#also obviously i am understanding when they email me these things but i also hate it. cuz how many other people are they telling.

[sarpedon]

the push online to reduce the stigma around mental illness has created a strange group of undergrads who seem unaware that there still very much is a stigma around mental illness. i have students email me casually telling me their diagnosis, telling me they need an assignment extension because their anti anxiety medication refill was delayed, telling me they discussed something with their therapist, that they are getting assessed for ADHD, etc etc etc.

dont do that. dont tell me that. dont tell any of your TAs or instructors these sorts of things.

what if i suck? what if i think ADHD is a fake condition that people only get diagnosed with cuz they want drugs? what if i think people who think they have anxiety or depression are just weak snowflakes who cant handle the real world? provide as little information as you can get away with.

i dont know how it works in other countries but here (ontario, canada) most universities have some form of student accessibility services. theyre not great usually, but what they do is act as a go between. so you tell SAS your diagnosis and what accommodations you need, and then they come to us and say "this student needs this accommodation." and we dont ever know why. we also arent allowed to ignore it.

you tell me you need an extension because your ADHD meds ran out? you run the risk of 1) me not giving you the extension, and 2) me deciding you're a lazy ass who cant handle academia and marking you extremely harshly for the rest of the term.

dont open yourself up to that.

[kanmom51]

I have always wondered why JM Stans hates JK. I have seen posts about how JK is being the Company's favorite and that Scooter is trying to use JK to out sell JM. I don't believe it but I do want your opinions on this. I know you will probably say that's a very stupid thing to ask for but I see it a lot and I wonder why they keep saying that JK and V are the companies favorites. And also do you think the company didn't actively promote JM? This Fandom has finally twisted things around. I just need to know your thoughts on this matter. Thanks

Hey love.

Ok, where do we start?

Maybe from the end.

It being that it does feel at times that JM gets the raw deal from the company. If it's intentional or just because he's too nice and doesn't speak up enough I don't know. But this has been going on for years. The way the promotions for Face were handled, the way his name or photo somehow seem to disappear at times from official sites. For example the official BTS US store had all the members apart from JM in the index.

The issue has been since fixed, but it took angry JM stans posting and sending messages and emails to the company to notice it and make it happen.

Or, another example is JM's Like crazy Korean and English version streams being counted separately by Spotify.

Little things that make you ask "why him?" or more so "why is it always happening with him?"

Now, it's not that Jin has been forgotten at times as well (being cropped out of group photos at times). Somehow it's always those two, but with JM it's way more frequent and feels off.

Saying that, I do feel that some JM solos tend to make JM out as a constant victim (perhaps part of allowing them to be his saviors). While doing that they are constantly making comparisons with the others and while doing so also try to tear the others down.

I think this is part of the issue with solos. Forgetting that these 7 men are part of one band. A band they ALL want to be part of. Something they have said multiple times in the past and recently as well. 7 men that love each other (not to mention the elephant - cough couple cough - in the room).

It's more than ok to have a preference. A member you feel you like more or feel more connected to. It's a different matter to call yourself a fan of a single member elevating him by tearing down the others and constantly calling for said member to ditch the others and go solo. Spewing hate at the other members in that person's name, supposedly for him. Obviously you are not a fan of BTS when you do that, but more so you are not a true fan of said member who loves the others you constantly attack and wants to stay with them as a group, as he constantly and repeatedly tells us all.

Like the whole comparison made between JM's promotions and JK's (two totally different stories, different artists' objectives, different markets). And let me be clear here. I am not saying it felt like JM's success, which was, I feel, unexpected, was downplayed or not properly formally and publicly recognized. At the time it certainly felt that way. What we don't know is what JM's feelings were on the matter. Did he want it that way or was it a company decision? I know how it looks, but at times we need to understand that there are so many undercurrents and we don't get to see most of what's under the water. We only see what's shared or not shared with us, by the powers at be's decision. For example: Later on, in his documentary we saw that JM did get a cake for the #1 billboard achievement. So was it his choice not to post a pic? At the same time we saw his success, again, kind of being downplayed in articles, in BPD's interview, so this is one of those things I am leaving with a big question mark. Was he given the well deserved acknowledgement (even if not publicly)? Was it downplayed from the start, even towards him? And if so, why?

That being said, attacking JK, writing hateful posts about him, his looks, his artistry, his character not only would not make a damn difference as to how JM is being treated by the company but goes against everything that JM is and everything that JM feels towards JK.

Same issue, btw, with all solos. JK solos and the hate towards JM, the person JK loves the most in this world.

Do you see what I mean?

That was a little long winded, lol.

So, I do take issue with the need to cut down at another members success only to lift JM's up (he don't need no lifting, he's bloody amazing). I can assure you that is something he personally would not want, being the beautiful soul that he is, he wants the others to succeed and is not in competition with them.

I also hated this need to cut down JK even before his music came out, during JK's promotions, when he was choosing to mirror JM, a clear friggin calculated choice with a clear friggin purpose, by calling him lazy and a copy cat.

First of all you could see, if only you had eyes and kept them open, how throughout ALL of his promotions JK was mirroring JM. It was with similar outfits (even using the same exact black leather pants). It was with wearing the top part of an outfit to which JM wore the bottom part in his promotions. It was with his hair style and colour choices and references to JM's album. Anyway, point being once again that attacking another member does nothing to help lift JM up.

I always find it funny that JM solos hate JK so much.

The person that JM loves more than anyone else, and who loves JM more than they could ever.

The person who knows JM more than they could ever.

The person that JM chose to spend the 18 months of his army service with together, 24/7!! This was not forced on either of them. This was their choice.

Could it be jealousy perhaps? You know, JK gets to get JM and they don't.

Or perhaps this need to be the savior - poor JM needs them to save him from the big bad JK and the big bad company.

p.s. - maybe, just maybe, if indeed JM is being targeted by someone in the company, that's the issue that someone has with him. The fact that he will always come first for JK. The fact that because of him they can't control JK. Well, JK is not someone easy to control, but a. with JM in the picture some of his priorities are different (like wanting to spend time with him, like wanting to go public with their relationship) or perhaps the effect JM has had on JK, being his catalyst (JK's words) and all; and b. Outright homophobia. JK is the golden goose and he is in a long term relationship with a man, a bandmate. It makes life much harder for those that would rather milk the badboy hetero fuckboy image to the limit when said person wants to be accepted for his true self...

Well, that was definitely me digressing from your questions. Oopsy.

Bottom line:

Something kind of feels off with how things seem to go with JM and official content at times over the years (that includes photos, sites, spotify etc.) including his solo promotions.

That said, the comparison with other members, in my opinion, is unjustifiable. Because first and utmost they wouldn't want their fans to be comparing them. They all put themselves out there for their fans and all heartedly supported each other on that journey. Every single one of them had a different kind of solo debut. This is about different music genres, collabs or not, writing their own music or not, promoting out side of Korea or not, even down to the language of the songs. And with this also comes the different kind of promotions. Music shows or live/recorded performances for army, in bigger or smaller venues or even a tour, like Yoongi did.

The comparison with JK is just unfair to both of them. Especially given the very special relationship those two have. Both being the other's biggest fan and supporter.

That aside, the two went on two very different journeys. JM went on a personal journey releasing his first album taking part fully in it's creation, it being a very personal story he was telling us. JK, on the other hand, for whatever reasons (some of which he told us some of which he most likely didn't) decided to go with songs written by others, choosing to challenge himself with singing in English, and new genres and vocals. The choice for an album in English could very much have been pushed by the powers of be, and I do not want to go into the discussion of just how much influence SB has or not, other than say that Bang PD, a very smart and savvy man, knows his way around the music industry and business worlds and has much more influence on JK than anyone else, and that JK is a grown ass man and has told us on more than one occasion that he tends to make decisions for himself, even if at times they might not be the right ones, he goes with his gut. JK also told us he wants to be a huge superstar and singing in English, what can you do, opens up the US and other markets for him in a way that singing in Korean wouldn't.

But even putting that aside people seem to forget that from the get go JK was always the Golden maknae, the one that not only the company saw as their golden goose, but also all other members put on a pedestal. Not saying that's right. Not saying that's fair. But it is what it is. The company is a money making business. And now that BH are under Hybe, although they have autonomy (mostly) on the music, the costs and promotions, they don't have free reign over. And if it's about money making and profits, at times these will be the guidelines as to into what and where the money goes as far as promoting an artist. Let me be clear here. I'm talking here about costs and profits as in how much hard cash was put into a member's promotion over another's. This here isn't about other shit that's happened, such as no public acknowledgement or counting streams of different versions of the same song together or separately. That is another issue. What I'm trying to say here is that the starting point was and never will be the same also due to financial decision making.

Ok, so I think that maybe I've made more of a mess here than anything else, lol.

My bottom line is that even if I feel that JM is being wronged by the company in one way or another (and this goes for any member that might be wronged as well), I would never turn on another member and blame them for it nor would I compare between them. You can like or dislike the music each and every one of them released. That's fair enough and makes sense too. But belittling a member just to try and lift up the other one, that is just wrong in my books.

[freyafrida]

20 Questions for Writers

tagged by @librarylexicon!! ty ty ❤️

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

nineteen

2. What's your total AO3 word count?

154,262

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Currently Anne of Green Gables and Midnighters. i've also dabbled in some other fandoms but haven't written for them in a while, or i feel like i've written all i want to for them, so i don't count them.

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Come Back Home, by faaaar (252). following that, How Certain the Journey (160), Arco Iris (144), but i don't know who you are (105), there's another, not a sister (73). all aogg fics!

just for fun, top non-aogg fic by kudos is you're my unforeseen, a kenzi/hale fic from back when i watched lost girl. (also canadian content......sensing a theme here.)

5. Do you respond to comments?

i try to! i always really appreciate them and ofc if there's a thoughtful comment i do want to respond in kind. (kind of funny, i think i'm better at replying to comments than i used to be solely bc i have an email job now so i'm always like "ah yes gotta turn around a reply to this in 24-48 business hours.")

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

hmm...i don't usually end on an angsty note! i like to leave things hopeful or peaceful, at the very least, if not outright happy. i guess it would be leave me the way i was before, which ends on an ambiguous note -- even though the characters come to an understanding and no longer hate/blame each other, they know they can't stay together and help each other heal.

(oh yeah i just re-scrolled through my fics and i guess but i don't know who you are is kind of a downer, bc walter realizes he loves una but he's already in the trenches and the ending implies it's too late oops. i was counting it as a happy one since hey, at least he realized it! lmao)

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Come Back Home, pretty obviously -- canon ends with walter dead and una forever alone, so having walter live and return her feelings and both of them finding some peace/their place in the world after WWI is pretty happy i think!

8. Do you get hate on fics?

never gotten full-on hate, fortunately! wayyy back in the day on FFN, when i wrote a rarepair or unpopular character, i'd often get 1-2 passive-aggressive comments like "uhhh your writing is ok i guess but i don't think you understand canon because OBVIOUSLY you wouldn't have written this if you did", but those seem less common/acceptable now thankfully.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

occasionally, yeah. i've never written anything super explicit, but there's a...middling amount of detail? lol. i like writing romance and intimacy and vulnerability and simping and i've gotten more comfortable with portraying/exploring those themes via sex scenes.

10. Do you write crossovers?

no, never have -- "characters from X and Y fandoms meet" isn't my cup of tea, although i do like "AU of characters from X fandom in Y fandom's plot/setting", provided, you know, i find the latter interesting haha.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

uhhhh...🫣 not outright stolen, but i did once stumble upon a fic that seemed to have lifted a scene from one of mine. the fic was already abandoned by the time i read it and the author seemed pretty young, so i didn't want to like call them out, but...welp. hopefully they quietly learned their lesson. also yeah pretty much all my fic has been scraped and reposted to random knockoff sites.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

yeah!! my rebelde way fic, Comfort Zones, was very kindly translated into russian by Alice_Bolognini.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

nope! i don't think i ever will; seemingly like a lot of my mutuals, i am kind of a control freak over my fics lol. i also am a super-slow writer so i imagine a co-writer would get really fed up with me after a while!

14. What's your all-time favourite ship?

i...guess walter/una? haha that's really hard to pick, i love romance and have a ton of fave ships and i like them all in their own special ways! but walter/una has had me in a chokehold for almost the longest* and i think maybe has the most ~scope for imagination~ for me -- i still get ideas for what i want to write for them and bits of their characters that i think are interesting and how it would affect the dynamic between them. (tangent, i think the fact that anne's kids have several gaps in the narration of their lives is what makes me so interested in them, versus anne herself? like i never feel the need to write anne/gilbert fic, and i very rarely get the urge to read it, because their canon story is so complete and perfect to me. anyway.)

*honestly, in terms of pure "years i have spent thinking about them" numbers, it would probably be...david/shay from uglies. or james/sarah from liberty's kids lmao lmao /o\

15. What's a WIP you want to finish but doubt you will?

no such thing, i am determined to finish everything i post! (see also: coming back to How Certain the Journey after 9 years). the WIP that will probably take me the longest is the clocks are black, a Midnighters fix-it fic that i ran out of steam for a few years ago. i still tinker with it and plan to finish it, but it's unfortunately slow coming.

16. What are your writing strengths?

i think characterization and language (word choice, sentence flow) in general -- at least, those are the things people point out the most, so i'm rolling with it! the latter is probably what i pay attention to most while writing.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

i am not great at writing action scenes for sure. also i'm not great at coming up with zingers, so writing witty/snappy dialogue is rough for me (not that i write very many snappy characters...i probably am subconsciously avoiding them for this reason lmao).

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

full on lines of dialogue, no -- it feels unnecessary; at that point i'd rather write it in english and indicate elsewhere in the text that they're speaking another language (or write "so-and-so said something in [language]", if the POV character wouldn't understand it.) i don't mind using an occasional word/phrase when necessary, though.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

a series of unfortunate events! in the dark depths of fanfiction.net, under a different username, you can find a ton of my klaus/isadora fics with evanescence lyrics for titles. good times.

20. Favourite fic you've written?

Come Back Home is the fic i'm proudest of. it's the fullest and most complete thing i've ever written, in terms of being the longest and having the most plot (not that it has a lot, still) and actually being completed. that does make it my favorite in some ways -- it's still the only longfic i've ever finished and i'm still just like. eternally pleased that i managed to write all my wish-fulfilly walter/una thoughts into something coherent and give myself something to reread when i want to ignore canon. buuut it's also 11(!!!) years old and there are parts i think i could write better now (although i wouldn't touch it either, too many war flashbacks to authors taking down completed fic to rewrite it, and then never completing the new version ;_;)

my actual favorite fic at the moment is the more that you say, the less i know, which is a david/shay fic i wrote a few years ago! i just always had a lot of feelings about shay's story arc in uglies and how she was treated by the narration/other characters, and i feel pretty happy with how it was all distilled and portrayed in the fic. it's also recent enough that i'm not embarrassed by the writing yet. also i wanted to keep it fairly concise and not write 20+ chapters for it, so i'm happy i managed to keep it to 4 haha. it still took me a whole year to edit chapter 3 tho

tagging @jomiddlemarch @gogandmagog @noneedtoamputate! ofc feel free to not do it, and anyone else who wants to do it can consider themselves tagged :D

[elftwink]

every few months or so i have to reach out to someone i inexplicably stopped speaking to for literally no reason at all and in my mind this doesn't impact the nature of our relationship in the slightest (i think ive seen a post floating around on here that phrases this like "i don't have a friendship decay mechanic" and thats pretty accurate to me as well) but it is literally so scary because other people definitely can feel negatively about this complete gap in interaction and read into it my intentions (or worse when its due to memory issues do that thing where theyre like "if it was important you would remember ergo i am not important to you") and its like idk how explain that life is just moving to damn fast like to me we may as well have been talking yesterday... makes me very sad because on the one hand people have a right to feel that way and i understand that it can feel like your time is being wasted or that the other person doesn't respect you enough to get back to you (because also. some people do deliberately ignore messages for these reasons unfortunately)

but on the other hand. for me i feel like im always on the back foot because i just dont have the capacity to actually keep up with everyone, and i barely have the capacity to do the apology rounds every few months. also i hate the apology rounds because even if i have every intention of keeping up with people it always slips. i dont think i was meant to live in a world with instant messaging i think we should go back to snail mail. i would also be bad at replying to people with it but at least i would have a better excuse

also sometimes im just like i must be inventing problems when i write replies to people like an email on average takes me 4 hours or so to compose if given my own time. for time sensitive work emails it's still at least half an hour to an hour, which is also about the time it takes me to compose a text message to someone (unless i see it right away and stream of consciousness my answer without thinking then i can do it in 2 minutes but if i dont do this at the exact moment i see the text i cannot do it at a later time). during this process it feels impossible to speed up but its obviously ridiculous for two emails to take the time of an entire work day. also i have to take a break after sending an email or text like it is genuinely really draining and there is just no way it takes this much time or energy for anyone else because if it did we would have made texting illegal by now. but at the same time no single component of writing an email/text is that obviously difficult or energy intensive so im like sweating blood for hours to produce something that looks like it took 3 1/2 minutes maximum like what is wrong with meeeeeee

also no i didnt send my email yet im procrastinating by writing this post. perhaps this is also contributing to my extremely long composition times :/ ok bye everyone if i post again in the next hour and it does say "yay i sent my email" or something of the like please yell at me

[sae-something]

I have a Q for when you have a moment (I know maybe you don’t have a moment bc you’re not well and I’m also sending all the peaceful/recover-asap vibes your way <3)

I emailed my T yesterday saying that I hate her so much. I said a bunch of bad things. I did it because I was stuck in feeling so much need/want for her that I thought I would explode and then my feelings suddenly catapulted in the opposite direction and I was so angry and wanted her to get out of my life.

I had already emailed her earlier in the week to check that she was still there and she replied to that neutrally.

She didn’t reply to the hate email because I told her not to.

I feel so so guilty and I want to apologise but I have sent her too many emails and I don’t rlly know what to do. I might wait until next week and apologise in person but also I want to apologise now because I feel so guilty (but maybe I just want to hear that she’s ok with me which is selfish of me).

How does A respond to angry emails? Does she bring them up in session?

Hey anon,

Ahhhh I really relate to basically everything you described. Sending hugs your way, it's really a lot to go through.

Personally I always wrote another email if I felt the way you feel right now. Mostly because I decided that that was what I would like - obviously I'm not a therapist but I imagined a fight with a friend where maybe the friend had just been sending me endless messages. What would feel better for me? One more message with an apology/explanation? Or one less message? And for me, I'd always prefer one more message. At some point I asked A about it and she expressed a similar sentiment. It helps her to hear my explanation of what happened to cause the "I HATE YOU"-reaction and to hear that (many) part(s) of me don't share the hateful feelings.

Obviously just going "sorry sorry sorry sorry I'm such a bad person" is not really helpful, and if at all possible I'd encourage you to try and implement some sort of "XYZ piled up, which made me feel ABC, etc"-explanation. But also, it's still therapy. And I've definitely also written about how much I dislike when that hate-reaction kicks in. It's been really helpful for me too, that even those horrible emails were 'welcomed' by A; the last half year (?) there's been a shift and it hasn't really happened at all anymore.

With A, we have the deal that emails always come back in therapy. So yes, when there had been an email-spiral from my side, we would always touch on that in therapy. Sometimes I would have already written out all the chain reactions that happened for me (with feelings, parts, reactions, triggers, etc.) and we would spend a whole session on it. Sometimes we had already emailed back and forth and just concluded in session that 'it had been talked through' sufficiently, and if either of us had anything to add to it still.

As for how A responds, let me dive into my emails, lol. Some (translated) phrases from emails she sent me:

I can imagine you are full of rage and anger! I don't think you are a monster, let's talk about it on monday

Oh Sae, so horrible for you. I am glad you emailed me and of course 'I hate you' is painful to read but with everything you share with it, I also understand it. The most horrible thing is, I think, how much you hate yourself. Well; I don't hate you and I want to help you.

Oof, that sounds like a looott of anger!

Oof, it seems really really difficult to feel all there is to feel. Good to see you later today because this is so painful to do alone!

So yeah. That's some examples. The last 2 replies were to emails from me that basically only consisted of "I hate you, you make everything worse, I hope you never come back [from vacation], I hate you, I hate you, I HATE YOU". The first two examples were sentences in bigger emails, which were replies to also much bigger emails from me (where, besides the "I hate you", I also wrote about other emotions/things).

Also... if I may suggest so, stop asking your therapist to not reply. You are emailing for a reason, and sending huge (emotional) signals and then depriving yourself of a response... that might just be mirroring past experiences of not being seen/met/heard when in emotional turmoil. Of course I don't know you at all, so maybe it's entirely different for you, but that's a little something that stood out to me. You deserve to be heard. Even when raging, even when hating, even when being mean or unreasonable.

If you want to, let me know how things went? I hope you'll be able to talk through this with your therapist when you see her next. It can be really helpful (though extremely terrifying) to bring this into the room.

Sending a hug your way, take care!! <3

[hypergamiss]

Maybe you can help me understand the way insta's recommendations work....But I think If someone has ever had your phone number, you will be suggested to follow them on insta and vice versa. I think this is the gist, I've tried reading thru the policy but can't find anything that explicitly states this.

Anyway, I'm bringing this up because I'm about to change my phone number because I keep getting suggested to follow people I haven't seen in 6+ years. Like co workers and people from group projects in college. I have accidentally stumbled across so many girls' OF/sex work accounts and it makes me sad and embarrassed for them. The trend, especially for gen z, is to give sex work a chance because the media tells us it's lucrative. I'm so glad I chose not to put myself out there like that--the internet will do you dirty every time. The fake user names are not hiding anything.

I just got done reading thru mess on twitter. A young girl who had a lot of promise, went against my advice I gave her years ago and gave up a full ride for OF content. She really thought she would be better off without a degree. Well, she found a pimp/bf and they're both struggling while they rely on her content to pay the bills. Selling pics of her privates for 8.99 a month. I found all this because she was randomly suggested on insta. Neither one of us have the others numbers anymore, yet because we had that digital connection several years ago we will never be able to escape each other online.

I'm a sex positive woman, but I hate that so many girls lacked guidance and discernment when they made these decisions. If I am stumbling across these accounts against my will, imagine who else in their life is seeing this. The internet is forever and people are not as stealthy as they think they are. I just feel so sad knowing this digital footprint is going to haunt them later on. I had a SD in college but I met him through a friend and didn't need to put myself online. He was actually the one who taught me how to be truly anonymous online because he knew I'd be thankful for it once my career took off.

I'm not very knowledgable on instagrams recommendations but I'm guessing that it's using data that goes back all the way to when you first created a facebook profile since Meta became a thing and they're all under one umbrella now. There is so much that is being done with everyone's(personal) data, at this point it might have to do more with your email than you're phone number(or both).

I never fully understood the pimp dynamic. I legit thought the pimp concept was a made up thing that they used only for films and music videos(naive, I know). Then I grew up and one day met a "pimp" in real life(laughed at his face, I thought he was joking about it) and my jaw was glued to the floor. I still can't fathom why any woman would just hand over all her earnings to a man so he can just live off of her income and work her to death. Oh and they have multiple women at once??? My brain still doesn't want to accept that pimps are a real thing😅 Obviously now I assume that a trouble history and maybe drug abuse might lead women to this path, but even then. Pimps are NOTHING without women...

I agree with you on the digital footprint topic, I wish everyone took it more seriously.... It's a forever thing. More permanent than a tattoo or a marriage will ever be!

It also saddens me that many young women don't have the guidance that they could really use. I wish I could personally be there for each and every one of them.

[ballsballsbowls]

Saw a post the other day talking about a fic author who is very upset to know that people are talking about their fic in Private Exclusive Discord Servers and they feel "excluded" and it makes them want to write less. I obviously do not want literally ANYONE who'd participate in that discussion on tumblr to see what I have to say, which is going to lump fic and published books together, because I am one on those mean meanies who HAS a private discord book club of sorts and we do both published books AND fic.

Besides not being sure there's any relation between "talking about stuff you're reading on discord" and not openly leaving comments or reviews or anything on the works themselves, which feels a little "every pirated copy of my song is someone who would have purchased it and I have actively lost the cost of the album for every single download." (And it's deeply, unquestionably fucked to say outright that people should blame themselves if you quit writing because they didn't comment enough.) Part of the reason I went from talking about books I read on tumblr in extremely coded language to not discussing them at all is because when there's no private internet places anymore, the only people who truly lose are the people who want to complain about things, even a little tiny bit.

To be clear, all references to "criticism" from here on in will NOT mean, "The author should be sent to break rocks on a penal colony on the moon so they never have a chance to write dogshit like this again," we're talking "This was good but they need better editing." Or a "This was fun but it was 10k too long" sort of criticism that balances "I read this to completion and it was a net good and I enjoyed it" vs a mild but understandable critique.

You are Not Allowed to have even tepid criticism of a work on AO3 (or in reviews on indie books) because The Author Might See It, and you don't know whether they will vague about you or blame you for them not writing x thing. There's always another Indie Author harassing people who leave reviews that are even marginally negative.

You are Not Allowed to collect fics to recommend to other people using AO3's bookmark feature if you leave mediocre notes because The Author Can See It.

You are Not Allowed to have a middling review on social media because The Author Will See It. If you set it to private, someone will screencap it and email it to the author.

If you compile book or fic recs where people can see it, some stranger (rarely the authors) will take umbrage with your choices. Then you either get hate mail or someone will email them to your boss.

I don't want people hounding me and I don't want people mad at me, so I moved everything to a more private venue. I comment and review when the spirit moves me, but I think long and hard about whether the review could be construed as negative and keep it to myself if it does. I can control who is seeing what I have to say, and these are people I trust implicitly to have my best interests at heart and know that an opinion like, "I don't know why they bothered with sex scenes at all" will be taken at face value.

Besides there's only so many times I can discuss a book on tumblr and pretend it is a book titled "Half Vampire Half Angel All Stupid" and lampshade the plot points so it's not recognizable because god forbid the author has a tumblr and sees me saying that their book's incredibly bad and that I read the entire thing.

If knowing people are discussing your work in a discord that you're not allowed in turns you into a shivering critter in a Sarah McLachlan ASPCA commercial, I'm not sure what to tell you, other than, whether you are writing for fun or for money: I genuinely think that people who liked your stuff should comment/review more

and I also think our lives were both made worse when every place I could go on the internet to say "I spite-finished their new work but I didn't care for it. I'm going to read the next one once it's out and see if I hate it less" disappeared so that I am forced to have this convo right within earshot of you. I think that hurts us both.

[jupitercl0uds]

hi! i'm ash

they/them/xe/xem • panromantic • asexual • non binary • autistic (with suspicions of having adhd) • english • atheist quaker • a tad bit silly

been on the tumbler since 2021 so i know my way around here but i dont get every little reference (i get most and for the ones i dont i just nod and smile along). i am still a teenager so some Classic Posts are older than me and most are from when i was in primary school.

i dont really have a sophisticated tagging system, but if it helps, spouting to the void is my text post tag. i dont even strictly use it for text posts tbf

blogs i run:

this one (obviously)

@blues-amazing-blog - oc blog (currently on hiatus)

@wswe-autism-fic - fanfic blog (for waluigi says 'wa' everyday until dekuyama is popular). i also treat this as an alt account for fandom stuff sometimes

@knuckles-with-a-keyboard - silly little blog where i pretend to be boom!knuckles (i really really love this blog its so fun)

@jupitercl0uds-art - my art blog (shock horror)

@nonbinary-sticks-the-badger - my sonic blog

external links (whoops forgot to add this)

maybe one day ill set up a linktree idk

ao3

letterboxd

twitter (i only use this for posting from my switch now)

spotify profile

email me - jupitercl0uds.burner@gmail.com

dm me on discord: jupitercl0uds

i think thats it

click this link for more external links including some of the above ones but specifically how to contact me if i cant use tumblr

interests:

omg i love so many things its not even funny. a few important ones are waluigi (special interest), sonic the hedgehog (special interest AND hyperfixation (omg please kill me)), art (like, as a general thing, but particularly visual) and you WILL find me randomly posting oh-so-passionately about something ive never even mentioned before.

i do animation and illustration but that's over on my art blog. also all my animations are WIPs. you probably won't find anything other than a few weird lip syncs from when i was like 11 (i got into animation because of gacha life and animation memes). most of my art is sonic atm lol.

i also read and write fanfic! my wattpad and ao3 is jupitercl0uds :D

wattpad is mostly old stuff, crack and occasional reposts of my ao3 stuff. ao3 is mostly whatever is on my mind at the moment and WSWE.

misc

occasionally i get all heated up about actually important stuff. that's usually sandwiched inbetween my regular goofy goober behaviour. for the basic gist of it: very left wing, the tories are cunts, vote green, free palestine. you also need to understand the weight of that sentence because i hate swearing.

i have other socials too but i dont really use them that much. got bored of twitter and i forget about all my other accounts. only ones i use now are whatsapp (lmao), tumblr and i guess ao3 and wattpad. theres no real point in linking something i havent used in months

anyway, have a nice day and please go to bed on time!

faves (non-exhaustive)

AUTISM BOY!!!! ANXIETY GUY!!!! MILES 'TAILS' PROWER!!!! he's been my favourite sonic character since i was little!!!! except for that brief period where it was amy because i found out tails was a boy and i, as a 7-year-old girl who had just learned about misoginy, decided amy was better because she was a girl. and that briefer period where it was cream because she had confetti in sonic dash.

my favourite iterations of him are scu tails, classic tails and sonic boom tails!!! i h/c him as autistic, having anxiety, low self-esteem but also being really cheerful and nonchalant about a lot of stuff. i enjoy trans tails of all kinds, but i believe in cis gnc tails.

NON-BINARY ICON!!!! TOP SURGERY GUY!!!! WALUIGI!!!! call me thomas jefferson cause i have an entire binder on this guy. waluigi is THE blorbo from my spin-off-party-shows. i got into him because 'hahahaha! it is the funny garlic man's funny rose partner!' and that became 'they could marry me and i'd say yes on the basis that we'd get to see each other everyday, even if i only love him as a friend.

im very passionately hateful about 'hot' waluigi. shut up. waluigi is perfect. i hope he can be canon one day <3 i h/c him as autistic, transmasc non binary and really into gothic lolita. i interpret their relationship with wario as romantic partners and waluigi being super super poor. also, wlw mlm solidarity with rosalina!!!!!

anti-faves

dr starline i love a bisexual icon as much as the next person but starline is not it. i want him to Suffer. which is why i then go on to make loads of fanart of him where he's crying over something. in the one shown above, i have just kicked him in the balls (full image). i also would love to be a VA for him because that'd really piss him off. good style tho. you go girl.

manjimutt (sorry but i only have 1 image of him)

hello to the other living yokai watch fan out there. i hate manjimutt. when i was younger i felt sorry for him, cause i was like 'oh, poor guy, always going to jail!!!' no. die. i do not like him. i hate manjimutt. i do like saying his name tho. MAnji-mutt! i think i hate him more than starline, because at least starline has redeeming qualities. the only redeeming qualities manjimutt has is pity because hes not actually committing crimes. thats it. hes not a nice person. hes just a guy. hit him with a wooden plank (har har).

that poor poor poodle though

posts i like

idk posts on my own blog i like a lot. idk if thisll be A Thing because im literally only doing tthis because of the first post on the list

recognising a url and the chaos that followed

stuff about my lgbtq+ identity idk

THIS IS HOW MUCH I KNOW ABOUT SONIC OK!!!!!

can you call me that slur?

[babygenius]

Inspired by this post

Anyway so my name is Welsh. It is one so easily anglicized that for the longest time I didn’t realize that we were pronouncing it the anglicized way and not the correct way.

There is literally nothing hard about my name. Nothing. You wanna know how I know? People can say Rihanna. It is child's play to add an 'n' at the end (Rhiannon). Literally so easy.

Yet, my entire life, I have put up with people saying Rihanna, and when I correct them and say "No, it's Rhiannon" they continue to say rihanna. At certain points, depending on how long I was going to know this person, I would just give up, because it wasn't worth my energy.

Every time someone couldn't pronounce my name, they'd say "Oh well can I just call you this? I'm going to call you this." Which is how I wound up with the dreadful nickname "Rhi" on both my swimming and basketball teams in middle school.

My first job, my boss couldn't be bothered to get my name right, so she laughed and said, "I'm just going to call you Ray!"

Out of the many nicknames people had assigned to me, I didn't hate this one, and I decided to go with it because it was easiest. Because at this point I still thought "I should make it easier on both myself and others and give them a shortcut".

My first semester in college, whenever a professor or student took too long to pronounce my name correctly, I'd let them get away with Ray. (I also use it as my internet name, but that's not because people can't get my name--most of the time--and is a different matter for me all together). This need to give people a shortcut lasted two years, until my spring semester of freshman year I said, "Y'know what? Fuck this."

Now I only use it if they're going to be acquaintances of a day at most.

At my job last summer I introduced myself to a patron and had to correct her, at which point she threw up her hands very exasperatedly and said, "Oh I don't understand what's with all these new-fangled names!"

I very cheerfully said, "Oh, it's not new! Rhiannon is a Welsh deity and has been around in some form for hundreds of years!"

She was a very sweet lady, seemed very surprised at this fact, and we both continued on our day. This type of interaction is not uncommon for me.

Last fall semester, my physics class had a substitute. (I would later find out that the reason he wasn't teaching the class in the first place was because he'd been suspended from teaching.) The entire class, he made a joke out of not being able to recall a simple name. The others found it funny, and while I didn't find it the epitome of humor I still laughed.

I answered a question, he asked for my name. (Worth noting is I had emailed this professor over the summer to talk to him about getting into his class, before the instructor was switched).

"Rhiannon."

"Rihanna."

"No, Rhiannon, just add an 'n' at the end."

"Rihanna."

I sighed and said, "It's like 'Shannon', just with a 'Rhi'." That, combined with the idea of 'Rihanna' is usually enough.

"Shannonrhi."

The class laughed. Now you're just being deliberately obtuse, I thought but didn't say.

After class had finished and everyone had left, I went up to him and reintroduced myself, mentioning that I was the student who had emailed him over the summer.

"Oh!" He said, remembering. He gave a very sheepish laugh and said, "Sorry about the whole name thing--" and I thought that was that and everything was done--"obviously if you were a minority I would have..."

I froze for a second, completely taken aback. Now, yes, I am ridiculously white, and afforded the privileges of that, but that's not the only type of minority that exists???

ALSO

EVEN MORE IMPORTANT

You shouldn't strive to get people's "difficult" names right only when they're a visible minority and you're worried about the cry of racism

You should strive to get people's names right because it's basic fucking decency and etiquette and it's rude otherwise.

When I visited Scotland in 2020 not a single person over there ever struggled with my name or got it wrong. I kinda miss that, honestly, because it's so fucking draining to wonder when you introduce yourself if you're going to have to capitulate and give them a nickname because you're too tired to deal with this shit today, or if you're going to be seen as the "stubborn" one who won't let people be wrong about something so basic as a name and move on.

I will leave you with one last story before my tl;dr. When I graduated eighth grade, we walked in a procession as a teacher announced our full names in alphabetical order. The teacher announcing for my section of the alphabet had never had me in class before, yet she looked at my name and asked me "How do I pronounce this?" She had no difficulty with my first name, and was mainly hung up on my middle name, which is Irish. I told her, she said it correctly. In the times leading up to graduation, whenever she felt like she'd forgotten or just wanted to make sure, she'd ask me again, and I'd tell her again, and she'd say it correctly again.

During one of the practices, another teacher said my name completely wrong. She even messed up my last name, which is pronounced phonetically and is a common enough last name that she's heard it before. I will admit that even I laughed, but only because up until that point? She had said my name correctly every other time. So when she messed up, everyone stopped their walking to raise and eyebrow at her and laugh, and she facepalmed and said, "Yeah, I don't know how that came out that way, sorry." And she said it correctly, and everything continued.

I felt very seen by both of those teachers, who didn't try to laugh it off and say that it was "just too hard" or "too unusual" or "oh it doesn't really matter, does it?" It was very nice.

For obvious reasons, I insist on knowing how to pronounce everyone's names, and I do not settle for a nickname unless they genuinely prefer the nickname as it is their chosen name.

TL;DR: learn how to pronounce people's fucking names correctly because it's basic courtesy and you sound stupid when you insist on not affording certain people that courtesy just because you've never heard that name before.

[applesandbannas747]

Wait, I'm confused... do you like the Fence novels or no? Because your first review sounded positive and happy with the fun humor, and then every other thing I've seen from you about them is most pointing out the (very prominent, very not-good) flaws with them.

fair question! I had a Journey with the Fence novels and it was hellish. First, please keep in mind that I am unhealthily fixated on Fence and that does impact things all along the way.

When Striking Distance was announced, I was as excited as anyone, though wary because Pacat was handing it off to someone else to write. Still, I was hopeful--and more hopeful after reading In Other Lands because, despite the disturbing sexism that squicked me tf out, I really enjoyed that book! And so I was very eager to get my hands on Striking Distance. So I went on an absolute quest to get an ARC...and I did! It took a lot of dead ends and desperate tries, but remember that I'm insane. So I got my hands on an advanced copy by emailing the editor assigned to the book (who has since left the position). And as is custom with ARCs, he asked me to send my review when it went live.

Reading Striking Distance was such an experience dude. I wanted to love it as much as I loved the comics--remember that at this point, we only had up to issue 12 and the characterization therein. I love the OG 12 issues, and they'll always hold more sway in my understanding of the characters, but when reading SD, it was very clear that I'd read the entire comic completely fucking wrong. Remember my unhealthy obsession? Yeah. Trying to come to terms with Fence being something so opposite of everything I really loved about it and the fact that my reading of it was so wrong was really hard--like mental breakdowns level of hard. I wish I was joking. But I tried to force myself to love the reality of Fence anyway, despite kind of hating the novel, which I absolutely would not admit to myself because disliking any part of Fence felt like SUCH a betrayal to it, and I really really really didn't want to hate the characters I'd spent so much time bringing to life in my mind, because selfishly I didn't want to have to divorce my idea of the characters from canon, I just wanted to be able to love the canon characters and add onto them a little the way I'd been able to with the comics up until that point. So especially right after reading Striking Distance, I was insistent on liking it, and even as I slowly started to acknowledge that there were parts of it that made me want to scratch off my skin they made me so uncomfortable (see: the steak scene), I was really hell-bent on understating my dislike/criticism of it.

So when I went to write my review for Striking Distance to send to the really nice editor who sent me the ARC, I didn't want to betray Fence, I hadn't really processed my issues with it (and was--and honestly still am to an extent--worried that I was just being an entitled baby because my stupid fanfictions/interpretations were so fucking wrong), I didn't want to upset or hurt the feelings of the man who did me this HUGE favor, and because I wanted a chance to get an early copy of a possible sequel (because hating the novels didn't lesson my Need for early access to them. i know I'm unwell about fence jdhfa), I pulled out all the nicest thoughts I had about Striking Distance, exaggerated them and stretched them and sugar-coated everything else to provide a review that was nice and non-hostile.

Obviously, the longer I sat with Striking Distance and processed some things about it and about me, the more I started picking apart all the aspects that I hated and found I was able to produce reasons for each piece I disliked and was also able to pinpoint in the OG comics where I got all the pieces of the stories and characters I loved. So I did have to divorce my idea of Fence from canon if I wanted to keep loving Fence. And when I decided to keep loving Fence for all the reasons I used to instead of feel sick looking at/thinking about the franchise and characters, I was sort of free of the things holding me back from speaking about the things I didn't like, and so I started to analyze and essay and post about the novels and my untangled, truthful thoughts about them.

So I don't like the novels--there are maybe 3-4 things total that passed the vibe-check for me in both novels. I never liked the novels, and I lied about liking Striking Distance...but I was lying to myself about that one as much as anyone. And I haven't changed that review because, at the time, that was where my feelings were about it. So up it stays.

Here’s my fun little list of some of the places I've explained my dislike of the novels if you're curious, but yeah these are the real thoughts, the SD review was a carefully crafted lie <3

My full review of Disarmed

Autism representation in Seiji

Seiji in general

Eugene

Eugesse as a concept in Disarmed

Eugesse interactions in Disarmed

Nick's bisexuality

Coach Williams and sexual harassment

[not-poignant]

Hello, happy holidays!

I’ve been a quiet consumer of your works and I just wanted to thank you for being such a source of writing inspiration for me. Especially with regards to how you handle reader engagement.

I used to be really sensitive about every negative/not explicitly positive interaction regarding my story and ruminate for days about what I did wrong, but your attitude towards people not always being into your content has really helped me engage with mine in a healthier way.

Idk if that makes sense lol. Feel free to ignore this if it doesn’t. Happy holidays again!

Hi anon!

Hopefully my replying to asks in sometimes an extremely untimely manner has not made you too anxious, it's definitely a me thing, and not a you thing. (*Quietly kicks my email inbox under the rug*).

Honestly, I can understand being sensitive to these things! I think a lot of creators are like 'you have to develop a tough skin' and while it's nice if you can, some of us remain relatively thin-skinned until the end of time, so instead we just have to learn ways to deal with it otherwise. Negative things still get to me, but now I can actively remind myself that it often has nothing at all to do with me, when it comes to my writing, or that I don't deserve to be treated with disrespect, or to be made to feel like it's my fault that *they made the choice to read my writing.* (I've never made anyone read my writing - but I do like it when it happens!)

I think as well, when people like and don't like your stuff, you're doing something right. It means you're making something real. I love onions on a burger, will always ask for extra onions on a burger, and some people can't stand onions and will be like 'ONIONS ARE THE GROSSEST THINGS EVER' (and asshole twats will be like) 'HOW DARE YOU EVER EAT ANOTHER BURGER AGAIN WITH ONIONS BECAUSE I HATE THEM' and when you look at negative comments through the lens of my burger analogy, you realise just how much what these people say has nothing to do with the people who like onions on their burgers. They are screaming into the abyss. They forgot they could use their little legs to just walk into a different store lmao. They forget they can leave.

That's what blocking, deleting, or reminding people that they could at least be respectful is for. But yeah, ultimately, people just need to find the burgers they like, and stop expecting the whole world to cater to them. Especially when it comes to free fanfiction / labour.

Anyway so it does make sense. I can talk about this until the cows come home (obviously). I don't think you need to feel unaffected by this stuff when the negativity comes, as long as you can gently remember some perspective here. Whatever your favourite food is, some people hate it, and the responsibility of those people isn't to get you to change your favourite food, it's to go elsewhere. And if someone forgets they have that power, I am always happy to remind them. And a block/delete reminds people just as well as saying something, depending on the level of troll you're encountering.

(If it's just general polite negativity I generally still remind them that I didn't make them read a thing, and they are welcome to go elsewhere. Sometimes you need to remind people that the exit is exactly the same as they door they came in through, they just need to turn around and use it, lol. And if it's general polite negativity with a few positive comments, I'll just respond to the positive stuff and ignore the rest).

(Also caveat: Doing things actually wrong when it comes to representing marginalised identities is an entirely different kettle of fish, obviously this is something to listen to and take on board and reflect on. That's just a very different strata to the kind of engagement I'm talking about here, where someone gets weird because like... I didn't make a character pregnant, or because I didn't describe a back story the way they wanted me to and so on (that's why fanfiction exists! Folks should write some!))

Sometimes folks also just need to be reminded of - or taught - fanfiction and fandom etiquette. Not everyone knows it, and not everyone picks it up through osmosis. But ultimately...

I don't have an ultimately, I just had a Wednesday afternoon ramble hehe.

[applesfallingfromblondehair]

You’ve written it so well that you’re like no Ross isn’t a rebound or a plan B but when you do a reread (different anon btw just also did a recent reread) I truly think that Matty would still choose George if he was given the opportunity. It’s not like George is single and Matty has chosen Ross, Matty literally can’t have George in any real way right now and is choosing the safe and stable option, just like what George is doing. I truly believe that if George showed up in NY and was like I broke up with Charli, let’s do this then Matty would grab that Italian take out and follow him anywhere (just a quick pit stop for a tattoo cover up before they go anywhere). They just have a history and connection that sadly I don’t think can be matched by Ross no matter how sweet he is. The thing with Matty and George just seems like something you don’t move on from and there will always be a what if in the back of their minds. The NY chapter was so sweet but they’re also in a bubble and that isn’t realistic for life. In a few weeks they go back to living in tight quarters with George 24/7 and I don’t think Matty has moved on, more out of sight out of mind. Especially if George is going to be nice and understanding now which is harder to hate than when he was being an asshole.

I know we have the tattoo and the remix coming up which is cringe, but is it wrong? They said goodbye to each other and Matty is now with Ross. Just like George couldn’t be mad at Matty’s actions because he had a girlfriend, Matty has Ross now and George doesn’t belong to him in any capacity. He made his choices and I don’t think George owes Matty anything in this regard.

And come on, that goodbye scene in the last chapter. That was heartbreaking, clearly two people that truly want each other but the timing and situations aren’t aligning.

God DAMN this is long. This is like one of those emails I usually reply "please see my answers below in green" to, except I can't do it here on tumblr and also this is MUCH MORE FUN, obviously. 😂 Alright, here we fucking go. *cracks knuckles*

Matty would still choose George if he was given the opportunity: I feel like this is correct in some way, and I feel like Normal People has both made me and ruined me as an author, because I am now an absolute sucker for the will-they-won't-they star-crossed lovers dynamic, the couple that seems to be destined to be together but also who doesn't ever seem to align at any time. Or better, they do, but it never seems to last for whatever reason. (Mostly, because they don't talk to each other much.) And I know I shouldn't draw comparisons between me and actually celebrated published authors because now you'll all think my writing is shite, but please be aware that that's the kind of heartache I'm shooting for. So no, you're not wrong here at all.

If George showed up, Matty would immediately go with him: honestly, I don't think it's that simple. And I'm not saying this because I'm rooting for the healthy relationship here, even if in some capacity I am, but because it's just not that simple. But again, I see where you're coming from with this and it seems to be that eternal loop of going back to the One Person You Think Is Your Person even if the Person hurt you over and over again, or maybe more accurately you can't seem to stop hurting each other. I get it, and it's a valid point too.

The NY chapter was so sweet but they’re also in a bubble and that isn’t realistic for life: yeah, very true. More on this next week, you're definitely bang on on this. But also, let them be happy for a while you monster 😭

I don’t think Matty has moved on, more out of sight out of mind: I mean, it's hard to 'move on' from someone like that, especially in such a short period of time. Have you ever considered Christmas bringing about surprises, though? 👀

In conclusion, I'm not saying what's right or wrong because I don't want to ruin everything (and honestly because I'm still making key decisions but shhhh don't tell anyone okay?) but I love your analysis and how in depth you go, and all of the points you brought up are extremely good.

I am so blessed to have such engaged readers like you and I LOVE discussing these things, so please never stop sending these in. I adore you guys ❤️

[wyomink]

My thoughts are snagged and frustrated, there are a lot of kinks i haven't worked out, but what I can say is that I think education is genuinely, 100% the most important thing we can do for people. And whatever the actual material reason may be for compulsory education laws, they do exist. This is why it's hard for me to get my understanding of my own job as a teacher to "it's just a job." I've got this new neighbor in my new place who is a lonely old man, you know the type, they grab your ear and they can't let go, even if they feel themselves doing it. Today he's talking to me for like an hour about Warhammer 40k out of nowhere, boring as hell, but I'm letting him, uh-huhing nodding. It's like when my dad wants me to watch specific David Letterman clips so he can talk about them with me. People want a friend, but they also want a friend with whatever same interest as them, so they proselytize a bit. This is something I struggle with, because I want some clear boundary notion of evil popular pastimes (TV shows, bad art, etc.) vs good popular pastimes (whatever I do/am into, obviously.)

(What you're afraid of is people not getting it, is feeling like you're letting your dad down because you don't want to watch late show interviews, is being pestered at recess by the kid on the spectrum who won't stop asking you rhetorical questions about the Notre Dame fire and Uvalde, is being unable to find a socially graceful exit from the conversation with your neighbor, is tuning out a loved one because you're lost in your own thoughts. But — take me as I am or let me go. What you're afraid of is perfect social cohesion being impossible, and it is impossible.)

You hate to have to drop a hint on purpose, and you feel bad anyway if you drop a hint on accident. What I'm afraid of is that I can't get along with people, that secretly I can't stand them and they can't stand me.

Anyway, my lonely old man neighbor has beef with the building manager, who I personally don't like because she never responded to my emails when I was moving in and couldn't figure out why I had no power. Now I'm sure it's like a sick Hegelian dialectic for the both of them, but my neighbor drops this truism, that you can't be in this line of work if you don't like people. Well, I feel weird saying that because now I've got this fear that I myself don't like people, but the true and sharp point of his fact remains that her job is managing apartments where people live. I move in on the weekend because the 1st falls on a Friday, and because that's when I have my days off because I'm a teacher, and there's no power, and the only person I can get ahold of to help me from the management company — because it's the weekend — is the one electrician working the weekend, putting out metaphorical fires across the city. I didn't get power till Monday, two days in the dark with cold water, but I didn't want to go back to my dad's house because I feel too guilty about not liking him that much. Specifically, filial piety leaves a bad taste in my mouth I think because the ruling dynamic in the relationship was fear and resentment, and now it's something like contempt and pity. I don't like my father, except in the moments that I do. I'll have to come to terms with that, but the fact remains that I want to keep him at a distance.

So I am a teacher, and trust me that I've got all this internal conflict and cognitive dissonance about when I try to do it My Way, when I give everyone 100% on homework sheets without checking who's done them or turned them in, apparently because I can't even be fucked to do even that, when I . . . show up and improvise lessons. I hate and revile the entire educational system, the grade-based assessment, multiple choice, teaching to the test, the fact my school is for-profit, that they shove 30 kids in a classroom, all that. Despite that, I want to do the best I can for the students, and I, from practical experience (having gone to school myself) knowing that "education is what remains after you've forgotten what you learned", can only really conclude that there must be something good I can do for the students in — forgive me for phrasing it like this — being good to be around and cultivating good vibes in my classroom, reprimanding them for actually cruel behavior (i.e. being mean, inconsiderate or cruel) and supporting them everywhere else as much as I possibly can. Trying to help them break out of any cruel boxes they might be painted into by friends or family, protecting them from stupid or potentially harmful school-oriented situations without consideration for what's specifically good or bad for me.

The main thing this sort of thing requires is me saying: "I have sound enough judgment that my judgment more often than not correctly identifies where the System is good or bad for the students." I only have good intentions, but then it's probably true that the ideas that people come up with are just how they make sense of the material situation that they're in. Like — I don't think this is the case, but it Could be the case that I'm crazy and a screw-up, and I explain my ill fit in this world — otherwise mostly good — by envisioning myself on a doomed, noble crusade.

The original point of this post was to express that I want to be at work every day because I think that's important to being a good teacher in any sense, and I think it's really stupid that doctors don't do appointments on the weekend. Why can't we coordinate so that half of the doctors do Sun-Thurs, and half do Tues-Sat? I shouldn't have to wait till the summer or take time off because I'm trying to become healthier. "One afternoon off isn't a big deal!" What about the rest?

I have this idea of myself in my mind now as unhealthy, and I can't tell whether I am or not. I know having to drive all over the place makes me feel like shit musculoskeletally, but everyone acts like it's normal to drive everywhere, and the whole fucking city is set up so that you can't walk anywhere, and I feel like shit when I do walk, and my best guess is my stupid fucking feet are too weak and malformed to just wear normal shoes from the store, but even once I jump through a bunch of hoops and pay a bunch of money to fix that I'll still have to drive everywhere, because everything is really far apart, and the only place that's really walkable is the 24 hour corner store, and only unhealthy things are purchased there. This is really why I don't like my dad: he thinks everything is fine.

I want to be the best teacher ever. This is both a selfish and an unselfish aspiration; selfish because I want this because I wish my experience in school had been better, but unselfish because I know that the only sensible goal to draw from this is to try and make it better for others. I think I am capable of identifying with anyone. Something I'm scared of is that I am uniquely deficient — I'm just physically malformed, or I'm just lazy — and that's why I often feel like shit, and that's why I can't keep my life in order. I'm hoping the IRS takes my electronically filed taxes, because for verification I needed to provide my gross adjusted income from last year, and I don't know where my tax return from last year is, so I just sort of guessed based on an old W2 I did have. Actually, I haven't even looked for last year's tax return. My dad would just say — and he did warn me — keep track of your tax return, don't lose it. Now that I've thought about it for 20 seconds I probably know where it is, I could probably spend 5 minutes digging it up. But I'm always scrambling, and when I'm focused on one thing i'm scared to break my focus, because focus is a precious thing.

You buy something and it turns out to be garbage. In Protagoras, Socrates is warning you off about snake oil, even back then; that's the comparison he makes to Protagoras, he's saying, how do you know Protagoras isn't going to sell you spiritual snake oil?

I would never want to sell anybody snake oil; this is why I can't teach to the test, because that feels like snake oil. This is why testing anything besides fucking math is stupid, because jesus, how can you justify that? It's either trivia, or it's something that feels insane to tell kids is definitely wrong or definitely right. It gives them the wrong idea.

Course, my end goals are crazy, coz don't people really do like watching late night shows, or playing Warhammer? Maybe I only resent people for enjoying themselves because I'm sick. But you buy something and it turns out to be garbage, including medicine, spiritual practices, this and that. I can't trust that I go to a podiatrist from the phone book and they actually care about fixing my feet. I can't trust that anyone can fix my feet, coz no psychiatrist has ever fixed my soul, nor doctor my gut. I feel lonely, and someone tries to love me, and I send them away coz I can't love them back. What am I trying to do with education? I'm trying to create a world in which, had I been born at the right time, I could have been happy.

Well, I won't give into despair. There will be further moments of happiness in my life — perhaps more or perhaps less, but it doesn't matter either way. What matters is the conviction that I am capable of making the world a better place, or that it's at least worth trying to.

I love you with all my heart.

[transfatliberation]

story time! tw internalized transphobia

I’m a Data Hoarder™️ and was going through my hoard about 6 months ago, when i discovered some old chat logs. Anyone remember Messenger Plus from waaaaaaay back in the day? Anyway, many years ago, like 13 or so, back when i was a teenager, i was a HORRIBLE transphobe, because… that was what i grew up with. I grew up in the Bible Belt. All i knew about trans people were like the jokes made in movies like Ace Ventura and 4chan posts (I KNOW, i know, i got better) about like the “open wound” GRS i now know to be bullshit, stuff like that. And of course, my abusive stepfather who punished any sign of queerness (and to be clear, i was a very obviously queer kid despite being seemingly a “boy” exclusively into girls, but that’s for another post).

All that to say, i had a loooooot of internalized transphobia, and really DID consider it like… a way to protect myself from the Capital-G Gender feelings i was having. So when one of my closest online friends i’d talked to for years came out as a trans girl to my little online friend group, needless to say, I freaked out.

I threw every “logical, rational point” i had at her, which is to say, i basically sounded like Ben Shapiro or his ilk do today and I just. kept. on. For so long. I really thought i was doing her a favor, really thought i was trying to save her from some life of delusion and torture, because that’s genuinely what i thought it was. i really loved her and was trying to shove her back in the closet because I knew it to be safe there.

but that’s not how it came out, because the fact remains, I was trying to do an inherently hateful thing. I had so much love for her, but hated the gender feelings I had in myself, therefore, took it out on her for being brave enough to actually come out with them. and believe me, i took every. single. fear i had out on her. oh, it makes me sick to my stomach still to this day.

Discovering those logs and finding them with that in them really changed my world. I really did not remember that at all, I repressed that memory completely. We barely ever talked after that, which is understandable! And not only that… I lost a lot of my online friend group from back then. I never registered why, though in hindsight, it’s obvious. I genuinely thought we just drifted apart. i even repressed that she came out!

I tried to email this girl and apologize, but it had been over 10 years since then. For all I know, she doesn’t have access to it anymore. Or heck, blocked me. It’d be valid. but all that to say, it was one of the biggest mistakes of my life.

and i beat myself up over it for a good few months too. Before I came to this comic, i had to come to its same conclusion. I’m gonna carry that weight. i’m gonna sit with it, and never repress or forget it again, but also not beat myself up over it. over 10 years have passed since then. i’m a completely different person than i was back then. Fuck, i’m literally unrecognizable from my past self in pictures from just a few years ago, of COURSE i’ve changed and grown since Teen Years Ago, the absolute sickness in the pit of my stomach when i think about that incident PROVES it.

But of course, i can’t just sit on my laurels now and rot either. I have to keep moving forward, always striving to be a better person than I was. I genuinely hope someday i look back on who i am now with the same “oh no bb what is u doin” energy. because that’s how i’ll know i’ve truly grown.

Me when I remember something I said ages ago that was wrong or my values no longer align with

[personallylivingeasy]

I don’t even know what I would say. I have so many thoughts but my god who wants to hear all the things traveling through my mind at 100mph. Maybe you. Barely me.

There’s so many different parts of me in this situation. There’s the part that is insecure. That says, how dumb could you possibly be? Trusting a man by his word? Defending him to friends, waiting for him?! Not dating in HOPES that he follows through with his word. How embarrassing for you!!! You being ME.

There’s another part of me that thinks yes this is a bummer but he set this boundary and I respect that boundary. It’s tough but it’s okay bc this is something he needs to do for himself. That he needs to do in order to be a good (potential) partner. And for that I can wait.

And then there’s the most honest vulnerable side of me. The one that thinks wow how lucky am I that there’s a person in this world that cares enough about me to say as much as I want this I need to be in a better place to preserve our friendship. Making me feel so safe and protected. So incredibly secure in my decision to wait. My trust outweighs the insecurities that come up. I think to myself that this is the person I’m going to be with. I’ve made up my mind that this is my person. That yes this situation sucks but what is one year when we have the future together.

It’s so conflicting. How do you tell someone who is going through something, “hey you’re it, I’m waiting, nothing has changed for me” I don’t want to put pressure on anything. Because really I don’t want anything to change. Obviously we will have a relationship in addition to our friendship but I don’t want him to think the friendship isn’t going away just because we are dating. Or that I’m expecting him on a knee or something. I just want us! And it doesn’t have to be in this moment. God in this moment I want my friend. I miss my friend.

I miss my friend but I don’t want him to think that because I said “friend” that he’s back in the friendzone. It’s just that we have 12 years of friendship and a blip of relationship. So it’s hard to miss the blip, now that isn’t to say I’m not imagining what it would be like or what it will be like without this situation. I do! Constantly ! But thinking about not being able to text him with random life updates running updates sucks. And I hate that.

I want to say. Can we have check ins every other month. Something to keep me from spiraling and something to just keep us in the loop. The last time we emailed he mentioned that it was like emailing his friend not girlfriend. I think that’ll take me a minute to figure out the difference in texting him or emailing him. I want him to know it’s going to be weird at first but the more we do it the more gf bf it will feel.

And I want to stop saying things are weird. They aren’t weird, they are simply different than what we are used to. And that’s okay and it will wear off .

I’m just sad. I miss him. A lot. I’m sad the text wasn’t answered. I’m sad that it was delivered just fine and it’s just sitting. I’m glad I sent it but I was hoping for some kind of response! People are bad mouthing him and I’m trying to stay on the understanding patient side of things but it’s hard. Like really hard. Bc my feelings are hurt. Someone I miss hasn’t responded back after almost 3 months of not talking. That makes me sad.

But I keep reminding myself, this is jack and he wouldn’t do anything to hurt me. This isn’t a man who doesn’t care if I live or die. This is a man who got me a cancer necklace and said I was it. I need to remember that. But it gets hard sometimes. And Fuckin hell I have to book the Hawaii room and I haven’t yet and he doesn’t even know about it yet!!!!

Also I know I love him as my friend but I’m worried I just straight up love him. That’s a lot. All of this is a lot. I want to tell him everything except this last paragraph…. Miss you love you miss you

[servin-up-surveys]

survey #186

What was the longest time you've liked someone? Maybe like, five or six years?

Who was the last girl in your room? Besides me obviously, my mom.

What are you excited for? Girt's birthday is right on the horizon, and I'm of course excited to celebrate that with him.

Who was the last person you took a picture with? My nephew at his birthday party.

Anything happen to you in the past month that made you really mad? Maybe, I can't recall.

Do you have any bruises on you? No.

Are you ticklish? YES

Did you reject or accept your last friend request? Accept, it was actually an old friend I understandably pissed off when I was a homophobic teenager and sent an apology to them years ago, I guess they eventually read it. Even if they didn't though, I think I'm very obvious in being LGBTQ+-friendly on my Facebook, so that also coulda said enough.

Are you a morning person, or a night person? I'm in a better mood generally in the morning, and almost always less anxious.

Where was your last hug? My bed.

Were you smiling in the last picture taken of you? Faintly I guess, Roman was cuddling with me on the couch and Mom took a picture of us.

Did you have a good childhood? In some ways, but in many others, no.

What pets did you have when you were growing up? We had an infestation of outdoor, unfixed cats. It's my childhood with them that makes me feel so strongly about the need for cats to be indoor animals.

Would you ever date someone who had issues with substance abuse? NO. I am not getting involved in that shit. I know realistically if - god fucking forbid - Girt developed a problem, I wouldn't leave him just for that, but that's only because of what we already have built together.

Have you ever been on a vacation that ended up being ruined? What happened? I don't talk much of this because I feel so shitty about it, but yes, by my own fault. I went to the beach with my then-best friend Jenna and her mom, and I feel like I lasted only one night because I had such severe separation anxiety from my mom as a child. We might have even left that night, I can't remember. I just remember being so fucking embarrassed and feeling absolutely terrible because neither wanted to go back home of course (and it was like, a two hour drive), I just wasn't okay.

Do you know anyone who has had a miscarriage? Multiple people. This is more common than I think a lot of people realize.

What's your last ex's opinion of you? She hates me and considers me a weak-willed deadweight. Rather be that than a Nazi, I guess.

Are there any major drama queens in your family? Yes. My mom's sister Kelly immediately comes to mind, we don't even associate with her anymore. Not only is she a drama queen, she's emotionally abusive.

Do you like Stephen King novels? I've never read any.

What is one adventurous thing you’d be willing to do? (ex: skydive) Cave exploration. I REALLY wanna do this one day!!

How many email accounts do you have? Two that I actually use.

Have you ever fallen asleep on public transport? (including planes) Yes, at least as a kid.

Do you pay rent for the place you live? How often? I don't, but my mom does, and I don't know how much.

Where was the last place you went on vacation/holiday to? Who’d you go with? I guess the closest thing that could be considered a vacation/holiday would be the last time I flew to Illinois to see Sara, which was multiple years ago. "Vacations" in the traditional sense don't really exist for me or Mom.

Does the place you work have music playing? What sort? I'm unemployed.

What’s your favourite type of donut? I feel like this varies with my mood. Sometimes it's just glazed, or chocolate frosted, or completely plain/cake donuts.

Would you ever want to go on vacation with just one of your parents? Yeah, my parents are divorced and I'm well aware Mom hates Dad's very guts so you'd never see us vacation together.

Has someone ever tried to start an argument with you over Facebook? What happened? lol this has certainly happened before, more than once.

When you’re at home, do you spend most of your time in your room? No, but in the spare room instead. I literally lived in my bed/room for years and it affected me horrifically, physically and mentally, so now my bed is strictly for bedtime.

Do you have a hard time admitting you’re wrong? I'm certainly not gonna lie and say it's never happened, but generally, I find this pretty easy to do with my shitty self-image anyway.

Are you listening to music right now? No, I'm watching herping videos from a channel I really enjoy.

When were you the saddest in your life? The end of 2015 and all of 2016.

Who in your family has been married the longest? (and how long?) Hell if I know.

Do you take your shoes off when you come inside? Yes.

What was the first social media site you ever used? MySpace.

Do you have any exes you really regret dating? Not like, "really" regret. I regret dating Tyler, but "really regret" makes it sound like a more desperate feeling.

Have you ever been catcalled? Not that I remember.

Have you ever cut your own hair? No.

Are you a fan of video games? Yeah, but I play them way less than I did growing up. Nowadays I tend to enjoy games more when I'm playing with others, or am just an observer.

What's your favorite color combination? Black and gold.

Has anyone besides your family seen you naked? If so, who? My ex. My current boyfriend kinda-sorta has I guess, but I've never been 100% fully undressed in front of him because of my own self-consciousness, but he's basically seen everything at one point or another. Women who have done psych hospital intake stuff with me count too, I guess. That was always the most uncomfortable shit.

Did your parents sign you up for anything you hated as a child? Yes, soccer and cheerleading. Neither lasted very long.

Do you know how to use Photoshop? I'd say I'm pretty okay with it. I prefer Lightroom, though.

Who is the best artist you've seen live? I've only ever seen Alice Cooper, but don't get me wrong, he's great.

Do more people call you by a nickname or your first name? Most people address me as "Britt," which is just a shortening of my first name.

Do you have the right time set on your microwave? Yes.

Do you have a radar detector for your car? No.

Have you ever been arrested? For what? No.

Where did you go today? I went to see my psychiatrist, and Mom and I stopped at a dollar store to get fillers for the pinata I'm doing for Girt's bday, lol.

Do you like to go fishing? I have fun doing it and find it extremely relaxing, but I no longer really do it because I feel mean lol.

Where is your favorite person? He's currently at work.

What mode of transport did you take to high school? My mom drove me.

Name a personality trait of yours that you like. I'm very empathetic.

Name something about your physical attraction that you dislike. I hate how dark my leg hair is, I'm mortified by my legs.

Have you ever made an item of clothing? No.

Who was the last person you had an intelligent debate with? I don't know; I tend to avoid debates because I panic and think the other person hates me lol.

Who was the last person who cooked something for you? My mom. She's the only one that cooks in this house, I really SHOULD change that... She provides so much for me.

Who was the last person who you heard singing? Oh definitely Girt, he's always singing something to himself lol.

Who was the last person you were upset with? Me.

Who was the last person you danced with? Sara.

Who was the last person you had a crush on? Well, Girt.

Who was the last person you got drunk with? I've never been drunk, but I last had alcohol with Mom.

Who was the last person who touched your hair? Besides myself, Girt.

What was the last birthday party you attended? My nephew's 7th in August.

What was the last thing you said to your mother? I thanked her for bringing home dinner.

What was the last song you listened to? "World so Cold" by Three Days Grace.

What was the last vegetable you ate? I wanna say green beans.

What was the last thing you had to drink? I have strawberry-flavored water right now.

What was the last fast food place you ate at? Mom happened to get McD's today.

When was the last time you had a sleepover? Girt spent the night around a week ago?

Where did you last go to celebrate your own birthday? The Cheesecake Factory.

Where does the last person you hung out with live? He lives about 30 minutes from where I do in another city, which I won't share.