#I think he’s too susceptible to conspiracies

[themightybooshfan]

Noel + his older brother that gets him into chaos but also loves on him and protects him

[rhysintherain]

@blackjackkent's liveblog of BG3 has inspired So Many Thoughts about the Emperor and Raphael and how they compare as characters.

It's come up that the Emperor's character writing could be intended to portray very different motivations based on how the player character responds to it, but personally I don't think that's it. At its core, I think the Emperor is being honest about its motivations: it only wants to survive. What it's not saying is that it will do anything to achieve that end, at the cost of anyone in its way. And the best tool it has to do that is the protagonist.

Its conversations with the protagonist always remind me of abusive relationship dynamics. it plays nice as long as that works, and changes tactics when nice doesn't get what it wants. It constantly reminds you that you need each other, that you couldn't survive without it, that it is the only one you can trust. It offers moments of vulnerability to lure you in, then tries to cut you off from any allies or courses of action it doesn't approve of.

The thing about abusive relationships is that they only turn violent and confrontational when the abuser doesn't get their way. Violence is a last resort, and most abusers prefer to manipulate people without it. Some people go years without discovering their abuser has the capacity for violence, because they never confront them on the control they exert.

And that's exactly how the Emperor relates to the protagonist. If you never question it, never choose a path it doesn't like, you never get pushback. As long as you play by its rules it has no reason to change tactics, because what it's doing is working.

It's only when the protagonist's aims clearly don't match its own that it resorts to threats. It's only when you call the Emperor's bluff, tell it you know it doesn't care about you, that it shows you the truth about its relationship with Stelmane.

Because the truth is, it only cares about its own survival and freedom. And it's very skilled at the game it's playing. It has a profound ability to judge what the protagonist needs to hear, and show them what they want to see. If you want to see a friend who transcends what a mind flayer is supposed to be, it plays that part flawlessly. If you see through that, it has other methods of control at its disposal.

And the Emperor is brilliantly written as a manipulator. It can convince you that it's been on your side all along. It leaves just enough doubt that you might never know the truth. It preys on trust, and exploits the protagonist's willingness to believe in the inherent goodness of people. It expresses trust and vulnerability to the protagonist, anticipating that they will return that trust in response, regardless of whether it can be trusted.

And the cool thing about Raphael is that he's a very similar type of character. He also knows that being nice gets you further than being dangerous. The difference between them is that Raphael isn't quite as good at it: he has a temper, and is quicker to drop the mask. He has an ego that won't let him tolerate even the slightest resistance without breaking character. He believes in bribery over trust, and it makes his act easier to see through. The protagonist can express the same doubt in both of them and get threats from Raphael and disappointment from the Emperor, which pushes them away from one and towards the other.

And one of the striking things about BG3 is the sheer range of dangerous people it throws at your party. You have the tyrant queen, who took power through betrayal and maintains it through disinformation. The power-hungry boss, who offers what you want only until his rise to power is threatened. The abusive parent, who sees his children as possessions who exist to entertain him. The political climber, who treats his loyalists as pawns in a long game of personal gain. The sadistic elite, who's never had to hide her cruelty to those she controls because that's what authority means in her social circle. The loving father, who cares so little for the rest of the world he'd burn it all down to keep his daughter safe.

It's all excellent writing, but the Emperor might be the masterpiece. You can play out the whole story without clearly seeing how it fits the pattern. It can be your loyal partner, standing at your side and protecting you from all those dangerous people.

But it doesn't have to be. If you question its protection and loyalty, it can also be your worst enemy, determined to use all your shared struggles and deepest secrets to tear you apart.

[mortalityplays]

This is a very good illustration of the increasing susceptibility to conspiratorial thought patterns I've been seeing on the left lately. Just because you don't believe there are space marines on Mars doesn't mean you're immune to building imaginary connections between aesthetic or emotional data points and mistaking them for evidence. A lot of well meaning people in my circles have been sharing this story, buying uncritically into the first narrative they encountered. I want to break down why:

Jones' twitter thread was extremely emotional and extremely urgent. The idea of a child being ripped away from his frantic mother and a ticking clock to decide his fate both helped the story to bypass analytical scrutiny. It sends the message 'act now, before it's too late, it's the only compassionate thing to do'.

Her connection to an existing conspiracy (a concerted effort by the state to cover up Covid statistics) creates a strengthening association with the idea that this is also a conspiracy. The thread offers no positive evidence that her son's arrest was a conspiracy, and no positive evidence that his arrest has any connection to her prior experiences.

Jones' allegation that the arrest was retribution for her actions as a whistleblower implicitly identifies her in the reader's mind. A lot could be unpacked about her dispute with the DOH but it doesn't really matter because I don't think most people who circulated this story knew much about it either way. The point is that it anchors her identity in a few key concepts: 'whistleblower', 'covid scientist', 'concerned citizen'. None of these qualities are relevant to the events detailed in the thread (or evidenced in the thread, if we're being really rigorous), but they unconsciously prejudice the reader's assessment of whether to trust or side with her. Simply put, if you are concerned about how covid was handled and/or inclined to support whistleblowers, you are more likely to assume she's credible.

If you dislike and distrust cops, you are primed to accept a narrative in which they are doing something straightforwardly evil. Don't get me wrong, fuck 12, but I say that armed with an enormous preponderance of cases in which we have positive evidence of police acting out of self interest, cruelty, corruption, racism, misogyny, etc. Allowing ourselves to be seduced by the fantasy that they are always always without fail breaking rules and fashing it up in broad daylight only makes us easier to delude and manipulate.

She repeatedly made the point that her son is autistic. Again, if you are autistic or sympathetic to autistic people, you are more likely to be 'warmed up' by this detail and inclined to take her side. I'm not going to say it's irrelevant to the idea that he was being unfairly targeted, but it is overwhelmingly emotionally weighted. And again, it is not evidence that he was unfairly targeted. It's another weight on the scale that tips you to judge the truth value of her story without reality checking.

The example of a meme that she shared is characteristic of a type of online humour that is at least familiar to most of us. If you or your friends make edgy jokes and share tasteless irony memes, or if you've been online for more than like a week, you understand that they're mostly harmless. The idea that this meme could be used as evidence by law enforcement to detain you is ideologically threatening in an immediately relatable way. It evokes a reflex defensive impulse — that's not fair, the cops are wrong, the kid is innocent — bypassing the process of verification. Is this meme the reason he was arrested? Is it the only one he posted? Is it the only reason he was arrested?

All of these factors create a gut-led constellation of information that quickly forms a picture. Because it is being pieced together from multiple subconscious feelings and prejudices, it feels as if it has been evidenced. Because the thread was highly emotional and highly urgent, readers were pressured to jump to rapid conclusions and ask "what can I do to help?" (and the answer, as it almost always is, was 'donate money, quick').

I want to be really clear that I am not saying Jones manufactured any of these effects on purpose. It would be completely within reason that having a young child arrested would send anyone into an emotional tailspin, grasping for reasons this might have happened, leaping to his defense, rallying resources to fight on his behalf. I am not in any way ascribing malice to her actions.

What I'm interested in is the effect that this emotive kneejerk appeal had on people who were unknowingly predisposed to believe that the state of Florida would kidnap a child to punish a scientist for disagreeing with the department of health about covid statistics. That is a baseless conspiracy theory, and a huge number of people in my immediate circles reflexively amplified it.

Personally, I think arrest is a godawful way to respond to a child having a mental health crisis, even if they are seen to pose a violent threat. That still doesn't mean the cops did it at the bidding of a mad dictator in waiting. In the hypothetical parallel universe where it turns out Jones was right and this was all a conspiracy to punish her, it still would not have served the situation to jump to that conclusion on a gut feeling.

Pausing to identify relevant, verifiable facts before sharing a story like this is always warranted, even if you think the person telling it is 'on your side'. The more you worry that questioning the narrative wastes precious time or makes you a bad person, the more you should scrutinise why you are being made to feel that way. Accepting unfounded conspiracies into your worldview is not benign, even if you think the 'targets' deserve it. It erodes your critical perspective and turns you into a vector for the people around you.

tl;dr: you are not immune to baseless conspiratorial thought

[saintsenara]

hi! any thoughts on antonin dolohov? back in the day i used to have a huge obsession with him, i remember when i was reading deathly hallows for the first time i was so happy when he got mentioned like 3 times in passing... anyway, it's been a long time but i still have a soft spot for this character and was curious how you imagine his background and motivations and whatnot. does he survive the war? and most importantly, why the hell does he always get petrificus totalused, is it a coincidence, a conspiracy or an ancient curse on his family?

thank you very much for the ask, anon! having an elaborate backstory for random death eaters is my bread and butter [i'd walk through fire for augustus "irrelevant" rookwood] and so - yes - i do indeed have thoughts on antonin dolohov.

most of these are connected to the geopolitics of wizarding russia, which - given both the small magical population, the fact that the need to maintain the statute of secrecy seems to drive wizards to accept fairly authoritarian systems of government, and the fact that elves fill the roles of serfs - almost certainly doesn't have the right social conditions to foment a parallel to the 1917 revolution. i'm obsessed with the idea of russian purebloods living bizarre ancien régime lives as the muggle world around them changes unrecognisably.

i know dolohov doesn't actually have to be a russian national - he could be a british citizen with a russian name - but jkr tends to only use non-commonwealth surnames [under which colonial umbrella come names like "patil" or "chang"] for characters who are non-british nationals, like fleur, krum, or karkaroff. and since i'm obsessed with the fact that voldemort seems to spend so much of his travels in the eastern bloc - and that there are two death eaters with slavic-language names, but no order members or ministry officials - i like to imagine that he is.

when it comes to the man, though, the canon incidental character detail which i love is that dolohov is clearly a great pal. he travels all the way to hogsmeade to wish voldemort luck for his interview and buy him a drink after:

"Then if I were to go to the Hog's Head tonight, I would not find a group of them - Nott, Rosier, Mulciber, Dolohov - awaiting your return? Devoted friends indeed, to travel this far with you on a snowy night, merely to wish you luck as you attempted to secure a teaching post."

[dumbledore's just being a bitch here because he's so gutted he doesn't have a group of lads ready to assemble for pints at any opportunity...]

dolohov is also is gassed for yaxley when he achieves his greatest professional triumph:

"My Lord, I have good news on that score. I have - with difficulty, and after great effort - suceeded in placing an Imperius Curse upon Pius Thicknesse." Many of those sitting around Yaxley looked impressed; his neighbour, Dolohov, a man with a long, twisted face, clapped him on the back.

[voldemort - in contrast - couldn't give less of a fuck because he's too busy flirting with snape. so real of him.]

so i think we have the answer as to why he seems so susceptible to the ol' petrificus totalus: he's easily ambushed because he's so busy being impressed by everything else going on around him.

[rindragon-from-twewy]

Uh oh! Someone left me alone with my thoughts again! I don't see many people talking too deeply about pre-game stuff beyond "Number One was a terrible person" so I'm here to throw my own poorly explained hot take in to the ring-

I'm not really built for theory crafting and tend to miss or forget obvious details so consider this... an AU proposal more then anything. (Tbh I mostly just wanted to draw smol Yuma lmao-)

Spoiler warning ofc and enjoy this horrifically long and poorly explained ramble-

So... I don't really know much about the general fandom age headcannons on characters. I won't be going in to specifics right now about what I think all the character ages are cuz this isn't about that but for context, I pin Yuma around 15-16, on the early 18 side if you really wanna push it. Mainly cuz... it'd be kinda weird for Kurumi (a school student) to be one of his main love interests otherwise- For the sake of argument, I'll say 18.

So anyways-

Makoto's like... what? 3 or 4 years old? Forgive me for not re-watching chapter 5 just to get my timeline correct here but that's roughly right. Meaning that Number One would've been about 13 or 14 when he agreed to participate in the experiments at most. And sure, he's the smartest person in the world but anyone can be susceptible to lies or manipulations, especially someone that young.

But then of course we don't know how long Yuma had the Number One title for. Surely it would've had to have been at least a little while- I doubt the unified government would go after the blood of the newly appointed "smartest detective in the world" the second he got in to office. So who's to say exactly how much this literal child had been manipulated beforehand?

I'm imagining a sort of... Nagisa plus Kirigiri scenario (the danganronpa characters lol-) where they'd been set on a very specific academic path nearly their whole lives. Sure, Yuma probably had been born a genius and his strong moral code was most likely all his own but... no matter what way you spin it, there must have been some negligence to allow someone so young to become so cut off from the rest of society. It could've been intentional, it could've been accidental. Either way, why is someone like Yuma, who is obviously younger then most of his peers, who could easily pass as a trainee detective simply because of how smol he is, make it all the way to the top on his sheer intelligence alone?

This rambling's getting incoherent, sorry, it's late and I'm tired-

Makoto's pretty manipulative, sure, but he only got to the CEO position cuz of all the blackmail he had- Man had zero control over the city to the point he had to let outsiders get smuggled in just to help him fix it. Makoto (and by extension Number One) is book smart. Not street smart. They can build the rain machine, they can run multiple government conspiracies, etc etc. But if Number One was a kid at the time, it would've been pretty difficult for them to manipulate, mansplain, malewife his way in to office imo. A kid can't manipulate a dozens of adults in to being the leader of the whole WDO, no matter how naturally gifted they are. I mean it's no secret that the unified government and by extension the WDO are just as shady as Amaterasu so why wouldn't they take advantage of a young and impressionable kid when the opportunity arises?

We don't really know how Number One truly felt about anything. We know how Makoto views it, we know what Yuma thinks about it but we don't know if Number One really understood what the repercussions of the experiments could've been.

So let me just... break down what I'd interpret a vague timeline of events to be (in this hypothetical... Uh... AU I guess?)

- Yuma gets in to the WDO somehow. Very young, very impressionable. He may be really good at solving crimes but like any kid, he doesn't know anything that he isn't taught about. Being surrounded by mysteries and crimes, all while constantly being praised by adults as being "just soooo smart!" Is probably what taught him that he didn't need other people and so never learnt (or potentially was never even allowed to) make friends.

- Growing up surrounded by a combination of Yes-Men and people who let the obvious child labour/ exploitation slide because "This little genius is such a special case, we gotta let it slide this once!" Made it so he reached to the level of Number One far faster then anyone would expect. And that then came along with abandoning his old name and identity, isolating himself completely for his own protection. (I like to think he may not even remember his original name because he was so young at the time (for extra angst ^vO))

- And so a completely isolated pre-teen, who's entire life up until this point has entirely consisted of gory murder scenes and tragic crimes he was personally responsible for solving, was approached by the unified government. Who knows exactly how much detail they went in to with explaining their plan? Maybe they said that it probably wouldn't even work out, given all the past failures. Maybe they came begging for his help, like many people seeking justice would have done before them. Maybe they simply told him it was for the sake of peace? Maybe he was in his angsty emo phase and thought having a clone would be cool, who really knows? A pre-teen is a pree-teen, they all do dumb things- either way, he agreed.

- And so things played out like they said in the game, Makoto was created, escaped, saved the citizens of Kanai Ward via isolating them. He keeps them fed the only way he knows how - through the WDO; the only organisation he's ever been able to rely on (and thanks to his authority level, of course). Yuma starts getting suspicious while also simultaneously maturing enough to realise just how wrong everything about his life is, gets his new identity, makes the contract with Shinigami and heads off to start fixing his problems.

Additional Thoughts:

It's like that thing in the original beauty and the beast movie where everyone suddenly realised that the witch probably cursed a 9 year old for not letting a creepy stranger in to his home-

Maybe that's why he stuck with the name Yuma after everything. Cuz he didn't remember his original name to fall back on. He could've been Number One for as long as he could remember for all we know!

Maybe he was so busy trying to run the whole WDO that he didn't even pay much mind to the experiments? Could've just agreed to shut them up without knowing what he was getting in to. Makoto really drove it in to the mud how horrible of a person Number One was but how can we be sure that's an objective fact and not completely opinion driven?

I'm like actually really curious what other's perspectives on this could be. Again, I don't know much about the rain code fandom's age headcannons but it's pretty obvious to me at least that Yuma's on the younger end of the cast- (And by extension, Makoto too-)

Maybe I'll fact check myself when I have the time- either way, it's an interesting AU idea at the very least. I'll probably delete the writing portion of this post if it turns out I'm horrendously wrong-

Its probably gunna turn out that Yuma's in his mid 30s or 40s and suffers from baby face syndrome or something cringe fail like that lmfao-

So. Yeah. That's all just a theory (minus most of the fact checking) A GAME THEORY- Thanks for reading! :D

[celticcrossanon]

Dear Celta, what a collaboration you’ve had with @ladykinrannoch you’re very complimentary to each others style of tarot reading. Something came up in the last day or so as to what Harry might be holding over Camilla/Charles. Feel free to not post this ask, as it’s just my ruminations and it may just be a wild conspiracy theory.

In considering how William feels about the press I made a post yesterday about how William came to distrust the media. In casting back into the past I recalled the forged financial statement, and the lie that was told to Diana that William was wearing a watch with a listening device. A huge question came up. WHO would have so much influence that they would convince a staff member off the BBC that Diana would be susceptible to these lies. WHO had that much influence that they would bring this to bear, to bring this level of malevolence to the Princess of Wales. To push her over the edge in such a personal, cruel and sadistic manner??? I remember that the BBC laid the blame squarely at Martin Brasheer’s feet and closed the investigation down without delving into the source of the forgery. Oh Brasheer was that creative and instinctively knew she would fall for this. But the more I think about the more I see a possible influence there.

Also Harry was living at Highgrove when William went to uni. So he was on his own with C&C. Is it possible that he overheard them speaking about the BBC and Martin Brasheer interview in a totally different way? Did they reveal themselves in a certain conversation that Harry overheard??? Is this the source of the blackmail?

Remember the Queen was wise, she knew a divorce would weaken the monarchy, and she didn’t have any constructive advice for Diana about her marriage since she herself couldn’t control Charles. Is it possible that C&C colluded with the BBC to concoct this false story with the aim of making Diana look crazy and paranoid. The lies did convince her to give that infamous interview which started the ball rolling towards her death in Paris. It started a chain of events which culminated in that car crash in Paris.

Diana refused the Queen’s offer of Ravec security after the divorce. At a minimum she would have had a sober driver. I bet they didn’t foresee how this would tragically play out.

Both you and Lady K’s readings were very clear, it had to do with C&C ‘s marriage, or origin of marriage. Harry is dumb, he’s no constitutional expert, he couldn’t possibly know the ins and out of a Catholic and Anglican divorce and marriage in relation to the monarchy and being head of the church. But he is cunning, and he may have realized later on what it is he heard especially years later after Martin Brasheer took the fall for the BBC. In the 90s both Charles and Camilla together, and Diana separately were involving the press in their war with each other. It just came out recently in a book this year that Camilla was in weekly contact with this journalist, so she also may have been needling Diana in the press, separately from Charles.

If this resonates with you, please consider asking your cards who influenced the BBC to go down this road with Diana. Who gave them the ideas of the forged financial statements and the William watch lie. Imagine the cruelty of such a lie, it looks very personal to me.

Thanks for reading my screed Celta.

Hi AnonymousRetired,

Thank you for the kind words about the duet reading. I appreciate them very much.

I do want to look more into that reading and what came out of it, but it won't be tonight - I am just too tired.

You raise very valid points about the Panorama interview. The forged statement may have been all from Bashir, or other people may have been involved. There was no investigation so it is likely that we shall never know.

I can believe Charles and Camilla firing shots at Diana through the press. The whole time period of the four year separation and divorce was horrible in terms of what was revealed and was was said in the papers.

I will add the tarot reading to my list and consider it when I have more energy. :) Thank you for sharing your theories with me. I always like hearing what other people have to say.

[liminalmemories21]

Lim!!! If you haven't had them already! 24: Who most likely distracts the other with their wiles after they broke something? And 31: Who is most likely to believe in a conspiracy theory?

Thank you!

24: Who most likely distracts the other with their wiles after they broke something?

I mean, canonically, TK. I'm not sure Carlos is going to fall for it a second time - who knows where the lizard might be. But, definitely canonically TK wants to try and distract Carlos until he can fix whatever it was.

31: Who is most likely to believe in a conspiracy theory?

Okay, I think TK grew up with Owen, and he's acquired a healthy skepticism of anything that sounds like it's answering a question that nobody needed to ask.

Carlos, I don't think he'd fall for conspiracy theories exactly - he's more likely to go look something up from a reputable source before he blindly believes, doesn't believe everything he sees on google. But, he is susceptible to a well thought out prank - like if someone he trusts tells him something with a straight face he's going to believe it, even if it seems wild (I mean, some of the calls the 126 have been on, are wild, but he knows they happened). When Paul figures this out, he enlists the entire firehouse in getting revenge for the pudding incident, and gets Carlos to believe that Kendra introduced Owen to pegging, and they went a little hard this weekend, and Owen's a little sore, and if Carlos could make sure to offer him a pillow to sit on (and like, this is more than he ever needed to know, but plausible, and Owen's his father-in-law - and omg, TK you were in on this, how could you let me . . . ., and TK's crying laughing, and like, babe, I'm sorry, I'm really really sorry, but Paul's pudding, and holy shit, baby, if you could have seen your face, my dad's face, and then he's gone again, laughing too hard to speak, and Carlos vows revenge).

Tarlos inbox - who is more likely?

[confusedfoam]

okay I’m home I’ve cut all my hair off I’ve sort of eaten dinner I think I can approach articulation let’s uuuuhh take this character by character I think

Normal

rip this kid, he got pretty fucked over this go around. his house got fire and water damage and his mom also got lit on fire so that sucks.

Also his attempts to connect with scary got undermined and brushed off, he was trying to tell her she has people who care and that they’ll be there and all this lovely stuff and link was going the complete opposite angle and undermining him. (note: this is not a complaint, his approach was too head on to get through to scary and I think it makes beautiful sense for everyone’s characters but damn sucks for normal tho)

and of course. Teeny, gone. His will they won’t they partner, a mole and betrayer. This boy is going to be shattered and somehow I don’t think the goofs realm is going to be exactly comforting.

oh and can we talk about normals cult susceptibility and his family history cause 👀👀👀 yo thank you will

Taylor

Oh man him crying broke my heart, just thinking of him all heart broken and blubbering. I hope he gets to see Nick again soon but I feel like he probably won’t. I also love that his roll in the hug was just a shitty attempt at a sleeper hold.

failing to get through to his mom was one of the most frustrating shitty rolls of his so far but narratively its probably for the best. but man fuck willy and how things go his way (crack conspiracy of the minute: Willy’s got Cassandra on the back burner hoping to (already has?) knock her up for a back up source of daddy magic)

Link

Links teen apathy arc is so valid. also congrats to the gothcleats enthusiasts this was a banger for y'all. I respect the hell out of Matt as a roleplayer. he knows what he wants to do with link so well. I don’t even know what to say I’m happy this is working out for him I guess, can’t wait to watch it crash down.

Scary

Ohhhhhhh boy. oh boy. my poor girl. She needs so much therapy. She needs her mom. She needs more hugs. Christ.

but for real god bless beth may “am I enough?” nearly fucking killed me there were almost real actual tears. her asking willy for a hug and getting so coldly brushed off, not even rejected just brushed off? crushing.

Scary embracing her apathy arc is such a set up for disaster. I am very excited about the soccer admission though I think that was a good start. someone get this girl a sunny afternoon and a beautiful soccer field asap. (the other crack conspiracy: Scary’s had her jock phase, her goth phase, it’s now time to enter her stoner burnout phase. this is founded nothing on other than how she said it when she confessed to wanted to play soccer and also that it would be pretty funny. no more feelings time to just smoke pot about them)

Hermie

I mean that reveal was so much. like holy shit. also I know some people don’t like his name being herman but I actually love that so much sorry y'all.

Anthony

mad and endless respect to my anti egot king that dad fact was so fucking funny. maybe a contender against the back tattoo incident

-

annnnd that’s my current run down of thoughts. what an episode. pls talk to me about it I’m dying out here

[the-empress-7]

But Harry, to do all these to his own family, his brother and sister in law, who had supported him through every single mistakes he had done. And not only he turn his back on them, but he practically stomp all over them. It's evil and malicious....That is why he is lashing out at the hierarchy.

I read an internet op-ed many years ago that has always stuck with me, all this time later. The op-ed speculated that Harry is a pretty fragile person who doesn't really have his own personality but takes on (or emulates) the personality of whomever he's with, which makes him easily susceptible to conspiracy theories.

The op-ed suggested that Harry totally bought into the public's hysteria of Diana's death. Meaning he more or less beatified her the same way the public did and he essentially turned on his own family, believing them to be somewhat responsible for her death. (And frankly, it isn't too far a stretch of the imagination given how much he intensely he believes that royal security will protect him and his family.) Anyway, the op-ed went on to say that the reason why Harry is so antagonistic towards his own family is because he believes it's Diana's legacy to tear the BRF down and because she died before she could do anything, it's his responsibility as her son to pick up where she left off.

I remember thinking it was a hokey piece at the time but now I realize how prescient it was. Makes me wonder if, like the anon, Harry has always loathed and hated his family but Meghan was the key to unlocking it because unlike anyone else in Harry's life, she encouraged and fed into these feelings.

If Harry ever comes back to the UK, divorce or not, Charles or William better make therapy -- real therapy, not this BetterUp shit -- mandatory before they spend a penny more of taxpayer money on him.

Thank you for sharing this, and let me just say....Wow.

[introspectivememories]

For your mess is mine who are the people Bernard is close with? Is it people who were in the cult and are now out? Is it the groups of guys we saw in one panel? And what do they know more about than Tim?

okay first of all, thank you so much for the ask!!! i'm always sooo fucking excited to talk about these fics even if haven't written a sentence in like a month.

who are the people Bernard is close with? Is it people who were in the cult and are now out? Is it the groups of guys we saw in one panel?

in mess is mine, i just made up new friends for bear. we never really see him hang out with anybody and he is soooo isolated compared to tim. i didn't really like those 3 guys we saw in urban legends so i just... made up new ones! and bear deserves to have people who love him and take care of him.

so if you've been on my page for long enough, you know i have like a reoccurring oc?, i guess you could call it, called mori. he's in like everything i write, when i want someone connected to bear. alongside mori, there's khadija, chinna, and jam. but i'm still developing those characters.

after writing data analyst!bernard, i've been playing with the idea of putting jimmy and tyrone in there too. but i know my own strengths and putting that many characters means a lot of them are gonna get sidelined. (maybe i can put them in as a throwaway line? much to think about.)

i know that him being isolated is probably what made him so susceptible to the cult in the first place, but isn't there something so real about watching your friend slowly destroy themselves? isn't there something so tragic about being able to do nothing but pick up the pieces after each event? of wanting him to stop hurting himself but it seems like he doesn't know how to live unless he's hurting? mori, chinna, 'dija, and jam love bear, but it's not enough.

And what do they know more about than Tim?

everything. in urban legends, they've just started reconnecting. and i've taken that to mean that there was no contact after the shooting. so if we do the math, let's say they were both 16/17 during war games and i've always hc both of them as being around 21 when they meet up again, that's about 4-5 years that tim has missed. people change a lot in just 1 year! to miss around 5??? yeah tim barely knows this man anymore.

and yeah, bear still smiles the same and he still makes outlandish conspiracy theories but bear is so unfamiliar to tim these days. he might as well be a different person. and i think for tim, who is having all these new feelings at seeing bear again, would feel uncomfortable. where is his bear who laughed with his mouth open? where is his bear who didn't have scars on his arms and back? where is his bear who took up the whole room with his personality? tim doesn't know.

the story takes place in the hospital after the attempted sacrifice as tim deals with bear's friends, who are complete strangers to him, just knowing exactly what to do while he fumbles around. one of the scenes that i first wrote was tim sitting in the waiting area struggling to fill out the paperwork. and then bear's friends come in and do it effortlessly.

i hope this answers your questions!! i feel like i got so excited talking about this, it came out a little incoherent lol.

[creppersfunpalooza]

hi can u tell me more about Koi and ur ocs i think they’re really cool !!

yeah absolutely!! now that u have background knowledge i can tell you more about his backstory.

Koi is not a human. he thought he was, as did most people around him. the only people who really knew was his mom (Clarissa Riverson), his dad (Samuel Riverson, he’s dead now but we’ll get into that later), a private medical staff (to be fair they never knew much about it, they just knew he definitely wasn’t normal), and the D.A. later on. also Astir Bettencourt (i’ll talk abt him some other time if someone asks) but that was his own personal conspiracy theory and he told himself that there was no way that was even plausible (it was!)

koi’s actually a dreamwalker (don’t know if i’ll keep the name, but that’s what it’s been for years so), which is basically a shapeshifting being able to see into and alter the dreams and thoughts of others. in the beta version they could also take over someone’s body and possess it (with the drawback being that their natural form would be asleep while doing this), but i don’t know if i’ll keep that. if i do, it’ll only be for much more experienced ones. Dreamwalkers come from the Void and have very specific and strict customs and practices and have a very spiritual culture, considering themselves descended directly from their gods. Among one of these customs is letting their young develop their own forms free from anything else’s influence by keeping them in isolation for a number of years until they’re fully developed. somewhere along the timeline there was a massive doomsday event which lead to a mass extinction or something i don’t know the dreamwalkers have had a ton of rewrites i kind of lost track of what exactly happened. i need to rewrite them again too so a lot of this is bound to change. but yeah, most of them are dead. somehow koi’s bio. parents managed to like toss him out of the dimension or something seriously i don’t know i need to rewrite stuff desperately but i’m doing things in chunks and that’s not what i’m worried abt rn.

so yeah, koi’s form original is basically an amalgamation of random things he saw as a tiny guy, resulting in a primarily humanoid form. this has some interesting results though when you take into account that these were mainly just outside appearances with makeup and such, not to mention the fact that there were no internal organs that made sense with the regular human’s anatomy because, well, he didn’t ever see anything like that.

Along comes Clarissa, a wealthy businesswoman/CEO of a quickly growing tech company. She sees a random kiddo who seems to look less human the more she looks at it? that’s her son now. yeah no questions asked. that’s clarissa for you. she doesn’t question the strange or abnormal and welcomes it with open arms. For his own safety, she raised him as a normal kid and put in an effort to help keep his form consistent enough that it wouldn’t be questioned. before she knew for sure that he was, well, abnormal, he still had normal public healthcare. this turned out to be a terrible idea. fortunately, most people are very susceptible to hush money!

Koi’s dad, Samuel, was a pretty generic guy. i don’t know how else to describe him. Koi didn’t ever know him that well, but he worked with Clarissa under her company. One night during a fundraiser she was hosting, he had to leave early for whatever reason. He didn’t return home. A few days later, his car and body was found in the woods, heavily damaged. Many of the wounds he suffered didn’t quite make sense, but nothing came of it during investigation. After that, Clarissa became much more protective of Koi. She never really had him in the public eye to begin with, but after that, she was even more careful about it. In the following years after her husband’s death, she gave him a lot of attention. Unfortunately, work picked up again and she was forced to focus more on her career than him, pretty much removing her from his life with the exception of a few occasional visits and check ins.

Koi grew up pretty lonely. his personality was considered overwhelming to a lot of people and he had a tendency to ramble about stuff nobody seemed to ever care about. He did, however, manage to make one notable friend. Juniper. Juniper’s mainly rewritten already so most of this is up to date. She also struggled a lot with making friends and had very overbearing parents who barley even let her leave the house other than for school. The two quickly became inseparable and started dating in their freshman year of high school. In their junior year (maybe sophomore, haven’t decided yet), Juniper became friends with a girl named Eshima, who quickly joined their little friend group. Eshima’s got her own silly plot line and had a major crush on Juniper in high school, but that fizzled out over time (mostly!). Koi barely graduated, considering the fact that he struggled to ever pay attention or understand what was being taught and even ditched class pretty often. Juniper on the other hand was kind of known to be a straight A student due to a lot of academic pressure from her parents. She helped him a bit (a lot). Juniper was looking yo go to a college for astrophysics and managed to get a pretty good scholarship, Eshima attended law school because her dad wanted her to (but dropped out after a few years, which stirred up a bit of family drama), and Koi… Well, considering everything, it was obvious he wouldn’t get a scholarship or anything. Hell, he probably wouldn’t even get accepted into a college.

until that letter showed up. it advertised a new experience, one that would be far more interactive and still provide a proper education. it sounded perfect.

you know what happens from there! ish.

anyways here’s some general facts about him!!

- he was 17 when he graduated and just about 18 when he joined the D.A.

- clarissa used to take him literally everywhere with her. like he was not allowed to leave her side.

- he really likes the super sugary smoothies and energy drinks. he just has a major sweet tooth in general

- He was ~22 when he got out of the D.A. and is 23-24 in present time (this may change)

- I don’t know how this works considering species but he may have ADHD and obviously CPTSD

- He’s pansexual

- technically, he doesn’t have a gender assigned from birth. whether that makes him trans or not is up for interpretation imo because dreamwalkers don’t really have genders. bliss just goes by she/her because it works better for communication but she’s agender

- While he’s not polyam himself, he’s alright with open relationships

- He’s a big sci-fi nerd and before the D.A. was absolutely obsessed with Star Wars and Star Trek too. i like to think that he and Juniper would just hang out and watch stuff together. He’d reference it to no end. He also probably collected dvds and such.

- Due to the burn marks on his arms, he always either wears arm warmers, thick bracelets, or long sleeved shirts and hoodies.

- In beta, he had a much more feminine fashion style. i decided it doesn’t fit his character though. i mainly just did it because it was easiest for royale high which is where i used him a lot LOL

- His canonical friends include Kate (somehow. i don’t know how yet. in fact there’s no reason they should be friends.), Ophelia (surprisingly), Eshima (it’s a bit complicated. eshima thinks he just cut them off completely and he’s not ready to tell her what happened yet.), and That One Guy Who I’m Not Sure If I Should Re-name Or Not Because Of Silly Stuff

if u want me to go into depth for any other characters just lmk i love talking about these silly guys

[tiredmortal]

Absolutely love these tags.

I feel like the majority of the batfam would be enamoured with this weird but strangely cute child. They come to the realisation later that their current moniker for him is fucking subpar when they realise that he’s a possible baby eldritch being?

Tim and Bruce however would be suspicious as fuck, their paranoia kicks in and goes into overdrive. They’re both just squinting over the top of their coffee mugs during family meals coming up with conspiracy theories in their head.

I like to imagine that Tim is the one who finds out first, and it’s either entirely by accident or when he tries to subtly question Danny he’s just nonchalant and is like:

Oh no, you are entirely right to be suspicious of me.

And Tim is just standing there because this does not compute:

Why would he reveal that so easily? Does he think that no one would believe Tim over him? Or does he plan on killing him so that he can replace him with a clone or maybe an alien and bury his body in the forest just off of Wayne Manor where probably no one would discover his remains?

While Tim is contemplating this— completely sleep deprived by the way— Danny gets weirded out by the way he’s just staring at the wall, expression blank, hands cradling a a coffee that’s probably to hot to be holding it the way Tim is and just sort of leaves. Tim comes find him later to demand an explanation, ready to full on interrogate this tiny child, and Danny just tells him. Tim is suspicious of his willingness and just a tiny bit disappointed that he didn’t get to enact his plan, or his back-up plan, or his back-up, back-up plan.

Anyway, I see this going two ways, either Tim:

a.) Believes his story wholeheartedly, and is like— yeah, okay, that checks out. That is a thing that seems entirely plausible.

Or—

b.) Is just very disbelieving about what whole thing and dubious of Danny’s explanation and proceeds to ignore said explanation and comes up with his own theories and assumptions, either assuming that maybe Danny was brainwashed. Children are very susceptible to it after all. He reasons to himself, or maybe he’s like:

No. My alien theory fits better and I will die on this hill if you attempt to convince me otherwise.

And Danny is exasperated and done with everything and:

Fine, Sure— whatever. This is a thing now.

Tim then leaves after nodding, and Danny is just staring after him. Tim goes to say fuck you to Dick, because there is definitely no such thing as too much paranoia and his reasons were completely justifiable before also leaving once again, humming while he nearly skips to find Bruce so that he can inform him of the alien that they’re currently harbouring illegally.

De-aged Danny sitting at the Wayne Manor dinner table struggling with his meal:

Batfam: you good there bud? :3

Danny, muttering under his breath: why are my hands so small?

[hangedy]

ok so after coming back to it. i did delete the post about tiktokers saying bin laden's teachings were changing their geopolitical views because looking into it a bit more it DOES feel like it's a psyop* (the whole "antizionism is antisemitism propaganda stopped working so they got actual antisemitism") to push misinformation on history and discredit young people's political views and concerns, especially those who either were too young to remember 9/11 as an event or were born afterwards. and im a little embarrassed by the fact that i didnt really catch it at first but granted i was. dissociated and psychotic last night. and i also should probably note that i have been in spaces with reactionaries who would justify bin laden in favor of his anti-americanism, they do exist and they are scary fucking people, which is why everyone in notes interacting with it so uncritically was triggering me so much

it's no surprise given how much dumb conspiracy shit spreads online, some people will be susceptible, and ridiculing it within your own spaces when you see it is still a good tactic. im just not certain im comfortable right now leaving something like that up when we dont know the circumstances of the overall situation yet

all in all. dont fucking praise osama bin laden in any capacity. dont do that oh my god 😭 please learn to fucking read up on history like he was literally a CIA collaborator you're actually insane if you genuinely think of him or his teachings as an aid to us in any capacity. it's vital for the future of palestine that you combat any reactionary behavior you see in your spaces. im watching you fucking people especially you american meme accounts you all have some fucking balls for sharing this shit alongside memri tv i fucking hate the tiktokification of politics

*has not been confirmed to be a psyop yet by any sources but it seems to me most of these tiktoks are scripted the exact same way, which is so sus...

[aceofwonders]

8, 9, 25 for maizakeen and nolan!

ty alana 🧡// oc development questions

—does your oc prefer being in a crowd or being completely alone? how many people can be around them before they get uncomfortable?

MAIZAKEEN — she would much prefer a crowd as she doesn’t particularly like being completely alone. when she’s alone with her thoughts that’s prime time for her ghostly voices to flood in (which she has gotten used to dealing with but sometimes they can be distracting and disrupt what is supposed to be her quiet personal time). I also imagine the noise of a crowd is a good distraction from the base line volume of her inner voices. she has spent so much time alone in her life I think it would take A LOT crowd wise to make her uncomfortable. she’d just be excited to see that many people in one place tbh

NOLAN — if he’s wanting to relax he’d prefer to be alone (or with limited amount of people). because his passive perception is so damn high and he can’t really turn off Detective Mode, when in a crowd he just gets sucked into observing and taking it all in which he’s down to do if he’s working but again if he wants to relax at all he’s gotta avoid that shit. and I’d say he’d start to get uncomfortable at a Massive gathering only because he’d be anxious about something illegal/dangerous happening somewhere because he can’t see the whole place at once...rest in peace to this guy always being on high alert he needs a vacation

—how easily does your oc make friends? do they have difficulty talking to new people? why?

MAIZAKEEN — she had a terrible time making friends growing up between her isolation and her Spooky Girl reputation. she’s definitely gotten more confident in recent years and is pretty good at talking to new people (she’s just dealing with outside perceptions) but now that she’s leaving home (and that reputation behind) she’s hoping she can just jump in and make some friends! it’s literally one of her personal goals lol

NOLAN — when he was younger he was pretty good at talking to new people and making friends but ever since he became a workaholic detective that’s a big NOPE! he’s way too focused on stopping crime and solving conspiracies and finds it hard to talk about literally anything else. which is why the few friends he has kept up are other cops…every time I answer a question about this man I realize he desperately needs some help lmao

—how does your oc handle being sick? do they pretend not to be? do they complain a lot? how susceptible to getting sick are they?

MAIZAKEEN — I’m gonna decide right now that she’s just one of those people who rarely ever gets sick. when she does she lays around all pathetic, though she doesn’t complain all that much as she doesn’t want to pester others with her meager health issues. the only person she’d really bother and ask to help her out would be her fiancée tbh

NOLAN — probably doesn’t get sick too often but oh he absolutely hates it when it happens. he doesn’t have time for that it is an obstacle to his work! he will 100% pretend to not be ill and will continue to go about his day until someone forces him to go home and sleep it off or he literally passes out…once again help him!

[thetaekookcloset]

I was reading your old posts and one anon talked about business strategy behind bighit like they deliberately do things to share narrative for particular things. So I went to look at last year's Run episodes and I found it to be so true! Last episode is so much scripted in terms of sitting arrangement, what clips will be shown, which people will be in frame at what point. I am surprised I never noticed this. I am ot7 and my bias is Jimin (he is my mochi 💜) but surprisingly rise in taekook content made me search for them and I stumbled on your blog. I never knew they were close. In the beginning, yes but I thought they aren't close anymore.

Well so I looked at last 3 Run episodes and I saw how three ships were subtly incorporated in the show. Jikook, Vmin and Taejin. Nothing was over the top just the choice of clips like v kissing Jin (v said of course army will like this thing). I was expecting v and jungkook's clip when they were in water park hanging and jimin laughing in background because it's so famous. You can always see it all over internet.

Another thing I noticed was seating arrangement and taekook scene cuts. Like in third last epi when they are singing karaoke v and jungkook stand with V's hand on jungkook's shoulder and then you will see them going back to their seats like someone told them or they changed their mind. In last two episodes they never sat together even though there were a lot of chances (not counting when V sprawled at the edge of the couch). I also saw at one point V approaching to sit where jikook were sitting but at next second V is sitting across the couch. I thought they didn't want to put ships with high tension together but looking at how jungkook's and jimin's cute interaction were captured. I am not sure what to think anymore.

Additionally, in Karaoke episode Jungkook would not help V until he saw V was losing points too much but ready to help others so easily. I am not sure what exactly is their bond. Anyone looking at official content will feel they are not close. In fact if I have to rate ppl close to Jungkook, I would go by this rank- Jimin, Jin, J-Hope, sometimes RM or V and then Suga. Yet looking at behind the scenes I am unable to come to a conclusion. I won't go as far to say to say V and jungkook are in relationship or has the best bond but all these cuts and deliberate placements by bighit is sure raising my eyebrows.

If you don't mind I'll be going through your blog silently and I really appreciate your answering approach.

Of course I don’t mind at all!  I hope the blog is a good resource for you if you decide this is a topic you’re interested in and want to keep digging around in.  We have a lot of great discussions here.

One thing that I personally feel pretty strongly about is consuming content -- any content, BTS or otherwise -- with a critical lens.  Anything created for consumption by others is going to have some sort of intention behind it.  Usually at least part of that intention is to communicate something to the viewer.  People like patterns and stories; we’re very susceptible to narrative, and narrative is a good tool to achieve goals where people are concerned.

I’m generally not one to claim any big conspiracy theories where Big Hit is concerned, but it’s only common sense, in my opinion, that as a corporation with money on the line, they’re going to craft specific narratives to give consumers the impressions that will encourage them to spend more money, without taking too many risks.  They use shows like Run BTS, Bon Voyage, and In the Soop at least partially to do that.

In any case, I definitely agree that there are some eyebrow-raising moments in official content where Taehyung and Jungkook are concerned.  If you do decide to keep poking around on this topic, you’ll likely come across a lot of content that doesn’t come from Big Hit, and you’ll be able to draw more of your own conclusions from there.

Thank you so much for sharing your observations, and feel free to shoot me an ask anytime you like!

[all-encompasing-mossball]

I guess I will throw my cent in the ring in this topic. My lovely girlfriend, wife to be, is a Wizard, she rejects the term witch, but even with her magic and spiritualism, she still keeps her scientific understandings and that beautiful analytical brain if hers into her practices and if she rejected modern medicine it would be a deal.breaker and she doesn't. She thinks that is hard science is hard science. She like I know that there are limits too science and supernatural is just that, ncapable f being measured n a naturalstc way, there doesn't have to be a conspiracy or a disruptions of the 2.

The false dichotomy many of the people discussed in greater detail above hold a very(ironically) Christian way of thinking in terns of Dichotomies between science and religion, when there was no distinction before. There is a sort of "Witch Evangelical" Ive noticed is out there who rejected Christianity and them joined another religion but kept the same tendencies as he Christians. They didn't stop and self reflect in between religions these are the most susceptible of people.

And in these lfty spaces where some of the left leaning woo peddlers and shit exist, there are lefty enablers who are fresh faced lefties who only recently watched a Sophie from Mars video or another softer side of bread tube and think that if you have any form of minority title to claim, they will be willing to overlook certain tendencies, ai have seen people inironically say that Black Antivaxxers are allowed to spew thier woo in left spaces because historically they have been used to test medicines on.

Yes, there is a conversation to be had here, but the vaccines was given too everyone and we are in a pandemic and they are actively putting the lives of disabled and imunocomprimised people in active danger, that's not okay and these people enabled tbay behavior.

There is a left wing grifting circle, ours are just more private.

not to be too euphoric on main, but astrology is also phenomenologically similar to other new age grifts-turned-identity-markers that also have a deeply reactionary bent, that I can’t help but wonder how many people start out on the neopagan astrology lefty side of the spectrum and end up Qanon antivaxers who think flouride is turning our children trans. there’s a continuity of thought there that goes beyond just susceptibility to bad ideas with little evidence (and a lot of confirmation bias), and includes not just anti-intellectualism but intellectual as a politically suspect category. the details of that suspicion do differ–the intellectual as tagged with properties like authoritarian, hegemonic, patriarchal, heteronormative vs the intellectual as tagged with properties like decadent and marxist–but both train a reflexive response to critique as, frequently, being born from a place of profit motive, of cynical self-interest, as not requiring any kind of thoughtful engagement.

there’s a woman on tiktok whose videos i run across occasionally who talks about her experience being wrenched out of the “crunchy mom” bubble and trying to have a more balanced and healthy approach to interacting with the world since; a big part of what seemed to make the whole alternative health and wellness space attractive to her in the first place seemed to be this deep-seated craving for purity, both physical and ideological, for not only ways of living which offered moral reassurance, but for systems of knowledge that offered that as well. and the thing that actually jolted her out of her complacency was hanging out with her other crunchy mom friends and one day one of them just casually rattles of some insanely nasty transphobic bullshit that makes her hair stand on end, like she was expected to agree as a matter of course, and she realized, oh shit, these people are actually insane. and i’m one of them.

i think we forget–which is surprising, in an era where the slightest bit of validation of people with only somewhat repellent beliefs by people with absolutely vile beliefs sends once moderate or even progressive public figures running into the arms of right-wing lunatics–that our social context, and the beliefs we choose to cultivate and focus on, can really deeply shape or re-shape our worldview. given that fact, we should care if the things we believe are true or not! that makes truth-seeking all the more urgent. it also makes me deeply suspicious and not a little hostile to systems of knowledge which elide the difficult complexities of human experience in favor of predetermined categorizations, or don’t support critical examinations of our own flaws, or seems to encourage surrendering our agency in the world in favor of impersonal explanations about an immutable nature shaped by distant cosmic forces.