#I know my experience is fairly unique

[bisexualseraphim]

Also, I refuse to entertain the discourse as to whether acespec people are “oppressed” or not, but I will say it’s really fucking lonely — especially if you fall somewhere on the spectrum that’s a little more unconventional.

I’ve discussed many times before how I feel absolutely no attraction whatsoever except towards my lovely partner. I went through the phases queer men tend to: exploring many types of pornography and cruising on Grindr. I really tried, and none of it has ever done anything for me. It wasn’t until I started having sex with my partner that I realised, ohhh, so that’s how most people feel. And even then, enjoying sex with him is far more of an intimacy thing than the actual physical sensations. I do not fantasise about other people or consume porn. There is only him.

And yet when I’ve spoken about this in acespec spaces, I’m still treated as some sort of weirdo who doesn’t belong. I’ve literally been told many times that I can’t be demisexual because demis will still fantasise and consume porn (although that doesn’t line up with my understanding that demis require a close bond to feel sexual attraction, but never mind), and I’ve even been accused of having some weird internalised Christian puritan shit going on because I genuinely cannot comprehend ever looking at or thinking about someone in that way who isn’t my man. As if anything about this is a choice for me and it is offensive to them somehow. As if only feeling attraction to one person is like… “worse” than never feeling any attraction at all. I’ve never once shamed others for how they experience sex and sexual attraction and never would, yet people act like that’s what I’m inherently doing just by speaking about my own experiences.

So no, I won’t say whether acespec people are “oppressed” or not because honestly, when is this shit ever going to come up in conversation and ever be that relevant? But the fact I don’t feel I can talk about it even amongst other queer people, even amongst others in the acespec community, kind of speaks for itself.

Being a queer man who can’t relate to all the stereotypes and anecdotes about enjoying casual sex is one type of loneliness. Being a queer acespec man who can’t even relate to most others in the acespec community is another. I can never win, and either way I do not fit in.

[conidiophore]

My favorite activity to do with friends is to have a sleepover where there's only one bed (it's a trope for a reason) and the room is cold enough that huddling is necessary. There's a specific kind of excitement that takes over when two people have their faces inches apart and are trying not to make it obvious that the closeness is all they can think about, and the tension of trying to decide if making the first move is going to make it weird. When things reach the "you know, you can touch me anywhere..." or "would you rub my back for a little while" stage, things can get extremely hard to ignore... An especially enjoyable thing for me is extending this tense, touch-nervous period until the other person is struggling to keep their breathing even. Knowing I have control over the effect I have on someone else just from being close in a way that they might be into is something that Greatly Effects me.

Stray brushes to sensitive places (upper/inner thigh is my favorite, but the back, lower part of the ribs is usually ticklish enough to work well) or occasional kisses to the neck/collarbone are my gold standard tactic for leading people into deliriousness. Unfortunately for everyone I get much more turned on when nothing goes anywhere, especially when social expectations make it difficult/impossible for the person to sneak away and "take care" of themselves. I vaguely introduce this well beforehand by saying like. "I'm into some weird orgasm control stuff"/"leading people on is my turn on" but I'm not sure people i do this with fully understand what i mean by that. I had someone reply by saying "who said you'd be orgasming" one time, which clearly indicated that they had a very different kind of interpretation of those phrases than I did. Oh well.

[babooshka-yah-yahs-wife]

🌊

[captain-athos]

on progress and tradition in Conclave, or: why I don't refer to Vincent as a "liberal" or "progressive" pope.

I've seen posts comparing lots of different characters in Conclave but I've not yet seen one talk about Bellini and Tedesco. The entire Conclave is divided between the progressives and the traditionalists, between liberal and conservative, and ultimately neither of those things is actually presented as the solution. Like I know that it is more comfortable to headcanon Vincent as a "liberal" Pope but aside from his denouncement of Tedesco's comments (and, I suppose his assertion that he doesn't care for tradition if it stands in the way of serving the people of the church), we actually don't get a solid look at what Vincent's politics even are. More on this later.

I've seen plenty of talk about Tedesco's dogwhistles re: his comments on the latin liturgy and his remarks about Adeyemi, but on the flip side of this I've seen less acknowledgement of Bellini's "common sense approach" which I also find really interesting. Because common sense is really not all that common at all, and while his supporters will know what he means, Bellini uses language that is at best vague with regards to his intended policies, and ultimately frames his standpoint as "everything Tedesco does not." I also especially enjoyed the part in the book where he and his supporters tried to actually articulate what increasing the participation of women in the curia might look like, and weren't able to find a way to do so. I mean, nuns come into the auditorium while Bellini is making this point and everybody acts like they're making some huge imposition on the Important Man Talk until Lawrence, the only one who acknowledges them, says thank you.

Tedesco is equally ineffective, and for the same reasons. He and Bellini operate on a surface level, reactionary approach to their politics. They are the equivalent of slapping a band-aid on the problem. Tedesco sees that there is division in the college of cardinals, and he's right! They are a divided, petty, gossiping, politics-and-ego-driven group. He's noticed that the increased diversity has led to everybody sticking with their countrymen, and has concluded that the problem is diversity.

But the problem, in my opinion, is a layer deeper than this. We have diversity, but within the framework of an organisation that still favours eurocentrism, that is still built on centuries of ingrained, systemic racism. This beautiful Adeyemi-centric fic "although the virgin is white, paint me black angels - for they too go to heaven (all of the good black angels)" touches on this. Shoehorning a wider range of cultures into a church that was not built with their unique experiences and perspectives in mind is not addressing the underlying problem! We see this in hollywood all the time: thoughtless, arbitrary representation does very little to help marginalised people! And therein lies the issue: All of the changes that Tedesco and Bellini want to make do not address the fact that they operate in a church that systemically allows for, and in many ways nurtures discrimination, corruption, and abuse.

Furthermore, Bellini is a classic liberal, but in the way that liberals often struggle to enter into any sort of genuine conflict, and are largely concerned with appearances and messaging rather than action. Imo that's what makes him so reluctant to admit his interest in the papacy, and also what makes it so easy for him to bow out and move his support to Tremblay. He is, at heart, a coward with a fairly malleable adherence to his values, because it's the appearance of them and not the action that counts. He doesn't want to be seen seeking out the papacy. His meetings discuss the optics of the votes, of his policies, of the current standings of the top candidates. To cover his involvement with Tremblay's simony he grasps for excuses - he doesn't want to be the Richard Nixon of popes. He doesn't want to damage the reputation of the curia. It's all about optics, and while Lawrence does voice his discomfort with this as a priority, it's Vincent's gentle questioning that puts everything back into perspective. "You want me to vote for a man you see as ambitious?"

So where does this leave Vincent? I do believe that there are values that he would share with people like Bellini. But if we were to call him liberal or progressive, that defeats the purpose of him being there at all. Why not elect Bellini then? What's the narrative purpose of Vincent's character even existing?

Here's what I believe: he is the secret third thing. He is hope. He is faith. He is the possibility of forward momentum that has thus far not been considered. This is really hard to engage with in a fanwork or even as a writer though, because to me he represents the undiscovered! (however, there is a delightful fic series called "It’s Vincent And His Baseball Bat Against This Transitory Period" which touches on some smaller scale post-election possibilities I have had a great time reading about)

I mean, what would dismantling the power imbalances and abuse and corruption holding up the church look like? Would the church even survive something like that? That's the slow, slow work of so many lifetimes, and we don't even know what it could look like yet. What we do know is that Vincent would be up for it. In the book he actually refuses outright to indicate which "side" of the political spectrum he falls on, but he does tell Lawrence that he actually doesn't give a fuck if his actions do "ruin" the church - when Lawrence tells him to vote for Tremblay lest there be repercussions, even another schism... Vincent doesn't care! He remains steadfast that he will vote for whomever he deems most worthy.

I'm pretty critical of the Catholic church in general so do I personally think that this is a realistic hope that we end on? Not really. Vincent would get eaten alive. If we were being real, the papacy would kill him, I think. Being the pope is fucking brutal. But I don't think that's the point of Conclave anyway. By design, we very specifically never see Vincent as Pope. So I can respect the place he inhabits in the narrative. A pope whose hope for the future comes from the space between certainties.

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

AITA for buying plus-sized clothes at second hand shops?

I'm a fairly big girl - about six feet and rather wide. I also love wearing unique clothes and I always get happy when I see something fun my size when I visit second hand shops because the mass produced clothes aren't always very fun for plus sized women. I never saw a problem with that, but lately my friend started questioning me.

We went shopping together and I found a blouse that fit my wide shoulders perfectly. My friend said "are you sure you REALLY want to buy that?" and I asked what was wrong. she said that perhaps a trans woman would want to buy it, but I took the only one? It was cute and feminine, and as hard it is for me to find nice clothes my size, it must be even harder for trans women, especially quite and girly ones. "A trans girl could have found that and it could have given her euphoria, but now you will basically steal it from her. Do you really want that on your conscience?" I said that she couldn't know whether another potential buyer would be a trans woman or cis like me, but she said this wasn't exactly the first time this would happen since I often buy my clothes at second hand shops.

Basically, I ruin the supply by buying clothes, and it's a bummer for me that it's hard finding clothes, but I should consider myself privileged even so. That expressing oneself is more important to trans people. I just don't know. I think she has a point, but it feels weird to cater my shopping experience to potential people.

[sabertoothwalrus]

I'm going to think out loud about the dungeon meshi ages for a sec

I'm going to preface this by saying that this is based on my existing knowledge, and fact checking is difficult because there is A LOT of contentious research out there.

First of all, I think a lot of people come at this from a modern lens, forgetting the context that this is fantasy medieval era. this is fiction. on top of that, this is specifically Ryoko Kui's understanding of medieval era aging. plus fantasy. So before anyone comes at me with a bunch of 'ermmmm actualy's just consider that I don't really care and also it might not matter in this context lol

as far as the "age of maturity" assigned for each race, something I don't see many people talk about is that "teenagers" are a fairly recent concept. For a long time, you were either considered A Kid or Not A Kid. but this doesn't necessarily mean kids were more/less developed then, just our cultural expectations for certain age groups have changed.

Laios says the age of maturity for tallmen is 16. I don't think that means 16 year olds in the dungeon meshi universe are necessarily "more mature" than modern 16 year olds, but moreso that they have more responsibilities. However, things like medicine, smoking, drinking, sun exposure, physical activity, etc all affect age, so it's possible that developmentally they're closer to modern 18 year olds? Izutsumi is 17 (less than two weeks from turning 18, actually), and very much acts like a modern 17 year old.

The age of maturity for half-foots is 14. Chilchuck was 13 when he got married and had his first two children. Even though, at age 29, he's the equivalent of a modern 50 year old, I don't think he was That much more developed at 13 than a tallman. I think if half-foot 14 is equal to tallman 16, then Chilchuck was Pretty Damn Young for a parent LMAO. Even if you're generous and say tallman 16 is a modern 18, he still would've been younger than that.

The long-lived races are interesting. Marcille is obviously a unique case, and not a lot of this applies to her. We do know what Senshi was like as a minor (miner, lol), and he seemed like a modern 15ish, considering he was 36 and dwarf maturity is 40. I think it'd be really interesting to delve into how a culture functions with people being developmentally adolescent for soooooo long. Imagine middle school lasting 20 years. that would fucking suck. I suppose it makes sense why long-lived races are so patronizing.

Moving onto lifespans, I want to emphasize that they're average lifespans. Even in the manga, they say some half-foots live to 100, it's just rare. So it's less that a tallman 60 year old is "older" than a modern 60 year old, it's that it's easier to keep people alive for longer nowadays. Modern medicine is a BIG contributor. Dental health as well, considering how much your health is affected by your diet (and how much the action of chewing alone aids in digestion). Curious to know what the FUCK elven dentistry is like.

It also makes me wonder if half-foots would have a longer average lifespan if they weren't like, used for bait and treated so poorly, but half-foot 29 does seem to be middle-aged for half-foots. so who knows!

In that vein, I don't know if I can see Mithrun quite making it to 400 😬 like, his experience as a dungeon lord took a lot out of him quite literally, and he's doing exceptionally well despite it! I imagine he'd eventually start to develop a lot of heart problems if he doesn't have them already. Perhaps early-onset dementia. His memory seems still quite intact (he corrects Kabru on his story's accuracy) and he doesn't act like, lobotomized. He doesn't seem forgetful or confused, and he has a sense of humor/sarcasm still. It's mostly his task initiation that's been affected.

I almost want to say that mana affinity could affect long-lived races' lifespans, except dwarves have very poor tolerance for mana, so it's probably not that.

okay anyway I didn't really have a point to this post so I'm just gonna end my rambling here

[yumeka-sxf]

Japanese Linguistic Observations in Spy x Family - part 1

This is a post series I've been planning for a while and I've finally had the time to complete part 1! 😃 I may have mentioned here before that I got my B.A. in Japanese/East Asian Studies, and even though I'm not fluent, I know the linguistics of the language fairly well. So I thought it would be fun to examine the interesting aspects of the Japanese version of the SxF manga that aren't reflected in the English translation. It might also be an informative experience for those who don't know any Japanese to learn a bit about the language through SxF! I'll try not to get too technical with the linguistics and keep my explanations at a beginner's level.

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Part 1 - Twilight's "honne and tatemae"

One of the main themes in SxF is how many of the characters have secrets they want to hide, so they act a certain way in front of others in order to mask their true selves. Japanese has a word for this phenomena called 本音と建前 ("honne and tatemae").

I remember learning about the concept of "honne and tatemae" during my Japanese college studies – a quick google search will yield a lot of publications on the topic and its relation to Japanese culture in particular. While the idea of hiding one's true intentions behind a fake facade can exist anywhere and is not something unique to Japan, it is enough of an occurrence in Japanese culture that there are specific words for it. The Wiki article has a basic but good definition of honne and tatemae, to quote:

A person's honne may be contrary to what is expected by society or what is required according to one's position and circumstances, and they are often kept hidden, except with one's closest friends. Tatemae is what is expected by society and required according to one's position and circumstances, and these may or may not match one's honne. In many cases, tatemae leads to outright telling of lies in order to avoid exposing the true inward feelings.

Sounds very much like the characters in SxF, doesn't it? Twilight especially, because unlike other characters like Yor and Anya, who simply have secrets they need to keep but don't create fake personas for themselves, Twilight does – the cheerful, friendly Loid Forger is a different person from the cold, calculating Twilight after all. Also unlike Yor and Anya, who speak the same way consistently no matter who they're talking to, Twilight uses different speech levels depending on which persona he's using and who he's talking to.

There are many different levels of speech in Japanese, ranging from super formal to totally crude. These speech levels are distinguished mostly by the pronouns the speaker chooses to use for themselves and who they're speaking to, as well as how they choose to conjugate the words they use. For example, 座ってください (suwatte kudasai), 座って (suwatte,) and 座れ (suware) all mean "sit," as in, telling someone to sit down. But the tone being conveyed is different: the first one is polite, the second one is casual, and the last one could be seen as rude if you're not using it with a close friend/family member.

As Twilight, he uses casual speech with the masculine and less polite pronoun 俺 or オレ (ore). This is the speech he uses when talking to a fellow spy like Fiona, and for his own inner thoughts.

As Loid Forger, he uses the polite 敬語 (keigo) speech, which is basically comprised of using the -ます (-masu) conjugation for verbs and the "to be" verb です (desu). He also uses the pronoun ボク or 僕 (boku), which is the standard male pronoun and more polite than "ore." He uses keigo to address pretty much everyone who doesn't know his true identity. When talking to a higher-up like Sylvia, he'll still use "ore" but will use polite speech instead of casual speech.

Anya is an exception to this: with her, he uses his most casual speech, the same as he uses with Franky.

I discussed a bit about this in part 24 of my Twiyor analysis posts, but this could be because Anya is a little kid, so he doesn't feel the need to put on any airs with her (same with Bond, whom he also uses casual speech with).

An interesting side note is that, as a child, Twilight used the pronoun "boku" but then changed to "ore" as soon as he became an adult/soldier.

Another aspect of keigo, besides using the more polite forms of pronouns and verb conjugations, is putting the honorific さん (san) after people's names. Twilight does this all the time with Yor, as she does with him. However, he switches to casual speech and drops the "san" part in her name when addressing her in front of people who (supposedly) believe they're a real married couple, such as Yuri and Fiona – because it would be weird for a real couple who have been married for a year to address each other in such a formal way, especially the husband. In the below panel when Fiona visits them, he's calling her "Yor" instead of "Yor-san" and using casual speech instead of keigo.

Oddly in these situations, while he uses just "Yor" when addressing her directly, he still calls her "Yor-san" when talking about her. During Yuri's first visit for example, he calls her "Yor-san" when telling Yuri how much Anya loves her (talking to someone about her) but then calls her just "Yor" a few moments later when telling her that he'll clean up the spill (talking to her directly). It's strange to me that he wouldn't just consistently use "Yor" whether he's talking to her or about her in these situations...I'm honestly not sure if he does this intentionally or if he just slips up since he's so used to using "Yor-san" in her presence.

*UPDATE* Thank you to @dentedintheworld-blog for enlightening me with the below reply about this!

"In Japanese, when speaking to your spouse's family about your spouse, you address her/him by attaching "san" her/his name out of respect for her/his family. This is also to show her/his family that you respect your spouse. That's why Loid calls Yor with san when he talks about how much he loves Yor to Yuri."

That definitely makes sense for why Twilight switches between "Yor" and "Yor-san" in these situations.

Regardless, this is why the scene in chapter 86 is so significant – when Yor isn't present, there's no reason for him to refer to her as "Yor-san," especially in front of a fellow spy like Fiona who knows he (supposedly) shouldn't have any feelings for her. Yet, even after he just called Yuri by his full name "Yuri Briar" a moment before, he doesn't do the same for Yor and continues to call her "Yor-san" here, much to Fiona's dismay.

In the same chapter, it's also significant that he uses "ore" when addressing Yor directly in his thoughts. Even though he's not speaking out loud, I believe this is the first time he's speaking directly "to" her as Twilight and/or his true self and not as Loid Forger.

But despite all this, I think that both Loid Forger and Twilight are tatemae…they're both masks to hide the person he truly is. The person who fondly talked about his mother to Yor on the park bench, the person who genuinely expressed gratitude for her sacrifice when leaving the resort island, the person who refused to kill Yuri in a life-or-death struggle because he knew it would hurt her…that's his actual honne. But of course, the ongoing conflict of the series is that he has yet to realize this. He won't even show his honne to his closest friend, Franky. Seems like it mostly comes out in dribs and drabs during his interactions with Yor...no surprise there, lol. The man is certainly a work in progress. When he finally starts letting his "honne" show, I'm curious what form of speech he'll adopt.

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Continue to Part 2 ->

[valtsv]

Do you have any tips to get better at writing? Your word usage is so amazing. the way u describe things are so utterly unique, it’s so mesmerizing. You motivated me to write more but I want to reach your level of skill

i'll be honest, i personally find my writing to be rather subpar and lacking in the necessary technical skill to justify its overly stylised prose and excessive wordiness, so i wouldn't necessarily recommend taking inspiration from me. that being said, i'm my own worst critic and i am very flattered that my writing resonates so strongly with you. i'm not a professional writer, so i can't offer much in the way of advice beyond what has, through trial and error and years of practice, worked for me.

something that people often point out to me when complimenting my writing is that i have a rather lyrical style, which i can see. i try to pay attention to the way that words flow together - which words best complement one another - and choose how to structure and order sentences based on that. i do have a fairly extensive vocabulary thanks to reading a lot from a young age, but i also frequently make use of the thesaurus (my most dearly beloved). obviously, trying to beef up your writing by simply using more obscure words that you found in a book will come across as clumsy, and detract from your writing rather than enhancing it, but if you learn how to stitch words together in a way that has a pleasing ear or mouthfeel, you can mitigate that somewhat, and even make it part of your repertoire of skills.

speaking of vocabulary, the more expansive it becomes, the more doors it opens to you in terms of what you can write and how you can write it. this is pretty straightforward common sense stuff, but you'd be surprised by how effective is if you actually start paying attention to it. likewise with grammar. not everything you write needs to sound like it was written for a sophisticated publication in a well-respected 19th century newsletter, but if you read widely and often, you'll find that your understanding of just how many ways the scaffolding of phrasing and punctuation can be used to support incredible linguistic architecture there are grows immensely, and start seeing opportunities to make all these little adjustments and additions and substitutions that enhance your work's overall presentation.

with regard to the above, i'd also recommend considering how you want your audience to feel. you can alter a reader's entire undercurrent of sensational experience simply by changing a few words, according to whatever emotional (or even more primal) response you intend to provoke. you can also mix your palettes, and flirt with crossing the wires (horror tinged with eroticism and vice versa, fantasy with a dose of down-to-earth pragmatism, tragicomedy, and so on). the more you experiment, the more your confidence will grow, and your skills begin to take shape, from crude instruments to refined, specialised tools.

one word of caution i'd offer you, based on my own shortcomings, is that my style of writing does very much neglect realistic-sounding dialogue. the way that i write and the way human beings talk to one another clashes without much grace or redemptive quality (at least in my opinion), and i have yet to find a satisfactory solution to this. i'll let you know if i ever figure it out.

[charliedawn]

Hi Charlie! Kindly coming into your ask box- First of all how are you? I adore your stories, I read them whenever I'm feeling down and it's perfect whenever I want to forget about my real life problems haha.

I was wondering how would the slashers react to a Hungarian y/n? Obviously I never found anyone writing about this scenario, for we 'hungries' are few. I'm actually Székely (Hungarians who speak the older version of the language and live in a different region than actual Hungarians), which means I'm Transylvanian. Like how would they react finding out that reader can literally move around with a bottle of alcohol on their head without it sliding off? Having long hair that is traditionally braided in two, and red ribbons braided in it (this is female case, which means the girl is 'on the market'), being able to speak multiple languages, meeting bears every single month given living in forest mountains, and owning traditional clothes that in old times mean high status? I'm sorry that this sounds so personal but like all my life (ever since I found out about slashers) I wanted to know how one might react to this kind of situation, given most fandoms, OBVIOUSLY include English reader. You can ignore if you want and sorry if u don't understand what I wrote :')

If you don't want to write for this (like I feel like I'm being too specific and personal with things) then I guess how they would react to reader with an interesting accent- all my English friends told me they love how I speak it's funny for them. Sending hugs and kisses I adore ur work <3

No need to apologize ! My pleasure. This is a really unique and interesting request, and I had fun searching what a Székely reader would be like. I hope I did it right. 😆

Slashers React to a Székely Reader

Jason Voorhees

Jason, being deeply connected to his own forested home, would be fascinated by your experiences with bears. He’s used to dealing with intruders, but meeting a bear every month ? That’s next-level survival. He’d probably view you as someone incredibly strong and capable, which earns you a lot of respect in his eyes. Your ability to balance a bottle on your head would both impress and confuse him—he’d tilt his head like how ? He is a clumsy man and if he tried the same, no bottle would survive. If you let him touch your traditional clothes, he’d be extra careful, appreciating the craftsmanship and the colors.

Michael Myers

Michael doesn’t react outwardly, but he watches. A lot. He’d probably test your balancing skills by suddenly throwing something your way while you’re carrying the bottle. If you catch it without dropping the bottle, you’d get a slow approving nod. He might also silently grab a red ribbon from your hair, just to see how you react—if you snatch it back, he’ll keep doing it just to mess with you. But, he would also appreciate the traditions and understand your connection to nature—since nature is fairly important to him as well. If you could, he would ask you to learn the language. True, he would not be able to speak it—but just hearing it would make him happy. He would also ask you to teach him your traditional dishes.

Brahms Heelshire

Brahms would fixate on your braids and ribbons. He’d like the idea of your clothes being a ‘status’ marker since Brahms is from a higher-class family himself. But the ribbons…he would like them, but might get possessive, asking you to remove the ribbons or change their color so others don’t think you’re ‘on the market.’ Because you are not. You are HIS friend. No sharing or letting someone take you away from him. He’d also adore your ability to speak multiple languages, insisting you talk to him in Hungarian just so he can hear how it sounds. Your traditional clothes ? He’d want you to wear them all the time in the manor, seeing them as regal and elegant.

Bo & Vincent Sinclair

Bo would act like he’s unimpressed but would secretly be very intrigued. He’d tease you about the bottle-balancing trick—"Alright, but can ya do that while runnin’ ?"—but would absolutely brag about it to tourists before luring them into his trap. He would show them your trick and kill them while they are dumbstruck. Or he would ask you to bring his beers like that—and exclusively like that. And when he first saw you in your traditional clothes ? He was mesmerised. You looked like a damn princess. When you told him what the braids and ribbons meant though…Bo suddenly grabbed your braids and quickly pulled your braids loose…On the market ? Like hell you are…

Vincent, on the other hand, would love your traditional clothes. He’d want to sketch you in them, fascinated by the detail and historical meaning behind them. He would love to take pictures of you too. He would ask you about your culture and be really interested. He would also be impressed by the bottle trick and would immediately inform Bo because Bo would be impressed too for sure.

Norman Bates

Norman would see you as someone from another world—elegant, mysterious, and old-fashioned in the best way. He’d be captivated by your hair and the meaning behind the ribbons, maybe a little too curious about your availability status. If you ever wear your traditional clothes, he’d compare you to an old painting, romanticizing it. Your survival stories about the mountains and bears would leave him both impressed and slightly intimidated.

Norman *comes up behind you and slowly wraps his arms around you from behind* : "…Te vagy gyönyörű, drágám."

He would learn the recipes for Székely Gulyás (Székely stew), Puliszka (A cornmeal dish similar to polenta, eaten with cheese, milk, or stew) and Töltött Káposzta (Stuffed cabbage, a staple at Székely celebrations) to surprise you.

Freddy Krueger

Freddy would not take you seriously at first—until he sees the bottle trick. Then, suddenly, he’s got a new game to play. He’d try to mess with you by making dream versions of your traditional clothes wrong just to see if you notice the inaccuracies. He’d also probably joke about the bears—"So, what, you got one as a pet ?" If you start speaking Hungarian with him, though ? He’d hate it—he loves running his mouth, and now he doesn’t know what you’re saying. He would have to get a dictionary. He doesn’t like reading.

Pennywise & Penny

Pennywise would see you as someone tied to old traditions, which he respects in a strange way. He’d enjoy the idea of you carrying history with you. Penny, on the other hand, would love that you meet bears regularly—he’d probably insist that the next time you see one, you have to bring him along. The bottle-balancing trick ? Oh, now it’s a game. He’d try to distract you just to see if you mess up.

Penny would definitely imitate you and laugh as he starts dancing with three bottles on his head.

Jack Torrance

Jack would instantly bond with you over alcohol—if you can balance a bottle on your head, you must know good drinks, right ? He’d want to drink with you, hear your stories, and maybe even try balancing a bottle himself (bad idea). Your language skills would impress him, but he’d be especially curious about your encounters with bears—probably comparing it to his experiences in the snowy Overlook. He would also use you as an inspiration for his work and ask you questions about your traditions. He would also be interested in learning your language.

Ghostface! Eddie Munson

Eddie would be so hyped about your skills. "Dude, that’s metal as hell ! You walk around with a bottle on your head and survive bear encounters ? Like…what ?" He’d immediately ask you to teach him your language, failing horribly but loving every second. Your traditional clothes would remind him of a fantasy character, and he’d start calling you things like “the warrior queen of Transylvania.” He’d also be obsessed with the fact that you speak multiple languages—every time you switch to Hungarian, he’d dramatically pretend to swoon.

You: "A mosolyod beragyogja a napomat."

Him *looking at you with a big smile* : "I didn’t understand a single word that just came out of your mouth, but I love it."

[tyrantisterror]

So...

...your favorite book about mystery solving teens in a wizard school turns out to have been written by a bigot who actively funneled her ludicrous wealth into the political campaign of several like-minded bigots in order to make the United Kingdom even more hostile towards trans people than it already was. Worse, this is only the latest and most egregious bullet point in a long pattern of bigoted behavior, and one that only serves to underline what people have been telling you for years: you cannot support the Harry Potter franchise without also supporting repugnant bigotry.

And that sucks! I get it, dude, I really do, it sucks hardcore, because that series was part of your childhood, man! I, too, am a millennial, a child of the 90's. I understand what the heights of Harry Potter mania were like. I went to midnight book release parties at Barnes and Noble, I saw the movies on opening day. I had the incomparable experience of having that book series grow up with me - beginning as fairly childish stories fit for an eleven year old, and slowly getting more mature and complex with each entry. I understand how important the fantasy of a place like Hogwarts is - of going somewhere that values your weirdness, your oddity, your desire to see the world differently. A place where being an oddball and a weirdo with your head in the clouds is the norm, where you're surrounded by other people who want to see magic in the world. I understand why you don't want to give that up.

The bad news is that you have to. I'm sorry, there's no excuses anymore, and honestly, there haven't really been any for a long time. The best you can do is argue ignorance, and if your best defense is "Well I'm a dummy who never reads the news ever," well, that's not a great place to be in your life, is it?

The good news, my friends, is that giving up Harry Potter does not mean you have to give up having a multi-book series about mystery-solving teens attending a school for wizards in a world filled with magical beasts and dark secrets. Take my hand, friends. It's time we left the grade school bullshit of Hogwarts and went off to college together. Follow me to the Academy of Applied Arcana and Magic...

...and let me tell you about Wizard School Mysteries.

A BEGINNER'S GUIDE TO WIZARD SCHOOL MYSTERIES: THE NICOTINE PATCH FOR YOUR HARRY POTTER ADDICTION

Wizard School Mysteries is a series of novels about eight students attending a prestigious wizard college called the Academy of Applied Arcana and Magic, or the AAAM for short. These eighteen year old sleuths end up encountering all sorts of mysterious and deadly plots while trying to complete their studies, from unexplained disappearances to lethally-sabotaged sporting events, and even to outright unkillable monsters stalking campus and preying upon its students. By pooling their unique talents and perspectives, our eight meddlesome youths uncover the perpetrators of these plots and save the day, all while slowly unraveling the threads of a far greater scheme lurking behind the scenes.

Our protagonist is James Chaucer, a bespectacled wizard boy with shaggy black hair who escapes from an abusive home to begin studying magic at the AAAM. A chance encounter with a fortune teller on the road sucks him into the center of a prophecy that James is slowly realizing may be a much bigger deal than he initially believed. While generally even-tempered and unflappable, James has a tendency to overwork himself severely when trying to right wrongs, and is unyielding in his pursuit of justice and the truth.

Or, as one fan of this series said, "He's like if Harry Potter actually believed in something!"

James Chaucer is also a trans man, and his identity as a trans person is important to the plot - in fact, the first book's resolution would not be possible if James Chaucer was cis. This isn't a "oh there's totally representation in my wizard book series, you just have to read a tweet to know it's there!" thing, it's a part of the explicit text.

James's first friend is a goofy and kind-hearted wizard named Ivan Muromets. Coming from a poor home, Ivan is ignorant of a lot of things and often quick to call himself stupid, but his innocence also allows him to think up solutions and ideas that wouldn't occur to other people. He's a steadfast friend of James, and willing to give everyone the benefit of the doubt no matter how often he gets burned for it.

Ivan is gay, and again, this is explicit in the text. He develops a crush on another boy in the first book, and that crush turns into a relationship in the second - the first canon romantic relationship in the series, in fact. Again, not something that was hastily tweeted out, but explicit in the text itself.

He also doesn't constantly neg the source of his affection out of envy, like some characters who fill his role in other stories do constantly.

The second friend James makes on his way to the AAAM is Gretchen Pappenheimer, a well-read and highly intelligent wizard girl with curly brown hair whose vast supply of booksmarts is juxtaposed next to her relative lack of social skills. Though she can be acerbic and blunt, Gretchen proves to be every bit as loyal and caring a friend as Ivan, and her vast knowledge of obscure magic lore make her an invaluable ally to James on his journey.

Gretchen is a trans woman, which is also established early in the series itself - when James explains his situation, Gretchen comments that she has the same issue but in reverse, and her dysphoria plays a key role in the conflict of the third book. She is also black, and again, this is part of the text, not something that I arbitrarily decided to take credit for when a stage production of a semi-canonical sequel to this series cast a black woman as her in it, like certain other authors I could mention did.

Now, you may be looking at these three and thinking, "Hold on, is this JUST a Harry Potter rip off then?" If so, congrats, you fell for my bait! I purposely made the first three of our eight kids superficially resemble the famous wizard kid trio from Harry Potter to jab at the expectation that Wizard School Mysteries is just a knockoff/parody of it. But by the time you get to chapter three, you'll realize that the story goes wildly off those rails and into some very different territory indeed.

After all, I said there were eight of these meddlesome youths, not three...

The fourth member of this merry band is Margot d'Francane, a girl whose magic powers come on so strong that her body has grown far larger than is normal to accommodate it, and even then, the sheer amount of destructive magic power she constantly channels has made her left hand wither as a grisly side effect. The group's muscle, Margot is sweet, polite, and more than capable of putting even the gnarliest magic monster six feet under.

Our fifth youth is Rodrigo Cervantes, the seventh son of a nobleman and James's room-mate at the AAAM. Being the only member of the team who comes from money, Rodrigo understands fashion, wealth, and the customs of noblity that otherwise ellude his peers, which proves crucial when their rogues gallery includes at least one royal villain. Add to this his ability to scope out threats to the teams' morale and network with allies from all sorts of circles, and you have a valuable member of the Meddlesome Youths.

Rodrigo is of Arabic descent - this is, unfortunately, not stated explicitly in the text, mainly because Wizard School Mysteries takes place in a fantasy world that doesn't have our modern day countries but rather rough equivalents of them, so there's not really an elegant in-universe way to say it explicitly, but the intent is that Rodrigo is Arabic, and I have tried to establish that in ways that make sense for the setting.

The sixth student to join the team is Serena Takeuchi, a wizard whose boundless and bubbly enthusiasm is matched only by her sheer tenacity on the battlefield. With unsurpassed skill in utilizing crystals in her magic and a keen eye for figuring out the motives behind people's actions, Serena helps the team both in battles of spellcraft and of the mind.

While not explicitly stated in the text for the same reasons as Rodrigo, Serena is of Japanese descent.

Our seventh Meddlesome Youth, Charlotte Bolshe, isn't a human wizard at all, but rather an Ettercap, i.e. a kind of spider-fairy. Because if you have a fantasy series about a world of magic people that canonically has several species of non-human people who are magical, it'd be kind of weird if not a single one of them was a main character, wouldn't it? Charlotte is a sweet, compassionate soul whose effortless kindness disguises a truly cunning mind. She also has something of a Little Mermaid complex, being fascinated with humanity and envious of their ability to live in places and ways that she, as of now, cannot.

Hey. Hey, you. Yes, you, the goth girl who had a crush on Draco Malfoy when you were fifteen, and spent years arguing that he was actually misunderstood and deserved a redemption arc, only to ultimately be disappointed when J.K. Rowling gave him none of the dimensions you projected onto him and ended his character arc with the redemption equivalent of a wet fart. Do you still crave to see a blonde rival to a bespectacled wizard boy protagonist who has hidden depths and slowly but surely grows into a good person?

Well, meet Polybeus Antony. You will be annoyed by him when you first meet him. Hell, you might even hate him. But by the end of book 2, you will love him. He might even be your favorite.

And yes, he has ship tease with the other boys. THEY ALL HAVE SHIP TEASE! I TEASE ALL THE SHIPS, AND I DO IT FOR YOU, GOTH GIRLS WHO WERE INFATUATED WITH DRACO MALFOY!

...

ahem.

Of course, the core group of kids is not the sole appeal of Harry Potter, because it also has a large supporting cast of characters who are just as beloved, and Wizard School Mysteries is no different in that regard! We have wacky teachers...

...whimsical students...

...and diabolical villains...

Oh, and magical creatures, of course. Fantastic beasts, the lot of 'em.

While there are continuous plot threads and changes to the status quo that make reading the series in order necessary, each book has its own mystery that is more or less independent - i.e. you will not find, say, a redundant recurring plotline of "the Big Bad has a new evil scheme to get back his body and/or take over the world" each book, but rather new villains with their own schemes that are independent of those that came before, and new curveballs they throw at the protagonists AND the audience as a result.

For example...

Wizard School Mysteries Book 1: The Meddlesome Youths sees our heroes come together for the first time as they unwrap a scheme by wicked fairies to spirit young wizards away into Fairyland.

Wizard School Mysteries Book 2: Tournament of Death sees our heroes trying to identify the culprit behind a series of violent and, eventually, LETHAL sabotages of the participants in the school's annual spell-casting tournament.

Wizard School Mysteries Book 3: Wicked Witchcraft pits our heroes against a seemingly unkillable undead monster, while at the same time one of their own is trapped in a literal internship from Hell.

And that's just the three novels currently published! A grant total of eight Wizard School Mysteries books are planned, and as a treat, I'm going to post the in-progress covers of the remaining five entries at the end of this - though be warned, there might be slight spoilers in them.

Before that, though, there's one last question to answer: where can you buy this wonderful series?

Well, as of now, you have two options. You can find the entire series on Amazon.com, and likely will be able to do so for the forseeable future. As much as I hate to be tied to Jeff Bezos's business, at the moment it's the only site that allows me to get this book to all the members of my audience who want it for an affordable price. Until there is a better option, it's gotta stay on Amazon.

...but if you don't mind paying for shipping, I do have the ability to buy these books at production cost, i.e. without giving Amazon a cent of profit. Simply send me a DM and I'll work on getting you copies that don't put money in Bezos's coffers, then send you a bill for the price of the book + whatever shipping ends up being once I've sent them to you in the mail. I'll even autograph them for free!

Ok, time for those covers. You read? Start scrolling!

[blaithnne]

Local big sister experiences emotions, more at 6

Been wanting to do one of these with Lauren for AGES, but I never got round to it. Then I saw the Lydia and Phinium expression sheets on @littledigits’ website and I felt inspiration like never before.

The funniest struggle I have with Lauren’s design right now is that she nose too big for she got damn face. Literally, Hilda characters noses take up a fairly small portion of their faces, and her’s took up WAY too much, leaving little room for her to make facial expressions. But I struggled to find a fix because when I made the nose smaller it just didn’t look like Lauren anymore, so I took this as an opportunity to work on that!

She still has a larger nose than most characters, starting higher up (like her grandad!) and ending lower down (but not quite as low as before). I also made her eyes a little smaller and with a shape similar to Lydia’s (though you can see in some of these I hadn’t quite landed on that yet and her eyes are a bit too big), which works both as a nod to her parentage and because I think it makes the nose look bigger. This still doesn’t leave as much room for the mouth as most other characters, but that’s okay — Lauren is a very private person who keeps her feelings close to her chest, I think it works for her to have subtler expressions, adds to how guarded she is! Oh and I also updated the shape of her hair slightly, just to make it a bit more style accurate.

These changes are pretty small on their own, but I think combined they work well to make Lauren feel a lot more…alive? Far less stiff, anyway. I think she also has a more unique facial structure now, instead of just “what if Johanna was 90% nose”. She’s still got a big old nose and I love it but now she can emote, yay!

This is really all just concept stuff, I’m hoping to get a new fullbody style-ref for Lauren out soon! Now that I’ve improved the main issues I had with her face in the last ref, now it’s onto the silhouette! I want her to read as more of a strong character (though it comes across decently in her current ref, I wanna push it more without being as exaggerated as Ahlberg, which is. A challenge for me lol), streamline her silhouette, and finally make her taller than Johanna like she’s always meant to have been <3 I made her shorter for so long because I thought it would help her read better as her daughter but you know what? That’s dumb actually, she’s tall.

ANYWAYS, thank you for listening in on the annual Lauren redesign, and to the artists behind the show for posting so much amazing inspiring show stopping concept work for free because it makes my autism worse /pos

[mariacallous]

For half a millennium until the Holocaust, the cosmopolitan city of Thessaloniki, Greece, had a unique claim to fame: it was Europe’s only major city with a Jewish majority. 

But the golden age of Thessaloniki’s mostly Sephardic Ladino-speaking Jewish community came to a sudden end with the Nazi occupation of Greece in 1941 and turned cataclysmic with the deportation two years later to Auschwitz of nearly all the city’s Jews. By the end of World War II, some 65,000 Greek Jews — 87% of the total and 96% of those from Thessaloniki — had been killed, leaving barely 2,000 survivors in Thessaloniki (also known as Salonika).

Among them were the parents of Dr. Albert Bourla, a veterinarian who would go on to become the chairman and CEO of Pfizer, one of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies.

In 2022, Bourla won the Genesis Prize — often described as the Jewish Nobel — for having led the development of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine. Stan Polovets, co-founder and chairman of the Genesis Prize Foundation, said in announcing the reward, “Millions of people are alive and healthy because of what Dr. Bourla and his team at Pfizer have accomplished.”

Now, with global antisemitism at its worst levels since World War II, Bourla is about to realize another milestone: the long-awaited opening of a Holocaust Museum of Greece. 

Bourla donated the $1 million Genesis Prize money toward construction of the museum. The museum is also being funded by the Stavros Niarchos Foundation, and the governments of Greece and Germany. The management of the museum is currently trying to raise an additional $10 million.

“Those who know me know that in addition to being very proud of my Jewish heritage, I am equally proud of being Greek,” Bourla said in an emotional June 2022 speech in Jerusalem accepting the Genesis Prize. “My mother’s courage and optimism came from her experience of narrowly escaping death at the hands of the Nazis. In fact, both of my parents turned their experience surviving the Holocaust into something positive and life-affirming. This clearly shaped my worldview.”

The 9,000-square-foot museum occupying eight floors in an octagon-shaped structure will be located at the site of Thessaloniki’s Old Railway Station, where the first Nazi train carrying Jews to Auschwitz departed on March 15, 1943. 

But the museum, slated to open in 2026, won’t be just about the tragedy of the Holocaust. Exhibits and artifacts will tell the story of more than 2,300 years of Greek Jewish history in Thessaloniki and 38 other communities, beginning with the ancient Romaniote Jews who settled in Greece during the reign of Alexander the Great.

At an Oct. 29 groundbreaking ceremony in Thessaloniki, Polovets was joined by German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, Greek President Katerina Sakellaropoulou, and local dignitaries and Holocaust survivors.

“I was honored to participate and was moved by the ceremony, during which President Steinmeier said he ‘felt shame’ and that the memory of what was done to the Jewish people on this site ‘cannot be erased.’ That is why this museum is so important,” Polovets said. “The memory of this once-vibrant Greek Jewish community and its near destruction by the Nazis —  especially during the current wave of rising global antisemitism — must never be erased.”

Only about 5,000 Jews remain in Greece: About 4,000 live in Athens, and the remainder live in Thessaloniki, Ioannina, Rhodes, Corfu and other communities. Meanwhile, Greece has not been immune to the wave of antisemitism sweeping Europe. Vandalism of Jewish cemeteries and Holocaust memorials is fairly commonplace.

A 2014 global survey of antisemitism by the Anti-Defamation League found that 69% of Greeks harbor antisemitic views — the highest percentage of any country in the world outside the Middle East. While those findings are sometimes disputed, Greece continues to struggle with antisemitism. 

However, physical violence against Greek Jews is extremely rare, and the current Greek government, as well as the one that preceded it, are considered among the most pro-Israel in Europe. Greece observes International Holocaust Remembrance Day, and in 2014 the parliament outlawed Holocaust denial.

A big push for the Holocaust museum came from Thessaloniki’s former mayor, 82-year-old Yiannis Boutaris, who died on Nov. 4, less than a week after the Holocaust museum’s groundbreaking ceremony. Boutaris announced that his city would build the museum at a 2017 event attended by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other dignitaries.

“It will symbolize our shame,” Boutaris said at the time, “for what happened, for what we did, and mostly for what we could not or did not wish to do… during and after the war.”

In addition to Bourla, other famous Jews with roots in Thessaloniki include actor Hank Azaria, Israeli businessman and philanthropist Leon Recanati, his sister the philanthropist Jude Recanati, actress Lea Michele, former Nevada congresswoman Shelley Berkley and Belgian-born American fashion designer Diane von Fürstenberg. 

Polovets said Bourla’s donation aligns with the Genesis Prize Foundation’s values and mission of inspiring Jewish pride.

“With the rise of global antisemitism, education will be at the center of the museum’s activities, hosting permanent and temporary exhibitions and archives that will highlight the value of preserving the remembrance of the Holocaust, acceptance and respect for diversity, human rights, and freedom,” he said.

Polovets said he hopes the museum will inspire visitors to fight hatred from spreading today.

“Hatred in any form leads to denial, disrespect and destruction,” he said. “Democracy and respect for others are values that can never be taken for granted, and each of us has a responsibility to stand up to all forms of hatred.”

[jamiepaige]

Constant Companions Closeup #9: OBJECT OF AFFECTION

(also on spotify!)

O, wayward soul, I beg of thee an ear; Companionship, a Constant of desire, is all too fleeting. Would thee quell this fire? My love, do you know what you want to hear?

Welcome back to the Constant Companions Closeups - a series of in-depth dives into the songs off of my latest album, Constant Companions! Yesterday was some gay shit (Liaison) and today is some more gay shit (Object of Affection)

---

I'm usually pretty good about letting go of the things I make and letting them live imperfectly, but there is exactly one released song of mine that I've ever been actively unhappy with the final product of, that I haven't been able to let go of my displeasure with.

Honor Majesty, off of Autumn Every Day.

It's not that it's a bad song, or that it didn't have good ideas! In fact, I genuinely think it shares more with the music I make now than a lot of my older work does. Rather, it was incredibly rushed and full of uninspired choices I made for the sake of completing the song rather than making it the best version of itself, and it ultimately ended up falling incredibly flat relative to what I wanted it to be!

I really like the intersection of synthpop/electropop and fantasy. One of my favorite musicians ever is Baths, whose album Romaplasm is chock full of this exact thematic and sonic intersection, and it's so deeply inspiring to me that it still gets put on whenever I want to dream things up. I've always wanted to make things like that! Bubbly and fantastical, brimming with a sense of magic so pervasive it makes even the mundane seem mystic.

...Also I'm just a fantasy dork okay. I like wizards and shit. Sue me

I've been wanting to make a grandiose and fantastical story song for years, and my single attempt to do so felt like it missed the mark entirely. I did touch on fantasy a couple times on Bittersweet, but ultimately, when I started working on this album, I knew exactly what I wanted to take a second crack at.

---

The intended story in question here is fairly vague, but to sum it up as literally as possible:

A rebellious, disobedient, gender-questioning prince has mildly inconvenienced "his" royal lineage one too many times. Their solution is to invoke magicks widely regarded as heretical - what's a fantasy monarchy without some hypocrisy - to seal their "son's" soul within an automaton body, rendering "him" a perfect, subservient doll.

This doll is promptly spirited away under cover of darkness by a mage, and is granted free will once again. She experiences the crushing weight of newfound self-awareness and nearly spirals out of control, before realizing the mage who saved her is the same - a doll. It turns out being a magical-mechanical construct has its perks if you are TRANSGENDER. then they overthrow the monarchy and fuck nasty or whatever idk this is where the story gives way to things like "metaphor"

this is a song about artifice and being transgender

Seriously, though, I know that being an electronic-music-producing transgender lesbian with a thing about dolls or robots or whatever is a major endless-store-shelves-of-identical-buzz-lightyear-action-figures moment on my part, but dammit, I own a copy of Logic Pro and a genuine leather wizard hat, I inject estrogen into my stomach fat every Wednesday, and I think ball joints are cute. I'm posting this on Tumblr, for gods sake, I am unconcerned as an active choice

---

With the exception of Liaison, the entirety of Constant Companions utilizes only three unique vocal synth characters - ANRI, Gumi, and Teto. This trifecta was born organically from simply being the vocal synths I enjoy using the most, and in this song, I wanted to use all three of them almost like one single singer, freely shifting intonation based on the context. I messed with this idea before on Ballroom, my voice meshing and melting into Gumi V3's voice, but it felt especially appropriate for this context; Plus, I feel like there aren't a lot of examples of vocal synths being used/recontextualized in this way, and that's a shame in my opinion!!

I really want to do more story-driven songwriting like this in the future as well. Now that I'm a bonafide VocaloP I've been floating the idea of doing a song series with this trio... I'm mostly just worried I'll want to get too ambitious with it.

Off the top of my head, Object of Affection references at least eight other songs of mine - Honor Majesty is an obvious one, but it also directly samples parts of Autumn Every Day, and lyrically references genuinely just a bunch of things. I'm probably forgetting some, even!

I know I'm the Leitmotif Lover, but it's a lot even by my standards. However, this song's entire existence already served to satisfy a fairly self-indulgent desire, and these days, I don't deal in half measures. I think the final product serves as a lovely little look back at where I've come from, though, and perhaps even a little glimpse into the future!

That all being said, Object of Affection in some sense is also a love letter to a beloved part of my creative process - the voice memo. A lot of the audio I've provided with these posts have been recordings off my phone for good reason! Not only are the chops at the beginning of the song entirely comprised of edited recordings I got on my phone, but the sample at the very end happens to be from a particularly legendary recording, never before heard by the public...

Until now. I present to you an excerpt from "the worst beat on planet earth", featuring none other than unit.0.

That's about it for today!! If you have any questions, I'll gladly answer them below, but otherwise, I'll be back here tomorrow to talk about this album's title track laid askew - My Darling, My Companion!

[prince-liest]

It's kind of a weird (not sure if good or bad or just neutral!) experience to realize that a lot of the personal headcanons I've written into my own writing have become well-known enough that they're treated as general fanon with a lot of people using them and not realizing that they, like, originated from a specific place rather than just being ambiently popular. Every once in a while I come across a fic where there's an AN that says something to the tune of, "Oh, I saw this popular headcanon that [insert something really specific from 666: Live On Air!] and wanted to[...]" without attributing it to me - or, most likely, even realizing that it came from me!

It's an interesting feeling! I think the times that actually bother me are when it's people that know they got the headcanon directly from me and choose not to credit me (or in one weird instance, credit me, then edit their stuff to bury the credit to be really hard to find for some reason - y'all, I do notice these things even when I don't comment on them).

I've been straight up plagiarized many times before. It's ranged from friends in RP groups stealing my characters because I wasn't using them often anymore, to more recently someone ripping out chunks of one of my Hazbin Hotel fics and rewriting it as their own. It's a uniquely horrible feeling, and I think it makes me sensitive to feeling uncredited as a result even when plagiarism isn't occuring. On the other hand, this is literally how headcanons evolve and I'm actually so fucking happy that specific things that I was outright nervous to post because I thought people would (and in a few cases, people did) react very poorly to them are now, like...fairly common fanon.

Anyway, I don't think it's wrong for people to carry forward headcanons to the point where they don't even know where they came from. I also think most likely some concepts became convergently popular when more than one person had the same thought! It's how fandoms work and I know for a fact I've done the same... but it does very much give me the warm and fuzzies when people that use my ideas do give a nod in my direction for where they got the inspiration! In return, I try to make a point to do the same.

[publishinggoblin]

What Makes Confluence New?

Right now on Backerkit, Confluence: The Living Archive is in its final 11 days of funding. This is a Table Top Role Playing Game unlike any other, but not just for the reasons you might think.

Look, yes, it's a 6 book set with incredible art and layout and an amazing world to explore. This is all true. It's a true living world you get to dive into and experience at the table. That's great, truly!

But the thing that made Confluence different from any other project out there that I've ever heard of, is that in this industry, freelance writing for TTRPGs pays pennies on the word you turn in.

Some people were recently talking about how 10 cents per word is pretty good! You write 5000 words for a project? That's a nice $500. Other indie people were talking about paying 7 cents per word. But what they almost never offer is hourly pay, or pay for work you do outside the writing (including researching the game material you're writing for, or research for what you're writing!)

The Confluence Contract

Confluence has always meant the world to me. Truly. I tried to fund it and make it on my own multiple times in the past. When the Alleyman's Tarot was successful, I immediately wrote the contract with my lawyer for Confluence.

Everyone who worked on the project would make $25/hr for any work they do on the project. We would all feel we had equal pull and power here in that way, as it had to be collaborative.

Everyone would be paid an up-front Retainer of $10,000 if they were going to work part time, or $20,000 if they were going to work 30 or more hours a week. This was to alleviate current financial stress and give them space to explore the game with more freedom.

Everyone who worked on the project would share ownership with things they make. New cool mechanic? It lives in Confluence AND the creator can take it to their own games later. Awesome NPC? In Confluence and can be adapted anywhere else! I didn't want anyone to hold anything back. As far as I know, this has never been done before.

I did all this because, you see, I had an amazing team of people who came together to help bring this to life. People in the US, yes, but in Canada, the UK, Brazil, India, the Philippines. You can learn more and get links to them on the Pub Gob website here!

Do You Expect This to be the New Standard?

No, I don't expect all indie publishers to start doing this for TTRPGs. It's costly and not easy. But I want to stress that this is a unique situation we will likely never see again. And Confluence can only exist into the future with such an amazing team if we can step up support on the crowdfunding project!

This experiential game doesn't want to change the industry, but it changed the process behind the scenes already. If you believe in such a thing, a possibility for people to be paid fairly and have equal say and keep the rights for their works, consider believing in this project with us. Confluence needs your help to reach its funding goal, but it also needs your help to push further so the team can continue working in this amazing space to bring you even more materials in the future!

So check us out on Backerkit today!

[drdtappreciation]

I've always liked the DRDT fan artist Ninh. (I'm sure most of you guys know them) We've talked a few times, and they were really nice to me, plus I'm very fascinated by their unique art style and the way they like Arturo a lot. All in all, this person is just a huge green flag to me. But after the post they made on their Instagram story?? Oh my god, the respect I already had for them doubled. In short words, Ninh talked about how they're not too opposed to people using their art or even copying their style and they explained why by sharing a bad experience they had with an artist who treated them horribly over them copying their art style. They were young and didn't know any better. I just feel like Ninh is such a down to earth and understanding person. I really respect people like them. Also, I find them calling Ace ugly genuinely funny, I personally disagree with that but it's funny when they do it Ninh not only like DRDT but Regular Show and Fairly Odd Parents as well??? It's so hard finding people who are a fan of those these days. I'd show my top 3 favorite drawings from them, but I hate how messy it looks when I try to send multiple photos. (Points to my sprite appreciation posts) So I'll just show one of my favorites:

Chibi Teruko On a side note, if anyone is curious on my take on this personally... If you use my art or copy my art style as inspiration, then go ahead. Just either credit me or let me know. I want to see what you guys make or do with my art

@ninhawesome :D