#ain't gonna be here

[bo-bo-bean]

Chapter Two: A Swing and A Miss

Flaky stared with wide eyes. Nausea was bubbling like lava in her stomach. Flippy, on the other hand, was feeling cold, as if he had just dunked himself in an ice bath.

“So, I thought it would be a great idea!” Giggles finished up a conversation not heard by the bear and porcupine.

“... this?” Flippy asked with a nervous smile. Flaky giggled in a hysteric, desperate manner. She often laughed when really nervous. Here, in front of her… was her worst nightmare. The bear tried to offer some etiquette, showing his open hand. She flinched at it.

“Uh… hey, Flaky…! Good to… see you again,” he grinned as best as he could. Trapped in a social snare, she timidly took his hand and shook it once before snatching it back.

“Awww see? Already, this is going great!” Cuddles chimed in, his arm wrapped around Giggles. Flippy gave a glare to the rabbit before Toothy saved the day.

“This is gonna be great! You’ll see! Just relax and have fun!”

Flippy opened his mouth to seemingly object to either one part or the whole situation, but it didn’t get out before Cuddles wrapped his other arm around Toothy and then looked at Petunia.

“Well, it’s about time we get going!”

“G-going!?” the nervous quilled friend seemingly yelped out. Terror had her by the throat.

“Yep! We got other things to do! But you two have fun!”

“Ah, wait wait,” Flippy reached out. “What do we do…!?”

“Up to you!” Giggles tittered. Before anything else was asked, they all left the two in the middle of downtown. Flaky felt herself panicking. There was no way she could hang out with a monster…! Just seeing his crest and three arrows kept dragging the thought of him being insane in her head, flooding her vision.

“I don’t get where their intentions lie…” the bear sighed. He looked at Flaky for input, but saw she was about to fall to the snow. “Flaky…!”

He went in front of her, holding her hands and giving them a squeeze. “Hey, hey it’s alright…! Can you hear me?”

She feebly nodded, trying to match his gaze. When her eyes couldn’t stay in the same place, Flippy picked up on it. “No no just worry about hearing me. We’re going to do box breathing.”

“B-box…” she muttered.

“Breathe in, as much as you can,” he instructed. “Let your stomach expand, let your shoulders reach your ears, just breathe in. Visualize a… balloon.”

“W-won’t it pop!?”

“Okay okay! Not a balloon! A uh… imagine the ocean…!”

“I-it’s dangerous…! Th-the creatures and-and drowning…!”

“Well what are you NOT scared of?”

She already felt like she was being a hassle, a bother, a waste of time… but Flippy didn’t seem impatient. Rather, quite the opposite. She could tell he was giving a gentle smile.

“B-... base… ball…” she wheezed.

“Okay, that’s good! Imagine, uh, winding up to hit the ball…! You’re stretching your arms back all the way. See yourself doing that and breathe until you can’t stretch anymore.”

With a nod, she did so. Despite the snow falling, she already could feel the sunny, dry day and the clear sky. The sun behind her, friends cheering from the bleachers, even Flippy! He always did come to her games. No matter what, even if she lost, he brought her a drink or a snack, say good game and give a smile. He once pat her back but when she flinched away, he stopped and did what was comfortable to her. “Aaaand now you’re the baseball,” his voice spoke through her thoughts. She almost imagined the Flippy in her head saying it to her. “You get hit and you’re soaring through the sky…! Until you hit the ground, until your belly deflates and shoulders are slack? Breathe out.”

The breath she held was slowly released. She imagined the baseball catching the perfect light, no distractions of wind or players scurrying to catch it.

“Go Flaky!!” Flippy screamed from the bleachers.

Flaky, in her jersey, looked at Flippy as her knees were stuck together like glue. Her legs were shaking up a storm.

“She won’t do it…!” Shifty scoffed. “Who wants to bet she gets scared, eh? Let’s start a betting round!”

“She can…!” Flippy squinted. “You can! Just focus on the ball!”

She glanced at Flippy for what seemed like an eternity before giving a smile. He always was there to root her on, whether she scraped herself or won, he believed in her. Well… maybe he didn’t. Maybe he knew just as well under pressure, she was horrible. But… hearing him cheer her on over and over at every game? It helped her so much. He didn’t even know what it did for her, but she knew it did everything.

The windup, the pitch, a curveball…! She could handle fastballs, sluggers even, but oh, how she dreaded the curve! Still, she did as Flippy said. Focus… Focus…

She closed her eyes and swung, hearing the familiar crack on her bat.

“Yes!! Go Flaky! Go!!” he screamed out with absolute joy. She opened her eyes, seeing the ball soaring through the sky like nothing! She did that!? She did!?

Without wasting time, she flung the bat away and sprinted. Going, going, almost gone! The ball bounced off the fence and then to the grass in front of it.

“Grab it!” Cuddles shouted. As Toothy scurried over to the fence, Flaky made it past first base. Itching the adrenaline and seeing the ball wasn’t retrieved yet, she made her way to second, sliding in until her toe hit it, rolled and back to running to third! Flippy was hollering with joy, she could tell at that moment he did believe in her. He always had!

A hop on third and finally on her way to home. She was going to make it! She would make Shifty eat those words! She would show everyone this scardey-pine was more than just dandruff and quills! She would be in the front page of newspapers! “Flaky, professional athlete scores a homerun for Happy Tree Town!” She would read that over and over, relishing in-

“Out!”

The word made her stop, realizing Toothy had the ball and tagged her arm, wheezing.

“I got it!” he cheered. One point for the opposing team and they had won.

Toothy’s team ran over and lifted him up in the air, chanting his name. Shifty, collecting heaps of cash from swindling on the bet, gave a sneer to her. “Thanks for the free cash!” he called.

Feeling like garbage, her once shaken knees now finally gave out on to the dirt. Her eyes became hot, welling up with tears before she saw a green hand in view.

“Hey, don’t beat yourself up…!” Flippy told her. Sniffling, she took the hand and lifted herself up, wiping her eyes. “That was incredible!”

“N-no it wasn’t…” she kicked at the dirt, hands tied in knots behind her back. “I beefed it…”

“Nah, I couldn’t tell.”

She looked up with a curious expresssion, meeting his own proud face. “I’ve never seen you that determined in your life…! You hit the ball to the fence! You ran faster than Cuddles across that field and you didn’t give up…! Even if you lost, you didn’t lose.”

“Why’s… Why’s that…?”

“Well… do you want to stop?”

“S-stop baseball?” She was flabbtergasted at such a question. “N-no…! I love baseball!”

“Then you didn’t lose,” she shook his head. “A loser would give up. You still won…! You don’t lose unless you let one thing stop what you love.”

Hesitantly, he put a hand on her shoulder and gave it a pat. “I admire that, really I do. So… come on, winner,” he pointed in a direction. “I’m getting you an ice cream!”

“Y-... you’re sure?” She no longer felt upset. Honestly… she felt touched. If it wasn’t evident he believed in her, it was now.

“Yeah! You did astonishing today!”

With a small smile, she nodded and walked beside him.

“... thank you,” she spoke out. “For… um… showing up…”

“I wouldn’t miss it for the world,” he told her. “You’re a great player.”

“Flaky…!”

She gasped, opening her eyes. There was Flippy, in front of her, covered in snow. “You okay?”

“... I… think so,” she told herself to be sure before nodding. “Yeah, I think so.”

“Phew…” he put his paw over his chest. “I thought I lost you… You just weren’t really talking.”

“I-I wasn’t? S-sorry…! I didn’t mean to-to…” she trailed off. “... sorry…”

“It’s okay, really it is…!” he chuckled, his shoulders bouncing along. “Come on, I thought of a great idea for us to do.” This caught her interest, peering up at him, then following his pointed finger to a cafe. “Hot chocolate sounds delightful, doesn’t it?”

A blink, then a smile and another nod.

“Y-yeah it um… it IS cold, yeah,” she thought out loud.

“Plus, who would turn down some?” he joked. They both wandered into the doors, embracing the warm air and the smell of baked goods and coffee, along with the seasonal scent of peppermint. “We could get some and maybe wander around and look at the lights. Nothing too extreme, would be a nice start, right?”

“Oh…! Y-yeah, I like that…!”

They went up to the counter to Lammy.

“Hi Flippy! Hi Flaky!” she waved eagerly. “Happy to see friendly faces!”

“Same to you…!” Flippy started the conversation, knowing Flaky wouldn’t be able to. “We’re just hoping to get some hot chocolate.”

He opened his jacket to pull out his wallet, but Lammy held up a hand.

“Oh, it’s already paid for!”

“Huh?” the two questioned almost in sync.

“Who… would?” Flaky wondered.

“... Christmas miracle?” he chuckled a little.

As they ordered, Petunia from a far table looked up from the menu she was hiding behind.

“How much did you put down, Toothy?” she asked to her left.

“Uh… like… ten… maybe… fifty?”

“Fifty!?” Giggled gasped. Cuddles tried to quiet her down, but knew doing so would enrage her even more. “Why fifty!?”

“I thought they would get a meal, alright…!?” he threw his hands up. “I try to do something nice…!”

“Better be expensive cocoas then,” the skunk tisked.

“Just cocoas? Nothing else?” the rabbit inquired.

“Well, let’s hope they at least get something to eat. Food is always a good bonding moment!” Giggles settled with a smile. “I know my Cuddly Bunny and me would never have our six month anniversary if he didn’t see how I would demolish a hamburger…!” She hugged his arm as he reminenced.

“It was like a lion,” he admitted with a big smile, leaning on her head. “It’s why I fell in love with her…”

“Oh oh! They have their drinks…! We gotta go…!” Toothy pointed.

“Wait, well now I’m hungry for hamburgers…!” Cuddles whined. “Can’t we at least get fries?”

“Now!” Petunia yanked his arm and followed the two out as they laughed together, to go cups filled with whipped cream.

“I didn’t think they would be literal on the extra whipped cream…!” Flippy snorted. He tried licking any spillage that fell over the rim, but it just got all over his fur. “Awwuugh…!”

“Pssheeheehee! I got nahahapkins!”

“Thank god you’re so cautious,” he gratefully told her, grabbing one and wiping his hands. She giggled again, blew at her drink a few times before sipping it and looking at the falling snow. “So, feel a little better?”

“Ah, yeah,” she nodded. “Breathing really helped…”

“I’m glad…!” he beamed. “We used that trick a lot in… erm…” A side glance as he trailed off, but quickly reeled back. “Well just a trick I learned.”

“I’m glad you did,” she nodded. The two set off towards the light display, sipping on their drinks gingerly and laughing as Flippy continued to clumsily drink his own, with hopefully unseen guests following.

[theoihalioistuff]

ARES IS NOT THE PROTECTOR OF WOMEN IN GREEK MYTHOLOGY.

He is never presented as such in any source, there is no evidence such a role was ever assigned to him in any account, and as far as I'm aware this popular yet unattested assertion is born from the echo-chambers of tumblr. In fact quite the opposite could be argued. TW for sexual assault.

This baffling claim seems to originate from a sort of shallow examination of the way Ares "behaves in myth", and the following arguments are the most frequently presented:

1. Ares protects his daughter Alkippe from assault, and is therefore morally opposed to rape. (Apollodorus 3.180, Pausanias 1.21.4, Suidas "Areios pagos", attributed to Hellanikos)

Curiously this argument is never applied to, among other examples: Apollo for defending his mother Leto from Tytios, Herakles for defending Hera from Porphyrion (or his wife Deianeira from Nessos), or Zeus for defending his sister Demeter from Iasion (in the versions where he attacks her), etc. The multiple accounts of rape of the previously mentioned figures did not conflict with these stories in greek thought: they're defending family members or women otherwise close to them. This sort of mentality is not uncommon even in contemporary times, e.g. a warrior may have no ethical problem killing men, but would not want his own family or loved ones to be killed. The same goes here for sexual assault.

2. There are no surviving accounts of Ares sexually assaulting anybody.

The idea that the ancient greeks pictured that, among all the gods, Ares was the only one who shied away from committing rape is baseless and borders on ridiculous. In this case absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

The majority of surviving records regarding Ares' unions are presented in a genealogical manner, and do not go into details on their nature. This is the case for most works of mythography, where specifics of sexual encounters are to be found elsewhere. However, common motifs present in other accounts of rape also appear in stories concerning Ares' relationships, e.g. tropes like shape-shifting/the use of disguises, the victim being a huntress, secrecy, and the disposal of the concieved child, are to be found in the stories of Phylonome and Astyoche respectively:

Φυλονόμη Νυκτίμου καὶ Ἀρκαδίας θυγάτηρ ἐκυνήγει σὺν τῇ Ἀρτέμιδι: Ἄρης δ᾽ ἐν σχήματι ποιμένος ἔγκυον ἐποίησεν. ἡ δὲ τεκοῦσα διδύμους παῖδας καὶ φοβουμένη τὸν πατέρα ἔρριψεν εἰς τὸν Ἐρύμανθο

"Phylonome, the daughter of Nyktimos and Arkadia, was wont to hunt with Artemis; but Ares, in the guise of a shepherd, got her with child. She gave birth to twin children and, fearing her father, cast them into the [River] Erymanthos." (Pseudo-Plutarch, Greek and Roman Parallel Stories, 36)

οἳ δ᾽ Ἀσπληδόνα ναῖον ἰδ᾽ Ὀρχομενὸν Μινύειον, τῶν ἦρχ᾽ Ἀσκάλαφος καὶ Ἰάλμενος υἷες Ἄρηος οὓς τέκεν Ἀστυόχη δόμῳ Ἄκτορος Ἀζεΐδαο, παρθένος αἰδοίη ὑπερώϊον εἰσαναβᾶσα Ἄρηϊ κρατερῷ: ὃ δέ οἱ παρελέξατο λάθρῃ: τοῖς δὲ τριήκοντα γλαφυραὶ νέες ἐστιχόωντο.

"And they that dwelt in Aspledon and Orchomenus of the Minyae were led by Ascalaphus and Ialmenus, sons of Ares, whom, in the palace of Actor, son of Azeus, Astyoche, the honoured maiden, conceived of mighty Ares, when she had entered into her upper chamber; for he lay with her in secret" (Homer, Iliad 2. 512 ff)

In neither of these cases is a verb explicitly denoting rape used, though it is heavily implied by the context. The focus of the action is on the conception of sons, the nature of the interaction is secondary.

Other examples are found among the daughters of the river Asopos, who where (and here there's no confusion) ravished and kidnapped by different gods to different parts of the greek world, where they found local lines through children borne to their abductors and serve as eponyms. Surviving fragments from Corinna of Tanagra tell us:

"Asopos went to his haunts . . from you halls . . into woe . . Of these [nine] daughters Zeus, giver of good things, took his [Asopos'] child Aigina . . from her father's [house] . . while Korkyra and Salamis and lovely Euboia were stolen by father Poseidon, and Leto's son is in possession of Sinope and Thespia . . [and Tanagra was seized by Hermes] . . But to Asopos no one was able to make the matter clear, until . . [the seer Akraiphen reveals to him] 'And of your daughters father Zeus, king of all, has three; and Poseidon, ruler of the sea, married three; and Phoibos [Apollon] is master of the beds of two of them, and of one Hermes, good son of Maia. For so did the pair Eros and the Kypris persuade them, that they should go in secret to your house and take your nine daughters." (heavily fragmented papyrus. Corinna fr. 654)

"For your [Tanagra's] sake Hermes boxed against Ares." (Corinna fr. 666)

It seems that, similar to the myths of Beroe or Marpessa, the abducted maiden is fought over by two competing "suitors", and though we can infer that the outcome of the story is that Hermes gets to keep Tanagra, apparently by beating Ares in a boxing match, we don't actually know what happened or how it happened. In any case, Ares does mate with another daughter of Asopos, Harpina, who bears him Oinomaos according to some versions (Paus. 5.22.6; Stephanus Byzantium. Ethnica. A125.3; Diodorus Siculus 4. 73. 1). There is little reason to suppose that this encounter wasn't pictured as an abduction like the rest of her sisters.

The blatant statement that each of his affairs was envisioned as consensual is simply not true.

3. He was worshipped under the epithet Gynaikothoinas "feasted by women"

This was a local cult that existed in Tegea, the following reason is given:

"There is also an image of Ares in the marketplace of Tegea. Carved in relief on a slab it is called Gynaecothoenas. At the time of the Laconian war, when Charillus king of Lacedaemon made the first invasion, the women armed themselves and lay in ambush under the hill they call today Phylactris. When the armies met and the men on either side were performing many remarkable exploits, the women, they say, came on the scene and put the Lacedaemonians to flight. Marpessa, surnamed Choera, surpassed, they say, the other women in daring, while Charillus himself was one of the Spartan prisoners. The story goes on to say that he was set free without ransom, swore to the Tegeans that the Lacedaemonians would never again attack Tegea, and then broke his oath; that the women offered to Ares a sacrifice of victory on their own account without the men, and gave to the men no share in the meat of the victim. For this reason Ares got his surname." (Paus. 8.48.4-5)

As emphasised by Georgoudi in To Act, Not Submit: Women’s Attitudes in Situations of War in Ancient Greece (part of the highly recommendable collection of essays Women and War in Antiquity), "it is not necessary to see the operation of an invitation in the bestowal of the epithet Γυναικοθοίνας on Ares". The epithet is ambiguous, and can be translated both as "Host of the banquet of women" or "[He who is] invited to the banquet of women". In any case no act of divine intervention occurs, and the main reason for the women's act of devotion lies principally in recognising their decisive role in the routing of the Lakedaimonians. It's they who preside/participate in the feast of war, the men are excluded.

Also this a local epithet that isn't found anywhere else in Greece. As such it would be worth reminding that not every Ares is Gynaikothoinas, in the same way not every Zeus is Aithiopian, not every Demeter Erinys, and not every Artemis of Ephesos.

4. He was the patron god of the Amazons

He was considered progenitor of the Amazons because of their proverbial warlike nature and love of battle, the same reason he was associated with other "barbaric" tribes, like the Thracians or the Scythians. In this capacity he was also appointed as a suitable father/ancestor for other violent and savage characters who generally function as antagonists (e.g. Kyknos, Diomedes of Thrace, Tereos of Thrace, Oinomaos, Agrios and Oreios, Phlegyas, Lykos etc.). Also he was by no means the only god connected with the Amazons (they were in fact especially linked to Artemis, see Religious Cults Associated With the Amazons by Florence Mary Bennett, if only for the bibliography).

Similarly, Poseidon was considered patron and ancestor of the Phaiakians mainly because of their mastery over the art of seafaring (and was curiously also credited in genealogies as father to monsters and other disreputable figures).

On another note I have found no sources that claim he taught his amazon daughters how to fight, as I've seen often mentioned (though I admit I'd love to be proven wrong on that point).

5. Finally, the last reason Ares could never be portrayed as a protector of women is because of his divine assignation itself

The uncountable references to his love of bloodshed and man-slaying don't just stop short of the battlefield, but continue on to the conclusion and intended purpose of most waged wars in antiquity: the sacking of the city. The title Sacker of Cities as an epithet of Ares (though it is by no means exclusive to him) is encountered numerous times and in different variations (eg. τειχεσιπλήτης or πτολίπορθος), and the meaning behind the epithet is plain. Though it is hard to summarise without being reductionist, the sacking of a city entails the plundering of all its goods, the slaughtering of its men, and the sistematic raping and enslavement of the surviving women (to name only a small few of the literary references see The Iliad, The Trojan Women or The Women of Trachis). There is little need to emphasise that war as concieved of in ancient greece, especifically the brutal aspects of war Ares is most often associated with, directly entailed sexual violence against women as one of it's main concerns. The multiple references to Ares being an unloved or disliked deity are because of this, because war is horrifying (not because his daddy is a big old meany who hates him for no reason, Zeus makes very clear the motive for his contempt in the Iliad (5. 889-891): "Do not sit beside me and whine, you double-faced liar. To me you are most hateful of all gods who hold Olympos. Forever quarreling is dear to your heart, wars and battles.")

Ares was only the protector of women inasmuch as he could be averted or repelled (e.g. surviving apotropaic chants):

"There is no clash of brazen shields but our fight is with the war god, a war god ringed with the cries of men, a savage god who burns us; grant that he turn in racing course backward out of our country’s bounds, to the great palace of Amphitrite or where the waves of the thracian sea deny the stranger safe anchorage. Whatsoever escapes the night at last the light of day revisits; so smite him, Father Zeus, beneath your thunderbolt, for you are the lord of the lightning, the lightning that carries fire." (Shophocles, Oedipus Tyrannos, 190-202)

"And let no murderous havoc come upon the realm to ravage it, by arming Ares—foe to the dance and lute, parent of tears—and the shout of civil strife." (Aeschylus, Suppliant Women 678)

~~~~~

All that being said, this is a post about Ares as conceptualized and attested in ancient sources, made specifically in response to condescending statements about how "uhmmm, actually, in greek mythology Ares was a super-feminist himbo who was worshipped as the protector of women and was hated by his family for no reason, you idiot". It is factually incorrect. HOWEVER, far be it from me to tell anyone how they have to interact with this deity. Be it your retellings, your headcannons or your own personal religious attachments and beliefs towards Ares, those are your own provinces and prerogatives, and not what was being discussed here at all (I personally love art where Ares and Aphrodite goof around, or retellings where he plays with his daughters, or headcannons that showcase his more noble sides, etc.)

~~~~~

I've seen that other people on tumblr have made similar posts, the ones I've seen were by @deathlessathanasia and @en-theos . I have no idea how to link their posts, but they're really good so go check them out on their pages!

[seventh-district]

Making Incorrect H:SR Quotes Until I Run Out of (hopefully) Original Ideas - Pt. 4 - Nuthin' but Boothill Edition

[Pt. 1] [Pt. 2] [Pt. 3] [Pt. 5] [Pt. 6]

[wingbuffet]

The 'Smoldering Corpse', a bar in the planar city of Sigil from D&D's upcoming 'Sigil and the Outlands' book (and originally from Planescape Torment)

Never have I painted so many NPCs in such a big scene, with so many little stories going on :D

[avastazyana]

The Lord of the Decepticons and the Last of the Primes? Scandalous!

[iwasbored777]

How I feel after blocking Despicable Me haters on Tumblr cuz I don't need that negativity in my life

[moonkhao]

You dropped me off that night, right? When was that? I can’t remember it. Don’t pretend you can’t remember. Even if I was drunk, I could recall it. If you could, then why are you asking? So, it wasn’t a dream that night. And do you remember what you said to me that night?

WE ARE | EP4

[carrot-felisidad]

Fic idea: Jiang Cheng was cursed to say and do what he really feels for a day.

He caresses Wei Wuxian's cheeks and says how proud he is of him. He hugs Jin Ling and confesses that he's the center of his world. He praises his disciples and expresses how happy he is for staying with him. He swam around the lotus pond on only his inner robes as he always dreams of doing. He sweet-talked Lan Xichen out of seclusion. He glared at Lan Wangji and told him to get lost.

[ts-kk-blog]

OMG OMG OMG wtf OMG !!!!

Fresh out of the slammer is so kaylor coded like it's giving they made it together

Karlie elizabeth kloss (sunshine) said she's the american dream.

Also fresh out of the slammer is the 7 song in the ablum and taylor 7 album was lover when it all Down

(He don't understand me Splintered back in winter, silent dinners, Bitter he was with her in dreams Grey and blue and fights and tunnels, Handcuffed to the spell I was under)

[eddiezpaghetti]

It has come to my attention that SOME OF YOU who read my last Byler post remain UNCONVINCED. So I'm gonna tack onto it this:

I'm older than fucking God and air, and I've been out and proud since 2007. Yes, I know what homophobia is, and yes, I know what queerbaiting is. I know about Supernatural and Teen Wolf and Sherlock and blahdyblahdyblah. No new ground is being covered here. I thought I made that clear in the original post, but, clearly, I did not.

I am aware of queerbaiting and homophobia, and I'm still wholeheartedly certain in Byler being canon anyway.

Okay, so there are three types of relationship I want to discuss when it comes to queerbaiting. They're all, like, "queer relationships that could have happened, but didn't".

First off, queer-coding. This isn't really a thing so much anymore, but it still crops up every once in a while. I'd argue it probably happens most with male-male relationships in family shows these days. First example that comes to mind is Mr. Smiley and Mr. Frowny from Steven Universe. You can't make a relationship canon because some shitty overhead bastard overhead said no, so you get as close as you can without compromising the show. Can't make someone gay? Well, now their comedy routine is a blatant allegory for a romantic relationship. Boom-shaka-laka. This is something I don't see being a problem with regards to Stranger Things, but I want it to be there as contrast, a demonstration of one of many things queerbaiting is not. However, one could argue that, thus far, Will Byers is, canonically, queer-coded. It's pretty fucking heavily implied in the show, and the creators have confirmed it, and you're gonna be able to see it if you're not FUCKING BLIND, but word of god is not technically canon which means that interviews don't technically make something canon, blahdyblahdyblahdyblah, technicalities, Robin has been explicitly stated in the text to be queer while Will has, thus far, not, outside of good ol' Show-Don't-Tell. Of course, anyone with two brain cells to rub together can tell that that's going to change by the end of Season 5, but, hey, for what it's worth, I'm throwing this out there.

Alrighty, Thingamajingama Number Two: "Oops, I accidentally made the greatest love story known to man." AKA, a genuine, honest-to-goodness mistake. Unfortunately, we do live in a heteronormative society. Sometimes people who don't think about being gay much write a friendship that's incredibly compelling and don't even consider the possibility that it could have been read as romantic. Something something Top Gun something. This is, again, not queerbaiting. This is Steddie, this is Ronance, this is Elmax, this is your favorite flavor of non-canon ship this week, this is not Byler. The creators know DAMN well what they're doing. They've talked about it. We know this. Nothing new here.

Which brings us to the topic of discussion here. Actual queerbaiting. This usually starts out as an "accidental greatest love story", and then reacts to fan response. And when I say "reacts", I mean like a goddamn chemical reaction. Like bleach and ammonia, bitch. It's noxious and it's gonna kick your fucking ass without mercy. This is when a creator is like, "Hey, let's get our queer audience invested, but we're not actually going to give them what they want because our straight audience isn't here for that/we personally think it's gross/we don't give enough of a shit to want to research a goddamn thing to write a real gay character," blah blah blah whatever excuse they want to come up with this time.

And when you think "queerbaiting", I want you to think "bullying". Because that's what it is. It's lucrative bullying, like beating us up and taking our lunch money, but it's bullying all the same. And it's a real goddamn thing, even if people misuse the word a lot, often when they mean one of the two above, sometimes when they mean "bury your gays", which is another homophobic thing entirely that I'm not going to get into here. Queerbaiting is the thing we're focused on, and it's real, and it's bullying. And here's the reason I want you to think of it as bullying:

They

Think

It's

Funny.

They are actively making fun of us.

That's why Dean had the "Cas, get out of my ass," line in Supernatural. It's why the "Do you like boys?" line happened in Teen Wolf. It's why "Lie with me, Watson," happened in the RDJ Sherlock Holmes movies. Because "It's just a joke, mate." "It was just a prank, bro." "You didn't really think it would happen, did you?" "You should see your face."

So here's probably the biggest reason I don't think it's specifically queerbaiting in this specific instance of Will Byers and Mike Wheeler.

Stranger Things has never, not once, made a gay joke. Ever.

Every single time queerness comes up, it's dead serious.

Lonnie calls Will a fag, and the show is not at all reluctant to show what a goddamn horrible person he is. And when Hopper latches onto that, it's not as "Hahah, is he gay, though?" It's because he's trying to determine a potential motive for Will's disappearance, and even if someone had interpreted it as a joke, Joyce immediately has a line that functions as snapping her fingers in front of the audience's face and yelling "FOCUS" when she says "He's MISSING." Basically outright saying "This isn't funny!"

Troy calls him a fairy, along with targeting Lucas and Dustin for their skin color and disability respectively, and Mike gets damn near murderous. Troy is portrayed as a goddamn monster and the show portrays it as justice when El makes him piss his pants and later breaks his arm.

Steve calls Jonathan "queer" as a slur and gets the shit beat out of him for it.

Billy's father is revealed to be homophobic and abusive in the same breath.

Mike says "It's not my fault you don't like girls!" and we're shown how devastated Will is and Mike immediately follows him to beg for forgiveness.

There is a joke in Robin's coming-out scene, but it's not at Robin's expense. It's at Steve's. Specifically for being heteronormative.

Jonathan has multiple scenes where he's trying so hard to tell Will that he's always going to love him as he is, whether he's gay or not, without pressuring him to come out before he's ready.

Even when there's a little bit of ribbing at Robin's expense, it's always because she's an awkward nerd who's nervous around pretty girls, just the same as Lucas and Dustin are teased when they both first develop crushes on Max, and even then, even then, it always comes as a package deal where they make fun of Steve's girl problems at the same time.

Stranger Things is an emphatically pro-gay show. It may not be the core point of the show the way it is in, say, Our Flag Means Death, but there is nothing less than respect for its queer characters. Its queer characters are always taken completely seriously. No one is making fun of us. They never have. That's why I have serious doubts that this is queerbaiting. It would come completely out of left field for the bullying to start in Stranger Things' final season.

So it's not at all likely to be queerbaiting because queerness is taken completely seriously. The creators have talked about Will's queerness, at least, so it's not an accident. And queer-coding would be silly to expect from this show when it's already on its final season. Like, what is Netflix gonna do? Cancel it? Not to mention all the explicit queerness that's in there already. And no one's gonna "What about the children?" a show that's had sex scenes in it since the first season.

There's no fakeout here. It's gonna happen. Breathe.

[papa-evershed]

Rob James-Collier as Kevin O'Dowd

THE LEVEL

[vaggieslefteye]

CHARLIE MAGNE from HAZBIN HOTEL (2019): Pilot - "That's Entertainment" ↳ "So, I've been thinking: Isn't there a more humane way to hinder overpopulation here in Hell? Perhaps we can create an alternative way to change souls through... redemption?"

[useragarfield]

♡ ULTIMATE SHIPS MEME ♡: First Meetings [5/5] ↳ Derek Shepherd & Meredith Grey, Grey's Anatomy 1.01 ( 2005 - )

[infiniteglitterfall]

OMG, COULD EVERYONE PLEASE STOP IMMEDIATELY BELIEVING AND REPEATING DISINFORMATION?!

Sorry, I just. Was just on Twitter, and I snapped.

I literally haven't seen one true statement about Israel on social media in MONTHS.

It's gotten to the point that I'm seriously considering starting a sideblog fact-checking all of it.

PLEASE STOP BEING GARFIELD I AM BEGGING ALL OF YOU

BE NERMAL FOR FUCK'S SAKE.

I've written at least one really long post about fact-checking things before. I have another saved as a draft somewhere.

But all you really have to do at this point is GO LOOK AT AN ACTUAL NEWS SOURCE.

What do I mean by an Actual News Source?

An actual news source will tell you where it's getting its information.

Basically: Wikipedia rules apply at all times. Citation. Fucking. Needed.

Except with news articles, I don't mean a detailed footnote.

I mean, if they say, "Rosco Flubberish reported seeing a pig fly across Whatever Place. 'It was a flying pig,' he said," they're fine.

If they say, "Sources close to the President reported that the Department of Farmland Creatures launched a pig into the air this afternoon," they're fine.

If they say, "There have also been reports that pigs flew," they are purely making shit up.

Just check CNN or something. CNN checks their shit, and they're very quick on the draw.

NBC has been very reliable too, in my experience. So have ABC, Newsweek, the Jerusalem Post, the Guardian, the New York Times, the AP, PBS, the Washington Post, and Reuters.

You can break through most paywalls by putting archive.is or 12ft.io before the https:// of the URL. Or just go to either of those sites and paste the URL in the box.

Nobody is perfect. I've seen some articles from all of the above that were accurate, but left things out that I personally thought were important.

Journalists are humans, humans fuck up.

(Also, NONE OF THIS APPLIES TO OPINION PIECES ON ANY TOPIC. Opinion pieces are exactly that: opinions. They don't seem to be fact-checked anywhere, as far as I can tell. They range from super-accurate and informative to complete nonsense.)

(Surprisingly unreliable sources in my experience: Democracy Now, Jacobin, Workers World Party. The latter two act like news sites but are basically running nothing but opinion pieces; Democracy Now can do important deep dives, but I've also seen news coverage from it that was wildly misinformed in that same way.

On the flip side, Slate and the Atlantic are largely opinion -- the Atlantic more than Slate, maybe -- but they often have really well-researched analysis of political situations. Ditto Teen Vogue, and sometimes Vox.)

You don't have to read CNN or the NYT or whateverfor fun. You don't have to make it one of your news sources.

Just. Do a quick check on Google News before you assume anything is true, and then run it through a bullshit filter as described above.

You are being actively lied to, all the time. So am I. We all are.

And people will believe and repeat literally anything that sounds about right.

That's just human nature.

That is WHY none of us are immune to propaganda.

if you want my personal shortlist of Bad Sources, as in Sources That Consistently Publish Absolute Falsehoods:

Any and all state-owned or state-controlled media. For example:

Al Jazeera is owned by the Qatari government, and so are a bunch of other news sites.

Mehr News, the Tehran Times, Al-Quds TV, and Al-Alam are owned by the dictatorship of Iran.

Oops. Looks like every form of broadcast Iranian news media is owned by the dictatorship of Iran, which has a monopoly.

Palestinian Broadcasting Corporation, Palestinian News and Info Agency, and Al-Hayat Al-Jadida are owned by the government of Palestine (the Palestinian Authority)

Al-Aqsa TV and Felesteen are owned by Hamas.

TASS / Russia News Agency, Russia Today, and a fuckton of others are owned by the Russian government.

State Media Monitor seems to do a pretty great job of tracking and listing these things. Check out your own country there!

I specifically listed those ones because some of them (especially Al Jazeera, Mehr News, and TASS) are sites I've seen come up frequently on Tumblr, or in my attempts to fact-check what people are saying here and on Twitter. The rest are just more examples from the same governments.

Al Jazeera deserves special notice because it's become a very popular leftist news source. Believe me, I used to read it all the time too.

It can be reliable and accurate sometimes. But:

It consistently tweets things that are unsourced, never appear anywhere else, and that would be big news you'd expect it to follow up on if they were true. It seems to be following a strategy of "tweet every rumor you hear in case it's true, so you can get the scoop."

It also does this with its liveblogs of the war. And ALL its coverage of the war at this point is liveblogs. So things that are verifiably true will run right next to things that are complete hearsay, but are too long to just tweet.

This is especially dangerous because as far as I can tell, Al Jazeera doesn't delete anything that turns out to be false.

I've also seen regular news articles in Al Jazeera, on multiple topics, that veer from Absolutely True Statements to Wildly Exaggerated Numbers and Speculation. Stuff you wouldn't expect a source on, like statistics or descriptions. And there's no way to tell the difference unless you already know a topic really well, or are fact-checking them while you read.

One especially terrible example, from Gazan activist Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib:

Al Jazeera has never posted or published a correction.

Alkhatib has also blamed it for destabilizing the region, although he's exaggerating about it being Hamas's official propaganda outlet:

TL;DR: If you see a Tumblr post making any kind of factual news statement without a link, at this point you need to assume it is absolutely not true. And either scroll on past, or go check Google News.

If there IS a link, you need to click through to see what it's from and what it actually says.

(Honestly, you need to do that with Wikipedia too. I've repeatedly clicked through on citations that absolutely did not say what the article implied they did.)

And pro tip: on mobile, you can just smack a button to sort Google's news results by most recent, and it helps A LOT. There's gotta be a way to do the same on desktop, but if there is, it's not immediately visible, which sucks.

[sparkles-rule-4eva]

If I see one more post trashing on the Sonic movies just because they're not like the games and because of the human characters I'm going to explode and then punt the sun itself into their faces

GUUUYYYSSSSS. THERE'S THIS MAGIC THING CALLED A MULTIVERSE. THE SONIC MOVIES ARE NOT SUPPOSED TO BE LIKE THE GAMES, THEY ARE IN AN ENTIRELY SEPARATE UNIVERSE. YOU SHOULD NOT BE JUDGING THEM BASED ON HOW WELL THEY FOLLOW THE GAME CANON, BECAUSE THEY ARE NOT THE GAMES. THE MOVIES AND THE GAMES CAN COEXIST AS SEPARATE UNIVERSES OF THE SAME CHARACTERS LIVING THEIR LIVES IN DIFFERENT WAYS, MKAY??

Once you accept this I can almost guarantee you'll be a much happier fan. I can testify. 😘

Sonic Wachowski ≠ Game!Sonic. Because they grew up in different environments and around different people in different circumstances, and that changed the way they turned out. I believe that if Wachowski grew up the same way Game! did, he would've turned out like Game! did. I also believe that if Game! grew up the same way Wachowski did, he would've turned out like Wachowski did. The core of this character is the same. In both the movies and the games, he's the fastest thing alive, he LOVES running, he loves his friends, he loves chili dogs, he loves living, and he will fight for what he believes is right. 💙

Just take into account the different worlds, the different lives, the different influences, and the fact that the movies are not trying to imitate the games (I thought this was obvious from day 1?) and it'll be a lot more fun in this fandom for you. In fact, you'll find you're a lot happier when you're actually taking time to love and appreciate the things you're interested in rather than just nitpicking about everything. 👌😜

And if you don't like the movies, you can kindly leave them be as well as all those of us who DO enjoy the movies. If you only like the games, stick to the games. 💙

[cumaeansibyl]

Guy in last night's meeting talking about when he first got sober a little while ago and he said in a rehab meeting "I'm doing this for my baby daughter so I can give her a better life."

And a woman said to him, "You know, your daughter deserves a great life, but so do you, dude."

Yeah I feel like that's the thing you gotta believe before you can change your life -- you don't have to believe it all the time, we all have doubts, but if you can just one time find that spark inside you that says "I deserve better than this" it'll take you farther than you thought was possible

anyway this week I have twelve years of sobriety and I hope for you the same success in overcoming whatever's keeping you from the better life you deserve