#IT SOUNDS ROMANTIC but i’m also certain that it’s kind of not in context

[se-dissimuler]

duck smoking with sinner hat.gif

[certifiedsexed]

Hi. I was wondering if you could help me figure out something with my sexuality? I didn’t grow up in a context where I would have the language to understand these parts of myself, and, while they might not be for everyone, I would kind of like to have a label for it just to know that I’m not alone in the ways I feel.

I feel like I don’t experience things “correctly”? For example, I can be kissing someone that I really, really like and it doesn’t feel…romantic? I’ve had this happen during sex as well. It feels more like a fun activity than anything else. And sometimes I do have the romantic feelings, but other times (and most of the time, really) I just…don’t. It seems rare for me to. It makes me feel like a bad person because I truly love my partner and we’ve been together for several, several years but I feel like I’m cheating them out of a fuller experience. Like they could be with someone else who could feel those things consistently. And I managed to work up the courage to discuss this with them and they have assured me that they love me and always will even if they don’t fully understand. But it still makes me feel bad. I don’t understand why affection feels so platonic to me even if I love the person I’m sharing the affection with.

Is it bad that I’m only now able to admit these things to myself as an adult who has been fully fledged and out in the world for a not insignificant amount of time? I tried to ignore it for so, so long. Is there something wrong with me? Is there a label for something like this? Am I just broken?

Hi! I can try. I can't guarantee anything, though.

First, I want to tell you that there is no "correct" way to experience things. It's okay not to feel romantic feelings, while kissing, while having sex, it doesn't matter. It doesn't make you a bad person.

Even if you have a partner! Your partner doesn't love you just for you to love them back [romantically], it sounds like they love you for who you are. That's beautiful.

Not consistently feeling romantic feelings is actually a very common aromantic experience, which I'd genuinely suggest you look into. I'd also look into asexuality, just in case that's part of it too [since you mentioned sex specifically.].

But it's not bad that you're only now discussing and trying to explore this! Everyone is growing and changing and learning more all the time: you've made great progress discussing something that is very uncomfortable for you. However long it took, that's incredible.

It's very, very common for people to try to bury and "fix" parts of their sexuality and/or gender for extended periods of time and it doesn't mean something's wrong with you. The world just tries to hide certain sexualities/etc from people and that can make you feel broken because you don't understand what's going on.

There's definitely a label for that. I don't know it off the top of my head but I'm fairly sure someone following me might. [Drop it in the comments if you do.] But even if there's not, you're not broken, Anon, just because you don't experience romantic emotions in a "typical" way.

I hope this helps! Let me know if you have any other questions. <3

[iguessitsjustme]

Love Sea Ep 3 Thoughts

I just had the kind of day that makes you fall back in love with life a little bit. So what better time to watch Love Sea than right now? I will say I have been warned that certain parts of this episode will make me angry. So odds are, if you like the show, you won’t like my thoughts. But I’ll go in with an open mind. Episode 2 was fine. Right? Right. Anyway, just in case, if you click the read more and you don’t like what I say…that’s on you. You were warned. So let’s do this thing. Episode 3 time.

This time the movie I watched before this show didn’t have literally the best sound mixing I’ve ever heard in my entire life. So I think my ears are safe this time. It won’t be good but at least I’m not going from the best to…this.

IQIYI translate texts challenge 2k24. I said it last time and I’ll say it again. I am very skilled. I have many talents. Reading Thai is not one of them. What’s the point of paying for this streaming service if they’re only gonna half ass the subs? Anyway. Give the translators a raise and hire more of them. Or face my wrath in the form of one tiny little post under a read more on the internet that you will never see. But you should feel my scorn. Feel it!

Rak better keep his glasses. I swear if Rak loses his glasses….

It is raining in the show so I feel the need to tell y’all that I bought two umbrellas today! They were both on clearance. Isn’t that great? My collection grows.

Oh also IQIYI translate the fucking spoken words too challenge??? Girl what is going on.

I have no context for this line. Zero. Why are they talking about her boobs? What is happening in the rest of the conversation. Cause I also can’t speak Thai. I wish I could. That language is simply not in my wheelhouse.

I could be watching the Stray Kid’s cover of Sherlock for the millionth time but instead I’m listening to a Thai phone call that means nothing to me. All I know is she mentioned her boobs.

Noisy drunk street people go home challenge. Go home and stop conversatin right outside my apartment. Do that elsewhere. You have now left the bar cause it’s closed. My apartment is not open for business so I don’t know why you’re loitering outside it. Time to blast some kpop real quick. That typically works. Oh they left before I got to play any music. They must have a sixth sense.

Thank god I got this conversation fully subbed. The fuck is up with his dad? Actually. You know what? I don’t want to know. Whatever it is, it’s bad. And I don’t want that. I don’t trust MAME to do trauma actually. Well. I trust MAME will do trauma but I don’t trust her to do it well.

I STILL CAN’T READ THAI.

I did not gain that skill in the last 15 minutes. Why are they doing this to me specifically?

I am enjoying this song a whole lot.

Why are we getting flashbacks in every episode? MAME is a better writer than this. Why is she relying so heavily on flashbacks? I’m so confused.

Rak, do not go to a secondary location with that man. Dear Mut, what the fuck? He has said no. That is a complete sentence. And believe it or not, he does not need to explain it to you. He was being generous by telling you why he said no. But you are going to force him to go somewhere else? Have you considered I hate you and will kick you right in the balls?

The music is trying to convince me this is romantic but honestly I’m just confused.

THEY DIDN’T EVEN WEAR HELMETS. And then my soul was launched from my body straight into the sun and I feel nothing anymore.

Oh to be stargazing on a beach while laying next to a hot boy and having deep conversations about life. Oh if only that were me. Hey real quick, anyone want to go stargazing with me? I’ve never been stargazing and I think I should do it. 

I’ve only been watching this episode for 23 minutes. I thought it was almost over. This shit is dragging. The directing in this show needs significant work. There is not enough movement on screen in far too many scenes. Even when We Are had two characters (Tan and Fang) just standing and talking, it wasn’t difficult to watch because they were both constantly moving. Well, mostly Tan. But Fang did too. There was something for the eye to catch. Something to watch. With Love Sea, they have Rak and Mut just stand and talk, or sit and talk, or lay down and talk, and there is not nearly enough movement. They need to be doing something. I am moving more just sitting on my ass on my couch (shoveling cake in my mouth) while I watch than these two are doing on screen and that is a directorial problem. Imagine working with an established actor pair who are known partially for their chemistry together and just…having them lay there. I was prepared to go into this show mad at it for the typical MAME reasons but honestly, I’m mostly mad that the show elements are bad. The writing is not up to MAME’s usual standard and the directing is ass. The music is par for the course and I’m more objective about it this week at least.

FINALLY. Some movement. God that took forever.

It must be nice to be able to read Thai and know what the fuck is being said.

People stop reading over Rak’s shoulder. Let him have some privacy. The fuck?

If someone forcibly made me cover up like that on a hot day, I would pull a gun outta my ass and shoot them. It is HOT. I am SWEATY. Let me BREATHE.

MUT. NO DOES ME NO. BUT NOT WHEN YOU’RE TRYING TO OVERRIDE SOMEONE’S AUTONOMY. LET RAK’S TITS BREATHE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD. LET THEM BREATHE.

Save Mook. Seriously. Save her.

Horny boys.

This scene would have far more emotional impact if we had any more time with these characters. Literally we started the episode with Rak refusing to go somewhere with Mut and being forced to go. And now he’s willing to stay? Doesn’t he believe love is a figment of the imagination? Did that fucking change? Did we see that change? Was it in one of the texts I couldn’t read?

I’m not…angry at this show. I mean Mut is never gonna be my favorite and neither is Rak, but MAME has had far worse cough cough PrapaiSky cough cough This show’s problem is actually the worst problem a show can have: it’s boring. I’m bored. The writing is lazy, the directing is abysmal, and honestly the sound mixing thinks it’s doing something and utterly failing. Those are the only three things I feel I’m knowledgeable enough to comment on but I’m sure the rest isn’t great either. I’m upset that I can’t even be mad at the characters. Cause it’s all so boring. When did I go back in time to get a BL that was so poorly written as to be a joke? It’s 2024. I refuse to believe this is what they put together. For all its faults, LITA was at least entertaining. At least it didn’t ruin my lovely day. I am gonna go get ready for bed now because unfortunately, I have to work in the morning. Oh to have a summer off. Oh to go to the sea and stargaze at the beach. I can’t believe this show managed to make even that boring.

[addictedtostorytelling]

Hi! I have read that the GSR season 6 reveal was a surprise to Jorja Fox. Do you know/think that the relationships was a surprise to her? Do you think she and Billy “knew” their characters where in a secret relationship?

hi, anon!

so word on the street has always been that the s6 gsr reveal was a last-minute addition to episode 06x24 "way to go," not originally scripted, so it was kind of a surprise to everyone, jorja fox included.

that said, i do think that what was surprising about the scene wasn't necessarily its content but rather its placement—i.e., while it wasn't a surprise to billy and jorja that grissom and sara were already a couple, it was a surprise to them that tptb had finally decided to reveal that they were, right on the tail end of the season finale.

the reason i think that billy and jorja already knew that grissom and sara were in a relationship prior to the filming of the reveal scene in episode 06x24 “way to go” is because the original plan had been to have the reveal come much earlier in the season, during episode 06x05 “gum drops,” and things had only changed because billy had become unavailable to film the episode due to a death in his family.

by necessity, there would have had to have been some discussion leading up to the filming of episode 06x05 “gum drops” of what the nature of grissom and sara’s relationship was and how long it had been going on and what its specifics happened to be, and then once billy became unavailable and the revisions to the script were made, there would have also had to have been additional discussion on how things should be played going forward, including whether or not billy and jorja should depict grissom and sara as if they were already together.

not only does the gsr content from s6 suggest that both the writers and billy and jorja were conceiving of grissom and sara as a secret couple throughout the season—as there are many gsr scenes that only really make sense in that context—but there is also “outside of the universe of the show” evidence to indicate that such was the case, such as, for example, an interview jorja gave in january ‘06 (midway through s6), in which she both mentioned the original reveal scene cut from episode 06x05 “gum drops” AND stated that she fully believed that the gsr romantic storyline would be revisited within the course of the year, saying, "the grissom and sara storyline is not over. it will get revisited. i’m inclined to think it will be this year."

sounds to me like she's pretty certain, like she knows they’re already together and is just waiting for that information to be revealed to the viewing audience.

to much the same end: there was also another cut scene from episode 06x08 "a bullet runs through it," pt. ii that touched on the fact of grissom and sara already being together that, at the very least, made it to script, even if it was never filmed. in said scene, grissom acknowledged sara's upset over finding sofia in his office in such a way that made it fairly clear he was talking to her as his girlfriend ("you being angry at me made me feel closer to you").

all of the above being so, my thought is that what surprised billy and jorja about the inclusion of the reveal scene in episode 06x24 "way to go" wasn't necessarily the information that their characters were together (which was something they already knew) but rather that the audience was finally going to be told that such was the case.

after receiving the original script for episode 06x24 "way to go" with no reveal included, they probably assumed they were going to go into s7 with the relationship still under wraps only to be (pleasantly) surprised when director kenneth fink and writer jerry stahl pulled the bedroom scene out of nowhere.

or at least that’s my sense, anyway.

thanks for the question! please feel welcome to send another any time.

[my-strange-attraction]

Little update because I think it’s warranted with how hectic my past few posts have been:

I am in fact still very confused. I came out to my friends as lesbian and I said it on here, but it’s been just over a week since I started questioning and even though I have this comprehensive list of reasons why I think I am, I am still very unsure. The title of this blog applies because I, in fact, still have no idea what the hell attraction is anyways. I know I have had fixations on girls who are pretty/cool. I know that if I were to have sex (which I am actually interested in doing at this point in time) it would be with a girl. 

I THINK this adds up to lesbian being part of my identity. I keep flip flopping on that because it feels like wishful thinking in a way, but also it’s literally something I’ve already talked about on this blog in several different posts where I’ve tried to reason out why I have this desire for a relationship even though I grew up pretty sheltered (I’m 100% certain it’s not internalized amatonormativity, my mom really didn’t raise me to value romantic relationships above all and I didn’t like romance plots at all until middle school, it’s just something I want because of myself, not because of society) and the desire for a relationship is always going to be a part of whatever identity I have. This new aspect of my identity is just more like a clarification of what kind of relationship I want. 

That last paragraph was messy, sorry if it was hard to read. Anyways I do want to clarify in this post that me being lesbian is probably almost certainly in addition to whatever aspec identity I still hold. I’m really not sure what still stands at this point or how it interacts with my identity as a whole. I’m toying around with a couple different things, but I’m really unsure at this point. Also because this entire time I’ve been questioning I haven’t been talking to really anyone because things were winding down and now it’s break. I feel like I’m in an alternate universe.

I’m also not sure where this leaves me gender-wise. To be honest, gender is mostly confusing for me because of my neurodivergence and inability to conceptualize gender and pronouns. I am very feminine and very comfortable with being a girl, but I started noticing a few years ago that something about my gender is queer. I use all pronouns and call myself genderqueer now, after much contemplation (people who have been following a while, you know. You remember). However, and I said this in my lesbian master list post, my gender makes a lot more sense in the context where I am lesbian. As in, girl is pretty important and central to me, but there is something just undeniably queer in addition. Ok, when I type it out it sounds like the same thing as before, but it makes more sense in my head, I promise. 

I intended this to be a short explanation post where did that intention go, lol. I hope this all makes sense, I just felt weird leaving it at oh I’m just a lesbian now and have no other context or clarifications. That’s today on: Identity Is Hard. Interactions welcome :)

[daja-the-hypnokitten]

Jukebox reviews part 31! For context, see my post “A Project”     under this same tag. If you want to see a full list of his EMCSA   stories, they can be found here, sorted alphabetically.And if you want to see some of his drabbles, check out his blog at @jukeboxemcsa

 Trust in Me

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7/23/2016                                     mc mf fd

This is such a good use of a hypnosis trope, and I love how smoothly she does it. And I love how she uses her size, strength, and grappling skill to work with her use of tropes and hypnotic instincts. That all said, a lot of the sensory descriptions - especially at the end of the story - just ... *no*. They sound miserable and my brain goes "DO NOT WANT" so firmly it knocks me out of the story. 8/10 spirals 

 Uniform (Jukebox)

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7/30/2016                                     mc mf md

I don't understand latex. I just don't. So there's layers here I don't get or find hot. That out of the way, the way she just loses herself into the act of getting into uniform, into the role she takes while at work, is something I *do* enjoy quite a lot. The change from a dynamic gal who does parkour moves to get to work and wishes she'd had a Supergirl t-shirt on into a mindless pet? That is *hot,* no question. 9/10 spirals. 

 Breathe It In

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8/6/2016                                       mc ff

*laughs* the last couple of lines make this story wonderful. This is the sort of interplay I love so much: a little bratting, a lot of loss of control, and some deliciously hot brainwashing thrown in. I do wish we had more of a sense of the exact nature of the brainwashing - the problem with amnesia suggestions and third person limited narration is that we just don't get all the fun, hot details - but still. It's just good and lovely and just the sort of playful dynamic I enjoy, both in fiction and real life. And I'd never be partial to the scent of a flower being helplessly hypnotic, no, not at all. (By which I mean yes, yes I am, for Reasons(tm) ) 10/10 spirals. 

 Pussy Control

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8/13/2016                                     mc mf md

Wait, since when is a biochem lab only 2 hours long? Mine were closer to 3 hours! Electrophoresis prep and testing takes a certain amount of time, after all! As do all the other sorts of blots and chromatography columns and other things that you work with in biochem! And also, of all the classes you could skip, a lab is BY FAR the worst one. Daniel's at *best* a sloppy hypnotist, if not predatory, to not have put safeties in to make sure Mallory didn't let her schoolwork slip in ways that can't be recovered from. (Look, my degree's in biochem, this is *personal* for me now :P) The concept's hot enough - mostly, anyway - but the lack of care for a degree Mallory's spending significant money on just ... irritates me in a way I can't shake. 6/10 spirals 

 Keeper of the Flame

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8/20/2016                                     mc mf fd

This is a miss for me. It's mostly magic, in a way that doesn't work for me, and hypnotizing someone just to have a kid is ... it squicks me out. I can't rate this one fairly. 

 Fix You

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8/27/2016                                     mc mf md

Another therapist betraying a client story, another one I can't effectively rate. But if you like that trope, give it a look! 

 My Mind Is Gone

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9/3/2016                                       mc ff

This is cute and sweet and rather not ethical but like, in a tender way? In a "I care about this person a lot but also I'm horribly tempted by this so I'm going to do it in the gentlest way I know how" kind of way that I'm tentatively ok with in fiction. Especially when it's so *accidental* at first. The gals are sweet and cute and I hope that this starts a lovely relationship between the two of them 'cause I'm a romantic at heart, darn it. 8/10 spirals. 

 Afterglow

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9/10/2016                                     mc ff

Oh, this is so, so good. Not that oxytocin works like that, but still. The implications of the turning the tables on someone who was behaving a bit unethically are ... not my favourite part? but they do add to the context and the heat of it. And hey, both of the ladies seem happy enough together! 8/10 spirals 

 Radio Daze

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9/24/2016                                     mc mf ff

Well, if you're going to get brainwashed into missing a music festival, Altamont was probably the one to miss. But brainwashing people via a radio station that can be heard on the highway? that's just *begging* for trouble. C'mon, have a bit in there that encourages people driving by to change the station or something, so you don't have a pattern of people causing an accident and get people wondering what in the radio broadcast might have done it! Besides that, though, this story just doesn't quite hit for me. It  doesn't feel like there's a real change so much as a nudging of what's already there, and even that doesn't feel like something we see clearly. 6/10 spirals. 

 When I Come Around

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9/24/2016                                     mc mf md cb

*Oh,* now THAT'S a premise. Not the actual story itself - that's all well and good, superheros and magitech and shenanigans, I like it plenty fine - but the note it ends on? I want the story that follows this one. Maybe I'll get lucky and it'll come up in the next 220-some stories I have yet to review! That would be a lovely blend of desire and consent and resistence and all of it. This story's fine, another Liberty League story, and I like it plenty well, but I don't want it to just *end* here. It's so very magitech, but the idea of how she tries to resist, and what happens to her when she tries? oh, that's *fun* 9/10 spirals

[starswirly]

What does self-shipping feel like? I know this sounds really weird, but I’m potentially aro of some kind (except for The Character) and I have no idea what feelings are

[ * Uuuunfortunately, I am also aro! I strongly doubt what I do is typical. For me it was a growing attachment to certain characters that sorta culminated in me wanting to affectionate with them, and wanting it to have that sort of romantic context. And I’ve just started calling myself a self shipper, I’m not super in touch with its community. ]

[ * Honestly tho? If you feel attached to The Character and want to think of them as in a relationship with you (whatever relationship that may be) I think it’s fully within your right to do so. Whether it impacts your arospec identity is up to you :] ]

[blckcndlwx]

I’ve found that I enjoy monster aus and fantasy type settings more and more lately and I’ve been slightly inspired.

Some context first that this is by all accounts a mish mash of different ideas in every single way, I had some old OCs I wanted to revamp and I decided I wanted them to be monsters while putting a fun twist on the usual stuff. Secondary context is that I’m a huge Science nerd and I enjoy reading species studies in that textbook style description so when talking specifically about certain species/races I often use that manner of speaking a bit. Latin, Greek, and Old English are also very prevalent influences in how I go about naming things haha.

I’ve taken to calling this universe ‘Rigor Mortis’ to remind myself that I want there to absolutely be uncanny and eerie elements along with some mildly wholesome ideas. I also just think it’s sounds cool 😎 Pardon me if this is all a lil messy and all over the place 😞

Rigor Mortis is a universe in which the veritable “monsters” of mythology, folklore, and the like are very real and are just as old and prevalent as humankind. Humans of course referred to these creatures as “monsters” for a very long time and though of course there is actual names they have given their kinds the term continued to stick horrendously and the official term is Monstrum when speaking in vagueness of the inhuman.

That being said the power struggle between humankind and monstrum is quite literally ancient. With a variety of Holy Wars being raged as well as retaliatory conquests plaguing the planets history throughout the continents. Eventually though a ceasefire and shaky peace was achieved only barely in the last few decades with multiple civil disputes and arguments of rights for either side still occurring until now. (I wanna say circa the late 1890s early 1900s is about when things get politically stable)

The climate of the interpersonal relationships between humans varies from country to country and can be extreme in its differences. Some countries are responsible for industries like human farms, specialty construction/tailoring, and synthetic nutrition . Simply for the reasons that while there is peace in one particular country it doesn’t change the fact that some monstrum do still require a diet that involves human consumption thus why synthetic means are also being developed, monstrum can also come in such vastly different shapes and sizes there is no way to maintain a standard for ANYTHING so practically everything one owns often is or needs to get specialized.

Humans despite what you may think, are not the majority of the population! In fact Humans are more of a minority (for a multitude of reasons) that only make up about 40% of the planet’s population which does include those contained in the aforementioned farms. Which is not to say that there are not humanoid looking variants of monstrum, the 40% statistic applies to full blooded humans. The numbers having seriously lowered after a boom in monstrum population 😅

Ironically humans, as hilarious as it was to find out after a time, are like O- of the reproductive world of monstrum. They can mix seamlessly with any race of them and the offspring retain a majority of the inhuman traits and very little human ones, a real purists dream. Thus some upper class monstrum who like to stress bloodlines and retain their traits can often pay extensively good money for human aid (willing participants or not) but this fact is also attributed to the influx in monstrum population as more and more cases of interbreeding became slightly more common. To be perfectly honest however humans are largely more common to be fetishized by monstrum than seeking anything romantic

On the subject of reproduction, monstrum are perfectly capable of reproducing within themselves to a degree. These mixed offspring however end up with a strong mixture of both parents and can make for some interesting looking individuals. If a monstrum has fairly mixed heritage, of over 3 specific races, then they’re considered Chimeric! Chimeras themselves don’t fall under the statistics of multiple categories and instead are classified both medically and governmentally by their most prominent race. (Obviously an insectoid can’t reproduce with a lycanthrope or fish person normally, however cases of this and similar situations can be plausible if the parents have just enough human genes to bridge the gap. These individuals are incredibly uncommon but they do exist, as retention of human genes is enormously recessive and take generations of consistent reproduction with humans to acquire them.)

Aside from the 40% of pure humans the remainder 60% of monstrum can be broken down into multiple subsidiary categories. They can be classified based on either the same genus, family, or species classification we may give animals or by specific traits they have in common. (i.e. diet, specific physical features, environment..) but ‘genus’ is the most popular way of classification.

I know I have literally zero followers so nobody else is probably going to read this but me, but I’ve had this sort of open project idea for awhile and figure that here is as good a place as any to write down what I have so far of this universe premise. More posts to come as well detailing actual species/race details

….eventually. Maybe. At some point. If I actually remember to 🥲

[ms-demeanor]

I am absolutely not joking at all when I say that The Sixth Sense should be required as teaching material when you’re trying to get kids to learn about why color matters.

No, the red DOESN’T mean love or violence or passion, however the creators set it up so that in this particular work red means OH NO A SCARY GHOST IS HERE.

When I was in college (as a lit major) I ended up sitting down and talking to a returning student who was having trouble in one of our classes. He liked books, and he had GI bill money so he decided to be a lit major.

He was VERY confused about the “The Curtains Are Blue And It Means Something” approach to symbolism and I remember that he very seriously got out a notebook and a pen, sat down, and asked me “Okay so what to stars mean as a symbol?” 

And I was at a loss because of course I was! Stars-as-a-symbol can mean a thousand things and are heavily dependent on context. Are you reading a book about sea travel? Stars mean a map. Are you reading Maus? Stars represent faith and community and the way that the Nazis dehumanized Jewish people. Are you reading something by a romantic author who has a thing for the classics? Stars probably have something to do with heroism and destiny. Are you reading science fiction? Stars are probably just stars but if you’re reading Whipping Star by Frank Herbert they are literally people and our entire conception of stars is reexamined.

So one one the things that I think a lot of people are missing in their high school English classes is that whether the curtains are blue matters or not depends on the work.

The fact that Hamlet is wearing black is an important part of the story and the antagonist commenting on it it is almost the first thing that happens in the play.

What color dress is Lizzy wearing at the first dance in Pride & Prejudice? It doesn’t matter, the curtains are just blue.

And that’s one of those things that it takes a lot of time and a lot of exposure to different kinds of stories to learn and when you’re in high school you just don’t have that experience and your teachers are just now telling you for the first time “sometimes it matters why the curtains are blue” and I know you’re going “okay, sounds fake” but the goal is to get you to look at blue curtains and ask if they do matter, which is why they hand you books with big obvious examples of the kind of shit they’re talking about. You read A Tale of Two Cities because it’s full of binaries and line motifs and it’s the perfect thing to teach a fifteen year old how to look for a motif because there are a shitload of them. You read  The Scarlet Letter to look for color symbolism and to ferret out biblical allusions.

“The curtains are just blue” is just “yet another day has gone by and I haven’t needed algebra.” Most people aren’t going to need algebra in their day-to-day lives but it’s handy to know how to do a bit when you need it and it’s good to learn that the concept exists.

If you’re reading books just because they’re fun and you like them then that is cool and I’m glad you’re having a good time and you absolutely do not have to give a fuck about symbolism.

But I am going to laugh my ass off at you if you’re one of those folks who is like “the curtains are just blue it doesn’t matter” and then whines about why scifi and comics and cartoons and video games are all political these days. They were always political, you just couldn’t tell because the curtains were red.

(also because you were socialized to see certain things as apolitical and value neutral but if you’re going “WHY DO THEY PUT SERIOUS MORALS AND SHIT IN A KID’S SHOW, STEPHEN UNIVERSE IS FOR TEN YEAR OLDS IT’S NOT THAT DEEP, LOONEY TUNES WASN’T LIKE THIS” I’m afraid I’m going to have to refer you to all the actual war propaganda made by Disney and Warner Brothers.)

[withoutyouimsaskia]

15 lines

Tagged by the fabulously talented @theviridianbunny 💚

Tagging: @dotieeee @honeybeezgobzzzzz @aralezinspace @cuckoo-on-a-string and anyone other writers who would like to join in.

Rules: Post 15 lines (or less) of character dialog. You can include context for the scene if you wish!

All of these are from my Sandman works - happy to provide context in the comments or through an ask.

"You need only call me and I will come.”

“Remember to be kind to yourself.”

"You appeared, I told you that you were attractive, we argued a bit, you blew sand in my face and then I found myself here.”

“You are safe here. You can relax. Just relax your body and your mind will follow. That's it. Drift across to the Dreaming. I'll meet you there.”

"I fear I may struggle to get through even the first course with you looking like this, my love."

“I’m an adult who lives in the UK, Morpheus. This is what we do when things go to shit.”

“We could mourn the loss of our teeth together.”

"I can't believe I did that in front of you."

“Oh great, a hallucination that talks.”

“I said I wanted you to burn in hell. I’ve decided I’m going to send you there myself.”

"But you have just as much power to hurt him, sweetness. We have provided you with it."

"You asked me not to stop, my dearest dreamer."

"It makes no difference if you're honest with me or not. I don't know you."

"In fact, friend relationships are not given the same level of importance in society as romantic ones so caring deeply for him is not only a perfectly good thing, it is also very... umm... progressive."

“I don’t want it to sound like I’m trying to get rid of you but don’t you have a certain collective unconscious to manage?”

15 lines

tagged by @another-corpo-rat (thank you love!)

tagging @withoutyouimsaskia @merge-conflict @aggravateddurian @ouroboros-hideout @blackrevell

@wanderingaldecaldo @clusterfxckedbysirens @artabellaluna @heywoodvirgin

@timaeusterrored @henyiijy @sankttealeaf @streetkid-named-desire

Rules: Post 15 lines (or less) of character dialog. You can include context for the scene if you wish!

Wil be doing this for a mix of ocs - feel free to drop an ask in regards to context.

"you don't get to just leave - not like that. "

"ready for a rematch, bubs?"

"im poision. quite literally"

"what did I do to deserve this?!"

"if you hadn't taken that job - you would not have lead me back into arasaka's jaws"

"pass me a zero percent beer- seeing as we're on babysitting duty"

“ i want to live- and to have clean bed sheets and a clean night gown- and to sleep knowing i'll wake up ne-next to you every morning”

“it will hit you double time because you're not suited up in a runner suit-  gods- Wh-Why do you think this stuffs called coolant?”

"no escape now - little rabbit"

"i swear we booked a twin room"

"join me for dinner?"

"you are not your father."

"you're always so grouchy when you're sick-”

" you do know the professor would shun us if he ever knew we snuck up here to smoke. He would probably say we're a bad infulence on the kids - or whatever"

“need you to focus on my voice - and the thought all the things we should do when this is over”

[merymoonbeam]

What do you think about that spark Azriel felt in his chest and the image of Gwyn he buried deep down? I recently saw a long post on the other side of Gw/nriel parallels to couples and one stuck out the most to me. From the pov chapter “Buried the image down deep, where it glowed quietly” paralleled “And somewhere far and deep inside her, an ember began to glow” for Rowaelin in Heir of Fire. It left me like 😟😟 do you think it means anything?

Do I think the glowing image means anything? Yes

Do I think it is romantic? No

The glow is a word that Sarah uses it a lot. When you read all of her books you can see that there are phrases and words that she uses all the time and glow is one of them. Sarah uses glow to show “magic/power” and for actual meaning of glow. here is a post about that showing magic part > glow=power

I think the “image” is about gwyn’s lightsinger powers(I might be wrong about that but with all the quotes and parallels that’s the theory I’m leaning towards right now) I made a few post about lightsingers theory.

I say read these posts by @silverlinedeyes she made two big posts about lightsingers> part1 , part2

Glowed quietly > you can see that gwyn’s singing is described as summoning which literally means “calling an image to mind” also glowed quietly(?) as if the image is radiating some kind of sound right? Quietly....weiiirddd

Cauldron’s song and Gwyn’s song > pretty sure one of my favorite posts I made lol. I compared Elain being lured by Cauldron’s song to Gwyn’s singing

Okay going back to Sarah using certain phrases and words a lot... when you are looking into her writing you have to take context of the text into consideration. With gwyn and Azriel... it is not romantic. The guy literally thought “He wouldn't go so far as to call Gwyn a friend” a page earlier before that scene. And in the book three days after that solstice night he was more aloof than usual and we can guess why...Elain (that is a parallel to Nessian acomaf bonus chapter) and towards the end of the book he went to save Eris instead of Gwyn... their fans say it is because he “trusted” her but cassian was losing his fucking mind over Nesta being in the Blood Rite and didn’t even heard what the IC was saying while Azriel was making plans with IC about how to save Eris. I said this before and I’m going to say it again if Azriel was supposed to have the next book with Gwyn his reaction to Gwyn being thrown into the Blood rite should have been bigger than his reaction to Elain being captured by the Cauldron. The guy was ready to die to save Elain so...yeah... context is important in Sarah writing if I made my case clear lol. All of these pushed me to think that there was another reason for that “glowing image” quote and then the rest is about the lightsinger theory which I linked above.

As I said... context is important while reading and making parallels. 😀

[therealvinelle]

I agree that Aro definitely is not straight, but if he is gay and not bi, why window shop for a wife? If he wanted a partner for some reason, why not find a male one? It was a different era, yes, but are vampires really homophobic?

So, for this meta, we’ll have to get historical. Before we do, keep in mind that while I know Ancient Greece better than most, having studied it (introductory level classes only, mind), I don’t know it well enough to be any kind of authority on the matter. History, more than any other discipline I can think of, is not respected as an academic field, and people with poor to no understanding of historical hermeneutics will make very bold assumptions that they then have too poor understanding of history to realize are bullshit. This is a disclaimer because I don’t want to join in on the chorus of authoritative-sounding people on the internet with no verifiable credentials who spout things about history that are then taken to be gospel truth by readers because the author made it sound good.

More, I say this because your question is asking me to explain the morality and social norms surrounding a character from 14th century BC Greece. And this man would not, for the record have been Ancient Greek, he would have been Mycenaean Greek. Very quick history lesson: Mycenaean Greece was a flourishing society that suffered a downfall, Greek civilization fell into its very own dark ages, until around 800 BC when Greeks began forming what would become the Ancient Greece we know and love. This in turn means that I can’t very well read up on the marital and sexual norms of Ancient Greece when I’m researching for Aro, because he was five hundred years old already when Ancient Greece became a thing.

And your question concerns cultural history. And for that we’re going to have to look at how we know the things we know about history. How history is studied.

Historians have two kinds of sources: archeological findings and written records. (I’m aware that oral tradition, like the one carried by the Aborigine people, isn’t technically one of these, but to my understanding it’ll be treated to similar analysis as written records, which leaves us with the two types of sources standing strong.) These sources are analyzed, and we apply various theories and models onto them to make sense of the context they were written in. The more sources we have, the more we can refine or eliminate these theories or models.

More, history is an ever evolving field. There are movements and schools of thought that influence how history is written (marxism in history, that is, history as a class struggle, was heavy in the 60′s and I think until the 80′s), which means that how a certain culture will be perceived today is not the way it was perceived a few decades ago, nor will it be perceived the same way a few decades in the future.

You see why I am daunted by you asking me to give you an answer about sexual and marital norms for a guy who lived 3000 years ago, and I hope you’ll understand why I feel this word vomit is necessary.

Now, the danger with Mycenaean Greece is that it’s a society it’s easy to feel we know a lot about, because it was the precursor to Ancient Greece, and we know a lot about the latter. But, first of, the reason why we know as much as we do about the Ancient Greeks is the Romans. The Greeks wrote about their history, their philosophy, their government, and they wrote plays and told stories. However, that was two thousand years ago and their writings would have been lost to the sands of time if the Romans hadn’t idolized and sought to emulate their society. This meant preserving their written records. This tradition was carried on by the Christians, in part because Hellenistic philosophy was incorporated into Christian philosophy. We have neo-platonism to thank for Christian asceticism, the “mind over matter” cornerstone.

What I’m getting at with all of this is that we know the insane amount about Ancient Greece that we do because of some very unique circumstances, and so we can make very sophisticated theories about what the Hellenistic world was like. It’s still detective work, but not Pepe Silvia type of detective work. This is not the case for Mycenaean Greece. We know a comparative lot about Mycenaean Greece, considering how long ago it was, but there is very much we don’t know.

With Mycenaean Greece, we are dealing with a lot more uncertainty. We haven’t deciphered one of their two writing styles, and a lot of the text we do have is very fragmentary. Coming up with detailed societal models for Mycenaean Greece, and for the 14th century BC specifically, is... well I don’t know enough about what this society left behind to know what historians have to work with, but I imagine they have their work cut out.

More, I haven’t studied this at all, which means that any attempt on my end to research this would be stumbling around in the dark.

One example: the Illiad and the Odyssey, while composed around the 8th century BC, were set in the early 12th century BC, which is nearly Aro’s time period. The Illiad depicts a homoerotic relationship between Patroclus and Achilles, and both works depict a lot of matrimonies, so I wish I could use it as a source. However, not only would this time gap alone make these sources questionable, but there’s also the matter of the Illiad and the Odyssey being transmitted orally, from bard to bard. Changes were made over the years. For example, the technology described in the Illiad is from several eras, as the warriors will be using bronze weaponry in one book and then switch to iron in the next. This game of telephone is what happens when a story is transmitted orally from person to person. So, while it’s tempting to use these works as a sort of reference point, the possibility, likelihood even, that the bards made adjustments to keep the old story entertaining for their contemporary audience is strong.

For this reason, I can’t give you any kind of historically correct analysis on what the marital or sexual mores would have been like in Aro’s time. Even if the knowledge is out there, I don’t have it.

But I can say this, spouses have for the longest time been partners. Men and women got married, even in the gay, gay, Ancient Greece, not just to have children but because they complemented each other, they were partners. Men needs wives, and women needs husbands. And a partner was canonically exactly what Aro was looking for, feelings had nothing to do with it:

After Caius and Marcus had found their romantic attachments, Aro decided to find his own, although rather than finding his other half in another vampire Aro decided to create his own instead. Aro had a certain type of woman in mind and he found what he was looking for in Sulpicia. He successfully courted her and she came to fall in love with him.

As for vampires being homophobic, I think that is for another post about what culture they bring with them into their new life. But to be brief I’ll say that while the individual vampire can be homophobic, there can be no homophobia at an institutional level because vampires have no institutions. And it’s the institutional homophobia that gets ya. It’s what the whole fight for gay rights has been about: secure legislation against discrimination and that protects gay people. (The right to marry and protection from employees firing LGBT employees comes to mind as examples of this.)

So, no one could force Aro to marry a woman. 

And I’d go into a rant here about how the prospect of gay marriage, of even identifying as homosexual (the labels homosexual, bisexual, and heterosexual are very new and, to my recollection, were born off of the Western psychiatric discipline as men who slept with other men were diagnosed with homosexuality. I imagine a man from the Antiquity would be confused at the notion that just because he likes to sleep with dudes he shouldn’t get married to a woman), was unthinkable up until very recently, but I just made this obscenely long rant about how I can’t really make these kinds of guesses, so I’m not gonna.

I think being married to a woman and then banging hot dudes who came along suited Aro just fine.

Also, I can’t believe I’m doing this, but - I’m going to encourage history asks. Because this fandom has a bit of a history problem, as a lot of the characters are from different time periods and many feel unsatisfied with the way Meyer handled that. I am by no means a historian, but I know several of the historical periods the characters of Twilight are from well enough to make educated guesses.

So, hit me with your worst.

[jedi-valjean]

-The Jedi Path is not canon. Just because they released a special edition in 2016 doesn’t make it canon. This took me five seconds to look up on Wookieepedia. Basic fact checking does wonders for the credibility of one's argument. (Also fact-checked on Wookieepedia: your claim in another thread that The Clone Wars referenced Baby Ludi. Guess what's not listed anywhere on Baby Ludi's appearances page? A single Clone Wars episode. Couldn't find anything on Depa and Sar's backstories still being canon either, at least not the name-changing, kept-separated part you talked about.)

-Luke’s Jedi Order did not remove the attachment rule. Luke is very anti-attachment in The Book of Boba Fett (honestly, if you wanna complain about that, I’m actually with you there.)

-Jedi don’t have contact with their families for the same reason many adoptees don’t have contact with their biological parents. That’s just how it works out most of the time. I’m fairly certain it’s not outright forbidden— in canon— to reconnect with family. Dooku established regular correspondence with his sister, and I might be wrong because I haven’t listened to the audiobook, but I’m pretty sure the Jedi didn’t take issue with it. (His father did, though.)

-On that note, there are literally Jedi siblings in canon who fought side by side during the Clone Wars. It was part of a pretty crucial episode lore-wise with Order 66 and everything

-At the time Anakin was recruited, the Jedi were not a military force. Carrying a weapon doesn’t make you a soldier.

-I need to watch the episode again but I’m fairly certain the Order offered to set Ahsoka up with what she needed to live a post-Jedi life and she turned them down. She chose not to accept their help because she had lost her trust in them and felt she needed to make it on her own.

-It’s been said ad nauseam but apparently it needs to be explained again: attachment =/= relationships, attachment =/= love, attachment =/= emotion. The Jedi aren’t using the psychology textbook definition here. Attachment is selfish, possessive love. The kind of “love” that makes you send hundreds of living breathing men needlessly to their deaths because you forgot to wipe your robot’s hard drive and turned him into an operational security hazard, or become so obsessed with saving your wife from something that might not even happen that you end up being the one to cause it. It’s the inability to accept realities like death and other people’s feelings. Jedi can still have friends and even romantic relationships. Why do you think the Jedi let Anakin sneak off to visit Padmé all the time? It’s firmly established canon by now that they knew they were sleeping together. That wasn’t an issue in and of itself.

-Context for Yoda’s advice:

1) Anakin is being extremely vague. Yoda has almost nothing to work with

2) Anakin is worried solely because of some bad dreams. What’s that thing Yoda said in ESB about the future? Any good Jedi should know that prophecy is a crapshoot in the Star Wars universe. Almost all prophecies that come true in it are self-fulfilling. So dreams would be just about the most unreliable evidence Anakin could receive, and that’s all he’s got. He’s worried over nothing.

3) I realize how it sounds, but Yoda’s not actually saying “stop caring.” Anakin is mourning someone who’s still alive. There’s no point in that. If you’re going to be sad when they die, why get a head start? Why miss something who’s still here? Enjoy the time you have with them. How do you think they’d feel if they spent your last days alive moping instead of being there for you? To kill a loved one in your heart before they die is one of attachment’s greatest follies, and that’s what Anakin did before he ended up killing Padmé physically.

-On the topic of visions! We’ve established that visions are unreliable. So Luke has no reason to think his friends are actually in danger at that moment. They were, of course, but here’s the thing: they didn’t want him to rescue them. If he failed, he could be killed or captured by Vader. That would undo so much of the work his friends did for the Rebellion. Yoda says as much. But Luke is okay with putting the Rebellion at risk just to save his friends. And as luck would have it, he manages to save them and prove his mentors wrong! He kicks Vader's butt, rescues Leia, Chewie and Threepio, stops Boba Fett from taking Han, and helps Lando free Cloud City from the Empire. Suck it, Ben and Yoda! Wait a minute... Vader kicked his butt, Lando rescued Leia, Chewie and Threepio, and Boba Fett was practically already gone by the time Luke got to the carbonite chamber. What gives? That's not how I remember The Empire Strikes Back! Yeah, turns out, in terms of saving his friends, Luke could not have been much more useless. They ended up having to save him. As for why else Yoda and Ben didn't want him to go...

-Luke's had daddy issues from the beginning. Owen's not a terrible parent, but he's not a very warm or understanding one either, and dialogue suggests that he has a short temper and disciplines Luke physically. And though he loves Luke like a son, he doesn't call him one. So Luke, much as he loved his uncle, found himself craving a father figure who lacked Owen's parental shortcomings. He projected that fantasy of a father figure onto Anakin, who was dead.

So imagine you're Obi-Wan Kenobi. You know this kid wants a positive father figure more than anything. He lost the man who raised him, and then you bit the dust too so you can't really fill that role either. You know what wouldn't be a traumatizing bombshell at all to drop on him? "Hey, your father, the one you've wanted to meet your entire life, is actually one of the most evil people alive in the universe."

The worst-case scenario for Luke— after getting killed or corrupted— ended up happening just like Ben and Yoda feared. Vader delivered the most devastating revelation Luke could possibly receive, and Luke reacted by trying to commit suicide. Learning Vader was his father messed him up so bad he was emotionally compromised for months on end. That's why he had to face Vader again— not to kill him, but to resolve that emotional turmoil inside him. You don't have to take my word for it, here's George Lucas himself on the matter. Ben and Yoda didn't want Luke to kill Vader. It's just that if he had to act in self-defense or for some other extenuating circumstance, he would have to be prepared to do it anyway.

-"Luke succeeded because he refused to let go of attachments."

Let's play "guess that Star Wars episode." Ready? The protagonist cares for someone so deeply that they give everything to save them. But instead of being grateful, that person rejects their efforts and refuses to stand by them after everything they've done. The protagonist flies into a rage and nearly kills the person they wanted so desperately to save.

Are you thinking of more than one Star Wars movie right now? You should be!

This is what happens when you give in to attachment.

Luke was attached to Anakin. When he learned that Anakin was nothing like he imagined, he made it his foremost mission to see that Anakin became like the man he dreamed he was. Now, trying to redeem a fallen Jedi is not wrong in and of itself. Yoda himself would be guilty if it were. But Luke lacks the maturity to be realistic about his goal.

Anakin is his own person. Nobody can force him to turn good again, not even his son. Attachment won't save Anakin. Not Luke's attachment to him, not his attachment to Luke.

Luke has trouble accepting that. He doesn't see Anakin as a person with his own motives, desires, and fears. Before this point, Luke's father didn't have a face. Now, he still doesn't have a face— it's hidden under a mask. Luke thinks if he can just get through to Vader, Anakin will return. After all, Vader's just a machine, a shell that Anakin's trapped inside of. All Luke has to do is break him out. But no, Vader and Anakin are very much the same person and Anakin does not want to be saved. Or even if he wants to, he doesn't think it's possible. And as long as he refuses to see the way out, then it is impossible.

When Luke learned Vader was Anakin, he went through the five stages of grief. First, denial. "That's not true, that's impossible." Now traditionally, anger is the next stage, but Luke goes to bargaining first. He's different from Anakin in that respect. The entire movie, he's been trying to bargain for his father to come back. But when Vader threatens someone else Luke loves, that's when he jumps to anger. It's not just because he's protective of Leia. It's because this is the moment where he realizes Vader still won't turn. Not only will his love for Luke not sway him to forsake the Emperor, but he is still quite willingly entrenched in the dark side and is essentially mocking Luke here for believing otherwise. That's when Luke snaps. But unlike Anakin, Luke actually realizes how far he's gone before Vader dies. He realizes he's become the last thing he ever wanted to be. He almost killed his father for not being what he wanted. So he tosses aside his saber. He won't go any further. Anakin may not return, but Luke will not fall. "You've failed, Your Highness," he says to the Emperor. "You won't convert me, as you did my father. I am a Jedi, like my father before me." The man lying at Luke's feet is not a Jedi, but he was once. Luke accepts in that moment that the past is the past, and that if Anakin is to be a Jedi once more, it will be by Anakin's choice, not Luke's.

Luke's love for his father has been completely transformed. It's not about himself anymore. He's learned to love the man for what he is, not what he was or what Luke wants him to be. For the first time, he has compassion for Vader. Vader isn't a project anymore, but a person. Luke hasn't become wiser than Obi-Wan and Yoda at this point— he's finally learned what they were trying to teach him. He can't change Vader for the sake of his emotional and moral gratification. Luke can't choose the path of the light for Anakin, but he can choose it for himself, so he does. And that's when it finally clicks for Anakin, when he sees his son's unselfish love.

In Vader's final moments, he chooses to save his son knowing he will die in the process. That's more than he was willing to do for Padmé. If he had died to save Padmé, there would have been no point in saving her, because he wouldn't be around to keep loving her. So instead he turned to murdering children because an old man promised him a magic solution to a problem that, as I said before, might have been nothing. If there was any point at which he could have given his life to save Padmé's, he wouldn't have taken the opportunity. In fact it's implied that he did have an opportunity to sacrifice his life for Padmé, and he chose to save himself instead. While Padmé drew her last breaths, Vader drew his first. Though it's not explicitly stated, the visual language of the scene suggests that Anakin did learn Plagueis' secret after all without knowing it— to save people from dying, you must take the lives of others, and in that effort, the only person you will save is yourself. But Luke showed him the value of self-sacrifice. Luke showed him what it truly meant to be a Jedi. So Vader intervened, knowing he would die. Knowing Palpatine would kill him in the process. He'd stuck by Palpatine for so long, out of attachment. He stayed because he thought he had committed too many crimes to be redeemed. He stayed because maybe, just maybe he could bring Padmé back after all. He stayed because he hated himself and wanted to punish himself. He stayed because he hated Obi-Wan and wanted revenge against him. He stayed because if Luke wouldn't join him, killing Palpatine would mean killing the only family he had left. But in his final moments, he let go. He finally learned to let go. He finally turned around and took a step down the right path. It was only one step. But in taking it, he proved to himself that he could walk back. It was a long process he would never be able to complete before dying, if completing it in his lifetime was even possible. But what matters was that he did something. He saw what needed to be done in that moment and did it, with no thought of reward or benefit. In that moment, it didn't matter that Luke was his son. It didn't matter that he was Luke's father. All that mattered was that a boy in pain needed his father to save him, and Anakin was standing right there.

Anyway, the Jedi aren't perfect, but I feel pretty strongly that in order to critique them, you have to make sure you're not missing the entire point of the story.

Ah, I see the "oh noes, the Jedi don't kidnap children, that's all mean genocide apologist talk" is making the rounds again. Sigh.

The Jedi conscript kids into their program as toddlers and babies. This is not debated anywhere in the media. As to the ethics of that, no, they may not have put kids under their arms and run away with them, but it can't be denied that they did conscript those kids, train them for Jedi combat and expect them to serve the Republic for the rest of their lives, while denying them attachment, contact and community outside the Jedi Order.

That's not propaganda. It's what we see in Star Wars media. I'd like to call attention to the fact that a major Jedi character in the entire Star Wars franchise, Luke Skywalker, had issues with this aspect of the Jedi Order and specifically changed it. Is he "Sith propaganda" too?

Exhibit A: Luke Skywalker's New Jedi Order specifically cited the lack of attachment and methods of the old Jedi as problems. Luke's Jedi were allowed to keep all attachments and ties to their families.

This is the old AU, but a substantial body of work, literally decades of books, revolve around Luke's New Jedi Order. Also, in the Jedi Path (my bad, I called it Book of the Jedi, sorry) which IS Disney canon, Luke makes several notations about "my order won't run like this, it will be completely voluntary, and I think attachments are good."

Exhibit B: The Jedi Path published as Disney canon as the collected thoughts of various Jedi says, among other things:

1. The Jedi absolutely were thought of as kidnappers by some, to the point where there were organized groups in the Republic who opposed them.

2. There was Republic law that allowed them to take children from their families if the families didn't want it.

3. The issue that the children didn't consent was dismissed as them being chosen and consenting because they were Force sensitive.

4. The Book of the Jedi also notes specifically that attachment to birth families needed to be disavowed, which is something Luke Skywalker objected to in the footnotes.

In various Star Wars media we also see:

1. Numerous characters such as Ahsokha and Ashara Zavros who say they have had no contact with their families for decades.

2. Jaesa Willsaam's family being told they should not expect to hear from their daughter again.

3. Shmi not being allowed to remain in touch with Anakin and actually rebuffed when she tried to call him at the Jedi temple.

4. Anakin being told by Yoda that if harm to someone is troubling him, drop the attachment and stop caring.

5. Baby Ludi. This was a case where a Force sensitive baby was taken during wartime and given a new name. When her mother was found to be alive she exhausted all resources going to Coruscant to try to get her child back. The Jedi refused. She sued, and Republic courts sided with the Jedi. The Jedi refused to allow her to even see her daughter again.

Yes, the Jedi did originally think the baby was orphaned, but upon finding out that wasn't the case and that the mother was in fact desperate for her child to be returned, they did not return her. Nor did they restore her birth name.

6. In the original trilogy, Obi-Wan and Yoda expect Luke to give up attachments by a) leaving Han and Leia to die on Bespin; b) deliberately not sharing that Leia and Luke were siblings until their hand was forced; c) insisting that Luke needed to put aside any familial feelings to kill Darth Vader. Luke succeeds in the original trilogy because he refuses to give up his attachments. He calls Vader 'father' and pulls on that thread of attachment until Vader can't resist it - and does the right thing.

7. Yes, Jedi do keep their own cultural traditions but they are still not largely in touch with family or their communities as a whole. As to keeping their own names, tell that to Ludi Billane, Depa Billaba and Sar Labooda.

8. "But the kids and parents consent." Okay, Qui-Gon asked Anakin if he wanted to be a Jedi. Did he sit down and explain it meant he would be bound to a strict moral code for the rest of his life, would not be allowed any attachments or family contact, and would have to sacrifice any of his friends for the greater good, or fight for the Republic regardless if he agreed in their cause?

And even if he had, do we routinely let nine year olds conscript themselves into lifetime military or religious service? Or do we recognize that they should perhaps not make major life decisions at that juncture? Moreover, since the Jedi recruit toddlers and babies do you think they have even the slightest amount of comprehension at that point as to how this will affect the rest of their lives?

But Shmi said yes. Yes, she did. It was offering her kid a ticket out of being enslaved on Tatooine forever, what do we really think she was going to say? If Qui-Gon had said "I'm going to buy your freedom, and your son's, and help you start a new life" would she have made the same choice? Yes, other parents said yes. How much were they advised that this was the safest way for their child, the ONLY way for their child?

9. "But they can leave at any time!" Mhmm. Now how far will they get without any money, possessions, professional connections, experience with living outside the Jedi Order, etc? Yeah maybe they are lucky and can reclaim an inheritance like Dooku but maybe they end up like Ahokha living hand to mouth in poverty on the lower levels of Coruscant.

None of this is "Sith propaganda." It's what the writers of Star Wars actually described. If a fan wants to think this level of separating children from their families and attachments is acceptable, and justifiable nothing I say will change that. Appreciate Star Wars as you want. If some of us think that it's one reason the Jedi kind of suck and had very harmful practices (and let's use critical thinking here and realize that saying "the Jedi kind of suck" is not in any way agreeing with genocide, erasure, slavery or fascism, or similar practices found in other factions), that should also be fine. Don't like that? Such is life.

[aspecpplarebeautiful]

okay so!! i think i’m aromantic, i’ve never had a crush but some things confuse me so i was wondering if you could possibly help?

i’m going to explain and rant now, you don’t have to help obviously but thank you if you do!!

i often find myself imagining doing romantic things like holding hands with people im close with at the time, it’s not like a crush - i know that much - but i also don’t know what it is because i haven’t heard many people talk about it b4. Also, i tend to compare me and this friend to fictional characters relationships that i’m obsessed with at the time. I used to think these were crushes because i didn’t know what else they could be and had never experienced anything else so i have acted on them b4. When i found out one of these friends liked me, i ‘confessed’ and i felt super excited at the time because ‘omg i’m gonna have my dream relationship’ but after the excitement i didn’t feel anything at all. I didn’t blush when they spoke to me or anything which confused me (because other people seemed so happy in these relationships) but i just ended up telling myself it was because the relationship was online (kinda unsafe of me lmao). This is kind of what has convinced me i’m aro but here’s the thing, the idea of romantic stuff doesn’t disgust me (but i do want it to stop because i know i don’t like them like that so it just feels random and pointless atp and isn’t even fun to imagine anymore) and i even find myself having butterflies around close friends which has made me doubt myself a lot because when i tried searching it up, all i could find was people trying to tell me i probably liked my close friends - which i don’t so it made me kinda mad. Idk if any of this was understandable but thank you for reading and i kinda needed to get this stuff out because it’s been causing me a lot of doubt because i don’t always find myself relating to other ppl on the arospec. Ig i’m asking if you know of any other aro ppl who have experienced these things, like just to quieten the doubts. Tysm for reading this and i’m so sorry if this is annoying!!

So I'm going to throw out two labels you may find interesting. The first is aegoromantic. Someone who is aegoromantic may like romance in theory or enjoy romance in some contexts, but experience a disconnect between themselves and what they find romantic. So for example they may have romantic fantasies but not want to participate in romance themselves.

So it sounds like you have fantasies, but when actually trying romance out with a real person you're not really feeling anything. Which is what made me think of this label.

The other label is akoiromantic/lithromantic, and that's someone who has romantic feelings or experiences romantic attraction, but doesn't want or need it reciprocated.

So this is a bit of an umbrella term, but for some akoiromantic people they will get romantic feelings around certain people, but when those people return the feelings or they try and start a relationship, these feelings fade or disappear. Other akoi people are just in general not interested in dating the people they're attracted to, whether the feelings disappear or not.

These labels can overlap sometimes, so if you relate to both that's totally fine. Though it's also fine if you don't connect to one or both.

In general sometimes romantic feelings can just work that way, you can not really experience the full range or attraction.

But yeah, definitely I've seen other aro people with similar experiences. You're definitely not alone in that.

All the best, Anon! Take care.

[rebellionbeach]

I love how supportive Misaki is of Akihiko’s hobbies, well non-judging.  Back in act 4 or so of JR when Isaka was cock blocking their perfect date, he mentioned how tiring it must be living with Akihiko and how it’s weird that he collects these kid objects and bears.  Misaki only defends his bf, which is really adorable.  I feel like most people would very judgey toward his, “hobbies”, I know that I’m sort of weirded out a little.  Maybe it’s because he understands why Akihiko does it, that he wants to feel what it must have been like in a normal family setting which is pretty depressing in context.  

It kind of leads me back to my theory on who fell in “love” first.  I think the period when Misaki and Usami had a tutor relationship is a pretty untouched part of their timeline.  There is the OVA and of course the first act but besides that we never get to see really the gradual relationship between Akihiko and Misaki.  However, the back covers of every JR usually contains these small little acts that show mostly this time frame.  I don’t know if they’re canon or not, I’d assume they are though, but they’re actually really informative and give a more fuller picture on how they started to fall for each other.  Personally, I think that it was Misaki who first started having feelings for Akihiko, maybe after seeing how thoughtful he is toward his brother despite knowing he’d never truly have him, then Akihiko felt something during their time together but was still focused on Takahiro.  The mindset of knowing he’d never get what he really wanted was still in-grained into his mind and even throughout the whole proposal scene in act 1 he just kept a soft smile seeing the love he cultivated for this man over the last ten or so years absolutely crushed.  What’s absolutely brilliant, and I truly mean this, is how Nakamura ties back act 1 as an integral part of both of their character developments.  Once Misaki cried for him, it really changed his entire world.  Suddenly what he wanted was right there in front of him and seemed to be right in his reach.  It wasn’t even really a want however, that sounds too possessive anyway, more of finally having that integral piece missing from your life finally found.  Misaki is the first person he has ever experienced mutual love with, throughout his ENTIRE life.  This isn’t just romantic love either, ANY love.  As a child his parents never expressed it, his family life was a mess, his friends were only that, and Takahiro was from the start just a desire he knew he’d never be able to achieve.  The brilliance of act 1 is that once you read the entire story and seeing certain character traits, you see how important that one event was.  

That’s what I like to think anyway.  Junjou Romantica to me is a story about two people who find a missing part of them that deep down they never knew they could have.  For Misaki I think it was also to love somebody but to also start to be selfish and strong for himself.  Then for Akihiko, it was a mutual love that he was never given throughout his childhood.  That’s why I love this story so much, it isn’t perfect and maybe I’m giving Nakamura a little too much credit but at the same time I think she truly is a brilliant artist.

[yanderecandystore]

Yandere dog man in heat, please.

At first I got really confused, and I came up with three different scenarios of how this could play out:

Medieval Monster Dog Man: Kinda like a werewolf, really feral but maybe he can't transform into a human (making it a different type of monster). In this setting I imagined monsters and humans being kinda against one another.

Modern Anthro Dog Man: Beastars basically, a world where either everyone is an anthro animal (furry lol-), or a world where humans and anthro/monster animals coexist in a modernized setting.

Anime Neko Style: A dog man with more human features than dog-like, leaving his tail and his ears and a couple of mannerisms.

Let me see what I can do for you, boo.

TW/Tags: basic horniness (nsfw stuff: mentions of pillow grinding, vague biting kink, sexual frustration, implied sex after ending, slight mentions of breeding kink, etc) // gender neutral/nonspecific reader // I decided to go with a semi fantasy setting, although vaguely described so you can imagine this universe the way you like // I consider him to be from some kind of monster species-

🍭꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖♡🍮꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖♡🍰꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖♡🍮꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖🍭

Partners through tough and thin [Yandere!DogMan/Monster?? x GN!Reader - Headcanons]:

Let's start with a bit of an off-topic: Did you read my mind boo? Did you know that I was planning on adding a section to the Masterlist dedicated to humanoid/animalistic monsters? I was thinking more about driders/insectoid monsters actually- But I don't really mind this.

Regardless, let's set up the context!

🎇 Let me set the stage for a quick sec!🎇

So, I won't talk for too long this time, just a quick basic talk about your relationship with Flint (don't @ me, I'm terrible at picking names out of the blue-).

You two meet each other pretty much by coincidence, both of you were looking for people to form an adventuring party with- But ultimately finding almost no luck.

To be fair, you weren't really looking for an adventure with strangers, as mostly you just wanted to gain more knowledge by exploring your vast world with someone you would at least want to be near with. You were a couple of ranks above him, yet you found him to be such great company that you two formed some sort of bond over the time you guys spent together.

Expedition after expedition, and it started to feel like you two were more than random colleagues being together just for the sake of finishing a task, it felt like you two were mutual friends that were so accustomed to working together that it felt weird being separated or near strangers.

You were surprised to find someone so easy to rely on, so sweet and kind and extremely gullible. After seeing so many narcissistic jerks who only wanted someone to carry their stuff and do all the hard work while you stood by and watched them take all the glory of completing their quest- It felt like a breeze of fresh air to find Flint looking for someone as well.

Which was weird considering how easily any of them would have taken him to be their personal walking inventory.

You two didn't get along right away, but you guys did warm up to each other as the time passed on. You thought Flint was too childish and Flint thought you were too stern, and even after five years of working with each other, nothing seems to have changed.

Nothing except a better understanding between you two. Even with your differences, it was as if you two were inseparable at this point.

Flint is a lovely guy, you can't tell if it's because of his dog side, but he radiates Good Boy Energy™. He is loyal to you as an adventuring partner, and he is the best friend someone can have, yet you would be lying if you said you knew everything about him.

Flint is not the best at hiding things, especially his own emotions and even he knows about that! Throughout these five years you two spent together, Flint would always try to keep his distance from you in certain times of the year.

At first you didn't understand why did he act so weird and be so distant from you- Until you realized what was happening and you started to feel stupid for not getting it sooner- Fling goes through a heat cycle every six months and that has proven to be quite the interesting change to your routine- Considering you never knew (and still doesn't know-) what to do about it.

Flint always told you it was fine- It was a normal thing to him at this point and you didn't need to worry about it- You just needed to keep a reasonable distance from him and… Close your ears every night through these cycles.

It was fine, you know? I mean- To you it's a bit of an awkward situation as you aren't the same species or him/or don't go through these heat cycles as him- But to him it was absolutely normal. Inconvenient, but normal.

You have no idea what he does to himself to stop it from getting in the way of your partnerships- But one can't help but be curious, especially since he could just stay home if he wasn't feeling alright, he didn't need to continue this journey.

For some reason he always preferred to ignore it and keep going, to focus on his task to be able to give in to the carnal instincts brewing inside him. That was before he met you, however.

He always had dealt with his heat by occupying his mind, and it worked for the most part- But why does it feel so strong now? Why does it feel so unbearable?

It's been a couple of days that he can't find peace anymore, even if he tries to ease his pain each night, it nevers seems to get better. Whatever medication/potion or spell he could use to stop it, it wasn't working anymore, he somehow felt just as if not more sensitive than he was before he took those.

It wasn't just his body that was struggling to find some rest, his mind was also being haunted by mockeries of his own fantasies- To be fair, he hasn't been in peace with himself for a long time now, probably longer than he thinks, but you know how it is- You don't know you have fallen in love with someone until it's too late, and he has just recently discovered the seed of affection towards you growing into something more and more.

He had a crush on you, he doesn't know for how long yet it feels like it has been an eternity- It doesn't really help that you two spend more time with each other than with other adventurers and explorers, and it doesn't help that while you're sleeping in your tent, approximately 15 meters away from his own, as his mind is filled with worse and worse thoughts about you-

It's way too late at night for him to be feeling so needy- He's been trying to relieve himself for maybe 3 hours already, yet he still hasn't been able to calm down his mind and body. He has been carefully listening to each sound that came from outside, more specifically from inside your tent. Every snore, every breath, every whine you give in your sleep is making him mad with feelings he shouldn't have let it grow to this extent. He was supposed to be listening carefully to make sure you're safe, but instead he is having lewd ideas about your sleeping noises.

The feelings and thoughts that are suddenly coming to his mind are nothing short of disgusting to him, he knows he shouldn't be thinking I'll of an friend he loves so much, he shouldn't be craving someone to this degrading extent- Yet he can't stop biting his pillow and imagining it to be you, constantly breathing out your name while crying pathetically as he continues to indulge in this act while his mind is in a half sleep state.

So sleepy in fact that he hasn't heard you coming inside his tent- He wasn't even sure if your soft caressing was real or just a figment of his own twisted mind. He feels so grossed out by his own mind, he would rather believe this is all a dream then to realize he was being so loud you decided to come inside and see if he was okay-

Please, he is already the worst being alive just for fantasizing about you- Don't tell him he woke you up with his whining, it makes him feel more pathetic.

It's such a bittersweet situation, you came here genuinely deciding to help him out however you could- Not because of pity, but for something more than just wanting to help him ease his urges- But even if he is earning for this with all his heart, he feels too bad about himself to stop crying and apologizing for what he was about to do. You two seemed to have your hearts in the same direction, but can he control his instinct to take you for himself and breed you?

It doesn't really matter if he can or not breed you, his mind is already lost to countless nights without sleeping and constant thoughts about loving you and making love with you- Whatever sense of logic has been thrown out of the window.

However, maybe he isn't completely lost! Maybe he'll try his best to be more romantic about this, as it wasn't really how he expected it to happen. Even if he is currently acting like a lovesick lust beast, you don't need to worry because the good boy as your partner is commonly known for will be back in the morning, just a bit more clingy and overly protective of you.

🍭꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖♡🍮꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖♡🍰꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖♡🍮꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖🍭