#also i find the fandomization of real life people that happens on this site to be very strange buuuuut that’s a story for another day~ ^_^

[princehatterene]

being a lesbian sports fan on tumblr is like. i’m not into the sport or parasocial toward the players because i find them hot or i want them to kiss each other. we share a warrior’s bond. they are my drinking buddies. they protect me from weird men who hit on me at the bar. they showed me their baby pictures and i’ve been teasing them about it endlessly. ​they’re trying to set me up with a player on pwhl montreal. we are not the same.

[damnfandomproblems]

Fandom Problem #5387:

There's a bit of a catch-22, if you're open about something you're "shoving it in everyone's face", and if you're private about something you're being sneaky because you know deep down that it's shameful and wrong.

I think part of it has to do with how the internet and social media blurs the line between what is a "public" space and a "private" space. If I have a particular kink, and I make a separate side blog dedicated to that kink, it's because I know that there are a lot of people who follow my main who do not want to see that, so I have a place to also discuss it where they don't have to see it. It's not because I know it's actually immoral to have a kink so I'm actively trying to trick people into thinking I don't. Also, because some people tend to view someone's blog as their entire LIFE, if I have a blog where I put all my kink stuff to keep it separate from my regular SFW content, then they must think I go around in my real life talking to everyone only about kink stuff all the time. Instead of like, a regular person who has a public life and a private life. That if you break into my house, rummage through all my stuff, and happen to find a vibrator buried in the sock drawer, that it's no different than if I ran naked through the streets waving dildos around.

The problem is that they don't understand the concept of "certain things are inappropriate at certain times or places", instead they think if something may be inappropriate in SOME contexts then it shouldn't be allowed in ANY context.

Don't make adult content, A CHILD could see it, doesn't matter that it's on an 18+ site.

Don't make anything with potentially triggering subject matter, in case someone with specific types of trauma sees it, it doesn't matter if you put content warnings on it.

Don't put sex scenes in movies and shows, what if someone wants to watch it with their family and it'd be soooo awkward? It's not like movies and shows come with a rating on them and tell you exactly what got it that rating. Or you could just, you know, suck it up and deal with the awkward for a minute or two.

[mirandyficlists]

Fic Searches sometimes take Time.

Hey there my Mirandy Dandies hope you're all well.

After a number of particularly noxious Anonymous messages from someone, or possibly several someones, kvetching about oh so many shortcomings with my Tumblr site and my other actions in the fandom as a whole, I felt I needed to make this post to clarify a few things about:

What I do,

What I'm able to do.

What I'm willing to do

The way this platform works...something, bear in mind, that I can't change.

I am a diehard Mirandy Dandy and one of the things I love to do is to SHARE the goodness and to chat about fics whenever I can. Having been a victim of the loss of Angelfire and Geocities when so much amazing fic was lost to us in the Xenaverse and other of my earlier fandoms, when I became a Mirandy Dandy I was not going to see myself in the same limbo and made a point of fully harvesting all fics as they were posted and keeping external copies of my treasures, updated monthly whenever possible. I did this, by the way, from the beginning on LJ to the present and let me tell you, keeping track of and harvesting fics from LJ was not easy and took a hell of a lot of time copying and pasting but I did it to the best of my ability.

The Mirandyverse is now 18 years old (we should all buy us a drink…well in the UK anyway, lol.) and we have people finding the Dark Side every week. Now these newbies and youngsters have often never set foot on LJ, if they’ve even heard of it, some have never set foot on FFnet even not to mention places like Passion & Perfection and the Pink Rabbit Consortium, and therefor have missed out on some great gems and giants of the days when new fics came out thick and fast. Thus the difference between the 3732 fics recorded for DWP on AO3 and the 5422 fics I have listed on my spreadsheet. Added to this the number of fics that have since been deleted or lost in other ways and you end up with the Newbies truly missing out.  And so I try to spread the goodness as best I can and share my harvested treasures when asked, as well as letting the masses know about that on several different platforms.

Because I love the fandom as I do, a significant amount of my time is invested in it, but as with everyone, I have a real 3D life that demands my presence and attention regularly and sometimes exclusively when, well, when shit happens as they say. Add to this my personal disabilities and I sometimes struggle being able to do things and thus have to let some things, like fandoms, slide in order to cope with the day to day. But when I’m better I always come back. And my disabilities can bear good fruit too, in this case my fic Spreadsheets, necessitated for my enjoyment because of my medically induced memory problems but that have been used and enjoyed by the fandom as a whole. Silver linings and all that.

I am always willing to share the Mirandy goodness in anyway I can manage. I LOVE being able to send deleted fics to people who either haven’t read them or aren’t able to access their old favourites because they were deleted. Hence my spreadsheet which keeps track of the existence and whereabouts of about 97% of all Mirandy fics online. And also my Themed Rec lists, now numbering 157 different groupings. All of which assist me in helping out with fic searches which I always try to source whenever they are presented, and that sourcing includes seeking help of other Dandies on different platforms.  Now, just to clarify, none of these things are complete or exhaustive, but I do keep them up to date within the limitations stated above AND try to make sure to share them online at least every couple of years. I don’t mind doing it, it gives me pleasure, but to my nasty Nonnies from earlier and any other Trolls who might be lurking…I AM UNDER NO OBLIGATION TO DO ANY OF THE THINGS I DO FOR THE FANDOM. I do it out of love of the Mirandyverse and the vast, VAST majority of truly wonderful Mirandy Dandies.

Tumblr is, as we who tumble know, both glorious and hideous as far as social networking platforms go, and has always been meddled with by admin for the sake of selling it off and trying to monetize it into oblivion and not to actually improve the functionality for the users in anyway. And that is the arena in which I operate this Tumblr and adapt how I do so in order to accommodate my needs.

So just for your collective FYI specifically regarding Anonymous asked fic searches…

If you have sent an anonymous fic search and have not seen an answer posted for a very long while:        

I am NOT ignoring you.

                                I am NOT ‘being lazy.’   

                                I have NOT deleted your request.            

                                And believe it or not I have NOT forgotten about you.

I check my in box weekly to remind myself of the searches I am still tracking down, so

not getting a response to an Anonymous ask only means I have not yet found your fic, but I am still looking for the fic, when time permits me.

Because you sent an Anonymous ask, if I try to answer it and let you know that I’m still looking for the fic, the ask is removed from my in box and I no longer have it in an easily accessible place to remind myself to continue the search.   So instead, I keep the asks in my in box until I find the fic requested, which lets be honest my Dandies, given some of the descriptions or key points you sometimes give could be one of several thousand fics and it takes some time to sift through, lolol.  If you want to be kept updated on the search progress, then it is much better if you PM me directly so that I can communicate with you.

To finish off I do want to say, ANY Mirandy Dandy is ALWAYS welcome to contact me with asks and questions in what ever way best suits their needs all I ask is that you appreciate any limitations attached to your preferred method and behave accordingly.

The Mirandyverse is generally a stress-free and positive place to be and always has been, and it is my dearest hope that it continues to be a space free from the toxicity that often invades other fandoms.  To that end I will always continue to offer my services to fellow Dandies in a spirit of helpfulness and sheer Joie de Vive.

Long live the Mirandyverse!

[tetitous]

Everyone, I have done it.

So, the post about Yugo and queerness in Wakfu is a 3 parter due to my use and abuse of pictures. You'll be able to enjoy part 2 here, and dw I'll add one at the bottom too

First, I would like to preface this by saying that, while I do believe they didn’t create or write Yugo with the idea making him queer in mind, I do not think the creators made things unintentionally either. What I think they actually wanted to do with Yugo, was to have a character that felt as gender neutral as possible, in order to make him relatable to the show's originally young audience, without alienating girls or boys. A character not leaning too much one way or the other.

But as such Yugo is a character that can be read within a queer lens without that much of an effort. I know a lot of people on this site hc him as on the aro and/or ace spectrum, some degree of nonbinary and in my specific case as genderfluid bi/pan, and I'm even considering possibly intersex.

Wakfu also happens to be the kind of show that, whether intentionally or not, just finds itself to have a ton and a half of queerness in it: from simple implications to actually out queer characters, the world depicted in the show is a diverse one, in that sense and more.

That’s why I genuinely think that it's not just random readings that come from fandom's typical queering goggles, I think there are elements in the show that do help these readings, precise elements as well as elements that need a little more digging.

So here's what this post aims to do: to find those elements and compile them in as clear a way as possible. Please do take into account that I am very easily prone to reaching so if you don't see it, that's totally fine, and I may end up structuring things in very chaotic ways, but I am doing my best.

I decided to separate my writing between the gender elements and the sexuality elements, with a listing format. One element, one dash. Since I am french and don’t know much about the english translation, I’ll be illustrating everything using screenshots as reminders, and will be adding some small notes and quotes translated by myself when needed. Well then, let's get started!

The gender category, or as I'd like to call it "this could have been an email- but make it about a trans character":

Yugo's name: first, this one is 100% due to a fic I read that made me reflect on a very interesting fact: in s1ep1, when Alibert finds Grougal's message, Yugo's name is never mentioned.

During that scene, he’s only called “this child” and “that small one”

What that means, given that Yugo's name has been "Yugo" since previous lives, is that either Alibert somehow picked the right name on first try, or, more logically, that he didn't. That Yugo got called another name for some years, until he got old enough to correct them.

And you would think the argument stops there, but in s2ep12, a character gets openly deadnamed and mocked for it by literally everyone, saying "his real name is…". There is one exception to this,

Yugo, who never mocks him and says "It’s not because your parents named you… ", which is a very interesting nuance in phrasing. It implies that, while to others the name their parents chose is a "real" name, an immovable fact of life, to Yugo it is a choice made by others for them, that can be wrong, that can be changed.

Yugo's relationship with femininity (and masculinity): Have you ever noticed that the Brotherhood of the Tofu very frequently separate themselves with gendered terms? You’ll often hear Tristepin and Ruel call Amalia and Eva “the girls” and Eva and Amalia call them plus Yugo “the boys”. Prior to the OVAs Yugo only does so in one episode, s2ep21, the one episode where he's magically seduced into being aggressive towards "the girls".

“You are so strong and smart, right guys?”

“If you aren’t happy you can go with the girls!”

Prior to this, Yugo never really plays into gender roles, and after it will be mainly due to his aging process, which we will discuss.

Yugo seems to treat socially gendered activities as if they weren’t, I believe it is also noticeable with his relationship to heroism, though that one can only be inferred in contrast to Tristepin's former very strict hero/princess binary viewpoint.

(Here I would have put an exception about the OVA and him admitting he always wanted to save a princess, but given that in the most recent manga the term is used as a pet name for him I guess I’ll let that one slide)

During s1ep4, Yugo crossdresses and not only is he comfortable with that fact, not only is he the one who came up with the idea (although Amalia gave him an unconscious push), he is thriving in it.

Look at the joy on his face upon putting a bow on.

I feel the need to remind everyone Yugo is 12 during s1, an age at which young boys are definitely aware of a gender divide and typically reject girly stuff like the pest.

Back to the Boufbowl episode once more, in s1ep10, you may have noticed Ruel calling being a cheerleader “being the girls”, and while Yugo may be on the bench as a substitute, he does participate in cheerleading right in the next episode.

Two three very motivated children and their unconvinced chaperone.

Actually he is the only character in the Brotherhood of the Tofu to be a cheerleader during both Boufbowl arcs.

His outfits are also not strongly gendered, especially compared to Tristepin's chest-out s2 design or Eva and Amalia's early short skirts, his most gendered character design might be his adult-form one, and even then, when compared to Nora's, you’ll notice Yugo is only ever wearing the same thing as her with added details (royal details?) and his own color palette. My take is he’s actually meant to look like the Eliatrope goddess, with his cape reproducing her hair.

S4 teaser Yugo because we don’t have a clean pic of his s4 design, and I did my best for Nora.

Yugo's aging process as a metaphor for transness: as we all know, from the OVAs until the last quarter of s4, Yugo is a young adult trapped within a child's body. He gets mocked and infantilized on the regular, his status as king belittled. The only thing that he maintains some form of respect for is his status as a hero. And you can tell it is weighing him down. For one, this body is an obstacle to his relationship with Amalia, not just due to the eyes of others,

"I grow slowly whereas she, she became a queen, a woman...", with the implication "and I'm not a man” or “I don't pass as one"

but also due to his own degrading self-perception.

“Let’s see who’s small!”

(notice how easily he gets tickled by a simple comment on his size, how the mere notion of his body being revealed becomes reason enough for violence in s3ep7).

Yugo gets angry and violent, a lot, and more than is typically expected of him.

“I tried thinking like Yugo, I’m sure he would have preferred this to the hit-you-in-the-face method.”

“Dear little brother, I don’t know what happened to you these last few years, but I don’t recognize you anymore!”

A result of trauma, sure, but if you're like me you may have noticed how turning into an adult made him feel very… relaxed, suddenly. In a way that can be compared to the disappearance of symptoms of body dysphoria with people who go through a process of gender-affirming transition.

As an aside, his s3 design really makes him look like he's wearing a binder, in addition to the turtleneck that would hide the absence of an Adam's apple, the look is very transmasc.

That one particular art of him is what really marked me, because of the slight shade under the chest. Doesn’t mean it is a binder, just means it could look like one.

Yugo's Eliatrope hat as a metaphor: There may not seem like there is much to say, but the fact is that this hat was very mysterious for a very long time. If you were part of the fandom before the s2 finale you may have been theorizing on a forum about what was going on behind that hat (I was on the "a second pair of ears but these are shaped like cat ears" team, but still slightly unconvinced), and you knew that there wasn't anyone more curious about this than Nox.

“We may finally get to find out what you hide under your hat.

-Even my friends never forced me to tell them!”

was a very iconic line, one that definitely could remind people of the infamous "what's in your pants" question.

Well the Brotherhood was curious as well, but mostly respectful and patient with their friend.

It was clear that there was discomfort with that part of him that he refused to reveal, so much so that he probably never washed with any of his friends. When they would hang around for days, when the girls wouldn't care between each other (and neither would Eva and Pinpin between each other, wink wink), when they would all sleep together, Yugo probably would still never take it off in front of them.

Overall my point is just that inthe rare times the hat gets discussed, it just doesn't sound cis.

the Eliotropes: they're coming back in the sexuality section, dw.

But, as Yugo himself says, they are "versions" of himself. The interesting question now is "in which way?" Since they are not "past versions" of him, and since they seem to "inherit" some of his personality/physical traits, I do believe them to be an expression of his own fragmented sense of self. Some of them may be men, as a reflection of his own perception of himself as one, but then some may be women for that same reason, and well some are women, some even are canonically enby.

Character on the far left is enby and character on the far right is a woman. Obviously Echo is not an Eliotrope.

One could even go as far as considering these traits can physically express themselves only because Yugo's anatomy reflects them, and in that case we can go into not just a gender reading, but into an intersex one. Pushing further into it, Yugo, being their creator, effectively gave birth to them, and as such they call him father, but the act of giving birth itself is typically associated with the feminine, sowe could argue that Yugo’s position is both one of father and of mother.

Of course they also have physical and mental aspects that are separate from Yugo, like none of the ones we met are the same sandy blonde as Yugo is for example, but the ambiguity of the existence of the Eliotropes is and will always be a matter of "where does Yugo end and where do they begin?".

A little question mark for the road: In OVA2, as a joke, Rubilax “reveals” that Tristepin was actually a woman all along. This is a sample of everyone’s reaction:

1st, Amalia is so bi it’s insane, but that’s not my point here. Yugo’s reaction being of absolute shock, even more so than Tristepin himself always had me wondering what was going on in his head. Through a queer lens it remains just as hard to read through, so my personal take is that Yugo is amazed at how male-“passing” Pinpin is, so much so he may think “You mean to tell me I knew that guy for years and never realized he was trans too?!” I don’t know, I’d love to get some feedback on that one.

That first section was 2 pages-long without the pictures, so let’s take a tiny break and enjoy some Yugo cuteness as a breather.

Just the cutest. He doesn’t even need to try.

part 2

[pro-sipper]

What do proshippers generally believe about shipping real people? Stuff like creator x creator or celebrity x reader?

That it falls under the umbrella of "you should be allowed to write anything you want". Once again, it's not my personal thing. There's no real life pairing I read for, and the whole "blank x reader" is not appealing to me at all.

But I have no problem with people writing that stuff, or knowing it's out there. I saw someone a while back say that it's basically just writing about another character, and I agree with that. No matter how much a creator posts or how open a celebrity seems with their personal life, we're still only seeing a tiny snippet of their lives. We have no clue who they are when the cameras aren't recording because we just don't know them. And whatever someone chooses to write about is mostly stemming from that particular persona that they happen to put on for the world and that's it. It's completely separate from our reality because they're basically just writing about another made up character

The problem I have, and it's what I imagine most proshippers also take issue with, is when people start blurring the lines between fiction and reality. To me, there's a world of difference between posting something on ao3, and speculating on secret relationships in the comments of someone's youtube video. Or between talking about something on tumblr, and tagging the person directly on twitter.

I just don't understand people who condemn rpf and talk about how gross and invasive it is, but think it's funny to tag celebrities on twitter to bring up (what they think is) cringe-worthy fanfic tropes that people have written them into. Or people who print out fanworks to shove into an actor's face at a meet and greet and ask them what they think about it. That's where the lines get crossed, to me.

I think ao3 and tumblr still have an air of mysticism to them. A little secrecy, a little privacy. In the sense that someone in the public eye would have to put in a little work to find this stuff for themselves. They'd have to go to the site and search themselves up to find anything. As opposed to just about anyone in the world being able to force this content in their line of sight with a simple @ on a site like twitter.

So to me the problem isn't that this content exists. The problem is when people don't know how to keep fandom stuff private. Write all the rpf you want but remember at the end of the day these are real people, not your blorbos. You don't know them. It's inappropriate to say these things to them personally (which yes, also includes tagging them on twitter or in the comments of their videos). But it's also inappropriate to run up to them with other people's content just to say "look what these FREAKS wrote about you!!" And I think people either forget or just genuinely don't care about the latter.

[chronicallyonline-fandomwh0r3]

Y'know... i love the dpxdc fandom a lot. I follow a lot of creators and love to see different viewpoints on this fandom.

BUT, that does not mean I will tolerate people being asses and/or bullies. YOU don't want to see this crossover? the fucking block tags/blogs button is RIGHT THERE.

Limiting peoples fun and want to write? FUCK YOU.

Limiting peoples creativity and crack filled bullshittery of posts? FUCK YOU.

THIS IS TUMBLR, ITS NOT MENT TO BE A SERIOUS SITE. WE LOVINGLY CALL IT THE HELL SITE FOR A REASON.

Now, anyone who sees this post will be wondering why I'm being a bitch and what brought this on.

WELL, I have been gone for a few days dealing with real life shit and when I come back, i find out that this @jedipirateking person keeps "fact checking" and "I don't like this for so and so" on a lot of my mutuals posts.

Now at first I didn't want to deal with it. I made one response and BLOCKED the person.

I come back AGAIN after being gone for a few more days to find this account being a total DOUCHEBAG about my post and several others concerning power scaling systems. (i had to unblock to figure out why so many people were having arguments in my replies and such, AND BOY WAS IT A MESS.)

Now usually I would love to have an in depth conversation with you concerning power systems.

BUT, that post? THAT my dude was a CRACK POST. it was meant to be fun and all bullshit. NOTHING SERIOUS!

AND saying CANON beats FANON always? DUDE, the whole phandom is crack bullshit and FANON. There is little CANON used in the DP Phandom at any given moment!

If you want to start your bullshit hating on people, GO TO FUCKING REDDIT. THIS IS TUMBLR, WE ARE CRINGEY AND FUCKING BULLSHITING ALL THE TIME.

STOP. YOU ARE NOT WELCOME OR NEEDED.

BLOCK US. BLOCK THE TAGS. I DON'T GIVE A FUCK, JUST LEAVE WRITERS AND CREATIVE PEOPLE BE FUCKING CREATIVE. EVEN IF ITS CRACKED UP BULLSHIT.

Now, yelling over. Reply to this post, comment, i dont give a flying fuck. I'll keep you unblocked to be able to see ur bullshit. BUT i encourage everyone in the DPxDC fandom to block this person and ignore them. Its obvious they want to hate on people becuase they themselves are full of hate and anger at something else.

I hope you figure out your life and bullshit dude. Really i do. Because right now your cowardly ass is fucking up everyone elses fun.

To my mutuals

I am so frustrated with this happening and being late to the party. Please just block this douchbag.

also @bonebrokebuddy i love the reply you gave me. Thank you for the conversation starter for power scaling and challenging stuff. im just tired of this guy shitting on everyones posts lately.

@stealingyourbones @bongo-clash @spacedace @britcision

[outrunningthedark]

The way I read your post, guessed people were claiming the RG bts stuff was because Buddie is going canon, went looking and yup. That's the current theory lol.

TBH, I wasn't planning on being serious about this ask, but it's motivating me to get something off my chest. (Nothing to do with anon, just a general overview of where things stand.) I'm about to say something that might come off as (unintentionally) mean? (I cannot control how anyone will interpret this), but I also don't know how else to describe what I've been feeling. I know that recently we (collectively) discussed sunk cost fallacy as a big reason for why people cannot let the idea of Canon Buddie become go, but to me...it's become deeper than that for some, and it's honestly...alarming. You know how it's common for people to use social media sites as an "escape" from real life/the real world? Yeah. I think we've reached that stage with a fictional ship. Some (not all!) fans are, IMO, using Buddie as an "escape" from whatever's going on in their lives outside the internet. (Real life putting your mental health in the gutter? Just ignore all of that and focus on the happy stuff instead. In this case, Buddie.) Their happiness has become dependent on being right about a ship going canon. So they can have this one good thing. And while I can sympathize with the motivation behind certain actions (look at me with WWE and other sports - sports make me happy), I worry about those who don't want to face the fact that the joy over Buddie (possibly) going canon will be short-lived in the long run when real life doesn't get better as a direct result of what happens in fiction. There's also the flip side of the coin, the darker side. If someone's happiness is dependent on Buddie ending up together in canon, what's going to happen if/when they never get together at all? How will fans cope? (I think we've already seen some of the above, though. The longer it takes Buddie to go canon the more people we find are on "hiatus" from the fandom or have deactivated their accounts entirely and gone MIA. They don't know how to find joy in the show or the fandom experience unless they're getting exactly what they want.)

[myfandomrealitea]

Hey so i was wondering if you have a piece on how fanfics about real people. Been in fandoms since 2012 and well growing up in such places you learn ( just like you wrote in your fanfic’s are a restaurant, don’t order it if you don’t like it)

(All within reason)

You can enjoy what to read. Your business no need to push it down someone’s throat neither is someone pushing anything for you to like. Don’t like it, it isn’t for you, move on.

I wrote something recently saying how surprised i am I didn’t find fanfic’s on a certain actor, seen as there is always something for everyone. Then someone jumps my throat and says how unacceptable it is to write about actual people.

I remember vividly this conversation has been had in the sherlock fandom when Benedict found some fic’s about him and it started the conversation “ actor fanfic’s; okay or not”

I told this person to move on and mind their business. If it isn’t for you, move on. There is plenty of fanfics for henry cavill / jensen ackels and other known actors so what is the problem with me asking about a new person who is on the come up. It isn’t a niche choice i know that actor ( alan ritchson) is going to have quite the fanbase after the ministry of ungentlemanly warfare.

So please tell me, am i crazy? I remember the debate years ago on fanfic morality being settled with the verdict of “ as long as you are not a creep who is walking up to actors or bothering them with fic’s about THEM not characters and keeping to yourself as ang other fic… you do you”

RPF is a touchy spot for a lot of people, but in short, writing RPF is perfectly fine provided you follow the typical safeguarding measures such as using sites like AO3, using proper tags to enable blacklisting, ect.

RPF is not and frankly has never been the problem. The problem is specific individuals with no regard or respect for real life boundaries and proper conduct.

Celebrities know RPF happens. Trust me; they know. They know people are on specific websites writing the nastiest rawdogging you can imagine.

Celebrities are also aware of the means by which they can avoid it. They are not clueless little creatures bumbling around and accidentally finding the likes of AO3. They know.

Just like with fan-to-fan content, its our job as their fans to respect their boundaries and choices by giving them the appropriate measures by which to control what parts of our world they see.

(Its part of why you'll never see me on the likes of Twitter sharing fanfic, fanart, ect. The filtering tools on Twitter are frankly appalling and the knowledge that my monsterfucking eggpreg ABO dystopian smutverse could end up on Henry Cavill's homefeed would leave me actually killing myself with a hammer.)

[ladysisyphus]

Okay! Now that we have finished it, I would like to take this moment to recommend the Chinese drama The Disguiser.

It is a must-watch if you liked Nirvana in Fire, because of course it's the same director and a significant chunk of that same cast, except all playing significantly different roles with different dynamics.

For normal people, you should give it a go if you like:

spies

suits

spies in suits

the amazing east-meets-west aesthetic of late 1930s Shanghai

international incidents

acknowledgements that non-marriage-trajectory relationships can still be important and intimate

minimal unfounded valorization of heterosexuality (like, I can't really explain this one without spoilers, but trust me)

but when the heterosexuality happens, it's cute? so you can't really begrudge it for happening

pretty men getting tortured horrifically

some amazing female villains, like seriously, most of the main bad guys are ladies and they're powerhouses

transparently hilarious try-hard patriotic shit

the inherent eroticism of having someone who loves you shoot you with a sniper rifle

did I mention the suits? because damn

an ending that is satisfying and not relentlessly, senselessly tragic

For perverts, let me sell the show to you like this:

大姐. Elegant and terrifying. Will make you kneel and hit you with a flogger, but only because she loves you. Mommy? Sorry. (Not sorry.)

大哥. Executive homosexual. Will bend you over a bench and paddle you in the foyer, but only because da jie told him to.

弟弟. Should not, from what I understand of the book (and the musical???), be the main character, except he's Hu Ge, so of course he's the main character. Spoiled little gremlin. Everybody's baby. Has a real weird daddy thing going with a very bad man, if you're into that. Bisexual slut powers activated, but only patriotically.

弟弟 #2. Adopted when he was ten. Just like a member of the family except when he's not. Faithful right hand and subordinate of da ge, whom he tops so hard. (But seriously, they're in love.) (No, really. They're basically married.) (I sense the source material has him a little saltier about his station in life, but in the show, he never shows an inkling of being anything but perfectly content doing what he does.) Sultry baritone. Will hold you down so da ge can spank you.

And I'm going to say that pervert shit runs strong throughout what little fandom there is, at least as AO3 would have it:

Which is what happens if you include everything tagged for the Disguiser. If you filter it by English-language works only...

And some of those that say they're in English aren't even in English! They're just pretending to be in English! What I'm saying is, if you feel like making kinky things for a bitty little fandom, this is the place.

Now! If I've sold you on it, here is how to watch it:

Option 1: KissAsian. Upside: Subtitled by the same Viki team that did the Nirvana in Fire subtitles, so they're absolutely readable and like 98% comprehensible. Downside: Slightly sketchy site.

Option 2: YouTube. Upside: It's YouTube; different translation that's also perfectly okay; hardcoded Chinese subs. Downside: Whoever formatted the hardcoded English subs did not put anything behind the plain white text, so any time the English text appears over a bright background (which is curiously often), the words disappear.

Also there's a musical??? that came out in 2021????? If I find a link to a full production of that, I'll come back here and update. The clips I've seen of it look great, though.

Look, this is not a show for everyone. It's got some gore and torture and onscreen injury that's pretty disturbing. It portrays the truly awful realities of Japanese occupation of China during this period. The rah-rah communism! bits are at best hokey and at worst distasteful. It can be slow at times and way too condensed at others. If you're not familiar with this period of history, it's tough to keep track of all the various resistance factions. Because of the spycraft and double-agent business, it can be legitimately tricky to remember who's lying to whom about what at any given moment.

Nonetheless, pervert shit aside, it's a solid story about a complicated quartet of siblings who love and also injure one another, and all the people who love/hate them. There are plenty of genuinely tense moments. The hairstyling and costuming are perfectly on point. The actors turn in some stellar performances. As I alluded to in my bullet points, it has an ending that includes some tragic elements, but not so many that it'll sink all your ships and ruin your day. And I tell you what, this show is legitimately horny for everyone in this car:

So if you watch it, let me know what you think!

[otherkinnews]

One of the anti-furry bills might become about religion in schools instead

(Orion Scribner originally posted the following article to the Otherkin News blog on Dreamwidth on February 25, 2024.)

Content warnings: Rated G. Mentions of abortion and transphobia.

Summary: Checking for updates on this year's three anti-furry bills in the US. None of them have progressed. The bill for calling animal control on furry students has a new sponsor. He wants to rewrite it. It would instead become a duplicate of his bill that says classrooms must display the Ten Commandments. The bill hasn't changed yet, so it's still an anti-furry bill.

I just checked for updates about the current status of all of the proposed laws (bills) in the US that are about furries or people who identify as animals. Anti-furry bills aren't based on anything that anyone in real life is doing: not participants of the furry fandom, not children pretending to be animals in the playground, and not people who really do identify as animals. Republicans say they wrote these bills because of an urban legend that schools provide litter boxes for students who identify as animals. According to fact-checkers Reuters and Snopes, no schools have ever done that. Republicans made up the urban legend and bills in parody of transgender students asking to use school restrooms. On the Otherkin News blog, we have previously written about all three of the anti-furry bills that are active, which you can read here and here. I searched on LegiScan to see if Republicans have introduced more anti-furry bills since then, but I didn’t find any new ones.

Two of the bills haven’t had any action since we posted about them before. Those are Mississippi HB 176 and Missouri HB 2678. They’re both still at 25% progression toward becoming laws. Their state government sites don’t say that hearings have been scheduled for them.

Oklahoma HB 3084 is also still at 25% progression, but some things have been happening with it. This is the bill where Republican Representative Justin Humphrey (he/him) proposed that students who are furries should be taken away from school by animal control. As of the 15th, the bill added a second sponsor, Republican Representative Jim Olsen (he/him). Olsen took Humphrey's place as the principal sponsor. Some other bills that Olsen sponsors are against abortion (OK HB 1537, HB 3013, and HJR 1046), and to allow children to not get vaccines (HB 2963 and HB 3249). Last year, Olsen sponsored some anti-transgender bills (HB 1011, HB 2177, and HB 2186).

On the 19th, Olsen proposed an amendment to HB 3084, the anti-furry bill. You can read his proposed amendment on Oklahoma’s site, or read it on a third-party site, LegiScan. This amendment would delete the entire text of the bill and replace it with an unrelated text. The text of this amendment is the same as another bill Olsen sponsored this month, HB 2962. It would no longer be about furry students at all. Instead, it would propose a law requiring public school classrooms to display the Ten Commandments. That would be unlikely to pass. In the US, public schools are government establishments, which prohibits them from displaying religious materials like that. I don't know what the advantage would be of duplicating the same text in two bills, or changing the topic of a bill so much. At this time, Olsen’s proposed amendment hasn’t been accepted. The bill’s current text is still what Humphrey originally wrote about furries.

On the 21st, the bill was withdrawn from the Rules committee. Then it was referred to the House Appropriations and Budget Education Subcommittee Committee. They haven't voted on it. I don’t see that they have scheduled a hearing for it. I'll keep watching for whatever happens next.

About the writer of this blog post: Orion Scribner (they/them) is a moderator on the Otherkin News blog.

[tomatoland]

Only Friends as a morality drama, groupthink & media literacy

I can't find the clip now, but Off was on GMMTV Live House and asked if people were watching Only Friends. And he then made a comment saying it's like a morality drama. And I really like that he said that because yes, Only Friends is making us think about what we would do in these situations, but also try to understand why do these characters or people in general behave the way they do.

I don't get the moral comparisons between the characters. Because if your barometer for a person is just that they are just better than another person, your bar is LOW? Or this couple is better than the other? Because in real life, is your barometer for a relationship just that it's better than someone else's relationship? Does your own romantic partner need to be the one who is deemed the most popular choice? Or do your own life decisions have to be what others would do in your situation?

Different choices for different people 👏 And who has a right to judge you for your life decisions? They don't know why or how you came to that decision.

I used to be really black and white about cheating in real life, but now I don't know, real life is FAR more complicated and grey. And we actually still don't know if Mew considered it cheating. He's still never outright says it. He always says "what you did to me," so it's debatable.

But accountability is a big theme in the show. There might be a reason why you behave the way you do, but it does not excuse your actions, you still have to take responsibility for it. Literally all the characters have to pay the piper/take accountability for what they do... except a certain someone who shall not be named.

In fandom as well as life, it is extremely easy to surround yourself with only opinions that validate your own. I am actually really against this kind of surreal groupthink/hive mentality thing happening in this fandom.

And I just want anyone coming across this post to know it's okay to not share the same opinion. Do not think that just because an opinion is popular that it's right.

I always for representing the minority opinion. Representation ALWAYS. I think society as a whole is better when different people share their different POVs. If the opinions on this site about OF were more fair and not so quick to romanticize some characters or villainize others, I probably would have not started posting opinions and just come on Tumblr to reblog some gifsets to be honest.

I've seen people say "someone told me this or that about these actors" or "from what I've seen about what people said about Mew on reddit, he is a master manipulator" and "the people I follow said" some even in tags on my own posts and I'm like "you realize what you just said/admitted to, right??"

Somebody TOLD you what to think and that's why you think that way. I will be honest, I would be embarrassed to say that out loud. And it's okay if you didn't realize you were doing it. (I didn't always myself. I've just had a lot of trips around the sun to figure out that groupthink should always be challenged.)

But if you recognize yourself doing this, start to ask "who is presenting this information? What is their bias? What is their motive? Are you being told what to think? Be really wary of people who make big statements without support.

I am upfront about my bias, you will see it right away from my blog, but I am more interested in the art because to romanticize some characters or villainize others just because you have a CP preference is just a NO for me.

Everyone gets judged fairly by the same measuring stick 👏

Only Friends is art created by MANY. Not just what the characters say and the acting on the screen. The world was constructed by Jojo and Ninew, Den, Best, filming, lighting, costuming, set design, etc.

Who is this character? How have they been characterized? What do they know? What don't they know? What could be motivating them to behave this way?

What is creator's intent? This is Thai media made for a Thai audience. While we have access to OF because it's on Youtube, we are not the original intended audience.

What Western or International perspective could we have that affects why we view things differently than the characters do or the Thai audience would? This is such a silly example, but I was and am still kind of triggered by it. In the episode 5 scene of TopMew at dinner, Mew got flack for how he eats. And I just want you to know that dining etiquette is not standardized around the world. When my dad first immigrated, his coworkers also gave him flack about this and he still fucking remembers the story 30 years later, so yeah actually I still feel strongly about this. Anyway, the Thai reactors only thought that Mew looked classy/expensive because he knows how to swirl a wine glass.

Is the reason you think this because the show is telling you to think that by how they film the scenes, music, etc? I always said that TopMew's lack of romantic suspense in the early episodes didn't make sense because all these characters exist in the same universe. They are written, filmed, and directed by the same people. And a lingering close-up on hands with accompanying romantic music is NOT acting, that's filming and art direction.

What personal perspectives or worldviews do we bring to our approach to media, etc, etc? The list goes on.

I actually didn't know what this is called until now but I've seen people mention media literacy and looked it up just now. Turns out this is what it is 🤷🏻‍♀️

Is there a take-away? Err, don't be a sheep. Decide for yourself what you think. And don't discredit art created by a whole ton of people just because you only care about certain actors.

[ja3yun]

Maybe I’m naive or maybe it’s the brain rot… but am I being completely delusional in thinking that tumblr is almost 99.999% a fan site that artists (especially kpop idols) do not engage with and probably don’t even have much regard for? Like this is a space for the chronically online. Most people don’t use any of their own personal information/faces/identifiers bc this is not a real place; it’s a black hole. That’s not to say that your work here is insignificant (it’s helped me a lot to escape from everyday anxiety and stress so thank you 🙏) but it's not like you or any other adult writer are writing these stories and then spamming them on Weverse or any other platform where the members are active.

I guess my point is that we the adults that engage in 18+ enhablr are minding our business and keeping the fantasies in fantasy land and then going to work in the real world. Like we do not know Enha for real. Some people apparently don't have jobs or lives, so they send hate to people online and act like they are personally offended on behalf of adult men they don't know and never will. It's giving desperate fan that thinks going to the airport to get an interaction is more sane than staying at home, kicking your feet, and giggling at imagining meeting and knowing the boys in real life (95% of the time as non-idols anyways which is another degree of separation).

I'm sorry for ranting. I'm just a huge believer that fanfic is a very safe and respectful way of engaging in fandom because we leave the real people out of it. We're not screaming inappropriate things and sexually harassing the boys to their faces, which happens way too often. We're engaging in community fan-to-fan which to me strengthens the fandom. There are things we talk about as Engenes that will never make it back to boys and thats okay. What makes fandom fun is not always the direct connection to the artist, it's the community we build because of them.

I hope you and the other amazing writers on this site know how important you are ❤️ thanks for taking your time to write and engage 💐

anon this is so!! you get it exactly. i think a lot of us post here because why tf would enha know this place exists? and its a safe place really bc if you want smut, you come here or go to ao3.

i think hate to writers is so petty bc it is the one form of media you can easily avoid? like to see smut you need to seek it out yknow? i never write in the general tags or post inappropriately, so for people to find my blog must mean they are looking for smthn 💀

hate comes w any platform, esp to creators of any kind so i kinda knew what i was signing up for. some of it kinda makes me go??? like im not making the boys out to be horrible or bullies like i try and write them as nice as i can so some of the hate saying i 'tarnish' their name is so false lmao

thank you anon, i'm sure every writer here appreciates the kind words and also, just the fact that you understand is enough for us

ilysm <33

[a-darling-thing]

Lately I've been reminiscing about the internet/blogging/fandom cultures in the late 2000s and early 2010s. Specifically about how it was a culture of free and open sharing of art, fic, crafts, time and skill without people monetizing absolutely everything.

In fandom circles we would constantly write and draw things for each other. There were fan-organized gift exchanges, competitions, and big bangs. Friends gifted art and fic to one another and this encouraged more art and fic to be produced. No one dared to charge for their fanworks back then because there was a very real fear of getting sued by folks like Anne Rice.

I know that this still happens in fandom circles to a certain extent, but over the years I have watched organizers struggle to get the numbers they once had, and more and more people not wanting to spend time creating stuff they won't get paid for. People also seem much less likely to freely donate their time and skills, also. I don't think that a site like A03 could be started today, and I sometimes wonder how long they will be able to continue operating, given it is run entirely by volunteers.

Back then we kept all our fan created stuff in fan spaces, and it was shared and created out of love and passion. It was almost like private correspondence within our little fandom in groups, and outside the prying eyes of show creators, movie producers, actors and book authors, and it was glorious.

I am still friends with and am still sharing creatively with friends I made during that time period (some I followed into later fandoms). I'm not sure I could say that of fandom friends I made later, with a couple of rare exceptions.

I don't know, I just feel like the commodification and monetization of fandom has really stilted creativity and connections over the years, and I'm hardly involved in fandom circles anymore, because I don't find it enriching and fun. It's just one more space trying to sell me stuff, or is so mired down in unnecessary, quasi-political drama (I blame tumblr, twenty-teens sjw culture and then later twitter and puriteen fandom cultures for the way some of this drama took root, mutated, and spread).

I guess I just miss community. There was a time when fandom spaces truly felt like community. We talked about and debated things in good faith, for the most part, we created art and fic out of love and passion and then shared those creative works freely, and it just doesn't feel that way to me anymore.

Listen, I'm not going to begrudge anyone who needs or wants to make money from their art. I get it. Life is hard, and the economy freakin' sucks, but the commodification of fandom, and the growing popularity of social media platforms and their unhealthy community dynamics did absolutely change fandom culture and not for the better, imo, and sometimes I just miss that old sense of close-knit community and free interchange of art and ideas I used to get in fandom from about 2005 - 2013.

[battle-of-alberta]

Hi and welcome to this thing that's sort of a prequel to the timeline I'm working on. The working title is Alberta Story, but as you can see I kind of changed directions midway through as I thought about it more, I figured if I was getting frustrated then surely Ed was also getting frustrated with it so I turned it over to him to express that, haha. I wrote the first half of this last fall and stewed on it for about a year and decided, screw it, I don't know where I'm going with this but I will slap on a few more panels and figure it out as I go.

This might be the closest thing to a reboot of the BoAB main storyline for a while. I wanted to do something that gave a cursory outline of Canadian / Albertan history for people who are new to it, but of course it runs the risk of repeating every narrative Canada / Alberta have about themselves and that's quite frustrating, to be honest! Particularly when you are trying to write characters who lived through a great chunk of it.

I was trying to think about where to "start" the story of Alberta, particularly after reading Mavericks: An Incorrigible History of Alberta. A lot of the tongue in cheek ahistorical assigning of Albertan-ness to even protozoic life rubbed me the wrong way even though I found it an interesting narrative, so I wanted to illustrate the difficulty of "beginning".

Additionally: I really find it frustrating in the Hetalia fandom when people kind of take Himaruya's approach and suggest the colonized personifications almost predate colonization somehow, like they were "always there", or the approach that they are direct descendants of some ambiguous ancestral "Native America" that mysteriously no longer exists. At the same time, I sort of understand how it also happens with the narratives we construct ourselves, in textbooks and museums, that have long illustrated "pre-history" (Indigenous history) as opposed to "history" (the "Real" history of Euro-Canadians). It's a cultural underpinning that needs to be undone.

I don't make any ambitious claims to produce real, decolonizing work, I realize there's this big gap in this universe I'm building that acknowledges municipal personifications and only vaguely gestures at the idea of others and there's a myriad of issues with that, but it's a place that I as a euro-canadian myself am starting with and I hope to continue learning and growing from here.

"Here" is summed up as: isn't it crazy that a company that was just gifted 1/12th of the surface of the Earth not only predates the idea of this country and its cities but also still exists and is just a place you end up in at the mall now?

More detailed explanation of each panel follows.

Diver's Claw: Several stories in different First Nations cosmologies reference the Creator or another figure making a flood that covered the whole earth, where a survivor (Wisakedjek in Cree/Ojibwe stories, Na'pi in Blackfoot, etc) sends down a succession of animals to the bottom of the waters to retrieve a piece of the old earth, which they can then use to create anew.

Mounds of Earth: When the Northwest Mounted Police were sent out west from Canada after purchasing the territories (including Alberta) from the Hudson's Bay Company in 1870, they marked the border along what would become the 49th parallel between Canada and the United States with piles of dirt.

Descent from the Stars: This is supposed to be a depiction of Manitou Asiniy, also known as the Manitou Stone or Creator's Stone, a meteorite that has spiritual significance to many Indigenous peoples. As I write this, he (as a sacred being, he is referred to with these pronouns) is currently in the custody of the Royal Alberta Museum which has recently agreed to return him to the site where he was originally taken from near Hardisty in 1866. Currently, the gallery is open for worship and ceremony until it is time to repatriate him.

Bodies liquified in coral: this is NOT a scientific illustration, haha. The idea is that a lot of Albertan identity comes from about 400 million years ago in the Devonian period. At the time, a big chunk of "Alberta" was covered by ocean. The organisms lived, died, and over time became crushed by sediment layered over them. Coral has a lot of holes perfect for holding this sludge and fossilizes nicely here, and it is this layer of Earth's long history that speculators are looking for when drilling for oil.

Lips to a book: Alberta joined Confederation on September 1st, 1905, which our last premier tried to commemorate with a holiday that no one showed up to. Back at the turn of the century however, it was a massive party attended by Prime Minister Wilfrid Laurier and the Governor General, a position in Canadian parliament that represents the King or Queen of England. Govenor General Grey (his grandpa was the Earl Grey the tea was named for, I believe) was the one who kissed the bible at this inauguration.

Prince: The prince here is Prince Rupert, who Rupert's Land was named for, and the king in question is Charles II of England (yes, the Restoration and Great Fire of London party guy from the Stuart era). Rupert's Land centred on Hudson's Bay and made up over 40% of what is now considered Canada. The Hudson's Bay Company was granted the charter to all this territory - if they found the Northwest Passage while they were at the business of acquiring beaver or otter pelts, it was certainly a bonus.

The rest is fairly self explanatory, I hope. Like I said, I felt like I was falling into the trap of the same old story of pioneers and exploration that has been absolutely done to death in Canadian history, and I didn't have anything particularly new to say about it that would maintain this storybook level of accessibility so I just. Stopped! Shifted gears! haha. Still, I think the fur trade is a very important piece to the puzzle that often gets either a bit overhyped or glossed over in favour of railroads in Canadian history and almost entirely ignored and forgotten in American history, and it makes sense to start there, particularly for Ed who has a lot of Complicated Feelings about it.

Enjoy! Maybe one day I will figure out part two.

[thetriumphantpanda]

hi charlie! 

to say the vibes have been off lately would be an understatement, wouldn’t it? because there has been a lot of negativity, too much for a place that is supposed to be about finding an outlet for your creativity and people to share your interests.

i know it has been difficult, draining to be around here and face all the discourse cankering the fandom. 

because of all this negativity, i believe it is important to try and balance it out with some kindness. so here i am, doing a little check-up on you <3

so first, how are you, really?

everything you feel regarding what is happening is valid and you deserve to feel happy and safe around here. so please, make sure you take the time you need from posting, from sharing fics, even just from being on the platform. i want you to know it’s okay and i support whatever you decide, for whatever reason.

i also want you to know that you have your place here, as much as the rest of us. you’re loved and wanted and i can assure you the fandom is a far better place with you in it.

i hope you’re taking care of yourself outside of tumblr as well. please remember to stay hydrated and to eat something 🫶🏼

now i would like you to sit back and enjoy the perfect, quiet night in with joel <3

do not hesitate to reach out if you need to talk, i’m here for you! sending you all my love and so many hugs 🫂

anna 💗

Ahhh Anna, this is so sweet of you - thank you for taking the time to try and combat so much of the negativity on here by spreading some love - it's so important!

I have had so many thoughts about what's been going on lately, some of which I'll share here, but I'll put under a read-more so if you're not wanting to read discourse, you don't have to!

I'm going to go and enjoy my quiet night in with Joel, because that would absolutely fix me right now and thank you for sharing that with me. He's making me a cup of tea right now and is going to bring it to me, we'll watch TV and I will continue crocheting a blanket for us to snuggle up under!

Take care of yourself Anna, and thank you for always being kind and wonderful on here!

If you've been around here a while, you'll know that I rarely, if ever, get involved and wade into the discourse that floats around often. It's not because I don't care, it's because this blog has, and always will be, my way to escape the pressure of my real life. I have enough personal drama to contend with outside of the internet, and I very rarely want to allow it to bleed into the one space I have where I can escape for some peace.

That being said, it has become harder and harder for me to ignore the absolute storm of shit that has been swirling these past weeks. My friends and mutuals having their works blatantly stolen and then receiving hate when calling this out. People I look up to and whose writing I enjoy being attacked for presenting certain kinks. The insane rise in anon hate being spouted not just here, but across other sites as well. It's all too much and it all has to stop.

The people on this site create fic because they enjoy it. They graciously and selflessly write thousands of words for your enjoyment, for free might I add, without asking for very much in return. They write often around full-time jobs, school work and through personal and health issues. They agonise over making sure their work is as good as they can make it. They don't owe you anything, we don't owe you anything. We do this because we enjoy it, but the current climate on this absolute hellsite is making the enjoyment really fucking hard to find these days.

Be kind to each other. Stop hiding behind the cloak of anonymity to spew hate and be mean. Stop stealing other people's work. If you come across a fic that has warnings or themes that aren't your cup of tea, stop reading and walk away. Take a step back and think about what will happen if writers are continuously driven off this site.

[ask-vladimir-makarov]

This blog is going on hiatus until further notice.

This will be a long post. Please read it anyway.

I've gone back and forth on this for a while now. I've been dealing with health problems and real life responsibilities that make it difficult to keep up with my regular posting, let alone with projects like this, which is why I haven't posted in so long. However, in the end, I decided I don't want to anymore.

I like Vladimir Makarov, as a character. I’ve been drawn to him since high school. He’s an interesting character to pick apart and analyze, both in the context of his fictional world and the larger meta context of his place in the narrative and how he’s received by his audience, especially in the realm of fandom.

However, he's also a character who has canonically committed genocide against the Chechen people during the First Chechen War. He is a character who, during his operations as a terrorist, profits from genocide in the Global South, particularly on the continent of Africa. And his reboot incarnation is no better, having taken part in Barkov’s occupation of Urzikstan and seeking to reoccupy it—timeline discrepancies aside, this is the character Infinity Ward and Sledgehammer wrote. And it’s for a reason.

I can sit here and talk about the nuances of fiction and reality and what it means to like a fictional character all day. However, I cannot and will not run a fan blog for a fictional genocider when my country, the United States, is funding, conducting, and aiding and abetting in multiple genocides across the world. I cannot draw Makarov cheekily answering asks about his love life and personal tastes while people suffer in Palestine, in Sudan, in Congo and elsewhere. I cannot contribute to a fandom environment where colonialism, oppression, and genocide are glossed over, whether fictional or real.

I implore everyone who follows this blog, or who reads this post, to do something within your ability if you aren't already. Attend a protest, participate in strikes like the one currently underway, and contact your representatives and implore them to denounce genocide and apartheid. Boycott companies on the BDS list and give your financial support to those who need it, whether that means donating to trustworthy organizations, purchasing e-sims for people on the ground in Gaza, or donating directly to those in need. Buy your electronics used and refurbished, not new. Create art—draw, write, make music, whatever it is you do—in solidarity for the peoples affected by colonialism, apartheid, and genocide. If you use social media frequently, follow those affected by these conflicts, pay attention to the news they share. Take the time to put the present into context and educate yourselves on the history of these conflicts and the systems at play. Encourage others to do the same.

Here is a very small list of resources on Palestine, Sudan, and the DRC to get you started. I may add more links in the near future, but keep in mind this is no way meant to be exhaustive; it is imperative that y’all take the time to inform and investigate yourselves. I nor anyone else can spoon-feed the facts. I've linked directly to donation pages for some, but I encourage y'all to dig through their sites to learn more and find more resources.

🇵🇸 Eye on Palestine + Taawon Association + Palestinian Children's Relief Fund 🇵🇸

🇸🇩 NasAlSudan: The Sudanese Revolution + What is Happening in Sudan? 🇸🇩

🇸🇩 Darfur Women Action Group 🇸🇩

🇨🇩 Friends of the Congo + their Resource Center 🇨🇩

>> kandakat_alhaqq on Twitter also has an extensive linktree of resources on many countries and groups in need of aid, including Sudan and South Sudan, Palestine, Somalia, Congo, Libya, Afghanistan, Yemen, Syria, Morocco, and the Uyghur people Some of the links I've already listed here.

>> Genocide Watch tracks genocide around the world. They have a list of reports by region and many resources on educating oneself about genocide, including a breakdown of the Ten Stages of Genocide.

Finally, as fans of Call of Duty, it’s important to acknowledge and reckon with the fact that these games are military propaganda. I’ve seen this refrain passed around the fandom time and time again, but very rarely do I see it actively engaged with; most often it’s used as a way of dismissing the game’s narratives in favor of doing whatever one wants with the characters. And as someone who’s made it My Thing to do whatever I want with the characters while also staying cognizant of the themes of the stories these characters come from, I’m going to challenge y’all to do the same.

Engage with the propaganda.

Take the time to analyze and deconstruct the games and their themes and pay attention to what viewpoints they’re encouraging. Pay attention to who you, the player, will have your guns pointed at most often, and why.

(Also, please please PLEASE watch Jacob Geller's excellent video, "Does Call of Duty Believe in Anything?")

And for those of us who like Makarov the character, take the time to educate yourselves on the very real things this fictional character was involved in, whether in the context of the original trilogy or the ongoing reboot. Put the present into context. Consider the role this character plays in the narrative, and why.

Do these things privately and publicly. Post about it alongside whatever else you share in fandom, whether that's art, fanfic, headcanons or meta analysis. Discuss it with your fellow fans.

I may one day come back to this blog, or I may not. Please do not hold your breath either way—this blog was a short and fun thing while it lasted, but to me, paying attention to the real world and treating these games with the gravity and depth they require is a more important use of my time. None of us are free until all of us are.

Thank you to the kind people who've followed this blog and sent asks, and thank you for reading this post all the way through.

I’ll see y’all downrange.