#Nuances Nice

[lepetitlugourmand]

Effervescence dans la sphère sucrée niçoise... Julien Dugourd, Gaël Moutet, Maison Céline...

Effervescence dans la sphère sucrée niçoise… Julien Dugourd, Gaël Moutet, Maison Céline, Les Petits Marchands… Après les chefs, les pâtissiers sont les nouvelles stars des réseaux sociaux et leurs « instagrammables » créations provoquent tant l’émulation numérique que de longues queues devant leurs boutiques. Les aficionados sont prêts à dépenser de belles sommes pour déguster ou faire un selfie…

[inkskinned]

you're grabbing lunch with a nice man and he gives you that strange grimace-smile that's popular right now; an almost sardonic "twist" of his mouth while he looks literally down on you. it looks like he practiced the move as he leans back, arms folded. he just finished reciting the details of NFTs to you and explaining Oppenheimer even though he only watched a youtube about it and hasn't actually seen it. you are at the bottom of your wine glass.

you ask the man across from you if he has siblings, desperately looking for a topic. literally anything else.

he says i don't like small talk. and then he smiles again, watching you.

a few years ago, you probably would have said you're above celebrity gossip, but honestly, you've been kind of enjoying the dumb shit of it these days. with the rest of the earth burning, there's something familiar and banal about dragging ariana grande through the mud. you think about jeanette mccurdy, who has often times gently warned the world she's not as nice as she appears. you liked i'm glad my mom died but it made you cry a lot.

he doesn't like small talk, figure out something to say.

you want to talk about responsibility, and how ariana grande is only like 6 days older than you are - which means she just turned 30 and still dresses and acts like a 13 year old, but like sexy. there's something in there about the whole thing - about insecurity, and never growing up, and being sexualized from a young age.

people have been saying that gay people are groomers. like, that's something that's come back into the public. you have even said yourself that it's just ... easier to date men sometimes. you would identify as whatever the opposite of "heteroflexible" is, but here you are again, across from a man. you like every woman, and 3 people on tv. and not this guy. but you're trying. your mother is worried about you. she thinks it's not okay you're single. and honestly this guy was better before you met, back when you were just texting.

wait, shit. are you doing the same thing as ariana grande? are you looking for male validation in order to appease some internalized promise of heteronormativity? do you conform to the idea that your happiness must result in heterosexuality? do you believe that you can resolve your internal loneliness by being accepted into the patriarchy? is there a reason dating men is easier? why are you so scared of fucking it up with women? why don't you reach out to more of them? you have a good sense of humor and a big ol' brain, you could have done a better job at online dating.

also. jesus christ. why can't you just get a drink with somebody without your internal feminism meter pinging. although - in your favor (and judgement aside) in the case of your ariana grande deposition: you have been in enough therapy you probably wouldn't date anyone who had just broken up with their wife of many years (and who has a young child). you'd be like - maybe take some personal time before you begin this journey. like, grande has been on broadway, you'd think she would have heard of the plot of hamlet.

he leans forward and taps two fingers to the table. "i'm not, like an andrew tate guy," he's saying, "but i do think partnership is about two people knowing their place. i like order."

you knew it was going to be hard. being non-straight in any particular way is like, always hard. these days you kind of like answering the question what's your sexuality? with a shrug and a smile - it's fine - is your most common response. like they asked you how your life is going and not to reveal your identity. you like not being straight. you like kissing girls. some days you know you're into men, and sometimes you're sitting across from a man, and you're thinking about the power of compulsory heterosexuality. are you into men, or are you just into the safety that comes from being seen with them? after all, everyone knows you're failing in life unless you have a husband. it almost feels like a gradebook - people see "straight married" as being "all A's", and anything else even vaguely noncompliant as being ... like you dropped out of the school system. you cannot just ignore years of that kind of conditioning, of course you like attention from men.

"so let's talk boundaries." he orders more wine for you, gesturing with one hand like he's rousing an orchestra. sir, this is a fucking chain restaurant. "I am not gonna date someone who still has male friends. also, i don't care about your little friends, i care about me. whatever stupid girls night things - those are lower priority. if i want you there, you're there."

he wasn't like this over text, right? you wouldn't have been even in the building if he was like this. you squint at him. in another version of yourself, you'd be running. you'd just get up and go. that's what happens on the internet - people get annoyed, and they just leave. you are locked in place, almost frozen. you need to go to the bathroom and text someone to call you so you have an excuse, like it's rude to just-leave. like he already kind of owns you. rudeness implies a power paradigm, though. see, even your social anxiety allows the patriarchy to get to you.

you take a sip of the new glass of wine. maybe this will be a funny story. maybe you can write about it on your blog. maybe you can meet ariana grande and ask her if she just maybe needs to take some time to sit and think about her happiness and how she measures her own success.

is this settling down? is this all that's left in your dating pool? just accepting that someone will eventually love you, and you have to stop being picky about who "makes" you a wife?

you look down to your hand, clutching the knife.

[linootte]

My critical role obsession awoke like a sleeper agent after THAT animatic. I MISSED THE M9 OK

Dont worry dunmeshi fans, i see you and old man chilchuck is still in my brain. Its just ...crowded in here that's all.

[wasyago]

jay and chip as tritons hehe

(i know that every other person drew them as tritons already, but like, cmon its so fun)

[bunnwich]

A bit of controversial post maybe??? (feel free to skip)

Not to be controversial but I keep seeing how ppl are reading the “Leona is kind to Sally” situation and just thinking how my perspective is bit…different.  (if you don't care about my opinion ofc you can always skip)

SPOILERS FOR EVENT

When I saw it, these were my thoughts:

"Oh I love this so much!! It's adorable for one, and I’ve been saying for years that Leona is only mean to ppl he doesn't like/finds annoying or doesn’t care about. Like he HAS the ability, like everyone else to be polite and nice but we only see him interact with ppl who annoy him etc. Which is...um most of the cast. AND we rarely get a peak at how he would be with someone he likes.

I hope that this helps ppl see that he can be gentler to act toward someone he's SUPPOSED to like as a friend or even like romantically. 

Banter is one thing but I don’t believe he'd ever act straight-up rude to someone he was true friends with, dating or had a crush on?" 

So, a lot of ppl loved this scene I DO TOO! However…

This whole “Leona said men ain’t shit” joke is worrisome. Like…do you guys think that Leona would in fact be ruder or less gentle to a masc or nonbinary S/O vs a femme one? Some of these remarks…feel uh not really nice to those who have nonbinary/masc pairing with him.

He grew up in a matriarchal society, he respects women NO DOUBT.

I just think it would be nice to for us to be kinder in how we phrase things like this. I know they are jokes but still Yumes and ships mean a lot to ppl and I think it's just another catalyst for masc and masc-leaning fans to feel further alienated in the fandom space, yk?

Do I believe he respects women OFC, but much like those who had the “consent king” take about the voiceline of him being offended at Scully kissing the MC's hand I ONLY agree to an extent. WHY? Bc Leona is a big-ass hypocrite! Leona, for all I defend him, is not always keen on physical boundaries himself and can be quite rude. I think that line is more him being annoyed at Scully than genuinely worried for anyone's virtue, yk?

And to bring it back to the Sally/Leona thing I think it's not just bc Sally is a woman he is nice to her, bc she is SMART and cunning and was quickly underestimated by the rest of the cast. She was able take care of herself. He liked that about her. I really don't think it was just cause she was girl by itself.

Idk thats all I have to say, this is just my opinion as usual but it just didn’t sit right with me from a fandom perspective and I genuinely feel the “Leona is the feminist king of all time” is not a full reading of the character when we’ve seen him be nice to others and neutral to other women. Plus, he’s IS a hypocrite about the manners thing! The cast even call him out on it.

Leona is still flawed just like any other character in twst and I don't think him “bowing down at every women's feet” is something I subscribe to. Not in the way some ppl are acting anyways.

And frankly how some ppl are wording themselves in their tags and reblogs of these posts about Leona “drinking respect women’s juice bc he dislikes men” feels alienating toward those who have nonbinary/masc ships with him.

This is meant as no offense to anyone's fun I just thought I’d give my perspective on it. 

TLDR: I do think that it is genuinely funny and endearing to see the juxtaposition of how Leona treats everyone else VS Sally HOWEVER I don't think it is purely a gender thing and making that just doesn't sit right with me.

[gay-rad-desert]

Charlie putting the padlock on the bridge for him and Tao was actually one of my favourite scenes of the season. The way this scene shows the importance of friendship and puts platonic relationships on the same level as romantic ones is so fucking refreshing to me. Taking such an inherently romantic action and just making it not romantic in the slightest but about Charlie's love for his best friend that is equally important to the love he has for his boyfriend is so beautiful and important to me.

Heartstopper obviously does put a huge focus on different queer romantic relationships but I absolutely adore the way the second season portrays queer friendships and doesn't make them seem less worth than the romantic ones.

[chongoblog]

as it turns out there is a way to denounce transgenderism without being anti woke, or as you like to call it "transphobic" you see if you think sex or as you like to call it "gender" is a social construct then how can you identify as a women if according to you that "gender" isn't real but a mere social construct? By that logic we're all fruitless, or as you like to call it "nonbinary" either way it looks your pronoun wars are ending in defeat. Checkmate.

I feel like this is meant to be hate mail, but you're unironically advocating for abolition of gender roles, which is pretty based

[pand1on]

i wish i could articulate my frustration with the knuckles series/scu's handling of knuckles' heritage. i just hope that people recognized that stupid 'joke' where wade couldn't pronounce pachacamac's name as the anti-Indigenous racism it was

[neiptune]

keep in mind that these are stories... that people are writing as a hobby... for free... most times for you to bust a nut...............

[mxfrodo]

y'all for fucking real. don't fucking write slave fics or x reader fics of aventurine's slavery??? are you guys out of your goddamn minds???

[foundfamilywhump]

see like the thing with 'carewhumpers' as a concept to me is it just like... i know this is prrrrobably not really how it's meant but something skeeves me out about the idea that kindness or caretaking mixed in with hurting someone can somehow meaningfully complicate or dilute the harm done to the point of making that character no longer a 'whumper' whereas someone doing the same 'bad' things but not ever being gentle or caring for them would just be a straight-out whumper. when like... that's how 90% of irl abuse dynamics work? so i just... don't really get the point, i guess. like to me it implies something about the 'care' provided somehow mitigating or combating the harm done that. i just do not personally appreciate or enjoy.

[weepylucifer]

One reason why i fuck heavily with disco elysium is like... idek how to describe this phenomenon, but usually when i read Fantasy or Sci-Fi there always has to be this protective layer of Allegory where like, we can't possibly call a thing what it is lest it get too Real so we have like, The Empire. The Dark Lord. The Federation. The Culture. The Ministry. The Shmeebus Bleebus. YOU know. But DE is the first narrative i ever encountered that'll just straight up say "This is about communism. This is about fascism. This is about centrism. This is about nihilism." Like actually use the grownup words for it, you know?? And trust that the audience won't faint away with shock when confronted with ideologies

[rebellum]

The whole transandrophobia discussion thing is weird bc it feels like it's a bunch of poc and jewish trans people being like "here are my experiences of how specifically being MASCULINE had affected me, and the discrimination and violence I experienced based on that. And here is how that relates to me being a racial/ethnic minority"

And then a few loud white trans people going "ohhh you wanna be oppressed so bad you *slur*. This is why there aren't any poc in your movement it's because REAL poc understand intersectionality"

[sunb0ts]

something that always gets me about klavier is that he is so clearly just like. friendly. he cares so much and he cares too much. he's one to tease simultaneously but he so clearly just like. loves and loves and loves, even when it puts him in harm's way, he likes people and he likes being around people enough to be desperate for it and for friendship like. ough

[flying-fangirls]

Watching my little (half) joke post after Part 43 spark some discussion has made me think a lot over this for the past couple days, and I think I've pinpointed my main frustration with the women of Malevolent overall.

Simply put: the women of Malevolent do not get to have a voice.

Yes, literally they aren't voice-acted by Harlan. But I don't really want to get into that side of the topic here. I'm saying figuratively women do not have their own voice in this show.

Who is Bella outside of her relationships to Arthur or Daniel? Did she like music too, was she sarcastic or sincere, what was her biggest goal in life? Who is Faroe outside of how she makes Arthur feel? Who are Anna and Amanda outside of their connections to the King in Yellow? And I don't mean just a quick sentence-long description about them, I mean a genuine in-depth answer to "Who are they?"

Secondary characters that are men/male-aligned (Noel, Oscar, Collins, etc) have a strong sense of individual personality and motivations, enough that you could get a decent amount of discussion/analysis about them if you wanted. You can't get that kind of character discussion for the women if you tried because the show simply does not provide it for you, no matter how integral to the plot their characters (or concept of a character) may be. Heck, Shub set up the plot of this whole show and yet she's so nothing of a character that she's practically just a name to throw around when it sounds cool.

Almost everything we know about the women comes from men's perspectives, either through their side of relationships or through quick mentions of the women without any real substance to who those women really were. Other people have suggested the idea of finding a journal or a few more letters from Amanda to give her character more time/attention-- something similar could be done with any of the other women too, anything that lets their personalities/unique motivations be directly shown instead of vaguely mentioned or hinted at by men.

(I'll admit that I do think Marie is written more along the lines of secondary characters like Oscar, and I'm pretty happy with her character! But the fact that she's the only woman I can think of to break that pattern is... not great)

And yes I know that there are men in this show that also do not get to have their own voice (Roland, Parker, Henry, etc.) That's expected! All stories have characters that act as collateral or tools to move the plot/main characters forward. But when every single female character serves as a plot device with no strong sense of unique self, while only some of the male characters get that same treatment and the rest get plenty of personality and individuality-- that's when it becomes a problem.

The women of Malevolent get names (or, some of them do), they get roles and influence within the plot, and a few of them get small glimpses of what could be a personality if you look for it. But the women of Malevolent do not get a voice. We can see the vague shape of them on the edges of the show, but we never get the chance to hear them. And they never get the chance to speak themselves, to be heard.

I love Malevolent-- really, truly love this show. Which is why it's only so much more frustrating for me when it overall struggles to give its female characters the same respect as its male characters. Again, I'm not talking about the voice-acting, and I completely skipped the expanded cast of female characters (the wraith, the widow, the witch, etc.) and my concerns with what kinds of women are represented in the show and how they're presented. This post is really just me trying to express a genuine frustration that I (and at least a few other people) have with the writing of this show, and try to explain why those frustrations exist.

I promise this is NOT meant to be an attack on anyone and I'm not trying to deny other perspectives on this topic. This is also NOT an attack on Harlan or the podcast as a whole. I'm just trying to share some thoughts here.