#THE WHOLE POINT OF HIS RACE IS THAT THEY ARE INFANTILIZED FOR THE WAY THEY LOOK

[clione16]

"chilchuck is that one 'she is 10000-year-old dragon' trope but he is guy so no one ever think it is weird" "people who thirst over him is a pedo" Do. You. Even. Read. The. Manga.

[ms-scarletwings]

Endearing through the Alien Lens: A Clue About the Primitive Irken?

I love literary xenobiology. I love it a whole lot, in fact. There’s a paradoxical line I dance across, between criticizing intelligent fictional aliens for their likeness to our species, and criticizing them for their unlikeness. It’s a pretentious and laughable dance between “Come on, the sky’s the limit, there’s no real reason for a bucket of different extraterrestrial races to just all be more flavors of quirky humanoids! Boring, show me something actually alien!!” and the yearn for the use of alien races as a funhouse mirror of mankind’s own evolution. I think the way Irkens nonchalantly dwell somewhere on that subjective tightrope is a good part of why I can’t seem to stop thinking about them.

They are inspired and yet creatively original. They are truly alien, and yet, they can still play foil to the bottomlessly decadent humanity that Vasquez’s Earth has set the stage for.

Before, in the very first brain dump I let loose about them, I noted a few of their parallels to the worst in Homo sapiens and the insects they resemble. This time, something is chewing on me that i haven’t seen another put into perspective. A something that seems contradictory to our collective view of the heartless, sexless, atomized conquerors that all of the cosmos will fear:

They… have parental instincts.

I didn’t necessarily say drives or wants; however, they undeniably havewhat seems to be an actual, instinctual “cuteness response”. Like us, like social pack animals which invest a great deal of resources and time into their young. Given that the closest thing that 100% of smeets born on the home world get to call a parental figure is a literal cold, unfeeling, automated machine, this seems kind of weird, doesn’t it? They’re not even born like mammals or nested like birds, they’re mass produced, like hived wasps or ants, miles beneath their actual society and out of the business of the adults. So, what the heck with them being written to be humanized with this baseless, arbitrary trait?

But, ah ah ah, nitpicker Scarlet, it’s not baseless. It’s only ✨vestigial✨

Y’all could probably make a good guess to what the cuteness response is and why it exists in Homo sapiens, but to sum up- it’s the phenomenon of when we see something we find “cute” and it makes us react to it in a protective, nurturing fashion- or also want to bite/squeeze things, weirdly, if it’s just too damn cute. Well, what do humans find cute? Things that resemble human infants, basically. It’s a biological reflex that makes us want to defend and provide care for our kind’s absurdly dependent and slow-developing young, rather than abandon them in the shrubbery like they’re just screamy, food-leeching paperweights.

“Pff, really? Well I must be special cause I don’t even LIKE babies. I think babies are icky gross, not cute! So, genetic instinct my ass!”

I hear you, sure, but what about… harp seals? Or koalas, or pandas and puppies and fawns and kittens? Or funny little cartoon blorbos? At bare minimum you’d have to be an alien yourself to feel nothing looking at photos of young hedgehogs

See, the fact that a lot of us may often find baby animals a great amount more endearing than even humans’ is not even in conflict with this understanding of cuteness.

The concept of the “baby schema” was formally proposed in 1943 by Konrad Lorenz, an Austrian ethologist. Fun fact is he was also the same researcher who originally observed and described imprinting behaviors, as seen in newly hatched waterfowl. Point is that his “Kindchenschema” idea grouped together a handful of infantile traits that make fireworks go off in the parts of your brain that wants to keep things alive and baby-talk to them. Included on the list were features like proportionally large heads, big eyes, round faces, short noses, etc. despite the name, the baby schema’s effect is something applied not to just actual babies, but children generally, and even in our reactions to non-human animals.

It’s the hypothesis behind both why we’ve jacked up the skulls of so many small dog breeds in the name of aesthetics and why we generally find the portraits on the left side of this image more appealing to look at than the ones on the right.

The consistency of these features across many species may also give some hint that they experience a similar phenonemon, especially given that these are traits shared among bird or mammalian offspring which require significant attention and protection to survive. And, it may also explain why this image likewise gives me a huge dose of that sweet, sweet response.

Awww, look at that lil’ mans! Look at his teeny noodle arms!! I just wanna pinch him like a marshmallow!

YOU are not immune to cuteness psychology, and neither are the proud Irken warriors. I’m going to cite Zim’s proclivity to what I can only describe as paternal bonding as a demonstration of this response, but before you go reminding me about his pak defects, it’s far from the only evidence that this is a natural Irken trait.

Check out little Timmy (importantly, the surrounding response to him), a hilariously out of place youngster who appeared briefly in the trial transcript for the sole purpose of a dark gag and to get us some lore revealed.

Take further note of the complimentary nature of smeets themselves.

Suddenly finding themselves alive, fresh Irken babies too, like the hatched gosling, begin to immediately seek an emotional attachment with the first animate thing they see. While mobile and fast learners, smeets are far from being able to truly fend for themselves. They’re tiny and naive and they need lots of mental enrichment/teaching. They also play and form something akin to friendships, much like human children. In the bygone era before Irkens were so reliant on Paks and all of the advanced technology of the modern empire, smeets would have been exceedingly vulnerable. All signs point to a phase in Irk’s natural history where they were once nurtured after by adults of their own kind, and commonly bonded with their caretakers. This could mean compact family units, or maybe even a communal raising situation, akin to penguin crèches (Personally I like to headcanon that the tallests/queens were traditionally the only breeding members of the population but that’s neither here or now). Either sense, the evolutionary remnants of a parental creature are still around.

Taking all that to note, instead of perceiving Zim as the bizarre outlier to the Irken condition when it comes to having this soft spot, I instead see him as an opportunity to see natural behaviors in action without the suppression of his militarized society and its distractions. Even someone as warped and selfish as he can be is still very, very full of love to give that he doesn’t even understand enough language to describe. He pretty clearly shows he has no cultural understanding or reference of cuteness, and still, he’s not so different in this “weakness” than the very humans he manipulated into fawning over Ultra Peepi. It just took an example his own sensibilities could relate to instead of an unfamiliar, repulsive alien rodent.

And when he’s given the rare circumstance to show that potential, well-

*(With the rough shape/size down, no nose, and huge, bug-like eyes, Li’l Meat man may actually be a great approximation of the key “smeet schema” features. More importantly, it was made to specifically resemble Zim himself)

- I feel that’s downright adorable.

[genericpuff]

I was reading your essay on "fat" rep in LO and as woman who is overweight, maybe not but definitely chubby/pudgy and often getting shit for it by my family... Do we ever see Persephone with a not-flat stomach? Even just a little protruding, not necessarily round. Or a double chin? I know fat looks different on different people, but... To me that seems like a pretty obvious way for an artist to show their character is meant as fat rep. If Rachel actually wanted that, I mean.

There are definitely times Rachel tries to draw her "fat" but it feels so tone deaf because it's still just like... as I've mentioned in my essay about it, it's "Hollywood fat", i.e. the kind of belly pouch fat that many women have that's often painted as ugly even though it's very commonplace to have (because no person is entirely flat! we're humans, not planks of wood!) The problem is if you try to quantify as little amount of fat as possible as "fat representation", you can't really call it fat representation because it only represents people on the lower end of the spectrum of fat. Here's an example of what I mean when I tried to find that one specific image example I was thinking of that I had seen ages ago lmao (this isn't the one I was thinking of but it gets the same point across):

Yes, cartoon stylization is a thing, but watch out for the folks who say they can't draw fat people because "it wouldn't suit my style", it falls into the same type of excuse camp as Tim Burton saying black people wouldn't suit the "aesthetic" of his films. They actually could draw fat characters in their style, it's more likely they just don't want to (but don't want to admit to that).

And honestly, if someone just wants to stick to drawing characters of a specific race, body type, etc. that they're familiar with, that's not a crime in and of itself IMO, but don't claim that your work is representation for a group when it's really only carrying the bare minimum or if you're just forcing it for the sake of seeming progressive. That's pretty much where LO falls, its "fat representation" only represents the bare minimum of fat that doesn't apply to the people who are looking for legitimate fat rep in media. Sure, there will be people who will still connect with that body type, especially for people who have stretch marks or belly pouches, but can it really be called 'fat rep' on the whole when it's not going to connect with the people who are genuinely fat? I'm someone who's gone through weight gain and struggled with body image, while I can totally relate to the type of body Persephone has where she (sometimes) has a muffin top and cellulite on her legs, that doesn't make her "fat representation" as a whole because she doesn't represent the women who are genuinely fat beyond chubbiness or being "not flat".

All that aside, the only indications of Persephone being 'fat' are the odd panel where Rachel gives her a belly or "stretch marks" (tbh they look less like stretch marks and more like scars from a bear attack lol):

But then she'll also draw Persephone with a straight up bodybuilder torso and have her say outloud that she's "small-medium":

It all feels very tone deaf because it's Rachel trying to have her cake and eat it too - she wants to draw Persephone as her usual small cinnamon roll self who can be infantilized and fetishized by the men around her (which Rachel loves to write and draw btw) BUT she also wants to try and take credit for Persephone being "fat rep" so whenever she remembers to do so, she'll throw in her laziest attempts at making Persephone seem "fat" but really she's just the Hollywood version of "fat" by having a belly pouch and stretch marks that many women of varying sizes have regardless of weight changes. We can't even assume that she may have been fat at one point and lost the weight (leading to the stretch marks) because we've seen Persephone in basically all stages of her life from childhood to adulthood. She's always been itty bitty and her entire personality and relationship with Hades is written around that.

[hazshit-hotel-hater]

What gets me with Vel is that we see she has a good rapport with her coworkers/friends. She may sometimes roll her eyes at the other two and their antics and of course when her direct business gets interrupted she gets frustrated, but we mostly see her on good grounds with the rest of the Vees. They respect her when it comes to serious business and in that last scene of the season they all look to be very much on the same page and in it together, smiling about their future... yet fanon (if it isn't infantalizing her as you've pointed out) is constantly projecting "angry black woman" stereotypes onto her.

It's gross and in my opinion clearly racially motivated that they see her as nothing more than a "bitchy" woman of color. While the fanon I've seen also has separate gross issues with Vox and Val they are at least allowed some nuance on occasion, but I just don't ever see that with Vel, she's just an angry woman rendered to the background in their eyes stripped completely of her professionalism, intellect, and cunning. She's one of my faves and it sucks so bad to see.

Hi. :) I wrote 5 paragraphs in response to this question and Tumblr so graciously decided to delete fucking all of it. :)

The Hazbin Hotel fandom has a serious racism problem and not enough people are talking about it. Aside from the infantilization of Velvette, other BIPOC characters are put into stupid stereotypes or treated like children because either Vivzie can’t handle writing competently or the fandom doesn’t know how to behave themselves. This is especially apparent for the women, but—and this is probably the only time I will talk about him in this way—Valentino is also suffering from this shitass issue.

Firstly about Velvette, just like how this said, Velvette used to be treated like a child in canon (now fanon) and is being portrayed as only a sassy angry black woman by the fandom. This is disgusting! I don’t think I need to say that! For some reason (misogyny) the Hazbin fandom just has this thing where they take a POC person or a woman—usually both—and decide to treat them like a child. Best examples being Niffty and Velvette being portrayed as Angel & Husk’s and Vox & Valentino’s children. Niffty is 22 and Velvette is in her 30’s. And of course they are both POC. I know there’s going to be someone accusing me of just whining about racism or being like “not everything is about race” but shut the fuck up because I’m busy talking.

I think the best scene to depict Velvette’s character—even though she hardly has any scenes. It shows that she will and can respect her colleagues but for other people, you either need to give her something she wants or her respect needs to be earned. She literally sings a whole song about it.

For other characters like Niffty I have a post for her in the works so I won’t spill it all here, but I can’t in good faith talk about the racism problem without mentioning Valentino. The fact Vivzie has made her worst character into the basic tall hot hispanic/latino man with the hot spanish accent stereotype. Honestly this sort of stereotype doesn’t bother me much, there’s a few villain characters I like with it like Alejandro from TDI, but Vivzie making this a big aggressive and dangerous POC person abusing a sad little white guy just grosses me out. It’s not like the situation would be any better if Angel wasn’t white, but it really does just leave that extra sour taste in my mouth.

Also I don’t need to explain why 90% of the POC cast being fucking grey or purple or blue is bad right.

[bohemian-nights]

For the life of me I can’t understand how people think it’s acceptable for House of the Dragon a show that is pushing for more diversity (making the Velaryon’s Black and Mysaria Asian) to race bend the only canonical black character. If they wanted to race bend any of the characters they could’ve made Alys Rivers Indian. They could make Sara Snow Mexican and so on. It’s just so frustrating to see this happen time and time again in media when it comes to the portrayal of WOC in general but especially black women.

Like I don't care if people ship Daemyra you know? If shipping those two makes them happy go for it. My only thing is I just want them to stop with the racist shit they say about all the WOC in Daemon's life. From his lovers (cause they've said some racist shit about Mysaria too) to his wife and to even his daughters. At this point I'm convinced half of them don't even like Daemon because if they did they wouldn't stay shitting on the women who at one point or another were/are important to him.

Idk 🤷🏽‍♀️ it's just very strange to me.

The discourse surrounding Nettles is absolutely crazy and you can tell it’s being fueled by anti-black weirdos who are mainly Dumbnyra stans(lol Team Green have their issues too, but they aren’t the ones who are advocating to race bend Nettles ����)

Honestly, I did not have a problem with Dumbnyra(and yes I’m going to call it that) at the beginning of the show. I was indifferent to it. However, that quickly changed when most of the fans started to show themselves to be the racist psychopaths that they are. Down to them literally calling Laena the n-word and celebrating her death🙃:

You might say it’s just a couple of the more “extreme” fans that feel that way, but literally go on their blogs, Twitter accounts, etc., and 90% are arguing some bs.

If it’s not bashing Laena(yes they are still doing this even though she’s dead and according to them Rhaenyra was the love of Daemon’s life so it really doesn’t make sense to do all of this for a dead woman who paled in comparison to the “love of his life”🙃) it’s bashing Nettles.

Boy, do they hate Nettles. I'm posting her picture cause this is the face of their nightmares🤣

If it’s not saying Daemon never loved her and she was just this “giant misunderstanding” between himself and the “love of his life” despite him literally going against his wife and queen’s orders to save her, it’s saying how she’s Daemon’s daughter or Daemon saw her like a daughter.

Their relationship was 100% paternal or mentee/ mentor. Stop mentioning the bath’s which were father-daughter bonding time or the fact that they might’ve slept in the same bed which was just done to comfort a frightened child. Daemon would never get with someone so black I mean so foul-mouthed in canon. She’s just his child😅

Why do you want a bada** with a middle-aged white man? You’re the one with the problem, not me even though I’m trying to infantilize a young black woman and pidgin hole her into the “strong independent black woman” trope while supporting a white woman getting with her uncle cause I can relate to her. I refuse to read the books(or parts of the books) because every time I do I want to ripe out my hair when Daemon and Nettles' relationship is mentioned 🙃

Anyway, if it’s not saying she’s going to be cut and replaced with Rhaena(cause then they know that the relationship would actually be non-romantic☺️), it’s saying and actively hoping she’ll be race bent because they can’t stand the thought of Daemon being with a black woman💁🏽‍♀️:

All minorities are the same don’t cha know 😀and we have too many black people on this show. What we have Corlys, his sons, Rhaena, and Baela. Yes, Rhaena and Baela are mixed, but they count as representation cause their skin isn’t white and I can’t relate because of that. Why add the only in-canon black person when we have a whopping 5 whole black people in a sea of whites 🙃

Also, we don’t know what race Nettles is even though we have pictures of her in the lore and in the books as well as descriptions of her appearance that show that she is black, but again every time Nettles is mentioned I get triggered so I skip over her parts😀

Moving on. If it’s not bashing Nettles they are blatantly ignoring that Rhaena and Baela are Daemon’s daughters and his only daughters. They’ll literally draw a million and one pictures of lizard baby (that’s what I’m calling it, cause again, these people don’t deserve respect) and pretend like it ever drew breath and that it is his only daughter🙃 Or my personal favorite which is essentially Daemon is a good father because he didn’t abandon them on the side of the road (where they belong).

They were educated, clothed, and fed, children don’t need affection, stop complaining. The fandom loves Rhaena and Baela🙃. No one cares about poor Rhaenyra and her boys(who Daemon sees as his real children cause they share the same skin color🙃). That’s why I draw, write, and gif for these poor neglected souls and completely leave out the black ingrates, I mean Rhaena and Baela😅

Finally Mysaria. Oh, Mysaria, I’ve got my own problems with her, but yeah they do bash her by pinning all of Rhaenyra’s psycho deeds on her(so much for your girl being a queen who has "agency"🙃).

Like yeah, she’s not innocent, but she’s not the only one who isn’t innocent, and while I definitely don’t think Daemon was ever that in love with her given how quickly he was willing to call her a wh*re, it hasn’t escaped my notice that the only reason why she isn’t that much of a focus is because they do regulate her to just a wh*re 🙃

They hate Rhea too and try to make her into a groomer to justify Daemon murdering her, but we aren’t going to get into that because we are talking about how this fandom treats the non-white women of Daemon’s life.

Look, I could go on and on, but this ship literally attracts the most racist, white supremacist-leaning, self-hating fans(yes there are Black and other non-white fans who will literally throw their own under a bus for this ship🤦🏽‍♀️), and anti-Black fans by the boat load. And the thing is, they all hide behind “feminism” when called out for it🤣🤣🤣

Yeah, you can ship what you want, but it’s pretty obvious at this point it’s beyond shipping. If you are literally bashing every single woman and girl (especially the non-white women/girls) besides Rhaenyra in Daemon’s life then dude there is something wrong here.

They definitely aren’t Daemon fans(hell he probably has about as many actual fans as Nettles does🤦🏽‍♀️). They are Rhaenyra self-inserters who are pissed off that their ship is on borrowed time and “their man” is about to “leave” their self-insert in the dust for gasp 😱 a black woman so they are taking all the shots they can to feel better about this Titanic ship 🤷🏽‍♀️

[spotconlonsbabe]

rating headcanons that yall say

lowkey kinda love reading hcs and some are scarily accurate but some are like??where did you even?????get that from?????

so im gonna like? debunk some? and just like, comment on shit? if i miss anything ask n ill make a separate post

crutchie is not like.. ✨uWu soft baby cinnamon roll✨. its fbhjdksabkh frustrating like the whole "let crutchie say fuck" thing annoyed him. just bc he has a disability doesnt mean hes infantilized. he is actually a little fucking menace and he will hit you. he is opinionated and not a innocent little child.

i (race) like biting. thats it. i bite.

jack is like chronically adhd but he doesnt think he is. hell hyperfixate and infodump and get so distracted on one thing (90% of the time its his current artwork) that the outside world just stops existing. yet he thinks this is just normal people things to do while i just 🫠

hes also a manwhore. he gets around a lot (albeit as a coping mechanism for his ✨everything trauma✨). like before the strike he slept around, with random people hed pick up on the street, theatregoers hed see during meddas shows and talked to afterwards ("dont come a knockin" style), meddas backstage crew, people hed sell the evening paper to, anyone. gender was irrelevant to him, he just needed an outlet for all his energy. it was usually a no stings attached scenario, but not like, "wham bam thank you maam" sorta thing, he treated them with respeect

alberts safe food is lamb. thats it.

spot is a chihuahua. down to the soul. (he will deny this till the day he dies)

everyone is some form of neurodivergent. all funky in the brain /lh

also some things that are not true (soz guys)

-um. ralbert. it just doesnt make sense for either of us? hes my best friend and i do love him but not like that. also i dont think wed be able to survive as a couple. we collectively share about three (3) brain cells and i think we would destroy a house together. like blow it up (storytime for later about that if yall wanna hear)

-neither is javey (sorry everyone). jack an davey love each other. yes. but not in a romantic way. theyll trust each other with things theyd never tell anyone else, but they are strictly platonic. they said they could never imagine being together, sorry to all the avid javey supporters out there.

-kathy's a lesbian. false 💖

shes bi with a preference for women. she did THINK she was a lesbian until she had this big dumb guy come up to her on the street and offer to bring her a paper personally.

-newsies dont have an age limit. we dont "age out" of selling. it isnt "just a kids job". anyone could sell papers. the whole point of being a newsie is that anyone could do the job, it didnt matter who you were or where you were from, you just had to have enough money to buy the paper from the distributor. we had a like 40 year old woman who used to come buy her papers after we did. so the theories of "what happens when jack ages out??" arent nessicarily accurate, if anything he would leave by choice.

[smokeybrandcompositions]

Somebody That I Use to Know

I know a guy who got Red-Pilled after his wife cheated on him. It was the second time he was cheated on by a spouse and dude just said f*ck it! Full MAGA afterward. It’s wild to see because I’ve known this due for, like a decade and change. He was never a cat who had any strong opinions one way or the other, and tended to kind of follow behind whichever cat in the room had the strongest male energy, but he was a good dude overall. Kind of a weenie, but not terrible in any way. And then he moved to Idaho, like a lot of other White folks, to get away from “California”. Not California, as in the State, but “California”, the Elitist, Liberal hellscape most ignorant Conservatives seem to have built my home up to in their own mind. It’s a crime to these people that we value intelligence, diversity, and equity. I do not, for the life of me, understand why so many of these Right Wing Cooks, have such a hate boner for California, but that’s something to ponder for a different day. I just read an article going into the Trump plan to take his entire campaign by leaning hard into the gender gap. He is basically courting all of these Manosphere types while, simultaneously, infantilizing women. It’s wild to see. How do you plan to win this election, by telling woman they won’t have to worry about abortion anymore because he’ll make sure you’re all happy? While taking credit for overturning Wade in the same goddamn breath? Who’s that for? The Red-Pilled guy I know.

See, this wasn’t a one-off thing for him. Moving to Idaho set in motions the slow, racist, devolution of someone I once proudly called friend. Now, it’s “I know a guy.” He sends me articles from the New York Post, never Fox News because he knows I don’t even consider that sh*t worthy of rebuttal, but didn’t understand that THAT Post is just the print version of Fox News. We once had an argument over something he read in the Epoch Times. I’ve seen that rag before. It’s the most Ultra Conservative garbage you’ll ever see, but stupid people think that, because it’s printed on newspaper stock and they see their favorite Senator carrying it into the Chambers with them, that it’s legit. The Epoch Times is not legit. It literal Chinese Propaganda. It’s published by the same cult that puts on those Shen Wu shows or whatever. They are so radical and violent, China kicked them out. I think they own a compound up upper New Jersey and basically bought off every local politician a la Scientology so they can do their weird, abusive, Chinese cult sh*t in peace. But this guy I know thought that was news, that the sh*t printed in that trash was something to actually believe. Like, mans is against Kamala Harris because she hasn’t done anything as Vice President. What the f*ck has ANY Vice President done? He then hit me with the whole Black or Indian nonsense. That was the first time anyone said that sh*t to me and, having been absolutely infatuated with a Blaxican for the better part of two decades, it was plain to me that Harris is both? Like, it was a question for because of how goddamn obvious it was. Not for this guy I know. For him, it was a point of contention, a proper issue. Neither one of us keyed in on the fact that though is she/ain’t she rhetoric is just good old fashion racism. I did, a day or so later, and asked him about it. He never answered. Which leads me to the fact that the guy I know is just plain bigoted now.

Ever since his wife stepped out on him, the guy I know has just been outright malicious. Like, he was always kind of weird about race, most White people are, but he was still pretty cognoscente of how to maneuver within minority spaces. His best friend and first love was a person of color, so he had an understanding of his privilege. Mans moves to Idaho, gets surrounded by ninety-six percent White people with an errant Mexican on occasion and Black folks as rare as f*cking naturally occurring platinum, he he’s about that “Shut up and Dribble” life. Like, WAY back during the whole Black Lives Matter movement, he was one of these assholes that tried to make the disingenuous argument that AL Live Matter. Of course they do, dick, but your White lives aren’t getting gunned down while jogging and choked out but cops in front of the bodega, are they? Nope, my BLACK lives are, and they have been since we were f*cking forced here! The protests are ruining the game of basketball, a league predominately Black and raised in environments identical to those of where George Floyd was killed. Hell, a former NBA player KNOWS Floyd! Stephen Jackson grew up with the guy! But excuse the hell out of us for protesting during your racially muted escapism. Value the Black body but not the Black life. Shut up and dribble, is it? That guy I know dismissed every argument, every point that we, as a culture were making during that summer, because there were riots. Bro, what the f*ck else were we to do? I asked him that, point blank. We’ve been peaceful. We’ve passed legislature. We did the sit-ins and arm-in-arm blockades. What did you respond with? Dogs, hoses, and guns. We pleaded and you beat us. But we aren’t entitled to a tantrum or two every, what? Fifty years? Really?

How do you go from having Black friends to f*cking fighting Critical Race Theory in schools? How can you have a wife, sister, cousin, best friend who has experienced the cruelty of male entitlement, and support Wade being overturned? I have an IQ of one hundred, fifty-four. Less than two percent of the population has an IQ score higher than one hundred and thirty. I’m usually the smartest in the room, wherever I go. I can learn anything, do any job, as long as I have a month or less to process the procedure. My Black ass is brilliant but, according to the guy I know, any job I get is because of DEI. Like, I WORKED with this dude. He knows me. He knows how intelligent I am but, because of the Red-Pill, I’m here to fill a guv’ment quota. How do you just allow yourself to be manipulated by the worst people you know (Republican Politicians and f*cking Andrew Tate types), into dismissing your own firsthand, personal, experiences? How do you let Trump convince you that the Haitians are illegal and eating cats, when the opposite of that is true? When the eaten cat in question magically reappears in the basement of their owner’s house and she admits on TV the story was nonsense? How can you support a blatantly racist bill, laughably performative, trying to make it illegal for the undocumented to vote on threat of government shutdown, when it’ already illegal for them to vote? None of that makes any f*cking sense if you stop and think for just a second but I don’t think that guy I know wants to think anymore. I believe he’s fine with some weird strong man telling how to live. I believe he wants to be that in his own family because he had his masculinity shattered for a second time. I think the Red-Pill is a means for weak men to “take back their power”. And above all, I think that sh*t is gay. Like, legitimately homosexual behavior. How the f*ck do you, as a man, let another man, tell you how to treat women? How to live your life?

[smokeybrand]

Somebody That I Use to Know

I know a guy who got Red-Pilled after his wife cheated on him. It was the second time he was cheated on by a spouse and dude just said f*ck it! Full MAGA afterward. It’s wild to see because I’ve known this due for, like a decade and change. He was never a cat who had any strong opinions one way or the other, and tended to kind of follow behind whichever cat in the room had the strongest male energy, but he was a good dude overall. Kind of a weenie, but not terrible in any way. And then he moved to Idaho, like a lot of other White folks, to get away from “California”. Not California, as in the State, but “California”, the Elitist, Liberal hellscape most ignorant Conservatives seem to have built my home up to in their own mind. It’s a crime to these people that we value intelligence, diversity, and equity. I do not, for the life of me, understand why so many of these Right Wing Cooks, have such a hate boner for California, but that’s something to ponder for a different day. I just read an article going into the Trump plan to take his entire campaign by leaning hard into the gender gap. He is basically courting all of these Manosphere types while, simultaneously, infantilizing women. It’s wild to see. How do you plan to win this election, by telling woman they won’t have to worry about abortion anymore because he’ll make sure you’re all happy? While taking credit for overturning Wade in the same goddamn breath? Who’s that for? The Red-Pilled guy I know.

See, this wasn’t a one-off thing for him. Moving to Idaho set in motions the slow, racist, devolution of someone I once proudly called friend. Now, it’s “I know a guy.” He sends me articles from the New York Post, never Fox News because he knows I don’t even consider that sh*t worthy of rebuttal, but didn’t understand that THAT Post is just the print version of Fox News. We once had an argument over something he read in the Epoch Times. I’ve seen that rag before. It’s the most Ultra Conservative garbage you’ll ever see, but stupid people think that, because it’s printed on newspaper stock and they see their favorite Senator carrying it into the Chambers with them, that it’s legit. The Epoch Times is not legit. It literal Chinese Propaganda. It’s published by the same cult that puts on those Shen Wu shows or whatever. They are so radical and violent, China kicked them out. I think they own a compound up upper New Jersey and basically bought off every local politician a la Scientology so they can do their weird, abusive, Chinese cult sh*t in peace. But this guy I know thought that was news, that the sh*t printed in that trash was something to actually believe. Like, mans is against Kamala Harris because she hasn’t done anything as Vice President. What the f*ck has ANY Vice President done? He then hit me with the whole Black or Indian nonsense. That was the first time anyone said that sh*t to me and, having been absolutely infatuated with a Blaxican for the better part of two decades, it was plain to me that Harris is both? Like, it was a question for because of how goddamn obvious it was. Not for this guy I know. For him, it was a point of contention, a proper issue. Neither one of us keyed in on the fact that though is she/ain’t she rhetoric is just good old fashion racism. I did, a day or so later, and asked him about it. He never answered. Which leads me to the fact that the guy I know is just plain bigoted now.

Ever since his wife stepped out on him, the guy I know has just been outright malicious. Like, he was always kind of weird about race, most White people are, but he was still pretty cognoscente of how to maneuver within minority spaces. His best friend and first love was a person of color, so he had an understanding of his privilege. Mans moves to Idaho, gets surrounded by ninety-six percent White people with an errant Mexican on occasion and Black folks as rare as f*cking naturally occurring platinum, he he’s about that “Shut up and Dribble” life. Like, WAY back during the whole Black Lives Matter movement, he was one of these assholes that tried to make the disingenuous argument that AL Live Matter. Of course they do, dick, but your White lives aren’t getting gunned down while jogging and choked out but cops in front of the bodega, are they? Nope, my BLACK lives are, and they have been since we were f*cking forced here! The protests are ruining the game of basketball, a league predominately Black and raised in environments identical to those of where George Floyd was killed. Hell, a former NBA player KNOWS Floyd! Stephen Jackson grew up with the guy! But excuse the hell out of us for protesting during your racially muted escapism. Value the Black body but not the Black life. Shut up and dribble, is it? That guy I know dismissed every argument, every point that we, as a culture were making during that summer, because there were riots. Bro, what the f*ck else were we to do? I asked him that, point blank. We’ve been peaceful. We’ve passed legislature. We did the sit-ins and arm-in-arm blockades. What did you respond with? Dogs, hoses, and guns. We pleaded and you beat us. But we aren’t entitled to a tantrum or two every, what? Fifty years? Really?

How do you go from having Black friends to f*cking fighting Critical Race Theory in schools? How can you have a wife, sister, cousin, best friend who has experienced the cruelty of male entitlement, and support Wade being overturned? I have an IQ of one hundred, fifty-four. Less than two percent of the population has an IQ score higher than one hundred and thirty. I’m usually the smartest in the room, wherever I go. I can learn anything, do any job, as long as I have a month or less to process the procedure. My Black ass is brilliant but, according to the guy I know, any job I get is because of DEI. Like, I WORKED with this dude. He knows me. He knows how intelligent I am but, because of the Red-Pill, I’m here to fill a guv’ment quota. How do you just allow yourself to be manipulated by the worst people you know (Republican Politicians and f*cking Andrew Tate types), into dismissing your own firsthand, personal, experiences? How do you let Trump convince you that the Haitians are illegal and eating cats, when the opposite of that is true? When the eaten cat in question magically reappears in the basement of their owner’s house and she admits on TV the story was nonsense? How can you support a blatantly racist bill, laughably performative, trying to make it illegal for the undocumented to vote on threat of government shutdown, when it’ already illegal for them to vote? None of that makes any f*cking sense if you stop and think for just a second but I don’t think that guy I know wants to think anymore. I believe he’s fine with some weird strong man telling how to live. I believe he wants to be that in his own family because he had his masculinity shattered for a second time. I think the Red-Pill is a means for weak men to “take back their power”. And above all, I think that sh*t is gay. Like, legitimately homosexual behavior. How the f*ck do you, as a man, let another man, tell you how to treat women? How to live your life?

[avictorypointe]

The Phantom Diaper, Part II

Baby Puss

This chapter gets into the backstory of Tony and Natalie. Still emotional build up, mostly. ;) Enjoy

Tony had grown up with a diaper fetish. Early in his life, he saw ACME cartoons with characters relegated to the role of “baby” when they played house on the TV. In his mind, the Baby Puss episode of Tom & Jerry stuck with him: a stern little girl turns Tom into a padded baby, forcing him to drink from a bottle, take castor oil, and wear diapers. When Tony saw it as a kid late one night, his curiosity drove him to the bathroom.

Without much thought, he wet his pants.

During these prepubescent years, Tony couldn’t be aroused, but the warmth of the liquid stuck against his body created an alluring sensation…combined with immediate shame. He raced to clean everything up & hide the late night experiment, but he found himself doing it again a few nights later…then again, and again.

Eventually, this turned into stealing towels and safety pins to make diapers or pocketing diapers from other mother’s purses or diaper bags. He treasured baby powder in his room and indulged in the scent in private. Once he stole a pack of baby wipes for the specific smell between “clean” and “baby” that ran through his mind. He even took an old, red shirt and turned it into a crop top with fringed hems from rough scissor cuts: he used this shirt to pretend he was in the Hundred Acre Wood with Christopher Robin.

While the production value increased over time, Tony felt more and more shame alongside these euphoric sensations. It created a turbulent series of ups and downs.

In the downs, Tony found loneliness. For years, he thought he was a weirdo. “I’m so embarrassing and strange… I must be the only person who could possibly do this…” he thought during low moments while cleaning after another “pretend” accident. For his entire youth up to age 18, Tony believed this deeply: he would be alone in this strange ritual & no way to explain it to anyone.

One day, though, he saw a term: AB/DL. It gave him a starting point: something to read and research. He wasn’t alone! There was a whole community!

“…But how will I ever find a Mommy?” he worried.

Luckily, he had found Natalie. By happenstance, they had been childhood neighbors. Natalie was Tony’s sister’s best friend growing up. The two would constantly fight and bicker, often leading to wrestling matches with Natalie the victor due to her age.

Tony loved the attention during these moments, even if they were charged with anger. For him, it was a chance to play with Natalie. If this was the only way she would touch him, then he would constantly take up the annoying brother mantle to bring them “together.”

One day, while wrestling, Natalie pinned Tony to the floor. Usually, he hated the sensation of his wrists touching anything. But when Natalie touched them, he dreamt she would never let go. Of course, at this particular moment, Natalie was pissed, but the passion in her eyes attracted him. In anger, she slashed at his arm with sturdy & short claws. It left a mark on his wrist—a mark he would secretly treasure as a memory.

As they got older, they drifted further apart due to age and lack of shared interests. Tony loved staying in doors with a good video game & went to college out of state for a CompSci degree. Natalie preferred partying with others & stayed in their childhood town while earning her cosmetology license.

When Tony returned, his body had changed: physically, he was taller and grown up, but intellectually, he was much smarter than before. Natalie found his growth and new worldly knowledge attractive, and the two reconnected.

At the beginning of their relationship, Tony inquired with Natalie about his private world. One day, he told Natalie he had something to show her. He asked her to wait in the bedroom.

With the bravery of a samurai but attire similar to an infantile Sumo wrestler, Tony stepped into the room wearing a white, fluffy diaper decorated with letter blocks on the landing strip only.

Natalie repressed a laugh, and Tony tried to speak through his anxiety. It made his voice shake uncontrollably, along with much of his body. “I like diapers…” he stuttered while using his bare arms to cover his body. His shame made him want to run away to somewhere he could never be found.

Natalie, not one to judge, asked Tony questions. “Why do you like this? What’s fun about it? How often do you use them?” Her curiosity made Tony feel safe, like he could share his interior life without judgment. He was so used to his harsh self judgment that any change of pace felt alleviating.

“Can I be your mommy?” Natalie asked in a classic, joking fashion. However, to Tony, it never dawned on him that anyone would ever ask. The simple act touched him deeply and brought tears to his cheeks. Natalie immediately rushed to console him and wrapped her arms around him. “Shh, shh, it’s okay…”

And like that, they were exploring this dynamic together.

From then on, their relationship went through the normal stages in their public life. They married, had kids, more important jobs. Their private play ebbed and flowed alongside major milestones: Tony wore diapers less often when the kids were young to cut down on the diaper changes. Sometimes, he didn’t wear for months… or years.

However, Natalie grew to find her own enjoyment of the AB/DL dynamic. Watching grown men shake with embarrassment brought out a hungry arousal in her body—that part turned her on.

But the dress up, the cuddles, and the titles created a magic circle of kind & quiet love that the two of them relished in solitude together. Whereas the kids grew out of warm cuddles next to Mommy, it was all Tony wanted to do (sometimes to his detriment). It was affirming for Natalie to have those close moments and know at least one baby wouldn’t grow out of them.

[cecoeur]

The way you defend Ric for not giving a shit about the CH victim, but blast Max for staying neutral and not kicking his dad to the kerb? Girl, get a grip, they're all rich, no fucks given assholes, at least be consistent...

Omg you are legit my first anon hater, how fab! I hope you see this and enjoy some kind of warm fuzzy feeling because no lie this is hilarious to me. Strap in, baby because I have never been very succinct and I want to give my first anon hate due respect. ❤️

I Don’t think I’ve defended Daniel or his response to this situation - in fact I think the main thing I said about his comments were these tags:

Where I said basically exactly what you said in your message. They’re rich entitled men who aren’t impacted directly and don’t really care. Also, I’ve said in other tags that he’s a dumb fuck who needs to do better! Legit this might be the only other thing I’ve said about Daniel’s comments:

So.. I don’t think I’ve defended him? And if that’s not clear, let me be clear. He’s an ignorant rich man who says stupid shit that I don’t agree with. Lewis is the only driver who has had even a remotely okay answer to any question asked about it. (Which is a whole other wild thing. Like they knew these questions would come and they still fumbled them so badly.) Ultimately my feeling on this is that they’re all probably fine people but they are narcissists who really only care about what’s happening in their immediate lives and this is only impactful in that people keep asking them questions about it.

Now to Max. I also don’t think I said Max should kick his dad to the curb but I appreciate that this is what you may have perceived. What I said is that he is complicit in his dad’s actions/comments when he openly refers to them as a team and they act as business partners. And that the folks who are infantilizing him and telling reporters to stop asking him about his dad because he can’t control what his dad said, are ultimately wrong. He can…he point blankly refuses to and doubles down on how tied his dad is to his racing career. Ergo, it’s fair for him to be asked about it. 🤷🏻‍♀️

And finally, he 100% is not staying neutral in that. He literally said his dad doesn’t lie and he supports him. He also has some kind of weird symbiotic relationship with the reanimated corpse that his Helmut Marko soooooo def not neutral.

Still a fan of both Max and Daniel but that’s just kind of how shit goes? I want F1 and everyone involved to be more inclusive and progressive (I want that on a worldwide scale, obvs) but I’m also aware that this is a hyper fixation that I enjoy mostly on the internet/ the tumblr community and so im not going to expect too much out of it.

Nor am I going to anonymously tell someone to get a grip about it but that’s apparently just me. 😘

[janeindamembrane]

Question one:

Freud, through an analysis of the German root words unheimlich and Heimlich concludes that an event is uncanny when it becomes overly canny.  Something that is canny is familiar, but this familiarity can be developed to a point where, though it originated from something familiar and is still recognizable, has a eerie sense to it as if something that “ought to have remained hidden and secret… [has] come to light”[1]. The uncanny (or the perversion of the canny) is a morbid anxiety that derives from the recurrence of something that was repressed- an infantile belief that belongs to the “phase of individual development corresponding to the animistic stage in primitive men”[2] or the vestiges of the narcissistic ego before its social reconstruction via the conscious[3]. In addition to having been repressed, the trigger of the uncanny could also be something that confirms a previous belief that has been surmounted, such as the beliefs of our primitive forefathers in the “omnipotence of thoughts, instantaneous wish fulfilments, secret power to do harm, and the return of the dead”[4].

For something to be truly uncanny, it must create a conflict between real and nonreal, new beliefs and surmounted beliefs. This contradiction leading to uncanniness is why Freud explains that many things in literature which aren’t uncanny (like fairytales) would be uncanny in actual life.[5]

[1] Sigmund Freud, “The Uncanny”, in Collected Papers, vol. 4, ed. By Ernest Jones (London: Hogarth Press, 1948), 376.

[2] Freud, “The Uncanny”, 394.

[3] Freud, 387.

[4] Freud, 40.1

[5] Freud, 403, 404.

Question two:

Society is the creator of personal neurosis, as the latter results from the fracturing of the self- the alienation of the spectacular I (the id) from the I because of societal pressures and cultural intervention[1]. Ego defense is the result of the isolation of the spectacular I and unleashes feelings and behaviors (anger, jealousy, and aggression) associated as more primitive and without the social mediation of desire[2].

Fanon expands upon this and talks specifically about hos society’s power structures within the context of race and colonialism dictate the neurosis (or rather abnormality) of anyone deemed the other (the non-white or non-Christian), as the mirror stage that Lacan proposes as the creator of the spectacular I is doomed to become fractured for the other when it is pointed out to them that their reflection is not in line with the white man. This causes an extreme inner conflict when the other has been raised on the collective catharsis (a channeling of the id) and signs of the white man[3].

[1] Jacques Lacan Écrits, “The Mirror Stage as Formative of the I Function”, in The First Complete Edition in English, trans. by Bruce Fink (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2006), 79.

[2] Lacan, 79.

[3] Frantz Fanon, “The Negro and Psychopathology”, in Black Skin White Masks, trans. Charles Lam Markmann (London: Pluto Press, 1986), 112.

Question three:

The marginalized and oppressed will undoubtably have their mirror stage broken, yet suffer the consequence of having formerly thought they belonged only to be othered by the white man and eventually themselves. Fanon summarizes the process of this self-realization in black scholars such as himself. The childhood of the young black child raised upon the media meant for the young white children ends with the “formation and crystallization of an attitude and a way of thinking and seeing that are essentially white”[1], but since the young black child is black he will learn that “he is a Negro… once he goes to Europe. It is here that this black youth will encounter the myth of his blackness and will from this point onward carry “the whole weight of his blackness”[2]. This is like when Lacan mentions the fracturing between the spectacular I and the social I, but there is a heavier weight in the social plane for these others (Fanon also continuously references Jewish myth and hatred) as an oppressive social myth is thrust upon their self-image. Since the youth grew up associating with whiteness, and yet the white structure insists upon their blackness, the black youth ends up hating blackness (or the White myth of blackness). A black youth who wishes to “climb up into society- white and civilized- tends to reject his family” as a black family structure is not viewed within white society as a good basis to become subjected to the white national structure[3]. The problem is that the youth is black and will never be allowed to transcend the myth (a betrayal of the white society) resulting in him being “forever in combat with his own image”[4]. This youth has chosen to ignore their skin color or project the myth of it onto others as the author consistently did in his youth onto the Senegalese[5]. There is the alternate path of absorbing the myth and oppressing oneself. He “selects himself as an object capable of carrying the burden of the original sin… He enslaves himself”[6]. The final solution to this imposition of oppressive culture on identity is to “rise above this absurd drama that others have staged”[7].

This anger, self-hatred, and self-oppression could be lessened or mitigated if one were to remove the original trauma of the deep fracturing of the image the youth created upon white media since this media not only betrays them when they are not allowed by white society to identify with the white heroes meant for white youth but perpetrates the black myth that will impose itself into their lives and cause their hatred of themselves for being unable to be the hero and forced to be the black man.

[1] Fanon, 114.

[2] Fanon, 116.

[3] Fanon, 115.

[4] Fanon, 150.

[5] Fanon, 114.

[6] Fanon, 148.

[7] Fanon, 153.

Reading Notes 6: Freud to Lacan to Fanon

We look to Sigmund Freud’s “The Uncanny,” Jacques Lacan’s “The Mirror Stage as Formative of the Function of the I,” and Frantz Fanon’s “The Negro and Psychopathology” for our inquiry into the functions of psychoanalysis and subjectivity when examining visual texts.

Why do people call an experience or event uncanny, and what makes an occurrence that appears to be uncanny but is not uncanny?

What is the relation of personal neurosis to social passions?

In what ways are oppressed and marginalized viewers alienated when they are not or rarely represented?

@theuncannyprofessoro

[disastergay]

the boyfriends webtoon drama: myths and facts (NOT a callout)

for those of you who are unfamiliar with the name 'refrainbow,' here's a quick rundown of basic information:

Ray, aka refrainbow on twitter, is a 23 y/o gay transmasculine comic artist. there is no easily accessible publicly available information about their race or ethnicity in their carrd.co link (or bio) aside from the words "based in Indonesia."

you may recognize his art style from this fan animated short on youtube, which went viral mainly for being... less-than-well-received. the comic's gratuitous usage of internet slang and flashy pastel overtones (some of which clash with each other to the point that it irritates my scotopic sensitivity syndrome), and barely-there character development (to the point where readers have to go out of their way to look up any of the character's names) have given it a notorious reputation for representing "everything that's wrong with fandom culture and LGBTQ+ rep as a whole."

the premise is simple: four guys who go to the same university decide to start dating each other. each represents a different character trope--goth, jock, prep, and nerd.

some users have gone so far as to argue that the webtoon perpetuates harmful stereotypes about gayness, transness, and polyamorous relationships. (while I can't really agree or disagree since I haven't read the comic, from the few panels I've seen, it does seem to take a strangely infantilizing approach to the discussion of top/bottom dynamics.)

I think we all most of us can agree that just because something makes us cringe doesn't mean it has no right to exist. at the end of the day, this comic has very little influence on mainstream media, even less so after its controversial public reception.

unfortunately, the controversy didn't stay fictional.

on May 13, 2021, Ray confirmed that they used to create non-SFW comics featuring members of BTS, which fall under the category of RPF ('real person fiction'), and later stopped doing so, citing "I've come to realize that it is a violation of their consent" as the reason why.

on October 10, 2021, Ray quoted a tweet from 9 years ago (October 5, 2013) where they had, at age 14, called a character from the competitive swimming anime Free! the n word, saying "I'm very sorry for ever using it ... I'll make sure that I will never use it again."

while I'm glad they apologized for the harm they have caused and are attempting to make amends, it's not my place to forgive them (I'm nonblack and not east asian), and the same goes for many of you who are reading this post.

for anyone who skipped to the end of this post looking for a TL;DR or waited patiently for me to finish, without further ado, here's the 'boyfriends' webtoon/refrainbow discourse summarized.

Myths* ❌

refrainbow is white

he fetishizes asian men

they're a troll trying to make the LGBTQ+ community look bad

he genuinely intends to perpetuate queerphobic stereotypes and harmful beliefs about polyamory

they intentionally slutshame/are anti sexworker

*when I say "myths" I mean we currently don't have sufficient information to determine whether or not they are true, and anyone spreading this information very likely has no real basis for it.

Facts ✔️

refrainbow is nonblack

they used the n word at age 14, when they should have been old enough to know better than to do so

he used to create smutty comics featuring real life members of BTS

since then, they have apologized for both

some of the phrases his OCs use and ways they act are stereotypical of gay/trans men and polycules, especially when related to their sex lives

anyway. I'm tired of looking at this post and I have better things to do with my time, so I'm gonna sign off now. do with this information what you will.

[cobra-creampuff]

i truly do find most race-related media ""discourse"" to be SO infantilizing lol. "the casting is bad because it's colorblind and-" the actors chose to take those parts. "this character shouldn't have x trait because that's a stereotype-" the originator of the character chose to make them that way. "but racists think this trait is bad-" it's representative of lived experience and/or cultural norm, and racists think being brown is bad full stop, so.

like, obviously it's not as flat as this, but like. i see so many people arguing these points and saying these things as if the actual real life brown people who made fully autonomous choices for which they surely had their own reasons just..... don't exist, or need someone to save them from their own actions lol.

like the audience climate right now somehow manages both to behave amongst itself as if anything you think about a character or enjoy in fiction is automatically real-world applicable, but at the same time regards writers, actors, directors, artists, etc as if they are as hypothetical as the people or concepts they are portraying.

they are real people. most of the time adults. real human adults who are alive and more importantly almost certainly have given interviews about the choices they made in their art that you can look up lol.

maybe there was a particular intention behind "colorblind" casting in that stage play other than "well it doesn't really matter". the people involved in that are fully aware that they are doing something transgressive, and why it's transgressive, and they did in fact do it on purpose. that MOC who collaborated on a character he plays decided to make that character have anger issues, intentionally, on purpose, and then chose to audition for and then accept the part. he is a grown man, with thoughts in his head, and an awareness of what it's like to be brown in the arts, without your help.

you can't remove these people from these creative choices or act like they were totally unwitting or powerless in them. if you want to discuss how stuff like this may or may not have been handled well or whatever, you have to acknowledge that brown people did them themselves on purpose for a reason. and with anything critically acclaimed that reason is going to be pretty easy to find, and then you can engage with that rather than just putting a blanket This Thing Always Bad, Hurt Brown People! on it because you saw that said once about something else and never considering the perspective of the brown people who actually did it. like. i truly cannot emphasize enough that the perspective is there, and brown people do things with intention and thought, and are not helpless barbie dolls for white people (or people you personally deem to be simply Less Brown somehow).

they chose to do it. on purpose. they chose to. intentionally. with whole entire processes of higher reasoning. by choice.

[pixelfun20]

for the trope grading thing: yes i'll bite grade hermit!tommy

Oh boy here we go. So many issues.

TL;DR, Hermit!Tommy is a solid grade F for me. I see why people like it, but as a Hermit main who's followed the DSMP since August 2020, I find it generally harmful to the Hermitcraft fandom and unfaithful to c!Tommy.

Disclaimer: While I was in the DSMP fandom for around half a year, I have not considered myself part of the fandom since June. I personally have never been a fan of c!Tommy, but I talked to people who are in writing this so hopefully the bias isn't too pronounced. I've been watching Hermitcraft since March 2020, right around the start of season 7. While this will be critical of the Hermit!Tommy trope, I don’t intend it to be negative. If you like it, good for you! Write what you love! These are just the reasons I don't.

For those of you who want my full breakdown of the trope, brave the read more below.

Initially, I was actually really open to the idea of the Hermit!Tommy trope. The first big fics to start this up began around the time of Exile, and as someone who personally really didn't like that arc, I was more than ready for something that wasn't angst-centered. I followed a few fics with this trope for a while, the longest for 2 months-ish before I dropped it and started avoiding it.

Why? Well for one, a lot of these fics seem to come from people who are DSMP mains and only know cursory information about Hermitcraft. Nothing wrong with that, have fun with it, but as someone who is a Hermit main, it rubbed me the wrong way. Hermitcraft would be portrayed as this utopia where everybody got along and had perfect coping techniques and would drop everything to help this random dude who dropped in their server.

Which, um, this would not happen. Hermitcraft is chaotic. They are certainly healthier than the DSMP, but that's a low bar. ZombieCleo held a game where people hunted for each other's heads. The Turf war and Mayor race were whole things. C!Docm77 would not trust a random teenager on his server as far as he could throw him. Above all, Hermitcraft is private. Getting in requires not only getting sponsored by an existing Hermit, but the unanimous consent of every member of the server. Random teenagers don't mix in well, traumatized or not. (Also, they would not tolerate swearing).

Secondly, the characters of the Hermits often are twisted to center almost entirely around Tommy. It got to the point where a friend and I made a parody of the Sexy Lamp Test, the Generic Father Figure Test. If a Hermit can be replaced with any other Generic Father Figure (Phil, Wilbur, Batman, etc), they fail the test. The Hermits would not all simultaneously adopt Tommy for reasons explained above. While I can very much see them worry and provide help where needed, it would not be the whole server and it would not be at the level of parent/child.

For my last point, we'll talk about Tommy. Like I said before, though, I'm biased against Tommy, so I found a friend who rather likes him, and got their opinion, so these are their points below:

1) Infantilization: "When I hit rock bottom, I need support, not someone to smother me or shove me onto a healing arc. A lot of fics treat Tommy's like he's incapable."

2) Stubbornness: "Tommy's so fucking stubborn he refuses to accept help. It results in a lot of fics having a constant cycle of tommy refusing to get healed and fleeing while the hermits try to force it."

3) Fanfic Therapy: "The one hermit tommy story I like was good bc it wasn't forced, he just came around bit by bit. Most fics don't do that."

Anyways, that's my rant grading of Hermit!Tommy. If you like it, I really don't begrudge you of it. I’m sure there are fics out there that are great and might not even fall into my criticisms listed here. At the end of the day, you can choose how you want to characterize the Hermits and Tommy, and for a lot of people, including me at one point, it was/is loved mostly for the angsty, hurt/comfort vibes. Which is valid. It's just... not for me. At all.

[greensaplinggrace]

there’s a certain beauty in fandom idealizing bardugo’s assessment of manipulation as well. how they give more weight to a level of predatory and highly manipulative behavior that does not exist within canon to support analyses that would previously fall flat. in an effort to forego real literary analysis, fans will take the author’s word for her intent and reapply it backwards throughout her works regardless of supporting evidence.

I think this shows a special kind of mindset that isn’t necessarily unique to fandom. many people in the world would rather allow confirmation bias to cloud their judgement of a situation than to view it through their own unbiased lenses. a show of support as well as community in a world where losing such connections may paint one as a predator or an outcast.

that the very act of shipping something is seen as supporting abuse or falling for manipulation when such actions present very different societal consequences overall is indicative of a larger misunderstanding about the world in general and literature's influence on the masses.

it’s the same argument that one would, say, use about people agreeing with midsommar or fight club or american psycho. yet when real satirical pieces of work criticizing prevalent societal problems in subversive ways are put side by side with shadow and bone, it becomes obvious where this argument fails. after all, for shadow and bone to present the issue of abuse and manipulation in a way that truly critiques society, it would first have to accurately depict the ways manipulation and cult tactics are utilized to exert control, and it would secondly have to display the real ways in which power is allotted within a system to the general populace as well as the individual - and it would have to tackle with nuance the diversity and intersectionality of privilege and trauma within a time of war and genocide.

the darkling's whole thing is his ability to manipulate people to empathize with him despite his wrongdoings and the fandom just proves that

a mischaracterization like this shows why such a misunderstanding would take place, however. when positing that the darkling's ability to manipulate people canonically relies on convincing them to empathize with him despite his wrongdoings, you insert more meaning into the narrative than exists. the darkling textually manipulates one young woman through his looks, because while bardugo argues that he represents a master manipulator, she only writes him as someone capable of being just pretty enough to catch a young woman's attention, so that he may use this interest to his advantage whilst still allowing her feelings of prejudice towards his race to go unaddressed.

the darkling gets alina to empathize with him, but his wrongdoings don't play a part in this. alina empathizes when she knows about his wrongdoings, yet never falls for it and still kills him. she empathizes with him when she doesn't know about his wrongdoings, and all this does is give her the impression that she understands him a bit more. nobody else is manipulated by this, so it isn't his thing. in fact, the darkling doesn't even try to appeal to anybody but alina, who canonically never fully falls for him anyway.

so to say people shipping a fictional ship somehow proves bardugo's point about the relationship... being unhealthy? is a shallow stone throwing opinion that is bound to hit some glass ceilings.

let's be real here for a second. bardugo treats her female fans like children and infantilizes her female characters. bardugo's point about the darkling's manipulation lacks nuance. bardugo's writing about abuse and manipulation in general lacks nuance, and is ultimately more harmful than helpful in any way. she has no point, because her point cannot even be supported by her own text.

comparing people liking an unhealthy fictional ship to the same mindset that occurs when consuming satirical media meant to display overall biases within general society runs into the very simple issue of that unhealthy ship representing nothing and addressing nothing prevalent about society in any meaningful way. not only that, but it isn't even portrayed in a way that would manipulate readers, considering the cheap use of narrative devices and the formatting of the story and themes overall. so what you are looking at when people like the darkling or ship the darkling and alina is people who admire the potential of these cobbled together archetypes and caricatures, and who simply admire the symbolism of such a dynamic.

for readers to, say, fall for the darkling in a way that makes bardugo's point, shadow and bone would have to be written very differently. it would have to have an accurate and nuanced handle on power and manipulation, a diverse assessment of privilege and oppression, a more realistic world state with more complex character arcs, and a consistent internal narrative that drives the plot. it would also have to have a better understanding of society and politics overall, and the methods through which organizations as well as people handle control and enforce conformity as well as obedience.

of course I hate darklina, but there's a certain beauty in people who ship them simply because of how it proves Leigh's point of his manipulation. how even though he's a murderer, predator, and so much worse, people still manage to think he deserves a relationship with Alina. that they should be together. the darkling's whole thing is his ability to manipulate people to empathize with him despite his wrongdoings and the fandom just proves that

[the-lightning-strikes-again]

Posting this for @pilotkinkade​ in response to their recent post made here, regarding concerns about VLD and how it includes white savior complex or potentially smears Allura’s character with that complex. I’m not reblogging directly because this is a long response lol. Thank you pilotkinkade for chatting earlier; I hope you find this post interesting at least and would be curious of your thoughts in return!

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I do agree with your general sentiments, that VLD takes on a disquieting savior complex throughout a good portion of the show, even more so than in previous Voltron iterations. For me, it feels most apparent in the way that Voltron as an all-powerful machine in VLD is piloted by its second generation.

To compare: In the original OG alliance (Alfor, Zarkon, Trigel, Gyrgan, and Blaytz), multiple major races were represented, functioning as one to save their own collective galaxy from threats. So even among the OG paladins, there were checks and balances (maybe Zarkon had the strongest military skills personally, but Alfor had the alchemy, etc.), with mass racial diversity. This seemed like a pretty innovative and cool addition to the Voltron franchise. The s3 finale also clarifies that, unlike VLD’s second-generation, all of these paladins were leaders of their people. This meant they had political and legal authority/experience that an average warrior or citizen wouldn’t.

By removing that whole structure and retrofitting Voltron with (mostly) a group of unprepared teenagers from a single planet entirely uninvolved in the universal conflict, it created a lot of strange hierarchies...

We see much of the known universe raise up people who had zero prior experience with war, and little to no military or diplomatic training, as well as very little awareness of the traumas or people groups involved in this war. (Shiro is possibly the exception here.) But suddenly, all of these paladins also had unfettered, largely unquestioned access to ultimate power to carry out whatever vision they felt was right in the moment. Because simply “might is right,” we see even highly experienced commanders like Kolivan become castrated in authority compared to Team Voltron. Various alien groups express upset or side-eye Team Voltron’s well-meaning actions but obvious insensitivity to/ignorance of their problems or fears. Even at the paladin-level, a princess trained to fight and lead is subordinated to a boy with zero leadership training whatsoever (which is very different from previous iterations where Keith was actually very competent, more experienced, and wanted to be a leader).

And when Voltron plays the unchecked judge, jury, and executioner across the entire universe, the new paladins as a whole also do not have the political or legal authority the OG pallies did in the boundaries of their own galaxy. The second-gen paladins are not authorities of their people or representative of the people groups affected in the war they’re now leading. The OG pallies built the actual legend of Voltron in less than 28 decaphoebs, clearly going beyond their 5 nations to help others suffering from natural disasters or unknown needs, which might raise some eyebrows perhaps because we don’t know what all that entailed. But while we see that the Voltron machine eventually got celebrated, the OG pallies are never shown personally soaking in some kind of savior celebration…

(Photo ID: Alfor says, “Why I joined up this band of scoundrels, I’ll never know.” Trigel responds, “Because we’re the only band of scoundrels that would have you.” Third screenshot is of the paladins celebrating their alliance win by themselves.)

…compared to second-gen paladins (or some anyway) who pretty clearly soak in the love and prestige they’ve received based off the historical and legendary precedence of the OG alliance’s work:

(Photo IDs: Lance taking selfies with aliens excited to be around paladins. A second screenshot of Lance daydreaming about being a universal savior, stomping on Zarkon, planting a flag to mark ownership, and having Allura stare up at him in worship.)

In fact, a lot of the pro-Voltron war propaganda relies heavily more on recreating the legend already built for them, than on the actual competency or experience of the current paladins:

(Photo ID: Pidge complains about the war propaganda scripts, “This isn’t even factually accurate.” Coran replies, “Well, this is the Legend of Voltron, not the documentary of Voltron.”)

On that note, we even see the scripts reverse who is actually the most competent or capable of performing.

(Photo ID: Coran says, “Ladies and gentle-aliens, bear witness as the Paladins of Voltron attack Zarkon’s base to save the helpless Princess Allura!”)

Coran’s script, however well-meant, pretty massively infantilizes Allura as someone who needs to be saved by an external force, rather than mentioning her as someone who is an active and critical ally of the Voltron paladins in this war.

Unlike Coran’s script, Princess Allura isn’t helpless. In terms of the second-generation paladins, she’s has the most war-time experience, and is also the one that the paladins lean on constantly to create a meaningful connection with other people groups who are otherwise hesitant about Voltron.

(Photo ID: Allura speaks to the Balmeran people, “Balmerans, this is Princess Allura. You don’t know me, but I am here to help. I know what it’s like to watch your home planet die.”)

Allura is the successor to the Altean monarchy and a direct victim of the OG galaxy wars. So unlike other second-gen paladins, she has some semblance of legal/political authority that she was actively trained for, as well as personal skin in the game. She is ultimately the only paladin who has experienced a mass omnicide of her home and people, similar to other victims of the Galra regime. She also still accepts the authority of her father, whose AI tells her in season 1 to be prepared to sacrifice everything to undo his mistakes.

We see Allura from that point onward functioning under that directive from her father and king—to sacrifice everything she has to end Zarkon’s regime. One could potentially make the argument that, within this structure, Allura might suffer from a certain subset of “white knight syndrome,” in which one feels they’re worthless if they’re not sacrificing for others. If I have my facts right, it’s a different psychological state from white savior complex (in which I define white savior complex as “when someone outside the issue at hand barges in to make a change that may or may not benefit the recipient, simply to make themselves feel better or appear useful, without regard to the recipient’s wishes or real needs”). But I feel even the comparison of “white knight syndrome” gets dicey. Because Allura is shown as acting happy without necessarily sacrificing things (in fact, she acts progressively depressed s7-s8, the more she has to give up intrinsic things about herself or her identity). But when Allura chooses to assist or sacrifice, the sacrifice she makes has a very relevant and functional impact for the people she helps.

In season 1, she chooses to sacrifice herself to save Shiro. Shiro was, at that time, the Black Paladin and leader of Voltron, so Allura saw herself as functionally the less important of the two to save since she did not pilot the universe’s only weapon against Zarkon.

With the Balmera, she similarly chooses to act because the Balmerans themselves acknowledge they are entirely out of options, and also because the Balmerans (and the Balmera itself) accept her help she offers. At this point in time, she has already established a deep personal connection with them by virtue of their shared trauma of losing their home planets.

(Photo IDs: Shay says, “We’re lost! All are trapped with no chance for escape!” Allura says, “We can’t give up.” Shay responds, “But what can be done?” The group realizes the Balmera is regenerating beneath the ship, and Shay wonders why. Allura says, “The Castle!”)

Here, Allura assumes that the Castle—which is powered by a Balmeran crystal itself—could be regenerating the Balmera. But a Balmeran elder corrects her:

(Photo ID: A Balmeran elder says, “Not just the Castle, but you, as well.”)

So Allura did not even recognize at first that she was in any way a part of the solution to the Balmera regenerating.

Regarding the Balmera act itself, I’m not sure it satisfies the conditions for a white savior complex? I’m curious about your thoughts here, because I guess I saw it happening differently, from a witchcraft perspective...

We know from both Coran and Shay that originally, Alteans were one of the historical races who sacrificed some of their own energy to replenish the Balmera when seeking a crystal:

(Photo ID: Coran saying, “In the days of old, when Alteans were given the gift of crystals from a Balmera, we would repay its sacrifice by performing a ceremony. A sacred Altean would re-infuse the Balmera with quintessence. In this way, we had a symbiotic relationship.”)

We see that Balmerans were a voluntary part of this energy exchange by virtue of their unique connective powers (which is likely why we see them kneeling and activating said powers during these ceremonies).

Shay herself seems to indicate she is highly aware of these old ceremonies:

(Photo ID: Rax says, “Everyone comes to Balmera and takes, but gives nothing in return!” Shay says, “In the past, those who took the Balmera’s crystals would replenish her with energy. It was an equal exchange.”)

Shay agrees that the ceremony itself involves a sacred exchange of life force.

So I would argue that in this case, the Balmerans are not kneeling to Allura specifically or worshiping someone—it seems to be just the imagery associated with magical spells/magical transfers (where one object in the middle is the main conduit/focal point, and the other objects surrounding help to create and sustain the spell/protective barrier, etc).

One of the basic practices in real-world witchcraft is casting a magic/ritual circle. The circle creates a space where the spell, ritual, or form of protection can be performed. Forgive the stock image, but here’s just a super basic example:

(Photo ID: A magic circle in the form of a pentagram, with a candle in the middle, compared to a screenshot of 5 Balmerans surrounding Allura in the form of a pentacle, creating a sacred space with Allura glowing in the center.)

The five points in particular mimic standard pentacle-based ritual circles designed to create a sacred space of some kind. We do see various configurations of witchcraft imagery used in other instances throughout the show, such as when the druids have to help Haggar sustain her spells:

(Photo ID: Haggar centered in a magic circle, surrounded by druids helping her complete the ritual. Haggar kneels against the glowing symbols to complete the ritual.)

I think, similar to the druids that Haggar relied upon to help her complete a spell, it can be argued that the Balmerans were an active part of the regeneration spell with Allura. We see across the entire Balmera that they magically connect to help sustain the energy transfer, because it’s a planet-wide, massive undertaking:

(Photo ID: Balmerans activating their connection to the Balmera in the middle of the sacred ceremony to regenerate the Balmera.)

To me, it felt like the Balmerans were necessary to complete this ceremony--without their agreement to this energy exchange, and without them connecting to the Balmera to assist the transfer, Allura might not have been able to connect her life force and transfer power to the whole planet.

And to complete the ceremony, Allura herself kneels as well, just as Haggar did and just as the Balmerans around her do, in connection with the Balmera:

(Photo ID: Allura kneeling alongside Balmerans to complete the ritual.)

(Which means she’s technically kneeling to at least three other Balmerans in front of her.)

So I think the kneeling imagery would not correlate to some white savior complex event as suggested.

One other thought I had is that I feel help from a “white savior” is often haphazard and pushed onto recipients regardless of their thoughts or real needs. In comparison, we know that the Balmerans were willing to try this spell with Allura and accepted her idea of attempting the ancient ceremony. The only person who expressed hesitancy is Coran, who warns Allura that this attempt could kill her.

(Photo ID: Coran warns Allura, “To heal an entire planet, it could take more energy than you possess.”)

I do think it could again be argued that Allura seriously undermines her own value and worth in an attempt to help everyone, no matter the cost, which potentially gets more into white knight syndrome born out of trauma than white savior complex born out of privilege. She snaps back at Coran for being concerned about her well-being, and then she proceeds to enact the ceremony, not knowing for sure whether she’d live or die. But Allura also knows that her life force is uniquely tied to Voltron and that she is the only one with this kind of connection to the Castle ship’s battle-class Balmera crystal—all of this makes her a very powerful capacitor in a lot of ways. Which is why she looks like this after the ceremony:

(Photo ID: Allura having collapsed in Shay’s arms after regenerating the Balmera, but her physical features are not otherwise affected.)

And not like this:

(Photo ID: A screenshot of an Altean named Petrulius from season 6, whose features are distorted after having had the life/quintessence sucked out of him.)

So to me, it seemed that Allura was enacting an ages-old, magical ceremony approved by and wanted by the Balmerans—simply on a scale that no one had ever before attempted. And it’s likely that no one else would or could attempt it, because Allura is the single character in the entire universe whose personal life force is tied to Voltron’s regenerative energy (by virtue of Alfor’s alchemy on her as mentioned in episode 1). It’s an even deeper tie to the whole machine than the transient bond between paladin and lion. No other Balmeran or Galran or Altean had that kind of tie in their life force. Likely, even Alfor would have died if he’d attempted this act himself without being connected to an infinite power source.

And after Allura saves the Balmera with assistance from Balmerans, we also do not see her like this with the Balmeran people:

(Photo ID: Lance soaking up a savior fantasy as previously mentioned in this meta.)

Instead, post-Balmera resurrection, we see it’s actually not even the Balmerans themselves who thank Allura. The Balmerans simply convey the will of the Balmera, which Allura cannot hear:

(Photo ID: A Balmeran says to Allura, “Yes. The Balmera lives. It thanks you.”)

So backing up for a second, I do think there are much larger issues happening in the narrative with Voltron itself, with the unequal power dynamics of having young, inexperienced people from a single planet make and enact all the big universal decisions. But in the instance with the Balmera, it seemed like Allura was openly welcomed to help save the planet, using magical ceremonies as approved by the Balmerans themselves for millennia, and that the Balmerans were not passive in those ceremonies but a necessary part of their success.  

In general, Allura doesn’t seem to embody the “white savior complex” vibe at all to me, unlike some others in the show. Even in season 8, when Allura planned to make The Really Big Sacrifice, she asked her team to keep her actions a secret. She literally didn’t care for any respect or acknowledgment or prestige in exchange for sacrificing her life. She was doing what needed to be done because she was, once again, one of the few who could even perform at that level:

(Photo ID: Shiro says to Allura, “Most of them won’t know the sacrifice you made so they could live.” Allura replies, “And they’ll never need to.”)

(As an aside, I would argue that it was entirely unnecessary that the narrative would demand Allura sacrifice herself at all when she was literally standing in the universe’s seat of power alongside other powerful beings like her own father or the billions of other magic-wielding dead people, because apparently the lines between life and death blur in that space.)

(I also think there are some questionable “master race” vibes in the VLD universe in general, given that it forcefully pushes, even against the wishes of Alteans themselves, that Alteans are the only ones who can wield the big power to do big things. It’s clear that other groups and beings can wield magical abilities, but the larger narrative very oddly pins the “purest quintessence/bluest blood” back on Alteans time and time again in later seasons, leaving Allura in basically a no-win, no-help-available situation until other Alteans come along.) 

So yeah, I hope something in this meta might help settle some concerns about Allura as a representation of white savior complex? Or at least that this would open conversation for further discussion about what could be done in future iterations to avoid that messaging. Because yeah, I agree with you that the unquestioned savior complexes in this show are a topic that can and should be discussed! And also that, despite early world-building to suggest otherwise, the narrative especially in s6-s8 pushes that Alteans have a “purer/more alive” life force compared to any other race or form. Which is just…hm. Like, the master race vibes of all that are weird and definitely not even inherent to the Voltron franchise. (In previous iterations, humans, Galrans/Drule, and Alteans could all perform incredible levels of magic. For example, in Dynamite Voltron, Keith, Lotor, and Lotor’s siblings had all been taught magic.)

There’s definitely some weird images and unnatural power dynamics in VLD at times. It seems like more often than not, the narrative does strive to make Allura sacrificing something the only viable resort for anyone ever. In those circumstances, I’m just not convinced that she herself functions as an embodiment of white savior complex, by virtue of her behavior in those instances. But it’s definitely weird that the narrative places so much weight on her when the larger Team Voltron narrative is supposed to be about found family and strength in unity.

(If you read this far, thank you! Sorry I’m not succinct.)