#I have many instances of 'ugh that IS just WRONG' for other fandom | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

idiacide · 3 years ago

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Man holy fuck, you're really good dude

I feel like I've hit the jackpot lmAo

Everyone is so in character, it's all straddling that line perfectly of Accurate characterization and Wish Fulfillment. It makes me so sad when people say that X twst character wouldn't be interested in romance or what-have-you. You don't go and make anyone mushier than they would realistically be, either. You take the character, as they are, into consideration first and just agsjdkfl. Ugh. It's perfect. You're perfect. Thank you for sharing your skill with us.

I really appreciate that, you’re very sweet. I’ve been interested in dating sims and x reader content for a really long time and its one of my favorite ways to do character studies. Toboso’s also just, really good at efficiently fleshing out characters and leaving drops of dynamics that make my brain start sparking. Also apologies for what’s to follow because evidently your comment just made me decide to drop a thesis on my character building ethos:

So far as “X wouldn’t be interested in romance” (as in, x would never care about a person like that), to me that take has always been really confusing in every fandom I’ve encountered it in. Sure, plenty of characters aren’t going to go in for a sappy, end of the world romance where you promise your whole heart and devotion to only each other. Looking at TWST specifically, I have a hard time imagining Floyd, Jade, Leona, or Vil going in for that kind of thing. The thing about all those characters, though, is they’re still capable of forming relationship connections. What connection looks like isn’t going to be the same for every single character, but that doesn’t mean there wouldn’t be real feelings and affection there. Instead of deciding who does and doesn’t like love its more interesting for me to assume that the character does love someone, and what that love tends to manifest itself as depending on the context of those feelings.

What’s particularly consistent for TWST characters is that all of them have a series of walls they’ve constructed around themselves to guard some core vulnerability from the world around them. Yes, even the upbeat ones. Kalim, for instance, has his title as his core vulnerability, and has his kindness and generosity as walls around that. I think what we’re shown time and again is that Kalim doesn’t like the distance that being the firstborn Asim son puts between himself and others, or the fact that there are so many people who hate him and want him dead for reasons that have nothing to do with who he actually is. As a result, he tends to go hard on being kind, friendly, and generous with others because he wants so badly for them to like him. So the question then becomes, how does that interact with having an s/o, someone who you theoretically have getting closer to your vulnerabilities? Does he bury them in praise and compliments because he’s worried they might get scared off by that fear, or does he have a certain amount of insecurity about giving them things because that feels like pushing them back? These questions make for a really interesting push and pull and allow for the creation of conflict that feels natural without me having to make the reader insert too much of an OC.

Importantly, the core vulnerability is not the same thing as a character flaw (though it can overlap). Kalim’s flaws are that he’s frequently a little bit selfish and often steamrolls the needs and wishes of others in his excitement. His vulnerability is the fear that if he doesn’t make himself fun and likable, then all people will see is a prince that they’re jealous of. Riddle’s flaws are that he’s controlling, anal, and has a superiority complex. His vulnerability is that if he’s not Achieving, he must not deserve love and must be doing something very wrong. As a general rule in my writing, flaws are the responsibility of the character. No one is going to mother Riddle out of being controlling, he has to make the decision himself. The vulnerability, however, is something that the reader (or the characters friends!) has to work on with them. Its something so deeply rooted in insecurity and trauma that trying to talk themselves out of feeling it runs the risk of making it worse. I will never have a reader forced to do pep talks for Kalim’s selfishness, that’s something that he can and should control. But I will typically create scenarios which encourage the reader to affirm to Kalim that he is more than just his family, and that he doesn’t have to convince them to see him as a good and kind person.

All this to say. Interpersonal relationships, whether theyre romantic or very close platonic ones, are fun to write and engage with. People are like puzzle pieces a lot of the times. You’re never going to find someone without a few jagged edges. You’re never going to BE someone without a few jagged edges of your own. But with luck, patience, and a little bit of hard work. you can maybe find someone who’s edges fit right up against yours, just so.

#apologies if the sincerity looks cringe to the viewers i have a lot of feelings apparently #might go off at some point and make a post detailing those core vulnerabilities for each character #cause it really has been such a good way for me to ground them in my head #personal #long post #twisted wonderland #twst

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max--phillips · 1 year ago

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I was gonna put this in the tags but I hate writing in the tags (and also it got really fuckin long) so I’m just gonna tack it on here.

I still don’t have any fuckin’ idea what’s going on here specifically, but nonetheless: I’ve been in this fandom on this website since early 2020. In those almost four years, absolutely nothing has changed. This is probably the fifth or sixth time I’ve seen this exact conversation happen.

I’m not saying this to be like, “ugh god would you people shut up im so tired of hearing about this.” I Am White. I know better than that. I’m saying this really to ask like… when will we learn? “We” being white people in fandom.

The vast majority of reader inserts in fics written by white people are white coded. That’s just fact. It may not be intentional, it may not be malicious, but unless you’re making the active choice to make the reader insert as ambiguous as possible, you’re likely drawing from your own, white experience. If you don’t believe me, go back through your fics and tally up the following: how many times did someone run their fingers through reader’s hair? At any point, is the color of the reader’s skin referenced? Does the reader visibly blush (flush, cheeks turned pink, etc)? Is the reader supposed to be related to a canon character, and is that character white? If the number of any of these is above 0, your character almost certainly comes across as white coded. (If you go back to some of my earlier fics, I have a handful of instances of the above examples. It happens.)

There’s nothing inherently wrong with that, but like… you gotta accept the fact that your reader is white coded and not flip your shit when someone points that out. No matter what, you certainly don’t have the right to dismiss a person of color’s experience in fandom.

I have seen an absolutely absurd number of fans of color leave this fandom. And it sucks, because a lot of them were extremely fucking talented artists and authors, or just cool people, but like, I definitely can’t blame them because this fandom (and… like… most fandoms in general, honestly) is a toxic cesspit of racism, and if I may be so bold, particularly anti-blackness. It doesn’t help that this fandom has popped up around a Latino man and a lot of white women are unwilling to unlearn Latino stereotypes and treat Pedro like a human person with like, boundaries and feelings and the ability to give and withdraw consent (which is why I’ve been vehemently against RPF this whole time, among other things).

All of that’s to say: it isn’t hard to not be a dick. Take a deep breath and consider the fact that hey, your worldview and life experience isn’t universal, and maybe other people have different experiences, and that’s okay, and you can learn from that by shutting up and listening. Don’t be dismissive. And ultimately (and I know this is asking the impossible, apparently) don’t be fucking racist.

Imagine a poc talking about their experiences in a fandom, and how so many fics have a white coded reader, and then you proceed to tell them that they are wrong, and that their experiences are invalid.

You do not get to have an opinion on a poc's experience if you are not a poc!!

Talking over them, and telling them that their feelings are invalid is extremely racist.

If you have an issue with someone telling you some of your writing may come across as white coded, and you get defensive, maybe you need to take a step back and revaluate

#don’t even get me started on the Star Wars fandom as a whole & uncoupled from PP

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thechangeling · 4 years ago

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Enough.

So a while ago I made a headcannon post about Ty's sexuality and the autistic exploration of sex and sexual desire. I have now written a fic about it. This ones for Alex @bedspells my very own Alyssa. Also side note I want to make it clear that yes, I still ship kitty 100%. But I've seen plenty of people write fics and headcannons about Kit exploring things with other people. There's no reason why Ty can't do the same.

Edit: Ok a long time ago this fic actually got a hate comment on Ao3 saying that I was erasing Ty's sexuality by having him hook up with a girl because he was cannonly gay due to a tweet CC made in 2013. Now I don't even have twitter and I wasn't a part of the fandom back then. Despite all of that I actually don't really consider that to be the basis of canon? And in the books he doesn't really express interest in anyone except for Kit. So as far as I'm concerned this was fair game. Not to mention gay people sometimes experiment before they realize they're gay. Especially autistic people!! And that was actually kind of the point of this fic. So maybe just keep that in mind going forward. Thanks!

Tw for mentions and discussions of sex.

Ty could count the instances he hadn't been bothered by another person's touch on one hand. This was certainly one of them. It was so late into the night it could certainly be considered the next morning. Anush, Ty and Alyssa had been doing research on Livvy and the effect she seemed to be having on a serge of demonic activity in the area.

Ty was fairly stressed about the possibility to say the least. It felt like everything was spilling away from him. Livvy, his family, his career.

Kit.

He really didn't want to think about Kit but it was difficult. It was like trying to ignore a bleeding wound that everyone kept referring to as a paper cut.

The shining lights in all of this were Anush and Alyssa. Befriending both of them had been the best part of coming to the scholomance.

Especially Alyssa.

Meeting someone who shared some of his thoughts, feelings and experiences was more then refreshing. It was liberating. Talking, laughing and crying with Alyssa about the things that no one else would understand was like a balm for Ty's soul.

At a certain point Anush had announced that he was retiring to bed and they should both probably do the same. Livvy was still floating around the room observing their work. But as time went on Ty had stopped paying as much attention to her. Now he was resting against Alyssa with his head in her lap. She was sitting on the couch in the library, carefully running her fingers through his hair and rambling on about something, Ty wasn't exactly sure what.

Ty reached up to wrap a lock of her long dark hair around his finger, then watched it spring back into place again. Alyssa's hair was wavy but not curly like- like some peoples. So it didn't spring and bounce very well. That was the interesting thing about Ali in general. So many parts of her dress and appearance were so neat and polished and well put together that Ty almost wondered what it would be like to see her more disheveled. What would it be like to grab and twist and pull until she was left with something that wasn't glossy perfect waves.

Ty panicked a little at that thought. Where exactly had that come from? He was now more then ever painfully aware of the fact that he was lying in an attractive person's lap. And his sister was still in the same room.

Ty looked up to search for Livvy but realized that she was gone. Guiltily he realized she could have been gone for awhile now. But he hadn't noticed. Lately he had been feeling further and further away from his twin and he hated it.

"Do you think stars have feelings?" Alyssa asked wistfully. Ty laughed joyfully, feeling so light and and so far away from every bad thing that had happened three years ago.

"Because I was just thinking," she continued. "Like, what if they're lonley you know?" Ty had to smile at the Alyssa charm of it all. Also the autistic perspective might have had something to do with it.

"I don't know," Ty said, sitting up. "Maybe they're like us. Maybe they like being alone." Alyssa pondered this for awhile.

"Well no one can be alone forever," she pointed out, then laughed, rolling her eyes. "God how did we get here? Remember when we were supposed to be doing actual work Ty?"

"Well we were stupid to think that would last," Ty announced matter of factly. Alyssa shrugged and leaned back against the sofa.

"Probably. Once the neurotypical left it was all downhill from there."

"I disagree, Ty said softly, meeting her gaze. "I enjoy spending time with you." Alyssa instantly smiled, the kind of beautiful, honest, heartfelt smile that allistic people wrote poetry about.

Instantly Ty was reminded of someone else, another brilliant smile.

He shook it off.

"Me too," Alyssa finally answered. Then she shook her head. "Ugh feelings. Gross."

Ty rolled his eyes at her and laughed.

Then Alyssa sat up again as she seemed to remember something. "Oh yeah I meant to ask you about Anush. Do you like him?"

Ty shrugged. "Yeah he's really nice. He's become a good friend."

Alyssa shook her head. "No, no Ty, I mean-" She paused. "I mean do you like him like you wanna date him? Or do you have romantic feelings for him?" She asked.

Ty paused. He honestly wasn't sure. He had been trying to avoid thoughts of those types of feelings for a very specific reason. A Herondale reason. But the truth was he did like really like Anush. He enjoyed being around him. Ty just wasn't sure what that meant.

"I'm not sure," he answered honestly. "Maybe." Alyssa fiddled with her hair, rubbing it between her fingers.

"Hmm. Well do you even like boys?" She asked. "I just realised I've known you for five months now and I dont really know what your deal is," she said contemplating. "Like sexual orientation wise. I mean not that it matters, it totally doesn't," she stammered.

Ty shrugged. "It was never really relevant before. But I'm not really sure. I guess I'm fine with whatever." Alyssa beamed.

"So I guess that means you're kinda like me huh? She said happily. "I'm pansexual. Women are so beautiful and angelic and soft and squishy and awesome, but men can be good too," she mused. "I mean men are......men, but some of them aren't so bad. I mean look at you!" Alyssa tossed her hair back over her shoulder.

"Thanks," Ty responded dryly.

"Anyways you know what I mean," Alyssa waved her hand. "So are you attracted to him at least?" Ty sighed.

"Yeah I am," he admitted. "But I don't- I don't want a relationship Ali. I just can't."

Alyssa studied him for a moment. "Does this have anything to do with the Herondale pendent you wear that you always tell me never to ask questions about?"

Ty scowled. "Yes, but I don't want to talk about it." Alyssa rolled her eyes and put her hands up in surrender.

"Fucking shit fuck! Fine!" She complained. "Anyways, my point is you dont need to date him neccesarily. Just have sex with him and see how you feel?"

Ty sat up and faced her. "What?"

Alyssa laughed. "You heard me. There's nothing wrong with causal sex between consenting adults. I mean, if you want to."

Ty felt the urge to stand up to try and aliviate some of the anxiety he was feeling, but he stayed sitting.

"I've never done it before," he admitted. Ty was 19, he knew most of the people his age had already had some sort of sexual experience. But he had always been too afraid. Too afraid of people touching him and demanding things from him with harsh vague bullshit. In Ty's mind it was just another social interaction that he could screw up and then pay the price for it.

Alyssa shrugged. "It's no big deal. Virginity is just a social construct anyways." Alyssa was playing with her hair casually and biting her lip slightly, to indicate that she was mulling something over.

Ty shook his head trying to explain it. "No, it's- I mean see, you say that, but, one of the things I've learned about this world is that social constructs kind of matter to a lot of people." Ty was taping his fingers against his leg and trying to stop himself from shaking. Alyssa noticed this.

"Because people tell you that's it's no big deal and not to worry, and then other people make it into a big deal like it means something, and then everyone's telling you to do something different," Ty explained with a panicked, rushed voice. "I don't know who you listen to, or what to do!" He was moving his hands frantically while he spoke to emphasize his points.

"Hey it's ok," she cooed, inching towards him. "Trust yourself. Or if you feel like you can't, then trust me." Ty felt a pang in his chest. A cacophony of conflicting emotions erupted within him. But mostly he found that despite his better judgement he actually believed her.

They had created something different between the two of them. Something that almost transcended labels or rules or traditional allistic boundaries. Alyssa was like the armor he put on every morning, with the strength and confidence that he wasn't alone in this world. In the midst of all of their jokes and late night heartbreaking conversations. In the midst of this fragile peace they had created, there was something there. Something indescribable.

Something like the sound of the page being turned in one of his Sherlock novels, or the sound of their favourite songs. A connection. A lifeline.

Ty looked over at Alyssa's concerned face and smiled softly. "I trust you," he promised. "I don't really trust many people, but I've always trusted you," he admitted. Alyssa inhaled sharply. She made an interesting facial expression that might have been a facial stim and then gaped for awhile before finally closing her mouth and avoiding Ty's gaze.

"Yeah that's cool. I trust you too," she said casually. She had gone back to pulling at her poor hair which was shedding everywhere. Anush always joked that he could always tell where Alyssa was by following the trail of hair.

"So, about the whole sex thing," she continued rather unceremoniously. Ty had to laugh a little. "Do you think it's something you're actually interested in? Or do you just feel like you have to?" She asked.

Ty pondered this for a moment. "I think I might want to. I just want to be with someone that I trust. Someone who will be considerate of my boundries, you know?" Ty did a quick glance around the room to make sure Livvy was still gone.

"Wait she's not here right?" Alyssa asked anxiously, catching on. Ty shook his head.

Alyssa paused for a moment, looking lost in thought. She was flicking her fingernails against each other and continuing to murder her bottom lip by chewing on it. Finally she looked up at him, looking rather amused.

"Ok. This might just be the exhaustion talking, or the autism, or a combination of both. So if you feel uncomfortable with what I'm about to say, then afterwards we can just forget it ok?" Alyssa sounded serious. Ty just nodded, trying not to be concerned.

Alyssa gave him an interesting look, one that he was pretty sure he had never recieved before. Her eyes scanned him up and down, then she smirked.

"I could potentially offer my services," she said innocently. Ty blinked a few times, then continued to stare at her. She stared back unflinching.

Wait. What?

Ty shook his head in confusion. "Hold on. Wait. You mean-?" He cut himself off. Alyssa nodded with that same smirk. "Yeah I mean why not right?" She shrugged, relaxing back against the sofa. "But if you dont want to then that's totally fine."

"Wait." Ty attempted to clear his head and stay focused. He stayed frozen for awhile, thinking. Then he folded his arms around himself, applying pressure. "Why exactly?"

Alyssa shrugged again. "Well why not? You're hot. I'm hot, and besides you know me," she pointed out. She paused, and then giggled.

"Four hours into investigating the paranormal phenomenon of his dead twin sister and chill, then she offers to take his virginity," she cackled. "I so enjoy our quality time together."

"The way your mind works really concerns me sometimes, you know that?" He asked playfully. Alyssa rolled her eyes at him and shoved him gently.

"Hey you don't have to, it was just an idea," she said, raising her hands in defense. Ty was silent. He was still thinking about it.

"Most people don't really do stuff like this right?" He asked warily. "Like most friends don't just randomly hook up and then laugh it off later."

Alyssa shook her head slowly. "Honey do you see me laughing?"

Ty was conflicted. There was something in him, a new, complicated feeling. A burning desire that nagged at the back of his mind everytime Alyssa bit her lip or pouted.

If he was really honest with himself. Ty could remember another time when he felt this way. But that was different, that was-.

He shook his head. No. Ty wasn't thinking about that anymore. He needed a distraction.

"God I can practically hear you thinking over here Ty," Alyssa teased. "Listen. If it freaks you out to much then we can forget about it. But-." She paused and reached towards him. Their fingertips met and she slowly dragged her fingertips down the top of Ty's hand.

"I want to do this for you because I care about you," she said solemnly. "I want make you feel good. Because you're special, and I dont mean that in the bullshit ableist way. I mean I think that you're special because you have such a big heart and you care so much," she said with a laugh.

Ty felt like he was about to cry. He was taking in long deep breaths trying not to get overwhelmed. He didnt know how to respond to this, this kind of attention and praise. His heart felt warm and tight absorbed in so much fondness and melancholy and regret all at once.

He knew this wasn't anything like what had happened that day on the beach. This wasn't that kind of love that he was feeling for Alyssa and that was a good thing. Romantic love, he decided, was too complicated.

"You deserve good things and good experiences. You deserve to have your first time be somewhere familiar. Somewhere you feel safe, and with someone who loves you." Alyssa wiped her eyes on the back of her hand.

"God sorry for getting all emotional like that," she joked.

Ty couldn't speak, so he just squeezed her hand. He hoped she would understand.

I love you too.

Ty took a breath, then nodded. "Yeah," he admitted. "Yeah I want that. I want you."

Alyssa exhaled, then grinned. "Ok then. Great. I'll see if I can pencil you in sometime this week," she joked. Ty cocked his head to the side in confusion.

"Oh," he murmered, suprised with how disappointed he felt. "You mean later?" Alyssa laughed.

"Well yeah, I mean aren't you tired?"

"Are you?" Ty countered.

Alyssa shrugged. "Hey you know how it is, autistic sleep cycle. I'm gonna be up for awhile. I just figured you might want some time to think."

Ty shook his head. "No I don't want to think anymore. I'm tired of thinking Ali. I'm tired of worrying and overanalyzing everything." His eyes met hers, she seemed a little worried.

She moved closer to him so that she was practically in his lap. "You need a distraction," she said matter of factly. "It's ok." She moved her hands from his arms to grasp his waist.

"Is this good?"

Ty flinched. "More pressure," he replied in a tone that was hopefully not too demanding. Alyssa pressed her fingertips down harder into his skin. A soothing feeling washed over him.

"Good?" She asked, scratching his skin with her fingernails. Ty just nodded, feeling slightly dazed.

Alyssa smiled, lowering herself gracefully into his lap. Everything she did was with precision and grace. Alyssa was a dancer. It was one of her special interests. She had stopped taking lessons a long time ago though because she found it challenging to dance in a group.

She could never copy what everyone else was doing exactly on count when she was supposed to. She was always going off and improvising on her own. There was probably a metaphor in there somewhere.

Alyssa's weight against him was comforting. She was moving her hands up and down his back underneath his shirt while still applying pressure. Ty felt heat beginning to pool in the base of his stomach. He stared at her curiously, taking in her soft curves and her smooth golden skin.

"Can I touch you?" Ty asked, feeling his fingers twitch.

Alyssa moved her hands to his chest. "Sure." She said softly. "Just be careful. Remember pressure and all of that, and try to avoid my stomach area. For some reason it's really sensitive." Ty nodded, instantly reaching for her long wavy dark hair and twisting his fingers around it, pulling slightly. She laughed.

This drew Ty's attention to her mouth. Her lips were cracked and rough looking from Alyssa constantly biting them, but Ty still wanted to kiss her. He had never kissed anyone before. He needed to know what it felt like.

He moved his hands to her shoulders and then to her sides, pulling Alyssa even closer. "Can you teach me how to kiss?" He asked looking her in the eye briefly. She snorted.

"I don't think you'll like it very much," she murmered. "It's not really a good sensory experience. At least not for me. Allistic people seem to like it though."

Ty nodded. "Exactly that's my point," he said, using one hand to cradle the side of her neck. "I need to learn for other people later on." He absentmindedly pressed his thumb into one of the divots in her neck, just to fill the space. Alyssa sighed and dug her fingernails into his chest.

"Ok fine but you're gonna hate the tounge thing," she breathed. She leaned down very slowly and then carefully pressed her lips to Ty's, kissing him softly.

It was a weird sensation but not entirely unpleasant. Ty happily slid his hands back into her hair and began to fiddle with a few thick pieces. Alyssa moved her own hands up his chest to cradle her face, applying pressure with thumbs against his cheekbones.

Alyssa deepened the kiss and slid her tounge into his mouth. Instantly Ty winced and felt every cell in his body seize up. But he didn't stop. He was determined to figure this out. If he wanted to kiss someone who wasn't autistic in the future then he would need to. Ty relaxed his body and kissed her back forcefully, making out with Alyssa until the uncomfortable noise in his head was too much and he broke the kiss.

Ty shook his head and Ali laughed, stroking his hair. "I fucking told you so," she exclaimed. Ty shut his eyes and allowed his breathing to return to normal.

"Ok so that's something we can forget about for now, thank god. The beauty of this whole situation is that we dont have to follow any allistic script for this sort of thing." Ty opened his eyes. Alyssa was watching him carefully, still only centimeters away from his face.

"So is there anything you want to do?" She asked him. "Just tell me and I'll see if we can make it happen."

Ty saw no need to maintain any sort of filter. "Well there are a lot of things actually, but for some reason I really want to bite you," he said pointedly, glancing down at her neck. Alyssa burst out laughing, nearly falling over.

Ty glared at her. "I'm sorry," she gasped breathlessly. "I'm sorry it's just,-," she regained her composure, shaking her head. "I just love how we all used to be the weird kids who growled and hissed at people on the playground if they bothered us and now as adults we're just super kinky. Like it's kind of poetic in a way," she laughed.

Ty rolled his eyes. There was no need to ask what she meant by we. When Alyssa said we, it only referred to one thing.

"I'm sure it's not absolutely every autistic person," he protested. "Also we should move, on account of the fact that this is still a public setting." Alysza's eyes widened as if she had just remembered that.

"Oh right. Shit, as if these people needed any more reasons to hate me. Let's go!" She rolled off of Ty and stood in front if him, holding out her hand. "We can use my room." Ty stayed sitting, taking a moment to fully absorb it all.

He couldn't help but feel the weight of the Herondale pendent against his chest as a heavy reminder. He willed himself not to get distracted. Alyssa smiled at him slightly, almost as if she knew.

"Enough," she said softly.

Ty didn't know what to say to that. He wasn't even sure if their was anything he wanted say. Then finally he understood.

"Enough," he echoed back.

He took her outstretched hand and let her take him away.

@ti-bae-rius @eutony-in-whisper @dianasarrow @dianasarrow @stxr-thxif @talia-lightwood @doitforthecarstairs @thelandunderthehilll @zfoxdraws @waterlillies

#tda #the dark artifices #tsc #twp #the wicked powers #ty blackthorn #Alyssa Reyes #autistic representation #Fae's oc

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strazem · 4 years ago

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I noticed that I’ve been getting blocked by a lot of Ososan artists lately and... At this point I’m sure it’s because of bad rumors and misinfo getting spread about me in discord servers. I’m going to put a lot of this under a readmore because I don’t want to clog people’s dashes with this, but I really want to clear the air here as I feel like there are a lot of things being left out of the narratives people are telling about me, and also the fact this is still happening and has been for four-five years, isolating me from a lot of the ososan community and hurting me in a very deep way...

Now, first off, I’m not here to say that over the past 4-5 years I wasn’t immature and childish. There were many times where I was, even to the point the behaviors could be seen as abusive or toxic even if that wasn’t the intention. I was in my early to mid 20s and had serious issues with oversharing my thoughts and feelings with people I really only knew casually, usually to the point of making them uncomfortable. I would also use all caps a lot, not really realizing the effect it had on people, making others feel like they were being shouted at. I would also act immaturely when I saw that other roleplay blogs were getting more attention than mine, even though the ones I had were for OCs, which meant that of course canon characters would get more traction.

Again, I was very young and not very socially developed. I am by no means trying to use my autism as an excuse, but rather an explanation.

Prior to getting into Ososan around 2016, I did not have any “real life” friends, that is, friends I knew in person. I did not know anyone my age and socializing was, and still is pretty limited to just my immediate family. Almost all of my interactions were online, and even that I struggled with. I had recently gotten out of an abusive relationship as well, and was just starting college. I did not think about how others felt enough and was too concerned with saying my piece and sharing my own opinions, making everything about me or about how I felt, and less about the other person. Again, this is something I’ve struggled with for most of my life as part of my ASD, but I’m still not excusing it by any means, especially considering the fact that other people ended up hurt.

I think the main issue was how immature and self-focused I was if I’m being honest, and how I would tend to make everything about me and how I felt and what I made.

My intentions were always good, that never changed. But as people have stated to me before, good intentions don’t mean anything if the outcome is bad. My immaturity really ended up hurting a lot of other people’s feelings and causing a lot of resentment, and I am by no means saying that anyone has to forgive me or be “ok” with me.

What I do wish though is that perhaps people who I have had struggles with in the past could refrain from spreading biased opinions of me to people who have never even met me. I understand wanting to support your friends, and I also understand that when someone you know tells you someone is “bad news”, it’s natural to take their word for it, especially if they only show screenshots of me at my lowest rather than when I was trying my absolute best to be a good friend, despite my immaturity.

However, I’ll be honest and say that I do think that this behavior in general seems counterproductive and perhaps even concerning... If there’s someone that upset me in my past, I don’t tell others or divulge about them to new people I meet unless I felt they did something actually illegal. I remember misinforming about someone in the ososan community based on false claims and I still feel guilty about it to this day, so I’ve also been guilty of this in the past. It’s also important to keep in mind that if someone is really making someone out to sound terrible or horrible that there is usually a bias clouding their perception. I've sat and reflected a lot on my own biases these past five years in therapy, and at the end of the day, I don’t think most people have bad intentions, at least not lonely kids in a small fandom. I think it’s a lot of miscommunication, lack of confrontation, and fear rather than any malicious intent.

Because if there’s one thing I know that I’m not, it’s a manipulator. I straight up do not have the social intelligence for that. I would all caps, I would get upset and leave chats and worry people, I would go on rants that people couldn’t talk me down from, or get too emotionally volatile, or put my own emotional issues onto other people by panicking and venting and putting on a scary and upsetting scene, but I never tried to manipulate anyone or turn anyone’s friends against them. The only two instances I can think of that even come close to me “warning” anyone about someone (and not for blm*tsu related reasons) happened in 2018 and 2019, well after all of this was (I assumed) done with.

Most of my issues that people have gotten upset with me for was regarding my social immaturity, self-centeredness, altercations, public panic attacks, public mental breakdowns and a tendency to go off on emotional and heated rants, especially in public areas and in public chats. That’s why this thing about me being a manipulator seems misinformed to me, because I’ve never been great at DMing or talking to others one on one, I think anyone that’s known me will agree. Many of these altercations happened in public group chats.

I’m assuming that many of the bad rumors being spread about me are regarding my skype days back in 2016-2017, back before discord became the new norm for online chatting and servers and such, as well as a very specific “drama” that happened on anti-bl oso-twitter concerning people that had met in an osomatsu-san kin discord server (which I was not in or even knew about).

Essentially, I befriended some of these people on twitter through people that had been in my second skype roleplay group (the first one I made was in 2016 I believe). I was unaware of any previous dramas or issues and was even unaware that said “person of interest” was even upset with me or thought I was toxic or bad. I had figured we had just stopped talking due to naturally drifting apart. Of course, in my young and naive mind, before understanding “social media etiquette” I went to go ask them why they had blocked me on twitter (I had started being active on twitter during that time.)

And of course, in my immaturity, was freaking out and panicking about having been blocked by someone I thought was a friend to people in my second roleplay group chat... As always... Ugh.. It wasn’t anything malicious though, just confusion and me being scared I had done something wrong.

One member in the roleplay group though, who I guess was a member of the osomatsu-san kin discord, started going off about said “person of interest”, claiming they had gotten their friend into a car accident and that they had groomed minors. Another person in the roleplay group felt the allegations were crazy and unfounded and left. Meanwhile, I was just lost as to what was even happening, I wasn’t aware these people were this connected or knew each other and admittedly, did a pretty poor job as a mod/admin that I didn’t stop the discussions sooner.

I have no idea if the claims were true or not, I imagine they were exaggerated due to bias, I have no idea, but then the same person who had made those claims showed me screenshots that “person of interest” sent to their mutual friend about me. How I was scary and toxic, that I had upset lots of people.. That they were panicking that I even contacted them on tumblr with a friendly “hello!”

Naturally, I responded with confusion. Again, my autism makes it very difficult for me to realize when people are upset or frustrated with me, especially over text. At the time, I couldn’t think of anything I had done to upset them and was very hurt and confused, as our last actual interaction had been seemingly positive.

I did not try to turn anyone against them though. Here’s what actually happened: After being given this info, I also learned that there was a small discord group of the friend group that the person making the claims was from. I joined it hoping to learn more or get some sort of clarification only to find out that this entire group was very upset with “person of interest”. Like very upset. They made claims that this person lied, that this person liked to play victim as a way to manipulate others, that they had groomed two of the people in the group, that they had said unsettling things, that they would do strange and backhanded things ect. Again, I don’t know if these statements are true and I’m not trying to claim they are, I just know that this group of friends had been very upset with "person of interest” before I had even come into the picture. They were already planning on cutting them off!

I did not sway anyone or say anything, I was literally just there in the hopes of finding out if I’d done something wrong.

Of course, this doesn’t at all excuse when I was still friends with “person of interest” and subjected them to my barrage of emotional baggage and panic attacks. I just want to make it clear that I never sent anyone after them or tried to turn their friends against them. In fact, I even tried to help them when they came to my twitter DMs asking me for help. I was already incredibly scared of pissing anyone off in general, and tried to keep things peaceful on both sides. When I asked the second roleplay group if they’d be okay with them rejoining, it was a unanimous “no”... I distinctly remember offering to still roleplay with them one on one and to make a new group that they could be in (and this was even after I had been shown the screenshots of them calling me toxic, which I still wasn’t holding against them!), but the offer was turned down.

I’ve noticed this very distinct pattern over the years of me running into a lot of issues due to miscommunication as well. It was very rare that people would express with me how they were feeling, or when they did, it was usually during one of my panic attacks, which were often bad enough that my brain would repress the memories of what happened during them the second they stopped, and it was rare that I would actually go back and read the things I said. People have had a very easy time going to others and complaining or venting about me to friends, but have had a very hard time actually telling me these complaints themselves, as themselves. I don’t really blame them, as we were all pretty young and given how much I freaked out publicly, it would make sense to be scared of how I might react. Not to mention there were probably things in their own pasts that made something like confrontation difficult. However, what I don’t understand is why this would still be happening five years later... I would assume by this point people would have moved on, especially regarding spats within fandoms.

I hold no ill will towards people in my past who’ve gotten upset with me, I do not hold grudges, and for the most part, if someone wants to cut contact with me, I just accept it and move on. But now that I’m noticing that these false claims are being spread around to other people in the fandom, people who weren’t even involved in these situations, blocking me based off of... Stuff they’ve heard about me... I felt a need to say something.

Honestly, my biggest wish or hope is that, given that it has been five or so years, that people who have never spoken to me or met me before maybe give me another chance? If I have personally hurt you, I don’t want you to feel the need to reach some sort of conclusion with me, or forgive me, or whatever...

But at the very least, perhaps people could be more careful when sharing personal issues we went through with other people, people who know very little about me and who I am and only know me through the lenses and narratives of people who felt slighted by me.

I have changed immensely over the past five years, more than I can even describe. I am not the same person mentally that I was, I have had therapy, I have had help, I have reflected, I have become more sensitive to other people’s thoughts and feelings. I even managed to help a friend of mine get therapy! I was not perfect, I behaved irrationally, but I do think it’s important to drive home the fact that it has been a few years and that I’ve made a lot of progress and that as I’m nearing 30, I have mentally matured quite a bit.

Again, no one from my past has to forgive me, I am not here to dictate how people should feel about me. I am just here to try to share my own side seeing as how I am unable to join most ososan servers and communities nowadays, and thus have a harder time being able to get in contact with or reach others.

I’ve been dying to say something, but kept worrying that it would stir up negative feelings or memories for others, but it’s getting to a point now where I’ve felt so isolated and hated by the fandom for five whole years that I’ve actually started having thoughts of self-harm again for the first time in awhile. I’m not saying this to make anyone feel guilty, and I haven’t acted on the thoughts, I just need to be honest.

This sort of behavior on the internet; gossiping about others, spreading misinformation about others, using a position of influence within a fandom to keep someone from making friends in fandom spaces... Or maybe people don’t even realize how much their words can affect others? Especially if they’re well-liked and exist in a lot of spaces. I’m sure there are no actual bad intentions when people say these things or vent to their friends.

And while I explained that one specific incident in detail that was with a specific person, it is not the only issue I’ve gotten myself into over the years either. I simply spoke about that one as I am just guessing it’s the big reason a lot of this is still going on to this day. I behaved poorly enough in the past that separate groups of people have ended up mad at me, regardless of even knowing each other. I was incredibly troubled, dealing with the aftermath of an abusive relationship, overworked with my animation assignments, and incredibly clueless in social situations or trying to relate to others. Again, these aren’t excuses... But explanations. Mentally ill people are not well, that’s why it’s an illness. In 2016-2017, I was at the lowest of my low, and continued to be until around the Fall of 2019. I have also matured significantly since, and have been working with a far more effective therapist as of late 2018, which I think is why I had such a positive change by 2019, as well as finding wonderful and supportive friends who truly care about me.

I know this is getting really long, too long honestly, but I really needed to get this off my chest...

I’m trying to decide whether or not this will be one of my final posts on tumblr as a whole, as I don’t think I will be able to participate in enjoying ososan publicly with how isolated I’ve been over the years by various groups and people; I think by this point the reputation is too soured for me to be a part of the community. Again, probably not out of malice, but fear and resentment at how I’ve acted.

The fact that I’m seeing more than a few people in ososan fandom I’ve never really spoken to, or people I was mutuals with blocking me is enough I think for me to consider calling it quits for public enjoyment. The fandom is already very small, and the anti-bl side is even smaller, so everyone is pretty interconnected and rumors can spread very easily. There’s no way I can compete with that, especially if I’m barred from most servers anyways.

I’m still going to mull it over, but again, if you’ve never met me, or if you’ve only seen screenshots of me from 2016 while panicking or allcapsing or at my worst... All I can really do is hope that maybe you’ll be able to see past these things and consider giving me a chance.

As for the people I genuinely did hurt, I know I’ve said sorry many times now, even on my old blog Nutastic which I abandoned for similar reasons, but I don’t know how else or how better to prove how genuinely sorry I am... Because the proof of regret is in changing and becoming a better person, and there’s not much chance to see if I have or haven’t if I’ve been cut off.

No one has to forgive me, but perhaps at least entertain the idea I might’ve changed over the course of five years, and that telling people how I was back then instead of who I am now seems a bit unfair. Again, I suppose I dug my own grave by behaving like that in the first place, but I always try to show empathy even to people who wronged me at a low place in their lives, unless they were incredibly abusive and cruel.

At the end of the day, we’re all just people trying to enjoy a show about wacky sextuplets, and I don’t think anyone actually has any ill-will in their hearts, or has it in them to be “bad”, specifically on the anti-bl side. I don’t hold grudges, there’s no one that I currently have blocked unless they are a bl or a man that made me uncomfortable. My DMs are always open, as is my askbox.

Feel free to ask me anything or confront me about anything, though admittedly, doing so through anon makes it hard for me to reply as I don’t want to post anything potentially upsetting publicly.

And I will try to come to a decision about whether or not to pull a Jenna Marbles and leave social media for good out of regret and declining mental health. I will most likely make a post about it when I’m feeling more capable.

Thank you so much for reading, and I hope your year is going good so far despite... Well, everything

#//VERY LONG #//important

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androgynousblackbox · 4 years ago

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God, I keep getting recommended that goddamn killing stalking video. No YouTube, I actually *dont* want to watch a video essay about some dude who did fuck all research talk about why he doesn't like this comic I really enjoyed. I bet he ignores the fact that it's one of (if not, the only) popular queer media that focuses on horror. Yes, queer people and horror are very much intertwined, but this is the only piece of media where its explicitly queer by having the two main characters be queer men. Sorry, I'm just really upset by people not doing a lick of research then getting up on their high horse to preach to us about how shit something is. Ugh.

To be fair (and this is the only point I will give him because fuck that guy), he doesn’t criticize the manwha on itself. It’s a little annoying that he defines as a stritctly psychological horror and completely disregard the Boy Love portion of it’s genre, either because he doesn’t know or decided that it was irrelevant, which is a little disrespectful considering it’s a an asian genre and his western ass kept acting as if the idea of this being considered anything BUT horror was just wrong. Like, his whole shtick really REEKS of someone who hasn’t ever even read BL but still dismiss it all the same because his comprehension is limited by his own ethnocentrism. I mean, the fact that he could only mention three other works that “romanticize abuse” and they were all western was pretty fucking telling. Besides he was talking about how it was “weird” for Koogi to publish sexy/shippy art of her own characters on her social media because it’s a horror, which... I didn’t get at all to be honest. Like, what is weird about an artist doing fanart of her own work? “But why would she do that if that is meant to be psychological horror, I don’t know, I don’t get it, let’s ignore that” To be someone who brags about how knowledgeable he is, he sounded EXACTLY as your average teenage anti here on tumblr who literally discovered yesterday that shipping exist. No, the real point of that video is that he “criticizes” the fandom and how wrong fans are to see anything romantic on the manwha, enough that we would ever want to ship the main characters. The concept of whump is completely alien to him. The idea that some survivors use it as coping is not even an option (in fact we are harming survivors of abuse, the usual). The notion that some of us like the disturbing shit BECAUSE it’s disturbing never enters the picture, despite the fact that he made two whole fucking videos talking about queer people enjoying horror. The story is fine, the characters are fine, but we, the fans and especially the shippers? The one who supported Koogi from the start? The ones who spend months and even years theorizing about every single piece on each panels, analyzing colors, expressions, and kept talking about the many instances the abuse is shown and how masterful it was the way of Koogi to do it? We are reduced to nothing but teenage girls “fetishizing gay men” on Tiktok, because he is an outsider who clearly has no experience with transformative fandom AT ALL, doesn’t know what shipping is besides just really liking an already established canon couple and yet still felt the need to act as if he just knows so much better than all of us. The fact that he decided to frame us like that AND literally put himself on a position of superiority is so disgustingly misogynistic I am appalled that no one else calling him out on it. The comments of that video are nothing but “I read the story, I liked it, but the fandom was just awful, man, nothing but uwuw shippy shit, why would anyone like that, it’s so abusive uwuw”. It really shows that as long you paint a group as teenage girls then you can always dismiss them entirely. If he had attacked the manwha itself, I could calmly refute it, but he grabbed a sample of the fandom from the worst source possible, didn’t even THINK about bringing our perspective, thoughts or feelings into the table for discussion and declared himself the owner of the right way to see this manwha, which, you know, feels pretty fucking insulting.

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bigskydreaming · 5 years ago

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Seriously.

WHAT IS THE OBSESSION WITH MAKING JASON PUNCH DICK AND THEN ACTING LIKE THIS IS OKAY, THIS IS JUST HOW JASON SHOWS HE’S HURT?

Forget about the fucked up nature of Dick being treated like a punching bag just for a second (and the fact that its ONLY Dick who seems to get punched constantly by Jason in fics).

Do you NOT see how fucking GROSS it is to make the BATKID FROM AN ABUSIVE HOME....

Regularly express his anger towards his brother BY PHYSICALLY ABUSING HIM? And no.....when Dick always just TAKES it, and never reciprocates, they’re not actually fighting, its not boys being boys, it is PHYSICALLY ABUSING HIM.

You are regularly, habitually, NORMALIZING the abuse survivor being an abuser himself.

STOP IT.

I’m sorry, its just I was literally JUST ranting about that last night/this morning already, and just saw it in a brand new update yet AGAIN and its like omgggggggggggggggggggggg whyyyyyyyyyyyyy.

See, this is why I will always ALWAYS be against this fandom-wide pathological insecurity about criticism. If you want the freedom to obsessively fixate on Jason’s abusive childhood and the ramifications of it and lasting effects it has on him in like, every single fic about Jason, then people - such as abuse survivors - have to be equally free to CALL. THIS. SHIT. OUT.

Because do you even know how much abuse survivors have to struggle with the society-perpetuated MYTH that we’re all (ESPECIALLY male abuse survivors) inevitably destined to become abusers ourselves, and create a never-ending cycle?

AND HERE YOU ARE VALIDATING IT.

IN FIC AFTER FIC AFTER FIC.

Where so many of you CONSTANTLY treat it as though Jason is JUSTIFIED in abusing everyone around him.

On account of how ‘DAMAGED’ he is because of how he was abused!

Its absolutely fucking maddening.

And your constant FEAR of being called out even when writing ideas that ABSOLUTELY cause harm (see: how the constant and INCESSANT normalization of the idea that all abuse victims are inevitably destined to become abusers fucks with our heads, makes us afraid to ever allow ourselves to express anger, etc, etc)....

Like. That just makes it all so much more infuriating, ngl.

Hey, pro-tip:

If you’re NOT mature enough to handle being told you’re handling a subject wrong in a way that has directly impacted another human being in a way THEY classify as harm....

You are NOT mature enough to be writing that subject.

Full stop.

End of story.

I am so TIRED of people romanticizing Jason’s abuse and using it as a reason to absolve him of all wrong-doing AT THE EXACT SAME TIME they have him inflict it on others (usually Dick) without anyone having the awareness to CALL it that.

And what makes it even worse, is the same fandom that obsessively fixates on Jason’s abuse AND Tim’s neglect with the Drakes and how THAT constitutes abuse as well....

CONTINUALLY and with zero awareness writes Jason being physically violent with Dick in fic at every available opportunity. Has to be ARGUED with in order to get an acknowledgment that yes, Dick’s father punching him in the face and beating him up counts as abuse. Can’t even REMEMBER that Tim and Damian both punched Dick in canon because it left so little impression, even though both instances happened in a very popular and often-cited series......

But meanwhile, this entire fandom can still cite chapter and verse of every single time Dick has lost his temper or inflicted something that can be called even in the VICINITY of harm or wrong-doing to his family, INCLUDING THINGS THAT ARE COMPLETELY MADE UP AND NEVER HAPPENED OUTSIDE OF FANON.

The few times I’ve seen people write Dick punching Jason in fic, people fucking RAKE HIM OVER THE COALS. How DARE Dick do such a thing to his abuse survivor brother?

But his abuse survivor brother ABUSES him (already an abuse survivor himself in canon, whether people want to admit it or not), and people barely even bat an eye.

Ugh.

So much ugh.

And yes, like everything I post that I don’t put under a cut, you are absolutely free to reblog this, because I am sooooooooooo beyond fed up with this shit and I do not care who knows it or whose feelings are hurt by it because THIS.

DOES.

HARM.

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panharmonium · 4 years ago

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hey guys, semi-rhetorical question,

what exactly do i have to do in order to stop total strangers from leaving their unsolicited opinions on posts that i wrote for myself, on my own blog, behind a cut, not under the merlin tag, with a disclaimer saying “it’s cool if we have different opinions, feel free to scroll on by if this isn’t your jam”?

how many more steps do i have to take to remind strangers on the internet that i am not soliciting commentary and that not everything is an invitation for debate? it’s frustrating enough that i feel like i have to take these steps at all - basic etiquette should be enough for people to understand that when you see a take you don’t agree with, you can just go ahead and scroll past it.

i am going to try to muse about this in the gentlest way possible, because it’s hard to know on the internet whether people are maybe just too young to realize these things, or maybe they just weren’t thinking in that particular moment (like - the way i would talk about this with a young person is not the same way i would talk to a fandom veteran who ought to know better, for instance), but this is definitely a recurring thing on tumblr that i have experienced numerous times, and which i do think is aggravated by the structure of the platform. and, given that tumblr does not have the old LJ-style functionality of friends-only or anything like that, the truth is that this site can make it kind of a challenging to establish a comfortable space for yourself, which is something that has bothered me for a long time.

this is why i started putting disclaimers on meta in the first place. i know it’s hard to remember, given the structure of this website, but not everything on the internet is written in the spirit of “prove me wrong.” that’s why i started writing preludes saying “this is how *I* engage with the show. it is fine if *YOU* engage with the show a different way. i am just writing in my own space for my own personal enjoyment, please feel free to continue enjoying the show in your own way.”

as an example - this is the disclaimer i put on a piece of meta that recently earned itself some unsolicited commentary (boldings added now, for emphasis [and yes, the commentary has been removed already, to protect that user’s anonymity; i’m not interested in pointing fingers at specific people, just in discussing the dynamics of a wider phenomenon that i encounter sometimes on this website]):

just some meandering thoughts on where the thematic center of merlin bbc lies for me, and how it weaves itself in and out of my fandom experience.

under a cut because this is a) sort of long and b) not really directed anywhere but my own brain, as i keep thinking about and creating for this show.

[as always, before i get rolling, a reminder: when i write about how i engage with this show, it’s just me talking about what gives me, personally, the most satisfaction or enjoyment, not the way i think everybody should do things. if this isn’t your particular read, please feel free to scroll past. i am not ever going to bother anybody for engaging with this show in their own way, so please don’t worry about it if we are not on the same page.]

when i look at that, i’m not sure how much clearer i can be. i’m not sure what part of this says, “send me a six-paragraph screed about how vehemently you disagree with me, as if i personally placed this analysis in your inbox and forced you to read it.”

do you know how often in a day i see fandom posts that i disagree with? every time i see a merthur post, for instance, i think to myself “ugh, this is not remotely accurate.” but i have never, in my life, left a reply on someone’s post telling them how wrong i think their take is. that’s just not polite, and it’s just not necessary. what do i care if someone has a different opinion than me? they are just having fun in their own area. it doesn’t make sense for me to enter their space and tell them what i, personally, think of their take. they aren’t asking me for a debate. they are hanging out on their own blog, having a good time in their own way. i am glad they are enjoying themselves! i am happy to let them keep having fun! i do not need to insert myself into that conversation and rain on their parade.

i know this is something tumblr culture isn’t always good about understanding (and i know the structure of this website makes it almost impossible to remember, too; i do get that), but just, as a gentle reminder: me posting an analysis on my own blog, in my own space, is not equivalent to me saying “you, a stranger on the internet, must agree with this!” me posting on my own blog is not directed at you at all. it has nothing to do with you. i did not send you that post. i did not ask you to read it. i did not put it in your inbox. i did not insert myself into your space. i did not ask for your attention. i did not come anywhere NEAR you. i don’t even know who you are. i don’t mind if you engage with this show in a different way. it does not affect me. i have never and will never leave contentious replies on posts that i disagree with in order to try to convince people they’re wrong. i have never in my life sent somebody a message to change their mind about a fandom opinion of theirs that i believe to be ill-conceived.

i see posts that i disagree with every day, and every single time, i scroll past them. i leave them alone. i let people have their fun.

i understand that the knee-jerk reaction on this platform is for us to react to everything as if it’s being shouted at us, personally, through a megaphone, and a lot of this is a structural problem on this website, i know. i know that. it’s bothered me for years. the reblog function creates a system where posts leave their homes quickly, so it’s all too easy for people to feel like an OP is seeking them out and forcing them to read something, or soliciting contributions from the wider internet. but we HAVE to remember the structure of the forum we’re in - any particular post you stumble across was written on an individual blog, and the individual who wrote it did not ask you to look at it. they had no control over whether you saw it or not. it wasn’t directed at you personally, and it isn’t an automatic invitation for caustic debate with strangers, either.

people are allowed to write about their own fandom thoughts on their own blogs. the act of writing about one’s own fandom thoughts on one’s own blog is not equivalent to canceling someone else’s fun, or stopping other people from liking/disliking things in whatever way they please. i am allowed to write about my own opinions, in my own space, without worrying about other people who might wander by, catch a glimpse of my house through the window, and get upset because i’m “telling them” something they didn’t agree with. i didn’t “tell you” anything! you came here yourself. i did not send this post to you. i did not visit your blog and tell you ‘you’re doing fandom wrong.’ i don’t even know who you are. we have never spoken to each other in our lives. you don’t follow me, we’re not friends, and my post (in this particular instance) has zero reblogs - the only place you could have read it was on my own blog, which you chose to visit.

i’ve met tons of great people on here, and we’ve had lots of fun conversations. and sometimes our takes are not even the same! but i don’t mind that, because we’ve introduced ourselves to each other and have already developed a friendly relationship. like, just today, i was having a fantastic convo about hunith where myself and the other participant weren’t 100% on the same page, but we were still having a great time with the discussion. i don’t mind talking to people who have different opinions than me - to be honest, most of the topics about which i recently received a bunch of unsolicited commentary were actually things that i have written about previously, and that i would’ve loved to have talked about more, under different circumstances. but i do mind strangers barreling into my house uninvited and then lecturing me, via a series of long, combative messages (devoid of any background context that could have been gleaned from the rest of my writing), about how the ultimate message of merlin bbc is that “the only correct way to fight oppression is to suck your oppressors dick.”

like. was that necessary?

if we were friends, or even acquaintances, you would know that i do in fact talk about this theme a lot. but we’re not, and i am not interested in having a conversation with someone whose first message to me was a) an unsolicited argument and b) a reference to metaphorically sucking someone off. i have literally never met you before in my life. you did not say hello, you did not introduce yourself. and you jumped right into that?

it’s just not polite. i wouldn’t approach a stranger like that in real life. it’s not cool to do it on the internet, either.

and just to be clear - i don’t have anything personally against any of the people who have ever sent me messages like this. i’m not mad about it, and i really do think that for the most part it’s not intended to be malicious in any way; i just think people legitimately don’t register that this isn’t an okay way to approach someone. so just - in the spirit of maybe helping people pause before they interact with somebody else like this, because i’m pretty chill myself, but other people might be more rankled by it - please, next time, just stop and think for a second. if it helps to ask yourself “would i interact with this person like this if we were off the internet,” then definitely consider that. entering someone else’s space for the sole purpose of leaving them negative commentary, when you have never met them before, and when they did not come anywhere near you or ask for your attention or approach you in any way, is not a good way to start a conversation with a stranger, especially when that person’s work specifically states “these are my own thoughts, not a directive for how others should do things/if you have a different take, no worries; feel free to just scroll past.”

*deep breath* ...anyhow.

there is no “friends-only” option on tumblr, so i don’t really know what else i can do to make it clear that i am only writing about my own thoughts and my own experiences, and if your thoughts and experiences are different, cool! go have fun! i don’t need you to agree with me about everything. i will never, ever come to your blog and leave you notes about all the ways i think your analysis is flawed, especially when i’ve never met you and haven’t read your other work, plenty of which address the “disagreements” i have. i just don’t think it’s a polite or fun thing to do to others, and i would love it if people could extend me the same courtesy.

#tl;dr - i clearly did not take a long enough break from tumblr #don't reblog this please! :)#i'm good; just a little calm venting #i'm not even tagging this 'fandom'#it has nothing to do with fandom #it's more a tumblr issue honestly

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fandom-collective-writers · 5 years ago

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Ieyasu x Reader

Title: "Better than Curry"

Fandom: Ikemen Sengoku

Character: Ieyasu Tokugawa

Genre: Modern AU

Warnings: Smut

Written by: @rikumorimachisgirl

A/N: His PoV

Other notes: Hope you like this, Anon!

Word count: 2,047

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I came home to an empty apartment a little past nine in the evening. Except for the pin lights by the door and at the corner of the living room where Wasabi's bed is set up, the whole place was dark.

'That's odd, ' I thought as I walked inside the quiet apartment I shared with my girlfriend. Usually, she would be sprawled on the couch munching on chips while reading one of her mangas or watching another one of those popular samurai dramas she's so crazy about. Whenever I'd come home, no matter how late it was, she'd be here - she'd just be here waiting - and then she'd take off like a madwoman and hold me like I was some prodigal child who had just returned after decades or something. I ran my fingers along with the backrest of the vacant couch and thought about how she would force me to sit beside her and listen to her go on and on about how her day went, despite knowing that I had also come home from a long day at the lab. I found myself smiling wryly at the memory of how pouty I usually was five minutes into her story. 'What the heck is wrong with me, ' I asked myself. Maybe I'm just hungry.

I moved to the kitchen, and gazed at the matching dinnerware she insisted on buying for us when we had first moved in together. I then wondered when we had last shared a meal together. Lately, I've been neck-deep in research on the new anti-Cancer drug that my boss has invested in, and my work hours have been longer than usual. 'She, on the other hand…'. Before I was able to complete that thought, my stomach growled loudly, Wasabi, who had just approached to greet me, scampered off. Sighing, I looked at the cupboard and fridge for the ingredients I needed to make nice, home-cooked curry rice. Surely, it couldn't be that hard - I had all the ingredients, so I'm just gonna mix them all up like she usually does. 'Easy peasy, ' I thought as I rolled up my sleeves and proceeded to cook.

Twenty minutes later, the fire alarm went off, and I heard someone hurry inside the apartment.

"Oh my God, Ieyasu!" My girlfriend called out to me with panic written all over her pretty face. "What happened here?"

"Nothing. " I shrugged, as I turned off the stove. "The fire alarm is so dramatic. I hardly burned the -"

"Are you crazy? There's smoke everywhere! Did you even turn the exhaust on?"

Ugh. Too many questions! I shot my girlfriend a sidelong glance to let her know she's yapping too much. She hasn't stopped talking and moving about, which is strange. She usually picks up my non-verbal cues pretty easily.

"Ieyasu!"

Her voice startled me, and I staggered back a little bit when I saw her staring at me up close. Immediately, I straightened up and looked at her smugly. "You're too loud."

"I'm sorry, but you weren't responding when I called out to you. I was offering to cook. You want to eat curry, right?"Judging by her clipped tone, I knew she was trying her best not to lose her cool. I also knew that in these instances, I should just keep quiet and let her be, but for some reason, I couldn't help but mutter, "It's about time" under my breath.

I sat by the counter and pretended to check my emails on my mobile while she busied herself in the kitchen. Despite having been together for over a year, I still couldn't bring myself to tell her that every little thing she does makes me happy - from caring for Wasabi to preparing packed lunches and making sure my clothes were freshly laundered and pressed every day.

As I watched her chop the potatoes she was going to use for my meal, I couldn't help but notice that something was amiss, and I quietly observed her find out what it was. Just as I was trying to figure out what was wrong, Wasabi calmly walked over to her and bumped her nose behind my busy girlfriend's leg.

"Oh, hello Wasabi, " she said, as she placed the knife on the chopping board and turned her attention to the sweet little deer behind her. "Have you eaten? I'm sorry I can't hang out with you yet…"

When she spoke, I realized it was the sound of her sweet voice that was missing the whole time. My girlfriend is a chatterbox - she always has a story to tell or something ridiculous to ask - but right now, her silence was unsettling. There were so many questions I wanted to ask - are you okay? Is there a problem? What's bothering you? Why don't you talk to me about it?

"Why'd you come home so late?" I decided to ask.

She stopped petting Wasabi, and I saw her waver for a bit before she met my gaze. She gave me a small smile, but I could see past that.

"Well?"

I saw her shoulders drop and knew something was wrong. She sighed. "Remember the promotion I applied for last month? Well, my boss told me I wasn't ready for it and gave it to someone else."

I never hated myself so much for not noticing sooner. My girlfriend - the love of my life - was feeling down, and there I was waiting for her to cook dinner for me. I'm such a jerk!

I rose from my seat and walked over to her and took her hand in mine. "I'm sorry."

"No, it's alright." She squeezed my hand and tried to put on a brave face. "Maybe he's right. Maybe I'm not ready for it…"

"Don't be too hard on yourself -"

"I wanted to move up so badly because I want you to be proud of me, " she said, as a stray tear fell down her cheek.

But she may have as well hit me in the gut. I stared at her, speechless for a couple of seconds before I held her in my arms. "What are you talking about? I'm proud of you, " I whispered to her hair as I held her close. "I'm always proud of you."

Dammit, how could she not know how proud I am? I wanted to shake her back to her senses so badly, but when I looked at her, I saw her staring back at me with so much longing in her eyes, I knew I had to do something. Fast.

I held her shoulders and looked into her eyes. "Listen to me, Princess, " I racked my brains to find the right words to say, and she held her breath. "I love you. You have no idea how good you make me feel…"

And that was the last thing I said before I cupped her face with my hands and claimed her mouth. I heard her gasp in surprise but didn't protest. When I felt her kiss me back, I decided to take it a step further and plunged my tongue into her mouth, probing and playing with hers. She responded in kind, and I walked us out of the kitchen, occasionally breaking our kiss to come up for air. I took her coat off and tossed it aside, and my fingers fumbled on the buttons of her blouse, as I tried to make quick work of it. I heard her giggle, and felt her hand over mine, as she helped me take the offending item off her without having to tear it apart.

I palmed her breasts and removed my mouth from hers so I could suck on her perfectly pink buds. I started with her right nipple, licking and sucking greedily until she moaned and bucked against me. I felt her hands rake through my hair, coaxing me to give her other nipple equal attention.

"Do you like that?"

"Yes, " she moaned, pulling my head closer to her breasts. "Baby don't stop…"

The back of her legs hit the couch and I carefully set her on it. "Just sit back, " I whispered before I knelt in front of her and guided her legs over my shoulders and nestled between them. The scent of her arousal called to me, and I didn't have to guess to figure out how wet she was. From this position, I could see her staring at me wide-eyed, her cheeks flushed and her hair slightly messy.

"Ieyas-"

Before she had a chance to finish what she was going to say, I pulled her panties aside and ran my tongue along her wet slit. After hearing her moan, I gently parted her folds and continued to lick her wetness. I felt her hands on my hair as she rocked her hips against my tongue, eager to get off.

"There, baby… right there, " I heard her say as I slowly trailed my tongue over her clit, looking at her as she threw her head back with her eyes closed, shamelessly rubbing her pussy on my face as she palmed her breasts, and pinched her nipples. "Ieyasu, please… I want… harder - more…"

"Are you close, Princess?" I asked in between French kissing her lower lips.

"Almost, baby… I'm -"

Without warning, I slipped my tongue inside her and ran my thumb over her clit. Her eyes flew wide open, and her toes curled as she let out a loud moan and I lapped on her juices as she continued to ride her orgasm.

As soon as she came down from her high, I sat back and admired her. My sweet girl looked flushed. Half-naked with her skirt pushed up, her undies still on, and the sheen of sweat on her lithe body, she looked a hundred times sexier than ever. I was aware of my arousal building up and my cock becoming hard under my trousers at the sight of my love looking so uninhibited.

"That was fantastic, " she said, still catching her breath.

I moved up and cupped the back of her neck with my hand. "You taste fantastic, " I said and kissed her hard once again, slipping my tongue in her mouth so she could taste her essence. When she sucked on my tongue and unzipped my trousers, I knew I was done for.

"Ieyasu, please…"

She didn't have to beg me a second time. My cock sprang to life as soon as I tugged my pants down. Tearing off her panties, I lifted her and positioned her on top of my throbbing member. She eagerly lowered herself on me, taking all of me in one swift motion.

"You're so wet, " I moaned.

"You're so big, " she responded before capturing my lips in a deep kiss. I placed my hands on her pelvis and guided her as she bounced up and down the length of my cock, slowly at first and then gradually increasing our pace. For a while, the only sounds we heard were the slapping of our skin against each other and our breathless moans.

She was close, I could tell. And I was close to spilling, too. We've never done it bare before, so I knew I had to pull out, but she made no move to stop.

"Princess, " I said, trying to catch my breath. "I'm close. I need to pull out -"

"No, " she said, grinding her hips against me, "I want you to cum inside me. Please…"

"Are you sure?"

"Yes, " she said, before throwing her head back as she hit her orgasm. "Yes, yes, yes…"

I felt her clamp around my cock, and I followed shortly after, grunting as I shot my seed deep inside her.

As she came down from her high, she slumped against my chest and smiled. "Baby, " she said, as she peered at my face sleepily. "Sorry about dinner."

I laughed and kissed her lips lightly. "Doesn't matter, " I said, holding her tightly. "I had something much better than curry."

End.

#ikemen sengoku fanfic #ikesen fanfic #ikesen ieyasu #ieyasu x reader

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makiema · 5 years ago

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Hello! What makes you ship Levi and Eren? (always curious about how people get into ereri)

Hi there, anon! I wish I could’ve answered this briefly but you’ve asked me something that I could honestly ramble on about forever. I’d try to be precise but I’m afraid it’d still be quite long because I don’t have the time to summarise, so bear withe me please >.

Okay so first of all, I used to be more into Eremika than Ereri in the beginning and the precious Eremika moment from Chapter 50 owned my heart. Back then the 13 y/o me didn’t get shit about Levi and Eren’s platonic canon relationship. But the popularity of Ereri was overwhelming and even though they were far from being my OTP I still shipped them in AU settings mainly because the fanfics were excellent. Also, at that point of time, I was more invested in the Naruto fandom and SS was my only OTP. In fact, I didn’t even know about the Visual Novel until late 2015 or early 2016 (I don’t remember exactly) which made me really get into Ereri. Reading the VN actually changed my whole perspective on Ereri and made me realise the depth of their canon relationship. When I re-read the manga again after that none of their subtle moments were lost on me and that’s how the ship started growing on me. Since then I even began picking up on a lot of parallels, symbolisms, etc. associated with them and all of that collectively went into becoming the reason why Ereri is my OTP.

I probably cannot think up of everything that makes me ship them at one go. Also I have my internals next week and Im losing my mind. Anyway here are some of the reasons that immediately came to mind when I saw your ask:

• Levi equating Eren to “The Tyger” : The VN concluded with the first two stanzas of Blake’s poem “The Tyger”. The poem is taken from The Songs of Innocence and Experience and the entire volume focuses on two things : the transition from childhood into adulthood and the existence of both beneficial and malevolent forces in human beings. So in the novel, Levi’s understanding, acceptance and even admiration of both the humane and the monstrous potential in Eren is commendable : “A monster with perfect, fearsome beauty; that inspires awe” Also, Levi acknowledges Eren’s will that “cannot be made to surrender” and his drive for freedom that “people living like birds in cages won’t get”. This shows us how Levi realizes that Eren’s mental maturity is not that of a normal 15 yo; that his “experiences” have made him into someone much more gritty, resilient and strong-willed for his age. “The Tyger” here is the agent of free-will and the poem further emphasises on free spirit by incorporating references to mythological figures who’re deemed as humanity’s heroes, for instance, “seize the fire” refers to Prometheus who is mankind’s hero because he stole fire from Zeus. It is said that because of him mankind could gain knowledge ; that mankind could step out of the bounds of ignorance ( See the parallel with Eren who said how ignorance is the biggest obstacle to freedom in Chapter 112 ). Another hero alluded to in the poem is Icarus who grew his wings of freedom and attempted to reach the farthest point (dangerously close to the sun) even though he was burned in the attempt (parallels with Eren’s whole attitude of ‘no matter what kind of hell awaits me I’ll keep moving forward’ ). Yeah so, that’s how deep Levi’s understanding of Eren runs.( Can you imagine the entire arc of Eren’s character was foreshadowed in Levi’s thoughts about him?) To me understanding is the most important factor when it comes to a ship so, I think Levi’s pov in the VN is the biggest contributor to their development.

• The way Eren looks at Levi : Idk how cliched this sounds but yes, the way he looks at Levi honestly gives me life. Be it in the Forest of the Giant Trees, or in the Reiss Chapel or in the Marley Arc, his eyes say it all. Add to this his signature shaky way of saing “Captain?”, idk if it’s only me but that just carries so much feeling, so much angst, so many unspoken emotions right there. If Levi’s thoughts on Eren made me fall in love with Ereri in the first place then Eren’s body language when it comes to Levi made me fuckin smitten over them (i kid u not honestly this ship is one of the very few things that actually give me the will to live)

• Hope and Strength : Honestly, I love Levi and Eren’s roles as humanity’s strength and humanity’s hope because this actually speaks volumes about their relationship. If Erwin gave Levi’s strength a dimension then Eren gave his strength meaning. Their roles in canon show their inter-dependence. After all, what is strength without hope? I don’t remember who first pointed this out, but someone said that this is the very concept the Survey Corps logo alludes to. The Wings of Freedom are shown as blue and white because royal blue represents strength and white represents hope. So the Wings are symbolical of what Levi and Eren individually stand for as well as signifies their dependence on each other.

• Levi’s role as Eren’s guardian : I love him both as Eren’s protector and his mentor. (oh also let’s not forget Eren had a little crush on him,,how adorable 🥺)

We’ve seen Levi giving it his all to protect Eren multiple times. And when he couldn’t protect him during the Battle of Trost because of his injury we see him clenching his fists in frustration. Again, in RTS we see Levi quite baffled when Erwin orders him to protect the horses and not protect Eren. Also in the RTS when Eren got flung on top of the wall, Levi was visibly concerned and then when Erwin couldnt come up with a plan that’d guarantee their survival, he quickly suggested that BOTH Erwin and Eren flit from there. This goes on to show how Levi thinks Erwin and Eren are EQUALLY important for ensuring humanity’s survival. It is evident from here that his liege and his mentee both belong on the same pedestal and he’d do anything to save them. Levi similarly comes up with an abrupt suggestion again in Ch 112 to save Eren when the Soldiers informed him that the higher authorities plan on having Eren eaten. Even though he clearly disapproved of Eren’s actions in Liberio, even though Levi himself always adhered to rules and discipline, he still had faith in Eren and he’d never accept such a ridiculous order, even if it came from Pixis. (plus he remembers the first time he met Eren which sort of makes us realize that Levi still sees himself as Eren’s protector🥺)

Next comes Levi’s role as a mentor in Eren’s life. I think his words of advice to Eren is an important factor that made him the man he is today. Levi encouraged him to believe in himself, he acknowledged his willpower, appreciated his relentless drive for freedom and even goaded him on to make important choices by himself. The recent happenings in the manga made a lot of people say that Eren follows the principle of “the end justifies the means” but originally, to quote Levi: “nobody can dictate you on what is the right path or what is the wrong one till you arrive at a certain outcome resulting from your choice”. I think one of the major reasons why Levi kicked Eren in the Marley arc again was because the outcome that Eren caused (at least according to Levi and the SC) was making Paradis the enemy of the whole enemy of the world and also a mountain of civilian deaths. This is just head canon but I think Levi was mainly disappointed because Eren didn’t seek his approval (unlike in the Reiss Chapel incident where he urged Levi to have faith in him before jumping into action of his own volition). Him comparing Eren with the underground thugs also makes me assume that he was genuinely hurt because he thought Eren has become complacent to the point where he doesn’t see Levi as a mentor anymore. But, right after his voice trails with the “you too..”, we see Eren looking up at him with the same beaming eyes. Curious why he’d do that at that instant. Also, during Serum Bowl, Eren used his height as the trump card to tower upon Levi. It was the only time he actually defied Levi and he did manage to look 100 percent domineering. But, post time skip Eren grew in leaps and bounds and he could easily repeat that but HE DID NOT. In fact, he utters his usual “Captain..?” and his eyes also have the same look. So maybe he still sees Levi as his inspiration but he cannot express that because he’s in a bind and has to act distant and cold with everyone. After all in Chapter 121, in the memory panel, we did see him recalling that very moment when Levi first advised him on making independent choices. His role as the mentor in Eren’s life is therefore once again reinforced by Isayama and I think that adds substantially to their wonderful platonic dynamic. ____________xxx___________

I probably couldn’t fit them all and even this is a terrible briefing. It is all so disarrayed and incoherent. I didn’t even get the time to attach pictures. Ugh, I’m so sorry anon ;-; I wish Uni would spare me some time to rant properly about my precious babies >.

#snk #ereri #riren #levieren #asks #thank you for the ask!#this is so shitty but i hope you'll accept this anon #i'll write a proper appreciation next time #also let me know why you ship them!#and have a nice day #<3

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canimal · 5 years ago

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I wanted to write a time travel fanfic and about Evan Rosier/Hermione Granger as a main pairing but... I'm stuck. I didn't choose the most redeemable character (Rosier was killed by Moody after a magical fight) and it's complicated bc how Hermione can fall in love with someone like Evan no matter how charming and smart he is ? How did you deal with that (Hermione, Death Eater and their ideology) ? All I can see is something like Jaime/Brienne (GoT) and a very slow burn. But it still feel wrong.

(Please bear with me as this is going to be a super long response. I’ll put it underneath the cut so those who want to read it can read it and those who want to scroll past it can do so quickly.)

To be perfectly honest, if a story feels “wrong”, you shouldn’t be writing it. Trying to force something that you don’t feel comfortable writing and don't fully believe in will not only make for a story that feels forced and unnatural to the reader, but it will also become a story that you will not enjoy writing. (Never forget that this is our hobby, not our job.). Eventually, you would likely hit a wall where the story was unable to progress further and you’d be stuck. Lots of writers try to write a story with certain elements or pairings that are “trendy” and end up stuck because they forced a story. Writing should flow fairly smoothly. I’m not saying that writers should never stumble or feel blocked, but I am saying that if you’re not allowing a story to remain organic and grow naturally, you will find you quality and likely your own enthusiasm and enjoyment in writing the story suffer.

Why do you want to write a story with Evan Rosier? Is it because you find his character fascinating or you want to uncover more about him? Or is it because he’s not a character that’s written about a lot and you’re hoping to stand out in a growing sea of Death Eater stories?

I promise I’m not trying to be rude or condescending, even if it seems like it. This is an honest question. If your answer is on the first couple, awesome. Go for it.

But, if you’re hoping writing about him will get you instant recognition and a large number of followers on your story immediately, I’m sorry to tell you that that probably won’t happen. Most readers don’t want to take a chance on unknown characters. They just don’t. I’ve mentioned this many times, but when I first started writing Thorfinn Rowle as more than just a one-dimensional bad guy in the background in first, The Dark Mage’s Captive and then Parolee and His Princess, I frequently got PMs and reviews asking me who the fuck Thorfinn Rowle even was and that I might actually get more people to read my stories if I didn’t write such weird pairings. 🙄 (Let’s not forget the troll who commented “This should’ve been a Dramione” on literally every single chapter at least twice. Sigh.) So it’s both amusing and incredibly frustrating to have readers in the fandom announce that Thormione is their OTP when most of them wouldn’t have given my stories the time of day when I was writing them and they were the ONLY Thorfinn stories in existence on FFN for certain and probably everywhere else. Because so few people were interested in reading a story with Thorfinn as the main love interest when I was actually writing Parolee and His Princess, if I was only writing the story in an attempt to stand out and not because that was the story I wanted to write, then I likely would’ve gotten frustrated and quit before I ever finished.

So, if you’re serious about writing an Evan Rosier story because it’s what you want to write, I wish you the best of luck. It’s always challenging to write a character with little to no background info in canon. Challenging can also be a great deal of fun. If we never challenge ourselves as writers, we won’t ever get any better. Writers must be willing to learn and try new things if they want to get better. Practice is crucial. Too many writers (professional and otherwise) get to a place where they don’t believe they need to improve and their writing gets stagnant. It’s sad.

Now to your question about how or why Hermione might fall in love with someone with such a different and dangerous ideology... there are many different ways this can be tackled. I must stress thought that you make sure the decision you make makes sense within your story. Don’t try to force something. Let it grow naturally.

First of all, I don’t believe anyone is unredeemable. (Or irredeemable. Same meaning, right?) Perhaps it’s because of my own personal faith and religious beliefs, but I don’t believe anyone is wholly evil or wholly good. Yes, even in this hyper-partisan world we now live in, I don’t believe that anyone (even those who might disagree with me) are pure evil. This has actually gotten me a lot of grief from angry trolls and super sensitive former readers alike. I’ve been accused of being an “apologist” for all manner of depravity including, but not limited to, rape, violence, murder, racism, all the bad things ever, etc. simply because I believe that no is unredeemable... irredeemable. Ugh, whatever. You know what I mean.

Everyone has good qualities in them, even those who appear to be nothing but evil. Far fewer good qualities than most certainly, but still there. I’m also a firm believer that people, even really bad people, can have an existential change of heart and want to be a better person. Many just have to be given the opportunity to change. Of course, I don’t believe that they shouldn’t be punished for their crimes or they should be excused just because there’s something good about them. I’ll never understand why I’ve been accused of being an apologist. 🙄 Some people are truly exhausting.

For every story about a Death Eater falling for Hermione, there’s a different explanation. If you’ve ready any, you’re probably already familiar. Because I try very hard to make every story I write unique from the others I’ve already written, I’ve mixed it up. Antonin only joined for knowledge and power without realizing until too late what was really happening. Rodolphus was pressured by his wife in one and his grief and depression made him fall further in than he meant to. Sometimes the Death Eater was pressured by family to follow in their footsteps; others by their peers. There are countless reasons why people join these kinds of groups. Disillusionment, looking for a place to belong... you really could make it anything. I’ve known people who were drawn in and brainwashed by cults because they were desperate for purpose, for belonging, for a feeling like their life actually mattered. It can be super easy to get sucked into a cult and takes years to get out... if you can.

JKR wrote the Death Eaters as being simply bad for bad’s sake. They’re almost all one-dimensional. No person is actually one-dimensional. They have hopes and fears and dreams just like everyone else. Maybe they thought they believed in the sort of pro-Pureblood world that Voldemort imagined, but once they got in they were in over their head. Reality rarely meets our expectations. People grow and change. Even my own beliefs have changed as I’ve grown older. What I used to think was important no longer is and there are issues I have done a complete 180 on as I’ve grown up and begun to live in what I call “grownup reality”. (Life is much different for me than it was even when I was just in my twenties and how I see the world has changed drastically in some instances.). So if experience and time has been able to shape and change my beliefs and even my values to a minute degree, why could the same not be said for a Death Eater who discovered all was not as it seemed when they were recruited?

It’s also important to remember that no one thinks, acts, or believes like everyone in their set group one hundred percent of the time. Each individual has their own thoughts and beliefs. Maybe they joined because they hated Muggles, but then they realized they were wrong to do so. Maybe their family pressured them to join but they didn’t agree. Maybe they were afraid to die so they joined. I know a lovely man whose father died in World War II fighting for the Nazis - not because he was an admirer of Hitler and believed in everything dreadful and evil the Nazi party believed in. No, his father was conscripted into the German Army and fought because he would’ve been arrested in the best case scenario and executed in the worst. His young wife and their two small children could’ve also been in danger had he refused. It’s a terribly sad story. And hardly the only one. That’s just one example. History has countless other incidents all over the world when scared people fought and fell in line with a terrible leader because they had no other choice. Or at least it seemed like they had no other choice. Not everyone is strong and brave enough to stand up to injustice and evil when their lives are on the lines. Humans by our very nature can be quite cowardly at times.

It’s possible that a person who has done evil deeds or believed just absolutely atrocious things could want to change and be a better person. Though it wouldn’t be easy, someone like Hermione could choose to forgive them for their past. Especially if they’re truly remorseful.

Of course, it’s also unfortunately true that there are sometimes relationships that are just absolutely toxic. Love can make idiots of us all. How many women (and men to an extent though not nearly as often) see the potential in a man and want to change them into something good and perfect? It happens so often it’s a cliche. Woman falls in love with bad boy. Wants to change him. Stays with him with hopes and dreams that he’ll stop being so awful. Is disappointed over and over again. Have you ever known someone who fell in love with a truly terrible person and even though their relationship wasn’t healthy whatsoever never seemed to quit them? Kept going back for more even when everyone told them it was a terrible idea? I’m pretty sure you have. You might’ve even been in one of those relationships yourself. I know I was. No, he might not have been a murderous minion of a madman, but he certainly had his terrible qualities that I thought I could help him get past. Tale as old as time.

I could go on and on and on about reasons why Hermione might fall in love with a completely unsuitable man who might even wish her dead, but there’s no reason. It could be for a thousand reasons. And don’t forget, Hermione isn’t exactly some innocent paragon of virtue herself. She’s pretty dark even in canon. Trapping a lady in a jar? Cursing a girl’s face possibly permanently? Leading another witch into a forest knowing there are centaurs in there who are dangerous? And those are just the things that unobservant Harry noticed! Who knows what she was doing off-stage? She has her own darkness and her own demons to fight. She’s not perfect nor is she some pure angelic creature who only uses light magic for good. Nah, she’s pretty twisted at times. (On a side note - Please don’t try to write her as being all-powerful, perfect, and never do anything the least bit bad. That’s not her character at all. It bothers me to see her written as some sort of pearl-clutching virgin who has never done anything bad in her entire life. That’s NOT the Hermione I read in the books.)

You just have to find the right motivation in your own story. If you’re not forcing the story and allowing it to develop naturally, you’ll figure it out. If you’re forcing it, I’m afraid you’re going to stay stuck.

I hope this can be so some help! Sorry I’m rambled on and on and on.

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phdna · 6 years ago

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*arriving a month late with Starbucks and an uninteresting Endgame review*

This took me forever to write because work has been very intense lately, but I have thoughts I want to write down, for my own future reference when I’m an old woman looking back on my life, if for nothing else.

SPOILERS AHEAD, of course!

From whatever little I’ve been online since Endgame came out, it seems like the internet has been on fire swearing undying love, eternal hate and everything in between. I’m used to that because the MCU fandom has a tendency to be like that, but it feels like this time is more intense, which puzzled me a little bit, as it mostly adheres to the Marvel rules of storytelling, and people tend to not fuss over movies that do that as much as they do over movies that break the established MCU patterns. And then I did some reading and watching and talking and it just hit me that people aren’t reacting to Endgame itself, they’re reacting to the MCU. Both people who think it’s the best movie ever and people who think it’s absolute trash aren’t talking a lot about the movie, they’re talking about how the movie handled the end of this long journey that was the MCU. (Exception: time travel. I’ll get back to it in a moment!) I know I’m having a Captain Obvious moment here, but bear with me for a moment, I’m going somewhere with this.

Here’s the thing: as long as there are more movies coming, we can all overlook things we dislike about the MCU really well – “they’ll just fix it later,” right? Or we can fix it ourselves, even if we don’t write/read fics – the endless theories about what the next movies are gonna be about are in large part wish-fulfillment. Maybe next time Marvel will have more representation of all kinds, maybe next time Marvel will develop their female characters as much as their male counterparts, maybe next time Marvel will focus on this particular relationship that is either underdeveloped or so developed that it should get more attention, maybe next time Marvel will direct a character arc towards where I think it should go. But when the end arrives, we have to face that we aren’t in charge of the MCU and have sometimes wildly different expectations that what the Powers That Be have in mind. We have been emotionally invested in this universe for a long time – we bring the MCU with us in our lives even away from screens – and it sucks a little to realize that, ultimately, we are powerless to impact it. If Endgame was 100% everything you’ve always wanted for every single character and for the universe as whole, great! You’re still gonna mourn the end a little bit, but it’s cool! But if you feel like even one character of the dozens in the cast got the short end of the stick, you’re gonna be upset because don’t we all wish we could sit down with Marvel and teach them Why They Are Wrong About This Character?

I hope I’m not sounding holier-than-thou, like I’m being absolutely cool and adult about the whole thing. Hell no. I’d fight Kevin Feige in a parking lot any time, and have been ready to do that since huh… the MCU started. (Especially because the MCU has taken over the comics and I like 616 more than I like the MCU, so I’ve got beef with Marvel for that.)

So yeah, I have plenty of “What? No! Whose idea was that, that’s terrible!” moments, but I always try to focus on what I enjoyed more than on what I hated. Sometimes it doesn’t work and I get forever bitter, but most of the time, I make an active effort to 1) be grateful that WE EVEN HAVE GOOD SUPERHERO MOVIES AT ALL and 2) watch the movies I’m actually watching instead of watching the movies I think I should watch. For instance, I want to set myself on fire whenever I think about how un-family-like the Avengers are in the MCU, but since being a family isn’t a story the MCU is trying to tell, I consciously try to find something I enjoy about the constant conflicts, such as what they tell us about what each character believes, and how they keep coming back together to do the right thing despite their differences.

Arguably, that’s too much effort, and I get why some people want to be entertained and get upset if the MCU doesn’t deliver that entertainment – I mean, movies are supposed to be fun. But since I was a kid, I’ve always been a fan of imperfect things I have no control over, and I muddle through what I don’t enjoy to get to the shiny bits that give me goosebumps and keep me up at night feeling giddy over how good something was. It’s part of how I react to stuff I like by now. I don’t know, maybe it’s my History degree talking, but I don’t see what the big deal is with saying “Some of it sucks, some of it is brilliant, some of it has to be challenged on the ground of human rights, but overall I’m interested in learning more about it.”

Why the essay on how to engage with the MCU?

Because no matter how I think about it, my primary opinion about Endgame isn’t “I think it’s good” or “I think it’s bad” but just “I’m thankful.” That’s it. I can’t look at Endgame and see it as an isolated movie. I look at it and think “God, I was just out of school when Tony said I am Iron Man and now I’m a teacher and the MCU has always been there helping me keep track of the passage of time all these years.” Here, have a bad analogy: Endgame is when you finish a long travel and there’s nothing home to eat and you have to unpack and you’re exhausted and normal life is depressing and you have a headache and you’re frustrated that holidays are over and you didn’t do everything you wanted…. but that doesn’t make the entire travel a waste of time, does it? It’s actually the opposite. If the travel sucks, getting home is great. And very, very, very few people walk out of Endgame saying “Thank god this MCU saga is over, ugh, I was following it just out of obligation and I’m glad I’m free now” – I mean, there are people like that, and I can see why, but I also never finish things just out of obligation so I can’t relate. Anyway, mostly, people either expected more because the MCU is good enough to do better or thought this was the perfect ending. I’m both. Some things I loved, some things I really wish would be different, but mostly, I’m, like I said, grateful that the journey was so good that no ending would’ve fully satisfied me.

My biggest problem is with time travel. I’ve never liked the trope (not huge on alternate universes, either!), so I knew this would be a pet peeve even before I watched Endgame. I’m also surprised that apparently nobody involved in the movie can agree on how aforementioned time travel works. Fans certainly can’t. And I don’t think it’s a good thing if your audience is confused by a major part of your movie, even if there is a perfectly good explanation and the audience just didn’t get it. (Which isn’t the case, as apparently there isn’t a perfect explanation.) But you know what? I’m hand-waving it. It’s a convoluted plot device but it made a good movie, so like, whatever. Let it work in ABC way unless XYZ needs to happen, in which case, XYZ is how it’s always worked regardless of how ABC was used before. I don’t care. I’m taking what they say happened and saying “Okay, that’s how it happened” and ignoring the hows and the whys. It’s just bad comic book logic on the big screen, I’ve been rolling with this kind of thing since I was a literal child. Having said that, I don’t know what year it is in the MCU, I don’t know how Spider-Man will work, I’m not touching Cap’s time paradox with a ten-foot pole, and I’m not even gonna try to understand any of the timeline charts going around online.

My other major problems have to do with real life more than with the movie. The only original female Avenger dies in the same way the only original female Guardian of the Galaxy died, and neither of them get funerals but we do get the men in their lives suffering over it (which switches the focus from mourning the women to the men’s journeys.) Not sure if the joke was that Thor was clinically depressed or if the joke was that Thor was fat, but haha hilarious. The first openly queer character is omg a nameless cameo talking about someone we never see, isn’t the MCU so progressive? (The bar was so low that Marvel had to dig a ditch so they could somehow get lower than that.) Not loving the idea of “Thanos treated Gamora like shit but the Soul Stone recognizes he loved her” and “Tony’s dad was awful but Tony can Forgive Him” being presented as touching – it’s creepy af and makes me wonder if the MCU will end up saying Alexander Pierce actually cared about Bucky somewhat or something of that sort. Female hero team up: unironically loved it and want it projected on my tombstone (it was one of my favorite part), but it’s a little disturbing that almost none of them had much of a storyline in the movie because they don’t have much of a storyline in the MCU – it really highlights that Marvel has a boy’s club problem still. Now, none of these things make for a bad movie, it just reminds me that Marvel has a long way to go with they want to become inclusive.

Okay, now on to storylines…

Tony. Loved it. I love how the Russos direct Tony (I do have a problem with how M&M write Tony, sometimes, though, and always have) because they love to highlight how soft Tony’s heart is. Part of what makes the character interesting in any universe is that he’s willing to do morally shady stuff when he thinks he’s justified and he tends to think he’s justified because he knows exactly how smart he is, but if you explore this borderline antihero behavior without a deep commitment to reminding the audience that Tony is emotional and gentle, you end up with Reed Richards. 616!Tony will always be sweeter than MCU!Tony (even though 616!Tony’s dad literally tried to beat emotions out of him, while MCU!Tony’s dad more ignored him than actively tried to make him colder, but that’s besides the point) but Tony was so openly loving in this movie, and it helps make his death hit home, why so many people will miss Iron Man and Tony I pity Morgan a lot because she won’t remember her dad, but the only way to feel like the torch has truly been passed to other heroes was to kill Tony – keep him alive in any way and characters are gonna want his advice even if he stops fighting. I want to see how other heroes will protect a world without Iron Man. It’s exciting and brand new and feels a bit like when Fury said in 2008 that Tony isn’t the only superhero.

Steve. Let’s take the time paradox at face value and say everything goes well in every possible timeline and nobody suffers more than they would if he hadn’t done his time-heist thing, because I think that��s what the movie wanted to imply. I’m actually happy he got to be with Peggy. It’s not how I’d write him, mind you, but I always knew MCU Steve was being written as someone who is inherently out of place in the modern world. In the comics, Steve has a culture shock and he mourns people, but he finds a new family in the Avengers and truly becomes part of this century. MCU Steve was never that guy. And that’s okay, it’s a valid take! Not what I’d do, but given his storyline throughout the other movies, I think it’s a very satisfying ending that feels very organic. Saying “screw everything, I’ll do what I think it’s important” has been Steve’s constant in all movies, and it’s nice that he learned that he is important too, not just everybody else. Handing the shield was also very important – no “I think he’d want you to have it” to fuel conspiracy theories in the future: Steve made a good decision and that’s fine. (And I’ll cut a bitch if y’all keep saying “maybe Bucky had the shield before” because Sam can be a first choice fgs!!!)

Professor Hulk is a thing and I liked it more than I thought I would. Hopefully we’ll see more of him. I liked Bruce and I liked the Hulk, but somehow this version of him made me go from “Yeah, they’re nice” to “PLEASE TELL ME HE’LL HAVE A SOLO MOVIE” so good job in redeeming the Hulk franchise, Marvel! It only took you 10 years to get the right tone, but hey, what matters is that you did it!

Thor…….. Um. Hard. I liked his character arc but hated how it was handled. I’m not even a huge fan of Ragnarok because comedy isn’t my thing, but watching Ragnarok, I could see why the movie worked and the humor didn’t come at the expense of being fair to the character. Endgame felt more like the movie itself was bullying him. They’re laughing at his pain, basically, and it’s just not funny. It bothers me for the same reason it bothers me when people say pre-serum Steve should never leave home – just… no. But then, we got Thor and Frigga and I’d sell a kidney for more Frigga, so, it wasn’t completely awful. Just like, 90%?

Natasha!!! I hope everybody who said Scarjo can’t act paid attention to this movie, because she gave Nat a depth that we haven’t seen since CATWS, and even then, because it was Steve’s story, she was sidelined. That’s the Nat I’ve always wanted in the MCU. …and of course, she’s dead. Luckily, we don’t know anything about MCU!Nat, so we can still get prequels even if they don’t want to bring her back to life. It’s a little shady that she dies (why is it that the randomly decided death always seem to be randomly assigned to whatever the minority in a team is, huh?) but I love that she sacrificed herself for the greater good. It’s a heroic end to a woman who thought she was gonna be a villain her entire life. Oh, oh, oh, I have to say this: Natasha leading the remaining Avengers? Godtier. I’m not much of a fic person but I desperately want fics of that off-screen period where she’s being a boss.

Clint. MCU!Clint never did much for me, so I was impressed that I was rooting so much for him during the movie. I don’t know if he’ll just retire completely, but I’m hoping he doesn’t so we can see more of him in the MCU.

Okay, that’s the original Avengers and I’ve already written……. Too much. So I’ll stop – sort of – here.

But first, other random comments.

Fight choreography? On point, 10/10, would let Marvel beat me up to experience these sequences myself

“I am inevitable.” “I am Iron Man.” I cried so much the screen got blurry and I almost missed the snap. Thank you for this exchange.

I love and support Morgan, but I’m dreading the idea that in a near future, the MCU will get Riri’s entire story and give it to Morgan. Please, MCU, I’m counting on you, have Morgan grow up to befriend Riri, not to steal her role.

Nebula needs a solo movie. Nebula needs a whole cinematic universe, actually. What a character.

Speaking of which, GotG 3 is shaping up to be very cool

Sam being the one to say “On your left” in the movie where he becomes Captain America? Poetic cinema. Also! Sam Wilson is Captain America and both the human being who wants children to grow up in a better world and the geek who wants to see flying Cap in me are equally over the moon with joy

Bucky, my darling, the MCU hasn’t known what to make of you since 2011. It’s okay, Sebastian Stan will always do his magic and make you be Bucky even when Marvel doesn’t fully understand anything about your character

Pepper’s character development in 10 years is protagonist-worthy, I can’t believe how she always only has a couple of scenes every movie

Tom Holland should not be allowed to have crying scenes, they make my heart hurt

The movie feels a lot shorter than it is

There’s a lot more I could say, but I’m writing it on Word (tumblr sometimes eat my text posts as I’m writing them) and the wordcount is nearing 3k, so I better shut up. If you’ve read all of this, please treat yourself to a milkshake, you’re awesome. If there’s anything you want to talk about that I didn’t address (or just… you know, about Marvel in general), my ask and my direct messages are always open. I’ll probably take forever to get back to you (I NEED A VACATION ASAP) but I will eventually answer you and I don’t bite, so please go ahead if you’re curious about my not-so-very-interesting thoughts :)

TL;DR: Endgame isn’t my favorite movie (IM, IM3, CATFA, CATWS and BP all come first, sorry) but it’s up there in the “I can watch this movie a thousand times and I won’t get tired of it” list, and I think it does a fairly good job in ending the Infinity Saga, so I’m basically pleased!

#avengers endgame spoilers

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robininthelabyrinth · 6 years ago

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Fic: The Beginning of Wisdom - Chapter 22 (Ao3 link)

Fandom: Flash, Legends of Tomorrow Pairing: Leonard Snart (Len) & Leonard Snart (Leo), Len Snart/Mick Rory, Leo Snart/Mick Rory, Len Snart/Mick Rory/Leo Snart, Leo Snart/Ray Terrill, Len Snart/Barry Allen

Summary: In which Leonard Snart is twins.

(the life and times and loves of Len and Leo Snart)

—————————————————————————————————–

Leo woke slowly, which was unusual for him – both he and Len typically woke up all at once, a sharp shift from sleep to wakefulness, and any lying around in bed after that was a conscious choice. This groggy feeling of rising up slowly through the mud towards awareness was something he associated, if at all, with being severely sick and stuffed full of medications that warned of causing drowsiness.

He didn't remember being sick.

Had he gotten drugged?

It wasn't as though people hadn't tried, of course, slipping something into his drink at clubs or even at model shoots – whether out of misplaced lust, ambition or revenge, he was never sure. He'd even accidentally had some a few times before he'd learned that he needed to be as cautious in his world of fashion as Len was in his world of crime; the only reason nothing had happened to him was that he'd generally reacted by tottering into the nearby coatroom, telling Len he was sleepy, and letting Len handle the rest of the evening while he slept it off.

Following the first few instances of that, they'd told Mick about Leo's newfound party-related narcolepsy and he'd rolled his eyes and asked them if they'd ever considered the possibility of roofies.

Since that little revelation, Leo had opted to bring his own water bottles to drink at parties. He wasn't much of a drinker anyway, he always said no to drugs – he was always getting offered so very many drugs, seriously, models were ridiculous – and anyway, it was good for a designer to have a few quirks.

(Leo was well aware that his models weren't all as clean as he'd like, but he made sure that while they were in his employ, they had regular but highly supervised access to their drug of choice to keep them from buying it anyway unsafe, and also that they had access to rehab services without the embarrassment of publicly going to a clinic. A surprising number took him up on the offer, enough that he would routinely disappear them on highly secret photography projects that let them go in-patient for a short while – it felt like the least he could do.)

Still, it'd been a long time since any of that had happened, so this was still unusual.

Where had he been the night before? A party? Some bar? Some...

No, hadn't he gone to the racetrack on that job of Len's? Yes, that was it, the racetrack job.

What boring work it was, sitting around to wait for the right moment before finally going in, doing a bit of shouting and gun-waving, and walking out with the money. It was terribly anti-climactic; Leo remembered now how much he'd disliked it as a child.

Ugh, and he'd agreed to do more of this; he must have lost his mind...

"I know you're awake."

Every muscle in Leo's body froze in terror well before his mind, floundering, finally placed the voice in his memory.

He'd heard that voice so often, so many times before, that it was indelibly seared into his brain, but he'd tried so hard to forget it and it had been so long that he'd almost succeeded.

But now it was back.

"Dad," Leo croaked, and opened his eyes.

Lewis Snart was older, fatter, and smaller than Leo remembered, but when he smiled, a stretch of the lips with no warmth in the eyes, all of that was immaterial to the terror and hatred he invoked in Leo's heart.

He was three again, five again, seven again, ten again – he was in the position he'd sworn he'd never be again, caught at the mercy of Lewis Snart, who had none.

And the worst part was: his first thought was to wonder why Len was not here to protect him.

To be him.

No.

Lewis smirked. "About time you gave up the charade," he said. "We have work to do."

"Don't work with you anymore," Leo said, struggling to sit up. He was still woozy, but he had willpower to fight through the dizziness. This was not a time to display weakness. "Haven't for years – or have you started to forget already, old man?"

Bravado, of course, and Leo was already tensing up in anticipation of the blow that speaking back to his father would earn him.

But it didn't.

Instead, Lewis smiled, a sick, twisted little smile, as if some question had been answered.

"On the contrary," he said, his piggish little eyes gleaming, "I'm starting to remember."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Leo asked cautiously.

"A few things," Lewis said, standing up. "First: you haven't asked where your sister is."

Leo froze.

No!

"Don't worry," Lewis assured him, smirk widening. "She's free as a bird – but I'm keeping a very close eye on her. If you disobey, well, that wouldn't make me happy – with either of you."

The threat was clear enough, even without the details that Lewis would undoubtedly be more than happy to fill Leo in on later. Worse, Lewis would go through with it; of that, Leo had no doubt.

Len might have doubted the depths of their father's cruelty, might have protested, if only in his mind, in the hopes of changing their father's mind, but then Len always did have the softer heart.

Especially, as much as Leo hated it, where their father was concerned.

"Do we understand each other, son?" Lewis asked, putting a hand on Leo's shoulder – a paternal gesture twisted into an act of dominance, of possession, rather than of any affection.

"Yeah," Leo spits out. "I read you loud and clear."

It was fine: Lisa and Mick would go to Len, and Len would recruit Barry and Ray and everyone else, and they'd come to rescue him the second they figured out where he was.

He'd just have to play Len a little more closely than anticipated for a little longer.

He could do that.

He was pretty sure he could do that, anyway.

"Good," Lewis said, not removing his hand. "Because I've got a plan that needs your – special expertise."

Leo pressed his lips together.

Forget about whether he could do this. He would do this.

"I'm all ears, Dad," Leonard said to his father. "What's the job? What skills do you need?"

"Skills is probably the wrong word," Lewis mused. "You never did have any skills other than cringing away from me, did you?"

What was that supposed to mean?

Leo's confusion must have been evident, because Lewis laughed and his grip tightened on Leo's shoulder until the point of pain.

"Like I said, son," Lewis said. "I've been remembering a lot of things, these last few years in prison. And skills or no skills, I think you've got something that I can use."

His smirk widened into a maniacal grin of triumph.

"Ain't that right, Lionel?"

No.

Not that.

Anything but that.

The name they hated most, the name of that empty and forgotten boy, the one they'd tried so hard to bury the ghost of, the one whom no one loved and no one cared for or thought about or knew existed, not since their mother died.

Or so they'd thought.

But that wasn't exactly true, now, was it?

Leo stared at their father in horror. He should have realized – should have expected – he never even considered –

Of course Lewis Snart knew about them.

Of all people, he had the most right to know: he'd been there in the hospital when they'd been born, he'd signed off on their birth certificates, he'd taken the two of them back to his home.

No amount of hiding, no clever tricks, no bribes or computer viruses could erase that knowledge.

And if he knew –

All those years of hiding. All those years of taking each other’s' place, of Len bearing the scars of abuse so that Leo wouldn't have to, of Leo just as scarred by the endless neglect, all those jobs, all those sacrifices, all those fights –

Lewis had known.

He just hadn't cared.

One son was all he needed, after all; one son was all that was convenient for him to have, and it was one son he'd helped make them into.

It was their own decision, yes, and they loved playing each other so much that they would have done it no matter what -

But he was where the trauma around it started.

He was the one who'd turned it from a game into survival.

And now, all these years later, he'd emerged from whatever dark hole he should have rotted in and seen that the Leonard he had raised, the Leonard he’d wanted, the thief par excellence, the kleptomaniac, the supervillain, the killer with nightmares, the soft heart frozen over – all his work, all due to him, all forced upon them by him -

Now, after all that, he didn't have any more use for that Leonard.

No, now he wanted the other Leonard: the one Len and Leo had created together through pain and suffering and deprivation, the one born of other's sacrifice, the one who had the space to go straight, to pursue his passions, to finish college, to be free to do as he wished.

To be free of Lewis.

And now Lewis wanted Leo.

Leo, who was enraged.

"That ain't my name," he said, and his voice was cold enough to burn stars.

Lewis backhanded him.

"Your name is whatever I say it is," he said, casual as if he were remarking on the weather. "I gave it to you, and only I can take it away, whatever nonsense you might've done with changing your name by the law."

"My name," Leo said again, ignoring the pain and quickly forming bruise, "is Leonard."

Lewis barked a laugh. "You know that's a name I gave you too, right?" he jeered. "But sure, son, have it your way. I know you're not the thief – anyone watching you could've figured that out. Your reflexes are slow and you don't have the confidence to do a proper stick-up; it was pathetic to watch."

So what if Leo wasn't a good thief?

He didn't have to be. That was the point.

"Now get up," Lewis added. "We have a job to plan. Unless you care less about your sister than you do your name...?"

Wordless, Leo got up.

Len sat down.

"What do you mean, you're having trouble tracking him?!" he demanded. "You designed the goddamn gun, Ramon; I know you know how to pinpoint its location."

"It's not as easy as all that," Cisco protested.

"You tracked me with it, didn't you?"

"You were using it! I've set up a city-wide tracking system, but I haven't picked up a single downward spike in temperature anywhere –"

"Nothing," Barry reported, appearing in a burst of lightning. He was panting lightly, suggesting that he'd pushed himself past the limits of even his ridiculous speed. "I've been through the streets twice; not a sign of him or the van you describe. He must be underground or inside somewhere."

"He can't just be gone," Ray said from where he's been pacing for the last hour. He was shining like a lamp, unable to contain the spike in his powers due to sheer worry-fueled adrenaline, but there was nothing he could use them for right now. He'd mastered throwing light beams and was working on using his light as a means of propulsion to fly, but while they'd theorized that he might have the ability to use his light powers as some sort of advanced scanning system – comparisons had been made to both echolocation (but with light) and super-vision (and associated puns about supervising), and there had been perhaps gratuitous misuse of the line about "everywhere the light touches" from The Lion King – but he hadn't managed it yet.

He'd been too busy to properly practice the ability, something he was clearly regretting now.

It didn't matter, though. If Barry couldn't find Leo, and Cisco couldn't find Leo, then they were dealing with something – different.

Len still thought a new supervillain seemed like a likely option for the culprit, but he was starting to suspect that it wasn't that. Mick's injuries had been somewhat worse than reported – he'd left the hospital AMA, only to collapse again once he reached STAR Labs, where Caitlin was now treating him – and if it had been a supervillain looking to catch a supervillain, then why not take Mick as well?

Maybe this was personal.

"I'm going to go ask some contacts of mine some questions," he decided.

"Won't that tip people off about there being two of you?" Cisco asked.

"I don't fucking care," Len said, and found that it was true. Leo was more important to him than Leonard would ever be – that's how this whole mess started, after all, back in the beginning.

It had always been about protecting Leo.

And no matter what it cost, Len would find a way to protect him now.

Unfortunately, most of his contacts had no clue about anyone gunning for him – no need to confuse them with details – but it didn't matter. Len was going to keep going down his list until someone told him something.

Even if it meant –

There was a small neighborhood of Keystone that Len always avoided. It wasn't a great area – pretty run-down – but it was out of the slums and moderately respectable, with a decent school for children and a possible way out of poverty if you worked hard and were lucky. The Families left it largely alone, despite the thriving sex work industry centered there, considering it a neutral area.

Len had helped broker that deal himself, at some considerable personal cost.

People had thought, at first, that he was getting something out of it – jokes regarding sex workers had been made at his expense – but when the years passed and he avoided the area like the plague, his work on behalf of that neighborhood was seen not as a measure for personal gain, but of unlikely sentimentality.

The neighborhood was, after all, home to one of the best known and most well-protected domestic violence relocation shelters in the Gem Cities.

(Leo always did say that Len was the one with the soft heart.)

Len never went there.

Not for anything.

He went there now.

(For Leo, he would do far more than anything.)

The neighborhood had been even more poor and unwanted, years and years ago, so it had been easy enough for an infusion of some serious (mostly illegal) cash to enable the shelter to buy the land for a song during one of the housing crashes. What houses and shops were still functioning and could pay rent, even minimal, did so, and helped restore the shelter's coffers; those that were empty and abandoned were redistributed to those who needed them: women fleeing from abusive husbands, husbands from wives, children from parents, people of any gender or sexuality but the norm from those who did not understand, or any mixture of the above.

The shelter had originally expected people to move out of the area when they no longer needed the help, but they hadn't. They'd stayed, even as they flourished, and helped pay for more houses, more apartments, and for a neighborhood watch strong enough to do what the corrupt or indifferent police would not.

They protected their own.

When Len came to the neighborhood, they watched him with a wary eye: he was dangerous, they could tell just by looking at him, and this neighborhood had no love for dangerous men.

"I want to speak with the head of the shelter," Len told the first one that stopped him, a woman half a head shorter than him but with eyes of steel.

"Why?" she asked bluntly. "Looking for someone?"

Len's face twisted up in a grimace of pain.

"Yes," he said. "But I doubt I'd find him here. I just need to know if – if she's heard anything. That's all. Then I'll leave."

The woman, whose name he did not ask, and which she did not share, waited to receive confirmation that he would be allowed in before letting him pass onwards, and Len waited with her in silence. He wasn't sure if she'd get that confirmation: there was a reason he did not come here.

After all, he was dangerous, and this neighborhood had good reason to hate dangerous men. Why should he be exempted?

And yet –

He needed to come here now, to ask. This shelter took in everyone who needed it, rich or poor, and some of those who came here were those with connections to every branch of power in either Central or Keystone: politicians and Families and more.

There was a chance, however small, that they might know something that would show him the way.

He was willing to break his vow never to come here for that chance.

For Leo, he would do anything.

More than anything.

The woman checked her phone when it buzzed. "Okay," she said, not softening even in the slightest degree. "You can go."

Len nodded and continued past her. He could feel her watching him as he went, and her eyes were not the only ones he could feel on his back as he climbed the shallow steps to the old armory, that massive squat building that no one had wanted when it fell into disrepair and which had now been converted into the main offices of the shelter - a bomb shelter and a place designed to resist a siege, all in one.

The first stop for anyone seeking aid, and the final stop for those that sought to abuse the shelter's offerings.

Len hoped he would be considered the former.

The head of the shelter had been beautiful in her youth, with soft dark hair that she'd once dyed even more black and dark eyes that always seemed wet and hurt but somehow warm, and she was beautiful still today - hardly more than fifty years old, with hair streaked with silver that she didn't bother to dye, the faint traces of Asian features more noticeable now that she no longer hid them with layers of makeup, and the same big eyes that were hurt no longer –

But they were still warm.

"Leonard," she said with a smile, reaching out her arms to him, but taking no offense when he instinctively shied away from her. "My little man."

Len shuddered. "I'm not your anything," he said, but he couldn't make his voice as sharp as he would have liked.

He never could, with people he cared for.

"I know," she said, and her voice was sad, though the warmth was still there. "You aren't. Not anymore. But won't you at least say it's good to see me?"

Len would rather not.

But he came here as a supplicant, and there was no harm in telling the truth when it served his purposes.

"It's good to see you," he said. "Marie."

#leonard snart #leo snart #len snart #beginning of wisdom #my fic

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seyaryminamoto · 7 years ago

Note

Yeah why does Zuko treat his sister like that when his entire character and development revolves around him learning compassion and sympathy?

Because that’s what his entire character and development SHOULD revolve around, what most people think they revolve around… but it’s actually not the case.

There are many instances where the show tries to press on that Zuko has become a kind and compassionate man, and those instances are mainly dialogues and quotes. I’ll list several ones that the fandom seems to cry about back and forth, and then we’ll break everything down bit by bit, so I can explain why I think Zuko’s development isn’t about any of these things…

Examples: The Guru

“It’s a new day. We’ve got a new apartment, new furniture, and today’s the grand opening of your new tea shop. Things are looking up, Uncle.”_____________Iroh: “Who thought when we came to this city as refugees, that I’d end up owning my own tea shop? Follow your passion, Zuko, and life will reward you.”Zuko: “Congratulations, Uncle.”Iroh: “I am very thankful.”Zuko: “You deserve it. The Jasmine Dragon will be the best tea shop in the city.”Iroh: “No. I’m thankful because you decided to share this special day with me. It means more than you know.”Zuko: “Now let’s make these people some tea!” Iroh: “Yes, let’s make some tea!”

Day of Black Sun Part 2.

“No, I’ve learned everything! And I’ve had to learn it on my own! Growing up, we were taught that the Fire Nation was the greatest civilization in history. And somehow, the War was our way of sharing our greatness with the rest of the world. What an amazing lie that was. The people of the world are terrified by the Fire Nation. They don’t see our greatness. They hate us! And we deserve it! We’ve created an era of fear in the world. And if we don’t want the world to destroy itself, we need to replace it with an era of peace and kindness.”

Ember Island Players

Toph: “Geez, everyone’s getting so upset about their characters. Even you seem more down than usual, and that’s saying something!”Zuko: “You don’t get it, it’s different for you. You get a muscly version of yourself, taking down ten bad guys at once, and making sassy remarks.”Toph: “Yeah, that’s pretty great!”Zuko: “But for me, it takes all the mistakes I’ve made in my life, and shoves them back in my face. My uncle, he’s always been on my side, even when things were bad. He was there for me, he taught me so much, and how do I repay him? With a knife in his back. It’s my greatest regret, and I may never get to redeem myself.”Toph: “You have redeemed yourself to your uncle. You don’t realize it, but you already have.”Zuko: “How do you know?”Toph: “Because I once had a long conversation with the guy, and all he would talk about was you.”Zuko: “Really?”Toph: “Yeah, and it was kind of annoying.”Zuko: “Oh, sorry.”Toph: “But it was also very sweet. All your uncle wanted was for you to find your own path, and see the light. Now you’re here with us. He’d be proud.”

Sozin’s Comet: The Old Masters

Zuko: “Uncle, I know you must have mixed feelings about seeing me. But I want you to know, I am so, so, sorry, Uncle. I am so sorry and ashamed of what I did. I don’t know how I can ever make it up to you. But I’ll-… How can you forgive me so easily? I thought you would be furious with me.”Iroh: “I was never angry with you. I was sad because I was afraid you lost your way.”Zuko: “I did lose my way.”Iroh: “But you found it again. And you did it by yourself. And I am so happy you found your way here.”

There’s even a hilarious thing going around in a popular post these days, about his “Father Lord” slip of tongue, interpreting that as Zuko being so aware of the fact that it’s his FATHER who has to be defeated/die… while of course, ignoring the rest of the context. Just the kind of posts I love, as you’ll imagine.

Anyways, with these quotes in mind… what is the main takeaway the general public gets? That Zuko learned kindness! That Zuko learned the Fire Nation was wrong!

And now I ask… if he learned it all, as apparently he did, where’s the proof of it in his actions? When does Zuko show genuine kindness and empathy towards other characters and people, post-redemption?

First of all, the Guru gives us the creepy Zuko who’s happy and chill after getting out of his emo coma. What bothers me about Zuko in these episodes is that his transformation doesn’t feel genuine to me AT ALL. Zuko made the right decision, he let Appa go, after Iroh encouraged him and told him to do that. But reasonably speaking, did he really understand what Iroh was telling him? Iroh scolds him for not thinking things through, and tells him that it’s time for him to think about what he wants, and who he wants to be, basically. Zuko’s answer to that is letting Appa go, and then fainting, and then coming back to life as a happy boy. Which… eh? He should have changed, no doubt, after this experience… but to this extreme? And this fast?

The reason it feels fake is because you can’t really see him pondering Iroh’s words properly. He had a bunch of nightmares and even then we have no idea if he learned anything from them. If there was any reflection on his part over what he was experiencing. Where he SHOULD HAVE asked Iroh for advice, where he should have taken his seat and sipped his tea while asking Iroh about his own experiences, hoping to unravel what his own path should be… Zuko just got happy. That’s that. That’s how he learned kindness and empathy and sympathy and all that. So he becomes a very supportive nephew, but Iroh doesn’t really understand where that came from, and from the looks of it, neither does Zuko because as soon as the stakes are high again, what did he do? Pick his old life over the new. And that, again, reinforces my interpretation that his “change” was him trying to behave the way Iroh would approve of, rather than him actually trying to understand ANYTHING from Iroh’s words in lake Laogai. Rather than him learning a single thing about kindness and peace and good will towards men.

Second, DOBS Part 2. Zuko gives Ozai a funny speech about how they’ve been indoctrinated in the Fire Nation to believe they’re great and spreading greatness through the war. What an amazing lie it was, he says. A lie he believed in and fought for, directly, during at least 3 years. Yet also a lie he set aside for his own benefit, whenever he so wished (see the Blue Spirit, for instance). A lie he apparently stopped believing in when Azula shows up to drag him home as a prisoner. He cuts his hair and discards his ties to his nation…

… And yet still tries to fight Aang in the Chase. Because he’s got to get the Avatar, despite he knows the Fire Nation has listed him as a wanted criminal.

And he still tries to use Appa to bring Aang to him in Lake Laogai, because this way he’s going to get the Avatar for real and still go back to the horrible nation that issued out a wanted poster for him.

When you look back, all the way to episode 3?

“If my father thinks the rest of the world will follow him willingly, then he is a fool!”

Point and case being: Zuko, for one thing, wasn’t as blind to Ozai’s war at every point in the show as most people would have you believe. If he was aware of how Ozai wasn’t going to get the world to follow him, to the point of calling his terrifying father A FOOL??? Then clearly Zuko didn’t buy into the propaganda entirely. His actions during the war are NOT for the Fire Nation’s sake, or for his father’s sake, but for the sake of going home already and putting an end to his banishment once and for all. Nothing in the entire show has ever lead me to think otherwise, and I know for a fact that I’m not the only person who sees it this way. So Zuko didn’t really care about the lies and the greatness: it was NEVER what guided his actions, because what he truly wanted was to stop being banished.

So, now that the whole lie thing is out of the way, he tells Ozai that the rest of the world hates them! And yes, they do! He sees that for himself in Zuko Alone… you know, that episode that comes after he’s been out there, stealing from Earth Kingdom people, OUT OF A SENSE OF ENTITLEMENT. So sorry, I will always bring this up because Zuko NEVER owned up to this and I have no reason to believe he even regretted it. So… ugh. Anyways, point being that Zuko is telling Ozai all about how the Fire Nation deserve the Earth Kingdom’s hatred… which of course, Ozai knows. He’s not THAT stupid, he just doesn’t give a crap about being despised xD But the thing is… Zuko talks about this like he’s seen the world, like he’s watched how Fire Nation people treat Earth Kingdom people horribly, like he’s learned how messed up his own people can be.

But… when did we see Zuko standing up to Fire Nation people who were oppressing Earth Kingdom ones?

The answer is a grand total of zero times. Zuko stands up to a group of Earth Kingdom bullies who are harassing other Earth Kingdom people, and then after revealing who he is, he discovers they hate him even more than they hate the bullies. Zuko also helps Jet steal food on their ferry ride to Ba Sing Se, but who’s he stealing it from? Earth Kingdom people who are oppressing Earth Kingdom people. Zuko didn’t actually see how the Earth Kingdom people hated the Fire Nation, he saw how the Earth Kingdom people hated HIM, all through Books 1 and 2.

Now, why did Zuko help the people he helped? The bullies bothering Lee’s town had bothered Zuko too, the people hoarding food bothered him as well because he was eating crap while the good stuff was kept elsewhere. Zuko NEVER acted the way Aang did, spontaneously deciding to help the oppressed and downtrodden who needed help out of the good will of his heart. Nope, Zuko worked with others when it was convenient, most of all. Lee only gets Zuko to stay after the bully soldiers steal Zuko’s food, convincing him when he offers to feed Zuko’s ostrich horse at his house. Without that offer, Zuko would have just left and done nothing for these people.

In short, Zuko apparently learned that the Fire Nation is despised… when, as I said, going by his experiences, the one he should have learned was despised was HIM. He’s holding the Fire Nation as a whole responsible for his actions, for his wrongdoings, for everything bad he ever did in the Earth Kingdom. I repeat, the only time Zuko saw Earth Kingdom vs. Fire Nation in the flesh was when it was Earth Kingdom people mad at him for whatever he was doing, be it setting their villages on fire, stealing their food or treating them like lesser than him. The only exception I can think of is when the Earth Kingdom soldiers captured Iroh, and what happened there? Zuko and Iroh fought them, didn’t even reflect on how rightful or not these people were to pick a fight with them, and moved on. That simple.

We never get to see Zuko reflecting on how the Fire Nation has harmed these people so badly. We don’t get him reflecting on his own faults and mistakes often, but he certainly never seems to give much thought to how messed up things are and how the Fire Nation has no right to destroy everyone else. His showdown with Ozai, so very awaited by so many people? It, again, feels forced and hard to believe. It comes after we’ve seen Zuko talking to Mai about how he was his father’s perfect son but then he wasn’t HIM… and aside from that? What else did we have throughout the first half of season 3 to show us why Zuko is seeing the world differently than how he saw it before? He heard a story about his ancestors and was told he had good and bad inside him? Well, gee, that didn’t stop him from displaying his entitled side again by boasting to Mai that he can make anything she wants happen because he’s a prince, only a couple of episodes later. It didn’t stop him from wanting to be part of a war meeting desperately, with the attitude of a tantrum-throwing child.

There are SO MANY CHANCES the third season could have taken to portray a Zuko who ponders things, who pays attention to the world around him and realizes that he’s part of the Fire Nation, that he wants to respect everyone different from him too, that he doesn’t care about nation division but about doing what’s right by the world. Instead, he’s out there sending murderous cyborgs to kill the Avatar, he’s yelling at his imprisoned uncle, he goes to the beach and just picks fights both with his friends and with complete strangers, and throws more temper tantrums than anyone ever should.

And that brings up the really essential question: where, in all three seasons, did Zuko learn that peace and kindness were the answer? He says as much to Ozai, no doubt. But HOW is this his conclusion? Why would Zuko think that everyone should be kind and get along when the first person who always jumps into violence/conflict mode is him?

His field trips do nothing to prove he actually changed in this way, if you think about it:

Aang’s field trip: Zuko is aggressive and angry over losing his bending. He’s not very kind and peaceful about it, as far as I can remember. When they reach the Sun Warriors’ place, he’s clever for 10 seconds and stupid right after again, and when told that they have to be deemed worthy by Ran and Shaw? His immediate response to Aang’s doubts and uncertainties is “Well, we’re the Fire Prince and the Avatar. I think we could take these guys in a fight, whoever they are”. Again, responding with violence to a situation that he didn’t even know understand fully. What’s Zuko’s instinctive response to everything? Violence!

Sokka’s field trip: Zuko may know a thing or two about political prisoners, who knows, I certainly don’t know because the show never touched this subject. Tyrants like Ozai can and will imprison people who don’t deserve to be in jail… but as far as we saw? That might not have been the case in the Boiling Rock. We learn no stories of any of the people in this prison. We don’t have any clue about who they are. We don’t know if they deserve to be in there or not. But Zuko not only agrees to help Sokka break out his dad and girlfriend… he also agrees to helping Chit Sang, a complete stranger, who may just be hella dangerous for all they know (the wikia claims he’s been accused for murder and he says it’s not true: if he’s lying that means Zuko helped release a murderer from prison!). While the Boiling Rock is Zuko’s best field trip by far, it still makes you wonder if he gives his actions proper thought. Does he really want to release Fire Nation prisoners without knowing who they are or what they did to end up in there? How does this count as “peace” and “kindness”? Granted, the kind part is letting the guy go, sure, and what about the part where, if he were a murderer indeed, he might just go out there and kill again? How is that still kind, still peaceful?

Katara’s field trip: I barely even need to talk about this because Zuko absolutely condones Katara killing Fire Nation soldiers, who are/were acting UNDER ORDERS OF THEIR SUPERIORS, all because he wants to be her friend. Zuko, Mr. I’m-going-to-be-the-Fire-Lord-of-peace-and-kindness, standing by and even encouraging a girl who’s mad with grief and who wants revenge for her mother’s death, regardless of the cost. Again… is this Zuko’s peaceful doctrine? What sort of kindness do these actions reflect? When Aang says they shouldn’t do this, Zuko SCOFFS, he MOCKS him… and yet six episodes ago he was rambling about peace and kindness to his father, who of course, LAUGHED IN HIS FACE THE SAME WAY ZUKO WAS LAUGHING IN AANG’S FACE NOW…?

My point… Zuko learned some very pretty words that he can’t seem to put into actions. Heck, who knows if he even understands their meaning. But maybe what he meant was that everyone else should be kind and everyone else should be peaceful, and only when they all are nice and peaceful will he become nice and peaceful too. Maybe.

Carrying on after his speech to Ozai, though: as usual, his conversation with Toph only strengthens my belief that his development was about becoming exactly what Iroh wanted him to be rather than growing on his own and genuinely learning to better himself for his own sake. He says that the play rubs his worst mistakes in his face: what did the play show him doing? Yelling at Iroh, sending Iroh away, and I suppose having a weird affair with Katara (is this somehow implying that having a moment with Katara was one of his worst mistakes? Well, okay then, Zuko… x’D)? I can’t remember the play portraying anything else. Oh, well, growing out his hair. I guess he didn’t like his hair much either. Ah, and breaking Aang out of prison, I’m guessing he’s really sorry for that now, for… some reason?

Point is… the play didn’t show a Zuko who was hurting strangers, the way he often did in Book 1. It didn’t show a Zuko who was treating Earth Kingdom people like they owed him stuff just because he was Fire Nation royal, as he did in Book 2. We were shown a Zuko who, above all else, was mean to Iroh: THAT is his biggest mistake. Or so he believes. His remorse, his guilt? It’s all about Iroh. And that he’s acting the way Iroh expects of him is what makes him a worthwhile person now, basically. Instead of Zuko questioning what deserves to be questioned, we get a Zuko who adopts Iroh’s beliefs blindly, and who doesn’t even act on them entirely. He just tries to talk the way Iroh would, but as I said above? His answer to every problem is STILL violence. He STILL doesn’t think things through, he may have set a murderer loose in the Fire Nation on his trip to get out of prison, he thinks murder is fine and dandy in general… but because he will recite Iroh’s creed he’s somehow all good now?

And when Iroh takes him back, everyone’s happy, everyone’s moved, that’s what he deserves! Well, no doubt Iroh was going to accept him as he did, why wouldn’t he? Zuko modeled himself after his uncle, entirely. He wants to be Iroh 2.0, and he’ll do whatever he has to do to earn his approval.

But being Iroh 2.0 doesn’t mean having mercy for everyone, it doesn’t mean believing in peace and kindness as the answers to every ordeal. No, it means stopping the war, at any cost, and by doing whatever needs to be done. And that would be fine, but it also means that BOTH Iroh and Zuko don’t care, ultimately, if their other relatives live or die. Iroh never suggested Aang could find another way to defeat Ozai other than killing him, meaning he probably didn’t think there was another one and, meaning, he didn’t care that his brother had to die. He must have seen it as a necessity. Likewise, Zuko sees his sister unhinged and broken, and his reaction is simply to take advantage of her loss of sanity, and after her defeat, to stand by watching her writhing on the ground. Iroh has already told him Azula needs to go down, and that he shouldn’t get along with her. So he doesn’t even try. He doesn’t really need to freak out about whatever his sister’s future will be, because as long as she’s not standing between himself and the throne, he can easily just discard her.

I brought up that I found that “Father Lord” interpretation ridiculous to no end, but I’ll expand on why now: Zuko isn’t “painfully aware” of the fact that it’s his father who has to die. He’s not shown hesitating, instead, he’s shown hoping Aang can get it done, basically. Zuko isn’t particularly worried about Ozai’s fate, and it shows not only an episode before, where he’s actively scolding Aang for trying to find a solution other than murder. And it shows, again, in the finale when he confronts Ozai in his prison cell by telling him:

“You should count yourself lucky that the Avatar spared your life.”

Does this SERIOUSLY sound to anyone like a guy who was conflicted and sad that his father had to die? I can’t see it. I really can’t. If he was worried about Ozai, if he felt bad about his potential death? That feeling was buried SO DEEP that Zuko wasn’t even conscious of it. And as a reminder.. he has accepted Iroh as his actual father. He outright tells Ozai that Iroh is the one who was a real father to him. So… I don’t know if he’s really that conflicted about Ozai dying. Not when the person who’s most eager in the show to get Aang to kill Ozai is Zuko.

… Anyways.

In short, Zuko’s story was not about kindness, despite what the show would want everyone to believe. Zuko has ALWAYS suffered from a severe disconnection between his actions and his words. It’s something many people have criticized about his character before, and this ask really just ended up turning into a criticism about that, too. Zuko can talk about goodness and honor and kindness and peace all he wants, but when he stands watching his broken sister, with a look on his face that suggests Katara is more affected by Azula’s broken display than he is? You get the feeling he’s really just all talk. That a guy who preaches peace and then goes out to help his new best friend on her vengeful killer spree actually doesn’t care about peace or kindness unless it’s convenient to bring it up. Sure, he poured tea for people once in a while. Sure, he has taken up Iroh’s example and he may become an even better person in the future.

But the Zuko we saw in the show? He’s not changed nearly as much as people want to think he has. His redemption was supposed to be about how he learned better, how he became a good person, and how he’s the ideal Fire Lord for a Fire Nation headed for peace: do excuse me for questioning that, considering that the comics got their start with a trilogy where Zuko was charging against the Earth Kingdom all over again, as if his speech to Ozai had been hollow because here we are again, Fire Nation vs. Earth Kingdom. Who learned anything from the 100 Year War? Not Zuko!

All talk about Zuko’s kindness and good heart isn’t completely unfounded, but the show never developed his best traits the way it was supposed to. And the thousands of times where he shows no kindness, no mercy, where he chooses violence over peace, speak much louder than the handful of times where he decided to do the right thing, for a change. Especially when the merciless, violent stuff happens after he’s supposed to be all redeemed. Zuko’s growth was nowhere near as brilliantly executed as so many people would like to believe. Switching sides while barely changing your behavior and responses to situations is merely switching sides. It’s not a full-blown redemption, let alone is it one based on how compassionate and nice he’s become.

#markhamillz #... I ranted again #I did not mean to #crap

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fandom-rants · 7 years ago

Text

STOP MAKING TERRA THE BAD GUY, AQUA STANS

I hate even dipping my toes into the Kingdom Hearts fandom, because for some reason, this site snuggles the poorly-written female characters (Kairi, Xion, etc.) and plotlines and practically deifies the more well-written ones (Aqua even more than Namine). But the worst are the Terr*qua fans. I mean, so many people like this pairing, and yet even those who do like it also like to make Terra seem like the failure of the two.

Specifically, the two must overcome the damage between them caused by Terra.

Um, what?

What?

By the way, my bitterness and anger over this got long.

First, they give Aqua a free pass for spying on Terra. As if that’s okay. As if she’s right to do so. Let me tell you: spying on a loved one is never okay. Are your parents spying on you? Doubt you’d think that’s okay. Your boyfriend or girlfriend? Beyond not okay! But Aqua spying on Terra? Perfectly acceptable, for some reason. And Terra getting angry about it? “He could have handled it better.” An actual quote from a Terr*qua fan. An actual quote.

By the way, Ven was “insulting her” when he called her awful for spying on Terra. To these people Ven was a bad guy in this situation. My brain can’t even wrap itself around this. Ven, the child of pure light, calling Aqua’s spying awful. Was the rude one. (Someone even mentioned him calling her awful and said “yikes.” WHAT.)

And please. Please. Any of these Aqua stans. Go ahead and find a single instance of Aqua saying something nice about Terra to Terra’s face. Go ahead.

Go ahead.

I’ll wait.

Because there isn’t one.

Every time Aqua stands in front of Terra, she degrades him. She calls him a failure, says she’s heard of the awful stuff he’s done, says he’ll fail to defeat the darkness. Not once does she show him she has any sort of faith in him.

Oh, and when not talking to Terra? She still shows no faith in who he is.

Nope.

All she shows faith in is her belief that he’ll become who she wants him to be. The only time we get something nice from her is when she agrees with Eraqus to spy on Terra and bring him back should he start to fall to darkness. She says, and I quote, “Only this time, he’ll show you he has what it takes to be a Master. He’s not as weak as you think.” How nice. Only she just promised to spy on him and bring him back, so...? Where’s the faith in him there, exactly?

As for practically every other time in the game, save the short moment she defends Terra to Ven in Enchanted Dominion? Ew. Just ew. Don’t believe me? Let’s look at some of these quotes.

Sounds kinda nice, right? He’ll be all right. He won’t give in to it. He’ll find a way to become better than he is. It may be there, but he’ll overcome. Sounds nice... until you realize it’s on the expectation that he change, that he suppress or deny that part of himself. Then it starts sounding a little... ew.

I actually have two problems with this one. One: Terra asked her to convey his thanks, but instead Aqua makes it about her and does not pass his words along. Two: her “thanks for teaching Terra he needs to keep believing.” Thanks for teaching Terra something I, Aqua, already knew, and he needed to learn. Thanks for helping him start to change.” Again, it may seem nice until you realize she’s still thinking he isn’t good enough as he is.

This continues ad nauseum, because Aqua has taken everything Eraqus says and believes to heart, and she doesn’t question it. Ever. So when Terra, who is so good he gets tricked easier than Ven, fails due to “being unable to control his darkness,” she thinks in Eraqus’ terms, that Terra needs to get rid of said darkness and tamp it down. He must get rid of a part of who he is. She and Eraqus both teach Terra that who he is isn’t good enough if there’s darkness in him.

Do you know who never does that? Who always accepts Terra, darkness and all, and loves him simply for who he is, no questions asked? VENTUS. Only Ventus. And unfortunately, everyone’s too busy trying to put him in a protective bubble to listen. And yes, I include Terra in that list. But let’s move on.

We then get Aqua defending Terra to Ven, which is great! I loved that reaction. But then it’s immediately followed up with her doubting, just as Ven did. Only she never stops doubting. Even though Maleficent, in her next breath, admits to knowing Xehanort, thus potentially learning of keyblades from him. And it’s not like Aqua herself doesn’t demand to know what Xehanort told Maleficent, or tell Maleficent to stop lying (another moment I loved). But no! No, it must have been because Terra really did help Maleficent out of his own free will. Which she must believe enough, or else she never would have pulled that shitty line on him in Radiant Garden. Sigh.

The sad thing is, I liked Aqua in Enchanted Dominion. Okay, so I wasn’t a fan of her “Terra, you better stay strong for me,” but that was because I was already prejudiced against her making his struggle about her, and already hated how she acted as if he wasn’t strong enough already. (Another thing that carries through her entire playthrough.) But this wasn’t bad. She’d continued believing in him... I’d thought.

But unless you want me ranting for decades, I won’t even TOUCH on Radiant Garden. Suffice it to say that she was awful and let’s move on.

No. Seriously. Spying on someone? Saying to Maleficent that you believe in him and then turning right around and throwing Maleficent’s accusations into his face? Having an accusing tone the moment he insinuates there’s something big happening and Ven needs to stay safe? Not even talking to him first? If that’s not awful to Terr*qua fans, then I just don’t know what to say. Enjoy unhealthy relationships, but don’t pretend Terra was the one in the wrong here.

Olympus Coliseum? She was happy because she thought Terra had “triumphed over the darkness,” which meant he wasn’t “spineless.” Again with him needing to become better. Again with the whole light = strong, darkness = weak; Terra must prove he’s strong enough to be good enough. (Wonder where that issue of his with strength came from? Who knows? It’s such a mystery.)

At this point, Aqua is surprised at every turn when she actually hears something nice Terra said or did. Terra fought against the darkness? Crazy! He said a friend made his Wayfinder charm? I thought him the type to drop me like a rock when I did something heinous! (Maybe he should have; what she did was pretty horrible-)

OH WAIT.

OH, NO.

BECAUSE THIS IS WHAT SHE ACTUALLY SAID WHEN SHE HEARD TERRA SAID THE WAYFINDER WAS MADE FOR HIM BY A FRIEND:

WHAT?!?!

Did she just act like he was the one who’d acted unacceptably, like he was the one who’d nearly destroyed their friendship - like he was in danger of being lost, but if he still think she’s his friend, then he’s okay??? As if, if he stopped being her friend after the stunt she pulled in Radiant Garden, he would clearly have fallen to darkness?? BY NOT BEING HER FRIEND AND ACCEPTING HER SPYING AND ACCUSATIONS?!?!?! Oh ho ho ho no, I am not okay with that. At all.

(Neverland hardly mentioned Terra at all, and I know I’m getting pithy here but if people want to jump Terra’s shit for thinking he could take on Xehanort and Vanitas by himself, then Aqua deserves the same level of fish-eye because she thinks she can beat Vanitas. In fact, she fights him twice, and both times thinks she beat him even though she didn’t even come close. Don’t talk smack about Terra without holding your female fave up to the same stark lighting.)

(I’m not sure how to take her whole “one keyblade is enough for any friendship thing,” because does she think her becoming master and not him made him fall into darkness? Because he already had darkness, or else he would’ve been made a master. And he’d never brought up any feelings of anger or jealousy over her becoming master, so...??? Where is this even coming from???)

Then we get the usual denial that Terra did something horrible, this time with her denying Yen Sid’s words that Terra killed Eraqus. But then she backflips once again and says this:

So much for not believing him capable of killing Eraqus, eh? And then, of course, she goes to the Keyblade Graveyard and once again rags on Terra to his face. Wonderful. Maybe, just maybe, Aqua stans, she’s not nearly as perfect as you make her out to be.

Look. Aqua isn’t a bad person. But her entire story was one in which she needed to learn some things. That light isn’t all good. That light can’t get rid of darkness. That love defeats darkness. She had to come to terms with her self-righteousness (though she didn’t, even at the end) and accept that what she’d been taught might have been wrong. (Something the Fairy Godmother herself started teaching her.)

Love conquering darkness. This is the thing she learns only in the Final Episode, when she goes after Terranort. Until then, she hounds Terra’s every step, saying he’s done awful things, saying he’ll fall to darkness because it’s nothing but hatred and rage and he’s bound to fall again - she shows no faith in him, no trust. Even though Cinderella taught Terra that simply having faith was enough to banish the darkness, she fails to have faith in him. Huh.

Look. Like Aqua if you want - I do, when I’m not seeing the drivel on this site. Like Terr*qua if you want, though, ugh, talk about a giant ‘no, thank you’ from me on that one. I don’t think I have a bigger NOTP in any fandom anywhere, ever. But acting as if Aqua did no wrong, that Terra was the one messing everything up, is just disgusting. Hell! Say they were both in the wrong, even though Terra, throughout the game, was being manipulated, used, and abused. Go ahead! (Even though that’s gross, too.) But Aqua isn’t perfect, and it’s about time you stans, especially you terr*qua stans, started facing that fact.

#what? a female character with flaws? who isn't perfect? who hurts those she loves?#IMPOSSIBURU #anti aqua #even though i'm just pointing out a couple of her flaws but okay whatever #anti fandom #kingdom hearts rant #anti terr*qua #like. people. you don't understand.#I LIKE S*KAI MORE THAN I LIKE TERR*QUA #and it SUCKS because i love terra but terr*qua fans have TAKEN OVER that tag #and it makes me want to vomit #i HATE that pairing #HATE IT #NOTPx10000000 #feel free to block me #but sending hate or pro-terr*qua shit on this will make me mock you and block you #so don't even get me going any further than you people already have

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