#I only listed the ships I'm involved in here - but any will fit the narrative

[ask-jiro-kirisaki]

With the holiday fast approaching, Jiro takes a late night to create various confections for the students of Mortkranken. He wouldn't be able to participate in any large gatherings, so he decided to leave these out in the common area to show his appreciation for their hard work. It wasn't as if he'd be alone though. He had friends to visit in the coming days, opting for a more one-on-one approach where he could to avoid potential illness. Following tradition though, Christmas Eve was reserved for a partner. He would spend the evening (and late into the night) spoiling his partner in any way that he was able. On Christmas Day, he allows himself to rest - save from taking care of some necessary daily tasks in the office/lab. And if said partner didn't have any plans, Jiro would welcome their company.

[perciverthoughts]

Sometimes the canon straight relationships are deeper, better fleshed out, and more compelling than the fanon gay ships btw.

Not all the time, and this might be sacrilegious to post about on the Gay Fanon website, but I really do mean it. I ship a lot of non canon gay couples in a lot of different fandoms, but I can also see when popular fanon ships are just an excuse to put someones favourite blorbo into a gay relationship. And like, it's fine or whatever. Let the little fourteen year old queer kids who don't have any other outlet to explore their queerness have fun and feel safe. Let them create their made up worlds where everyone is queer and accepting and gets a happy ending because they may never find that in the real world. Escapism can be fun and healing. But lets not pretend these worlds are narratively as strong as some cannon ships and let's not pretend this part of fandom culture doesn't carry some serious issues. Let's not pretend these ships don't often end up reducing complex characters to one dimensional stereotypes. Let's not pretend they involve ignoring key details about a character's background or beliefs to project [insert sexuality here] onto a character to fit the ship. Let's not pretend this often leads to perpetuating negative stereotypes in order for a antagonistic character to fit a fanon narrative (a common one I see is bullies or bigoted characters only doing it because they were closeted. Like, what message does this send kids when their past shitty behaviour is automatically excused by other characters because of it?)

Also, let's not pretend fetishization of gay people (or trans people, I see this too) doesn't play a role (at least some of the time) either. Let's not pretend that sometimes some fanon gay ships are just an excuse to get female characters out of the picture because people carry so much internalised misogyny they refuse to adress. Let's not pretend that taking a male character who's arc revolved around unlearning misogyny, learning to respect women, and falling in love with one, and pushing him into a fanon gay relationship kind of assassinates his character a bit.

And I know, believe me I know, we're starved for queer characters. Believe me I do. But taking a canon straight couple, that were well written and well suited and whose arcs complimented each other and going well he's gay now and is in love with Hot Male Villain #1 but she's a lesbian now too so don't worry there's no hard feelings on her end and also I don't hate women but i'll never write about this lesbian relationship ever it's just an excuse to get her out of the way without having to explore any negative feelings ever- is, a bit weird to me.

I've also noticed there tends to be this odd conflation in fandom spaces where queer characters= inherently morally good and straight characters= inherently morally bad in an overwhelming number of stories, and I find it concerning. Sexuality and gender identity and queerness in any form is inherently a neutral thing. It has no moral connotation whatsoever. At all. And while I know most people know this, this feature of equating queerness with morality and straightness with immorality is not a good thing for anybody, queer or not queer. These are not the sorts of ideas it's healthy for anyone to internalize, and having these messages beamed at you from every direction ever day means people will start to internalize them

This isn't a callout post and I'm not about to start listing ships or fandoms because that is neither constructive nor kind and I really don't need people coming after me for 'attacking their ships' but I find a lot of these issues pervasive and slightly worrisome. Again, everyone is absolutely entitled to their escapism and their interpretations of a character, but if you're interpretation of a character involves changing literally everything about them just to put them in a gay relationship, maybe you don't actually like that character that much. Maybe write an OC. Ask yourself why you ship this so hard? Do these characters as PEOPLE make a good couple regardless of their sexuality or gender identity? If one of them was canonically in a straight relationship maybe ask yourself why you think they were so ill suited. Ask yourself if one of the characters in that canon relationship you hate so much was genderbent if you'd still think the relationship would never work. Ask yourself if the narrative purpose of that canon straight relationship was important enough to the story that to dissolve it would dissolve the main themes of the work itself.

Again, this doesn't apply to every straight relationship in media. A lot of them are shitty, heteronormative, underdeveloped, and excuses to put two single characters together because god forbid a fictional character ever be happily single. But some straight relationships are well written and cute and explored well and central enough to the centre of a story that pulling characters out of that relationship deeply affects your ability to actually engage with a piece of media, it's themes, and the messages it conveys. And I know not everyone is into literary analysis as much as I am and that a lot of people just want to use their blorbos like paper dolls, and again that's absolutely fine! But call it what it is, be cognizant of the media you're consuming and creating, and try not to fall into common 'traps' in fandom spaces because goddamn even the most lighthearted of these spaces are a goddamn echo chamber.

[curlygrant44]

Mod: Hey folks! This isn't aimed at anyone in particular, and it's come up after multiple asks and conversations from several different parties over months, so please don't think of this as a callout! I'm solely establishing the norms for this blog to make sure that newer folks are aware of how things work here.

Pumpkin's crew, from his ship, consists of the following people, exclusively and definitively:

@/nursexanya

@/cptjimmy

@/swan-and-bolts

@/theman-withthe-dustpan

He does not currently have a Daisuke, which isn't really a big deal the way things are currently being written; if one is added to the crew, it will only be by the consensus of said crew's mods.

The only OC directly affiliated with this crew at present is Jon/June, the janitor, which was decided mutually after ooc discussion based on what made narrative sense to us based on what we had been writing together. Jon was not an original part of his crew before the anomaly and his acceptance as part of the crew now does not mean that we have retconned that.

All of our blogs are written with a serious tone, grounded in a hefty dose of realism both in terms of science when and where we can, and also in the human interactions. We hold ourselves to a high standard in this regard, and most of us very rarely allow magic anons, and only circumstantially do when we find it helpful to the blog in some way.

Because of that, while we may have plenty of humorous moments, the overall tone of our writing tends to be darker and full of conflict between the crew due to the circumstances they find themselves in. This is by design. We all met because of our desire to tell a serious story and coalesced because of our shared values about this and other matters.

You are more than welcome to send asks and starters and interact with Pumpkin, but here's a handy list of what to do or not do:

DO

Have a well-fleshed out character with an actual backstory

Give your character genuine struggles to overcome

Make them behave like a professional in a workplace

Interact with Curly in a professional capacity

Keep personal interactions appropriate to talking with a stranger

Give your character hobbies and interests

Make sure they behave like a reasonable adult

DON'T

Start hitting on Curly immediately

Provide nothing but surface-level interactions

Write with the primary intention of pursuing a relationship with Curly

Claim to be a member of his ship's crew

Flirt aggressively

Try to retcon your character into his prior interactions

Godmode (try to take control of someone else's character, in this case Curly)

Pressure me into writing my character differently

Have a minor (under 18yo) character

Write your character as being constantly immature or childish

If you're unsure and need clarification about any of these, feel free to send an ask about it. :) Once again, this isn't meant to discourage anyone from interaction. This is solely about establishing what this blog is intended for, and what both Curly's standards for the people he'll voluntarily talk to, and my standards as mod for what I'm willing to write, involve. If you find that what you prefer to write is on my list of no's, that doesn't mean I hate you. All it means is that our writing wouldn't be a fit together, and that you're better off finding another Curly to interact with who does enjoy those things.

As long as you're writing a realistic and mature adult in their workplace and behaving accordingly, it's likely that they'll get along with Pumpkin just fine.

[hecku-luna]

30 Day Danganronpa Challenge but April is pretty far away and I can't slowburn for shit so here we go!!

(Spoilers for the entire Danganronpa series, obviously)

1. HIMIKO!!!

2. Either Teruteru, Kazuichi, or Haiji. Genuinely awful people. (Hifumi is disgusting too, but at least he tries(?) to keep it to 2D only. I guess.)

3. All of them!! Yes, ALL of them!!

4. Definitely gotta go to Gundham. Considering he's one of the only good ones lmao

5. If she didn't get killed off in the first fucking chapter, Kaede would be an absolute lock. But Shuichi's good too, at the very least compared to the other protags. I would say Komaru too, but she called Haiji's creepy ass tendencies "attractive," so...

6. I had to think for a good minute about whether I could reasonably say I like any of the other characters that fit the antagonist mold than the obvious and overplayed. But. Fuck it, it's like they say! It's always Junko!

7. CHIYOMIKO!!!!!

8. Straight ships in general tbh, but ESPECIALLY involving Hifumi, Teruteru, Kazuichi, or Haiji

9. You could not pay me to care about the interactions between two men

10. If I HAD to pick a favorite straight ship, gun pointed to my head and bombs strapped to my family and loved ones... I guess Saimatsu isn't the worst. Can I go now, Jigsaw?

11.

12. See #7 UwU

13. V3. As long as I pretend chapter 6 doesn't exist

14. CHIHIRO!!!! 🏳️‍⚧️

15. HIYOKO!!!! 👘

16. HIMIKO!!!! 🪄

17.

18. It's kind of a tossup between Ultimate Programmer and Ultimate Artist, as those are THE most important things to my goals of creating my own video games

19. Probably Gundham's for the emotional weight of it. There's just... something about seeing the Four Dark Devas of Destruction's reaction to the execution of their master that made me sad the first time I saw it.

20. If this is like favorite OST overall? Probably V3's anyway? But if we're talking favorite song... LET'S START THE KILLING GAME!!!

21. HIYOKO IN A HEARTBEAT

22. Gundham's, for the reasons listed in 19. He's also the only guy in the SDR2 cast that I can confidently say I like, so that also had part in it

23. The DR3 girl with the Pikachu hoodie and homophobia in her eyes

24. ALL OF THE GIRLS HONEST TO GOD. But surprisingly enough, I think I'd go with Hiyoko first and foremost cause I can see us starting so much shit together lmao

25. I'm gonna assume this is weak as in relating to the narrative, so I'm gonna go with Kurokuma. Like, did he even do anything? At all? I mean, it's been a while since I've sat through UDG, but I genuinely do not remember him contributing to anything besides half-baked comic relief

26. Gonna get controversial here. My candidates are Makoto, Ishimaru, Hajime, and Keebo. Whichever one makes people the most upset, that's my pick

27. Oh, y'all are gonna hate me for this one. Himiko. She had some GROWTH, she went through some SHIT, and she still lived to tell the tale. To any of y'all who say she didn't deserve it, I hope your favorite character in Kodaka's next project gets killed immediately.

28. Okay this one was actually easier than i thought it would be. Ibuki for sure! She lives and breaths the 2000s, how could I not wanna dress like her every day if I had the option?

29. Again, HIMIKO!!!

30. I'm starting to think there's a theme here...

-------------

And with that, my Danganronpa opinions are out in the open for the public to scrutinize every last detail of! Here's my faves made in Pony Town as treat for making it this far ^w^

[fluorescentpurplejellyfish]

Let's Talk About the Founding Fathers and Slavery

Let's start off by saying that when I say "Founding Fathers", I'm lumping together everyone who had a hand in creating the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. I'm going to be focussing on Jefferson a lot because I don't think you understand how much of a PUZZLE this guy is to modern historians. There was a really good display in the Smithsonian called Paradox of liberty that featured the writing desk he used to write the Declaration of Independence, and behind him the list of all the slaves he owned in his lifetime. (Spoiler alert: it's A LOT)

You've probably seen the screencaps from Twitter that point out all of the Founding Fathers who were slave owners. And they're right, a large number of them were slave owners. But I also think it's important to look at the history of those same mens' attempts to abolish or at least outright condemn slavery (something the American government refused to do in later years) right from the word go.

When the Committee of Five (Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Robert Livingston, and Roger Sherman) were brought together to write up a Declaration of Independence, their first draft included a paragraph in the list of grievances that condemned England for introducing slavery to America, and attacked the practice itself (read it here). Adams is well known for being very outspoken in general, but especially about slavery (He was an abolitionist lawyer who worked to help runaway slaves). The rest of the committee with the exception of Livingston were all slave owners, Jefferson was probably the largest slaveholder. He owned over 600 slaves in his lifetime (not all at once, but total).

Yet at the same time he was also outspoken against slavery. He called it a "moral depravity" and a "hideous blot". He thought slavery was the biggest threat to the union, and went against the laws of nature which he believed declared that all men had a right to personal liberty. He helped draft a law in 1778 that prohibited the importation of slaves to Virginia. In 1784 he proposed that slavery be banned in the Northwest territories (the Monticello site has a lot to say about all this and has a lot of good references and primary sources).

When the southern delegates and a few of the Northern ones, too who benefited from the slave trade (who's ships do you think they were using, and where do you think all the cotton for their textile mills came from?) read the draft of the declaration, they threatened to walk out and destroy the convention unless the "offending passage" was removed, which according to their rules meant that the subject of independence would never be brought up again. They argued for weeks over this one passage that condemned slavery, until Jefferson and the rest of the Committee of Five agreed to remove it as a compromise. Independence for America first, then slavery. If they didnt get their independence, then the rest of it wouldn't make a difference anyway, and all the work and sacrifices not just them but the people who were fighting and dying against England had made and were currently making wouldn't matter. The musical 1776 does a great job portraying this.

Many of these same men (with the exception of Jefferson and Adams who were away in Europe) met together again this time to write a constitution for their new government. James Madison included a passage that would end slavery. The delegates from North and South Carolina, Georgia and other southern states once again threatened to walk out if they continued to press the issue, resulting in compromises like the infamous Three-fifths Compromise and the agreement to end the importation of slaves after 1808, which would give them time to prepare for what the considered a radical change to their economy. Everyone thought that slavery would Peter out and die off on its own if they could at least end its increase.

Jefferson had a plan to end slavery and actively worked towards it from the 1770s to the day he died. It involved: 1. Ending transatlantic slave trade (which he did), 2. Requiring slaeowners to better the living conditions of their slaves, and 3. All slaves born after a certain date would be freed. Jefferson had felt that this plan was the best shot at making slavery unprofitable to slavewoners, and the only way to successfully end slavery would be if the slavholders willingly gave it up. He felt that it should be a democratic issue, and if they were forced, then the Southerners would dig in their heels and leave the union (which is exactly what happened). An unintended side effect of this plan is that a lot of people twisted it after his death and argued that if slavery could be "bettered" then there was no reason to abolish it. And despite the fact that the importation of slaves had been abolished, the number of slaves in the U.S. still continued to drastically increase ("forced pregnancies" is a nice way to say it).

George Washington was also frequently outspoken about slavery and attempted to free his slaves in his will and stipulated that any slaves that were to elderly or sick to work would be supported by the estate in perpetuity, but the vast majority had been inherited through his wife Martha from her previous husband Daniel Custis after he died without a will, and by law neither George or Martha could free them. So after her death the inherited slaves were divided up among her grandkids, while the rest were given their freedom by Martha.

There were many other Founding Fathers who were slave owners, and spoke out against slavery, such as Colonel George Mason, and I'd love to include them but this post is already waaaaay longer than I intended it to be. I just want to end with saying that I know we as people we like to try to fit other people into boxes or labels because it helps us to easily understand what role they play in the historical narrative, and I'm definitely not trying to give a definitive answer on whether or not anyone of these founding fathers were "good" or "bad". Historians much more experienced than I have been trying to reconcile how people who owned slaves could also be actively working against it at the same time. I'll end by saying that people are complicated, and I just don't think that you can accurately understand who a person is by only looking at one aspect of a bigger picture.