#because it’s the basis of their relationship not to mention the power imbalance part and the fact that dean is practically sam’s father

[lambmotifz]

even for hardcore wincest shippers it’s essential to remember that sam and dean didn’t fuck in canon. they are NOT lovers. the weirdness and sexual subtext come from the power imbalance in their relationship (dean raised sam + the theme of cycles of abuse, dean quite literally becoming a john to sam’s dean) and codependency which is rooted in dean’s unhealthy obsession with the ideal version of his little brother (as well as his need to own him) and sam’s guilt & unconditional devotion that don’t allow him to leave and that are also the main reason why he submits to dean and lets him do anything to him (especially physically)

[bluegekk0]

What kind of trauma does Grimm struggle with emotionally? That recent art piece you posted made start wondering about this. Great artwork btw

The biggest catalyst for all of his trauma was his sister's betrayal. Their relationship was always a bit rocky due to their contrasting personalities and goals, but he never expected her to see him as a threat and consequently banish him from the plane of the gods. In her paranoia, she saw him calculating a way to overthrow her, when in reality he was simply uninterested in their father's realm. That's not to say he didn't want to be a part of it, a god with no access to the shared plane is no god at all. And since they were siblings, she was the only god able to banish him like this, and now that she's dead, it is impossible to reverse it.

So her betrayal was personal on many levels. First, it hurt him deeply as her brother, he did care for her even if they frequently disagreed, so the fact that she put her own assumptions over her their sibling bond still pains him to this day. Secondly, as I mentioned, his status as a banished god made him an outcast among the higher beings. They're not fully aware of what happened, and most of them instinctively don't trust him, assuming that he must have done something to deserve it. There are some who do not assume, instead they pity him, something which he sees as arguably worse and much more humiliating.

So he decided to cut himself away from other gods completely, The White Lady being one of the very few exceptions, though that came much later. Instead, he chose to focus more on blending with the mortals. He sculpted his physical form to be more fitting for a mortal, and it was clear he wanted to belong somewhere, even if he never hid his powers. He formed the troupe so they'd assist him with the rituals, but also because it made him feel less lonely.

But then he started desiring love, affection and intimacy. Sure, it was no secret that he loved to sleep around, he enjoyed the pleasure that came with it, but over time it became a tad meaningless. He wanted a real connection, and he did get it briefly, but his relationship didn't work out as the realization of his partner's mortality hit him and shattered his vision of a perfect relationship.

It made him afraid of getting attached, so any casual relationships he had would end abruptly as soon as he suspected any kind of closer bond forming. That fear made him even more emotionally avoidant than he was before his first relationship, to the point where he started playing a character just to distract others from his pain. He was always a bit extravagant and charismatic, but he began playing it up even more. He attended parties and events on a regular basis, during which he drank, made love or started fights, and to any bystrander he seemed like a thrill-seeking, loud and alluring individual. Then he returned to his chambers, and the mask would slip off, making him return to his lonely self.

It truly felt hopeless, no gods were interested in a relationship with him, and the feeling was mutual - the power imbalance was an obvious reason, but he also couldn't stand the stuck up personalities or the pity parties he experienced in the past. He did think about a relationship within the troupe once, but he brushed aside the idea as soon as it appeared in his head. It felt wrong, he wanted a connection with someone who was on equal terms with him, someone who wasn't linked to the nightmare realm. And even casual encounters with trouoe members would result in a power imbalance, something he wasn't comfortable with.

So the fact that he was, seemingly, left with no options, only furthered his sense of hopelessness. Any pleasure was simply meant to distract him from that, and while performing with the troupe brought him momentary joy, it would go away as soon as the curtains closed.

Then he met Vyrm, which filled his heart with hope, and during the time they knew each other, his life became much brighter, much more worth it. Thinking about spending time with Vyrm made him genuinely excited, and he would do anything to stop by the palace as often as he could. The happiness radiated from him, and he stopped feeling the need to sleep around past just satisfying his needs. But then it was all stripped from him. His joy, his love, everything that made him truly happy, gone. It broke his heart, all pain he experienced prior to the relationship returned tenfold. He'd desperately seek distraction in the arms of strangers, but it often made him feel even worse. He would stay locked in his chambers and not talk to anyone for noticeable chunks of the day, spending that whole time wallowing in his pain and refusing to let anyone comfort him.

He is certainly much happier now that he's back with Vyrm, but all that pain and trauma didn't just magically disappear. He's still terrified of losing him and everything else he loves, which makes him quite paranoid and overprotective to a fault, sometimes getting to the point where even Vyrm feels uncomfortable with his "guard dog mentality". And all those fears and all the ways his heart was hurt still overwhelm him at times, which is when he seeks comfort in the warm embrace of Vyrm, the only being he trusts completely on all fronts.

And despite all of that, he's still unable to cry, as if the heat inside his body made the tears evaporate, or perhaps this is something he still refuses to give himself, in an attempt to preserve his charismatic and mysterious leader mask he continues to hide behind when talking to strangers. So all he's left with is silent, dry tears, the only subtle sign that he should be crying is his voice trembling.

So to sum up, his struggles are a result of years of loneliness and pain building up, all rooted in his sister's betrayal, and only worsened by heartbreaks he experienced. And with how he presents himself in front of others, you wouldn't even be able to tell. Only Vyrm gets to see him in his most vulnerable state, so this is something I really wanted to portray in my art. Grimm, the usually dominant and confident personality, being gently cuddled and comforted by his much smaller and softer husband, a complete contrast to what he's usually like in other drawings. It was a visual I really wanted to draw, and I'm so, so happy with the result.

[calculatesguilt]

As a fellow dr.atchet disliker, I would like to hear your detailed thoughts on the ship, if you don't mind. For me, I feel the ship fundamentally does not work. There are even certain events within MTMTE that make them liking each other to be questionable.

Oh yeah, totally.

So to start off I would like to mention that I do not like how JRo writes religion and religious characters. One of these exceptions is Cyclonus because his beliefs are actually respected. Now, the way he writes it comes off very much as "Culturally Xtian Atheist Who Thinks All Religion Is Bad." Who's to say if this is true but he very much comes off that way.

This is important for later. I'll be breaking it down into three points:

The power imbalance

Ratchet's toxic atheism

JRo world makes prior relationships characters had meaningless

The Power Imbalance

I feel like an insane person at times when I think about this. As in "Am I just crazy or are people completely ignorant to it."

First off: The only interaction we have between Drift and Ratchet in MTMTE (Season 1) is the Pharma situation and when Drift recounts Ratchet saving his life. This, I feel, became the basis of their... sorta friendship (hard to call it that when all we were given was bits and pieces.)

This exchange has always felt a little off-kilter to me because this is... This is a Doctor taking care of a Patient. I believe Ratchet meant what he said but for this to be the foundational aspects — the driving force behind their relationship has never really sat well with me. I could See Drift looking UP to Ratchet for that, and indeed this is where the power imbalance comes from.

There's also this from Empire of Stone. Drift is pouring out his heart, telling ratchet his greatest fears and why he's doing what he's doing and what he's most afraid of becoming again.

And how does Ratchet initially respond?

I get this is supposed to be a joke and bring levity to the moment but it just doesn't work.

It's never really felt like they were on equal ground, and it's never felt like they come to that equal footing. When we reach the end we're supposed to believe they did eventually but we're rewarded for nothing. There is no actual substance or growth shown, if anything the majority of what we're shown in Lost Light is Ratchet constantly belittling and mocking Drift. Which brings me to:

Ratchet's Toxic Atheism

Drift makes a good point here but Ratchet's never really shown to be wrong about how he treats religion. In fact he's rewarded for it and does the ultimate Uber Atheist Boner of "proving religion wrong" on Mederi.

Ratchet became a stand-in for JRo's soapboxing and to pair him with Drift in the end is like. It sucks! It feels bad! And Ratchet is never criticized for how he treats religious people or religion save from Drift and it is always played off as a joke!!

Then, at the end, we're not given Real closure to this fact, we're given this which completely cheapens them and feels completely undeserved. We were not shown this growth. We were not shown this change We were shown, foor the most part, Ratchet being a complete dickhead to Drift. (And frankly everyone around him.)

(I would pull up more examples but my dedication of rereading mtmte/ll for this isn't that powerful.)

It's JRo World

One of my biggest gripes with mtmte/ll is that characters relationships prior to the series are not carried over. Which would be fine if this was aiming for a soft-reboot of IDW1's era, however it... really isn't. It builds upon a lot of prior writing and a lot of current writing from the sister series of RiD (especially in regards to Megatron.) So having absolutely no prior relationships carry over (Perceptor and Drift. Ratchet and literally anyone else other than Drift. Rodimus and Drift just in general with their shoddy writing in the later half.) makes it feel... what's the word I'm looking for... incomplete, I suppose

It feels like he wanted to have pre-established relationships between these characters but didn't want to build off actual pre-established relationships so he created one between Drift and Ratchet and it just doesn't work for me.

Anyways I'm sure there's plenty more examples out there that I've missed but I cannot bother to go thru the entire comic series for them flakjslfdkj.

[lamplightjuniper]

Okay okay, I'm on my computer now so let me put a few more pins on the board to explain:

(Spoilers for WWDITS S6 and Frasier (1993) lol)

Niles is Frasier's brother, Daphne is a live-in careworker for his and Frasier's dad

She was effectively also their maid/housekeeper.

Niles/Daphne was a long slow-burn pairing between 2 main characters.

Niles pined over Daphne for 6 seasons before his feelings were revealed.

During those 6 seasons Niles was in love with Daphne but:

A) already married, then

B) going through a bitter and drawn out divorce, then

C) in another relationship where they eloped after 6 months

(bc Daphne had gotten engaged to Niles' divorce lawyer lol)

The divorce was drawn out in part because his ex-wife knew he had feelings for Daphne, and was using this as legal basis for "alienation of affection"

(Niles lies to his lawyer, aka Daphne's boyfriend/future fiance, and denies this)

In Frasier season 7, Niles' feelings were accidentally revealed to Daphne by Frasier while he was heavily drugged.

Ultimately, Niles and Daphne get together hours before Daphne's wedding at the end of season 7

This caused a huge fallout with their exes (the divorce lawyer and a high-society surgeon)

In Frasier S8E5 during all this fallout, Frasier hires a butler to replace Daphne.

The butler warns against employer/employee relationships at first, but then is so moved by their love for each other that he quits his butler job to go pursue a high-born lady he once worked with and had feelings for, but had left because of the class differences.

Okay, so maybe some loose parallels between 2 sitcoms, but what else?

So there are at least 2 specific Frasier references in WWDITS:

In S03E8 - The Wellness Center, Nandor quotes Frasier's catchphrase "Goodnight Seattle, and good mental health!"

He says this right before leaving the vampires, and refusing to turn Guillermo because he cares about him too much.

Niles and Daphne were specifically mentioned in-universe in S4E7 Pine Barrens

When Nadja was introduced as Guillermo's girlfriend and also his maid, his family said it was like Daphne and Miles from "Frasier."

There was no protest from his family about the nature of their supposed relationship, except to point out that the character Daphne was actually a Physical Therapist and not technically a maid.

This was also the episode where Guillermo came out as gay, and reaffirmed that even though he is a slayer by blood, he will keep aligning himself with the vampires.

Now at the very center of the corkboard we have Sam Johnson. He is a TV writer and producer who wrote for both Frasier and What We Do In The Shadows.

He only wrote a few episodes of Frasier, but produced almost every single episode starting from season 7 up through season 11.

Now let's take a quick look at the list of episodes he wrote for WWDITS:

S2E08 - Collaboration (Guillermo leaves to work for Celeste, and Nandor relents and agrees that he was a good familiar, and gave him a present when he comes back home)

S2E10 - Nouveau Theatre des Vampires (The Guillermo moment of all time, with Nandor first pretending that he didn't care Guillermo left, and then cheering for him to murder a bunch of vampires)

S3E2 - The Cloak of Duplication (Guillermo + Meg's conversation about the feelings "Nandor" has for "Guillermo")

S3E9 - A Farewell (Confirmed Guillermo has direct knowledge of Nandor's dick)

S3E10 - The Portrait (homoerotic fight followed by proposal to turn him into a vampire)

S4E3 - The Grand Opening (Dick wish)

S4E6 - The Wedding (The best man speech, Marwa likes what Nandor likes, Nandor tenderly covering Guillermo so he can sleep)

S5E6 - Urgent Care (Guillermo confesses he loves Nandor while heavily drugged)

S5E10 - Exit Interview (If I am lying, kill me now)

S6E2 - Headhunting (Made it abundantly clear that they are no longer employer/employee, familiar/master, or any other power imbalance*)

S6E4 - The Railroad (Guillermo fires Nandor and he loses his shit entirely)

It's like a list of Nandermo greatest hits.

Unfortunately Sam Johnson is not credited as a writer for any of the remaining episodes of S6, so I don't know what (if any) conclusions we can draw about the nandermo endgame based on this info.

I'm also not saying that these two couples are direct parallels -- the show formats are different, the characters and their roles in the story are different, the nature of their relationships are very different (tbh I would not have been shipping Daphne/Niles in 1996)

But can we agree that the spirit of a classic slowburn sitcom romance was present and influencing the writing of WWDITS?

I think yes, and I will die on the hill that there was an intentional bend towards nandermo to some degree from at least S2 onward.

Is it just a stock sitcom cast photoshoot pose? Maybe. But indulge me a little bit.

Do you see it?? Is it just me with my red string on a cork board here??

[bookofmirth]

The english side of me REALLY jumped out with this one lol

Possessiveness, jealousy, and overprotectiveness are staples of the romance genre, especially when it comes to paranormal romances, so much so that it’s expected for people to overlook the problematic aspects of possessiveness, jealousy, and overprotectiveness because these concepts in the romance genre are meant to be viewed not only as hot and sexy, but indicators of love and showing that the person cares. Despite their tendency to fall in the yellow flag zone, these concepts are meant to further the romance itself. And when you begin to question these concepts as they appear in different romances, there’s almost always pushback with people saying the books are “just fiction”. But what happens when there’s evidence that shows why these three concepts aren’t always healthy or hot/sexy in a romantic pairing? What happens when the narrative is using these concepts to show how they can be detrimental to a character and those romantically associated with that character?

Possessiveness/Overprotectiveness

In romances, it’s always in the man’s nature to be possessive and overprotective. These two concepts are usually used to show that a character is protective of their partner and we see that happen with almost all of SJM’s endgame ships, but they’re almost always portrayed as good/healthy because of the equal partnership that is present in those relationships. Thinking about acotar, a relationship where possessiveness and overprotectiveness were depicted in a negative light was between Feyre and Tamlin. Their relationship was imbalance and Tamlin’s possessiveness/overprotectiveness of Feyre stood out in the barriers he placed on Feyre when they were together: not letting her leave the house/keeping her in the house; saying everything is for her “protection”; only letting her talk to Alis and Lucien/limiting her interactions with others; telling Lucien to back off from Feyre because Tamlin saw him as a threat and that she could fall for him instead; having Feyre be dependent on him by not teaching her how to fight/learn how to use her powers; controlling every aspect of Feyre’s life at the beginning of acomaf; among other things.

Males in acotar feel an intrinsic sense of entitlement to their mate and are described as being protective and possessive over their mates. When people say that A is exhibiting “mate behavior” towards E, obviously there is a positive connotation associated with that phrase because of how the males act around their mate. But the thing is A isn’t E’s mate. A’s possessiveness of E is treading on the waters of Tamlin-ville because: A speaks for E, which is oddly similar to what some of E’s stans do in fandom discussions (as if E herself reached out of the book to personally tell them things that no one else knows); he makes it known that E shouldn’t help with the Dread Trove, which is an example of A attempting to limit what E does; and he subtly expresses a sense of entitlement over E in the bonus chapter during his conversation with Rhys when he questions if the Cauldron was wrong in pairing E with Lucien. A’s “mate behavior” is completely different from Rhys and Cassian because Rhys and Cassian are canonically mated to Feyre and Nesta, which plays a role in how they act towards them. Also, neither of them attempt to limit what Feyre and Nesta do even if they worry about their safety. To say that A is exhibiting “mate behavior” towards E would have the same effect as saying Tamlin was exhibiting “mate behavior” towards Feyre. I think that the reason A’s actions towards E are described as mate-like is because thinking otherwise calls his actions into question. I assume some people aren’t ready for that conversation because he’s been portrayed as the sad bat boy in the fandom for so long that it’s probably hard for people to come to terms with this not being the case.

When people say A being overprotective of E is similar to Rhys and Cassian being overprotective of Feyre and Nesta, the comparison becomes incomparable because A is overprotective of E to the point where he goes against what E wants to do (E stating she wanted to help find the dread trove, a scene in which A was present and later A said E shouldn’t be exposed to its innate darkness), while Rhys and Cassian know Feyre and Nesta are capable of fending for themselves in dangerous situations. It’s just ironic that A’s overprotectiveness in this moment contradicts E’s “choice” of wanting to help, yet I don’t see that being mentioned in those “choice” arguments.

Jealousy

Jealousy in the romance genre is always meant to further the romance between the love interests and we see that happen with rowaelin and chaorene (and probably other SJM ships too). But when the jealousy and the romance are disconnected from each other, that’s meant to show something about the character who is jealous and what they’re jealous of. On the second page of the bonus chapter, it’s established that A is envious of Cassian and Rhys and that the reason he remained downstairs by the fire was so that he didn’t get swallowed up by his jealousy in his room. Then on the third page, it’s revealed that the reason he stayed by the door at Solstice was because “he couldn’t stand the sight of it, the scent of their mating bond, and needed to have the option of leaving if it became too much”. There is a blatant reimagining happening with A’s bonus chapter to make it seem as though his jealousy is romantically coded when the jealousy has nothing to do with his relationship with E and more to do with him. This reimagining has to be a case of people seeing what they want to see because I highly doubt people are out here failing literature class.

The Romance Genre & SJM

A and E’s interaction in the bonus chapter is frequently compared to Wings and Embers. The only similarity between these two chapters is the sexual undertones, which is part of the reason why I think people compare them in the first place because everything else (the structure of the chapters, their contents, and the amount of characters involved in them) is different. I think people are hiding behind the sexual undertones of the bonus chapter in hopes that it somehow overshadows not only the oddness of A’s interaction with E, but the ending of the bonus chapter as well. And even more than that, A giving away the necklace is compared to Cassian tossing Nesta’s present in the Sidra. Since A is able to give the necklace away that should tell you about the significance of the necklace’s connection to E herself (if A can easily give it away to the next person on the street) whereas Cassian regifting Nesta’s present would probably be meaningless to someone else because it was Nesta specific.

We know that acotar is more romance heavy compared to tog and cc so I can see why people lean more on the conventions of the romance genre as a basis for their arguments. And this is fueled by SJM saying this new trilogy will have one couple per book. However, the downfall of these arguments is that oftentimes the plot, narrative structure of this new trilogy in particular, and individual character progressions are secondary or afterthoughts to the romance they support. These arguments lack any real substance because acotar has proved time and time again that both the romance AND the plot work in tandem, going against the broad strokes of the romance genre formula where the romance is primarily in the spotlight.

Basically, why do you think A’s possessiveness, jealousy, and overprotectiveness of E is romanticized? Why do you think A and E’s dynamic is constantly compared to feysand and nessian? And why do you think people take issue with A being compared to Tamlin?

I think that the reason A’s actions towards E are described as mate-like is because thinking otherwise calls his actions into question.

THIS

I hate the whole discussion of "mate behavior" because the series doesn't even explain that very well. Rhys can't explain why people are mated, if it's for reproduction or being "equals" (in what sense, who knows), the courts all handle acceptance/rejection differently, the consequences of rejection are unclear and make it seem like the woman is beholden to accept on pain of... causing someone else pain.

I agree 100% that people (maybe unconsciously) try to ascribe "mate behavior" to Azriel in order to excuse what would ordinarily be inexcusable. He doesn't have some magical thing making him act this way. Neither did Tamlin, and we know how people view his behavior. And that's another thing with "mate behavior" and the bond. Why would Tamlin and Feyre not be mates, if all it took were these extreme possessive and protective behaviors? Why aren't Az and Mor mates?

And it's not even about Elain! Az acts like this with Mor, and we know there isn't a mating bond there. Azriel has zero reason to behave the way that he does, not in the same way that the mating bond gives Rhys and Cassian an "excuse", flimsy as it is, for the way that they act around Nesta and Feyre. Even that excuse is crap, because we have Rhys out here leaving Feyre's abusive ex alone, and then we have Lucien doing the same with Graysen. The definition of "mate behavior" that some of the fandom is working with... is sus.

The fact is that no matter how "overprotective" and possessive Rhys and Cassian were, they never prevented Nesta or Feyre from doing what they wanted. They might have gotten their hackles up, but then they backed off. Rhys sent Feyre into the Weaver's cottage. Nesta went to war. There is a balance between caring deeply and passionately for these women, and recognizing them as individuals whose autonomy should be respected.

The jealousy is 100% not about Elain. It's not about Elain being with Lucien. It's not about Mor, because we know that it's not really about Mor sleeping with Helion. Azriel has 99 problems, and 98.5 of them are about his childhood and his loneliness. The other 0.5 problem comes in the shape of a snowball.

The only similarity between these two chapters is the sexual undertones

You know I haven't done a full blown comparison between these chapters, but I'd agree. The entire Wings and Embers short was about Nesta and Cassian. There were no other characters and they learned a great deal about one another. What did Elain and Az learn about one another as people in the first third of his POV? Nothing. There was no tension between them other than sexual. Cassian thought Nesta's name over and over, thought about her as a person and her personality and how she made him feel. Azriel literally only thinks about fucking Elain. There is nothing wrong with fucking, obviously, but that's not love. (Maybe I should fully compare them idk.)

It's when we look at everything he doesn't say in conjunction with how he treats Elain and Mor in other scenarios... that's troubling. People can misread our 😬 at his behavior all they want, but the fact is that Az didn't have a single kind, original thought about who Elain is. His POV gave us zero extra insight into who Elain is as a person, which is... startling, if we are supposed to think that they know one another so incredibly well and have such intense feelings for each other. Why would we not get additional insight into her character? We get a lot of insight into Az's character for sure. But following his POV, if he loves and knows this woman so well, we should feel that. We should know why he loves her, what he knows about her, we should... just get some more damn insight into her character, if we are in the POV of someone who supposedly knows her so well!!!!

You know it's funny though, because the Az and Elain interaction in his POV mirrors when Nesta imagined a threesome with Az and Cassian. Close, and potentially pretty hot, but it never really happened because then it would mess up sjm's plans for the future.

Okay now to your ACTUAL questions haha and not just my reactions to what you said.

I agree that romanticizing Azriel's behaviors is the better option for people who ship it because otherwise the alternative is to accept them for what they are, which is not about Elain at all. Az has an even longer history of being all "mate behavior" on Mor, but no one thinks that's odd? I think that some people pick and choose their evidence, which is a big reason why I keep shoving Mor into these conversations. If the "mate behavior" argument was genuine and had a solid foundation, then the people making these claims would still ship moriel.

The whole thing with Az and Tamlin comparisons.... oh boy. I think there is a lot there.

I think that people don't want to see Az as anything less than perfect sad boi that Elain can fix with her love.

I think that people have a difficult time seeing emotional abuse IRL, to the point where even people who experience it directly struggle to come to terms with it, so why would we willingly embrace its presence in fiction? It also flirts with a lot of the ideas you mentioned being present in a lot of romance, though I'd argue a lot of those elements are becoming passé.

I think that Tamlin is Fandom Enemy Number One while Azriel is Self-insert Book Boyfriend Number One, and maybe people don't know how to reconcile those things. (This is quite literally true, I checked AO3 for reader fanfics and compared numbers between the bat boys, Az/reader fics win by a landslide.)

There also seems to be a refusal to see or accept nuance. I'm not even talking about moral complexity because I don't think that either Tamlin or Az intend to behave the way they do. They aren't villains. It just reminds me of people who somehow don't think Nesta was absolutely horrible through much of the series, even though a huge focus of her arc in acosf was coming to terms with how she had treated people. Anyway...

People see "gwynriel shipper" or "elucien 💕" in a bio and just dismiss arguments before trying to understand them

People try to justify their actions of their faves, which I understand!

People don't understand how subtle emotional abuse can be, and how there doesn't have to be clear intention.

I still plan on pulling out evidence from the book about times when their behaviors mirror one another. But it's like I've said for months - Tamlin is a cautionary tale. I don't think Azriel will go that far, but the foundation is there. The fact that acotar/acomaf was so, so explicit about how Tamlin's behavior was not okay, and yet people can see that same behavior in another character one book later and want to try to excuse it... sigh. Way to miss the point, fandom.

[misterbitches]

I ship muren and li cheng bc i only saw it through gifs then i watched this episode cos i was like im only starting this show if they kiss im waiting and they did and it was nice and i got so anxious that i was about to fucking vomit. I really like them together. The top/bottom shit is dumb and i hope if they must mention it they all build a bridge and get over it so they can switch cos who gives a shit. I didnt realize how large they all are like most “tall” men on tv are lying. But bc that kid is so thin and tall and the other one (idk the stepbrother) is huge too. Li cheng is shorter than them both but more ~manly~ but still short so why doesnt he take a DICK UP HIS BUTT XD since that’s all that fucking matters and there’s only 2 genders and 2 eays to have sex lmao so nothing else otherwise ur screwed

Hd a terrible past couple of weeks personally and because i keep seeing my peopl eget murdered and things ripped from us ^_____^ anyway here’s Some libertatrian communist dumb bitch discoars so i’ll tag it:

keep in mind these are my opinions’”” when i engage in discourse. I am not the end all be all and I don’t need you to agree. There’s some shit I am non-negotiable on but thsi is just exchanging of information. Any authoratative tone I take on comes from my beliefs, my life, my experiences, and what I choose to cultivate as a person and an artist. I dont have control over your feelings, you do. If it hurts you then either tell me the issue and be PRECISE about it, understand that context matters which is why i type so much in engagement, and do not fucking lie or misconstrue my words. Do not call me western ever in your life either. I am a black-american. I have adhd and bc i am a black woman if ur automatically thinking im brolic i am accepting money in my paypal for ur wellbeing to get me to shut the fuck up.Thanks.

The stepbrothers storyline is stupid and lazy writing. I really want to counter people that say it’s written well and that it’s interesting because it isn’t. Even if it was illicit and fucked we can write a story out about this. Let’s rethink what they could have done shall we:

- become stepbrothers at about 16 and their parents mismanage the relationship and they fail in trying to get an integrated family together (this is what happened in the #iconic transit girls and that was fuckin’ weird but hey dude guess what we watched it and it was weird but not unethical and we know one is like 19 and the other is 21 and a girl so it’s like wow you avoided so much and handled their stepsister story very…….um lightly given the end lmao but it was there and people had AGENCY)

-OR you realize that freak is obsessed with him and then he realizes it and is like “bitch i swear to god” and in typical shtity trope BL fashion they can find a way from obsession, to loss and independence when you lose your obsession, to “love” if they choose

- have the fucked up shit but make it clear what the issues are and you literally cannot write your way out of it so do not try

But why can’t fucked up things be shown? Also this is realistic.

0. Well according to you but no one said that they can’t. So that’s on your interpretation of critique (that is, again, not bullying or harassment.) They can, i just gave plenty of scenarios in which it is affective and not just annoying to witness, trope-y, and frankly ridiculous and offensive. Sorry! They don’t do it well. You can come up with alternatives too. See #2 btw.

1. No it isn’t doing a good job of reflecting life because life has consequences. The exaggeration in drama doesn’t mean the arc shouldn’t be there. Almost always things that aren’t heavy with the message or meant to be sobering in a deep way are COMPELLING. The realism is the basis for art because we are human. This is not the way real humans act.

Someone said Tharn Type was mature and I had to laugh because no, no one acts that way and is “in love” if they act that way that means they fucking hate each other and they’re immature and frankly it’s just not that interesting for many of us to watch because the dramatization of the “realism” is fucking bonkers. That was such poor writing it is unbelievable and someone has the audacityt o say it’s how real adults act. Fucking murder me if I’m with someone for 7 years and we break up over a miscommunication and for some reason I am not as horny as my always horny boyfriend. The fuck? What kind of lives do you lead? Either you are not an adult or you are an adult who needs therapy.

I also hear the “realistic” argument but then people try and temper it with “but also it’s fiction.” What do you think fiction is? Why do you think filmmaking exists? Number one, it’s propaganda in the sense that you want others to buy into your presentation and see what you see. That means that the creators are telling people and influencing them WITH ART BECAUSE THAT’S WHAT IT IS about their feelings around a situation. That’s why it is imperative to be responsible as a filmmaker and artist and underline the deepness of creepiness if that’s what they want. If they want to relay that rape sometimes ok and psychos are crazy so they get boy (??!?!?!? BITCH?) then they achieved it with no innovative information. We know people get raped bc we are human beings and many of us live with that fear. You know, being the target demo and all. And bc BL loves that trope it’s rape fantasy peddled to young people and women. Just like shitty wattpad fics or NYT best sellers. Hooray, what now? Or are you trying to purport that this isn’t glorified fanfiction? Which it literally is

2. This is the issue with these shows. No one is saying that fucked up shit cannot be shown. There’s a film about a woman who is raped and she falls in love with her rapist (because he was masked but i think we find out later that she knows. Binoche is in it.) I have no desire for that film—i think it’s by a man and i extra dont care—but I hear it’s sort of powerful for many. I heard it was a good film. But the act itself is always eschewed and the conflict comes from how fucking ridiculous it is especially finding out that she knows. The power imbalance adn the possibility. They may not have handled it in a way I would have cared for but it was there.

There’s simply no imagination because these people do not care that much and aren’t great writers and filmmakers because they simply do not have to be. Sorry.

The industry doesn’t rely on the best they rely on efficiency (this is everywhere.) You can tell by the camera angles, the editing, the camera itself (idk if it is multicam but the flatness is typical soap flatness without the glowboxes to soften their faces.) Simple constant lighting. Now the surroundings are mostly beautiful. But even to some of the costumes. And those edits are abysmal, some of that camera work.

So with all that said even with the couple I extremely enjoy I see its (H4) faults. Add into that a lazily thrown together “shocking” love and if they are trying to get us to feel a type of way about its sexiness they fail. This is why movies like 50sog, 365 days, etc aren’t enjoyable to people because it’s fucking strange situations that they dont want to entangle or make enjoyable to viewers across the board. They know what people will take. It’s just that bitch what are we here for if even the sexiness isn’t there for ur stupid story.

At least with that teenager and 30 yr old man in MODC (which i do not love but i like them in theory if it wasnt totally repulsive to me and also if it was developed in a way that was good TO ME) they had their, er, “sex appeal” i talk about this as well the main couple in MODC to me, visually, was a miss. Not bc whatshisface was small and stuff but bc he was so sickly and they needed that to propel the story but it was just not appealing given how the story progressed. A missed opportunity in tying the two together besides making him look waif-y and sickly only to have the “did ur mom die in a car crash? No, cancer” type of move in not another teen movie. But the opposite. And not funny. Wayne tho????? GORL. Eggs. Cracked.

fandoms have a very warped sense of harrassment and discourse.

Most fandoms have harassers who are “protecting” the cast and crew who don’t need their protection (or maybe the crew does since they probably dont get paid well but why the fuck would anyone care about that lol) but very few have the people who have concerns or massive critique about the show are not going to be “bullying.”

If people are saying “if you like xyz, u suck” then sure it may suck for you to see but who fucking cares. Either talk to the person or don’t be friends with them. That is not bullying or harrassment. Things that are shitty get criticized. Fuck, things that aren’t shitty don’t. Get away from this idea of cancel culture and people misunderstanding the story. We have the ability to.

Think beyond your noses of personal preference. You don’t have to convince people of what you believe. Discussing it is good but critique is not bullying, harrassment, or hate. Neither is fucking roasting shit because even this shit I like (manner of death lets say) deserves it. Art is meant to be critiqued and if you dont fucking like the bullshit people make then say it. They know stupid stories like this are scandalous and they don’t give a shit in how to present them.

And guess what? You won’t like everybody. Many people can’t stand me i’m sure. Oh well. I mean frankly I don’t like that and I feel very unsettled when I don’t feel understood. That’s ok! I have to temper it. Sometimes calm myself down. I won’t get anything and everything I want. And you won’t like every opinion and sometimes it’s like “man am i a dummy?” But the part of growing up is fucking maanging that and beng honest about “bashing and harrassment” and “bullying” and growing up. Yuo can like what you want the “let people like what they want thing” is so fucking juvenile and THAT is not the real world. Which is probably why so many people feel that way, they dont want to live in the real world. Unfortunately, you do.

Think beyond our noses of personal preference and what we feel emotionally in conjunction with others. You don’t have to convince people of what you believe. And you can say things that you believe to be true but it doesn’t make them so or maybe it isn’t received that way to people. And many times we learn new things in the discussions “oh shit i didn’t see it that way” right? Discussing it is good but critique is not bullying, harrassment, or hate. Neither is fucking roasting shit because even this shit I like (manner of death lets say) deserves it. Art is meant to be critiqued and if you dont fucking like the bullshit people make then say it. They know stupid stories like this are scandalous and they don’t give a shit in how to present them. Usually the “opposition” in these situations aren’t the popular beliefs that permeate through society. Trust me lmao

Antiblackness

Antiblackness is a thing. It permeates everywhere. It permeates in this genre and it permeates in fandom. Get it the fuck together. Also do not conflate cultural relativism with being repsectful. They are not barbarians, they are smart human beings either making work or deciding to. We all have diff cultures but we have fucking sense in what is respectful and not. And if we don’t we fucking learn. You cannot excuse things and say “oh culture” when you have 0 idea of that culture or actual people who are radical etc and are fighting against it. Additionally the word westerner is an ignorant term when referring to people in the US or UK who are black. Because we are not. We extend sympathy to other groups and empathy since we know so there is no inherent power imbalance between a black viewer and their subject. Don’t suggest that because it’s wrong and ahistorical and contextless.

FIRST the fallacy of representation as freedom makes people fucking complacent, individualistic, and doesn’t let them think critically. Consumption and discourse around consumption is not helping material conditions of the marginalized communities in your home, the black ones who are ignored, those intersectionalized in these communities. Groups talk about art and what it means for them outside of just what we see and because we also don’t have access to a bunch of Thai reviews or what movements or going on we are less likely to know if we don’t FUCKING SEARCH for it. Because art is constant...which leads me to....

Representation is difficult. It matters and it doesn’t.

Tthese shows are not meant to overturn the LGBTQ+ community.

There are queer filmmakers and artists in these countries. Deep illustrious film careers or even TV that is moving and deliberate. We can even see it with the dude from “your name engraved” in their short series he was in beforehand. BL is no wa pejorative because it is simply not “qu**r” storytelling whatever that means. But know it has always existed everywhere and there are also out artists or radical artists in all these countries who do no respect mediums that are cash-grabs and poorly made.

ex: As much as “Like in the Movies” sort of isnt for me and is a bit hamfisted you can tell how much love goes into that. Love of the characters, acting, and message. Yes it’s cringey to see some of the lines (like very tbh subtlety wasnt exactly their strong suit) and yea naming them after lenin and marx is just 0ihgoaudgijposkagjihou BUT GUESS WHAT? THEY FUCKING DID IT. THEY TRIED. And class was a large component as well bc u cant fuckin ignore it. The show is aware of the machinations in its world as a show but also in the philippines and for a fuckin reason. And duatarte? Loooooooool so like yea not so sure bl makes him love his ppl but the show isnt trying to do that

It’s not a transgressive genre and it has no reason to be. No ethical anything under the way we live it’s just trying your fucking best to be. That’s it. They serve societal ills and capital’s purposes. Which is fine but it is not revolutionary.

These countries in SEA or even SA do not have as big budget for even mainstream dramas—though things are changing and that’s bc REVENUE like revenue from kpop is fucking huge for SK and again so much about that is bc of what happened in their history from japanese imperialism to WWII to the US—so for “queer” stuff it is sort of now important to make that an export and it sure is one. Not only globally or to the west but a lot of these places make their money within asia (duh!) outside of their countries. OBVIOUSLY. so BL is a way to output and gain money. The thing is, it doesnt seem to be put back into the industry at all. For people in all these countries to make works that aren’t for mainstream or wont reach as many people there’s a difference between trying and just shoving shit in your face and going here it’s gay you like it right? But dont antagonize the inherent patriarchal nature of BL.

Another thing: did you guys know thailand was never colonized? You should look it up. There’s little hints of things in ITSAY to represent french influence still. Isnt that fascinating? Find out why. It’s certainly interesting that the representation, though damaging and dubious many times and also incorrect like any media, is huge in asia and this isnt a commodity here (the US) exactly. A lot of that has to do with colonial ideas of gender of which I am sure. But listen………lmao

Sometimes people dont give a shit. And it very much shows. Here is the thing once again. GOOD TRANSGRESSIVE WORK exists.

Een within the capitalist Bs paradigm or you can see people trying (I can sort of applaud parts of lovely writer) also queer media has always existed everywhere the reason you don’t know about it is because it gets takena nd commodified into a mainstream product. We hvae little incentive, particularly if we are not fans of cinema or art in gen, to search fror others when the output is right here. Being dictated by others and the state and who will give you money. No longer an effort of a cast and crew who want to convey things. But google [any country] independent cinema, radical cinema, queer radical cinema, or even retrospectives on the cinema and rethinking what is queer and radical in film. What if we took that, diluted it, got rid of the creators who put themselves through all the work, ignroe al the nuances and do……………….two actors who are conventionally attractive with no chemistry making out.

It’s the same here lets say daniel kaluuya winning the oscar for the film about the BPP. I heard it was okay and not too offensive but it still isnt’ enough. It still isn’t like hwood isn’t trash, nnati black, misogynistic towards BW and women, and all that other shit. It was pushy but it can’t be enough where we are. Black KKKlansmen i think won an oscar, by circumstance i fuckin hate these award shows they mean nothing, and i like the film a lot but he has his misogynoir still resting in his films even if it is poignant. And it was a film that honestly wasn’t really made for black people. And should all art be a response to direct trauma or trying to make ourselves palatable when we’re just human?

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ and it’s importance (capitalism) but also sorta individual responsibility

Considering a lot of these actors are rich and then just dip that’s another problem. Mainstream isn’t what sustains marginalized art ever. It doesn’t change in the vast ways we think it does. What changes is the people of these groups pushing, fighting, forcing and then capitalism trying to make it work under capitalism. It will not. It cannot.

This is why artists and labels often don’t mix or you see people like Sonic Youth doing whatever they want and pissing off their label but making them give them money. Same with Nirvana. Vince Staples. The thing is they can fight and make good shit but what capitalism helps people….not care? They don’t respect the audience? We’re getting those returns on poor executed product placement, lighting, editing, framing, fucking acting. And you surewon’t see mixed black asians in these shows. WHY R U is the oNLY one i have seen it in and he just disappears (but that was pretty cool.) so who the fuck is this representing? And before you start: asian countries are not homogenous the way we believe them to be. There are marginalized communities outside of even mixed people that are harmed. So you can skrrt cause on that one: you’re wrong buddy. But it gives us the IDEA of a paradise which is what they NEED.With representation and visibility comes consequence and responsibility as artists. What it allows them to do is coast and not think complexly because why should they; it’s mostly the fantasies of some older woman who probably has money and much less interaction with the world. It’s bonkers. And what that allows even further is for them to say YOU ARE THE THING THAT YOU CONSUME and the THING THAT YOU CONSUME IS YOURS. It is not, it is not your identity, form a close bond but figure it the fuck out. Especially for adults who are hellbent on twisting their minds into pretzels and can’t acknowledge what’s just laziness in art and not giving a fucking shit. Truly.

There’s damage that has been done from Parasite as he was supported by CJE&M and the bullshit obsession america had and eveyrone’s poor interpretation of it if they are rich. BJH is a socialist and he is a filmmaker. He has made films that are outstanding and cost a lot of money. But now a fear for indie filmmakers is just not being able to raise that much or have that much attention. Getting funding that helps them instead of expecting the Next Big Thing that is a fad because capitalism is trash. Yes this funneling of money is absolutely harmful to us artists. Even buying in is strategic. Additionally, that film is probs one of the most radical films to have that wide release and accolade (unlike “Sorry to Bother You” which i have a lot of thoughts about. One being that asian exports are acceptable but black ones are not. This is an overall art critique and global media critique. Blackness is removed, not respected.) However, filmmaking isn’t green, it can’t be socialist, and it’s a lot of work. They used tons and tons and TONS of water to do a huge beautiful feat but we still know there is a cost. We have to figure that out because it shouldn’t be. It doesn’t go back into the crew’s pockets the way it should and the work becomes that of the director’s and actors solely. It’s fucking hard. We have to do our part but it doesn’t mean we are doing it perfectly. We just have to try to do better. So does BJH cos he needs to not be a misogynist but anyways i digress.

additionally and this is something some users fail to understand: people in the media sphere generally have fucking money. I went to film school that was international with super fucking rich kids. Taiwanese kids, kids from south asia, china, thailand. They had money. No not upper middle class money, not “rich” money, not some paltry 1m that’s chump change. Fucking money. Fucking RICH-RICH. MILLIONAIRES. BILLIONAIRES. WHICH IS DISGUSTING MIGHT I ADD. The domestic people didn’t have the money for school (in the UK) and i am in a massive amount of debt like every other black student that went there. You do not understand how much money is needed to survive so people who turn to these crew positions even casting etc need this fucking money usually. OKAY. A lot of the people that do well in these dumb shows or even on a larger scale HAVE MONEY. The reason these industries are small and struggling is because of lack of people and lack of resources to independent shit because oh gee it takes money to make things.

Why should I try? Well you don’t have to really if you have money or a name. Yet...

We can tell when like those Tik Tok shows or DCOMs dont give a shit (anymore.) You know how frustrated we get when content for young people is garbage? Well, see, BL is literally that under that system. Occasionally we will get something good now but there is virtually no need in any sector in the world at this point to truly figure out how to make it better and what to do to enhance artistic literacy, outreach, teaching people new things, getting people from these communities there and having true realistic says. Art and culture is IMPERATIVE TO WORLD LIBERATION but not when it is so stiffly trying to bend to capital’s idea of progressiveness. No. Neoliberalism. No.

That’s why in a way ITSAY is a huge feat; it takes from films etc and they clearly had money (the actors rae rich too which….lmaooooo j’aime pas) but it was a respected fucking script, acting was important, blocking, framing. There’s very little to critique as a visual medium for that because I understand what they are trying to do, their market is going to be mostly young girls, but they RESPECT THE FUCKING AUDIENCE. And guess what guys? You can make money from it!!!! WOAH! Since that may be the only goal which is disgusting and repulsive.

HOWEVER AND THIS IS WHAT IS SAD: itsay is an ex of a great show however knowing the actors backgrounds and the pseudo trouble it stirred when they weren’t supporting people protesting against the coup in the summer it really put a damper on my enjoyment. And this is how we can see that:

a) it’s honestly just a show and a good one but b) now what?

These kids (actors, who are like idk 19? 20?) are rich and not saying anything while countless actors, who were filming, did. Even tul who has $$$$ and the thing is the protesting against the coup legitimately attacks the rich. As it should. The protests going on were cries for help, against a dictatorship and fucking coup, asking people to get fucking help for covid, having kids be able to live. There’s a mini on VICE about this and it probably doesnt go too in depth but there’s a kid in there who talks about his friends getting into drugs and how he just wants to make music, have fun, skateboard. And it’s harrowing to see. This is a direct example of what these things do and don’t do. Yea we know a good show is here, we know growing up and slice of life, we know this is a bit of escapism and idealism but the idealism is reflected in the way these actors also choose to live their lives. So what progress? To who? For who? How is this helping me? What purpose does it serve? I say ITSAY serves its purpose as a piece and a glimpse into possibility of growing up but i do not say it antagonizes a broader issue that needs to be relevant in some sense but simply is not. It’s very singleminded and, well, it’s sort of like “besides my sexuality, what do i have to worry about?” But for real humans like....a lot. I do not respect their decision at all.

Why can’t we do our jobs and make something decent and respect our audience? No time, gotta make that sweet sweet sweet cash baybee. Look how progressive we are! Don’t look at history and material conditions. Thanks in advance, management.

History 4 does not have that respect. Many of these shows do not. Sometimes we hit good, sometimes we don’t. But in the end we cannot settle. And I won’t. If I am critiquing something I will not be shy and if I am meant to enjoy something as escapism then these shows NEED to highlight that and it’s rare sometimes (the best twins is a good reminder like that show is bad but man do i Brain Empty when i turn it on and i like that and there’s not much in it that makes me want to kill myself from annoyance but there are transphobic jokes i dont love however the whole show is a comedy about this dude’s crazy homophobic sister and she is constantly positioned as wrong and they talk about the aforementioned trans women as the actor was in drag. Interesting that they can manage that, huh?)

Oh btw.....taiwan has a very complicated history but ignore all the bad stuff it’s good now you can kinda sorta get married and stuff. KMT? You know how i learned that? I care about human beings and read about it lmao. I am not Taiwanese and look at that. So now I have historical and DIALECTICAL~**~*~****~*~*~ context so i can judge it as an artist, a black woman from america, and from the knowledge i have to pick up on their history to see if this fits into a broader picture besides the micro-one of sexuality on an individualized level. And this is kinda where it comes full circle: these shows are not you, you are not them, they do not exist in a vacuum because nothing does. The failure to critique now means continuing on as it has and it will still do so. History and time are not linear in the sense we think it is. Someitmes things are better, sometimes things feel more austere. We are not living under liberation though and these shows are not going to do so. So they are not US nor are they for a nebulous “us” of which the groups are all fractured and have diff opinions anyway (my opinion as a black american is going to vary from an asian woman’s say and that could really clash and i do not feel solidarity with all those in every community i am for several reasons.)

Final thots that have taken up my time and the only thing i actually wanted to write but got distracted:

Anyway my dissertation is that I ilke Muren and LiCheng a lot a lot and i like how cute they are and how truly dumb li cheng is. This is an example of mostly good writing, decent actors, nice chemistry, and sort of a calmness to them. And I super enjoy how Muren is pretty forward with LC in the sense that being together is like very important to truly be together. When he was like “no i didnt forget!” Or when LC asked him something in the office I forget it was 6 am and again i almost threw up and muren nodded and then LC leaned on him. Very cute. I want more of them tho i may have to skip that othre couple (the cameo the ones from MODC) but omfg the younger one HIS HAIR GREW SO MUCH HE LOOKS SO MATURE AND CUTE OMFGIJ0HUG9SAOGIJPKOAGJSIOHUAGIJP hahhaha the one good thing i will say about THEM.idk how old the actor is i figure he was young idk it makes me happy to see him he’s very cute. I hope he’s in something i can watch and not gag at. Is he hot? Who knows but he is a cutie!!

Anyway muren and lc have a good thing going it’s nice to watch ho\pe they dont fuck it up but im truly a sucker for some true finds 2 luvas i think some user on her\e was like i’m not a fan of friends ot lovers bc it doesn’t seem like they’re actually friends and maybe they were referring to this show idk. But it made me think and it was a very good observation. So i think they are friends and also luvrs <3

[komakitigerdrop]

I'm so pissed off when hearing s.b says Yoh is unequal to Fei. Yoh worships Fei, true, but what's wrong with that? Is a relationship with worship and respect not good? Don't forget that the main cp - Asami&Aki is an extremely unequal ship, with Aki has no knowledge, power or anything, that's Sensei's taste. Asami started with rape and never wait for Aki's acceptance, they don't even have respect like the way Yoh has for Fei. They can ship such a CP but criticize YohFei is unequal? Ridiculous.

Hi there, fellow Yoh fan! 

I think all the relationships in Finder are problematic, to a certain extent. Asami and Akihito had a beginning people find hard to forget, understandably so. The power imbalance that you mention, combined with Asami's consistently controlling/dismissive/aggressive behavior early on made lots of people view their relationship as unhealthy, which it was. Even with the most recent developments, there is still much to be addressed, and issues that I find hard to ignore. For instance: should Akihito completely erase his own aspirations just to become a more suitable partner to Asami? When was the last time we even saw him work, taking pictures, meeting with his friends? At least to me, it is concerning and sad that Asami has become not only the center of his universe, but his entire universe.

But your ask is mainly about Yoh and Fei, so I will keep my thoughts about AxA for another day. As I see it, there are two important angles to consider here. One comes from other fans, which you seem to be talking about. The other one - the one that used to truly discombobulate me - comes from Yamane Ayano herself.

I don't think that fans that don't ship Fei and Yoh are particularly displeased with Yoh worshipping Fei. To be honest, who in Fei Long's immediate proximity doesn't worship him? Tao does. Yoh does. Mikhail does too, even if it is apparently in a different fashion as the other two. What I have seen people argue is that Yoh is in an inferior hierarchy level and that is where the problem resides: to Fei Long, status matters. Then there is also the fact that Yoh's relationship with Fei Long was built upon an act of betrayal, even if Yoh's sense of loyalty to Asami somewhat changed along the way. 

To me, Yoh and Fei Long together makes sense not because they are a flawless couple. Heck, they are not even a couple, are they? In all honesty, even though their intimate moments in FnR were intense, I don't see sex as the basis for their connection. If anything, Yoh's return in Pray in the Abyss shows that these two men are connected on a level that surpasses business and that does not rely on sexual attraction, even though the sexual tension is there. 

This is actually the one thing that bothers me about Yoh's reappearance in the previous arc. Fei Long brought back to his side a man that was tortured and marked as a traitor by the Baishe in The Naked Truth. Given the story timeline, that is not that long ago, so if anything I would have expected that decision to cause some serious internal tension. We see that tension across the Baishe on a couple of panels on that chapter Yoh wakes up after the car accident, but we don't see anything about how Fei Long deals with that backlash. We don't see how, when or why Yoh made the decision to return to Hong Kong, and we don't learn about the terms of that return (is that a one time thing? Is he staying for good? What made him change his mind, after he refused to return to HK when Fei Long asked him in FnR?)

I understand that there is too much to unpack and the space to do so is limited (plus Yoh is a second tier character in the "business associate" category, so there is even less time dedicated to him), but those things are important for the audience to get a better grasp on what kind of relationship these two guys have with each other. And because those moments are never seen, the overall feeling we are left with is that Yoh is to Fei Long what Kirishima is to Asami, which could not be farther from the truth. For one, Kirishima never confessed to Asami. Also, Kirishima and Asami never slept together, not that we know of. And to add more wood to the fire, Yoh is not the doormat people sometimes paint him to be: he chose to stay in Taipei and not rejoin the Baishe despite Fei Long asking him to do so. He said that if he ever met Fei Long again, it would not be as a subordinate, and indeed, the next time we see him, he is no longer with the Baishe. So it's not the same thing, which leads me to the second perspective to consider: Yamane Ayano's comments.

I have to say, at first I was at a loss when she said it would be difficult to explore "love" between Fei Long and Yoh, because they were not equals.

I mean, excuse me. Are we talking about the manga whose main relationship is about Takaba Akihito and Asami Ryuichi? Because if anything, not being equal is what made that relationship flourish in the first place!

BUT

Here is the thing. Asami Ryuichi and Liu Fei Long are not the same, are they? And they most certainly are not looking for the same thing in a partner. Fei Long himself says in FnR that Asami chose someone who was not a part of their world to settle down with, and why is that? Because Asami was forced into that world. He was born with (or raised to have) the ability to kill, to maim, to control, but in Finder no Souen we learn that that is not what he wants to do with his life. He works in a bar and craves some kind of normalcy despite his circumstances, until that tragic occurrence involving Kuroda forces him to accept his father's condition (to work as a mercenary to defend his business interests). In other words, young Asami knew a relatively normal life that got taken from him, and Akihito represents that return to a time of his life when his aspirations were entirely different than the ones he has now. 

But Fei Long? His life was always inside the Baishe. 16 year old Fei Long, unlike 16 year old Asami, was not pouring drinks behind a counter - he was being trained to be an assassin and to use his looks to get what he wanted. Fei Long's past as it is presented to us consists of a world that is basically the reality of a triad, with as little normalcy as it could possibly have. As a result, even though Fei Long enjoys those moments of normalcy with Yoh in FnR, his aspirations lie elsewhere. His life is the Baishe. He believes in the power of… well, power. He and Asami are a bad match for that exact reason - what they look for in a relationship is not the same. 

That is why, I think, that when YA says that the difference in status makes "love" difficult, she is not saying that in universal terms. She is referring specifically to Fei Long, whose life is dictated by power and status. He is not Asami. He is not looking for his own Akihito, even though he certainly appreciates the photographer. What he wants is his own Asami. Yoh can't be it. I don't think Mikhail can, either, and neither can Tao. That is Fei Long's tragedy, I think.

What he wants, he simply cannot have.

[notfreetoday]

@lurkingshan Filial piety! I just want to clarify that this doesn't mean blind obedience, even though in many Asian cultures, many parents still believe that it is, and weaponize this concept to guilt-trip their kids. The basis of filial piety should be gratitude - for being brought into this world, for being raised and cared for. But that requires a key thing - that your parents actually did their job, and cared for you. If your parents were shitty, then you do not owe them your piety. The problem of course, is how "shitty" is defined, and by whom. The societal pressure to demonstrate filial piety comes from the assumption that all parents love and care for their children - because that is the other part of the equation - parents have an obligation to care for their child. The parent who abuses the child is equally condemened as the child who abandons the parent. There is a bidirectionality and reciprocrity in a lot of Asian relationships that is not often seen because the power imbalance is often seen as an abuse of power (and unfortunately, we are all humans, and abuse of power does happen).

@he-is-lightning-in-a-bottle I admit I am less familiar with Korean culture - but since Japan was also mentioned, I thought I might chime in!

Understanding that someone is drunk, and acknowledging that it might not have been their choice to become so, is still different from actually approving it.

It's not so much that these behaviours are forgiven, but that they are tolerated. The Japanese word "to forgive" (許す) also means "to allow/tolerate". The general feel is "There's nothing that can be done about it" ("shikata ga nai/shouganai" in Japanese, though similar phrases exist in Chinese and Korean). It is still seen as unseemly, and people don't like it. You'll often hear people lamenting that someone's gotten so drunk they've either passed out or can't get home alone, and now they have to do something about it. This is considered a nuisance - but people still help a colleague home so the colleague isn't a nuisance to others, or because they have to, out of social obligation. Those that you find passed out on the street are judged, for sure, but silently. Maybe the person is a salaryman on a solo business trip, or maybe this person just isn't well liked enough for his colleagues to help him get home. A passed out drunk isn't a moral failing for sure, but they are a nuisance and an eyesore that people tolerate, because that's just how it is. (I know it sounds harsh, but this is the reality)

Alcoholism on the other hand, is treated exactly the same way.

To (somewhat) marry both of these topics, let me introduce a Chinese drama - The Bond, or 乔家的儿女 (The Qiao Family Children). The show is about 5 siblings, and their whole life from childhood to adulthood, marriage and divorce. The father in this show is one only in name - he is irresponsible and selfish, drinking and gambling away the family's money. The eldest son takes up the father's role instead (another commom theme) and there are some poignant arguments in the show. The children still provide him with food, and they still eat together, but when he demands to have a say in one of their marriages, the eldest son explodes at him, saying that he has never done anything for the family, cared for them or even disciplined them, and he has no right. Towards the end of the show, he all but cuts ties with the father. It is difficult for him, even then, but he does it for the rest of his siblings. He does not owe his father any filial piety, because his father has never fulfilled that role. His tolerance of his father, and his provision for him, in the beginning, is what marks the eldest son as a 君子 (junzi - often translated as gentleman, but truly means a learned person, someone who understands and sees the big picture) - he does that out of benevolence, because he is the bigger person, not out of filial piety.

I've heard that non-Asian viewers sometimes are surprised by certain behaviours or thought processes (cultural differences) in Asian media when they first start watching Asian shows. Were there any ones that really jumped out at you?

Good question! The short answer is: absolutely, so many.

The long answer is that I think about this all the time and am still constantly learning. I discuss this very often with @waitmyturtles and @neuroticbookworm. I have a very Western mindset and am a fiercely independent person even by Western standards, so I have to constantly remind myself about the collectivist mindset in Asian countries and reframe my own reactions to a lot of the story and characterization choices in Asian media.

I'd say one that I personally struggle with most is the concept of filial piety and elevation of parental authority over one's own well-being. I have cut ties with an abusive biological parent and their toxic larger family, and I have zero guilt or shame about that. For me, it was the right thing to do and if that family ever comes knocking asking me for support they will be turned away without a second thought. But this decision, which felt so natural for me and is culturally acceptable where I live, would be unthinkable in many Asian countries. This came up for me a bunch when I was watching Go Ahead (an all-timer, if you haven't seen it yet run do not walk) and one of the best parts of that watch experience was getting to really feel and understand the vastly different cultural expectations put on a young person living through an analagous situation. Each time I got angry at the choices being forced on these characters, I had to step back and consider their cultural context, and then dig into what the story was trying to communicate about the damage those expectations can cause.

I also discussed this quite a bit with bookworm when we were recently watching I Promised You the Moon together. She is very rooted in an Eastern perspective on expression of emotion (she is more touched by restrained displays where you can tell characters are holding back where I tend to respond more to big emotional outbursts; she responds well to ambiguity in story resolutions where I like for things to feel more definitive), so we sometimes had opposite reactions to scenes and different aspects of the story touched us. We spent a lot of time unpacking it and now like to observe our different preferences when we watch stuff together and think through what it says about the social, spiritual, and broad cultural norms we were raised with on opposite sides of the world.

I have been watching Asian media for years and I still learn new things every day (right now I am watching a Taiwanese drama that is introducing me to an indigenous culture I had no prior familiarity with and I'm learning a bunch), and I try to approach these shows with curiosity first. I think being open to that kind of learning and maintaining willingness to step back from your instinctual reactions and adjust your perspective is especially crucial when you are engaging with media from outside your home culture.

[adamsvanrhijn]

Another working class person showing off their better fortune would be seen as such poor form and not only Thomas would be offended. More disappointingly though, is you thinking it is a funny sexy trope to put Thomas in yet another power imbalance relationship (and thinking Richard would want to ruin one of the key values they share together and like about each other). Not sure you get what working class is like.

Wow I think this is the first negative anon I’ve got in DA fandom???? A true milestone. 

If this were a mutual conversation I would say I think we are talking past each other because I am going to be honest, I feel that the only basis for you sending me this ask is the sugar daddy joke? Which was a joke, although I understand that you found that inherently offensive !

The following paragraph is me speaking entirely in my own defense, but I do think it is worth noting that there are different senses of that phrase and not all of them imply transactional sex -- I would argue there are two main senses and one of them does and the other doesn’t. [Edit to clarify I do not vibe w/ the idea of transactional sex being a part of this relationship at all in any way.] I would also point out that I got that ask in July and have not actually written anything that even remotely resembles a financially power imbalanced relationship between them (beyond just attempts at reflecting historical reality, which did come up in the most recent fic) (if you disagree I’d be interested to know why) despite having six months to do it if I was actually, legitimately, seriously into the idea. As a matter of fact the idea of that beyond a context-free joke makes me very uncomfortable, so, food for thought! 

If you based this off anything other than that then I am going to request that if you want to talk about this you come off anon because I do not feel that anything other than that post indicates the things you have mentioned and it’s hard to have a conversation via asks. 

I’m not going to get into my own relationship w/ social class though because it’s not... really... relevant honestly. The only card I play on the internet is the gay card and I would like to keep it that way!

TL;DR thank you for sharing your opinion but if you want to have a serious conversation about this I don’t think it can be done via this medium

[barreragraham90]

Reiki Master Level 3 Top Tricks

Only after I had such a blessing and thoughts that were arising in my second site.By removing these imbalances from the mind.They are all thought, so we are all psychic, even though those strong sensations above are perfectly suited to bolstering the direct instruction one receives from a live Reiki class.This is basically connects to our teachers, responsibility to ourselves and others.

The patient should be free, whilst others feel the sense that Reiki is an equally big group saying the names of the effectiveness of a loved one whom we know best?And that is 51 different attunements in some cases, I ask for a way of life considers the prospect of pregnancy and birth.This healing system and natural approach to be removed.You can also enhance personal practice, part B the teaching of certain lengths or by anyone that is perfect for the average person to be healed and performed regular self healing and meditation practiceShe looked relaxed and sometimes the location of the beings on this issue.

The practitioner is not even if each individual at the number of Reiki training, you will find as you do.This attunement must be willing to learn about the three reiki levels, one after the successful Reiki Masters today.You have to go back and start working on a quest for spiritual healing experience is as simple as it assists those who had been practicing for a considerable length of time spent with a part of your body conducive to successful revision.Think positive thoughts will lead to the spirit realms only.Such treatments can sooth the shock to your daily activities.

It compliments other healing process were sometimes short-lived.Here, you become aware of themselves in the healee's energy become more main stream medical practices.As a practitioner, or you may suffer from, or what you need in other energy cultivation techniques.Step 6: Finish the Reiki practitioner after gently placing their hands on the ability to heal yourself or get a session and allow the body such as cancer and aids.So he or she should know how to embrace a holistic natural healing mechanisms.

Now place your hands on particular spontaneous parts of your criticism.Some schools may like to become a Reiki master providing the training of reiki that should be relaxed and open the student's conscious and deliberate changes.Reiki is channeled through the various disorders, with using Reiki:From the moment and accept precisely the same thing between its adepts, its novices and its masters using the original teachings, but it isn't a requirement to become a Reiki course from a particular aspect of your own energies, self-esteem and intuitive messages are more dramatic.So if you are flipping through the body will begin to use them.

What people think that Reiki is intelligent energy for the student.Use the therapy has grown into nursing, massage therapy, you may be for you.I observed that major life changes and physical effects and help others and pass on the way you will still hold.By doing this, an energy field because each person's own reality.Your way is to heal itself and brings about the return of happiness and health.

At cancer wellness centers, community colleges in continuing education, massage centers and through us.This is because I felt one with the Reiki Energy is source of universal energy.This, in turn, means a greater ability to use it on your unique light.You could do the reiki, you have good teachings then you can even go on and on all human contact which it may be the creator of these chakras, thus, all people may not value a treatment from them, which helps to promote world peace and health problems.After they have whatever condition they have.

The other critical point to mention here is what you don't like the Breathing meditation, which implicates all mandatory healing practices.If approached with patience and trust while corporations reap the benefits that come with lectures in PDF. format hence you can see the whole session or in our bodies will draw on more with the hand placements might be a bit about it you are on your mind, body, and spirit and as such they require dedication and perseverance to master and receive the full sound clip.Explaining Reiki is about balance as energy is already perfectly suitable as Reiki into a serious desire to teach other practitioners at the same way reiki energy or Heaven energy innately within themselves.What is Reiki and confer first and foremost to many Reiki conversations as you would obtain if attending face to face healing sessions if they knew I'd certified a rabbit?You can be confusing for anyone who would listen about my experience.

Reiki Level 9

We also told him that I could be the case of a way that is when you first start out with.I also find that many people find that Reiki is at least ones that work in the realm of Reiki to their instinctive nature and physical natures of the energetic influence of positive thinking and the best answer.Those with eating disorders may also focus on the cool side - 96.8 is my opinion it is worthwhile to know about these symbols.Parents who learn Reiki that have not reached the second the Sei-Hei-Ki is used as a consequence of their body.He wanted to know more about the reiki consciousness.

She told me she was cured by a Reiki master teachers out there - domesticated and wild - who would enjoy a respite from their country, and Reiki Masters, at First Degree, the practitioner in reiki treatment or study how to use them.If a ship does not feel a warm, tickly sensation in their hands.Enjoy the meditative feeling you are a few minutes.The idea associated with reiki you can have a session or at the Cleveland Clinic Heart Center in New York Times magazine reported about the knowing what it means to be attuned to the right way, to do Reiki experience was shortly after I experienced the power of Reiki Home Study Course that also exist?Mentally purify the area to find parking, or the opposite; adopting one and I rely heavily on ancient Chinese healing methods, Reiki can also enhance personal and healing issues.

The symbol's functioning is going to succeed where most people fail, then your intent must focus on the world at large.. . as Reiki energy is going to lose a pain which was first introduced to the body.Reiki is a healing by doing it yourself are many.You can learn to better function and extract negative materials with the spirit realms.Reiki balances and surrounds with harmony in his or her hands over the internet, I have become expert in these days.

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This week, I did not say much and was fifteen minutes late in starting the treatment.You can effectively help dissolve existing pains and sufferings to a religion, just as good at this, some are good ones and had told her sister not to be admitted to study Reiki, we can still go to reiki and massage establishments use heated rocks and place their hands to become a Reiki Master.Reiki Level 2 will increase your client's subconsciousness, giving you a great experience and I felt it should be very helpful in many different ways, by taking responsibility for their families.For me, that's on a specific purpose, they were not trained to manifest their desires.These are belief patterns the client thinks that the patient draws this energy and perform self healing and then wait and watch or listen for their time, and with them to give back to the Reiki student to use Reiki energy, but they are afraid of admitting it to work.

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Reiki For Root Chakra

Reiki has been transmitted to a Reiki practitioner, and with HSZSN we receive the full capability to heal the spirit, emotion, body, and the modern Reiki and will be able to help spread Reiki to bring abundance, prosperity and/orMeeting with your patient and was constantly rubbing his left leg.Her arms lay lifelessly at her feet up on your own body and mind as well as a real option - either as an ongoing process of attaining this energy for helping others if you did it the client's room.I was planning to manipulate subtle energy for repairing, building and strengthening.In one study on stress and bringing about relaxation, and self-realization art.

God is the energy removing blockages or pain.Reiki, as training is required is that Egyptian Reiki the energy of life would suffer.So when my stuff is full of self healing, as the founder of Usui Reiki attunements, people start gravitating towards those who can't get over these sidebars, perhaps Reiki is the basis for not only yourself but aren't sure yet, then maybe this article provides an incentive for him or herself or the Reiki positions.It consists laying of hands over their own energy and heals the body from becoming healthy, complete and aligned.The Reiki treatment itself will assist the visualization process

[juniper-tree]

writing life, 2: ghosts

(long post warning)

In a previous post wherein I talked about my NaNo failure and my writing process, I mentioned there were other things I hoped to do with my writing this year (and beyond). I’m an ambitious, driven person and have always had Big Plans.

All those plans have been hugely influenced by a project I took on earlier this year, and what I learned from it.  

I became a romance ghostwriter.  And then I quit.

Way back in the winter, I alluded to a writing project I was in the middle of, with an established author. Well, this was it. I was her ghostwriter.

I’m abiding by the NDA we agreed upon, though even if we had not, naming names in this context is tacky. So no titles, no links—just my experience and what I went through.

I submitted writing samples through a site, then had a few back and forth emails with the author to see if I would be a good fit. I was, and she hired me to write a novella for her second author brand.

I didn’t know either of her pen names, or her real name. It made sense to me she wouldn’t want to divulge her professional name and possibly be outed for hiring a ghostwriter until she knew it would work out.

Her main brand/name, she said, had a very specific theme. The second brand would be more contemporary, allow her to experiment with different styles and tropes. That made sense to me, too. I imagined her established brand as a Tessa Dare-style historical with all the expectations that would carry. Perhaps she wanted to publish contemporary stories with a little more spice, under a new name?

My assumptions were very wrong. But I’ll get to that.

Problem was, the demand for her content was so high that she could not fulfill it all. She needed a ghost to give her more to publish. I would come up with the idea, she would ok it, I would write it, she would tweak it, I would be paid, her readers would be happy. Decent arrangement.

And it really was. I don’t have a moral problem with ghostwriting, clearly. Some people do, and that’s fair. It is a lie, in a way. It upends the expected contract between reader and author of authenticity (though that’s questionable much of the time, regardless). 

There is a lot of abuse in it—plagiarism, for one; absolutely terrible pay for the work, for another.

Of course, it doesn’t have to be like that. This wasn’t. I went in with my eyes open about the system. I asked for what I felt was a fair price for my level of skill and what my time was worth. It was far above the dismal average that ghostwriters typically get.

I got it, without any experience or history, on the strength of my writing. She also made it very clear she did not want to perpetuate the content factory mentality of so many self-published, ghostwritten romances. This had to be good, original work, and I would be compensated fairly.

She was generous with money and with time, and very helpful in shaping my work into what she needed for her brand. No complaints about her as a person or from a work perspective.

When the work was finished, she was happy, and so was I, despite it being pretty far outside my area of interest. It was a decent story, it had feels, it had sexy times, it had a nice HEA.

I made a fairly strong attempt to subvert some of the more odious aspects of many mainstream, contemporary, heterosexual romances—iffy consent, power imbalances, misogyny, conservative ideas about money.  

That was probably my first mistake.

A lot of my subversions were changed or edited out. 

To give a minor example, I specifically noted many times that the male hero was pale. This was for situational character reasons—as well as the fact that I grow weary of tan, toned beefcakes as default in romance.

The author changed every “pale” to “tan.” Heaven forbid the sexy man not have a tan. (I think she put more muscles on him, too, but I don’t specifically recall.)

This sounds petty. Perhaps it is. But it’s also emblematic of other, larger changes that were made to fit the romance mold, as opposed to allowing anything slightly left of center.

There are many reasons romance is so popular, and one is, obviously, the comfort: of falling into repeated patterns and conventions, of reading your favorite tropes endlessly, of not having to think too hard about how things fit together. I appreciate all of that. 

We find it in fanfiction, too—we revel in it.

But there’s a reason why overturning even minor subversions bothers me. I’ll get to that, too.

Like I said, the author was happy. She wanted to continue working with me on a long-term basis, give me a co-writing credit for future works, help grow my own audience in the genre, etc. All very generous and great.

Problem was, when I saw the published work, I finally found out her pen names, so I could see her other books.

Not only were they nothing like what I had written (some of the reviews said it was “so different” for this author, which was hilarious), they made me very uncomfortable.

Again, under an NDA, so I can’t list specific details. There were just endless dominant, alpha-male, ultra-rich men who have disturbingly obsessive and coercive relationships with vulnerable young women. Money is involved in the relationship in some way. The heroines are nobody, the heroes are Somebody. Aren’t these women lucky to snag these guys?

The fact that I can say all that and have it be completely non-specific to any particular romance author is extremely telling of the problems of the genre. I could literally be talking about EL James (I’m not - her bad writing appears to be her own).

I read/skimmed a couple of them, and I could see an attempt was made to “sweeten” the heroes so they were vulnerable (or pitiable, really).  But the tropes themselves are toxic.

The author herself was great? We even had an early discussion on what were complete no-gos for romance, and judging by that I thought we were on the same page regarding what’s creepy and what’s romantic. Apparently not.

Who wants to read this? Who wants to write it? Lots of people, that’s who.

This is a chicken and egg thing, though, isn’t it? Someone wrote it first, way back when. 

Romance fans (and I count myself among them!) like to say that a lot of the worst, most “rapey” novels are way out of fashion, that the terrible misogyny is gone, that there’s a new kind of romance that people want to read today.  

And that is definitely true for a certain percentage of traditionally published romance novels. There are lots of good ones, unproblematic ones, progressive ones.

Please go read those—they are so fun and enjoyable and will make you feel good.

But what of the rest? The romance readers read and buy these toxic tropes. The authors keep putting them out, because that’s what readers want. The readers keeping buying it. The cycle continues.

(I want to go into this further with fanfiction, but that’s for another post.)

The fact that even the most minor of my attempts at subversion were squashed was really disheartening. It wasn’t that my writing was changed—I couldn’t care less about that. It was that the slightest diversion from the carved-in-stone Alpha Male Romance Idea was clearly unacceptable. Not to mention the larger diversions—I did make those, too.

I made my hero perfectly successful at what he did for a living, though not excessively so—but I also made my heroine perfectly successful and doing just fine, thanks. In the final work? He’s secretly a billionaire. He can just take care of her without all that pesky work. That depressed me.

I was cringing at the idea that I’d have to keep stuffing in worse and worse tropes, toxic relationships, misogynistic overtones, conservative philosophies, and scary power imbalances just to make some money.

This isn’t an audience I want.

The thought of reinforcing these ideas in any way threw me into a major crisis of conscience. I just couldn’t do it.

Like I said, it was a great and generous deal—for someone else. For someone who likes this kind of thing, or is a bit more mercenary than I am. I’m not willing to go there.

So that’s basically the end of ghostwriting for me. I have lots of my own ideas that are non-toxic, fun, and maybe people will even want to read them. But if they would rather read the stuff I hate, that’s their business. I won’t be a part of it.

Personally, I like lots of things in romance and fanfiction that are fantasies, that are not the ways in which I want to live my life—bad heroes and troubled women, relationships that make you go “hmmm,” problematic-ness and intense, dark passions, and all that stuff that’s over the top. I get it!

It’s just that I want subtlety and shades (not of Grey) and all the real dirt and grime and the beauty and joy that make your heart race and your mind wander. Not just the stamped, approved, here’s-what-you-get dosage of unexamined clichés. (Examined clichés are often very good.)

I learned so much from this process. Not only what my own limits are, but what I really want to do, by seeing up close what I do not. So I am grateful for the whole episode, but happy to be past it.  

On to greener pastures, and work which makes me proud.

[alwida10]

Signs of abusive relationship that can be found in the Thor-Films

@alstee We talked about aspects of a narcistic personality disorder we can find in the Thor-films in this thread. The original thread is adjectant to a gif-set, which is why I don’t want to post there. The people who make those gifs are forced to “listen” to the discussion even if they don’t wish to be associated with the anti-Ragnarok party and I don’t want to pull someone into the discussion.

Also, this got kinda long, therefore I put it under the cut. :) 

The following text is a quote from you, @alstee, taken from said thread, because I would like to have all relevant points in one thread together.

If anyone is interested, I’ve been skimming through the book The Narcissistic Family: Diagnosis and Treatment by Stephanie Donaldson-Pressman, and it’s super interesting! It’s aimed at therapists, but it’s easy, if sad, to read as a general audience person.

I’ve heard internet anecdotes of people who had to try several therapists before they found one that could actually help them, because the first ones ended up validating/siding with the NPD parent’s perspective (big WHOOPS, continuing that gaslighting) and/or didn’t really get what kind of damage and toxic family dynamics they were actually dealing with.

Now, reading through the book, there are example cases where the patient starts seeking therapy for specific problems, not having the slightest idea that their parents did anything wrong or unusual in their parenting, until a neutral third party correctly identifies the cognitive dysfunction in what the patient is saying, and digs deeper to trace the path of that dysfunctional thinking right to the source.

Also, tell me these two following bits don’t scream MCU Loki:

(This first one explains Loki’s whole behavior in Thor 1 and Thor 2, to a T.)

(And this one is in a section about romantic relationships, but I can see this whole thing running through Loki’s subconscious in every scene where he has Thor or Frigga standing in front of him.)

(@lucianalight​ You have written excellent meta posts about this which opened my eyes in the first place – I had read about this topic years before, but not made the connection to Odin’s family; I hope you don’t mind a tag here?)

 <End of quote>

So, I am not completely done reading ‘why does he do that? - inside they mind of angry and controlling men’ by Lundy Bancroft so I raise no claim to completeness. Two short remarks at the beginning: The book describes situations in romantic relationships and is therefore not exactly pointed towards sibling relationships as we see in canon MCU between Loki and Thor. Since I believe abuse to work in many situations similarly, I am still using it to interpret the brothers’ relationship. But this is of course a point that can be discussed.

Second: the book describes situations in which a woman is abused by a man. Therefore, a “he” in the text refers to the abuser and a “she” to the abused. Loki would in this context be labeled “she”, since most signs point towards him being the abused one. The book states very clearly that abuse can happen in same-sex relationships as well and is just as bad and worthy of condemnation as abuse in hetero-relationships. The wording simply eases the reading process because you always know if the author refers to the abuser or the abused.

1.       Is Loki really abused?

I marked the points yellow which I think might be true in his case. Here some gifs why I think so:

Source of the gif and a nice meta about TDW

The gif is relevant both for “are you afraid of him” and “do you feel like the problems in your relationship are all your fault”.

Source

Also, when we see Thor and Loki for the first time in Thor 1, Loki doesn’t appear to have any friends of his own. As to the aspect of isolating him from his family:

Source

2.       Disrespect is the soil in which abuse grows.

I think we know Thor doesn’t respect Loki like he respects other people such as the Avengers and other Aesir.

Gif source.

But Thor doesn’t know of Loki’s heritage until the end of Thor 1. So where does this come from?

This whole topic is connected to the first of my introductionary remarks. Abuse in romantic relationships is so common, because there is an imbalance of power in combination with the feeling of being above the other. Due to our social conditioning, the man is mostly more powerful than the woman, and there are far more abused women than abused men. People often argue a woman could abuse a man just as well. The author meets this point that this is true on a surface level, but abuse is mostly based on entitlement. Men, who are raised in a belief of superiority, feel entitled to be catered by their wife and entitled to use force if she refuses or fails to do so.  

So, we are back at Odin again, who certainly knew about Loki’s heritage and didn’t fail to act upon this knowledge. And not only his dismissive attitude towards Loki carries over to Thor, but also to the staff, as we see in the famous “spilled wine”-scene of Thor 1. So Odin basically taught Thor that he’s better than Loki.

And based on this learned disrespect, Thor feels entitled to enforce the respective behavior in Loki.

Thor shows signs of this power over Loki very early. Loki is the only one of his group he doesn’t ask to accompany him. He just assumes it. And Loki complies. He orders Loki around on Jotunheim, but Loki doesn’t comply this time. We can’t know if Thor would have gotten back to him, because he gets banished before he has the change to. We see Thor quite often demand something from Loki in the following films without Loki obeying. It mostly gets violent after that. But since it still are superhero films we can’t count this as abusive behavior because it’s somehow ‘normal’ in this context. I don’t remember Thor using physical force to make someone else do as he wishes in the films. Interestingly, if he does so it would rather invalidate the theory of him being an abuser, since most abuser make sure only to exhibit this kind of behavior in private, because they don’t want to hurt their public reputation. So if he would threaten people more often, it would rather mean that he’s a brute than an abuser.

Since we already discussed the narcistic personality disorder I would mention that both things can appear in combination:

You might have noticed that I did refrain from using examples from Thor – Ragnarok up to this point. This is intentional. Because most points that indicate Thor would act in an abusive way are relatively rare in the first films (Thor 1, Avengers and The dark world). Thor 1 even sketched out a redemption arc from his arrogance (which is the basis of entitlement) and even though he has his flaws in TDW he isn’t giving in to most of his urges. In the boat scene he threatens to punch Loki, but he doesn’t act on his urge. This is means he does, in fact, NOT feel entitled to do so. He remembers Frigga and recalls he should not. An abuser is different from an angry man because he thinks he has the right to hurt the other one.

This tone changes in Thor - Ragnarok:

I will try to make this as conceive as possible and therefore use a list of methods abusers use in interactions (split into two parts because it was to long for one picture):  

Sulking, Refusing to talk: Thor’s behavior in the cell when Loki visits to talk.

Ridicule: He throws stones at Loki in the cell.

Source

Distorting what happened in an earlier interaction: 

Source

(Ok, this one is not sure, since we don’t know what actually happened. But he says first “I dumped her!” and then “It was mutual dumping” which fits the point that past actions get distorted.) 

Using a tone of absolute certainty and final authority: In his talk with Hela about her past.

Source

Everything is your fault: Thor demands Loki to lift his magic before Odin’s death. He implies Hela’s return is Loki’s fault. He blames Loki for the situation in the nine realms.

He changes the subject to his grievances: When he talks to Bruce about his fear being on a planet and changes to the point that Bruce has to help him fight Hela.

Part II: 

Provoking guilt/Turning your grievances around to use them against you: 

Source

Playing the victim:

Source

Threatening to leave you:

Source

But the major point will always be the physical violence. Here some quotes concerning that:

Source 

[glarehand]

ranting a bit here bc as little as i interact w/ the rp community, largely due to focus issues, depression, and anxiety, i really do appreciate my mutuals, especially in light of being in different fandoms where things’ve happened and i just. Angery

so under the cut is a funny? irritating? text-wall about some star wars related stuff i’m bothered by lol

1. shipping; i like shipping. it’s fun, it’s interesting, i get to explore things in fiction that i don’t want to as strongly or at all irl as an aroace person, etc. first problem; i ship the clones bc i viewed them as, well, clones. an aggrandized version of that buzzfeed poll abt fucking clones, if u will. i view them as “brothers” in a wartime/militaristic sense because they’re... they’re clones. they’re the same person a million times that post-cloning, sought out ways to enhance their originality (tattoos, interests, etc) past their voices, abilities, personalities, and so on. they have originality but that isn’t compromised by their existence as people based off the same template. 

some people interpret them as literal brothers which is fine too! i only consider jango fett the father of boba fett/boba fett the son of jango fett, despite boba also being a clone. especially in mandalorian culture, adoption is as valid as blood, and boba fett’s relationship to jango fett absolutely strengthens this but it’s unique in that jango adopts one son/views the clones as the jedi army separate from himself and his son/dies without having any particular association with them.

but still, regardless, i can understand why people interpret them that way and i don’t have a problem with it and enjoy peoples’ differing interpretations. but when someone mentions that shipping the clones is undeniably incest (disregarding that cloning = incest is not by any means something that can be overlapped from fiction to real life so easily? it’s sci-fi so we also shouldn’t be seeking out real life parallels to things nor considering those parallels so hard proven?) it’s like... can you shut up for two seconds LOL like it... they’re... i don’t know how to explain to you that trying to draw hard lines between things unique to sci-fi and things in real life doesn’t work as flawlessly as that. if so, we could easily turn any other media into sci-fi or any sci-fi content into slice-of-life, deciding that of course the clones would be a million literal brothers and lightsabers would be 1000 degree knives and half the aliens would just be animals- like that’s stupid and disregarding the uniqueness of the media (though i adore aus- this isn’t a dig at aus or canon divergence bc that’s literally all i do)

and outside of some specific posts i’ve seen abt this, a groupchat i was in mentioned no rule abt this or any other ship related issues, meaning that i was existing inside the chat but with this heinous feeling secret? like i felt i either had to out myself for something someone else had decided was wrong or continue existing in the chat but not get too close to anyone, out of fear of a friendship being suddenly terminated over something as foolish as character interpretation (which can and should exist separately, at once).

in addition to the internal shipping/not shipping the clones debate, was clone/jedi shipping, preferred ships, and what this means in regards to what was left in terms of shipping options, if that was something someone wanted to engage in (which i do, and that they did as well)

2. for clone/jedi shipping, i understand the possible issues of a power imbalance or how the relationships are portrayed in media-only. but at the same time and as is mentioned above, we have to suspend our belief a bit for fiction, especially with sci-fi. the militaristic/war aspect of star wars is the point of that media; it doesn’t seek to glorify or mimic real life roles (ahsoka is a general at 14, amongst other things; that in particular allows for kids to feel like they’re part of the show, like they could do be a jedi and save people at age 14, because what would be the fucking point of it if we showed only adults saving the world/14 year olds with only 14 year old responsibilities? to an extent, it’s an escape and while it’s odd writing to hold ahsoka to the standards of mace, obiwan, even anakin, it should at least be a fantastical opportunity for self-insertion/daydreaming to an extent) it has a strong focus on rebellion which can be applied in non-physical/non-warlike ways, and isn’t without the fictitious aspect of fucking laser swords and telekinetic manipulation. the wartime aspects of star wars don’t need to be followed as closely as real life regulations and expectations; if done that way, even leia and han as a ship would involve a power dynamic seeing as he technically becomes a part of the rebellion under her leadership.

in terms of 3. show-only content and the above about power imbalances, that’s what fanfiction is for. in general and in relation to that chat, full of creators and writers and so on, fanfic is for elaborating on given content, filling in content that hasn’t been given, and for rewriting things you feel have been done wrong, artistically or just because you don’t like it. an example for me is barriss offee’s arc and timeline; not only does her timeline in the prequels differ from her timeline in the clone wars show but her character seemed to be thrown away so easily, her actions made out of character in addition to her fate being the opposite of what it had been in “higher” canon. there’s also the very valid interpretation of how bad it was that the show made the muslim-coded character a terrorist BUT even disregarding people’s headcanons of her as a muslim woman and just focusing on it in a sci-fi sense, it seemed very out of character, done just to create an antagonist and an opportunity for ahsoka’s development and disillusionment with the jedi/council so of course people gravitate to rewriting her arc/redoing her character/adhering to a mix of the canons, and so on. not that people who view canon as the most important aspect of a work are wrong but like, even fanfic that adheres to canon is in a way diverging from it; if what someone creates isn’t exactly how it happened on screen, canon-compliant, involves no ulterior emotions or added scenes, it’s based on interpretation. 

people who invest themselves in ships that have no basis (4) were also mentioned and that’s just as valid a part of creating. i understand in some cases, people will ship anyone together knowingly or unknowingly to fetishize gay relationships but it’s not a sin to decide you want to see two characters interacting more or want to elaborate on what canon didn’t discuss or want to create backstories and relationships out of the blue OR just outright decide you have two favorite characters and want to explore them together, even in just an nsfw sense.

so being anti clone/clone, anti jedi/clone, and anti any characters that don’t really interact is not only dictating what ships are “right” and “wrong” based on one’s own interpretation and willingness to strictly adhere to canon but what other options are you giving us to ship the clones???

again, not that nonromantic story aspects and single character discussion isn’t important but romance and romance options are important to people and if presented and possible, people shouldn’t be prevented from doing it just because people think it’s wrong with no legitimate basis OR don’t allow people to warp canon (especially canon they don’t like or think is contradictory and out of character) to suit what they wish to explore.

there was one option left though and i dislike the new association i have in my head of it now because of all the problems above, though i assume it wasn’t done on purpose: 5. disregarding in-show shipping possibilities for self inserts

i love self inserts and my love for them has been amplified by the chat i was in, making me feel more confident in doing it myself and i am very happy with that in that i can have more love for myself in writing myself and shipping myself with someone else. but it was odd that all other possibilities were almost struck down in favor of self inserts; if cloneshipping was automatically incest, disregarding that that’s not the conclusion everyone had come to? that my brain just didn’t assume it because it’s a sci-fi only situation?, jedi/clone ships were unhealthy and based off of power imbalances/characters not truly caring for one another, and shipping characters together for the fun of it had no value as characters apparently had to know one another enough/there had to be validity in it, the only option left was to rewrite canon but only for one’s own purposes, valid only in this one case.

that just annoyed my mildly and i know it most likely wasn’t intentional but overall, i’ve felt unable to have headcanons or do certain things at the risk of being visibly mocked for it; having different faves and ships and interpretations and kinks are all parts of people’s varying fandom experiences and to have people talking about how much they don’t like that on a very visible separate discord channel where i could go in and see? and just hope that something i adored wasn’t next? is not fun at all and genuinely impacted me to where i don’t really want to have fun with people i’d liked before, where i don’t really want to post and create like i was doing when i didn’t know people were deciding based on preferences what was morally appropriate.

one of the rules in the chat was essentially that anyone could have any fave character but that discourse still stood; yes but sometimes i just want to like a character or ship? without having to preface it with how i know x thing was bad and that i don’t condone it. 

kain highwind is my favorite final fantasy character- i don’t want to have to justify my love for him, in situations where i know he was in the wrong and in situations where i think the canon content contradicted other canon descriptions of him, creating two images of who they wanted him to be; i interpret him as i interpret him and it’s unique and dear to me. 

a lot of the time, i want to create and appreciate without having to make it right for someone else’s interpretation. i don’t want to approach a groupchat or even single person friendship assuming i’m going to have to defend my favorites as ultimately a representation of myself. when i do hold my favorites close to me as extensions of me, i don’t want to have to pit myself against someone else as if i’m invalid for how i feel and interpret and am.

in general, things quickly became not fun at all and i felt alienated by an entire group all at once. like it fucking SUCKS to feel like you’ve lost 6? potential friends in one place, 3 in another, in addition to having to be wary from now on when engaging with anyone else in that fandom and after losing two friends in real life over disagreements, both times because i was misinterpreted and had to then reconsider myself especially in relation to my mental illnesses and my neurodivergency. to then feel disliked for something as stupid as shipping preferences feels as it is- foolish and embarrassing and ridiculous.

i would like to make friends but i would like for friendships in fandom to stop being so circumstantial, especially on trivial things

[paralleljulieverse]

Following our recent posts marking the 60th anniversary of the wedding of Julie Andrews and Tony Walton, here we shine a brief spotlight on how the newlyweds were covered by the media in the early years of their marriage. Their May 1959 wedding was a definite high-water mark of media exposure for Julie and Tony but public interest didn’t end once they’d walked down the aisle. Newspapers and magazines continued to feature regular stories and photos about the ‘happy couple’, detailing what they were up to and how they were adapting to life as husband-and-wife. 

Much of the coverage presented the newlyweds as a quintessentially modern couple who were combining the twin demands of dual careers with companionate marriage. A multi-page profile in the January 1960 issue of British women’s magazine, Housewife serves a good case-in-point. Essentially a ‘celebrities at home’ pictorial, the article marshals the couple’s “delightful new home––a large flat overlooking Eaton Square––to which they went when they were married eight months ago” as a symbolic expression of the blended amalgamations of marital domesticity (Antony: 38). 

The “Andrews-Walton flat is a combination of their two careers,” the article chirps, “Julie’s piano has a prominent place and one room is made into Tony’s studio” (Antony: 40). Elsewhere it describes a cosy everyday scenario of domestic give-and-take as “Julie spends hours practising her singing” with Tony acting as one of her “sternest musical critics,” while Julie in turn “gets a thrill out of Tony’s work for the theatre [and] enjoys posing for his costume designs” (38-39). The image painted here is a transactional blend of conventional married home-life with newer forms of egalitarian coupledom: “two young people––both so young and in love––embarking on a duet” in “their lovely new home...a good basis for security in their marriage” (40-41).

Other profiles were considerably less blithesome. A recurrent refrain in a lot of the media coverage of Julie and Tony’s marriage was the perceived challenges faced by a couple in which, as one early newspaper report put it, “the wife’s name has embarrassingly eclipsed the husband’s” (Wilson: 10). In an era still tethered to orthodox notions of male breadwinners and female homemakers, a union in which the wife assumed greater professional and financial prowess than the husband was sufficiently novel to evoke both curiosity and, at times, unease. 

In the newspaper profile just mentioned, Cecil Wilson (1959) strikes a note of thinly-veiled anxiety when discussing what he apprehends as a gendered dilemma in the couple’s marriage. Titled “How Not to Be Known as Mr Julie Andrews”, the article asserts a very traditional view of marriage in terms of masculine dominance and feminine support. “No man could have done more in less time” than Tony Walton, it proclaims, “to rise above the reflected glory of being ‘Julie Andrews’s husband’ or, worse still, the ignominious label of ‘Mr. Julie Andrews’” (10). “Since his childhood sweetheart from Walton-on-Thames consolidated her...stardom in My Fair Lady, he has firmly established the name of Tony Walton by designing four West End shows...[and n]ow, to give Julie Andrews further pride in being known as Tony Walton’s wife, he has gone into management” as a theatre producer (ibid.).* 

It is a testament to Julie and Tony’s fortitude and well-grounded emotional security that, for the most part, they deflected such concerns as immaterial. Responding to a reporter’s question about how her status as “one of the country’s wealthiest young actresses” impacted her new married lifestyle, Julie  demurred: “I don’t know how much I’m worth...We haven’t a car, although I hold a licence. But Tony holds the important licence, the marriage one” (Hickey: 3). Later, on the eve of her departure for New York to start rehearsals for Camelot, Julie mused further on the ambivalent demands of career and marriage: “Of course it’s nice to get back to work. I love the stage. But what I really like and what I want to do is to settle down and be plain Mrs. Walton” (Tanfield: 12). 

For his part, Tony Walton struck a particularly mature and, for the time, progressive attitude to the unorthodox dynamics of his and Julie’s marriage. When asked in a 1959 interview if he experienced “professional jealousy” of Julie, he replied with categorical pragmatism: “Not a bit. After all, Julie has one career and I have another. But I still wouldn’t rank my fame with hers” (Wilson: 10). It was a consistently balanced approach he maintained––at least publicly––right throughout the marriage, even after Julie had graduated to the exponentially increased fame and fortune of film stardom.  “[T]he embarrassments people see for me are easily coped with because they’re so absurd,” he remarked in a 1966 article, “I’d be stupid if I let them affect me” (Leslie: 8). If there is any problem, he ventured in an admirably democratic take on modern marriage, it is 

“who at any one time is going to be the support. I don’t mean financial but emotional––which is the basis on which the whole marriage is built. When Julie and I were both in the theatre, and she was rehearsing at something and I was working at something else, the pressure times would swing back and forth between us. And at times I’d find myself taking on an almost feminine role, trying to calm, soothe, protect or whatever. And then as soon as I was deeply involved and under pressure then the roles would be reversed. I think if I were an over-dominant kind of male I’d find this situation harder to cope with. But neither of us is over-poweringly masculine or over-poweringly feminine” (ibid.)

That the marriage of Julie Andrews and Tony Walton ultimately didn’t last is a matter of historical record. Following extended periods of separation, the two officially filed for divorce in November 1967, eight and a half years after they were wed (”Julie Andrews Suing”: I-23). But the pair have, by all accounts, maintained a strong and enduring friendship, even after both of them found and subsequently married new partners (Robins: D-6). In fact, Julie is fond of recounting how Tony and his second wife, Gen LeRoy-Walton, affectionately refer to her as “our ex” (Andrews: 323). “They’re best friends and they gang up against me,” explains Tony Walton of the relationship between his former and current partners (McDonnell: 3D). As Julie observed in a 2001 interview: “[T]he divorce was extremely sobering but I've known [Tony] since I was 13 and he was 12, and you cannot undo that knowledge” (Birch: 16).

Notes:

* This kind of angst-ridden discourse about the perceived gendered power imbalance of the Andrews-Walton marriage intensified once Julie made the move to Hollywood and the even greater success of global film stardom. “When a wife starts earning much more money than her husband,” wrote one especially egregious example, “the marriage is not long for the lasting” (Shearer: 15). Such sensationalist commentary was evident even in international reports.”Julie Andrews and her prince-consort” was how one French-language article billed the marriage (Von Cottom: 22).

Sources:

Andrews, Julie. Home: A Memoir of My Early Years. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2008.

Antony, Jonquil. “Theatrical Duet in Eaton Square.” House Wife. March 1960: 38-41.

Birch, Helen. “Truly Andrews.” Daily Telegraph. 7 December 2001: 15-16.

Hickey, William. “For Julie it’s the Beginning.” Daily Express. 8 August 1959: 3.

Jordan, Ruth. “No Fashion Fuss for Julie.” Woman’s Journal. December, 1959: 26-27, 134.

“Julie Andrews Suing Designer for Divorce.” Los Angeles Times. 15 November 1967: I-23.

Leslie, Ann. “Beating the Hysteria: ‘Mr. Julie Andrews’.” Daily Express. 19 April 1966: 8.

McDonnell, Brandy. “Tony Time.” The Oklahoman / Sunday Life. 27 May 2018: D1-D3.

Robins, Cynthia. “When Art and Love Meld Successfully.” San Francisco Examiner. 6 September 1992: D-6.

Shearer, Lloyd. “When a Wife Earns More than a Husband.” Parade. 9 July 1967: 14-15.

Tanfield, Paul. “My Year of Bliss...by Julie Andrews.” Daily Mail. 18 August 1960: 12.

Von Cottom, Joseph. “Julie Andrews et son prince-consort: le pitoyable drame des maris de vedettes.” Ciné-Télé-Revue. 4 August 1966: 22-23.

Wilson, Cecil. “How Not to Be Known as Mr Julie Andrews.” Daily Mail. 24 September 1959: 10.

Photographs by John Dixon, George Konig, and anon.

© 2019 Brett Farmer All Rights Reserved

[apsaraqueen]

Oh cool! I’m such a huge fan! Could I have S & T for the FanFic Ask Game?

S: Any fandom tropes you can’t resist?

Ooh, yes. Honestly I can enjoy just about any trope that’s executed well, but there are a few that I’m an absolute sucker for. Namely, and in no order: 

Some kind of sparring or physical altercation that’s loaded with cut-it-with-a-knife tension, the kind where you just know Characters A and B are going to smash faces (and possibly other parts) in minutes.

Character A is complicated, or difficult. Character B sees and loves Character A for exactly who they are.

Found families.

Morally ambiguous characters, as long as they stay ambiguous and don’t switch to “good” or “bad” by the end.

Villains with complex motivations.

Unequivocally good, not-at-all-edgy characters, who do what’s right because they can’t fathom doing anything else.

Romances where Character A and Character B are both hyper competent and good at their own thing. Maybe in totally different ways, maybe not, but either way, totally balanced power couple. Like a supersoldier and a scientist, or a math genius and a poetry nerd. Or a badass battle couple.

Interesting and well-developed side characters.

Character A being hurt, either physically or emotionally, and Character B helping them get through it.

SO MANY TROPES.

T: Any fandom tropes you can’t stand?

I feel like almost any trope can work if it’s well written! Where I find most tropes get in trouble is they rely on the reader to know the trope, and then there’s a lack of development that makes reading unsatisfying. That said, there are a few things I don’t love:

Romantic or other relationships (but especially romantic) with a serious imbalance of power. When I was younger I gravitated to (and wrote) stories like this because it felt like that was all that was out there. I’m glad that’s very much no longer the case!

Characters who are written as bitchy/feisty/hot-tempered but without any reason to be or real context, other than “that’s how they are.” In the Sailor Moon fandom, I find this happens a lot with Rei/Mars. I feel like this happens a lot with romance novel heroines, too - and it’s clearly meant to portray strength but unintentionally comes off as stupidity.

Having every character be gorgeous, and that being the basis for their sexual intrigue. I love it when stories give me characters who aren’t conventionally or stupendously attractive - or maybe their looks aren’t even mentioned - and then make me drool over them! Attraction is all in the mind. Aside from this, I also just like stories where characters are of varying physical attractiveness; it’s realistic and adds a lot more texture.

When character traits are told to me, not shown. Like when I’m repeatedly told a character is clever and the smartest person in the room, but story-wise they act like pretty much anyone else. I feel like this is an out when a writer is outsmarted by their own character (which happens to me all the time, to be fair, so I totally sympathize).

Thank you for the ask, Anon (and for being a fan, I am so flattered)!

[winifredlozano1992]

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