#and that’s not the point

[moowithmidnight]

Cashmere and Glimmer

I know it’s a popular theory that Cashmere was Glimmer’s mentor in the 74th Games and purposefully trained her poorly to cause her death, saving her from being sex trafficked like Cashmere.

However, that rings very false for me, because the Careers weren’t like the other tributes, and weren’t going to be very susceptible to bad advice. They weren’t only trained by their current Games mentors, not necessarily. Glimmer was training for the Hunger Games likely long before she’d ever met Cashmere. And even if Cashmere had started training her earlier, she likely wouldn’t be the only person. Cashmere’s speciality is knives, I don’t think they’re going to pick her to teach Glimmer every type of weapon, not when District 1 has other Victors with other specialities.

But I honestly think that adds a layer of tragedy.

Because let’s say that Cashmere had tried to sabotage her. Glimmer is way more likely to assume Cashmere was some sort of idiot than doubt her own training. Glimmer was extremely confident in herself; even if she’d looked up to Cashmere, she was likely going to ignore any bad advice Cashmere could’ve tried to secretly feed her.

Another thing to remember is how important appealing to the Capitol is, especially for District 1, as they’re one of the more respected Districts. While the Capitol sees all Districts as below them regardless, we’re shown that they’re still a lot more likely to root for and support the Career tributes. Whatever angle Glimmer presented herself to the Capitol from was going to matter.

While it’s not in the movies, Glimmer’s outfit for her interview with Caesar is described as essentially transparent. She came right out the gate with blatant sex appeal as her angle, something that Cashmere could’ve had some control over, but not all. (I’d argue not even most- people tend to downplay how important fashion is in the books.)

Counterintuitively, this is amplified because Glimmer is a Career; again, she’s gotten much more advice from outside sources. Besides, Glimmer never would’ve acted meek or scared, she’s from District 1. And Cashmere could’ve told her to dial down her flirtatiousness, but the people of the Capitol were willing to sleep with a 14 year old Victor. I don’t think that would’ve made much of a difference, and certainly wouldn’t have had the impact that a different costume choice would’ve had.

All of that to say that whoever the District 1 stylist/prep team were had infinitely more power than Cashmere ever did on how the Capitol was going to see Glimmer. While they might not have saved her from Cashmere’s fate completely, they definitely could’ve taken measures to change how the Capitol sees her. And sure, Cashmere might have tried to give her input and convince the stylists to do XYZ differently, but she’d never would have gotten the final say.

Cashmere could never have done anything to save Glimmer from her own fate, not a single thing. Even if Cashmere hadn’t gone to Sponsors, people would have sponsored District 1 anyway. Glimmer was taught to survive at all costs anyway, she likely knew how to live without relying on Sponsors.

Being a mentor is already a terrible punishment. And this is something that the Snow knows because of his experience watching Sejanus break during the 10th Games. It serves as a reminder from Snow that while the mentors may be respected as Victors, they don’t have any real power, and they never will.

The very second Glimmer volunteered for the Games it was game over, even if she’d survived.

And Cashmere knows it.

I think that is so much more a tragedy than anything else.

[noccolibroccoli]

So I had a hysterectomy today (hooray!) and I brought along my stuffed orca, Shamu, as a comfort object. And everyone i interacted with during my pre-op was like "Oh! Who's this?" so I was telling them all about him, how he's been with me since I was 9 and gone on every single vacation and road trip, and they were telling me about their own stuffed buddies (one lady said she still has hers after 40 years!) and all of this while I was signing consent forms and providing a list of the things I'd brought with me, you know, small talk.

So then a nurse comes over and goes "Okay, I've got some stickers I'll put on your things so we know they're yours" and I'm like "OK cool" so she puts a sticker on my coat and stickers on my bags of clothes and then she turns to Shamu and I'm like "oh I guess he gets a sticker too"

But no. She pulls out a hospital bracelet that's an exact copy of mine and slaps it on his tail, like so:

And i was delighted by this, so I took a picture to send to my friends, who were equally delighted, and were cracking me up with their reactions (like so:)

Anyway, they take me back and put me under, and when I awake groggily a few hours later it takes me a minute to get my bearings, so I don't notice Shamu at first. But then I realize he's tucked up next to me in the gurney, so I grab him, and my hand touches gauze.

And I'm like "huh?" so I look at him and I realize

They gave my fucking orca a hysterectomy

[astronnova]

yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

[bixels]

As gen-AI becomes more normalized (Chappell Roan encouraging it, grifters on the rise, young artists using it), I wanna express how I will never turn to it because it fundamentally bores me to my core. There is no reason for me to want to use gen-AI because I will never want to give up my autonomy in creating art. I never want to become reliant on an inhuman object for expression, least of all if that object is created and controlled by tech companies. I draw not because I want a drawing but because I love the process of drawing. So even in a future where everyone’s accepted it, I’m never gonna sway on this.

[smoliboops]

[charlesoberonn]

It's gonna be such a funny mess when Donald Trump dies of a stroke on April 1st, 2024.

Naturally everybody will think it's fake because of the date only to lose their minds (both positively and negatively based on their opinion of trump) when realizing it's real

There will be massive celebrations in the streets and on social media and lots of predictable "don't speak ill of the dead" discourse about those celebrations

Weird evangelicals will pull some weird number trick talking about how Jesus was conceived on April 1st and that makes Trump a sort of messiah and people will make fun of that

The Republicans (after they're done with the faux-sadness and faux-outrage) will stomp over each other to be his successor but none of them will succeed. They'll tear each other apart and have no single nominee for the November elections.

There will be discourse about if Biden and the living former presidents should go to his funeral (they won't, he was a traitor insurrectionist)

The Ukraine-Russia War immediately goes in favor of Ukraine as morale in the Kremlin is reduced. China similarly backs off from its threats on Taiwan.

Ten thousand new memes are made, some sticking around for years to come.

Not a month later a bunch of unofficial biographies of Trump hit the bookshelves, many with new details about just how awful he was.

[twinliches]

nearly had a medical emergency today because - and i cannot stress enough how little i am making this up - a helicopter landed in front of an open grain silo while i was getting off my ship and i am deathly allergic to the wheat that said helicopters rotor blades proceeded to blast in my face at full force. the cosmic forces are plotting against me ass situation to be in

[danlous]

Ignoring the real possibility he intentionally let himself be caught from the little we know so far Luigi Mangione's case is a fascinating combination of astonishing brilliance and confusing stupidity. This young man plans and executes his assassination and escape with such a meticulous care and calmness that it's suspected that he's a professional hitman. He comes up with Riddler-sque moves like writing his manifesto poetically on the bullets and leaving his backpack behind full of Monopoly money. He carefully wears a mask to avoid being identified but removes it because a woman who was checking him into the hostel was flirting with him and wanted to see his smile. He still manages to escape the most surveilled city in the country in the midst of ongoing national manhunt only to get caught in the middle of bumfuck nowhere Pennsylvania while eating at the McDonalds. Because for some reason he had the same clothes and mask as in New York and was carrying the same gun and suppressor. And when the cops detained him he showed them the same fake id he used in New York. And oh yeah he's a frat bro gym rat who has a masters degree in computer science from Penn but reads stupid self-help books about being on the grind and is 'anti-woke' while being bisexual suffering from anxiety and wanting to end oppressive capitalism. Not even god himself could invent a person like this

[wishfulsketching]

Girl dad Silco is a source of endless entertainment for me

Extra doodles:

Someone save Sevika, she is in hell

[saszor]

Overview of some topics when it comes to drawing characters who are burn survivors.

DISCLAIMER. Please keep in mind that this is an introductory overview for drawing some burn scars and has a lot of generalizations in it, so not every “X is Z” statement will be true for Actual People. I'm calling this introductory because I hope to get people to actually do their own research before drawing disabled & visibly different characters rather than just making stuff up. Think of it as a starting point and take it with a grain of salt (especially if you have a very different art style from mine).

Talking about research and learning... don't make your burn survivor characters evil. Burn survivors are normal people and don't deserve to be constantly portrayed in such a way.

Consider supporting me on ko-fi if you find this to be helpful.

edit: apparently tum "queerest place on the internet" blr hates disabled people so much that this post got automatically filtered. cool!

second way more important edit: How are people seeing this post where I specifically talk about burn survivors being normal, real people, and still tag this as "TW body horror"? Not a single one of these drawings or pictures is a fresh injury. All of them are healed. How the hell would you feel if someone tagged a photo of you as "trigger warning: gore"?

Disabled people are not your fucking body horror. Grow up.

[mediocre-megs]

honestly more media should portray the anti aging industry as horrific and decidedly unhuman. it IS body horror it IS grotesque it DOES go against nature*. it WILL kill you. yes.

*this is NOT anti-hrt or anti-vax or anything of the sort. i love criticisms of the anti aging industry + sci-fi/horror. i also love trans people and vaccines and medicine and science. i also don’t care if you personally have botox. this was a shitpost i made while high and 2/3 of the way through the substance (2024). terfs dni. cheers.

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

we need more divorcebaiting. how strongly can canon imply (without technically outright stating) that these two characters are bitterly, acrimoniously divorced? essential we explore this

[mushyooms]

buying him time

[beaft]

do genuinely find it fascinating how indeed.com is like the biggest job-hunting website out there and yet manages to be profoundly useless in every possible way

[lastoneout]

I still think the single funniest thing about the cybertruck is that it has all those security cameras built in that are set to activate if anyone gets too close to the vehicle...and those cameras need electricity to run, and the cybertruck is a piece of shit that has way less battery life than you'd think, so you can legit just fuck over the owner by just standing near it and doing nothing else.

Like goddamn Elongated Muskrat found a way to let us siphon gas out of a car without even touching it. Fucking incredible.