have influence over everyone, you just need to have strong influence over the right person.

And that's what Wilbur had and has.

Wilbur's accomplishments are just pretty much him having a vision and Tommy throwing himself at it to make it come true.

Wilbur had the idea for L'manberg but Tommy was the one leading the troops. Tommy was the one who negotiated for their independence and got it when Wilbur was negotiating their surrender. Tommy was the one who FOR NO REASON built the escape tunnel they escaped through when Dream blew up L'manberg and he was the one who built the lil panic room at the end. Tommy was the one who's home became the embassy to L'manberg (something Wilbur very much pressured and kinda manipulated him into btw. I'm never not gonna mention that lil detail when the embassy comes up)

Wilbur had the idea and stood around looking pretty. My guy literally stood around looking pretty, without armor, during battles. Just. I love him.

And let's not forget that Tommy was fckin great at being the general. The SMP was so much better equipped and still, L'manberg was kinda winning. To the extend that Dream saw the need for TnT (which was hidden) and the betrayal through Eret (which was hidden)

Dream felt the need to pull two deceitful moves to keep if not even gain the upper hand.

If I'm not mixing stuff up here, correct me if I'm wrong.

And stuff like the tunnel weren't even expected of Tommy. My boy just thought of that on his own and did it on his own. Noone knew it existed. Noone expected it to exist.

After independence Wilbur is implied to have been leading but he generally wasn't around too much. Tommy was keeping order in the more face to face kinda way. He tried to navigate people's personal conflicts and make sure things didn't escalate and just. He did so well.

And Pogtopia? Oh, Pogtopia.

It's a bit more difficult here, since they were no longer on exactly the same side and goals are more muddled but still.

(and I want to make it clear that I'm in no way trying to shame Wilbur for mental health issues or anything. This isn't about that. I'd never fucking even imply that)

Tommy kept morale high. He made sure that other people were fine, when there was a chance. He tried to reassure Wilbur when Wilbur was spiraling, he asked Tubbo if he was happier, he told Tubbo to be safe, he recruited Quackity when he saw the chance while making sure that Quackity's intentions were sincere enough (he didn't just naively offer Quackity a place in Pogtopia and risk it being a trap).

He avoided any kind of destruction to L'manberg as much as possible.

He rallied people.

Really, his one actual flaw was not "turning" on Wilbur. His unwillingness to give up on him or even just incapacitate him or limiting his ability to act as he wanted was what ended up costing him everything. His unwillingness to interfere with Wilburs plans beyond talking to him and threatening him with a crossbow that one time ended up making the 16th possible. And he can hardly be blamed for that.

And Wilbur, during Pogtopia... Well... Nobody liked him, he made everyone uncomfortable and most people just kinda tolerated him because... Yeah...

Without Tommy troop morale would have been abysmal thanks to Wilbur. He constantly put himself and his side down, labeling them as villains and thus morally inferior. He pitted his own people against each other, spread paranoia between his people. No communication or actually planning involving other people. Still refused to wear armor.

And don't get me wrong, that's the point. He wasn't on their side. Obviously Tommy added more to their victory, Wilbur didn't want their victory. But still I just wanna praise my boy Tommy, he was. So amazing. Boy fucking peaked.

He's so good in tactical warfare or whatever you call it.

And I wanna just make it clear that this isn't criticism of Wilbur. Not at all. This isn't criticism at all. This is just about the big fanon perception of Wilbur as this great and mature leader.

Tbh this is actually more about showing people how amazing Tommy was and PLEASE I WANT FICS TO HAVE TOMMY BE MORE OF AN EFFECTIVE POWERHOUSE

Regarding my former ask I just wanted to clarify again that I'm not trying to critique Wilbur or anything.

It's really just that I think it's hilarious how people remember him as way more put together and competent than he really was.

-

Yeah, honestly one of the biggest disservice people have done to c!Tommy in this fandom is fail to portray him as the badass general that he actually was. Like, sure, Wilbur's title was as "general", but he never did anything for it. He gave a few speeches, but then the work was left up to Tommy. Like, genuinely, rewatch the Eret betrayal vod, Wilbur says it openly that he's leaving it in Tommy's hands. And Tommy does manage to lead his troops into an advantageous position! They get their enemies to retire at one point during the very first battle!

Then, of course, there is the betrayal, but, once again, Tommy didn't give up. He built the tunnel for their scuffed escape beforehand and, when everyone was just about ready to give up, he went against Dream in a duel and then traded the discs for their independence without loosing a beat.

Tommy was a BIG asset during that war!

Wilbur mostly was and still is kind of a wreak. And it's not his fault, 'cause mental health is an absolute bitch and he wasn't doing too hot after the war, then it got worse with Pogtopia and even worse during the 13 years in Limbo. And now we are where we are now with Wilbur being... not a great individual.

But still! In Pogtopia Tommy was the de-facto leader. And yeah, that was because Wilbur wasn't on their side anymore, but they didn't entirely know that. Or didn't wanna see that.

Tommy himself was hoping that Wilbur would "come back around" if he managed to get back their country. That was a big motivator for him. And he did everything that was in his power to do to not lose either Wilbur or L'Manburg. He tried talking to Wilbur multiple times, tried persuading him that there was another way, he never bought into Wilbur's ideals, he recruited people and he lead the troops once again. It wasn't Techno that lead the troops (despite him being a much better fighter) it was Tommy. And once everything was exploded and Techno and Wilbur betrayed them? Well he kept encouraging people. Literally I'm begging everyone to watch that vod! Tommy was there at every step of the way, telling Niki that it wasn't over, telling Quackity to keep fighting and, after that, you know who was there to validate Tubbo's presidency? To rally people behind him? It wasn't Tubbo. Tommy gathered everyone by the L'Mantree and got their spirits high once again.

He is just genuinely amazing.

And, like, yeah now Wilbur managed to manipulate Tommy to an extent to be by his side. But that's not that much of an accomplishment anymore because Tommy has just been through so much that he's exhausted now, as you said. Like, remember when Tommy said he wanted to be on Wilbur's side because "he gets things done"? Well, I'm still waiting to see that one honestly...

[voiddemon]

I'm elaborating because yeah and I also strongly disagree with saying this applies to Magolor.

Magolor is both popular and hated because he's a betrayer character. He doesn't really have a stated tragic backstory, and within the series he isn't portrayed as anything other than a conniving liar. (Except for RTDLD, where he is in fact a sad little meow meow) What he did was pretty personal, but ultimately he didn't betray a family member or a best friend. Mostly just Kirby, who had been tricked before by Marx, so it's easy to take a "you should've seen this coming" angle (especially with how it's super obvious he's evil). Also compared to the other three, his actions don't have even a vaguely implied lasting impact on the setting or the characters. Also for a long time we thought he straight up died and then got better. Also Also he's easy to make fun of.

Important thing I forgot to mention for magolor people who love him either love the fact that he's evil and run with that, or they want to fix him/make him good which. I don't know how to elaborate on that but you know what I mean. We've all seen those people.

The mage sisters did try to destroy the universe which yeah yikes, but thats honestly really impersonal. They didn't even know Popstar, Kirby, or any of the beloved characters existed before they fought for the first time. A couple of things make them much easier to like: All three of them died, or came close to dying. They're in a cult, indoctrinated after being revived/saved by the cult leader. They didn't directly hurt anyone in the cast or destroy anything near and dear to the players. They didn't possess anyone directly, the dark hearts did, and they're out collecting them. While this is their fault it's not as personal. They have sisterly bonds which are shown in game (Flamberge and Francisca, specifically). Zan was later tossed aside by Hyness.

During Triple Deluxe Taranza is driven by the romantic love of his best friend, and he also caused the downfall of said friend unintentionally. (Also for this specifically, the fandom often blames the Dimensional Mirror and DMK rather than his ignorance in stealing the mirror.) Taranza captures Dedede and puppets him around, but it's sort of like 'Whats new' since he does this to Dedede. By the end of the game Taranza and Dedede aren't too opposed to each other, either, so it's just sort of shrugged off. Sectonia also betrays him after he's been nothing short of loyal to her. Important to note Taranza is also more likeable because he's a good punching bag and fun to make the butt of jokes.

However while Susie captures Meta Knight, she also mechanizes him, but it's way different this time. For one, it's Meta Knight, a character who honestly doesn't get fucked with that often by the series. He's also THE fan favorite. Also being turned into a robot is far more invasive than just getting possessed. Even though he just sort of walks it off in the series she never is shown to have made up in any way.

Haltmann doesn't ever really betray Susie intentionally, her being lost in another dimension was a tragedy, and he didn't intentionally forget her. In fact Susie is the one to technically betray him even though it backfires since she didn't want him dead, only wanting to "Teach him a lesson." Unlike with the Mage Sisters, Susie chose to be evil to be with her father, and she does like being evil. (Taranza did the same, but he really didn't go as far as Susie did.)

She is also a likeable character because she has faced a lot of tragedy. Surviving Another Dimension as a child due to an accident, having her father forget her, etc. Which does make her pretty popular, but often people who expand on this sort of forget what she did or brush it off like they would do with Taranza. But you can do this with Taranza because HAL does the same, casting him in a very positive (if pitiable) light. I mean literally one of his idle animations in SA is him crying ok.

Susie remains cast in a morally gray light within the series. Those who focus on her more positive traits lose sight of the dark, and those who focus far too much on her villainous acts can't see the light of her reasoning. HAL doesn't show much of an emotional side to her after Robobot, and she shows no remorse for her actions during the game in SA. Also it's very hard for us, as people, to balance the idea that she has had bad things happen to her and she's done bad things. Which often ends in us either perceiving her as pure evil or as "she's so sad" since it's easier than mentally balancing the fact that she is both. She's both a sad character but she's also done undeniably very fucked up things. ALSO when it comes to joking about her it's way funnier to make fun of her for being evil than being a sad little meow meow.

TLDR: Magolor is a betrayer character, Taranza is sad and pathetic and HAL treats him as such, the Mage Sisters have eachother and do very impersonal things which make them seem less evil. Susie isn't given any of these liberties and she's morally gray, but it's easier to say she's completely absolved by her past or she's pure evil than trying to balance those two things out.

Who is the most controversial Kirby character and why is it Susie?

[magicalgirlagency]

Since you've explained why you don't ship KyoSaya, I think you should explain why you don't like MadoHomu as well, to even the odds.

For better context, here's the old ask where I explain why I don't ship KyouSaya.

My pet peeve with MadoHomu is that 99% of the fandom isn't creeped out by it, specially after The Rebellion Story. There's a huge lack of nuance, and it's worrisome IMO.

Like, a majority of people have this black-and-white view of gay people; they think that by being a marginalized minority, any sort of morally reprehensible behaviour that they display is justified. Many people have this romanticized view of gay people in media, and sees them as pure, innocent and sinless saints that cannot do anything wrong, and if they do wrong, it's because the others had it coming and have only themsleves to blame.

And it's not just gay people; any other minority has been flanderized by the media at some point in their lives.

It's basically the same issue that I have with RosePearl (Steven Universe) and Catradora (She-Ra and the Princesses of Power).

May I remind you that these two are MASTER AND SLAVE, and I think I don't need to explain how fucked up this is.

Dude, there's a whole entire blog that documents Catra's abusive behavior towards Adora, and that alone should say something: @anti-catradora-receipts

These ships are all kinds of manipulative and abusive, but both the fandom and the staff don't see it; everything is shamelessly romanticized and seen as beautiful, like a "Love Conquers All" kinda thing. And in Madoka Magica, this is no exception.

Homura has rewritten the universe just so she could be with Madoka, and she actively manipulates everyone's memories just so her personal utopia can remain intact.

"But, wait!", I hear you all cry, "Mami, Nagisa, Kyouko and Sayaka can all live normal lives and be happy, and Kyuubey is paying for their crimes! Isn't that great? Shouldn't we be happy for them?"

Yes and no. Yes, because we get to see Kyuubey suffer; Incubator abuse is always welcome on this here blog. No, because Homura thinks of the other girls (minus Madoka, of course) as afterthoughts as heavily implied in her confront with Sayaka: "All I took was a tiny piece of it [The Law of Cycles]. Just the records of the person that Madoka was before she ceased to exist. Somehow, all of you wound up being pulled in as well. And it seems you can't return to wherever you were before."

And after that, she messes with Sayaka's memories a bit more, so she can't do anything about it, and says this: "We should pretend to be friendly in daily life. If you're confrontational all the time, even she [Madoka] may dislike you."

And speaking of Madoka, it's weird how she is titular character of the original series, and yet no one considers how she feels about Homura's decision. And if you want my honest opinion, I don't think she actually asked for any of this, as she has tried to alert Homura: "Homura-chan, don't! You'll rip me apart!"

To be honest, I don't think Homura sees Madoka as an equal, which it should be the standard for any relationship, romantic and/or otherwise. She created this whole fantasy where Madoka is the weak and helpless damsel in distress that constantly needs protection and saving.

There are even hints of uneasiness and hesitance in Madoka's voice in the second new world, specially when Homura asks her if she considers order important: "Well, I... um... I-I do treasure it. I guess I do think it's kind of bad to break rules becuase you feel like it."

If Madoka REALLY wanted to become mortal again, she wouldn't be so hesitant about it. I mean, she didn't hesitated when she wished for Witch metamorphosis to be erradicated (even though I strongly disapprove of the original ending).

And before I forget, the scenes of Homura's descent into madness had to be redone a second time, because Chiwa Saito's first takes were bordeline yandere. Coincidence? I think not.

"But how can you say it's all romanticized? The whole scene was indeed portrayed to be unsettling!", that is correct, however, the magazine scans and posters see no trouble with the ship:

Why does Madoka seems so helpless? And why does Homura looks so perverse? And why are these two 14yos so heavily sexualized in these? And why is no one freaked out by this?!

And also, I detect a teeny-tiny bit of queerbait in this ship, because during the NitroPlus Q&A panel in Animanga 2013, when Gen Urobuchi was asked if Homura was in love with Madoka, his answer was: "Probably." Noralities' video essay on Magical Girls and queerness touches upon this discrepancy under the Queerbaiting section.

The Rebellion Story had one job, and one job only: To provide fanservice, to please that other half of the audience that thought the original fates of the heroines were cruel and unfair, only for the plot-twist in the end to trample on it. Hell, MadoMagi wasn't supposed to have a third movie; Magia Quartet only came up with it just so SHAFT could keep on milking the cow.

Here's the thing, if you want to see gay relationships being more represented in media, you got to understand that they can be just as messy and complicated as straight relationships are, and they must be acknowledged with the seriousness and urgency that they deserve. Not every relationship is going to be a healthy one.

You know what I want to see in the fourth movie? I want to see Madoka be ANGRY at Homura, I want to see the Cinnamon Roll LASH OUT and TAKE NO PRISONERS. I want to see Homura being called out and her selfishness and I want to see them FIGHT. If this is the path we're taking, then fucking take it seriously, don't sugarcoat that shit.

But Urobuchi is returning for this movie as its writer, so it's best to not create expectations for it. When Urobutcher is at work, we all lose!

(It makes me wonder, though... are there any fanfics where Madoka and Homura fight? Because I'm really interested in reading some of them, since I don't have any high hopes for the movie...)

And last, but not least: Before anyone says that I hate Homura, I just wanna say that this is a lie. I don't hate her, I hate how the stans constantly claim that she hasn't done anything wrong. She DID. She did everything wrong, and then some!

Being gay and/or traumatized is NOT an excuse to do whatever you like. Consequences exist, and anyone, reguardless of origin, orientation/identity, moral alignment and etc., CAN, WILL and SHOULD face them.

We all have suffered and grieved at some point in our lives, and Little Miss "Existence Known As "Evil"" ain’t special. We don't call it a "Karmic Destiny" for nothing.

You're free to like villainous characters, just don't go coddling them like babies, as they are fully capable and aware of their cruelty, and will keep on testing how far they'll go.

Have some nuance. Please, that's all I ask.

[burrowingdweller]

Hey, so I just wanted to know. What's your thought process behind the hxh ship (that you apparently like) that is clearly predatory? I know you've answered a similiar question before, but I would really just want to know how you'd defend it other than just saying "he's not a pedophile" (which isn't true, since as far as I'm aware; an adult being in a romantic relationship with a minor is pedophilia..) or that "it's fiction, it can be whatever I want" because, in reality, giving those types of tropes attention will only make you draw the people that have those types of values to you. I don't know if that's what you're looking for or if you're just not interested in what this stuff can cause. Either way, it's harmful. And I'm not trying to ruin your fun, either. I'm genuinely concerned because I used to see you as such a thoughtful person.

From your permission, I will start a little from afar and will not immediately answer the question posed, or at least I will answer in parts and perhaps out of order. First, of course, this relationship is "predatory", because if you've watched the anime carefully, you know that Hisoka wants to kill Gon :) For some reason, no one has any complaints about this fact, although Hisoka is a literal killer, and what regarding accusations of "pedophilia", all we have is a couple of dubious moments, to which we will come back later. Yet with this we also have this fact that another adult character of the same anime forcibly persuaded Gon to become romantically involved. But for some reason nobody speaks about that. If we start talking about problematicity, then let's look at the whole picture as a whole, and not at one specific thing that does not suit you specifically. And, although I do not intend to give up my point of view about Hisoka, I agree to play by your rules. Let's take it as an axiom that he really is sexually attracted to a twelve-year-old - well, let's say, this is no longer the quality that could cause affection for the character. However, even with that, there are literally no acts of sexual abuse against minors in the anime. There are acts of ordinary violence, and this is what Hisoka, like many other characters, however, can be blamed for, this is true. But even so, since, as we know, I like this pairing, it is implied that I see some kind of chemistry between the characters, and for now, as a reminder, the convention I have adopted that Hisoka is indeed a pedophile is in effect. And this becomes a problem if pairing really comes down to abuse and sexual violence - I do not approve this in real life, although I consider it acceptable in fiction, however, in my opinion, these relationships and chemistry are more complex and also it is not one-sided. After all, let's not forget that Gon in this situation is far from a weak-willed victim of circumstances, but he actually can stand up for himself, although it is obvious that the forces are not equal. And although he directly says that he is afraid of Hisoka, he also notes that he is "excited" by the existing interaction between them. Gon likes the sense of danger, and sometimes shows interest in Hisoka as much as Hisoka shows in Gon. Is this a healthy interest? Hardly. Is it interesting to watch this? Yes. Also, let's go back to specific scenes and look at the events of the Greed Island arc. I know that many, to put it mildly, are embarrassed by the scene of the company meeting with Hisoka, but then, when they work in a team, Hisoka does not show any hostility or sexual tension, all that drives him is the desire to have fun and at the same time help Gon, and that even seems pretty cute: he has no reason to help Gon and exert himself unnecessarily besides the fact that Gon would have liked it. Yes, it was nothing more than a beautiful gesture, but even so - from Hisoka's part it was pretty sweet. To summarize, I just want to say that even if a character does have some kind of sexual deviation, this is far from the only indicator that defines him as a person. And Hisoka really does have them, it's just not pedophilia, as many believe - his sexuality is directly related to the infliction of physical violence and murder, while the age and gender of the object of violence are not important, but only his potential as a fighter. Then again, if you've watched anime, or maybe even read manga, then you might have noticed that Gon isn't the only character that evokes a certain kind of... reaction from Hisoka. He reacts in the same way, for example, to Chrollo, or to the very opportunity to piss off Illumi and fight him. And these two characters, as we can see, are definitely adults, but this is not important, because, as I said, Hisoka's sexual energy is directed not at the people themselves, but at the opportunity to fight and/or kill them. As for your concern about this pairing, or about people I can attract, it's in vain. I dare to assure that I am conscious enough to understand that these relationships are problematic, however, they do not become less interesting to me. As for people, from the unpleasant meetings I have only had those where I encountered hatred towards not only the pairing itself, but also towards the people who create content on it, so yes, you're right here, the contingent who I'm attracted is quite toxic, but I'm ready to put up with it. Have a nice day! (Also sorry for complex sentence constructions, I’ve translated this from Russian cuz it was pretty challenging to write this even using my native language, so, duh, I hope this is still readable).

[liskantope]

I'm getting exhausted from this thread, but I do feel I have one last loop to close and owe you a reblog/response here; I think your reblog was a good one and might wind up shifting my position significantly.

I think to some extent we're talking past each other here.

We certainly were talking past each other, including in the six-months-ago thread when you interpreted my complaint about "identity-centrism" in terms of the "born this way" vs. "choice" debate, while I was trying to talk about a phenomenon I see as entirely different. Now, however, I think we're on the same page about what I've meant and the points you make do address it, and I appreciate that.

I do remember people going around chortling, "What's next, people are going to think they have a right to marry whom- or whatever they want now?" I remember how my middle school best friend -turned- super conservative by the end of high school made some crack about people arguing next for marriage rights between humans and Great Danes.

And you're right. This is just what it sounds like when people are trying to deride rhetoric that relies on "X is whatever someone claims it is" -type reasoning (where X = love). This is maybe the most effective hole-poking of my initial thesis in this whole thread. And I do see why I might sound to you exactly like those conservatives and pessimistic liberals of two decades ago.

But here's the thing: this rhetoric you're citing is only the rhetoric issuing from the anti-gay side, and just because it purports to mock something coming from the pro-gay side, it doesn't necessarily imply that said thing was coming from the pro-gay side in any substantial amount. At least, I wasn't noticing a ton of "love is automatically whatever someone claims it is" stuff, and so I dismissed the "are people going to start marrying their toasters?" stuff as a stupid slippery-slope argument. In other words, since (as I believed) it wasn't lambasting something that actually existed, to me at the time it came off as weak and petulant, which made me glad.

Now, a bunch of people in this thread have me halfway convinced that there was just an awful lot I wasn't noticing at the time, so I don't know. The arguments I do remember hearing from the pro-gay side were often along the lines of "We're not saying that marriage should just be between any number of parties of any sort at all; we're saying that a loving, committed same-sex couple as all the same salient characteristics of a loving, committed opposite-sex couple" and then pointing to real evidence of this. Actually, your post triggered a memory of most of a decade later, when gay marriage was legalized at the national level and Jon Stewart played a clip of a conservative saying, "What's next, legalizing marriages between more than two people?", and Stewart, rather than being forced to shrug his shoulders as "love is whatever" might require, rebutted by pointing to real differences between the natures of being gay and of being poly. (This point is not to imply that I'm not open to the idea of legalizing marriage between more than two people, though clearly Stewart wasn't.)

But maybe you and others are right. And so I'll try to drop the constant invocation of my memories from that time.

Since I'm talking to you, I may as well briefly address what you said in my thread six months ago. By now it would be retreading old ground to explain why my complaint is quite distinct from the "born that way" vs. "choice" debate, and I think we're past that now, but I'll just say again that one hundred percent absolutely I remember that being a huge thing, going all the way from heated arguments I was having with people in high school and college to the presidential candidates discussing it in one of the debates (and yes, I did all of my growing up in the US). So given that you understood me to be forgetting it ever happened, I absolutely don't blame you at all for your subtly exasperated tone in that post.

Okay, obviously… Well, no, I was going to say that there’s not a direct parallel here because people don’t generally accuse homosexuals of hiding their actual orientation, but then I realized, like, yeah… People say that Bisexuals are actually just deluded heterosexuals or deluded homosexuals, and a big part of the last couple of decades of LGBT stuff has involved bisexuals asserting that their sexuality is real.

I actually agree that there's a certain aspect of the "fixation on internally-defined identities" thing going on in the struggles over who counts as bisexual as well as a number of other sexual orientation labels, and I guess some of it annoys me although seems relatively inconsequential and I certainly don't believe the bisexuality visibility movement is doing any kind of real harm in how it champions a righteous cause. And I believe that the horde of further sexual orientation terminology out there nowadays can be used quite meaningfully and usefully, provided that people don't get bogged down in treating them as central identity labels rather than just additional descriptors (hey, I used "reciproromantic" to describe myself just the other day! which might actually be an invention based on "reciprosexual" being the actually existing term?). All that said, again (*cue collective eye roll*) I don't remember ever so much as hearing of bi-erasure or related things until well past college, even after one of my main social groups in college was a gay group (perhaps the group being composed mainly of gay men and straight women and not exactly being a queer group had something to do with that?). I have not known this to be "a big part" rather than a quite minor part of mainstream gay activism two decades ago. But I'm learning that there might be quite a lot I don't know/remember.

Half a year ago, I got myself involved in a thread which compared trans rights to gay rights and tried to make a case that, in terms of arguments for each, the issues are not as directly comparable as a lot of people seem to think. A lot of my perspective comes from a sort of an empathy I feel with the non- religiously conservative, non- radical feminist motivations for doubting some of what this social movement is pushing for, particularly with regard to its disconnect with how more traditional people view identity categories.

This portion of a recent interview on the YouTube channel Nonzero (see until 47:43) is a stunningly crystal-clear illustration of the attitude and motivation I was trying to describe at the time, so much so that I think it's instructive and kind of fascinating to watch, even if it's almost so extreme and ridiculous as to come across as parody. (Warning: a certain kind of non-conservative, non-TERFy transphobia, which I'll quote bits of below.)

The interviewee, Norman Finkelstein, feels violently averse to using "they/them" pronouns purely because it would be implicitly affirming what in his mind is an untruth. (Presumably he would not want to refer to a male-presenting student as "she" or a female-presenting student as "he", for a similar reason, but this doesn't directly come up.) He appears to have no other motive, but the motive of not liking to "play along" with someone else's factual untruth is plenty for him. There is no particular social conservatism evident in him; he states plainly that he's fine with androgyny, of people dressing/presenting any way they wish, and that stuff doesn't bother him in the slightest, because that doesn't involve saying things that are untrue. Politically and philosophically he is obviously left-leaning, pro-science, and non/anti-religious in most areas: he repeatedly likens affirming someone's gender identity to affirming that the world is flat or that climate change isn't real or "all the craziness you attribute to the Trump base". Not pronouncing things that imply a factual untruth or deny objective reality is sacred to him as a professor and an intellectual, is what he is saying.

Also, this:

I'm not insulting anyone. If I'm calling you a "he", it's not like I'm calling you the N word or I'm calling you a c*** or something. It's just a relatively stable identifier.

Notice how completely uncomprehending Finkelstein is of the notion that not affirming someone's claimed identity (on the basis of what he believes to be objective reality or established definitions of words) could possibly be an insult or convey lack of respect or qualify as dehumanizing treatment of someone else. That a refusal to affirm someone's claimed identity (on the basis that it denies objective reality) is somehow a form of dehumanization is a completely unfathomable concept to many.

Now I find Finkelstein's perspective flawed on at least half a dozen counts, and fallacious on a particular fundamental level in conflating different types of "objective facts" (something that Robert Wright, who takes a much more reasonable, kind, and open-minded agnostic view on all of this, gently tried to push back on him about). I do think Finkelstein had some good points later in the excerpt about not forcing jarring changes in language down everyone's throats -- this is how I feel about artificial and ugly terms like Latinx, for instance, and I would have had some issues with xie/xir and the like becoming widespread nonbinary pronouns -- but in my opinion these points can't be applied well to using singular "they" for nonbinary people. Moreover, Finkelstein comes across as hardly more than a crusty, curmudgeonly jackass throughout, one who proudly and stubbornly adheres to a disagreeable absolutist view and refuses to open his mind to where his defense of that view might be flawed.

(More minor point: in arguing that mispronouning someone isn't a form of insult, he compares it to factually saying someone's hair is white or that their muscular dystrophy will prevent them from running a 4-minute mile. But, while maybe "insult" or "dehumanization" wouldn't be the best way to describe these things, they are certainly rude in certain contexts: you probably shouldn't call attention to someone's hair being white if they are sensitive about aging, for instance. Similarly, calling a nonbinary but male-presenting person "he" is pretty unkind if they don't want to present as male and are sensitive about it. But Finkelstein clearly isn't the kind of person to prioritize others' feelings over his duty towards "objective reality" in this way.)

But I contend that this is simply an extreme and rather dickish version of how tons and tons of people think, because in terms of the history of social justice and civil rights movements, it is brand new for a movement to be so heavily based in the objective truth of internally-felt identities and accusing people of fundamental dehumanization when they refuse to affirm them. And yet, activist rhetoric sounds as if this is simply part of how identities always worked and what dehumanization always meant, rather than something that appeared on the scene just yesterday.

There is certainly still a major constituency of conservatively religious people who believe that everyone should only do with their bodies what their bodies were "created to do" or whatever, but conservative Christianity is very weakened in our culture since it lost the last major culture war, and I think a lot of people in that camp still also fall into the category of finding it incomprehensible nonsense to say that an identity category is whatever each of us says it is and that it's dehumanizing ever to imply otherwise. I believe it's simply a misconception to assume that the pushback against trans activism is comprised mainly of fundamentalists and TERFs. Norman Finkelstein is an (albeit extreme) example of someone who appears to be neither, and my perception at least in the US is that most people are neither, but that a great many Americans, if not a majority, don't really get the "identity is whatever you say it is" concept and at best are bemusedly humoring it as long as it doesn't get too much into their faces.

(On each day of this past weekend, I was in a different public place -- a bar restaurant and a coffee shop -- and overheard part of a conversation about how "the people in such-and-such social group over there all ask about and share pronouns and a bunch of them go by 'they'", and in context this wasn't being attacked in any way, but it was being treated as bemusing and only semi-comprehensible.)

As Tumblr user Bambamramfan once said, people (particularly scientific-minded, non-faith-y people) really don't like to assert things they don't actually believe (don't have time to look up the post right now; the way they phrased it was something like "Americans don't like to lie about what they believe" and it was in the context of lesser-of-two-evils voting, a topic on which I emphatically disagreed with Bambambramfan, but I consider that particular point to be wise). I wish this were more recognized in social justice activism communities in general, and both that more rhetoric were crafted and ideological assumptions were more carefully examined with it in mind.

I'll end by saying, as I've probably said before, that I'm not claiming just because certain ideological assumptions in trans right activism are fundamentally brand new, that they are wrong or shouldn't become adopted by the wider community. Lots of fundamental ideological assumptions that we are obviously better off for making the default, such as "people owning other people is a gross moral evil", were once brand new at least on a society-wide scale. What I complain about is activists completely refusing to acknowledge or even be aware of this novelty, and so refusing to critically examine it, to defend it on its own merits, or to meet others where they're at.

[theangrypokemaniac]

@nyarthsis

First of all, it's symbolic.

No reason was ever provided why Jessibelle looks so much like Jessie. It would've been simpler and more instinctive to invent an entirely new design. Instead, it was decided to turn them into identical strangers.

I can't see what purpose this serves other than to validate Rocketshipping. As his fiancée, Jessibelle is the romantic figure in his life. Whether he likes it or not, James is in a relationship with her, albeit a long distance one.

The intention is for he and she to be married, but the similarity between the girls invites viewers to picture Jessie in that role. It's hard not to, since the Jessibelle is simply Jessie from the upper class. Whatever way he turns, he's fated to fall in with a red head.

Bear in mind also that this idea has not sprung from thin air. Up to this episode, Jessie and James have often acted like a couple in all but name: rowing, hugging, holding hands and inseparable. People may have had an inkling beforehand but this confirms suspicions.

Remember James's parents too. Yes, they selected Jessibelle for him because she's wealthy and presumably from a good home, but they genuinely appear to have affection for her too, and want her to join the family.

Since James ran away it could be concluded that Jessibelle replaced him in their lives, explaining that relationship. Maybe in these circumstances she went from being just a suitable future wife to the daughter they never had, and like adoring parents, they can't see any wrong in her.

Plus, the reason James gives for leaving home was Jessibelle's demanding nature, asking he use the right spoon and do things a specific way.

To Ma and Pa, that's commendable behaviour: she's merely trying to mould their wayward son into a gentleman. That he won't accept instruction just shows him to be difficult.

Personally, I don't think what she asks is so bad. He's got a cosseted life, waited on every minute, due to inherit billions from parents who didn't walk out, and can really have anything he wants.

It's got to have some catch, if only to be fair to the rest of us. Yet having to conform to a set of exacting rules of etiquette isn't really so awful, especially when it's all you know, and everyone in your social circle follows them, as in they aren't expecting anything they wouldn't do.

Considering that James rejected these in favour of joining Team Rocket, whereas Jessibelle remained a law-abiding lady, it looks like she was right to try and curb his instincts, as see what he got up to when left to his own devices.

If all Ma and Pa cared about was money and background, they could've found anyone of that description for James, even an ugly bride, but they made a point of selecting a pretty, decorative candidate, suggesting they like her appearance too.

Add all this together, and it could be said that, whatever Jessie and James feel for one another, any happy ending is an impossibility The gulf in status is just insurmountable.

Ma and Pa would never welcome Jessie, a poor thief, who's led their son astray, over a refined example of femininity, polished and sophisticated, and certainly not when they love her.

Choosing Jessie means James may well be impoverished for the rest of his life, and he's known luxury, so going without it is more obvious than it is to her, who grew up deprived.

Jessie and Jessibelle are similar in personality too, except that the latter is not always violent. I don't believe her ladylike manners are an act, I think she really is like that most of the time. It might well be that the 'dominatrix' routine is a one-off, to punish James for abandoning her.

Jessibelle is actually quite a tranquil person. She never loses her temper, barely raises her voice, and remains calm and controlled throughout. As a wife, that may be what James can expect.

Jessie however is constantly on the edge, forever losing her temper and dispatching her fists. I don't blame her for that; it's how life has shaped her.

At worst, James will be beaten by Jessibelle, but has all that moolah as consolation. With Jessie, a beating is the norm, and he's poor and starving. It'd be understandable of it all got too much and he decided he's better off at home.

The resemblance between the girls smooths out many of these obstacles. If James refused to obey his parents, and presented them with his choice, who was the complete opposite of who they had in mind, it'd be too jarring to tolerate. They'll have spent years imaging what it'll be like to have Jessibelle in the family and her giving them grandchildren.

If it's Jessie, then it's easier for Ma and Pa to accept. She fits into their dynastic fantasies to the snug level that an outsider might not notice the difference, and maybe they'd occasionally forget it hadn't all gone to plan.

As they want heirs, James has to be intended to find Jessibelle attractive, so they can't say they don't know what he sees in Jessie.

Much of her inner rage is probably frustration over failure and general unhappiness. If that's alleviated, she'd be far more laid-back, and so not so unsuitable to high society. Ma could offer a little instruction then.

The second thing is the events leading to this situation. Yes, James couldn't cope with marrying Jessibelle, and so, when away from home at Pokémon Tech., he ran off.

Before this, he encountered Jessie, as in a girl the exact image of the one he wanted to escape.

That meeting is an accidental twist of fate, and can't be helped, but to James it must've been the universe conspiring against him. He'd have believed it was Jessibelle initially.

If he hated his fiancée to the depths of his soul, every bit of her, he ought to have run for the hills. How could you stomach being around someone that similar to all you'd gone to the trouble to avoid?

Instead, he not only befriended Jessie, but stays beside her from that day. He joins the Bike Gang with her, enters Team Rocket with her, and walks over the world with her.

Every single day he has a reminder of Jessibelle before him. He absconded, but she's inescapable, and he decided to make it that way.

Why would this be?

It's as if, whatever he says to the contrary, he does like Jessibelle. He wanted to leave her behind, but not her face, and found himself a replica.

Somehow, Jessibelle telling him what to do was unreasonable, but he wanted her, without that element of control. He then found Jessie, who not only orders him about, but hits him, yet that's alright, as long as he has a certain level of freedom.

If he's in Jessie's company every minute of the day, he can't resent her appearance. In turn, that implies he likes it, and so he must fancy Jessibelle. If that's so, he has to also be attracted to Jessie.

The funny thing is that Rocketshipping and Rumishipping aren't rival ships, they're two sides of the same thing. If you support one, you must accept the other, else yours can't exist.

[tarashima]

I saw a fandom celebrity stating that Ryoken was co-working with Dr Kogami when picking the lost incident victims, and that Ryoken was actively helping out, which I do believe myself and I'm glad I'm not alone, so how come you and your friends don't see it that way?

I was tempted not to answer this but I looked into it and while I’m not surprised that the thought exists on a greater scale, I am very concerned about how well-spread it still is. And I do not agree, one bit.

Foremostly because of the most obvious reason that I hate how it has to be brought up constantly just because too many seem to either forget, ignore or overlook it: 

Ryouken was 8 years old during the Lost Incident. 

If you don’t remember how it was like being 8 years old, then that’s fine and more than understandable. But if you try and apply mindsets of a grownup on a kid that by no means should have those, something is very wrong, even more so when putting such heavy blame on a child. 

I like for you, anon, to imagine this: an 8-year-old boy, who loves and respects his father immensely, growing up in a household where science is everything, and the dream of helping humanity escape death is a topic brought up often.

To say Ryouken had no clue what was going on is both right and wrong. He knew why Kougami created the Lost Incident and he knew the goals and he wanted to believe in that. 

What he didn’t know nor understood, was why the nature of the Lost Incident was a part of reaching the goals and how it could be justified. And as much as he loved and respected Kougami, he was also too scared to ask about it. If he was scared of Kougami or the answer he might’ve gotten is up in the air (most likely a combination of both), but it doesn’t change the fact that he simply couldn’t ask. 

And even if he wasn’t scared about answers or Kougami himself, he was scared enough to make the phone call anonymously. And until he told Yuusaku and Kusanagi about it, no one else knew the truth. 

Ryouken clearly wanted to believe in Kougami’s goals and he respects and loves his father more than enough to be his loyal soldier in the cause, even after his death. But he did not approve of Kougami’s methods, and until Kougami died, Ryouken never revealed it to anyone. 

I cannot stress this enough; 8-year-old Ryouken isn’t the same person as 18-year-old Ryouken and how that gets overlooked, ignored or forgotten makes me sad. Not because I love Ryouken, but because a child shouldn’t be expected to have the same mindset and/or understanding as an adult. 

Ryouken luring Yuusaku away is included in that. Because what I get from it, is that yes, Ryouken most likely knew Yuusaku was going to help in experiments of creating humanity’s successor and reaching Kougami’s goals, but he didn’t know the nature of those experiments and how they would go down, or else the guilt he showed later wouldn’t have been as prominent as it was. 

Which brings me to the second point that I get surprised over being treated as canon: Ryouken’s involvement with the other victims, or that he and Kougami would’ve put deeper thoughts and planning together to pick out the victims. It’s surprising how well-spread this is because nowhere in canon do we get to see if Ryouken was involved or not, in the kidnappings or any form of planning. 

When it comes to the kidnappings, neither Takeru nor Spectre ever hints at Ryouken having a part of theirs. Yes, it has been brought up that Spectre knew Ryouken was coming for him as Spectre returned to the facility to be brought back to the “fun times”, but for me, it’s not enough to say if Ryouken had a hand in his kidnapping or not. It’s safe to say that he had a connection to the place, and we the audience as well as Spectre, know that, but that’s it. 

Takeru on the other hand never mentions details at all. The closest we get when focusing on Ryouken is that Takeru lashes out at Ryouken since he believes that he played a huge part in the incident and was one of the people responsible for it. And when he learns the truth from Yuusaku, he deflates remarkably. 

While we don’t get to hear a lot about Jin, we can make the assumption Ryouken had nothing to do with that either, or else Kusanagi or Ryouken himself would’ve hinted at it (would Kusanagi even have accepted to cooperate with Ryouken had he been responsible? who knows). Miyu and Windy’s origin is definitely up to debate but I see no reason to blame on Ryouken and call it canon since we have nothing to back it up with. 

So since we’re in the dark about how all the kidnappings happened, is it really fair to put the blame solely on Ryouken and call him responsible since he lured away Yuusaku? No, it isn’t. Especially since it’s stated several times how Ryouken isn’t the one responsible for the incident.

Which brings me to the second part of that statement, how Ryouken and Kougami together “chose” the victims. 

Honestly? I don’t think there was much thought behind it at all, other than picking kids that for a moment was alone and could be lured away without anyone stopping it. Which, mind you, happens out in the real world, as horrible as it is. Kougami needed subjects that could duel, but if they needed to be skilled is never told. And given that all the victims were young children, we can assume they didn’t needed to be. 

Would it then be too far-fetched to assume that any kid would do? Not for me, Kougami has shown enough signs to be uncaring enough to do so. 

The only one we get to know about it Yuusaku, and as a 6-year-old, he loved duelling. But he wasn’t picked, Ryouken accidentally bumped into him, and took the opportunity to take Yuusaku with him. 

And while Yuusaku tells us of Ryouken being his voice of hope, he’s also said that he believed for ten years how Ryouken was trapped as well, which is also something people tend to forget or ignore when discussing this. 

Heck, Kougami himself did admit guilt over even dragging Ryouken into the mix to begin with, implying even further that he wasn’t involved more than the show suggests.

Tl,dr; Canon does little to nothing to prove Dr Kougami and Ryouken was actively working together with both picking out the victims and doing the kidnappings themselves so to say that it is, in fact, canon is a huge misunderstanding of both the plot as well as Ryouken’s character. This is also my own thoughts, I can’t speak for others nor my friends. 

Just say you don’t like Ryouken, anon, and move on. It’s okay.