#anyways. this has been a rant
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We started the session being comfortable putting our nose in and then immediately pulling back for a treat. We end our session comfortably (loosely) bucked in
#with a little walk around the house and a loooot of treats. then off and done#and she wanted to keep going too#but i know I'd end up pushing too far. better to stop early... especially since im not a very good trainer and undoing issues would be hard#anyways. this because i want to try whippet racing#and i know sometimes its required for coursing so may as well be ready for anything#or like. “a natural relaxed yet alert stance” as the racing rulebook says... im assuming basically stacked?#pretty sure that's how she's arranged for the measurement wicket at roll call#she doesn't like standing on the board and she doesn't like the wicket either so a couple people helped me arrange her#would like to not need that. and that wont be allowed for racing so like. double the reason to improve#idk idk i just want her to have a full enriched life. as much as I'm able to give#fastcat is frequent nearby but seems kinda disappointing for her. since its not really that much running/chasing#lure coursing is infrequent and very satisfying for her#i dont know yet how frequent or nearby racing is but at least it would be another fun thing for her!#getting a rc car is in line with that goal. more frequent fun chase games + conditioning for other things we do#we just dont have any fast friends nearby so she rarely really runs the way i know she wants to#anyways. this has been a rant#whippet#misdemeanor#dogblr#petblr
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I cannot believe there are people in this fandom that like Karen Wheeler
#karen wheeler#we have seen a different show#her interactions w. billy in s3 were AWFUL#genuinely inexcusable#and her character is so bland!#pretty much every other character. i can at least understand why they have fans#but KAREN#just because she had a girlboss scene?? just stan joyce the canonically good mother#anyways. this has been a rant
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"You and me, Ethan. Together we go save Rose, and then we can grind Miranda into paste!"
#ethan winters#karl heisenberg#wintersberg#resident evil#resident evil fanart#rebhfun#resident evil village#resident evil 8#re8#re8 if karl didnt fumble so hard he literally died#anytime i draw wintersberg know that it is under the assumption that karl did not propose to use rosemary as a weapon#it would be incredibly ooc for ethan to agree to something like that and also increidbly immoral 😭#anyone who blames ethan is nuts#why should it have been on ethan to negotiate with the dude who has done nothing to prove himself as trustworthy#karl literally tries to SCARE ethan into taking his deal#thats like a huge sign that its gonna be a horrible partnership#i love karl#hes a great character#but him thinking that ethan would ever accept his deal was just delusional#anyways#ethan was not stupid or wrong for not taking karls deal#anyone who geniunly believes ethan was a idiot for not taking the deal is forgetting that he is in fact his own character#and would rightfully not want to use his baby under a vague deal that doesnt even elaborate on details#a karl and ethan teamup WOULD be cool#but with the deal karl proposed#it was doomed from the start#*rants about why karl and ethan should never teamed up *#*draws wintersberg*#ok rant over whatever
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Novice sewing pattern: Cut out shapes. Line up the little triangles on the edges. Stitch edges together. We've also included step-by-step assembly instructions with illustrations.
Novice knitting pattern: yOU MUSt uNDerstANd thE SECret cOdE CO67 (73, 87, 93) BO44 (63, 76, 90) 28 (32, 34) slip first pw repeat 7x K to end *kl (pl) 42 * until 13" (13, 13, 15) join new at 30 pl for 17 rows ssk 27 k2tog mattress lengthwise BO and sacrifice a goat to the knitting gods. WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU WANT "INSTRUCTIONS," I JUST GAVE THEM TO YOU
#knitting#no it's not a real pattern but I can't write one that makes sense because I have no freaking clue what any of that means#How do you make things that aren't basic rectangles#Why has every knitter I've asked for help just said 'patterns are easy; you just have to know how to read them' & then refused to teach me#Where do I even find a goat to sacrifice#How do I join the pattern cult#I am so confused#I've been knitting for almost a decade but I can only make scarves and potholders#I learned one (1) stitch by watching a YouTube video and none of my friends or family knit so I have no IRL resources#And nobody I meet seems to want to take the time to explain the rest to me#I taught myself to sew through trial and error but that doesn't really work with knitting because error is pretty much just... Unraveling?#Anyway sorry for the tag rant I'm just frustrated that I see pretty things I want to make but the instructions are in an alien language#And the gap between 'absolute novice' and 'intermediate' seems to be about 20 years of experience and formal instruction
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"Finnick Odair? Who's that?"
rip Finnick you would've loved chilling with your kids and not being famous
commissions open!
#i should really start an art tag#the hunger games#finnick odair#catching fire#mockingjay#annie cresta#odesta#because its their kids#anyway small rant in the tags#my work has really been flopping lately#and i know that doesnt mean im bad#but feedback really motivates me#when you guys like it then i want to make more#ill keep posting anyway but#just gets discouraging yk
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There's been something about the woobification of Buck that's been sitting on the tip of my tongue for weeks now, and I think I've finally figured it out.
This is, of course, mostly in reference to the moral outrage about a decade-ish (give or take) age gap between two adult men and the infantalization of one said grown man, so all the puritanism isn't really coming from a place of good faith anyway, but here's the thing that's been bugging me that I couldn't quite put a finger on until now.
Buck has people he goes to for certain things. He has, what are in his mind, experts in the field for most of the things he can't think through on his own, that he goes to for a sounding board.
He went to Hen to talk through the sperm donor dilemma for a few reasons that made sense to him. 1) She's a mom. She has very much had to deal with the reality of 'giving up' children she considered her own. Buck is aware that he would be giving up something that could mean something to him, and he wants to talk to someone who has some insight into that. 2) She's dealt with IVF. She knows the risks, she knows the trials and tribulations, she knows about this thing that he is thinking about agreeing to be a part of so she's going to have a fuller grasp on the enormity of everything this process entails.
And they drink about it. Hen gives him what she can and cautions him where she thinks she should and they continue to talk about it and regardless of what SHE thinks, he makes his mind up in part because he got to talk to his Expert.
Bobby is often his go to when he feels like he's losing his grip on things. He's seen Bobby staring down the bottom of the bottle. He's seen the work he's done to pull himself back into the world, and he's seen the way he fights for his family, his people. Buck leans on him in times of questioning himself because he knows Bobby has pulled himself off the ledge with bleeding hands and a bleeding heart.
He reaches out to Maddie about interpersonal shit constantly. We see it all the way back in S2 when he's starting to question what the hell he's still doing in Abby's apartment, and that never really changes. She's the one with advice for him when he's angry with his parents, upset with the firefam, worried about his friends, or just generally concerned with the way he's perceived by people or how he perceives the world. He goes to her when he's embarrassed, ashamed, because he knows she won't judge him for it. She'll call him out, for sure, but she's not going to look at him differently when she knows he's done something he considers bad behavior.
When he goes to her during the Tommy arc, he's there for one reason he'll admit, and another she has to ferret out. 1) He lied to his best friend and he doesn't know why. 2) Oh yeah he went on a date with a dude that's not strange WHY IS THAT STRANGE I'VE ALWAYS BEEN AN ALLY PLEASE DON'T PULL BACK THE CURTAIN - and Maddie is there with two things: 1) It's not weird but it IS new and something you clearly haven't worked through all the way which is why 2) you'll tell Eddie when you're ready
And Eddie is sort of his go-to to bounce ideas off of. Eddie is his Buck expert. Eddie is the guy who can sort through all the bullshit and who sees Buck for exactly who he is, every time, regardless of what Buck himself is thinking. Eddie is his best friend, and he knows the good the bad and the ugly better than anyone else. He is also, quite frankly, the one Buck seeks out to help him contextualize all of his romantic feelings for people. Eddie's the guy he talks to when he's interested in someone, when he's falling for someone, he's the guy through which Buck filters his love interests into the firefam. I do the same shit with my best friend. It's instinct to want the person you consider the expert on you to meet the person you are interested in, it's instinct to want them to like each other, to get along. Buck knows Eddie loves him (in whatever way you see that love, Buck knows Eddie loves him) and he wants this person who loves him to be at least an active listener as he talks himself through the minefield of relationships. I do also think that up until the events of season seven, Buck considers Eddie sort of an expert on that traditional love-marriage-kids-white-picket-fence relationship Buck thinks he's striving for - in a very naive way, because obviously the wasn't what Eddie and Shannon had and Buck knows that, but he's probably fed some of Eddie's rose colored reminiscences back into that notion.
When he comes out to Eddie he's got two worries. 1) I lied to you and I figured out why but I'm still a little worried you think it's weird and 2) I screwed it up with someone I really like and I don't know where to go from here.
And Eddie (Buck expert) reassures him that just because it's new and unexpected doesn't make it strange, that it doesn't change anything in their friendship. And then he gets right to the heart of it - if you like him you should reach out and tell him that. He doesn't know you like we do but if you give him the chance to, he'll love you as much as we do. If he doesn't give it the same shot you want to he's the idiot.
With all that context in mind, Buck isn't seeking out Tommy's attention because he wants an authority figure, or someone to take care of him, someone to guide him through sex or love or relationship dynamics or any of the other random shit I've seen ppl infantalizing Buck about.
What he's looking for, and what he ultimately tells Tommy he'd like to pursue, is a partnership. Someone to walk (or more likely for Buck, speedrun) through experiences together. The Athena to his Bobby, the Chim to his Maddie, the Karen to his Hen.
So every time I see someone infantalizing Buck for seeking out a relationship with an older man for X or Y reason, I'm just like - no. He has Bobby, Hen, Maddie, Eddie, Chim etc for that. He doesn't want or need Tommy for that. He is a grown ass man who has built these strong relationships with his peers and his mentors and he is so fucking aware of that because he reaches for their help any time he feels the urge for a helping hand.
So yeah, Tommy's older. Yes, Tommy has more experience with his sexuality than Buck. And that - that's really it. Buck's been in the same career for more than half a decade. He's lived on his own since he was no older than 19/20. He's had serious relationships, he has a rich and fulfilling life. There is no power imbalance in the relationship between Buck and Tommy.
And while the age gap may be a bit of a draw for Buck, it's not WHY he's attracted to Tommy. We know because he's told Maddie. He's cool. He's interesting. He's confident. He has a cleft.
Buck isn't going into this waiting for someone older and more experienced to take the fucking reins. He felt like he clicked with Tommy, like there was an immediate connection, and yes, Tommy had to kiss him about it for Buck to actually figure out what it was he was experiencing, but from that point on it was all on Buck (and the people he leans on for advice) to help him sort through.
Tommy didn't do shit other than pump the brakes and try to give Buck the space he thought he needed to decide what he was ready for. Buck (again, with the help of his experts - Maddie for the emotional piece of it, Eddie for the Buck of it all) did the work on his own. Tommy didn't swoop in and overbearingly hold his hand through a sexual awakening. He kissed him, asked him out, realized he wasn't ready, stepped back and then checked in multiple times when Buck came back at it going 120 miles an hour.
And then he did everything he could to prove to Buck he wanted the same thing - a partner, someone to talk to, and lean on, and flirt with and rely on to show up whenever they could feasibly manage it (and sometimes when it's a little unfeasible too).
The narrative even acknowledges that Buck had no reason to go to Bobby in this scenario, when he often would, and lays out exactly why.
Within the canon of this particular arc, we're meant to see this as Buck realizing he has the experience necessary to think these things through on his own. This is Buck finally taking control of something that's always felt like it fell into his lap a bit. This is Buck doing more than treading water until his legs give out.
And minimizing that growth bc you personally don't like the LI he's pursuing is gross at best. At worst it's something much more insidious.
#anyway thats my rant i think#the fact that theres a group of people out there refusing to acknowledge that buck already HAS people for all the things they're#accusing tommy of 'taking advantage' of buck for#and buck ACTIVELY nourishes those relationships so he doesn't and would never NEED tommy for that#not in any way that tommy could manipulate him into dropping anyway#(not that Tommy would)#it drives me batty#im aware they're mostly bad faith shipper arguments#but its been driving me NUTS seeing glimpses of it#when discourse gets filtered onto my dash#bucktommy
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i lied i had like atleast one more weston thought to expell from my brain, before i miss this boat entirely. we're heading to green lands woooo
#god i had a fever this entire morning and afternoon so I think it was my inability to do anything that finally pushed me to finish this#seriously it took a month... disapointing#more disappointing is that i didn't have the time to tear up the internet in order to find what a professors break room looked like in 1899#if there was such a thing#really tragic#ah yea welp im very glad it's out there atleast. I want to release all of my black butler stuff so badly but guh...#tragedy has struck and i have been inspired to finally make a person project of my own#so that's taking a long time#but not to worry after like 5 years and some pondering i know well that black butler will always be one half of my brain#coooool#anyway i got more dorky stuff coming I hope??? wasn't lying before I am thinking of the midfords#and ill pray i can find the strength to get everything done soon#hope my rants are more tasteful after months of absence if ur still here#kuroshitsuji#black butler#kuroshitsuji fanart#fanart#sebastian michaelis#digital art#animation#animatic#video#weston college arc#black butler anime#black butler agares
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they are best friends and siblings and i love them both so dearly. featuring piercings bc i stand strong in my belief that they would
#leo valdez#piper mclean#rachiebee art#heroes of olympus#leo valdez fanart#piper mclean fanart#annabeth chase#jason grace#percy jackson#nico di angelo#will solace#they're all on the photowall btw i didnt just add those tags for fun#might reblog w/out the overlays later#anyway its upsetting to me in toa when reyna becomes leo's “big sister” and he only gets one on screen scene with piper#what do you MEAN he has a line abt a sister and its not piper#i'm of the devout belief that the only reason leo ended up actually considering people his family after everything was BECAUSE of piper#and jason too damn word limit#reyna and leo is cute i love them as ace buddies but i wish he got like#more time to reunite w piper. idk. and i know its from apollos pov but still#anyway thats a mini rant in the tags sorry ive been thinking about it more and more
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i'm sorry but i'm a buffy apologist at heart y'all are wild if you think her reaction as a literal teenager to faith's accidental murder of an innocent was in any way wrong or bad. in what universe.
#btvs#buffy summers#faith lehane#fucking hell#sorry but buffy acted pretty damn reasonably all things considered#like yeah faith could've used the support and i understand where faith was coming from#but honestly that was something the ADULTS in their lives should have been handling#anyways i adore faith and dont think she did anything wrong ever#but i also dont think buffy has ever been in the wrong regarding her reactions to faith#and tbqf angel had no right to pull a 'this is my city' on buffy#after what faith did in the bodyswap#btvs discourse#ish#kinda just a rant lol
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Something that really sets Wille and Simon apart from other queer ships is that when we say their love language is physical touch, IT REALLY IS PHYSICAL TOUCH. And I’m not speaking of just sex. Over the course of the show, the amount of touching between them is astronomical. And that’s really something rarely seen in queer media. There may be moments here or there, but often times there’s a lack of physical contact unless it’s for “the plot”. Wille and Simon feel like a real couple in the way they’re always physically reaching out for each other.
#wilmon#young royals#OH ALSO#wtfock#sobbe#cuz they def belong in this category too#constant touching between them#but you don’t get it with most queer ships and idk if it’s just bc production is afraid of it being ‘too much’ or what#but it’s annoying#and frustrating#just something I’ve been pondering on recently#tv has come a long way in terms of representation#but it still feels like there’s almost a FEAR of too much affection between queer pairings#it’s seen more with mlm than wlw cuz I think they’re like oh well women are more physically affectionate in general even with friends#but damn like#I mean I’m a woman and bisexual so obv I have a lot of queer friends#and a couple of my besties are gay men who have been married for years#fun thing they live right next door to my parents lol#and I’ve known one half (michael) since I was 16 and he was 14 lol my friend jen actually had a big crush on him#and I was like GIRL#BUT ANYWAY#he and rick have been married for many years and they’re SO AFFECTIONATE in a casual way that you would be with a partner#just touches here and there on the shoulder or hand hold or kisses like???#obviously they aren’t the only gay couple I know but I’m around them so much so they are a good example#Lol this got weirdly personal but the point is that we don’t see that shit in queer media#at least not enough of it it’s like producers/writers are afraid of ‘too much’#so they give not enough#ANYWAYYYY rant over!!!
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Have some Ted doodles- as a treat.
#was counting up all the times I’ve drawn my little guys and Ted is now at around 71#highest of the hatchetfield characters for sure#he’s just fun to draw#I get it Tinky#I understand your obsession#did these while listening to exam review#rip long hair Ted#never gonna stop thinking of you#yall ive got so many WIPs it’s crazy#after exams are over I’m not going to stop drawing#anyways how’re you#hope you’re doing well#all good things i hope#I don’t feel like going and grabbing my fact book so today you get one off the top of my head#fun fact: contrary to popular belief- tomatoes are not fruits; they are a category of vegetable called fruit vegetable#there is a heart scene in Stardew Valley with Demetrius and Robin in which Demetrius asks you if a tomato is a fruit or vegetable and#if you say vegetable he gets all huffy#this frustrates me because he says ‘oh you are a farmer you should know’ and DUDE I DO KNOW#ITS YOU WHO DOESNT KNOW#Anyways yeah#this has been the fun fact corner ft. me ranting about tomatoes#ted spankoffski#tinky npmd#tinky#tnoy karaxis#theodore spankoffski#tgwdlm#hatchetfield#Starkid#Joey richter
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popping in randomly after almost an entire month just to talk non stop about the tsaritsa again everyone sit down.
specifically just thinking about the implications of tsaritsa's ideals originally being about love + the abandonment of those ideals to complete her goal of, presumably, destroying Celestia or whatever she's cooking up. to the point even her people don't love her and I probably don't even remember a time her ideals were of love. now it's all just ice and snow and cold.
which makes romantic fics w her even funnier because she's purposely removed this part of herself and suddenly reader walks into teyvat like they own the place (they do) and I can only imagine her reaction. angry, probably. because why you? what are you doing to her that's caused her hundreds of years of strict adherence to rejecting "love" both from others and to others to just. collapse. absolute shattering of her world and you probably don't even know it bc if nothing else she's good at hiding it. a lot of denial. tries to pick you apart and see what's makes you so different.
and oh she just hates it. she loathes it.
basically one sided enemies to lover trope because she can't stand you for a while but if you stick around she starts warming up to you and it makes it WORSE. so much worse. tries to distance herself but your just everywhere and it gets on her nerves because why does she love you? she isn't capable of love, not anymore. she thought she was.
g-d forbid one of the harbingers or PIERRO notices she'd never live it down. might even consider the implications of just killing you (she doesnt). worse if you know about it and act like a brat she will lose her damn mind
just the tsaritsa being an absolutely horrible mess internally.
#sagau#genshin sagau#self aware genshin#genshin impact sagau#self aware genshin impact#genshin cult au#genshin impact cult au#tsaritsa#i could also talk sbt furi here and how similar they r + how writing one of them influences my writing of the other#but anyway#ive been busy moving i havent had time to write unfortunately#but i do have time for tsaritsa! and furi. mwah#i just think its funny imagining tsaritsa trying to be polite snd cordial but ohh shes SEETHING. she hates you. she loves you.#she wants to kiss you snd kill you and devour you. a horrible mess of a woman who closed herself off snd suddenly she feels exposed#she hates it. wants to hate you but oh g-d you make her soft in the worst of ways. she'd destroy teyvat itself if you asked her to#shes like a cat you gotta work to earn her trust but oh lord when you do. velcroed to your side#she will say she despises you before kissing you so tenderly it makes you dizzy. between vitriol she brushes her knuckles against your cheek#longing and yearning so violently you will tear each other apart just to be closer.#is there anything so undoing as loving another so wholly it consumes you?#she swears she's indifferent but she pampers you and sends you extravagant gifts with no name attached yet it smells like her. you know.#oh to be in a horribly complicated relationship thats almost one sided enemies to lovers w the tsaritsa that consumes you both#like two stars wanting to be closer and yet..in doing so you undo each other when you inevitably collide. caught in an orbit that dooms both#this has been ur monthly tsaritsa ranting ur welcome and goodnight 🫡#when i say im crazy sbt the tsaritsa i am so serious. i AM her number 1 fan source me
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I’m sure that this is not a hot take and that a lot of people feel the same way but like…
The question “does it have spice?!🌶️🔥” makes me want to jump off a cliff. I’m out here looking for gothic book recommendations on Reddit, tumblr, and goodreads and WHY is this the first question so many people ask 😭
Look, I love erotica as much as the next person but come on. There have got to be other things that matter when recommending books or choosing to pick one up, my GOD.
#am I just old?#like am I being unreasonable?#I don’t want to blame booktok for this but I’m dying over here#and romance and spice are two different things#a lot of these spicy books are just straight up trash but people tout them as amazing romances#like excuse me?#if they’re having nasty sex within 50 pages it’s not romance#it’s not love at first sight either#it’s lust#Christ I just wanted a gothic book for fall and after I’ve been in a reading slump after finishing the shepherd king duology#don’t fucking recommend me haunting Adeline good GOD#anyway#if someone has a solid gothic recommendation pls send it my way#otherwise I’ll be forced to read Jane Eyre or Wuthering Heights and I am more of an Austen girlie than a Brontë girlie#sorry grandma pls don’t haunt me from the afterlife for that#booktok cringe#anti booktok#I don’t even know how to tag this bc I’m not even anti booktok#book recommendations#book recs#someone help me#personal#rant#half the time the spice isn’t even good#I get better smut from fanfiction#I need to clarify that I don’t care if you like spicy books#go off girly pop#but I am BEGGING for a modicum of self reflection#spice should not be the only reason you’re reading a book 100% of the time holy fuck
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light: when i was talking to ryuzaki he--oh by the way ryuzaki ive been saying "he" but what do you prefer L: interesting. do you think this could be relevant to the kira case, yagami-kun? light: no, just curious. light: (is this a trap? would kira care about something like masculinity? no... kira is a paragon of justice. he would never misgender someone.) L: maybe yagami-kun thinks that a name and a face are not enough. does he think kira may also need a gender? light: interesting theory. is that why you don't have pronouns in your bio, ryuzaki? light: (ive got him. the other officers will never respect him if they find out L is a transphobe! wait, they're cops. damn it. has this all been for nothing?) L: ive actually taken the liberty of making fake pronoun pins for everyone in the squad, to ensure your security. here, yagami-kun. or should i say... yagami-chan. light: neopronouns?! (do i give off nya/nyam/nyaself vibes? or is this another clever ruse? he still hasn't even told me his own pronouns...) ryuk: hey, light. don't forget about the deal. the shinigami eyes would let you see anyone's pronouns at a glance. light: (forget it! im not giving up half my life just to they/them ryuzaki!) L: id just like to flag for the audience that im aware this is a stupid bit but don't worry it's over now
#rookposting#death note#do you know how long this has been in my drafts and i didnt post it because it's stupid#it started on twitter but twitter has a character limit of 2 and this post is 1 million characters#anyway for the record i think L would respond to quite literally any pronouns and doesnt care#and yes by the way i do insist that light would be normal about pronouns but im only going on this rant if someone triggers it#otherwise you can take it as self evident that i am right and correct about everything in the world forever#short version evil is not a blanket hes evil but it's like a pointed deliberate evil. like hed murder you but he wouldnt deadname you#he literally couldnt in fact. the death note wouldnt let him
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Do people still use this kind of templates?
Anyway, my Chaggie headcanons :) disclaimer that this is just the way I interpret them, it’s 100% okay to disagree lol
#if I'm being honest here this has been done since June but I didn't feel like posting it lmao#will do this with my other ships and with other templates because it was sm fun :)#hazbin hotel#chaggie#rainbowmoth#fallenstar#charlie morningstar#vaggie#my art <3#hazbin hotel charlie#hazbin hotel vaggie#art#ship template#chaggie ship template#understand my ship in 5 minutes#I'm very sane about them please trust me (lying)#also random info but I'm back at uni and this summer has been so busy for me it's like I haven't rested at all :') send help#I've been functioning on 4 hours of sleep for around 4 months now😭#things are going back to normal now (thankfully)#anyway rant over hope you're all doing well <33
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Re: Flavian’s outburst to Christopher about how he (Christopher) has been an unfeeling, stuck-up brat—Flavian’s not exactly right or wrong here. I think Jones is demonstrating that Christopher is so caught up in his (very real) powerlessness to control his situation, he doesn’t realize that he DOES have the power to really and truly hurt others. He’s so caught up in his own misery that he (selfishly) forgets that others might be miserable too.
This is part of growing up! Christopher hasn’t really been taught empathy, and he hasn’t really had it modeled for him either, outside of Tacroy caring for him, but that doesn’t excuse his behavior. He’s so focused on how the people at the castle aren’t caring for his conscious wants that he entirely ignores the ways they ARE intentionally and deliberately attempting to care for him (I think at least a little classism privilege is at play in him ignoring the maids—he’s only ever known his parents’ mistreatment of servants, but presumably he should have been paying attention to how the castle folk treat the maids differently)
However, I think the adults at Chrestomanci Castle are guilty of the exact same kind of blindness and self-focus as Christopher. They HAVEN’T been meeting his needs emotionally (which has led to their inability to physically protect him either), and whatever their intentions throughout his stay, they did not try to get to know or understand Christopher as a person at his arrival, and they’re paying for that first impression. He’s a CHILD. a child from an unloving and neglectful home, who’s just been ripped away from his friends and his home at school, a child’s just DIED for the second time, and he’s a child with hopes and dreams and self-will, all of which have just been casually, thoughtlessly stripped from him. The castle folk are so focused on their OWN need of a successor for Gabriel that they treat Christopher as an object to be formed to meet their needs instead of a person with needs of his own. They’re so focused on their search for the Wraith and the hell he’s wreaking on others that they miss the very real hell they’re imposing on Christopher. All of their attempts at care are based solely on their perception of what he SHOULD need and want because! They never! Ask him! What he needs or wants!!!!!
What’s that post about how some people act like “if you don’t give me the respect I think I deserve as an authority figure, I won’t give you the respect you deserve as a person”? I think that’s basically how the otherwise decent and well-meaning adults of Chrestomanci Castle treat little Christopher Chant. Confident in their own virtue, they presume that of course this boy who doesn’t know them will trust them immediately. Confident in their work for the greater good, they are indifferent to the suffering of the individual before them. It’s clear that they care about him and his well-being, but without treating him like a real person at all, and it’s never more obvious than in the scene where Gabriel takes his spare life away. They are taking tangible, drastic steps to protect him because they are very worried on his behalf, but throughout the whole process they have no real knowledge of the horror and terror he is experiencing because they are too busy making choices for him to ask him why he’s making the choices he does (and again, Christopher doesn’t TRUST them. But they never empathize with him enough to realize that.) Another example is how Miss Rosalie and the others keep chasing Throgmorton away from Christopher when he’s laid up. They’re so focused on how uncomfortable Throgmorton makes them feel that they don’t care at all they’re isolating Christopher and depriving him of his only companionship.
But none of their bad conduct exonerates Christopher of Flavian’s charges of being rude and unfeeling towards them, even though Flavian is STILL presuming to know and understand Christopher’s motivations and choices despite being completely in the dark about them. The very personhood Christopher wants the others to acknowledge in him is the reason that Christopher is responsible for his own actions towards the castle folk.
And that’s the tea on human responsibility in The Lives of Christopher Chant. (thanks for coming to my ted talk)
#I love this book so much but it makes me so fired up lol#I love the way that Diana Wynne Jones has her protagonists realize their flaws and their accountability for them regardless of circumstance#It’s what it means to grow up!#To realize that no matter how you’ve been treated you’re a person with the freedom to make choices#The theme of responsibility for the actions of others in her books is one that I haven’t thought deeply about#But I betcha that would be really interesting too#Anyway#the lives of Christopher Chant#chronicles of chrestomanci#diana wynne jones#chrestomanci#Peace reads books#ranting and raving
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