#but like I have not let anyone I actually like *know* relate these two accounts lmao

[collectivecloseness]

hi sorry this might sound a bit weird and idek if it’s correct but I’ve been stalking your blog for like a week and I have to ask, did you used to write for starkid by any chance? As in the Hatchetfield plays if you’ve heard of them like the guy who didn’t like musicals and Black Friday and stuff? There was someone who wrote for them a while ago and your blog got recommended to me and then u posted abt having an old series set mid 90s which a creator did who I think has the same age/pronouns so it all seemed kinda coincidental I guess, maybe like your writing styles have similar vibes too or something I’m not sure. But like Starkid Stranger Things and Spree are some of the only fandoms I’ve read for so maybe it’s just that hahahahaah. I’m really sorry if it isn’t you or this is weird to ask lol! Just ignore it if it’s not sorry again!!

CSSKFFGHJKKLBXDJKLH yeah I did use to write for the Hatchetfield cinematic universe and that’s probably the series you’re thinking of oh my god. Idk if this is one of my mutuals who’s caught up with me but hii lmfao.

Yeah that was my last fandom I wrote for before stopping for a while and then eventually moving over here hahahaha. Wow that’s so funny that you could tell, I wonder if it is smth to do with writing also! I started that other account over 4 years ago so I hope I’ve at least improved by now lmao but omfg

Weirdly enough I’ve also noticed a lot of crossover in fans between Spree, Stranger Things, and Starkid. I mean it’s obvious why there’s crossover between the first two, but I wonder what it is about S, ST, and SK lmaoo

[diamondcitydarlin]

Just fair warning- I said on my personal post about this that I wasn't going to talk about Neil Gaiman anymore, but as it's becoming clear that him and his publishers and anyone else who makes money off of him is circling the wagons and trying to bury these allegations, as well as some fans still defending and trying to 'rationalize' this information, I feel like, actually, we need to keep talking about him (as much as I cannot stand him and feel physically disgusted now when I so much as see his face somewhere). Specifically, the fact that he's a liar, master manipulator and should not, under any circumstances, be given access to his fans like he has in the past. At the very least. (And if you need to blacklist his name or even unfollow me so as to not be triggered, I completely understand, but I will always try to tag these posts accordingly and I think it's crucial right now that the truth be put where people can see)

This post specifically is in response to those 'rationalizations' I've seen, some that have gone as far as to blame the young fans/groupies that hooked up with him for being 'golddiggers' or just making a mountain out of a molehill for something they now regret. It's not that simple, yall. (And, again, this requires some amount of completely ignoring the story about him extorting his tenant for sex under threat of eviction of her and her three young children, I'm not sure how you 'rationalize' that under the best of circumstances)

So let's be clear here. What we know is that NG has routinely, for possibly an upwards of 30 years, pulled sexual 'partners' from his fan groups, most of whom are 18-22 year old young women (though possibly younger, accounts are coming forward of 16 year olds having allegedly been inappropriately touched/flirted/propositioned by him, which ig is the age of consent in the UK but still?? 16 year olds!!). This wasn't one or two times in the course of three decades, this was a constant pattern of behavior for him and for a very insidious reason.

This isn't to try to infantilize those fans or young women/young people in general or try to suggest that they couldn't have consented to sex with an older person or famous person. In fact, the onus isn't on them at all. This is about an older guy with a lot of fame, power and wealth choosing to sleep with people that he had already conditioned to idolize him and using that power imbalance to coerce them into doing things they didn't want to.

Regardless of one's age or gender identity, it can be difficult to impossible to say 'no' to someone like that. After all, you've been 'chosen' by the chosen one, you're special and not like everyone else, and if you don't do what the popular person everyone trusts is telling you to do you could end up ostracized. Alienated. Or worse. And you know what? Gaiman knew that! He knew it when he was crafting his 'approachable dad' persona on tumblr. He knew it when he was cultivating a fandom of personality. He knew it when he was having huge meetups to try to ensnare more victims. I hate to even think it, but I'm starting to believe he knew it when he was writing children's books too.

It's been talked about again and again in separate issues, but needless to say something not being strictly illegal does not make it inherently, morally okay. It does not erase the fact that this man has been essentially grooming his fandom to feel safe meeting/speaking with him so he can coerce those he can snare into sexual acts they're not comfortable with. That is predator behavior, whether strictly 'illegal' in the eyes of a court or not (but ofc I think he should be criminally punished even if I'm not naive enough to think he actually will be, because this IS rape and rape should be criminally punished)

I'm not personally advocating for anyone to give up being in his related fandoms, but what I am personally advocating for is that people don't forget who he is and what he's capable of, especially when he tries to crawl back to where he was (I'm almost certain he will eventually, as I've said).

Again, at the very least, we need to use what little influence we do have to keep him from infiltrating fan spaces again. He should not be on tumblr yukking it up with young people, he should not be at public appearances hitting on teenagers, he should not be given the unrestricted access to fans that he's 'enjoyed' for the past 30+ years because he is not a safe person. While I wish there was more in the way of restorative justice that could be done, I think at very, very least we should do what we can to limit his proximity to people he could hurt in the future. Make sure no one forgets, because sweeping this under the rug means Gaiman gets to hurt more people.

Lastly, no one is the wrong for having been manipulated by him. Let's make that very clear. What we're NOT gonna do is blame ourselves, each other, the victims, etc, for evil acts that Gaiman chose to do himself, time and time and time again. It doesn't help the situation and it certainly doesn't protect future potential victims. We were all duped because we're human and we attach and a lot of us want to believe there are good people out there, particularly those who make art that means so much to us.

And there are. But let's also use this a teaching/learning tool about how much faith we place in famous people in the future, regardless of how 'approachable' and 'safe' they might seem. Let's remember to have a healthy suspicion of creators/famous people that are oddly immersed in fandom spaces- yes, even the ones you still currently like that seem fine, as difficult as that may seem.

At the end of the day, we don't know them or what they're capable of doing or what they might be plotting to do to us. Support victims. Amplify their voices. Don't forget.

[snoopyhughes]

to be loved is to be known: Quinn hughes

hello and welcome to the first installment of my "to be loved is to be known" series! you can find all posts related to this series in the series tag! Quinn screams acts of service, domestic moments, quiet moments, really just the little things about love that make it so special, so I thought it would be perfect to start this off with Quinn. feedback is always lovely and if you would like to see me write one of these about someone else, feel free to send it in, although I can't guarantee I will write for them.

just about 1k words, no physical features mentioned of reader.

to be loved is to be known...

Quinn, who starts every morning with his routine that he created just for the two of you. He always rises before you, laying a soft kiss on your forehead and tucking the blankets up to your shoulders. He always leaves a sweatshirt on the chair in your bedroom for you to slip into, right next to your slippers, because he knows you want to be cozy when you first wake. He has a sixth sense for when you've woken up, and no matter when you descend down the stairs into the kitchen, Quinn has a cup of coffee, prepared exactly how you like it, seemingly made just moments ago. He will always prepare a small breakfast for you as well, because it is most important to Quinn that you get three meals a day. speaking of that...

to be loved is to be known...

Your health and safety is Quinn's number one priority. If you don't eat three meals a day, Quinn knows, it's like a sixth sense. He always tries to face time you during at least one meal a day so he can have the reassurance that you're well taken care of. If you have a tough day, just know to expect a DoorDash of your favorite restaurant at yours and Quinn's apartment when he's out of town.

And safety is just as important to Quinn. The sidewalk rule is more of a law to Quinn. His card is saved in your Uber account because you will not be walking anywhere on his watch. Quinn watches like a hawk whenever you two go out together. There's no such thing as jealousy because Quinn knows you're his forever, and he also trusts you more than anything. But he understands how special you are better than anyone. Any wandering eyes or hopeful suitors approaching you are quickly turned away when Quinn lays eyes on them.

Quinn's gruff exterior lets people know that he does not mess around when it comes to you. The team knows better than to ever try to poke fun or make any semblance of a joke about you, because he does not joke about the love of his life.

to be loved is to be known...

speaking of the Uber account... you would pay for nothing if Quinn had his way. Quinn is a caretaker, it is his natural state due to being the oldest. He knows how hard you work, he admires your dedication and your resilience almost more than anything about you. But he can't help it. Quinn loves you, truly so much. He would buy you the world if he could. It's not even about material things or buying out the store, he just wants you to feel loved, he thinks you should never want for anything. Want is one thing, but Quinn would just topple over if you ever struggled for money. Quinn knows why you work so hard, he thinks you are the best but he knows his salary isn't common in the real world. Quinn would actually combust if you ever struggled financially, especially on his watch. He's not naive to think that people don't struggle financially, but he never wants that for you, especially on his watch.

to be loved is to be known...

It's no secret that Quinn isn't a man of many words. He wishes that he could tell you how much he loves you, how much you mean to him, but he struggles to convey that verbally, hence, the acts of service. This is part of why Quinn tries to get you whatever you want. However, you've had a conversation that Quinn doesn't need to buy you anything, you know how much he loves you, you see it everyday in the little things.

to be loved is to be known...

Some of the little things include... post it notes around the house, telling you he loves you, that you're beautiful, how much he appreciates you, that you work so hard, he's proud of you, whatever he can think of, you name it.

Flowers, every Monday, no matter what. If he's home, he works with the local florist to create a custom bouquet for you each week, complete with the sweetest note you could ever think of, always wrapped in brown paper because you mentioned once that you liked the way they look. When he's away, you get a delivery to work at 11 am everyday, because don't think he also doesn't have a flower delivery service on speed dial.

Songs that make him think of you. He sends you songs frequently, usually just with the message of: this made me think of you. Sometimes, he will send you a lyric that made me think of you. When you met the captain of the Vancouver Canucks, you couldn't have imagined him sending you Noah Kahan lyrics that remind him of your beauty, your smile, your laugh, but Quinn really stumps you everyday.

Chores around the house are always done. Quinn is a busy guy, but he doesn't assume he's the only one who's busy. When you come home from a long day at work, you can often find Quinn folding laundry on the couch, the smell of cleaning products in the air, with dinner simmering on the stove. He knows well that a bad day can feel even worse when you come home to a dirty apartment, an uncooked meal, or heaps of dirty laundry. If he can do anything to make your life easier, he's doing it.

All in all... if acts of service is your love language, trust that Quinn is the one for you. Quinn lives to make your day easier, to make you feel loved through actions, not words. A man of few words, he would match rather show you how much he loves you by filling your gas tank, cleaning the sheets and making the bed, cleaning up your side of the vanity when he does his own, filling the pantry when he notices your favorites are low, anything he can do to make your life easier, to make you happy, is non-negotiable for Quinn.

[amissamidstthemist]

I haven't seen anyone do it yet, but I think swapping Bill with Scalene and Euclid in a Relativity Falls AU would go so hard.

Not only would it be on theme, but it also opens up so many new possibilities. Since we know so little of Scalene and Euclid it's very easy to mold them into what the AU needs them to be, they're pretty much blank slates for fanfic and fanart.

Exploring Dipper's character in such a scenario would also be way more interesting than just making him work with Bill, really take into account the differences between his and Ford's personality. Which manipulation tactics would be effective in convincing Dipper to do the interdimensional couple's bidding? How could they relate to him?

Maybe, instead of the romantic undertones Billford has, it's a familial feeling that brings their Relativity Falls couterparts together. Let's say Dipper's been kind of isolated in Gravity Falls while researching the strangeness of the town and, as odd as it is to feel such a connection to two triangles, Scalene and Euclid seem just so much nicer than his actual parents who fought and screamed at each other. He misses Mabel, misses having family he can rely on. They make him feel like one of their own.

[theresattrpgforthat]

Character Friction: On “Asshole Characters”, or Shitty Little Guys.

A while ago I floated a few thoughts I had about “asshole” characters in the Indy TTRPGs community. I floated these questions because I had been listening to this interview between Klaus von Hohenloe of The Dungeon Newb's Guide and The Panic Table. In particular, Klaus mentions that some games don’t allow for player friction, and in games where this is the case (cough D&D cough), it culminates in a horrible experience for all involved.

To illustrate, I’m going to talk about some experience I’ve had with my own play groups.

Art from Last Fleet, by Vicentius Matthew.

It might be shocking to hear, but I’ve played D&D once or twice. I remember being in a campaign with two players who wanted very different things from that game. Player A wanted to bring their character on a deep emotional journey, while Player B wanted to act as strategically as possible in pursuit of their character’s benefit, often to the detriment of other members of the party. My own character wanted to track down leads to a mystery that mattered to her, but not really to anyone else. This often led to frustrating moments where characters might not communicate as much information to the party as they might have otherwise, and in other cases one character’s actions could pull the entire party’s journey off-course.

The three of us all played together in a completely different game, three years later - Last Fleet. Let me tell you, the character interactions were completely flipped on their heads. Player A got a dramatic emotional arc around an NPC who was integral to the main plot. Player B got to pursue their own agenda, often in ways that worked against the efforts of other PCs. As the GM, I was given tools that actually encouraged both of these moments: both pushing Player A to wrestle with their relationship and implicating Player B as a suspicious person very early on.

A basic move from Last Fleet.

There are a number of reasons this worked in Last Fleet and not in D&D. One, Last Fleet playbooks often encourage players to keep secrets, work against the benefit of the crew, and fuck up their relationships with each-other. Two, Last Fleet has something called the Pressure mechanic. This is both a resource and a time bomb: you can mark Pressure to improve your chances of success, but hit your cap and your character has to do something to relieve their stress - and that choice is usually rather detrimental to the ship.

Finally, Last Fleet’s a different kind of story. You’re not playing heroic adventurers fighting monsters and clearing out dungeons. You’re playing the last desperate strains of humanity, fleeing an alien threat that has the power to infiltrate your fleet and resemble the ones you love most. Last Fleet is all about how a high-stress situation can lead people to making poor decisions, and, should you desire, it can also be about how people are sometimes forced to rely on each-other in order to get through a harrowing situation.

When I compare these situations, I don’t think we had bad players at the table: we just had the wrong kind of game for the story that the players wanted. I suppose I haven’t necessarily played enough D&D to say that it can’t allow for compelling, flawed characters - what I like to call “shitty little guys” - but I certainly don’t think it’s a play culture that accounts for the diversity of player goals.

More to the point, I find myself really drawn to playing flawed characters - both with them and for them. I love my over-perfectionist superhero in MASKS who lashes out when her friends don’t meet her standards. I adore my Thirsty Sword Lesbian who doesn’t know how to flirt or how to process emotions. I’m having so much fun watching play-testers pick up their various monsters in Protect the Child and demonstrate each character’s struggles when it comes to relating to a kid. I think it’s fascinating that in Changeling: the Lost 1e, a Fairest is rewarded with a discount when they use their Contracts of Reflection to spy on people that they love.

Contract of Reflections, Equinox Road Sourcebook, Changeling the Lost 1e.

I’ve personally seen the most leeway for character friction in PbtA games, like Apocalypse World, Urban Shadows, and Apocalypse Keys. When I brought up the question in the Community post, I asked folks for other examples of playing Shitty Little Guys. Their interpretations were really interesting, and far broader than my initial scope.

@nebmia mentioned that by giving your characters “unpleasant” abilities, it will incentivize them to use those abilities in unpleasant ways.

@goblincow has a lot of thoughts about creating little guys who aren’t just horrible, but are also in horrible situations - which gives license for the players to endanger their characters in the pursuit of mischief.

@airkseablade brought up Tenra Bansho Zero, and how it uses something called an “Emotion Matrix” to randomly determine how a player character might reaction to meeting a new person, as well as “Fates”, which are goals that each player is rewarded for playing towards, but mostly based on group consensus.

@willknightauthor talked about Wraith: (The Oblivion?), and how each archetype available to players has a part of themselves that pulls them towards darker choices.

It turns out that we really like playing characters who are mean-spirited, greedy, and struggling to get what they want, and we have a lot of different ways to make that happen. It reminds me of a common piece of advice given to writers when they’re writing a novel - you want a character who’s flawed, because those flaws can be used.

In games like Trilogy or TSL, you might want those flaws because you want to see your character overcome them. In games like Mothership or Cairn, you might want those flaws because then it makes it easier to push your guys through a meat-grinder. In games like Hillfolk or Apocalypse World, you might want those flaws because you want to see just how much well-meaning or desperate characters can fuck each-other up, given the right circumstances.

So what’s the point of all this? What am I trying to get out of this?

When I hear stories about horrible players, the experience I’ve had at my tables makes me want to approach these “trouble” players with a bit of grace. Perhaps these “trouble” players simply want something that is a challenge to provide in a game like D&D, but in Mothership, Urban Shadows, Apocalypse World etc., they might find their choices welcomed and encouraged. And if you've found yourself being accused of being a "trouble" player because you like to a cause drama, perhaps these games might be more up your alley than you think!

Consider playing a game with horrible guys who suck today!

[stormblessed95]

I saw one of ur reblog where it was about AYS gifs and someone said that the Fandom either is afraid of them and something like that and you know what i find confusing about the Fandom? It's as we know that they don't mention jikook together as much as they do with others or don't usually acknowledge jikook "moments" like they'd have done if it was other duos but one thing i have always noticed is when there's some "WTF?" Jkk moments are there armys will be like "Of course it's these two who could it be", "i won't even be surprise if they kiss in front of everyone one day" or "i have lost all the shock value at jikook because these two has no boundaries whatsoever", "of course it's jikook being gay who else". So on very rare times they see something jikook has done e.g. the butt slap or when jikook were quite literally moaning entering the villa in the last ep, i even came across someone saying "i wouldn't be surprised if they had se* after this scene because they both nasty all the time" etc. During that butt slap in the nyc scene ppl were like "If you have survived DVD jikook then you know it's another Tuesday for them" so i believe the Fandom knows what jikook does is past what usually anyone in BTS would do so is it because they know if they post jikook content that's not the unusual for other pairings is it because it's confusing to them as well? Do they also feel uncomfortable? Is it because they get ppl in their mentions saying "Stop sexualizing members" but it's nothing and just a clip of what jkk did....i think they see and they know it's different than others and they know by putting those videos or pics up on their accounts what it'll look like plus many of them re closeted tkkrs so obviously they don't wanna post many things related to jikook if they can't caption it with "Siblings behaviour".

That trend of "That one k-pop ship which actually has evidence of being true" or smtg and it's mostly jikook from BTS's side so u know ppl see it too but the reason of not posting is they don't want to, it's intentional and the reason behind those intentions are many.

Funny how every jungkook shirtless pic makes armys go crazy that I see same pic on my tl for DAYS but when behind AYS was released all big accounts posted was vminkook, vmin and taekook but as usual no jikook. Funny how no jk big solo FB posted the pic with jm's name on his chest lol because they know how they'll look if they edit it and they know they don't want to post the og one lol. Not even any big army accounts posted this but let it be namkook, yoonmin, taekook, vmin or ANY other pairing of BTS and everyone would have posted. By doing this they're showing nothing but their hyporisy lol. They know, they see it's different but they just don't wanna admit it.

.

[marengogo]

Are You Sure?! - #1: A Vampire’s Utopia

Who by Jimin focused playlist 

[Music is a very big part of my life and I’m MOSTLY INCAPABLE of writing without music, so I just thought I'd share what I am listening to while writing this]

–🐺–🐺–🐺–

Hello my JM & JK Loving Gurls, Bois and Enbys! 

How have we all been since Thursday? 😌 Who’s watched both episodes at least 3 times? 🤡 Who’s gonna keep watching the episodes until Thursday? 💜 Who’s been left marvelling, yet again, about how intricately beautiful human beings are 🙋🏾‍♀️…

Oh! Only me?! 👀.

... Well what can I say? If it weren’t for my undying love for movies I would have definitely chosen a job related to psychology. Now whether I would have turned out to be a help or a menace to society, is anyone’s guess, after all, there is no sense, or point, in speculating things that have no way of presently happening due to decisions made in the past. However, do y'all know what we can speculate on? The present based on actions that actually happened in the past.

I’ve admittedly rewatched both episodes of AYS for the fourth time yesterday for research purposes obviously, and what brings me here is that now very infamous moment there are presently ao3 books being written on this particular moment ? The one when my cutie-patootie twin-flame very concisely summarises his and JM’s “solo/chapter 2 relationship”, up to that point (which to be precise, is the period of time between 14 July 2022: Hobi’s Listening Party and 13 July 2023: AYS in USA… exactly 1 year: DAMN!) as per below:

First time I saw this part, the first thing I did was snort and then I immediately thought: DRAMA QUEEN and trust me, I would know. Oh, and let it be clear, I can only attempt to speculate on my twin-flame, especially in cases like this when I strongly feel that my boi has been … misunderstood. If it weren’t clear enough from the title, this is indeed a JK post you know JM-blood thirsting vampire etc etc etc.

Let's start with the fact that I beleive that JM was simply trying to start a simple bit of banter when he said:

And I would sincerely like to apologise to JM cause, indeed, this simple type of banter would have warranted a just as simple type of reply. Something like what JK eventually ended up saying after he allowed his thoughts to come forth and take the stage, but we will address this in a second:

But no.

You see, homeboi over here seems to be the type to hold on to things and will not let go until he’s cleared things, or situations, in the way he has known and/or perceived them to have happened, which tend to happen a lot when you are a very emotional person, who isn’t necessarily as eloquent. The most important thing to understand here, however, is the fact that whatever topic such people decide to discuss is all according to their most sensible account of facts and perceptions. They don't mean to offend or distort truths, they just ... emote for lack of better words. For example, it is a fact that, during that period, JK & JM were both busy, it is apparently also a fact that JK didn’t call, but according to JM it is not a fact that he himself didn’t call. 

Does that make JK a liar? In my opinion, not only can't I know what actually happened, but in fact, that is absolutely not the point of the case at hand. The way I see it, this is simply how JK has perceived this particular absence in his life, during that particular period. In fact, let’s dive even deeper.

Because of those two sentences, you’d I KNOW FOR A FACT THAT MANY DO ... think that JM and JK actually never met each other during that particular period of time 14 July 2022 - 13 July 2023. Now, I am sure we all remember him sorta/kinda pining on weverse during the period from 3 February 2023 and 14 March 2023, right?:

But let’s quickly look at a timeline of the 14 July 2022: Hobi’s Listening Party and 13 July 2023: AYS in USA period. Below are dates when they definitely met, with other members, that we are aware of. I’ve also inserted his most relevant weverse pinings, and the period of time they were busy at the same time, just for me to have a time reference:

・14 JULY 2022: J-HOPE’S LISTENING PARTY - OT6 (Yoongi was sick)

・1 SEPTEMBER 2022: JUNGKOOK BIRTHDAY - JM waint with Hobi to celebrate his birthday

・15 OCTOBER 2022 - BUSAN CONCERT - OT7

・12 DECEMBER 2022 - JIN’S ENLISTMENT SEND-OFF - OT7 

・most likely FEBRUARY-MARCH 2023 - LIKE CRAZY DANCE PRACTICE - JK went to see JM practice

 3 Feb 2023 - 14 Mar 2023 ——— LIGHT WEVERSE PINING - The above collage period

・25 MARCH 2023 - MEMBERS MEET WITH JIN DURING HIS HOLIDAY - OT7

27 March 2023 ——— HEAVY WEVERSE PINING - JK posting “I miss you”, then watching Suchita and reacting to JM content.

・18 APRIL 2023 - HOBI’S ENLISTMENT SEND-OFF - OT7

April - May ——— both JK & JM are travelling around the world for work and/or pleasure.

・25 JUNE 2023 - D-DAY in SEOUL ‘DAY 2’ - VMINKOOK at Yoongi’s concert 

・13 JULY 2023 - AYS in NYC - JK & JM (and staff) have dinner at ANTOYA 

… If you asked me, it would appear that JK’s issue is actually the fact that they didn’t get a chance to go out alone, just the two of them. Yeah … My twin-flame seems to always have had strong, almost impulsive, reactions when it comes to anything concerning JM, it is actually probably the most vocal he becomes for a non-talkative guy that is.

Can you recall any other member, other than JM, he was ever upset about because he didn’t get to hear their music? Can you think about any other member other than JM, who JK would most likely be spending time rehearsing, eating, doing nothing during band activities? Can you think of any other member other than JM, for whom he’s made a bit more of an effort during birthdays and special dates? Once again ... If you ask me ... JK truly values his time alone with JM, which is why I think his perception felt so fatalistic/dramatic we all know that for example, JM did go to the Golden Listening Party in October ... 

And don’t get me wrong, I definitely don’t believe it to be a one-way affair. Are You Sure?! exist exactly because JM would seem to also appreciate his alone time with JK, be it in front of a camera, in a hotel room, or whreever. After all, they were supposed to only go for one trip, but not only did they magically whip out time to go on two more Jeju and Sapporo, but they are now talking about doing this until they are 50. LOL I’ll be in my 60s but I’ll tune in! . And then, to top it all off … They ended up enlisting together. The way JM wanted to “make a video of their adventures and freedom” before enlistment, you’d think they’d be apart for the following 18 months because of said enlistment 😒.  

It’s actually quite funny if you think about it. Between the two of them JM is most definitely the shiest, but JM is most definitely the better one at expressing himself. Y’all can obviously disagree with me, but from where I stand, my twin-flame is actually smart as hell one day people will finally acknowledge that, but he is not the best with words. I’m sure in JK’s Utopia, the world is a place where people sing to each other in order to communicate, instead of spoken words. Alas, this is not JM-blood thirsting Vampire Utopia, and in the world where we presently live, JK seems to be the type who’s first reaction to stressful situations is finding the funny side of things and when that fails then he needs to do something about it; anything.

Now, as always, everyone is entitled to their opinions, in fact, many have made it very clear that to them JK was feeling “off” in these episodes, but to me, not only he was being his typical weird self, but I also I discovered a few new aspects, for example, when he truly cares about something, his devotion has really no limits. But let me use some images, and some words, to better explain how I perceived JK in these two episodes. Remember how JK once substituted the word Love with Jimin, in a Boy with Luv lyric Jimin nothing stronger? Well I’d like to do the same thing and sub the word Love with JK in the following very famous biblical paragraph and associate specific moments in both episodes to each line:

JK is patient, 

If this is not the testament sequence of a man who’s been waiting to spend time with you, no matter what, then I don’t know what else is.

JK is kind.

He does not envy, he does not boast, he is not proud.  

He does not dishonor others, he is not self-seeking, 

LOL … one day JK will be able to pull a prank on JM; I believe in you.

He is not easily angered, he keeps no record of wrongs.

I shouldn’t have to say this, but ... there are no “wrongs” done between JM & JK, what they do with each other is joke, have accidents and play around - but gotta say this just in case!

Last but not least, though JK was coughing like there was no tomorrow, wouldn’t you think that JM being vehemently sick, would be grounds for the whole show to be cancelled? In fact, we didn’t even know there was going to be a show, so nobody would have missed anything and at some point they could have used the footage in a bangtan-bomb, or during Festa, or something. … The fact that they were willing to keep going and even show us themselves in such a vulnerable state, the fact that because of it JM was so worried and doubting almost everything, and the fact that JK ultimately wasn’t worried and regretted nothing, kinda reinforced for me just how much they truly wanted to be together on that trip at that time it was basically overdue. 

In conclusion, though my Twin-flame’s strongest suit isn’t communication, and his recollection of events may or may not be as accurate due to emotional perception, his heart is ALWAYS in the right place, sturdy, confident and ready to let JK be the best he can be, at all times. I mean, you don’t have to take my word for anything I've just said but below is JK a mere 10 days after they separated from NYC/Connecticut ... look at him ... giddy AF and hella playful if you ask me and once again … weverse pining.

I guess one alone trip wasn’t enough after all 😉.

Always respectfully yours 🫰🏾💜,

Marengo.

[dworkinlover]

I’m primarily an ed blog but I’ve kinda been radicalized. I want to speak to more radfems, but I don’t want to abandon any of my friends in the ed community. Do you have any advice? And if I don’t nuke all my posts would you mind if I still followed you?

Hi! I completely understand how you feel and want to firstly say I empathise 💜💜. It is a strange feeling to be sort of teetering on the edge where you see yourself as a radical feminist but aren't fully "in" as part of the community. I do want you to know that you are very welcome on radblr, and while I can't speak for everyone, I think most of us are very happy to see new faces.

I absolutely don't mind if you follow me, and honestly I doubt that anyone in your community will care enough to sift through everyone you follow and call you out on following a radfem blog or two. There is definitely no need to get rid of all your existing posts!!

That said, an option might be to create a sideblog that is fully dedicated to radblr. Another alternative could be looking for radical feminist communities on other platforms, on which you'd feel more comfortable following radfem-aligned content. I'll use this post as an opportunity to make some reference lists to three other social media: reddit, pinterest, and instagram.

Reddit: r/PornIsMisogyny, r/AntiPornography, r/AntiSexWork, r/AntiKink, r/AntiBDSM, r/4B, r/WereNotEmpowered, r/BanFemaleHateSubs, r/DeppDelusion, r/FourthWaveWomen, r/FemaleAntinatalism, r/RadicalFeminism, r/WGTOW.

Disclaimer: not all of these subreddits are completely radfem, because reddit bans radfem subs pretty often, especially where it detects anything mildly terfy (most recent example being r/FemaleSeparatists). There are also private subs like r/FemalePessimist. People sometimes start radical feminist discord servers and spread the word about them via reddit.

Pinterest: this is a bit harder because there aren't really accounts that I follow on there, but there definitely is a lot of radfem content (it's how I got introduced to it actually). Here is a link to my related saved pins - maybe if you save a few, the pinterest algorithm will stsrt showing you that kind of content.

Instagram: prowomyn, female.liberation, femaleradicalized, ogdyke, radfemlibrary, raddish.haggish, anticornfeminist, burningtheroots, gravvefem, labrysliterati, women.are.females, labryswrites, misandryisahoax, wmstonline, radfeminology, xxliberationfront, 4bmovement2024, 4bworldwide, radfemw1tch, xx_revolt, please_save_us_andrea_dworkin.

if anyone has any to add to these lists please do let me know!!

[l1fe0njup1ter]

PLEASE READ. quick reminders esp for newbie l1fters

i’m seeing a lot of baby l1fters on here which is great but they are also making some common mistakes which puts our community at risk! i’m not trying to be rude (i made some of these mistakes too when i started this account and people had to dm me to remind me lol) just trying to keep everyone here safe.

PLEASE don’t post with hashtags. don’t use #\lifting or whatever. please remember this is a public forum and you are posting yourself roleplaying illegal activity. tags make it easier to find your account.

hide your likes and following!! it makes it easier for people outside our community to find it - as one account can lead to many others by just looking at your likes and follow lists.

use that block button liberally. BLOCK ANYONE WHO FOLLOWS YOU AND IS NOT PART OF THE L1FTING COMMUNITY. for me - anyone i find somewhat suspicious. blocked. anyone with only one or two small posts related to l1fting. blocked. people with their follow or like lists open. blocked. as difficult and silly as it may seem that you will be doxxed or caught via tumblr, it is always a possibility. i will also block those who use their regular tumblr accounts to repost or post their l1fting content.

this one is obvious and should go without saying but just in case- censor shop names, don’t post hauls right away, and for fucks sake clarify you are ROLEPLAYING or just telling a story or whatever you want to say. people might think you’re actually carrying out illegal activity… which we all definitely are NOT.

let me know if you need any help with anything i said here, if you have any questions or anything to add. please please stay safe everybody.

[getvalentined]

FF7 Fandom PSA

This is not a callout post, this is a warning about a genuinely dangerous abuser who uses fandom spaces to acquire victims.

Apparently my abusive ex is ingratiating himself into fandom spaces again, so if you're in the FF7 fandom please keep an eye out for someone calling himself Pix or Pixeled.

The details of what he did to me specifically are available in a post from almost exactly two years ago, readable here. Other people have shared their own stories, but I don't have the energy to dig up all of them. Trigger warnings for gaslighting, emotional abuse, violent threats, forced isolation, manipulation, and more that I'm definitely missing.

Known usernames:

Instagram: midgardsomrnights, pixeledartsy, okgoosefus, pixeledpalace

AO3: pixeled, pixeledxxx

tiktok: pixrexpen, gaywrathlet

FFXIV: sarielperedhil (on Brynhildr)

ko-fi: pixrexpalace

Other: pix pendragon, pixeled pendragon, pixrexpendragon

Some of these are current, most of them are not; he's no longer active here or on Twitter that I'm aware of, so I'm not referring to his usernames there, but he uses some combination of parts from these for his usernames everywhere so they followed the same theme.

This is not "fandom drama," this is a sincere warning to anyone in his orbit to be careful and be safe. Please love yourself more than he wants you to.

With that in mind, there are more personal details under the cut, discussing the fallout of going public with his abuse and more of his behavior; no screenshots on these because it's years in the past, not all of the related accounts and spaces still exist, and back when I was first gathering evidence I had to stop before it lapsed into the territory of emotional self-harm.

Same trigger warnings as above, plus racism, (implied) sexual exploitation, sexual manipulation, and discussion of Body Dysmorphic Disorder.

I want to be very clear that I was not the first person to go through this, I was just the first to go public afterward. I have lost relationships with people I thought were friends by doing so, and actually been referred to as abusive in response to my initial thread on Twitter letting people know what he'd done. I've had people who used his treatment of me as an excuse to join in with hurting me go on to co-opt my abuse to make themselves look like victims, claiming that we were best friends until he drove us apart—or worse, to use him as a complete stand-in for their own behavior, implying or outright stating that he forced them to isolate me from friends and fandom activities and treat me like shit, all while these people have me blocked on every possible platform where I could reconnect with them.

Pix was the Bad Guy of early 2022 on FF7 Twitter, and while he deserved the title, not everything everyone said about him was true. Not everything everyone said about me was true, either, but people tend to take anything connected to fandom as "drama," even when it involves literal abuse.

One thing I never told anyone except my closest friends is that Pix drove me to the verge of suicide multiple times. He put up videos insulting me to be "funny" and got friends laughing along, when I asked him to stop teasing me all the time he exploded and said that he was allowed to express himself however he wanted and if I had a problem then I should break up with him so he could finally kill himself guilt-free, he told me that he wasn't going to placate me anymore by saying "I love you," he told me in public spaces to shut up because I didn't know anything. He used racist slurs against Asian people behind my back and told everyone who called him on it that I'd told him it was all right, leading to a continuing belief among some circles that I have some deep internalized racism toward my own fucking ethnicity.

He told me that his mother saw me as a whore and a homewrecker, because I'd seduced him away from his boyfriend of eight years—in spite of the fact that I told him outright I did not want a romantic relationship with him because he was already in one, and I wouldn't be party to cheating. When I went public with what he did, he claimed that I pressured him into a romantic relationship, neglecting to mention that he'd been pushing for one almost since we met and that I'd shot him down because he was already with someone else. He said that I'd forced him to break up with his boyfriend, and seemed to be implying that I'd somehow sexually exploited him because I'm a cisgender lesbian and he identified as an aro/ace trans man at the time we broke up. When we got together, he identified as a bisexual nonbinary person.

To be completely honest, though, his orientation and gender identity doesn't even fucking matter with regards to the implication that I exploited him because we never had any form of sexual contact—unless you want to count RP, which I don't, and if I did I would be calling him a cheater because I was not his only RP partner.

To be completely clear, we were in a long distance relationship, thousands of miles apart, and we had no sexual contact. We never sexted, we never had phone sex, we never even exchanged dirty pictures. Our relationship had no sexual element whatsoever. He eventually told me in no uncertain terms that if/when we got married, he wasn't going to sleep with me because he didn't have a sex drive anymore due to trauma, and that since I loved him so much I'd have to be happy with that.

He would remind me of this when my Body Dysmorphic Disorder began to relapse constantly from the amount of stress he had me under, because my experience with the condition is rooted on my lack of physical femininity and leads me to see myself as completely sexually repulsive. When I was triggered and trying to untie the knot in my chest that made me want to throw up at the thought of my own body, he would remind me that I didn't have to worry about being too ugly for sex with him, because he was never going to fuck me anyway. That it didn't matter if I was disgusting, because he found all bodies disgusting, so really I was lucky to have him. He didn't even care that I was disabled and that my arms and legs are too long, that my joints slip out of place all the time, that the way I have to move sometimes to keep from hurting makes me look "weird and stupid." I was so lucky to have him, because even though he was very aware of all those things, he didn't actually care. He wasn't going to fuck me anyway.

The last Christmas card he sent me literally had the words "You deserve a high-five!" printed on the front, and on the reverse he'd written something along the lines of "okay but you know I'd be sure to miss and slap you in the face, sorry not sorry."

He made my life hell in every possible way, and people said it was drama because we met through fandom—and that I deserved it, honestly, since I was so fucked up and he was such a good person for even caring about me in the first place. I deserved it, people said, since I turned around and stabbed him in the back after he'd done so much for me for the years we were together. It was just fandom drama, they said, and I was just thriving off the social capital it allegedly earned me.

And now he's back and making new friends, but it's fine because this all happened years ago, and everyone with a brain should be able to see that it's just fandom drama. But it's not. It never was. Don't let him convince you otherwise.

[accio-victuuri]

follow up clowning related to gg’s weibo post from here. a reminder first that i don’t think everything has to mean something and most of the time what they post is just plain and simple. we are clowns, so we will speculate but that doesn’t mean we have to find some candy for every content they post before we can enjoy & appreciate it. for example, we also think that the reason GG is doing these solar terms right now, while he is filming LoZ is in the synopsis of the drama, his character is the son of the “director of the Imperial Observatory of the Great Yong Kingdom” , that’s the english translation. but the key here in the original text is this word: 钦天监 [qīn tiān jiàn].

what is it? thank you to good old baidu for always having the answer:

Qin Tianjian is the signature of an official whose function is to observe celestial phenomena, calculate solar terms, and formulate calendars.

calculating solar terms. so that could be the connection he is hinting at that is somehow significant to the character he is playing. makes sense right?

this is not me washing anyone’s candy. i’m only laying out alternative explanations cause that’s how i do things. lol. the addition i have seen going around is kadian related and i’m not a kadian girlie so i was blocking it out when i first saw it. 😅😅😅

okay, now let’s go to the cpn. ⬇���⬇️⬇️

the post he made is his 1085th on weibo. oh what a good number, like a mashup between their birthdays. and the kadian that was used 191919. which means still still still. or you can concentrate on the repeated use of the number 999 ( In Chinese, nine is pronounced jiu, which also means “long lasting.” As the highest single digit, it represents the maximum level of mortal happiness, longevity, and good luck. A perfect ten is reserved for the gods. Case in point: in respect to the Heavens, the Forbidden City in Beijing has 9999.5 rooms, just short of a flawless 10,000. )

who is saying still too? forever with who? wang yibo. based on my first post about it, his use of that word 谷雨 that also came up in LTS lyrics.

another coincidence is that in the song itself, the word comes up in the 0:19 mark. 👀

commemorating the anniversary of when he followed yibo on weibo, 4/20/2018 so he posted on the eve of that day. maybe he is celebrating something else that only the two of them know and it’s not necessarily something as mundane as following a person on weibo. who knows. however, it’s on the bxg calendar so we are marking that down as a possible reason. 📝

i love this explanation tho, that goes back to that actual day years ago and what happened. it was the 5th day of filming CQL and they did not have scenes together, so why did he pay attention and followed him? he was filming the scene in the burial mounds, WWX was drunk and reminiscing about when he first met LWJ. WWX misses LWJ cause he is not there. Was XZ also missing WYB that time? to the point that he went to his weibo account and followed him?

it’s not a secret that XZ prefers it when WYB is there, not only to act with, but just there for him. plus this level of attachment on the 5th day of filming is not surprising when it comes to them.

finally, the imagery of the rain when it comes to them is one that holds some meaning. much like how we fixate on the stars and moon. photos below to show some of those relations to the rain. ☔️

and that lrlg conversation they had that went:

XZ: "I'm waiting for you"

WYB: "I'll come and have dinner with you when it rains”

XZ: "Tomorrow's meal"

WYB: "Then tomorrow"

before we end, i’ll add this quote that seems to fit the whole subject of rain:

"Because it rains so often, many important things in life seem to have happened in the rain. Those memories are now uncovered and still feel wet. Even if they dry, they are like a book soaked in water, with ripples on the paper that are difficult to calm down."

sources aside from the ones directly linked: one / two / three / four 💛

[secret-engima]

Kumo Thoughts

So this will hopefully be quick but the most common take I see for Kumo in the Naruto fandom is that it's a overly militaristic hellhole (pardon the language) that kidnaps and forcibly breeds any bloodline it can get its hands on and like.

I get it?

the Naruto ninja world is absolutely messed up enough to accommodate a village like that. Especially with- *waves at Kiri*, *waves at ROOT*, *waves at Ame*, *wa-*. But I feel like personally I think that's. The shallowest take? Like if that's how you wanna world build it! You can! Lots of angst and interesting subterfuge down that way.

But we seen in canon that shinobi who live in Really horrible villages do tend to go missing-nin en masse; Kiri is the poster child for this, but Iwa and Suna both have some ... pretty noticeable defections. On the flip side the only REAL Kumo missing-nin we see, iirc, are the Kinkaku brothers.

From The First Shinobi War.

Like- what are things we know about Kumo *really* from the show/s?

and the one everyone harps on in worldbuilding- they tried to kidnap Hinata and Kushina.

HOWEVER. The rest of the things we know about them are:

2. Their Raikage is allergic to doors. He refuses to acknowledge doors. He can and will smash through any wall, window, or other non-door entity in order to exit or enter a room when at all possible. This is not the behavior of a Strict Rigid Militaristic Man this is the behavior of a feral gorilla someone stuffed in an office and expected to do paperwork. Which, granted, A is fully capable of doing his paperwork, by all accounts he's actually really good at running his village. But again. This man is allergic to doors or manners and anyone who is willing to arm wrestle Senju Tsunade to get medical assistance for his own men can't be all bad let's be real.

3. Killer B exists. I feel like he alone is enough evidence against the "military breeding program hellhole" fanon but to break it down. This "brother" of A is not actually his brother. In canon, B is literally just- *some kid*, AT BEST a cousin of the previous Jinchuuriki but that is not confirmed iirc, that was among several other kids that were all lined up and told "we need a new Jinchuuriki and A needs a fighting buddy, run at this training dummy and see if you can help him decapitate it" and when B was the one who succeeded they went "congrats you're his brother now, here's your complimentary octopus monster". And like everyone just accepts this? Not a SINGLE person calls B as a fake brother or points out that he and A are not actually related. Not to mention B has the strongest and most stable relationship with his Biju until Naruto and Kurama work out their bromance, and B was rocking that friendship with his biju *years* before Naruto even knew Kurama was a Thing That Existed.

4. B is also beloved by his village. BELOVED. The people adore him and his weird rapping nonsense. And yeah there's flashbacks in the anime to that not being the case when he was first introduced but B was actually able to work on changing their minds. You really think "small feral child rapping at civilians to make them warm up to him" would have flown in Kiri? In Iwa who canonically keep abusing their jinchuuriki to the point of running off? Nope. No sir. B is also allowed to have a team of his own, and seems to not only be an accepted member of the village but also a much trusted and beloved one who is even allowed his own team? Even Konoha doesn't have that good a track record lbr. It took Naruto face punching the guy who just committed genocide on the entire village for Konoha to go "you know what? We like you now".

5. One of the only other jinchuuriki we see that has fully mastered their Biju state and is on good terms with their Biju while also not being a missing-nin (or brainwashed and then immediately dead) is ALSO a Kumo ninja. Namely the holder of the Two Tails. Now on the wiki it says that she was put through a "detestable" training program but we all know how inconsistent Kishi is with... everything worldbuilding ever. And if we go off behavior alone from the brief scenes with her, Yugito Nii is?? Really stable??? And solid with her Biju??? She gave her pawprint for an Uchiha child's book of cat paw prints for crying out loud.

6. throughout the entire show, Jinchuuriki are consistently treated as the lowest class citizens. In basically every village. Naruto in Konoha, Kushina cried when she realized Minato was going to make Naruto a Jinchuuriki and put him through what she went through growing up as one so you know she didn't have a great time either, GAARA is his own entire dissertation on Jinchuuriki treatment and stability, Fuu was raised by the village leader of her village but had zero friends and was canonically super lonely and isolated, Han and Roku straight up ran away from Iwa because of whatever they were put through, a maneuver only repeated in another village by Utakata from Kiri. But in Kumo we find two jinchuuriki who have mastered their biju, are well respected by their peers and fellow citizens, and are basically treated like any other really weirdo ninja from the village barring needing to be monitored with bodyguards in B's case, which is mostly because he keeps running away to go train under rap artists so you can understand why A is ready to go frothing at the mouth feral at his brother sometimes.

All I'm saying is that if even the village's "monsters" are treated that way, why does everyone stick with the fanon that they're a breeding, bloodline stealing hellhole?

Imo it would be WAY more fun to world build Kumo as the feral mountain ninja-mandalorians of the Elemental Nations, who have a reputation for bloodline theft because they keep finding Actual Strays, Refugees from other villages, and Illegitimate bloodline children and going: YO ANYONE GONNA ADOPT THIS? and not waiting for an answer. Your a missing ninja from Kiri and you're fed up with both them and missing-nin life and want to come work for us? Great. Oh you also have a valuable kekkei genkai that can be inherited? Awesome have you heard of our red light district and child support program or better yet our tax deductible program for marrying one of our lovely civilians and raising a family here where no bloodline purges will ever happen ever. Oh you're a stray Uzumaki on the run from bloodline hunters? Well we may have been involved in destroying Uzushio (depends on your fan interpretation since canonically we do not know which villages did that other than Not Konoha) but we also have hot food, good housing, high ninja standards of living, and free weekly entertainment in betting when our Raikage is going to launch his desk at his brother like a high speed missile because B's rapping got too cringy.

Let Hinata's and Kushina's kidnapping either be the exception to their usual playbook of how they acquire bloodlines (hey it's not their fault if the other villages can't keep it in their pants/can't inspire loyalty) OR have it be seen, culturally in Kumo, as something more akin to a rescue mission. Yes these two girls are useful and have useful bloodlines, that's tactically wise, but also have you SEEN how Konoha treats their jinchuuriki? They have seal master princess and are treating her like a dog on a leash! And literally everyone knows what the Hyuuga do to their own kids if they aren't main branch, and we can't rescue any of those kids without their eyeballs exploding and them dying but hey we can snag the heiress and then any kids she has won't have to be branded so-.

Like I feel that would be so much more INTERESTING? Instead of having Konoha be the only "nice" village and make this weird tonal dissonance for how the "nice" village has the most incompetent leadership (Sarutobi) and underground atrocities (Danzo and Orochimaru) while every other village is Horrible All The Time For Everyone why not have Kumo be actually Really Functional and treat their shinobi and Jinchuuriki well and their horrible reputation is *mostly* (not entirely, because. Ninja.) be cultural clashes between the feral mountain ninja and Everyone Else and propaganda from the other villages who would like their shinobi to STOP DEFECTING TO KUMO PLEASE. WHAT DO YOU MEAN THEY HAVE DENTAL.

Seriously I feel like there is so much more you could do with that angle than just "yet another shinobi village that is Bad and Awful and Needs The Power of Friendship yet somehow has this really stupid goofy jinchuuriki man who loves his brother and his village shut up don't think about it".

[andiatas]

So, @cambridgemadness just slid into my DMs to talk about a tweet that cited an article (about Marius) from the Norwegian tabloid Se og Hor. Maybe this is me being mentally drained, or I truly had a lightbulb moment - I'll let you guys be the judge of that. Now... I have been one of those who have repeated "omg it just keeps getting worse" over & over these past two months... but I've changed my opinion.

This isn't actually getting worse (just to be overly clear here, I'm not talking about one of the ex-girlfriends having to flee her home because someone tried to murder her - that's obviously an escalation of the situation regarding the domestic violence cases). This is the Norwegian version of the Swedish 2010 scandal.

I've briefly talked about this before & I know @duchessofostergotlands have made posts about this topic, but a brief recap for those who aren't familiar; in 2010 a book about Carl Gustaf was published, the title roughly translating to "The Unwilling Monarch". This book was a bombshell because up until this point, there was this magical shimmer around the royals - you couldn't just publish or say whatever you wanted about the royals, they were royalty! Of course, people gossiped & speculated etc. etc. but there were certain lines you just didn't cross because, again, they were royalty. What was so groundbreaking (is that the right word?) with this book was that it took the King, the Head of State, & treated him like any other person worthy of scrutiny.

This book didn't just talk about the partying Crown Prince & later partying King. This book went further & detailed connections to criminals. It talked about sex & strip clubs (which led to this iconic meme), "coffee girls" & made accusations that Carl Gustaf had a fling with Camilla Henemark & that Silvia was aware of it. This was further & more detailed than anyone had ever dared go before & of course, these accusations caused chaos. But people were also shocked because, how could you say these things about the King?! Anyway, the point with why I'm mentioning this is that after this book, the floodgates were opened & the coverage of the Swedish royals was never the same.

I hope you guys can see the parallels here with what we & the Norwegian royals are going through at the moment. This is their 2010, however, it's not the King who is in the hot seat, it's Marius. As we know, the Norwegian royals have been criticised before, there have been scandals & Marius has been under scrutiny before. What has changed is that the Norwegian media aren't holding back anymore.

From an outside perspective, it probably looks like things are just getting worse & worse. But if you look at what is actually said in Norwegian media, these aren't technically news. Most of this is public secrets that we're now getting the full picture of. People knew Marius had been charged with things before; Marius has a public Instagram account & his friends haven't been shy about posting things about him on social media. But instead of just "Marius had a run-in with the police at Skaugum for a traffic-related incident" + "someone tried to sell silverware to an auction house that obviously is taken from a royal residence" we now get the story that "Marius had a party at Skaugum with his friends from Hell's Angels where said criminals stole stuff from Haakon & Mette-Marit (which the idiots tried to sell but were obviously caught)! Oh, & by the way, Marius himself had a visit from the police last October after having crashed into a fence at Skaugum!"

To wrap this up, what do you guys think? Do you agree or do you have a different interpretation of the situation?

P.S. If you can't tell, I'm heavily taking back my previous statement made weeks ago that I feel bad for Marius. I do have issues with how certain things have been handled, but I don't feel bad for him as a person anymore.

[she-posts-nerdy-stuff]

New series idea: analysing my favourite (underrated) lines from Six of Crows

I feel like I haven't given you any analysis in a while, and I've had this idea for some time now so I thought it was worth giving it a try. This is going to be a list of my personal favourite quotes in Chapter 2 of Six of Crows with explanation/analysis for any that I have an explanation/analysis for - but if a famous or popular quote isn't included then it's not because I don't like it, it's just because I don't feel I have anything new to add to the existing analyses around it. And yeah, if you guys like this then I'll make it a more regular thing and go through chapter by chapter (probably sometimes including multiple chapters in one post), so let me know what you think!

(Also, I chose to start with Chapter 2 on purpose because I don't have loads to say about Chapter 1, but if anyone is interested I'm open to trying it in the future)

"every favour came with enough strings attached to stage a puppet show" - ugh words cannot explain my love of this quote. Not only is this a gorgeous and vibrant metaphor that brings forth very clear imagery, it also achieves two different concepts relating to the idea of the "puppet show". Firstly, we have the idea that Kaz is the puppet master and Ketterdam is his stage; he is in complete control, he can bend the city to his whims, and it's ultimate his say that can make or break someone. This is definitely the image we're given of Kaz in the opening two chapters, and this singular line really reinforces that, however the rest of the book and many of the descriptions in Crooked Kingdom unravel this view very quickly. This description far better fits Pekka Rollins, which brings me onto the other concept relating to the "puppet show": the question of who it actually is pulling the strings. Arguably Kaz is a puppet on Rollins' stage, and Rollins a puppet on the Merchant Councils'. each has power but each is ultimately at the whims of the other. This brings worth the suggestion that something darker is at play and that there's far more to Kaz than initally meets the eyes before we've even met him, so in short it's just completely and utter genius.

"Kaz hated a puzzle he couldn't solve, and he and Inej had concocted a hundred theories to account for the murder - none of which satisfied" - again, Kaz has thus far said a single line, and not one with a lot of information in it ("Yes and no. It's always good to have a country in debt to you, makes for friendlier negotiations) and yet we know so much about him - and even some details about his relationship with Inej! It even tells us a lot about Inej; we've been presented with a figure heralded as near-omnipotent in his city, someone no-one wants to be on the wrong side of, someone who has complete control over every conversation he has with you, and she is someone with whom he will spend hours trying to solve a riddle? So then, the reader is forced to think, what kind of power does she has? What makes her worthy of his closeness, why does he trust her, and why does she know him well enough to so intimately know his likes and dislikes? Inej hasn't even spoken yet.

"But it didn't feel neutral to Inej. It felt like the hush of the woods before the snare yanks tight and the rabbit starts to scream" - ok most of my enjoyment of this quote is just of the beautiful prose, however I would like to add that all six Crows experienced this sort of 'calm before the storm' leading up to the most painful experiences of their lives - Wylan thinking he could go to music school, Inej at the beach with her parents and calling sleepily to the man she though was her father, Kaz staying at the cafe and meeting Margit and Saskia, Matthias knowing he was going to be a big brother, Jesper seeing his mother for the last time when she picked him up and hugged him even though he was up past his bedtime, Nina feeling that she had purpose and loving the way she could help her country - so this could be considered foreshadowing.

" 'Care to place a wager?' Jesper asked.

'I'm not going to bet on my own death,'

Kaz flipped his hat onto his head and ran his gloved fingers along the brim in a quick saulte. 'Why not Bolliger? We do it every day,' "

"Kaz had done his best to teach her, but she didn't quite have his way with breaking and entering, and it took her a few tries to finesse the lock" - my main source for liking this quote comes from an analysis I did a while ago when someone asked me about comapring this quote and Kaz's self-proclaimed "shoddy job" of teaching her to pick locks. It's a while since I posted that so I'll run through it here briefly, basically it's very indicative of their relationship dynamic. Whilst both place the other on a pedestal, they do it in different ways, and Kaz particularly often glorifies Inej and almost finds it difficult to accept that she, like anyone, must be flawed. So if she fails at something, like picking locks as well as he can, and she cannot possibly be flawed then the error must be in his teaching - it can never be with her. It's also a glaring example of Kaz's self-destructive nature. My other reason for liking this quotes is just that it once again tells us about the characters so early on and without having to directly explain it to us - we know Kaz is good with locks because he tried to teach Inej and she isn't as good as him, but she still manages to get it open.

' "I'm a business man,' he'd told her, 'No more, no less,'

'You're a thief, Kaz,'

'Isn't that what I just said?' " - I ADORE this, but honestly all I can say for analysis is that it sums up the entire theme of the novels beuatifully.

"Now he looked like some kind of priest come to preach to a group of circus performers" - this sets up a great parallel that I've mentioned before in one of my "little details you might have missed/forgotten" posts, but it's also interesting to have it come from Inej's perspective since she's incredibly religious and performed as a travelling acrobat with her family. It's probably drawn from personal experience, someone in dark clothes who judges the brightness of Suli traditional clothing and/or culture and tries to preach religion to a group who've already long found it because they don't align with thier idea of religion. It's even possible that she links that idea with Kaz, not because of his actions but because he's from a country that has perversely sexualised and condemned her culture and he dresses like the rich merchants who would preach this exact kind of message - and possibly even have visited her at the Menagerie, where she was forced to appropriate her own heritage and way of life for the enjoyment of those who look down it with no reason for doing so.

"Inej pitied the boy who might die alone with no one to comfort him in his last hours or who might live and spend his life as an exile. But the night's work wasn't over yet, and the Wraith didn't have time for traitors" - this is one of the few but fabulous examples we get of the idea that "Inej" and "the Wraith" are separate entities; Inej being the girl she was, the girl she should have been, and the Wraith being a creation of necessity to aid survival. Inej is a religious young woman from Ravka who has been through far more than she should have done, but the Wraith was born and raised on the blood-soaked streets of Ketterdam and has every intention of surviving them - no matter the cost. This concept is only mentioned a few times, however it runs a beautiful parallel with the distinction between Kaz Rietveld and Kaz Brekker, or Kaz and Dirtyhands depending on how you look at it.

Ok I realise this is a pretty long post but thanks for reading it if you got this far, and I really enjoyed making this so please let me know if you guys would enjoy seeing more. And, in summary, Leigh Bardugo is a genius

[olderthannetfic]

(spellchecking this was a nightmare; I got sent this a while back as a response to a topic I commented on, where I basically agreed there is an oversaturation issue of a specific nature form not friendly people making the community they clam to be supporting look bad in the process. I agree with them but what is your take?)

First off no hate intended but I sometimes forget form past experiences that Mod (s) form a specific blog get bit heated around the shipper issue. (Fujoshi is the proper term for this specific shipper type; but tumblr has issues with that term being used in its proper context. there is actually a darker reason why this became a term its a Idol culture rabbit hole to be saved for later.) As for the topic I genuinely believe that they can't really relate to this topic without proper context. A great deal of this is probably because they defend who they should not and I will do my best to explain this issue without calling anyone out. No hate intended, I like to see the best in people and encourage that to grow more as individuals. The fandom in question is pretty small but the issue is not. There are other fandoms that can relate thou this one is for a game genre. I can't fathom why people defend other users for this horrible behavior towards others just because they ship the only popular guy on guy ship in the fandom.

Lets start by providing context, there are two different types of user here the kind that just mind their business and enjoy their ship, these ones are not the issue, and (lets call them Troublemakers since tumblr hates the term. The term literally means "Filthy Girl" and more importantly I know why it means this but that is somewhat irrelevant here and not the topic.) Basically I really want to understand why no one is calling out their vile behavior because to me its just as bad to not hold them accountable for the bad things they do just because they throw around a trigger or two. I am not saying they can not better themselves, just that not frowning upon their actions does not help them.

Sorry for the long clarification I just wanted to make this clear before getting to the topic because this is about a specific set of individuals, not he group as a whole and I think some people forget that this is a thing with said group. The inconvenient truth is there is a good and bad way to handle it, ignoring the issue and praying it goes away is not a way to handle it.

NOW FOR THE STORY: Because it is a general issue we shall improvise with names, it also makes cleanup easer). In this Game story the ML (Author) and the FL (Gwen) are portrayed as having a deeper bond, the only other character (Lance) also has a deep bond but is a different relationship entirely and you can tell form the interactions hinted at the the deep lore.

During the course of the story Lance becomes cannon fodder for Author's development after he makes a bad deal; yet his tragedy is not a total loss for Lance as lore in this story says Lance IS able to warn Author of a plot form his father that would lead to Author being turned into a literal human puppet.

Here is where the Trublemakers come in, They have been drawing people into the fandom claiming that a offshoot of the story in question that is teased could be centered around Author and Lance as a couple to spite the writers of this series saying if Author were to get with anyone it would be Gwen.

They also mention that is not where they want Authors story to go. Basically developers were saying that the romantic openness is just that an openness to interpret the relationship as romantic and something they only put with Gwen and Author. They also clarify that Authors relationship with Lance before Author has to end him is a "Brothers in Arms" one thou they are very close as friends they are not romantic.

Lances story is meant to be a tragedy as you discover Lance was not in the best of health in the game he even says he "Made a deal with a devil and regrets it" and it is hinted that this deal has taken his freedom form him rendering Lance nothing more than a tool for the Antagonist to use against Author in the end. When Author makes the final blow Lance thanks him for finally freeing him form his terrible fate. This isn't to dog on the ship but in the end the issue is the Trublemakers are ruining the chances of this small fandom to grow by trying push that this is a canon Pairing when its a tragedy that was meant to grow the Protagonists resentment towards his father who is hinted as being the devil in question. Something that is meant to progress to the final confrontation where the protagonist is given a choice to side with his father (become the human puppet) or rebel against him which leads to his fathers tragic end after the epic final battle of this story. This series is NOT sunshine and rainbows it is classified as a Dark Fantasy hence why we using fantasy references. and Cannon fodder like Lance is common in this genre. The concern is that the Trublemakers are creating false expectations for incoming fans about the series; sadly Lance is not likely to come back, thou he was developed as a character who could, as it is made abundantly clear that Lance in the end found his freedom in his passing. The Bad actors are making light of the fact Lance sacrificed himself to Warn Author and is in some since disrespectful to the writers as well who are trying to not falsely advertise the games story or genre. Oh but it gets worse; in the fandoms they are literally intimidating and bothering fans that refuse to shill the ship going after people who just do not post the things and that could be any reason what so ever there. It could even be personal preference we are talking full on attack mode, hiding behind a gray face, trashing people behind their back to people they interact with exc. So enter my dilemma; am I really wrong for thinking this behavior is bad? I do not feel as if its right to consider my stance here flawed or worthy of scorn and hate. My concern is not the ship existing but the bad actors that are in it being coddled when they behave just as vile as the "Unicorns" in the Idol fanbase trying to force real people to bone to appease their single sex couple fetishes. (That is literally why its so bad I did say it was a Rabbit hole, thou the term Hole is a gorse understatement of how deep.)

--

Ahahaha. What the actual fuck is this?

Am I understanding you that most of this is a c&p of something you received? Okay, then, let's break it down.

Okay, big picture:

It is bad to pressure creators to make your ship canon.

It is bad to pressure other fans to ship your ship or harass them for not posting enough about it.

But as for this little essay, no, of course I don't agree with it: It's so full of red flags it has barely any room for anything but red flags.

'Fujoshi' has a ~darker reason~? What? The history is simple: 2chan bros used a rude but kind of funny pun for women who were "spoiled"—i.e. undatable—because they liked m/m content. Those women found the pun amusing and reclaimed it for themselves. The end.

It's just the 'fu' from 'tofu' and is a pun on a homonym, 婦女子, that refers to a married woman. It's "rotten" like food going bad, not like moral depravity (though I'm sure the 2chan bros do think it's morally depraved for women not to cater to them).

Right off the bat, this is a red flag because it's trying to hint at some dark depths here that just are not present and are not a big deal. It's trying to set up a tone that the author has Special Knowledge and we should just trust them. Sheesh.

I am not saying they can not better themselves

And here we dive straight into "I'm just trying to help you" bullshit. This is condescending and creepy.

The description of the canon is convoluted and pointless. Brothers in arms is the main driver of oldschool m/m ships. Yes, of fucking course people are going to ship this.

"Baww, the creators said they didn't mean it that way!" What the actual fuck is this? Who cares what the creators think? Why is this essay fellating the idea of canon compliance?

"The het subtext was intentional!!!" is not an argument that anybody should be making because there is literally no reason fans should care which subtext was intentional when it comes to whether they ship something.

Almost the entire description of the canon could have been cut out to just leave:

"They have been drawing people into the fandom claiming that a offshoot of the story in question that is teased could be centered around Author and Lance as a couple to spite the writers of this series saying if Author were to get with anyone it would be Gwen."

Now... I think the second half of that is a reach. Are they actually doing it out of spite? What's the evidence? Canon's plot is not evidence.

Tinhats are a plague everywhere, they aren't usually doing it out of spite, and they aren't all m/m shippers. It's far more likely that a bunch of dummies are seeing shippy potential and extrapolating to think it's intentional and leading somewhere. Sherlock fandom was full of this. Many fandoms are.

But regardless, the first half does make sense as a complaint. If I'm understanding the situation correctly, some fans are bringing in new fans with false promises of canon m/m.

in the end the issue is the Trublemakers are ruining the chances of this small fandom to grow by trying push that this is a canon Pairing when its a tragedy that

Okay, you've lost me. You've lost every fan with a single particle of sense.

Don't talk about fandoms like you're talking about the third quarter profits of a corporation. That's obnoxious nonsense.

Either your fandom will grow organically or, most likely, it will not. Some annoying m/m shippers aren't the real reason: the fact that most things don't get that popular is the real reason.

Why aren't the het shippers or the gen fans able to draw in more people? Maybe the m/m ship is more interesting. Maybe these other fans should make more of an effort if they really want to treat fandom as a job or religious evangelism.

And moreover, who says tragedy and ships are opposites? Even canon ships! Even canon ships where someone died!

Look, I believe you/the person you're c&ping that this particular canon is not gearing up for "Lance" to come back, but considering how many fujoshi are still creaming themselves over The Untamed or Scum Villain, I really do not think that one of the dudes falling off a cliff or even dying for real is much of an impediment.

This is Tumblr, dude. Have you not seen that "Your greatest enemy will rise from the grave and never leave you alone" story? Come the fuck on!

If the canon's creators wanted to bring Lance back and make this BL, they could. If they prefer not to, that's fine.

The issue is entitled fans demanding that their vision be the creators' vision. Full stop.

The minute you try to hand-wring about the m/m aspect of it, you sound like a homophobic and/or misogynist douchebag. It does not matter what specific thing the demanding fans are demanding. It only matters if they're harassing people.

their single sex couple fetishes

And now we have the mother of all red flags!

Having sexual fantasies is not a ~fetish~. Clowns who think it is are not to be trusted. Does this person (you?) think that, what, idol band RPF fandoms are where the concept or term 'fujoshi' comes from? I have bad news about the levels of bonkers stalker bullshit the band guy/female self shippers pull, not to mention the bullying by people who just like a group and don't want anyone to like them the "wrong" way.

The issue is not horny thoughts. The issue is bullying and harassment.

What I'm hearing here is "Wah, wah, waaaah. Other fans of the game I like keep inviting their friends, and they all ship a ship I don't like! Won't someone think of the (near) canon het!"

That shit was tired and old in the 1970s. It's worse now.

--

If you cannot describe the harassment without resorting to all of this anti-m/m nonsense, you're never going to convince anyone that there's a problem.

If the issue is "These tinhats say X is going to be canon, but the creators have said it's not", ditch the other shit and just say that part.

M/M fans have dealt with the likes of the Johnlock Conspiracy before. We also hate annoying tinhats who create false expectations and over-promise canon m/m.

Just say:

It sucks when people pretend a canon is BL after the creators have said they aren't going to include m/m.

[thatonefandomjumper]

If you were able to make Valdangelo canon how would you write them ?

Very good question.

The thing is, Valdangelo is a relationship that I feel had so so much potential due to how the characters were individually written, but at the same time, I really don't trust that Riordan would have done them justice just on account of how Heroes of Olympus was written as a whole. To really make their relationship satisfying, I'd probobly need to make some substantial rewrites to the series as a itself.

But for simplicity sake, let's say we're keeping all big plot points and beats the same with the only difference being that Valdangelo is endgame.

House of Hades would be the most logical place for the two of them to shine, considering Nico was, uh, quite occupied during Mark of Athena. Leo is canonically very spooked by Nico's mere existence on the ship and Nico prefers to keep to himself most times. Not only that, but the two places they each spend the most time is not only the most isolated parts of the ship but also, sort of the furthest away from each other (Crows nest and Engine room).

Not only that, but these two are so bad at normal human interactions that the only way they could genuinely start to open up to each other and find that they are oh so eerily similar is for some outside factor to push for it to happen.

Whatever that is, and no matter how it happens, the biggest thing the two of them need is just a conversation. Genuinely, I think that's all that is needed for something to happen. Something romantic? Not necessarily, but hoo-boy if they opened up to each other in one way or another things would never be the same.

There will always be a terrifying thought of "Oh god, you see right though me and I see myself in you. This is awful I must stay away or I might learn something about myself that I don't want too." But at the same time, no one else will ever get it. To hate yourself so much. To feel alone all the time. To be unworthy of love and broken beyond repair.

So as much as they want to stay away, they inevitable meet again. Possibly in the night, when they are alone, because they would not want anyone around for this.

I am a dynamic girly at the end of the day, so when I ship characters I rarely actually think about the getting together part or anything that relates to that, but were they to get together at this point, it would be in a sort of fucked up self-discovery way where both of them adamantly agree to keep it a secret. They do not want anyone to find out ever that they kiss when they are on the verge of breakdowns.

But evolving from that (And after Nico's outing and Leo's stay in Ogygia, probobly with platonic Caleo or at least Leo feeling obligated to save her out of guilt for not being able to be with her) they become each others confidants. They both dislike showing true weakness, especially of the emotional kind so having someone who just gets it is not only new but terrifying. Whether that be the deaths of their family members or both of their serious cases of internalized homophobia, the other will understand.

People notice, of course, but Nico and Leo avoid each other in public to such a comical degree that it makes it almost more obvious that something is going on. They deflect like crazy when their relationship is brought up and most back off out of respect, but Piper and Percy are the two who speculate the most...

As the journey passes, little things start happening. Leo tells Nico to eat once in a while. Nico forces Leo to take a proper nap. Things the others either don't know they struggle with or aren't thinking about because there ae more important things going on. And slowly, the two start... improving? It was never the intention because they don't see themselves worthy of healing, but the other wants them to get better, and they don't want to lose the one relationship that let's them be wholly vulnerable. It's strange, but it feels good.

Now, I have always hated how angry Nico was at Leo for dying in canon because it makes zero sense in my opinion, but that's a whole 'nother conversation. But this time around, Nico would feel every right to be furious, because let's be real, Leo's secretive ass would not tell him this. There is a line to his emotional openness and telling his sort-of-dating-for-convenience-boyfriend about the fact he's actively planning his own suicide, despite the fact he's planning to bounce back from it is just a step too far. He knows it's selfish. But he just can't.

And it's in the time they're apart that they truly understand just how much they'd started leaning on each other in the time they were together. The bad habits they broke coming back and the longjng to see the other growing stronger. They both sort of hate it. Nico joins Jason and Piper in their search while Leo is trying his best to get back to camp.

No matter how the reunion would go, I like to think that Nico would have spilled the beans about their relationship to the others at that point, so Leo, who had been psyching himself up to swoop Nico into his arms and declare their love to the camp doesn't exactly get that. But what he does get is tears, angry, possibly unfair words, and reconciliation. Their back with each other, and this time, they won't screw it up.

Valdangelo is a story of healing. Of two broken people building each other back up. No matter what direction I'd go with actually making the relationship happen, they will always represent the mortifying ordeal of being known.

Anyway, they are actually impossible and there is something very wrong with them. Thank you for the ask and here's a drawing:

Also, I wrote a Valdangelo fic way back in 2021 where a similar scenario played out if you are interested: