#This is a call for all theorists!

[hotguycomiczine]

To: you

From: Pearl <Pearl@hermitherald.com>

Subject: New milestone! (and a new clue? 👀)

Hey everyone! Looks like there's a whole bunch of new people waiting for the latest scoop! Well, don't you worry... I'm on the scent of something pretty big that I think will satisfy the lot of you. And I know I'm not the only one doing some investigating— yeah, that's right, I see you! There's a few readers out here who think they know how it all plays out! Wanna share some notes? You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours? Or maybe you don't need me to share these juicy scoops... that's fine! We can see just who got the yarn untangled once it's done a-weaving. Just remember— both threads and herrings can share the same red. Well, see you next time! Keep your eyes peeled ;) Yours in pursuit of the truth, Pearl Moon

[biblically-accurate-dca]

first meetings (bonus panel under the cut!!)

i didnt wanna add it to the main post bc it's a different size and it would mess up the format lmaooo

i think about these two a lot i think they could be really fun together in several ways. monty golf is right next to the daycare after all!!

[hall0wedwyrm]

I woke up today not expecting to get some weird lore about Sans and Papyrus

AND YET HERE WE ARE

How does Papyrus know about Jevil. How does PAPYRUS know about JEVIL. HOW DOES-

Its such a Papyrus way of explaining Jevil too. A clown playing 'games' with everyone and generally being a menace would be annoying and would be the reason he would be locked away...

This just adds to the major Deltarune theories tbh (Papyrus is the Knight and The Brothers being from Deltarune) and also because I dont know what else to think of it.

[bugwolfsstuff]

I saw a Indo-raptor x Blue jurassic park tiktok on fyp and someone tell me why someone in the comments wrote an entire ass paragraph about how the indo-raptor is an 'abomination' and 'a testament to human hybris' and 'does not deserve nice things'

Like oh my gods bro what did Ripper do to you specifically😭I don't even ship it or even in that fandom no more but I honestly half expected them to start spitting bible verses at her.

[ludinusdaleth]

the thing about c3s plot "coming out of nowhere" is if you look in my friends twitter accounts far enough, we realized a second calamity about the gods morality & mortality probably led by ludinus would happen, before the m9 even went to travelercon. and i know before i had joined their discussion theyd pieced some together long before me. there were enough plot threads to hint, it was just about loose interpretation at the time.

[theoryandahalf]

I feel like we should keep a thread of the theorist hosts being absolute chaos gremlins on Instagram because I was stalking Tom's Instagram posts (as one does) and came across this gem of an interaction:

For context this was on a video where Tom made a cover of Pikachu's Goodbye for Mat.

AND THERE'S SO MUCH MORE TOO?? It's not just Tom and Santi either, all four hosts are constantly at each others' throats and it makes me really want another GTLive where it's just Mat and the hosts on the couch doing dumb shit. I would watch the hell out of that.

From what I've seen so far it seems like there's some reoccuring themes:

Tom and Santi's beef (obviously)

Amy fanning the flames and just generally being a general menace

Lee being the slightly normal(?) one, also he constantly threatens to steal Tom's content

Santi compliments Tom aggressively to which Tom insults Santi aggressively which causes Santi to insult Tom aggressively

And ok I'll stop yapping now but I DID NOT ANTICIPATE HOW MUCH CHAOS THE NEW HOSTS WILL BRING and honestly? I'm all here for it.

(also I've just given up on being anonymous now LMAO it's so annoying how anonymous asks doesn't allow images or links)

Absolutely! When it’s not late o’clock where I live I’ll go through my phone to find the screenshots I saved of some of their more interesting moments.

Here’s two quick ones from Santi. Sir, thats a boyfriend pose, what are you doing?

[reypevensie]

My new favorite thing about writing this series is Poe Dameron roasting Maglor. I just find that concept funny, because Poe would roast everyone (except Leia and Chewie for obvious reasons), so not even Maglor My-Family-Invented-War-Crimes Fëanorion (who is also Galadriel’s cousin and Elrond’s former foster father) is safe from that. It only gets worse when Poe finds out his age and that he seriously considers singing as an effective battle strategy.

[frodo-baggins]

you guys wouldn’t believe me if i told you how badly my move yesterday went 😭

[beeribas]

Learning more about how elections actually work and how Trump won 2016 has gotten me thinking. All I can think is how satisfying, how poetic, how karmic it would be if Trump were to loose 2024 as he won 2016; thanks to the popular vote.

[firelord-frowny]

not to be a conspiracy theorist* but the orange terror definitely 100% without a doubt orchestrated this wack ass ~assassination attempt~

[wild-at-mind]

Listening to Jon Ronson's podcast series on the 'culture wars' that ignited during the pandemic, and it had a very interesting insight on what makes people so vehemently convinced of their conspiracy theory beliefs- if it mixes with personal grievances it can become incredibly strong for that person individually. Example given was Judy Mikovits, a scientist who fell into conspiracy thinking after her research into potential viral causes of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome was discredited in 2011. Those speaking on the podcast who knew her work believe Mikovits made an honest mistake caused by contaminated lab equipment. And from the interview with her, it was clear she feels very strongly about finding something that can help sufferers of CFS. So there's the powerful emotional aspect of her being unable to accept her own failure to do that.

For my dad, it was the fact that his mother, my grandmother, who is in her 90s and had been living alone in good physical and mental health, began to show symptoms of cognitive decline early in lockdown when she could no longer meet her friends and socialise. She's now in a dementia home. And she is very elderly so you could say that she might have developed dementia anyway, but my dad who was visiting her regularly saw it happening in real time and made the direct connection to lockdown. That started him off with the emotional bias against lockdown. (Also he hated masks because he's extremely short sighted and was sick of them fogging his glasses- I feel like there were probably solutions to that one that he didn't try though, as a fellow glasses wearer.)

I've ranted before about people trying to give smart insights on susceptable groups (the old 'did you know left wing people can fall for conspiracy theories?? And intelligent people??' ones who tell on themselves by revealing they think this is somehow about intelligence level). This is the first time I've seen someone make the connection to an individual emotional upheaval. I think it's very good insight. We sort of knew that what happened with his mother was connected to his views on the pandemic in some way, but this was somewhat of a lightbulb moment for me.

[louderfade]

exene talking about the state of the world. the good stuff starts at eight minutes. or you can just read the transcript complete with the usual errors that accompany robot transcribed speech (the irony of which is not lost on me). maybe it's not about transhumanism and living forever (or maybe it is who knows), but there's definitely an agenda of surveillance and control at work which is designed to keep the powerful in power. cash rules everything around me and you will own nothing etc. the future is worse.

[loadsofcats]

Hate hate hate digitalisation hate only being able to pay with credit cards hate touchscreens instead of people hate cashierless shops hate how ai is causing less jobs and less privacy and hate generated art and generated stories and aaaaaaaaagggghhhhhhhh

[storyuntrue]

my energy is minimal, so i come here, i report bot blogs, i scroll a bit and i leave.

[evisxerate]

Ppl on Tumblr will really sit here and act like sexuality can't actively be flexible or change over time. like okay lmfao

[not-poignant]

We teach our kids to read

We must teach our kids to read media too

We prioritise book literacy

but arguably most kids consume far, far more mass media, and that means learning mass media literacy.

And those skills involve everything OP talked about - critical thinking, self-responsibility, reaching out for support, asking questions about what you're seeing (and getting non-judgemental, compassionate responses that are appropriate for your child), reminders that what they see on TV is rarely real, and 'if a person kept making you feel bad, you'd tell them to stop. If a show keeps making you feel bad in a way that's not okay, you turn that show off, or you come to me or someone you trust and talk about it.'

I once knew a guy who refused to let his kids play video games. He's an Assoc. Professor and is one of the most globally respected orofacial pain specialists in the world. He said they can play when they're in their late teens because there's so much garbage in them.

And I said gently, with my Media Studies background, 'you don't have to listen to me because I'm just here for my absolutely brutal jaw pain, but with all respect, how will your kids know how to negotiate or deal with any difficult, challenging, or overwhelming themes in the games they encounter when they're 16 or 17? How are you preparing them for that world now? Or will you just throw them in the deep end? Because it sounds like you only want the best for your kids. Media literacy is really important, and violent video games are so much easier for any kid to negotiate if they have a parent helping htem out with it, instead of telling them it's all 'garbage' and leaving them to fend for themselves.'

Because he's a great human being, he asked me for a bunch of peer reviewed studies on media literacy, I sent them on over, along with a rec for the book Moral Combat: Why the War on Video Games is Wrong (seriously go read it right now) and he realised that media literacy is at least as important as book literacy.

If you know it's important to teach your kids to read.

Please know it's equally important to teach your kids how to read mass media.

I often see posts about curating your own online experience that make the point, “content creators aren’t your parents.” And, yes, that is absolutely true! And I try not to be like “as a parent,“ but as a parent…

EVEN PARENTS ARE SUPPOSED TO ENCOURAGE RESPONSIBLE READING/VIEWING BEHAVIOR. NOT filter everything ahead of time for their kid.

When my kiddo was 5, his pediatrician was asking him the usual Well Child Visit questions (“What are your favorite foods? What do you do to get your body moving? Do you know what to do if you get lost in a public place?” Etc.) and she asked, “What do you do if you see something on TV that scares or upsets you?”

I piped up like, “Oh, he doesn’t watch TV without one of us in the room,” which was true at the time and is still largely true now. She said, “Yes, but that won’t always be the case, so make sure you’re talking to him about what to do if he sees something that upsets him.”

So we started talking to him about that, and the answer is simple: “Turn it off or leave the room, and talk to someone you trust about what you saw and what you’re feeling.”

The answer is NOT “Ask your parents to make sure you never see anything upsetting again,” because that’s just not possible — and ultimately that would be doing the kid a disservice, since sooner or later he’s going to be out in the world where we can’t control what he watches or reads. That doesn’t mean we don’t try to make sure he’s watching/reading age-appropriate stuff, it just means that’s not the only safeguard he has — and that’s a good thing.

So yes, content creators aren’t your parents and aren’t responsible for making sure you never see anything you don’t like — but also, your own parents should have taught you what to do when that happens. So if they didn’t, take it from me, your internet mom:

Turn it off.

Walk away.

Talk to someone you trust about how you’re feeling.

And leave the person who created the thing that upset you alone.