#barely anyone had or used the internet in the 90s

[darrengrave]

God I found this video essay about internet horror in the 90s, like the actual 90s, which is such a boon. I've never seen anyone analyze or document this prior to appx 2005.

[halfmoonaria]

not allowed

pairing: prof!sam carpenter x student!female reader

summary: sam does something thats certainly not allowed.

words: 2k

warnings: age gap, sexual content, language.

Sam's love life was completely dull and uneventful, it was something she's very self aware of.

It was almost tragic how lonely she was.

Although she knew she should have had an active love life; being a professor brought opportunities for intellectual conversations, networking events, and collaborative projects, which should've brought at least some kind of connections to her.

But it didn't.

All of Sam's colleagues were polite and all, but they were all so much older than her, she couldn't find herself relating to relate to any of them.

And besides, dating wasn't her thing. Since the last time she had thought she found the right person, she almost ended up dead along with her sister.

Sam could never trust anyone enough to date them. All the blame for the lack of trust rested on her previous psycho ex.

Richie had left a scar on her body, and it wasn't in the form of a stab wound.

Despite the loneliness and the lack of company, Sam loved her job.

She loved the subject she was teaching, and her colleagues were actually pretty decent.

The biggest bonus was that she got a good paycheck. She didn't have to work two jobs that could barely pay the rent for her and Tara's apartment.

And to Sam's own surprise and satisfaction, the students didn't seem to whisper about her or spread the rumors that had been on the internet ever since the murders in Woodsboro.

Most of Sam's classes were filled with jocks, party-goers or just genuinely stupid people. After all, the school she taught at had a reputation for attracting a more socially-oriented crowd rather than focusing on academic excellence.

Sam wasn't really the kind of teacher that had a big connection with her classes, sure she would crack awkward jokes in class occasionally and greet them in the hall, but no more than that.

It never felt important to her, she was there to teach, to work and to get her salary.

But then there was you.

Sam never payed attention to the people that entered the classroom, or on what place they chose to sit in for the rest of the lesson. But with you, she did.

You had caught her attention the second her eyes got in contact with your figure. It had been when she was about to introduce herself in front of the class, her first day.

The way you had looked at her when she spoke didn't make you seem like the cocky or popular type, however the outfits you chose to wear to school told her otherwise.

Skirts that were either the size of a belt or skirts that would totally show your entire ass if you bent over the slightest. And if it wasn't minimal skirts it was low waisted jeans that showed the top of your underwear.

Tiny and tight crop tops that would show the exact outline and shape of your breasts.

Sam was shocked when she found out the college didn't have a dress code, since it allowed students like you to dress like models straight out from a 90s porno.

Based on the choice of clothing you thought was school appropriate, made Sam think that you were one of those popular mean girls that she used to absolute gush over in high school.

But you didn't seem to be like that. Sure, you were popular, but that was because of your prettiness, not because you were rude or that people were scared of you. Because in fact, nobody was scared of you.

You were loyal. You were friends with technically everyone, including the teachers.

From what Sam had seen in the halls and in the classroom, you always had a smile on your face, greeting everyone you saw with a wave and the smile that looked as if the person you were talking to had hung the stars.

Sam thought it was impressive how much beauty can do for a person. The way everybody loved you because you were pretty, everybody.

Although Sam didn't think much about your scandalous outfits or the way you admired Sam every time she made eye contact with you during briefings.

Not until you had began to walk towards her desk after class had been finished.

The way you would call her 'Mrs Carpenter'. Just like you should've, just like everyone else did, yet it sounded so different.

At first it had only been a simple question about an assignment, but then you started to stop by after every single lesson.

Sam tried to act like normal, responsible. But it was almost impossible when you would slightly lean forward, basically forcing Sam's gaze to your chest. Your hushed and low voice did it for her as well. You talked as if it was secret, as if nobody else was allowed to hear.

She was starting to think that it was all on purpose, that it was all because you wanted a better grade that you couldn't accomplish by yourself.

Sam knew for a certain that she wouldn't give in, she wouldn't give in because you tried to 'flirt' with her, it might've worked with your other professors but it definitely wouldn't work with her.

Sam was stubborn and incredibly obstinate, but she was also very insecure, alongside having no self respect. Most times when she would tell herself to avoid doing something, her lack of confidence would make her do it regardless.

Weeks passed and you didn't stop. You asked Sam for help after every single class.

You spoke to her in a flirty and hushed voice,  Sam had tried to talk back normally, but she would be lying if she couldn't hear her own voice sounding flirty as well.

Sam didn't know what she was doing, you were her student. But you made it so incredibly difficult for her to act like it.

You were gorgeous, model material. But that wasn't the problem. The problem was that you were aware of it, you knew how pretty you were, you knew exactly how to act around people to get your way.

She couldn't understand what was happening, but when you were with her, Sam felt this subtle flutter whenever you approached or just looked at her.

Sam had never felt that feeling before, not even when she was with Richie.

So instead of telling herself you did that with all your teachers, she began thinking that maybe, just maybe you did it because you actually liked her. Even though it wasn't allowed.

Sam was starved. Not from food starvation or hunger, but from love and touch. And she knew it was wrong to think that way when it was about you, it was so wrong.

But it was just thoughts right? Nobody could hear them.

That's what she had thought, but it was like you could read her mind.

Your attempts of trying to make Sam give in got more and more intense. You would touch her hands, standing close up to her and compliment her.

Eventually, Sam's mouth had moved faster than her mind could process. She had accepted your request for her to tutor you.

Sam knew that you didn't actually want tutoring, you were passing the subjects enough to graduate, unlike everybody else in your class. She knew that this was your attempt to flirt even more.

She knew she should've cancelled. The thought still haunted her, what would've happened if she did? Everything would've been so different.

However, Sam didn't cancel. And it turned out exactly like she thought it would.

You had insisted to sit beside her, and not in front of her. You would make sure your arms touched, that you spoke closely to her ear, you would bite your lips and toe flirt with her.

You were bold, so bold that it made you look hotter than Sam thought was possible.

Sam was desperate for something to change so she wouldn't feel the desire to be touched. Her body was craving a touch that wasn't from herself, not from anybody but you.

She felt disgusted by her own thoughts, every single thought her mind managed to convey was about you.

Next thing she knew, your lips had landed on hers. And Sam just couldn't pull away, her mind wasn't working properly. She had kissed you back.

But when her mind started to fall back in place, she pulled away, panic rushing through her as she had scanned the place, making sure nobody had seen it.

She had kissed her student, in a library. A public library.

Her mind had done this before. When she had been on top of Richie, knife going in and out of his chest, blood being the only thing that could be seen. It was like a blackout, Sam didn't know what she was doing, but at the same time, she knew exactly. But it had felt too good to stop. Just like it had been with you.

When you got the confirmation of Sam wanting the same thing, you had pulled her into the bathroom stall, where Sam couldn't help but kiss you just as hungrily as she had done in her disgusting thoughts.

Nothing mattered when your hands were roaming her body. The fact that you were her student and she was your teacher didn't seem to matter at all in that moment.

Sam couldn't understand what her mind was doing to her. This was like another one of those blackouts, where she couldn't think about the consequences of the things she was doing.

Like now, when she found herself in her own bed tangled up in the sheets, with you next to her.

Bare.

Her mind was all over the place. Thoughts racing through her mind like the traffic in New York, making her head feel like it was about to explode.

She couldn't show you the panic she was feeling about the whole situation. Because that would make you think she regretted it. And she didn't, god no she didn't.

You were so gentle yet bold at the same time. You made sure to ask for permission before doing everything, but you did everything so well.

Your touch was everything Sam's body had craved for months, it was nothing like she had done before. Your touch basically boiled on her skin.

You worshipped Sam in ways she didn't even know existed. The ways you touched her felt so good that she couldn't begin to understand what you were doing.

It had all felt so good that Sam could barely remember it. She remembered moaning, she remembered the satisfaction in it all; the warmth, the passion and the wetness.

Looking down at your figure laying against her, legs tangled up in each other, to see that your eyes were already on her. Your beautiful eyes filled with curiosity and admiration was inspecting her face, fingers smoothly running through her hair.

"What're you thinking about?" Your voice came out as a whisper, voice cracking from the lack of talking; words had not been the priority just minutes before.

When Sam made eye contact with you, all the worries faded away. She could be fired because of this, because of you, yet you were the person who could make the worries bluntly disappear.

Sam's lips curled into a gentle smile when she looked at you, bringing up her finger to subtly caress your cheek. "That this won't help you get a better grade.." She lied, a faint laugh escaping from her lips.

You smirked up at her before planting a kiss on her lips. "Please Mrs Carpenter. I promise I'll do better next time." Sarcasm laced your voice, and if Sam hadn't heard that, she would be panicking.

The fact that you had called her 'Mrs Carpenter' made her stomach twirl, sparkles flying around in it. Just like it had done when you moaned it a few minutes ago.

Although the twirls quickly turned into guilt. She shouldn't be doing this, she shouldn't be in bed with you, let alone be in her own apartment with you.

It truly didn't matter how many excuses she tried to make for herself, it wasn't right, and she should've been disgusted with herself.

She was a professor at a college who had fucked her student. And for obvious reasons, that just wasn't allowed.

[i-am-dulaman]

Okay I'm riled up about this rn so time for a history of economics lesson (rant) from me, a stranger on the internet

I'm a communist, I hate capitlism, so lemme just put that out there. But capitlism had its moments. Even marx had some praise for parts of capitlism.

And by far the most successful form of capitlism was Keynesian economics, as evident by the enormous increase in living standards in those countries which adopted it between the 1930s and 1970s.

What's Keynesian economics? The idea that capitlism can't survive on its own, and must be supported by government spending at the poorest ends of society and taxes at the richest ends of society (essentially the opposite of trickle down economics) as well as strong regulations on certain industries like banking.

It basically started in 1936 with President Roosevelt who was a personal friend of John Keynes (who the theory is named after).

Roosevelt implemented Keynesian economics to great effect; he raised the top tax rate to 94% (he actually wanted a 100% tax rate on the highest incomes, essentially creating a maximum wage, but the senate negotiated down to 94%) and similarly high corporate tax rates, he created the first ever minimum wage, created the first ever unemployment benefit, created social security in America, pension funds, and increased public spending on things like public utilities and infrastructure, national parks, etc. Which created about 15 million public sector jobs.

This ended the great depression and eventually lead to America winning world War 2, after which many countries followed suit in implementing similar policies, including UK, Australia, and NZ (apologies for the anglosphere-centric list here but they're the countries I'm personally most familiar with so bare with me)

Over the next 40 years these countries had unprecedented growth in living standards and incomes, and either decreasing or stable wealth inequality, and housing prices increasing in line with inflation. Virtually every household bought a car and a TV, rates of higher education increased dramatically, america put a man on the moon, and so on.

Then it all abruptly ended in the 80s and the answer is plain and obvious. 1979 thatcher became UK prime minister. 1981 reagan became US president. 1983 the wage accords were signed in aus. 1984 was the start of rogernomics in NZ (Someone link that Twitter thread of the guy who posts graphs of economic trends and points out where reagan became president)

(Also worth noting those last two in NZ and Aus were both implemented by 'left' leaning governments, but they are both heavily associated with right wing policies.)

This marked the beginning of trickle down economics: tax cuts, privatization of publicly owned assets, reduction in public spending, and deregulation of the finance sector. The top tax rates are down to the low 30s in most of these countries, down from the 80s/90s it was prior. Now THATS a tax cut.

And what happened next?

Wages stagnated. Housing prices skyrocketed. Bankers got away with gambling on the economy. Public infrastruce and utilies degraded. And wealth inequality now exceeds France in 1791.

I don't know how anyone can deny the evidence if they see it, but there's so much propaganda and false information that a lot of people just don't see the evidence.

Literally all the evidence supports going back to Keynesian economics but now that the rich have accumulated so much wealth it's virtually impossible to democratically dethrone them when they have most of the politicians on both the right and the left in their pocket.

Unfortunately it was the great depression and ww2 that gave politicians the political power to implement these policies the first time around. Some thought the 2008 crash would spur movement back towards Keynesianism (which it actually did in Iceland, congrats to them), I hoped covid would force governments to now, but nope.

All these recent crises' seem to have just pushed politics further and further right, with more austerity and tax cuts.

I don't really have a message or statement to end on other than shits fucked yo.

[thegoldencontracts]

AITA For Benevolently Providing My Fellow Students With Study Guides?

I'm posting on a throwaway because I have caught my classmates (It is laughably easy, they love gathering in large spaces and 'whispering' loudly about their schemes) looking through my main account on multiple occasions in a search for blackmail, blathering about "freeing their friends" or "avenging their brother" and whatnot. I apologize in advance if you find my formatting or wording cumbersome.

You see, I(17M) greatly enjoy assisting poor, unfortunate souls with whatever they need. Now, I admit that I have partaken in some rather improper behavior in the past, but I have mended my ways. I fortunately know a fair amount about both magic and my fellow classmate's troubles, and I understand that you wish to laugh with the next part - I use my talents to assist the miserable, lonely, and depressed.

Recently, I have taken to assisting my fellow students who are struggling with their Final exams, in the form of study guide guaranteed to garner them a bare minimum of 90 (and if used with maximum efficiency, a perfect score) if they look over it even once.

However, as the landfolk say, "There's no such thing as a free lunch." I don't charge much for my study guides (entirely legitimate, for your information, designed for maximum efficiency and lawfulness by sifting through the past 100 years worth of test questions), in fact, in many cases, I don't charge anything at all. If they manage to earn a grade rewardable with School-provided merits, then, in fact, I shall reward them by not only waiving the fee, but also, by providing them study guides for the rest of their time at school.

However, if they fail to do so, I ask for compensation in the form of providing me some of their time. They were fully aware of this, in fact, I even gave them the chance to look through my (thaumaturgically binding) contracts for as long as they needed before signing.

Now, Finals have concluded recently, and the merits have been displayed. Now, some people are calling me "a cheat", making such audacious claims as "this is slavery" (it is not, they were compensated for their service and they don't have to be loyal to me for their whole lives) and "You guys should have believed me when I told you that brother-killer was bad news" (I have never killed anyone's brothers, I can assure you of this) and, personally, I don't think I'm the 'A', as reddit calls it.

However, my dorm-mate and employee, F, urged me to ask the internet, his reasoning being "It'd be funny" (his words, not mine) while slacking off of work - he had a shift scheduled, and then he seriously threatened to eat me when I scolded him, so I forced him to kneel until he learned his lesson. I then realized that he didn't have a shift scheduled for that day - he had it scheduled for the day *after* - and that I was apparently mildly delirious from not having slept for three days, so as compensation, I doubled his pay and offered him one wish of choice, which he used to tell me to make this post. For that reason, I humbly ask of you now: Am I in the wrong?

[bruhstation]

can't quite tell when casa tidmouth is set but given how much work has to be done online these days, who do you think would be tech literate v tech phobic? I can see thomas trolling on twitter and james endlessly posting on insta while gordon can barely open his emails and gets furious when anyone brings this up (edward has no idea either but he's willing to ask and learn. and he loves cat memes.)

casa tidmouth is set in the summer of 1999! though their fashion sense and architecture are more leaning to the 60s and 70s due to gold dust shenanigans. there are computers ofc so the cast use the internet

the younger ones are the most tech literate, like thomas and percy. if modern websites were around during the 90s thomas would be trolling people on twitter. he loves seeing people seethe. especially gordon. his opponent would give him well thought out replies and thomas would just reply with a stupid reaction image or “not reading all of that”. he tried doing the same on a subreddit only to get jumped there

percy likes browsing youtube! and blogging about his life on various social medias! he posts pictures of the railway and his friends from time to time. “been getting into yoghurt lately” “does anyone remember that show about talking tugboats” percy doesn’t have a large following but his internet circle likes him because he’s nice and positive. also he and thomas love spongebob youtube poops so so much it pisses gordon off

james would post instagram selfies. correct. he uses way too many tags like #railway #girl #boy #nonbinary #hottie #selflove #selfie etc etc but he gets 10 likes at max on. he has to deal with thomas_a.billington commenting “idc” under his posts almost every week

the older bunch of the cast don’t really use the internet that much. especially edward since he’s got books for the things he need help with. he doesn’t know how account verifications work so he gave up on social media. he’s very online on goodreads and online bookstores though. edward likes history videos. asmr too. the ones titled Gentle Rain - Rain Sounds For Sleeping, Concentration, Healing - 99% Works [10 Hours]. toby’s the same except he’s more casual

henry and gordon would struggle with opening and replying tonemails (edward too but he’s patient and doesn’t even use the internet that much). the latter especially to the point it pisses him off. “we should use letters like normal people” gordon says. he also doesn’t touch social media because “it’s beneath me” but we all know he struggles with it and is most likely to get baited into entering heated debates so he had to restrain himself. he does like cat videos. they’re cute. cooking channels too. he’s a bit embarassed about it though

henry founds himself stopping by forums like yahoo answers or quora every once in a while and even got into arguments with housewives about taking care of plants. gordon gets dragged into the mischief and encourages henry to fight back. show them who’s the boss in petunias and roses and dahlias. “do NOT lose. this is a matter of pride and dignity” the forum then got locked after 500 replies and henry gave gordon the silent treatment for 24 hours after he gained post internet argument clarity

tldr this is thomas’ relationship with his coworkers online

[hopeymchope]

Emio - The Smiling Man is a welcome return for FDC... but a disappointing one

As I mentioned once before, Famicom Detective Club is BACK. Not just the title, but also its central heroes: Assistant detectives Taro Ninten and Ayumi Tachibana have returned for a new first-person menu-driven adventure game with a new mystery.

This is a much bigger deal for Japanese fans, where this is the first new game in the series (and the first real new adventure for these characters) since 1997 — and that '97 game is pretty obscure/hard to come by (I'll get to that), so it's really the first full-fledged NEW release since 1989! But the rest of the world only had a fan translation of the second game's SNES remake since 2004, which meant it was really only experienced by hardcore adventure game enthusiasts. And we only got our first official release of the first two games in the form of the Switch remakes in 2021.

I liked those Switch remakes a lot. I especially liked how many detailed, fluid animations there were in nearly every setting, which really brought the adventures to life. For any newcomers, I still recommend both of those titles — and in fact, I think The Girl Who Stands Behind remains the best in the series even now. The Missing Heir is full of dated design roadblocks that will almost certainly send you rushing to find an online guide, but The GIrl Who Stands Behind is a pretty easy playthrough for anyone.

Time has left the third game in the series behind, rendering it to obscurity. It truly is The Past that Disappeared in the Snow.

Though I should clarify that I only mean that The Girl Who Stands Behind is, IMO, the best out of the three games we English-only fans can experience. Because Emio - The Smiling Man is actually the fourth game in the series... and the third one is extremely obscure. That game was only released via Nintendo's Satellaview service in Japan, which let you use download games over dial-up Internet back in the '90s. That third game, titled The Past that Disappeared in the Snow, was the only one (until now!) where you played as Ayumi Tachibana. When her mom was accused of a murder, Ayumi had to uncover a decades-long family feud between her own family and another... and we don't know much more than that, because although the ROM file certainly is out there, nobody has ever bothered to translate this game into English.

But... I digress. It's time I stopped meandering around the central topic and started talking about the newest release: Emio.

In terms of gameplay, this one skews much closer to The Girl Who Stands Behind than The Missing Heir. There's one late-game moment where you're likely to be stymied about what to do or where to go next, because advancement requires some outside-the-box thinking. But otherwise, most players will be able to step through the narrative without too much trouble.

One cool touch that I alluded two a couple paragraphs earlier is that you will actually swap between Taro and Ayumi's perspectives in this one. I quite like that angle, though Taro pretty consistently gets the more interesting parts of the story. Perhaps that's because he still dominates 70% of the perspective.

The game will grade your performance in each chapter at the very end of the story, so do your best on the reviews and other multiple-choice segments.

If you're just looking to have a new adventure with some compelling late reveals? Emio - The Smiling Man has you covered. The same general gameplay from The Girl Who Stands Behind is back, including the end-of-chapter reviews of information that will ultimately help determine your graded performance.

Unfortunately I also feel that, in some ways, this is the weakest of the stories we've been able to play in English. And I feel that way primarily for three reasons:

Prepare to spend a lot of time at Planet Coffee, receiving very little information.

The sad truth is that, for much of this game, it feels like you're treading water. You barely ever seem to make advancements in the story until the last few chapters—instead, it's just piecemeal drip-feeding of tiny details that don't actually seem to move the needle. The Missing Heir was dropping new murders and mysteries left and right. In comparison, The Girl Who Stands Behind was more similar to how Emio is structured... but TGWSB had a creepy overlaying atmosphere and sense of dread that helped propel it along. For me at least, Emio is comparatively... well, it's kind of boring. Not much happens for most of the game. The last two main chapters and the Epilogue are all powerfully compelling, but up until that point, it feels more like you experience almost 10 chapters where you learn random facts that don't actually link to one another, and almost no one ever seems to be in any danger?

Worse is that sometimes, some things DO happen that the narrative just kind of... forgets about. One of the most compelling twists in the investigation is never explained in any way! At one point, we follow Ayumi as she follows a mysterious figure and then gets jumped by them... and then this is never discussed or addressed again! It's hard to believe a game with this many staff members involved could see this and shrug these dropped plot points off. Maybe they were all too scared to speak up to producer/writer Yoshio Sakamoto? But it's frustrating.

Ayumi gets jumped early in Chapter 7. When we next see her, she never mentions that this happened, nor is this ever explained or referenced again for the entire game.

You know how I mentioned after playing the previous two games that I was shipping Ayumi and Taro? Well, this game kind of killed that for me. For some reason, this is the only game in the series where Ayumi is treated as this gorgeous, irresistable being that every boy she encounters (while playing as her) simps for. And our playable hero, Taro, is just such a simp, too! Maybe it just felt overwhelming to me because it's every boy (and a couple girls) that she runs into, while in reality she doesn't talk to that many characters. But for me, it felt exhausting and kind of gross to see a couple of the male characters bicker over who knows her better, get possessively jealous when they have no right to, and basically act like total toolbags whenever Ayumi is involved. Taro, for his part, has gone from "implied to maybe kinda like her" to "acting weirdly possessive and overtly pining for her whenever they interact." Which I don't care for. For Ayumi's sake, I'm glad she seems to be somehow blissfully ignorant of her hypnotic effect. :P At least their boss, Utsugi, seems like he's not gunning for her... ?

So yeah, these are the three things that I think held the game back from being as good a story as the first two for me personally. Yet that's not to say the game is bad, either — I'm still quite happy to be unraveling mysteries with the Utsugi Detective Agency. There are still lots of fluid character touches in the animated scenes, the art is consistently great, the soundtrack is good, and things REALLY get gripping by the end.

If you're wondering why this game has an "M" rating while the previous two had "T" ratings, that's entirely due to the game's epilogue. After you beat the main story, many plot threads remain dangling. And as I stated up above, some will sadly stay that way. But most of them are filled in by the epilogue, which walks you through the incredibly dark, tragic, and disturbing tale of the culprit. The epilogue is more like a 20-minute visual novel followed by a 30-minute anime, because you don't actually PLAY it much; you really just read and then watch it. You are warned beforehand that this tale will be "gruesome," and though it's still far less so than most horror-based video games, it's definitely QUITE gruesome by Nintendo standards. But it's one of the most gripping parts of the whole story, honestly.

[the-heart-of-leo]

I hate it but... help

As I've stated before, I broke my foot/ankle back at the beginning of March. I got to where I can walk on it again but I had already used up all my sick days at my job so when a bad day came along...

Well, I'm out of a job (which sucks because I really liked that job)

For the last month I've been applying to places, preferably places where I'm not standing for 6 hours a day, but no hits yet.

But to add insult to injury, my youngest nephew, who is autistic, and usually draws a check... is not getting it because of paperwork and it'll take 30-90 days to fix. It's already been 30.

My phone is turned off. Rent is coming up (and we're on thin ice with the landlord already) and bills are coming up.

I've been using my free time to write (Original work as well as fic but that takes a bit more work to do) but that's a long term goal.

If anyone can spare anything, I'd super appreciate it.

Paypal

Ko-Fi

It's been a rough year for me and it's barely half over. Thank you all so much. I love you guys, even though I'm a creepy goblin hermit just sitting in my corner of the internet.

[earl-grey-love]

[CW: Politics, current world events, body image, segregation, all that icky stuff]

I've been on the internet for nearly 20 years. While it wasn't the very first era of the internet, it was when it started its massive boom into popularity. But back then, even when I was a teenager, when you turned off your pc, you no longer had access to the internet. Most "smart" phones of that time could barely open a browser. They were good for texting and calling mostly.

But nowadays you're plugged into the internet literally 24/7. Even TVs and "smart" fridges/speakers/lights/all kinds of shit do. Even the youngest and oldest of people have smart phones/ipads practically glued to their hands or sides all day every day. The effects this has had on society literally fill tens of thousands of research documents and articles, and counting. We are lonelier and yet more connected than we have ever been in human history, and it's only getting worse.

Now, I'm not here to vilify phones and the internet, and people who use them. Nuh-uh. That'd not only be incorrect, but also weird and hypocrital. It's not our fault we're addicted to this stuff. It's DESIGNED that way. It always has been. But back when I was a teenager, this shit wasn't this bad because we could turn it off. Now we're expected to be at available at the click of a button to anyone who wants us 24/7. This affects relationships, work life balance, and directly the mental health of everybody. Especially when we naturally cope with these negative experiences and emotions by using addictive software like apps we can endlessly scroll on and post to get validation.

Now I've never been a huge fan of social media, but back in the day it was far easier to make meaningful connections. Nowadays, I see so many hate comments on literally anything and everything on the internet that it genuinely makes me ill. People cannot use social media for what it was designed for. If you post something mildly embarrassing or cringe or anything remotely "socially unacceptable", you'll be subjected to literal medieval torture in the form of mass public humiliation. Every single week theres new "discourse" about some poor fucker who dared to be a little cringe, a little controversial, a little human, on the internet.

And it's no surprise 99% of those victims are queer, bipoc, fem presenting, transgender, non-christian, children/teens, and/or anyone that's considered a minority or otherwise shunned. People without power. Like good fucking god, I thought cancel culture was about giving people with power social consequences for the fucked up shit they do, because legal systems are pay to win, yet I rarely see the actual bad people targetted. Cancel culture these days is 90% of the time little more than cyberbullying en mass. It's disgusting.

I blame the cringe culture epidemic of 2016. It changed the internet forever and irreparably so. Everyone who got cringe cultured back then were exactly the minority groups I just named. Godforbid you become a minority person who gets just a little bit of fame and fortune, your own community will put you back in your place. And it's not even community's fault either, it's corporations.

Corporations have, in modern times, always decided what we do. What we think. What we eat. What we wear. What we dream of. Now it's shoved down our throats 24/7 because we can't unplug from it. Everything you see when you scroll these days is an advertisement for something. Nothing is sacred any more. Even the anti-capitalist or rebellious movements of by-gone eras are now co-opted for cash, or are even outright exclusionary these days (see, cottagecore, goth/punk, etc). It's nearly impossible for anything to exist without immediate being churned out of a fast market fuelled by modern day slavery, just so the already rich can get a few more bucks for their fifth home.

Meanwhile, we've never been poorer and more overworked. Why the fuck do people have to work multiple jobs and have multi-income households just so people CAN EAT. That's fucking dystopian. People cannot afford basic living necessities like food, water, shelter and healthcare. All of this shit should be fucking free and yet people have to sell their souls for it??? Their bodies their lives their happiness their health, just for some fucking paper and that paper is NEVER enough.

All while we can barely survive, we get ad after ad shoved in our face of all the things we need to buy to be "cool" or "happy" or "worthy of love". We gotta be thin, we gotta be sexy, we gotta have a sleek car and a perfectly tasteful and organised wardrobe, and don't you dare eat animal products or buy fast fashion!! You have to be perfect all of the time. Go to work, do your job, have a perfect home, never be disabled, never have a thought you weren't programmed to have. Keep giving us more money by the way!

Meanwhile all the rights generations have worked hard for are stripped away. Bit by bit, as we're now too overworked and worn down to even notice. Media outlets don't cover it anymore because someone posted something cringe on tiktok and that's obviously more important than gen0cide. And see that? I had to censor it because we're not even allowed to openly talk on the internet any more. Sure, we're allowed to buy billions of tonnes of platic per year, but godforbid we talk about human rights. Or s*x or "unaliving" or schmental schmelth or grape.

Are we even allowed to be human? Because we're being denied the right to even be alive.

I'm both terrified of and terrified for the people younger than me. I see the way they live and talk to each other and now that Oz.empic Chic is in style, I'm more terrified than ever. Please be kind to each other. Don't fall for the divisive, hateful, violence perpetuating culture that social media has become. Love yourself and love each other, because our communities are all we have. If that's taken from us, then we have nothing left.

[village-skeptic]

music meme!

An eon ago @floggingink tagged me in a music shuffle meme! I'm not a huge playlist person, but here's a selection of tabs I had open, stuff I heard on the radio in the part few days, etc etc. (Is the radio the analog version of shuffle? You tell me.)

The Who, "Baba O'Riley" — The episode of Joe Pera Talks to You where Joe Pera discovers Baba O'Riley (sample here) is such a pure and joyful watch, and also IMO one of the best on-screen depictions I have ever seen of how the first ecstatic stage of a new hyperfixation feels: this, more, again, again! Let me share this thing with you, strangers and friends, so that you might also feel transcendent joy!

The Lone Bellow, "Honey" — Love the mellow energy on this one. For some reason I feel like if this had been on the radio in 2017/2018, it would have shown up in a bunch of top-shelf Bughead fics. Maybe it's the "Put the pedal to the floor/Let the darkness come" lyric?(@anniemurphys, thoughts?)

R.E.M., "Strange Currencies" — This Esquire article described the soundtrack for The Bear as "widely praised by forty-something-year-old Midwestern dads," and like, uhhhh: guilty as charged.

boygenius, "Not Strong Enough" — "Always an angel, never a god": what a mood, what a mood. Also, it reminded me that I really want to make a mixtape of song pairs with opposite titles. Obviously the match for this one is Sheryl Crow's "Strong Enough."

Twisted Sister, "We're Not Going to Take It" — I have always wondered about the lyric "Your life is trite and jaded/Boring and confiscated." My theory is that it was supposed to be "constipated," but that that was actually too much rebellion for the label.

Skeeter Davis, "The End of the World" — Whenever I hear this song, it's playing over the credits of Mad Men in November 1963. But the other day I heard it on my local oldies radio station, followed directly by Len's unparalleled 1999 one-hit wonder "Steal My Sunshine," and gentle readers, I about had a stroke.

Dove Cameron, "Boyfriend" — I've never encountered this song anywhere outside of the Internet, but anytime I hear it, I walk around with it stuck in my head for the next 3 days. It's basically the same lick over and over again, but when it's this sticky, you don't honestly need more than that.

Jimmy Buffett, "Come Monday" — Awww, Jimmy. Legitimately sad about his passing.

Duncan Sheik, "Barely Breathing" — Truly, the '90s will always be with us. Or at least with me.

Joni Mitchell (with Brandi Carlile and others, 2022), "Both Sides Now" — Do you need to have a good cry? Well, you do now. Consider this an open tag for anyone who wants to play - I'd love to hear what you've been listening to!

[bubblesandgutz]

Every Record I Own - Day 781: G.I.S.M. Detestation

Back in the '90s, you were more likely to hear rumors and stories about Tokyo's G.I.S.M. than their actual music. It was difficult enough to find Japanese hardcore records in the States, and it was even more difficult when the band was barely active, never left Japan, and had developed a reputation for violent behavior towards bootleggers. It seemed like you either had to have been in Tokyo in the '80s to snag a copy of G.I.S.M.'s debut album or you had to have some solid connections in the pre-internet record collecting world.

But G.I.S.M. did manage to get a song on the 1984 International P.E.A.C.E. Benefit Compilation double album, along with artists like Dead Kennedys, Crass, Conflict, DRI, MDC, and Subhumans, and as a result became one of (if not the first) Japanese hardcore bands to get exposure outside of their home country. The myth began to snowball, and as more Japanese hardcore bands began to find an international following, the G.I.S.M. legend grew.

Most of the stories about G.I.S.M. involved their singer Sakevi Yokoyama. He supposedly fired a homemade flamethrower into an unsuspecting crowd at one of their shows. The flamethrower was also supposedly used on a morning commuter who was staring at Sakevi on a train. There was also the story of Sakevi trashing a clothing store that stocked bootleg G.I.S.M. shirts. Considering Japan's reputation in the West for law and order, tradition, and etiquette, this sort of behavior seemed even more shocking and rebellious. G.I.S.M.'s album art further reinforced the band's nihilistic and destructive behavior. Though obviously culling musical ideas and design aesthetics from the British anarcho / peace punk scene, there was also a heavy dose of heavy metal's gratuitous shock value. So in addition to the anti-war messaging and anarchist symbols on the cover, you also had song titles like "(Tere Their) Syphilitic Vaginas to Pieces" and a swastika in the collage art on the original album cover.

This was all enough to make G.I.S.M. a polarizing band, but we haven't even discussed the music yet. If you were expecting Japan's response to Discharge, you were going to be confused, if not outright disappointed. Sure, there's some of that d-beat speed and power, but the music owes as much to British heavy metal like Judas Priest as it does to British punk. Throw in some truly grimy production and some flirtations with experimental music and early industrial music and it's no wonder a lot of folks responded to the recent official reissues of G.I.S.M.'s first two albums with "wait... THIS is what everyone has been hyping all these years?"

That polarization is even more pronounced in the wake of Sakevi's death at the end of August. There are people praising G.I.S.M.'s pioneering sound and wild art aesthetic, but there are also people criticizing Sakevi's antisocial behavior, misogynist imagery, and references to anti-Semitic conspiracy theories on a later G.I.S.M. album.

My two cents: you don't have to look too hard to find a lot of problematic things with punk and hardcore bands from forty years ago. The ideas espoused in Bad Brains' "Don't Blow Bubbles," Black Flag's "Slip It In," and Minor Threat's "Guilty of Being White" haven't exactly aged well. If anything, G.I.S.M.'s mish-mash of disparate sounds and symbols seems less like a coherent agenda and more like a schizophrenic response to a modern world teetering on the edge of self-destruction. It's ugly and confusing, and the line between what Sakevi is advocating versus admonishing is often blurry, but I don't think anyone has ever looked at Detestation as a road map to a better world. In the final decades of the 20th century, Japan had a reputation in the States as a kind of utopia. It was a clean and efficient culture with very little crime and plenty of prosperity. And then you had G.I.S.M., which countered that reputation by taking all the confusion, fear, angst, and paranoia of industrialized society and reflecting it back in this warped and feral eight-song album.

[hiding-in-my-blanket-fort]

.

Something I’ve been struggling with lately is the demand to stay in constant communication, and if you don’t, you’re deemed a demonic avoidant who ghosts people.

I grew up in the 90s, homeschooled, with no phone of my own, using dial up internet. I emailed a few kids I was friendly with, but that could be done when I had the time for it. I wasn’t expected to respond immediately.

Saw a video today explaining “proper communication”: a “good morning” text was necessary daily and if they couldn’t maintain conversation throughout the day, they were required to send another text, saying they were busy for the day so if you don’t hear from them, that’s the reason why.

And I’m seeing that sentiment A LOT.

Started chatting with someone online - just the “how are you?” stage!! - and he got anxious, thinking that I had ghosted him because I hadn’t responded in 12 hours. Like…no? I just slept, grabbed some food, and got ready for work.

Another person got irritated that I wasn’t responding to texts fast enough and I explained that I had low spoons (which is true). He said that wasn’t an excuse and I could find *some* energy to text back.

It’s ironic because it seems to create this hyperbolic extreme of intense, constant communication, or no communication at all and loneliness.

I’m 33 years old and I would like to try and develop a friendship. Just one. I had shitty friendships when I was growing up. I haven’t had a friendship in long time now. And it would just be nice to like…go to the movies with a friend, which I’ve never done in my life.

But when I encounter stuff like this, I literally physically cannot maintain it. And it’s frustrating because I WANT to. I want to foster relationships that are healthier than my dysfunctional family dynamic.

But I’m introverted. Socially anxious to the point that I get a tension headache after two hours of socializing and I’m wiped out for the rest of the day. I’m 99% sure I have anxious avoidant attachment issues thanks to childhood trauma bullshit, so that probably factors in. I didn’t have my own space growing up, I was constantly “on” to raise my siblings, or play caretaker to my emotionally immature parents. My mother insisted we were all glued at the hip, so we always had to do everything together, or not at all.

And I would just like some adult breathing room at this point. I would like to socialize without explaining where I am or what I’m doing every minute of the day because someone wants to know why I’m not giving them attention ALL the time.

At my last job, there were two co-workers who had notifications going off on their phones constantly because of group chats they were in. I’ve never been in a group chat thing, but just listening to it was enough to make me stressed. How does anyone have the energy to stay in contact that much with people??? Don’t you get tired? Don’t you want time alone to yourself?

I NEED time alone to recharge. I always block off Saturday so I can disconnect. Otherwise, I feel very drained. It feels like there’s this endless like…”white noise”…in my head.

I try to remind people - repeatedly - that I have low spoons, I need time alone, etc. But it goes in one ear and out the other. In the next breath, they want to do a movie marathon all day. They want to know why I’m not texting them back faster.

It makes it harder to socialize, and socializing is already pretty damn hard. And it gets discouraging because I know before I even start that I can’t meet the demands other people claim is “bare minimum”.

[dodgebolts]

Hello! Happy June! It's Pride and I have another question (8/30)

HiHi, today we are again diving into the evolution of another word: queer!

The word queer entered the English language around the 16th century, and initially meant "strange", "odd" or "eccentric". (This is a slightly unrelated sidenote; as someone whose dialect of English is Hiberno-English, the word queer is still very commonly used to still mean this, and has also evolved to the word "quare" which can be used in place of "really" or "very" to provide adverbial emphasis <- like if someone is "quare tall" they're so tall that you're kinda in a little disbelief about it. Anyway just thought this was a fun side note because I really had not realised this word was controversial for people until I was on the internet)

Anyway, onto the late 19th century, the word queer began to have the connotation of "sexual deviance", before then starting to be used specifically about the "sexual deviance" of "feminine men".

The first, or at least one of the first, recorded time that the word queer was used as a pejorative for gay was in a letter written by John Sholto Douglas, 9th Marquis of Queensberry, about his son's relationship with Oscar Wilde. This letter was read out in Wilde's trial in April 1895 (in which he was being tried for "gross indecency" or "homosexuality"), and in it Douglas refers to Wilde and other gay men at the time as "Snob Queers". It is believed that American newspapers picked up this phrase and began using it themselves, thus spreading the pejorative to the US's vocabulary.

"The Concise New Partridge Dictionary of Slang" (1937) defined the word queer as "Homosexual. Derogatory from the outside, not from within. US, 1914", which tells us both that by 1914 it was a common pejorative or insult for gay people, but also, that queer people were using the word to refer to themselves as well. Around this time, queer, fairy, trade and gay all signified distinct "categories" of homosexual men. Historian George Chauncey notes in his book ("Gay New York") that queer would've been the self-identifier of ""masculine"" gay men.

We can also assume that this is what was happening in the U.K. as well, as a letter held in the National Archives shows us (you can look up the letter in full, search the full name of the person and "My Dear Billy"). This letter was written by a man named Cyril Coeur de Leon to ‘My Dear Billy’ in 1934. Billy was the owner of "The Caravan Club", a ""disorderly house"" of ""male prostitutes"", and in it he writes "Just a note to say that I am very disappointed about you. I honestly thought you were queer, but different from the others, and I liked you very much […] I have only been queer since I came to London about two years ago, before then I knew nothing about it." This use of queer is arguably ahead of it's time, given that at this point queer was exclusively about gay men, whereas de Leon mentions he "still likes girls occasionally".

Over the years though, queer has evolved from the narrow definition of "gay man" to "gay men and lesbians" to "anyone not heterosexual" to "not heterosexual and/or not cisgender". And despite the fact that for the majority of the time that it has meant "gay" it has been used by the community, some people are still of the opinion that the word is "too offensive" to be used, but thankfully, this argument isn't as common as it was in the 90s and 00s, though still annoying persistent.

And as for my question, today I want to know firstly, if you use the word queer yourself? and secondly, what is your favourite word/way to refer to the queer community? (for example, "friend of dorothy" is funny to drop into conversation, and today I spoke to some who said they were "looking forward to meeting other *limp hand movement* at [pub name] tonight!")

Happy Pride 🌈 🎉

AAA I'm so sorry for taking so long on these I've barely been logged in at all the past couple of days 😭 I personally don't use it to describe myself but when I'm chatting about the topic I do tend to use it as an umbrella term and to generally refer to the LGBTQ+ community, or when talking about specific people, as a nonspecific label of the "vaguely gestures" variety like my roommate was last year :]

Also yeah I do tend to use the limp hand movement a lot!! I had a lot of really cool discussions with my roommate last year about queerness esp since they're way more knowledgeable in queer theory than I can ever hope to be and Well that's what we used to talk about stuff sometimes lhsfdgkjs

[berlynn-wohl]

A Long And Winding Post

Lately I've been getting back into a thing that was my special interest in the 90s -- before I had access to the World Wide Web, and way before the internet could be used by anyone to get an instant answer to any question or to immediately access any piece of media ever created. It’s been interesting to think of the difference in how I was able to be a fan in those days, versus now. While I would not necessarily want to go back to a time when I was unable to (for example) hold a phone up to a speaker to find out what song was playing, the appeal of that time lay partly in always being surrounded by ~mysteries~. In every fandom, some recordings, film clips, and books were the stuff of legend, because they were out of print or otherwise essentially inaccessible. It was a time when every trip to the library or video rental place or record store or book store was an adventure that might yield a rare and precious physical media treasure. Being a fan in the pre-web era was laden with the suspense of the hunt and the ecstasy of acquisition.

Anyway, stand back because I’m about to make up a guy:

Let's say you were born in 1963. You're too young to remember seeing the Beatles on the Ed Sullivan show but old enough to remember hearing the news that they'd broken up. Perhaps you have an older sibling or a cool aunt or uncle who plays Beatle records for you, while your pre-teen peers are listening to the Osmonds and David Cassidy, and while the radio is playing Elton John and Jefferson Starship. But being a Beatles devotee in the 1970s is to be in a veritable media desert: Not only are there no new Beatles albums anymore, there are no documentaries to watch on television, there are no biographies being published. There’s no way to watch old film clips or television appearances. Maybe a second-run theater will show A Hard Day’s Night one weekend, but other than that it's just you and your records, which you play religiously, studiously, straining to notice and appreciate every experimental effect, every shriek and mew and swirl.

Sometimes you pick up a rock music magazine that speculates that the Beatles were overrated, not as musically talented or socially important as people naively thought in the 60s. This is partly because every thought or feeling that young people had in the 60s is increasingly being regarded as childishly naïve, but also partly because the new music being released by ex-Beatles is, for the most part, underwhelming. Once you have acquired all the Beatles records, to satisfy your desire for more of their music, you dutifully buy Walls and Bridges or London Town, but there is no magic there, and while you dream that someday the Beatles might get back together, you start to wonder, were that to happen, if that same spark could ever ignite again. It seems that even the Beatles are not immune to the malaise, the disillusionment, and the aimlessness of the 70s. Your earliest memories are of a world that seemed on the precipice of something exciting, a great change, an upheaval whose violence would give way to peace. But Vietnam, Watergate, an economic crisis, and the drugged-out surge of hedonism and nihilism exemplified by punk and disco make those days seem very, very far away.

And then, when it's cold and the days are short and you are seventeen, you hear the news that John Lennon has been murdered. The shock and disbelief is multi-layered. This is not the death of one man, a husband and father and friend. This is the moment when you, and everyone else, truly understands that the 60s are over. There was a better time when people dreamed of a different world, and you just barely missed experiencing it. Now that dream is over.

You are angry, furiously angry at the senselessness of Lennon's murder. You scream and weep and curse the lunatic who could not possibly have understood what harm he did to the world by committing this act. And you are not alone in feeling this way. But from this anger comes love: the love that the whole world had for the Beatles, which had lain dormant for ten years, now stirs from its slumber. Journalists, insiders, and hangers-on take advantage with new biographies and memoirs. There are new things to watch and read and learn and discover. You're particularly in luck if you believe that John Lennon was the only true artist and genius in the Beatles, because that narrative, already pervasive in the 70s, goes into overdrive now that his life has been cut tragically short. And you're not immune -- you feel guilty and ungrateful for never thinking very highly of his solo albums, now that you know he will never have the chance to make another one.

Years go by, and the world settles back down into its occupation with the present. On this day, you are not listening to the oldies or classic rock station; you're driving in your car, tuned in to Top 40. Prince, Tina Turner, Lionel Richie. Some songs you enjoy, others you don’t care for, but are too focused on traffic to search for something more appealing on the dial. And then you hear a voice that hasn't been heard on Top 40 radio in four years: a reedy tenor that you identify instantly as John Lennon's. Your heart seizes. Your first silly thought is, Were you somehow misinformed all this time? Is John Lennon actually alive? But in an instant, of course, you dismiss this thought. Obviously he is not alive. This must just be a demo someone dug up and dusted off, though not before adding some synthesizers and a drum machine. But the glossy contemporary production does nothing to dilute the thrill of hearing the signature sound: miserably personal lyrics punctuated by the keening final word that jumps an octave at the end of each couplet. You struggle to memorize each line as it tumbles forth: "Ever since you been leaving me / I been wanting to diiieee."

The rush of emotion makes you dash for the nearest parking lot, so you can get your shaking hands off the steering wheel and focus on what you're hearing. "It's much too late for goodbyes," he sings, and you slump to one side, your temple pressed against the window, and you weep. How cruel of some money-grubbing record executive to have this song fixed up and released, to have John's ironic foresight inflicted upon unsuspecting fans who still believe in what he attempted, in vain, to instill in us, and himself.

At the end of the song, you wait for the DJ to identify and explain what you just heard, but instead you hear the lazy opening waahh-waahh of "I Just Called To Say I Love You." You sit patiently through it, but are rewarded only with a commercial for a car dealership.

The new John Lennon song might remain a mystery for hours, or for weeks. It depends on what it occurs to you to do. You might call up the radio station, and ask what song they just played. You might walk into a record store and see what happens when you ask for "the new John Lennon song." In this case, all you think to do is ask your friends if they have heard this song as well -- and you receive in reply only quizzical looks. You wait to hear it named when it's played again on the radio, but ultimately the mystery is solved days later, when you hear a snippet of it from the other room when your roommate is channel-surfing. He skipped past MTV, being uninterested in clips that do not feature either Van Halen or a half-naked video vixen or both, but you rush in and tell him to change the channel back, until you see the last moments of a starling image: a pale young man with stylishly unkempt hair and a startlingly familiar aquiline nose and soft, myopic gaze. But he's not John Lennon. The credits that pop up in the corner of the screen as the image fades out identify this man as Lennon's elder son, Julian.

You feel no relief now that the mystery has been solved. A new churn of emotions unsettles you. The first thing you remember is that Julian is your age. While you'd known this for years, you hadn't seen a picture of him that was taken after 1970 or so, and so in your mind he has remained a child. Here he is now, old enough to follow in his father's footsteps -- not only choosing professional musicianship, but also, it seems, similarly inclined to process his parental trauma for a worldwide audience. The snippets of lyrics you remember hearing in the car are newly haunting -- "Too Late For Goodbyes", it turns out, is not a breakup song.

What does Julian Lennon's emergence into the public eye mean? Is it more meaningful that he so resembles his father in voice and appearance? Is this deliberate on his part, an affectation to secure wider appeal? Or does he feel imprisoned in his body, doomed to be perceived as his father’s weak shadow?  You could talk to your friends about it, but they're not particularly interested in the Beatles. Perhaps in a week or two there will be a feature about him in the new issue of Rolling Stone, or an interview segment on Entertainment Tonight. Journalists are always happy to tell you how you should feel about music and the people who make it. But barring a chance encounter with another Beatles fan who has the time for a long chat, this is something you're going to have to ruminate on by yourself, and to yourself.

[hezuart]

That anaversary aizen looks absolutely fabulous, he looks like a figure skater xd.

I heard along time ago the last arc of the anime was being animated finally bc they pulled a 90s sailor moon were the last season was not either animated or dubbed untill decades later.

I recall near the end of the current 366 episodes there was an episode were the creapy demon ppl woke up in hell and we're all bitter, and there was the other guy who was like, iM cOmEiNg FoR u IChIgO, but then is never mentioned again after and I'm like,why? Why is lt there just plopted randomly into a different arc that seams unrelated.

And locking aizen up underground seems ok, but It deff won't hold, and he will. Escape, and he will kill, you either need that one spell from star, dubbed, the darkest spell of moon the undaunted, a powerfull dark spell that killed immortal beings, that came from best character, eclipsa, the queen of darkness.

We need that.

Or stick him I'm crystal like eclipsa was in star. Is there no one who could trap him in ice or crystal for all eternity.

How about throw him into the centre of a volcano trapped and caged , forverr being killed by heat?

I assume there's space travel, send I'm into a black whole, were a black whole don't fuckin care if your immortal or fat, you will die

:3

Yes, I love anniversary Aizen. His original octopus-butterfly hollow design was ugly so I'm glad he's back to being the fashion icon he is.

Locking Aizen up underground once is one thing, doing it twice after saying he got more powerful by just sitting there, and he escaped to battle the Quincy Soul King God... is another. I think he should have escaped at the end of the Quincy arc. That is the only feasibility.

I heard the anime is coming back for the Quincy arc as well, but because of COVID its probably going to be delayed. (I'm not gonna watch it until the Rain section of the arc then I'm dipping out. I'm only here for Zangetsu)

and funny that you mention that hell scene in the manga :)

-> spoilers for the new BLEACH 73 page anniversary chapter / thoughts/critique on it

So hey you had a premonition! Syazel .... returned? And his hole is outside of his body??? for some reason???

(I didn't understand the explanation or why / how that happens and what that means for the hollow)

And my friend and I were laughing because out of ALL the things. Kubo could do in this anniversary. He gave Syazel his dick back after going to hell. That is iconic. (that's where his hole was located, and now that its not on his body ... well...) This is the funniest thing Kubo has EVER pulled. Kudos to you, sir.

The entire internet is freaking out over Ukitake being in hell. Honestly Kubo has done far worse, and we've established that Soul Society is a corrupt system that hasn't changed, so I'm not surprised he would pull something like this.

At the same time, Kubo 1. cheated his audience. 2. continues to prove me right that he cannot bring himself to kill his characters

1. Hollows who have commit murder in their human life are sent to hell. Syazel and Aaorniero are two of these hollows, and yet, when they are killed, there is NO gates of hell scene. We see them there later in the hell chapter (which was more of a promotion for the fourth movie and I didn't believe it would hold any merit)

But the same goes for Ukitake. We never see the gates of hell take him. What, was hell late? Did hell's gates get lost like an uber before picking him up? It's bull. Withholding such vital information from your audience, not showing the gates of hell when they should pick up this soul IMMEDIATELY is ... I mean its a lie. Kubo lied to his audience.

2. Now we are told powerful shinigami are sent to hell when they die. First of all that sounds like a security threat. Wouldn't shinigami want revenge for that? Or attempt to escape? Why would they still hold loyalty after being sent to a prison of eternal suffering?

Also "Yhwach and Aizen" were the only ones keeping Hell's gates closed is way too convenient and doesn't really make any sense. I feel like Aizen should have deliberately gone to hell to retrieve powerful shinigami / hollows for his army instead of keeping it /closed/.

This is definitely a Kubo-doesn't-know-what-he's-doing-and-is -making- stuff-up-as-he-goes, but it might have a pinch of merit because of previous plot lines.... but either way, there's some big plot holes here, but again, its Kubo, so I expected nothing less.

Again, he can't kill off his characters. He introduced zombification, he introduced immortality through the hougyoku, he has Orihime and Hachigen's reversal / rejection abilities. He brought back Luppi, friggen.... a character who's entire upper half of his body was incinerated. Like.... come on. No. He's dead, you can't bring him back like that. That's a cop out and just weird. You're taking away consequences and grief.

(Also Yamamoto and Unohana deserve to be in hell far over Ukitake, they've done some fcked up stuff in their pasts unlike him)

Also Kubo's favorite character is Mayuri, which.... you're allowed to have a favorite problematic character. But Keeping said character alive and bared from the consequences of abusing his daughter, murdering innocents, and experimenting on your own squad members? Nah. Nope. Kill him, Kubo. Kill this dude.

(his weird attachment to Mayuri is probably why he keeps bringing Syazel back, since Syazel is Mayuri 2.0, but Syazel is the bad guy who does face consequences for his actions while Mayuri is not)

~

Also, I'm certain Kazui and Orihime are going to be THRILLED that their precious husband/dad is going to hell when he dies :)

(I just... Rukia teased Ichigo about leaving Orihime at home. She teased him about having a house wife who he leaves all the chores to. Orihime had two panels. She checks on her son who promised he would be at home and sleep. Kazui fcking breaks his promise like it never mattered to him and JUMPS out the window after pretending to sleep in front of his mother. ... An 8 year old... alone... in the middle of the night.)

Orihime is abandoned. She is not invited to SS, she is not informed of what is going on, her son leaves her.... I...

Orihime is a side character. She doesn't matter anymore. She hasn't mattered for a long, long time.

A part of me is glad she had little screen time, since she tends to waste it, but another part of me is embroiled with rage.

I've even see people try to defend this. "Orihime and Ichigo can't be together ALL the time, that's an unhealthy relationship!" and I'm like guys... that's not the point. The point is Orihime is not part of Ichigo's other life. Any shinigami stuff from now on is none of her business. She's going to stay at home while Kazui and Ichigo go off and save the world. Ichigo is going to be fighting by Rukia and Renji while Orihime watches from the sidelines, or worse, doesn't even know what is going on with her husband and son. Orihime is going to be uninformed and abandoned, because she has not proven she is capable of fighting by their sides(go on, @ me. I will fight this. She's a failure.), and also because she prefers a human life over a dead one. Which is ironic, because she married a dead man. Ichigo is a shinigami, and he will be one forever. god forbid she ever meets his Zanpaktou. She would tremble in fear at the monsters her husband harbors in his soul, especially when she realizes they don't care about her and would rather see her dead. (Zangetsu would absolutely kill Orihime. Not sure about Kazui, but Orihime has not accepted Zangetsu, she does not like either of them, and the feeling is assuredly mutual.) frick now I want to make a comic about this

Also still frustrated over Zangetsu's shikai / bankai regression. Kubo once again lied to his audience. Ichigo has no bankai. How ridiculous is that? The main character of BLEACH doesn't have a bankai. Insulting.

(RIP to Chad. He doesn't exist anymore. He's just gone. No mention, no cameo. Gone.)

Kazui is a demon child. That character from the novels? Hikone? They're the same character. Literally same personality, same power level. Its worse because Kazui is a liar. He constantly goes behind his parents' backs. He can summon creepy fish and creepy eyeballs and open portals like is ANYONE aware of this? How has SS not kidnapped Ichigo's son and experimented on him / locked away his powers yet? All substitute shinigami require a reiatsu controlling / spy badge to keep them in line. Where is Kazui's? Or is he just a weird fullbringer?

I was worried Kubo was gonna try and pull a knock off Boruto but luckily he kept the focus on Ichigo and the others. But that being said, Ichika and Kazui are now just... sort of there? Kazui was kinda just.... having his own adventure that doesn't matter to the plot at hand, and Ichika had some nice characterization at first but she just hid behind her dad the whole time.

I have a feeling Kazui is gonna step in at the last minute or do some major behind the scenes thing that indirectly interferes with the main plot so no one will realize how powerful and dangerous he actually is. Its sad because Ichika is the superior character in personality and likability, but she clearly is not going to have a bigger part in this.

Ichigo having a normal life after everything still feels extremely boring and uncomfortable to me. Everyone's like 'I'm still bLEACH!" but.... BLEACH just... doesn't feel like BLEACH anymore. It hasn't for a while now.

~~~

There's two new shinigami characters. Didn't care for the girl, but the Sign Language kid who talks to animals is adorable ... however... he just reminds me of Chad, and I just... it hurts knowing Chad has essentially been deleted. Chad and Orihime are officially benched. They have chosen the human world, and Orihime has given Ichigo his spawn so she has no more use/purpose to him anymore... ////sigh

~~~

Also. This is claimed to be a new "arc". So is the BLEACH manga coming back? What is happening. I thought Kubo was tired and didn't want to do BLEACH anymore. I thought Shounen Jump cut him off. People made so many excuses for Kubo and why the past two arcs have been so badly written the past 6 years and now almost everything they've attempted to defend him with has been revoked.

BLEACH is going to continue to screw up its plot lines and characters, so Its probably best for it to stay dead but I've seen a lot of Kubo stans drooling over this content, they're desperate for BLEACH's return, but its already given out all its possible revelations. There's really nothing else to top here. It's just going to make things up as it goes along ,and I'm not really here for half-assed writing like that, especially since the damage of rushing the previous manga has already been done. Kubo and Shounen Jump are riding off a money nostalgia. None of this was planned.

Honestly though.... overall feeling of this chapter, not as bad as it could have been.

Syazel stole the spotlight, and he's my friend's favorite character, so that's all that really matters.

[olderthannetfic]

"the internet has become accesible [...] instead of only certain privileged people" are you saying dumb and ignorant people (often poor or barely hanging there enough to have internet access) are the ones ruining your precious spaces, be them fandom or not? / "monetization of fandom" Ignoring ffnet and wattpad, what about the people who takes fanart/fanfic commissions? Are all the same "capitalistic ghouls" taking advantage of the oh so sacred hobby of fandom? Not everyone is a creator

--

That's quite a chip you've got there, nonnie.

In the 90s, you needed a lot of privilege to be online. That level of privilege makes you less likely to have trouble making rent. Thus some of these issues were fundamentally less likely to come up. (And offline fandom always required certain resources/geographical locations/etc. to access also.)

On the whole, I think fandom (and the internet!) being more accessible now is a good thing. It does, however, mean there are going to be more culture clashes: between new-to-fandom people and fandom Olds, between Olds of different fandom traditions, between people with very different offline lives, etc. I don't place any particular moral judgment on the existence of clashes. It's just a natural and inevitable outcome of more types of people rubbing elbows.

Yes, there is a double standard with regards to fic and art. People have explained its nature and why it exists ad nauseam. I'm not going to rehash them all here for such a disingenuous ask. Fanlore covers it amply.

My take from the legal side (I am not a lawyer and this is not legal advice) is that all of it is on thin ice. Fan art regularly gets the axe despite people thinking it's safe.

My take from a social side is that none of it is necessarily bad full stop, but a space with creators and audience is fundamentally different from one of peers in a gift economy. The former is monetized youtubers. The latter is AO3.

There are plenty of fan artists and fan art fans who dislike what the commercial factor has done to art spaces, and there are plenty of fic-focused fans who are jealous of the profit-focused art spaces.

I choose to use my labor to build more of the not-for-money spaces. A lot of different people built AO3, and when they did so, they too chose to put their efforts towards a space that was not into monetizing. It's fine to not like that style of fandom... It is not fine to disrespect all that labor by posting your patreon on AO3.

Build the space that reflects your values. Go to spaces that do the same. Yes, obviously, that means multiple spaces reflecting multiple understandings of what fandom is.

Too often, I see people upset that I'm prioritizing this anti-profit model as though I'm taking away something they had an equal right to. But, in fact, I'm talking about me using my labor how I see fit and taking my friends with me.

I'm not quite sure where you're going with "not everyone is a creator". Not everyone draws or writes well, but in the "fannish gift economy" understanding of fandom, things like posting good fic recs are one of the gifts a fan can bring to the community. Anyone who wishes to put in a little effort can participate.

It's possible to have a real life that precludes putting in a little effort, and that's very sad, but I'm talking about community building here, not consumption. I wish 100% lurkers joy in their lurking, but by definition, they're not part of my community because they do not interact. They do not have social ties. This isn't a judgment but a neutral description of fact.

I subscribe to a subculture model of fandom that focuses on the social ties between members as opposed to a model that focuses on concrete products produced by fandom. This difference in approach is behind a lot of the really intense failures to communicate among people analyzing fandom.

[bnhaficsforthesoul]

BNHA characters and their genshin experiences

I've been way into genshin for the past couple months, if anyone wants to play with me message me (I'm lvl 45 rn) but be warned I have shitty internet and am a partial razor main

but this is mainly characters I can see actually putting time into genshin

Bakugou

Mains: Yanfei

his main has probably been most every pyro character at some point

he wants diluc so bad, whenever someone else complains that diluc ruined their pity he wants to ruin their existence

before yanfei his main was probably hu Tao

hed definitely play klee if he had her lmao but he doesnt and is patiently waiting for her rerun

he has a lot of 5 star characters and is f2p, he can always get banner characters within at least the first pity, but for standard 5 stars hes gotten keqing and qiqi way too many times and hes livid

especially as a previous hu tao main, he was begging for Jean, still has yet to come home

hes probably a very high level, not fully maxed out considering he hasnt been playing all that long, he was probably forced to start when the rest of the bakusquad started playing it and he just took off

has really shitty artifact luck though, like his characters arent bad or anything but they could be so, so much better

and ugh hes livid

explores everything, has 100% exploration everywhere, but hes not bored hes still got artifact farming to do and he enjoys terrorizing enemies

in co op he will set you and everything around you on fire. cope.

Todoroki

Mains: Xiao or Ganyu

probably only started playing because Izuku asked him to

kaeya has also been on his team since day 1 and he is never leaving doesnt matter his friendship has been level 10 for weeks now who cares

was f2p until xiao, who didnt want to come home at all, and he finally got him on his 180th pull

now he doesnt care and will buy primogems whenever hes bored

he has a lot of constellations on kaeya and hes so proud of that, probably c4, is considering buying way too many primogems just so that he can hopefully get his c6

now his artifact luck is godly, you'll go into a domain with him and be like ugh I got nothing and hes like I got a 4 piece set with all attack or crit rate/damage main stats like haha I hate you

but yeah his characters are very strong cause of this, but he doesnt put effort into building a lot of them, he only levels up and gives good artifacts to his team and a couple other characters he likes but everyone else just sits there for a while

hes not super obsessed with the game, but he does think its funny seeing bakugou get so upset whenever they do domains together

doesnt even bother doing daily tasks really unless hes trying to save primogems

Midoriya

Mains: Venti

hes so good at building characters, like he looks up builds online and watches those "do INSANE damage with these tips" videos - and he sets out to get them done and he does

bakugou is once again livid whenever they play together, because Izuku barely has to try and can do so much more damage than him

he does have to put in a lot of work for his artifacts though because he doesnt settle for the okay ones he needs the absolute best

he builds his favorite characters the most ofc, but he evenly distributes things to other characters he knows can be useful- those characters might not have insane stats but they're still good

will not kill timmies pigeons, hell hunt birds in the wild for fun though

definitely a food hoarder

also does a lot of exploring and probably has at least 90% for each area

Kaminari

Mains: Lisa

he is 1000% in love with Lisa, he took her quest very seriously

and so many people say shes horrible, he hates it, hes made her crazy strong out of spite

his team consists of only his wifus- meaning lisa, beidou, rosaria, and mona

for a long time beidou was his second but then rosaria came along and hes like ugh big tiddy goth gf, but lisa still remains queen

these are the only characters hes built though, save for a couple like probably razor and xiangling that he used before he fully got this team

is an ayaka saver

he doesnt care too much about most 5 stars but will sometimes get them just to say he has them, but they end up just sitting there rotting away because he never puts work into them

he does have hu tao though and would get ganyu if she ever had a rerun

Kirishima

Mains: Diluc Razor or Beidou

they're all on his team, the last person switches out but it's most likely zhongli or childe

hes all about dps, support who, he just wants to hit hard and do insane damage , so yes he made dps zhongli

except his builds arent that great, with some help his builds are decent, but on his own hell be like ugh that's some sexy 300 damage

probably didnt know what 90% of the stats even meant and just put random attack ones on people and went yeah that looks good

doesnt really care though and is just having fun so hell play how he wants (as he should) but he does have to ask for help when farming bosses

loves exploring but misses so much, hell get distracted easily and end up just messing around

honestly probably hasnt bothered to ascend his world since he got to level 35, if he did the quest hed probably go straight to 45 and even then hed still have extra exp because hes been there for so long oml

but eventually he would have to and hed be trying to do it like :,) this is fine and it takes him a lot of tries but he gets there eventually,,, only to immediately have another one waiting for him poor baby

Mina

Mains: Klee or Xiangling

thinks baizhu is hot (and is correct) so shes desperately waiting for him

was a I must play 24/7 player until after the last story quest, then she got kinda bored but still plays frequently so she can save primogems and likes playing co op

goes into random peoples worlds a lot

shes got some pretty strong characters and is proud of her account

definitely makes tiktoks of her playing with the bakusquad cause it's always v chaotic (it's probably only denki and kirishima most of the time, but sometimes either bakugou or sero will join in)

does all the genshin tiktok trends

shes a pretty high level since shes probably been playing for a while and has most everything done

she loves helping lower level people though she thinks it's so cute and loves the power she feels when she one shots things

Sero

Mains: Xingqui

hes a pretty casual player, kinda only plays when hes bored or the others make him play with them

but his stats arent too bad, they're fairly average but he gets by

has so many primogems because he doesnt bother to wish on anyone, probably wants kazuha though

he does get super invested into the story though, hes so curious about the world and where the story is gonna lead

probably watches a lot of genshin theory videos and now he over thinks everything in the game

he explores a lot, not so much to find every single thing but more so just because he likes looking at everything, hes very excited for all the new places

Shinsou

Mains: Childe

hes a very thorough player, he explores a lot and puts a lot of work into building his characters

most of them arent all that great but he has plans to fix them

his main team is very well built, not the best, but still good

he struggles when he has to switch someone out for a domain or something because his other characters are so painfully mediocre right now and he feels so bad

shinsou, playing a character that can do like max 200 physical damage and biggest damage is like 2 thousand, repeatedly saying I'm sorry, I'm sorry, you deserve so much better, I'm so sorry

even if it's not the worst damage by far, he feels bad about anything under his main team's stats because they're just so much higher

broke. has no primogems. spent them all on childe and his constellations. does he regret it? well he sure does appreciate his c6 so- hell manage

yes he spent real money on his stupid mass murderer who he loves very much

fights childe every day even though he already collected the treasure, he is but a humble simp

probably decently lucky with wishing like he can beat the 50/50 almost every time

Tamaki

Mains: Chongyun and Sucrose

he only started playing recently, probably kirishima got him into it, but he immediately fell in love

kirishima was like tell me when you're level 16 so we can play together !!! and 2 days later tamaki was level 16 and kiri was shook because how the hell did he do it so fast

hates domains, the dread he feels when he realizes the lower level isnt going to give him anything anymore, and he has to move up to the next, and the next,,

asks kirishima to help him only to realize he isnt much help, is too nice to say that so he let's kiri keep trying- one day kiri gets deku to play with the two of them and tamaki almost cries because finally he can get through the level 90 domain and actually get things ugh

cannot get xingqui to save his life he refuses to come home and poor tamaki is so sad he wants him a lot hes even got all his materials saved up

Monoma

Mains: Ningguang

honestly doesnt play all that much but takes pride in making his account seem v good, is a whale

but hes very good at the game, didnt know what the artifacts were for at first and gave people ones based on how they looked but once he figured it out hes fixed them

is a very standard player, logs in every day to do his commissions and use his resin then logs out, he doesnt put too much time into the game and doesnt worry if he misses a day or two

worships ningguang, also really likes xinyan, his other team members are probably venti and albedo

has every single banner 5 star that has come out since he started playing, probably doesnt have klee though and is v upset about it, and is thanking the heavens for all the reruns lately

also doesnt have keqing and wants her a lot cause he likes her

accepts every single co op request he gets, and despite what a lot may think hes actually a very nice person to play with, not toxic at all - unless you're someone he knows then he might be mean to you shshshsh

Shigaraki

Mains: Razor

haha isnt it so odd that they sound so similar haha (if you dont know they have the same japanese va and I'm guessing hed play it in Japanese)

obviously he can be kinda busy ya know being a criminal and all that but when hes not he puts a lot of time into genshin

sadly doesnt have very good luck when it comes to characters or artifacts, but hes doing his best even with 0 primogems and his 50% crit rate

doesnt explore all that much, most of the exploring hes done came from him trying to get all the oculus

his razor is so good though, except that's the only character hes put tons of effort into

except for now zhongli, hes not replacing razor but ugh does he love zhongli

but his other characters are pretty mediocre at best, he could build them if he wanted to, hes good enough at gaming to figure it out, he just doesnt have the time to spend to do it so he focuses on his main team

also (spoiler alert kinda) when we had to go to the wolf spirit to fight the abyss herald and razor was there, afterwards how razor was saying how he was too weak and stuff and was super sad, at that very moment shiggy decided the entire abyss order had to be destroyed - sorry aether (he chose lumine) but razor is more important than you