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ultfreakme · 3 months ago

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"It'd make more sense if he was a villain" : Jay Nakamura, The Yellow Peril and Orientalism in the Comics Community

That quote above is speculating the potential of Jay Nakamura as a villain, specifically in the context of arguing for the incompatibility of Jon and Jay as a romantic couple due to the ideological differences that may arise from being a villain. Such speculations about fictional characters aren't uncommon and have been demonstrated in the canon of comics itself with stories like Injustice. But these statements should be regarded with caution, and with consideration for the context of a character.

This quote was said in service of comparing Jay Nakamura and Ash, a character introduced in Lazarus Planet, and to emphasize his potential as a love interest despite him being a villain.

There’s more but the general consensus seemed to be, that there was excitement in the potential for romantic tension between Jon and Ash due to Ash’s villainy, but the same was the reason for separating Jon and Jay. Many others stated Jay had to have manipulated Jon to an extent, which ‘corrupts’ Jon. This argument is not a concern when it comes to Ash although textually, Ash is the ‘homme fatale’ as defined by C.S.Pacat and is thus intentionally manipulating Jon throughout his appearance by looking down on his attitude as a hero, whereas there is no evidence of manipulation between Jon and Jay.

Why would one see a potential for "villainy" in certain characters? Is it story-based? Is it a personal preference for certain themes? Is it for entertainment? Or perhaps, something much deeper than all of this that you may not even be aware of?

What is the difference between Jay and Ash, and why does the villainy of one elicit enthusiasm and the perceived villainy of the other bring out irritation? While there is audience reception, writing quality, and subjective opinion which readers are free to express, these large-scale reactions warrant examination. Jon and Jay’s relationship had caused waves in international news. The story of Superman is inherently political and that of ‘Superman: Son of Kal-El’, ties itself back to these roots. Thus, the immediate aversion to Jay must be addressed and examined, since his character and his relationship with Superman can impact queer representation in media by virtue of carrying the brand of Superman.

DC Comics and The Depiction of Asian Culture

With characters such as Black Lightning, Steel, and New Super-Man getting new runs, and newer characters such as Xanthe Zhou and Cameron Kim(City Boy) being introduced, recent years have seen a push in diversifying the cast of superheroes. But American Comics as a medium have always idealized the image of the White Man and has been a means to define American Values, thereby alienating people of color(POC). Comics often reflected the anxieties of the Western World, with Captain America from Marvel Comics punching Nazis, and Superman fighting the Ku Klux Klan. While it has pushed for the message of freedom, community and rebellion with an emphasis on righteousness, the reflected anxieties are confined to those of the White Man.

World War 2 had given rise to anti-Chinese and Japanese propaganda, with American-Asian individuals being suspected for treason. Japanese immigrants in the 40s were accused of being spies for Japan. A quote from the article, ‘The "Yellow Peril" Mystique: Origins and Vicissitudes of a Racist Discourse’ states:

“Anyone who accepts an invitation to visit China or to entertain visitors to America from China are to be regarded either as dupes, as potential victims of cleverly trained agents of the People's Republic of China, who, during the course of an ordinary conversation, are able to extract secrets from them, or as spies working for a foreign government.”

Tensions from World War 2 and the perception of China as a Communist hellscape threatening American Capitalistic freedoms has led to such accusations. The idea of those of “the Orient” but specifically East Asians being experts in espionage to gather data, and leak it to the Chinese or Japanese governments has transferred over into fiction.

Colonialism, and the racial hierarchies proposed by evolutionary theories of the nineteenth century placed the ambiguously Eastward individuals as subservient to the White Man. The concept of evolution had been co-opted by colonizers, upper class Western political circles, to expand upon eugenics to justify that POC fell into a hierarchy, where the white people were always on top. Asian and specifically East Asian people were defined by inferiority and a lack of advancement, but also as a marked threat with their supposed shrewdness as we’ve established.

The most prominent Asian characters in DC have been Ra’s Al Ghul, Talia Al Ghul, Lady Shiva, Cheshire, and Katana. They have long histories within the comics and are deeply influential, but the characters listed are typically in antagonistic roles, primarily using espionage-based techniques, expertise in weaponry, and membership among shadowed organizations to execute their goals. For the sake of brevity, we’ll be examining the portrayal of the Al Ghuls with a focus on Talia Al Ghul. Talia, much like Jay, is introduced first as a love interest and thus relevant for further discussion on the perception of Jay.

The Threat of The Lover from The Orient

The Al Ghuls originate from an undefined part of the Arab world. Talia is Arab and Chinese, but she is not allowed to be fluid, she is not allowed both. Depending on the creative team’s intentions, she is portrayed both as a temptress and a romantic interest, oscillating between these identities depending on her loyalty to her father and her love for Batman. When she is meant to be a victim of her father, imposing stereotypical morals assigned to the Arab world through orientalism, she wears ‘harem’ robes, she is darker, she is distinctly Arab. When she is a sly temptress, she wears a qipao or a kimono, leaning into Asian stereotypes.

While Orientalism portrays Asian women as sexual beings, who are seen as particularly dangerous because of their influence on the libidos of White Men, it veers towards a lack of desirability in Asian men. The sexual interest of Asian men is portrayed as inherently predatory of white women, a danger from which white women must be rescued.

What would this mean, then, for an Asian Queer Man, who is a romantic interest of Superman?

Jay Nakamura and “The Pink Hair Connundrum”

Talia’s former fluidity in her design and clothing is contrasted starkly by the clear definition of Jay’s design. Much like Lois Lane, whose assigned color is purple, Jay has been assigned a specific set of colors to make him identifiable; these being pink, orange, greens and teals.

Many of the recently introduced Asian characters have strong silhouettes and stylization. Kong Kenan is primarily red with accents of yellow and black, Xanthe Zhou’s is blue and yellow, City Boy is Black and Red. Identifiable and concretized designs are necessary to the superhero genre, where the design is essential towards cementing identity. This is in direct contrast to long-term portrayals of Talia, whose skin tone, color scheme and styling varied with great frequency.

Jay’s design competes in vibrance with the primary colors of the Superman suit. This raises issues because the Asian Love interest is visually not subservient to the White Hero. The muted colors expected of any romantic interest is not present here, which immediately creates tension.

His design adheres to typical fashion choices in queer culture. The stereotype of a ‘pronoun haver with dyed’ hair has run rampant in recent years. While queerphobic individuals denigrate these features as something lesser, the queer community gravitates towards alternative design choices which turn eyes for a purpose. The LGBTQIA+ community uses alternate clothing, colors, and fashion pieces to mark themselves and their identity within the community, mainly to signal to other LGBTQIA+ individuals of their presence (Flags and Fashion: Expressions of Solidarity through Lesbian Clothing, Eleanor Medhurst). It is a form of solidarity.

Heteronormativity is defined by a set of social rules imposed on varying aspects of culture, from language to clothes, and the replication of these enforces what is ‘normal’. The fashion choices of the LGBTQIA+ community defy these rules despite efforts by these imposed social norms to police them. The heteronormative majority see it as their duty to correct these transgressions in hair color, clothing, speech, etc.

But, following these normative rules means the marginalized individual would have to put in extra labour to conform– to not be judged and refused. The queer person is expected to do this additional labour, and it falls to the marginalized people to negotiate within themselves the extent of compromise they must make for their own identity to fit into their environment (A gay reflection on microaggressions, symbolic normativities, and pink hair Aleksi Soini). The normative people are never challenged.

It is up to the LGBTQIA+ individual to prove themselves as ‘normal’.

Solini’s article recounts a moment where a coworker of his stated, “‘You're okay; you're not one of those over-the-top faggots with bleached hair”. Heteronormativity functions in binaries. You are male or female. Similarly, you are straight or gay. There is of course, in the name of inclusion, a “normal” gay, and an “abnormal” gay.

Jay Nakamura would be considered the latter, because his character design is a representation of someone who takes no efforts to conform to heteronormativity.

In the context of Superman: Son of Kal-El, he is a reporter who wants attention so that he may redirect it to protect refugees. He purposefully stands out with his chosen orange and green hoodies. His ability to stand out is a direct attack against the narrative created by the colonizer of his country, Henry Bendix.

Henry Bendix kidnapped Jay and his mother, Sara, to silence them. Sara was the former president of Gamorra, and ran against Henry Bendix in the previous elections. Bendix abducts these two in an effort to silence the call for the freedom of Gamorra. Jay is one among hundreds who are experimented on, essentially enslaved under Bendix’s command— a clear effort to erase their identities. It is implied his hair turned pink due to the experiments, since he has black hair in an alternate universe where Bendix did not colonize Gamorra.

His hair is a symbol of resistance within the story itself, since he gained it after surviving long periods of experimentation. On a metatextual level as a queer character, he represents the LGBTQIA+ tendency to transgress heternormativity. Subversion is an act of resistance.

The aesthetic of “Superman and Lois Lane” appeals to conservative values, and this is often used to push the image of a perfect American Nuclear Family, leaning towards the stereotypes of yesteryears where ‘traditional values’ reigned supreme. Superman 2016 leans into this, the setting is an idyllic countryside village known as Hamilton. Lois Lane, defined as a career woman and intrepid journalist is confined to the home, and Clark is seen primarily around the farm. They are both removed from their profession meant to symbolize the protection and distribution of truth. Their clothing abides by these as well. Lois wears athleisure, tight tops and leggings, found in muted pinks and purples, as opposed to her rumpled office formals. Clark is often seen in flannel tops, jeans, and jackets, primarily in reds and muted blues and browns. Visually, they are meant to conform to the binary established by heteronormativity. The primary colors of the Superman suit are shown in tandem with the American Flag. There is space made for color, but only as long as it conforms.

Jon and Jay’s story is firmly set in the city of Metropolis and constantly circles the idea of truth, journalistic integrity, and propaganda. His unnatural hair and bright clothing stand in stark contrast to Superman 2016, disrupting the aesthetic rules of heteronormativity in the fabric of the Superman story.

The clear definition of his color story, as an Asian man, a queer man, and a love interest, creates tension within the world of comics.

Espionage and Distrust of Asian Characters.

As established previously, the World Wars, colonialism and the eugenicist taken on evolution embraced by the Western world in the 19th century led to a deep suspicion of anyone of East Asian descent.

The belief in the shrewdness of Asian characters is reflected in the characterization of those like Talia. Talia is portrayed as having deeper meaning in all her actions. She leaks information to the heroes in ‘Tower of Babel’. In her time as the CEO of LexCorp, she sold all the assets to Bruce Wayne though she was portrayed as a villain. Her character is frequently presented as untrustworthy, and readers are made to question her every move. This is further reinforced by these double-crosses and information sharing. Similarly, Cheshire and Catman’s relationship in Secret Six is defined by deep distrust, Cheshire toys with Catman by hiding information and shifting loyalties depending on what is advantageous to her. Simone often comments on her sexual appeal being dangerous, and the ways in which she uses a character’s unwillingness to trust her to further intrigue and disseminate information.

As an Asian journalist, a refugee, and a recently-introduced love interest, Jay is in a position which raises anxieties in the common American comic reader who has been trained to distrust the idea of information in the hands of such an individual. The established tension arising from his character design motivates readers to uphold such suspicion.

The text of the story makes it explicit that he admires Lois Lane, and his position as the journalist love interest of Superman calls for parallels with Lois. His monicker, The Truth, is directly derived from the Superman slogan, ‘Truth, Justice, and a Better Tomorrow’. Yet, there is fear that he is manipulating Jon.

The fight between the Axis and Allied powers led to a deep mistrust from the American against Japanese immigrants and American-Japanese citizens. General John L. DeWitt’s statement regarding the Japanese immigrant population summarizes the sentiments in this time:

Sinophobia continued to flourish, and was worsened with the accusation and trial of Wen Ho Lee, a naturalized American Citizen from Taiwan, who confessed to reporting classified information regarding nuclear weapons in America to Chinese scientists while visiting Beijing. The truth of this accusation remains contested, but the confession and sentencing led to the intensification of distrust in Chinese people.

The country of Gamorra is located in Asia, and is located south of Japan. It was created initially by Korean writers Brandon Choi and Jim Lee. Gamorra was colonized by those of Japanese descent, and it can be surmised it is an allegory for the colonization of Korea by the Japanese Empire. This history is not reflected in Superman: Son of Kal-El, and readers would identify Gamorra as vaguely Asian.

Though the Yellow Peril targeted various countries in different manners, xenohpobia and orientalism affected Asian populations on a similar scale. It was specifically, “the Whites” against “the Others”. The ambiguity of Jay’s Asian origin makes him a potential target for a combined imposition of stereotypes from varying Asian cultures.

The overall effect, is that in fiction, the Asian Lover cannot be trusted with information.

Seduction, Hypnotization and the threat of Sexuality

Morality Panic around the sexuality of Asian bodies has existed for centuries. The British population characterized Chinese immigrants as morally depraved, defining them as opium smoking individuals who indulged in gambling and prostitution. Setting aside the fact that the cause of the opium distribution in China was due to the British, and the first of the Opium Wars were fought because the Chinese government took measures to get rid of opium, the presence of Chinese populations in Britian was in defiance of the colonial mindset.

An increase in immigration occurred during the World Wars, and White Women grew more independent through the job opportunities created during this period. The reluctance of White Women to conform to the patriarchy and the increase in immigration, led to rumours of helpless white women being lost in the Limehouse streets, victim to the “moral depravity” of the Asian Man.

Sexuality has always been a source of control in the heteronormative patriarchy. The binary of male and female is defined by the subservience of women, sexually, to men. Specifically, white men. A loss of control in this sexuality for the White Man is a threat.

Cheshire, Lady Shiva, and Talia are portrayed as using their sexuality to weaken their White Male opponents. She is a threat because she results in a loss of control over libido, she weaponizes it against the White Hero. He falls victim to his sexuality, and is seen as helpless to these ‘charms’ and a hapless victim. Grant Morrison takes this much farther with Talia and Bruce, wherein she is implied to have sexually assaulted Bruce Wayne. The metaphor of sexuality as a weapon becomes that of overt assault, the stereotype stretched to its extreme. Cheshire’s seduction is shown as dangerous, and Thomas Blake is weakened drastically around her purely due to his attraction towards her. It seems her mere existence is a devastating blow.

While the Asian Woman is a sexual object, one who seduces, a temptation which cannot be refuted, the Asian Man is portrayed as deeply undesirable and sexless. Anti-immigration laws, exclusion, and the deep history of Orientalism and Xenophobia ostracizes the Asian Man from American Masculinity, creating the “American male” and the “other”, thus stripping Asian Men of their masculinity. Due to masculinity being defined by sexuality, the othering of the Asian Man leads to an assignation of sexlessness (Park, M. (2012). Asian American masculinity eclipsed: A legal and historical perspective of emasculation through US immigration practices. Mod. Am., 8, 5).

They are feminized, portrayed as undesirable. Which leads to the stereotype of The Seducer, a byproduct of the Yellow Peril. Due to the perceived lack of desirability in Asian Men, their sexuality is instead portrayed as inherently predatory. Shanghai Express(1936) and The Cheat(1915) portray Asian Men as sexual predators victimizing white women, who must be rescued by the White Heroes. The Limehouse district of London were fear mongered as places where the Triad Gangsters would kidnap White Women and force them into sexual slavery (Witchard, Anne (4 February 2015). "Yellow Peril: Sinophobia and the Great War: a Q&A with Dr. Anne Witchard".).

Jay is a queer man, desired by a white man. On many occasions, Jon has initiated physical intimacy with Jay. White men, as we’ve seen before, are seen as victims of their libidos. But Asian men are sexless. A white man could not possibly truly desire for the Asian body, especially not for the Asian male body. The impositions of the aforementioned stereotypes in fiction have led to a disbelief in the existence of such a relationship configuration. Jay does not conform to the aesthetic of the Asian seductress, or of a feminization of any sort. Rather, he has glasses, fitting more into the Asian Nerd stereotype, which emerged from the demasculinization of Asian Men.

It is difficult for a comic reader, who has been hammered down with the idea of seduction, temptation and subterfuge around the Asian sexuality, to see Superman fall for an Asian boy with glasses, free of external manipulation. Jay with pink hair and a distinct lack of revealing outfits or overt sexual advances must then, therefore, be using some unseen and undetectable force, more sinister than can be imagined, shifting into the realm of the magical.

Whatever the explanation, it surely cannot be an honest desire.

And so it veers into speculations of seduction. Many had hilariously proposed that he had used pink kryptonite with sincerity. Plenty had examined the swirl-like pattern behind Jay in a singular panel to mean that he had used hypnosis. His joke about working with Lex Luthor to tease Jon was used as a confession of his crimes, and his plans were always to expose Jon's vulnerabilities. On and on they went

The label of ‘terrorist’, journalism, and the perception of refugees

This, is sensitive. I have often hesitated to speak about this to anyone due to how fresh the topic is, how real the violence of this can be. It is no secret, that the United States labels the populations it wishes to exploit or eradicate with the label of ‘terrorist’. The invasion of Iraq, the current unchecked occupation of Palestine, Syria and Lebanon, and the dismissal of Yemeni efforts to support the aforementioned countries is due to the labelling of a fight for liberation, for freedom, as ‘terrorist activity’. Heradstveit and Pugh put it best;

One of the primary ways in which a government increases its legitimacy and induces its population to support it above and beyond what their own interests dictate is by assimilating the concepts of ‘opposition’ and ‘crime’. It goes without saying that governments are meant to act against ‘crime’, at any rate crime committed by their less powerful subjects, as this is part of the definition of a government.

They propose that the label of ‘terrorism’ can cover anything from guerilla warfare, armed resistance, any form of political opposition, even those which are non-violent and can be classified as vandalism. Any action in opposition to the locus of control, is classified as terrorist activity.

Comics reflect reality, as mentioned at the beginning. Jay does the same in his journalism. The second issue of Superman: Son of Kal-El, portrays Jay reporting on a Gamorran refugee boat, which was sinking on its way to Metropolis. These are the first bits of dialogue we hear from Jay. He is aligned with an anarachist group called ‘The Revolutionaries’, who undertake armed violence in a fight for liberation. Batman puts the label of criminality and specifically, of terrorism, into the reader’s minds.

This is meant to be refuted, and it is within a single issue. But the readership saw it as confirmation of their suspicions arising from the previously mentioned points, while ignoring the critique on the US government. Jay’s position as a disenfranchised refugee is entirely forgotten, despite the text repeating his position at varying points.

The seeming confirmation of the Asian seductress, of subterfuge, always takes precedence.

Superman comics have often been used to empower people. Superman’s story is inspired by Jewish myths and lived experiences. His status as an illegal immigrant has been covered across multiple mediums. He has smashed the Klan, he has helped free an enslaved world, he has helped people through their trauma, he has defended immigrants trying to find safety, assured queer children that they are loved and accepted, he fights corrupt billionaires who exploit the common folk.

Jay’s story contributes to the same values, but he is dismissed purely on aesthetics and race.

It is important to evaluate why certain characters make us uncomfortable. What elicits this reaction? What is the source? I would never urge someone to like a character, this is subjective but it is important to analyze where our biases can come from. Sometimes it is as harmless as being unable to relate to a story. On other occasions, it can be rooted in something as insidious as this.

If you would like to make Jay a villain, or any hero into a villain for that matter, ask why.

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genderqueerdykes · 3 months ago

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Aight I’m gonna say it: I hate the divide in trans spaces. I hate trans infighting. The discourse is fucking ridiculous. I’m a non binary person who’s commonly mistaken as a trans woman by trans people and transphobes alike despite the fact I was not born Amab. Shit like “theyfab” makes me roll my eyes. The constant dismissal of intersex and people of colour and disabled people’s thoughts and experiences is horrendous. Trans women don’t hold power over transmascs, but you have to be delusional to pretend trans men at large are treated like cis men are and hold the same power. I’m baffled some people sincerely believe that skyler, the 14 years old black they/he with purple hair is treated the same and holds the same power over fellow trans people as any upper-middle class white guy. Be so fr. We need to stay together instead of playing oppression olympics.

agreed, holy shit. for the future, i'm psychotic, i have schizophrenia & experience delusions and just wanted to explain that 'delusional' is not a good word to use in this scenario as it can come across as demonizing psychotic people, but i understand what you meant & i can tell that you mean no harm. just wanted to point that out for the future! :) however, i get the message that you're saying, and that's way more important!

agreed. this infighting is dumb, petty, and pointless. all it does is waste time and give conservatives and terfs what they want.

"theyfab" is one of the most embarrassing things i've seen come out of online discourse. like i don't know how anyone says that and doesn't feel like the most embarrassing person on planet earth. like if you use that term, how do you not feel like an absolute loser for saying that knowing the entire reason you misgendered another person was for haha funnie internet points? i don't like calling things cringe, but if i had to assign that word to anything, it would be "theyfab". literally one of the most embarrassing things i've ever heard in my life. THAT is "cringe". like you should genuinely be embarrassed if you think that calling another person that is okay. you should genuinely be embarrassed of proudly misgendering another person for likes on a post.

i swear people are acting like toddlers and they second they're near an AFAB person they're like "omg don't give me your GIRL COOTIES!!!" how do you think you're cool when you're saying shit like this? how do you wake up in the morning and think you're cool and right and smart when you're literally just terrified of an AGAB?

also since when was misgendering people cool? like i'm sorry, did i fall asleep for too long and wake up to a completely new society? why do you get your head ripped off if you accidentally they/them a she/her trans woman, but people literally post tiktoks and instagram reels bragging about how they misgender trans men and AFAB nonbinary people and they get thousands of likes and comments? what a dogshit double standard!

people love to proudly discredit AFAB people due to their rampant misogyny. like can we just call a spade a spade here? hating on AFAB people is very painfully, blatantly misogynistic. people are being mean as hell specifically because of that "F"- that's why the word "whiny" comes up so much. we know what you're doing. we know that you see all AFAB trans people as "weird cis women". we know. your verbiage says it all. we get it that you don't think that AFAB people can be trans. we get it that you think AFAB people are annoying for drawing a breath and daring to speak. please work on your misogyny. it's through the fucking roof

I’m baffled some people sincerely believe that skyler, the 14 years old black they/he with purple hair is treated the same and holds the same power over fellow trans people as any upper-middle class white guy. Be so fr. We need to stay together instead of playing oppression olympics.

you're right and you should say it. people NEVER care about or consider that there are trans boys, mascs and men of color. nobody gives a fuck about how transmascs and men of color struggle. nobody gives a shit or listens when transmascs of color talk about the extreme violence and isolation we face. like do you seriously think a black trans boy has the exact same amount of power and privilege as an abled cishet white man in a position of power? really? come on, now. NOBODY gives a fuck about the trans men, boys and mascs of color. nobody gives a shit that this affects men of color, and that's just fucked.

and agreed. let's stop this oppression olympics thing once and for all. that's what we're doing at this stage and it's fucking embarrassing. queer identities are not legitimized by how oppressed they are. we are ALL oppressed. every single one of us. but our identities themselves are not about oppression. our identities are about ourselves, our lives, our passions, our bodies, and who we do or don't love. they're about ourselves. we have to stop depersonalizing the queer experience. we're taking the individuals out of it and turning it into "whoever's the most oppressed gets to talk the entire time and everyone else needs to shut the hell up." this is ridiculous. it's time to stop.

live your life. love your queer siblings. they have your back, you gotta have theirs.

#asks #feedback #answers #trans infighting

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kisseobie · 10 months ago

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hun i honestly cannot find anything with ppl talking shit about you. i mean it’s good to know but like where in the hell did those anons get that info 🤨 ????

i honestly think maybe people deleted whatever they were saying or most people are blocked from seeing it, not entirely sure but i’m thankful my anons made me aware of it so that i can at least attempt to address this controversy. i hope you don’t mind me using this ask as my response to whatever “shit” people have been talking about me and/or my blog 😭

1. if people are upset about me writing nsfw for seobsoul, i could honestly not care less. the argument i have seen in most kpop nsfw writing discourse for idols who have recently turned 18 is that it somehow “doesn’t matter” that the people typically writing these works about these idols are literally in the same age range, sometimes even younger than said idols, for example, seobsoul. i have never written nsfw for seobsoul before they turned 18, and i don’t even think i started writing fanfiction for p1harmony before seob was 18 😭 do these people honestly think that we don’t see that they write for intak in the same way i write for seobsoul? people started writing smut for intak when he turned 18 as well, but it’s suddenly a huge issue when someone born in the same year as seobsoul writes for them too. mind you, intak is a total of 2 years older than jongseob and shota!!

2. i have nsfw warnings on my page for a reason. if people who don’t like nsfw for seobsoul choose willingly to snoop around on my page, that’s their prerogative. i clearly have different opinions on this topic than they do and that is ok! nothing i have written towards jongseob and soul has ever been predatory so to paint me as a weirdo is silly imo. if a p1ece is attracted to a member that is the same age range as them, why do they have to wait “a year or two” to write smut about them? that doesn’t even sound genuine in the slightest 😭 waiting to write smut doesn’t equate to not having sexual fantasies about them at their current age, it just means you’re scared of how people will react. i however, am not because why the hell would i be embarrassed of natural attraction to men my age?

3. “regardless their age, you don’t know these idols so you shouldn’t be writing smut about them” .. to this i say: there are bigger issues in the world. there are real predators on this planet and you genuinely think that me writing smut about boys my own age is the end of the world? fanfiction, including smut, will always exist. fanfiction is an outlet of creativity and i have never claimed that the things i write would actually happen in real life.. that’s the whole point of writing, at least to me.. to create universes based on people you love, and to share them with others who love those people as deeply as you do. however, i do understand that fanfiction will always be seen as a morally grey topic and i won’t sit here and attempt to explain my side in a 10-page essay. i will say though, that if you don’t agree with nsfw seobsoul writers, just block them and move on lol

anyways .. p1harmony comeback soon guys who else is excited :3

#kpop writers #p1harmony x reader #jongseob texts #soul smut #p1h soul #soul p1harmony #p1harmony soul #p1harmony reactions #p1harmony #p1h #p1harmony drabbles #piwon #jongseob x reader #p1harmony smut #jongseob #p1harmony scenarios #haku shota #kimjongseob #btw this is probably the last time i’m gonna address this lol

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feminismisstillahatemovement · 1 year ago

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I'm certain that Elon is full of shit at some times, but what good things has he done that deserve recognition, too? And, what are commonly-believed lies about him, that are easily dispelled?

Putting aside that the man is singlehandedly putting human beings on other planets, and thereby doing more to try bring about the long-term survival of the human race than every climate activist collectively throwing soup at paintings, and that he - again, near-singlehandedly - has made electric vehicles both cool and a workable alternative to the combustion engine, with close to 17,000 Tesla Superchargers in the US alone... just the single act of him buying Twitter and removing the censorship and bias has likely altered the future of the entire human world, and for the better.

Because of one man, the entire mainstream media corporate narrative now has an unavoidably public alternative, and every one of their lies now gets community noted into oblivion within minutes of them speaking them. What once was an unquestioned Democrat party line, held by all major TV companies and news sites, is now being laughed at by the entire world in real time. It cannot be overestimated how much this changes the political discourse and narrative of the time we are living through, and everyone benefits from it. Freedom of speech is something everyone should appreciate and applaud, regardless of how they vote.

Maybe the weirdest lie that went viral is that his father owned an emerald mine and so Elon grew up sitting on a golden throne wiping his arse with jewels and dollar bills. Even the woke/left-wing Snopes debunked this, but there are probably millions of people out there still believing it, and vilifying Musk because of it.

I've noticed more girls seem to have believed this nonsense than boys: both a current female friend and my ex-girlfriend would only mention his name with a sneer, but when I asked them to lay out why for me, so I could understand what they were seeing, they both trailed off to a slightly puzzled silence, because when trying to articulate it, they realized it was based on nothing, just an attitude they'd taken on from the tone of media reporting and the groupthink of their peers.

Elon is a flawed human being like the rest of us, and I'm sure there are many things I'd disagree with him on, but he's a genuinely great man in a world of mosquitoes, and we desperately need more great men with vision and courage to get us out of the mess we all agree we're in.

#elon musk

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alexluvsskittlez · 6 months ago

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I haven't made an into in months so uhhh..

HI EVERYPONY!!! my name is Alex, you can also call me Sam, Zoe, or Binoo

I'm 14 years old, my birthday is April 23rd

i am an artist, animator, content creator, and I'm learning how to sing :3

I'm audhd and dyscalculic (idk if i spelled that right sorry)

my special interests are Paramore and my ocs

I am currently hyperfixated on Emily Armstrong

I am PARAMORE'S #1 FAN!!!!!!!

i am a PROUD SELFSHIPPER!!!!

BYI:

I am Emily Armstrong's #1 defender (sorry haters XD)

I have the worst sense of humor on this planet

i kinda fw some rpf ships some of them being people who aren't actually together sorry. I'm respectful about it tho 😓

I usually don't think before I post so if I post something wrong please let me know

idrgaf about proship discourse and it's not something that I like involving myself in. I generally don't care what people ship but I still think shipping illegal stuff is weird as hell

I get pissed really easily but I promise I'm nice

bands/artists i like (warning, its a LOT):

Paramore, pierce the veil, linkin park, mcr, Hayley Williams, pinkshift, meet me @ the altar, silverstien, fall out boy, green day, bring me the horizon, p!atd, la dispute, lemon demon, sunny day real estate, Will Wood and the tapeworms, Will Wood, asking Alexandria, not enough space, get scared, the used, Owl city, mitski, Florence + the machine, stomach book, she wants revenge, Weezer, picture me broken, rites of spring, halfnoise, isles & glaciers, dead by sunrise, black veil brides, system of a down, limp Bizkit, silly goose, dead sara, scary kids scaring kids, alesana, femtanyl, the cure, modern baseball, foxszn, 3drinkz, yellow card, vylet pony, american football, boygenius, Avril Lavigne, millionaires, Kesha, s3rl, 3oh!3, attack attack, brokencyde, and waterparks.

shows I like:

smiling friends, steven universe, gravity falls, murder drones, madoka magica, the owl house, amphibia, clone high, invader zim, eddsworld, spooky month, inside job, pelswick, tadc, toopy and binoo, mlp, and the ghost and molly mcgee.

movies i like:

the final riot, steven universe the movie, atsv, itsv, the fnaf movie, mean girls, juno, the tamagotchi movie (i think there's actually multiple but I'm specifically talking about the anime one made in 2007), toopy and binoo the movie, and mlp the movie

games i like:

splatoon 2, fnaf, minecraft, animal crossing, mario kart, castle cats, pjsekai, nintendogs, roblox, regretevator, cart ride into 17 pregnant hyenas (rip </3), baldis basics, and ddlc

youtubers i like:

Kurtis Conner, Danny Gonzalez, Drew Gooden, funkyfrogbait, bredrawz, flamingo, benoftheweek, sinjin drowning, cybernoop, dantdm, stariaat, lovely lor, juj, and penguinz0

musicals i like:

mean girls, be more chill and Hamilton (I'm still getting into musicals so if you have any recommendations please tell me!!)

titles I gave myself (probably not necessary but idgaf)

Paramore's #1 fan

Pim Pimling's spouse

professional Pim kisser

#1 tell me how listener

#1 misadventures fan

#1 Emily Armstrong defender

tamagotchi dad of 3

spinel and mars' parent

#1 laika's comet fan

#1 class of 09 the flipside hater

#1 mip hater

worst dancer in history

other stuff I like (some are fandom related some aren't):

alternative subcultures/fashion, laikas comet, homestuck, warrior cats, tamagotchis/digital pets in general, mid-late 2010s animation memes, old internet stuff, space stuff, and animals

dni:

basic dni stuff uhh, people who are 12 and under, people who harass proshippers (yeah they're weird but harassing them is no better than being one), Paramore haters, Emily Armstrong haters, and those 4chan femcel self proclaimed problematic mfs. other than that i just block freely.

other socials:

ig: alexluvsskittlez

youtube: alexluvsskittlez

sketchers united: alexluvsskittlez

newgrounds: alexluvsskittlez

deviantart: pixelisgay

spotify: Pimkisser69420👽🙏

ermm that's all BYEEE!!!

#paramore #piercetheveil #linkin park #mcr #smiling friends #steven universe #gravity falls #im not adding more tags

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jinx-blackout-84 · 2 years ago

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What is you being nice to me and finding me funny and interesting and hot I'm a visual learner by the way

Hi! My name is Jinx!

Fandom loser through and through, cringe as fuck and I talk about my blorbos too much. I draw sometimes, and I write fic!

Pronouns: wouldn't you like to know, weatherboy?

And hey! If you're having a bad day, here's a masterpost of some links to cheer you up

Your residents tide pods georg, doorframe eating, vice president of the sad blonde boys club, cole Brookstone fanboy.

and a part of the mutuals cinematic universe (gay roleplay gang) with my husbands @glo-katt84 @felixisfruity and @swagaythor

My spotify

Some fandoms I'm in: DC, Sonic The Hedgehog, Ninjago!!!!!, my hero academia/boku no hero academia, IT, The Umbrella Academy, does liking game changer count as being part of a fandom, legend of Zelda, I'm an inniter but also a lot of Dsmp stuff is kinda covered in the goo for me, and I'm about to start Hannibal

CWs for this blog: I talk about sex, I discuss racism and homophobia and abelism, I do not support any discrimination. I talk about mcyts, I curse, and I am cringe. Don't follow if you're not okay with seeing Ninjago and sonic x shadow on your dash. I am cringe but I am free.

Fics I am working on:

You're too slow! (Title pending):

Sonic x shadow street racer AU enemies to lovers, a little crack, Amy isn't a bad guy or into sonic she's gay background rouge x knuckles, probably gonna be multichap

The IKEA fic:

Ninjago AU where the ninjas all work at IKEA and Wu is the boss. Garmadon keeps messing up displays and Morro keeps trying to pretend he's an employee.

I don't call people anything:

Sleepy boys inc. Fic where Techno just moved to a new high school and meets the rest of SBI Chaos ensues as they try and get invites to parties win class elections, win fencing tournaments, and Tech fights a kid for a plot of land in the community garden.

The Shady Kid From The Alleyway:

Obligitory SBI vigilante AU venchtrio are vigilantes and syndicate are villains.

Any discourse:

#discourse

Me just talking:

#jinx screams into the void

Talking to my friends:

#and the void screams back

Reblogs:

#Foraged from the void

Anytime I talk about fics I am writing:

#Fic stuff

Real life stories:

#jinx exists in real life D:

Song posting:

#Jinx yaps about music

Roleplaying with the mutuals:

#mcu (mutual cinematic universe)

Any posts a out a fandom will usually have that fandom's abbreviation for the media

DNI----

Don't talk to me about Dream Team or CC!Wilbur

I will use tone indicators if requested!

I am a minor so please don't send me sex things!

Thank you for reading <3

Time for my 50 billion userboxes and fanart

Flash warning below the cut

FANART TIME

⬆️ This beautiful art from the wonderful, lovely, talented, kind, and amazing @glokatt

⬆️This amazing art from my beloved friend @felixisfruity, who is so amazing and talented and I AGAHAGGAGA.

⬆️ this AMAZING fanart is also by @glokatt, who is perhaps the kindest, funniest, most chaotic person on this planet. They are so awesome and you should go check out his blog because they are the absolute coolest.

⬆️ this amazing fanart by amazing and wonderful and funny and super cool mutual @dumbartist101 whom I adore! Go check them put because they are amazing and wonderful and so cool aghggagagagag.

Sorry for being a userbox whore

#intro post #Fic stuff #Goodnight post #Jinx screams into the void #And the void screams back #Foraged from the void

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antimasculist · 1 year ago

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i love the discourse about whether or not lesbians can be boys. lesbians are better at being boys than possibly anybody else on this planet

#gone fishing

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dana-chan-the-control-brain · 1 year ago

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I remember seeing things that were complaining about Fallout Boy's updated version of We didn't start the fire.

For some reason I thought it was disrespectful to the source material.

But....I just listened to it for the first time and.... No???

It's a pretty good version that encapsulates my generation of America through the past two decades to now. Listing all the big political events, and biggest franchises that came to be in those years and major sports events.

So I was wondering what the problem was.

From how my friend explained it to me, it was because Trump was mentioned and his supporters got mad and that was it.

.... really?

Cus that's so dumb. He got impeached twice, I don't know what to tell them. They're saying he didn't? It's a thing that happened.

They're getting mad about a song that lists off Pokemon, Twilight, SpongeBob Captain Planet, Isis and Micheal Jackson and Elon Musk more or less in the same breath.

Unless I'm missing something critical, yeah this is just a discourse I think I don't get.

Great bonus track

#personal #for people who are pro merica supporters of the trumpet man very easily want him to be a dictator. i dont get it #danachan's rants #it could be possible im misinformed #but its weird i knew the discourse before i heard the song #Spotify

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alysinscotland · 3 months ago

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Impending doom.

It's been less than a day since tiktok was banned. and then approximately 12 hours since the app was unbanned by Donald Trump. I have to be honest, at first, i cared very little for this sensational news - I'm scottish and i didn't believe the ban was really going to happen. This news was sooo the boy who cried wolf and it felt like fear-mongering at its finest, to which i would boast, I'm not the one to get baited! But then i saw this for what it really was and it scared me. My algorithm sucked me deeper into the whirlpool of fascism, oligarchy and right-wing media creating a hole so deep that when i woke up this morning, dread filled my chest so full i felt i was going to burst. Is the world ending, or have i fallen this easily into the media trap? It's hard to truly deduce how bad the state of our world is in this era, and on TikTok it's even harder to separate the truth from the lies. But i digress, the (shortest) ban made me truly think whether i even want to be on this app when all i see is how horribly we treat each other and the planet. It's like how my parents no longer watch the news because its too depressing. I used to be appalled by this, exclaiming not everyone has the privilege to just turn the television off, making my current thoughts guilty and hypocritical. it's hard to support a cause that even in the UK feels like a minority. I can feel the politics of places like the USA reaching its claws deeper into the very vunerable politics of Britain (i'll admit also already a conservative state), escalating the rise of right wing supporters, misogynistic, racist and homophobic discourse, striking a sense of doom in me i have never felt before. It is actually mind-blowing to me how so many people i know of or know personally are travelling backwards to ideals of the past. Online I see such a disconnect from people on having empathy or even humanity, and almost worse, there are no consequences for this type of behaviour. Due to this I worry so much for the children of this time who are so vulnerable to propaganda and hateful ideas. I worry for how long our planet will last as i have to sit back knowing i cannot stop the 1% from destroying our home. I worry. Every time i open social media i am shown how desensitised and demoralised people can be and whilst this doom seems to be having a crippling effect on me, social media will every so often (not in the past 24 hours but that just might be tiktok's impressive algorithm!), show me that it is not too late and there is always hope. The people of this world and the world itself deserve so much more grace and kindness than they have been given and I believe that while there is hope out there, there is a bright future ahead. With hope, not all is lost. If there was one good thing from the past 24 hours for me, it's that my beliefs and passion have been reinforced in a way I haven't felt in a long time. Hope will keep me going. I hope love will win.

Alys <3

#tiktok #tik tok ban #leftism #usa #uk politics #hope #doom #impending doom #mwah #culture

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spidermanifested · 1 year ago

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this is not my usual type of post but ive been rotating some thoughts and i guess my blogs as good a place as any to get them organized. okay so this is basically my take on the entire discourse surrounding the "feminine (presumed cis lets be honest) women are uniquely oppressed for being feminine/making female characters quote unquote Less Feminine is antifeminist" thing. which i keep seeing come up. on this internet of ours

context being im a trans guy. grew up largely seen by others as female, probably, sort of. was about as far from a cishet womans feminine as you can imagine. not in a cool tomboy way. not in a way that society had a box for. and thats the thing, is that when you fail at gender, whether youre conscious of it or not, theres this extremely profound loneliness that comes with it. part of it was the autism but i made like 6 real-life friends total from ages 4 to 18 and there were no examples of anyone with an even remotely adjacent experience i could find in the media or irl. anytime a female character skirted a little too close to actual masculinity in a tv show or movie shed get that makeover eventually. i was bullied by both boys and girls but the girls who bullied me were uniformly very feminine.

and so i see people talking about how hard feminine women and girls have it, how the world hates them for being beautiful, and on the one hand its like okay, Misogyny Exists. thats not really refutable thats just the reality of it. society hates women. and as for eurocentric femininity specifically i understand its a hard tightrope to walk!!! you have to put on all these masks BUT make them seem natural, youre forced into these narrow boxes of acceptable behavior and appearance and desires, and if you under- or over-shoot then people get reminded the whole thing is a farce and get mad (often violently!) at YOU for it

........but then my thing is, that on one side of the tightrope, the "overperforming eurocentric femininity" side, the tradwife or girlboss or blonde bimbo side, theres an entire history of structural trope-crafting to break your fall, right. like its a shitty box but its the box society WANTS you to be in. they look at you and go "yep thats a woman. we dont like those but that sure is one". there are known social niches to carve out. theres a script.

on the unfeminine side theres just. nothing. its stone cold concrete down there. and apparently twitter would have you believe its actually that the "more masculine" somebody presumed female appears the more society respects them but that to me is the wildest and most nonsense take on the planet because if people see you as a woman or girl who has not taken the needed steps to justify your place as one of those things you might as well be an alien, or even a monster. theres no script at all. and i feel like this is one of the major experiences that trans and gnc people of every gender share-- god knows trans women get the brunt of the vitriol-- and from my knowledge a lot of nonwhite people too, and also fat and disabled people, like. there are SO many things that affect your ability to achieve even a fraction of success at this aspirational femininity.

ive had to see people for real make the argument that princess peach making an angry face is masculine. i think the most masculine woman anyone on twitter can imagine right now is like a businesswoman in a form-fitting pantsuit and light mascara. maybe the struggle of succeeding at femininity under patriarchy deserves exploration, ive seen plenty of coherent and reasonable points, its not without worth as a discussion. but i do not trust the general public with the topic without immediately sliding into bog standard gender policing and transphobia, and so in closing, when the mainstream feminist take on the whole thing seems to be "the more you perform the femininity expected of you the worse you have it", i get the sensation that nobody told me it was opposite day and im about to feel real silly

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gemini-care-barr · 1 year ago

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Interesting you say ur top three heroes are Batman, Hal and flash! I’m surprised superman (or a superman member like superhero) didn’t take place of third and Bruce did! Can you indulge as to why? X

Oof, this one is gonna be a loaded answer haha.

So, just to get it out there, my top 5 heroes, in order, are The Flash (Barry Allen), Green Lantern (Hal Jordan), Batman (Bruce Wayne), Aquaman (Arthur Curry), and Superman (Clark Kent). There have been times in the past where Bruce and Hal have switched places, but they’ve been pretty solidly in their current spots for the past few years and I expect they’ll be staying there in the foreseeable future haha.

Now, I want to kinda defend my love of Clark while I’m here too, so I’ll start by saying I do absolutely adore him. I think he’s an amazing character and I’m absolutely already planning my future PHD dissertation on him and his stories haha. He has a rich history and is so admirable and sweet and good, not unlike my absolute bestest boy Barry, but I almost feel like that’s why he isn’t in my top 3. I already have Barry! And Barry scratches some intellectual and emotional itches that Clark doesn’t, which is the perfect segue into why I love Bruce.

I was a sad kid… lol. Like really sad! Like the level of sad where you can look at a ton of my childhood photos and I’m very rarely looking at the camera because I’d much rather be moping around with my face hiding up against my mom or dad ahaha. And it was with this incredible sadness that I looked upon Bruce’s face for the first time and saw a kindred spirit. Granted, Bruce had a (very well-known) reason to be sad while I was just a very marred by unfortunate events but otherwise mostly blessed child, but Bruce’s sadness was still very raw and real and relatable to me. And still is!

But I love him for more than just his broodiness, I also love him because of his incredible capacity to love and, maybe, hopefully, at least sometimes, be happy despite that sadness. Bruce is an amazingly tortured soul who still finds the time, and puts in the effort, to keep going, keep loving, keep finding and fighting for happiness. Does he get beaten down sometimes? Does he brood a lot? Does he come across as a bit heartless or cold? Self-isolate? Yes, all of the above. But he also has the BatFamily, he created the BatFamily. The BatFamily that includes Alfred, Selina, Dick, Jason, Tim, Damian, Duke, Barbara, Cassandra, Stephanie, Kate, Lucius, Gordon, Luke, and probably several more than I’m woefully forgetting. And he fights for and loves all of them and they are his happiness and light and motivation and I just love that so much because, yeah, same. I can be incredibly sad and mopey and not want to be with anyone, but then I remember my family and friends and I want to fight for them and their happiness too and I get Bruce in those moments.

Still, Bruce is not only intensely relatable for me, he’s also hugely admirable. Because, man, do I not want to do anything for anyone sometimes haha. Yeah, I just went on a whole spiel about wanting to fight for the happiness of my loved ones, but, hey, I’m not perfect and I am very susceptible to thinking “yeah, I care, but I’m sad right now and I don’t really want to care,” but Bruce’s unending fight is the fight to care despite having no reason to. He’s literally a vigilante in the most corrupt and crime-ridden city on the planet, a place where no one cares, and yet he puts on the cape and cowl each night to show and prove that he cares even if no one else does. He cares even if he has no reason to. He cares even when he has a reason not to. He’s so sad and broken and isolated, but he cares. And that is so dang cool.

So, yeah, I’m not here to start any “Batman vs Superman: who is the cooler hero??” discourse, but I am going to point out that I think their true dichotomy isn’t that one has powers and the other is just a man. It’s that one serves as a beacon of hope for a world that wants to hope, while the other is a beacon of hope for a world that is so sick and tired of hoping. The storytelling possibilities are endless in either direction, and I, personally, just find myself extremely drawn to the latter.

Bottom line: he’ll always be my Bruce 🫶

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morally-grey-girlbosses · 2 years ago

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Vriska Serket Propaganda Post

People love her! People hate her! People want to fuck her! People want her dead! It’s Vriska fucking Serket bby! No introduction needed.

she did nothing wrong but i guess you could bring up that time she mind controlled one of her friends to jump off a cliff permanently paralysing him and then later stabbed him through the chest with his own lance or that time she killed one of her other friends by mind controlling one of her friends or that time she blinded her best friend because said best friend blew up her magic artifact causing her to lose an arm and an eye. said best friend would later kill her and then thousands of pages later rework the timeline to not kill her. and then they kissed. shes also a mentally ill neurodivergent gay teenager living on murder death planet who was forced to murder lest her spider mom eat her for breakfast, basing her entire personality off her singular role model who was a fucked up pirate who lived a longass time ago. she has a redemption arc after dying and genuinely begins to heal from her traumas and work towards being a healthier and better person and then an alternate version of her gets created by aforementioned timeline reworking and shouts at her and steals her girlfriend. she did nothing wrong. she created so much discourse. i love her immensely. shes even vriska (vriska)

It's vriska. Need i say more?

It’s Vriska.

She had her own discourse tag (Vriscourse) due to all the crimes she did. These include murder (of enemies, friends, and strangers), a revenge sprial that led to her paralyzing one friend and blinding another, and literal mind control. She was one of the protagonists. Also one of the biggest problems that needed solving. A deeply hurt and desperate teenager, she tricked a lot of her team and a lot of the fanbase into thinking she was a shallow violent "spider8itch." She earned every last bit of vitriol she got. She was a scared lonely teenage girl. Her best friend (the one she blinded) murdered her. It was declared both a just and heroic death. It had to be undone with time travel because it was impossible to suceed without her. She had so much love to give. She delivered needless pain instead. She was a result of her society and unbringing. Her friends were not nearly as brutal as her. She's like it Azula ATLA had a sense of humor and was allowed to say fuck.

vriska serket ... she is still so controversial - hence the moral ambiguity yes she does do terrible things but consider: she has an evil spidermom that needs to be fed children and she lives on the imperialist militaristic kill planet ... is it any wonder she is so morally dubious ?

8 Ball On The Giant Pool Table

#propaganda #vriska serket

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boysplanetrecaps · 1 year ago

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Build Up Ep 8, Part 2: 💖Guilty 💖

Hello and welcome to another Build Up recap in the series! In the previous one we saw a team rock out! In this one, we’ll see a team get sexxxy. I have a lot to say! Let’s do this!

We start off with the team coming out on stage as usual and greeting everyone. They joke that Donghun and Jeup are the parents and that Woong and Bain are their sons #1 and #2.

Left to right: Bain (Just B), Donghun (A.C.E.), Jeup (IMFACT), Woong (AB6IX)

Their name is transliterated Dongupjadur, I think? It’s written in a really stylized way and my hangul reading skills aren’t quite up to it.

As they’re coming out, the other teams backstage wonder out loud if the guys will be showing their abs -- specifically, if Jeup will be showing his abs. When I was watching this episode for the first time, I didn’t know that Jeup showing his abs was that a thing that could happen. I was like… What? Jeup? Abs? Tell me more!

Ohhh.

등 부시러 갑니다 = “I’m going to break my back.”

So you’re telling me that he just looked like that? Under his s w e a t e r s? THE WHOLE TIME?

Anyway, the team is going to… perform? A song? Something like that. What? Yeah, a song. This is a singing competition. I remember now.

The judges say that the combination is unexpected, and yeah, it kind of is. They’re all good, but aside from Donghun and Jeup singing one song together, no one in this group has performed with anyone else from this group so far on this show. So… what is the unifying concept? Why did Jeup pick them? You guys. YOU GUYS. I have so much to say. More on this soon.

We flash back to them meeting… on a… I don’t know, staircase. A big wide staircase.

Just like, a good staircase to have a meeting on, you know? We’ve all had meetings on big indoor staircases, why am I even explaining this?

Woong asks Jeup why he chose Bain and himself.

s w e a t e r

Jeup basically answers that Bain and Woong are good singers and he wanted to work with them and make a team that can do anything. Hmmm.

On a first watch, I wondered if maybe the real reason was that he wanted a group full of debuted idols? Bain is from Just B, Woong is from AB6IX, Jeup is from IMFACT, and Donghun is from A.C.E. But that just doesn’t seem convincing, does it? Ok, like I said, more on this soon.

The guys do a little skit where they pretend to be choosing a song together, but it seems obvious when you watch it that they already know what they’re doing, and what they’ll be doing is Guilty, the song by Taemin. That’s a ballsy choice! A choice full of balls!

Ok, a little bit about Taemin, in case you don’t know him well. He’s a member of SHINee, the same group that was once home to Jonghyeon who we talked about a lot during the 2x2 round. Taemin was only 13 when he debuted, and at the time, he basically couldn’t sing. At all. Like, at all at all. He was there to dance -- and boy can this guy dance -- and to be a cute maknae.

Over the years, a combination of a lot of hard work and some really good vocal training has made him a quite good vocalist. He also absolutely, positively drips with charisma -- both as in the sense of “star quality” and in the sense of “sexiness”. If you have never listened to Move or Want, you’ve been missing out, so rectify that ASAP.

Guilty came out in October of ‘23, shortly after Taemin came back from military service. He’s said in interviews that he drew inspiration for the album from a book called Erotisicm by a philsopher named George Bataille. A summary of the book: “Bataille challenges any single discourse on the erotic. … Investigating desire prior to and extending beyond the realm of sexuality, he argues that eroticism is ‘a psychological quest not alien to death.’” Well, ok then! So that’s the book that inspired him. What about the song itself? Well, the lyrics could be summarized: You know you want me, baby!

In other words, my friends, the song is a fuck song. And boy, do fuck songs do well on shows like this. Consider Boys Planet, if you will. Songs like Love Killa were always going to beat songs like Home. Team Over Me was always going to place ahead of Switch.

In addition to being a fuck song, Guilty is a good song, but I don’t know if it’s fucking good, if you feel me? Something about it -- I don’t know, I didn’t fall in love with it the way I did with Move and Want. In fact, the day I first watched the episode, I had actually skipped Guilty when it came up in my shuffle. Twice. Don’t get mad at me sometimes I have to hear some EXO or I’ll die okay?

Alright, back the episode. Where were we? Oh yeah, the guys were pretending that this was the moment that they chose the song. The show reminds us that Guilty, with its attention grabbing choreography, is a popular “challenge” right now, for idols and just anyone who thinks their belly is flat enough. (Hwang Soyeon, where are you?)

Woong points out that they really have to do the up-the-shirt-neck-grab move -- and he’s right, I mean imagine doing Gashina and not doing the finger guns? Some choreography is so connected to the song that you can’t take it away without missing it a lot. They also know, though, that they have to prioritize good vocals.

Next question -- should they all show their abs? The immediate answer is yes, but -- and this is really interesting to me -- Donghun gestures to his ab area and says “I’m going to wear Heattech in here.” I did some research and can’t find anything on singers traditionally keeping their abdomen warm in order to sing better, though it doesn’t seem completely crazy. I have a chronic illness (endometriosis) and I know that heat is really great therapy for a lot of things, but I just have never heard of singers doing this.

Plus, go with me on this -- even though in their little skit Donghun is the one who appears to suggest Guilty as their song, he apparently hadn’t thought through the necessary ab exposure or he wouldn’t be bringing this up now as a possible issue. See what I mean about it just being a skit? I’m pretty sure that Jeup had already picked out the song when he put the group together and then for some reason had to make it look like someone else was suggesting it when they filmed this scene.

And poor Bain is like, um, guys, I don’t *have* abs. Bain isn’t skin stretched over muscles like most kpop idols, it seems. That’s ok, Bain, I still love ya! I sure as hell don’t have visible abs. He says he thinks he needs to work out, as if it’s possible to go from not having abs to having abs in like, two weeks. Sorry, dude, that is not happening, or at least, not without doing something super dangerous for your health.

Anyway, luckily for the team, they have a leader who can also lead them in personal training.

The show gives us some good shots of Jeup’s bod, and in the interest of thoroughly covering this topic, I’ll take a screen shot.

What can I say -- I’m a hard worker. (That’s what he said!)

Then the guys go work out with Jeup and he does fucking leglifts hanging from a bar the way you’d lift a single finger.

“It’s easy,” he says. “Just hang on. And just put your legs up.” Sure. Just do that. Just. Do. That.

They all take a turn doing this incredibly difficult advanced move. Woong asks Jeup to hold him up from behind and says “I feel like I’m going to die,” but he can do it. He has abs already, anyway.

Donghun also needs Jeup to hold him up, but he can also basically do the move.

It turns out that Bain absolutely cannot do the move -- he can’t hang there and he can’t lift up his legs. So the whole team helps him.

I think it’s supposed to be funny? It’s a weird combination of horrible (because Bain is the butt of the joke) and oddly wholesome (because they’re all approaching it with kindness), but it’s also kind of wrong, because “abs start in the kitchen,” meaning, that it’s much more about whether you have abdominal fat than whether you have abdominal muscles. So all this work will not actually give him visible ads unless he, IDK, does this for two hours a day and also doesn’t eat, which is a bad thing to do.

They also do some rehearsing at BR N W MUSIC, whatever that might be!

And that brings us to performance day! Right before they perform, Yeo One backstage says that Donghun drew his abs on with a marker. Hey, man, don’t blow up his spot like that.

It’s time to perform, which means it’s also time for a commercial!

Full version without reactions

Alright, I want to talk about the performance itself and believe me I will but first, get your tinfoil hat ready because I think I know why Jeup picked out this group. It became clear to me as I watched the performance and did some thinking.

It’s because

Jeup is very smart

Jeup knows what a mostly-female survival-show audience loves best is sparkles in their pants

Jeup selected the other three guys on the show that can pull off a sexy concept most easily.

Look, I am not saying that I find any of these guys besides Jeup particularly sexy when they’re just goofing around. But they’re all sexy when they perform! Or rather, I should say, they create a sexy mood. Let me explain.

Have you ever listened to a sad song that makes you tear up a little, even though you’re not actually sad about anything in real life? Or maybe a song kind of makes you feel inspired and lifted up? Into the New World by SNSD does that for me. Or maybe a song makes you feel snarky and sarcastic, like Wife by G-Idle. It’s like that, but with sexiness. You get to live in a sexy world for a few minutes, without it being focused at anyone or anything in particular.

To put it differently: it’s like they emit the smell of baking cookies, only instead of baking cookies, it’s sex. You breathe it in instead of actually… having it.

Woong, Bain, and Donghun can all do the sexy concept. Not everyone can do sexy. In EXO, for example, I’d argue that Xiumin and D.O. struggle with sex appeal in performances, despite their beautiful faces; that’s part of why a comeback like Obsession was only possible when those two were away in the military. Suho can kind of do sexy on stage, but that’s helped by the fact that to me he seems the sexiest off stage. I don’t know, I guess it’s all subjective of course, but “doing sexy” is different from “being sexy” and both are different from actual sex.

So yeah, Bain can do sexy, abs or no abs. That’s why his whispering “like a river!” in River worked.

Woong can do sexy, as you can tell if you watch AB6IX perform.

And Donghun can do sexy, despite being kind of not sexy at all in real life.

Jeup knows that he’s a Kai/Hyunjin/Kang Daniel/Baekho/Wyatt type, and he knows that he has to give the ladies sparkles in their pants. That’s why he had to ditch Suhwan, despite Suhwan’s strong vocals. He needed a group that could be his backup sexies as he hit us full bore with the force of his sexiness.

And boy can this boy do sexy. I actually learned how to make gifs in order to make this one:

Just Park Jeup stroking his mic stand lightly all the way down, while Donghun hits a high note. Jeup is a fucking genius, and yes, I mean that. He knows exactly what he’s doing. It's funny because I later on noticed that all of them are doing the microphone stand stroke, but Jeup is the one who the editors decided to highlight, and I mean, come on. Yes. He does it best.

The ab reveal was fine. I think Jeup is sexier just staring into the camera, but that’s just me. Here are some gifs to delight you:

Did Woong tear his shirt?

As to the song and the performance itself.

I am now the world’s foremost expert on this song as I have listened to it approximately one million times in the past few days. I listen to it the way I listen to an EXO song -- noticing each new voice (“ooh, that’s Jeup! Ooh that’s Bain!”) and enjoying it.

And in my expert opinion, this was PERFECT -- the perfect choice of song, the perfect group, the perfect performance. There were high notes for Jeup to croon, whispered parts for Bain to whisper, emotional parts for Donghun to emote, and sassy parts for Woong to sass. And they all did their jobs.

I almost don’t even want to analyze their various vocals because I just love this so much, but I also do want to because they were so good. First off, if you listen to the studio version that was released and compare it to the live version, the live version is actually better. Seriously. There isn’t a note out of place here.

GOD but my Bain is SO GOOD. I am so proud of myself for picking him out at the start of the show as my main pick. He’s so good. His voice is just perfect. His adlib at 3:16 in to the Youtube version is so gorgeous. His technique is so clean, with no closed throat sounds or a feeling of being out of control of pitch or anything like that, ever. No nasality that I notice. Just the perfect amount of vibrato. It’s just perfect overall. His vocals are my favorite on this team.

Woong’s vocals are obviously not powerful and perfect like the other three’s but he adds this sassy contrast to the others. I wouldn’t swap him out for anyone else. He slightly reminds me of Woongki from Boys Planet -- offstage, not sexy at all, in fact kind of feminine seeming. And then give him the right concept (Supercharger for Woongki) and you see what he’s capable of.

Jeup is an absolutely top tier vocalist in addition to being a gorgeous man. I don’t know if I have anything more to say than that. It’s just like, yeah. Did you hear it? You heard it, right? I’m getting used to his vocal color and liking it more and more.

Donghun does a great job here too, obviously, especially in providing harmonies with the lightest touch imaginable. That’s a real talent. In fact, I think my favorite part is from :39 to :47, when Jeup and Donghun climb up that lazy scale together. It’s like a hand moving up your leg to your thigh. It’s really something.

See, Jeup is a genius. Everyone else kind of leans forward, like Donghun on the left. But Jeup keep his head up and just looks to the side, while leaning back slightly and tilting his pelvis up. He GETS it. How can someone look as tasty as Kai while also singing as well as Chen and not like, be the most famous person in Korea? I don’t get it.

I think I’m going to be cheering for Partners at this point. I just want this team to release a whole cover album with them singing like, IDK, Taemin’s entire catalog. I want this team to manifest. Just more singing like this.

EDIT: I just showed this performance to My Fella and he said, "So that won, right? That had to win. That made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up." My Fella is the best, isn't he?

Counter offer: I don’t really have one. This was the right song. Hoo boy. But if they had to pick out a song for next week (and I don’t think they do, based on what I think its next), I’d recommend Touch by NCT. There are lots of kinds of sexy, and they’ve already done the vaguely menacing kind of overt sexy, so next is the “boyfriend in jeans” sexy level to conquer. Alternatively maybe they could do Playboy by EXO (another song written by Jonghyun). It’s overtly sexy but in a jazzy flirty way instead of in an aggressive dangerous way.

Ok, so in the MNET edit the focus seems to be mostly on the shirt lift moment. There was a cute bit where Jeup the Genius gently strokes his collar bone area, as if to remind everyone of what’s under his shirt, and backstage, Wumuti is like, “hey! I was promised abs!!”

Wendy is impressed with Bain’s vocals

Jaehwan needs an adult!

So when they’re done, of course the audience goes batshit while the judges applaud. Jaehwan stands up and Wendy gives a thumbs up.

Backstage, the other guys have mixed reviews. They seem to think that this was pandering to the audience, but I think that’s unfair. I have been *listening* to this performance for days. Just on repeat while I’m on the plane or driving my stupid rental car around. If I could listen without watching or watch without listening, I’d much rather listen. I love this performance vocally, truly, I do. I respect the sexy cloud they generated, too. That’s not easy to do.

VCG compliments Woong and he lets out the cutest, goofiest grin.

The judges vote, and the highest score is revealed: It’s a 95 from VCG.

Seems like they’re pretty surprised by that.

Backstage, Haram says to his teammates that he’s not surprised by that high score. “You can’t ignore the sense of presence,” he explains. That’s the name of my next Jeup x reader fanfic -- “The Sense of Presence.”

VCG explains his grade. “I felt that the skills of reading the song for singers who have been on stage was different.” He also says that Donghun really understands the stage and how to change up his voice based on the flow of the performance.

Eunkwang says that the team had good teamwork -- that they divided the parts properly and worked well together.

Solar praises Woong, and he grins again.

Wendy asks about the killing part -- “Did you all work out together?” Ha ha!

VCG asks how they feel the ab reveal went -- did they get the response they were hoping for? I mean, if they were hoping from high pitched squeals from all the women -- and most of the men -- in the audience, then yes. Hilariously, Jeup can’t help but be honest and say that they had difficulties with that in rehearsal because their abs weren’t being revealed properly. They had to really work at it. I find the idea of them conscientiously making sure that their abs showed when they lifted up their shirts to be so funny. It’s this sensual move, and here they are like, “Is my shirt lifting properly? Let me adjust the angle. Hmm, I might need a different shirt. I think cotton slides more easily than poly blends.”

Solar’s like “it showed really well, don’t worry.” I mean, we know she was looking.

”Hey Solar, I know you do a bit of pole dancing. I do that too, on the side. It’s great for the abs. Want to hang out and work on our abs together? I know a lot of cool moves that will improve your balance and control. And abs. We can do ab lifts and drink supplement smoothies and then take pictures of each other for Instagram.” -- Jeup, probably

Backstage, Soomin wonders if his team should also show their abs, and Seohyung continues to be everyone’s favorite when he says:

“It’s kind of weird to reveal abs while saying MILKY UP.”

Dude, it’s kind of weird to do anything while saying MILKY UP. In fact, it’s weird to just say MILKY UP. I hate it.

And with that, we reach the end of this segment! We didn’t hear a single word of praise for Bain or Jeup’s vocals. Fuck that shit, man.

In the next post, we’ll visit with Waterfire, Wumuti’s team, who are doing a cover of Aespa’s Drama. See you then!

#mnet build up #bpr recaps build up #build up #build up mnet #park jeup #a.c.e donghun #ab6ix woong #bain #just b #a.c.e.#ab6ix #imfact

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