#about as concise as you can get

[thedisablednaturalist]

Sometimes terms mean certain things and belong to certain groups of people and are not meant to apply to people outside that group. And that is on purpose and valid. You can make your own terms to describe your own experiences, you don't get to take terms from other people, especially people more vulnerable/less privileged than you. If multiple people tell you that the term is not for you, respect that.

When terms get used for many different situations they get diluted and trivialized. Remember "trigger"? It was a specific medical term and is now used to mean "something that pissed or upset someone". Brain fog is now turning into abled people just being a little sleepy or out of it, not literally a clinical term for brains not functioning correctly due to various illnesses. I tell someone I have brain fog and they say lol me too XD no you fucking don't. "Spirit animal" was taken from indigenous peoples so white people could make funny haha relatable t-shirts. Two spirit almost got taken by queer white people as well (although I think most people have backed off on that hopefully).

Not everything needs to apply to as many people as possible. You don't need to and can't relate to everyone. We can still support each other while respecting differences.

(Edited ver)

[sugaredoleander]

i say this with love. house fanfic writers, if you ever want me to beta something for medical accuracy, i'll fucking do it no questions asked

[eloquentsisyphianturmoil]

Dear silm fandom, concerning Fandom meta. Might be provocative for some.

‘The silm fandom is misogynistic’ ‘Feanorian fans are misunderstanding the characters’ ‘Silm fans hate Elwing’ And so on.

Can we stop? Your opinions are not better if you like feanorians. Your opinions are not better if you like peredhil. This is not black and white. I won’t argue ‘not all silm fans’, because I recognise that we have problems. But condescension will not fix them. Thank you.

[gazlineart]

Star faerie (bisexual panic alien edition) au johnshi that broke sai every time I saved so I had to call it good here

Bonus: there's not a single brain cell behind those eyes and Johnny is failing upwards with high ranking aliens (he has priorities)

[townofcadence]

So I've seen a lot of people with rules against reblogging their art. And I totally understand and respect that! If you don't want it shared, that's 100% your decision. I've been trying to adhere to that by only replying or liking things. I totally get not wanting your stuff to break containment in any way, or having issues tracking things if the notes get too big, or even anxiety being seen by too many people! But-- now I've been thinking about how my way of handling things could effect friends who do want people to share things? I've made an effort not to cause problems by reblogging art, in case someone might not want me to (even if it's not necessarily in their rules, since sometimes those posts are made ooc, but not added). But lately I've been feeling maybe avoiding it entirely just in case ends up with me not supporting my mutuals' art, even if i might really like the work and they might want it to be shared. And I don't want it to seem like I don't care or don't think it's good enough to share or something because of anxiety. Soooo if you post art and you're okay with me reblogging it and tag talking about what you make if I want to, could you maybe give this a like or a reply so i know it's cool? So I can reference this in the future if my soup brain forgets? You can also reply if you have specific rules, besides the obvious 'if it's tagged with do not reblog, do not reblog' or something lol. But I want to make an active effort to support people who want to share if i like it!

[syrenki]

Does pretending to be fine on the outside bring you at least some sort of satisfaction? That they won’t see how bad it gets

yesss and it's so selfish and embarrassing, i keep hoping someday they'll all see right through the bullshit and then they'll say "oh my, it was so very bad all along and you never said anything? you withstood it all and never brought any attention to yourself? that's so selfless, i could never, i would have broken earlier, you are so strong. we will help you now, you deserve it now because you never asked for anything!!!" but it never happens and it never will happen and the worse it gets for me the more i put on the cheerful and selfless and carefree demeanor, i get so desperate to keep it all up because if i ever drop the act and start Acting Depressed, start wearing my arms out or stop smiling at everybody all the time, i would be acting selfish, i would be attention-seeking, i would be undeserving of any help at all since i'm simply craving attention. you see what i mean? it's all twisted but i swear there is a logic there - the more desperately i need something to change, the kinder i will act, the milder, gentler, more selfless, quieter, i have to handle it with humility because not complaining and just taking it quietly is what would make me deserving of some care, and sometimes i need it so badly that i'd do anything to deserve it. i keep thinking if i deserved it i would have already received it, only that's not how people function, people go to psychologists or tell their friends 'i'm depreseed' and that's how they get help, not through martyrdom and humility. but i do it the quiet way and the worse things get the quieter and more mellow i become and it will probably go on this way until i kill myself and then people will say "holy shit, she was always so cute and kind and pastel, nobody could have expected this, who could have had any idea?"

[cuddlytogas]

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

[sigh]

anyway. finally, the really really big one:

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

[maxdurden]

Lhokta Lore

The Lhokta Star Cluster holds three solar systems together: The Mordician System, the home of humans who over the years have explored, colonized and categorized the Cluster, was eventually abandoned after its resources had been exhausted. The Oneira System, lush with life and magic, successfully expelled Mordician influence but not before years of war brought its previously isolated planets together in a bid for survival. Finally, the Pyrrhic system, rich with resources but sparsely populated, became a refuge for Mordicians fleeing the collapse of their empire. 

(This is a promised lore dump for an OC universe of mine that has,,, wayyy too much worldbuilding going on for its own good. The rest is under a read more because! It’s long! Also fair warning before you proceed further, it’s by no means a finished product, so be gentle. But also! I would love to discuss it with folks if they find it interesting because it’s definitely a constantly growing thing and having people to bounce ideas off of is fun and the info here is honestly only the tip of the iceberg, i fear)

Timeline:

Magic: 

The Elsewhither is a plane of existence which sits atop and weaves through the world of the Lhokta Cluster. Gods make their home here, carving out parts of the wild realm of pure magic to create domains which they rule. All magic hails from the Elsewhither. Most commonly, magic is drawn from the Elsewhither through devotion to a god. Druids gain power from deities to whom they pledge fealty, or make a deal. Gods, whose existence is dependent on the belief of their followers, are often eager to strike such deals to ensure their continued survival. Some magic is drawn from the Elsewhither by nature of proximity. There are places where the plane bleeds into the material world of Lhokta, and there are demigods who pull it closer by merely existing. Those who have this kind of special relationship with the Elsewhither are rare, but possess an innate ability to see the Veil—the partition between the material plane and the Elsewhither—and manipulate it to cast magic. Lastly, there is the study of the language of the gods. When known to and studied by mortals, this language can allow them access to some level of magical ability.

Key Planets

The Oneira System:

⁽ᵗʰᶦˢ ˢʸˢᵗᵉᵐ, ᶦⁿ ᵖᵃʳᵗᶦᶜᵘˡᵃʳ, ᶦˢ ᵐʸ ᵇᵃᵇʸ ˢᵒ ᶦᶠ ʸᵒᵘ ᵗʰᶦⁿᵏ ʸᵒᵘ ˢᵉᵉ ᶠᵃᵛᵒʳᶦᵗᶦˢᵐ ᵇᵉᶦⁿᵍ ᵉˣʰᶦᵇᶦᵗᵉᵈ,,, ʸᵒᵘ’ʳᵉ ʳᶦᵍʰᵗ⁾

Menaea: The largest surviving human colony in the Oneira System, Menaea is also the seat of power for the Oneiran Delegation. Its development has been closely watched, and shepherded by the neighboring planet of Faerie. This is where the Delegation meets, as well as the Council of Seven, which seats a Septenary from each of the six Menaean provinces, as well as one representative from the neighboring planet of Halou. The Menaean Septenaries are also sovereign leaders of their respective province and aren’t elected. Most Delegate positions have also lapsed into a kind of lazy inheritance, but a few delegates are still elected. This includes the Septenary from Halou, who serves a seven year term before an election is held on their homeworld. Menaea is seen as a hub of culture and the academic study of magic. 

Faerie: No other planet is so closely interwoven with the Elsewhither. Its inhabitants include the fey, split roughly into the Seelie and Unseelie Courts; the dragons, which exist both as wild dragons and those domesticated by the Seelie Court; and the giants, which live in tentative peace with the fey every since they collaborated to defeat Mordician colonists. Aside from the giants, all creatures living on Faerie are deeply magical and immortal. Fey come in all kinds of shapes and sizes, from the Sylphs to pixies to Red Caps. Sylphs make up the majority of the actual Seelie Court, though other kinds of fey are aligned with the court, and the Fey Queen herself is a Sylph. Fey have an innate connection with the Elsewhither, the Veil and magic. Sylphs also traditionally take a bondmate in a dragon, which grows with them and acts as a magical conduit. They hold an event called the Wild Hunt where a contender is chosen to hunt a stag through the feywild. The Snarl denotes parts of the feywild where the Elsewhither practically breaks through onto the material plane, leaving the feywild even wilder and thriving with unpredictable magic.

Halou: The third planet in the ‘Central Ring,’ Halou holds more power than most other planets in the Oneira system. It is a heavily forested planet, populated by Audaxians (spider folks), Alethians (snake folks), and Therons (bird folks). 

Nochta: A planet of balance, Nochta has always been ruled by two god-brothers, one of order and fate and the other of chaos and free will. Aisa, the god of fate, had consolidated power and killed his brother bringing a suffocating stasis to the planet. He saw in the future one opportunity to once again bring his world glory, or else destroy it, and had a child with a mortal queen. Unfortunately, balance could not be restored before colonization by Mordis turned the planet into a husk of its former self. (This planet is mostly notable for being the homeworld of Maire, the child of Aisa, another OC)

Tarsus: The birthplace of vampires. Tarsus is a rocky, mountainous and inhospitable planet. A cult to the goddess Malochre was cursed with vampirism and then subsequently drained the planet of all life aside from themselves. While the curse—or disease, depending on who you ask—has long since spread from its planetary confines, those who live there and are still devoted to their goddess consider themselves to be the only true vampires, while all the rest are lowly parasites. They call themselves the Children of Malochre.

Quoah: A mining colony of Menaea and Faerie in the Outskirts, the people of Quoah are overworked, disadvantaged and poor. This particular colony is notable mostly for being the birth place of Erastos Arsinoe (an OC of mine who becomes their delegate and then gets up to a lot of mischief and mess)

The Mordician System:

Mordis: The human homeworld, once a marvel of scientific progress, eventually turns to a hollow shell of itself. It was the hub of human colonization efforts, stretching itself in all directions as colonists were sent to both of its neighboring systems. In the reckless pursuit of progress, the planet became completely inhospitable to life and its sprawling empire collapsed, retreating to Pyrrhus in the Pyrrhic System. 

The Pyrrhic System:

Pyrrhus: Rising from the ashes of Mordis’ failure, Pyrrhus is a hub for human civilization that appears destined to make all the same mistakes again. It exists as a cyberpunk dystopia, with layers of undercity accumulating in the dark as those with power ceaselessly build upwards. Eventually, the expansion spills from the containment of their planet.

Torr: A mining colony and high security prison, this planet has been commandeered by the Pyrrhic government as a way to handle the vampirism problem that ravages all of the systems. A tidally locked planet, the mines are built on the half of the planet trapped in eternal daylight, making it (nearly) impossible for its prisoners and workforce to escape.

[icewindandboringhorror]

Everytime I face a new character limit on a website that didn't have them before/used to have really long ones... AUGHHhhh the modern social media world was not made for people like me (lovers of details, rambling, elaboration, thorough explanation, and nuance)

[the-lark-ascending69]

> be a robin buckley fan

> be lesbian

> project on robin

> look up "internalized homophobia robin buckley" on tumblr because it's cathartic

> 3/4 of the posts are about st3ddie or just about steve

[marbleboa]

Very excited for the 7th Divison Arc aftermath fic, getting to write Koyama’s POV on the whole thing as well as getting to work with Scars outside of my usual duo has been a lot of fun, but also. My god. The “getting the others up to speed/coming to terms with the fact that We Fucked Up” discussion has been so tricky to keep on track.

Everyone is sleep deprived, has some level of physical/mental exhaustion, and are also contending with the kind of worldview shake-up that often makes people go in defense mode. The way arguments keep breaking out when I let myself go with the flow of the conversation a bit, I feel like I’m attempting to wrangle a group of cranky toddlers.

[morphinejunkie]

hi morph! what are your favorites scenes in crush? for any reason that is

i have a go-to answer for this question, like the "davey pavone" scene in ch 37 that has some of the strongest writing in the whole fic. it's the only time mello talks so much at length, obviously, and it's also the only time we see mello stutter mid-sentence. the emotionality of the scene took me by surprise. i didn't expect matt to say he was sorry for what happened - that wasn't in the outline.

another one is the jericho chapter, ch 25, especially when they're in the motel, because it calls back to my favourite m2 trope in a lot of fanfic that i've read which is them on the road in rural america, staying in shitty places, skulking around at night to avoid attention. it's my favourite image of their dynamic.

i also love ch 35, matt talking about their day in tokyo, because it's the only time you get to see how the two of them interact on a day-to-day basis. to see them have a natural rhythm with one another, and how they've gotten used to one another, is really nice. i love how m2 is very nonverbal around one another, they have strong synergy when they're not rubbing each other the wrong way.

[quietlyblooms]

we’re feeling off, folks, so it’s gonna be another quiet night from me. i’m not built to socialize this much in such a short span of time 😔

[butchshepherd]

"Contextualising the weaponisation of dogs at Europe’s borders today within a much longer history of racial violence, the article shows how canines have been systematically deployed by colonial and white supremacist powers against racialised bodies as tools to enact and secure racial order."

[byanyan]

i'm having a good time and i'm being very normal about this

[tytonnidaie]

trigun so easy to sift through people worth following the litmus test is just "what do they think of knives"