#bigotry is bad full stop

[lastoneout]

I keep thinking about all of the disabled activists and people before me who stranded themselves on the 4th floor of buildings for weeks and crawled up stairs and fought with airline staff and schools and doctors and refused to stop existing in the face of injustice and bigotry no matter how big and scary and hopeless it seemed. Every time I get angry and scared the protests that lead to the creation of the ADA pop up again and remind me that disabled people are so much fucking stronger than anyone has ever given us credit for, and I can't help but be proud of that. And I know not all disabled people feel like we should take pride in our disabilities and have flags or whatever, but I think not just living, but thriving, in spite of a world that wants us dead and gone, in the face of both illness and persecution, and how we've not only bought ourselves forward, but uplifted the disabled people around us, secured more equal futures for everyone who will come after, and truly changed the way so many abled people have seen us for the better is something to be damn fucking proud of.

We have always been here and we always will be, there will never be a world without disabled people because being disabled is not bad, it's a natural part of the human experience and yeah it sucks some times but even when it sucks we have fought to build beautiful, unique, happy lives with people, both like us and not, and that should be celebrated.

The first sign of human civilization is the healed femur. The body of the profoundly disabled person who would have needed help to even just eat being carefully laid to rest after decades of a full, happy life. The medicinal plants showing even before we were entirely human we were doing what we could to not just survive, but alleviate suffering while we're at it. Above everything, evolution selected not the baby who can walk and eat and be quiet, but the one that can ask for help.

Disabled people are not just angry cockroach motherfuckers who refuse to die, we are proof of humanity's HUMANITY. Proof that natural selection selected a species that takes care of each other. From healed femurs and medicinal plants to vaccines and IVs and insulin to now, we are driven to help one another, we are at our strongest when we don't leave our most vulnerable behind. And I am living proof of that. My mother is living proof of that. Every disabled and chronically and/or mentally ill person I know is living proof of that.

And I don't know about the rest of you, but will carry that shred of humanity's true nature inside me like it's my fucking soul. I am scared and angry and hurt, but I have a lifetime's experience being scared and angry, and I can shake off the kind of pain that would make Atlas crumble to dust like it's nothing but a stiff fucking breeze. Disabled people have always been here, turning fear and anger and pain into joy and beauty and connection, and I'm not going to let everyone who came before me down. I'm not going to give up. Not now, not ever.

It's okay if you're disabled and you've hit your limit, you're too scared and tired and hurt, I won't blame you. But I won't abandon you, either. I might not be able to right all of the wrongs in the world, but I'll be strong, I'll carry all of you with me, I will not give up.

As I've said before, society hates a cripple who won't die, so we must spite them and live anyway.

Please, live anyway. I know if anyone can, it's us.

[creatingblackcharacters]

"Calling Out Racists? Help!"

(shout out to the situation sender who's chosen to remain anonymous!)

NOTE: People of color, if you feel that your efforts would be in vain or cause more pain than it's worth, I fully respect not doing it. I've been there, and tbh I usually don't. But white netizens, I expect boots on the ground. Racism festers when no one does anything about it.

So, it's finally happened! You've come face to face with antiblackness in your fandom space. You never thought it could be this bad! Naturally YOU don't condone this behavior, so you take steps to remove yourself from this person.

However! Your friends and other fans are still happily sharing from someone that you KNOW is capable of this. Would they still be comfortable knowing they're yapping amongst racists? And then you wonder- should I tell everyone about them? I mean, surely everyone should know?

Thus we've come to the decision:

The Callout

In my honest opinion, callouts are morally neutral. When used to reveal consistent harmful beliefs, intentions, and behaviors to other people, usually of marginalized identities, I think they're critical. Our safety and humanity matters far more than someone's internet fame. If I can't stop someone from being a racist, I at least don't want their vitriol on my dash, and I ALSO don't want people thinking I agree! Racism shouldn't be tolerated at all, but unfortunately, many an antiblack racist has a popular following and will not be removed. Anything less overt than a slur like the example above is more often than not, not a dealbreaker for many.

On the other hand, when it is maliciously weaponized to drag someone down on nothing but hearsay and rumor, it can be devastating. It has often been used as retaliation against those very same marginalized peoples to shut down discussions of racism and other forms of bigotry. In my opinion, you should not do these sorts of things when you don't have any solid proof or an actual education on what you're talking about. Period.

I say that all to say, be intentional. Use your discernment and some critical thinking.

How Ice Deals With It

Let's say you see something that concerns you. First, you need to pay attention to if other Black fans have noted this person's behavior. Has it been previously noticed, have they seen dogwhistles you've completely missed? Keep in mind as well, antiblackness does not have to come from a white person. Don't let "I'm brown" fool you.

If you're confident: confront the person on the particular issue you've noticed.

‼️‼️‼️ For the maintenance of your mental health, you CANNOT go into this expecting to change someone's mind and behavior. If you do, 9/10 you will face demoralization. You cannot walk into these thinking they care. Most people don't, and will deny the harm of their behavior. It sucks, but it's the truth. Change your perspective. The only goal you need to have is pointing out the harm done, so that this person loses the excuse to be racist out of "ignorance". Once you've spoken up, ball's now in their court.

Confrontation doesn't have to be negative! It can be as simple as "hey, what you said was not okay, here's why, and I hope that you can learn from this to do better for yourself and for your fans." Simple, to the point.

‼️Keep in mind, from Fans of Color: the private confrontation is a sign that we're trying to give you a chance to do right. Everyone's not going to receive that grace, nor do I expect every fan of color to offer it. It might just be up with you and your racism that day. 🤷🏾‍♀️ I would take the chance if offered.‼️

We're going to go two routes here.

1) It works

If it works, then what should come next is 1) a full acknowledgment of the violence and harm, 2) visible steps to ameliorate that harm, and 3) an apology to those harmed.

It doesn't have to be a complex apology (unless the situation itself was that large). But it has to be genuine and the change needs to be seen.

Very often you'll see apologies for antiblackness... To white fans. You cannot apologize for your actions to people who were not harmed by them, because they are not the ones with the right to accept the apology!!!! It's not a real apology. They've just covered for being exposed, is all. Be willing to hold each other accountable!

2) It doesn't work

This might still happen after the "it works", btw! Some people genuinely just want the appearance of progressiveness.

Here's where it gets gritty and you'll experience the most discomfort, I'm just being honest:

They might fucking suck!

They might suck, they might make it a point to share with their followers that you suck, and those same followers might also suck! You know how they sound? Like those people who fought for rapist Brock Turner because "he had a good future and this shouldn't ruin it". Yeah.

Recognize that this backlash you may experience from strangers is not coming just from their need to be entertained, but from a realization that if their fave is antiblack and they agree, then THEY are being antiblack too.

That acute pain you're feeling from this effort- you're now feeling a part of the chronic pain that is being a Black fan! And if you're white, you just temporarily sacrificed your whiteness to defend what was right, and now you are seeing a piece what that whiteness shields you from. Idk how else to put it.

Now what?

Well first, this shouldn't make you go "oh well there's no point in fighting racism bc they're so mean." Why do you want to identify with the people who just acted like that lmao. Antiracism is hard, but the right thing isn't always easy. Stand up and dust yourself off, soldier.

Take the steps to protect yourself. That might be a break from socials to decompress. Block people as necessary, use the tag blocker thing.

Recognize that you are not in the wrong for wanting this harm to be accounted for. If this person didn't want to be seen as a willful racist, they should have chosen to do better. They didn't want to, they chose to triple down on their racism, which they are now aware of doing! They just don't care. And that's not within your control. They wanna be a racist, let them be treated like one!

"Curate your space" as they say, and recognize that antiblackness is going to have you potentially removing folks you thought were cool left and right. You might see some people close to you show their true colors. It's time to make some tough personal decisions. I can't walk you through that. But I don't want to be around people who treat antiblackness with apathy, because birds of a feather... 👀

I obviously didn't cover every single scenario here. And this is only *my* way of dealing with these things (if I do at all, anymore). Some folks may go about it differently. But yeah, in summary, go in to point the racism out, and don't let the response determine your self value. 👍🏾

[starstuffandalotofcoffee]

I am trying to like. not attack people with whom I'm broadly aligned on such ideas as "fascism and bigotry are bad" even if they are the sort of person who fetishizes a "mutual aid under tyranny is the true path to Full Communism" mentality. But it is really frustrating that I saw a lot of those sorts of self-identified white people calling Democrats unconscionable and abandoning POC for being fairly hard on immigration and it's like. Given the results we're seeing, we do in fact need to stop pretending people won't vote against their own interests, or rather, the interests that affect people of their same demographic. We do need to stop pretending that being a minority is an automatic pathway to good opinions, and stop treating specific egregiously bad examples as exceptions when even the most liberal-leaning minority groups have non-negligible numbers of Trump supporters. A lot of people do have an "i got mine" mentality and being nonwhite or queer or non-Christian does not prevent people from thinking this way.

[audhdnight]

Spanking is to parenting what prisons are to criminal justice. Allow me to elaborate:

What does spanking do? “It teaches kids to behave!” Actually, no. It teaches kids to fear their caregiver(s). But say we go with that line. How does spanking teach kids to behave? “It shows them the consequences of bad actions!” Actually, no. It shows kids that when the caregiver is displeased, the kid gets hurt. In the mind of the child, the sequence of events is not [misbehave:consequence]. It is [caregiver unhappy:pain]. And maybe you’ll say “But my kid stopped mouthing off after I started spanking them for it”. Okay, sure. Maybe they stopped responding when you argue, but only because the learned to fear what their response would bring. They’re not holding their tongue because they realized it’s disrespectful or rude or whatever else you believe it is. They’re holding their tongue because they know it won’t do any good and will only make the situation worse for them. I can guarantee they are still thinking all those rebellious naughty talk-backy thoughts. They just aren’t saying them out loud. Spanking did not teach your child to behave, it taught them to walk on eggshells.

Similarly, prisons do absolutely nothing to enforce laws. Prisons do nothing to fix the real crimes that do get committed. A shooter or rapist or embezzler being incarcerated does not bring their victim back to life, un-traumatize them, or make reparations for any damages. Additionally, it makes life a living hell for the innocent people who end up in jail (OF WHICH THERE ARE A HELL OF A LOT). And maybe you might say that the point of prison is to encourage good behavior, because no one wants to go to jail. I would ask, then, why there are so many prisons, of which so many are full or overcrowded. Clearly, the threat of incarceration is not keeping people out of jail. Additionally, much like a child who was spanked being afraid to do normal things in their own home for fear of displeasing their caregiver, regular non-criminal people are afraid of prison, even though they have done nothing wrong. They know they could be incarcerated because of falsified evidence, biased testimonies, unfair trial, or simply bigotry. Especially people of color. Even though they haven’t done anything wrong, they are scared of what could happen to them if the person in power (police) was unhappy with them.

Negative consequences unrelated to the actual incident do not discourage “bad behavior”. Just like a child who is spanked will simply learn to be sneakier, a thief who goes to jail will simply cover their tracks better next time.

Stop spanking your kids, and abolish prisons. Have a nice day.

[rjalker]

Flatland adaptations

[ID: A version of the "missing the point", meme, showing a purple square shouting in all caps, Holy shit other dimensions exist", while staring at a green sphere that intersects with his plane, while the sphere says, with the words literally going over the square's head, "Racism, ableism, misogyny, and classism are bad.". End ID.]

how come I've watched three full length Flatland movies and many shorter animations but only one of them, which is in Italian, which I don't speak, ever has anything to say about the political themes of the book and instead just goes "woah cool interdimensional theory!"???

[John Crichton voice] Where's my damn political commentary?

Why do people want to just throw out all the criticism of systemic bigotry to focus only on the dimensional stuff?

Edit: Yes, this 1000% applies to the 2007 Flatland film. It is not exempt at all. It is one of the main things I was thinking of while making this. A few seconds of absurdist humor does not mean the 2007 Flatland film is scathing political commentary that forces the audience to think about systems of inequality and question whether they might not be upholding some that are just as absurd and made up to keep people in power.

[ID: The same meme as above, now with a hybercube or tesseract saying, "Racism, ableism, misogyny, and classism are bad.", with the yellow A Sphere from the 2007 Flatland film staring at it in open-mouthed shock, exclaiming, "Wow!! Absurdist humor!!!" while the point flies over his head. End ID.]

Edit August 20 2024: Ladd Ehlinger, the creator of the 2007 Flatland film, is disgustingly fucking racist and misogynistic. He is literally a proud conservative.

He made a political ad in 2011 that's literally so blatantly racist and misogynistic that youtube has literally restricted it so you literally cannot share the link outside of youtube.

Because it's that blatantly fucking bigoted.

I wish I could say I'm shocked but considering how terribly the 2007 film handles the themes of the original novel, I'm not surprised in the least.

The ad literally has Black men chanting, "give me your cash bitch so we can shoot up the street", while a white woman, with the face of the politician the add is against photoshopped over her, pole dances as a sex worker.

He runs a tumblr account so make sure you block him. His username is filmladd.

He's literally a racist misogynistic conservative.

For the love of all that's holy everyone please stop defending this film immediately and make sure people are aware of exactly what kind of person produced it.

[eff-plays]

Goddd I keep seeing ppl defend the use of "non-binary" and saying it's unapologetic and doesn't allow for interpretation and how that's good because that means bigots and chuds won't be able to look away and deny anything.

And like cool I'm glad that you found this empowering in some way but to imply that anybody who doesn't is a hater who doesn't get it or a bigot is uuh. Well it's fucking insane and I'm tired of being nice about it!! Sorry dude! If you think anybody who's uncomfortable with Taash's writing is a bad person then you're brain broken!

First of all the implication that representation should be written to pre-empt the reactions of bigots rather than to organically depict and integrate the people you're claiming you care about kinda sucks ass?? Kinda insane actually? And also like ... how has that worked out for them lmao. Taash has become the icon for Veilguard itself among the very chuds it set out to prove something to.

Second of all. Dorian didn't go around saying "I am a homosexual man. I am gay" but we still knew what the fuck his story was about. Sera didn't say "yeah I'm a lesbian btw" and we still knew! If they'd established that using modern language was something that was fine in previous games, this wouldn't have been as jarring. But they didn't!

Third of all I'm fucking tired of having my own discomfort with the writing of Taash be sneered at as though I, a literal nonbinary person who literally has a mother who doesn't "get it" and literally has struggled to figure out where I belong due to my multicultural, immigrant existence, am the same as a trans/enbyphobe for not liking the fucking SLOP I'm being served.

Like, it's fine! It's fine if you like Taash! I'm glad you relate to them and that you see yourself reflected in them! Genuinely! I wish I could say the fucking same! But if I have to see another fucking "um actually Taash is so so so so important to me and anybody who doesn't feel the same way is just a bitter hater and a bigot who doesn't GET IT" I'm going to start blasting.

The blanket-dismissal of genuine criticism as bigotry or just "not getting it" or implying that anybody not comfortable with this "representation" somehow has no emotional intelligence is so much fucking WORSE to see than the reactionary chuds. Like okay wow you, the person supposedly pretending to be SOOO concerned with enby rep in video games are telling ME, a fellow enby, that I'm the same as an anti-woke reactionary assholes who hate us both? Is this a joke??

Well, to be fair, I have yet to see anybody actually, like, tell me they're nonbinary but liked Taash. Mostly it's people going "well yeah um anybody OVER THERE who doesn't like them or is made uncomfortable by their writing is a bigot" without acknowledging that fellow enbies might fucking hate their writing, too. Because that would be acknowledging valid criticism. And we can't fucking have that, can we?

Fuck, man. You felt that Taash was good rep. I felt that it was bad rep. We're both entitled to feel this way, but you don't get to dismiss ME as a bigot because I wasn't pleased with this depiction of a nonbinary person.

Any enby, trans or cis (ally) haters of Taash who also didn't like their writing have my full permission to use all of my Taash hater posts to back up any argument they might have for why their writing sucks. I do not even care anymore. I'm a proud nonbinary multicultural Taash hater and anybody who tells me I'm wrong or bigoted for this can eat my shorts.

Also can we please. Can we please fucking stop with the "well you didn't have a problem with the word MAN or WOMAN so why does this bother you?" Like be so for serious. Be so so so so for serious. I won't even pretend that's a valid argument.

Anyway, give it up for the FIRST TRUE AND BEST ENBY REP IN DRAGON AGE:

[bonebabbles]

It is honestly terrifying how they try and justify the mockery of the RiverClan refugees by going " Well nothing violent happened to them so this is them choosing to go home "

It's like getting a clear view into the writing teams brain, their true thoughts on the subject they're portraying, and it makes me sick. ( not saying the writing team hasn't had a /lot/ of scenes like this one in the past, DotC is full of them )

Like idk if they can justify this as just the characters anymore, this is just straight up writing team bigotry shining through, and the only small hope I have is hoping the writing team hasn't actually had the experience of tormenting people so much they've fled the land they fled /to/

Sorry if this is too like, sad or political, but I'm kinda expecting more scenes after this after you know who gets into office. Bigots always get bolder when he's in charge.

No, I agree. I think the longer I sit on it, the more disturbing it gets to me. Especially with the way the "wind is blowing," politically.

At what point do you stop calling it bad writing in an attempt to be charitable? Advanced incompetence has become indistinguishable from malice here. The text flatly says that it's fine behavior, not alarming at all, for two refugees to get harassed into "choosing" to go back to somewhere unsafe.

It's framed like a climactic moment, even. Sunbeam agreeing with Fernstripe shows that she does "truly belong here." Unlike those other immigrants who are just "exploiting" the code.

I can't know what's in the heads or hearts of the writing team at Coolabi. But it sure does start to make a lot of sense when you connect the dots of jilted character dialogue to deliver xenophobic messages, consistent emphasis on birth blood and nation over chosen bonds, and sheer dedication to authority, and draw a picture that The Writers Really Mean It.

[thesiltverses]

Hello! I found the silt verses about three weeks ago and have listened to it several times since. I have a few things to say.

I absolutely adore that episode about the national grid workers. I think it’s my favorite episode of any podcast I’ve ever listened to. My favorite part of that first episode Paige is in is how she justifies not standing up for Vaughn, that cognitive dissonance that you wrote so well. This episode gives me what I wanted from that episode, the workers all banding together to stop the wasteful sacrifice of one of them. The actor who played the foreman did an incredible job as well. I think that having him discuss which of his workers he would sacrifice was such a significant moment, despite how brief it is. It cuts right to the big question that I took away from the podcast which is, “How much is someone willing to sacrifice in order to maintain their comfort?” And the utter disrespect of Glodditch (apologies for the spelling) refusing to cancel even the radio but asking grid workers to kill themselves for 200kw/h! Top tier episode.

I grew up in the south and went to college in Appalachia. I saw the disparity in technology and “advancement” if that makes sense that poverty brings, and the way you set up the world invokes that feeling in me again. You are an amazing world builder and storyteller.

I really enjoyed the cameos - I’m a big fan of malevolent/devisor, Old gods of Appalachia, and all of Jonny sims work, so hearing familiar voices was an absolute delight. Harlan Guthrie as an acolyte of the snuff gods might have been a bit too on the nose with some of the things that man writes, though… /pos

I’m transmasculine, and something that I really appreciate is how you manage to make a trans man do some objectively awful things, but still manage to make him a complex, full character that I was rooting for very frequently. Brother Faulkner is so, so important to me as a character. Paula Vogel has a play called “Indecent,” which is about the true story of a troupe of I believe German Jewish actors between the years of 1910ish and 1940s putting on a show called “God of Vengeance” by Sholem Asch, also a Jewish man. “God of Vengeance” has queer themes and received a lot of criticism from the Jewish community for showing Jewish folks in a “bad” light at a time when there was already so much hatred for Jewish people. Brother Faulkner being as complex and, in my opinion, malicious and cutthroat as he is at a time when trans people face so much bigotry, especially legislatively in the United States, brings this conversation about “God of Vengeance” up again for me. I also love how normalized non-binary people are in this world, without question. “Sibling this or that,” the hunter, adjudicator Shrew - big thanks from me for all of this.

All of this to say, I love this podcast. Can you talk more about the rhetorical gods? Is Babble one? What makes them one if they are, or why aren’t they? I’m fascinated by them. Can you talk more about the propaganda gods too?

Thank you so much for the thoughtful and kind words!

I'll check out Indecent, it sounds really interesting and I'm very glad to hear Faulkner works for you as a character. I think the topic of how to include and write queer characters who are capable of terrible things and thoughts (because, after all, these characters are human beings and not tutelary exemplars), within the context of both a rising movement of transphobia right now and centuries-old scapegoating / pathologising portrayals more generally, is a really knotty but a really important one, and I always want to make sure I'm approaching it with care and due responsibility as well as a sense of humility around the limitations of what, as a cis writer, I can actually achieve.

To that end, I don't want to ever take the audience response for granted, but I'm always really grateful to hear that the portrayal is working for a listener!

Propaganda gods: gods whose prayer-marks or ritual verses are fed directly to the enemy, enforcing destructive or sabotaging changes to reality (so rather than sending a destructive saint or angel to rampage over the foe, you might drop pamphlets or send radio messages to the enemy to 'convert' them).

Rhetorical gods: gods whose followers possess reality-warping powers of language itself (which is why 'rhetorical god' is a polite way of saying 'liar's god'). In other words, the paranoia around them comes partly down to the fact that a disciple like Val may appear to be a limitless shaper of new forms, rather than shaped into a limited form of their own, as a result of their worship.

[mrsfrecklesmarauders]

James & Lily had their first time in a vulnerable moment. After months of James waiting for Lily to be ready, haunting for possible moments in which things could go to another level. But no, Lily was never ready. They weren't like other couples that were all over each other. And even if James dreamed of it, he respected that Lily needed her time.

When Lily finally felt she was ready, James wasn't expecting it to happen. It was Lily who took the initiative.

They had been chatting and James opened up about his feelings. How he felt he used to be a bad person and that brought consequences. How he felt guilty for having everything and not appreciating it before. How he felt his parents couldn't be proud of what he had become and that hurt him more than anything. His worries about his friends and the future. How the world was changing and he felt he had to do something to stop the bigotry, discrimination and hatred.

Then Lily felt something undescribable. A burning sensation inside her chest that it was about to explode any second. Lily understood that she didn't only fancy James. She was in love with him. Completely and foolishly in love.

So she kissed him, because words like: "I love you" weren't enough anymore. She kissed him until kisses weren't enough and she felt the desire to be closer to him. To melt in his arms and to become one.

That's when it happened.

Of course it was a bit awkward. It was full of "Are you sure?"s and "May I?"s because it was Lily's first time ever. Some parts were painful, others awkward but others beautiful. Because she trusted James and she was with the boy she loved.

After it they both understood that it had been worthy to wait because it was supposed to happen like this. And they were both over the moon.

Their friends only found out because they were so obvious that they couldn't stop smiling.

Both of them were idiots in love.

[deathbysports]

Actually, it's okay to admit your favorite player sucks.

(PT: Actually, it's okay to admit your favorite player sucks. End PT) Trigger Warning: References to sexual assault, violence, alcohol use and bigotry. And no. I'm not talking about point production (though it's okay to admit that they're not having a good year either) Last year I made a post talking about problematic players and what to do if it turns out a player we like sucks. Consider this to be a part two to that post because I feel like it's something to talk about again, especially with the amount of hockey players outing themselves as MAGA for the past months, as well as the upcoming Hockey Canada trial and, more recently, Artemi Panarin's sexual assault allegation. This time, I want to talk about the people who continue to defend them for some reason. And why you really need to cut it out with the "oh x player would NEVER do that!" bullshit.

Hockey is an enjoyable sport. It's fun, full of excitement and brings us joy. But I'm going to be honest, the culture around it fucking sucks. And with terrible culture, comes players who do bad shit. In particular, a lot of hockey players (and athletes in general, but the focus here is hockey players) are pretty fucking conservative, and hockey as a whole is a conservative sport. Let's take T.J Oshie as an example. A silly guy. A fun hockey player to watch. Both his personality and on-ice skills made me... rather fond of him. And then he made that pro-Trump post. Needless to say, I was... not thrilled. I was disappointed, disgusted, and unfortunately not surprised. Still, it hurt. Do I hate him? No, not really. I can't entirely bring myself to do that. But the whole thing definitely destroyed any desire I had of buying his jersey. Oshie's not the only one. Way too many players have outed themselves as MAGA as of late, with Ryker Evans being the most recent. Now I'm not going to deny that hockey is a conservative sport. It always has been a conservative white sport, full of rich, mostly white men. Still, it's pretty damn depressing when a player you've admired for so long is supporting a fascist. From Matthew Tkachuk to the Great One himself, Wayne Gretzky. And it's not just American politics either. Alex Ovechkin, a superstar that many people enjoy watching (myself included), and the man chasing Gretzky's goal ironically enough, is a well-known Putin supporter. And it goes beyond political views. Multiple players in the NHL have also been alleged or charged with *literal* crimes. And many of them are still playing in the NHL. Of course, it wouldn't be a 'problematic hockey players' post if we didn't bring up Patrick Kane. Ah Kaner... where do I begin with him? I'll admit, Patrick Kane's a player I do genuinely enjoy watching even as a Blues fan. Even though Chicago wasn't my favorite team. The moment I saw him play during the 2020 All-Stars I grew rather fond of him. That fondness didn't last, as a year later the Kyle Beach stuff came out. Rumors that he likely knew about it all and did nothing. Some believe he was partaking in the bullying that Beach endured. We may never know; I highly doubt we'll ever get full closure on it. But one thing is for sure: his response to the investigation findings was very, very fucking disappointing. Then I learned of his other controversies. Not just the 2015 sexual assault allegations. I'm talking about the cab driver incident. His drunken bender in Madison. His immaturity during his early years. The fucking blackface. I stopped engaging with content involving him after that for a while. I was disgusted. I was angry. I did eventually start looking at Kane content again, but even now there's a bit of a bad taste in my mouth. I will give credit where credit is due: Kane's actually made an effort to improve his image. He's stopped drinking, spoke out during the 2020 BLM movement, and showed remorse for his poor response to the Beach situation. But that doesn't absolve him of everything. He's never addressed the blackface as far as I know. He still punched a cab driver and got arrested for that. And he still has that sexual assault allegation from 2015. While I know he was never charged for it, that shit's not something that goes away easily, even with attempts to improve as a person. He's most likely going to have to live with that for the rest of his career, maybe even his life. So yeah, as much as I love watching guys like Kaner and Oshie and Ovi... I'm sorry but I also have to admit it; they kinda fucking suck as humans lmfao. Which brings me to something I've noticed; a lot of peeps aren't so willing to admit that about their own favorites, as well as a bunch of people who can't seem to handle criticism of said favorites. Here's an ask I got a while back when I posted about Kaner's alcoholism and how fans shouldn't be glorifying it (And that post wasn't even an anti-kane post!)

And honestly, this one's probably more tame compared to the other things I've seen people say. This is the thing that frustrates me the most. And listen, I do get it. It's hard to believe that a guy you idolized is a piece of shit. Sometimes it's easier to force yourself to deny it. But here's the catch; it's not an excuse to lash out at others who have very valid criticism and harsh thoughts about these guys. It's not okay to bash others who have negative opinions about your favs. None of that is okay. And it is especially not fucking okay to defend or justify or downplay these guys' actions. It's easy to say "oh this player could never!" or "my player would never do this!". Which... WRONG. You don't know these people. You don't know if they 'would never'. Sadly, because hockey culture fucking sucks, they probably fucking would do that. They probably would say that slur. They probably would commit that crime. But then again, I don't know that either. Again, I'm a stranger on the internet talking. And regardless if they have or haven't been in a scandal, the harsh truth is, these guys aren't some innocent babies that can do no wrong and just don't know better. These aren't your friends or family. These are grown fucking adults that know exactly what they're fucking doing most of the time. These people don't know you. They don't need you whiteknighting them. It's time to stop treating these guys like innocent children because they aren't. And you're allowed to have your own limits (and those limits are different for everyone). You don't have to hate them or put up some disclaimer saying "HEY THIS GUY SUCKS". I can't convince you to do that. All I ask is that you quit fucking dickriding these guys and treating them like good people because you don't fucking know that! Like, it's okay to enjoy these guys' hockey while acknowledging that they did shitty things! That doesn't make you less of a fan! Criticism isn't the same thing as hatred, and that's something some of you need to realize. Criticizing your favorites is a GOOD THING. And likewise, people are allowed to have opinions. People are allowed to be uncomfortable with the players and teams you like. If you can't handle that, consider using the block button instead of going to their ask box and screaming about how you think their opinion is "wrong" or some shit.

The world's not going to end because someone doesn't like your problematic fav. I promise.

[kerubimcrepin]

LIVEREAD: WAKFU, THE GREAT WAVE [TOME 1, Chapters 1-3]

I want to preemptively say that I wasn't the biggest fan of The Great Wave, while reading it originally. It had less to do with the contents of the comic, and more with the pacing — it's written in a very... webtoon-unfriendly way. Every week I'd wait, and then not much would happen.

I am hoping it will be less exhausting to read this comic this time, but there just isn't a lot that happens in it. It's quite sad, really.

Now that I am done with the "hey, I am not the biggest fan of the way this was executed, at least in this tome" warning, I want to say that I actually really like the idea of a tragic story. Like fuck yesss. With all the amount of foreshadowing we got, we deserve to see how Yugo's good intentions are going to bring disaster.

I will be honest, the day this dropped I went to discord and everyone was screaming "THEY ADDED PORN TO WAKFU" and then when I was finally able to read the comic after someone finally pirated and sent it to me, I saw the world's shortest scene of intimacy between a married couple.

Normal world.

Anyway: STOP FUCKING WHILE WEARING THE WORLD-ENDING MAGICAL NUKES ON YOU.

Hey chat! This reminds me of a very poggers thing I had said a while before this manga realeased:

You have no fucking idea how bigly I won. And this isn't even the last win of mine in this manga. No, I just keep winning and winning. Please, Tot Ankama, I beg you through whatever psychic link we have: do this thing you did to Yugo to Joris too. He deserves it.

In the future, I will be liveblogging myself reading the entire tomes too; instead of making small posts, as the comic releases chapter by chapter.

One of the reasons why? I love writing this post, while knowing full-well that these are Grougalorasalar's words.

MAN, I predicted Grougalorasalar using emotionally manipulative language that's pretty much "you're a fraud, you're amoral, DIE" in nightmarish visions sent to people ages before this manga happened, in my fanfic. And I was so giddy — because I love the idea of 'Salar torturing people like that, and because it means I got something right without having too much data to back it up!

First Joris war criminal arc, then Salar emotional abuse via nightmare visions arc... How is my taste so similar to Tot's??

I think it's very funny for Salar to be moralizing now. My brother in crepinjurgening, you were trying to resurrect your lizard son by shattering his soul forever and bringing him unimaginable suffering so that you can go commit more war crimes together?

Then again, his war crimes had virtually no chance of ending the world. I suppose it's natural for a Black Fire dragon to understand the sort of danger Yugo presents — the fact that they may all end up the same way the Necro world is...

I guess his morals are as weird as Joris's (world ending = bad, war crimes = sometimes good if they do those themselves?). Similarities are only to be expected, since they influenced and changed one-another irrevocably.

this shuoild happen to joris too. pleask.

LITERALLY IT'S SO FUNNY. HE'S SEEN THIS SORTA SHIT HAPPEN AGAIN AND AGAIN AND IS STILL GOING DOWN THAT ROUTE. BRO? 😭

Somehow I really doubt that Grougalorasalar's involvement in this situation is going to improve it in any way.

"I am the black dragon Grougalorasalar and I am going to save the world" ok and flowers can sing, and the world is made of pudding. Get a grip.

[twirling my hair around my fingers, giggling cutely] A shadow you say? This reminds me of Dofus MMO lore :3

I've seen people be upset at there being bigotry towards Eliatropes, but really — this has been coming since season 2. You've seen what a shitshow the idea of another class appearing caused back then.

Maybe it's my "knowing too much about hupperage oppression lore" and "knowing just a little bit about ouginak oppression lore" bias kicking in, but I'm not surprised? Eh?

THEY MULTIPLIED?!

Guys I don't think they're happy.

Originally this made me giggle: "ohh, is Joris going to have to choose between Bonta and his friendship with Yugo, in the future tomes of this manga? I wonder what he will choose, tee-hee."

But ngl, considering the fact that Joris has already demonstrated choosing Yugo over Bonta in season 4, and has been implied to be at odds with the government of Bonta during some ages, and downright opposed in others — I think we know the answer.

Literally not how it would work in real life. Even if Aurora has the right to inherit the throne in some way, her father is completely unrelated to that. He shouldn't even be here — if Aurora has the right to inherit the throne, it means she was made a member of the Sheran-Sharm family, and is no longer a part of her original family, because— [STARTS FOAMING AT THE MOUTH FROM ANGER]

[everything-transmasculine]

i think a lot of transmascs on this website need to confront their own victim complex. it's one thing to vent about our oppression, it's another to act as if we're uniquely persecuted in the trans community or being slighted by transfems. some guys are a little too eager to misinterpret things as being more invalidating than they are just to re-affirm their belief that they're especially hated, or their own insecurity. i want people to feel comfortable venting and discussing issues, but at the same time, i don't want to promote the idea that everyone on earth actively hates trans men and wants us to shut up and die.

i agree and disagree with this - partially because i come from a mindset of “if your circumstances suck, change them,” and partially because ive encountered so much bigotry in my own life. i completely pass, and have had one of the most stereotypical “optimal” transitions - but the idea that transmasculine people dont face unique hurdles is a false one, because even with all that, ive been on the receiving end of a ridiculous anount of anti-transmasculininity based bigotry.

i think theres a definite difference in the way that transmasculine people are treated, especially online, nowadays - as compared to the 2010s and before. and i think its important to discuss that what harms us, and hurts us - but i also dont want to further rhetoric that its transfeminine people vs transmasculine people. thats not true at all - we are all transgender, we are all affected by anti-trans bigotry. we need to all work together to protect our community against bad faith actors, discrimination, and violence. but we need to do that without “punching down/up” on “acceptable” targets. any person, whether cisgender or transgender, has the capability to be bigoted. being transgender doesnt exempt you from that, full stop.

as for the victimhood bias - i think people like feeling vindicated, rather than victimized. i dont think anyone likes being the target of discriminatory attacks, however, i think people (all people, cis or trans) like to feel reassured in their own viewpoint, psychologically speaking. its only natural that when you get large congregations of people who share a common trait (ie, transmasculinity) theres going to be confirmation bias when it comes to venting about oppression.

tldr; its a slippery slope, but i dont want this blog to become a pit of us vs them mentality - i want to focus on uplifting transmasculine voices, full stop.

[odinsblog]

One About The Atmosphere: Want to change minds? Stop trying. Change the atmosphere instead.

Donald Trump in 2016 greets a screaming horde of ecstatic white christian nationalists

Minivan was a nice enough guy. He was easygoing; a happy guy with a frequently deployed smile. I don’t recall much anger from him, nor many strongly held opinions. I wouldn’t call him a philosophical type. No deep late night talks with Stove Minivan is my recollection.

This is the sort of dude I’d hang out with at a party, if there were a party we were both at, but not one with whom I’d maintain a relationship if we both graduated and then moved to different places—which I know for a fact, because that’s what happened. We drifted.

So then what happened is twelve years or so later I got on The Facebook, and Stove Minivan was there, too, and before long, we were friends again, he and I, and so were me and my other college friends, and them with him, and … look, you know the drill. It was The Facebook.

Minivan was no longer a pre-med student at a small northern liberal arts college. He was a doctor—a general care practitioner, if memory serves—in a smallish plains state town, very much like many other towns in the great plains or elsewhere in the country, I imagine.

Anyway, before long I noticed something about Minivan. Even though his feed was full of pictures of him and his lovely family, and he was smiling in them just the same as he always had in college, he was angry.

He was *enraged*

What was he angry about? The Demonrats.

Minivan was absolutely enraged about everything the Demonrats did. He also was out of his mind angry about Killary, and Obummer, the leaders of the Demonrats—or at least they were the front for the real leader of the Demonrats, who even back then I believe was George Soros.

What did the Demonrats do? Oh my heck, what *didn’t* they do? Mostly they hated America and American security and American economic strength, it seems. They engaged in corruption and bowed to foreign powers a lot. They shredded the dignity of the presidency, that’s for sure.

Minivan’s worldview wasn’t particularly coherent, if you want to know the truth.

I couldn’t help to notice that the Demonrats weren’t actually doing many of the things that Minivan thought they were doing.

And I noticed other things.

For example, I couldn’t help but notice that a lot of the policies Minivan supported were directly *causing* the sorts problems that made Minivan so angry.

And I couldn’t help but notice that well-sourced information enraged him more than pretty much anything else.

There was a lot of linking to sites I’d never heard of, like Breitbart and Newsmax, and of course plenty of Fox News. There were a lot of memes. There were a lot of conspiracy theories (a big birther, was Minivan).

Some of his posts contained subtle bigotry. Most of the rest contained not-subtle bigotry. Several of them contained slogans and statements that were, very simply, neo Nazi and white supremacist memes and shibboleths.

There was a lot of commentary accompanying these posts from Minivan, who was saying shocking stuff for a small-town family doctor … the sorts of things that it seemed to me would make people not want to use this person as a doctor, or or sit next to that person on a bus.

I hadn’t heard of Alex Jones, yet, but Minivan sounded a lot like Alex Jones, word for word and beat for beat. He’d even start his posts like a right-wing radio host: Sorry folks, but you can’t even make stuff like this up—ironically, accompanying things that had been made up.

This was all pretty distressing to those of us who had known Minivan back in the day, before he had become so obsessed with Demonrats.

So, a lot of us, myself included, did exactly what The Facebook wants.

We engaged with him.

At the time my belief was, you defeated bad ideas with better ideas, by confronting the bad ideas directly with the better ideas. Debate was for changing minds. You presented your ideas, they presented theirs, you countered, they countered, eventually everybody saw the truth.

But the intention was that I’d change his mind, with facts presented logically, delivered calmly and patiently.

This was my belief.

What happened confounded me, but perhaps you can predict it.

Minivan escalated any correction, however calmly stated or bloodlessly presented, into scorched earth territory. He rejected all proofs by rejecting the source outright as irrevocably tainted by bias, or he’d spiral into non sequitur, spamming our feeds with more misinformation.

He would claim he never said things he had just said, even though the statements were still there for anybody to read, one comment earlier in the thread.

He’d claim that I said things I'd never said, as anyone foolish enough to read through our conversations could discover.

He demonstrated a complete dedication to his ignorance and anger, and a total disinterest in anything like observable truth that contradicted his grievance.

It was confounding and unfamiliar behavior to me, at the time.

At the time.

All of it was larded with grievance, a sense that people like him had never wronged anybody, and everybody else had done nothing but wrong people like him.

The bigotry and authoritarianism grew.

And all the time, on Facebook, he and his family kept smiling their perfect smiles.

I’ll admit that over time my interactions stopped being polite and bloodless, and I’m not particularly sorry for it. I told him some things about himself he seemed not to know, but which I thought really ought to be said.

I have a bit of a penchant for sarcasm, which you may have noticed.

I employed this skill, and you can feel how you want to about sarcasm, but I think it helped convey the correct posture to take toward someone who says the sorts of things Minivan was saying.

The correct posture being "you have proved yourself to be a person who should not be taken seriously, and your positions do not deserve even a modicum of respect."

I found this a more healthy message to convey about Minivan to anybody watching, and I still do.

Eventually he blocked me, and he was out of my life forever. It was the right choice, and I'm very glad he did that.

I’ve pondered the incident since, as it’s become more and more relevant to “the way things are.”

A few things had become clear over time.

Minivan was not somebody whose intentions could be trusted. He was not operating in good faith, and I believe he well knew it, because many of his favorite sources of information have written instruction books on how to engage with people in bad faith.

Minivan was not debating; he was using debate to inject his counterfactual beliefs into the discourse, which were designed to further marginalize already marginalized people while simultaneously cloaking himself in self-exonerating grievance.

More, he was exerting an active effort to not know things that could be easily known, and to demand to be convinced out of deliberate ignorance, not because he was interested in having his ideas challenged, but because he demanded a world in which he got to decide what was real.

Further still: Minivan *learned* from me. The effect of telling him he was using one or another logical fallacy was not to sharpen his reasoning, but to teach him about the existence of logical fallacies, which let him (incorrectly) accuse others of those same logical fallacies.

So Minivan was deploying the language of logic, in ways that betrayed a total lack of understanding about what those fallacies were, granted, but in ways that likely made him seem more knowledgeable and reasonable to a casual or sympathetic observer.

He learned to ape our phrases and arguments, in much the way he’d learned to ape the style of Alex Jones and all the various Breitbart and Newsmax contributors he used to inform himself.

And these days it occurs to me: I hear a lot about "groomers."

We were not changing him by engaging with him thoughtfully.

We certainly weren’t changing him by engaging with him in kind.

Rather: we were making him better at what he was doing, and we were validating his world view—to himself and others—as one that merited engagement.

And week after week on Facebook, Minivan kept smiling and smiling and getting angrier and angrier, at us and Obummer and all the other Demonrats and liberals and every member of every minority group who dared to fail to ceaselessly assure him that he was right about everything.

I don’t miss Minivan's black-hole-sun smile. I think of it as my first hint of MAGA: politically overrepresented, socially coddled people, often living outwardly happy privileged lives, while seething inwardly that other people might be getting anything, anything at all.

Indeed, soon enough, another figure would come on the scene, whose behavior matched that of Minivan almost exactly, a perfect avatar for this spirit of aggrieved bigotry and supremacy that seemed to be moving through my former friend.

And sure enough, as I saw, there were millions and millions of smiling seething people who loved him.

And that guy became president.

Nobody believed he would. And then he did.

Because Stove Minivan, it turns out, wasn’t some weird outlier.

He was part of a growing new normal, a group of people who had been offered a chance to immigrate from observable reality and enter a dark world of constant hostility, misinformation, and self-loving grievance.

It's an invitation they leapt at, to which they cling even now.

It's a constituency immune to proof, angered by equality, cheered by cruelty, who blame others for the foulness of the shallow puddle of reasoning within which they have demand to be seated, even though we can all see them fouling it themselves, every day.

And afterward, a huge number of those shocked by this development decided the proper reaction was to accommodate it, in the name of unity—a belief, it seems, grounded in the idea that what you choose to get along with isn’t as important as getting along no matter what.

I’ll finish with the question that all of Minivan’s former friends would eventually ask, whenever they gathered together long enough for the subject to arise.

"What the hell happened to Minivan?"

Here’s the answer, I think: nothing.

Nothing happened to Minivan. Nothing at all.

He was always that guy, and he always thought the things he thought.

What changed was that he was given a lot of language with which to express those ideas, and access to enough other people who thought that way too, that it created a critical mass of permission.

The permission allowed him to change his attitudes and actions, and created a lot of other people willing to accommodate and normalize his antisocial anti-reality behavior, rather than reject it out of hand.

In college you could be pretty conservative, honestly. It was a pretty conservative place. But you couldn't behave like Minivan later would.

You’d be understood to be a far-right extremist, and people would then treat you like a far-right extremist.

Which is what you'd be.

I think it just wasn't possible for Minivan to be what he later became, because the atmosphere wasn't conducive to the possibility.

But then the atmosphere changed.

If we want to change it back, it's worth thinking about how atmospheres change.

(source)

[lmkobsessedmoth]

LGBTQ hot line

Welcome to the woods of the moth man. This post shall be an introduction ish thing for new people and for people who need a refresher (please note I’ll be adding more to this post as time goes on and I reveal more about my au and introduce new characters)

🌙About me💫

Hi I’m Loyd/the moth man

I’m a nonbinary trans man (pronouns they/him) and I would appreciate that you use my preferred pronouns when talking to me

I love answering questions so don’t be afraid to send me asks (unless you’re going to ask me something invasive or to draw your oc) 

I love interacting with people and answering their questions but please do not message unless I talk to you a lot. I have social anxiety so I would appreciate it if you sent your messages to my ask box

I’m not in a lot of fandoms but I do like monkey kid, arcane, murder drones, fnaf, gacha life/club and avatar the last air bender

Here’s what my sona looks like (I haven’t drawn a full reference for them yet)

About my art

I’m an artist and storyteller who loves to share ideas and random scenarios through their artwork

I’ve been drawing for almost 5 years and have been an lmk fan artist for half of that time which my style makes obvious 

The only social media I post my art on is tumblr and discord (I use it post my art and twitter and koo but I stopped for a few reasons). If you see my art on any other platforms please report the account as that’s not me 

I do requests but only regarding the lmk show and my fan au. Please do not ask me to draw your ocs as I can’t do that with how my mind works

If you want to make fan art of my oc’s or au that is completely fine just credit and ping me, I would love to see it

I do not do art trades so don’t ask me about those

Do not trace or repost my art on other platforms. I’ve spent years working on my art skills and would rather people see my art through reblogs and links to my posts rather then someone taking my work and putting it on their social media with credit or not 

People who I don’t want to interact with (tw, mention of problematic shipping and bigotry)

Pro shippers and people who support problematic ships that contain things like incest or pedophilia will not be supported on my account or in my community

Racists, homophobs and general bigotry. Reality Can suck and I want this blog to be a break from that so if you think that people who are just living their lives as who they are is bad then this isn’t the community for you

Ai bros. Ai is cool for something’s but not for replacing people like artists and writers. I do not consent to having my work be used in ai at any point in time

Art “fixers” and people who generally change a characters design, race or body type to “fix” them aren’t supported here as it only hurts the artist who made the original art that gets changed to fit an agenda (redesigning a character for fun is fine)

You’re under the age of 12 to 13. My art and scenarios can deal with some serious topics that aren’t suitable for young children and personally I don’t feel comfortable talking to very young children

✨Information of my lmk au🌙

I have this au called untethered fates which the first part is about mk (and the rest of the cast) recovering from season 5 and getting used to normal life again. As chaos seeps into the world so too does the essence of what I call spirits and with the guidance of macaque, mk learns how to stop them from wreaking havoc. The later half of untethered fates is the monkey trio going to the celestial realm for a festival and end up having to defend it from spirit. This event makes the celestial court very paranoid which causes them to use mk and Yu ling as test subjects for an experiment to find a way to kill the spirits

(This may change in the future)

✨Oc’s included in the death au🌙

Ren Yu ling

Diedie

Bendy

Hou lin wel

The mystery maiden

The lady

✨Bonus Oc’s🌙

The assistant

[socialistexan]

Very easy to spot bad faith actors.

Remember, folks, the term "zio" was popularized by David Duke, a man too racist and antisemitic even for the KKK. It's a straight up neo-nazi term. Full stop.

If you use or or defend it's use, then anyone and everyone, regardless of political affiliation, is allowed to completely dismiss you as both unserious and a threat who deserves no platform.

Either you're a grifter using a tragedy to spread bigotry or you're a useful idiot who couldn't spare a critical thought to save your fucking life.

[christiansorrell]

RPG Read-through: .dungeon//remastered

For a while on Twitter, I've been doing read-through threads where I post my thoughts as I'm reading through a game for the first time. I recently did the same with Snow's .dungeon//remastered, a TTRPG where you are players logging in to a dead/dying MMO and exploring the digital fantasy world. I'm adapting those thoughts here for a proper Tumblr post! Enjoy!

First up, credits! Good folks who do good work in my experience. Also, we get the first of what seems to be a common through-line here that I enjoy: an online fandom bent to this all being a sort of GameFAQ style guide for an in-universe game.

My initial impression from most of the interior spreads I've seen just flipping through it is that I really love the style and layout. I think black and white layouts are underrated generally, but it really pops here with the pixelated text/symbols and the old school GUIs.

It's interesting to have these kind of "no bigotry" rules you see in many games couched within an in-universe framing. I think this more personal angle actually makes them land better for me than they typically do in games.

Of course, the author is still powerless to stop the players (just like with any instance of these rules, and all game rules in general tbh) BUT this is worldbuilding too, and it gives me a greater sense for the kind of in-universe fandom that's risen up around .dungeon.

Similarly, here's the game's unique version of safety tools - an in-game help menu that reworks things like lines/veils, x-card and more into the game world itself. I really like this.

Once again, the art in this is just great. I love the Fez-like runes/symbols. My ARG brain wants to know if there's a hidden message here.

I was surprised it was jumping right into the starter adventure, Tutorial Town, but I quickly found out that this is character creation AND a starting area/adventure all wrapped into one, video game-style, and that's so cool.

Each room of the starting area introduces a step of character creation. It's interesting that stats are based on real-world (not you the player at the table real-world but your PC at the "real-world" computer playing the game) ability. Your game knowledge, response time, etc.

As a long time Dota player, I also just really enjoy that the saving throw-like stat here is TILT. I have tilted many times and known many of my teammates to tilt regularly. Just fun to see that phrasing in a TTRPG.

There's more of the in-universe real-world player here than I expected coming in. Definitely has some really intriguing potential. I do wonder though if the intent is to be playing a "real-world" level character or if you are "playing" as yourself at that layer. Both would work.

Monster statblocks. Easy to parse and straightforward to run as the GM (tho at time the layout does have one two many things laid on top of one another that can make them hard to read at first glance - like where "GOBLIN" is here):

Health here is SYNC, and it's shared across the whole party - I'm interested to see how that full mechanic plays out and how it may affect play.

Reaction rolls. I'm surprised to see them given the video game setting, cus mobs in MMOs just always attack you. I've gone back and forth on it with my video game-inspired TTRPG. Don't think it's a bad choice, just one that means the game world is more than a usual video game.

So you have your real-world level Job (based on your characters' out of game job) and your in-game "Role" which follow the classic "holy trinity" of MMO design:

PCs and monsters can team up to attack and can forego damage for stunts - potentially fun/interesting moments happening from that. Monsters deal dmg to SYNC but only per type is interesting, means a crowd of one-enemy is more a long trickle of damage than an overwhelming burst.

Not knowing the ramifications of SYNC damage yet, I'm not sure what the Risk v Reward looks like for Respawns but it's intriguing. Letting your avatar die to keep the party in a stronger position overall (but being able to re-join after a fight) is definitely unique.

This is another fun room (and I like that other than saying late 90s/early 2000s it leaves appearance options open). I am not sure where to find the starting origins tho (they aren't on this spread and there's no page reference). Sadly, the PDF isn't bookmarked either, it seems.

This feels like a smart roadblock to place in player's paths early on. It's unlikely they'll have a lockpick at this point so really, it's about getting players into that creative mindset. What is in the room for you to exploit? What gear do you have you can use in a new way?

Might seem basic, especially to the OSR-experienced out there, but you'd be surprised how many players don't have experience with thinking more freeformly about the game in this way. No fault to them, most trad games condition you to use your PC's abilities/skills as a menu.

Another cool interaction between the layers of the game here (tho I do wish they all played more off of something more than just the tarot card being in the real-world layer). Still wondering if most folks play as themselves or as a real-world level PC.

This is interesting. I wonder if there is going to be a real-world layer to play or if this is meant to be the amount your party can heal between sessions of play (like when the actual real you stops playing in actual real life - this meta layer stuff is tricky to communicate).

I like this - a very short and sweet travel system.

I continue to love this art. Also, this tease here around dual-wielding requiring the discovery of new Roles out in the game world somewhere first is really enticing (I added the highlighter there btw).

This is fun - there are both in-game NPCs and PUGs which are other real-world players' in-game avatars. That extra layer to those types of NPCs is really fun and them running the gamut of fully out-of-character chatting to being hardcore RPers is fun to consider.

Whenever it leans into the digital world aspects, I'm super into it. Very much my kinda thing. I do wonder though how often players can swap their Roles. I don't believe I've seen that said yet - my inclination would be once on the fly (like Final Fantasy's Job systems).

And if these various layers weren't enough, .dungeon also features in-game collectible cards that are sort of enchantments and buffs. I wonder if my real-world level character can spend real money to buy Bytes to buy more packs from a merchant in town? lol

I won't spoil/detail too many more of these but these kind of fun (and common to video games but rarely seen when thinking of the world of a game or the intended way to play) moments are really appealing. Also, this game has Goons in it. Oh no.

Now I'm thinking the intention is the "real-world" level of play should be the real actual you, the person playing .dungeon the TTRPG (as opposed to a real-world level character still within the fiction of the game) since stuff like this would be tricky to track. Cool item!

Tutorial Island is cool, a good blend of char creation, intro to what the game is, and just a fun adventure with a session or more of play to it. I'd have to run/play this to really see but I find the Sync being tied to essentially your real-world session length interesting.

This stuff is cool and leans into that meta/fan-level play that only comes out of these big community-driven games, both MMOs but also things like Dark Souls.

A lot of these kind of possible secrets come as comments in the text, possibly just to inspire the GM and to get players interested in ways that the table can build out on their own over time. So far, I don't see some of the more esoteric secrets to be laid out (which I like).

The rest of the book, as far as I've seen, is lots of resources, gear tables, monsters, etc. to build out the game after player's leave Tutorial Island. The game world here has that anything goes Final Fantasy bent to it. There's swords & wagons, but laser guns & skateboards too.

The setting here is also explicitly queer (mostly seen so far in the "real-world" PUGs) and includes things like sex workers and other elements that it maybe could not have had but that would certainly lessen the richness of its world, the fandom presented throughout, etc.

The spellcasting uses the in-game money as mana points essentially. That's a cool way to limit spellcasting and motivate player's, especially spellcasters, to get out there and make some $$$.

Okay, here's the real-world explanation I was waiting for (after the in-game gear lists and such). This is cool - it's fun to have a real-life layer to this and to have the game's world support that sort of dropping in and out, doing things outside of a full party session, etc.

I know a lot of folks do this with ongoing campaigns anyway, but this is one of those fun things to include here to build that in as an expectation in play. You have your raid nights with friends and you have your little solo sessions after work where you sell your loot.

Now, the rest is a nice collection of random dungeon, NPC, settlement, hexfill tables and more. Everything you'd expect from an OSR-like ruleset but occasionally with some fun added meta-layers.

Players getting a quest from an in-game Moderator and then being able to become a Mod themselves is a really fun idea and something I could envision becoming a long-term goal for one or more players at a table. The threat of encountering an Admin is scary as well!

To finish it up, we've got a cool AASCII-style character sheet, complete with MingLiU-ExtB font (my beloved)!

And that's .dungeon//remastered! I really enjoyed reading this, and I think it has a strong core that's really enhanced by its real-world interaction layer. Gonna put this on "Play Soon" list. There are some smart rules in particular I'll likely steal for a future project.

.dungeon//remastered is available digitally NOW with, I believe, physical copies coming soon. I backed the Kickstarter to get this digital version. CHECK IT OUT HERE!