#The thing is this isn't new rhetoric about this at all

[bisolationist]

If you refuse to understand why calling any victims of any deliberate assault "collateral" is A) hugely insensitive and B) very attractive to people who want to belittle the situation and C) falls right in lockstep with their views whether it's your intent or not, then I really can't help you.

it's exactly the same was people who say bi ppl only experience "misdirected homophobia". In both cases there's the weird implications that A) what to us happened was somehow incidental or accidental and not "real" B) the trauma and context somehow doesn't "belong to us" and instead should be analyzed through the lens of it being "meant" as an attack on another group entirely.

In both cases it ignores that what happened to us personally was not "collateral" to anything. It was a targeted and deliberate attack that someone chose to perpetrate against us *because* we fit certain criteria. And the people who protect our abusers and work to silence victims are not doing it as part of some collateral against some other group - they were making deliberate decisions.

This does not mean you can't look at things from several angles, but if you make no-nuance claims about how it only exists because of some context where it's "collateral" you can't expect people not to get mad.

[unopenablebox]

i admit that i find it a little bit frustrating how Wildly Astonished other antizionist jews act when i tell them my israeli jewish family have lived in the region since [some unknown length of time before 1800 when there start being records about it]

[autisticsupervillain]

I'll take "posts that Lily Orchard would write" for 500, Alex.

what is this "as someone who escaped the alt right pipeline" failpost I've seen so many people vague about

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Prime’s enshittified advertising

Prime's gonna add more ads. They brought in ads in January, and people didn't cancel their Prime subscriptions, so Amazon figures that they can make Prime even worse and make more money:

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/10/amazon-prime-video-is-getting-more-ads-next-year/

The cruelty isn't the point. Money is the point. Every ad that Amazon shows you shifts value away from you – your time, your attention – to the company's shareholders.

That's the crux of enshittification. Companies don't enshittify – making their once-useful products monotonically worse – because it amuses them to erode the quality of their offerings. They enshittify them because their products are zero-sum: the things that make them valuable to you (watching videos without ads) make things less valuable to them (because they can't monetize your attention).

This isn't new. The internet has always been dominated by intermediaries – platforms – because there are lots more people who want to use the internet than are capable of building the internet. There's more people who want to write blogs than can make a blogging app. There's more people who want to play and listen to music than can host a music streaming service. There's more people who want to write and read ebooks than want to operate an ebook store or sell an ebooks reader.

Despite all the early internet rhetoric about the glories of disintermediation, intermediaries are good, actually:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/06/12/direct-the-problem-of-middlemen/

The problem isn't with intermediaries per se. The problem arises when intermediaries grow so powerful that they usurp the relationship between the parties they connect. The problem with Uber isn't the use of mobile phones to tell taxis that you're standing on a street somewhere and would like a cab, please. The problem is rampant worker misclassification, regulatory arbitrage, starvation wages, and price-gouging:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/29/geometry-hates-uber/#toronto-the-gullible

There's no problem with publishers, distributors, retailers, printers, and all the other parts of the bookselling ecosystem. While there are a few, rare authors who are capable of performing all of these functions – basically gnawing their books out of whole logs with their teeth – most writers can't, and even the ones who can, don't want to:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/19/crad-kilodney-was-an-outlier/#intermediation

When early internet boosters spoke of disintermediation, what they mostly meant was that it would be harder for intermediaries to capture those relationships – between sellers and buyers, creators and audiences, workers and customers. As Rebecca Giblin and I wrote in our 2022 book Chokepoint Capitalism, intermediaries in every sector rely on chokepoints, narrows where they can erect tollbooths:

https://chokepointcapitalism.com/

When chokepoints exist, they multiply up and down the supply chain. In the golden age of physical, recorded music, you had several chokepoints that reinforced one another. Limited radio airwaves gave radio stations power over record labels, who had to secretly, illegally bid for prime airspace ("payola"). Retail consolidation – the growth of big record chains – drove consolidation in the distributors who sold to the chains, and the more concentrated distributors became, the more they could squeeze retailers, which drove even more consolidation in record stores. The bigger a label was, the more power it had to shove back against the muscle of the stores and the distributors (and the pressing plants, etc). Consolidation in labels also drove consolidation in talent agencies, whose large client rosters gave them power to resist the squeeze from the labels. Consolidation in venues drives consolidation in ticketing and promotion – and vice-versa.

But there's two parties to this supply chain who can't consolidate: musicians and their fans. With limits on "sectoral bargaining" (where unions can represent workers against all the companies in a sector), musicians' unions were limited in their power against key parts of the supply chain, so the creative workers who made the music were easy pickings for labels, talent reps, promoters, ticketers, venues, retailers, etc. Music fans are diffused and dispersed, and organized fan clubs were usually run by the labels, who weren't about to allow those clubs to be used against the labels.

This is a perfect case-study in the problems of powerful intermediaries, who move from facilitator to parasite, paying workers less while degrading their products, and then charge customers more for those enshittified products.

The excitement about "disintermediation" wasn't so much about eliminating intermediaries as it was about disciplining them. If there were lots of ways to market a product or service, sell it, collect payment for it, and deliver it, then the natural inclination of intermediaries to turn predator would be curbed by the difficulty of corralling their prey into chokepoints.

Now that we're a quarter century on from the Napster Wars, we can see how that worked out. Decades of failure to enforce antitrust law allowed a few companies to effectively capture the internet, buying out rivals who were willing to sell, and bankrupting those who wouldn't with illegal tactics like predatory pricing (think of Uber losing $31 billion by subsidizing $0.41 out of every dollar they charged for taxi rides for more than a decade).

The market power that platforms gained through consolidation translated into political power. When a few companies dominate a sector, they're able to come to agreement on common strategies for dealing with their regulators, and they've got plenty of excess profits to spend on those strategies. First and foremost, platforms used their power to get more power, lobbying for even less antitrust enforcement. Additionally, platforms mobilized gigantic sums to secure the right to screw customers (for example, by making binding arbitration clauses in terms of service enforceable) and workers (think of the $225m Uber and Lyft spent on California's Prop 22, which formalized their worker misclassification swindle).

So big platforms were able to insulate themselves from the risk of competition ("five giant websites, filled with screenshots of the other four" – Tom Eastman), and from regulation. They were also able to expand and mobilize IP law to prevent anyone from breaking their chokepoints or undoing the abuses that these enabled. This is a good place to get specific about how Prime Video works.

There's two ways to get Prime videos: over an app, or in your browser. Both of these streams are encrypted, and that's really important here, because of a law – Section 1201 of the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act – which makes it really illegal to break this kind of encryption (commonly called "Digital Rights Management" or "DRM"). Practically speaking, that means that if a company encrypts its videos, no one is allowed to do anything to those videos, even things that are legal, without the company's permission, because doing all those legal things requires breaking the DRM, and breaking the DRM is a felony (five years in prison, $500k fine, for a first offense).

Copyright law actually gives subscribers to services like Prime a lot of rights, and it empowers businesses that offer tools to exercise those rights. Back in 1976, Sony rolled out the Betamax, the first major home video recorder. After an eight-year court battle, the Supreme Court weighed in on VCRs and ruled that it was legal for all of us to record videos at home, both to watch them later, and to build a library of our favorite shows. They also ruled that it was legal for Sony – and by that time, every other electronics company – to make VHS systems, even if those systems could be used in ways that violated copyright because they were "capable of sustaining a substantial non-infringing use" (letting you tape shows off your TV).

Now, this was more than a decade before the DMCA – and its prohibition on breaking DRM – passed, but even after the DMCA came into effect, there was a lot of media that didn't have DRM, so a new generation of tech companies were able to make tools that were "capable of sustaining a substantial non-infringing use" and that didn't have to break any DRM to do it.

Think of the Ipod and Itunes, which, together, were sold as a way to rip CDs (which weren't encrypted), and play them back from both your desktop computer and a wildly successful pocket-sized portable device. Itunes even let you stream from one computer to another. The record industry hated this, but they couldn't do anything about it, thanks to the Supreme Court's Betamax ruling.

Indeed, they eventually swallowed their bile and started selling their products through the Itunes Music Store. These tracks had DRM and were thus permanently locked to Apple's ecosystem, and Apple immediately used that power to squeeze the labels, who decided they didn't like DRM after all, and licensed all those same tracks to Amazon's DRM-free MP3 store, whose slogan was "DRM: Don't Restrict Me":

https://memex.craphound.com/2008/02/01/amazons-anti-drm-tee/

Apple played a funny double role here. In marketing Itunes/Ipods ("Rip, Mix, Burn"), they were the world's biggest cheerleaders for all the things you were allowed to do with copyrighted works, even when the copyright holder objected. But with the Itunes Music Store and its mandatory DRM, the company was also one of the world's biggest cheerleaders for wrapping copyrighted works in a thin skin of IP that would allow copyright holders to shut down products like the Ipod and Itunes.

Microsoft, predictably enough, focused on the "lock everything to our platform" strategy. Then-CEO Steve Ballmer went on record calling every Ipod owner a "thief" and arguing that every record company should wrap music in Microsoft's Zune DRM, which would allow them to restrict anything they didn't like, even if copyright allowed it (and would also give Microsoft the same abusive leverage over labels that they famously exercised over Windows software companies):

https://web.archive.org/web/20050113051129/http://management.silicon.com/itpro/0,39024675,39124642,00.htm

In the end, Amazon's approach won. Apple dropped DRM, and Microsoft retired the Zune and shut down its DRM servers, screwing anyone who'd ever bought a Zune track by rendering that music permanently unplayable.

Around the same time as all this was going on, another company was making history by making uses of copyrighted works that the law allowed, but which the copyright holders hated. That company was Tivo, who products did for personal video recorders (PVRs) what Apple's Ipod did for digital portable music players. With a Tivo, you could record any show over cable (which was too expensive and complicated to encrypt) and terrestrial broadcast (which is illegal to encrypt, since those are the public's airwaves, on loan to the TV stations).

That meant that you could record any show, and keep it forever. What's more, you could very easily skip through ads (and rival players quickly emerged that did automatic ad-skipping). All of this was legal, but of course the cable companies and broadcasters hated it. Like Ballmer, TV execs called Tivo owners "thieves."

But Tivo didn't usher in the ad-supported TV apocalypse that furious, spittle-flecked industry reps insisted it would. Rather, it disciplined the TV and cable operators. Tivo owners actually sought out ads that were funny and well-made enough to go viral. Meanwhile, every time the industry decided to increase the amount of advertising in a show, they also increased the likelihood that their viewers would seek out a Tivo, or worse, one of those auto-ad-skipping PVRs.

Given all the stink that TV execs raised over PVRs, you'd think that these represented a novel threat. But in fact, the TV industry's appetite for ads had been disciplined by viewers' access to new technology since 1956, when the first TV remotes appeared on the market (executives declared that anyone who changed the channel during an ad-break was a thief). Then came the mute button. Then the wireless remote. Meanwhile, a common VCR use-case – raised in the Supreme Court case – was fast-forwarding ads.

At each stage, TV adapted. Ads in TV shows represented a kind of offer: "Will you watch this many of these ads in return for a free TV show?" And the remote, the mute button, the wireless remote, the VCR, the PVR, and the ad-skipping PVR all represented a counter-offer. As economists would put it, the ability of viewers to make these counteroffers "shifted the equilibrium." If viewers had no defensive technology, they might tolerate more ads, but once they were able to enforce their preferences with technology, the industry couldn't enshittify its product to the liminal cusp of "so many ads that the viewer is right on the brink of turning off the TV (but not quite)."

This is the same equilibrium-shifting dynamic that we see on the open web, where more than 50% of users have installed an ad-blocker. The industry says, "Will you allow this many 'sign up to our mailing list' interrupters, pop ups, pop unders, autoplaying videos and other stuff that users hate but shareholders benefit from" and the ad-blocker makes a counteroffer: "How about 'nah?'":

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/07/adblocking-how-about-nah

TV remotes, PVRs and ad-blockers are all examples of "adversarial interoperability" – a new product that plugs into an existing one, extending or modifying its functions without permission from (or even over the objections of) the original manufacturer:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/10/adversarial-interoperability

Adversarial interop creates a powerful disciplining force on platform owners. Once a user grows so frustrated with a product's enshittification that they research, seek out, acquire and learn to use an adversarial interop tool, it's really game over. The printer owner who figures out where to get third-party ink is gone forever. Every time a company like HP raises its prices, they have to account for the number of customers who will finally figure out how to use generic ink and never, ever send another cent to HP.

This is where DMCA 1201 comes into play. Once a product is skinned with DRM, its manufacturers gain the right to prevent you from doing legal things, and can use the public's courts and law-enforcement apparatus to punish you for trying. Take HP: as soon as they started adding DRM to their cartridges, they gained the legal power to shut down companies that cloned, refilled or remanufactured their cartridges, and started raising the price of ink – which today sits at more than $10,000/gallon:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/09/30/life-finds-a-way/#ink-stained-wretches

Using third party ink in your printer isn't illegal (it's your printer, right?). But making third party ink for your printer becomes illegal once you have to break DRM to do so, and so HP gets to transform tinted water into literally the most expensive fluid on Earth. The ink you use to print your kid's homework costs more than vintage Veuve Cliquot or sperm from a Kentucky Derby-winning thoroughbred.

Adversarial interoperability is a powerful tool for shifting the equilibrium between producers, intermediaries and buyers. DRM is an even more powerful way of wrenching that equilibrium back towards the intermediary, reducing the share that buyers and sellers are able to eke out of the transaction.

Prime Video, of course, is delivered via an app, which means it has DRM. That means that subscribers don't get to exercise the rights afforded to them by copyright – only the rights that Amazon permits them to have. There's no Tivo for Prime, because it would have to break the DRM to record the shows you stream from Prime. That allows Prime to pull all kinds of shady shit. For example, every year around this time, Amazon pulls popular Christmas movies from its free-to-watch tier and moves them into pay-per-view, only restoring them in the spring:

https://www.reddit.com/r/vudu/comments/1bpzanx/looks_like_amazon_removed_the_free_titles_from/

And of course, Prime sticks ads in its videos. You can't skip these ads – not because it's technically challenging to make a 30-second advance button for a video stream, and doing so wouldn't violate anyone's copyright – but because Amazon doesn't permit you to do so, and the fact that the video is wrapped in DRM makes it a felony to even try.

This means that Amazon gets to seek a different equilibrium than TV companies have had to accept since 1956 and the invention of the TV remote. Amazon doesn't have to limit the quantity, volume, and invasiveness of its ads to "less the amount that would drive our subscribers to install and use an ad-skipping plugin." Instead, they can shoot for the much more lucrative equilibrium of "so obnoxious that the viewer is almost ready to cancel their subscription (but not quite)."

That's pretty much exactly how Kelly Day, the Amazon exec in charge of Prime Video, put it to the Financial Times: they're increasing the number of ads because "we haven’t really seen a groundswell of people churning out or cancelling":

https://www.ft.com/content/f8112991-820c-4e09-bcf4-23b5e0f190a5

At this point, attentive readers might be asking themselves, "Doesn't Amazon have to worry about Prime viewers who watch in their browsers?" After all browsers are built on open standards, and anyone can make one, so there should be browsers that can auto-skip Prime ads, right?

Wrong, alas. Back in 2017, the W3C – the organization that makes the most important browser standards – caved to pressure from the entertainment industry and the largest browser companies and created "Encrypted Media Extensions" (EME), a "standard" for video DRM that blocks all adversarial interoperability:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2017/09/open-letter-w3c-director-ceo-team-and-membership

This had the almost immediate effect of making it impossible to create an independent browser without licensing proprietary tech from Google – now a convicted monopolist! – who won't give you a license if you implement recording, ad-skipping, or any other legal (but dispreferred) feature:

https://blog.samuelmaddock.com/posts/the-end-of-indie-web-browsers/

This means that for Amazon, there's no way to shift value away from the platform to you. The company has locked you in, and has locked out anyone who might offer you a better deal. Companies that know you are technologically defenseless are endlessly inventive in finding ways to make things worse for you to make things better for them. Take Youtube, another DRM-video-serving platform that has jacked up the number of ads you have to sit through in order to watch a video – even as they slash payments to performers. They've got a new move: they're gonna start showing you ads while your video is paused:

https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2024/09/20/youtube-pause-ads-rollout/75306204007/

That is the kind of fuckery you only come up with when your victory condition is "a service that's almost so bad our customers quit (but not quite)."

In Amazon's case, the math is even worse. After all, Youtube may have near-total market dominance over a certain segment of the video market, but Prime Video is bundled with Prime Delivery, which the vast majority of US households subscribe to. You have to give up a lot to cancel your Prime subscription – especially since Amazon's predatory pricing devastated the rest of the retail sector:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/28/enshittification/#relentless-payola

Amazon's founding principle was "customer obsession." Ex-Amazoners tell me that this was more than an empty platitude: arguments over product design were won or lost based on whether they could satisfy the "customer obsession" litmus test. Now, everyone falls short of their ideals, but sticking to your ideals isn't merely a matter of internal discipline, of willpower. Living up to your ideals is a matter of external discipline, too. When Amazon no longer had to contend with competitors or regulators, when it was able to use DRM to control its customers and use the law to prevent them from using its products in legal ways, it lost those external sources of discipline.

Amazon suppliers have long complained of the company's high-handed treatment of the vendors who supplied it with goods. Its workers have complained bitterly and loudly about the dangerous and oppressive conditions in its warehouses and delivery vans. But Amazon's customers have consistently given Amazon high marks on quality and trustworthiness.

The reason Amazon treated its workers and suppliers badly and its customers well wasn't that it liked customers and hated workers and suppliers. Amazon was engaged in a cold-blooded calculus: it understood that treating customers well would give it control over those customers, and that this would translate market power to retain suppliers even as it ripped them off and screwed them over.

But now, Amazon has clearly concluded that it no longer needs to keep customers happy in order to retain them. Instead, it's shooting for "keeping customers so angry that they're almost ready to take their business elsewhere (but not quite)." You see this in the steady decline of Amazon product search, which preferences the products that pay the biggest bribes for search placement over the best matches:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/11/06/attention-rents/#consumer-welfare-queens

And you see it in the steady enshittification of Prime Video. Amazon's character never changed. The company always had a predatory side. But now that monopoly and IP law have insulated it from consequences for its actions, there's no longer any reason to keep the predator in check.

Tor Books as just published two new, free LITTLE BROTHER stories: VIGILANT, about creepy surveillance in distance education; and SPILL, about oil pipelines and indigenous landback.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/10/03/mother-may-i/#minmax

[renthony]

On "Consuming Content"

Every now and then a post crosses my feed that follows the vein of, "you have to do things other than consume media or else you'll be a dumb person who doesn't know anything about how the real world works and does nothing but pointless fandom stuff."

I hate those posts for three major reasons, not counting the inherent ableism and classism of "you must have approved Smart People hobbies or else you're worthless" rhetoric:

You don't know what people do or talk about outside of what you see on their social media. Responding to fandom communities on a fandom-driven website as if all these people are one-note cardboard cutouts of people is asinine. In many cases this genre of post feels like repackaged 2012 tumblr "not like other girls" and hipster discourse. Yes, yes, you think you're better than everyone else on this website because your hobbies are less mainstream, more morally pure, and have greater intellectual merit, we get it.

What do you even mean by consuming content? As someone who purposely avoids using the phrase "consuming content" because I find the term too vague to be useful, please be more specific. Are you including every single form of media engagement and art enjoyment? Are you just talking about mainstream TV and film? What about novels? Plays and scripts? Nonfiction books and instruction manuals? Do you mean to imply that going to a book club is a worthless non-hobby? Are you including academic reading? Are you including going to the art museum? Going to the theatre, concerts, or other performances? Taped liveshows? Watching sports events on TV? Are you including news media? Are you including YouTube tutorials about how to do various tasks, crafts, or other hobbies? Are you including trade magazines? Are you including industry publications in various fields? What constitutes "content," and what constitutes "consuming" in this discourse? Define it. "Consuming content" is a nothing phrase that people use to mean multiple different things depending on what they, personally, judge as valid media. It's a buzzword at best, and when the same buzzword can be used to describe both "idly scrolling social media" and "reading and discussing a book," it's a meaningless phrase.

As an artist and author, if engaging with media is bad and worthless, am I supposed to conclude that making it is equally worthless? If "consuming content" is a bad, lazy, worthless, fake hobby, what makes creating art a worthwhile pursuit? If I am constantly being told as an artist that engaging with media isn't a worthwhile pursuit in its own right, and the people who want to engage with my art are just brainless fandom losers, what incentive do I have to make that art anymore? Furthermore, to everyone reading this paragraph and thinking, "that's not what content creation is," I refer you to bullet #2: If the phrase "make content" can be used to mean "low-effort posts made to advertise cheap and useless products" as well as "being a novelist" or "getting a gig as a writer on a TV show," it's a meaningless phrase.

None of that is even getting into issues such as the way influencers are preyed on by both brands and targeted harassment from trolls. Influencer culture has major issues, but boiling those issues down to "stupid vapid young people who are too lazy to make real art or get real jobs" (which is a mindset I see frequently online) is unhelpful. So many people pursue influencer deals because they're living in poverty but are skilled at various social media and advertising related tasks, and just like any worker, they're being exploited because they need to eat. Labor rights for influencers are a huge topic that entertainment industry unions have been actively discussing and working toward. (Related links for further info: [x] [x] [x] [x])

"Consuming content is not a hobby" is a worthless statement unless you define what you mean by both "consuming" and "content." Quite frankly, you also need to define "hobby," because if you're putting requirements on what is and isn't allowed to be a "real" hobby, you mostly just seem like you're moving goalposts and defining "worthwhile hobby" as "hobby I, personally, think is good." Use more specific language to articulate your actual problems with the entertainment industry, the art world, influencer culture, or whatever else you're actually upset by.

Media and fandom can involve any number of enriching, satisfying hobbies that take up a perfectly acceptable and healthy space in someone's life. If you aren't into it, go find hobbies you do like and stop policing how other people spend their precious free time in this nightmare hellscape of a world.

[hyperlexichypatia]

This post reminded me of it, but my partner has observed that in contemporary gender discourse, maleness is so linked to adulthood and femaleness is so linked to childhood, that there are no "boys" or "women," only "men" and "girls."

This isn't exactly new -- for as long as patriarchy has existed, women have been infantilized, and "adult woman" has been treated as something of an oxymoron. Hegemonic beauty standards for women emphasize youthfulness, if not actual neoteny, and older women are considered "too old" to be attractive without ever quite being old enough to make their own decisions. There may be cultural allowances for the occasional older "wise woman," but a "wise woman" is always dangerously close to being a madwoman, or a witch. No matter how wise a woman is, she is never quite a rational agent. As Hanna K put it, "as a woman you're always either too young or too old for things, because the perfect age is when you're a man."

But the framing of underage boys as "men" has shifted, depending on popular conceptualizations of childhood and gender roles. Sometimes children of any gender are essentially feminized and grouped with women (the entire framing of "women and children" as a category). In the U.S. in the 21st century, the rise of men's rights and aggressively sexist ideology has correlated with an increased emphasis on little boys as "men" -- thus slogans like "Teach your son to be a man before his teacher teaches him to be a woman."

Of course, thanks to ageism and patriarchy (which literally means, not "rule by men," but "rule by fathers"), boys don't get any of the social benefits of being considered "men." They don't get to vote, make their own medical decisions, or have any of their own adult rights. They might have a little more childhood freedom than girls, if they're presumed to be sturdier and less vulnerable to "predators," but, for the most part, being considered "men" as young boys doesn't really get boys any more access to adult rights. What it does get them is aggressively gender-policed, often with violence. A little boy being "a man" means that he's not allowed to wear colors, have feelings, or experience the developmental stages of childhood.

This shifts in young adulthood, as boys forced into the role of "manhood" become actual men. As I've written about, I believe the trend of considering young adults "children" is harmful to everyone, but primarily to young women, young queer and trans people, and young disabled people. Abled, cisgender, heterosexual young men are rarely denied the rights and autonomy of adulthood due to "brain maturity."

What's particularly interesting is that, because transphobes misgender trans people as their birth-assigned genders, they constantly frame trans girls as "men" and trans men as "girls." A 10 year old trans girl on her elementary school soccer team is a "MAN using MAN STRENGTH on helpless GIRLS," while a 40 year old trans man is a "Poor confused little girl." Anyone assigned male at birth is born a scary, intimidating adult, while anyone female assigned at birth never becomes old enough to make xyr own decisions.

Feminist responses have also really fluctuated. Occasionally, feminists have played into the idea of little boys as "men," especially in trans-exclusionary rhetoric, or in one notorious case where members of a women's separatist compound were warned about "a man" who turned out to be a 6-month-old infant. There's periodic discourse around "Empowering our girls" or "Raising our boys with gentle masculinity," but for the most part, my problem with mainstream feminist rhetoric in general is that it tends to frame children solely as a labor imposed on women by men, not as subjects (and specifically, as an oppressed class) at all.

Second-wave feminists pushed back hard on calling adult women "girls" -- but they didn't necessarily view "women" as capable of autonomous decision-making, either. Adult women were women, but they might still need to be protected from their own false consciousness. As laws in the U.S., around medical privacy and autonomy, like HIPAA, started more firmly linking the concepts of autonomy with legal adulthood, and fixing the age of majority at 18, third-wave feminists embraced referring to women as "girls." Sometimes this was in an intentionally empowering way ("girl power," "girl boss"), which also served to shield women (mostly white, mostly bourgeois/wealthy) from criticism of their participation in racism and capitalism. But it also served to reinforce the narrative of women as "girls" needing to be protected from "men" (and their own choices).

I'm still hoping for a feminist politic that is pro-child, pro-youth, pro-disability, pro-autonomy, pro-equality, that rejects the infantilization of women, the adultification of boys, the objectification of children, the misgendering of trans people, and the imposition of gender roles.

[bohoteacher]

Navigating Betrayal: Reconciling Admiration with Disillusionment

Like many Neil Gaiman fans this month, I've been shocked and distressed by the news regarding the SA allegations. I won't go over the details, as they're readily available online. I'll start by saying that I believe the accusers, and even the most lenient interpretation of events is still troubling enough to discredit Gaiman. For a long time, I didn't know what to say. I was just shocked and, somewhat naively, felt betrayed. I don't typically idolize actors, authors, or other public figures—I'm here for the characters, they're who I love and believe in. So, how did I end up believing in this man and his rhetoric?

I only had a parasocial relationship with him, which is to say no real relationship at all. But I took his Masterclass on writing, spent hours taking notes, and learned from him. I feel betrayed by someone I saw as a beloved teacher. I know this is insignificant compared to what the women who came forward experienced, but it's a valid feeling, and I needed time to process it. My initial reaction was to throw out and discount everything he’s ever written or done—of course it was.

This isn't just about my love for Good Omens, although how can it not be? I learned so much from this man—about writing, about not being too hard on myself, about the creative process. I read his books to my middle school classes, and we all learned how to be better people from them. Today, I saw and bought Instructions, a children’s book by Neil Gaiman illustrated by Charles Vess, from the used bookstore where I volunteer. It was a used copy, so no royalties will go to him. It’s a beautifully illustrated book where the main character walks through a land that clearly symbolizes life, learning lessons like saying please and "if any creature cries to you that it hurts, if you can, ease its pain." How could someone write this and then do what he did? I asked myself. "What an evil hypocrite," was my first thought. But then I recalled a line from another author, Stephen King. In The Stand, a character is described as "awake at the lectern, but asleep at the switch," meaning they know the right thing to do and can talk about it, but in the moment of choice, they act without integrity.

I don’t know if I’m making sense, but I think it’s too easy to label Gaiman as simply evil, as if he intentionally manipulated us by saying the right things just to make us read or watch his creations. The reality is likely far more complicated. Within this man is the amazing, thought-provoking, life-affirming wisdom that many of us have tried to live by, but also the hard, thoughtless, selfish cruelty that led him to abuse young, vulnerable women. The wisdom does not justify the abuse, and the abuse does not nullify the wisdom.

I think it's too simplistic to say Gaiman is despicable and always has been, hiding it from us all along. This doesn't acknowledge the complexity of human nature—that there is potential for both good and bad within us all. As it’s said, possibly by Terry Pratchett or possibly by Neil Gaiman, “It may help to understand human affairs to be clear that most of the great triumphs and tragedies of history are caused, not by people being fundamentally good or fundamentally bad, but by people being fundamentally people.”

Gaiman is a man who has done some fundamentally good things and some fundamentally bad things. I can’t forget either one.

This is just my opinion. I know some people want to cancel him, while others want to exonerate him. You do you. As for me, I will continue to love Aziraphale and Crowley. I will continue to read and create fan-fiction. I will continue to find comfort and wisdom in books that have meant so much to me over the years. But I will also remember that they were created by a very flawed man whom I can no longer trust.

I understand that opinions on this matter vary widely. I know some people might feel that not discarding everything associated with him is wrong, but this is where I stand. I’m not looking to debate this or be told how I should react. I just needed to process my thoughts in writing and move forward in the way that feels right for me.

[tirfpikachu]

are we just crazy or are lgbt spaces getting legit deranged?????

every unusual experience of sexuality/gender is a valid part of the bootiful qweer biodiversity of the world by default, but you can't be gay/bi/trans and not want to be called the q slur or see cishets say the q slur. and you can't say that you're afab4afab or amab4amab, that's just a creepy bigoted fetish you freak. unless you're transmasc4transmasc or transfem4transfem ofc, you get a free pass. but also kinkshaming is evil and deeply harms the most marginalized. but also make sure you don't have a fetish about genitalia... if you do, it's a "preference" not an inborn trait and you really can therapize yourself into liking it, just try hard enough. if you fail to you're a bigot, so just keep trying!! make sure to feel guilty abt it at least, you dirty homo. but getting beat up can be a cool sexual thing and bestiality or noncon is fine. but actual genitalia "preferences" are bigoted. if you don't call the genderqueer person pansexual instead of bi they'll chew their own arm off and hit you with it and call the cops but don't say you're a female trans man or that you're a trans guy lesbian or link it to being a female homosexual in any way ever okay?! you can't be at peace with acknowledging your sex/agab as a trans person!!!! or feel a connection to lesbian spaces as a trans man or gay male spaces as a trans woman!!! that's BIGOTRY and that's just feeding terf cunts you dumb theyfab. you can't link your cis womanhood to being afab AT ALL either bc that's transmisogynistic and dangerous rhetoric but every other group of gender marginalized folks can define their own identities and have a billion microlabels. you can't say you're not into girldick because not all trans women have dicks dumbass, surgical vaginas are defo the exact same as bio vaginas anyway so if you only like afab pussy & afab bodies you're a gross pervert mocking bottom surgery. and someone's upbringing as a male/amab or female/afab person definitely isn't a huge part of why homosexual ppl are into the same-sex/agab so you shouldn't give a single shit if a transbian flirting with you hasn't grown up facing misogyny or going thru afab/female body struggles or any of that, that has NOTHING to do with lesbianism between female ppl and has no bearing whatsoever on attraction you absolute psychopath. sexes/agabs is just a mix of detached body parts and you can play mr potatohead with it all and if you glued it good enough homosexuals wouldn't be able to tell at all that he used to be a mrs potatohead!! so they'd still hit that, right? homosexuals will go for anything anyway right?? homosexual love obvs can't be any deeper than genitals and fetishes. amab4afab ppl can be homosexual too anyway if they pass as gay irl too so homosexual isn't even a real tangible thing anyways it doesn't involve sex/agab at all and those ppl don't get to be their own specific oppressed class and do their own activism and have agency over their own identity bc they're super privileged worldwide and the enby living as a gender conforming woman in society dating a neckbeard looking for a third is more oppressed than a visibly gnc crossdressing bio guy holding hands with his normie bf. they might be gay but they're not qweer... except to the rightwing ofc!! oh and if you're trans and recently started passing as straight you're more privileged than an afab4amab couple who's lived a hetero til they transitioned! so shut the fuck up and listen to the New Gays. don't call yourself homosexual anymore or you're a cis bootlicker and if you're transmasc you're oppressing every transfem, including ones who have never faced misogyny irl a day in their fucking life!!! just be valid the RIGHT WAY!!!!!! be more queer you dirty normie homo!!!!!!

HAHAH i love it here

[qiu-yan]

MDZS and asshole victims: thoughts on the second siege of the burial mounds scene

this post is not about morality judgments. this post is about reader sympathies only.

one rather clever rhetorical trick MDZS employs is putting all the more background "surviving victims of wei wuxian's actions" into one big angry mob at the second siege of the burial mounds, instead of letting them crop up anywhere else in the story. it's easy for a first-time reader to write off the guy who lost a leg at nightless city, or the guy whose parents died at nightless city, because both of those guys are being dicks. they're part of an angry mob baying for wei wuxian's blood--unfairly baying for wei wuxian's blood, because this time he didn't even do the thing they're saying he did. by putting these two victims into a mob of not just fellow victims but also unaffected individuals (ie. sect leader yao, who just showed up for kicks), the story can effectively equate these victims' grievances (ie. "you killed my parents") with unreasonable mob rule--even if these two things might not actually be equivalent.

the effect of this rhetorical trick, then, is that the reader can at once perceive the themes about mob mentality MXTX wishes to convey, and also effectively write off the victims' complaints. "yes, i did that to you, but i literally died already, what more do you want me to do? shall i walk on my knees repenting?" becomes easier for the reader to accept. and more importantly--wei wuxian's likability as a moral and just protagonist is not impacted.

ngl tho. it would be a bit more difficult for the reader to write off these victims' complaints if, instead of meeting said victims in an angry mob, the reader instead met these victims almost anywhere else. imagine if, instead of meeting mr. "you killed my parents" at the second siege of the burial mounds, we instead met him getting smashed at the local bar and crying about how his parents are dead. imagine if, instead of meeting mr. "you chopped off my leg" as a member of an angry mob, we instead met him begging for alms on the side of the road because his disability rendered him unable to work in a wuxia-esque setting. or imagine--if either of these background characters, overcome with survivor's guilt and trauma from nightless city, hung himself in his bedroom, and the next day his body was discovered by his 15-year-old daughter.

all of these scenarios are entirely plausible. you could easily include any of them into the story without changing the main plot at all. but suddenly shit just got a lot more depressing.

however, no such scene would ever be included in MDZS. the reason is that, as a work of fiction, MDZS's single most ardent goal is for us the readers to conclude not just that "we like wei wuxian as a character," but also that "wei wuxian is ultimately a morally righteous person." when the narrative focus shifts onto the people who were actually helped by wei wuxian's actions (mianmian and her family, lan sizhui, the few months of dignity the wen remnants were afforded) this becomes much easier for us to conclude; wei wuxian does indeed look like a hero. but the more narrative focus is given to the negative impacts of wei wuxian's actions--the more the "victims of wei wuxian" (whether actual victims or not) are given a face, instead of abstracted away by broad summaries--the more the reader might side-eye wei wuxian instead. every new victim given a name, given narrative attention that isn't just focused on making them look like an asshole, arouses the reader's sympathies in the opposite direction--and thus increases the risk that the reader might ultimately disagree with the novel's conclusion of "wei wuxian is a righteous person."

tbh, this does not seem like a risk MXTX particularly wants to take. instead, she's mastered the art of writing Asshole Victims.

which is an entirely valid writing decision, because imo basically every work of genre fiction out there does this to some extent.

[romancerepulsed]

maybe this is a "hot take," but it's something i genuinely believe is true. aphobes can broadly be sorted into 3 categories: the uninformed, the bigot, and the bully. there is overlap between all 3, and i'm sure there are some people out there who are aphobic in a fun new way that i can't possibly conceive of yet, but i think these categories are fairly accurate and helpful for an aspec to recognize.

the uninformed aphobe is what it sounds like– they either don't know anything about the aspectrum or they've been fed false information about it. this is the only type of aphobe that is ever worth engaging with, and only to politely correct them and point them towards resources that would help them broaden their understanding. i'll be completely honest though: you'd be pretty damn lucky if you managed to actually singlehandedly change their mind. if they're not receptive to your corrections, simply move on. it's not worth the headache. you at least gave them something to think about.

the bigot, in contrast, is absolutely never worth engaging with. the bigoted aphobe is aphobic simply because aspec people are queer and they hate queer people. terfs famously used (and still continue to use) aphobic rhetoric as a sort of gateway drug for transphobia. the people who will argue that aspec folks aren't queer are often the same people who despise us because they associate us with queerness.

the third aphobe is actually the most common on this website, i think, and they're the reason i'm making this post. the aphobic bully may know full well the fundamentals of the aspectrum, but they will simplify and misrepresent it on purpose in an attempt to make aspec people look bad. aspec people have long been "acceptable targets" of bullying on this site for a reason that is fairly obvious to me but one i haven't seen anyone else point out: aspec people are largely neurodivergent. it's really no coincidence that ace discourse and cringe culture peaked at around the same time– they were one in the same, and the treatment aspec and autistic people received were (and still are) damn near identical. portraying aspec people as cringey teenagers who watched too many cartoons and are just too socially awkward for anyone to love them or whatever... it's a sentiment thats existed for years and years now. it took me a while to realize it, but this is why so many "tumblr funnymen" and other assorted popular blogs were/are aphobes too– they've got egos the size of china but they know they can't get away with blatantly picking on autistic people. so they'll hide behind a guise of aspec exclusionism, something that's unfortunately viewed as a real and valid ideology for someone to have. even aside from the thinly veiled ableism, bullies are always coming from a place of insecurity and projecting it onto other people. i've found that a lot of the most vicious aphobes are people who are struggling romantically or sexually. you can see them post about it, you can see even in the most recent discourse so many of these people are deeply stressed and hurt from whatever romantic or sexual struggles they're facing. to them, someone being unconcerned with those sorts of things is almost offensive because it means so much to them. they read it as a challenge to their own allo identity. so, why not take out that frustration on the aspecs?

it goes without saying that the bully isn't worth engaging with, either. they want to rile you up because it makes them feel better about themselves. don't give them that satisfaction.

[diagonal-queen]

HELLO!! i keep requesting them sotty im obsessed but what about hunting dogs with a s/o who has a child😅😅i got silly again

Hunting Dogs with your child

♡ pairing: Fukuchi Ouchi, Jouno Saigiku, Tecchou Suehiro, Teruko Okura (platonic), Tachihara Michizou x gn!Reader

♡ synopsis: How do these goofballs fare as stepdads? (or, in Teruko's case, fun auntie?)

♡ cw: Swearing, unofficial stepfathering, unrealistically good stepfathering, reader's ex situation is not established but it's assumed that their baby momma/daddy is not in the picture (Tachihara), mentions of violence

note: I just haven't written anything in ages, and for that I apologise. Wow, being in university is time consuming! I've had block for months and it's been an absolute pain in the arse but I'm back babey! Keep your requests coming anon- I am the Hunting Dogs whisperer and I will write them till I die. Apologies for errors and I hope you enjoy x

Fukuchi:

My dude is so so so enthusiastic. You mean to tell him that he gets a beautiful loving partner AND a new little guy to hang out with?? Sign him tf up

This man buys your kid so many presents it's genuinely concerning. Your child is spoilt to hell and back by Fukuchi. You need to discourage him from this behaviour STAT

He constantly uses dad words like 'buddy' and 'pal' and 'kiddo' to refer to your kid and they eventually start responding to these nicknames lol

He would totally also do dad stances and just embrace the fatherly aura that is slowly overtaking him day by day (bro starts falling asleep on the couch while the game's on at 9pm)

He's actually surprisingly gentle with your child. If they cry he'll pick them up and comfort them very well. He's like a whole different person when your kid is scared or sad- it's the cutest thing ever

If your child ever gets him a Fathers' Day present he'll probably cry like old man tears of joy. In fact if your child ever does anything nice for him he'll be incredibly touched. Kinda reminds him what he's doing his job for :')

Tells your child great exaggerated (CHILD FRIENDLY) stories about his heroic achievements as a soldier before bed. It's genuinely super cute you guys

If the kid ever runs up to him in excitement when he arrives home in the evening he returns the energy and is like 'omg there they are! that's my kiddo! how have you been??' and picks them up and AUGH they're so cute

Just....🥺🥺

Jouno:

Your child is probably scared of him at first. Within their first meeting he probably makes them cry.

Sorry y'all 😭 but he doesn't exactly come off as much of a teddy bear...and nor does he really act like one with anyone else other than you in private

Jouno just isn't good with kids. Not in the sense that he's scared of them but that he doesn't really know how to interact with them without being intimidating or otherwise just detached

But he really loves you, and he wants to be a good parental figure to your kid, so he tries to warm them up to him by getting them a gift. That probably helps- he might not know much about kids but he's right to assume that they fucking love receiving gifts

Whatever your child's hobbies/interests are, Jouno genuinely does try to connect with them over it, and after a while it does work.

Soon enough your child and Jouno are inseparable and your child is spewing sadistic military rhetoric and oh dear god you've made a terrible mistake introducing the two of them

Yeah, Jouno probably teaches your kid all KINDS of horrible things. He will tell your child stories about times he's tortured suspects, or slaughtered gangs, and just stuff that is not family friendly. You have to nip that behaviour in the bud or else...

He's generally pretty good at taking care of your child, but like, if your kid cried because they were scared there was a monster under the bed, Jouno would probably be like "Yeah. There is. Good luck." and then turn off the lights and leave 💀

Just give him time. He'll learn how to be an emotionally available parent at SOME point

Tecchou:

He's not the step dad. He's the dad that stepped up

Tecchou is definitely very aloof and awkward around your child- like, he knows how to interact with you, but children are different. Children are frightening. And they are his biggest fear maybe

In spite of this, he is fiercely protective of your kid. He will make sure that child is as safe and calm as possible at all times, and he certainly prefers to show that he cares through actions rather than words.

He usually wouldn't initiate physical contact with your child but if they hugged him he would hug back, if they gave him a hi-five he would do it back, etc etc. he will never let your kid down

If your child likes make belief, you can bet you'd walk into a room and find your kid all dressed up, off their rocker in full theatre mode, while Tecchou is sitting on the floor, also dressed up, but looking more depressed than ever before

Save him from your baby. They are taking YEARS off his life

He probably accidentally sends your kid to hospital at some point because he cooked for them. Damnit Tecchou, how don't you realise that a child's stomach wouldn't be able to handle a combination of chocolate and beef

It's okay though, he does learn from this. Plus, he takes care of your child and buys them presents and hangs out with them until they're better <3

He might not join your child in the ball pit, but he would watch them swim around in there with the softest, faintest, most affectionate smile on his face. And that is all that matters folks

Teruko (platonic):

The funnest, meanest, coolest auntie ever

Teruko will lead your child down a dreadful path. Limit their visits to holidays and birthdays for your own sake and the sake of your young one

She's really more than happy to negatively influence look after your child if you need her to though, and they love her because she's super chill and lets them get away with all kinds of things (that aren't violent crimes against humanity)

Your parent says one cookie after dinner? Screw it, have six. I won't tell if you won't. - Teruko, probably

She uses her ability to entertain your kid sometimes- usually she'll decrease her age so she can join them in things like building pillow forts and playing on jungle gyms

I'm just picturing them playing at the park and some concerned parent coming up to them asking where their guardian is and Teruko just fucking transforms into a grown woman on the spot and goes 'WHO'S ASKING' 😭

Teruko is a super cool fun aunt. But she is very wise, and she really will give your kid good life advice on occasion.

She'll also cheer them up when they're feeling down, and if they're feeling scared she helps them step out of their comfort zones and confront their fears (in a safe way!!)

If your kid is like, getting picked on at school or something, Teruko will nag you to phone their school about it. If you don't, she does. If they don't do anything about it, she does. Bottom line is NOBODY fucks with your kid when Teruko is around

I guess technically she really is scary dog privilege lmao

Tachihara:

Help he's so nervous at first? Tachihara this is a child, not a wise sage- you can be normal around them

He just wants to make a good impression on the child okay he's doing his best

But (obviously) your kid immediately loves him, and thinks he's the coolest guy ever, and wants to hang out with him all the time

Tachihara has a bit of a concern that the kid will think that he's trying to replace their other parent, which is fair, but it's unfounded because your child absolutely adores him and does not care about that at all

If your child ever calls him 'Dad' watch his soul fucking transcend to a new plane, he's so surprised and honoured that this beautiful person's child would consider him their parent

Your kid has Tachihara wrapped around their tiny finger. He will oblige them with anything- if you've got a toddler who likes uppies and piggybacks, say your prayers for Tachihara's upper arm and back muscles because he will carry them for hours

You really need him to stop leaving weaponry around the house, though- the absolute HEART ATTACK you had when you saw your precious baby carrying around an unloaded pistol

Also, Tachihara, babe, STOP SWEARING SO MUCH AROUND THE BABY. I CAN'T HAVE MY KID SAYING 'FUCK' TO STRANGERS - you, probably

Doesn't really ever talk about his job(s) with your kid, all they know is that he 'kills bad guys', and they think that's cool as fuck

He's not perfect, sure. But he is trying so hard to be The Perfect Parent™ and, more importantly, he loves your child to bits

taglist~ ♡ @gettinshiggywithit, @fyodorhatr, @flower-of-darkness, @bejeweledgirl, @kokoenjiandco, @pinkiipeachiikeen

of course, thank you to anon for this req!

[xclowniex]

A part of antisemitism which I think a lot of goyim don't understand is that when a person does something utterly vile and disgusting, that you hope and pray that the person who did the vile thing isn't jewish, because if they are, their vile behavior will be used to paint all jews as partaking in said vile behavior.

There is already enough antisemitic shit going around painting all jews as pedophiles, and today a news story broke (here in NZ) about a former political figure sexually abusing two teenagers.

And the political figure has name suppression, because in NZ, if you will face repercussions from the allegation of the crime which would put your mental health in a position where you would harm yourself, put you in a position where others would seek you out to harm you, or would make you unhireable, you get name suppression during the trial. This is to protect those falsely accused from having it affect their life. If you are found guilty, unless there is a threat to your life if you are named, you will then be named.

Current members of parliment get zero name suppression regardless of the crime as it is in public interest for everyone to know.

And because this political figure has name suppression, all people are left to do is speculate. Something which is safe to assume, is that it's a right wing former politician based on their lawyer.

And I'm just super worried that it's a Jewish person. We have had one jewish prime minister in my lifetime, John Key, who was a right wing politician. And I really hope it's not him. Antisemitism has increased by 600% here in NZ, and I can only imagine the rhetoric about jews that would be spread if the political figure is Jewish.

And I also feel guilty for this worry. As well, all crimes transcend ethnicity and religion and the main focus should be on the victims. However I'm just worried for my safety if people don't realize that, and start spreading antisemitic rhetoric.

And I know it's not unique to jews and antisemitism to worry about stuff like this. I just feel as if it's something a lot of goyim simple don't realize that we have to worry about.

[bitter-me]

Coffee

Young Ranpo Edogawa | M. Reader

----------

"Your smell like coffee!"

----------

Coffee isn't Ranpo's thing.

They're bitter, sure the barista adds some milk and syrup in them but they're still bitter! Which is why he likes hot chocolate better. Unlike the bitter concoction hot chocolate is sweet and nice and warm, especially if you add marshmallows! Some may say that it's too sweet but not for Ranpo. It's just the right amount of sweetness.

And that leads to his confusion as to why his friend likes coffee.

Ranpo once saw [Name] drunk at least 5 cups to finish his school assignments. Like huh? Maybe it's a thing students have to deal with? I mean -- he's technically not a student so maybe that's why it confuses him to his wits end? Regardless the reason behind that habit Ranpo's not one to judge. After all, [Name] was the first ever person that understands him and doesn't shut him down like those adults were.

In fact, [Name] seemed rather fascinated by Ranpo's deductions and how he managed to know everything in seconds.

[Name] was the first person to do that... his first... friend...

So Ranpo's not going to judge him for something as petty as that.

The day Fukuzawa took him in, even though he won't say it out loud he was happy and grateful for it. And [Name] can't be any more happier to found out how Ranpo's life seemed to have a turn for the better. Even if Ranpo doesn't admit it [Name] had always knew about his struggles, his anxiety, his fears, everything. Which why he was beyond happy to found out about it.

Unlike Ranpo who seems to be very gifted in deductions and all.

[Name] is just an average straight A's high school student.

Ranpo has his life planned out before him, a path already build just for him, a path of being a promising detective. "The greatest detective" he'd put it. While [Name] have to find his own path.

Unknowing to all...

This set's him off the rails.

What is he supposed to do? What does he need? What does he want? People say to get a job that you like, that you enjoy. But what about money? Don't you need that to survive? But what if the job ended up being too hard and he'll not like it? What if it's boring? What if it's dull?

But then again what was the point? We all die anyways right? So what was the point in getting a stable and enjoyable job, and a happy life where we all just die in the end?

What if's and questions filled his head, day in day out.

He's not ready.... He needs more time...

But time won't wait for him.. or anyone in that manner...

.

.

Coffee is nice... It keeps your adrenaline high, give you a boost. [Name] couldn't help but enjoy it. That sudden boost of energy makes him more focus on his school work rather than his thoughts. Not to mention that they have quite a nice and pleasant smell the taste is also nice. Because of that [Name] would smell like coffee a scent Ranpo had grown to love, despite saying that coffee isn't his thing.

As time goes on, Ranpo began to be occupied with cases, while [Name] is busy with school. The two barely have time for each other as they used to. But they don't mind as it would just lead to them having a lot more to talk about once they meet again. It was nice... very nice... the warm and pleasant atmosphere...

"Hey Ranpo, since you're practically a detective now. Do you see a lot of bodies."

"Of course I do."

"So seeing one won't scare you? The scent of their blood and the sight of their dead, pale, and possibly disfigured form?"

"Of course not! What kind of detective get's scared of a corpse!"

[Name] chuckles at Ranpo's words, finding the small outburst to be entertaining in some way.

It was a rhetorical question...

It was a rhetorical question, right [Name]..?

Although he doesn't say it, Ranpo felt uneasy at the question. Why is [Name] suddenly asking about that? It felt random. Out of place. Completely out of the blue. It's common to asked that to a new detective, right? But why was it so specific? It probably didn't mean anything, right? But even so... Ranpo can't shake off the feeling that there's a hidden meaning to his friend's words... like a shadow..

As the days turn into weeks and the weeks turn into months and the months turn into years...

[Name]'s graduation day is growing closer and closer.

Ranpo can't be any happier for his friend, a friend he had grown to love... was finally going to graduate high school! He even requested a few days off for this special occasion! Not that he really need to as he could just walk off like usual. But still!!

As happy as he is, Ranpo can't help but have a gut feeling that something is wrong...

He can't explain it but... It's just felt wrong...

Like a dark cloud is hovering above him... dark shadow...

And....

......He's right as always....

The day before the graduation.

Ranpo received a case, which he had refused since he did requested a few days off for his friend's special occasion, but Fukuzawa insisted that he take it. Almost begging.

With no other choice, Ranpo accepts it.

But what he saw in the crime scene was one out of his nightmares.

He didn't even need to open the sheet that covered the body as his had already knew who it is.

The keychain attached to the book bag speaks for itself.

A keychain that belongs to someone dear to him... someone close... someone he had grown to love and adore... someone he was planning to spill his heart out to... someone he was hoping he could call his...

And the results of his deductions didn't help at all. It just made things worse as it revealed to him how much the victim was suffering. A pain that the victim didn't show until their last moments. A pain that Ranpo was too ignorant to notice. A pain where the victim decided that it was too much for them and wanted it to end.

"Why..?"

.

.

The next day... Ranpo graduated from a school he didn't even attend...

He did it in someone's stead.

.

.

Ranpo doesn't like coffee.

No....

He hates it.

[weirdmarioenemies]

Name: Swirlypod

Debut: Super Mario Bros. Wonder

YIPPEE YAHOO! A brand swirlin' new snail fresh for 2023! It has been quite a long time now since we've gotten a new Mario snail, and even since I've posted about one, since I covered all the snailiest Mario snails a while ago. But lookie here! Snaily snaily snail for me to see and for you to view!

Swirlypod is so delightful! To get this out of the way first, yes, its eyes are not on the ends of stalks. Yes, this is good and okay. Some snails are like that! Especially freshwater snails. And that's the kind of snail that this snail seems to be! While sometimes seen on land, it is also seen emerging from (poisonous) swamps. It can breathe that!

Swirlypod's face is just so, so precious. Its big, innocent, curious eyes experiencing the world in the way only a snail could! Its big ol' bulbous antennae, more bulbous than they have any right being, more like a nudibranch's than a normal snail's! And its mouth! I think that's its mouth? It's like three scrumbly tentacles ready to scrumble down some delicious fungus!

Did you know that the salt marsh snail Littoraria irrorata is able to FARM fungus? They damage marsh grasses to create large wounds for fungus to grow in, and even use their own poop as fertilizer! Snails can FARM!

Yes, indeed, what a wonderful snail we have here! Thank you, Super Mario Bros. Wonder!

...Hey! That shell comes right off! Now it's all Pod, with no Swirly! Does this mean Lime is The Impostor? I may have just asked you, but that was rhetorical. Don't ask me, because I don't know! Removable shells are a common ability for cartoon snails, and of course, the turtles of this world also have removable shells. I think it doesn't really mean much at all! Though, the idea of a "hermit slug" is very amusing. A snail who can't be bothered to grow its own shell. Maybe it wants to switch shells for different styles sometimes. A slow victim of fast fashion!

Wonder is one of those games where Koopa Troopas retreat into their shells when stomped, so Swirlypod is sort of a way to have Beach Koopa in the same game as the more standardly-behaving Koopa! Once it gets back on its foot, it will try to squirm back into a shell, if one is available. You can give it back! Just drop it down at your feet, and Swirlypod will have a home once more!

Another thing that sets Swirlypods apart from Koopas is that they are sticky slimy and can slither up and down vertical surfaces! Just like in real life! They don't only climb on the left and right sides of surfaces, either. They can even go on the surface facing the screen! Not just anyone is allowed to do that!

I am saving what may be the best tidbit for last! There is a good chance Swirlypod's bulbous antennae look familiar to you. That's because they look just like Leucochloridium paradoxum, the green-banded broodsac, everyone's favorite snail parasite! The flatworm that inhabits a snail's eyestalks, making them look more like caterpillars to get a bird to eat them so they can continue their life cycle! Swirlypod definitely isn't supposed to be like, ACTUALLY infected by this funny worm, but I think the resemblance is very much intentional, between the shape and coloring. And that is so awesome to see! This isn't even meant to be a scary snail or anything, but they represented a freaky parasite anyway!

[a-very-tired-jew]

Conversations with a younger colleague about I/P conflict

In my department there is a grad student who is friendly with myself and a few others of the openly nerdy ecologists. We actively talk about anime, video games, TTRPGs, etc... We've also all collaborated on research together because we generally study the same thing, and being a grad student we are also letting them helm their own research to carve their own path. The research topic that links all of us is decomposition ecology.

Meaning, we study death, how it effects the environment, and all the things having to do with it. Often we have our own terms that we define and use, but we also work within the framework of various medical and legal definitions nationally and internationally. Recently this student has been talking to me about the I/P conflict because it has dominated their social media feed. Like many young adults, this is their first I/P conflict and their first exposure to anything regarding that region. As such, they have come to me to talk about things knowing that I am Jewish. Not out of maliciousness, but because I am the only person they talk to that has any sort of connection to it. Over these past months they have repeated the "genocide/Holocaust" rhetoric that we have seen Western Activists use to make the conflict the Worst Thing Ever. Our conversation went as follows: GS: I can't believe they're committing a Holocaust on them after what they went through. Me: How is it a Holocaust? GS: They're committing a genocide against the Palestinians. Me: They're not doing either one, but let's touch upon the first thing you said. How? GS: They're killing them in large numbers! Me: Oh...oh...that's not what made the Holocaust the Holocaust, you know that right? It was years of systematic dehumanization that culminated in what we know. There were death camps, torture, experimentation, and so much more than simple "killing in large numbers". GS: Damn public school education... Me: You didn't really go over it too much did you? GS: WWII was, like, a week I want to say. Me: *sigh* yeah, not surprised at all. GS: Okay, so a genocide then? Me: GS, what do we study? GS: Decomp Me: and that involves? GS: Death Me: One avenue of which is mass casualty events which a number of our friends have published on. GS: Yeah! I read those papers, they were really good. Me: They were, but do you remember conversations we had about them and what differentiates mass casualty events from one another? GS: Cause? Me: And...? GS: Shit. Intent. Me: Exactly. Has their been an official stated intent to commit any genocide? I mean, you've got the bigots in the government like Ben Givir and the shit they say, I'll give you that. But has the official stance been genocidal? GS: No. I don't think so. Me: What has it been? GS: To get the hostages back and get rid of Hamas. Me: Uh huh, and what has been Hamas's stated intent? GS: To kill Zionists. Me: And before 2017 when they changed the wording in their charter? GS: ah fuck...it's Jews isn't it? Me: Ding ding ding. GS: So that's why no one in the group has said it's a genocide... Me: Correct. Humanitarian crisis brought about by war? Yes. Mass casualty event? Certainly. But genocide? Well, there's a reason no one in our circle has endorsed the term. And remember, we're considered experts on death. GS: I got puppeted didn't I? Me: Yep. GS: Shit. The only reason this went so well is due to our friendship and mentor/mentee dynamic. They already trust me to not lead them astray, be informed, and address the holes in their knowledge. Hell, they help me be a better scientist as well with how they bring in new and novel techniques that I didn't know. But they're still getting a lot of their info from TikTok and IG, and they've talked about a lot of BS from those two particular apps these past few years. This is just the latest (they had a TikTok induced anti-GMO trend for a while, it was bad).

[consumedbyfeels]

To those people saying Tevan can't be endgame because Buck needs to explore his sexuality. He's done enough exploring, he has sampled the buffet and gone for seconds and mixed flavors and even sampled in places you have no business sampling and with things from janitor's closet. Now he want to settle down at a nice restaurant with one meal for the rest of his life that no else samples.

He wants commitment he wants someone to love. And maybe he didn't sample all sides of the table but he can still explore what he might like with the one meal just switch out salad for fries every once in a while or trying adding pear even if it seems strange. You can get creative and explore with one person. It's probably even better with feelings and trust and love. And it's a safe space. So yeah he may not be at the buffet table anymore but he can still explore. And besides he hasn't been at the buffet table in a long while. he has been searching for that one meal since Abby that's what all these years he was doing with Ali, Taylor, and Natalia he wants to settle down.

You don't tell Straight people they have to explore their options. You don't tell people who come out in high school to explore their options. So why is this different?

Edit: I wanted to clarify cuz I think there might have been a little confusion. I'm not saying Tevan will be endgame its too early in the relationship to know what will become of them (yes I love Tevan and would love for them to end the series together but mostly I just want both Buck and Tommy to be happy) The thing this post was ment to address is the fact that a certain subset of the fandom (not naming names but we all know the ones) have been trying to perpetuate the bi people are all ho's stereotype, some even going as far as to want Buck to cheat on Tommy (leading into another horrible stereotype about bi people being cheaters) just because they don't like a ship. They would all be fine with Buck marrying the first man he dated if it was we all know who but since it isn't it's a problem. Assuming Buck and Tommy aren't endgame (again too early to say one way or another) but assuming they aren't Buck doesn't have to sleep around after they break up he can date seriously like he was doing before, now just with this new part of himself on the surface. He could go on dates with men and women. I stand by my point earlier regardless of who it is or what gender they are Buck wants commitment. Who knows maybe when the show is all said and done he marries a woman but that doesn't negate his sexuality or make this point in his life any less valid. We should just be happy that he is happy and living his best most authentic life. That boy deserves a break. Please be kind to each other and be careful what harmful stereotypes and rhetoric you perpetuate intentionally or otherwise. its harmful. Even if you are doing so with fictional characters and not real people. It still causes harm in the real world.