#bc we understand each others experience better than any white friend we make will

[sprimpfriedrice]

White dungeon meshi fans sound like this to me:

It's extremely fascinating and frightening to me how hateful some of you people are towards shuro, a man who is clearly depicted as japanese, (a man who could look like me or literally any member of my family in real life) for being a normal, complex, and flawed human being.

Why do you single him out for getting frustrated with and mad at laios when chilchuck and marcille do the same literally all the time? What's the difference between them and shuro?

Why do you feel the unnecessary need to protect these white women from a japanese man?

Do you expect that this japanese man is inherently going to have some kind of ugly negative quality that has not been once hinted at canonically? Do you know what that's called? Because i do and it's fucking racism.

You people get scared the moment a character that is a person of color isnt a quiet little model minority or a sweet mammy archetype. You grasp at your pearls the moment they are revealed to have complex personalities and histories; when they feel negative, big emotions that are literally part of the human experience. Or god forbid, when they show romantic interest in a pure, helpless, little white woman.

And when a person of color stops behaving good and docile the way you want, when they decide that theyre not going to put up with a situation that makes them uncomfortable or miserable or RIGHTEOUSLY FURIOUS, they become the bad guy. As seen countless times in the medias demonizing depiction of the Black Lives Matter protests and even of black people who get punished for just living their lives. It happens so often i shouldnt have to reiterate it to you but it somehow keeps flying over your head.

And when that dirty, conniving, perverted, slant eyed, buck toothed, stumpy little japanese man understandably snaps at the white person you guys are projecting onto and all you see is this:

So dont be surprised when i say that id rather kill myself than entrust the safety of my oldest aunts and uncles or my youngest cousins with any of you who act like this. Im terrified of what could have happened if people like you worked at the facility that my great grandmother lived out her final years in. Would you have seen her as a wild animal that needed to be subdued too when she had one of her many dementia-induced violent episode?

I will not apologize for saying that i find it deeply disconcerting to see so many of you happily posting hateful vitriol or even about committing acts of violence against a man that looks like me, solely because he was experiencing his humanity

[featureenvyproductions]

my thoughts on how to do Basically Kinda cel animation but cheap as fuck. strap in this is a long post and there are many swears PART 1

Really long intro

ok so I was animating my thing the other month right, and I was going to infodump on how I do cel animation without the right training from the comfort of my chaotic mess of an office. But I got into it and I was like "my god, I'm going to have surgery in a few months and my gofundme has accumulated dust, I can't be buying fucking $1/each cels and more paint". that got me thinking like....MOST people are probably like "wow I'm broke as shit I can't do this" even if they want to, but I think you can, so I took a couple weekends to hurl myself face first into seeing if I could do this - the version for if you're broke as fuck or don't want to spend money.

Obviously if you want something good quality AND you don't want to make this a struggle, splurge on good supplies like real cels and paint if you have the money. But if you don't or you just want to fuck around, this info dump is for you.

Disclaimer: I'm not a professional (if you can't already tell lol 👀👀👀) and I have no idea if this is what cal arts would approve of or whatever the shit but to be brutally honest, I also don't give a fuck, they're too busy fulfilling their role as the gatekeepers of the human-expression-to-corporate-tax-write-off pipeline to watch your heartfelt if low res artistic expression so come join me in this pit and let's just do whatever the fuck we want with whatever we got.

My goal is to give you ideas so you too can do the fucking thing. It's not gonna be Snow White. It's not gonna even be Steamboat Willie. That's fine. The point is to do the thing anyway and make some shit you wouldn't have tried otherwise. (And share it with me here on the internet bc I'm bored and depressed. If you feel like it) because sure you can go and pull up your 2d animation software and rig some shit up and blow anything I can do by hand out of the water in about 3 min flat but THATS NOT THE POINT IS IT THE POINT IS THAT YOU TOO WANT TO EXPERIENCE ART AS SUFFERING AND MAYBE ALSO UNDERSTAND THAT SOFTWARE DOESNT MAKE ART FORMS OBSOLETE.

Anyway let me just stow this soap box under the counter real quick.

There.

K So I'm gonna go through how I tackled this challenge - cheap ass cel animation - starting with prep, then the drawing steps, then getting the shit into some form where you can put all the frames together.

Prerequisite suggestion

This ramble assumes that you at least vaguely understand how drawing works and understand the basic idea of how animation works. How to animate overall - like the principals of animation- is a wee bit outside the scope of this post, in no small part because I know there are a BILLION people out there who understand those principles and execute them better than I do. I think I followed some of Aaron Blaise's videos to learn, but there are also other tutorials on YouTube. I also just learned from watching pencil tests and filming references of my long suffering friend in which i gave her instructions like "ok NOW put your hands on your hips dramatically in the direction of that rock". But yeah like I said the principals of animation themselves are better off taught by someone who isn't me (and I'm honestly still practicing).

Alright that's enough intro. Let's start with setup

FINALLY THE INGREDIENTS LIST

Most of the stuff in this ?tutorial? is really probably honestly laying around your house right now, especially if you live with any 50+ people who have ever had an office job. But I will talk about costs anyway in case you're starting from scratch. I found pretty much all of the stuff at Dollar Tree, and yeah, it's not an ideal place to go, but also this is a tutorial for if you're broke. And also unlike things that you have to repeatedly buy that cost you more per unit in the long run, most things you are using here are one time necessities, so you really are saving money. ....Now I'm in the US. If you're not in the US, I think there are also similar stores in other places....It'll be similar to something like if there's a shop that sells stuff for 1-2 euro or whatever. Things at dollar tree range from about 1-5 bucks, but I managed this with the $1.25 items (some were actually less than that but I lost track of my receipt).

You will need the following shit for part 1 of this vaguely educational series:

The smallest cheapest strand of fairy lights you can get. Mine were battery powered, doesn't really matter either way. If you can get white ones get white ones. (I could Not find white ones :/)*

Batteries if they need batteries *

An 8.5x11 drawing pad (at the dollar store I got the 64 pg one)

A translucent container with a flat bottom. I got a little 8x12 storage basket for this. You probably can't get anything big at the dollar store but try to get something with a bottom as close to the drawing pad size as possible (it's ok if it's a little smaller) *

Scissors (or a knife/craft knife you don't mind destroying. You may want safety goggles if you don't have them. These also exist in dollar tree)**

Clear tape**

Something small and tube like. Maybe plastic straws. I actually used flagpoles from those tiny flags, you know the ones (ok these in the picture are NOT from dollar tree and i will provide excuses later on in this document. You could also use straws i think)

Hole punch

Super glue (or the strongest adhesive you can otherwise get if this isn't available to you)**

pencils (I don't know why I didn't take a picture of them but you're on the gay art website I feel like you've probably seen a pencil in your life)

sharpie (you'll use it more later but you might as well get it now)

A pack of sheet protectors (you may or may not need more depending on how many frames you're doing but for now one will do but for this first part you only need one)

* this is part of an optional component but you WANT TO HAVE IT TRUST ME

**if you are REALLY not in the mood to buy these things and you don't need the tape/scissors for the above optional item, you can technically just go to FedEx and like make a cheap b/w self serve photocopy of something to avoid the employees yelling at you and then quickly go use their choppy thing and the tape and scissors they have laying around in the self serve area. They may have a hole punch too idk

And now FOR THE MAKING PART

First thing to make: substitute peg bar

Some things I'm doing here are optional, but the one that really isn't is the peg bar. That's the thing that keeps all your stuff lined up. Without this your frames are going to be moving all over the place and movements won't register the right way. It's got (if you couldn't guess) pegs on it. And these match up with the holes in your paper or cels.

This is a real peg bar

I think this is like 16-20 bucks if you buy it on Amazon, maybe a smidge cheaper if you go through someone else (I will discuss traditional animation supplies for when you're NOT broke as shit in another post). The problem is that this is for acme punched paper (notice how two of the holes are long). Yes it helps things register better, but we're going to be punching our own paper and a 700 dollar acme punch is NOT in our budget today.

There is a version of a peg bar you can get that fits normal hole punch holes. But this isn't the buy things the easy way tutorial, this is the broke as fuck tutorial. So we're going to be making this shit.

Steps to make the thing (I'm sorry about this list not being numbered apparently even when you fuck with the html directly you can't put images in a numbered list on this webbed site):

Ok first we need some cardboard or cardstock. Something sturdier than regular paper. OH GUESS WHAT WE HAVE THAT. If you don't have other stuff to use laying around, take all the backing cardstock off the drawing pad. Be careful to keep as much of the adhesive stuff left on the actual paper as possible.

We're going to cut that into strips. Keep them as straight as possible. They should be like 1/2-3/4 in wide.

(You may want to skip ahead in the steps a bit to see how we're using this so when we use tape in this step you can avoid putting it where the pegs go. You don't have to but things will stick better) Stack them and tape them together as tightly as possible. This will be the bar part of the bar.

Take one of your page protectors and place it on the bar and try to center the middle hole on the bar. Trace that hole onto the bar and pick two others to trace (pick circle ones that fit entirely onto the bar).

Now we make the pegs. You will use the flags for this (or straws, see flags and note in the Ingredients TM list) So I actually had these pride flags from Walmart (please remember we are trying to stay dirt fucking cheap here, I promise I don't usually go to Walmart at all.) Bc my dollar tree doesn't have them yet, HOWEVER I KNOW THEY WILL BECAUSE IVE GOTTEN THEM BEFORE so technically by the time I finish writing this you will be able to get them there most likely. Now the great thing about cheap flags is they're cheap. That means they use shitty hollow plastic tubes as poles. That's great for us because we are going to snip off the ends and use them as pegs. You want to measure up a 1/2 inch from the bottom and cut them. Do this on 3 SEPARATE flags, because you want at least one perfectly flat end for each (that's likely the factory end, so keep track of which end that is). You can also use plastic straws for this probably, or paper sticks for thick lolly pops. The idea is whatever you use needs to fit the page protector holes.

Take your super glue or other adhesive and put a little on the "pegs" and attach them (factory side down) to the bar where you marked the holes in step 4. (note that the pic shows that I taped both this and the thing you're making next to the leftover cardstock to keep it all together, which is an option but you don't have to if you like to suffer)

Let this dry while we work on the next part.

Second thing to make: "light box" (I use this term COMICALLY loosely. Optional but you will have an easier life if you have one)

This is the LED Light pad I use for animating. If you can afford like 30 bucks, just splurge and get one. It helps you cheat and see your previous pencil drawings under the current one so you can better draw the current frame. (And before you ask yes I know it looks like I dug it out of apocalypse aftermath rubble I will not be taking criticism at this time,,,,)

If you can't afford that, we're going to MacGyver together a little apparatus that works basically the same way. The "we have LED light box at home" if you will.

(I mean you can also just tape a peg bar to a window and go at it which is free but your arms are going to hurt drawing like that. You can also just get really good at page flipping while drawing. I am NOT good at that )

Steps to make the thing:

Remember how I made you get a plastic container with as flat of a bottom as possible? (It can be flat on the inside or outside bottom doesn't matter) We're going to mutilate that. Put on your safety glasses if you have them and you're scissor-cutting something that tends to crack rather than bend because the occasional plastic shard will fly off. Cut the sides off the container. It's probably easier with a knife but I was all about suffering. Try to get as much of the sides off as possible. It's ok to leave some of them if that's the side you'll have facing down. (For me my container had an annoying hard to cut rim on the bottom so I just decided to cut the sides off entirely and have that side down).

Take your fairy lights out and unwind them. If you have battery powered ones... Pry the cheap little battery compartment open (you can see there's a screw driver there so use one if you have it but this plastic is so cheap you'll probably be able to just bend the cover and pry it open and rotate it out of the way tbh) and stick the batteries in. We do this first to make sure the lights work before we waste time using them.

Cut a little notch in the side of your plastic piece where the wires can go.

Flip your plastic piece so that the side facing you is the side you want facing down the rest of the time when you're actually drawing on this thing.

Feed the wire from the battery box (or coming off the plug if no battery box) through the little notch , with the battery box OUTSIDE the plastic area, and tape the wire in place.

Now arrange the strand so you have as even as possible a distribution of lights all over the plastic, and tape the wires down to hold the arrangement in place.

Flip it back over and switch it on. Voila shitty light box. Now you can't put a lot of PRESSURE on this but it'll do the job. You can see like 1-2 previous images through it too believe it or not. And this is with these horrible yellow lights I found, if you have brighter ones it should be more effective. (Now switch it off so you don't eat battery life)

Now let's get the paper ready

Now that the first part of your setup is done you need shit to do your pencil tests/preliminary animation on. (The thing you'll eventually trace onto the cel)

Take the paper you removed the backing from. We're going to mark and punch it. We'll be punching from the ADHESIVE/PERFORATED SIDE. This is important because it will help keep the pages and therefore holes aligned when we take the hole punch after it.

Here's how you go about it for the best result in my humble opinion:

If you made your peg bar as above, you've already removed the cardstock cover of your cheap drawing pad so go to step 2. If you haven't, then remove the cardstock cover/backing from your pad now. Try to keep the adhesive intact as much as you possibly can (basically you want to keep the pages from slipping when you eventually punch them so they need to stay in a neat little stack. If you're having trouble or you're having to use a different type of paper such as ink jet paper, you can probably also achieve this with binder clips in a pinch- is that what they're called? the black things? look like 90s butterfly hair things if you squint? Just make sure the paper is stacked evenly and the stack is held firmly together. )

Still trying to keep the adhesive holding the stack together as much as possible, carefully separate the paper into 2 or 3 smaller stacks. (ignore the hole markings in this picture I took it after I realized I needed to demonstrate this step)

Take one stack and put one of the sheet protectors over it, lining the side with the holes up so that that edge is along the perforation in the drawing paper (if you're using a different type of paper than the dollar store pad, line the edge of the sheet protector up with the edge of the paper, but move it about 1/8th to 1/4th inch away from the edge. basically you don't want the holes right on the edge of the paper). Trace the holes onto the paper with a pen or pencil. (Note: if you're using a manufactured peg bar, use that to determine the hole placement instead of a sheet protector - it'll be easier to modify the holes in sheet protectors if necessary later).

Carefully, keeping the stack of paper all lined up and together, punch each of your three holes with the hole punch. (The reason you made stacks is that do you really want to do this with each individual page? I didn't think so)

Ok Let's Try It Out!!

Alright here's a shot of me using this to draw some frames from my animation about some creepy deer (coming soon to a feature envy productions official tumblr near you). You take some paper and carefully place it on the pegs, sketch a key frame, and then place another sheet over that on the pegs, switch on the "light box" and sketch the next key frame, referencing the first one. (Oh and of course make sure you're drawing on the smooth side - not the side you taped the lights to). Like I said, this is definitely like. If you have no other options you might as well try it - You generally can see through about 3 sheets of paper in a dark room. At least the key areas. So you should be able to in between with this setup as well. Not great but hey! If you're on a strict budget, you can still do this, and it beats buying a bunch of expensive shit on Amazon. I'm pretty confident that most people have almost all of these items laying around their house like I said, but let's break it down - If you're like me and you animate at 24 fps but on 3s, that's an average of 8 frames per second. So for each pad of dollar store paper, you're getting about 8 seconds of animation (maybe more, maybe less). You can factor that in when deciding how many drawing pads to purchase (keep in mind if your backgrounds are very simple, you may be able to use the additional cardstock for this purpose as well instead of using up sheets of paper).

Stay tuned because we're not done yet!

Part 2 will be Inking and painting. (Note: on the day I'm writing this I have a placeholder post there, but if it's still a placeholder when you look, please keep checking, I will add the second part, I just didn't want someone to have to HUNT for it if you're looking at this from like a year from now) Yes ink and paint. You didn't think I was getting you all excited for a vine's worth of pencil tests were you? no we're doing the whole expensive process from pencils to final product. And I'm going to show you the cheapest way I could figure out.

[itztlislost]

i quit my retail job

hey y'all, it has been months since I've been active. the last time i reposted something, tumblr immediately terminated my account. I was able to get it back after emailing customer service, which they apologized that it even happen because they don't even know why it happened. weird, but whatever.

anyways, I was inactive because my mental health was my priority. I cut of friends, stopped doing the things I liked and much more just to maintain a baseline of 'ok', which wasn't great considering my only interaction was people at my job of a cashier at a grocery store.

I ended up quitting when the workplace took a turn for the worst, both coworkers and management becoming toxic and I only had one work friend who kept their head on straight. I'm not going to say we never did anything wrong and that it was everyone else being assholes, that isnt true and I don't believe it was anyone but managements fault.

I'm not really sure what caused for this shift to happen, I was too focused on my own problems at the time before i eventually noticed. basically, everyone was in a bad mood, constantly. we all had problems with everyone and each other, we all wanted things and refused to compromise without complaints. The holiday season ended, hours were cut along with all this and management decided to play favorites. white employees got to keep their hours while the rest of us didn't even get the bare minimum of 20 hours, even if we were apart of the union. I know the managers have favorites, we all do, but they suddenly didn't care about being fair.

I was already fighting a losing battle with hr, all the while I was working 10 hour shifts three days into being of my 300ml Effexor and suffering the worst of my withdrawals at the customer service desk. I finally had a breakdown and meltdown, so bad I woke the next morning unable to speak or open my eyes because of the hours long of me screaming and sobbing the night before. do to how bad I was suffering, I called out sick and included all this information which i did not have to and shouldnt have. I genuinely care about my co workers and managers, I didnt want them to think I was faking being sick and I wanted them to know I had stuck it out for as long as I could all things considered. Instead of understanding, I got a huff in reply a dry 'are you sure? fine, ok'.

after that call I proceeded to spend the rest of the day and my days off screaming and crying while I waited for my doctor to fix whatever mistake set this off. that being said, it made me realize how little my work place cared. I built so many friendships with everyone at work that I tricked myself into thinking that this location and management could be any different than corporate or any other chain. Next day, I put in my two weeks and went to stay with my fiance while I got back on my meds.

I'm doing better now and figuring out a better path since I refuse to go back to working retail. the customers were actually the best part of the job imo, good and bad interactions alike. so yeah this was mainly a vent and also just a reminder to myself every time I come back here to remember how horrible that experience was. but hey, let it be a cautionary tale too i guess. Take your meds, call and make sure they get refilled a week or two before you're out bc trust me you may think they'll refill it fast but don't risk it. also retail sucks major doo doo, quit on the spot once you see any red flags. you're disposable to them, make them disposable to you.

[nevermindirah]

Do you have any thoughts on the use of AAVE for Nile (or lack thereof) in TOG fanfiction? I've been reading some Book of Nile fic and some writers seem to write her as a Millennial™ (using words like "fave" and "woke") but never acknowledge her Blackness in her patterns of speech. I know we don't see her use as much AAVE in the films, but I would argue she's in situations where code-switching would be valued (first in a "professional" environment in the army, then around a group of non-Black strangers).

Hi anon! I have many thoughts on this and I'm honored you asked me! But I should start by saying I'm white and any thoughts Black fans and especially Black American fans have on this that they want to share would be beyond lovely. (I'm not gonna tag anybody bc that feels rude but please add onto this post if any of y'all see this and want to!)

The main reason I personally avoid AAVE for Nile in my own fics is because I'm not Black. But Nile-centric fics by Black writers tend to avoid using much of it too, at least from what I've noticed/understood, and my guess is it's largely for the reason you mention, that she's in situations that encourage code-switching.

In movie canon Nile is highly competent at tailoring her language to each situation she finds herself in. This fantastic linguistics analysis meta shows how skillfully Nile chooses her vocabulary and grammar to meet her goals with different conversation partners in different contexts. In comics canon Nile had a bunch of different civilian jobs before joining the Marines, so she would've had experience code-switching in the ways that made sense for all those different contexts as well as the Marines and her family and high school and wherever else she spent her time before we met her. And now she's spending her time with a handful of immortals none of whom are native English speakers and a fellow Black American but one with a Queen's English UK accent whose professional experience is in the CIA where high-status code-switching is often an absolute must for success or even survival.

Fics featuring Nile are charged with extrapolating from that to how it might show up in her use of language that she's coping with a traumatic separation from her family and her career and pretty much everything she's ever known and now she needs to be able to make herself understood to people who seem to care about her and each other but are super duper in crisis, three (soon to be four) of whom predate Modern English entirely and the only one who's anywhere near her contemporary she's not supposed to talk to for a century. All of these people are telling her that pretty much any contact with any mortals poses an existential threat to her and the rest of the group. How the FUCK is she supposed to cope with that, like, generally? And would it be a more effective way for her to cope if she talked to Andy Joe and Nicky using the speech patterns that she used to use with her mom and brother, to at least retain that part of her identity even if it means having to do a lot of explaining, or would it meet her needs better to prioritize Andy Joe and Nicky understanding what she means with her words over using the particular words and grammar forms she used with her family?

I've seen several fics, both Nile-centric / BoN and otherwise, explore this a little bit in how/whether Nile uses Millennial™ speak. It's often a theme in Nile texting Booker despite the exile because of the popular headcanon that he as The Tech Guy is the only other immortal who understands memes. But Nile's much-younger-than-Booker mom probably uses Boomer and/or Gen X memes and Andy has been adapting to new communication styles for forever as evidenced by her canon high level of fluency with standard-American-accented English.

Which brings us back to people avoiding AAVE because they're not Black and they don't want to make mistakes (or they're not Black and they don't want to get yelled at for making mistakes, though I think many people overestimate how much they'll get yelled at while underestimating how much these mistakes can hurt). I can imagine some Black fans hold back from using much AAVE in fic because they don't want to share in-group stuff with white people who are likely to then adopt and ruin it, as white people so often do with Black cultural stuff. Some links about this including a great Khadija Mbowe video. I'm saying this gently, anon, because you might not know: woke, an example you cited as Millennial™ speak, is AAVE, and that's gotten erased by so many white people appropriating it and using it incorrectly online.

And also there's the part where fandom is a hobby and you never know when you're reading a fic that's the very first thing someone's ever written outside of a school assignment. This cultural considerations of language shit takes a level of effort and skill that not everybody puts into every fic, or even could if they wanted to because they haven't had time to build their skills yet. It's definitely easier for non-Black fans to project our millennial feels onto Nile than to do the layers of research and self-reflection it requires to depict what Blackness might mean to Nile, and it's not surprising that often people sharing their hobby creations on the internet have gone the easier route. There's not even necessarily shame in doing what's easier. It's just frustrating and often hurtful when structural white supremacy means that 3-dimensional Black characters are rare in media and thoughtful explorations of them in fandom are seen by the majority of fans as not-easy to make and therefore Nile Freeman, the main character in The Old Guard (2020) dir. Gina Prince-Bythewood, has the least fic and meta and art made about her of our 5 main immortals.

I've been active in different fandoms off and on for twenty years and I barely managed to write 5,000 words about Sam Wilson across multiple different fics in the 7 years since I fell in love with him. There's an alchemy to which characters we connect with, and on top of that which characters we connect with in a way that causes us to create stuff about them. Something about Nile Freeman finally tipped me over the edge from a voracious reader to a voracious writer. It's not for me to judge which characters speak to other individuals to the level of creating content about them, but I do think it's important for us to notice, and then work to fight, the pattern where across this fandom as a whole Nile gets way less content, and way less depth in so much of the content that's in theory about her, than any of these other characters.

Anyway, back to language. My two long fics feature Nile with several Black friends — Copley and OCs and cameos from other media — but all of those characters except Alec Hardison from Leverage aren't American. It's very possible I'm guilty of stereotyping Black British speech patterns in I See Your Eyes Seek a Distant Shore. I watched hours and hours of Black haircare YouTube videos in the research for that fic and I modeled my OCs' speech patterns on what I heard from some of those YouTubers as well as what I've heard people like John Boyega and Idris Elba saying in interviews, but the thing about doing your best is you still might fuck up.

I'm slowly making progress on my WIP where Nile and Sam Wilson are cousins, and what ways of talking with a family member might be authentic for Nile is a major question I need to figure out. For that, I'm largely modeling my writing choices on how I hear my Black friends and colleagues talking to each other. I haven't overheard colleagues talking in an office in a long-ass time, but back when that was a thing, I remember seeing a ton of nuance in the different ways many of my Black colleagues would talk to each other. Different people have different personalities! And backgrounds! And priorities! A few jobs ago my department was about 1/3 Black and we worked closely with Obama administration staff many of whom were Black and there was SO MUCH VARIETY in how Black people talked to each other, about work and workplace-appropriate personal stuff, where I and other white coworkers could hear. There are a few work friends in particular who I have in my head when I'm trying to imagine how Sam and Nile might talk to each other. From the outside looking in, God DAMN is shit complicated, intellectually and interpersonally and spiritually, for Black people who are devoting their professional lives to public service in the United States.

One more aspect of this that I have big thoughts on but I need to take extra care in talking about is the idea of acknowledging Nile's Blackness in her patterns of speech. There's no one right way to be Black, and Nile's a fictional character created by a white dude but there are plenty of real-life Black Americans who don't use much or even any AAVE, for reasons that are complicated because of white supremacy. (Highly highly recommend this video by Shanspeare on the harms of the Oreo stereotype.)

Something that's not the same but has enough similarity that I think it's worth talking about is my personal experience with authenticity and American Jewish speech patterns. My Jewish family members don't talk like they're in The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, and I've known lots of people who do talk that way (or the millennial version of it), some of whom have questioned my Jewishness because I don't talk that way. That hurts me. Sometimes when another Jew tells me some shit like "I've never heard a Jew say y'all'd've," I can respond with "well now you have asshole, bless your Yankee-ass heart," because the myth of Dixie is a racist lie but I will totally call white Northerners Yankees when they're being shitty to me for being Southern, and this particular Jew fucking revels in using "bless your heart" with maximum polite aggression, especially with said Yankees. But sometimes I don't have it in me to say anything and it just quietly hurts having an important part of me disbelieved by someone who shares that important part of me. The sting isn't quite the same when non-Jews disbelieve or discount my Jewishness, but that hurts too.

Who counts as authentically Jewish is a messy in-group conversation and it doesn't really make sense to explain it all here. Who counts as authentically Jewish is a matter of legal status for immigration, citizenship, and civil rights in Israel, and it's my number 2 reason after horrific treatment of Palestinians that I'm antizionist. But outside that extremely high-stakes legal situation, it can just feel really shitty to not be recognized as One Of Us, especially by your own people.

It can also feel really shitty to be The Only One of Your Kind in a group, even if that group is an immortal chosen family who all loves each other dearly. Sometimes especially in a situation like that where you know those people love you but there are certain things they don't get about you and will never quite be able to. I'm definitely projecting at least a little bit of my "lonely Jew who will be alone again for yet another Jewish holiday" stuff onto Nile when at the end of I See Your Eyes Seek a Distant Shore she's thinking about being the only Black immortal and moving away from the community she'd built with a mostly-Black group of mortals in that fic. Maybe that tracks, or maybe that's fucked up of me.

Basically, this got very long but it's complicated, writing about experiences that aren't your own takes skill which in turn takes time and practice to build, writing about experiences not your own that our society maligns can cause a lot of harm if done badly, it can also cause a lot of harm when a large enough portion of a fandom just decides to nope out of something that's difficult and risky because then there's just not much content about a character who deserves just a shit ton of loving and nuanced content, people are individuals and two people who come from the exact same cultural context might show that influence in all kinds of different ways, identity is complicated, language is complicated, writing is hard, and empathy and humility and doing our best aren't a guarantee of avoiding harm but they do go a long way in helping people create thoughtful content about a character as awesome and powerful and kind and messy and scared and curious and WORTHY as Nile Freeman.

[space-city-traffic]

yet again im back on my bullshit so... (gazes with mixed feelings at the TV show Firefly) i could fix him.

my extremely long thoughts about my Own Personal Good Version of Firefly (with plenty of spoilers for the show and the movie) under the cut:

things that are getting axed first thing no question:

out with the whole “let’s add in a thin veneer of Chinese cultural aesthetics out of context for ~flavor~” deal. just no.

instead, let’s hire some actors from a bunch of different cultures and work with them to figure out how their characters would bring those cultures into space with them!! and also hopefully bring some experiences with immigration/alienation/travel into it, since the Whole Core of Firefly is about how humanity always brings our doomed and silly and stubborn and unique warmth with us even into the cold void where nothing is familiar or homey in the slightest.

let’s respect our sex worker character shall we?

i do appreciate that Inara’s work as a companion is described as legitimate and well respected in the show. however please stop having your captain and hero call her a wh*re every five seconds against her clearly expressed wishes and portraying this as just a totally acceptable thing

let’s be more respectful of our characters of color and also have some more diversity, shall we?

others have put it better than me but yeah, the way Zoe and Book are treated is very uncomfy, and the rest of the show is depressingly monochromatic. come on let’s do better.

stop the weird confederacy hat tips

again others have pointed these out with much more thoroughness than I could, but the names of some characters and locations, as well as some of the language used to describe the browncoats, has uncomfortably confederate vibes. instead i propose we very Clearly tip our hats to the Alliance equaling space capitalism instead! you can’t go wrong with space capitalism as a villain.

don’t! make! the! psychotic! character! violent!

listen i love River Tam with my whole heart. but you should absolutely not portray your only character with psychosis as violent because of that psychosis!!!!!!! and yeah, a huge part of her character is that her brain got fucked up by the alliance and so she hallucinates and is also a super ninja. but like. she doesn’t need to be a super ninja for her character to work, okay? the crew does not need to be scared of her for her character to work, okay??? more on this later bc it would take a lot of care and nuance to make her character work but i really think it can be done

things we are absolutely keeping:

found family tropes my fucking beloved

this should be self evident. this is why the show is as appealing as it is despite its flaws, at least in my eyes.

malcolm reynolds, the knight in dusty armor

there’s something so appealing to me about what Mal stands for. because at his core is this ridiculous, silly, stubborn, doomed devotion to what he thinks is important and right, a romantic idealism thinly covered by cynical cowboy platitudes that he thinks make his bleeding heart totally invisible. and he is so obvious and entirely incorrect. bless. this is a man who will do anything for his family, who charges into swordfights to defend his friend from a man who wants to turn her into an object despite having no clue how to hold a sword. at his worst, he starts brawls in bars just for the martyr’s thrill of being persecuted for supporting the right; at his best, he inspires downright religious belief from his crew because he represents a romantic and chivalrous and doomed dedication to the right thing over any practical concerns. and then he throws a “selfish��� quip over it with 100% confidence that everyone fell for his clever distraction and believes him to be a dirtbag. he’s oblivious and ridiculous and god he makes me want to be a better person because he’s just so goddamned sincere. stupid, but sincere. 10/10 himbo. <3

Mal and Inara ultraslowburn friends to enemies to friends to lovers to enemies to friends to lovers to friends to...

there’s nothing i love more than a ship that’s just two people who know each other way too well, and they’re each the only one who knows the other well enough to call them out on their bullshit. the way Mal and Inara interact in the show sometimes makes me uncomfy but like. the core of their relationship has to stay.

space western aesthetic

i need the cows on a spaceship scene to stay like i need air okay

that sweet sweet religious shit

mal, who lost his faith in gd and a whole lot else during the war. who lost his faith in himself, and now feels he has to hide the part of him that still wants to be good, because he knows he can’t be anymore, and he feels like it’s embarrassing for a guy like him to want something so unattainable. who takes a preacher on board, and the preacher has lost something, too. the preacher has his own past, and his own questions. but not questions like the observant neurodivergent girl, the one who wants to interact with and understand this thing that’s so important to him, but it just doesn’t click with how her brain works and she feels like something needs to be fixed, either the Bible or herself. and Mal takes care of them all, and slowly, he begins to find gd again, not in a prayer but in humanity. humanity doesn’t need to be fixed, like the alliance thinks. the shining imperfect strawberry sweetness of it in his family’s smiles is something to be worshiped and served and devoted to. and he finds he has something to believe in again. (and his crew find that he’s given them someone to believe in, too. and maybe suddenly he’s a saint.)

and finally, my brilliant ideas as to what i would like to add:

TRANS WOMAN KAYLEE RIGHTS

listen her femininity is so important to me okay? it’s so thrilled about everything that’s pretty, from dresses to the spaceship’s electric innards, and it’s so non-traditional and grease stained until it’s not and it’s pink and ruffly and twirly, and she never sees any of it as a contradiction, because none of it contradicts, it’s all just her! her gender is warmth and love and prettiness, feeling pretty and appreciating the pretty and making her friends’ days pretty too.

i want us to find out she’s trans in that episode with the ball, and i want us to find out alongside Mal who just never asked or never realized. Kaylee gasps and squeals at the dress in the shop window and Mal makes an off handed, ill considered comment, and then... someone yanks him aside and hisses a few very significant words in his ear. and suddenly he remembers what the blue white and pink she painted all over the engine room means, and he knows he has something to make right. so he buys her that dress himself and lets her know just how pretty she looks, and when he walks into that ball with her displayed on his arm like something precious, he looks the proudest out of any man there. and she notices. for a few seconds, of course, until there’s chocolate, and ‘nara, and a chandelier—and some horrible girls, but she’s used to that, until—suddenly, she finds her people. a group of old men who light up when she jokes about compression coils and whack presumptuous boys who ask her to dance. they adopt her as a treasured granddaughter, and Mal is beaming at her like a proud dad, and she finds that one of her new elderly friends gazes a little too long at her bracelet, and so she gives it to xem and teaches xem a few new words, and... it’s a good day, huh? it’s a really good day. (of course, then the captain has to go and punch somebody in the face, but it was a real nice party up until then.)

also she and Simon are both transhet t4t im correct and you know it

time for a better River Tam

the first thing we’ve established is that this version of her is not unpredictably violent and the crew is not scared of her!!!! it makes no sense to take a kid who’s primarily brilliant, experiment on her brain, give her telepathic powers....... and tack on the fact that she also has super strength and speed and dexterity and what not, AND say that they programmed her to be super violent. no! no. not only is that extremely harmful rep, that’s also just stupid.

instead!! my version of River is in fact not terrifying to the crew, but is actually the one they feel safest around. River has always been totally blunt, she was one of those kids you could tell realllllly early was autistic, and she doesn’t like being disengenous at all. so you can always trust her to tell the truth and not play weird passive aggressive games or have any hidden agenda, which makes her just a really chill person to be around. also, one of her longtime special interests is music and dance, so whether or not she’s nonverbal on a given day, there will always be some sort of beautiful sound when she’s around. she does have the singing voice of a dying crow unfortunately but that’s ok bc Simon’s is even worse and they’re both incredibly competitive so you’ll at least get free entertainment out of the affair.

my version of River does have psychosis and hallucinations because of the trauma of the experiments, and they are really troubling to her. she and Simon work together to find ways to cope and meds that help, and it’s a process, but there are some things that help.

the only thing she gained from the academy was the ability to hear people’s thoughts and sense the future a little bit. and yeah, that led to her picking up a few spooky secrets at the beginning, which, yikes. and for a while, it was hard to figure out which voices were real and which were hallucinations. but around her friends, she always feels safe to ask “did you just think about triple cheese burritos or was that just a me thing?”, and they’ll always tell her the truth no matter how embarrassing their thoughts are, bc it’s important to all of them to respect her and help her sort accurately through what’s reality and what’s not. and bit by bit, she gets better and better at figuring out what kinds of things tend to be telepathy and what kinds of things tend to be psychosis, and that each one feels a little different. and because of the trust and respect and support of her found family she’s able to do that in a safe environment!!!

trans man Simon rights

listen i wanted to keep him as just a side note on Kaylee’s list but he is my son and he’s important to my heart so here goes

out on the outer rim where Kaylee’s from, gender ain’t much of a big deal, there’s an individualistic quality to life out there, and so if the trail you blaze is the trail of a woman or a man or neither or both, that’s respected even in the rare cases where it’s not outright encouraged. but in the inner planets, where competition and connections and public faces and family names are everything, you have to be what’s expected of you to survive. you can’t change your brand, you can’t be anything other than what your family planned for you since before you were born, it’s incredibly hard to survive in such a hyper competitive environment, and so your very identity becomes just a tool in how to market yourself for better success.

needless to say Simon (just as autistic as his little sister and also very trans) fuckin hated it there. but he was very good at it. correction: he was very good at his very specific field of STEM, good enough to where people stopped talking about how cute he looked in bows and started talking about how impressive his work was from a very young age. and his work had no gender. he could be whatever he wanted to in equations. so that was where he could express himself, and gd, he got so much praise for it, he never wanted to stop.

not until he discovered that his sister needed him, and ran away, and needed a disguise, and realized... suddenly, every stifling rule and prying eye was a million miles away. he was freefloating, freefalling, with none of the charted paths he’d been following all his life... so you know what? fuck it. he’s always enjoyed the name Simon. and since it’s not on any legal records, it’ll make him just that much more untraceable.

and on Serenity, starting over with new people who never knew him before his transition feels like an unbelievable blessing that just dropped right into his lap. he has to keep up the secrecy, he has to make sure they never find out who he used to be, because gd, it’s so nice when they look at him and say his name right, and he doesn’t know if he can handle losing that, not when it’s so new and so important to the person he’s finally becoming. but then one day, the unthinkable happens, the wanted posters for his arrest have an old name on them, they’re looking for the Tam sisters, and... nothing changes. the crew of Serenity could not give even a tenth of a percent of a fuck, and it doesn’t seem like they even know they’re supposed to. huh. that’s new. Simon could get used to that, he thinks.

i’m sure there’s more i could add, but it’s 4:30 in the morning now, so if more occurs to me, ill simply add it in a reblog tomorrow. if you’ve read down this far, i am in love with you. please let me know your Better Firefly ideas, too, bc im always down to yell about this show!!!

[constellaj]

16

Please talk more about your reboot!

16: If you could change anything in the show, what would you change?

okay so how i would re-do CANON is completely different from how i would talk abt a reboot so im gonna touch on a couple things in both contexts! the reason for the difference is canon rewrites imply i can go back in time and introduce dp fresh and new, before anyone knows what it is; but for a reboot, id be working with an audience that has a better understanding of the source material, so i dont need to spend as much time explaining, but i also need to keep everything recognizable

Valerie

REWRITE: i would def make it more danny's fault that her dad lost his job, like danny was intentionally being reckless and shattered some security stuff, and he has a whole mini lesson about learning to not just run in guns blazing. i would probably remove the dating stuff with her and danny (and tuckers crush) too, I think them wanting to be good friends is good enough for freshman year

REBOOT: the fandom already knows valerie exists, so i would actually skip the whole shades-of-gray introductory episode and have her be present as the huntress from day 1-- probably even before danny got his powers. cujo is also HER dog, and her backstory-- we'd find out in like, season 1, that a natural ghost portal (maybe one wulf opened) ripped open on her dog and killed him, and since then shes had a vendetta against ghosts cause of how reckless they are and their disregard for life-- of course, cujo isnt actually dead. cujo is a halfa. a puby halfa. anyway instead of a hoverboard she actually rides cujo around cause he can fly and its big and epic. valerie has BEEN amity parks ghost-eradicating superhero for at least a year (tho shes been in the shadows abt it) and her hatred towards danny actually just becomes really petty, like them flying next to each other chasing skulker just going "I got this. no I got this. no I got this" and they just get in each others' way and its a mutual grudge.

BOTH: i am NOT keeping in vlad giving her the suit to watch danny under any circumstances. it was only utilized half assedly in canon (when vlad couldve just had an invisible duplicate watching him instead) anyway, and I dont have any reason to keep it in a reboot either. instead i want her tech to be a combination of half-stolen and half-gerryrigged stuff and she slowly slowly learns how to build her own.

I also dont want anyone knowing her secret identity, except maybe her dad, and sam or tucker. i think it works better if danny isnt privy to this magic info

Freakshow

REWRITE: i would honestly just remove him. the episodes hes in arent particularly interesting, theyre just generic "we need a plot about x" filler and he's not compelling enough a character (at least in writing) to carry a better plot that another antagonist couldnt. i'm serious

REBOOT: unfortunately in a reboot he's gonna have to pop up somewhere or else ppl will be like "where IS HE" so I'm going to stick with running some kind of ghost circus, maybe a few occult things, but cut out a lot of the spooky magical knowledge and mcguffin stuff. maybe i could make him like, someone from vlad/jack/maddies college who always felt pushed around by them and so he has a vendetta? and theyd be the only reason he even learned abt ghosts in the first place. idk in either way I want to force him into being irredeemable but also include LYDIA (the tattoo girl ghost) way more-- I want to give her an arc that ends in her tossing freakshow aside and running off to be a ghost vigilante.

BOTH: dear god the infinity gauntlet is stupid that needs to GO AWAY. especially for the reboot cause it would exist in a post-mcu world and way too many people would complain about it

Vlad

REWRITE: amp him up to a far more sinister and villainous character. the crushing on maddie isnt enough, I want to show him on-screen performing experiments on ghosts and himself, dismissing everyone else cause he thinks hes smarter than them. i want him to be actively sabotaging the fentons at every turn. i would also clarify that he doesnt actually want danny as a son, but as a trophy-- a line where danny says something along the lines of "you don't want a son. you want a slave". i want to make him a character who wants to destroy the entire planet and put it in the ghost zone so he can be the true ghost king and i want to make this all evident from day one. if i'm writing a series villain you can bet i'm going to write a GOOD one. less petty drama here and more actual stakes.

REBOOT: it seems silly but sense with reboot we have the benefit of hindsight and recognizing that vlad wasn't a big series villain, theres no way i'd actually go back and write him to be such. for starters, of course, theres the fact that anything he does would really be an exaggerated part of the original, and it would bore an audience to see the same story again-- theres also the fact that it doesnt seem right to take a character who was treated as a joke half the time and suddenly make them big and important. no, instead for my reboot i want to lean into the petty gay uncle vibe. he had a crush on jack and now just casually insults him. he moves mansions every now and again by just haunting the family who lives in the one he wants, and taking over-- i mean, who is gonna believe that an actual ghost haunted you. he dislikes danny not because he has some concept of 'evil' and 'good' but bc danny is just too damn active. of course he actually does care about danny and his safety deep down, it's just on the surface they have very conflicting motivations-- not to mention that danny has been raised on legends from his parents of the villainous Wisconsin Ghost, who has to be stopped at all costs.

BOTH: i want jack and maddie to KNOW he's a half ghost and to actively be hunting him down for it, maybe bc they think hes possessed, or been a ghost tricking them this whole time, or the victim of a tragic lab accident who needs to be put to rest, etc. whatever the case it will give vlad actual tangible reason to despise them and genuinely suspect they dont have dannys best interests at heart. i think it would be neat if vlad was cynical and every time danny hit him with the "I'll expose us both. at least theyll still love ME" vlad could be like in the back of his head "oh god theyre going to kill this child"

Dani

REWRITE: cut her out. we don't need her character at all. maybe replace her with a more ominous shadow duplicate / clone that actually looks like danny himself and doesnt really have a name? you could probably combine her and dark dans characters for their arcs

REBOOT: instead of a clone from vlad, she's a guys in white creation using some of dannys dna after he was captured (and vlad broke him out bc he was like "ugh i guess i have to save this child")

BOTH: vlad actually cares abt her (duh), shes nonbinary (double duh), she gets the funny dissolve into goo powers

i had more i thought i was gonna write but this post is already very long and also im running out of coherency for this LUL

[kim-ruzek]

It’s been a week since the finales and while I’m over the moon about fire, I’m still so conflicted over pd, specifically Adam and how he talked to Kevin.

I know they’re brothers and the show will have them get over this, but if my white friend said what Adam did? I wouldn’t look at them the same way. I’d lose a lot of love/respect that I had for them.

And a lot of people (of a certain color) are saying it’s not a big deal because of the situation? But like those are his real thoughts, his filter is just gone. Maybe I’m just being too sensitive tho.

I’d love to hear your take on this. If your comfortable sharing it.

I've been thinking of this ask all day, of how to answer it. Because honestly, I have SO many thoughts on this, but I was debating if I should say them all or just sum up but I decided that I'm just gonna speak my mind!!

I, too, have a lot of complexed and conflicting thoughts over this. And I have to say, with stuff like this, with racial issues, you can NEVER be too sensitive.

Firstly, I agree. Kev and Adam are brothers, and the show will have them get over this, it wouldn't be realistic otherwise. But I really do hope they do it in a good, believable and decent way. Because I also agree with what you said about if my white friend said that shit? A little bit of my love and respect for them would be forever tarnished-- at least until I see some REAL improvement, which would take a minimum of a year to properly heal.

This fandom is a real good fandom, but yeah, I HAVE seen a lot of white fans not treating this like the big deal it is. The majority DO accept it's a big deal, but at the same time, they don't seem to truly get just how big, like how they think Kevin and Adam will have to move on from this is quite watered down.

Now, where I stand:

I watched cpd for Kim, Adam and Kev. I got into it for Burzek, and fell so hard in love with Kevin immediately. So when Kevin and Adam fight, I find it really hard because they're my boys! But it's necessary, and I think will help them become even more tight once Adam gets his head screwed on straight.

I do agree that they're his "real thoughts", but my take is that it's a little more complicated than that. Like Adam is a bit of a hothead, and that moment? He was more scared than he's ever been, and Kev, in his mind, is the only other person who loves Kim as much so when Kev did what Adam took as a "betrayal", Adam was angry. And that was shitty. And he should be accountable for that, AND for what he said.

But I think calling them his real thoughts is a little simplistic. They're thoughts that's going to be in his mind a lot, obviously, because Adam doesn't fully get this. So there's two layers to this:

One: People say things out of anger. I've got a temper, and I keep it under control obviously, but it's there, and when you're angry, especially betrayed and hurt, you just want to hurt people the same way you are. And when it's someone you really, really love? You say things you have maybe thought when you were a little annoyed but rationality won and reminded you it's a stupid thought, things that you KNOW will hurt.

And I think that's what this was. Obviously you do this, no matter what the reason, you need to fucking apologize and grovel. Like I'm not saying you shouldn't because I really don't think that. Especially as someone who's said really hurtful things out of anger, I PASSIONATELY believe that you should be held to a high standard about your actions. Because anger is not good, it's an ugly emotion, and you have to fight it.

Two: I definitely think those things are stuff Adam has thought before. I mean, thoughts in anger rarely appears out of nowhere, they're there in the background. But this isn't necessary a bad thing, or makes Adam a bad person. Like we ALL have less than nice thoughts, it's human nature.

And for Adam, he tries, he really does, but the man just Does Not Get all the deep complexities of the police reform. So I think his stance is, he doesn't get it, but he goes along. There's been those times he's argued, but I think most of the time when he's confused, he kinda just...has one of those thoughts but doesn't express it because he KNOWS it's more complicated than that, even if he doesn't understand it.

So when Kevin and Adam fought, Adam got ANGRY, because he felt scared and betrayed, and that's when he voiced all these thoughts he's thought before but kept inside because even though he doesn't understand why or how, he knows it's more complicated. But he was angry because Kim was in danger, and suddenly, it didn't seem logical or rational to keep by book.

Okay so now I've said that, onto what I think this means and how I want this go moving forward.

Adam was a jerk. What he said to Kevin was such a low blow, and things are going to be fractured between those two. And I think nothing Adam feels towards Kev has changed, but I do think they'll be that little emptiness in Kev, because hearing your white best friend say that? Ugh. Pain.

In a general sense, I think they'll be fine. But they can't be as close as they were, without Kevin feeling some sort of distance without any closure.

So in season nine, we definitely need our boys to have a conversation. And not just one, but several. And we need to see Adam make some actual changes to his beliefs. Not just half assing it bc he knows he's wrong even if he doesn't understand the complexities of why, but actually challenging his own beliefs and learning.

I think one of my main problems with this fandom (the white fans) is how much emphasis is put on both Adam and Kev seeking each other out to have a conversation. That's just wrong-- Adam should be the one. None of this, fixing this, educating Adam is on this is NOT in any way, shape or form is on Kevin.

What Adam said is hurtful, and I think Kevin still loves Adam, still sees him as his brother. But siblings don't always get along, or even like each other, even if there's that I'll-die-for-you love. And I think that's where Kevin is at. Adam hurt him, and that's gonna do some damage, and so even though Kev does understand, he's not gonna seek him out or try to fix it AS HE SHOULDN'T, because that onus is purely on Adam's shoulders.

Like. I think what white fans don't get is just how exhausting it is always having to understand, always having to be patient. Like yeah white people don't get the ins and outs like we do, so we're forced to always be understanding bc while we have to learn these things from our first days, they're just learning now. But it's exhausting, so that's why I really hope they have Adam seek Kev out, not have Kev approach him to talk about this.

(it's always why I love how they had Kevin full on yeet Adam, and beat the crap out of him. Poc always have been portrayed as patient when cruel remarks are hurled at us from people we love in anger, and I'm happy they showed Kevin snapping. Bc that was not on, and Kevin was just as worried about Kim, and Adam implying otherwise is wrong. It's also though why I also love that as soon as they were pulled apart, Kev stopped fighting/looking so angry quicker than Adam).

Like I'd be okay with Kev just saying, simply, to Adam "you don't ever say that stuff to me again." And that's that. But for them to actually have a conversation about this, has to come from Adam and HAS to start with an apology.

And Adam has to actively do better. Like no more just accepting things are different even if he doesn't understand, he HAS to learn everything, all the ins and outs, all the complexities, until he lives and breathes it as much as any white man can. Because I can't see Kevin having what was fracture ever feeling completely solid again without that.

And I do like that the show went there, because it's necessary and I think it's the best position for Adam to realise just how Shitty he was. Because Kim was found-- by the book. Like most of his anger was from how in the past, they've gotten their results by being off book, so I think in Adam's mind, he thinks that's the best way to secure safety. But it was by the book that found Kim, and I think that will really make Adam realise that these enforced policies DON'T make it harder to secure their own safety.

Also, Adam's presumably going to spend a lot of time around Makayla, and so forth, will probably get a lot of firsthand experience of seeing racism or it's affects. Like I know we wish he'd see if bc of Kev, and he does with a lot, just not other stuff, but it's different when you're seeing it through the eyes of a little kid, not a grown adult. And I think this will make Adam a lot more humble, which will help patch things up between him and Kevin.

And then there's Kim. People often forget how when you have multiple white friends, when you're hurt, your more knowledgeable friend steps in. Kim gets this stuff a lot more than Adam, even if she can never understand like Kev, and so I can COMPLETELY see her teaching Adam more stuff. Like because she'd want to help her boys, because Adam's a part of Makayla's life, because Kevin shouldn't HAVE to be the one to educate Adam, whereas Kim can bring him up to her own level, and that's when they rely on Kev.

So I think overall, I'm not that conflicted over PD because I'm really hoping this will spark deeper conversations and that Adam will grovel and fix his ignorant stances. And I hope to god they let Kevin heal and forgive in the way he should be allowed to.

I have a LOT more thoughts on this, including how I hate that they only show Adam's ignorance when a lot of the unit is also Not Great, and about partnerships and how Jay and Kev should be going forward. But this is getting really long now, so I won't delve into that or this any further. But I might, especially if it's wanted, because I have so many thoughts.

Also, thank you for sending me this ask!! I am ALWAYS comfortable sharing my thoughts on this fandom (about anything really, racism, sexism, ships ect) but especially the racism and the racial storylines and issues. Sorry it took so long to answer; I've been thinking on it all day, wanting to give you the best answer I could!!

[wreckofawriter]

Jelly Slugs

Pairing: Harry Potter x reader

Word Count: 2,278

Warnings: Swearing, a little angsty, still plenty of fluff

Song to Set the Vibe: broken ~ lovelytheband

Request: @mcluuvin666 hi could i request a harry potterxreader in which the reader & harry always seem to find each other in the hospital wing at the end of each year because of harry’s adventures & somehow she always ends up hurt in a funny/ironic way even though it wasn’t her intention to get caught in their messes if that makes sense? either way harry & the reader get really close throughout years of ending up in the hospital wing w the reader being frustrated w the trio bc they’re the “reason” why she’s hurt and she’s just kinda like “you lot are going to be the death of me” but harry and reader end up going out anyway. lots of fluff and maybe angst if you can? thank you so much!!

A/n: Once agian so sorry this took so long! It may not be completely edited, excuse typos, I wrote litteratly all of it tonight. I'm trying to burn through my requets, if u sent one I got it I'm just waiting to get to it

    At eleven years old you had already had far too many near-death experiences, for you that meant one. You hadn’t meant to do anything at all, well except grab some snacks from the kitchen after hours, but it wasn’t anything you hadn’t done before. On your way back your ears had picked up a sweet symphony and you had grown curious. 

Turning a few unfamiliar corners you found the room, its heavy door ajar. You pushed it all the way open, a pastry still stuffed in your mouth preventing you from screaming. A large three-headed beast lay in front of you snoring loudly. Before you could turn and run your eyes found a small wooden trap door at its feet. The phrase your mother often scolded you with echoed in your head, Curiosity killed the cat. You about turned on your heel but then the ending of the saying learned from an equally mischievous classmate came to you, But satisfaction brought it back. 

You dropped the food in your hands and walked hesitantly towards the large dog. You then quietly opened the door, cringing as its hinges squeaked and peered inside being met with complete darkness. You were going to close the door retrieve your treats then head back to your dorm but as you turned you met a pair of brilliantly green eyes and you let out a yelp before stumbling backward and plunging into the hole with a scream. You were soon followed by three of your classmates almost as confused as you were. 

You ended up getting your arm broken by a giant chess piece on your way to retrieve something you didn’t fully understand and what you believed to be a curse began. 

You sat up in a cold sweat the image of a white stone queen drawing her sword waking you with a start. You rubbed your eyes only to find your left arm in a sling and aching a bit.

“Oh, good you’re awake.”

You turned to your right to see a little boy in round glasses smiling at you. “What happened last night?” you asked eyes wide.

“It’s a long story, but I suppose we have time.” He shrugged, “Jelly slug?” he offered holding out a colorfully wrapped package. 

“Yes please.”

Second year began as normal as it should have but it was soon strange and dangerous, pearlized classmates and strict rules making the school feel less and less like a home. Of course, your luck being about as bad as it got, you where the last victim of the basilisk. 

You had been polishing trophies to serve detention which you got for supposedly bad-mouthing Snape although it wasn’t your fault Draco was a filthy snitch. You then saw a large pair of yellow eyes in the shining metal and everything went dark.

You woke up four days later body aching eyes feeling extremely dry as you blinked vigorously. You had a strange sense of deja vu as the hospital wing soon came into view. Head once again thumping as you tried to recall your memories. 

“Oh right, you're here.”

You turned your head to the right to see a wide smile, green eyes hidden behind round glasses as cuts riddled the boy’s face. 

“Merlin Harry, what happened to you?” You gasped taking in his battered form. 

He shrugged, “I fought Voldemort.”

You cringed at the name but said nothing of it to him, “Again?” 

He laughed, “Yeah, this time it hurt more though.” 

“I’m glad you’re okay.” You grinned at him.

His cheeks reddened a bit, “Yeah, I’m glad you’re okay too.” 

You fell into an uncomfortable silence before Harry reached to his bedside table and offered you a tissue-wrapped box, “Jelly Slug?” 

You nodded taking it from him

Third-year had been downright dreadful for you. You were finally a teenager which basically meant everything that had been easy and quick now seemed to take hours and far too much thought. Every little thing you did you were sure would be scrutinized, it didn’t help when a close friend of yours spread a nasty rumor about you and you found yourself skipping classes and opting to stay in bed. A serial killer being on the loose certainly didn’t help. 

The only sort of decent thing that happened was your friendship with Harry, after two times of healing in the hospital wing together you decided to be at least acquaintances. You held study sessions with the boy and occasionally his two best friends although all they did was bicker.  

You also happened to be outside reading when a rat lept on you and dove down your shirt leading to you being dragged into a tree by a dog who turned out to be a serial killer who turned out to be Harry’s godfather. But to be honest you didn’t really care.

You were absolutely livid, your leg was torn apart and for the third time in a row you had somehow been shoved into an adventure you most certainly didn’t want to take part in and you were bleeding heavily because of it. 

Oh yes, how could you forget? You were also almost killed by your professor, who had turned into a werewolf just in time to almost kill you again. 

When you woke up in the hospital wing with the golden trio surrounding you, you weren’t so pleasant.

A string of foul curse words, pointing fingers and yelling was shot at the three teens who apologized profusely insisting they did not mean to get you caught up in their business. 

You eventually calmed down and found out it wasn’t all that bad considering you got to see the suddenly very attractive dark-haired boy who made a point to spend all of his free time in the hospital wing with you as your leg healed. You shared a large amount of jelly slugs as you read muggle books and did your best to stay on top of studies.

Fourth year was much better than the last. You and Harry spent more and more time together and you felt a large crush on the boy who lived growing. Hermione knew about it instantly and Ron seemed adamant to tease both of you just for the joy of watching your faces flush. But good things never lasted.

You had a heart attack when Harry’s name came out of the goblet and found yourself taking his side in a sudden war between him and Ron. The bitch of a journalist Rita Skita also plastered you and Harry’s face all over the daily prophet when she caught you hugging him before his first task. You went with Harry to the ball although to both of your disappointment only as friends. And you ended up comforting Hermione in the hallway anyway. 

You also were almost drowned by your sorry excuse for teachers in the second task. Never one to back down from a fight you yelled directly at Dumbledor and Karkaroff saying how if your name wasn’t pulled out of that idiotic goblet than you shouldn’t have to almost die for the even more idiotic tournament. Of course, you did this with a very colorful vocabulary that landed you three weeks of detention. 

When Harry pulled Cedric from the maze you had cheered clapping along with the band until suddenly you heard the boy wail like a wounded animal. You raced down to meet him and helped pull him off of the elder boy’s body.

He was shaking the entire time and when you finally managed to drag him away he buried his head into your neck and sobbed. 

Harry was then dragged away by Mad-Eye and you were quick to follow, bursting in on the two just as Moody no longer became Moody. 

“Harry!” You yelled diving at the quickly transforming man who was holding him at wand point. 

Your body suddenly erupted in such harsh pain you thought you might throw up. 

“Y/n!” Harry’s yells fell on deaf ears as the unforgivable curse took all of your attention. 

By the time Harry was able to disarm the man, you had passed out from the pain. 

You woke up in the hospital wing three days later a disheveled Harry seated in a chair next to you his arms folded on your bed his head resting on them. 

When you tapped his shoulder lightly he jolted awake immediately engulfing you in his embrace sobbing out apologies as you pushed yourself closer into his chest. 

“I’m so so sorry y/n, I never meant for you to be caught up in any of this.” He choked out pulling away from you and cupping your face in his hands. 

“It’s okay Harry, I’m okay.” You spoke smiling weakly feeling extremely exhausted. 

“But he used an unforgivable cu-” 

“I don’t care, I’m just happy you’re okay.” You interrupted leaning into the soft circles his thumb was drawing on your cheek.

Harry’s eyes filled with an unidentifiable emotion and suddenly his lips were on your own. 

The second they connected he backed away blushing so heavily you were sure he was hot to the touch.

“I’m so sorry y/n, I don’t know what I was thinking and I-”

You only shook your head and wrapped your hands around his neck bringing his lips back to yours. His hands ended up on either side of you as you leaned back down on the bed bringing him with you. He hovered over you, your tongue slipping into his mouth as you played with the ends of his hair. He tasted overly sugary with a hint of fruit, just like a jelly slug.

You were interrupted by a cough followed by a low chuckle and Harry immediately pulled away from you and you turned to see not only your headmaster but Professor McGonagal and Madame Pomfrey all staring at you. 

Your eyes went wide and you felt so hot you thought you might catch the sheets on fire. You stole a glance at Harry who had paled dramatically, looking sick. 

“I’m glad you’re feeling better y/n.” Dumbledore chortled. 

You hissed in at the pain that shot through your ankle. Your head had also begun to pound causing you to squeeze your eyes shut and attempt to relieve the pressure by pressing onto your temples. Fuck Umbridge. You hopped that bitch was dead, as your eyes began to adjust to the sudden brightness of your surroundings you saw an all to a familiar sight. The hospital wing had become your home away from home and now in fifth year you, it made sense you ended up there once again. 

When your psychotic headmaster dragged you, your boyfriend and your two best friends out to the forbidden forest as she was attacked by a giant she managed to hit you with some sort of spell which effectively left you in your current state. Harry who was seated beside you wrapped his arms around your waist and placed a kiss on your neck.

“You okay?” He asked he seemed stressed, then again when wasn’t he?

“I’m fine.” You lied with a smile pushing his glasses back up his nose. 

“I think you should stay here y/n/n, I can’t have you getting hurt.”  He frowned. You then took notice of the group of teenagers was behind him. They were clearly about to leave. 

“I think history has proven that kind of unavoidable at this point.” You sighed standing up and drinking whatever was on your nightstand, it turned out to be a pain medicine that tasted the equivalent of dragon piss. 

“Y/n...” Harry spoke hesitantly.

You turned to look at your boyfriend, your face set in stone. “If you don’t take me with you I will find another way to that building.” 

Harry sighed biting down on his lip, “Fine. Alright, guys, let’s go.”

Your lips twitched into a smile just as you were about to leave the room you noticed a small half-empty bag on the table next to your bed, you stuffed it into your pocket and ran after the group you had fallen behind. 

You sat silently eyelids feeling so heavy you thought they might close at any moment. Your entire body ached, your headache coming back stronger than ever, but you didn't let onto your pain. 

Harry had his head buried into your stomach as you combed through his messy hair, his sobs were the only sound in the massive black room. Sand was scattered around you as you clung to your boyfriend your back up against a black glass wall as you stared blankly ahead of you. Dumbledore stood a few feet away, seeming almost as lost as you were. Part of you hated him for putting Harry through everything he had just been through, but you knew it wasn’t his fault. 

Harry adjusted himself so his head was buried into the crook of your neck, his arms wrapped around your waist. The movement caused something in your pocket to crinkle, catching your attention. 

You reached into your robe and removed a half-empty bag of candy. You smiled in spite of yourself. 

You tapped Harry on the shoulder whispering his name. He looked up at you his eyes rimmed in red, his face blotchy, the sight made your heart throb.

“Jelly Slug?” You asked your voice cracking.

The boy let out a mix between a laugh and a sob before lightly placing his lips onto your own. He tastes salty and bitter, like tears and blood. You found yourself wishing you were elven again when everything was simple, wishing that Harry still tasted like jelly slugs. 

Taglist:

(Realizing I forgot this last fic I posted, my bad)

@accio-rogers

@roslea

@k3nz-doodl3

@theseuscmander

Masterlist

[non-sequitura]

Non-sequitura Disney in-depth analysis (after making a tier list)

Warning: SUPER longform. If you don’t know a movie well, you should skip the summary. I tried to be light on spoilers, but they’re there.

I went chronologically from favorite to least favorite. So S tier is, in order from fave to least fave, The Incredibles, WALL-E, then Zootopia.

S tier (Something I consider high quality AND a movie I greatly enjoy. I would love more Disney movies be like this.)

The Incredibles - one of my favorite movies of all time, possibly THE favorite. Rockin social commentary, epic action scenes, memorable characters, not a minute of screentime wasted, great take on the Fantastic Four, hilarious parts for both adults and children, an interesting villain, etc. 

WALL-E - I love how social commentary was done here. Also skies above, what a beautiful love story. Really blazed a trail in non-verbal storytelling (especially given it was an animated kids film!) Robot animations are particularly delightful. 

Zootopia - another social message delivered excellently and entertainingly. I love Judy and her persistence, I love the expressiveness of the faces and the epic city setting. I love Judy and Nick's banter. This movie deserves to be remembered longer than it has been so far. Admittedly, not one of my fave villains, which makes it my least favorite of the Ss. 

A tier (either super high quality or something I greatly enjoy and deem of at least reasonably good quality)

Mulan - this movie did everything right. Truly feminist protagonist, an icon for strong Asian women, fairly culturally accurate (tho Mushu confuses me), GORGEOUS and iconic music. Lets a relatively natural romance develop. I frickin love the action scenes, I love the emporer. Sadly, this movie just didn't lodge its way in my heart as well as Pixar did. Pixar just has some magic, yo. 

Cinderella - my gosh what an underrated protagonist. Her family straight-up abuses her and she never loses sight of her goals for a better life. Iconic visuals helped bring Disney out of bankruptcy. A gorgeous alto singing voice. 

Wreck-it Ralph - alright alright ppl don’t crucify me for this. I honestly can’t think of much wrong with this movie. Vanellope and Ralph’s vitriolic best buds relationship is adorable, her forgiveness of him is heartwarming and (relatively) deserved, rockin’ Owl City song, epic visuals that mix together bc of all the different games. ALSO ONE OF THE BEST DISNEY VILLAINS NO CAP. One of the only twist villains I like. And we stan the romantic pairing. 

Tangled - I’ve talked about this a lot, but Rapunzel deserved the whole world after what she’s gone through. That being said, Gothel is not some shallow monster she needs to escape from, but an intelligent, well-defined monster with backstory. I could totally see this story happening if the world of Tangled existed. Epic love story, hilarious dialogue. Music is… good but much of it is less memorable to me. Visuals are good but not quite at the level/creativity of many other disney films. 

The Lion King - they really put Hamlet in Africa and pulled it off lol. But in all seriousness, no one took the premise of this film seriously at the time and it became sooo iconic. I love Scar and his eventual downfall, I love how Simba grows emotionally, I love the sad moments that don’t overpower the overall feeling of light goofiness. And music so memorable it was one of the first Disney musicals. 

Coco - not a super unique story premise. But an incredible culture to explore with such creativity and sensitivity. I love the themes of death not being the worst and music being so central to the story. Twist/twist villain was memorable and not expected. And yeah, it did make me cry, so props there. 

Ratatouille - the most recently watched of these films for me. This movie is soooo unique! Back when Pixar was truly super out there with their concepts. Super Parisian visuals and soundtrack. It somehow starts goofy (THE OLD LADY TRIES TO KILL REMY WITH A SHOTGUN WHILE WEARING A GAS MASK) but really drives home the message that you can truly do what you want regardless of who you are. Colette can get it. And the monologue by Ego at the end is one of my favorites in film. 

Frozen - Anna is one of my favorite Disney protagonists. She’s so resilient and loyal. Elsa ain’t bad either but she experiences… less character development. The film is a tad too pleased with its own self-awareness for my taste, but there’s no denying how iconic the music and visuals were. 

Inside Out - Alright, this movie hits home for me bc I tried to run away after moving. A super thoughtful, heartfelt depiction of (potentially depression? imo) with great moments of humor. Riley’s inner world is so creative and lovely. Also realistic depictions of Minnesota/California culture. 

Tarzan - Jane! is! smart! and! adorable! Her scientific curiosity makes her very endearing. it’s so cute to see her and Tarzan learn from each other. Also Tarzan’s “found mother” is epic. Solid score. Solid film all around. To quote Lily Orchard, “This film is what Pocahontas tried to be.” 

B tier (one of my favorites but has a few significant flaws that bring it down (or not quite as memorable to me, but consider good quality))

Peter Pan - Haven’t seen it in a hot sec, but I remember being super charmed by this as a kid. Just going out, having incredible adventures, and returning to a warm home at the end of the day. Tinker Bell is hilarious and beautifully drawn. Gets major negative points for the depiction of Native Americans tho. 

Big Hero 6 - I was super charmed by the protagonist, his family/friends, and the setting. The plot/villain’s motivations are a bit of a mess, though. 

Princess and the Frog - This movie has so much flavor to it! The visuals/music are lovely and unique. Tiana is incredible but it’s kinda annoying how EVERYONE keeps trying to shoehorn her into romance. The thing is, her goals are entirely reasonable. Focus on her restaurant, then look to settle down. But they’re like “nooo you’re ignoring the important things in life” smh. Also, epic villain, woohoo! The movie dragged significantly for me when they were in the bayou. Charlotte is delightful. 

Winnie the Pooh - don’t remember it super well, but I think it was charming and occasionally dark, which is an addictive concoction. 

The Little Mermaid - MAN ppl roast Ariel way more than she deserves. Visually, it was… fine. idk. This movie is good. I don’t have much else to say about it. 

Snow White - the one that started it all. Visually, super impressive. Musically, lovely. I find the romance a bit… off. Well, more than a bit. What is it with Disney and kissing sleeping people? 

Alice in Wonderland - a nerdy acid trip. Right up my alley! I also like films where ppl go on incredible adventures and return to the status quo, but THEY changed bc of it. Epic. SUUUUPER creative visual interpretation of Carroll’s book. Brave - gosh I loooove films where a parent and child learn to understand each other. Never got why ppl hated this movie so much. The Scottish flavor is present and fun. Merida made one mistake and made it up. The arrow scene is iconic. 

Cars - a fun ride! (hahaha puns.) We love seeing Paul Newman as a car. 

B-minus tier? (same as B, but problematic, or weaker story-wise.)

Hunchback - man… settings-wise, this film might be my favorite. I also love Esmeralda and Quasimodo as characters and as a duo (though the sexualized depiction of Romani ppl is not epic.) I also don’t find the discrimination against Esmeralda/Quasimodo jarring bc it matches the time period. Frollo is super interesting as a villain. The gargoyles are… def not necessary. Basically, this film doesn’t know what it’s doing with tone. 

Sleeping Beauty - Aurora was my favorite when I was younger because I thought she was the prettiest, and that still defines how i feel about this, basically. Visually lovely - everything is kind of elongated and gothic. Maleficent is spiteful and epic. I have no issue with the fluffier parts of the movie, like the music or the fairies. RIP for lack of consent being a plot point, though. 

Hercules - Megara is incredible. one of the only Disney “princesses” who acts like an adult and has cynicism as a major part of her personality. I love her and Herc’s progression where she learns to trust him (yes, he is genuinely that sincere, it’s not a front.) Muses are unique, whoever came up with them was high on something and I’m living for it. I just think the plot itself was somewhat unrealistic/ weirdly-paced. There are some memorable songs, some less-than-memorable songs. Art style is cool but I’m personally not a fan. EXTREMELY inaccurate depictions of the original Greek gods. 

C tier (entertaining, but I don't consider it a great movie)

Bolt - I watched this like 11 years ago. It was fun! A cool concept about those put on a pedestal learning their worth even without celebrity boosting them up. Animation was… fine I think. not super memorable to me. 

Frozen 2 - They really took any scrap of character development Elsa had in the first movie, threw it in the garbage and set it on fire. Anna deserved so much better. Songs are bombastic and impressive, have the occasional interesting lyric, but are really weirdly placed and none are quite as iconic as the first movie’s (except Aurora, she does great work here. Also the song Anna sings after she thinks Elsa died.) 

Not a big fan of the vaguely homeopathic theme. Not a big fan of Olaf’s WEIRD character development. Not a big fan of the suuuuuper awkward dialogue and the animations that imply not only that Kristoff is into his reindeer but that Elsa and Anna are into each other (if you’re questioning if they did that, yes, they did, I can find screenshots of some really weird expressions/moments. THIS IS NOT THE TIME TO PANDER TO YOUR WEIRD FANS, DISNEY.) 

The voice actors did great work, the animators did great work (look at the details on their clothes! Look at how Elsa’s posture changes to be more confident! look at how they're animated while they're singing!) Some weird costume/makeup choices that make Elsa look like an aging starlet, but she also has some gorgeous moments so eh. It’s a wash for me. 

They really did not know what to do with Kristoff this movie, huh. The only thing that happened to him was singing a cheesy 90s ballad and marrying Anna, both of which were admittedly epic. Also, the trolls got 0 appearances despite being literally psychic. Probably could have helped with a lot. I'm not a huge fan of lore/worldbuilding, and thee was a lot of it here. Overall neutral on it. 

Also a big theme in this movie I don’t love - **** TANGIBLE CONSEQUENCES TO OUR ACTIONS!!! The danger is Elsa’s death, the elements, colonialism, and Arendelle literally being destroyed. None of those end up playing out, so I was left at the end going “this film had literally no stakes.” 

Monsters U - same as above - entertaining at the time! Not super memorable. The ppl we were supposed to dislike kept switching. Doesn’t really match the canon of Monsters Inc (I thought they were supposed to have known each other since childhood so why did they meet in college?) 

Cars 3 - so apparently, everyone HATED this movie! Fun! I never watched Cars 2 (yes watched Cars 1 if you haven’t been paying attention to this list), but I didn’t think this movie was bad at all. Well-acted, some fun chase scenes, the scene where Lightning fails at driving in the simulation is genuinely hilarious, and some interesting perspectives on teachers getting the spotlight for their skills for once. 

Incredibles 2 - I liked this film at first, but then it was… just okay in retrospect. I love me some good family dynamics. The plot here makes not a lot of sense. THEY BUILT UP THE UNDERMINER FOR NOTHING AND THEN FORGOT ABOUT HIM. I was surprised by the villain swap, but it happened so last minute I never really understood their motivations even after they explained them. Tried to tackle waaaay too many messages. 

D tier (I didn't enjoy these or consider them mediocre)

Finding Dory - Maybe I should have put this higher? Like C tier at least. Ah well. Wasn’t a huge fan of the body/physical comedy (not my thing), but it was entertaining and awww finding family is heartwarming. 

Finding Nemo - I remember nothing about this movie. 

E tier (this film has significant problems)

Beauty and the Beast - *sigh*… I want to love this movie. The score is gorgeous. Visually, they could have made it more distinctly Rococo-era France but didn’t (why?) The voice actors did good work and I think Paige O’Hara is SUPER underrated here. 

The Beast is emotionally manipulative with an awful temper that (for MOST of the movie. He doesn’t change.) That’s the main reason this is in E tier. This movie shaped so many generations of people thinking they can change the behavior of someone who treats them badly through the power of love. But you can’t. She learns to “love” the beast under coercion. It’s not Stockholm syndrome - it’s a trashy romance novel. Big fan of Gaston as a villain. He’s an archetype ppl can recognize and it’s so satisfying to hate him.

F tier (I think this film actively harms the industry and would rather it not have been made. Both the one in E tier could be considered harmful to the industry, but I think they had significant enough artistic accomplishments to scrape above that. I'm also generally a fan of "lack of censorship bc it's better to teach what not to do.")

Pocahontas - this movie took real historical events and romanticized them AND sexualized one of the only Native princesses they’ve had. Boo. Nothing wrong with animation!Pocahontas as a character, it’s just people put her in a story that doesn’t represent history well at all (and these historical events, unlike those in say, 14th-century Germany, had super relevant effects on people alive today.) And they portrayed the Native Americans and colonial settlers as equally in the wrong. (though I like Governor Radcliffe as a potential villain and love the line “see how I glitter.” I can’t NOT laugh when I hear it.) Lovely music, though. Nice animation, but the colors are weirdly… muted? 

Bad Garbage (I don't wish this film had never been made, but I wish I never had to see it.)

Planes - this movie was ridiculous. I remember not much about it except that I kinda hated it and that it was super cheesy with tension one could see right through that immediately resolved itself via one twist or another. 

Haven’t seen tier: Recess, A Bug’s Life, A Goofy Movie, DuckTakes Movie, Lilo and Stitch, Pinocchio (actually i have seen this but I remember nothing about it), The Nightmare before Christmas, Toy Stories 1, 2, and 3, Up, 101 Dalmatians, The Great Mouse Detective, Cars 2, Moana, The Good Dinosaur, Pete’s Dragon, Fantasia, Peter Pan Return to Neverland, Fantasia 2000, The Black Cauldron (read the book, though!), Bambi (or I did and remember nothing about it), The Rescuersm, The Rescuers Down Under, Planes Fire and Rescue, Bambi 2, The Fox & the Found, Oliver and Company, Atlantis, Treasure Planet (I want to, though), Piglet’s Big Movie, The Jungle Book, the Emporer’s New Groove, The Jungle Book 2, Chicken Little, Brother Bear, The Three Caballeros, Pooh’s Heffalump Movie, Dumbo, The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad, Aladdin (seen parts but never the whole thing), Strange Magic, The Sword in the Stone, James and the Giant Peach, Frankenweenie, Lady and the Tramp, Ralph Breaks the Internet, Doug’s 1st Movie, Monsters Inc. (want to, though), Meet the Robinsons, Dinosaur, The Aristocats, Robin Hood, The Tigger Movie, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, that pooh movie at the end without the title on it

-11/21/20

[gaylotusthatexists]

eyeshadow and flags

pairing: platonic creativitwins

summary: As much as they want to keep everything a secret, Roman realises they can’t hide from their brother forever.

trigger warnings: implied transphobia, unaccepting parents, slight misgendering, sympathetic remus

word count: 1515

a/n: aaaa ok i’m a day late bc reasons but! day four of pride prompts! today’s (well, yesterday’s) prompt was ‘flag’. and, as it was also roman’s birthday yesterday, this doubles as a roman birthday fic. hope y’all enjoy :)

ao3

Roman closed their door and let out a breath, sinking down to the floor. Guests were just beginning to leave - family members and family friends who'd come to celebrate their birthday, no one they were particularly interested in celebrating with but oh well. They'd be celebrating with their actual friends later in the week, sometime after school, although a couple had already given them their presents. Thinking that they'd be alone for a while longer, Roman scooted over to the other corner of their room and grabbed a few presents out of their school bag, leaning against their bed as they began to open them.

A photo album - that was sweet. As they flicked through the pages, they saw pictures of themself and their friends, in local parks and each other's bedrooms and at pride parades, all the fun times they'd had together. But their smile slowly faded, as they shut the book tight and hid it back in their school bag, knowing that if their parents found it and opened it and saw that they'd been to pride parades they'd have some questions, and they doubted that would go very well.

Then there was some necklaces and bracelets and makeup, all of which they couldn't wait to try out, but they'd have to wait a while first, perhaps at their next sleepover. And - oh, God, they'd been wanting that eyeshadow palette for ages, it must have cost their friend so much. They hummed. Perhaps a little eyeshadow wouldn't hurt, at the very least just to send a selfie to their friend who'd gifted them it. They heard the front door close - that would be their parents going out to get shopping, they always liked to go just before the shops closed. That meant Roman had, say, an hour, alone in the house. Humming, they began to apply some of the eyeshadow, just a simple red to start with, although they were very interested in experimenting some more some other time, and sent a quick photo to their friend.

And then the last present. Roman opened the wrapping, close to tears when they saw that their friend had given them - it was a flag, the nonbinary pride flag. They'd been so close to buying one of these at the last pride parade they'd went to but held themself back, for fear that their parents may find it. And, God, had their friend brought it all the way back then? Without Roman even realising?

They glanced around their room, considering whether there'd been a place they could hang it up. Probably best not to put it in plain view, anywhere where any of their family members may see it. That meant their options were either back in their bag, or perhaps somewhere their parents wouldn't look, like...

Nothing came to mind. Their mother tended to clean their room during the day whilst they were at school - without them even wanting her too, Roman would be quite happy cleaning on the weekend, but whenever they tried to tell her that she just said they were being 'ungrateful'. The safest places were their closet - their mother always let them put their own clothes away, at least, but it was a little risky - or, again, in their bag. Not feeling like taking the bigger risk, Roman decided to keep it in their bag, looking forward to being able to hang it up properly when they finally had a place of their alone.

"Roman!" a voice exclaimed, barging through the door and sliding onto their bed. "Roman, they're gone, do you wanna-"

"Remus," Roman hissed, trying their best to hide the flag still sitting in their lap, which was a little difficult to do - they ended up just wrapping the paper around it again, and slowly edging it towards their bag. "What are you doing here?"

"I wanna celebrate your birthday too! And now that the adults are gone we can- Oh!" Remus' eyes lit up with curiously. "What's that?" he asked, pointing at the terribly concealed flag in Roman's lap.

"Nothing," Roman spluttered, shoving it back into their bag. "Just a present from a friend."

"Was it a flag?" Remus guessed, moving closer to Roman. "What country was it? I don't recognise it-"

"It's not a country," Roman said, trying to make their voice sound not-so-shaky. "It's just some colours. Doesn't really mean anything."

Remus hummed.

Roman glared at him. "What?"

"I guess if you're not gonna tell me, I'll just have to look it up myself," he said, grinning. "What colours was it again - white, purple, was there a yellow in there?"

"Don't worry about it, Remus." Roman picked at their fingernails. "Seriously, it doesn't mean anything."

Remus seemed disappointed. But then a moment later, his eyes widened again. "Are you wearing eyeshadow?"

Roman blinked. "No?" Oh, wait, shit, they were, weren't they? "I mean, uh-"

"You totally are!" Remus hummed. "I didn't know guys could wear makeup. Can I try?"

Roman tried their best to not visibly cringe at Remus' statement, but figured they did anyway. Hopefully Remus wouldn't notice their discomfort, though - Remus wasn't exactly the most attentive.

Remus huffed. "Not letting me try? Rude."

"No, I-" Roman sighed. "Dad won't be too pleased about that. I should probably take it off anyway. Before they get back." They reached for their makeup wipes (also hidden in their bag) and began to take the eyeshadow off.

Remus pouted. "Why would they care?"

Roman rolled their eyes.

"No, seriously, what's wrong with guys-"

"I'm not a guy," Roman snapped, immediately regretting it afterwards. Shit.

Remus blinked. "You're... not?"

Roman breathed in. "I- I mean-"

"Are you a girl?" Remus asked. "Is that why you're wearing makeup? It would be a little weird though if I just find out that this whole time my brother has actually been my sister-"

Roman cringed. Remus wouldn't understand this - his friends were all right dicks, and Roman was well aware of their parents views. Roman doubted Remus had ever even heard of transgender and nonbinary people existing, and if he had he probably thought it was nothing more than a joke or something weird or wrong. But Roman didn't know how to get themself out of this one. They could feel themself shaking. Possibly close to tears.

"Roman?" Remus said, hanging upside down off the bed close to Roman's face. "You okay?"

Roman breathed in. "Yeah. I-" They cleared their throat, trying to pretend that they weren't about to cry. "Can I, uh, talk to you, about something?"

Apparently sensing the seriousness now in Roman's tone, Remus rolled off the bed and went to sit cross legged next to Roman, the mischievous grin fading from his face. "Yeah, of course."

Roman looked up at the ceiling, wanting to look anywhere but Remus' eyes. "Promise me you won't make fun of me?"

Remus nodded. "Promise."

"Or tell our parents?"

Remus frowned, but nodded again. "Yeah, sure."

Roman breathed in. It was now or never, they supposed. Maybe Remus wouldn't be a jerk about it. And, if he was, at least Roman knew that they'd have to cut him out of their life as well. That was unlikely, but-

God. Thinking about it was just making them procrastinate even longer. Roman breathed in, again, then quickly and quietly said, "I'm nonbinary."

Silence. Roman expected that much.

"What's that?" Remus asked, genuine confusion in his voice. Yeah - Roman has expected that too.

"I'm... More specifically I'm agender," they clarified, although that did nothing to make Remus any less confused. "It- It basically means that..." They drummed their fingers on their leg. "I'm not a boy. Or a girl. I don't... have a gender."

After a few more moments of silence, in which Roman was sure Remus was about to shout at them, or punch them, or disown them, or something along those lines. None of that happened. Instead, Remus just asked, "How does that work?"

Roman shrugged. "I- I don't know. Gender's weird. I just- I don't really feel like a boy, or a girl." Remus didn't seem to understand, but he let Roman continue talking. "Sometimes when people call me a guy or use he/him pronouns it feels... icky. I don't know. Like, it doesn't feel like me. But then she/her isn't any better."

Remus hummed. "What... What would you prefer, then?" he asked. "If you don't like he or she."

Roman breathed out. Remus was being cool about it. That was a good sign. "I've been going by they/them with my friends."

Remus nodded. "Okay. That's cool." He looked down at the floor. "Are you just my... sibling, then?"

Roman nodded. They felt like they were going to cry again, but for entirely different reasons. "Yeah, yeah, that'd be good."

Remus grinned. "Well-" He leant his head in Roman's shoulder. "-you're still the best sibling in the world."

Alright, yes, Roman was definitely going to cry. "Thanks. For being so cool with this."

"You're my sibling," Remus said. "I'm never going to hate you, y'know. No matter what you are."

[cafeinthemoon]

Purple Dragon - Chapter 1

Title: Purple Dragon

Genre: Fanfiction

Pairing: none yet

Rating: teen and up

Word count: 2405

Chapter: 1/?

Symbols: ⭕ | ➕ | 💛 | ▶️ | ▶️

Warnings: canon divergence, past trauma and other stuff in the next chapters, but the appropriate warnings will be included 👍

N. A.: God I'm so happy and nervous at the same time bc this is my first bnha fic! 🥺 Just binge watched 3 seasons in less than a week and now I'm reluctant to finish season 4 and face bnha hangover so I'm probably don't know exactly what I'm doing here, but here we go! Yay!

Chapter 1 - American Girl

The morning outside the U.A.’s building was so quiet that Midoriya Izuku would never believe that all the disturbance he heard once he walked into it was possible. A confusion of whispered words, exclamations of surprise and excitement and muffled laughs came from his classroom, at some point of the corridor through which he was walking now, and seemed to meet him as a morning greeting.

Well, soon he noticed that some of his friends were actually coming to greet him besides the noise, their faces showing the exact expression he would expect from what he heard. Uraraka Ochacho reached him first, her big eyes shinning as if she was proud of herself for being the first one to speak to the newcomer.

- Good morning, Deku-kun! – she showed the boy her best smile – I think you’re going to regret not coming earlier today!

Midoriya was not regretting anything at the moment. In fact, meeting Uraraka before anyone else at school was not something about which he would complain: the warmth that always came up to his cheeks when he put his eyes on her was both embarrassing and comforting, if such thing was possible. The only problem was that he used to struggle to pay attention to anything around him or to control his actions every time this happened, and that was his precise situation at that time.

- G-good morning, Uraraka-san – he heard his own voice as if it belonged to someone else, the words coming out by themselves – What are you talking about?

The girl took a breath and was about to spread the news, but another voice was heard behind her.

- Oh, Midoriya! Good morning! I suppose you already know by now... we are going to meet a new classmate today!

Iida Tenya, with his composed manners, joined them with that discreet smile he believed to be appropriate for a class representative to express how excited he was with the arrival of another student at the heroes’ course, but both Midoriya and Uraraka knew that more than any of their friends he was urging to meet the new aspiring hero.

Uraraka’s face was now red and her lips were closed so tight that she could suffocate. Maybe she was irritated by Iida’s interruption or something, but whatever the case that was how he saw things, and he started to apologize in his well known way.

- I am so sorry for my rude behavior, Uraraka-san! – he bent down at her, his arms glued to the sides of his body, his head almost touching the floor – Please, tell Midoriya the whole story and I will not open my mouth until you are finished! This is a promise!

While the girl was doing her best to convince Iida that she wasn’t offended at all, Midoriya was still a bit lost with all that information coming to him at once. He started to walk toward the class as the others followed him.

So we are going to have a new classmate soon, right?

- Yes! – Uraraka have completely forgotten all the irritation with the urge to speak – According to what I’ve heard, her name is Ryu and she just came from the United States. Well, actually she was born in Japan but her family moved to the United States when she was little, so this makes her almost a foreigner – she clenched her fists – It’s unbelievable! She can communicate in both Japanese and English, if what I’ve heard is correct. She must be a very smart person. At least we will be able to talk to her, and she might help us during English lessons! Isn’t it fantastic, Deku-kun?

Midoriya smiled, for the first time contemplating the idea of having a new classmate, and one who came from such a distant place as the United States.

- Yes, that’s amazing. But where is she?

This time, Iida, back to his composed attitude, didn’t see any problem in taking the floor:

- She’s talking to Aizawa sensei right now, but nobody can enter the room. Apart from what Uraraka said, we don’t have much more information about her. We don’t even know what type of quirk she has. We will have to wait until she is officially introduced to us.

They stopped at the classroom’s entry when Midoriya questioned how they got the little information they just spread. The answer to this came from the first person who greeted them at the door.

- We got a little help in this! – the pink, round face of Mina Ashido popped out in front of the trio with a smile that could be both of joy and embarrassment; she pointed her thumb to someone behind her back – Shouji kind of refused to collaborate, so fortunately we had Jirou by our side – and lowering her tone – She was dying to gather as much information as she could, but if you say that to her, she will deny, of course.

Midoriya pointed his finger to Jirou.

- So you asked her to listen behind the door?

Mina’s cheeks passed from pink to red in an instant. Jirou was not so close from the group to hear what was being said, but she looked away as to avoid additional questions. Midoriya looked at Iida and Uraraka seeking for a confirmation; it came in the form of clenched fists and lips bitten.

At the bottom of the class, there were more people who weren’t willing to discuss the bad habit of listening private conversations when such important events were about to take place: Kaminari was wondering if the new student’s quirk was similar to his; Kirishima, with his sharp smile at sight, agreed that it would be quite an experience if it happened; Sero was arguing that her quirk would be more impressive if it resembled his own; Mineta, lost in his own thoughts, didn’t say a word, but it would be no surprise if he was questioning himself about the girl’s physical attributes.

Though he could understand his classmates’ feelings, Midoriya couldn’t say he relate to the way in which they express their interest in the new girl. On his side, it was better not to create great expectations and let the facts surprise him by themselves. Maybe that was the opinion of some of the students who kept quiet in the middle of that noise, like Tsuyu Asui and Momo Yaoyorozu, engaged in a private and calm talking.

The only ones who seemed to have no particular interest in meeting the mysterious girl were Todoroki and Kacchan, the first one, with a book open in front of him, too concentrated in his own things to give his surroundings any attention, the second too irritated with all the mess to say anything.

***

Moments before

There were enough seats for at least ten people to occupy in that room, as well as a good space between each of them, but waiting in one of them somehow was not possible for Ryu Murasaki. There was something in the silence of those four walls that would not let her nerves relax. Was it the fact that she haven’t enough rest before attending to the U.A.’s call or was it the lack of time to process the fact that she was back in the country from where she moved at three? It wasn’t possible to tell, and neither she wanted to think about it. Not now.

The only thing Ryu could wish for now was the noise of her own thoughts to diminish. In normal circumstances, this could be reached while she would stand beside a window and just stare at the things outside, but now it didn’t seem to work though she has been in front of the room’s large windows for about ten minutes.

That was the funny thing about all of this: nothing under her sight – the morning sky out there, the trees, the school’s gates – was out of place. Yet not everything felt right. Ryu sighed; it was not so easy to stop projecting one’s impressions in lifeless things.

The door was opened at the opposite side of the room and she turned her neck toward it. A man entered the place without making a sound. He closed it behind his back and came to the center of the room, still in silence. Ryu has no great familiarity with the habits of the people there, but it was easy to suppose that she had to leave her spot and approach to greet him.

The man, tall and all dressed in black, carried a white fabric stripe wrapped around his neck, too thin and too long to be called a scarf. Was it an eccentricity of him or something else? There was no way to find out. This dress code was not the only unusual thing noticed by her: his hair, black and falling in waves around his shoulder and over his forehead, almost hiding his eyes, seemed to have grown for a long time without the interruption of a regular cut, and the same situation applied to his beard, all dark dots growing out the pale skin of his face. Everything in his appearance and presence reminded of tiredness and silence. Ryu didn’t try to guess what type of quirk he had, but she was convinced that it had something to do with put people to sleep.

The man’s greeting was simple.

- Good morning. You must be Ryu Murasaki, the girl who we are supposed to receive as our new student in the heroes course. According to what was sent to us, you were born in japan, but your parents moved to the United States with you when you were younger than five. So you manifested your quirk while you lived there.

The girl nodded.

- And thanks to your dual nationality, you are also fluent in English and Japanese.

- Yes.

His tone, low and slow, fitted him: it was not what she would call encouraging, so no question was made and he just kept speaking.

- I apologize for not giving enough time to rest after your long travel to Japan. My name is Shouta Aizawa and I am the teacher of 1 A Class, of which you are going to be part of. I’ve received some information about your quirk and your history, and what I can say is that it is something different from what I’ve seen in my years of experience as a hero and a teacher. So I’d like to hear an explanation from you. Can you give me details about your quirk?

Ryu felt warm sweat gathering in her palms and between her fingers. Speaking about her quirk always brought her the same sensation she thought she would have if someone asked her to take her clothes off in front of a crowd. Among the replies she had for that type of question was running away or hiding part of the answer.

This latter was what she tried to do at that time.

- I can… do things with my mind. I think of something I want to do and materialize my thought thanks to the energy I’m able to gather in my hands.

The next question came as no surprise after a short explanation like that.

- Can you show me how you do it?

Ryu swallowed. She looked around and found a small vase upon a table. When she raised her hand toward it, a purple, moving shade surrounded her fingers at the same time it manifested in the object’s surface; one movement from Ryu’s hand and the vase floated above the table. After a moment, she used the same delicacy to put it back in its place, and the purple shade finally disappeared from it and from her hand.

That was enough for now. It had to be enough…

- Is this everything you can do today?

The question hit her like a slap on her face.

- What do you mean, Aizawa-sensei?

- According to your history, you are currently able to modify, hide or destroy things with your quirk. However, instead of using your skills to change the object’s configuration , you just choose to make it float.

- And what’s the problem with it? – she interrupted.

Though his tone didn’t alter, something in his eyes intensified when Aizawa replied this time. Ryu didn’t like that.

- I hope you understand that I need to know exactly what you can do. It seemed that the best way to get an answer from you was by talking, but apparently I was deceived.

And what if I have my reasons to not talk to a stranger? was the first thing that came as an answer. But the words never came to her tongue. What she was supposed to say to that? Didn’t that man have no consideration at all?

Well, maybe not.

- Ryu Murasaki, activate your quirk and try to attack me now.

The girl took a step back without realizing it.

- You… You cannot be serious!

The silence Aizawa gave her as reply showed that yes, he was serious. Ryu had no choice. The purple energy appeared on her hand for the second time, more intense, faster in its swirling. She raised her hand and tried not to think of the results when she blasted the shade at his direction… and nothing happened.

She looked at the teacher and saw his hair floating above his head, while a reddish glimmer covered his pupils. She dropped her hand at the same time his hair and eyes went back to normal. The air in the room, suddenly disturbed with the conflict, was calm again. Ryu opened her mouth and closed it again, unable to speak, but the latent question was in her eyes. What did you just do?

- I forgot to mention, but I am also known as my hero name, Eraserhead. You must know what it means.

So, Aizawa’s quirk is to erase other people’s power. The fact that he was a teacher to aspiring heroes was suggesting, then. When she looked at him again, something assuring was perceived in his monotone traits.

- Overthinking your situation won’t help you at all. I know it seems too much to ask this from you now, but trust the U.A.’s program and you new teacher. As long as you are here, there’s nothing to worry about.

[domreaderrecs]

Oh boy do I have some kink discourse for you. Here’s a wholeass list:

1. A female dominant does not need to be a sadist who is always torturing and abusing their sub. They can be soft and kind and caring.

2. Findom is a valid form of domination and is really a kink, it is not just women faking it to get money.

3. Online domination is possible, although there are more risks involved, it is still a valid form of domination.

4. Submissive black men are allowed to refuse to be called slave and their dom shouldnt be annoyed they can’t used their preferred honorific.

5. Kink and fetishes can be incorporated without the use of the power dynamic found in BDSM.

6. BDSM is still BDSM if the rope is pink and the outfit is white lace instead of red and leather.

7. It should be standard practice for there to be a safe word that means everything is fine so that the Dom can check in on the sub easily without breaking the scene.

8. It is only BDSM when both parties have discussed before hand, otherwise it’s sexual assault (yes that includes Chad who brought out the rope without warning and now Bethany is just going along because she likes him)

9. BDSM has always and will always be driven by the LGBT community.

10. Under 18 year olds do not have a place in the BDSM community. If they wish to learn, then they should do so by finding articles and books, not by asking people involved in the scene.

Yeah that’s about it for now. I’m realizing you probably didn’t want this much but oh well. We’re here now. Let me know what you think!

whewww so much to unpack here lets go its essay time

1. !!!! this is probably one of the most fundamentally misunderstood parts of femdom. it don’t gotta be ball crushing and whipping and calling him a worm all the time, or even at all. this is probably what turns so many women off from trying it or thinking they might be into a more dominant role. gentle femdom is way more palatable for beginners and for me personally, just way more enjoyable (even tho i definitely would wanna make a boy cry from time to time)

2. I used to be one of those people who looked down on findom. I still don’t understand why anyone would be into it tbh but findoms get a lot of shit for no reason... being a sugar baby is so glamorized but if you’re a findom you’re cold, or a bitch, or taking advantage. even though they’re both just people who get money from men who have money to throw at them for sexual favors... but one’s demonized and one’s all the rage... hm i wonder why

3. I have no real/successful experience with this... more on that in number 10

4. 100000%!! the stories i’ve seen from black subs in kink (mostly black women but still) are horrendous. a lot of doms will try to enforce a master/slave relationship, and try to exercise their authority to make subs agree to it. i know it’s a common dynamic, but that shit is wayyyy different to black people... any dom should know that. forcing your sub to do anything is wrong, but especially something so racially, historically, and culturally insensitive. and don’t get me started on the surprise “race play” stories i’ve heard... like i said doing anything without your sub’s consent is wrong but THAT kind of thing requires double consent with a cherry on top. this is part of the reason I’m so scared to enter the kink scene... this shit scares me. thats why the title mistress and master/slave dynamics in general just isn’t for me. it makes me think of my ancestors :/

5. again, 1000% agree. i’ve said this on my blog before, but i’ll say it again. not everything has to be dom/sub stuff. if you wanna peg your bf you don’t have to tie him up and call him names or boss him around, you can just peg him. i feel like ever since FSOG this whole dom/sub thing has grown way out of proportion, but that’s a whole other essay for another day

6. yessss I hate the stereotype of dom outfits as black, latex, leather, way too high to walk in boots... like does it look fire?? yes of course but pink and lace and knee high socks would make a fit that’s just as fire. 

7. this is non-negotiable to me. whenever I hear someone say “I don’t like safe words” or “I/We don’t need a safe word” it’s just a red flag to me. idc what anyone says safe words are mandatory.

8. Yes. I feel like I shouldn’t have to say this but with the rise of the popularity of “rough sex” (again, thanks FSOG) there’s seems to be a rise in people who just assume their partner may be into something, or who just try to experiment on their partner without asking them first. I’ve heard a lot of friends and other girls talk about guys just going straight into choking them, spanking them, and pulling their hair without even asking if they like it (another reason I’m scared to get out there and do stuff, as a person who is very much not a sub or into being treated roughly or tossed around, it’s a big fear of mine). I’ve also seen a lot about girls just randomly trying to finger their boyfriends. If it’s not vanilla, and y’all haven’t discussed it, do not assume it’s on the table. We’ve gotten to a point that kinky stuff is so talked about and normalized (especially with young adults) that people forget it’s actually kinky. 

9. period.

10. okay so story time, around the age of 15/16 is when I started to realize I was into kinky stuff. The preference had kinda always been there, but I couldn’t really place a name to it. I had always felt like an outcast among my peers when it came to the way they would talk about romantic and sexual relationships (I was a year ahead, so all my friends were 1-2 years older than me, so they started to do that stuff earlier than I did) because the things they talked about and liked were way different from the stuff I would think/fantasize about, so I always stayed quiet (teenage girls are very vocal about having choking/daddy kinks but that’s definitely indicative of a much larger problem that i will not get into bc that’s a whole other very very long essay that I will definitely write on here one day but not now). So when I found out what gentle femdom was I felt like I had a community that understood me, and everything just clicked. I would lurk on online communities and I lived for the discourse on there but I could never actively participate because every community had a strict “no minors” policy. They would say exactly what you said, “If minors wish to learn, then they should do so by finding articles and books, not by asking people involved in the scene.” I didn’t want to make anyone catch a case and I didn’t want to get targeted by predators so I tried to follow their advice. i found nothing. There honestly just isn’t that much educational stuff for “kinky teenagers”, or at least none that fit me. There was no femdom oriented stuff. I mean sure there was the standard “consent is important especially in bdsm relationships” but like that didn’t really help me. I had so many questions, that I could never feel comfortable asking my mom or a therapist, and especially not my friends. I didn’t know how to express this part of myself. I couldn’t talk to anyone about it and I couldn’t even watch porn like a normal teenager (we all know the state of femdom porn. its bad) so I was this ball incredible frustration and confusion and i didn’t know what to do with it. So I unfortunately turned to twitter. There I made a little like minded friend. he was also 16 so i thought “this is good, a non adult also kinky teenager who I can relate too. what could go wrong :)”(I’m sure you see where this is going) I was so excited to have a new friend, but ofc, our convos soon took a turn. However, since he was the first person to ever show interest in me, and the only person my age who i could talk to who understood me, i started to catch feelings. But he was a teen just like me, just as horny and confused and sooo immature. He started to pressure me into domming him/becoming his domme, but I refused because I wasn’t ready (i saw on one of those online communities I used to lurk in that its not healthy for your first sexual experience to be bdsm and I took that to heart). he ghosted me. needless to say that “friendship” was toxic. i realized too late that he only saw me as a kink dispenser, and didn’t care about me on a personal level. it also made me realize how not “mature for my age” I was. i say all this to say, NO, teenagers should not be participating in kink. they are not mature enough. however education and resources for them are not where they should be. if we want to discourage them from putting themselves in these situations, we need to better provide them with education and healthy ways to relieve these urges/feelings (i eventually took up writing, it helped me a lot). i feel like had i found a healthier and safer way to express/explore that side of myself, I would’ve never gotten in that situation to begin with. That experience has kinda put me off from dipping my toe into the actual community (well that and the lack of diversity but we’ve already talked about that)

ALSO the amount of very young children i’ve seen in the kink “community” on twitter is alarming... you’re not a little you’re 12

anyways, thanks so much for this essay of an ask and sorry i wrote an essay in response to each one lol but like I said I could discuss kink all day

[elaphaemourra]

🖊 + Any of them ~

Hooooo this is a fckn, You Have Given Me Too Much Power. I have So Many Words.

Gonna be real tho, this is gonna be a Big Thing about Mita bc I have a fckn AU where he's the Outlander and I have some FEELINGS ABOUT THIS. Bc he's part of my main continuity as an adjacent player to the IA and BH storylines, sharing agent crew/other random shit with Phaeyla for the IA stuff (he got Vector and Scorpio, Phae got the rest) and serving as Another sidequest generator for Jeni in the BH line (I give Jeni so many nerds to keep track of whoops).

(THIS IS ALREADY LONG, AND I'M ABOUT 8 PARAGRAPHS IN, SO IT'S GETTING A READ MORE WHILE I'M STILL THINKING ABOUT IT)

Uh, TL;DR, Mita is handling being Commander about This Well:

OK SO in NORMAL canon he goes with Lana and Koth to go fetch the Outlander (who I decided is actually one of Zal's apprentices, a Voss named Thera-nal, until Zal fckn goes 'no fuck this. I have ghost experience. Gimme the emperor u don't have to deal with this urself' and steals Valk from her bc Good Inquisidad Takes On The Oof Ghost For His Kid) and then gets fckn Ditched on Zakuul. Like straight up that whole 'get the outlander on the ship, Vaylin is 3 meters away FUCK FUCK FUCK' thing, he pushes Thera-nal on and then the ship takes off. Without him. And he does a dive off the platform bc he's like 'nah' @ Vaylin and knows he can survive a Really Long Fall. It's all very dramatic, very ciffhangery. I'm still writing the next chapter beyond that in Left Behind.

He ends up fckn, roughing it on Zakuul, gets himself a sort-of job posing as an assassination droid in a gladiator ring (bc i'm a NERD for gladiator shit), grows up, gains some confidence. Knife baby gets a grow up and a glow up. It's awesome.

BUT. BUT I HAVE AN AU WHERE HE'S THE OUTLANDER. AND IT'S AN EXCELLENT EXAMPLE OF WHY HE SHOULD NEVER BE IN CHARGE OF ANYTHING EVER.

He and Lana don't like each other. It's a Thing. They can put their differences aside for the sake of Professionalism or when they give each other the 'r u seeing this shit' Look when someone else is being Stupid in both their opinions, but they don't like each other (this is true in the normal canon as well, they're very antagonistic to each other, it's a little silly how petty it is but it's Fun). Despite this, and their tendencies to piss each other off on purpose, Mita thinks she's the most tolerable of the initial Pile of People. The Conflict between Koth and Senya was A Lot for him to handle, and he doesn't do Leadership Positions very well. About an hour after they picked Senya up, he was already out of patience.

The constant arguing got to him SO FAST, it ran him out of patience and Fucks so quickly, he started getting real snippy. By the time they got to asylum he was throwing around threats to people who couldn't keep their Shit to themselves. He TRIED to do good things, to pull together enough patience and good will to be Benevolent in his actions, but as his patience fell apart, so did basically everything else good. Mita getting Tora was a whole Thing where he did the Nice Thing by making her apologize to Vik and when she talked back he turned around and drew a knife on her, told her to keep her mouth shut if she was going to complain because he WOULD kill her, and he DIDN'T need an engineer/mechanic THAT much. That he'd use her corpse as payment for the next batch of cargo, which, MITA. WHAT THE FUCK, MAN.

He started falling into MUCH older patterns of thinking, refusing to take any action that was Any risk to himself. It's a thought process he had before he got shoved full of implants, before he realized that he could be a Better Person and started being a rebellious little shit in Intelligence and taking risks that helped Other People instead of just being single-mindedly focused on his own self-preservation.

He's falling back into it, which is BRUTAL because he's making more and more devastating choices, and where he saved people by shutting down that reactor on the First blip of Zakuul, before he ran out of Patience and Fear, and he did Good Lightsided Things to Help People, he just went off with Kaliyo to blow the absolute shit out of that whole thing, and where he used to be like 'shit, we need to make things Better', now he's started talking about Vengeance. Which uh. Does me a Concern about Knife Baby.

Basically none of the advisors actually LIKE him. At best, Senya and him have a solid enough mutual understanding of Work Vs Free Time between them, but she's also Pissed that he keeps taking the Big Death Options and fucking over her citizens. Theron's basically constantly giving him the Pensive Side-Eye because of how consistently Freaky Mita has become. Their first interaction was Prickly at best, and Mita hasn't gained any more patience.

Ofc, Mita and Lana just Don't get along, but they at least vibe on the level of 'i am So Done with everyone here' and she's pulled him aside more than once to get him to cool off a little. Though mostly she pawned him off on HK, when the droid was still aroujd, so she's at least Done Something for his mental state, and he liked that droid enough for talking with him being Relaxing. Kind of.

He's a volatile Commander who Can and Will pull people who irritate him aside to threaten them with mortal or bodily harm, or yeet a datapad at the wall for that Big Sound, or just punch a wall while he's got gauntlets on, to get everyone to Shut Up and Pay Attention so he can yell at them for not keeping their Interpersonal Shit out of the war room and out of his presence. He's basically single-handedly driving the Alliance into the ground, driving it forwards through pure force of will and by making people scared enough to work together without Complaining, hoping that Arcann will give before he or the Alliance do.

He's refused every offer by Valkorion for Everything, and right now that's his saving grace.

Koth bounced, furious with Mita and Kaliyo's 'let's blow this bitch up' thing, and Mita's little circle of people he Actually Likes has uh, maybe Not the greatest influences among them. His inner circle is Kaliyo, Scorpio, Tora (which surprised me, but they are Remarkably chill with each other for people whose introduction was Humiliation and Death Threats, like, a 'they'd vibe and drink in a dark corner together' sort of deal), and Even More Surprising, Aric Jorgan.

Completely separate from the Alliance Advisory Squad, Jorgan seems to be REALLY good for Mita. He's just kinda, it's Working Out. Mita's doing Nicer Shit when Jorgan's around. I'm not sure if it's just, the lack of Shit-Stirrers, the comfort and familiarity of military company, Jorgan's 'ur not the boss of me' thing back in the swamps on Zakuul, or what. But Mita's doing Good Shit when that rad cat man's around. Hell, it might be that he just doesn't want to disappoint his new friend. But like, they're actually a STELLAR team friendship-wise. Mita's actually Relaxed enough to get shit done efficiently, do LIGHTSIDED SHIT, and he basically ONLY brings Jorgan when he goes raiding star fortresses. Kaliyo and Scorpio are higher up on Mita's 'would send out alone' list, but only because he worked with Kaliyo when he and Phaeyla got assigned to each other, and Scorpio was HIS team member.

Even with that though, Mita's reputation among Alliance personnel isn't a Kind one. He's terrifying, volatile and quick to snap at anyone and everyone who gets on his nerves. People avoid him in the halls unless they Absolutely Need Him, and there's ABSOLUTELY a network of people you can ask as a 'where's the Commander now' if you really need to spend the day Avoiding Him.

He's also leaned Heavily into the aesthetic of Big Scary. Dressed like a Sith all in black and white and grey (and a Republic insignia on his belt just for the added cognitive dissonance that gives him), with a Delightfully Menacing Helmet that makes him nigh unreadable. The voice modulation is something he Knows how to use to make himself more intimidating, and he knows how to hold himself to make Pointed Silence into something that can cause fear. He really leaned into that 'scaring people into working for you' thing, which isn't sustainable, and he KNOWS it isn't, but he's hoping to get shit done fast enough that it won't MATTER how unsustainable that type of leadership is.

He's Stressed and Tired and Angry, and he's going down a deep dark hole. He needs to be fckn, sat down and Confronted about where he's going because he MADE that choice to be better, on BALMORRA. It cost him his free will, his autonomy, and his identity. He was PHYSICALLY unable to say his own name without his upper body motor function locking up, for a long time, because it was part of the programming of his implants. He gave Everything up to be Better, and it took so much to get those things back, and now he's squandering it all by falling back into who he used to be.

He needs some Time to Chill The Fuck Out, an Intervention for what he's doing with himself, and a goddam nap.

Knife Baby is Stressed Out. He's the Team Medic. He was never designed to be In Charge, and it took its toll Very Quickly, and it's devolved into something Brutal and Unsustainable. Which is why this is an AU, and why my Canon Commander for the timeline is Zal.

Zal's a good leader, good under pressure, patient and fair almost to a fault, and a good person.

Mita can't handle the strain, and he KNOWS it. But he's doing it anyways, and will drag the people around him down with him if it means he'll win in the end. And in the mean time, he's frustrated, volatile, and Not Very Fun To Be Around.

[initiumseries]

Which parts of BTVS did you not like and how would you have changed them?

Yes! Great question. 

So, if I’m being honest, most, if not all, of my issues with BTVS start after she graduates high school. I feel like the show lost the magic of the Scoobies bond and the older they got, the more distance we had from them as characters, the more OOC it felt like everyone started behaving, So, I’ll start with s4, buckle in this is gonna be long lol.

Season 4

So as usual, I like the idea of season 4. The gang has graduated, they’re growing up, and trying to find their place in such a big pond. On top of that, the Initiative is on campus (which makes sense, you can’t just blow up a high school and there are no repercussions for that, and it’s kinda cool the idea of instead of a govn’t lockdown, they infiltrate Sunnydale and are running experiments to weaponize demons. Clever, fun. I like it.), and ofc Buffy’s given up having a normal life, but now she just wants a normal relationship, and doesn’t even get that. I’m on board. Especially the idea that the gang inadvertently drifts away from each other because that’s real. That happens when you go away to college, even if you go away together. So my issues, are rooted in the details. 

Maggie Walsh turned into this weird obsessive surrogate mother, who wanted to get Buffy out of the way, except the execution was so sloppy. I LIKED commanding, no nonsense, bitch monster from hell Maggie Walsh, and I would have liked to see that follow through in how she attempts to dispose of Buffy, and how she handles Riley. She becomes this soft, weirdly maternal unhinged force after trying to kill Buffy, and I don’t really understand why. I would have liked to see more of that motherly role, while still rooted in that commander in chief sort of aura she exudes when we first meet her, when it comes to Riley. I also thought her death came too soon, like they just didn’t know what to do with her after she executed her function *coughs in the Anointed One* of creating tension between Buffy and Riley (which, honestly, his being in the Initiative at all would have been enough conflict if they had leaned into that without stuffing so much stuff in there). I definitely would have had Maggie maintain that strength and authority, while softening where necessary to emotionally manipulate Riley. I’d make it really clear that Riley is deeply confused because we believe the hold she has on him, and withdrawal on the drugs would have been a nice touch, but I think it came too soon. Which leads me directly into: 

Super cool. I remember when I first watched this on TV and the gang finally rebonded (after a HILARIOUS episode of them finally addressing their conflicts), they’d reached the climax with the Initiative and Adam and Buffy does a very Sailor Moon thing of all the different emotional strengths of her friends bond together to give her enough power to defeat Adam. LOVE IT. 

Except what’s the point? Prof. Walsh created Adam...for what exactly? We never really get a clear, salient reason for that, bc they kill her, and Adam’s exposition is...not sufficient to explain why she had an off the books project to stitch together a...demon son. It’s weird and especially because Adam doesn’t really do all that much, it really leaves me wondering like, what was the point? For me, I feel like, instead of making Adam a spectator for a lot of the drama that takes place in s4, I would have preferred him be the driving force. behind most things. 

Also: Riley’s Black friend would not have been such an angry misogynistic raging asshole because I’m tired of Black people being The Worst to make the white characters look better, more reasonable.

I would have needed a stronger explanation for Adam trying to turn Riley into...whatever that was. 

Willow would have been bi and I absolutely would have, if I went in that direction, had a much more fleshed out discovery of that fact (Because in this world Seth wouldn’t have left lol). I also would have made sure Willow and the actress who played Tara would have had the chemistry they deserved.  

Anya would not have stayed in Sunnydale. She would have left. She was a poor man’s Cordelia and had 0 character growth or interest. 

Season 5

Again, love the ideas. Suddenly Buffy has a sister we ALL knew wasn’t there before? A God shows up? What I love(d) about Buffy is that the escalations felt so natural? Like it didn’t feel like the show was like HoW dO wE oUtDo oURsElVes aGaIN?! It felt more organic like, well, yeah, the govnt. Oh shit, a GOD? D A M N! And Glory had personality! She was crazy! And it also matches alongside Buffy’s coming to grips with her own abilities. She’s one of the oldest slayers on record at this point, watching her in s1 and in s5 you SEE, her skill level is above and beyond, and now she meets a foe that still provides such a challenge, Buffy is scared. LOVE IT.

So Spike, getting neutered, was interesting at first, but it really starts to wear out its welcome for me, about this time. My problem being, he poses so little of a threat, that all his scenes start to feel like filler and not like they’re driving the plot forward in any useful way. His obsession with Buffy becoming sexual, was INLINE for Spike, but I liked Spike because he was a DICK, he was also dangerous, and after a lot of hilarious moments in S4, watching his basically creep around Buffy’s house and try to manipulate her into spending time together (which felt soooo pathetic to me in a way I didn’t like) and like, the Buffy bot (fucking ew) all season was just, not a fun time. I think, for me, I would have had Spike maintain his dignity as a character and I absolutely would not have had him threaten Dru’s life to drive home his obsession for Buffy. Ew. Yuck. Cringe. I just think there had to be more that Spike could do this season than run around chasing Buffy’s coattails. 

One again, Tara/Willow. Tara had no character development (even in an episode that was created to provide her with development? I definitely would have made use of that episode to create more ACTUAL depth for her character) so then to turn around and have her become mindless for basically the REST of the season, is just, rude lol. And because they have no chemistry and their relationship feels so...baseless, when this moment happens, I don’t feel anything. I don’t believe WIllow would be this angry, this heartbroken, this devastated that she’d take in such dark magicks and blindly go after Glory. I’d believe it if it were Oz, but Tara/Willow do not get the same level of build up and relationship establishing for me to buy this. I would have changed that.

Unpopular opinion, but I also would have made Dawn less of an UTTERLY irritating, shrill, whiny, screaming white tween. I get it, she was supposed to be the baby. But I get nothing from watching a white girl who is mostly just bored and irritated with her life, start shoplifting from her sister’s friends and in general, because she’s kinda sad sometimes. Get a grip. The only time I feel bad for her is when she finds out she’s not real. Actual problems. Wicked, I’m on board. But I think I would have just made her less fucking annoying and whiny and a lot more sympathetic. She still could have been frustrating and bratty, but in a way that was a bit more likeable, so that in those moments where she’s *genuinely* struggling, you feel for her on a broader scope. I would not have made her do all of those incredibly infuriating, incredibly stupid things, like running away in the middle of a dangerous situation. Because it ends up reading to me, like Buffy’s anger, frustration and criticisms of Dawn aren’t her being too hard on her as the eldest, as the Slayer, but accurate because Dawn is a horrendous nightmare of a new human being with no real redeeming qualities. Definitely a better ways to execute that. 

Also, I feel like this season is where the Scoobies drift again, but this time we aren’t really addressing it? Buffy’s dealing with Joyce getting sick, Riley being a POS, Spike stalking her, and she never leans on Willow for any of it. They never even really talk about any of the things going on. It’s such a missed opportunity to lean back into the core gang navigating growing up together. Willow is now basically the guardian of her new partner, and again, we don’t really see WIllow lean on Buffy at all. And Giles is preparing to leave, which, to me, felt organic. He felt like Buffy had outgrown him, but I think he was also trying to rediscover himself, but is pulled back into being a Watcher and he seems both grateful and disappointed. I would have liked to, I donno, make that a little clearer. Also what is Xander doing at this point? He’s outgrown his usefulness as well, so he kinda just becomes a hanger’s on. If Xander doesn’t just leave Sunnydale after s3 or 4. He needs to do *something*, he should have been reintegrated into the group in a new way if it wasn’t through school. 

Season 6 

This is so hard. I feel like this season is just, SO dark, SO heavy, and absent the levity that had been established up til s4. But it’s also really earned. Buffy is going through it. The layers are wonderful. I LOVE IT. But I also needed like...emotional breaks? And this is also kinda where I needed the scoobies to feel like scoobies, and trying to figure out how to help their friend.  Xander and Willow have been friends their entire lives, and season 3 really fleshes out that emotional shorthand they have, but it’s so quickly abandoned in s4 and onward. Suddenly Willow/Xander feel like strangers with Anya and Tara between them. I feel like there should have been more moments of Xander and Willow just..being, and struggling with Buffy’s loss together in a way that only the two of them really understand because like Buffy said Xander has a piece of her that Oz, and so then Tara, can’t reach. That should be a constant thoroughline. Xander should have been the first person to see something wasn’t quite right with Willow and the magic. 

Giles should have left earlier to give more time between him leaving and Buffy coming back. I like the idea of Giles beginning to build a life for himself in England and literally dropping everything once he found out Buffy was back. I emotionally hate the conflict of Willow threatening Giles, but I like it as a character development issue, and Giles definitely should have side eyed Willow, maybe even brought up his concerns later with Xander. 

I think I also would have had Spike leave Sunnydale and come back when Buffy does. I didn’t need a reformed Spike, and it would have been interesting to see him ingratiate himself with the group now that Buffy is back, and he’s the only one who sees how much pain she’s in. 

I HATED Warren and the group. The disgustingly overwhelming and unchecked misogyny and Warren was INSANELY unlikeable. I don’t need to like him, but I needed some catharsis way before we got it. He was HORRENDOUS. 

Even in death, Tara is bland. 

Willow’s magic addiction legit comes out of nowhere. I needed more organic build up than Amy, who has been a rat for like 3 years, suddenly being like “hey I know this guys who can give us magic drugs!” 

The chasm between Willow and Buffy this season would have hit if they hadn’t been distant since s3. 

I think we needed the seeds for Dark!Willow planted a lot earlier like I described. 

Also a lot more evidence that Willow was running away from her nerdy past because when it comes up here, it’s completely left field.

This would have hit harder if they still felt close. 

Season 7

Fuck man, the whole thing was awful. But I ESPECIALLY would have thrown out that left field retcon of Buffy having been in an asylum. I lost sleep over that shit lol.

 But I would have totally rewritten season 7. If Spike’s involvement was necessary (it wasn’t), then I absolutely would not have had her defend him against Wood and Giles. I would have had her treat him extremely coolly. Like a tool they require. There would have been *some* level of redemption for him that was believable within the confines of his character, but not so much that we forget he’s an assaulter.

 The Potentials would have been WAY fucking less horrendously annoying and I really would have leaned into conflict avoidance with the scoobies that reaches a peak when Xander loses his eye. Giles and Buffy would have renegotiated their adult parent/child relationship in a far healthier way and we would have had a lot more interiority with Buffy like we’ve had, pretty much since the show’s inception. 

Angel would have been there when Buffy was isolated and alone, not Spike. Because #bangel4lyfe lmao. They still woulda kissed as a “greeting” lol. Buffy would not have told Spike she loved him, or that she ever loved him. She woulda told that dude thank you and dipped out of the cave lol. 

[rittz]

thoughts about being trans, idk where else to put them so here u go

it’s not like i don’t have trans guy friends to talk to about this, it’s just usually in the form of jokes or passing comments rather than an actually serious conversation. also, the transmasc people that i’m closest to identify more with the label “nonbinary” than i do-- it’s not like they couldn’t understand or relate to things i’m saying, but i’m just assuming that they probably don’t feel the exact same way i do

anyway, as a trans person we get often asked “so why do you feel like a [gender]?”, and the answer is usually some variation of “i just feel like it”. this is the most accurate but also vaguest possible answer, so i kinda wanted to break down my personal answer to that question?

basically, i identify as a man because i identify with men. in a general and also personal sense. gender stereotypes are something that trans people by necessity both embrace and reject. i relate to gender stereotypes about men more than those of women-- i’m less outwardly emotional, i like being handy, i don’t like kids, i have questionable personal hygiene, etc-- but obviously these things alone don’t make someone a man. however... you can’t deny that there is some general truth about behavioral differences between men and women (bc of society, not biology). men and women both experience different problems in the world, and each have trouble understanding the experiences and problems of the other. generally, i can relate to the experiences and problems of men more than those of women, even if it seems like i shouldn’t (for example, i am not afraid of walking alone at night, even though i am very tiny).

i, from a young age, have had a constant yearning for more male friends. i would occasionally choose to play video games as a male character. i was upset that i couldn’t be in boy scouts. i have been jealous of my younger brothers being treated by my parents the ways i wished i was treated. when i imagined myself older, i pictured myself less like my mom and more like my dad. when i’m around men, i want them to treat me like one of them. i want to be seen as a man.

and i think that’s what being trans really boils down to. wanting to be seen as someone other than how everyone sees you. wanting what you see on the outside to match how you feel on the inside. this obviously extends to nonbinary individuals, who face their own struggle when it comes to presentation. but at the end of the day, i think that presentation is equally important to gender identity as internal feelings. i mean, i think we’re all familiar with the research proving that transitioning makes trans people happier. surgery is an invasive, expensive, painful process that i DON’T think is necessary for every trans person, and HRT isn’t always easy to get. but changing a name, getting a new haircut, dressing differently, binding, etc. counts as transitioning. you don’t have to hate your body to be trans, but wanting to alter it in order to better connect your internal identity with your presentation, i think is necessary in order to consider yourself to be trans. 

i will admit i am confused by “GNC trans men” i see on tumblr and insta, who use he/him pronouns but exclusively present femininely. i’m not talking about trans guys who don’t yet pass, i mean trans guys who don’t want to. i don’t harbor any ill will, i’m just confused. if i understand being trans to mean “wanting what you see on the outside to match how you feel on the inside”, you can see how. doesn’t that make you feel dysphoric? don’t you want people who see you to read you as male? how is your life different from when you didn’t identify as male but presented the same way? this isn’t me trying to gatekeep on who’s “trans enough”, and especially when it comes to nonbinary identities it’s arbitrary to harp on presentation like this. but like, what’s going on here?

taking a turn here that will come back around, an extremely key component to why i identify as and with men is my sexuality. i have always idolized, envied, and evoked various queer icons from media and real life. the hunky, grunting, macho, hetero version of “man” never appealed to me the way that the fashionable, artsy, flirty, homo version of “man” did. drag queens, my mom’s hairdresser, glam rock stars, i could go on. associating my more feminine qualities with GAY stereotypes instead of FEMALE stereotypes suddenly made more sense, and made me feel less dysphoric. it’s also something that took me a long time to realize, because i had surrounded myself with queers who were mostly attracted to women. transmascs and butch lesbians historically have a lot in common, but personally, i didn’t relate as much to lesbians as i did to drag queens. in dating and loving men, i developed my understanding of them. but my attraction to men was why it had taken me so long to realize i felt more like a man-- i thought i was just some weird straight girl.

now, am i calling these “GNC gay trans men” with long pink hair and poofy skirts and conventionally attractive bisexual boyfriends “weird straight girls”? ...well, not to their faces. but i have to admit that i’m thinking it. these people would never go to a predominantly-male gay bar, these people would never be harassed on the street. i’m not saying i know someone’s identity better than they do, but i don’t agree with the liberal utopian ideal of “let everyone do whatever they want as long as they aren’t hurting anyone” when taken to mean that we can’t question other people’s choices. “why do you feel like a man?” is a question that, coming from another trans person, isn’t inherently transphobic. it’s not “forcing” someone to “prove” their “transness”, no one “owes” me an explanation of their identity. i’m just confused. i don’t disapprove of the way these people live their lives, i just want to know why.

a straight girl being feminine is different from a gay man being feminine, because it has less to do with personality and more to do with society’s historic view of gay men as closer to female than male because of the loving and fucking men aspect. an AMAB gay man wearing makeup and a crop top probably just wants to look good, but he is also signaling to other men that he’s gay via gender non-conformance. by being AFAB and female-passing, wearing makeup and a crop top is not GNC. in fact it’s pretty GC, and gay men will not recognize you as a gay man.

it’s easy to say “gender is fake so do whatever you want”, but like, we have to acknowledge reality. time is a social construct too, but we still use days of the week when talking to each other. strangers will treat you differently depending on what gender they interpret you as. different people will be willing to date you or not. you have to choose which public bathroom to go in. if being misgendered doesn’t bother these people, then who cares? but if it DOES, which it usually does, wouldn’t you want to take steps to prevent being misgendered in the future? if your desire to present femininely is stronger then your desire to be seen as male, then like... why call yourself a male at all? ultimately nothing these people do will really affect me in any way. it just makes me wonder if these people will eventually go on to present as male, or if they will later ID as nonbinary or even cis. i encourage people trying out different labels and exploring their identity, so it’s not like i think these people SHOULDN’T identify as trans guys. it’s more like, i wish they were able to articulate WHY they identify as trans more than “because i said so”. not wanting to be a woman doesn’t automatically make you a man, it just makes you not a woman.

maybe i’m particularly cynical because of the MULTIPLE times that people with larger online followings who identify and present this way have later turned out to be lying, manipulative people. hopefully it goes without saying that i do NOT think that everyone who identifies and presents this way is a toxic liar. the reason i bring it up is because some people genuinely can’t understand the possibility or purpose of misleadingly claiming a marginalized identity, but it can and does happen. an analogy could be made here about white people claiming indigenous heritage. we all WANT to believe what people say about themselves, and asking for “proof” is a social no-no. but we shouldn’t just... automatically trust everything someone says about themselves, right? and as bad as i WANT to live in a world where gender doesn’t matter and everyone default uses neutral pronouns and there are no divisions in clothing stores and bathrooms, we don’t live in that world (yet). when you are AFAB, /extremely/ femininely presenting, and have little to no plans of transitioning, saying “i am a man” will not make other people see you as one. and if you don’t want to be seen as a man, then maybe you aren’t one.

[mehenxe]

◈ ◈ ◈ ◈ & ღ & ♫ bc ur a slut for music ; & ✮ (i want explanaTIONS ...gET META W THIS SHIT )

◈ — share some head-canons you have for a muse of your choosing, but x4.

[ elijah kane ] ◈ — all efforts to get him into studying how to make robotics like hyacinth have resulted in a lot of miniature woodland creatures able to sprint across desks. it’s not exactly what anybody had in mind, but hey, you never know if ilya might not want to send in an actual animal for something he has going on. they can call up sugar kane industries ( big face-palm here ) to take care of the job. ( wyatt voice: seriously, you couldn’t think of anything better than sugar kane. ) / hyacinth kane has a nice ring to it. elijah has tested out several different nicknames: sugar kane also for them, mistah k, ( missus k? ), cinthy ... cindy ... ( sean: yeah! cindy k! like cindy crawford! / who the fuck is cindy crawford? / wyatt — / how old are you. ) / he’s had a life-long dream to be able to go scuba-diving off the coast of — some exotic island he can’t remember the name of. beforehand, it was one of those things that he was too afraid to do, but full-out war changes your perspective. in truth, he’s always been a water baby, growing up going swimming in the local rivers and running pellmell down the dirt lanes. he grew out of it, and then grew back into it. whether or not he’s going to be able to do that without monroe tagging along ( and then by default, ilya, and then probably hojin will want to come, and then ravi will have to, and then oliver will want to watch over them and then jinho will buy a whole yacht with his dumb vampire money — ) — ah, well, there’s worse people to spend an extended holiday with. his father will come along too: sit on the deck in a lawn chair and drink a virgin margarita as he deserves after putting up with this whole extended family. and with his son being a you-know-what.

[ alice bedi ] ◈ — there was a time where she was interested in wigs. she had percival sit down on her shack’s bed and watch as she perused through at least fifteen different styles of wigs. each one got a firm head-shake: too rough on your complexion; lilac looks good as a colour, but the style is horrid; why did they think it was a good idea to make a bob that length? a tough customer. she returned back to wearing veils, her preferred style being that of mantilla, or the veil that’s worn to chapel over a jade comb. due to the volume and length of her natural curls, she rarely wears the combs at all, but will if it’s a particularly formal occasion, like that time she accompanied percival to a ‘high-society event.’ ( translation: they crashed a party because he was bored, and she had a bad feeling about him going alone. ) / as the local librarian’s assistant, she’s the first to get in the way when someone is overtly curious: why are you asking so many questions? hmm? the irony is that she herself asks just as many questions — she insists that the difference is: she reads the room and knows when it’s inappropriate to ask them. ( and if she knows it’s inappropriate to ask them, and instead chooses to risk asking them regardless, it’s because she knows it’ll smooth out in the end. / despite what she wears daily, one of her most favourite colours is moss green. there are a multitude of reasons. moss is her favourite foliage. it’s similar to algae, another favourite foliage. and it reminds her of someone who she says is her sister; however, anybody who knows her, knows that she has no blood-siblings. one or the other might be a lie, or both might be the truth. when she’s in a mood, she’ll smear the moss at the base of her neck like a perfume, a splotch of green beneath white.

[ huang shen ] ◈ — he designed an irrigation system to work, specific to his farm, to be able to make rice paddies despite the surrounding environment. it’s a southern crop in the united states, but there was no way he was going to move to the south just to expand the business. his entire family was so relieved about it that they danced through the sprinklers and set off fireworks — and none of them are really into that kind of thing. it’s particularly incredible due to the area they’re in, being very prone to sometimes too much drought and too much rain, and both are responsible for driving out selling numbers of crops. his plan is to switch into an agricultural degree, and perhaps even expand it into engineering, so that he can continue helping this way. / one of his surprises for algernon was learning sign language. for the longest time, months even, shen made it out like he had no idea what was being said, and let damien, as surly as ever, be the translator when algernon was unwilling or unable to speak. in the background, however, he was working with a tutor and seeking to understand better what it meant to be both HoH and mute. then, when algernon’s birthday came around, everyone went silent ( holy god he was so nervous ) and he gave an entire romantic, long speech entirely in sign language. he’s sure that some of it got lost in translation due to how hard his hands were shaking, but the way that algernon kissed him afterwards, it didn’t seem to affect much. now, they communicate constantly on this even ground. / he’s started up horseback riding again — and has roped tobias into doing it alongside him. tobias might have grace on the stage floor, but certainly not on the back of a horse; he somehow ended up upside-down beneath the horse’s belly, and then fell down in a tangle of limbs. shen has taken to the western side of things, re-learning how to barrel race and rope cattle; but he and tobias have had to separate their lessons due to these antics. lucas isn’t allowed to come to any of them; his stupid remarks send them into fits of laughing. ( bold of us to assume he doesn’t just sit in the truck and shout anyways. )

[ deok bae ] ◈ — due to the empire no longer supporting his upgrades, nor looking in his general direction, he has had to find other ways to obtain new modifications. this is including, but not limited to, going and pulling them out of other people’s bodies as catharsis — but usually, he defects to yuri and silas to fix him up. to his chagrin, the LED-light in his forehead has absolutely no use whatsoever, only displaying his brain’s processing as a symptom of installation. he pulled it out himself via the tip of a knife’s blade. the next time that he’s seen by those who haven’t seen him in quite some time, he might be unrecognisable. i am not deok bae — perhaps deok bae is no longer himself either. if there was no connection to eli in his head, he would forget that; perhaps he would merely succumb to the machinery, perhaps he would succumb to the wolf-dom. there are several pairs of teeth in his mouth awaiting for their moment to bite. / when he was a teen, his version of ‘sneaking out’ would be to wheel his chair to the gardens at the back of the temple, where he would sit and think for hours and hours. his father would come and find him there; sometimes, master jhcor would instead. his father would return him back to where he needed to be, but master jhcor would sit beside him and gaze serenely until bae felt the need to speak what was on his mind: his angers, his fevers, his rages. one time, he was surprised to see that it was not master jhcor, nor master deok, but zan coming to sit with him. his heart had sat in his throat the whole time, half-expecting zan to laugh at him or say something particularly piteous. instead, the conversation was — well, looking back, absurdly normal, all things considering. when bae blinked tiredly, zan rose and took the handles of his chair and took him back. he hadn’t intended to ask him to do so, but it was done anyway. / bae drinks a lot of soda. it’s somewhat fitting, if you believe all that talk about how coca-cola can double as a cleaner due to the high carbonation and way it’s made. he does seem to get shiny after several cans — it’s also convenient that he can’t experience sugar-highs nor malfunctions of the liver or stomach due to too much consumption. he considers himself to be a soda connoisseur as a result. he offers a lot of hmm, that’ll taste disgusting comments that annoy the shit out of the others — but then kisung takes a drink and bae ends up being right, so there’s no regrets.

ღ ━ favourite canon ships for your muse(s). are there any you dislike?

there’s ... none that i dislike. there’s moments of come on, but that’s bound to happen. i think the favourite ships are the ... guardian / princess vibes ( whether it’s literal or not: akane / the samurai, quinn / sehrin, jian / elaine ). i also love the growing from previous immaturities towards each other ( grey / tobias, jihoon / wyatt, playboy / jordan ) — and himbos of course ( hojin / ravi!! ) there’s also the whole ... tsh, vampiric aesthetic that we get ( minzhe / yongha ) ... the ones like jisoo / mingfei, cyrian / ulysses, cadoc / pestilence ( exploring violence against but without the stickiness ). of course, if i keep going, i’ll end up listing all of them and then where would we be.

♫ ━ a small playlist for a muse of your choice

for nam jungsoo, because i actually once did make a playlist for him:

1. brand new — sic transit gloria ... glory fades 2. within temptation — what have you done 3. iamx feat. imogen heap — my secret friend 4. florence + the machine — shipwreck (the odyssey) 5. crown the empire — hologram

i mean, the songs are still kinda relevant considering his current character ...

✮ ━ top three favourite muses that you’ve played

but is it possible to pick three favourites ... that’s the real question. maybe. jianguo, because of catharsis, because of cultural exploration and similarities. grendel, because of the depth, the personal torment, the surrounding family. jinho & julius, because of exploring that darkness. and famine — man, now that’s something. there’s a lot more than three though. like blood and jisoo and tobias and arthur. but. the questions INSIST THAT I CHOOSE.