#as an euphemism for biology

[purple-iris]

Alright, I've listened to Lady Gaga's new song Disease enough time today, I've decided that it is actually about Amok Time

Lyrics as an argument :

Anyone with me on that one?

Either way someone should edit the episode to it-

[catman-draws]

How do you break this kind of news

[stormy-river]

Transcripts from the Humanity Hotline 7

As I finished this, I discovered it's been exactly one year since I posted the last Transcript. A lot has happened in that year; I've graduated college :) . I want to thank everyone for the support I've received, and I hope to get back into some of my creative projects and give you guys an opportunity to laugh, and maybe learn something. This one is inspired by a request from @a-romantic-twst from forever ago; I hope it was worth the wait (sorry about that). (It's about periods if anyone's uncomfortable with that and wants to skip this one.)

------

Operator: "Hi, my name is Mindy. How may I help you today?"

Caller: "Hello, Mindy, I am very concerned about one of the humans on my ship."

O: "What seems to be the problem?"

C: "Well, I'm the chief medical officer and this particular human has been on the ship for just over two Earth months now. On two separate occasions during that time, she has requested strong painkillers citing 'Shark Week' as the reason. I looked into what 'Shark Week' is, and found an Earth television special about certain aquatic predators, and I'm unsure how that could cause a human physical pain lightyears from Earth?"

O: "Interesting, is there anything else you can tell me about this human during these events?"

C: "Yes, I've also received reports from other crewmembers around these events that this human is not as outgoing as usual, and shows signs of discomfort with facial expressions and changes in appetite, but does not respond well to the standard psychological protocols for team building and social connection."

O: "What about the timing? You said this has happened twice, correct? How much time was between them?"

C: "Yes, I've documented both with dates. The human requested the painkillers twice, 28 days apart. The crew reported signs of distress for a few days following each request, and two times in the day before the first request."

O: "Alright, I believe your human is using the phrase, "Shark Week" as a euphemism for the start of the menstrual cycle, which is often referred to as a 'period'. To put it simply, one of the female reproductive organs sheds its inner lining roughly once an Earth month, lasting anywhere from a few days to a full week."

C: "Similar to how the Rythyani shed and replace their stomach linings?"

O: "Yes, though the uterus has blood vessels that extend into that lining, so shedding also causes bleeding."

C: "Bleeding? How much blood is lost? Why has she not requested bandages or a transfusion?"

O: "For most, a period is not life-threatening. The amount of blood loss does not require a transfusion to replace, or bandages to stop, though iron deficiency may be a concern for some that can be easily remedied through their diet. Ultimately, your human will know her body and how to handle her cycle best. We learn to deal with periods from a relatively young age. You should have received a human anatomy and physiology textbook when the first human joined your crew. Do you have it?"

C: "Yes, though I do admit I have not yet had the time to read it."

O: "That's alright. The chapter on human reproductive systems goes into more detail about the biology of the menstrual cycle than I can tell you. For the time being, make sure your human knows that she can ask for support if needed, and inform your crew that not all humans will be happy all the time, and they don't need to be. Over time, you will gain a better understanding your humans' patterns. Until then, trust them to express their needs, and talk to them if you have specific concerns. I can give general advice, but they will know themselves best."

C: "Thank you for clearing up the confusion, Mindy, I will look into this and update the protocols as necessary. I have no more questions for you at this time."

O: "You are very welcome, please don't hesitate to call again if something else comes up."

End Transmission

[nephriteknight]

we need a better word for masturbation. i know some of it is probably just social stigma but the word itself sounds like it belongs in a biology textbook and all the euphemisms are so... dismissive? boring? i don't want to jerk off or wank or whatever the hell, i want something sexy!

[toyybox]

Spiderwebs #32: Redmond

Masterlist

content: past starvation

• —– ٠ ✤ ٠ —– • ·

The truck stop had a store beside it. It was a warm morning, considering they were in the middle of winter. There were still not many people around. He was hungry.

The hunger came on with a violent force and speed, waking him up before the sunshine or Heather ever could. Now that Jackie had access to soup and tea and such luxuries, it seemed that his appetite had returned. His head ached, his limbs ached, his chest ached, and his guts shredded themselves into knots. It was a desire that drowned out all other wants, suffocated all thoughts, as sudden and intrusive as a bullet wound. 

It was a wonder, really, how he survived this long without any proper sustenance. He could believe in gouged eyes, severed limbs, and charred skin, but surviving extreme starvation was a little ridiculous. As an esteemed biochemist once said: was he a fucking plant? That wouldn’t make any sense, either. There was no sunlight in the basement. Those pages of Oliver Twist he gnawed on couldn’t have possibly been enough. But his biology didn’t care for such intricacies. He needed to deal with it immediately, and he would suffer immensely until these demands were met.

“Heather.”

“Yes, Jackie?”

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d be digging my own grave. I feel like I’m gonna keel over. Or puke.” He put his head against her shoulder. “I’m starving. Can I get—I don’t know, whatever this truck stop sells. I could eat a horse right now.”

“I’ll get you something. Don't be so dramatic.” She unlocked her door. “Do you think you can walk?”

“I can walk. A little.”

“Then you’re coming with me.” Heather cleared her throat. “Listen carefully. If anybody asks, your name is Elijah Smith. You’re my boyfriend, and we’re here on holiday. Don’t talk to anybody unless prompted. Try not to look so… I don’t know, inexplicably exhausted? Try to act natural.”

“Your boyfriend?” He cocked his head to one side, grinning.

“Funny you should mention that. I actually spent a lot of time thinking about this. You could pretend to be my brother, but the problem is that I’m an only child. Any investigator with half their wits could read my files and find out we’re lying. I’m not married, either, and I’ve never been divorced, so you can’t take my hypothetical husband’s name. You could be my friend, obviously, but that would sound suspicious. We will be sleeping in the same room, after all. People think romantic relationships are more important, and I’d rather not elicit any strange looks if we check into a hotel together. Any attention is bad attention. That about covers it, I think. Oh, and I don’t think you could ever pretend to be my dad. No offense, but you barely look twenty.”

"...Oh. Okay."

“By the way, if you’re planning to yell for help, don’t bother. I’ve got a pistol in my bag.” She opened the car door. There were sounds of seagulls—were they near water?—and the distant murmur of wind, as well as the dull roar of trucks above all that. “Come on. We don’t have all day.”

He left the car as well, and managed to stand up despite the debilitating sensation in his stomach. The air was rich with the scent of lake scum and dead fish, and quite a bit warmer than the biting breeze he’d felt the night before. There were a few trucks around, and one or two cars. A stray candy wrapper crashed and stumbled across the concrete. The yellow plastic was so vivid to him. Brilliant as a sheaf of gold, catching the sunlight like a newly cut jewel. It was lovely to be outside again.

Heather took his hand, a little too tightly, and they walked into the store. A bell rang above the doorway. It was not very big, but not crowded either. Its stock was similar to a convenience store, except they also sold pastries and coffee. No tea. He hadn’t seen this much food since… well. There were no polite euphemisms for kidnapping. It was hard for Jackie to take his eyes off the strudels and croissants, even as Heather spoke to him.

“I don’t know if they have soup,” she said in a low tone. “Do you think you can eat something else?”

He nodded. “I want a muffin. Can I have a muffin?”

“Alright, I’ll buy a muffin. Go look at some hunting knives or something. Don’t leave the store, though. I’ll come over when I’m done.”

He glanced over to the aisle of hunting knives. “Why do they have so many?”

“Lord knows.” She let go of his hand. 

He was left standing there, feeling rather lost in such a public space. 

He could have screamed. He could have run outside and kept running until his lungs went raw, or until the police found him. But to risk losing Heather’s trust would be suicide—no, a kamikaze, considering how much was at stake for her. And he would never get that muffin. Besides, he did sympathize with her situation. It wasn’t easy being on the run. He didn’t have to make things difficult for her. 

Either way, the cost of failure was too high. It was hard to forget the scars along his chest, or the burns on his skin. Escape was a pipe dream best left to rot.

The hunting knives were not particularly interesting, but they were something new, and he was always craving something new lately. They were small, curved on the edges. Used for skinning animals, he assumed. He didn’t think such a tiny knife could kill anything. But they were probably meant to be souvenirs, rather than actual tools. Some of them had little designs on the handles. There was one with the words Redmond, Washington on it, under the city’s pine tree symbol.

Redmond? We aren’t in Seattle anymore? Did Heather even live in Seattle? He had always assumed so. His old apartment was in Seattle. But it wasn’t a stretch to assume she’d gone hunting out of town, so to speak. She could have driven across the state in order to abduct her newest organ donor, even across the country. They couldn’t have reached a new state so quickly, though, so she probably still lived somewhere in Washington. Also, didn’t she have an address? Obviously. Everyone did. Why didn’t he check the address above her garage? There had to be one, but it had completely slipped his mind. I’m such an idiot. That’s why I got into this mess in the first place.

“Here’s your muffin.”

He jumped. “Shit, Heather, you could have said hello first. How do you walk so quietly?”

“You’re just zoned out half the time. You wouldn’t notice me if I came in with a tuba and a clown nose.” She gave him the muffin. In her other hand was another coffee, in a cup made out of green paper. “We can eat in the car. Come on.” 

He followed her to the door. The bell rang above their heads, one last time. The birds continued to screech, somewhere unseen in the bright blue sky.

The smell of stagnant water returned, but only until they entered the car again, where it was quickly replaced by the smell of leather seats. Jackie shifted to get as comfortable as he could, while Heather tapped her fingers on the wheel.

He studied his muffin. It had chocolate chips. He hadn’t eaten chocolate in… he wasn’t sure, actually. There had been a chocolate cake, at some point. So many shiny, new things. He was a magpie in a jeweler’s house, so fascinated by all these wonders of life. Another shiny, new thing to pass the time. 

He liked muffins. He wanted to eat it. Of course. Obviously. Why wouldn’t he? He was so hungry, God. He couldn’t imagine going on a strike now. He would faint first. The craving was so strong that he didn’t know how to even start. He hadn’t eaten in so long. 

“What’s wrong with the food?” she asked.

“Sorry.” He kept his stare down. Didn’t Heather have a thing against apologies? Too late now, anyway. He just needed to eat. He needed to get it over with. It made him sick, rising with a feeling like nausea in his stomach. His vision came unfocused, like rows of tilting mirrors, like the world was tilting on its axis. But he couldn’t look away, or stay still any longer.

“You know what, I think I forgot something in there.” Abruptly, Heather opened the car door and stepped outside. “Don’t wait for me. Bye.”

He turned towards her, but she was already gone, and he was by himself. 

He let out a short, shaky exhale. She definitely didn’t forget anything. It was surely a lie. Besides, it wasn’t like Heather to leave him unattended. She was probably watching from somewhere remote, where he couldn’t see her. But that was what mattered: he couldn’t see her, couldn’t feel her stare.

She’d done it for his sake, to give him that thin veneer of privacy. Was it guilt, or apathy? Disgust at his weakness? Or maybe even kindness, despite his better judgment. 

· • —– ٠ ✤ ٠ —– • ·

Taglist:

@theelvishcowgirl @lthrboy @whumpy-wyrms

@yassifiedinformation @creppersfunpalooza

@vidawhump

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Alex Byrne and Carole K. Hooven

Published: Apr 3, 2024

As you may have noticed, “sex” is out, and “sex assigned at birth” is in. Instead of asking for a person’s sex, some medical and camp forms these days ask for “sex assigned at birth” or “assigned sex” (often in addition to gender identity). The American Medical Association and the American Psychological Association endorse this terminology; its use has also exploded in academic articles. The Cleveland Clinic’s online glossary of diseases and conditions tells us that the “inability to achieve or maintain an erection” is a symptom of sexual dysfunction, not in “males,” but in “people assigned male at birth.”

This trend began around a decade ago, part of an increasing emphasis in society on emotional comfort and insulation from offense — what some have called “safetyism.” “Sex” is now often seen as a biased or insensitive word because it may fail to reflect how people identify themselves. One reason for the adoption of “assigned sex,” therefore, is that it supplies respectful euphemisms, softening what to some nonbinary and transgender people, among others, can feel like a harsh biological reality. Saying that someone was “assigned female at birth” is taken to be an indirect and more polite way of communicating that the person is biologically female. The terminology can also function to signal solidarity with trans and nonbinary people, as well as convey the radical idea that our traditional understanding of sex is outdated.

The shift to “sex assigned at birth” may be well intentioned, but it is not progress. We are not against politeness or expressions of solidarity, but “sex assigned at birth” can confuse people and creates doubt about a biological fact when there shouldn’t be any. Nor is the phrase called for because our traditional understanding of sex needs correcting — it doesn’t.

This matters because sex matters. Sex is a fundamental biological feature with significant consequences for our species, so there are costs to encouraging misconceptions about it.

Sex matters for health, safety and social policy and interacts in complicated ways with culture. Women are nearly twice as likely as men to experience harmful side effects from drugs, a problem that may be ameliorated by reducing drug doses for females. Males, meanwhile, are more likely to die from Covid-19 and cancer, and commit the vast majority of homicides and sexual assaults. We aren’t suggesting that “assigned sex” will increase the death toll. However, terminology about important matters should be as clear as possible.

More generally, the interaction between sex and human culture is crucial to understanding psychological and physical differences between boys and girls, men and women. We cannot have such understanding unless we know what sex is, which means having the linguistic tools necessary to discuss it. The Associated Press cautions journalists that describing women as “female” may be objectionable because “it can be seen as emphasizing biology,” but sometimes biology is highly relevant. The heated debate about transgender women participating in female sports is an example; whatever view one takes on the matter, biologically driven athletic differences between the sexes are real.

When influential organizations and individuals promote “sex assigned at birth,” they are encouraging a culture in which citizens can be shamed for using words like “sex,” “male” and “female” that are familiar to everyone in society, as well as necessary to discuss the implications of sex. This is not the usual kind of censoriousness, which discourages the public endorsement of certain opinions. It is more subtle, repressing the very vocabulary needed to discuss the opinions in the first place.

A proponent of the new language may object, arguing that sex is not being avoided, but merely addressed and described with greater empathy. The introduction of euphemisms to ease uncomfortable associations with old words happens all the time — for instance “plus sized” as a replacement for “overweight.” Admittedly, the effects may be short-lived, because euphemisms themselves often become offensive, and indeed “larger-bodied” is now often preferred to “plus sized.” But what’s the harm? No one gets confused, and the euphemisms allow us to express extra sensitivity. Some see “sex assigned at birth” in the same positive light: It’s a way of talking about sex that is gender-affirming and inclusive.

The problem is that “sex assigned at birth”— unlike “larger-bodied”— is very misleading. Saying that someone was “assigned female at birth” suggests that the person’s sex is at best a matter of educated guesswork. “Assigned” can connote arbitrariness — as in “assigned classroom seating” — and so “sex assigned at birth” can also suggest that there is no objective reality behind “male” and “female,” no biological categories to which the words refer.

Contrary to what we might assume, avoiding “sex” doesn’t serve the cause of inclusivity: not speaking plainly about males and females is patronizing. We sometimes sugarcoat the biological facts for children, but competent adults deserve straight talk. Nor are circumlocutions needed to secure personal protections and rights, including transgender rights. In the Supreme Court’s Bostock v. Clayton County decision in 2020, which outlawed workplace discrimination against gay and transgender people, Justice Neil Gorsuch used “sex,” not “sex assigned at birth.”

A more radical proponent of “assigned sex” will object that the very idea of sex as a biological fact is suspect. According to this view — associated with the French philosopher Michel Foucault and, more recently, the American philosopher Judith Butler — sex is somehow a cultural production, the result of labeling babies male or female. “Sex assigned at birth” should therefore be preferred over “sex,” not because it is more polite, but because it is more accurate.

This position tacitly assumes that humans are exempt from the natural order. If only! Alas, we are animals. Sexed organisms were present on Earth at least a billion years ago, and males and females would have been around even if humans had never evolved. Sex is not in any sense the result of linguistic ceremonies in the delivery room or other cultural practices. Lonesome George, the long-lived Galápagos giant tortoise, was male. He was not assigned male at birth — or rather, in George’s case, at hatching. A baby abandoned at birth may not have been assigned male or female by anyone, yet the baby still has a sex. Despite the confusion sown by some scholars, we can be confident that the sex binary is not a human invention.

Another downside of “assigned sex” is that it biases the conversation away from established biological facts and infuses it with a sociopolitical agenda, which only serves to intensify social and political divisions. We need shared language that can help us clearly state opinions and develop the best policies on medical, social and legal issues. That shared language is the starting point for mutual understanding and democratic deliberation, even if strong disagreement remains.

What can be done? The ascendance of “sex assigned at birth” is not an example of unhurried and organic linguistic change. As recently as 2012 The New York Times reported on the new fashion for gender-reveal parties, “during which expectant parents share the moment they discover their baby’s sex.” In the intervening decade, sex has gone from being “discovered” to “assigned” because so many authorities insisted on the new usage. In the face of organic change, resistance is usually futile. Fortunately, a trend that is imposed top-down is often easier to reverse.

Admittedly, no one individual, or even a small group, can turn the lumbering ship of English around. But if professional organizations change their style guides and glossaries, we can expect that their members will largely follow suit. And organizations in turn respond to lobbying from their members. Journalists, medical professionals, academics and others have the collective power to restore language that more faithfully reflects reality. We will have to wait for them to do that.

Meanwhile, we can each apply Strunk and White’s famous advice in “The Elements of Style” to “sex assigned at birth”: omit needless words.

Mr. Byrne is a philosopher and the author of “Trouble With Gender: Sex Facts, Gender Fictions.” Ms. Hooven is an evolutionary biologist and the author of “T: The Story of Testosterone, the Hormone That Dominates and Divides Us”

[ Via: https://archive.today/P05Ci ]

==

There's an entire world of animals out there who mate and reproduce successfully all day, every day, without needing humans to "assign" them a sex. The idea that we are separate from all of this is as much evolution denial - or, arguably, more so - as Ken Ham's stupid zoo boat.

Predictably, this essay was deemed "transphobic" by the same people who insist that "sex and gender are separate" - how it can be "transphobic" when accurately describing sex has no bearing on your "gender identity" is beyond me - and who not long ago were insisting that "nobody's saying sex isn't real." Of course, now they're saying it out loud, such as nutcases like Jonathan "India" Willoughby, who is male, literally claiming to be female. If he's not being an obnoxious troll, he's certainly dangerously delusional.

How did we get to the point where sex - which is a real thing that is objectively true and the entire reason our species exists at all - is being denied, and "gender identity" - which is mystical, metaphysical hokum of gender thetans being trapped into improperly matched meat prisons - is unquestionably true?

[kintatsujo]

speculative biology not as in "this fantasy race work exactly like this one animal that they happen to superficially resemble" but as in "so was 'the white scale only Zora women have' a euphemism for something because the dude Zora in this game all do have white scales"

[biologicalfandomhippo]

"NSFW" is deeply subjective. "Keep conversations work appropriate" I work in a biology lab, man. There are only so many euphemisms you can use. It's fish sex your honor. It's bat testicles. It's gore. It's guts. It's intestines in a jar. I have to watch my tongue talking about work with my friends sometimes.

[senselessalchemist]

non-major NSFW talk about working in IVF/ART below (... so maybe it's SFW in context? 🤔)

new to the world of helping people have babies thru Science and it strikes me as so fuckin weird that right now despite everything it still takes the same old bullshit to make a new human. tbf there may be technologies that I'm unaware of being developed or whatever but from what I know you still gotta use a pair of gametes to make a new tiny person. cant get around it. have never seen the word "masturbation" on so many medical forms but you need those dang sperm and that's often the easiest way to get them!

I think it's just the juxtaposition of the efficient/professional/reserved medical stuff and the messy realities of biology vis a vis sexual reproduction. come in a cup and bring it in to our lab, we're doing an icsi, make sure all your info is properly written on the label, we need at least two unique identifiers for all samples. (This is probably not unique, similar stuff must happen with like the majority of medical disciplines. you try to make it dry and clinical but the biology is always there, just kinda being nasty and probably goopy. Lots of slime in biology.)

* shrugs * also probably just because it's all new to me. I did microbial ecology in a nonhuman context and this is a very different scene, obviously. humans is all the same, tho, they still don't read the instructions fully even when they are paying out of pocket for incredibly expensive procedures and I'm like you didnt have your signature notarized (like it told you explicitly to do on the form) so I cant accept this consent for something you want done tomorrow. It's just like dealing with students not reading questions fully on exams. Feels like home

... sorry for so much jizz talk. Part of it is that I don't think most medical clinics have a room dedicated to manual pleasure (door closed all the time, please) - which is also just so stupidly funny to me. like I get it, it makes sense, it's probably generally evolutionarily sound to incentivize reproduction with something enjoyable but everything has been recontextualized for me recently and I cant help but just kinda laugh at it sometimes

(I promise I am so professional at work and that I'm not laughing at specific people when I think about this... more just the broad concept of ""Life"" and what it takes to propagate it. Because like in the end we're all just these weird colonies of cooperating bits and pieces, doing all this chemical nonsense that involves a lot of kind of disgusting stuff... and yet we try to pretend that we're beyond or above it. This is not to say anything about, I dunno, some weird concept of like biological absolutism or whatever, I'm not trying to say that we are solely defined by our bodies, but just that there are fundamental biological processes we all share and sometimes it feels silly when those get ignored or euphemized or treated as abhorrent and uncouth)

[gildedmuse]

So, I'm really sorry, but "falling down the stairs" is not a euphemism for death. It comes up quite often as accepted fact within the One Piece community (cause like literally why would anyone check, plus, within the context of Kuina, it makes sense), however, looking it up, the only things that turn up are One Piece reddit posts. Kuina's death emphasizes mainly the fact that at any given moment anyone one of us could just die, that human life is so, so fragile no matter the will of the person.

Thank you for the correction.

I actually got quite a few of these. I asked one of the most knowledgeable OP fans I know (@chromatic-lamina ) and got the same answer. So turns out that's just a myth.

I still hold that if makes more sense that Kuina died for falling, say, during a fight. Its easy to see how they could wind up in a fight, maybe because he thinks she's too old to continue kendo, and for that to messs her up, taking a bad backwards step.....

And yes, it could be an entirely random coincidence and for some people, that will be the preferable answer. That her death was senseless and arose from nothing.

But the fact that she is shown, in all media, to have learned that she could never be the best, that her dream is out of reach and seems to play a bigger part in her character.

And OP isn't exactly known for it's random coincidences that have nothing to do with fate.

So I would say a lot of what I spoke about, how Kuina may have developed the idea that she could never achieve her dream, that it is pure biology and nothing could change it. Kind of like how Mamo-chan is the ONLY person who could truly rule Wano even though it meant sacrificing his childhood. How the 100s of women when Sanji were all ridiculous but if someone like Okiku is hot enough it's okay for them to be trans. Kinda of make it seems like a reoccurring theme where these things aren't random.

[zorilleerrant]

drop the clois tentacle sex bestie x

(is it what I think it is? curiosity is my curse)

alright so I don't have a clear plan for this story yet, but the idea is: Clark and Lois are in a pretty standard friends-to-lovers arc (just like canon; nothing fancy here), so they've been dating for a while but haven't done much fooling around yet.

now. here's where the Kryptonian biology comes in. (yeah it's what you think.) Clark has tentacles. now he's very Midwestern Politesse so he's never really talked about sex with anyone? except in euphemisms which don't explain anything at all. his sex ed was bad. he's aware that he doesn't completely look human, but he's not sure how different it is or if anyone is okay with that.

so Clark, before they can do anything more than kiss, has to confess he's an alien. Lois put the Superman pieces together already, I think, but she didn't know (for sure) he wasn't human yet. so he's very embarrassed, and trying to explain what's going on, and Lois is trying very hard to comfort him and make sure he knows that she loves him and won't be horrified by his body.

little does he know: Lois has a secret, too. and her secret is that she's really super into tentacle porn and definitely wants to do tentacle sex. except Clark got all anxious about it and now she's too embarrassed to admit just how okay all of this is for her.

anyway eventually they resolve it and then enthusiastic consentacles ensue. so it's going to be porn with a little too much plot involved. and monsterfucker Lois

[enteringdullsville]

Random World Building Tidbits

The World and Society of Palette

The planet Palette is cylindrical in shape. Any and all globes worldwide are just tin cans painted to look like a planet. The poles are on the flat ends, like a battery but with stuff living on it. The other planets in their solar system may or may be shaped the same way, but the moon looks normal.

The show’s universe takes place in the mental realm, as do all other universes of fictional media. Every scrapped idea, including the three cancelled continuities, is a branching timeline from any given show’s canon series.

While the show does not take place on Earth, references to real-world places exist due to the mental realm causing reality to leak into the show.

Such reality glitches exist in all shows that can interfere with the show’s timeline and cause minor inconsistencies the characters are unaware of. These glitches are colloquially known as “retcons”, but the politically correct term is “colossal blunders by the idiot writers”.

While everyone is at least vaguely aware that they’re cartoon characters in the sense that it’s their species, very few people, most of whom are affiliated with the in-universe It’s Color Theory crew, know there’s a greater universe out there. As a result, the more prominent characters have absolutely no regard for the fourth wall and a stronger grasp of cartoon physics.

Despite everyone being color coded, a character’s aesthetic family (Tough, Goofy, Creepy, Beautiful, Cool, Cute, Savvy, and Plain) is the closest thing to an in-universe ethnicity any of the characters have…despite all of them being designed with an ethnicity in mind.

Similarly, Drewmans can be divided into three groups: Enactors (those who do dumb stuff), Inhibitors (those who prevent dumb stuff), and Accomplices (those who upload the dumb stuff to the internet).

Because everybody’s desensitized to the cartoon shenanigans that occur daily, characters usually only derive amusement from things that are deliberately meant to be funny in-universe…unless they’re feeling particularly sadistic.

Domesticated animals share the same level of intelligence as the more humanoid Drewmans and are generally considered citizens. Some are independent home owners, but most simply live as pets to avoid having to pay taxes. Wild animals are also fairly intelligent, but cannot speak and live relatively normal animal lives.

Reality will shift so that the more important characters are more likely to have interesting things happen around them. These characters typically have more familiar colors, which is why the the six main characters happen to be the colors of the rainbow.

The show’s tone directly affects how the show’s continuity works. In general, the darker and edgier the show becomes, the more likely it is for things to stick between episodes.

Drewmans aren’t killed when they die. This is a relatively recent development in the universe’s history due to a long period of peace after the Wartime Cartoon era about a century back keeping the tone positive. As a result, “killing” is considered an incredibly outdated slang word that has been phased out by the younger generations in favor of euphemisms such as “murder”, “make die”, or “encorpsify”. Dying forces them to wait as ghosts to respawn in the next episode, but on a slow day one can potentially recover between shots. However, they can still die of old age or if the aforementioned tone shifts strike at the right time. On a lighter note, being a hitman is a surprisingly lucrative career, and meat consumption is largely guilt-free.

Drewman Biology

A Drewman’s outline is a protective organ that is effectively a balance between an exoskeleton and the natural surface tension of a Drewman’s gelatinous flesh. Inanimate objects also have these organs, which is very weird. Claytonians such as Sylvester lack outlines and are essentially amorphous when not standing still, but can absorb outlines from their surroundings for added rigidity.

Drewmans are naturally elastic, and can temporarily shapeshift new body parts should they desire.

Drewmans can lob off and regrow body parts at will, the latter usually offscreen because it is considered horribly rude to look at somebody as they do so. Subsequently, they can take obscene amounts of punishment. The caveat is that their default character design is the base of recovery, so if they had a preexisting condition, such as being born without a limb, they’re pretty much stuck like that. On the flip side, the fleeting tone shifts can cause permanent changes to a character design…

Drewmans completely lack sex organs, except for when they don’t. It’s just a censor bar. Biologically, they’re genderless. If a Drewman feels romantic attraction, they’re pan without exception. Also, don’t ask how they reproduce. It only seems to happen when nobody’s looking.

Similarly, Drewmans only need to use the bathroom once every three or four months. When they do, the bathroom in question is almost inevitably closed for repairs.

A Drewman’s hair stiffens as it ages. Children may have hairstyles that change between episodes, but by adulthood it’s committed to a standard character design. Getting one’s hair wet can temporarily undo this, and there are a number of products specifically for this purpose.

A Drewman’s color can harmlessly stain objects they handle and even entire rooms through close proximity. This is only a temporary change.

The Dullsville Dirt and ICT’s Founding

Dullsville is a city in Euphoria as the most populous town in the state of Misery. The town was initially populated entirely by Plain Family Gray Drewmans, hence the name, but saw an influx of immigrants following the Wartime Cartoons and is currently among the most diverse cities on the planet.

The mayor of Dullsville as of a couple of years prior to the series is Elroy Reginald Berriman, a Royal Blue Drewman who stepped into the position after forty years of barely restrained anarchy due to absolutely nobody else wanting the title “Mayor of Dullsville”. His goal in life is to make Dullsville a (literally) picturesque town people want to live in…which of course brings him into conflict with Violet and the ICT crew, whose mere presence seems to bring chaos. As a side effect of the extended period of no real authority, the town’s youth, namely the small children, are remarkably more well adjusted than the adults.

Dullsville has two primary claims to fame. The first is its position as the “Supervillain Capital of the World”, due to no less than four distinct villainous factions being based there. The other is the Cosmic Latte Café, a world famous chain of coffee restaurants founded and somehow single-handedly managed by Brock Wipper, the Pitch Black Drewman whose face is unknown to the public despite running every CLC on the planet simultaneously. In the former’s case, Elroy actively hates the supervillain issue and has offered benefits to the superhero factions keeping them in line. The latter is of no concern to him, but he feels that a coffee shop that one could find anywhere isn’t the greatest tourist trap.

Due to the whole villain thing along with the ludicrously lax laws in Dullsville taking toon physics into account, crime rates are notably low, most emergencies being left to the various town superheroes. Only a sole officer is in charge of lesser crimes.

It’s Color Theory, Mayor B.’s main obstacle to a normal life, was founded by Violet Oobay, Gordon Monade, Angie O’Jayes, Rudy Razbry, J. Razbry, and Chloe Spearmin. The company, initially an outlet for a young Violet to publish her creative writing, started life as a small club consisting of the then eight-year-old Violet, Gordon, and a select few other friends in their childhood town of Happy Place in the state of Mind.

Over time, all but Violet and Gordon drifted apart, even Violet herself growing disillusioned with the lack of recognition the two had received, but the company saw new life after three relatively uneventful years in college, when a senior year Violet’s new freshman roommate encouraged (read: dragged) her and Gordon to continue their entertainment activities.

Violet and Gordon married soon after graduating and moved alongside Angie to Dullsville 2 years later, foolishly thinking it was a quiet town to raise their infant daughter. Instead, they immediately meet Rudy and J., twin stepbrothers who seem to personally know everyone in town and are charitable enough to let the startup trio move in. Inspired by the bros’ antics, Violet shifted her focus from simple writing to sketch comedy.

The final founding member, Chloe, was a then-child prodigy working as a company intern for college credit. Initially she only served as an assistant, but her increasingly impressive skills in inventing earned her a spot full time in the company, a spot she accepted since most other companies feared her. With her joining, the Founders of It’s Color Theory (FICT) had formed one year prior to the series’ start.

During that time period after Chloe’s admission, Violet started getting visions of a world on the other side. Visions of people trying to reach through the barrier between worlds to get to her. Visions of people who were invested in her success, even though they had no way of actually seeing her face to face. From then on, Violet’s life took on a new trajectory, starting with her spearheading a project to broadcast the city’s happenings to whatever extradimensional beings were interested. For months on end, Violet and Chloe worked tirelessly for results, but nothing came up…until it did. “Oh my muse, it works.”

Over time, more and more people joined the ICT crew, the first 24 being considered their core cast and longest serving members…but that’s a story for the future.

[selkiefinalist]

for director's cut: you promised not to write me an essay about nate's complicated relationship to his selkie heritage, but if I asked you to write me that essay??? If you aren't up for that, talk to me about your ej/sid ficlet because I, too, have thoughts and feelings and brainworms about two first overalls who went on two very different trajectories and also nathan mackinnon was there. -patrichornkissed

@patrichornkissed i do this for you even though you know i struggle to articulate things well. but if we are going to talk about nate’s complicated relationship to his selkie heritage (in that fic anyway), then i think we have to talk about it in terms of control, vulnerability, sameness, and tradition; and how sometimes nate wants all of those things, and sometimes he wants some of them, but most of them he doesn’t want to want at all. and at least a part of that fic is nate letting himself want.

control is a theme that’s so central to how i write nate, because this is a man who has built up so much lore about controlling his own destiny. changed his training! changed his diet! changed his therapist/therapy! he’s an outcome-based individual, and he can be pretty ruthless (in terms of his own soft-wants) when pursuing what i’ll call a hard-want. no euphemism intended. like, he will ignore the soft animal of his body if it means getting that big silver cup, you know. and the thing about being a selkie is that, at its mythological core, selkies are always in danger of giving up control of their lives. someone steals your skin and you can’t find it: game over. your life is no longer your own. of course in our modern era, that’s no longer such a threat - so instead i translated that into a physical need. he needs to change periodically in order to stay healthy; his biology requires that he face his selkie nature. he can’t cut it off entirely and continue to perform the way he wants to as a player. and he hates that, being betrayed by his own biology. i think you can see that in how he forces himself through the change, when he could let it happen more organically/naturally - he’s like, this is gonna hurt but let’s just get it over with, pain is temporary. and you know i love setting up that kind of life approach because it informs his choice to go all-in on ej even when he knows from the outset that it’s likely not going to turn out the way he wants it to.

that segues into vulnerability, i think, because nate has to change - and, even though the likelihood of someone stealing his skin and trapping him in that salt-scoured shack by the seashore or whatever is very small, it still exists. any time he’s changing, any time his skin is exposed. there’s risk. i played around with the ending scenes a bit in the original outlining, and one of the versions of the end that just didn’t fit anymore by the time i actually made it there was a scene where ej steals nate’s skin in CA, and nate lets him. like, it was implicit that ej would give it back if nate wanted him to, but nate was like, ‘keep it, it’s safe in your hands.’ not to mention the moments where he’s actually changing, naked and in so much pain on a dark beach. not an elegant moment, not the way you want your partner to see you when you’re trying to seem sexy and cool! but he gives that to ej from the very first beach scene - just hands himself over. and at that point, ej definitely doesn’t know what that gesture means - i don’t think nate does, fully, either - but i am here to tell you that gabe wasn’t gently draping blankets over nate or tucking his own hat over nate’s cold little ears, and nate definitely wouldn’t have let him. it might be fun to write that scene, actually (“fun,” lol, punch me in the face please) - from a previous season, gabe taking him out. just to see the differences! of course i told you this already, but that progression of car scenes and beach scenes, and having to painstakingly layer in growing intimacy until we get to that vancouver beach where nate’s like “you should watch me,” and ej finally does. tricky to execute but i do think i did okay with that. MY POINT IS, clear to me from the beginning that nate really wants that vulnerability - he literally gives ej shit about not looking at him in the first scene - even if he hates the implications of being vulnerable. he’s seeking it out from ej specifically because he trusts him not to use it against him. WAAH

sameness is really just in relation to hockey culture; nate’s not the only selkie in the league or the only two-natured, but the league enforces certain privacy standards not just to protect players but to keep that otherness from making any one player stand out too much. all nhl hockey players, at least to some degree, have to buy into that homogenous presentation. and for nate, the chips are already stacked a bit against him, because he’s not the same. more of an undercurrent in the fic but another complication - physically being a selkie can create issues with his play, socially it sets him apart from the team (his pod), and professionally could be seen as a liability from the league.

finally, tradition. on a side note, i’d say world-building in general is one thing i’m actually good at, and i was drafting (early draft) that trip back to cole harbour for christmas and realized i had done almost nothing to actually build out selkie culture. so i had to invent the chest and robe stuff really quick and then go back and insert that lore into other scenes. those symbols ended up working well, i think, but were certainly not part of the original outline.

okay, back to tradition. idk this is going to be a mess, but selkie tradition in this fic is very much draped in privacy, secrecy, and following the rules. how not? if a literal stranger can steal your entire life, you gotta be careful about things. but they live separately versus communally, and are pretty tight-lipped, even with each other. insulated, kind of. and i think like any young person, some traditions are more meaningful to nate and some just seem like a pain in the ass, especially when you know he’s not necessarily the biggest fan of his selkieness to begin with. but traditions also hold a lot of weight, at times. and so nate has to kind of negotiate for himself and within himself which he wants to keep, or at least acknowledge he’s not as detached as he thinks he is (that moment on New Year’s Day when he thinks ej’s about to hit him with a robe, for example). and you know, when he gets to see ej’s whole-hearted acceptance of him, sees ej start to engage in those traditions in his own way, he lets those traditions take a bit bigger foothold i think. also i just wanna cry a bit about baby nate carving little pine trees and stuff on his own chest, putting shells and pucks and dog collars and other important mementos in there :(((((( ok, sorry. if this is a fic about nate growing up, which at its core it really is, then part of it is that moment we all reach as adults where we get to choose what’s important to us or what parts of our histories we want to honor and what we want to let go of, and who gets to be part of that future.

i could go on and on and on and probably point out more things every time, like that meme with the guy and the pictures and the connecting lines but. here you go, fwiw <3

[frasier-crane-style]

I never thought I’d live to see the word ‘woman’ on the euphemism treadmill, but here we are.

Obviously, it’s immensely useful and necessary to have a word for those funny little critters that differ completely from men’s biology, but the moment you give them a word to themselves, certain people will insist that the word apply to them as well. So pretty soon they’ll insist that they are biological women, and then that they’re period-havers (this has already started), then uterus-holders (it’s a metaphorical uterus, a spiritual uterus if you will), and so on and so forth until people don’t at all distinguish between them and women (note: this will never happen).

[poorks]

Lemon loooooves fucking the aquarium interns and marine biology students. They’re always so shocked by her and get so excited when she comes onto them, and she gets massively turned on by how much they stare at her.

It’s unspoken but everyone who works there knows how willing Lemon is to fuck anyone there.

It’s hard not to want to touch her belly or figure out what shark tits feel like

“Shark milk” is a euphemism for sex with Lemon

A couple interns frequent her different kinds of livestreams

[21st-century-minutiae]

To "wean" is to transition an infant mammal undertakes going from a pure milk diet to one involving solid foods. "Weaner" is an unusual noun form of the verb meaning "one who weans." It, as seen above, is used to refer to infants at a specific age, defining them by this transition. It is not a word one would encounter often in the early twenty-first century, but it could be understood by English speakers in the proper context.

A "Weiner" is a type of sausage. It is also a common euphemism for male genitalia. In English (as opposed to its German origin, meaning "from Vienna"), it is pronounced identically to "weaner." It is a much more common word to encounter than 'weaner.'

"Super weaner," therefore, parses as "large penis" to most English speakers. This is humorous. Moreover, the idea of a large elephant seal is also humorous, and the image of a large "chonky" elephant seal is also humorous. To the early twenty-first century culture, the above would Garner a chuckle despite the fact that it is objectively a serious article about biology and ecosystems.