#SORRY IF I'VE BEEN OFF Y'ALL

[scriv3lloirl]

Hey so I was that ask a few days ago that said I was gonna draw you. And I finally finished this thing so here ya go.

Hope ya don’t mind I drew you in my own version of the gas mask, and I gave you bell bottoms cause uhhh, teehee.

Look at that. He’s having such a great time. He’s not in danger, he’s fine, look he’s laughing, he’s fine guys

YOU.

[princessefemmelesbian]

Transandrophobia truthers are so damn racist and white oh my fucking god y'all actually piss me the fuck off every time you tokenize Black and brown men for your stupid as fuck "mra but make it trans-inclusive" ideology created by a creepy guy with a corrective rape fetish(something I'll never let up on for as long as I live, btw). If I ever see another one of y'all say "Black and brown men face discrimination because they're seen as overly masculine and that's why masculinity in men is oppressed in this society" I will literally kill myself. Stop using Black and brown men as brownie points for your bullshit arguments about misandry being real when you don't have the slightest idea how racialized oppression works. White boys are so annoying and dumb istfg.

@punkeropercyjackson @punknicodiangelo @pinkpinkstarlet

[cuddlytogas]

an incomplete list of terrible but extremely popular Our Flag Means Death takes that I would like to never see again please

(and I do mean popular, as in, lots of people seem to think they're canon, to the point where I feel slightly insane and like I was watching a different show to everyone else)

1. Ed's mum was loving and nice and supportive, if hampered by her bad situation

this comes up more in fic than analysis, to be fair, but good god, what show were some of you watching? this isn't to vilify her, because yeah, she's clearly a product of colonialism, white christian supremacy, and domestic abuse, but like. that doesn't make how she raised Ed good. clearly she was trying to keep him safe, but "we don't deserve nice things", and especially "it's not up to us, it's up to god", speaks to me of someone who squashes down any ambition on her son's part, has fully bought into the lies of christian colonialism, and tries to pass them down to her son.

as does happen in colonised communities, particularly among older generations. I know us white people like to think that every indigenous person is a perfect left-wing anti-imperial activist, but that's simply not the case, and Ed's mum is so clearly an example of an older conservative christian indigenous parent who had to believe the lies told by their coloniser in order to survive, but is now passing on that trauma to their children. and I just...

if I read one more fic where Ed's mum is a perfect loving supportive angel who always believed in her kid and always supported and protected him, I'm gonna scream. yes, it's sweet, and it's fun to sometimes veer from canon and give your blorbo nice things, but it's still veering from canon. and yet, I see very few people acknowledge that, or actually talk about the nuances of Ed's mother, and how she definitely tried to protect him, but was far from sweet, doting, and unconditionally supportive.

2. Ed's loving look when Stede is picking food from his beard in 1x07

like most of these things, I enjoyed it as a joke or exaggeration at first, until I realised that people were actually being serious. but every time I watch that scene, I see Ed looking absently-mindedly over Stede's shoulder, because a) that's what you do when someone leans in to pick something off you, and b) surely the point of the scene is that they're so comfortable and easy together that they don't notice the intimacy of what they're doing, but Lucius, an outside observer, thinks it's obvious. right?? I can't be the only one seeing it???

[sigh]

anyway. finally, the really really big one:

3. Ed is a soft uwu babygirl princess femme bottom sub who loves her cat collar and is teaching Stede how to dom him in the "say you're the captain" scene

I mean, there's not much to say except to link to duke's absolutely phenomenal twitter thread about "how the 'babygirlfication' and infantilization of ofmd ed teach is an extension of racist perceptions of indigenous men being inherently violent and thus needing to be emasculated to be considered sympathetic"

but especially That One Fucking Scene, good lord. talk about taking shit out of context. everyone looked at a slowed-down gif of one shot in the trailer and cried "babygirl!! he's such a simp, he just wants to be dommed!!", when actually that scene is about how a) Stede is cringefail and terrible at being a typical harsh, commanding pirate, and b) Ed is lovingly embarrassed by this. he encourages Stede to assert himself (and give Ed something to do during his probation/help him make amends with the crew), but like. normally. he's acting perfectly normal in that scene, and mostly annoyed by the outfit and embarrassed by how badly Stede fails. but just because he's sitting down while Stede is standing, and he happens to take a breath in that one shot (because, you know, people breathe sometimes), everyone's doubled down on their "submissive babygirl" bullshit, and I can't get the fuck away from it.

which - listen, it's fun for me, too! it's fun to explore exaggerated aspects of a character, it's fun to read/write/draw that angle in smut, I get it! but I keep seeing people keep claim it's literally canon, and I cannot stress enough that that is Straight Up False. for the love of god, please just watch the show without your (potentially kinda racist) bias glasses on, and remember to treat the characters with respect instead of projecting onto their every interaction a shallow dom/sub binary just because you find it hot.

Our Flag is a show very specifically about masculinity, and what it means to be a man; how assumptions about that can harm and restrict men; and how men can grow beyond them. it's a nuanced and sympathetic examination of this. the whole point is that Ed is allowed to like nice fabrics and be tired of violent piracy and still be a man. the point is that two men fall in love - equal, honest, sincere love - and are still men, still exactly who they are.

(on that note, insisting that Ed is canonically trans or femme because of these things often ends up just leaning into gendered stereotypes: men are harsh and active and dominant, and women are soft and passive and submissive, and if Ed's not the former, he must be the latter, right? it also tends to hetero-ify the central relationship, casting Stede as "the boy" and Ed as "the girl", needing one to be masc and one femme. not always, and again, I understand and have enjoyed transformative works that take those elements and run with them, and explore what the story could be like if Ed were trans/nb/etc - but it's still a transformative interpretation. it's not canon.)

relatedly: those fucking wedding toppers! it seemed blatantly obvious to me that half the point of those scenes was that Ed is distraught and blaming himself for Stede leaving because he wasn't the ideal partner. it's his entire arc for the first half of season 2! Ed hates himself and believes there's something wrong about him that makes him unlovable. so he keeps and then discards the wedding toppers, painting himself onto one of them, because he's projecting himself onto an image of ideal/successful romantic love that he thinks Stede wants, and in which he doesn't fit. he's trying to mould himself into someone else to make himself lovable, not realising that Stede already loves him for himself.

so it's important to the whole narrative that Ed's yearning for/projection onto the wedding toppers is false, and born from his insecurity. he gets drunk, and play-acts a stereotypical image of romantic happiness into which he doesn't fit, but real love looks nothing like that, because real love isn't found in stifling hegemonic cultural structures, but honest, emotional connections between people allowed to be their whole, vulnerable selves. Stede is not like the groom, and Ed is not like the bride, because they shouldn't have to be. Ed should not (and does not) have to warp himself into a demure bride in order to be worthy of love: he's already lovable and loved exactly as he is! that's the point!! of the scene!!!!!!

like, it's important that the groom figure isn't actually like Stede, either. yes, it's blond and has a nice, peach-coloured suit, but a) Stede was very specifically unhappy in the posh, heterosexual, married state the figures represent, and b) Stede by this point looks nothing like that figurine. it's directly contrasted with the image of him in the rowboat, scruffy and plain and earnestly in love, rather than fancy, cold ceramic.

[EDIT 29/12/24: I ended up writing a whole Twitter essay about the wedding cake toppers that I then gussied up for Tumblr; so if you want a clearer, more substantial, and better supported argument about those, check that out!]

but no, I have to wade through swathes of art and fic and meta about how badly Ed wants to be a sweet little demure kitty princess, how he wants a wedding night and a ring to prove he's Stede's property, and acting as if this is somehow canon, because people on the internet have zero reading comprehension and are scared of brown men.

the whole point of Our Flag is that you don't need to compress yourself into prescribed social roles, and in fact, doing so will only make you miserable; and that racist, patriarchal, colonial institutions should be resisted and dismantled at every opportunity.

so tell me again why the ultimate message is that Ed and Stede should get married under an arch in front of an altar and their lined-up friends, with flowers and rice falling around them, all dressed in white, one in a suit and one in a dress, with rings and a kiss and a honeymoon after, before they move into a detached house with a yard and a fence and re-adopt the kids that Stede abandoned? and this isn't about promises, fidelity, or even monogamy - I'm specifically talking about everyone in this fandom who seems to think that the ultimate goal is the most stereotypical 20th century cisheteropatriarchal christian wedding, but with the name "matelotage" slapped on top, as if that takes away all of the underlying baggage.

just - I know we're all meant to hate men and masculinity and yadda yadda yadda, but actually, to be earnest for a second, men deserve respect too, because all people and all genders do. and two men are allowed to be in a relationship and still both be men - complex men, with their own, layered relationships to their gender - without having to fall into neatly-arranged dom/sub masc/femme roles, or seal the deal with a hegemonically-approved ceremony.

so please, stop reducing an indigenous lead character to a caricature of a femme uwu princess bottom just because he has long hair, wore a robe once, and you're too scared of brown men to imagine him with proper agency. and then please, for the love of god, stop claiming that that interpretation is canon.

[hyunip]

Model!black!reader x Artist!Ony

His hand slid into the frame of the photo, tring to move a piece of trash that seemed to also be peeking into the frame of your photos. This caused his large hand to be caught in one of the photos. You hated anything that was good enough for you on the first try, honestly. Despised it. More than someone chewing their food hella loud in your ear.

Without moving your head an inch, you moved your eyes to give him an evil glare. And he knew what that meant. The larger male, known as small artist Onyankopon, avoided this gaze and threw away the piece of trash, his nerves tingling as he felt your pretty hazel eyes burning right into the back of his head, waiting for him to turn around so you could finally make eye contact with him.

You were used to Ony avoided this stare, so when he finally turned towards you and held that gaze until one of you looked away, your heart jumped.

No matter how hard you stare at this man, whether the eye contact makes him nervous or not, he will not budge.

But to show you he does not play games, when you get home, you go off on him. Telling him how he fucked up one of your photos, he wraps his arm around your waist and pulled you towards him, telling you how it was only one photo.

Yet you couldn't let go of that, because that was important to you. "It don't matter Ony. You know how I feel about that."

and after all of that, he's finally the one taking the reigns in bed. He has you in missionary with your hands in his as he hunched over you, feeding you sweet, deep thrusts while he mumbles little apologies in your ear, kissing your neck and jaw every time before he said another one.

[wanderingibon]

inquisitor's rage

what if, in moments of strong emotion, remnants of the anchor's magic causes the inquisitor's eyes to glow a bright green? magic that coursed through their veins, although long gone, still makes itself known in its wake. a reminder that the inquisitor has been forever changed, and there is no going back.

[softguarnere]

Okay no wait but have we ever considered Joe having dyslexia and no one ever realizing it until he starts dating Webster . . . Because that really opens up so many fic possibilities for Webster reading to him and I think we need that. Especially if it's Web who realizes that Joe has dyslexia

[charmre]

Thank my father before me His mother before him Who would I be without you, without them?

[nyan-bynary]

TOMORROW

[bi-disastersoup]

Shifters - Part 2

I realize it has been almost a whole year since I posted part 1. I did some experimenting to see if I could get it all into one post this time instead of having to do two separate posts. Hopefully the formatting goes through okay...

Also, this probably goes without saying, but this was all done pre-DT.

Part 1

God I hope that posted in the right order lol

Anyway, I'm trying to work on crossposting stuff again. Wish me luck.

(Part 3)

[ask-roger-stuff]

So uh most of y'all probably saw this coming from a mile away, but I just hit a really big low recently. I'll probably keep answering asks when I can and if I feel like it, but I guess I just want y'all to know why I'm not posting, like at all. Nothing to do with this blog or anything, it's all personal issues, so I hope y'all understand that I won't be incredibly active for at least this week, at least while I sort stuff out.

Sorry that I didn't say anything sooner! Hopefully, I'll get everything figured out soon.

[spaceratprodigy]

✏ WIP Whenever ✏

Thank you for the tags @captastra @darkfire1177 @the-lastcall @hibernationsuit 💖💕

Haven't been working on too much personal art lately so not many new things to share

Have a lil sneaky peeky at these tiny sketches for the next few faith and max smoochy prompts in my ask box tho :]

open tag to anyone who wants to jump in!

[babacontainsmultitudes]

80 or so years of life really ain't enough can I have an elf lifespan instead please? Or at least a dwarf's... I need at least a couple hundred years... Oh and a new spine every 5 or so years, if that's not too much to ask. 3. 3 years actually. Yeah, a new spine every 2 years, and a lifespan of 350-750 years, that's all I want really.

[pigeonclaw]

the amount of times I have potentially controversial opinions that I type up and then save in my drafts forever because I still feel them but am too shy and afraid to choose violence in any way

[elliesbelle]

lol

[aphelea]

i finally watched good omens and am now a little bit obsessed with it holy shit

[trashyandtiredsol]

sol. Sol. Sol. Sol. Sol.

SOL.

ilysm.

you are so friggin extraordinary.

never change.

you're amazing.

Kept trying to think of some paragraph long response to this but I'm absolutely shitty with words-

SO

Tam. The feeling is very mutual- for you and everyone I've talked to at some point since I've been on this hellsite we call Tumblr /affectionate

Talking with everyone on here, sharing my art with everyone- just existing with everyone on here and seeing what y'all create has turned into such a huge aspect of my life (especially my social life like- y'all ARE my social life at this point 😅)

Plus I'm fuckin so glad I decided to try out Tumblr when I did cuz it was around a sorta traditional point in my life (moving outta a toxic ass house and away from a toxic, isolated life and my ex supposed father figure). Coming on here and talking with you and everyone else brightens my day and I'm glad to be a part of everything :3