#I don't know why I'm posting this thought

[glypt0don]

So, this is quite a rant. You can skip to the bottom, if you want to know my opinion but don't want to read that much... But I worked hard on it and I think it's important, so it would make me very happy if you read through the whole text.

So this fits into something I wanted to post about anyway: a broader theme of why do we frame things as wars? Like, why is it culture war, specifically. First I liked the concept, I thought it described something quite complicated reasonably easily. But I pondered on it a bit more and I think there's more going on.

It's pretty trivial, that most societies went through a huge change over the last half century. It's not just feminism. I could make a whole list of things we as a people took on. Anti-racism and civil rights, religious acceptance, global trade, reinterpreting the meaning of peace, connecting the word through the world-wide web, etc. We ( or, as I am barely an adult and have no idea how to change things for the better, I should say you, or maybe chat) decided it was time for change, so change came. You brought it about.

And I agree. Change WAS and IS necessary. What that change should entail, well, we all have our ideas, right? And they have the ugly tendency to differ from each other. The question then is, how do we coincide our contradictory ideas on society? The answer is both worrying and very important.

To be fair, our race doesn't have a great track record on solving these kinds of issues. I dug into my historical knowledge, since, you know, those who don't learn from it, repeat it... The only thing I can compare to what's happening today would be the Reformation (which probably says a lot about my historical knowledge). That's the only time I know, where societal assumptions were altered so much in such a short time. That time it was specifically about the Catholic church (if you don't know, what I'm talking about, you really should, so Google it), and the result was a series of wars, that ultimately may have wiped out about a fifth of Europes population. The wars were of course led by powerful men, who capitalised on the divide to further their own goals.

As back then, now too, we can't rely on institutions to tame the public. Many media and political identities have a direct interest in polarising society. Because that's what happens. All these contentious issues about gender, class, or foreign policy become dividing lines between folks who are supposed to be parts of the same whole (call it community, state, nation or humanity, depending on how wide you can think). You know, how it works, probably saw it a few times, whatever your interests are. It's literally everywhere! We fight it out with the perceived enemy of the week sometimes, when there is an election, something notable happens, or it's simply Pride Month. Then everyone goes back to their respective corners, where they vehemently agree with themselves. We don't talk a lot, just throw words at each other, like Buggs Bunny, playing tennis with a dynamite.

I should say, this post is a notable and refreshing outlier. Thanks, @trans-androgyne , for starting a discussion for a change!

I know, it's a bit like nuclear armament. You can't just stop, because THEY won't, and then they win, and you can't allow that. It's life and death! And I don't have some magic pill to make it all go right, or believe me, I wouldn't sit here, typing this out at 3 in the morning Central European Time. But let me propose this: don't call it a war! Neither culture war, nor gender war, nor anything like that. Because this isn't a war. Just ask anyone in the middle east! They can tell you, what is war, and THIS IS NOT IT! And also, because it may not be guns and destruction yet, but nothing guarantees, that it stays that way. We already had multiple attempted takeovers of capital buildings since this cursed decade began, because our social reality became so fragmented, that you can't accept the results of a popular election anymore. That should raise alarm bells. I know it does, but it can be much worse! Learn from history, do not repeat it! Hit the Wiki page on the Huguenot war! On the siege of Magdeburg. Or, if that's not your cup of tea, watch Civil War! I genuinely think it's the best movie of the year.

Call it Social Discourse! That sounds much more manageable, doesn't it? Or you can come up with something else, as long as it isn't some warmongering bullshit. And maybe the next time you meet someone with sexist, homophobic, racist, or maybe radical left and anarchistic views (whatever you're opposing), don't attack them with your words! Those aren't weapons. Try to talk to them instead! Try talking about feelings! Listen to theirs, make them understand yours! I say feelings, because you both have those. Try finding a common ground, however small, and build up from there. Like Minecraft Skyblock. It can be hard in a challenging way, instead of making you want to shoot yourself in the head. Remember, you aren't fighting a war. You are having a discourse.

All of it is to say, the world and society are changing, wether you like it or not, and we have to change with it, to survive. That is the simple fact. If you call that change a war, that's just gonna make the whole thing unnecessarily painful for everyone involved.

This was sociopolitical advice from a giant armadillo.

Genuinely, what happened to “feminism is for everyone”?

That’s the feminism I grew up with: encouraging people to recognize that fighting sexism and restrictive gender roles helps folks of every gender. We’d push back on the idea that feminists hate men, pointing to inclusive feminist literature and how many men are feminists.

Now, there are so many people insisting that the solution to patriarchy is to openly hate and ostracize men no matter what. Why? What is the benefit? It’s certainly not effective in fighting oppressive structures to exclude half the population from your cause on the basis of immutable traits. It may feel cathartic to say horrible things about men and try to punish them for your frustrations with patriarchy. But the only actual effect I see is the increasing right-wing radicalization of young men, who are being told that the left hates them for the way they were born and presented with an abundance of proof that it’s true.

Why are we going back to treating men and women as different species? It doesn’t fix things to say “well women are the good gender and men are the bad one” this time. If you sincerely want to dismantle sexism, you’re going to have to unpack and let go of all sex and gender essentialism—even that which considers women inherently pure and men inherently immoral.

[bucktommyscones]

Post 8x5 fic because Lou said so. (Not really, but kind of.) This got a little hornier than I'm sure we would have gotten, but you know, when in Rome. Also, isn't it great how the season ended with this ep? What an awfully short season. Oh well.

"No."

Tommy can't see him from where he's navigating them back to Evan's place, but he just knows he's pouting. After nearly six months, his Evan senses are always tingling.

"Oh come on," Evan whines. "Just pull over into an overlook or something. Bet I can get you off in no time."

Tommy snorts a laugh. "I'm sorry, is that supposed to make me want to do it? I thought you had a better sense of my abilities than that, Boil Boy."

Evan considers this and Tommy can see his grin out of his peripheral vision. He should look ridiculous with those damn things on his face, but he looks like an adorable brat, which is as per usual these days.

"Okay, that didn't come out right."

"No one's coming any time soon," Tommy says, turning on his signal to change lanes.

Evan snickers. "Fine, fine. No public sex for us. I get it. Can I get you out of that suit and get your dick in my mouth when we get to my place?"

Tommy reaches over and pinches his thigh, gratified when Evan jumps a little.

"Hey! Rude."

"Why are you so horny all of a sudden?"

"All of a sudden? I thought you knew me by now, Tommy."

Tommy laughs again. "Okay, okay."

"Besides," Evan says, and if Tommy isn't mistaken, his voice sounds...hesitant? "I just want to thank you. You know, for driving three hours from home to go to a dead outlaw's funeral."

Tommy feels himself melt. "You don't have to thank me. I enjoyed it."

"You did?" Evan sounds surprised.

"Seeing you in your element all cute and earnest? Getting to spend time with you? I'll do it any time."

Evan runs a hand through the hair on the back of Tommy's head, affectionate and warm. He loves it when Evan does that.

"How can you possibly think I'm cute right now?" Evan wonders and this is not the first time he's asked.

"I always think you're cute. Even when you're gross."

Evan's laugh is infectious and Tommy laughs with him. He leans forward in his seat and smacks a kiss to Tommy's cheek. "I like you, Tommy Kinard."

"I like you too, Evan Buckley," Tommy says. "Chinese on the way home?"

"Sounds good," Evan confirms. "Wanna make out on the couch and watch a movie? Then I can get your dick in my mouth?"

Tommy grins because watching a movie always turns into something else. "You're on."

tag list:

@desert--moonchild @sazzynatural, @multishippinghussy, @mmso-notlikethat, @esendoran

@sunnywithachanceofbi, @sleepywinchesters, @buck-up-buckley, @manifestingchaoticvibes, @corvid-cryptidd

@lbltpsmspenguin, @theotherbuckley, @cliophilyra, @actuallyitsellie, @thecarrott

@talktonytome, @misstommykinard, @the-omniscient-narrator, @bobbinsnash, @a-mel0n

@hyperfocusthusly, @mayorjack, @marvelousbuckley, @swagmaster9k

@byunbuckjunmy, @rutathenurse, @sluttytommykinard, @bidisasterevankinard

[sleepymccoy]

Someone I follow is posting about Spock and McCoy after the Katra sharing, but they're posting canon thoughts and I'm all fanon so I'm making my own post lol

Post Katra headcanons!

Spock swears in Southern when he's tired. He really doesnt like this

McCoy understands a bit of Vulcan, but only when he doesn't know the person isn't speaking English. Like, if they randomly switch to Vulcan he can keep up until it's pointed out

They can feel when the other is experiencing strong emotions. They don't know what emotion, but it's like an itch or a tickle in their throat to say the other is feeling something

They know a bit of each other's specialised knowledge. McCoy is passable at astrophysics now, and Spock is an even more annoying patient since he understands the terminology

They also remember a few private moments of eachother's that they weren't present for. Both politely don't mention this, but do find confusing ways to allude to it

McCoy can cook some Vulcan dishes now. Spock developed a taste for bourbon in the evening that takes everyone by surprise

With great effort Spock can project messages to McCoy. With greater effort McCoy can give Spock a feeling that translates to fuck off

On Vulcan they're legally super duper married and Spock just doesn't mention this. McCoy notices next tax return when he's taxed like a married man, not a single man. Takes him months of asking around to figure out who the government thinks he's married to. He files for divorce without talking to Spock

Spock won't divorce him cos he did carry his Katra, but he'll agree to an annulment. McCoy about pops off with anger

Kirk buys them a wedding gift when he finds out

They don't get the annulment and neither can really put their finger on why. Something about respecting Vulcan culture, cos they'll still be married on Vulcan no matter what

McCoy gets a headache whenever Spock mind melds with someone else

McCoy can initiate a mind meld with Spock, which they both get kinda very into cos their brains feel so good paired back up again. McCoy drunkenly described it as being better than sex to Kirk and the idea of that sticks around something terrible

Their telepathic connection is stronger after a meld, so they start doing it in advance of missions so they can be in touch immediately if things go sideways

If they're apart for a long time the connection will tell them when each other is close by. They've run into each other at conferences or in hotels or once on a transport ship they didn't know the other was booking too. They find each other quickly and easily when they're nearby

This becomes an uncanny capacity to always vaguely know where the other is. McCoy is bad at remembering that he shouldn't know and will volunteer Spock's whereabouts sometimes without thinking

They get good at learning what the various nudges and hints from their connection mean. They can tell different moods apart and send messages that the other can open at their leisure, rather than breaking through and being front of mind

If one of them is injured or captive or just bored as shit they'll sometimes pop into the other's head and basically turn into the back seat driver from hell

With everything they know and learn, they're very fond of each other

[scentedluminarysoul]

Yeah, gotta say as well, I'm not super excited to post new chapters sometimes. Like, I get comments, and it's great, some frequent flyers. But only on day one or two, rarely later. And then I just. Tend to forget honestly. Life goes on. And I think, maybe people just don't care.

But then I get a new comment, whether it be a newcomer or "an old friend" who's rereading, and I immediately want to publish more to get their opinions

But man. Even when I ask what people thought? Barely anyone says. I want to hear what you loved, what you didn't, what theories you have!

And I think this is in part due to creative work being reduced to "content". It's content people consume and then go to the next piece of content. People don't engage with fandom anymore. I'm old, I've been in fandom for 20 years, and it was so different back then. Now I have people just telling me to update, or asking why character X did Y. Dear readers: that's for you to ponder.

So I think in part it's also the erosion of good TV shows, actually. Used to be we had 22-24 episodes and the story unfolded slowly, questions left unanswered. Now? Shows drop all episodes at once, and only 6 of them, so we gotta speedrun, and we better explain everything every five minutes for the people on their phones.

Anyway, sorry, rambling.

Point is:

Tell an author that you liked their story!

If you're shy, or don't speak the language, that's fine! I have regulars who only comment emojis, or who comment in their native language (Spanish, Russian), or run their comment through translate to post in English.

It's fine! Emojis show emotion. And translators exist!

Just please, as a writer, I beg of you:

Comment.

Don't lock yourselves away, discussing a fic. If you like it, let the author know!

A friend of mine also spent so much time and effort plotting out a huge event in their fic, the grand finale, 30k+ words over multiple chapters, and they received barely any feedback. They were so bummed out and almost quit and deleted. They were depressed about it. And it was so good! You could tell they put so much soul into it to make it perfect. It just sucks when people don't say anything.

I often lack the energy for a long comment, so I'll just drop a short one. "I loved it! Thank you for writing!" and sometimes I go back later and leave a longer one when I have the spoons. But I want to leave something, because I know how it is

Because here's the other thing: fanfics aren't social media. You can still comment on fics that are finished and years old. I've seen people write new chapters on abandoned fics because of a single new comment!

Fandom creators provide fanworks for free. We put our heart and soul and whole pussy into it. And all we ask for in return is a little bit of appreciation

I apologize again for the rant

A writer friend told me something that broke my heart a little bit today; they're going to quit publishing their fanfic.

My instant thought was that they had been trolled or attacked or that something terrible had happened in their life because this person is so passionate about their writing. It wasn't any of that. Engagement with their works has been going down, as it has for many of us. Comments are like gold dust a lot of the time, and just looking through the historical comment counts on old fics on ao3 demonstrates this trend very clearly. It was not simply the comments dropping off which caused them to decide to stop posting, however.

My friend came across a discord server for their fandom (I should point out here that their fandom interest and mine diverged a couple of years ago, we stay in touch but don't currently read each other's posts because I'm not into their fandom and they would rather gouge their eyes out with a wooden spoon than read anything Star Wars) and specifically to share fic in that fandom. They joined, because we all love a good fic rec, only to discover that their latest multichapter fic, which has almost no comments and very few kudos, is being hotly discussed in this server as one of the best stories ever. Not one of these people has bothered to say this to them on the fic. When they asked, none of participants could see the point in telling the author of the fic they apparently loved so much that they love it.

This discovery has absolutely destroyed my friend's love of sharing fic. They share because they love seeing other people's enjoyment, and fic writers do that through comments and kudos/reblogs/likes because we don't get paid. There is no literary critic writing a blog post/article about how amazing the story is for us to copy and keep/frame. There is no money from royalties. All we have are the words of the people reading our works.

Those people on that server could have taken five minutes of the time they spent gushing about how amazing my friend's story was to other people and used it to tell the one person guaranteed to want to hear that praise how much they loved it. They could have taken a moment to express their opinion to the person who spent hours upon hours plotting, writing, editing, and posting those chapters. Instead, they deprived my friend of thing that keeps them sharing their writing, and in the process have killed their love of it. My friend now feels used and unmotivated.

I won't be sharing a link to their fic, they said I could share their experience but not their identity. I know they plan to post one final chapter. I know they intend to express their hurt at being excluded from the praise for the thing they created, and I know they intend to announce that as a consequence they will not be posting for a long while, if at all.

So please, I beg you, don't hide your love of a story from the writer. It's just about the only thing we have.

[makorragal-312]

You know what?

I'm not gonna look at this episode as a midseason finale.

Can't remember if this was confirmed or not, but I'm pretty sure Tim didn't intend for 8x08 to be the actual finale for this half of the season. Given the episode count, it would've made more sense for it to be either 8x09 or 8x10.

So with that said, I'm gonna go in with no expectations.

I'm just gonna treat 8x08 as just another regular episode that's more than likely gonna contain some filler and unwanted plot lines, but whatever. And any Buddie interactions or mentions of Chris are gonna be scarce at best and non-existent at worst. But that's probably because the real Buddie/Buckley-Diaz content is gonna be in the episodes after this one.

So yeah, that's how I'm gonna approach things.

[a-magpie-in-gravesfield]

I was looking at my gif folder today, and just wanted to post this to say, if you feel like you can't draw/animate something, keep practicing and don't give up !

I used to purposely crop animated shots in ways I didn't have to animate the difficult stuff because I had no idea how to. Then I tried and kinda hated the result, but this time I thought I would just remake it until I felt like it looked ok enough. I know my work currently is still by no means perfect, but I'm still pretty proud of it considering I hadn't really taken animation seriously until I started animating Philip about I think two years ago and taught myself through trial and error. The first Philip animation I had made was that timelapse one that was just very simple loops of him sitting at his desk because I was so scared to animate anything that "moved a lot", and then his story motivated me so much that this time I took it seriously and decided to just keep making stuff

(also two more old vs new because why not - dear lord those old ones were so off model it's painful edkewnbddenwkdnew)

[unpopularly-opinionated]

I can respect that. I myself often struggle with simply existing in between what is and what should be. Ideally yes, the presidency shouldn't be decided based on who is better at selling snake oil, but that's also the reality we live in. So the question becomes: "Do we stoop to the level of making our candidate a showman/woman over an intellectual, or do we keep pushing the intellectual and hope it works one day?" And mind you, I'm using "intellectual" as more of a personality identifier than a compliment. An intellectual can have dumb as rock takes, so long as they talk smartly, they're going to come across as "intellectual". But this isn't an exact science, just my own thoughts on it, I suppose. Don't take this binary too seriously, I sure don't.

My take on why Kamala lost is somewhat of a long one. Since I feel this element of it is all but guaranteed to get me sidetracked, I'll push past the business about how she was unfairly thrust upon us as a candidate, thus proving the primaries are essentially "rigged" and pointless (at least as far as the DNC goes, but for all I know, the RNC could be the same. I'm not a Republican so I couldn't say really). This is a big reason against her though, so it shouldn't be ignored. There was no hand-waving this issue away, and we can sit here and discuss what alternatives did or didn't exist until we're blue in the face, but as I said, that would sidetrack us.

Beyond that, I believe her biggest issue is one that the Democrats have had for years now and that's just a blanket assumption that Dems will just "Vote Blue No Matter Who", the idiotic phrase I will argue against until the day I die it seems. This is most evident by her inability to work her own base to vote for her, and instead she's out parading around Liz Cheney in some feeble-minded attempt to try and win over people who do not want to vote for her.

I mean she had 7,000,000+ less people vote for her than Biden, meanwhile Trump has gained 13,000,000+ since 2016. We consistently hear about how "if everyone who didn't vote voted, statistically most of them would vote Democrat" and yet it never seems to click with Democrats that they should be currying favor from non-voters as opposed to Republican voters. I don't understand why they're so insistent on trying to flip voters when there are tons of undeclared votes just sitting there. There were around 90,000,000 people who didn't vote. Even just a few million of those in the right states would've won her the election.

And to jump back to my point about trying to flip votes, they don't even do that right either, not that there's much hope of it working to begin with. They send out completely mixed messages like sending Liz Cheney out to campaign with Kamala, indicating that yes, even some Republicans are voting for her, while simultaneously telling you that if you don't vote for her, you're an idiot, uneducated, etc.

Like I know this sounds obnoxious, but I also fail to see how it isn't just common sense. You can believe in your heart of hearts that Republicans are dumb backwater hillbilly hicks all you'd like, but when you're in the midst of an election and for some idiotic reason your candidate is trying to appeal to those dumb backwater hillbilly hicks, perhaps you should reserve your opinions of them until after the election. When applying for a job, maybe you shouldn't call the guy interviewing you a dumbass until after you've left the interview, even if he was in fact a dumbass.

I also disagree with the sentiment that Republicans are the only ones voting based on emotion. Did you not hear Democrats leading into, and post-election? They genuinely believe the end of the world was at stake. Republicans may have voted on the hope that Trump will be their savior, but Democrats voted on the fear that Trump would be their doom. Fear is just as much an irrational emotion as hope is.

To summarize because I feel like I probably didn't get my point across too clearly:

Forced on us as our candidate, completely disregarding democracy, proving once and for all the primaries are pointless and it's all rigged.

Blanket assumption that Democrats will vote Democrat regardless of candidate, their platform, or the way they run their campaign.

Complete disregard of their own base, in favor of flipping votes.

In addition to the last point, would rather fail to flip votes than work on getting any of the millions of non-voters involved.

Indecisive attitudes of "we are better than you, Republicans" but also "please vote for us, Republicans".

Scapegoating minorities not voting for them as why they didn't win, on top of just in general lacking understanding as to why they didn't win.

The entire DNC needs to be ripped up from the roots and replaced.

[wretchedwitchpussy]

Thoughts on new WWDITS episode 6x07:

•Guidor is a red herring and I'm pretty sure we saw Nandor give up on her during the post credits scene when he saw Jerry at the door because we've seen previously whenever there's a little bit of resistance to his rebound loneliness relationships he tends to give up immediately. He literally said, "Fuck it," and gave up immediately when he was met with the smallest amount of resistance in the form of Jerry.

•We have seen that Nandor is routinely out of touch with his feelings especially when he's coping. He will actively say one thing because he's trying to convince himself of that thing, even though he feels another way. I believe that he doesn't actually think that humans are replaceable, because Guillermo is proof to the contrary. The amount of times that he has protected, stayed loyal to, saved Guillermo says that he doesn't believe that.

•I'm buying into the whole "Guillermo not being fully transformed means that he's an EV" theory and I'm pretty sure that's why Colin punched the shit out of him. Colin is the embodiment of milk toast. We've literally never once seen Colin angry EVER. Except once. EXCEPT when he was having an EV-off with Evie. I think Guillermo is feeding off of others' emotions (which emotion I'm not sure?? Possibly respect or admiration? We've seen EVs feed off of a variety of different emotions) and Colin got really fucking angry because he sensed competition, like he did with Evie. I don't think Guillermo knows he's feeding though, obviously, because I think we would see a lot more of the office staff fatigued/tired if he was trying to actively feed. Though I don't know why Colin wouldn't have picked up on it like he did with Evie—something something Van Helsing blood something something Colin is still a new EV because he was just born so he's not as good at sussing out competition yet?????

•The reason I think Guillermo is feeding off of admiration or something similar like respect is because we've seen that the office staff react positively to people putting others down. When Guillermo makes fun of Colin during their bit in the conference room, the room swells with "oooohs" and laughter. I think they admire Guillermo in this moment. Cue Colin punch. The next time, Guillermo is trying to talk to the office about mental health and be a "hero" for Colin, trying to give him some grace. I would imagine this would evoke a lot of admiration or respect again, since he's trying to be kind to Colin and very publicly offer him help. Cue another beatdown from Colin.

•I think that this would also fall neatly into Guillermo's arc of always having wanted respect and admiration from others. He's always wanted to feel like someone worthy of that.

•I don't exactly know how that would really work though in continuing his arc because I feel like I would rather have him find out that he needs self-respect and self admiration before finding that another people? But that's the best I got.

•Lazlo is most definitely going to turn Sean and probably Charmaine into vampires or learn something about mortality in the process if he doesn't

•Basically Paul Simms when I catch you. Paul when I fucking GET you.

•Add your thoughts

[777heavengirl]

the one with the post mortem

sirius black x reader ! - 1,244 words masterlist bags masterlist A/N: i cant tell if i like this or not but its the only thing I've been able to put out in days and its... yea no comment. also pls refer to this post about my update schedule and what I'm dealing w rn!

“You’re a bloody idiot Padfoot” James paced back and forth, hands on his hips as he scolded Sirius. “I just don't understand what you were thinking- they could’ve killed you”

“It's just a bruise Prongs can we relax here?” Sirius sighed as he held the frozen pea package to his face, he could already feel the tender skin around his eye bruising. The splitting headache he was now suffering from made him cringe as James's voice boomed around the living room.

“I think what James means to say is that-” You said as you walked back from their kitchen with tea in your hands, seamlessly passing the hot mug from your hands into his as you sat next to him on the Potter’s couch. “We are thankful it didn’t go past some shouting and a punch- Right James”

“Fuck no-”

“Come on-”

“No! It’s just-” James rubbed his temple, a frown etched deep within his features “Don’t put yourself back on their radar Sirius, I don't understand why you would want to go in the first place! You hated the woman!”

“We just don’t think it was the smartest idea to waltz into the funeral honey-” Lily said while rubbing circles mindlessly over her pregnant belly, her baby blue peplum top barely hiding the bottom slivers of her belly as she leaned back in her plush chair.

You stared at her round belly, a fleeting giddiness passing through you at the thought of the baby arriving soon. You had been scared you'd send her into labor when you knocked, dragging a bruised Sirius in, but she remained the calmest you had ever seen her, merely sighing as the two of you tumbled inside. Like it was just any other day. You guessed having James Potter as her husband meant he often brought home some excitement, to say the least.

“And then you also had the bloody brilliant idea of bringing y/n with you-”

“James-”

“No,” He shook his head, brown eyes staring straight into yours. “He shouldn’t have brought you! For Godric’s sake, they know you’re a muggle-born y/n! Merlin knows what they could’ve done-” 

“I convinced him to let me go with him, James! I wasn’t going to let him go alone-” James continued to lecture you, you did your best to concentrate on his words. But all you could focus on was Sirius's blank stare towards the floor.

You knew James's lecture came from a place of love and care. James was so much like his mother, you could almost see her. The way he argued with his hands on his hips, a kitchen towel thrown over his shoulder. Nothing but care and love, and worry seeped into his words. You knew he meant well, you knew he just did not understand why Sirius couldn’t just leave it alone. It frustrated James, it always had. They were brothers, no one could deny that. But a piece of Sirius, small and deep within him, hidden from the world, would always belong to the most honorable House of Black.

And it not only tore Sirius apart but James too. 

As much as Sirius was a part of his family, as much as he called Euphemia mum and Fleamont dad, as much as they were brothers in every way but blood. As much as they had built many memories together, happy Christmases, and bountiful birthdays, with many more to come. Endless days together, growing old together, like brothers, like family. Hell, Sirius was in the Potter’s family portrait. But even through all of this, they could never erase Sirius’s past. It would always be there, like an ugly inky stain on an otherwise pristine white shirt.

But you understood. Somehow. You knew what it felt like, the need to go crawling back to the parent that makes you feel worthless, hoping and praying it'll be different each time. 

Sirius craved to be seen by his mother just as much as you did your father.

You guessed that was why you didn’t fight him on going, why you decided to go with him. 

“He’s right,” the room went quiet as you all turned to look at Sirius, his eyes were now closed, one covered by the frozen bag. He felt exhausted, like his arms and legs were made of lead, his heart felt heavy with guilt and grief. “I shouldn’t have agreed to let you come, hell- I shouldn’t have gone in the first place but that’s my bullshit to deal with, not yours, love” 

You scoffed, “Since when do we deal with bullshit alone-”

“Since you decided that we needed to lead separate lives y/n” He snapped now, dropping the bag on his lap as he turned to look at you. 

“Oh grow up Sirius” You turned away now, away from how his features twisted in frustration and regret. You did your best to keep your face flat and monotone, afraid to let even a single sliver of emotion slip through. You hadn’t talked about it, yet. Avoiding the theme altogether for the last couple of days since he came home. But the tension was there, palpable and thick. It permeated every conversation and every interaction. It made everything feel heavy, the way that rain would drench and turn your clothes heavy. 

You couldn’t take the silence anymore, with a sigh you got up, pulling down the edge of your black dress. Lily and James merely stared, wide-eyed and shocked at the outburst from the both of you. 

“I’ll see you two later-” Your words had barely rang out as you apparated away, the faintest crack of the air following you. 

Sirius groaned, dropping his face into his hands. 

“So no, you haven’t fixed it yet-”

“It’s not that easy Prongs,” Sirius melted into the couch, fingers tracing patterns into the corduroy. 

“Why?” Lily stared at Sirius, a glint in her eye that was no stranger to Sirius. He narrowed his eyes at the red-head. “Why isn’t it easy Sirius? She loves you an obscene amount- watching the two of you is gross”

“What are you talking about Lilykins?” Sirius played with the edges of the soggy bag of peas, a childish pout on his lips.

“Lils is right, the two of you are worse than we are and we are married pads,” James sat on the arm of Lily’s armchair. Sirius scoffed-

“Come off it- no one’s worse than you two” They both rolled their eyes, a small smile on their lips they tried to repress. 

“I’m not wrong though- the two of you are disgustingly cute- always fawning over each other, whispering things to the other- you know you should really confess Sirius, tell her how you feel-” Sirius sat up, eyes wide,

“Tell her how I feel? Is pregnancy melting your brain Evans?”

“Oi! It’s Potter now, thank you very much-” James feigned hurt but Lily burst into laughter,

“God- the two of you are meant for each other,” James and Sirius stared dumbly at Lily, uncontrollable laughter shaking her body, she slapped James’s thigh excitedly “You really do- I can’t believe, Merlin-” She continued to laugh, starting to wipe tears from the corner of her eyes as she let out full spurts of laughter. “I can’t believe the two of you said the same thing-”

But as fast as she started she suddenly stopped with a small, oh, green eyes wide-

“W-what is it-” James stood, staring at his wife “Is everything okay?”

“I either just peed myself" Lily grabbed onto James's forearm to attempt to stand up from her recliner chair "or my water broke— currently leaning towards the latter” 

“Oh fuck-”

taglist ; @thatlittlered @giuli-in-earth @notsolong-pause @niceonejames7 @caspiankingofnarnia @ilovejamespottersomuch @bmyva1entine

let me know if you wanna be added ! or if i missed you

[httpscomexe]

Little Red

Summary: You're a little pissed off at one of your partners, but he of course, makes up for it.

(Find What I’m currently writing by checking my pinned post)

Parings: Wade x Reader x Logan

Warnings: Mention of sex. That’s it really. Heavy foul language?

Word Count: 2004

(I don't check for grammar, I'm too lazy for that shite)

“They’re in my sights, I’m moving in.” You look down at him from above the dark bridge, gun trained on the enemy as Wade moves in, gun pointed in their direction as they search for both of you, and you grin, you had them cornered and they didn’t even know it.

“Wait…” You mumble, sweeping your gun over the area again. “I thought there was three…”

“Shit-“ Then you hear it, the gun as it shoots you right in the back, your gun powering down for the next 10 seconds.

Fucking laser tag.

“Haha, I got you!” Peter pokes your forehead, pushing your head back playfully before running off for the last five seconds you had left, waiting for your gun to power back up.

Were you winning? Absolutely. Were you having fun? Most definitely. Should you all be out on a mission right now? We don’t talk about that.

There’s arcade music as your gun powers back up, and you immediately go back into ‘Call of Duty mode,’ as you like to call it, treating it as if it was a real mission and you didn’t just get shot in the back.

Turning a corner you see a blue glow, that meant Wade was there, your other partner having left already claiming the game wasn’t fair to them. Just because they’re blind, doesn’t mean it’s impossible.

“One is in the back left corner of the room, I’ll get the two on the opposite bridge.” Wade tells you, crouch running to get to the other side, cause who really gives a fuck about no running rules in laser tag rooms? Once the gun is in your hand and the vest is strapped around your front, the rules no longer apply, it was every man, or woman, for themselves, and you took it pretty damned seriously.

You turn the corner, the end of your gun pointed ahead with only 12 seconds left on the little screen, and so you rush it, moving into a jog to get to the end, searching for Kurt, and finding Peter, shooting him straight in the side while he’s looking up at Wade, satisfied with the 10 second time out, that meant he was done about 7 seconds early, so you pass him, ignoring the stupid look of defeat he gives you. You always start, and end with the first and last shot, and you always win. Today would not be the day you lost. So with your gun at the ready, you spot Kurt, he’s got his gun trained up where Wade is, you can tell by the blue glow, and he was waiting for Wades vest to pop up, but you knew it wasn’t going to, so you get close enough for the gun to catch onto the sensors, and you pull the trigger, but it doesn’t push down, instead of the classic video game gun sound, there’s a power down button as the lights turn on, cancelling out the neon and black lights, a groan leaving your throat.

“Why didn’t you shoot me?” Kurt laughs, standing up and looking at Wade again who was now scaling his way down the bridge over to you, Kurt, Peter, and Jane. Scott had also left the room because he was scared of lasers.

“I thought I had enough time for a takedown!” You smile largely, Wade coming up from behind you and lifting you around the waist, waddling awkwardly as he walks you to the exit.

You get out, looking up at the scoreboard. As usual, flawless accuracy, and the most points, you sigh. Thank you Clint. The winning team? Well, Wade picking you up and twirling you like a princess is enough to answer that question, obviously the blue team won. Meaning 500 tickets would be sent into your wristband, and your team wouldn’t be able to play again for thirty more minutes.

“Who won?” Al comes up behind you smiling, holding the big stuffie that she wants to believe is a teddy bear, no one had the heart to tell her…

“Uh, who do you think won?” Wade wiggles his finger directly in front of Al’s face.

“Judging by your hot breath on my face regardless of the mask, I’m assuming you and little red won?” Little red. You love Wade, but God that nickname was getting to be a bit much.

“You’re just mad you couldn’t see.”

“Bitch I got more shots than you probably.”

“Which would be impressive if your kill to death ratio wasn’t seven to twenty three.”

“Girls, come on, the pizza should be ready, and Logan should be here any minute now.” You grab Wades gloved hand, and you gently guide Althea over to the table where Scott was sitting, a small cup of tickets on the table, and a large box of pizza, only two missing. But you weren’t hungry, you were just excited to see Logan.

“Face it, he’s not coming.” Jane nudges you, grabbing a slice for herself, but you were pretty dedicated to looking towards the door, hoping his grumpy ass would peek in at any minute now. But to no avail.

“After this, we should do the race track.” Wade points at Kurt with the tip of his pizza, the weird bastard was eating it crust first. As if Wade couldn’t get weirder.

“Ze race track?” Kurt lifts the two litre bottle of coke, pouring it into a styrofoam cup with some ice that was half melted as you look down at your watch. Logan should’ve been there by now, he promised he’d be there… Surely he didn’t forget. Right?

“Yea, I mean one of us is bound to beat little red in racing, right?” Wade chuckles, looking at you looking at the doors.

“Right? Little red?” You feel a hand on your shoulder and you throw on a smile. “You can’t be good at racing too.”

“Actually, Tony Stark taught me himself.” Is what you would’ve said, but you’ll pass on that for now, those are stories for another time. “Wade, I will kick all of your asses in racing… I could beat you all with my eyes closed.” He smiles.

“Wanna give that a try?”

“No, I wanna go outside for a moment…” You answer quickly, it sounded almost sarcastic, but by the way Wade's chest heaves up and down in a silent heavy sigh, you know he’s disappointed. You were completely reliant on Logan, but you couldn’t help it. That bitch saved your life. And he wouldn’t even show up to an arcade for you now. “I just need a breather…” Wade nods, letting you go, a pat on the shoulder for comfort.

“Well, we’re gonna go practice rounds with five year olds as a replacement, and maybe we can even get Al driving. I'd love to see what she looks like behind a wheel completely unaware of another car in front of her.” You chuckle dryly, taking a step back.

“I’ll be right there, I promise.” You mumble the promise, stepping out of the large arcade and you go over to your truck, climbing into the bed and then onto the roof, sitting with your legs crossed as you open your phone, first checking Logan’s location, which as usual, was turned off. So you call him.

It rings.

And rings.

And rings.

And guess what?

It fucking rings.

You groan, opening your texts with him, the last one he sent being, “I’ll be there baby, I promise. Tell Wade I love him too.” Which makes you feel a wave of hurt just stroke through your body.

You call the number again for some reason. And it rings, and rings. Then it doesn’t.

“What the fuck?” Did this motherfucker just decline my call? Who the fuck does he think he is? You call back, and this time it only rings once before it’s sent straight back to voicemail. So again, you call, same thing. So you call again and again until you’re sure his voice box would be full of frustrated grumbles and groans from your side. “You motherfucking bitch…” Is what’s in the last voicemail until you open your camera app. Only to discover a fucking wall.

And that was it.

You hop off the roof of your truck, opening the door and starting the engine, letting it roar to life despite the snow as you buckle up quickly and swing out of the parking lot. You were not letting this motherfucker ignore you.

You take a sharp turn, speeding down the roads when you could, the little sticker on the back of your licence plate a warning for police not to pull you over.

“What the fuck could this ancient piece of art be possibly hiding from me?” You start yelling at nothing, wishing Wade was sitting next to you. “You save the fucking world with someone and you think you know a guy… especially one that’s been fucking inside of you.” You’re talking to the snow on your windshield now. You knew you’d get attached when you agreed to being in a relationship with Wade and Logan. You’re latched onto the two unkillable fucks like a leech, and until they see you when you’re out of your prime, you weren’t going anywhere, and they sure as hell weren’t gonna push you away. Especially not on the birthday that they all promised to be at. Which honestly, if it was just you, Wade, and Logan, you would’ve been completely satisfied. But with Logan missing, it just felt like a teenage hangout, Wade counting as a child.

You pull off the road, driving up the gravel quickly to the little cabin the three of you had put together, and you turn off the engine of the truck, throwing yourself out of the drivers seat, jamming the keys into the front door, and you push it slab of wood open, basically slamming it behind you before you freeze at the red coating the hardwood floor.

Rose petals…?

Your eyes squint in confusion. And you take another step inside. Red rose petals lead to the bedroom. Little fake candles lit up in the kitchen and living room. And you could barely hear two voices arguing with each other in the bedroom. Wade and Logan…

Logan…

Wade?

How the fuck-

Kurt…

You groan, taking slow and calculated steps towards the bedroom, you weren’t big on surprises, especially since on the other side of the wall there’s usually just a man with a gun.

But as soon as you step into the bedroom…

“Surprise!” Wade shouts, conferring thrown into the air, and there’s glitter flying at you, making you turn away but it just covers your clothes and the floor, not reaching your eyes, nose, or mouth.

Wade was standing in jeans and a pink polo now, his suit and mask kicked into the corner as if it was expertly hidden, and he even managed to get Logan to wear something else from his usual beater and jeans. He was now just wearing elmo pyjamas and a pink hoodie.

“Happy birthdayyy little red!” Wade sings, clapping his hands and running up to you for a hug, which you of course give him, sending a death glance towards Logan who just laughe, taking a few steps towards you.

“I know, I promised to go to the arcade, but baby I am more than two hundred years old, pac man isn’t exactly my thing…” He grabs your waist, wrapping one arm around you and smiling.

“So you set this up…?” He nods, and you feel Wade come up behind you.

“Figured we’d give you a break and let you relax while we take care of you…”

“It was my idea…” Wade chirps, and Logan growls. “Mostly my idea… the sex part was my idea…” His hands also rest on your waist, smiling against your neck as Logan stares down into your eyes.

“Happy birthday, little red…” He leans down, kissing you, and suddenly the nickname doesn’t seem all that bad.

[kimyoonmiauthor]

Might be more of a white culture thing. I get called names often when I point to actionable things one can do. Usually from particularly Black and other PoCs, they're more straight with me than white women are when they assume I'm a woman, even if I point out I'm NB and particularly don't subscribe to white (US Middle Class) woman's speech, which I never could quite master nor like.

There was a study on white women's speech about an Italian family, I think, granted US-based immigrants, where women of the family were taught more to be "peacemakers" and use indirect questions, (not the Jewish kind of questions) to particularly needle people into doing action.

Jewish speech (since I was raised Jewish as part of being adopted), tends to have more rhetorical questions to challenge people to think more deeper or examine their thoughts. (Plenty of papers on this, I actually wrote a long post about it)

But outside of (white) Jewish circles, often questions are used as passive aggressive behavior and ways to diffuse conflict. Such as the white woman speech of something like, "We do not hit other kids. How do you think the other kid feels?"

BTW, this is far from the white woman's tears and toxic white women's speech as pointed out by Robin DiAngelo, but does show the gulf between how women are treated between cultures and often I've observed PoCs are more likely to try to conform to white ways of gender when faced with someone white due to mainly stereotype threat and also some speech patterns which are harder to deal with if you aren't versed with how to deal with the toxicity. People tend to hedge their bets.

By the way, straight pitching here, but I'd really, really like a philosophical discussion on two things, though I'm well aware these are loosey goosey. And yes, maybe influenced by the US election:

The questions are these two:

Does true altruism exist? Is there a way to make an outgroup care about the in-group, when they have no skin in the game and keep showing up? I remember the episode you did about Sam Altman? But it didn't get into this question. We're stuck worldwide with people who don't care, but is there a philosophical way to get people to care about groups they don't belong to?

And the other question is how does one sell an idea of masculinity that is not the Alpha, Beta, etc set and can we escape that to men in such a way that they feel invited? I've read about sacred masculinity and also the secure masculinity models, but worldwide the shift towards that ultra masculinity seems to be winning because it feels powerful. The current movement of feminism is asking how to reframe masculinity itself.

I'd like to see it in an intersectional way for both topics. Such a way that it sees internationally and through lens of intersectional queerness.

You've circled around these topics, gone through them talked about queerness, communication, but I've felt like it's a glancing blow. I'm aware this is a hard ask. But I have to admit the last US election and watching other elections where people have swung far right on self interest alone over community has left me wondering if I missed something. Distrust of community that deep leaves me reeling.

I encountered women who were willing to, for example, stick it to trans people over protecting their own rights and philosophically I do not understand why they would choose hate over saying everyone deserves rights. I did the sit down and listen, but hit hard dead end walls, like I was being an elitist for going to college and the pursuit of knowledge is being snobby. Or literal professed Neo-Nazis, like telling me people should believe in Mein Kampf. And I'm sitting here thinking what more could I have done to make people care and care about people unlike them as a really marginalized person. It hit so many walls, and I tried very hard not to yell, scream, but reason through emotions, logic, but I can't help feeling a little frustrated that maybe I didn't know enough in order to get them to see a different way and move them that little bit or at least crack their wall through the interaction.

Separating The Art from the Artist ('s Gender)

an interesting thing I've observed:

I've been making art for my whole life, and I publicly transitioned a few years ago, and it's super interesting how much criticism changed when I came out

When I was in the closet the criticism I got for my work was a lot more useful. It was generally constructive, usually specific and actionable, usually coming from a place of sincerely engaging with my work even if it didn't always like it. So even the negative stuff was usually helpful?

Whereas now, most of the criticism I get seems a lot more "vibes based"? It's more vague; it's more likely to contain factual errors like "The work says X" when the work doesn't say that, or even says the opposite; the criticism is often less actionable; and it's more likely to treat my work as something that has accidental features to which the audience has a reaction that is the most important thing, rather than something that has deliberate features because I chose to put them there? And so it's judged much more by whether people vibed with it rather than by whether it achieved what I intended it to

idk, it's just interesting, maybe it's not a gender thing maybe it's just that people's media literacy is changing? maybe i'm attracting different audiences now? maybe I'm just worse lol

[margoshamangolord]

A BIG POST WHY TFA SENTINEL IS A GOOD CHARACTER WHILE STILL BEING A FUCKING PIECE OF SHIT

lots of thoughts under cut

I hated him like any tfa viewer is expected to, and i still do, because he's wrong oftenly and very fucking immature about his own actions, but it's just that fandom treats him like a simple flat cardboard designed for nagging the main characters, while he's not. Even people usually fond of discussing character depth just go "ew" at him, but i want to prove that he's not worse than even ratchet or bumblebee in terms of writing. His actions have depths, reasons and explanations. I do not want to excuse him in points where he actually fucked up, but i do want to remind that he's a character with a history and insecurities like others in tfa

I want to start off with the fact that while the hate he has inside the fandom is not really interesting, it is easily expected. He acts like a piece of shit and has a lot of negative traits (for example you have his attitude towards organics, and while you could kinda write it into being a reaction to Elita's 'death', it wouldn't be really valid, since Optimus was there too, he saw the same things as him, but he has no disgust towards humans)

The first thing i want to show would be this screenshot from the allspark almanac. It actually broke me when i saw it and prompted to write this because it brilliantly explains his whole character drama.

He feels guilty. He actually knows and admits he made a mistake and he is weighed down by it. He is fully and painfully aware of his stupidity in the situation.

But is he going to admit it? Is he going to apologise? Of course he's not. He cannot carry the weight of his guilt, but he cannot apologise and let himself be weak. So he made a vow.

He presses Optimus down and puts that weight on him because it's easier for him to stand straight reassuring himself that he's not at fault at all here. He feels that if he says sorry, then he'll be guilty forever and will never let go if he acknowledges it. He is guilty and he knows it, but he's immature and he does not want to think about it at all. He distracts himself with the rules and regulations.

"I did it, i fucked up trying to be something greater than i should, breaking rules. I'm never gonna wash it off, I'm guilty, but i must be better. If I don't make any more attempts at throwing over the rules, if I hold down others from doing so, i will be better, right?"

Rules are safety and comfort for him. Breaking rules and trying to be special is something he associates with Elita's death, and his thought process basically is "no rule breaking=no tragic accidents to be responsible for". He's confident that if he does everything by protocol, how he's told, then there will be no situation he would have to be blamed in. Of course he takes it to an extent. You oftenly see him obsessing over rules and regulations more oftenly than others — and now that makes sense.

The second thing would be his profile and Optimus's words about him. This text doesn't really serve us much important information, just a simple outside opinion on how he acts, except the first phrase.

"Sentinel means well, he really does."

As bizzare as it sounds, even Optimus, who he has a very sour relationship with, understands this. Sentinel actually means well — but it's just his experience and perception that really distort what comes out in the end. His "well" is very different from others' "well", but he definitely does not actually mean intentional harm in most occasions.

An unconcious goal that he most likely has is "do not let the elita incident happen again". It actually explains why he's trying to press down Optimus's ambitions and yells at young autobots about the importance of listening to the code. He may see himself in others.

Last is miscellaneous details. He actually covered Optimus and Elita when they were retreating — wouldn't do this if he was as selfish as creators want us to believe. He says he made a mistake in the almanac (when he was kinda being interviewed, he told the truth). Wouldn't really do that too. Most times he's been a dick to Optimus and his crew were him simply not believing immediate information without proof like he believes is the right way, like he's supposed to, and from his perspective he was genuinely sure he's doing the right thing

Conclusion

I would still slap him if i met him. But it doesn't mean that he should be rushed and avoided during discussion of character flaws and I'm tired of him just getting flatted down by the fandom as "mean and stupid do not touch". I want him to be taken seriously, and tbh finding out that he actually feels bad about archa seven is all it takes to be suddenly enlightened about the inner workings of his brain, because it connects all the dots.

And i would give all my money to see him canonically get a better development and more focus in the show. I would love if he accepted his wrongs, and if he had a genuinely honest conversation with Optimus. I really would.

[gunpowder-gemini]

Hi I have many many thoughts on Dandadan and where specific characters are going in the story, so incoming ramble posts lol. I've got thoughts on Okarun, Turbo Granny and Kinta specifically.

WARNING: SPOILERS FOR THE MANGA THROUGH CH. 175

First up: Okarun!

So obviously he's lost his turbo granny powers bc he's a good boy who keeps promises, but him having yokai curse powers is like, half the concept of the manga right? (The other half being Momo getting powers due to alien abduction). So clearly, he's gonna get them back because we can't just have one of our two main characters permanently sidelined. The question is just HOW.

I'm pretty sure Turbo Granny is gonna come back, she's a major supporting character and she had a whole little montage panel of Reasons To Stay despite her saying she has none but I'll get into that in a different post lol. HOWEVER! I don't think she's gonna give Okarun her powers again. I mean, they're HERS. And she just spent all that time getting them back why would she give them away again? So Okarun can fight? She can use her powers way better than he can, so if they're needed SHE'LL use them.

I think Okarun is gonna develop his own spiritual powers like Momo's.

In the recent chapters it's gone out of the way to highlight how ridiculously fit Okarun is now. Like, SUPER fit. Most obviously in the fitness tests, where he blew everyone out of the water:

But also in the fight against the pygmies he easily kept up with Aira, who was in her yokai form at the time.

Which I mean, it makes sense that he got fit - he's been fighting for his life as an after-school hobby lol. Obviously continually training to handle Turbo Granny's powers AND fighting things would result in him getting incredibly fit. But they've like REALLY emphasized it these past few chapters. It feels like they're really calling attention to it, you know?

But that in and of itself isn't the real reason I suspect he's got his own spiritual powers. It's actually because he can enter Empty Space.

So per the Serpoians, Empty Space is something aliens create that only pulls in humans with high spiritual power so the aliens can capture and study them. It's why once Aira got her acro silky powers she could enter Empty Space.

Okarun's high spiritual power wasn't his, it was Turbo Granny's. He was able to enter Empty Space because he had her power, but without it he's just a normal kid. So once he gave it back he should be unable to enter Empty Space. And yet:

He's gets pulled into Empty Space to fight the pygmies. He himself calls that out as strange! He shouldn't be able to! He doesn't have Granny's power! But there he is! So he must still have high spiritual power!

I think he spent such a long time with Turbo Granny's full power inside him, utilizing it so frequently, that it changed him. Either it awakened latent spiritual power within him or left behind an imprint of itself, I'm not sure lol. But I think he's developed his own version of Turbo Granny's power. I think it'll be a bit different from her, but still similar (I don't think they're gonna give him a completely different power ya know?). I suspect it'll come with a cool form change to his yokai form, like a costume upgrade lmao.

Furthermore, I think this happened because of the Danmanra arc. During that arc, in the final fight against the Fairy-Tale card, Okarun went all out three times.

He's never been able to do that - it's been kinda implied it would kill him. But through the ~power of love~ he managed to pull it off, and I think it is going to have an effect/consequences. I think this moment here changed him in some way, and it might be the catalyst for him developing his own version of Turbo Granny's powers.

Further to that point is Count Saint-Germain. He cornered Okarun, got him to yield and clearly intended to take his powers, but didn't.

I suspect it's because he wanted Turbo Granny's powers, but Okarun no longer has them. I think he either doesn't know Okarun has his own powers, or he does know and is waiting for Okarun to properly awaken them before he takes them. I'm like 90% sure the Empty Space in the pygmy fight was caused by him. Empty Space is pretty clearly outlined to be an Alien Thing and while the pygmies are spirits/yokai/whatever, Count Saint-Germain is probably an alien given his affiliation with the Kur. AND he was the one who gave Keiko the knife and the mission to steal Momo's power. Since Okarun got pulled into that Empty Space, if pretty boy here didn't know Okarun has some hidden spiritual power, he sure does now.

Either way, Okarun yielding to him here is definitely a Chekov's gun that's gotta fire at some point, and I've got theories on that but I'm gonna save them for my post on Turbo Granny lol.

Anyway TLDR; I think Okarun has his own superpowers like Momo now and we're gonna see them awaken in this arc.

Thanks for reading!

[parasolladyansy]

hello! i've liked ansy's adventure for a while, and i noticed how you play on japanese names for the pokemon, especially for mizumi's and sasmu's. what do you think of the languages in the pokemon world? i can guess hisuian equals japanese, but does sinnohan/kantonese also translate into japanese? or the four japanese-based regions are adapted into english ( or unovan?) i don't know if i'm explaining myself, but how do you view the pkmn languages and their equivalents in our world?

こんばんは! Good evening! Thank you for following along ^o^/

Class is in session lol! Professor Laventon seems to be most comfortable writing in his native Galarian, though he also has various notes in traditional “Japanese”, written vertically & read right to left.

So, language is a very interesting thing in fiction, & the Pokeverse is no exception! Through the games (& especially the latest ones, Scarlet / Violet) we’ve had a number of characters who spoke in different languages. I remember a couple of NPC’s in BW Unova, there’s Fantina in Sinnoh who peppers her speech with Kalosian (French), & a Hiker on Galar’s Route 6 who spoke what I’m guessing was Paldean (Spanish) rather than Galarian (English). Then in SV, we have Mr. Salvatore who teaches (& uses) many languages (off the top of my head, I remember him teaching how to say “thank you” in Spanish, French, Chinese, & German).

It does get tricky when it comes to the “Japanese” regions of Kanto, Johto, Hoenn, Sinnoh / Hisui, & Kitakami, as those regions otherwise make up one country in our world, but this has yet to have been canonically established (which is why I always put “Japan” / “Japanese” in quotes, as there currently isn’t a name for that one country, same with “America”). I do believe they share the same language - at the very least Hisui & Kitakami have the same written script, & I feel pretty confident that if they were to retcon it, they would have the other “Japanese” regions use it, too (before Legends Arceus, they just used random shapes that didn’t seem to spell anything, which I interpreted to just be placeholder characters).

If there is a common language in their world (& I think is, from characters from different regions being able to talk to each other no problem), I personally would guess it to be “Japanese” - as we look at the other regions, we can see a sort of Japanese flavor that would otherwise not be there (though they clearly did their homework on the various parts of the world these regions reflect!). Of course, Pokémon is from Japan, so it would make sense that they would add some of their own culture to this world they created. For a possible in-universe explanation, the Pokeverse seemed to have started in Japan (specifically in Sinnoh as we learned in Legends Arceus, so I guess their universe actually is geocentric like old astronomers used to think ours was?).

I think that’s about it. In DxP REWRITE, while my own language is American-English (& beginner-level Japanese lol) so I read the characters to be speaking American-English, they are actually speaking “Japanese” while in Sinnoh (which is why I haven’t really been peppering Ansy’s dialogue with Japanese). I have tried to write in the “Japanese” or Galarian scripts for signs & things a couple times:

The sign just says “Gear Station”

Here I (tried to lol) translate Mizumi’s letter to Japanese then wrote it out in in-game characters (in the modern horizontal, as Mizumi is from the modern era writing to someone in the modern era).

Thanks for reading yet another post of me geeking out lol. Feel free to let me know your thoughts in the comments! じゃあ、またね! Until next time! ^o^/

—

PS: For funsies, here’s the (non-canonical, as these were made by fans) references I’ve been using when writing in either Galarian or “Japanese” in DxP REWRITE:

I personally was confused by the “Japanese” script also being alphabetical rather than phonetic like hiragana / katakana (two common scripts in Japan, the first being mostly used to spell Japanese words while katakana is used to spell foreign words - the third script, kanji, is used to write whole words). If that is the case (which is how I wrote it in Mizumi’s letter), “Japanese” is written in what’s called “romanji”, where they write out words in the Latin (aka Roman) alphabet rather than phonetically: “ありがとうございます” becomes “arigatō-gozaimasu” (“thank you very much”).

Whether it is actually written out that way in game though…? At a glance of the signs I saw in Hisui & Kitakami, it does look like it’s more like hiragana & kanji instead, but this chart is all I got for now. Any Japanese folks or fluent Japanese-readers who can tell me if there’s anything out there in the Japanese fandom about this, please lemme know so I can do right by it into future - as of writing this, I haven’t seen much else among the English-speaking fandom 8u8;

As for the Galarian script, it’s clearly based on the Latin alphabet that much of the Western world uses for our various languages - we see it in Paldea as well as Galar, & according to the trailer in Pokemon ZA, they retconned it to be used in Kalos as well. In universe, I wonder if they were at all influenced by the Unown, being based on the Latin alphabet themselves. Again, who knows? (though I question the accuracy of this particular font / chart: if it is, the first thing Laventon’s chalkboard says “REXBOQ” lol XD)

[vanoodle]

Imagine you are a child and draw something with your crayons. Drawing it makes you really happy and at the end you get up and proudly show your drawing to your parents but you get no reaction.

Now imagine you're working on a project. You've made progress on it and you're so proud of it that you post it in the group chat you have with your friends. Again you get no reaction.

Then later you find out that one of your friends showed your project to another group chat you aren't in and said "Look at this, isn't it cool?" But for some reason, they didn't tell you they thought that. Wouldn't that hurt?

That, essentially, is what posting fanfic is. Or literally any kind of fanfwork that you post for the fandom to find.

Of course not all of these people who can see your fanwork are your friends, they're strangers a lot of the time but you're in the same fandom, the same community, so if feels similar. And so, when you post something to this "large friend group" called fandom, and you get no reaction, it feels like your friends (as in: fans of the same thing) not acknowledging the thing you made and wanted to share with them.

As for the writing vs posting part, I feel like many people mean "posting" when they say "writing" or a mix of the two. I have written quite a lot of fic that I have never posted. It sits on my hard drive and only I will ever get to see it. To other people however it will seem like I haven't written anything at all because they have no way of knowing that I made something.

Another part is whether or not I actually continue my fanfics. Many fanfics I have written for myself stop somewhere in the middle because I lose the drive to finish the story. If I were to post it and someone gives me a comment, this might give me the motivation to actually keep going with it.

Writing only for myself also makes me sloppy. I will no longer care about spelling or grammar or writing in a cohesive way. I'm only getting the thoughts out of my head and I can understand my own writing just fine, so why would I edit it? Why would I polish it?

The "write for yourself" argument has been made so so many times and while I understand that being guilt tripped into commenting doesn't feel nice and shouldn't be done, I also don't think that telling others to just "write for yourself" every time they express their desire for attention is that great of a move, either, and it bothers me each time I see it.

I DO write for myself, I LIKE writing for myself but I don't write for myself the way I will when I plan on posting something on AO3 to share it with others.

There's a genre of post that I see pretty frequently, which can overall be summed up as, "Modern fandom has a culture problem where fanfic authors are treated as content producers instead of community members and their fanfic is treated as a commodity to be consumed instead of a high-effort labor of love that deserves attention and compliments given directly to the author". I agree with 3/4ths of that. I find the part I disagree with very interesting, the same way I find a lot of writeblr interesting, because it's a perspective that I had to work very hard to actually understand.

Because the posts have such a warped view of what writing is and why we post our writing! They say that fanfic fights against the commodified internet we live in, but all they're doing is changing the currency of payment in this attention economy. Another way you can summarize about 70% of these posts is, "My payment for writing and posting my fanfiction is compliments, and if you do not give me those compliments you are not paying. If you give those compliments behind my back, or talk about them privately without giving them to me as well, then you are stealing from me." I don't want to put it like that, but a lot of these posts use words like 'deprive', as if the reader who enjoys the fic without commenting is withholding something from them that they deserve. They use the word engagement, and they do talk about how part of that engagement is just the joy of talking about AUs and ships with other people, but when people say that comments are their motivation to keep writing, what they mean is that validation is their motivation to keep writing. Which is compliments.

I understand that, because I understand that fanfic writers are not immune to the attention economy. But I don't understand how almost every one of these posts talk about how this lack of attention makes them stop writing - that this act of theft is killing their desire to write. I could understand this if they meant 'desire to POST fic' (I don't post fic I think zero people would read.), but they talk about how lack of payment stops them from writing at all.

IMHO, that is what creates a commodity from fic. People want to treat fic as art, but an artist makes art for themself. Art is made because we want to hold parts of skills and ourselves in our hands. If you won't make art if you get no payment, then you have devalued the art completely.

We think of AO3 as this unique site that's born entirely from passion and is filled with fics written for love of the game. But guilt-tripping posts that shame people for not commenting on a fic they enjoy, and that describe how there's no point in writing fic if it's not getting attention, are directly contributing towards the culture of treating fic like a commodity.

I also really want a fandom culture where the relationship between artist and reader is reciprocal, where it feels like a community, and where I get to talk about my fanfic with people. My favorite part of posting fanfic is rambling about it on my blog, because I can talk about my art all day and I love it when people stop and listen. But I love that because I love my own art. If you love your own art, then it'll always have value.

Also Google your username, just trust me, that's how you find The Secret Discussions. Someone made a TikTok fansong of me once. WHAT?

[avidhousehusband]

Listen. My love for post Canon fiddauthor is not because I don't like college era fiddauthor. On the contrary, part of why i love it is BECAUSE of college era fiddauthor. Because I relate so hard to it.

I met my wife in college. We did everything together. She stayed in my dorm room when things were bad, and we bonded over our weird little interests between classes.

But we didn't date. For years. I loved her, desperately, and she loved me, but we didn't know that. We didn't think we could pursue those things. We were both in the worst years of our lives. (And I was a sad closeted bastard who was too afraid.) So we took care of each other any way we could without owning up to anything.

Even afterwards, for years we were roommates, in our tiny apartment. Shopping together, eating together, doing everything together. I was there with her when things got bad in the middle of the night, and she was there with me when I finally lopped off 30 inches of hair, and started T.

It took a lot of scary shit happening for us to realize what we were hiding.

So here we are. Married for 4 years now. We could have been happy and started healing back when we first met, but we weren't ready.

She wasn't ready when she was fresh out of the marine corps with the motorcycle and the hip flask, working as a bouncer for a shitty music venue.

I wasn't ready when I was dirt broke, working ring crew for wrestling shows on the weekends, as janitor at night, and barely making it through college as a closeted cadet by day.

But, like post Canon fiddauthor, we have now. Things didn't work out when we were young,

My wife has her first gray hairs, lingering pains from the hard years, but she's an academic, pursuing a masters degree, and building a career that she loves.

I'm balding, don't have a relationship with my family, and I'm starting to get lines from age, but I get good sleep, I spend every day with my best friend, and I have the opportunity to grow into an old man, something I never thought possible.

Long post, but fiddauthor means the actual world to me. It's why I hone in on it so much. It shows that you can still figure it out. That just because you stutter step in your youth doesn't mean your life's done.