#and yes tumblr is annoying about discussing fanfiction

[orionsangel86]

There is a phenomenon happening on Tumblr right now which may be a product of the Twitter exodus or maybe its just modern fandom mentality vehemently rejecting the old, but you guys have GOT to stop being so damn MEAN about fandom.

There are posts circulating on Tumblr right now hating on so many aspects of fandom. Yeah we all know the incorrect quotes format can be cringe and most of the time its the same quotes used for every fandom ever reducing the characters to stereotypes. Yes we know most fandoms scramble to ship the two basic white guys over all the other characters. Yes we know your blorbo probably Does Not Fucking Say That. Yes we know A/B/O is weird AF (especially now its breached containment and found its way into mainstream hetero erotica). Yes we know SuperWhoLock was ridiculous and attempts to make modern shows into a new SuperWhoLock have got old fast.

But do you have to constantly drag these things all the time? Why is it suddenly cool and popular to ridicule and criticise and hate on peoples fun?

Let people be cringe

Let people play in the fandom sandbox

Let people have their fun

Not everything has to be an intellectual critique and it doesn't make you a better person to constantly shit on fandom ON THE FANDOM WEBSITE

Fandoms can be problematic, toxic, and infuriating at times. But all the negativity isn't making things better. Yeah okay some aspects of fandom can be annoying, but must we have so many call out posts go viral on here specifically for hating on parts of fandom culture? Yet people wonder why fandom creators are quitting and there isnt as much art and interaction on here as there used to be.

If you see another negative post shitting on aspects of fandom cross your dash, maybe think before you reblog it. Maybe ask yourself if that post may be hurtful to a mutual? Perhaps youve got a mutual who writers A/B/O or CharacterxReader fanfiction who doesnt wanna see your reblog of the callout post stating reader×character fanfic is gross, or perhaps your mutual creates fun text posts applying quotes to their fave characters and youve just reblogged a 90k+ note post calling them cringy and overdone.

Just THINK please. Its not necessary. We've got to be KINDER to each other. Please don't let this place become like Twitter. Twitter was a toxic cesspool where no one had anything worthwhile to add to the discussion, no one created, everyone was just screaming angry rants into the void. Dont let tumblr become like that, because it will be the death of this place. And where will you go to find fanart and gifsets of your blorbos then?

[opulent-today-slope]

I think I now realise why the “Hollywood's 13-episode streaming shows are shit” discourse on the social medias bothers me: it's a mix between the audiences batting for the 25-episode formula Hollywood used to do not realising how ridiculous its practice was to begin with, and how Hollywood itself is still using said practice that fails their new products before they get off the ground.

The argument for this 25-episode formula to come back usually is:

“There is more time for character development and understanding them as people who could exist, instead of vessels that recite words a writer made them say.”

And while there is truth here, sometimes I think supporters who say this have rose-tinted glasses from their nostalgia through fandom interaction.

I remember the 25-episode era very well and how annoyingly contradictory my favourite shows frequently got every week. Even at nine years old, I could feel the writers arguing with each other over how their interpretation is the correct one and how this is what the story should be about. (I think the people who argue this secretly feel it too. It's why most of their fanfiction exists, after all.)

Also, the possible scenarios we could've seen of the characters' day-to-day lives that would've given us a glimpse into character development or enrichment are instead nonsense episodes that I'd argue come off extremely forced.

“Oh, look! Stephanie has wooden figurines in her room she's established she makes herself in her free time when she's not fighting the mutant rodents! I hope they'll do an episode where she and her rival Derek settle their differences over woodwork and they tell each other about their lives, and then realise they have more in common than they thought and they become good friends! Oh wait, what? The show's doing an episode where the ensemble cast go to the beach for some reason. OK. ... Oh, it's a clip show.”

It was terrible to watch but now I've learnt more on how this format worked, Hollywood's 25-episode seasons are fine fading into obscurity, as far as I'm concerned.

“Just start watching from season two. It's way better,” people used to say about their favourite series online all the time, and sometimes the shows themselves make drastic changes from their debuts in season two. It's absolutely ridiculous audiences and Hollywood itself essentially allows these TV shows to waste time and resources like this. How many cancelled-after-one-season Hollywood shows have had their genuine potentials crushed through this systemic attitude?

This streaming era people moan about now is often compared to UK television where the only shows with more than 13 episodes are things like live television with a news edge, but UK TV is 100% prepared from the first ever episode and remains consistent throughout its run. Tumblr hated how BBC Sherlock went but its season two and three was more consistent than seasons one and two of Hollywood's version of The Office!

And I think because Hollywood doesn't run its television like this, that's the real reason people who argue this are annoyed with the streaming era. Hollywood could afford to fake it 'til they made it when season one had 20 episodes, but now there are eight, it's obvious the creators aren't prepared. Yes, there have been showrunners who've said in interviews that they want the season to feel like watching a movie, but then for every masterpiece, you get hundreds of streaming shows with 10 episodes giving its audience ten hours of ten trial-and-errors. And if the show's lucky, season two comes out completely different - sometimes with former major characters completely gone. No wonder no one's sticking around online for meaty fandom discussions the next day/month/three years!

this this this

[tenpintsof-sundrop]

Just got blocked by someone for “spam liking” their posts.. aka I found their fics through the search, read five in a row while in bed and liked them, and went to sleep. Woke up to go drop an ask about how much I enjoyed their stuff, reblog them from my likes, etc etc and I was blocked.. bro I don’t understand tumblr ~culture~ anymore. I just needed to sleep before putting my thoughts into words 😭 Tanisha I feel old and left behind

tbh this is something that gives me anxiety??

because so often, I will go onto someone's blog and like a bunch of posts specifically with the intention of queueing them or reblogging them later - especially because I have very specific preferences about how my blog is organized. so if someone's blog is 100% plushie themed or 100% DC themed, then I will like a bunch of their posts and intersperse those posts about things with other fandoms, because I much prefer when posts from different fandoms are alternated on my blog instead of there being huge blocks of several posts from the same fandom spammed at once

and yeah, as a fanfic writer, it does annoy me when someone makes it a habit of only liking my posts and never reblogging them. but with the fanfiction environment the way it is right now, if I went onto my fanfic sideblog and blocked every single person who only liked my fics instead of reblogging them, I would be blocking 80% of the people who read my fics. I would probably be blocking more than half my followers

and the whole point of posting fics at all is so that other people can enjoy them. I don't post fics for praise and admiration or because I want to see the posts get a lot of notes - I post the fics because I enjoyed writing them, and because I think they're good, so I want other people to enjoy them. if I wanted to stop people from seeing them (which is the purpose of blocking) then I just wouldn't post them at all. I genuinely do not get the logic of blocking someone who has been shown to enjoy your work

and with your situation - you can never tell if someone is liking a fic with the intention to reblog it later. everyone uses tumblr in their own way. and I am always tempted to block people with completely blank blogs who have proven that they do not use the reblog function at all - but even then, I don't want to block someone who clearly enjoys my fics.

(the only time I block someone for liking my fics is if they are a blatant thinspo blog, but that is a whole different rabbit hole)

yes, the primary function of this site is to reblog things, and it sucks that a lot of people don't use it, but blocking someone because they literally like and enjoy your posts is sooo insane. it feels like the equivalent of someone coming up to you irl, giving you a compliment, and then you being like "get the fuck away from me. how dare you"

and as far as the like vs reblog ratio aspect - (this is for Luna as well as for everyone reading, if you are someone who only likes fics and never reblogs them) I will always be more likely to write more for a fandom where my fics have more comments and more discussion, rather than more total notes (aka more likes).

if I am looking for a fic to make a sequel of, I never look at which fic has more likes - I look at which fic I personally enjoyed writing more or which fic people seemed more excited about in terms of discussion. if anything, a fic having more likes (and less reblogs and comments) deters me from making a sequel to it, because it just means that people are going to not leave comments on the sequel, or a fic having a lot of likes means that a lot of people are going to show up to the sequel feeling entitled for more (when that's not what I want for my fics lmao).

I have always counted fics as successful if they have fewer notes and more actual critical engagement.

but anyway - all that to say - fandom is pretty broken lately. people consume fanfiction far too quickly and mindlessly and then demand more, people harass fanfic authors rather than trying to participate in fandom, and fandoms are too large and over-saturated to be truly enjoyable unless you only engage with 10% of the current participants. which leads to stuff like this ^^ happening (aka people thinking others are being hostile toward them, when they are just well meaning and enjoying the same things as you)

[zeta-in-de-walls]

I’m making a reddit for DreamSMP fanfiction

Hey guys!! Okay so I’ve been thinking a ton about Dream SMP fanfiction over the last week. And much as I love it, I’m not all that good at finding the good stuff y’know? And I find that Tumblr’s not always the best medium to have discussions about fanfiction. 

So I was thinking we need a nice space to share and recommend and request fanfiction. That, believe it or not, translates to reddit.

Reddit is well designed as a wonderful place to rec and find fanfiction somehow. Fanfiction subreddits just work. You can make a post on something you’re looking for and then anyone who can help can comment. Then others can also read those comments and also discover new fics. It’s great to have discussion on niche topics on there as its nicely segmented but open. 

So I’ve decided to create a new subreddit for it. (There has been one or two attempts in the past but they looked a little dead so I thought I’d start from scratch.) It’s currently very basic but hopefully functional? I’ll work on sprucing it up more if I can get it rolling. 

https://www.reddit.com/r/DreamSMPfanfic/

And I would really appreciate your help!! I’m sure some of you don’t really know reddit but I’d adore it if you could help get it off the ground by making a few posts. (I’m pretty inexperienced too so if you’ve got any advice I’d love to hear it.) Just stuff like asking for some fics of a type so others can recommend stuff or reccing some good stories you know of. 

Thanks, I love you guys and it’d be so awesome to have a more organised way to search for fics and have fic discussion in this community. Even if it’s not entirely successful, I hope it’ll at least turn into a nice little archive for people looking for more stuff to read.

(Also reblogs for more attention would be very much appreciated. Thanks!)

[inspiteallthedanger]

Have you thought about that moment in Get Back where Paul says ''Good try that, Johnny'', and George says something immediately after to John, addressing him ''John'' pointedly? Like very pointedly. I mean it might have been discussed on Tumblr, but I just rewatched it on Youtube (it's in the beginning of a short video there called ''George's admiring Eric Clapton & Billy Preston'') and that moment always makes me smile and wonder. It's just a tiny second of interraction between the tree of them but a mess of so many possible feelings. It definitely sounds like George is either mocking Paul or in otherwise responding to the fact that Paul said ''JohnnY''. Like he's acknowledging that that petname sounds affectionate and is annoyed by that fact. It's also interesting to me that apparently it DID sound special/affectionate, it wasn't common for people to call John that, if George payed attention to it. It's like.. George's reaction in a way for me confirms Paul's affection which is why the moment makes me smile mostly. But also... they're not teenagers anymore but George is annoyed/jealous? That Paul likes John? That John's ass is kissed by Paul? That they were an annoying petname-calling team like that still? I mean it's kinda hilarious but also like our weird fanfictions are not so far from the truths. Sorry for that long rant over one second of Get Back, what do you think? :D

Hello. This is interesting, isn't it? My following response is assuming that this dialogue is presented in Get Back as it was (more or less) said in real life. Which, we know might not be the case. So, for a start, I’m ignoring the visuals in this. But, anyway, with that aside:

I do totally agree that George's 'John' does seem a pointed moment in response to Paul's ‘Johnny’. And yes! I think Paul's trying to create some sort of short-hand/intimacy with John there too. I think, overall, George is trying to win John over to his way of thinking in his on-going argument with Paul. I think it’s pointed because he’s sort of saying “Oh, no you don’t, Paul. You don’t get to win by pulling on your weird ass relationship with John.”

I’m not sure, entirely, why he’s annoyed. Because I don’t think it’s wildly unusual for Paul to call him Johnny in that context.

I wonder if it’s possible George's annoyed because Paul says it was good. Then sort of pauses and only calls out John as being good, and George takes that to mean Paul thinks George wasn't good? I can’t remember what they’ve just finished playing, so assuming they’ve all just done a song, that could be part of it?

But overall, I think he’s annoyed because he's trying to win the argument that he's been having with Paul since the start of the sessions i.e. how they should go about crafting these songs. So, he's mostly disagreeing with Paul that the take was good.

I do think this is part of George's on-going issues with the whole idea of the project. Specifically, he's talking here about why he can't do what Paul wants him to do: stop and fix each wrong note as they go (by which George thinks Paul thinks he should just automatically know how the song ought to go), or allowing them to play through it and figure it out once they have the overall shape.

I'm not sure if George is just very insecure during these sessions or what, but it's a clear through line from this chat to "You need Clapton for that" where John says, "We need Harrison". And likely why John jokes they should just bring him in when George leaves.

None of the Beatles were good at just jamming - when they tried it, apparently it was often terrible. Paul's dismissive, "That's jazz, man," is meant to say, "So what if Eric does that? Doesn't make him better than us, or what you do." Anyway, I think this is all part of them trying to get John to weigh in on one of their sides. Which is interesting, because by all accounts that isn’t what he ever did. Let alone by this time in their relationship.

Anyway, none of this takes away from anything you’ve put here. I just think it’s more about them more directly fighting for John’s approval/agreement. Which John is resolutely not about to do...

It’s also funny/sad that George thinks that Paul and John still likely have that bond. I mean, they do but the very timid sort of way Paul says ‘Johnny’ sort of suggested that he’s not even sure of his place with John currently. Like, he’s trying to get John engaged and in doing so is excluding George. The dynamics are wild and painful to behold!

[hakka84]

^ Manipper here and I agree. I never actually had the chance to make a NC-17 manip so far (Tumblr censorship thought otherwise, though). And yes, it's the same thing. And I always hated those that policed manips, while saying nothing about explicit arts (even realistic ones). But the double standard is not the point. The point is that policing fandom is always wrong.

The discussion about the use of AI is one thing - one can be fine or not, although the use of voice AI doesn't replace any artist or writer (like AI rendering arts or text does). It's the reason why this post was made that rubs me the wrong way. It doesn't appeal to the ethics of AI as its whole but on a supposed consent of the actors. As @katherynefromphilly well pointed out, the actors didn't consent to anything fandom does with their images and jobs (=roles). Neither Bradley James nor Colin Morgan haven't consented to the Merlin/Arthur sex arts. They haven't consented to the fanfics depicting their characters having sex. And, if you remember well, Colin wasn't that much happy when Eoin mentioned the slash pair, and quickly shut Eoin up. Bradley said something ambiguous back then, but in the recent years I got the feeling he's not a fan himself - he just doesn't care, but isn't a Merthur fan (or perhaps he's just fed up with Merthur more vocal fandom and said vocal fans ruined Merthur for him) (I don't think Colin was annoyed, he just didn't want to get dragged in that hole - but he could be also annoyed, who knows: anyone could be legitimately annoyed at the thought of people pairing the characters him and his friend play. Anyone could be annoyed at think that they put all themselves into portraying a friendship and people come and slash that friendship into a sexual relationship)

Not all actors are like Zachary Quinto and Chris Pine who went "lol" at the Spirk slash, or the trolling that Shatner did in the last decades (and he likely changed his mind in the last years). Not all actors are Misha Collins, who probably is lurking in AO3 writing Dean/Cas slash in the year 2024. Anyone ever bothered to wonder how Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson might have felt when 50 Shades debuted and it became public that the story was originally a Twilight fanfic? They could be genuinely weirded out. What about actors who are asexual/sex-repulsed, who perhaps attempted to make their character on screen the more asexual they could (given the constraint of the character not belonging to them), and they see their characters in dom/sub tropes or in Omegaverse settings. What about actors with a past of abuse (sexual, drugs, whatever) who get their characters being raped or being drugs addicts in fanfictions? I know I will say something very political incorrect, but do anyone of us in fandom stop to ask if the actors are even LGBT-friendly, before turning their (canon-established) straight characters into queer? No. (And probably fandom would double up in the slash just to spite the actor) But wouldn't doing this mean we wouldn't care about the actor's consent in the first place?

If we want to discuss about "actors consent" than we better close up AO3 and write only original art.

Alright, I just saw a post using voice cloning of Colin Morgan and Bradley James for a smutty Arthur x Merlin fanfic scene and it’s not ok. I’m going to message the creator and the author of the fanfic and explain why it shouldn’t be on there, but please if you see it do not reblog it or endorse it.

AI voice cloning is not ok. AI has no business in art. The actors did not consent.

I truly don’t wish any hate to anyone, but this is not a topic that should be taken lightly. It’s not an issue of “oh it’s just not for me” it’s an issue of consent and what is morally ok to do.

[cavehags]

why do you hate headcanons so much its just fun and silly twitter also headcanon's jo as a lesbian and brad and jo as autistic is that somehow horrifying to you

this hostility is so bizarre to me. headcanons are just (an incredibly stupid word for) fan interpretations of media. i do not hate fans interpreting their favorite shows. i think the fact that people can close-read a text and come away inspired to think more deeply about who the characters are is a good thing. but there’s a tricky thing with interpretations: some are better than others. good interpretations synthesize the information provided in the text with a mature understanding of the outside world in order to build on the text in a meaningful way. they fill in the negative space of the fictional world. other interpretations bring in an understanding of one or more of these elements that is flawed. they rely on tired tropes or stereotypes or they veer away from anything based in evidence entirely. these types of (please don’t make me say this dumb word) h**dcanons diverge from the text in order to build on fans’ desires to see wishes fulfilled.  

an earlier term for headcanons common within a fandom was “fanon.” in the essay One True Pairing: the Romance of Pornography and the Pornography of Romance, australian researcher catherine driscoll critiques the tropes fans bring into fanfiction by commenting on fanon as follows: 

Fanon is not an inferior interpretation of canon in this light, but a fantasy based on the needs of individual writers rather than the reality established by shared source text.

later in the same essay, she adds:

Fanon connotes undiscerning identification with an unreal object. In fact, fanon is also associated with naive writing styles and is opposed to stylistic sophistication, demonstrating that fanon is less about strict lists of canonical content than about the specter of fantasy.

driscoll argues that there is nothing inherently bad or wrong with fans interpreting a text as they see fit, but in studying fan communities closely, it is clear that there is nothing particularly enlightened about fanon either. in any analysis, fans bring their understanding of the world to the table. if the way they see the world is immature, the fanon they reproduce will be bad. if they see the world through a lens that is--just to name one example--racist, then guess what? their fanon is going to be racist. in the case of the “gay brad” interpretation, fanon is a naive, horny fantasy. i find this opinion utterly bewildering. but i also own that there are a lot of takes out there that are a lot worse. for some examples of how fanon can become reductive to the point of reinforcing racism and misogyny, perpetuating pedo culture, and more, i recommend dipping into the avatar the last airbender tags on tumblr dot com. the fandom is overrun with them. 

to circle back to your original question, i think fan interpretations can be good or they can be shitty. when i talk about media on the internet i want to have a coherent conversation with other adults that builds on the text in a meaningful way, so i get irritated when all i find is weird wish-fulfillment overidentification stuff that would be better discussed in therapy. 

and finally - yes, the ideas you brought up are completely unfounded and annoying. jo is a straight queen. have some respect for god’s sake.

[stellocchia]

woof other anon completely misses the point of fanfic--and also completely misrepresents published work at the same time.

there was a post here on tumblr a couple/few years back where a former editor for a publishing company during the Twilight Craze talked about the sheer girth of the vampire romance stories they got. And they said, straight up, that even some of the worst fanfics were more tolerable than the stuff that actually got published back then.

just because something got published doesn't mean its somehow the Best Writing Ever, it can easily just tie into whatever is a popular trend at the time. publishing companies, after all, have to follow marketing trends to keep making money. quality of work isn't always their biggest concern lmao

also angst isn't. trauma porn? like, if you go the route of no happy endings, than romeo & juliet is trauma porn. if you go the route of bad things just keep happening, its literally every long running series ever.

trauma porn is another one of those terms these days that people throw around that used to have a specific definition but now people just use it to describe 'bad things happen to characters and you LIKE it??' time vibe and i'm sorry to tell other anon but.

technically the DSMP itself with count as trauma porn in that case.

further: what does that mean? 'the writing has no substance'? it just sounds like the author's writing style has no appeal for the anon. or that just the general fanfic style isn't appealing for that anon.

like, genuinely, i don't actually like how the lord of the rings books were written. this is not a dig at tolkien: he wrote the books in his style and his style just happens to not appeal to me at all. that's just how it is.

other anon, going out of your way to insult an entire community of people isn't very Pogchamp of you. smh

I just want to clarify something here: other Anon did say that they wrote that pretty late when they were tired and preventively informed me that their opinion on the matter would be negative, and I have absolutely nothing against them for expressing it.

After all, any discussion is worth having in my opinion, as long as everyone involved is respectful.

That said, yes, I do agree that their problem with fanfiction sounded more like a matter of personal preference, while the generalized wording of it made it feel as if it was an objective fact. Which, of course, again, fanfiction often isn't really written to appeal to other people as much as it's written so the author can have fun, and I'd say that's the main difference between it and published works more so than being an issue of quality.

Also, you do raise a good point about the whole "trauma porn" thing. I'm so tired of seeing it thrown around by a bunch of pretentious kids who sound like they've never read a book in their life. There are plenty of books out there were things keep going worse and worse and they're widely recognized as wonderful pieces of literature. There is literally no limit to how horribly things can go for a certain character, the only limit there is given by your personal preference in the matter. And in the foster aus that were mentioned the limit is normally pretty low? Like, "kid was treated badly, and is now in a loving enviroment where he's able to slowly heal" is hardly dark content, I'm sorry. The dsmp explores much darker themes most of the time from what I've seen.

It's just something that slightly annoys me when I see it talked about.

[millenialfanfictionaddiction]

WHAT THE DAMN HELL?! That's it! I'm coming off anon for this.

Someone sent YOU hate? I mean did they need read your rules where it specifically says you do not write for minors? I need these holier than thou buttholes who defend fictional minors to use their time and go out to help real life minors who have abused.

Bestie, you run the most unproblematic blog I have come across. If your blog was anything like that idiot anon tried to insinuate it was, I would not be a follower or interact with you.

Also, to that anon, come on, don't be shy, tell us who you are. My fist just wants to discuss some things with your face. 😀

We're here for you bestie. We got your back.

Also, I am spooky anon 👻

🤗🤗🤗

Wait ✋🏻 😱 SPOOKY ANON??? OMG HI 🥺🥺🥺

Ope 👀 spooky anon went IN 😬

So I think I've come to the conclusion that this anon was most definitely a minor. Meaning, that that we are probably closer in age to the HQ characters than they are 😅 I'm assuming they went anon because they jusy wanted attention, which they got.

I think alot of us know that alot of fanfiction writers are college aged and above. These are the content creators on this app. Yes there are young adults who write and draw very well, but alot of us are adults. We started our obsession with anime young and it just grew. I still watch Pokémon and Beyblades with my kids! I will not apologize for writing for characters I enjoy and I most definitely don't write inappropriate underage material.

I use gifs because I like gifs. I use timeskip imagines when I'm talking about timeskip teams. I also do alot of warnings to make sure I cover everything.

It's annoying that I feel like I have to defend myself but it's a trauma response. I constantly feel like I need to make sure people know I'm doing what I'm actually doing and doing it to the beat if my abilities.

I truly appreciate all of your support bestie, along with the support of all of my other followers. At this point, I just want to write and enjoy anime with the people on Tumblr 🥰

[paper-n-ashes]

I... am probably going to get some kind of hate or backlash for this but... it’s kind of been sitting on my mind and I think it needs to be put out there.

This is going to be an essay. And I am not a confident or confrontational person so this is real scary for me.

I know how easy it is to take this - all of this blogging, writing, any creative outlet really - a little too seriously. For a lot of us, it’s a lifeline of positivity and a wonderful distraction to the shit show of daily life in 2020/2021. Certainly saved my ass last year. And I spend a lot of my waking hours thinking about it, because it’s my hobby and I adore it.

But (and I remind myself to do this CONSTANTLY) can we collectively take a breath and chill a little bit?

Let me explain.

I’m just seeing little hints poking through of toxic judgemental attitudes regarding how ‘legitimate’ someone’s fanfiction or writing is. That there’s somehow this divide between ‘real’ writing and ‘fast food’ fanfiction. I, for one, really dislike the term but I’m using it here to prove a point.

All of it, every piece put out into the public space, is valid. And I think it’s good to be reminded about that concept every so often.

We are all different people. With different experiences and preferences. We all seek out and consume different things, sometimes surprising even ourselves when we discover something new we didn’t think we’d enjoy.

Some people like more plot heavy and meaningful fanfiction. Those pieces or series’ that effect you and move you, play on your emotions in any and all ways. Some are short, some are 300k novels written over long periods of time. Some are canon, fix it fics or prequels, some are brilliantly imaginative AU’s involving our favourite worlds and characters we know and love.

Others enjoy (sometimes) quicker, sexually charged fanfiction. Fantasies played out in written form. Explorations of sexuality on a vast spectrum of more ‘vanilla’ (whatever that means to you) and more hardcore themes outside the regular realm of sex you might be used to. Characters we find attractive in places of canon or AU territory to thrill ourselves and others, or even just simply to scratch an itch.

Some enjoy both, on differing days. Dependant on moods or needs at the moment in time.

No matter what - All. Is. Valid.

None is better. None is worse.

When you read something you consider exactly or close to what you’re looking for from fanfiction, it is absolutely normal that you consider the piece, and the writer, of a higher standard. But this standard is subjective. Please remember this.

Don’t look down on others who enjoy something you don’t consider as having this standard. And certainly don’t have a lower view of the writer who put themselves out there to write it and post it.

We’re all judgmental fucks at times. I’ll easily admit I am, and have been. I’m in my late 20’s and still learning to be an emotionally intelligent human. I definitely have moments I’ve had to catch myself out. There are things I could rant on for days because of how much they irk me. And I believe it’s healthy to express your emotions about anything. But I do not put it into the public arena. I try my absolute fucking hardest not to let it colour any of my online interactions.

(This is the first time I’ve really put out a significant opinion in my own post and it’s fucking frightening. Seriously.)

Anyway,

If something is bothering me enough in terms of irks, that are completely subjective and my own, I speak to a trusted friend, to get the thoughts out and move on. And even then, some of those thoughts I’ve eventually pondered over and regretted the judgments I made.

But I will ALWAYS defend the right in this fanfiction realm for every writer to write about whatever the hell they want and not be looked down on or belittled for it.

If you are annoyed that certain pieces or writers get ‘popular’ or receive adoration you don’t believe they deserve - STOP YOURSELF RIGHT THERE. You can be annoyed. Go for it. Let yourself feel. But do not spread that negativity. Do not make yourself feel better by bringing others down in public view. It is not an appropriate coping mechanism.

Popularity is a whole other concept I do not have time to fully delve into. But it seriously happens by a decent combination of hard work that people don’t see, the right timing and LUCK. You cannot control it, and it will seriously help your mental health to not attempt to pursue as your goal. I speak from experience.

Whatever your reason for reading or writing fanfiction is, take a moment sometime to remind yourself we are at the end of the day just... fans. Fans of characters, actors, movies, TV shows, all of it. To be a fan is to be an enthusiast of anything that truly captures your interest. We just... like something or someone so much we read more about it, talk with others about it, even create more content about it.

Fandom is one of the coolest things I think humans have ever brought into fruition. People from all over coming together to love and discuss something that brings them joy or challenges their mind. And I’m sorry but I’m just getting a little tired of the competitiveness and superiority complex that works to make fandom a fucking shitty place to hang around in sometimes.

I am not saying everything has to be sunshine and roses, because there are lines that can be crossed and every good thing has it’s bad side. But... this is for happiness. At least, for me it is. Some days, writing out somewhat incoherent, horny thoughts and shorter stories brings me happiness. Sometimes writing out emotional turmoil and long, plot driven novel work brings me happiness. It’s just how my brain gives me that serotonin I crave, and I can’t excessively control that.

When people like one and not the other, I don’t care. I really don’t. I don’t need an explanation. It’s not personal. It’s just what brings THEIR brain serotonin, and I will never judge them for that. I’ve at least brought them a little bit of enjoyment in whatever way and that is just... fucking cool when you think about it.

Can’t it just be as simple as that? Fuck all the ‘popularity’ and legitimacy and notions of what is ‘better’?

Just do what brings you happiness, and give love/support/whatever to others who have done the same for you in what they’ve written.

That’s... it really. That’s all I needed to get out.

Okay. Anons. Yes feel free to counter me and make me feel poopy for my opinion because this is Tumblr and I’m not naive. Just know I probably won’t answer any hateful messages because I’m a wuss and can’t think of good witty replies.

[johannestevans]

Return to Normal Business

Hello!

I've been juggling a lot of health issues recently, and as a result of this I'd unfortunately dropped off my regular update schedule for a few months. I'll now be returning to the normal schedule, and a weekly update of works most recently published will be coming out on Saturdays going forward - this summary will be dispatched directly to inboxes by email via ButtonDown, as well as posted on  Tumblr.

I will be posting from Wales instead of Ireland for the foreseeable future, and as well as the usual retinue of TweetFic, essays and analysis, short fiction, and serial updates, I'm currently on a big Star Trek kick, and as well as posting episode analyses and likely specifically Star Trek: Deep Space Nine-themed essays , I'm also writing a bit of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine fanfiction at the moment!

If you're a fan of DS9 or Star Trek, it might be to your taste, but fanfic isn't part of any of my subscription models and of course, being fanfiction of a property that's not in the public domain, it won't be posted behind a paywall on Patreon or Medium - fanfiction will be posted on Ao3. It's just a little hobby stuff I'm doing on the side, so if people are into it, great, and if not, hopefully it's not too annoying in amongst the rest!

I'm going to put a summary of everything I've published since I last put out my weekly round-up in July and from here on, we'll be returning to our usual scheduled round-up each week.

Thanks so much for the patience and all the love, everybody! I'm feeling far, far better and much recovered compared to how I was a few months ago, and everyone's support has been lovely.

Summary of New Works Published

Serial Update: Powder and Feathers

Chapter Forty-Nine: Party Favour. Jean-Pierre and Aimé orchestrate their gangbang.

This chapter is pure filth.

Chapter content warnings: levels of dubious consent and consensual non-consent, with other men under the impression that Jean-Pierre is drunk; object insertion; messy sex; power exchange and power play; manipulation; rape fantasy; referenced violence; transphobia and misgendering; homophobia

Read on Medium / / Read on WorldAnvil

Serial Updates: An Uncommon Betrothal

Several updates of An Uncommon Betrothal have come out over the past few months, so I'm just going to pop a list of them all here!

Chapter Four: Read on Medium / / Read on WorldAnvil

Chapter Five: Read on Medium / / Read on WorldAnvil

Chapter Six: Read on Medium / / Read on WorldAnvil

Chapter Seven: Read on Medium / / Read on WorldAnvil

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Episode Analyses

This is a new format I’m going to be experimenting while working my way through Star Trek: Deep Space Nine over the next few months — I’ve seen the whole series many times before, and it’s my plan to do these write-ups which will be a mix of blog and live-reaction, character and story analysis and commentary, and other ephemera and thoughts on the show and the episode itself.

Effectively, the purpose of this and the other entries going forward is to do close-readings of each episode I have in front of me.

My main interests in watching Deep Space Nine are typically in queer-coding, the depiction of neurodivergence, mental illness, and disability, and in the Cardassians and the Ferengi.

S1:E1-E2 Emissary Part 1 & 2: Read on Medium / / Read on Patreon / / Read on Ao3

S1:E3 A Man Alone: Read on Medium / / Read on Patreon / / Read on Ao3

S1: E4 Past Prologue: Read on Medium / / Read on Patreon / / Read Ao3

TweetFic: A King's Man

The nastiest, NASTIEST men in this one, when an assassin is caught by his mark, the king, and held captive.

CW for violence, manipulation, heavily weighted power dynamics, consent issues, threats, and general MEAN Men.

Read on Twitter

Romance Short: The Blacksmith and the Florist

Romantic short: a chronically fatigued enchanter becomes fascinated with one of the neighbours. Adapted from a TweetFic — short and sweet! Discussions of chronic fatigue and pain throughout. Rated T, M/M, 2.3k.

Read on Medium / / Read on Patreon

Star Trek Deep Space Nine Fanfic: Tease

Garak/Bashir, Rated M, 1.5k. In the aftermath of the incident with Tahna Los, Garak catches Julian on the way back to his quarters.

Read on Ao3

Star Trek Deep Space Nine TweetFic: Aging Men

Garak/Bashir, bickering about growing older, dialogue only.

Read on Twitter

TweetFic: On The Job

Silly little slice of life and flirtation between a hotel receptionist and the new maintenance guy! Short and sweet.

Read on Twitter

Star Trek Deep Space Nine Fanfic: Interpersonal Studies

Fanfic serial. Garak/Bashir, Rated E, 15k+.

Garak and Julian work to get the measure of one another, each of them trying to see what's hidden under the other man's skin.

Playing with a lot of the canon relationship development but actually letting them touch and play with one another - leaning into Bashir's autism and his status as an augment from the beginning, not to mention his analysis of Garak, and Garak's own analysis of him.

Read on Ao3

Erotic Short: Suspended Pleasures

Rope bondage and potion play in the apothecary’s office. Rated E. 1k. M/M short between a cis apothecary and a trans partner.

Age difference, suspension bondage, overstimulation, crying, come inflation, and fear of getting caught, as well as mentions of exhibitionism.

Read on Medium / / Read on Patreon

Erotic Short: Fit For Purpose

Supervillains and superheroes, but with massive cocks and stretchy bodies. Oh, yes, you read that right.

M/M explicit short between a huge cis male alien superhero and a trans man supervillain with whole-body elasticity. 4.2k.

Silly and light in humour, but extreme on the porn! Featuring pheromones (mildly dubious consent for this, but both parties use pheromones to get their way, and are enthusiastically into it), come inflation, huge size difference, unrealistic sex, alien dicks, prodigious amounts of come, dom/sub, mild corporal punishment, undernegotiated kink, rough sex, objectification, dirty talk.

Read on Medium / / Read on Patreon

[ao3-sucks]

An Archive of Someone’s Own: my experiences being groomed in fandom circles on AO3

TW: Childhood sexual abuse, grooming, mentions of incest and rape.

I used to be a big writer of fanfiction. It was the logical choice for me. I loved to write and create bold and immersive worlds, and I craved an audience who would enjoy my work as much as I did. Since my writing wasn’t actually good, I needed a community of other amateurs who wouldn’t mind that, and by tweaking my characters and settings into ones from canonical media, I got the audience I so craved.

I started writing fanfiction online when I was 14, posting initially on FanFiction.net and then moving to AO3 a few months later. As I got back into writing original fiction towards the end of high school, I lost interest in this community, and it’s been a long time since I posted anything much on AO3.

I’ve always struggled with the fact I display a lot of symptoms of CSA, and for the longest time, I couldn’t figure out why. Throughout my teen years, I refused to get changed or bathe when anyone was even vaguely nearby, constantly paranoid about being spied on; I developed a severe touch phobia, and would have frequent panic attacks from something as small as brushing arms with a passerby; I resolutely identified as asexual and refused to get into anything resembling a relationship with others because the very concept disgusted and repulsed me.

Weird, considering I had grown up pretty normal and all of these symptoms had started around my early teens. It was only when I told my friends about my friendship with a 30 year old I had met online that the pieces started falling into place for me.

Child grooming is usually discussed in the context of one adult going out of their way to befriend a child with the goal of lowering their resistance to sexual abuse, through normalisation and friendliness. I’d like to talk about how that worked on the fanfiction website AO3. Since it’s an open website and most communication takes place between anonymous users or accounts in the comments section of a work, there is very little delineation between spaces for adults to discuss whatever dark topics they like and spaces for kids to do the same.

This frequently leads to pretty inappropriate conversations between people of widely varying ages and life experiences, which is how I ended up talking sex as a fourteen year old with people ranging from a couple of years older than me, who were generally okay, to more than twice my age. The 30 year old in question listed on her profile how many pedophilic ships she loved, and she knew my age but pushed me to keep discussing sexual topics with her. Sounds like a red flag, yeah? Well. I was 14, and very stupid.

This 30 year old woman, who I will call Aku (because it’s similar to her screen name and because it’s funny to name her after the bad guy from Samurai Jack) would start conversations with me whenever I posted anything to AO3 and would refuse to take no for an answer when I tried to back out of conversations with her, and since these conversations were public and occurring within comments, I didn’t want to be rude to her since this was taking place on content I was trying to promote.

I told her my age multiple times and she would either pretend she forgot from last time (saying her memory is super bad) or continue as though it was just trivia about me and not a sign she shouldn’t have been pushing me. My primary objection to what she would say to me (since most of it was just her being annoying) was her insistence on sexualising everything I wrote, and her determination to push me into writing pornographic content, which I eventually gave in to.

Yes, she was a terrible person. She emailed me using her personal email address, so I know her full name and place of residence, because she’s an idiot. These emails also contain sexually explicit materials. Nothing much ever happened between us except for these very creepy interactions and the fact we remained online friends for a few years. But here’s the thing: she wasn’t the only person pushing me into creating sexual content. Lots of people would comment on my writing demanding that I show explicit sexual content when I really didn’t want to.

After a while it felt like I couldn’t write a longer, romantic fanfiction without including explicit sexual content. Like my work wasn’t valid without it. Other, more popular writers were usually sexual in their content, and I wanted to be like them and bring in the views, right? So, when I look at my back catalog of works, I can see how my content moved from completely non-sexual to featuring sexual content over time, and the views usually came with. In this way, I was in an environment that was encouraging me on many levels to sexualise my own work, which impacted the way I thought about my creative process.

Here’s another example I remember. When I was a young sprout, I remember reading down someone’s list of fanfiction recommendations and seeing a work called Hug Therapy, which I promptly read. While the work is marked as explicit and containing the Loki/Thor pairing, the use of relationship and rating tags on AO3 is so poorly regulated that it didn’t really mean anything to me to see either of those. People tag hardcore material as non-explicit and tag friendships as relationships, because there’s no motivation to tag properly. Plus, someone I followed here on Tumblr had recommended it to me.

Now, you wouldn’t know from the listing, but while this piece starts out as comedy, it turns out in the end to include rape, incest, and BDSM in very explicit terms. The fact it was tagged as being explicit didn’t slow me down, because the liberal use of these tags could mean that an explicit tag was just there because sexual content was implied or mentioned, which I thought would be the case based on the rest of the listing. Out of curiosity, I recently tried to report this work to the moderators for containing no warnings about incest or rape, and I got this in response:

“Selecting “Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings” satisfies a creator’s obligation under the warnings policy. Users who wish to avoid specific elements entirely should not access fanworks marked with “Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings”. Our Terms of Service note: “You understand that using the Archive may expose you to material that is offensive, triggering, erroneous, sexually explicit, indecent, blasphemous, objectionable, grammatically incorrect, or badly spelled. ….. This decision is in accordance with our policy of maximum inclusiveness; we have therefore closed this case and will not be investigating further.”

Which, yeah, I guess. The frustration comes from how ‘Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings’ is an extremely commonly used tag, and most things that it’s used on are totally harmless.

This fanfiction, which I was recommended by a friend, is hugely popular, in the top 60 most read fanfictions in the entire fandom. You wanna hear the kicker? The author, Astolat, is one of the founders of AO3. They’re not just some random author who isn’t following the rules. They’re a creator of the whole website, and they made the rules. This is pretty telling about how seriously the website actually takes protecting their users.

My final example I want to give is one of fetish content. People in fetish communities generally (not always) say that fetishes are probably something one should work up to after the onset of sexual activity, especially potentially harmful stuff like BDSM. In the circles I was running in, if you weren’t sporting a fetish or two (no matter your age) you were a boring bitch.

Maybe this isn’t true of everywhere in the fanfiction community, but I used to feel that bizarre pressure until I got out. Bear in mind that my main time in this community was from ages 14 to 17. I never made my age a secret, either. I told people outright I was that age, I was in high school, I was playing hockey and studying The Great Gatsby when I wasn’t online.

Since I was in the Avengers fandom and I liked Loki and the Asgardians, I was frequently exposed to incestuous content between Loki and Thor, and a lot of it came out of nowhere or was poorly tagged. This was considered the norm, and while I at first felt completely horrified and repulsed, within a year or two I no longer gave a shit. It’s only in the last few years as I’ve begun to unpack everything that I’ve started to get that strong revulsion reaction to incestuous content.

In the circles I was in, it was relentlessly normal. Normal to the point that people who disliked it were usually shouted down. Even to this day, debate rages on in fandom spaces about whether or not content like this normalises this kind of abuse. In my own personal experience, which I don’t usually like to talk about, it absolutely does.

In real life, this normalisation started to have serious consequences for my mental health and interpersonal relationships. In fanfiction, any occasion when you are alone with someone could become sexual, any familial relationship is possibly sexual, and it doesn’t matter if you like it or not. I became incredibly anxious around male family members for fear of being sexually assaulted, and my OCD, which I had been developing since I was a child, turned from thoughts of physical violence to thoughts of graphically sexually assaulted by anyone and everyone around me.

My fear of being touched got to the point where I would have panic attacks if anyone came anywhere close to touching me. I quit sports, fucked up my romantic relationships, and didn’t hug anyone, not even members of my family, for years. All the while, I had bought my first laptop and was consuming more fanfiction than ever before. I struggled with my sexuality growing up, as I am bisexual, and while fanfiction provided LGBT content to help me, the content was frequently so disturbing that I viewed any expression of sexuality as something evil and predatory.

The community on AO3, whether you like it or not, is often sexual, and provides no barriers between the casual user looking for content and extremely intense fetish material. It’s sometimes called the Pornhub of fanfiction, but considering the wide range of people who use it, it’s more like if you opened Youtube and saw niche hardcore fetish videos just on the front page, recommended and trending.

Sure, you have to click a little button to confirm you’re 18 before you can actually read a story, but the tags and descriptions of readily available works can be extremely explicit. Fanfiction also brings you into close contact with fellow readers and the author, and encourages you to become a content creator, which in some ways makes it more dangerous.

I was affected much more strongly by what I saw than most people would be, because I was already treading shaky ground. But I’m also not the only person out there who has been hurt in this way. Most of my friends who grew up in fandom can report the impact that fanfiction culture had on them. One of my friends from high school knew a panoply of porn terms at age 14 or so due to reading fanfiction, and another of my other friends at high school almost exclusively read rape porn because it was her favourite. I didn’t have friends who watched porn; I had friends who read fanfiction. These are just as troubling to me as any other accounts of young people consuming visual porn from a very early age.

It’s frequently cited that fanfiction gives minority groups the opportunity for creative outlet. It was a great place for me to cut my teeth as a content creator, and a source of acceptance and kindness when times were tough. Fanfiction communities have historically been the domain of women and minorities, and create a space for these people to tell their own stories.

It’s largely because of this that fanfiction communities fear censorship and strict moderation, as they have been attacked in the past on homophobic or misogynistic grounds, resulting in mass deletions of works or the shutdown of websites. But there must be some middle ground between total censorship and the kind of free rein that puts vulnerable people in danger, and I strongly encourage the board of AO3 to seek this middle ground out.

But it’s the community itself that needs to shape up; AO3 is, after all, a community-led website built by fans for fans, so the fact that this website has such issues is a reflection of the issues that run deeply within the people who created it. Aku didn’t talk to me with the intention of doing me harm, or so I believe at this time, and she didn’t pursue me as a lone wolf or in isolation.

She was simply a particularly brazen member of a community that was used to having inappropriate conversations with young people and sexualising everything they did. Even people my own age were jokingly pushing me into discussing and consuming extremely sexual content. It was just normal. That’s what I want to say here. Inside the world of fandom on AO3, the grooming of children with sexual content is normal. And that’s scary.

- Mod Daft

[kirbyspits]

A lot of Makorra shippers only moved on because they’re afraid of being called homophobic for not shipping korrasami. I LITERALLY saw someone on Instagram yesterday call a makorra shipper homophobic just for saying korrasami came out of nowhere. Also, Korrasami shippers LOVE to bring up the "popping bottles" backlash to make fun of makorra shippers. I left the tlok fandom in 2014 bc it was so toxic as a teenager, but now i’m 23. I’m no longer afraid of shipping something i always loved.

Ah, yes, I realized I didn’t address the fandom's toxicity in the last ask, but I’ve spoken about it before. I don't talk too much about the past because I was at the edge of the fandom back in 2014/2015. I was aware of fights, but the discussions I saw were moreso on bi-erasure. I saw one post saying it was wrong to ship Makorra. I remember being really confused about why Makorra was actually problematic, but I didn’t appreciate being told who I can ship the only dark-skinned woman protagonist on a major television network with. Why are you forcing me to ignore Mako and Korra’s relationship? Book 1 is practically about Mako and Korra, all other characters be damned. Me preferring the story of one pairing and a popular romance trope, second chances, is not wrong, and no one would know how I view the LGBT+ community based on who I ship in one show.

I ended up leaving the community because I was disappointed with season 4 in general. When Korra was released on Netflix, I figured it was time to rewatch the series again (plus, I’ve been binging all my favorite romance anime). So imagine my shock when I created a new Tumblr and Twitter account to rant and rave about TLOK, and I saw nothing but hate and name-calling in the Makorra tags. I saw people casually throwing around the word “homophobic,” and one person said people who don’t like Korrasami are just misogynistic. 

I just wanted pretty pictures, and people are out here psychoanalyzing shippers! So, I dug through some blogs and to feel more grounded with this fandom I didn’t recognize. After reading through their commentaries and experiences, I actually became more upset at Bryke than the teenagers/children who comment on Makorra posts saying how much better Korrasami is or accuse Makorra shippers of being homophobic. 

Yes, I truly believe these comments are mostly coming from people in their late teens and younger, at least in 2020. I can’t speak on 2014/2015, but since we were younger, the early 20s/late teens, I wonder if our age group was also the loudest. Don’t get me wrong, adults can be horrible people and can get really nasty. However, every time I look up the rudest commenters' profiles, they were teens. When one Korrasami shipper wrote “screw Makorra” on my AMV, I figured I’d have some fun trolling them until I clicked on their profile and saw a child. Needless to say, I ignored them and reflected on how parents are allowing their babies on TikTok while my parents freaked out at the idea of showing my picture on FB growing up. 

*I’m not still mad about that*

Also, while it doesn’t give anyone an excuse to make such a strong accusation, part of me, as a straight person, feels like I can’t get too upset because I also become very aware of my privilege. The space I’m in is a majority of young LGBT+ fans (at least on Twitter where I’ve seen the most toxicity). Some people see TLOK as their safe space and imply why should there be Makorra shippers when they have all these other cis/het shows they can engage with. It doesn’t work like that, of course. TLOK doesn’t only feature Bi characters. They’re POC/Indigenous, women, and Korra has dark skin. That’s a lot of marginalized communities. Makorra/TLOK is my comfort show, not because she’s with a man, but because of the reasons I just listed. Also shipping Korra with Mako doesn’t mean she’s no longer bi. She’d still be attracted to women.

Here’s who I am upset with tho, Bryke. Mostly Bryan. While Makorra shippers called out Korrasami shippers for cyberbullying, the focus seemed to be on Bryan for making it seem like there was something wrong with them for not finding Korrasami’s narrative satisfying. It was especially sad to read bloggers who identified as being part of the LGTB+ community saying Bryan’s hetero-lens dismissed their experience and then having to defend/proving themselves to anonymous messengers. 

Fans saw it as a betrayal. They saw it as the go-head for the rude Korrasami shippers to harass Makorra artists because they “didn’t watch the show correctly.” When the creator, the person you admire, also puts the blame on you, that kind of pain is on another level.

Korrasami shippers played a huge role in kicking Makorra shippers out of the fandom, but we can’t underestimate how much Bryan’s statement is a slap in the face. He used his characters and social justice as a shield for reasonable criticism. Just because we say a story is bad and Asami is grossly underwritten doesn’t mean that we’re against the idea of Korra and Asami being a couple. 

Of course, I’ve seen some very problematic statements from Makorra shippers. After all, homophobia is real. However, aside from the actual bigots, people have no issue with Korrasami. They just wanted a stronger connection between the girls. Many people seem to think Makorra shippers were looking for more romance, but we know we couldn't expect that. We can expect more screentime, musical cues, and more emotional support, which most people can see as platonic, but be romantic if you really want to. Mako’s interactions in book 4 can be seen as platonic, but all of us Makorra shippers saw it to be romantic.

Popping bottles! I completely missed that joke in 2014 and I discovered it this year. I agree it’s pretty annoying, but I become a troll and say I’m popping bottles for my Makorra moments. I don’t get any engagement, but I don’t seem to lose followers for it. Maybe popping bottles represents “straight-baiting?” I don’t get it why it’s so funny after all this time, but we’re Makorra shippers. We’re the joke 🙄

Anyways, to wrap up, lately, there seems to be a bit of a shift on Twitter. When I first created an account. I stayed in my little corner live-tweeting about TLOK and Makorra. I had to stop looking at the Makorra tag because it was so negative. Now, I’m seeing people admit they’re cute, and then saying they’re platonic soulmates. I’ll take it, although, as one commenter said, “that’s boring!” 

Someone led a Makorra Week back in October, and it was really nice! I have feeling people speaking up on the name-calling and reminding people that we’re talking about 2D characters helped. We just want to be left alone and enjoy the scenes we have in the show, art, and fanfiction. 

Keep shipping who you want! Don’t let any stranger shame you for your shipping preferences, especially in fiction! I’m so happy you feel more comfortable shipping these two dorks! You’re not alone! I’ve been a Makorra shipper since 2012, and while I find Korrasami cute (I love Korra, and I love Asami), Makorra is my OTP. I really like them, and I think they were meant for each other.

[theelliottsmiths]

It makes me really sad how people happily consume deep, obviously hard won, creative output but aren’t at all prepared to accept that sometimes that battle gets a little ugly. Like you’re consuming content that obviously attracts a lot of criticism, and is completely impossible to do even from a practical point of view (recording, touring, etc.) without leaving the security blanket of employment, social security or society’s approval but expect the people in it to just ... not ever stand out or to misfit or be uncomfortable. It reminds me of what we had the other day, there is a fascination with darkness and wildness and being rebellious, but rarely are the onlookers prepared to deal with the blood and the tears and the dirt. I don’t understand that.

I mean I am basically expected to defend Richard at this point, but the thing is, he’s probably insufferable a lot of times. What gets to me whenever this comes up though, is that all the attributes people apply to him that are negative, almost all exclusively come from himself. Like, people read those interviews and for like one exception where Schneider is being a dick, it’s not like the others say “Richard was too controlling and dramatic” it’s him saying “yeah, I did that and that’s why I moved.” It’s like ... all the negative things people believe about him come from himself. People think he thinks he did the main stuff on Mutter because he went and said “I did too much on that album.” Because the rest of the band is pretty mum about it. And it makes me suspicious, and again, sad for him, that he is perceived that way because he goes out there and dares to show that vulnerable and flawed side of himself and admits what he’s done, and now he’s the boogieman because the others don’t say what they did, too.

Sorry for the emotional ramble, I’m thin skinned today, but I don’t know, people that make themselves vulnerable that way often get treated that way, and it just depresses me.

Disclaimer for the previous anon: this isn't about you specifically, this is a general thing

I think a lot of the issue is that most of the community on Tumblr are quite young and are still coming to terms with just how grey people are (not to mention we have no experience with 40 year relationships because the majority of us are half that, literally babies when it happened)? Because the reality is yes, people have flaws that are more offputting than lovable quirks and that's okay. The expectation that none of us should ever be annoying or have moments of cuntishness or self-centeredness is unrealistic and unfair, and the guys understand that well enough not to hold it against each other forever, especially when it's actively being improved. There are limits and he hit them, but that doesn't mean throw the whole boy out. He has so many good traits that balance it out!!! They clearly decided he was worth enough to them in other ways to keep around, the good times were enough to outweigh the bad ones.

I honestly think they all agreed, Richard included, that sanding it down into just saying it was Richards fault and moving on is the best course of action. I wouldn't be surprised if he's going a bit overboard to almost atone for it, downplaying other people's parts in it because it can't be denied that he was having a bad time. If you assume his heavy drug use was involved theres a whole other layer of regret and guilt and heightened emotions that could compound to make his reaction to his own behaviour worse. I just almost teared up considering that maybe he brings it up to remind himself and to show everyone else that he's trying? All of this post is essentially fanfiction with sources but that even more so but listen... Ouchie, right? Whereas most of the others are more forgiving of themselves and their behaviour so it's faded to a greater degree. If he shut up about it a bit more I wonder if they'd ever bring it up. He really does beat himself up and insist it's all in the name of his art.

We have slightly different opinions on the importance of Artistic Pain and Suffering, I know you side more than Richard on that than I do, but I can definitely agree that there's an issue with people loving the end product but rejecting how it came to be in the first place. That doesn't make any sense the way I worded it huh? If you want moral purity then anything outside that is going to feel like a blow. Is that why they say you should never meet your idols?

Related to that none-thing I just tried to say, there's also the fact that Richard has gone to therapy and worked on this stuff: He does acknowledge his issues and how they affected everyone else, and it's pretty clear the others appreciate that. A lot of it, even from our limited knowledge, has clear origins so I don't doubt that they take everything he's been through personally into consideration. I imagine the same can be said of Till and to a certain extent all the others too. You can't look at them through a purely individualistic lens, that's not how they think.

You know how a lot of people with mental health issues get into periods of hating themselves and can list a whole bunch of overinflated reasons why they're terrible awful bad waste-of-a-fleshsuit humans? Sometimes when Richard is discussed it's like people are listening to that and they agreeing without taking a second to evaluate the objectivity of the source. It's hard to look at for too long for some people. Till is treated way more sympathetically; his Bad Traits are less grating for people who don't know and aren't actually around him, I suppose.

I'm trying to find a quote by I think Paul about how he had to read a book of some kind to be able to understand and talk to Richard, Tumblr is impossible to search, but it really does highlight the effort they all put in that we don't see. They have long, long conversations with each other, they didn't just get angry, yell a bit, and then wait for things to change. Sometimes people forget that personal growth is a thing. He's not the same person in 2021 as he was in 2011 or 2001 or any other time.

Uh. Here's a cute Richard to improve the mood

[warriorteam1924]

They’ll say we’re fool and we don’t understand….

 I’m adding a cut right from the beginning here, because I think it can be long. Yesterday, I had so many thoughts inside my head, I suddenly felt the need to disappear. Someone very very sweet (not tagging them in case it would be annoying) got concerned and I thank them again for reaching out for me. And they reminded me it was okay to ramble…. Maybe it would help me get some thoughts out and carry on moving. (feel free to ignore and for the love of anything dear to you, don’t like if you didn’t even read it. That’s R.U.D.E.)

 I know so many people have much more worrying concerns, and I’m not writing this to make some kind of competition as to know who is suffering the most. This is not my point. I already know someone who does it very often, so no need to add more lol I’m just willing to get some points, ask you and myself questions. This is something we discussed today with my sis and we figured out a list of questions would be a nice way for me to close a subject for good and allow me to gain a little bit of peace of mind. Which I cruelly lack lately.

 There is something that’s been annoying me quite a bunch lately. There is a new series in France called HPI, and it’s supposed to be about gifted adults, also known as High Intelligence Potential. And it makes me real mad. That’s fine to make fictions about some people, about their skills, their strengths and their weaknesses and I got to say Audrey Fleurot is a real nice actress (and cute). But the problem is everyone is talking about it and I’ve seen press articles pop up about it. My first concern is that people will start to see this as a trend and say ‘oh I’m acting like this cause of my HIP”…. And when someone who is like me, that is to say a real Zebra, no one is gonna take this seriously. It’s taken me a lot of time to figure out what was it all about and this whole work on me will surely going to be ruined because of false assumptions from the Medias and the general audience. In this world were some are so lazy they should be hiding under their desk, they will take this as an excuse and it’s not acceptable. It’s just like someone pretending to be autistic to have advantages. It’s not fair for those of us Zebras who are really struggling.

In French articles, so far, I have not read a single line that truly stated what it really feels like to be a Zebra. But If anyone is interested, there is this article which is super great and totally fits me (x) 

In the article, they highlight several sentences and I think it fits me perfectly.

“It combines perfectionism, lucidity and fear of failure which makes it rock into a world of 'eternal dissatisfaction'. There is always a way to do more, to do better.”

I wouldn’t speak of a fear of failure, because I tend to say I fear nothing. But yes, failure is not acceptable, I always want to reach for perfection even if it doesn’t exist. Also, eternal dissatisfaction applies for me as well, but only in the sense it’s hard for me to be able to be okay with what I’m doing. The hardest feeling is the feeling of guilt, for everything and anything. Not being able to do everything I had planned in a day, not being able to manage my emotions properly, feeling like I’m a burden, all of this comes on repeat in my head lately and it’s really tiring.

 The second sentence that sums it up more or less is :

“Boredom watches us so we multiply projects to the point of sometimes bringing us to immobilism or burn out. Choosing is giving up and giving up is very difficult when so many things interest you.”

Just like Freddie said, for me boredom is the disease of my world. I always need to have something to do. And therefore it leads me to do so many things at once, which is okay cause I usually end up finishing what I’ve started. (on tumblr, I speak about fanfictions for instance. In real life, some of you have seen some of my creations like paintings). Yet, there is the other side of the coin, which is burn out. And I feel like this is what I’m facing lately. I just cannot manage everything and this leads me to a point of frustration I’ve hardly known so far and it’s really really hard. I feel committed to my sister, to my house, to my pets, to my friends online as well. And when I find five minutes for myself, I have this guilty feeling coming back and it feels like I’m failing someone. It’s terrible and even if I’m working on it, I struggle real badly lately.

 This leads me to my interaction with this world. It’s quite clear I’m not made for this world or this world isn’t made for me or both, I really don’t know. But, thanks to Tumblr, I’ve found amazing people, some I’m now proud to call friends, and it’s fantastic. You all come from all around the world, you all have a background story which is always nice to know, you all have your ups and downs and It’s always a pleasure to be here for you and with you. Of course, this is not perfect, but what is? Nothing of course. It’s easy to write this down. But my mind is often stating otherwise.

 In order to have some kind of protection with this world that seems to be rejecting me, the Zebra kinda creates some kind of scripts in their head to cope. It usually helps getting through a delicate situation or a moment of stress. The problem is, lately and for me at least, the scripts are way too negative. And it seems it’s leading me into darkness and I’m fighting real hard against this.

 For instance, I know so many of you are really very busy lately and I understand. Between work, school, family, other businesses that are personal and don’t need to be shared, there isn’t always much time to be around. It’s again very easy to write it. But in my head, the script goes like this : “I’ve done something wrong.” “they are not doing okay and I feel terrible for not being able to help them.” Or the classical “I’ve done nothing wrong but like the two others who already did, they just blocked me for no reason and I guess that’s it.” (this last case only happens once a year so I should know it will come at some point). All those negative scripts are not cool because deep inside, I know when I’m sending a message I’m usually going to have a reply. Y’all not just evils willing to annoy me lol

 The interaction with this world leads me to another thought that’s been bothering me for quite some time. There are some people around here (not giving names cause my point here is to understand) who really like interaction. Which is fine, I like interaction too. I just don’t do the ask games and all cause I feel no one would send anything and it would be boring and annoying for my followers.

Yet, when some ask for interaction, like sending asks, when I send them in, why don’t I get answers? In this case, there are so many questions in my head. Did tumblr mess up and my question wasn’t sent? Do they ignore me? WHY? (yes why is the main question in my head) what did I do? If you guys have an answer to this one, please feel free to let me know cause I’m really longing to know??? I’m someone really open and I guess quite smart, but being ignored for no reason is a real torture honestly.

 This will (I hope) leads me to a final point. It’s a more romantic and personal experience I’ve had (still have?) and that I don’t understand. Long story short, I met someone online, on Tumblr. We chatted a bit and I had the feeling we got along quite nicely. As a zebra? Or because of my personality, I kinda catch feeling really easily. (and it sucks).

This person (I’m gonna say E. so that’s easier) is depressed and I think they like to get a bit of attention. They often do ask games and reblogs some stuff like ‘give me attention’, ‘dm me and we are friends straight away’. I understand being depressed it hard. I’ve been through it. We don’t all have the same weapons to fight back. But there is always light at some point and I think when a hand is given one should take it. Yet, it seems E. doesn’t want to. It’s now been two months, they’ve just stopped interacting with me. While they do post on their blog, while they try (mostly failing) to get in touch with people on another social media.

Could someone please help me understand? I just don’t understand and it’s really hard for my Zebra brain. Did I do anything wrong? Am I not worth a single reply? Why? (yes, again)

 My logical side is fighting with my emotional side and I’ve been thinking a lot about just giving up and moving on. Like I did before with other persons, I mean this is part of life. Sometimes it can work out, sometimes it won’t. So yeah, simply unfollow and stop looking at their blogs.

Yet, I’m asking you this question. What am I supposed to do when like 5 seconds after I say ‘Okay, Kate, just let go’, there is something popping up in my face to remind me of them? You know, the kind of signs you just can’t miss. Like an ad for the place where E. lives. Like a TV program I’m watching about pets and telling the origins of the dogs is again the place where E. lives. Or the lyrics coming up “Hold the line, Love isn't always on time” while you know Queen is always playing at home (or most of the time). I don’t believe in many things in life, but I do think everything happens for a reason. But I need a bit of help on this one to know why life/karma, whatever its name is, put E. in my path. Will this lead anywhere? Is it already over, before it began? Or was it just one more proof I’m definitely not made for love and I should just learn to avoid having feelings at all? I’m not begging for a romantic relationship, y’all. Hear/read me well, I’ve been single for most of my life and having a partner has never defined me. But I need advice and to understand this situation. Cause the scripts about it in my head are really overwhelming and it’s really hard. So feel free to give me your opinions and all. I’m opened ^^

 Wow, it was hella long but I do feel better I guess. I’d feel amazing with answers I guess lol but it’s not that bad. Thanks for reading if you’ve made it this far ^^’

I just hope I can feel real better soon regarding, cause I’d love to get back to writing, I’ve been thinking about a unseen collab, I have so many ideas, i would love to get back to creating !!! And of course share around here cause it could always please someone !! 

 Again, I’m not tagging anyone, but I just wanted to share a brief note to finish this. I thank my tumblr pals : my starling, Stephanie, Lily, Rachel, Viky, and also Jules ^^ those folks never let me down no matter what and on tumblr, they truly make my Zebra world go round !!!

 Love you all and as always, stay safe and take care. 💖💜

[z3ld4]

Mercy Me - Part One

Summary: Jacqueline Laymore can’t really tell when it started to hurt to call Spencer her friend. But that didn’t really matter after she got kidnapped. Right now all that matters is getting home and getting Spencer Reid.

Warnings: Angsty? Mentions of self harm, suicidal ideation, death, kidnapping, is catholic guilt a warning? culty vibes, mentions of torture, and a very small mention of rape and gouging one’s eyes out.

Word Count: 1.3k (its a babey for the first part)

A/N: this is one of my first fanfictions on tumblr and in this fandom, so idk be nice or like really mean, criticize me, i don’t really mind. i used to write aphmau fanfiction nothing really hurts at this point. also this is an original female character fic because i for real can not write fic in the y/n format and i’ve had this idea for a while. it took a lot of effort to post this without puking in anxiety first but i hope it goes well ig.

If Jacqueline was going to die right then and there, she would have frankly been pissed. Sitting in the bathtub with blood seeping out of shallow cuts on her thighs would not be a great way to go. It’s especially stupid because they weren’t even new. Jacqueline knew better than to cut in the tub.

Especially since she’d been clean before the incident.

She wondered if that was the time to back up and take a second to think. Think about her wrongdoings.

Of course, Gabriel doesn’t give her the release of death and instead shot himself in the neck. Her eyes, always the worst part of her body, follow the arterial spray as it stains the yellowing ceilings. She almost wants to take the revolver and shoot herself in the head, but that would contaminate the crime scene.

Jacqueline is smarter than that. But the revolver is so close to her. Yet just out of reach. 

Everything seems to be just out of reach when you’re kidnapped. 

But everything is moot compared to the digging feeling in her stomach telling her that the gun still has five more rounds. 

She doesn’t. Of course, there is more to her life than being a martyr for another’s sins. That isn’t what Father Julien said when she was younger, but Father Julian also tried to gouge out her eyes in the town square.

Father Julian did a lot of things, talking about the grace of God wasn’t one of them. But what can you really expect from a man that creates a psychopath? Jacqueline dug the heels of her hands into her eyes, creating swirling patterns behind her eyelids. Phosphenes. She can hear him say it. Spencer always made sure to tell her the weirdest facts he could remember. She can’t remember most of them but sometimes his voice pops up in her head reminding her of them.

A lot of things pop up in Jacqueline’s head these days. She smoothed her hair back with the water on her hands and stepped awkwardly out of the tub. Taking two towels from the rack on the wall, she wrapped up her hair and body. Carefully stepping around Gabriel’s body and blood pool she enters the bedroom. For a cheap motel, it was quite clean. Frankly, it wouldn’t be half bad if the carpet wasn’t a brown color and she didn’t come with the guy who kidnapped her. She dug through Gabriel’s luggage until she found yet another, white cotton sundress. It wasn’t a bad dress, quite pretty in reality. It was the situation that made it the ugliest rag Jacqueline had ever seen. It fell to just below her knees and the bodice fit her waist perfectly, the spaghetti straps dug into her shoulders but it could have been much, much worse. 

Jacqueline would have liked the dress in another life. However, Gabriel had a thing for the whole ‘white equals purity’ thing and tortured her in a dress similar to the one she was putting on.

She stopped putting the dress on. Blinking through the tears forming in her line of sight, Jacqueline searches for a shirt and a pair of pants that could maybe fit her. She found Gabriel’s taupe button-up and slipped it over her shoulders, buttoning the front up to the third button. After digging a little more she finds a pair of army green pants, a little too high waisted for such a masculine man but she puts them on. Luckily Gabriel also had a pair of hiking boots which Jacqueline took the shoelace out of and used it as a belt.

The sandals that she wore when out with Gabriel would have to do, though it looked a little silly. Jacqueline took her hair out of the towel and ruffled it up a little, she always hated leaving her thick, wavy hair without product in it but it’s better than brushing it. The bangs brushing against the bridge of her nose are going to make her cry though. She used to hate how she looked in bangs but now, with Gabriel’s praises ringing in her ears, she almost likes the way they frame her face.

Almost.

Jacqueline grabbed Gabriel’s wallet on the way out of their hotel room.

The secretary looked at Jacqueline funny as she checked out. Granted, it was well deserved, Jacqueline looked like a mess of men’s clothing. She also was leaving without Gabriel, which sounded a little unheard of considering he didn’t even let her speak when they checked in.

Jacqueline wanted to call the police so the maid didn’t get a nasty surprise. She didn’t have a phone on her but she walked to the payphone on the street corner and quickly called 911. 

“Hi, Hello. Y-yes… I… I need to report a suicide at Maple Leaf Motel, room 3C. My… My p-partner shot himself in the neck!” She wailed into the phone before hanging up. She was always good at faking things. Right now, faking composure seems to be the only thing keeping her sane.

Time to catch a flight to Quantico, Virginia.

Or, more likely, hitchhike. If there was anything Jacqueline had learned in her nine years with the BAU is to not hitchhike. But she had about two hundred and fifty dollars and the clothes on her back. And if anything she could pay for some gas and maybe use the self-defense that Morgan taught her. She knew that from where she was it would be around twenty days by foot. A twenty-hour car ride. And maybe a five-hour flight depending on the airport. The closest 'big' town near Maple Leaf was Lexington. 

And deep down, Jacqueline really wanted to take a road trip. Nebraska is quite a pretty state. Though walking would be a little excessive considering she's technically been off for two months already.

The fact that she’d been with Gabriel for two months sent shivers down Jacqueline’s spine. The bureau wouldn't take her vacation days away for being kidnapped but you never really know with the government, do you? She started walking to the library when she realized that she could email Strauss and talk about her job and how fast she can be reinstated. Luckily the library was a few blocks down the street.

"Hello, dear! What can I help you with today?" The elderly woman behind the help desk smiled. Jacqueline figured that they didn't get that many people inside the small library. 

Jacqueline forced a smile and walked up to the desk, "Can I use one of the computers? I need to email my boss about my... vacation."

The librarian gives Jacqueline a sugary sweet smile. "May I, Deary," The librarian corrected.

"Right," Jacqueline drawls. The librarian walked her to a clunky old computer and logged on before shoving Jacqueline down into the seat. Jacqueline goes through google to find her email service and quickly write one to Strauss. Strauss responded quickly, a short email reading:

Dear Agent Laymore,

You're thought to be dead. I can not grant you the ability to step into your building for recertification and discussions of reinstating you until you prove otherwise.

Erin Strauss

Jacqueline responded:

Dear Erin,

You're supposed to be nicer to people who are held as a hostage. Anyways, I guess a way to prove my identity would be that I can sing 'On My Own' from Les Mis perfectly, I know you have heard me do it. And that your husband divorced you after he gave you half of his liver due to your liver cirrhosis. You told me this one night when I was crying over my brother killing himself and getting disowned. I am the only person on the current team (I assume, though I'm sure Rossi knows ;D) who has that information on you.

With love,

Dr. Jacqueline Laymore PsyD

Ps. Please don't give my job away because I made a joke.

Erin responded with a very annoyed emailing detailing what they will discuss once Jacqueline reaches Quantico. With a valid ID of course.

Now the hard part, finding someone who wasn't a serial killer to hitchhike with. For at least twenty-four hours. In a car.

Spencer's voice called out in the back of Jacqueline's head, reminding her that there is a 0.0000086% of being killed or raped while hitchhiking.