#I've been desiring other women a whole lot lately

[antiyourwokehomophobia2]

I wonder what it is about breaking up with someone and starting new that I find so upsetting. I realize that people also find break ups heartbreaking, but I know I take it to an extreme. I've never liked the idea of having different partners throughout my life. The idea of having an ex has always been something I hated. The type of breakup didn't matter to me. That is to say whether we ended on good or bad terms didn't make the idea of ending a relationship better to me. I'm not trying to be pretentious about it, I'm just being fr about a sentiment I've held for as long as I can remember. I've never been the type of person who enjoyed the idea of hook ups or casual dating. For better or worse, I've always held the belief that romantic relationships should be all in and serious from the beginning.

I think this feeling is definitely exacerbated by the fact that I've been passed up for another person before so I know what it's like to have someone "move on" from you, and it genuinely sucks like all fucking hell lmao. So the idea of "moving on" and being with someone else has been incredibly tarnished for me.

[titleleaf]

so many words about historical men's corsetry

(This got way too long to send via Discord -- Dangimace in the Renegade Bindery server asked about men's corset sewing/resource recs so here is my half-assed and non-exhaustive rundown. Most of my historical sewing is focused on fashions of the UK, US, and Europe for the second half of the 18th century and first half of the 19th century, so that bias is reflected here; also disclaimer overall that "menswear"/"womenswear" are socially constructed categories and real people's bodies have always looked a wider variety of ways than fashion and other social forces would dictate. I sew historical garments with enthusiastic disregard for the historical gender binary and I'm barrel-chested, thick-waisted, and narrow-hipped no matter what I'm wearing.)

Onward, lads!

Ok wrt men's corsetry: there's a whole lot of fogginess around how historical men's corsets were constructed for a bunch of annoying reasons but that means there's lots of possibilities to explore in pattern drafting and project planning. Stays and other stiffened body-shaping garments have a whole complex conceptual relationship to the body basically as soon as they start appearing. 16th and 17th century garments do a whole lot of shaping (both compressing and building up) for men and women alike, but things really kick off in the 18th century in terms of the symbolic weight placed on stays and (later) corsets. Whole lot of stuff about gender, social class, race, fatness, morality, etc. getting projected onto these garments. So I'm a little leery about people taking obviously satirical illustrations of fashion-victim dandies or Gross Corpulent Libertines getting laced into corsets as truthful and indicative of the way men were really dressing -- scurrilous gossip and exaggeration are both a pain to sift through if we want to know which men wore corsets, what kind, and why.

In the very late 18th/early 19th century corsets were part of the repertoire for achieving highly fashionable shapes in menswear. (Along with a whole lot of padding.) They weren't mandatory for all dudes, but for fashion-forward dandies and equally fashion-forward military men, male corsets/stays were definitely a thing. The whole Romantic-era pigeon-breasted, narrow-waisted silhouette can be emulated by shapewear worn beneath the clothes, pads in the garments themselves, or both; in addition to waist reduction it helped to maintain smooth visual lines underneath close-fitting garments.

(look at these minxy 1830s dudes and their tiny waists)

As the century goes on the desired menswear silhouette becomes boxier and less fitted, and male corsetry recedes into the background; we start to see patents and advertisements for men's corsetry, so they still seem to have been worn, but there's a lot more language around vigorous manly athleticism and supporting the structures of the body. It can be hard to tell whether a particular piece is intended to be worn primarily for some medical purpose or for its perceived aesthetic benefits. This is giving me such flashbacks to trying to find post-surgical compression garments.

(Side note: there's also a vigorous tradition of fetishist writing about corsetry all through the 19th century, in fairly mainstream channels, which is fascinating. Due to the relatively private and deeply horny nature of fetish tightlacing we don't necessarily know as much about what those same letter-writers may have "really" worn at home, but I hope they were having fun.)

I've seen very few specifically men's corsetry patterns from historical pattern-makers-- not even really big names like Redthreaded. I sewed my 19thc menswear corsets from the men's underbust pattern in Laughing Moon Mercantile #113 which afaik is speculative rather than reproducing a specific historical garment, but it's not too different from the women's late-19th-century underbust patterns in the same pattern pack.

(image credit: LMM)

However, a lot of underbust and waist-cincher patterns from more general historical patternmakers could be made suitable with some minor alterations. Here I'd also rec books like Jill Salen's Corsets: Historical Patterns And Techniques and Norah Waugh's Corsets & Crinolines, though their focus is definitely on womenswear and you need to be relatively comfortable scaling up or drafting from pattern diagrams.

The structural features and desired results for a man's corset are pretty much the same as any other corset (back support, compression in some areas, etc.) even when the desired silhouette is different; commercially-created patterns are drafted with the expectation of certain bodily proportions so like with all corset-sewing it's important to make a mockup for fitting purposes. (I ended up liking one of my mockups so much I finished the process and made it a whole separate corset.) I don't know much about this area but I seem to see a lot more belt-and-buckle closures and criss-crossing straps in corsets designated as being for men -- this might be a byproduct of gendered differences in how people got dressed, but it might be nothing.

There's some weird and wonderful historical examples, both extant and in images -- I appreciated this post at Matsuzake Sewing, "A Brief Discussion Of Men's Stays", and its accompanying roundup of images on Pinterest though the tone wrt historical fetishwear corsets in the blog post is a little snippy. I really want to make a replica of Thomas Chew's 1810s corset (which you can read more about here at the USS Constitution Museum) but it incorporates stretch panels made with a shitload of metal springs and I'm not ready for all the trial and error trying to replicate that.

(image credit: USS Constitution Museum Collections)

There's a pretty rich vein of modern men's corset patterns which seem like they could be easily pattern-hacked for historical costuming purposes, like these with shoulder straps from Corsets By Caroline or DrobeStoreUpcycling's waist cincher which also looks like it could be altered pretty easily to cinch with straps and buckles like some 19thc men's corsetry does. This pattern for a boned chest binder in vest form by KennaSewLastCentury is also really cool but I didn't get a chance to sew it pre-top-surgery. (I think I've also seen someone who made a chest-compressing variation on Regency short stays, but I can't find it now.) 

In general a lot of underbust and waist-cincher patterns should work just fine for silhouette-shaping without much bust/hip emphasis -- my usual resource for free corset patterns (Aranea Black) recently took down all her free patterns but they're definitely still circulating out there. For general fashion purposes the sky is the limit and there are a lot of enthusiastic dudes in corsets out there. This Lucy Corsetry round-up shows a variety of modern corsetiers'  styles designated as being for men or more masculine silhouettes (including a SUPER aspirational brocaded corset with matching waistcoat made by Heavenly Corsets that I'd love to sew a historical spin on) and you can see some commonalities and possibilities for body-shaping.

I can also give some more general corset-sewing resources but I'm very much in the learning process here and I'd love any recs or input from people more experienced in pattern-drafting and corset-sewing.

[romanticizingmurder]

One of the things that comes up a lot in meta on the vampire chronicles is trying to delineate between "this is being treated as a kink fantasy", "this is fictional trauma beinf sexualized", and "this is being treated like real trauma would be" and I think the interesting and almost unique to itself aspect of TVC is that...it's almost always all of the above.

I've been thinking about David and Lestat's respective turnings lately and what strikes me about both is how they don't really neatly line up into "portrayal of horrific trauma", "rape fantasy", or even "cnc fantasy" (hear me out, we'll get there), but are an uneasy mixture of all of them at the same time.

Disclaimer: I am going to be talking about rape in a fictional story both as a traumatic violence and as a fantasy. I am coming at this from the point of view of someone who enjoys kinks, including nonconsent in fiction, and who is a real life survivor.

Using David's turning because most of the discussion around it is neatly in the same one or two places, we see it treated as all of these things in turn.

Lestat undeniably rapes David. That is not only the implication from blood drinking as a metaphor for sexual desire, but explicitly the language used:

There are scenes of genuine anguish after the assault:

At the same time, the scene is, at least in my opinion, pretty sexualized! We linger in descriptions of David's body, of Lestat's pleasure in this monstrous deed.

And if this was all there was to it, I'd feel pretty comfortable putting this (and the many situations which mirror it in TVC) as a dead dove sort of situation. It's erotic horror, and this is both erotic and horrifying. What else did you expect?

And yet.

Let me make a relevant digression:

Up until 2012, when new research started coming out, the most popular theory for why rape fantasies are so prevalent among women was something called sexual blame avoidance. The idea being that women's sexuality and desires are so shamed by society as a whole that fantasies wherein they are forced allow them a guiltless way of experiencing desire.

This actually appears to not be the case for most people with these fantasies, but it certainly still is for many, and, possibly more relevantly: when these books were written, this would have been The theory on rape fantasies. That rape fantasies are a manifestation of desires that one feels ashamed of, so the fantasy of being forced removes one's agency and thus blame.

And here is David, having been raped by Lestat, saying he really did want it, he just couldn't allow himself to want it.

David had a desire he felt shame for desiring, and Lestat took away that shame by forcibly acting upon it.

It's easy to read this as simply rape apologism, and I can't stop anyone from reading it that way. And I don't and can't really know what Anne was thinking in this or in any number of other scenes that encompass erotica and horror and the comfort of fantasy all at once.

All I can do is say that the first thing I thought of when reading David's speech was how it felt directly lifted from any number of conversations I've had with other survivors on the appeal of cnc scenes. All I know is how I felt reading this and any number of other scenes in this series, which was: oh, finally someone understands what the fantasy is about.

But I think what trips people with that is that these stories aren't "just" short or erotica without weight. These are long stories with character development and emotional weight and real explorations of trauma. And I don't think that's inaccurate! I think they are that. I think these are, at least to me, also long explorations of kink fantasies and how the dynamics of those fantasies, removed from the need for consent and risk awareness of the real world.

Lestat can rape David and it can be something traumatic, something erotic, and something he ended up believing he wanted, because it's not one or the other in this universe. It can be an exporation of cycles of trauma, erotic horror, and long form kink fantasies written with real emotion, all at once. We don't have to choose just one - and I don't think Anne did, either.

[minas-linkverse]

Ngl I was going to ask about Breath of the Wild but I’d thought you’d get a million of those asks lol. I was also torn between asking about Wind Waker, so whichever one you want to answer more is chill!!

haha yea I thought I'd get a million asks too! Somehow even now this remains the only botw ask, I guess people just figured it must've been sent already 😅

Now to actually share my thoughts on botw... Man I hope people don't get mad at me.

I did not like it!. The first play through I had was mildly exciting simply due to there being a whole unknown world to see, but after a while that gimmick wore off. I knew that if I made my way to the cool looking mountain or interesting abandoned building I'd just find a bokoblin and/or a chest with a gem. Whats the point of a gorgeous expansive world when all I find is the same...! 😫

Oh wow! A town with a whole new atmosphere and culture I sure wonder what I'll get up to h- Ok they have the same shops with slightly different items. Ok cool. There's like a few small quests for more inventory filler I don't really need. Cool cool.

I understand that the game is really fun for some people, they'll do quests just to get to play more of the game. They want all that extra stuff to upgrade armour and really get into the nitty gritty mechanics of the game... But I did not. It was not for me.

Also ouugh the puzzles...! My favourite part of Zelda games is the puzzle solving, but these were in no way satisfying and often more fun to just break. Why would I bother even trying to get into the devs heads when A) I could just break it and B) I have too many options to consider! I can't possibly get a clean eureka moment when everything from monster guts to just climbing could be the solution...! Where's the engaging simplicity of knowing exactly what you have and following the devs' clues to reach the solution!! Waaaaaaaaaaaaa--

I also disliked the story, all the interesting bits in it happened a 100 years ago and I feel like I arrived late with a starbucks. I also will not get over the weird ending cutscene!! After countless fascinating memories of Zelda having very complex emotions at Link... What do you mean you're just going to have a vaguely romantic "Do you still remember me?" YEAH I DO, I thought u disliked me! Which is a fascinating story direction I would've loved continued but OK! I guess we're ignoring that! Women cant be angry that makes them less cute and marketable, I guess!!!!

I... Sorry this is so ranty, I've been holding it in a long time. I think there's a lot to love in botw and I wish I wasn't so sour about it. Other people's love and excitement for it is wonderful and I hope they keep making the art they love. If its your first game in the series and got you into it, that's nothing to be ashamed about. I'm just a grumpy old man waving at cloud /ref.

Honestly I think botw could've been wonderful if it was a new IP. It feels all the Zelda stuff was sort of glued onto a concept that wasn't prepared to carry that mantle. It would've been better off with a new exciting world and cast of characters. It still wouldn't be a game I much care for, but the freedom that could've granted the developers would've been a treat to see.

It's worth adding that even though I dislike botw, I want to treat the characters of that game with respect and care in my comic. I may not love them in game but I can see the passion others have and I am committed to make something worth their time. Your special guys are safe with me. I have 0 desire to dunk on them, and instead wish to honour the love you all have. In a way I'm learning to love them myself through that.

[shsl-heck]

One thing that's had me thinking about Amy lately, is the tension between disgust and desire. She is horrified by the immensity of her desire for Victoria, but the shame and guilt over it can only ever make it worse. Fear and arousal, disgust and desire, all of them bleed into each other (we see this constantly in both porn and horror). It's like she has this splinter at the core of her being and she either cant realize or wont accept that the more and more she digs for it to try to get it out, the deeper she's driving it into herself. She cannot remove this without help from someone else. (Coincidentally, not being able to recognize that her attempts to do/be what she's supposed to are only making things worse is also what leads to the Enwretchening)

I'm aware there's a reading of Worm in which Amy's attraction to Victoria is purely an expression of a kind of morality focused ocd, but I personally think that's less interesting. She definitely experiences some level of that (the urge to fuck up a baby she's healing followed by disgust with herself is like a perfect example of an intrusive thought associated with that brand of ocd), but I think this is a case of *and* rather than *or*. My reading of Amy is that of a deeply lonely and emotionally neglected child clinging to the one person in her life that gives her any form of affection, whose attachment only gets increasingly complicated as she starts to grow up and realizes she is attracted to women.

She has never been treated as part of the family, has always felt on some level that she's only playing at being a sister to Victoria, and she is dealing with that during a stage of her life that is turbulent at best for even people raised in a healthy functional environment. There is a broad cultural taboo around sex and desire, but there's a special sort of self-loathing and fear that you're somehow predatory for finding someone attractive that a lot of queer people experience due to the stigma surrounding their sexuality and/or gender. Homoeroticism and attraction is seen as disgusting and fundamentally wrong by society no matter what. It is especially disastrous for Amy because even though she's never been able to see herself as Victoria's sister, she knows she's supposed to, and that adds a whole new layer of guilt and shame to even a passing thought about Victoria being attractive.

Then she triggers. Suddenly she not only has to pretend to be Amy Dallon the well behaved unintrusive family member, she has to be Panacea, the girl who performs miracles. She doesn't even have a secret identity to fall back on for privacy because of New Wave's gimmick. Any resentment about her role, or desire to live a normal life become more proof that she is a sick, evil person; a parasite who has wormed her way into the Good and Heroic Dallon-Pelham family and is eating away at them from the inside-out.

Even as it forces her to repress more and more of herself, Panacea also offers Amy what is seemingly her only chance to be Good like her family. Healing people isn't just something she has to do in order to avoid being a terrible person, but also how she can atone for everything else that's Bad about her. Saving people is a way to try to purge herself of the desire for Victoria, and to prove that she can be a Dallon in more than name.

Like, as awful and lesbophobic as Wildbow's handling of Amy was, there is something deeply compelling and even relatable about her to me. She perfectly captures an emotional state that I've struggled (and failed) to explain as I wrote and rewrote this post. It's the hunger, the guilt, the shame, the fear, the loneliness that settles on your skin like frost as a child when you accept that there must be something wrong with you, because if there wasn't then you wouldn't have to try so hard to be good.

[coffeecatcraze]

So I've been thinking a lot about Exorcists lately, and the different little hints at their lore through the series. Thanks to both Carmilla's observations and Adam's pep talk, we can safely assume they're all women. But what about outside of that?

Being an Exorcist doesn't seem like it's a job. Vaggie refers to herself as one in the present tense to Carmilla when she's been living in Hell with Charlie for years; there's also Adam's comment about how he's the one who chose her name, and the little detail about his lieutenant having a name that sounds like a pet name version of her title. So what, are Exorcists created in Heaven for the specific purpose of being Exorcists? Makes sense, sure...except when you think about what we've seen from Vaggie and what we know about Heaven. (This isn't counting any lore from before the main show came out, mind you, since we know some things have been retconned.) That's where, to me at least, things don't quite line up with that "Heaven-born" idea.

In the main show, we've seen Vaggie speaking Spanish. If Heaven created a class of angels for the express purpose of being Exorcists, they wouldn't need to know multiple languages. Considering the exterminations are top secret (or they were, until Adam threw the threat at Charlie in the middle of a courtroom), what need would Exorcists have for any skills other than killing? They wouldn't need other skills; they wouldn't even be bred with the capacity for unnecessary skills. If they're made for only one purpose, and their purpose is a secret, it would also make more sense for them to only exist in a military compound with no risk of that secret getting out; they wouldn't have any desire or permission to go anywhere but barracks and a training ground. But we've seen Lute out and about in the streets of Heaven, and Vaggie seemed like she'd been around the city already before she came with Charlie for their meeting.

Not to mention that if the Exorcists were created to be mindless killing machines, where do the emotions come from? Why would Adam's offer of a monetary reward for killing Vaggie get any response? What's up with Lute's...let's just say unique disposition? And why leave this class of angels created for the purpose of slaughtering demons with even the capacity to feel mercy and exercise free will? Heaven wouldn't put effort into making such complex soldiers for a once-a-year secret massacre; Sera said she agreed to the exterminations, implying that Adam (until his death of course) was the one who ran the Exorcists and their activities, even though he still technically reported to her as his superior. And from what we know about Adam, if he got to create his army of lady angels from scratch, he wouldn't give them the capacity for individuality. Not after what happened in Eden with Lilith.

But if Exorcists are human souls who went to Heaven, why did Adam get to name them? Why is it a whole identity, not a job? Without more information, my current theory is heavy conditioning.

Picture this. When the right kind of soul comes to Heaven (a woman who doesn't have anything she'd be looking for in the afterlife, who doesn't have anyone there who would be looking for her, who wasn't some perfect pacifist saint in her human life), Adam gets to her before she can properly settle in and recruits her. Breaks down her identity to rebuild her as an Exorcist, even choosing a new name for her himself (and possibly reshaping her physical form to be more uniform or maybe just more to his tastes), to the point that it becomes as much of an identity as any other. That type of conditioning also explains Vaggie's military tendencies, and the way souls who went to Heaven are so eager to come down and slaughter thousands of souls when for all they know they might be killing someone they knew when they were alive.

The selection process also explains why no one but the other Exorcists would have noticed Vaggie going missing, or the Exorcist who was killed by Carmilla; if they're souls who didn't have anyone in Heaven who would miss them, and who were conditioned to the point that they identified as Exorcists who didn't bother trying to form any outside connections (which would probably be part of that conditioning to ensure none of them let the secret slip to a non-Exorcist), no one would ever notice if one of them disappeared. Even Sera didn't give any real indication that she knew one Exorcist defected and another died before Lucifer set up a meeting for her and his daughter. She just said Adam "failed to contain the demons' unrest" to the point that Lucifer was getting involved; no mention of if she knew things were starting to fracture before Lucifer called her up with the implication of looking to change things after spending millennia just passively watching it all happen. Human souls being selected to become Exorcists because their lack of attachment makes them vulnerable to such complete conditioning would explain a lot there.

(As a side note, it makes even more sense that Sera didn't know about Vaggie, because from what we know, Vaggie might not technically be fallen, at least up until the end of the hearing. She was still able to physically enter Heaven while it's implied that Lucifer can't. Lucifer became fallen because the angels at the top of the hierarchy cast him out, but Lute and Adam don't have that kind of authority. They took her wings and halo and left her in Hell, but Adam still referred to her as a current angel both in their private confrontation and in the courtroom, not a fallen one. By that logic, "fallen" status can only be assigned by someone of a high enough rank, and Adam and Lute are too low on the angelic food chain to officially declare someone fallen. That would have had to come from someone like Sera, and no way was Adam going to admit to his boss that one of his elite Exorcists chose to defy the purpose of the exterminations and let a demon live. Sera probably only learned about it because Adam decided to hurt and establish control over a very defiant Charlie in the courtroom by outing Vaggie as a former Exorcist. Though that's definitely A LOT of speculation on my part.)

But conditioning does still leave room for them to possess individuality, because they were human, and humans do inherently possess individuality. Being bilingual, especially from a young age, is something that gets hardwired into the brain; hence why Vaggie speaks fluent Spanish despite her conditioning. Personality can still shine through; hence the excitement of the Exorcists as a whole, Vaggie's show of mercy and subsequent life in Hell, and Lute being her fucked-up unhinged self.

Plus this little bonus: when Emily, a Heaven-born angel, gets mad her angry flush is distinctly a bright blue, which implies Heaven-born angels have blue blood (which also makes sense in a symbolic way, with the phase "blue-blooded" and all); Exorcists, like Adam (a human soul), bleed gold. We know from Helluva Boss that Hellborns bleed black, but we've seen that Sinners bleed red. (Of course Charlie's a Hellborn with red blood, but considering she's the only Hellborn who has a human soul as a parent, she's kind of a special case.) In other words, in both Heaven and Hell, it human souls and souls that have no direct link to humanity have different blood colors.

It also goes back to what I mentioned awhile ago about Heaven just being a real-world broken government doing the same bullshit that happens on Earth. Conditioning is a thing that really happens while artificial creation of pre-conditioned soldiers isn't. Of course this is also all just me talking to myself while my chaotic little hyperfixated brain throws ideas at the wall to see if they stick, but I at least don't think it's entirely baseless.

[diosama27]

Usui Takumi

So lately I've noticed a blonde guy from my class looking at me... No, to be accurate staring at me.

An: Yn was in the big girl group so no one literally gave her any attention, well she was fine with that cause she was one of the "independent women" they say but it's all because of the trust issues that she had with her past relationships and things she heard from others.

But for some reason, you knew that he was staring at your closest friend rather than you. Boys would swoon over the school's reigning queen. Misaki fucking Ayuzawa was who she was.

Misa was a typical tsundere girl who was literally without imperfections. The boys would do everything for her to notice, and since she's the prez, she obviously excels in the curriculum.

She is the goddess, a "smexy goddess," the all-powerful, supreme being. She has even rejected girls, which is painful to behold.

Everyone with a rational mind will, of course, fall for her. Because you two were great friends, a lot of males even approached you to introduce them to her.

Seriously, some guys merely talk to you to attract her attention, but she's just very protective of you and fears that you will get wounded as a result of everything. You weren't sure why, but you liked being the most important person to the school queen.

It's true because she detests men who use you as a stepping stone to approach her. She is the kind of friend that everybody desires.

But recently, she came clean about her emotions for Usui. Who has been the bad boy that most girls adored.

Honestly, after hearing this, you felt a little sad because you'd have to share your sexy bestie with someone else.

If she enters a relationship, you won't be able to spend time with her and hang out like you used to, but if she's pleased with it, you wanted to support her.

You want to make her smile, make fun of her, and discuss all the wonderful times she has had with her significant other.

That was like hearing about your daughter's love life and how happy it made you. Indeed the goddess and the bad boy thing would make a great couple, I reckon.

You get the impression that he has feelings for her, too. This relationship is now legitimate, and in a few days it might even become official.

Next day at school~~~

"Yn!! Why are you late today, uhh? What am I going to do with you?" She sighed. "Btw did you have your breakfast? Wait that's a stupid question so here" she handed you a bento similar to hers.

She does this so often she would bring food for you everytime. She's just too kind.

"Thank you misa~~~!!!!" you play cried and ate the food with her. She would do everything for you, protect you, bring you food, you can be comfortable around her, you will fall in love with her if this continues.

AN: And did I forget to mention that some of the guys and girls actually envy you for being treated like a lil baby by the queen of school.

Well you would've died a hundred times if dagger eyes could kill you, she would support you and just be there for you. The perfect waifu that everyone wants but is mine only. (Hehehe)

This usui guy wanted to say something to Misaki as he was literally all around her the whole day, but she just rejected him. It's to be mentioned that they were still in the friend stage.

You knew misa was not able to conceal her love for him. She was rejecting him only because if she spoke, he would've learned why she was a red tomato the whole day.

But you wanted him too find it out so they could get together you wanted to do something to help them confess their love for each other and come clean.

Students were already leaving their classes as the school bell rang, laughing and sighing alongside their friends and loves.

"Yn!!" When you turned around after hearing an unexpected voice call for you, you spotted him—the crucial target of your mission—in front of you.

Since you've never really said a hi or a hello to this man, you reasoned that God was on your side. You were trying to think of a way to approach him when he appeared.

"Wait, he's going to ask me to assist him in telling Misa how he feels. Yes of course, everything is going smoothly, and I only need to convince her to accept his offer. You were too preoccupied thinking about where they would go on their first date and how Usui would surprise Misa.

He was nervous, not at all like the bad guy he was, and you thought he really loved her. "Yn I want you to do me a favour and please don't say no, it's really important for me and only you could do this since Misaki trusts only you, so please," he said.

You mentally yelled out, "Yess it's here," and then asked, "Well, I'd do anything for Misa, so what is it?" You inquired, anticipating the responses you had in mind but this was different like really totally different.

"Actually, I need your support in arranging a date for Misaki with one of my friends. He attends a different school, and you can trust me when I say that Misaki would adore him. I'm not really sure how we became friends because he is nothing like me.

He is my best mate, and I want to do something for him because I know he would sacrifice his life for her. For her, he would do anything for her."

You just stood by and watched as he chuckled like a little kid while he reminisced about him and his pal.

"Please, Yn, help me in this. I know you would feel exactly the same way about Misaki, who needs to settle down with someone so she can have a lifestyle beyond the school as she's far too consumed with everything else to take care of herself. So, please."

He begged with you, and you were unable to even answer to his questions, like, "What the hell was he saying? She likes him, yet he's here asking me to set her up on a date with his best friend."

"That's not likely to happen; if he cares about her, he should come out and say it. How can she ever trust a coward who can't even communicate his own thoughts and emotions? If he truly loves her, ask him to grow up and have the guts to admit his feelings because the wonderful queen Misaki who she sure is doesn't need a love like that."

You were about to walk away when he said. "No, it's not like that, you should understand. He loves her, but he doesn't want her to know because he feels that he's not good enough to love her."

You are now really mad at how things turned out as you said "Even if we set up a date for them, Usui, do you honestly believe that Misa will accept his feelings? What are you even expecting when she doesn't even know who he is?"

He was puzzled but came up with "then how about we plan a double date so that we both could also go and make preparations for them to spend some alone time. How about that?"

'yes bye-bye misa I'm going to miss you, I'll miss you soo bad' you thought treasuring all those memories you had with misa and locking them all up in your heart.

"Wait no, no, no. That's not how it should be" you tried to think of other options but you couldn't come up with anything. When you heard him question "Then how should it be?" You were not in your right mind, millions of thoughts which were trying to make you go insane ran in your head and without even realising you blurted out the truth, the truth that only misa could say, the truth that only she has the right to say.

"Well, Misaki is in love with you" he was shocked and was comprehending what he just heard with an expression in his which waited for you to correct the sentence thinking that you made a mistake but no, it's the truth.

"What was that? No, it can't be true right? No." he paused for a few seconds but said "Yn, I'm actually in love with you. To be honest I wanted to confess in a better circumstances but I guess it too late now as it has come to this. But I have feelings for you and misa is just my friend, nothing more."

You were so shocked that your thoughts began to fade into the background of yourself and Misa and towards the reaction of the entire school once they learned what had actually happened.

He is the playboy, but now it's not the same him. He's dead serious and was anxiously anticipating your response, and you could see it as you stood still and stared at him.

You were confused, so you tried to take a glimpse of everything which happened so firstly you were You were trying to pair them up. Secondly Usui approached you and asked you to help him set up a date for Misa and his friend.

Finally he says that he's in love with you. You almost felt like you were in some kind of a tv drama or something. Things kept crashing into you.

"No, Misa is in love with you, and you need to be too. I should have no part in this, neither should your friend. Why did everything end up this way?" You could feel his hands on you while you were jabbering out loud and heard him acknowledge,

"Yn, I know all this is too much on you, but it's true, I genuinely love you and I can't even think about someone else in your stead. Don't make this a matter about others, please. I want to know what you feel about me, not how your friend thinks, please" usui says.

"I don't really know how to feel about this, maybe I need some time." You turn around to walk away when he pulls you and kiss you and says.

"I love you and I would do anything for you to love me back but I can't move on from you, no not in this life, so please give me a chance." He pleads while you stand there dumbstruck after the kiss.

Because to all this you never noticed Misa behind Usui standing in full shock trying to hold back the tears which were threatening to fall.

She just lowered her head and after a brief moment of looking away Misa murmured, "Yn, are you not cold? Would you like to walk with me as we head back home now that it's almost dusk?" As she was staring blank into your lifeless eyes. With that, she walked ahead saying "Let's meet up tomorrow, then. Take her home safely, Usui."

You didn't wait for anything and just ran behind Misa trying to stop her by then you were far away from Usui and near the local park were y'all sometimes chat for a while. She had tears stained her cheeks you couldn't just look at her like that. She was hurt. You hurt her.

"I'm sorry Misa, it's not like that, please understand. You are my friend and I'm sorry that you witnessed all this, I'm sorry, it's my fault, please, please forgive me." You cried as you hugged her.

Misa also couldn't control her emotions anymore and bursted into tears in your arms.

"Yn, I know, it's not your fault, it's just.... I can't. I don't want to loose you because of these emotions. You are one of the most important person in my life. I want you to be happy too."

"I know you love him too...."

You were trying to comfort her but when she said the last few words you knew you fucked up.

"What are you saying Misa, you think I like him, no, not a chan..."  Before you could finish she said. "Yn no, stop, I know you, don't give me that crap. But I'm sorry because I realised it too late, just after I, realised my feelings for him and when I confessed it to you that's only when I knew you also like him. I'm sorry, I should have said it before."

She sobbed onto you and you couldn't console her no more, she was broken and so were you. You knew you had feelings for Usui but it didn't matter when she had the same feelings for him.

"Yn, you should go back to him and tell him how you feel. I want you to be happy and find the one that you love, now that you found him you should do all you can. Yn, do it for me, please."

Stop this, it's not how it's supposed to be. No, I don't know what to do. By then Usui caught up to you and was just waiting for y'all to have your moment. "I'm sorry Misa, I didn't know all this, I'm sorry."

She wiped her tears away and said

"It's alright Usui, atleast you knew about my feelings, and I won't regret ever having feelings for you. But please understand yn and try to pursue her by anyway possible. You won't get anyone better than her. I can assure you for that."

She looked at you and said "Yn, nothing will tear us apart, this friendship is for life, as people say you either be with me or you die, so guess it's not the later?"

She playfully teased as she forms finger gun and points it to you. You just couldn't stop the tears which were now flowing like a waterfall. You hugged her so tight and she just pampered you for some time.

"Now I feel relieved. Please take care and take her home safe. Byee." She hugged you one more time and said "I love yn, let meet tomorrow. Bye" then she left.

Now it was only you and Usui, he saw you and said "A genuinely good friend to have, I guess." As you smiled and he hugged you removing the coldness in you when Misa left.

"I love you Usui, thank you for everything." You said as you were in his arms.

You could feel him tightening his grip around you as you face upwards you find his face beaming with joyful tears. He wipes them away and says "I love you too babe. I love you sooo much"

[erinthesails]

izzy, pete, power, and queer desire

DISCLAIMER: this was written pre season 2 and i think there will be a lot more to say on the topic once we're through the season, but i wanna post this as-is because there's so much interesting stuff going on in season 1 alone i wanted to think through!

So i've been thinking about Izzy and Pete lately, and as threatened, i've decided to write way too much about the two of them as narrative foils. The more I think about their arcs, seems the more I'm realizing that reading them side-by-side offers a lot of insight into their characters and also what they represent in the story as a whole

Let's get the most obvious comparisons out of the way. Both Pete and Izzy...

Incite incidents aboard the ship with the goal of getting Stede killed

Have a serious sense of ego and an inability to lose gracefully (as well as a heightened sensitivity to what counts as "losing")

Are obsessed with the Legend/Persona of Blackbeard (TM), and reify it as ideal piracy and masculinity

Have a narratively significant relationship with Lucius

As a sidenote, I believe they're also the only two crewmembers (so not including Calico Jack) to explicitly use femininity as an insult ("that's women's work"/"namby pamby" and calling lucius "bitch"), which feels significant given the rest of these traits

Put simply, they're the two characters who start the story very much in the same place, i.e., not on board with the type of piracy Stede is doing, and by extension, the type of masculinity Stede is doing, to the point that they literally want him dead. They end the season, however, in entirely opposite places, which (or so I believe) can tell us something about the way queer desire, masculinity, and power work in the narrative, and I think looking at these 4 shared traits is a really useful way to make sense of that

So let's start from the top...

1. Mutiny

Pete starts the story trying to kill Stede. No, he doesn't get very far, no he doesn't plan it well, but it happens. He explicitly wants Stede dead and a new captain to be elected. It's mutiny, plain and simple, and it's kind of the first overt conflict Stede faces in the whole show.

Izzy tries to kill Stede multiple times, but I think the most relevant to these particular parallels is the takeover by the English Navy at the end. As I see it, the duel was about Izzy trying to restore his sense of "order," which meant Ed in charge and himself positioned as Ed's only confidante. Stede's approach to piracy was a threat in his mind (though not the kind of existential one that some people on here have made it out to be, but I'll get to that later), and by getting rid of Stede, he gets rid of the disruption to status quo.

Calling Ye Olde Cops, on the other hand, is NOT a return to order. Whether or not he had planned for Ed to be aboard the ship, selling Stede out to the authorities meant there could be no return to things as they were. Getting the navy involved threatened everyone on that ship, and he knew that it wouldn't end with Stede executed and the rest of them sailing happily away. Something would have to change, and it seems evident from his comments throughout the show that he's hoping that change will include more power for himself. The deal he made proves it: his "payment" for giving Stede's location is being given captaincy over the Revenge and being given "custody" (yikes) of Ed. Whether he would have willingly returned control of the ship to Ed, we'll never know, but regardless, this is a mutiny in pretty much every sense of the term. He's usurping Stede and Ed both, and taking power for himself.

Notably, these two things come at opposite ends of each character's arc for the season. It's where Pete starts and it's where Izzy ends, and the significance of that, I think, can be traced to two of their defining character traits: ego and idealization of Blackbeard.

A lot has been said about Izzy's reasons for attempting to get rid of Stede, so I do intend to go into more detail about why I think these are the two main factors for both mutinies (and not revolutionary sentiment or safe spaces), but let's get into what I mean by each of these traits first.

2. Ego

Among the first things we learn about both Pete and Izzy is that they're really really really poor sports, and Stede's first crime against each of them is insulting their egos.

Pete, by assigning work and encouraging activities he thinks of as "below" him. Literally the opening scene of the show is Pete fucking up a game of cards for everyone because he's losing, closely followed by him getting unreasonably pissed off by a game of...I'm not even sure what it is, pickleball? Racketball? Giant ping pong?

Izzy, on the other hand, is insulted by being beaten at his own game.

Stede is supposed to be an idiot, beneath him, not even worthy of his notice, and yet he keeps winning! He keeps fucking winning! And what's worse, Blackbeard (and I make a distinction here between Blackbeard and Ed) is taking notice too, and giving this guy attention! Someone else once pointed out that what Stede did in this "ambush" was essentially a fuckery, something the Blackbeard crew does regularly. So it's not so much the method Izzy objects to, it's the fact that he's the recipient of it.

These two are constantly losing from the time we're introduced to them, and making it everyone else's problem.

Their definitions of losing are also heavily influenced by the ideal set by Blackbeard. Whatever their concept of "Blackbeard" is doing, that's what they should be doing, and falling short of that equals failure in their eyes.

3. Blackbeard as Ideal

This hopefully requires little explanation. Pete is the first person to evoke the idea of Blackbeard in the whole show. And though Pete's story is obviously embellished, if not 100% made up, but I think it provides a useful picture of the kind of awe and respect Ed's established around the persona of Blackbeard. We get an image of what the world sees when they look at Blackbeard, and what other pirates think when they think of him. It also establishes that the greatest personal glory Pete can imagine is the approval and acceptance of Blackbeard, something that he continues to chase even as he gets to know Ed as a person.

The same is true of Izzy. He's risen in the ranks so that he no longer has to be just a fanboy, but we know that he joined ed's crew to begin with BECAUSE of his respect for the Blackbeard persona.

Throughout the show, he aggressively corrects people who call Ed his name, insisting he be called Blackbeard--not just because it's who he is, but because Izzy considers Blackbeard a title of respect. In fact, the ultimate title of respect. He's not protecting Ed. He's protecting the image of Blackbeard that inspired him to join the crew to begin with.

When it comes down to it, his respect and loyalty is for Blackbeard, not Ed, and he tells us as much in Episode 10.

For Pete and Izzy, more than any other characters, the ideal of Blackbeard, an ideal that is firmly established through Ed's experiences to have been a toxic one devoid of emotional intimacy and self-worth, is foundational both to their lives as pirates and to their identities as individuals.

4. Mutiny Again

Okay, so we've established that both Izzy and Pete have easily bruised egos and style themselves in accordance with the narrative of piracy that the Legend of Blackbeard tells. So how do we know these are the reasons for mutiny?

Well, in Pete's case, he just literally tells us.

Pete has no practical, material reasons to want Stede off the ship. He's getting paid a salary, he's not asked to do much, he gets to spend his days hanging out and hooking up and whatever else he likes. We're never led to believe that he thinks Stede's leadership is dangerous. On the contrary, he seems pissed that Stede isn't putting them in enough danger! There's no justification given, no web woven, he tells us directly that Stede is dressing them up like fancyboys, denying them the opportunity to pillage and loot and drink and scheme and plot and kill the way that he thinks Blackbeard's crew must be doing. It's ego and the ideal of Blackbeard that drive the mutiny--if it was really about danger or money or safety, he'd just join a different crew. But no, he wants to be the new captain, despite little experience and no real leadership qualities, because that would suit both his ego and his desire to measure up to the standard set by Blackbeard.

But Izzy, I would argue, tells us nearly as directly, most critically in this moment when he explains his betrayal to Chauncey and Jackie:

"Bonnet done something to my boss's brain" seems pretty universally understood to mean "Stede queered him up in a way I don't like." Stede is causing Ed to fall short of the ideal of Blackbeard, to do piracy and masculinity in a way that doesn't track with Izzy's idea of success.

I guess you could argue he's withholding the whole truth from Chauncey, but his response to losing the duel, the precipitating incident of him running off to the Sea Police, is this:

What did we just say about making it everyone else's problem when he loses? The mutiny is an act of revenge against Ed as much as it is against Stede, for the damage done to his ego in losing and for their failure to allow him (again, in his mind) to fulfill the ideal of Blackbeard.

Some people have suggested that Izzy's hatred for Stede, his desire to get him off the ship and restore order, is in service of protecting what he saw as a "safe space," equating piracy with queerness and seeing Stede as someone attempting to gentrify it for mainstream tastes. This pretty clearly is not what's happening. He states his reasons pretty straightforwardly, and even if we want to claim he's not telling Chauncey the whole truth, he has no reason to lie to Ed. His response is to threaten Ed for "allowing" him to face the consequences of loss. A loss that was precipitated pretty directly by his discomfort with Ed's moving away from Blackbeard, and with his fear of the kind of piracy and masculinity that Stede represents.

Izzy's reasons for mutiny are far closer to Pete's than any kind of revolutionary queer sentiment. In both cases, the leadup to mutiny is a) an embarrassment to the ego, and b) an environment that fails to uphold and pursue the Blackbeard persona as ideal.

But Pete, despite his ongoing obsession with Blackbeard, despite his desire for power, despite his ego still being a bit fragile, ends the story thinking positively of Stede, and actively trying to prevent hard from coming to him, while Izzy CONTINUES threatening Ed until he gets a mouthful of toes for his trouble.

The two start from a similar place and experience completely opposite character arcs. So what's the variable here? What causes one to embrace a more flexible, compassionate approach to piracy and the other to deliver a homophobic tirade to Ed's face?

Well, I'd argue it's because of...

5. Lucius

In a show about queerness, masculinity, learning who you are and doing it on purpose, it seems fitting that Lucius—the first character we learn is gay, and the most outspokenly queer, gender-nonconforming person on the ship—be a key turning point in the narrative and in multiple character arcs.

As far as we can tell, Pete's big turn for the better comes right around the time he and Lucius get together. In the first two episodes, he's pretty much complaining continuously about how lame and weak and bad at piracy Stede and the crew of the Revenge are. But after episode 4, when he and Lucius hook up for the first time (that we're aware of, at least), he drops that completely. He wants to impress Ed, of course, but he also asserts that the whole crew should be thought of as "real pirates in the real world," where just a few episodes before, he was making fun of how shitty they all were at the job. Pete's antagonistic toward pretty much everyone until he and Lucius get together.

And, weirdly, Lucius seems to be Izzy's breaking point too. People more eloquent than I have noted the significance of the fact that, after the raid, Izzy targets all the worst of his ire at Lucius: again, the most non-masc, openly queer person on the ship, and his insult of choice is an explicitly gendered one. He catches both Pete and Lucius hooking up, but only targets one of them, and when Lucius steps out of line, it's queer desire that Izzy uses to threaten him ("You've been a proper seductress..."). Izzy, at this point, is living firmly in the world of hegemonic power. Queerness is an ontological evil, an inherent insult. it doesn't cross his mind that anyone would refuse to accept it as such.

When that backfires and Lucius establishes that a) his queerness is not something he's interested in hiding, limiting, or keeping quiet about, and b) no one else on this ship is interested in asking him to do so, something changes in Izzy. He goes from being confident, domineering, aggressive, to impulsive and fearful. That doesn't mean that he's less of a dick, but this run-in with Lucius represents a real change in behavior and attitude.

6. Finally, the Conclusion

Pete and Izzy are very similar character archetypes at their core. They have fragile egos, a commitment to tradition and expectation, a presentation so dedicated to masc gender compliance it borders on the camp. They're both gay men (okay okay maybe this isn't absolutely confirmed for Izzy, but it's literally only barely subtext) who are afraid of expressing queerness and gender nonconformity. And to each of them, Lucius, in all his confident flouting of gendered expectations, his visible and unapologetic queerness, represents something pivotal.

What's interesting, is that I think they both see the same thing, but have wildly different reactions to it. Lucius is their lighthouse.

To Pete, Lucius is a guide. An offer of safe passage, a symbol of other ways to be. A promise that he can be something and somewhere different, and that someone will be there waiting for him when he does. Lucius shows him that queerness can be a beautiful thing, worthy of love.

To Izzy, on the other hand, Lucius represents a deadly warning for all the same reasons. He's a reminder of all the things to be defended against. Queerness are the rocks you crack up on. It's the way to ruin and ruin itself, and the language he uses to describe Lucius, Stede, and Ed in his softer moments proves this. Izzy thinks by breaking down Lucius he can get rid of those rocks, protect himself from the queerness he's afraid to see in himself. Pete realizes that Lucius is just illuminating what's already there (the sketch scene!!! "I'm just recording what's there"!! augh!!).

Izzy's reaction to Lucius represents a concern about the very definitions of proper personhood. Of what consitutes allowable masculinity, allowable piracy. The kind of boundary policing often done by marginalized people with a slice of the world they have power over. Who rather than end that marginalization for everyone, will cling to the piece of power they have (or believe they have). Izzy is a pirate. He's outside traditional systems of power. But he's found stability, power, a way to get ahead of everyone else in rigid enforcement of the social standards that suit him. And by refusing to play by those rules, Lucius represents a breakdown of his sense of order that, I think, leads to so many of his decisions later int he show.

But if Izzy's response to Lucius is terror at the encroachement of the other within his neat borders of acceptability, Pete's is realizing that the definitions and borders themselves are flawed. Lucius is someone he sees beauty in, who he sees love and joy in. And if his definitions of the world require seeing someone like Lucius as lesser, how could those definitions be correct?

These connections between Pete and Izzy are important, I think, because they show what izzy had every opportunity to be! He and Pete had all the same prejudices and all the same chances to examine them, and while Pete learned that queer love has a potential that fear and self-loathing doesn't, Izzy retrenched into a view of the world shaped by fear, homophobia, and self-hate.

Pete is a sign that Izzy could have been different, but he's also a sign that he still can be. I think this show is fundamentally about love, forgiveness, and the capacity for change, which means that Izzy always has the chance to follow Pete's lead, reassess, and recognize that proximity to power won't bring him any closer to happiness

[anhed-nia]

BLOGTOBER 10/22-23/2023: SMILE (2022) and BARBARIAN (2022) - In Defense of the Tall Gangly Old Lady Monster

I've heard a lot of complaints lately (haven't we all) about the recent emergence of a new horror archetype--the tall, gangly, old lady monster--and I always get the feeling that the plaintiffs are willfully ignoring the context of this apparition. I mean sure, if you feel annoyed with the rapid proliferation of a prematurely tired cliche, that's fair; personally I'm pretty sick of scary clowns, even though some of them are still effective, if your main proposal is a scary clown then you're going to have to work harder than usual to get my attention. But vis a vis the tall scary old lady discourse, as far as I've seen, the objection is almost always the same: This monster is an expression of disdain for elderly people, and a reinforcement of the idea that women are worthy so long as they are considered sexually viable, after which point they deserve only disgust and rejection. And like there will surely be boring, misogynistic representations of this monster that are fair to roll one's eyes at, but the most visible targets of this criticism have been SMILE and BARBARIAN, and I would argue that both films are full of ambivalence and irony, and the specific morphology of the monster is thoughtful and deliberate.

I think that any time you hear a complaint that is based on the assumption that a movie is promoting real-life ideals and ethics, you need to double check that. This is the propaganda model of media analysis, and while nothing is created in a vacuum, not everything has didactic, propagandistic motivations. Certainly some movies ARE doing just that; I see quite a lot of chauvinism and bigotry in action movies, comedies, and (perhaps most of all) romantic comedies, whose content is clearly presented as aspirational. Low-hanging fruit of this kind is found in movies like SWEET HOME ALABAMA, which says that self-made independent career women are just fooling themselves and should stay home and serve whoever gets them pregnant first, or the similarly retrogressive JUNO in which a girl who gets knocked up during high school is universally worshiped and supported by everybody and truly loved by the knocker-upper and there is almost nothing really perilous or concerning about the whole situation, it's all very cute and desirable. Horror movies require a little more investigation. Sometimes the monster does embody some kind of moral mandate, or an unjust injunction against a certain demographic. Hitchcock and De Palma have been accused of transphobia, for instance, and while I don't think we should throw out their movies (which you should never have to do unless you're incapable of critical thought), the charges are fair. But other times, the monster embodies unfinished business, ambivalence, irony, insecurity. It exists not as a symbol of universal evil, but as a foil to the hero. And sometimes the hero is not a hero at all.

All of the following is extensively spoilery, so proceed with whatever caution is appropriate: Zach Cregger's BARBARIAN is a delightfully twisty, prismatic reflection on misogynistic violence and its consequences. It begins with a simple-seeming situation that prods the viewer to guess what protagonist Georgina Campbell should do about the problem of an unplanned male roommate in her Airbnb. Bill Skarsgård is sketchy and intrusive, but charming enough to create a dilemma for the savvy young woman--a dilemma which ends abruptly with the discovery of a monster in the basement. The building itself has its own polar identity: It offers appealing lodging for hip Detroit tourists in a once-desirable neighborhood devastated by racist, capitalist forces. The home's previous owner was a serial killer (the great Richard Brake!) with a penchant for forcibly breeding his female victims, and it is now the possession of Justin Long, a hot shot actor who is so poisoned by his own witless misogyny that he seems genuinely unaware of what constitutes rape. Lurking in the labyrinthine foundations of his investment property is one of Brake's victims: A tall, powerful, barely-human female who has been warped into believing that her captives are actually her babies. While BARBARIAN is willfully disorienting, and that is part of its charm, a bird's eye view shows its careful orchestration of clear spectrum of forms of abuse--from the institutional, to the constitutional, to the unconscious--alongside a polar pair of potential survivors, one final girl and one twisted victim.

Much has been made of the scene in which Justin Long is forced to suckle on the pendulous teat of the maternal morlock. The common assumption seems to be that we're supposed to share Long's disgust and pity his violation. I would question any impulse to side with Long as an innocent victim; certainly you're supposed to fear the monster, but that doesn't mean you can't share in the cathartic delight of a selfish, greedy, destructive, gentrifying rapist getting his comeuppance in the form of unwanted carnal contact with a female who shatters all of his fascist beauty standards. Yes, she is meant to be terrifying, but the all-important question is WHY, on what principle? On any close inspection, the motivation of BARBARIAN does not seem to involve reinforcing ageist, ableist, misogynistic values. And one might add that, in general, it doesn't get us very far culturally or artistically to insist that all oppressed-minority characters are always presented unambiguously as heroes or tragic victims. Sometimes we don't mind grossing you out, as long as we get our revenge.

Much like the dark mother in BARBARIAN, the monstrosity in Parker Finn's SMILE embodies the protagonist's neurotic phobias, rather than making a statement about objective good and evil. Sosie Bacon plays a therapist in an emergency psychiatric unit who makes the unfortunate acquaintance of a transient entity that perpetuates its existence by possessing the witnesses of violent suicides. As the traumatized target begins to perceive the leering entity everywhere, she descends into a self-destructive spiral that will end with her own inevitable death. Bacon makes an especially good victim because, aside from the immediate impact of the horrifying suicide she witnesses in her ward, she is haunted by the childhood memory of having passively allowed her mentally ill, substance-dependent mother to die. As an adult, Bacon has eschewed the challenge of deeper connections in favor of shallow, conditional relationships with people who will not forgive her flaws when they are exposed. The demon exploits her refusal to face herself by incarnating as a version of her mother that is at first pitiful and accusative, then powerful and terrifying. Once again, the dark mother is not here to encourage the audience's prejudices against women who are dysfunctional or physically past their supposed prime; in SMILE she is an avenging spirit who forces the protagonist, and the audience, into a direct confrontation with all that we ignore and avoid.

There is a lot more I would like to say about SMILE, and I kind of feel like I'm stealing from future me by including it in this abbreviated review! But as I have previously stated, I didn't know this was going to be a speed run of Blogtober until I was completely overwhelmed by life and it was too late to curate accordingly. To be honest, I liked BARBARIAN a lot and I think it's sort of deep in spite of itself, but SMILE scared the absolute shit out of me both times that I saw it. I probably found it even more effective the second time. It is unpredictable and beautifully articulated, with a strong visual personality that perfectly serves its psychological purposes. And like, if you happen to be a high-anxiety person with social problems who withers under too much attention or eye contact, and you have a basic daily fear that you don't really know who people are behind their er um uh smiles, THIS IS THE HORROR MOVIE FOR YOU. I got scared again just picking out images for my blog post! So, I reserve the right to revisit both of these movies on future Blogtobers. There is certainly a lot to say just about the emerging horror archetype of the giantess/ogress--other examples that immediately spring to mind include the vampire from Resident Evil: Village and the final (TERRIFYING!) monster in the original [REC], and I'm sure there are more, and I'm also pretty sure some real-deal academic will scoop me on this! Actually, I hope they do. Please holler at me when you inevitably see the relevant think piece.

[torialefay]

I reblogged my topic I was going to send here in case you didn't want to continue answering and furthering the concept about how lack of experience can affect the desirability of a person in sexual/romantic.

I'm 26, virgin, the last time I even kissed a guy was 5 years ago, never been in a long-term relationship and even though it is a HUGE insecurity of mine, I'm open about it on here because I have received a lot comments like-

'You're a virgin? your smut is so good and accurate, I thought you'd have loads of experience'

Which I love those comments, froth over them but I'm honest about my inexperience so ppl know I have no idea what the hell I'm writing about half the time.

But as a cis female, I do understand that it's more 'acceptable' for a woman to be 26 and have a lack of experience vs men to be 26 and have a lack of experience.

It's hard both ways- don't get me wrong because I know plenty of guys who are like...

'I don't want to be with someone who's a virgin because it's too much pressure to be someone's first'

Which for starters, how mediocre and effortless is your performance in the bedroom that you think it's 'too much pressure' to give someone a good time?

And secondly, I would argue and say there's less pressure because there's nothing for us to compare it too??

But as a female, I think we do get more sympathy about being a late-bloomer because 'she's a romantic, she's waiting until marriage, sex is more intimate for her etc etc'.

Whereas most the time when a guy is inexperienced, ppl are going to be like 'why? You're a guy, just go fuck whoever- unless you're a creep or incel wtf?'

But it's double edged because most ppl don't want to be with someone who's inexperienced but how are we meant to gain experience?

And then there's the whole other topic of a women being sexually rejected by a man and the stigma surrounding that-

Women are tend to be told that men will take all offers of sex and has someone who has been sexually rejected (more than once) by guys- I can safely say it's a level of humiliation that you don't find anywhere else.

In summary, as a demisexual 26 year old inexperienced female, pls give us a chance because most of us are eager and willing to learn and are just excited about fkn getting chosen by someone in all honesty.

i think it's okay to post about it as long as it's informational and isn't coming for anyone 😭😂 and i think this is an important topic because there definitely are people on this platform who also haven't had sex before & i think it's good for them to know that it's actually pretty normal. i have friends who haven't slept with anyone, and they're in their mid-twenties as well.

i also have friends who have liked & disliked that they were "virgins"... sometimes i struggle with the word bc i think it can have a negative or weird connotation sometimes, but i'm gonna use it for now anyways. there are some people who like the feeling of knowing they're gonna be the first dick inside of you/first person to do something to you (as if you've never used a toy or fingers before but whatever), and there are definitely people who don't give af about you & assume you want your first experience to be with someone more "special" than them. there's a wide range of responses to someone who openly says that they are a virgin.

i don't think most realize just how many people there are around our age who actually haven't slept with anyone... because they simply don't talk about it or have been made to feel weird or ashamed. my heart breaks over that sometimes bc some people simply want it out of curiosity, but others only want it to say they've done it or to not feel "weird" about themselves... or feeling "different" i guess.

i do think i've met more fem people who need an emotional connection before experiencing sexual attraction to a person... but i think there are plenty of masc people who feel this way as well, but it's been pushed on them that they SHOULD have the urge to fuck. and here's the same: it is so fucking hard & backwards to get into a relationship these days. i've read some studies that have projected that only about 60% of people in our age range & below will end up in relationships and be with that person long term/to the point of marriage... people have a dating problem & a commitment problem and that makes it a lot harder for some people to have sex or even want to have sex. even for me, i've only slept with people i've been in relationships with... but at this point in society, i genuinely don't know if i'll ever be in a meaningful relationship again sooooo ig you know what that means 🥲

point blank, there are tons of people out there, fem and masc, who haven't had sex. most of them just don't talk about it. and i don't think it's anything that anyone should be shamed for- regardless of the gender they identify as. plus, there will be plenty of people who are great at sex their first time, and plenty who aren't. some potential partners don't want to risk it as not being "great" their first time & that could contribute to saying no. but i would bet that there are plenty of people out there who would be just fine with it.

i hope you never have to feel alone in this. if people don't wanna fuck, that's not always on you. and please never feel like you have to be "chosen" bc a lot of these guys & gals choose sucky people for reasons we don't really know other than they think they'll insure a good time. i love youuuuu ❤️❤️❤️❤️

[kaijuposting]

So I watched Pacific Rim for the first time yesterday, in my late 20s (holy shit holy fuck holy shit why did I not see this sooner et cetera).

I've got a copy of the sequel Uprising too but I've heard some less good things about it (that it may contradict stuff in the first one etc) - would you recommend Uprising or is it better to just stick to the classic?

It depends on the movie experience you're looking for/what you're willing to put up with. In order to explain fully, I'll have to drop some mild spoilers, so be warned.

Uprising goes whole hog with a very pro-cop, pro-military attitude. Mako Mori is basically a cop. Jaegers are weaponized against civilians. There's child soldiers. Where the first movie presents the PPDC as a problematic institution that sometimes performs useful services (its bias toward protecting the wealthy is noted), Uprising presents it as unambiguously good and desirable to be a part of. The film seems to be completely unaware that the world it depicts is utterly dystopian. To see a sequel to a Guillermo del Toro film basically go "police states are cool and cool people support them!" is... jarring, let's say.

And then of course there's the whole storyline with Newt and Hermann. Some people enjoy it for the angst/angst fic potential. I personally just hate it because to me it just feels like what fundamentalists think will happen if you crack open a medieval grimoire or use a Ouija board or something. Like, it just feels this close to a corruption story from a Chick tract to me. Also, the movie turns Hermann into this utter doormat around Newt. It's very hard to imagine that this version of Hermann Gottlieb ever actually argued with Newt, and it's very difficult to imagine that the Hermann of the first film would have put up with Newt's behavior in this movie.

And yes, there's some... continuity weirdness. Like Newt's supposedly been drifting with the kaiju brain chunk from the first movie for ten years, even though the chunk being good for only one drift was a major plot point in the first film. Now of course minor continuity errors aren't a big deal, but here it just feels really sloppy; and in light of the way the second film lionizes the PPDC, it feels like another case of just not caring what the original film was doing.

And of course, what ultimately ends up happening with Mako Mori was a severe [everybody disliked that] moment.

The jaeger designs aren't as varied as they are in the first film, and the fight scenes suffer from a lot of visual clutter. The kaiju themselves are fine, but it's kind of hard to appreciate them when all of the clutter just makes it difficult to register what you're seeing.

And speaking of visuals, if you were really into the look of the first film, or into the way del Toro used color symbolism, Uprising is going to be a letdown. Like the first Pacific Rim film uses the color yellow for Raleigh. Uprising basically uses the color yellow because the first movie used the color yellow.

And then on the other hand... there's Jake Pentecost and Liwen Shao.

John Boyega's acting is great. He makes the character incredibly funny and likable. Sure, the whole thing with Jake being Pentecost's son doesn't really make a lot of sense, but when I actually watch him I just can't really care that much. Mainly I just wish he'd been in a much better movie, where maybe he was Pentecost's nephew or something. He and Nate Lambert read as ex-boyfriends, and for me their interactions are fun to watch.

Liwen Shao is so fun to watch as this genuinely kind of terrible person. In my view the character is utterly wasted on a story that doesn't really seem to appreciate why she's terrible. However, she's kinda got that whole evil girlboss vibe. If you like it when women are kinda evil, you might enjoy Liwen Shao.

So yeah, it's really down to what you're interested in and willing to put up with. It's really not a good film, but some parts of it can be enjoyable.

[scribeofpnakotis]

Like this is going to come off weird probably so please give me the benefit of the doubt here (literally in bed).

I think we maybe need to decouple sapphic sexuality from feminism (finished my wine tonight)

Basically (please no hate mail) I've lately been spending a lot of time thinking about why it is that I have trouble connecting with a lot of wlw media

And I think (maybe) the problem is that most mainstream sapphic stories are like. 'Leave your husband, self-discovery, eat-pray-love girlpower' OR functionally torture porn about how shit it was to be Female In The Past.

Like there have been better ones more recently but tbh they're mostly children's media (and cancelled)

( I have a whole other thing about how most current mlm rep is in explicitly adult media & wlw rep in family-friendly stuff)

Anyway I feel weird often that I connect more easily with mlm ships but like tbh I think it's mainly that the way fictional queer women are presented just doesn't vibe with my experience of queerness. I'm not really tormented by the societal expectation to marry a man (certainly I have relatives who think I should, but like. Fuck em). My desire for women isn't clean and pure and loving. I'm aromantic and I <3 tits.

My queer angst is generally about The Guilt. It's about the religious trauma & the Disappointing My Parents.

And for whatever reason, we never see that in lesbian media. The narrative is almost always focused on the wlw relationship as a metaphor for defying the patriarchy.

And like. That is a good and worthwhile narrative. But I'd love to see some fucking variety.

[evilwickedme]

This may be WILDLY belated considering when the books were published, but what’s the Raven Cycle about/why is it good in your opinion? Always heard a lot about it in the abstract but nothing actually about the plot.

I mean yeah it's a little belated but better late than never is real and especially applies to one of my fav books of all time

Ok so what is TRC about? In a literal sense it's about a girl named Blue, who isn't psychic but who lives in a house full of women who are including her mom, who's been told her entire life that if she kisses her true love, he will die. She then gets involved with a group of boys from the local prep school, Gansey, Adam, Ronan, and Noah, who - under Gansey's leadership - are looking for a dead (possibly not actually dead) Welsh King right there in West Virginia.

But that's just the story. Listen, this thing's got intrigue and murder and soft magic systems for days, but that's not what makes TRC one of my all time favorite books of all time.

So what is TRC about? As a whole, it's about family - in all its forms. Blood relations, for better and for worse, and friendships that are closer than blood. As a whole, it's about class - the ways class shapes us and the opportunities we do or do not get because of it and what it means about our past, present, and future and how it lets us relate to one another or prevents us from understanding one another.

But on an individual level, each character undergoes such specific arcs that are somehow so universal you can't help but empathize with all of them. It's about learning that you don't hate yourself, or at least learning to stop hating yourself. It's a coming out narrative. It's about getting out of an abusive situation and the many steps it takes to recover from that mindset. It's about chasing love. It's about desire. It's about wanting to plant your feet in the ground and still reach for the stars.

It's also about cars. And trees. There are so many trees.

Like seriously. A fuckload of trees.

Why is it good? It's well written, for one. All my copies, whether digital or physical, are covered in highlights and notes and google translations of latin. I've analyzed and analyzed again and read and reread these books and I always find something new in them.

There's something that's so homey about the minds of these characters. Especially having first read them as a deeply strange teen, they capture something about being a deeply strange teen that I simply haven't seen anywhere else. And this is the example of the found family trope, for me. These deeply strange teens who found other deeply strange teens to understand and love them.

The supporting cast here is also rich and varied. There's something like thirty POVs in the final book but it doesn't feel like it, because you've been existing alongside these characters for so many pages that getting to say goodbye to all of them is all that makes sense.

Beyond that a lot of the reasons I think are good are straight up spoilers or even veer into discourse. But yeah, TRC is worth your time. Several times over.

Also, the audiobooks are like, fine, and available for free on Spotify, which fucked up my stats for 2021 and also forever and ever in general, so there you go.

(I've only read each book in the sequel series, The Dreamer Trilogy, once each, so I'm not nearly as eloquent on it as I am this one, but I will say that it's also worth reading, but it deals with entirely different subjects, is a little darker, and I don't love it as much. I'm not unhappy with the end Maggie Stiefvater gave us for this world, however.)

[seeabout-afterdark09]

Fire & Desire

Fire & Desire

Drake (April 29, 2016)

This is a slow love song where Drake dedicates his devotion to a woman outside of his reach. When I first listened to Fire & Desire I was a bit taken aback because I didn't expect Drake to want to run back to Nicki so soon, but that's just the way love goes. When you're in love with someone you can't really control the intensity of your feelings. This song surprised me because at the time Views was being made, he had a fling with Serena Williams (2015) and started dating Rihanna (late 2015 - early 2016). Nicki was still on his mind while he was with someone else. Oh, what's that saying? Life is a flower of which love is honey.

"Dedicate, I dedicate the world/Yeah, oh/I dedicate, I dedicate." Brandy sings the intro, setting the mood and acknowledging the message of the song: everlasting dedication. "They throwin' dirt on my old name/Only gets worse when you know things/You don't see the perks of this whole thing/But you get real on a pill and I like it/You just like my sidekick, I just wanna ride, fulfill all your desires/Keep you in the front, never in the back and never on the side." In the beginning of the song Drake really opens up about one of his major fears during the beef with Meek and it's……Nicki. Nicki is scary because she knows a lot about Drake. She knows his biggest fears, his hopes, everything. She also has his heart. So to have her on his enemy's side only made things worse. But, even still Nicki doesn't know the effect she has on Drake nor does she see the perks of a potential arrangement between them in the way he'd like. Nicki was also still taking pills (Percocet) at the time. Through it all, Drake loves the real her. He wants to have her by his side because she's a "real ass woman" and he's tired of fighting himself over his feelings.

"Look, you know I'm a rider, nothin' left to hide/Your other nigga tired/Talk about you like you never leave his side/But I don't really buy it." You can hear the smile in Drake's voice as he raps these lines. He's feeling cocky because it's been solidified for him that his relationship with Nicki is "ride or die". Drake also doesn't believe that Nicki is as attached to Meek as she claims to be, complaining that this Omeeka (Meek + Nicki) business is tired and she needs to find a way back to him. "Me? I'm movin' quiet, all the things we're tryin'/Let's just keep it private (Don't say anything)/Tell me should I cut these other girls right out of my life?/'Cause we never decided, tell me how you feel inside." He let's it be known that he's been trying to get in contact with Nicki, but he's moving quietly to keep from pushing her away. Then Drake vaguely mentions a deal between the two of them that was never made official. I'm thinking…..a deal made in 2014. So because the deal was never official, Drake kept seeing other women. But, now he's willing to cut them off if Nicki will just let him in (which is a crazy thing to say considering he had a girlfriend, but I digress). "Yeah-yeah, I figure out you, you figure out me/We both a different breed/I'm followin' your lead, I ask you what you need/You say, "A guarantee"/I mean, you say that like it's easy." One thing I've learned from dissecting these songs is that they always come full circle. Remember Nicki's song I Lied? "Gotta protect me, you gotta sweat me/You said you thought you was ready and I said "Let's see"." Drake has been trying to convince Nicki, but she's still uneasy about it. "You never believe me/Told you I got Zs for these other girls sleepin' on 'em/Girl, I'm sleepy/Sometimes I'm so indecisive." In this last bar Drake owns up to his indecisiveness but affirms that he couldn't care less about being with these women if Nicki would just give him a chance. If there is one thing he's certain about, it's that Nicki is a real ass woman he's in love with.

[goshen-applecrumbledore]

I never watched late seasons so idk anything about Rowena other than that she's hot and she's a witch and that Sam definitely should have fucked her

I'm still working my way through, but! those are the salient points! you got em!!

similar to the reasons I like to think about crowley with sam, I think rowena represents this very decadent bad boy thing for sam. Sam is often trying very hard to be good (or he was before they nerfed him) and rowena is either not good at all, or trying very slightly to be good, briefly, if it suits her. so they have a lot in common there, and she represents this "wow it would be so fun and easy to do the wrong thing" indulgent type of thing for him, I feel. she is forbidden fruit, being an enemy of theirs, ancient, and crowley's mum.

all of that to say!!! this is why it's an ACTUALLY ENGAGING het ship, the only one I've ever seriously considered writing fic for in any fandom. I always think of the thing like, "writing good romance isn't about how you'll get them together but how you'll keep them apart," and Sam and rowena have that in SPADES, and that's why it's exciting. plenty of reasons not to be together.

it also would've been totally plausible in canon if the whole show didn't get very de-sexed there at the end. and dean should have fucked amara, while we're at it. what can I say, I'm a simple man with simple desires (evil women)

[sapphos-darlings]

holy shit ...you're asexual? i struggled massively with accepting my lack of sexual desire and tried for years to condition myself otherwise. like there's this part of the human experience im always going to be lacking. in my teens i thought perhaps i was just a late bloomer and would grow out of it but that never happened. admittedly i don't call myself asexual though. i just consider myself a sex-averse bisexual person.

i find it disheartening and ironic that even in radfem circles people equate "true" attraction with the desire for sexual interaction. so what if a bi woman or lesbian doesn't want to eat pussy? that doesn't mean she secretly craves dick or is lying about her attraction to the same sex; it may be that she just isn't a sexual person full-stop because believe it or not, they do exist. i think its strange how obsessed some people are with other's sex lives (or lack thereof).

anyway, sorry for the slight rant! i'm just glad there is someone else here i can relate to in this way.

Yep, about as asexual as a rock. It's been such a difficult thing to figure out and come to terms with, to find what I want and what I need, in the sea of opinions from other people, 80% of whom don't even have this experience. And even to date, I can't really sit comfortably with other terms outside of asexual, and there are people who would outright deny that I'm asexual to begin with, because in some contexts, I'm not sex aversed. For example, sex and sexuality are interests for me - from the same kind of perspective you'd say animal behaviour is your interest. I'm very interested about learning about sex and how sexuality between people works, how it affects behaviour, how it affects attraction, how attraction comes together with sexuality. It's an endless maze to get lost in, and not least because everyone's experience of sexuality is unique.

At this point, I've existed and self-explored long enough to have a picture of what my wants and needs are, and how I behave and react when it comes to sexuality. Not entirely too long ago, I made a post here where I used my own first time sex experience at my current age of 31 as a basis for telling others that there is no deadline for sex or sexual experiences, you can wait, you're not behind or delayed or anything of the sort for choosing your own terms. And, having been on both sides of this, the whole idea that sex is the thing that truly expresses your orientation is... bull. I may be a certified rug muncher now but the fact is that sex is 0.00001% of the ways my orientation (of being attracted to people) has ever presented itself. As a non-repulsed asexual, sex was just something that we did with my partner because my partner likes it and it was fun and entertaining for me, with clear boundaries set for what was mutually consensual (for example, I do not want to be touched, as I don't get aroused, have no desire to be stimulated, and do not want to be touched around my genitals at all, ever.) I didn't feel particularly attracted or non-attracted at the time, I was just having a good time with my partner, the literal same way I'd have a good time going to the zoo or watching a movie and eating chips. My attraction is absolutely not stored in the act of having sex, which is a minefield where once in a thousand years you may hit a spot where it can happen without being non-consensual or traumatising to me. And even now that I'm in such a spot with my partner, I might hit a point in my life where I've explored that area of relating to another person to my content and no longer want anything to do with it, given how I don't have a drive for sex whatsoever and quite frankly it makes a mess and takes a lot of time and energy for something that I don't fully understand.

Meanwhile, I was and will in future be just as attracted to women, and female people, (and men, and male people,) as I am now that I've had this experience. Literally nothing at all has changed, I went through zero spiritual awakenings. Everything I discovered about my orientation as a same-sex attracted person was already there; sex did not reveal shit to me. Sex did not define shit for me. Sex did absolutely nothing beyond happen between me and my partner, my attraction was there before that, and I am no firmer in my understanding of my orientation now than I was before. The only things I discovered were entirely unrelated to which gender I'm attracted to, and entirely limited to what I like doing and what I don't like doing in that specific set of circumstances.

For me, love (a thousand times!!! When I fall in love, it's the most fundamentally defining feeling I have ever experienced each time) and the desire to be close, to touch, to wake up beside my person in the morning and cuddle up to them at night, to spend day in and day out with them, and looking forwards to a shared future with them are infinitely more defining than any overblown seal of approval in the form of a physical "test" could ever be. I can't overstate how much sex is blown out of proportion in this respect. For some people, yes, finding out how absolutely wonderful sex can be with the right partner is a defining moment, but for god's sake, there are more ways than one to self-knowledge and understanding. Love is stored in the patience you show when your person needs it, in the calming voice you use for them when they're troubled, and in the little things like asking if you can carry their bag when they're tired. Attraction is in getting lost looking at them, pushing their hair out of their face and tracing your thumb over their lips and cheek, and thinking you've never in your life seen depth and colour like that in anyone else's eyes. It's pushing your face into their belly just to breathe in their scent, because it physically calms down your body and sometimes can make your breath hitch and your blood run faster.

Like, you can probably find all that and more in pussy. I'm not saying you can't. I'm sure it's just as awesome. But it's just one organ in a person's body. Attraction goes for the whole package, and priority varies from person to person. Not everyone is as obsessed with noses and brown eyes as I am, for example.