#ace week 2020

[simbistardis]

The asexual experience for white people is not the same for racially and ethnically marginalized people. Black aces and other asexuals of color must fight against stereotypes like the Jezebel, the Mammy, the China doll or the Geisha Girl, or the desexualized Asian male trope that have historically stripped our personhood of any nuance. Therefore, the insecurities we harbor that prevent many from even identifying within the community are valid.

Yes, diversifying spaces online and IRL can be hard. As the ace community continues to grow, BIPOC aces speaking on our experiences should be listened to and affirmed by white aces and all allosexual people alike. White aces with platforms in the community and beyond should especially “take the initiative to actively address anti-Blackness, they need to credit the Black aces they learn from, and they need to acknowledge the fact of that their whiteness helps to propel their careers,” Sherronda explains in the same interview. As even within the ace community, Black and POC asexuals often endure the harm of white supremacy and/or racial antagonism with little to no defense or solidarity from white asexuals.

BIPOC aces should know that we have long deserved better than the colonization of our sexuality. Societal myths, racial stereotypes, and tropes shouldn’t dictate our perception of ourselves. Luckily, in our broad understanding of (a)sexuality, we have many of the tools, knowledge, and resources to begin shifting narratives of sexuality that can ultimately benefit all people of color, whether they’re self-identified as asexual or not.

Asexuals of Color Still Seek To Validate Their Sexuality by Ebony Purks for Rebellious Magazine (2021)

[arielluva]

if only things had been different for you

id under cut

[ID] a digital painting of dahlia hawthorne and iris from ace attorney. their backs are facing each other, with dahlia on the far left of the picture, and iris on the far right. their hair is blowing towards each other, and connecting in the middle. dahlia is looking over her shoulder, with a neutral, but cold, expression. a single tear is falling from her eye, and her loose hair is blowing into her face. her right eye is not visible. white glowing butterflies are flying around her, and she has a noose around her neck. iris is facing sister bikini, who is off screen. iris is also crying, but bikini is wiping away her tears. iris's loose hair is blowing behind her, and out of her face. above dahlia and iris are two drawings of dusky bridge. above dahlia, the bridge shows the silhouettes of valerie hawthorne pointing a gun at terry fawles, who was holding a young dahlia hostage. no details can be seen on the figures. above iris, dusky bridge is on fire. underneath dahlia, there are red dahlias that are dripping blood, and under iris there are some irises. in the center of the picture, dahlia and iris as children are standing side by side. their hair is black and medium length. they have bangs and both twins have a braid going down the side of their head, dahlia's on the right side of her head, and iris' on the left. they are both wearing white dresses, white knee-high socks, and black mary jane shoes. both of their dresses are dirty, with dahlia's being slightly dirtier. [end ID]

[herlockslimbo]

after you finish 5-5 bobby fulbright is just eternally a really awkward character to see ingame. like you see him in the dlc case and it’s like heyyy….my good pal fulbright……..how’s it going……hahaha….

except i was spoiled going into dd so this effect has just been permanently applied to me from the outset

[renirae]

guys I think I'm addicted to making WAY too detailed illustrations for all of my fics now

(this one is from chapter one of 'cause I'm still turning out - a fic about Midoriya learning that he's aroace, with Shinsou's help :))

[odeandiewut]

old maria icon

[illdothehotvoice]

Cannot WAIT to go on Twitter and see everyone upset that the ace attorney announcement was fucking among us meanwhile I am SO fucking happy

[riacte]

The Hermitcraft identity in relation to 2020 MCC - a plea to the modern Hermitcraft fandom to stop ignoring hermits

(An angry, semi-biased essay of 3.4k words about MCC9, MCC10, and False Supremacy)

Spurred by the recent Dream drama, people are bringing up reasons to dislike him and the DTeam, including MCC10 Red Rabbits (Jimmy, Dream, George, Puffy) (Sep 2020). Such as this tweet (Jan 2025) which has gathered 20k likes at the time of writing. Main talking points include: them ignoring Jimmy and them talking shit about his friends during Dodgebolt. It is easy to feel bad for Jimmy and feel righteous anger over Jimmy’s friends being shat upon. However, bringing up the lack of sportsmanship in relation to only Jimmy is reductive and ignores the overall context of the hermits being underestimated only to prove people wrong. 

The 2020 MCC hermits faced a long history of being overlooked and seen as “cannon fodder” / “free kills”, only for hermit duos to win twice in a row, with a hermit completing an ace and becoming the first back to back winner. Because while they were complaining about the Dodgebolt players missing their shots, False of Hermitcraft fame completed an ace in which she shot all four opponents in one round. Impressively, she did this with four arrows, meaning she did not miss a single shot. Thus, she directly contradicted any criticism about “missing shots”. This, combined with MCC9 which occurred two weeks ago, started the legacy of hermits winning MCCs, and proved that they were not to be underestimated. 

MCC10 Dodgebolt (from Jimmy’s perspective)

Onto the Dodgebolt itself. For context, Red team got third and missed out on Dodgebolt so they were understandably salty. Members of the Dodgebolt finale teams include:

Orange (winning team): Pete, False, Cub, Joel

Green: Scott, Shubble, Quig, Lizzie

These are all either Jimmy’s friends or people Jimmy knew/ in his circle. For instance, Pete and Jimmy were in the same team for MCC7 Orange (Jimmy, Martyn, Pete, HBomb). This was also a Dodgebolt with many hermits (False, Cub) or hermit adjacents (Joel would become a future hermit but he was NOT treated as a hermit in 2020, Scott, Shubble, Lizzie). 

Select quotes before/during Dodgebolt:

“We could’ve easily taken either of these teams too in Dodgebolt as well.” [2:15:19]

“This is too slow! C’mon, shoot shoot!” [2:19:15]

“We don’t really know anybody who’s in here” [2:19:56]

“Orange is choking a little bit” [2:20:44]

“These are slow games! Everyone’s missing so much.” [2:21:50]

“None of them are good shots, they’re all just missing.” [2:21:59]

“Let’s just pretend these are the two viewer teams.” [2:22:21]

Round 4 (Orange 2 - Green 1), aka False’s ace round, is when they start to care about False— “False is literally carrying”. They mention Green shouldn’t aim for Pete and aim for the others, False included. Jimmy points out False has hit every single shot when she takes out three. They acknowledge False’s skills at the least when hard proof is shown to them. 

Orange wins MCC10, Cub and Joel get their first win. HBomb is losing his shit in the admin stream as the guy who made the “False is going to be great at Dodgebolt” Reddit post. False became the first back to back winner following her victory in MCC9 with Blue Bats Rendog, HBomb, and Fruitberries. Another hermit duo has won MCC, showing the strength of hermit teams. But how did the story begin?

The Hermitcraft identity in 2020 MCC - False, Ren, Cub, Grian

Once upon a time, from a hermit perspective, MCC was only about False and Ren. 

After Jevin in MCC1, False and Ren joined together in MCC4 Yellow alongside now hermit adjacents Fwhip and Katherine. Importantly, they formed a hermit duo and hence started the tradition of hermit teams. It was False and Ren who first established the narrative of hermit teams. The hermits would join MCC, but only when with each other or with adjacents. They would be in their comfort zone. While they had fun, they wouldn’t win.

Given the fact that a lot of hermits have now branched out, this sentiment is less important, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. The hermits continuously support their friends regardless of teams and see a win for any hermit as a win for all of them. Still, it is my firm belief that the original narrative is only this strong because of False and Ren together. They got a boost because of Blue Bats 9 clout and do-not-separatism, but I think False and Ren, when teamed together, are just genuinely happy to be there and play games because they simply really enjoy each other’s company. The hermits are all wholesome, but False and Ren in particular helped to push the narrative of hermits being friends who stick by each other, win together, and just have a fun, whimsical time in MCC. This is also why False and Ren were the only hermits capable of forming Blue Bats and its wholesome legacy— same reason why it could only ever be HBomb and Fruitberries. 

While Pearl and Joel are hermits, they were not hermits in 2020 and they were not treated as hermits by themselves, the hermits, or the wider community. However, there was definitely a stereotype that the “builders” were less “cracked at the game”— builders in this case refer to people like Fwhip. However, before MCC9, hermit adjacents (NOT hermits) have made their way to the Dodgebolt stage, with Fwhip winning in MCC7 (HBomb, Pete, Eret). Dodgebolt finale teams who didn’t win DB include: MCC6 Orange with Jimmy and Martyn, and MCC8 with Fwhip and Joel. Meanwhile, from 6 to 8, the hermit teams (aka. False and Ren teams) got ninth three times in a row. MCC6 Yellow: False, Ren, Cub, Ryguyrocky. MCC7 Aqua: False, Ren, Grian, Pearl. MCC8 Yellow: False, Ren, Cub, Pearl. It should be plainly obvious that even among the builders (hermits included), the hermits (specifically False, Ren, Cub, Grian, not Pearl and Joel) were seen as “worse”. I would even argue it’s specifically Ren and False because they were The Hermit Representatives— Grian was in non hermit duo teams, and Cub played every other MCC. 

Also, at the time, the hermits were rather isolated from the rest of the MCYT community. Their closest non-hermit buddy was probably Pearl. They were true hermits. This was before Life Series or whatever. This was 2020. The idea of the hermits hanging out with speedrunners and competitive players was impossible. 

So, what changed? Insert one of the most memorable, significant, and culturally important MCC wins ever: the one, the only, MCC9 Blue Bats. 

MCC9 - Blue Bats and Dreamslayer

To be fair, it’s probably unreasonable for me to act like a team from 2020 is still widely known and remembered. It’s not like all four of them still talk about it. It’s not like one of them used their crown in a fairly popular experimental Minecraft series, creating a chain of events that led to the normalising of shipping in traffic/hermit fan circles. It’s not like one of them actually got onto the Hermitcraft server for a 2023 event and it all started from MCC9. It’s not like MCC9 Blue Bats is remembered in any official, tangible, and physical form in the year 2024– oh wait. 

Instead of a 170k fanfic, here’s a TLDR: HBomb and Fruit were seen as carrying False and Ren. They were the underdogs which Reddit ranked them in 6th. They went on a training arc and were doing pretty good in the MCC until it came to their least wanted game in game 7— Survival Games. Then they went crazy and got 7200 coins multiplied, landing them firmly in first. Even if you argue the coins were unfair (which some people did), Blue Bats got 14 kills out of a possible 36. Fruitberries got 8 kills because he’s insane. Blue had a steady SoT and faced Green in Dodgebolt, which was, coincidentally, 2/4 DTeam (George, Sapnap, Eret, Kratzy). Blue Bats were two down in Dodgebolt and was about to lose, then pulled a reverse sweep in which they won three rounds in a row. So Blue won, lives were changed forever, Rendog never got over being called king, we all know it, etc etc, and immediately faced backlash from angry stans. You can still see salty people under their win announcement tweet. This was September 12th, 2020. Two weeks later, September 26th, 2020, Orange won MCC10, False did a perfect ace (“False Supremacy”), and became the first back to back winner. 

Also, Grian killed Dream in Survival Games.

In addition to killing Dream on Lime (Dream, Fundy, Sylvee, Tubbo), Grian killed Fundy and Tubbo in quick succession, hence swiftly eliminated ¾ of Lime very early on in SG. (Here is a transcript of MCC9 for easy reference.) This is significant because Lime was in first before SG, followed by Green and Blue. In my opinion, Grian paved the way for his fellow hermits to win. This was part of why Lime was stressed and potentially played risky in the following SoT, which led to the infamous “Dream got locked in SoT behind an iron door” incident. Lime and their audience were dissatisfied and salty, hence they rushed to support Green, and it genuinely looked like Green would win, after all 79.4% of the audience thought they would— then boom! Reverse sweep!

Regarding the hermit identity: False and Ren are pretty obviously besties who achieved success together. It was the typical “friendship is power” hero’s journey. False and Ren proudly donned MCC crowns and showed them off in their Hermitcraft videos (False: HC7 E47, Ren: HC7 E23, Ren included highlights in his video). False and Ren literally brought their wins home to Hermitcraft— in Ren’s case, he also brought his win to Third Life, which became his crown for the whole Red Winter saga. Grian was frantically rooting for Blue in Dodgebolt, repeatedly telling Pink they have to support his friends. Pearl in Orange showed the same kind of earnestness. The hermits and their friends were all happy with the first ever hermit win.

But not everyone was happy. People complained about the SG scores, the iron door, and that the hermits were “carried”. Maybe people acknowledged H and Fruit (Fruit gained S tier status after MCC9), but some were invalidating the hermits’ first win. Thankfully, this has a happy story. As early as the 2020-2021 MCC break, MCC9 Blue was seen as one of the fan favourite teams, even topping MCC4 Pink (SBI) in a poll. And we all know which team is the one recorded down for prosperity in Sky Battle TCG. 

Alright, so maybe Blue Bats was a fluke. Maybe False and Ren got carried. Maybe Grian just went insane with bloodlust. Maybe the hermits were just lucky. Surely this won’t be supported with a trend of hermits winning MCC. Oh wait—

MCC10 - Back to Back Winner

Modern MCC fans may argue that MCC10 isn’t a “canon” MCC because it included two viewer teams, but won’t press on it because everyone treats it as canon. Well, everyone certainly treats False being the first b2b winner as canon, same for her False Supremacy ace (fun fact: Scott coined that term in MCC9 DB). 

MCC10 is interesting in the sense it’s like MCC9’s younger, more overlooked sibling. It’s iconic because of the ace, it has excellent team chemistry, but it’s not as theatrical as MCC9. MCC10 is also interesting because it’s like MCC17. 1) Orange team with False, Pete, and one other hermit 2) late game Build Mart 3) insane Dodgebolt performance by a hermit that overshadows everything else in fanon. 

Onto Cub’s first win. Between MCC9 and MCC10, False said she would try to get Cub a crown so they would match [Twitch clip]. Similar to Ren and False, Cub showed off his win in his HC7 E64. All three of their wins were written down on Hermitcraft in Hermiton Herald, Volume 12: “Minecraft Championships: The Hermiton Herald congratulates Cubfan135, FalseSymmetry, and Rendog for winning the MCC Championships this past month.” September was a huge month for the hermits, and it was definitely a celebration they brought back to Hermitcraft. 

MCC11 and onwards - the Grian storyline

Naturally, after ¾ of the active hermits won MCC, the attention fell onto Grian. With great gusto came Grian’s first competitive MCC team— MCC11 Lime Liches (Grian, False, Ren, Fruitberries). This was ¾ Blue9 and Grian’s first team with FruityB, whom he was a big fan of. Lime11 got fourth and had a sucky Parkour Warrior, but this was the beginning of Grian seeking a win. Grian’s next brush with victory came in MCC13, which was another Pete-False team with late game BM, this time also with Kara. They got to Dodgebolt but didn’t win. This was fine. Grian got third in MCC14 (Pete, Martyn, Oli) and third in MCCP21 (Techno, Wilbur, Jimmy). His team was unlucky in MCC15 (Shubble, Pearl, H replaced Pete after game 4), but got first in coins in MCC16 (Scott, Fruit, Joel) while losing Dodgebolt. Finally, finally, he won in MCC17 with a spectacular 1v3. MCC17 was also in September, hence September was seen as a hermit victory month (not a Desert Duo month or whatever). 

This section is to elaborate that the Grian storyline is inherently connected with MCC9. There’s the obvious Dreamslaying, but MCC9 Blue created a formula for hermit teams, winning teams or otherwise. People like H, Fruit, and Pete are recurring teammates, leading to the meme of “hermits adopting S tiers”. Blue9 did it first. False and Ren did it first. 

MCC12 - George becomes the second back to back winner

Oh boy.

MCC12 was on November 14th, 2020. Teams of interest include Lime (Cub, Pearl, Joel, Fruit— Cub’s first non hermit duo team) and the typical hermit team on Aqua (False, Ren, Grian, Fwhip). As stated in the title, George became the second back to back winner by winning MCC11 and 12, with his team defeating Lime12 in Dodgebolt (Pearl had Aussie ping issues). False, as the first b2b winner, nicely acknowledged this by replying to his winning tweet— “welcome to the club 😏”.  

And the people just ignored her! People on mcyttwt were ignoring her achievements! Hermittwt (which by the way started out as a Blue9 fanclub, Know Your Roots) was in the trenches. People made Tumblr posts pointing this out [1] [2]. The clout of DT was suffocating and their fans made them trend no matter who won, hence the hermits were underappreciated or even shat on. False had way less hype than George did when they both did the same thing only she did it first. In fact, people seemed to not know False was the b2b winner first. Does this feel familiar? Yeah, MCC10 Dodgebolt. Yeah, it’s not just about Jimmy being sad. 

I made posts complaining about it (this one on Nov 15th was rather melodramatic). Here is another ask on Nov 15th, in which I quote:

“I said this before but one tweet really hurt me because it was so painfully accurate. It said the hermits are just memes in the eyes of mcyt community/ mcytwtt. And it’s so true. Think about it: False Supremacy, Lord Grian Dreamslayer, Cub Supremacy. Of course fans of them use these terms but... in the end, to a lot of people, they’re just memes. Builders who were lucky. Just there for comic relief. Just there to be laughed at. And although the tweet was “bitter”, it validated my feelings. So... I kinda wanna spread that.” 

Misogyny

2020: False’s achievement gets brushed past because some George and DTeam stans were being annoying. Okay, that sucks, but she proved them all wrong and modern MCC community holds her ace in high regard.

2025: “Home turf” of the Hermitcraft/Traffic/Grian’s friend group fandom. False, and Ren, and Cub, and even Grian himself and the narrative they created gets brushed past because people only mention Jimmy being sad during MCC10 DB. Okay… wait. This is home turf. People are supposed to care. They’re Jimmy’s friends. We’re supposed to bring up every hermit’s achievements because we like Hermitcraft. Wait, I can’t hear that? Is that not a thing now? In which half of the hermits get overshadowed by the other half that plays a non HC series? Or even people who aren’t hermits? 

Misogyny doesn’t have to be intentional statements of “I hate women”. It can be accidental. Unintentional. It can be subconsciously holding men and women to different standards. For more on MCC and misogyny, there’s this Reddit post about post MCC29, which funnily enough is about False fans being unhappy with George and his fans. False gets overlooked in MCC a ton, for example she got spoken over in MCC17 (yes, the MCC17), she was also very quiet and kind of ignored in MCC22 (yes, with HBomb, Grian, and Scar). It’s improved now, with multiple (male) teammates speaking up on how good False’s comms are. 

Double standards can be seen when False won Demise 2 (with Ren getting the final kill, why is Ren always at the scene of the crime, do not separate indeed) and people didn’t like that. While False was busy, she was online and fended off attacks live on stream. It wasn’t her fault that people didn’t want to attack her. It wasn’t her fault that Ren was so loyal to her just because he is. 

False gets called toxic and bossy a lot when she’s just trying to wrangle her teammates aka. doing what male players do. Most audacious of all is when False got called toxic by Ren’s chat while playing Hungry Hermits. On hermit turf! On Ren’s turf! Just say you hate women and go. 

The examples of Demise 2 and HH are directly targeted towards the Hermitcraft fandom. You can’t blame DT’s fanbase anymore now. It’s coming from inside the house. 

Would you still love me if I was no longer a marketable girlboss :(

I’ve been here since mid 2019. I’ve seen the 2019 discourse. And I have seen False’s fanon popularity drop like crazy. It’s baffling. Do people not like her anymore because she’s not the only “girlboss” on the server? (Note: I find depicting anyone on Hermitcraft as solely a “girlboss” flattens them and is not accurate to any of their personalities.) Do people not like her anymore because she’s not in Grian’s close circle of friends? Do people not like her because she’s not in Life? Talking with friends on why this happened creates confusing groups of words like: “misogyny” “Life series” “Grian” “Boatem” “Soup Group” “Life series” “Life series” “Life series” etc. 

Take the beginning of HC10. Ren organised a mining contest with like ¾ of the server. Cool. Fun. Why was most of the talk on the other ¼ then? Why are hermits only relevant when they’re in Life series, or in Ren’s case, when they’re actively playing Life? (Note: I also get frustrated about Ren’s fanon characterisation and how much of it is dominated by exactly two ships and Life series.) And why the fuck are non hermits put on the same level as hermits (eg. Jimmy and Martyn, Lizzie gets a pass as she’s a hermit spouse however she’s not a Hermitgal) while ignoring existing hermits? In this case, False. False genuinely has more appreciation on the MCC sub than the HC sub and it is humiliating. Get your shit together, Hermitcraft fandom. 

Life seriesification is a genuine problem in the HC fandom. It would be fine if people kept them separate. But no, it’s spilled over to HC in which you significantly gain more clout if you’re in Life. I vividly remember when False won Blue River Raceway Grand Prix and I checked the Hermitcraft tag only to see people congratulating Scar winning. Winning what? A Hermitcraft event? Did he also win the Grand Prix? Silly silly me, he won Secret Life. Is the Hermitcraft in the room with us right now?  

Back to MCC10. “None of them are good shots, they’re all just missing.” False gets a perfect ace— four shots with four arrows. MCC29— False gets punched down in TGTTOS by George for eighteen seconds (my fic on that here). She gets a 1v3 and shoots the winning shot. She becomes the first ever four time female winner. If you think you can stop the Symmetry, that’s False. 

I hope the Hermitcraft fandom can do better than DT’s fandom. Because from what I can see, both fandoms kind of brush her aside. 2020, 2025, and I’m still angry and bitter about the same old things. It is fucking exhausting. 

[aroaceleovaldez]

What is the PR disaster in question that made Rick announce TSATS? I wasn’t active in the online fandom at that point

Of course! This was awhile ago so it figures people don't remember it/aren't familiar:

Basically a couple years back (2020) the fandom had some posts circulate discussing the ways different characters in the Riordanverse were written poorly or offensively. There was a masterpost that went around tumblr but the two major points people were particularly focusing on were Piper and Samirah (particularly because Piper had featured prominently again in Trials of Apollo recently and the third MCGA book had further emphasized and discussed Samirah being Muslim, since it was supposed to take place during Ramadan). Basically each had multiple posts breaking down the ways they were depicted incorrectly or offensively. The entire fandom for a little bit was VERY intensely discussing this (and it's around this time the "RR crit" tag got very popularized on tumblr - it did exist before, but suddenly was being used VERY frequently - cause it was that wide-spread - though the discussion took over basically every side of Riordaverse social media on different platforms). People really wanted Rick to respond to these criticisms, so he did!

He made two blog posts, one about Piper and one about Samirah. He has since deleted both so the links are to archived versions. The short version: he essentially tried to justify his poor research and double-down that he hadn't written them offensively, actually, people were just being mean to him. The fandom, of course, reacted poorly to this.

[Further elaborated events under the cut since this got a bit lengthy]

(Fun fact, this all happened within a month or so of the time i posted an open letter on aphobic tropes in the Riordanverse that Rick replied to, and then he immediately followed with announcing that Reyna was intended to be ace-coded [which cause a LOT of fandom debate] before Rick dipped for a couple of weeks, and then came back to post the blog posts in response to Piper and Sam stuff. So I like to jokingly refer to this as "The time I imploded the fandom/drove Rick off of twitter." Twas I that set the house ablaze.)

Rick fully left social media after this and the LT Musical social media manager became Rick's social media manager for the time being.

So this all happened June/July of 2020. Tower of Nero would end up being published in October of 2020 and a few months after that Rick would state that he was done with the series and wouldn't be writing any more series installments involving Percy, and also that he wouldn't be writing a Nico quest following Tower of Nero as it "wasn't his place to" and encouraged the community to write their own versions of Nico's story.

The community continued to circulate the tumblr posts and discuss the topics of Rick's offensive character depictions, and this is also where we see the dramatic shift in how the fandom depicts Piper in fanwork (though in most cases it is admittedly not an improvement 😬) because of all this discussion. This is also around the time when the fandom brought Viria under scrutiny claiming that she was whitewashing Piper as part of the same discussions, through the justification that she was drawing Annabeth as having tan skin (which she does canonically), and if Annabeth has tanner skin then Piper then that's whitewashing Piper? Except they were using completely separate images of not fully rendered Piper art versus Annabeth in dramatic lighting, so it's all very awkward and poor logic, and did actually get kind of racist. A lot of people were calling it "Tannabeth Blackchase" (yeah, i know) or similar and a common sentiment you'd see repeated is "Don't draw Annabeth as having darker skin than Piper, because that's offensive/racist/whitewashing." (Note: it was not phrased "don't draw Piper as having lighter skin than Annabeth" - we also won't get into certain offensive depictions of Native Americans, but I digress). But yeah, the Annabeth stuff in all that did not age well at all.

Anyways, in October of 2021 however Rick would announce that he was co-writing The Sun And The Star - with a lot of heavy emphasis on how Mark Oshiro works as a sensitivity reader, and some false advertising from the official social media that Mark Oshiro was the first time a non-Riordan author would be collaborating on the series (disregarding the ghostwriters completely). One of the big criticisms in the breaking down of issues in Rick's writing was his lack of ever seeking a sensitivity reader, and fans claiming that a sensitivity reader could solve a lot of the problems. This was basically Rick's "look! I totally listened!!!!" (though it did little to actually improve things, based on the book) and in TSATS as well Piper gets a large cameo at the end where the text very directly addresses a lot of points made in criticism of Rick's writing of her.

We also then of course got the CoTG trilogy later, explicitly stated to be for advertising purposes for the show.

So basically, short version: Rick came under scrutiny for a lot of offensive writing within the span of two months, made some bad blog posts doubling down about it, left social media. TOA ends. Rick says he wasn't going to continue the series/write what would become TSATS. Community celebrates the end of of the franchise but also continues to discuss Rick's poor writing and the blog posts at length. Rick suddenly announces TSATS and Mark Oshiro's involvement. Everybody gets distracted from being mad. Show announcement stuff also happens and the discussions peter out.

[fatcathappycat]

7 more 7 year gap Narumitsu fic recs (here's part 2!)

The seven year gap years are some of the richest for Narumitsu fan fiction. Below are seven more of my favourite seven year gap fics, in no particular order. Part 1 is here and part 3 here.

Enjoy!

1) Mitte by sunsmasher

Rating: M Words: 4,693 Time to read: 10 min

This fic takes a more cynical look at love but oh, the end scene is perfect, and stays with you for a looooong while. I think I've reread it at least 4-5 times. It was one of the fics that motivated me to joining Ao3 as a member, rather than a guest, so I could participate more fully with commenting and Bookmarks. My original book mark said "Still thinking about this weeks later… so brutal but not without hope."

~7~

2) Rule of Three by DeiRyuu

Rating: G Words: 1,948 Time to read: 10 min

Taking place during one of the Wright's visits with Edgeworth in Europe, this fic is a wholesome, well written, fambly one shot. ❤️💙💙 Part 1 of NaruMitsu Week 2020 series

~7~

3) Bernstein (liminal) by just_a_wavefunction

Rating: G Words: 3,661 Time to read: 15 min

One of those fics that are so well written and that you crave more at the end. Set in the early years of the 7 year gap, Phoenix and Trucy spend quality time with Miles in Europe (Miles POV).

~7~

4) hop a plane by alyxellipsis

Rating: E Words: 3,790 Time to read: 15 min

Phoenix spontaneously flies to Europe to specifically not talk about his feelings with Miles. Kristophe is mentioned, read the tags. Recommending because it it is so good, but oh, my heart. This one kicked me.

~7~

5) Childswap by theacegrace

Rating: G Words: 11,781 Time to read: 50 min

A beloved Narumitsu ‘classic,' this one feels like it should be on a 'required reading' list for Ace Attorney found family fans. Written for narumitsu week 2019 day 7: domestic

~7~

6) Kindred by timepatches

Rating: G Words: 11, 781 Time to read: 6.5 hours

Pess fic! A case fic! and yes, a Narumitsu fic set during the 7 year gap years. Super charming and a wonderful story to settle into over a weekend. This set me off on a Pess fic binge (hmmm, maybe a future fic rec list :) )

~7~

7) The Same Thing, Self Aware by cosmogyral

Rating: M Words: 15,921 Time to read: 60 min

So well written. Ow my heart, but hold on, cosmogyral has you baby, there is hope. I love the way that Miles is written and while it hurts to see Phoenix so…asshole-ish? Jaded. I love how his path to redemption is so beautifully crafted in this story. It leaves me wanting more.

Also found in Podfic form by blotthis! Beautifully narrated and with excellent art!

And thus concludes part two of my 7 x 7 year gap fic recs. I hope you enjoy them all, and if you want more, please check out part 3 :)

₍˄·͈༝·͈˄₎ ੭ ♡* ੈ✩‧₊˚

[sheridanprideclub]

It is Aromantic Awareness Week! 💚🤍🩶🖤 With the passing of Valentine's Day and Family Day right around the corner, we remind ourselves that aros deserve to be treated as equals, and we live in a society.

[Image descriptions are included in the alt text for each image!]

Links to resources and sources below the cut

RESOURCES⛑️

Arocalypse forums site

Aromantic Spectrum Awareness Week

Aromantic Spectrum Union for Recognition, Education & Advocacy (AUREA)

Toronto Aces & Aros

SOURCES📚

2020 Aro Census Report

Elizabeth Brake on amatonormativity

[simbistardis]

'I am a Black asexual man. Being an asexual Black man, I have personal accounts of being typecast as some sexually perilous human being, solely due to my melanated skin.'

'The social stereotypes surrounding Black men really had a negative impact on my life. It’s even had an impact even after coming out as an ace. So often, asexual media has been dominated by media figures who fit a certain caricature of being white. The majority of asexual documentaries have featured white aces monolithically. I’ve struggled with even accepting that I’m asexual because all the asexual people I saw were white. Black asexuals have been few and far between, let alone Black asexual men. Not having a multicultural asexual representation growing up made it harder for me to truly accept my asexual identity. Not having a multicultural asexual representation made it all the harder to truly counteract the messaging of my youth that said the only way to be a real black guy was to be some “wild beast.”'

Stereotypes & media about Black masculinity made it harder to come out as asexual by Tyger Songbird for LGBTQ Nation (2023)

[thisqueerlove]

Aromantic Awareness Week

A list of Queer films and Shows with little to no romantic plot lines, or at the very least the main plot focuses on friendship/found family, some may have romantic subplots but I really tried hard to find LGBTQA+ movies where romance wasn’t the main plot. This list does not contain headcanons, those are all valid I just wanted to try to find canon Aro characters for this if I could.

To Wong Fu, Thanks for Everything (1995) (Drag Queens, no romance)

Wendell & Wild (2022) (Trans boy side character, no romance)

Strange World (2022) (Gay main character, no romance, he has a crush that’s barely in the film but this is about family)

Nimona (2023) (Nimona herself is AroAce)

Knives Out (2019) (the detective is a Gay man, no romance)

Pride (2014) (LGBTQ cast of characters, from what I remember there’s no romance)

I Am What I Am (2022) (I’ve seen a lot of praise from both Aro and Ace people about this film)

But I’m a Cheerleader (1999) (subplot but very much about found family)

Because there’s few films here’s some shows with canon Aro characters:

Koisenu Futari (2022) (JDrama about two AroAce people meeting and living together)

Heartstopper (2022) (while yes the main plot is romance Issac Henderson is AroAce)

The Owl House (2020) (some romance later on but Lilith Clawthorne is AroAce)

Cherry Magic (2020) (Fujisaki is AroAce)

Konya Sukiyaki Dayo (2023) (Tomoko is Aromantic)

Raise De Wa Chanto Shimasu (2020) (Takasugi Ume is Aromantic)

Kimi No Hana Ni Naru (2022) (Onodera Takara is Aromantic)

Happy Aromantic Awareness Week! I so hope some day you’ll have all the representation you could ever want! 💚🤍🩶🖤

(If you know of others please leave them in the comments for others to find!)

[rivalsforlife]

Ace Attorney News Roundup

Very behind on several of these, but news doesn't always cross over from twitter to tumblr, so I thought I'd recap some things here:

AAI 15th Anniversary

First: today marks the 15th anniversary of Ace Attorney Investigations! Tatsuro Iwamoto, the art director for AAI, made a celebratory sketch of Kay to commemorate the occasion (link to tweet):

Iwamoto has also been drawing fanart of minor characters throughout the ace attorney trilogy on his twitter page. These include: April May, Dee Vasquez, Yanni Yogi (and Polly), Richard Wellington, Turner Grey, Moe the Clown, Max Galactica, Oldbag (alien mode), Matt Engarde, Doug Swallow, Luke Atmey (and Mask☆DeMasque), Viola Cadaverini, Valerie Hawthorne, Lisa Basil, and Glen Elg. Technically these aren't official art, but it's always good to have more art of obscurer characters!

The Great Ace Attorney Hit A Million Copies

Some big news: The Great Ace Attorney's 2021 port hit a million copies sold, making it the second ace attorney game to hit Capcom's platinum titles list, the first being the Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney Trilogy from 2019! This comes just under 3 years since the release of the duology in July 2021. In comparison, the original AA trilogy hit a million copies in December 2020, shortly under two years since the release of the game in February 2019.

The update to the platinum titles sales shows that Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Trilogy has reached 3.3 million copies sold, which means that it has sold over a million copies in less than a year! (My last post that had information on sales, where I said the trilogy had sold 2.3 million, was in September 2023.) It also makes it the 30th highest selling title for Capcom, which I think is pretty impressive considering giants like Resident Evil, Monster Hunter, and Street Fighter are making up the majority of the top 30.

So, the AA trilogy made its first million in approximately 22 months, but now it has sold a million over the last 8 months. I don't know anything about game sales and so this next part is just speculation, but I wouldn't expect it to be very common for games to sell more years out from their release compared to at release? I think that's really saying something about the long-term staying power of this series, and its increasing popularity over the last few years despite not having any new releases (aside from ports - and porting the series to all platforms probably has something to do with the popularity.)

The AA Twitter Is Very Active Right Now

Here are a couple of bullet points with no relation to each other:

-The official ace attorney twitter has been VERY active, particularly the last week. They've been doing the same "weekly book club" for each case that they did for the Great Ace Attorney duology, but that wrapped up last week and now it's just been memes, at least one a day. In most of my time following this account over the last uhh six years, they mostly ramp up marketing around new releases but are kinda silent the rest of the time, with the occasional meme, but definitely not at this frequency.

-Summer Game Fest is next week.

That probably means nothing, as it has every other time I thought we might get some big ace attorney news, but I think it's worth noting.

So, lots of stuff happened this week! Thanks for reading.

[tinyfantasminha]

Hi op! Just wanted to say I love your art and your oc, and of course your brainrots over Jack  🫶 they made me like and appreciate Jack a lot more! If it's okay to ask, how did you ended up liking him? Was he already a fave from the start or did he worm your way into your heart gradually? And (if you're comfortable ofc) what made you decide to yume with him?

Hope you have a good new years!! 💕

AAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH CRYING ON MY KNEES.....!!!!! This makes me so jkgjgjfkdjkfkh,,gfhfgjddjfh ...... thank you so much 😭💕

No matter how many people still say to me they've come to appreciate Jack more because of me I can never get used to it but it's still a wonderful feeling!! Like YES that's what I want !! Love Jack Howl!!

Anon, you just opened pandora's box...... I wished I could answer that in a few words, but I can't. Too much thoughts, too much words I need to get out of my chest. FINALLY THIS OPPORTUNITY HAS COME... *rubs hands*

I might as well put up the whole Jack-loving saga from start to present in chronological order. This is gonna be a VERY long post. (a lot of spoilers and thoughts on book 2 and 3)

To tell the truth, no, Jack was not an immediate fave! I remember seeing the official promotional art for the dorms back in 2019 before the game even released. The ones that immediately got my attention first were Leona, Ruggie, Malleus and Silver. HJDDHHGNJDSD I remember being immediately excited seeing savanaclaw cause they tick a lot of boxes I like… ''ohh??! furry kemonomimi dorm with edgy biker aesthetics?!'' <- is obsessed with leather jackets. But I regret to say that Jack didn't catch my attention, aside from the wolf ears. I-It makes me sad to remember that I judged him at first… 😭 Since Leona and Ruggie are smirking in their official sprite, and Jack looks so overly serious and closed off. BUT BOY, IF ONLY YOU HAD TOLD ME BACK THEN THAT I WOULD HAVE A 4+ YEAR OBSESSION WITH THIS WOLF GUY…………

I had missed the game's launch (march 2020) and only got to know they had already released it when I saw an user on facebook sharing screenshots of their game. Before downloading the game, I decided to watch all of the released main story segments on youtube (god bless Shel_BB's channel). I got invested right off the bat, and as I watched my faves basically fluctuated every week or every a few days... I remember my first (?? was it actually first? I don't remember anymore) fave being Ace because of course hE'S THE FIRST CHARA OF THE MAIN CAST TO APPEAR... that is, until Leona's first appearance in book 1 it ruined my life. I was like ''ah, there he is. Hot lion guy. He's my fave. Can't wait for his chapter'' I SEE A HOT KEMONOMIMI I PRESS LIKE but after book 1 ending, I was so moved by Riddle's backstory that he also became one of my faves?! DAMN GIRL DECIDE

OKAY SO HERE COMES THE GOOD PART, which is book 2. Nowadays I think that book 2 is in fact not good from a writing perspective, Leona's plan is dumb, Ruggie and Jack never got the closure they deserved, it felt too rushed etc. But I wasn't really thinking about it in a critical way, I was just excited to see new characters and how the story would go (good for me ig?? at least I had a good experience). Anyway, I remember taking an immediate liking to Leona and Ruggie but I was still super neutral about Jack throughout most of the chapter. I remember admiring his sense of justice and willingness to betray his dorm, so he was already getting on my good side. sfgsdkjgs I think the first... spark... was the moment when Jack came into ramshackle to personally wake up Yuu. ''I wanted to make sure you didn't mess everything up by oversleeping'' OKAY LIKE BUT WE JUST MET...? I wondered why he'd go that far for a nobody he just met? Then it occurred to me, could it be that he... CARES.... 😱

I thought him being a tsundere was cute. I always had... a thing for characters that look stoic and edgy but are actually big softies. I blame Lucario from the movie Lucario and the mystery of mew for starting my obsession with canine stoic ''I need no friends'' energy characters when in fact they DO need friends And I was also both amused and surprised that he could transform into a literal wolf?! JKDSJKFGSJK I STARTED TO THINK AAWW THATS CUTE FOR HIM... I love fuzzy animals so this was a bonus for me. And then after Leona's overblot there WAS... THIS SCENE--

Something about Yuu pointing out that Jack genuinely smiled and him going all tsun about it stirred a warm feeling in me... I just thought it was the cutest moment in the game so far. This was the point where I realized Jack is a genuinely sweet and caring character. After book 2 ending he had already ranked a lot higher in my tier list.

But it was only during book 3 that ACTUALLY started my spiral to madness made me realize he was gonna be more than just a character I liked.

I want to clarify that when I was watching the main story, I was self inserting as Yuu the entire time, meaning I was trying to imagine myself in their situation and how I would react if I were in said situation. There wasn't anything of substance directly affecting Yuu in book 1 and 2, but book 3 was when it got a lot personal for me. Right off the bat in book 3, adeuce and Grim got separated from Yuu and were forced to be Azul's slaves alongside a bunch of other... idk 100+ students? (or was it 200?) this was the first time since the prologue that Yuu was completely alone, and it made me feel a pang of dread. I'm not proud to say I was never the most independent person, (must be from neurodivergency + always being the pampered youngest sibling of other 4 older siblings 💀) and being socially awkward, I'd completely freeze in this situation. It's just a very stressful and scary situation to be in. That's why I was immediately relieved when Jack appeared. He refused to help at first but all it took was ONE phrase (either tease him or make him feel pity for you) to convince him.

''You've gotten pretty used to how things work in this school. Can't be helped. I'll tag along with you for a bit.''

He said he would tag along FOR A BIT... AND HE LOYALLY STAYED BY YUU'S SIDE THE ENTIRE TIME, UNTIL THE END OF THE EPISODE. I was SO deeply moved by that, you have no idea. When I was in middle school I had really bad social anxiety, like Idia-level. I was the type of person who had to cling on every possible chance of being helped and escorted around in social situations, and I couldn't vocally ask for help, so I had to wait until an extrovert took pity on me and helped me. Once in a school trip, we had to take a train at the metro station and everyone else seemed to have a magnetic card but not me... I thought I was gonna be left behind so I started to panic real bad and have an anxiety attack, and when I pleaded to my extroverted 'friend' for help, they turned their back on me. It was an awful feeling that still makes me feel helpless every time I remember it. So that's why at first I thought Jack wasn't actually gonna help Yuu, and when he... changed his mind so quickly and decided to tag along, it was a very special moment to me. I thought, ''you have no reason to be helping me but you're doing it anyway.'' Feels like in twst most of the characters have an ulterior motive when helping others, but not Jack. He claims he's not worried about adeuce and grim, but he's too easy to read. He cares, even though he gets no compensation, or any kind of reward for this. It made me feel safe around him, like I could rely on him for everything. This was the first heart arrow.

Every time spent with Jack in book 3 I fell more and more in love with him (even though I wasn't aware of it yet). He's a lot more nuanced here than he was in book 2; he shows more sides of him like his silly puppy side (when he was excited to see that octavinelle was underwater and gushed about it like an excited puppy and then got self conscious and awkward about it STOP HEWASJSGJKGSOOSOCVNSMDOSO CUTE) his caring, worried, nervous sides… He also totally did NOT NEED to accompany Yuu in Mostro Lounge's VIP room since Azul had business with Yuu only, and yet Jack was ALWAYS on their side, like a loyal guard dog. Feeling safe and reassured around a person is EXTREMELY important to me. No matter what happens, Jack is not the type to turn his back on you. If you're nice and genuine with him, he will help you with anything and never let you down, it's what I thought.

AND THEN UH.... THERE WAS THAT ONE SCENE WHEN ADEUCE + GRIM + YUU + JACK HIDE UNDER AZULS TABLE IN THE VIP ROOM... THIS IS A SCENE I THIN K A LOT BECAUSE UH... SQUISHED-UNDER-A-TIGHT-SPACE-TOGETHER-TO-HIDE MAY BE ONE OF MY FAVORITE TROPES..... AND I CAUGHT MUYSEFL THINKING NOT SO FAMILY-FRIENDLY THOUGHTS LIKE....DOESS THAT MEAN I'M PRESSED AGAINST JACK HERE,,?!??'/? AGAINST HIS BIG, WARM... tibbies... WHERE I CAN FEEL SAFE AND PROTECTED.... ADNW WE HAVE TO STAY QUIET AND VERY STILL SO AZUL DOESN'T CATCH US OOOooooHHHH....... LET ME REMINGD YOU I STILL DIDNT CONSIDER MYSESLF A SIMP FOR JACK BUT MY CHEEKS WERE AFLAME I WAS RED IN THE FACE AND IT GOT ME THINKING '''''''N-NO WAY I DONT LIKE HIM LIKE THAT RIGHT??? (This was the second heart arrow.)

AND THEN AND THEN AAAAAAAAAAAAAaaaAA…… WHENB YUU AND GRIM ARE KICKED OUT OF RAMSHACKLE AND HAVE NOWHERE TO SLEEP AND SINCE ITS LIKE NOVEMBER IT MUST BE COLD AS FUCK OUTSIDE….. THIS IS BY FAR THE SCARIEST SITUATION FOR ME, I LIVE IN A WARM PLACE IF I HAD TO SLEEP OUTSIDE AT A TEMP UNDER 10 DEGREES CELCIUS WITH ONLY A SCHOOL UNIFORM I WOULDNT JUJST ''CATCH A COLD'' ACE TRAPPOLA I WOULD GET HYPOTHERMIA AND FUCKING DIE PROBABLY, GETTING KICKED OUT OF YOUR OWN HOME WITH NO PLACE TO SLEEP? I'D JUST GIVE UP CURL MYSELF INTO A BALL AND CRY……. BUT TJEN BUT THEN JACK LIKE AN ANGEL DESCENDED FROM HEAVEN OFFERED YUU AND GRIM TO TAKE THEM TO SAVANACALW?????????????? AND HE CLAIMS ITS CAUSE EVEN THOUGH HE SAID HE'D HAVE THEIR BACK, HE DIDN'T FEEL LIKE HE ACTUALLY HELPED THEM UNTIL NOW…. AND ACE AND DEUCE AND GRIM ALL SMIRKED AND TEASED HIM ABOUT LIKE ACE'S VOICE TONE IS VERY REMINISCING OF THE TONE SOMEBODY USES WHEN THEY TEASE SOMEONE ELSE ABOUT THEIR CRUSH I FELT IT IN MY BONESSS… LIKE HEY JACK WHY ARE YOU BEING SO NICE TO THEM IF IT DOESN'T BENEFIT YOU… COULD IT BE THAT YOU'RE (GASP) CRUSHING ON THEM…?!?!? YOU KNOW THIS IS THE ENERGY I GOT FROM THIS SCENE AND IF ONLY THIS GAME WAS ROMANCE-INCLINED THATS EXACTLY HOW THIS SCENE WOULD GO I FEEL IITTTTTTTTTTTT DSAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAJGNNJNJCFNJBCVÇ;CV;/VC;ÑCV~]DF.ÇHFDMHFDNJDHFJHBNDFJ

……..That was the third heart arrow.

My mind is hazy after this. I don't know what else to say for the climax + ending of book 3, I really enjoyed Azul and the tweel's characters, but my mind was still on Jack and how I came to love him after this. I remember hoping that… we would get to sleep in Jack's room (this was before I realized that all of first years room were a shared 4-person room, I thought only heartslabyul was like this 💀) but I was not disappointed to find out we'd sleep in Leona's room instead 😋 is bonked

While Jack was super high in my tier list at that point, he had to share first place with some others for a while… I downloaded the game in july 2020, but it was only during august that I started to actively post art here on my blog and engage more with the fandom. And during that time I was passing through a octavinelle + scarabia phase which was especially strong during august and september if you follow me ALL THE WAY back then…… congrats soldier my faves fluctuated between Jack, Jade, Floyd, Jamil and Kalim constantly and there was even a time where I considered the Ja-trio (Jade, Jack, Jamil) my favorite characters and couldn't choose between them. So what made me ultimately lean towards Jack? Uh, to sum it up it's because he was the least popular. I was in a somewhat big twst discord server back then and although I'm super grateful to have been part of the server and met wonderful people there who are friends till this day, I also had a few unpleasant experiences. Jade, Floyd and Jamil were super popular in the server I was in, so whenever I tried to talk or gush about them, I was talked over. The server was also yume-friendly but I was still figuring out this whole yume thing and who I'd yume. The more I was talked over and ignored in favor of the louder and more popular tweels/jamil stans in the server (I think there was AT LEAST 5 yumes for each of them...) the more I felt unmotivated to keep gushing for them. Whenever I made art of them, people would immediately tag the popular loud stans to gush other THEIR reaction, and suddenly the conversation was immediately shifted towards them. I know this sort of thing is expected in a big server since people already have their circles but man… It made me a lot insecure to yume them.

But whenever I talked about JACK I was actually listened to, and my opinions were validated. Simply because back then there were little to none Jack stans, so most of them looked up to me as reference for a ''Jack enjoyer/simp''. I started to think how unfair it was that the other characters had plenty of love, plenty of attention already while Jack had almost none. No one hated him but no one quite loved him either to consider him their #1. I was baffled because he's genuinely one of the sweetest characters. I know it sounds silly, but I felt compelled to be his advocate. I WANTED people to see just how sweet he is, how he's more than just a big, uninteresting jock that only talks about working out.

I always sympathized with the odd, with the outcasts, with the ones that weren't chosen because they were not like the majority because they remind me of what I went through as a socially anxious aspie kid (I was never really comfortable revealing my diagnosis online but there you have it, autistic vic reveal lol as if that wasn't obvious before ig) do you know the feeling of being in PE class and the two kids forming groups are choosing who they want for their team and you know you'll be dead last because no one wants you in their team? So you end up in a random team not because someone chose you, but because you were the only one left and they needed to fill the space. They don't necessarily want to kick you out of the team, but they don't want you either. You're indifferent to them. This is how I imagined how Jack must have felt like in the fandom. Always ''he's such a good boy'' ''he's so sweet'' but never someone's favorite. I've lost count of how many self proclaimed ''savanaclaw stans'' I met that are just solely Leona stans who talk 90% of the time about Leona, the other 10% about Ruggie and outright IGNORE Jack.

After getting Jack's first birthday card in the first 10 rolls, I decided, well he's gonna be MY favorite. The other popular characters have enough fans, enough people to make art and writing for them. It wouldn't make a difference if one more fan is added or removed. But for Jack, at least back then, it DID make a difference. Finding people in the eng fandom who would do fanart of him (like just HIM, not him being part of a group like savanaclaw or first years) was so rare. And especially finding accounts or blogs dedicated entirely about him…?? I don't remember seeing any of it. This…erasure, this indifference towards him made me feel even more connected to him. I want to keep supporting him, to keep giving him the love that he deserves.

In these 4 years he's been a massive source of comfort to me, if I feel anxious or stressed I imagine his big, warm hand on my shoulder, on the small of my back, patting my head etc… I imagine him motivating me to work harder, to push myself out of my comfort zone, telling me to stop moping and to get up and try again. I imagine him giving me his tail to hold and pet when I need to keep myself grounded. I imagine his disapproving look when I have dishonest thoughts or think about taking shortcuts.

I don't know how to finish this, but if you read ALL of this congrats and thank you for bearing with me lol it took me almost 4 hours to write this entire bible...... if you DID read all of this, I hope I could, if only a little bit, change your perspective on Jack Howl for the better.

I love Jack Howl.

[macandcheese-inhaler]

For aromantic awareness week, I'd like to share my pipeline of "I'm just ace" to "Uh-oh I'm aro too"

Back in 2020 (the first year I started actively questioning if I wasn't straight) whenever I heard asexual being mentioned, some form of a "they don't like dating" comment always followed.

It took several years for me to accept, but in the back of my mind I was always aware of my ace-ness. 1) because I am severely sex-repulsed & how different that made me became blatantly obvious whenever I hung around my friends. And 2) dating someone never was appealing. In fact, if I ever thought about what it would be like to date someone, I'd get bored or frustrated & quickly move on.

I tried to hang out in ace spaces online every so often, but it always felt... not right, I guess? I could never understand where the "(most) asexuals don't date" thing came from, b/c I never really saw that being reflected in actual ace spaces. Ever.

I felt disconnected b/c what I was feeling (or lack there of) didn't seem to be matching up with the "core" values of the ace communities. Sure, I agreed garlic bread was a million times better than sex, but I felt something other than just "ew sex." There was a disconnect between me & dating in general.

Funnily enough, the only reason I bothered to look into being aro was b/c an underclassman asked me if I was gay, I was freaking out about it in the group chat, and a friend of mine decided to point-blank ask if I've ever been attracted to anyone.

To which I replied, "Nope."

"You know there's a term for that, right?"

"Yeah..."

Now it was 2022. I wanted to finally find a term that matched up with my feelings, so I went to properly research the term "aromantic". I don't remember my first reaction to it well, but I remember thinking something like, "How can I know if I don't feel something if I don't know what that something feels like? What does it even mean to want to do romantic things with someone?" Which, I think should've been pretty telling, but ehhh, my closet's always been glass & back then I only drank water from Denial.

Being asexual was always obvious to me, mainly b/c of my repulsion. I knew I didn't feel sexual attraction b/c I felt like I was going to throw up any time sex was mentioned. My mind made it KNOWN that it wasn't my thing. Being aromantic wasn't as obvious b/c I'm more romance adverse than repulsed. On rare occasions I would somehow talk myself into a weird mindset of, "I wouldn't seek out a partner, but I think I could somewhat tolerate dating if I'd get to hold their hand."

My relationship with my aro and ace identities are different b/c they present themselves in different ways.

I've never been sexually attracted to someone, nor have I ever wanted to be. I've never wanted to date a specific person. However, I want to be wanted by someone. I so badly want to be someone's number one, the person they'll always put first, and in turn I want them to be my number one too. But how do I get that without being someone's romantic partner?

To wrap things up, in all honesty, even now there's a little voice in the back of my head that says, "You're not aro, you're just lying to yourself!" And who knows, maybe I am, but at the end of the day, I can tell you that I've never wanted to be romantically involved with someone. I thought thinking someone looked pretty was the same thing as a crush. I never understood why my friend's partners always took precedence over their friends. I've never understood how someone can obsess so, so much over someone they don't even know. I've never understood why my friends crave to be held, and why they are so determined to find their "other half." I've never understood why weddings are considered to be one of the most important days of your life. I've never understood why romantic love is the most valued type of love. I've never understood why someone would want to spend every waking hour of the day with their partner. And for the better or worse, there are plenty of other things I don't understand about romance, and I doubt I ever will.

If nothing else, I've found a place where I feel like I belong and that means everything to me :]

Happy aromantic awareness week! Party hard broskis <22

[hesontherun]

i got so excited by the ace attorney frozen fic updating that i redid my old fanart from 2020 😭 😭 i love this fic so much.. it genuinely is the thing that got me into ace attorney and i think that's beautiful ❤️

thank you @zarla-s and @bardic-feline for coming back to it after all these years, it made my week 💗💗!!!