#but the number of stereotypes i read in fiction and fan fiction is starting to aggravate me | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

qqueenofhades · 4 years ago

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Hi. I’m curious. What did you mean by “women who read fiction might get Bad Ideas!!!” has just reached its latest and stupidest form via tumblr purity culture.? I haven’t seen any of this but I’m new to tumblr.

Oh man. You really want to get me into trouble on, like, my first day back, don’t you?

Pretty much all of this has been explained elsewhere by people much smarter than me, so this isn’t necessarily going to say anything new, but I’ll do my best to synthesize and summarize it. As ever, it comes with the caveat that it is my personal interpretation, and is not intended as the be-all, end-all. You’ll definitely run across it if you spend any time on Tumblr (or social media in general, including Twitter, and any other fandom-related spaces). This will get long.

In short: in the nineteenth century, when Gothic/romantic literature became popular and women were increasingly able to read these kinds of novels for fun, there was an attendant moral panic over whether they, with their weak female brains, would be able to distinguish fiction from reality, and that they might start making immoral or inappropriate choices in their real life as a result. Obviously, there was a huge sexist and misogynistic component to this, and it would be nice to write it off entirely as just hysterical Victorian pearl-clutching, but that feeds into the “lol people in the past were all much stupider than we are today” kind of historical fallacy that I often and vigorously shut down. (Honestly, I’m not sure how anyone can ever write the “omg medieval people believed such weird things about medicine!” nonsense again after what we’ve gone through with COVID, but that is a whole other rant.) The thinking ran that women shouldn’t read novels for fear of corrupting their impressionable brains, or if they had to read novels at all, they should only be the Right Ones: i.e., those that came with a side of heavy-handed and explicit moralizing so that they wouldn’t be tempted to transgress. Of course, books trying to hammer their readers over the head with their Moral Point aren’t often much fun to read, and that’s not the point of fiction anyway. Or at least, it shouldn’t be.

Fast-forward to today, and the entire generation of young, otherwise well-meaning people who have come to believe that being a moral person involves only consuming the “right” kind of fictional content, and being outrageously mean to strangers on the internet who do not agree with that choice. There are a lot of factors contributing to this. First, the advent of social media and being subject to the judgment of people across the world at all times has made it imperative that you demonstrate the “right” opinions to fit in with your peer-group, and on fandom websites, that often falls into a twisted, hyper-critical, so-called “progressivism” that diligently knows all the social justice buzzwords, but has trouble applying them in nuance, context, and complicated real life. To some extent, this obviously is not a bad thing. People need to be critical of the media they engage with, to know what narratives the creator(s) are promoting, the tropes they are using, the conclusions that they are supporting, and to be able to recognize and push back against genuinely harmful content when it is produced – and this distinction is critical – by professional mainstream creators. Amateur, individual fan content is another kettle of fish. There is a difference between critiquing a professional creator (though social media has also made it incredibly easy to atrociously abuse them) and attacking your fellow fan and peer, who is on the exact same footing as you as a consumer of that content.

Obviously, again, this doesn’t mean that you can’t call out people who are engaging in actually toxic or abusive behavior, fans or otherwise. But certain segments of Tumblr culture have drained both those words (along with “gaslighting”) of almost all critical meaning, until they’re applied indiscriminately to “any fictional content that I don’t like, don’t agree with, or which doesn’t seem to model healthy behavior in real life” and “anyone who likes or engages with this content.” Somewhere along the line, a reactionary mindset has been formed in which the only fictional narratives or relationships are those which would be “acceptable” in real life, to which I say…. what? If I only wanted real life, I would watch the news and only read non-fiction. Once again, the underlying fear, even if it’s framed in different terms, is that the people (often women) enjoying this content can’t be trusted to tell the difference between fiction and reality, and if they like “problematic” fictional content, they will proceed to seek it out in their real life and personal relationships. And this is just… not true.

As I said above, critical media studies and thoughtful consumption of entertainment are both great things! There have been some great metas written on, say, the Marvel Cinematic Universe and how it is increasingly relying on villains who have outwardly admirable motives (see: the Flag Smashers in The Falcon and the Winter Soldier) who are then stigmatized by their anti-social, violent behavior and attacks on innocent people, which is bad even as the heroes also rely on violence to achieve their ends. This is a clever way to acknowledge social anxieties – to say that people who identify with the Flag Smashers are right, to an extent, but then the instant they cross the line into violence, they’re upsetting the status quo and need to be put down by the heroes. I watched TFATWS and obviously enjoyed it. I have gone on a Marvel re-watching binge recently as well. I like the MCU! I like the characters and the madcap sci-fi adventures! But I can also recognize it as a flawed piece of media that I don’t have to accept whole-cloth, and to be able to criticize some of the ancillary messages that come with it. It doesn’t have to be black and white.

When it comes to shipping, moreover, the toxic culture of “my ship is better than your ship because it’s Better in Real Life” ™ is both well-known and in my opinion, exhausting and pointless. As also noted, the whole point of fiction is that it allows us to create and experience realities that we don’t always want in real life. I certainly enjoy plenty of things in fiction that I would definitely not want in reality: apocalyptic space operas, violent adventures, and yes, garbage men. A large number of my ships over the years have been labeled “unhealthy” for one reason or another, presumably because they don’t adhere to the stereotype of the coffee-shop AU where there’s no tension and nobody ever makes mistakes or is allowed to have serious flaws. And I’m not even bagging on coffee-shop AUs! Some people want to remove characters from a violent situation and give them that fluff and release from the nonstop trauma that TV writers merrily inflict on them without ever thinking about the consequences. Fanfiction often focuses on the psychology and healing of characters who have been through too much, and since that’s something we can all relate to right now, it’s a very powerful exercise. As a transformative and interpretive tool, fanfic is pretty awesome.

The problem, again, comes when people think that fic/fandom can only be used in this way, and that going the other direction, and exploring darker or complicated or messy dynamics and relationships, is morally bad. As has been said before: shipping is not activism. You don’t get brownie points for only having “healthy” ships (and just my personal opinion as a queer person, these often tend to be heterosexual white ships engaging in notably heteronormative behavior) and only supporting behavior in fiction that you think is acceptable in real life. As we’ve said, there is a systematic problem in identifying what that is. Ironically, for people worried about Women Getting Ideas by confusing fiction and reality, they’re doing the same thing, and treating fiction like reality. Fiction is fiction. Nobody actually dies. Nobody actually gets hurt. These people are not real. We need to normalize the idea of characters as figments of a creator’s imagination, not actual people with their own agency. They exist as they are written, and by the choice of people whose motives can be scrutinized and questioned, but they themselves are not real. Nor do characters reflect the author’s personal views. Period.

This feeds into the fact that the internet, and fandom culture, is not intended as a “safe space” in the sense that no questionable or triggering content can ever be posted. Archive of Our Own, with its reams of scrupulous tagging and requests for you to explicitly click and confirm that you are of age to see M or E-rated content, is a constant target of the purity cultists for hosting fictional material that they see as “immoral.” But it repeatedly, unmistakably, directly asks you for your consent to see this material, and if you then act unfairly victimized, well… that’s on you. You agreed to look at this, and there are very few cases where you didn’t know what it entailed. Fandom involves adults creating contents for adults, and while teenagers and younger people can and do participate, they need to understand this fact, rather than expecting everything to be a PG Disney movie.

When I do write my “dark” ships with garbage men, moreover, they always involve a lot of the man being an idiot, being bluntly called out for an idiot, and learning healthier patterns of behavior, which is one of the fundamental patterns of romance novels. But they also involve an element of the woman realizing that societal standards are, in fact, bullshit, and she can go feral every so often, as a treat. But even if I wrote them another way, that would still be okay! There are plenty of ships and dynamics that I don’t care for and don’t express in my fic and fandom writing, but that doesn’t mean I seek out the people who do like them and reprimand them for it. I know plenty of people who use fiction, including dark fiction, in a cathartic way to process real-life trauma, and that’s exactly the role – one of them, at least – that fiction needs to be able to fulfill. It would be terribly boring and limited if we were only ever allowed to write about Real Life and nothing else. It needs to be complicated, dark, escapist, unreal, twisted, and whatever else. This means absolutely zilch about what the consumers of this fiction believe, act, or do in their real lives.

Once more, I do note the misogyny underlying this. Nobody, after all, seems to care what kind of books or fictional narratives men read, and there’s no reflection on whether this is teaching them unhealthy patterns of behavior, or whether it predicts how they’ll act in real life. (There was some of that with the “do video games cause mass shootings?”, but it was a straw man to distract from the actual issues of toxic masculinity and gun culture.) Certain kinds of fiction, especially historical fiction, romance novels, and fanfic, are intensely gendered and viewed as being “women’s fiction” and therefore hyper-criticized, while nobody’s asking if all the macho-man potboiler military-intrigue tough-guy stereotypical “men’s fiction” is teaching them bad things. So the panic about whether your average woman on the internet is reading dark fanfic with an Unhealthy Ship (zomgz) is, in my opinion, misguided at best, and actively destructive at worst.

#long post #anonymous #ask

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renegadewangs · 3 years ago

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Van Zieks - the Examination, part 2

Warnings: SPOILERS for The Great Ace Attorney: Chronicles. Additional warning for racist sentiments uttered by fictional characters (and screencaps to show these sentiments).

Disclaimer: (see Part 1 for the more detailed disclaimer.) - These posts are not meant to be taken as fact. Everything I'm outlining stems from my own views and experiences. If you believe that I've missed or misinterpreted something, please let me know so I can edit the post accordingly. -The purpose of these posts is an analysis, nothing more. Please do not come into these posts expecting me to either defend Barok van Zieks from haters, nor expecting me to encourage the hatred. - I'm using the Western release of The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles for these posts, but may refer to the original Japanese dialogue of Dai Gyakuten Saiban if needed to compare what's said. This also means I’m using the localized names and localized romanization of the names to stay consistent. -It doesn't matter one bit to me whether you like Barok van Zieks or dislike him. However, I will ask that everyone who comments refrains from attacking real, actual people.

It’s time to take a close look at Episode 3, The Runaway Room!

Episode 3: The Runaway Room.

We're skipping the first two cases, as they have no relevance to Barok van Zieks, and starting off here.

So Ryu is tossed into the deep. The Lord Chief Justice tells him that he’s basically the defendant’s only hope; if he doesn’t at least try to fight in court, McGilded will lose the trial and die for sure. (HAH… Good one, Stronghart.) So Ryu falls for this would-be motivational speech and heads for the courthouse where he finds out why McGilded doesn’t have a defense attorney to begin with; it’s because of the prosecution. No one dares to go up against Lord Barok van Zieks, also known as the Reaper of the Old Bailey, because all who he prosecutes are damned. This should sound familiar to anyone who’s played an Ace Attorney game before. ‘The prosecution has never been defeated before’ is the implication, which would initially lead us to believe Van Zieks is another one of those prodigies. Sure enough, Susato points out he must be very talented, to which McGilded replies that Van Zieks is not talented, rather, he’s cursed. This sets the mood even further. With words like “Reaper” and “curse” being tossed around, we’re sooner reminded of a prosecutor like Simon Blackquill, who was a convicted murderer wielding psychological manipulation techniques. Either way, with the grim atmosphere set, Ryu is ushered into the courtroom before he can ask any more questions.

As a sidenote, McGilded really scored some negative points with this remark:

Feels a bit softened compared to how fan translations tackled that line, but a nasty jab all the same.

So anyway, entering the courtroom we get our first look at Van Zieks and if the foreshadowing in the Defendant Antechamber wasn’t already bad enough, he honors his eerie reputation.

So far, he’s meeting the requirements then. He’s intimidating and as a wealthy white man, he’s perfectly juxtaposed to Ryu, the rookie from another country. Meanwhile, the first micro-aggression of this trial is actually uttered by the judge:

Which also makes narrative sense. Ryu’s more practical goal isn’t to win the prosecution’s trust. Heck, he could get through any trial just fine with Van Zieks’s dislike. No, what he needs is to win over the judge and the members of the jury. For them to also hold prejudice but put that aside in order to side with the truth is another important end-game here. So let’s continue. Van Zieks also has something to say here:

Initially, the remark about Ryu’s eyes might read as a typical racist jab towards someone from the East, but he is in fact referring to the way Ryu’s eyes are ‘swimming’ when he’s nervous, as evidenced by the next lines. “They shroud your fear, your doubt, your trepidation… They run wild, clinging to some phantom notion of courage.” Van Zieks is saying that while Ryu puts up a brave front, his swimming eyes betray just how nervous and unsure of his cause he really is. So really, he’s targeting the fact that Ryu is new to the courts. He did, however, make a point of tossing the word “Nipponese” in there when he didn’t need to, drawing attention to Ryu’s race in a derogatory fashion.

After the jurors are introduced, something else of interest happens. The judge points out that Van Zieks hasn’t been seen in the courtroom in a number of years. The judge had assumed that Van Zieks had renounced his fame, to which he replies with the following:

This is a very telling line. We learn several things. Firstly, Van Zieks had retired, and secondly, he doesn’t seem to think too highly of his title of Reaper. If he did, he would have gloated. To describe his reputation as infamy implies negative associations with this ‘curse’ that McGilded spoke of. Putting these two things together, one might conclude he retired because of this curse. When asked why he’s returned to the courts, he says that he’ll leave that to the judge’s imagination. So there’s hints of a backstory already being tossed in before the trial’s even properly kicked off.

Which it does now. So the opening statement happens as always and witnesses are brought in, but once it’s done Ryu interjects to say that he doesn’t understand the circumstances. ‘How could the witnesses have seen the inside of a moving carriage’? It shocks the entire courtroom and Van Zieks is the one to speak:

“-But you’re here in London yourself. Are you really so ignorant about our omnibuses? Tell me, my Nipponese friend… Have you even travelled in an omnibus?”

I have to be honest, I struggled to pinpoint just how I felt about these remarks. Sure, I can overanalyze this, looking at how the words “I’d read-” imply he doesn’t know the following sentiment to be true and therefore doesn’t feel confident enough to say something like “I knew-”... But it doesn’t change that he’s being scummy here. In a roundabout way, he’s still saying Japan is far less civilised than Britain and that Ryu is extra ignorant for not knowing about omnibuses when he’s in London. So basically, he gets scumbag points for this. But then there’s…:

Which is just a basic jab at Ryu’s intelligence. It’s the sort of remark we’d get from every single prosecutor. I think even Klavier would say this sort of line with a smile on his face.

But definitely more scumbag points here, because this was a direct attack in more ways than one. Particularly the word “stray” was uncalled for. CEO of Racism, indeed. Something very interesting happens when the knife gets pulled into the story halfway into the first cross-examination, though. When Ryu asks about it, Van Zieks replies with this:

He’s… actually being civil? (I doublechecked with Scarlet Study, and they are in agreement on the timid nature of this line, translating “yes, Counsel” as “Quite so”.) Instead, Van Zieks turns his attention to the fact that there’s an M on the sheath, directing all his offensive attitude towards McGilded. It gets even more curious when the last juror refuses to cast a guilty verdict, instead talking about what a good man she believes McGilded to be. Van Zieks says:

So he’s not only frustrated with McGilded now, he’s frustrated with the people of London for not knowing what sort of person McGilded really is. Van Zieks reveals he’s a dirty money lender who gained his fortune through corrupt means. He even takes the time to inform Ryu of this with the words “Your client is a shylock, sir!” Edit: I feel a need to address this: shylock is a word with antisemitic roots. It originally came from a Shakespeare play involving a very bad stereotype. It later evolved to have a more broad meaning basically synonymous to loan shark and I think that’s the context the localization means to use it in. There’s absolutely no indication of McGilded’s religious beliefs and even if there were, I highly doubt the localization would use that sort of slur. Still, it’s a very unfortunate choice of words and is sure to accidentally sour Van Zieks even more with some players.

With that, the last juror votes, the scale tips towards Guilty and Van Zieks assumes the trial to be over. He thanks the jurors for their work. Unfortunately, once Susato brings up the Summation Examination, Van Zieks gets very frustrated again. This happens:

IIII don’t know what to do with this line. On first glance, I didn’t think much of it and was even willing to consider it was a compliment. Then I thought it must’ve been passive aggressive somehow; that it’s the sort of thing he wouldn’t believe until he’d seen it with his own eyes. A friend directed me to the notion that it might be referencing a stereotype that ‘Eastern women are fierce’ because they were associated with, well, certain ‘paid services’. I don’t think I need to explain, I’m sure you understand what I mean. And if indeed that’s what Barok is insinuating, that’s a new low I never thought he’d reach. However, when you’ve finished the games and know that Barok was friends with a married Japanese man, it’s entirely possible that he’s remembering a story once told to him by Genshin Asogi. So this is either a bittersweet reminiscence or the most scumbag association he ever could’ve made, but I’m not sure we can ever prove which it is. Edit: As another option, it’s possible he’s referring to the Yamato Nadeshiko stereotype, if indeed it already held the ‘touch of iron’ aspect to it back in 1900. He proceeds to toast his hallowed chalice to “the enigmatic East” and to be honest, I’ve once again got nothing. All I know is that he once again drew attention to the defense’s race when he didn’t need to, so… Scumbag point. As a sidenote, in regards to the wine… I don’t count this as a humanizing trait. The same applies to the leg slam. These are animations meant to add some more lighthearted air and breathe more life into Van Zieks, so he doesn’t just stand there like a statue. They’re just quirks meant to have him stand out from other characters. So yeah, fun as the wine and leg slam animations are, they don’t count in the redemption requirements. Anyway, Van Zieks mocks the age of Susato’s book, saying that judging by its bindings it must be fifty years old. Considering the context of the conversation, this isn’t out of bounds. The defense is using ‘outdated’ information on the law, so he points that out. Any prosecutor would’ve done it like this. Simon Blackquill likely would’ve offered to shred that outdated tome to bits for Susato. Van Zieks does toss in a “Hmph, typical Nipponese” later though, which earns him one more scumbag point. Van Zieks continues to dismiss the Summation Examination, but the judge overrules him and allows it. Law is law, after all! And this is what I meant in my previous post when I said it’s satisfying to see Ryu use actual British law against Van Zieks. Ryu is using a perfectly legitimate technique to win the jurors over, and as Susato tells him, he can only do it by turning the jurors against one another with facts. He can’t appeal to them, he can only have them see sense. Which is difficult, because some jurors are more prejudiced than others:

… Yeah. Uh. Calling Ryu a “Dark Jinx” is pretty awful. Scumbag points for Juror No. 1! Meanwhile, Juror No. 4 keeps us updated on Barok’s actions throughout this trial:

Wow. Typical prosecutor behavior, though. Regardless, Ryu manages to win them all over in the end. With enough of the scales set back to not-guilty, the trial is allowed to continue, which leads to this:

Bye, hallowed chalice. A fun animation to keep things fresh and show us that the trial is about to take a turn. Once again, nothing new. We’ve seen prosecutors lose their patience before. What does interest me, though, is that Barok doesn’t direct physical frustration towards the defense. Remember: Franziska snaps a whip at Phoenix, Godot throws coffee at his head, Blackquill sends a hawk to attack the defense or uses that aijutsu slicing move, Nahyuta throws restricting beads… These were all direct physical attacks. Van Zieks, much like Edgeworth and Klavier, directs his frustration more inward and as a result he destroys his own property.

He succeeds in intimidating Ryu, though. Van Zieks explains that he kept silent, as is the norm during Examination Summation, but makes it clear that he considers it a charade all the same.

Van Zieks has been a pretty good gentleman towards the jury up until now, speaking to them politely despite that one remark about having their head in the clouds. Now that he’s seeing them ‘buy into Ryu’s stories’, as one might describe it, he’s getting frustrated with them. Maybe he’s even frustrated they’re choosing the defense’s side over his own.

He removes his cloak, entering what he says to be the next round of their ‘battle’. More typical prosecutor behavior, this. I’m not sure there’s an underlying thought to this, other than to indicate to the audience that ‘things have gotten serious’. When the next bit of testimony is going on, I noticed something odd. Both Fairplay and Furst testify to having seen blood on McGilded’s hands, to which Van Zieks says:

“... Reported that there was no trace of blood on Mr. McGilded’s gloved hands.” So in a way, by establishing this fact, he’s helping the defense and going against what the witnesses are saying. It doesn’t help the prosecution in any way at all.

The trial continues on, with Van Zieks uttering things like “My Nipponese friend” and “my learned friend from the East” and lord knows what else… I suppose to soften the harshness of the original wording a bit and make Van Zieks just a bit less dislikable? Edit: Tumblr user @beevean has pointed out that “my learned friend” is an actual term used in courts of law. There’s a tradition (also employed in British courts of law) that when addressing either the court or the judge, a barrister refers to the opposing counsel using the respectful term, "my learned friend". Of course, it can be said with an air of passive aggression and pretending to be respectful to the court while shamelessly disrespecting it is something Barok has always done, so the addition of “my learned friend” to the localization text is amazingly in-character. Then of course we have:

This is both a scumbag remark and foreshadowing. Naturally, those playing the game for the first time won’t recognize it as the latter and therefore take it as nothing more than a harsh blow. Things spiral even further out of control when he starts talking about how people who claim the island nations of the Far East have a learning and culture of their own use those terms ill-advisedly. He also uses the words “artless backwater” and really, this is the low point of the trial right here when it comes to prejudice. Van Zieks is just plain lashing out with these sort of jabs.

Eventually, McGilded is dragged onto the witness stand to testify about whether or not there was another passenger aboard the omnibus. McGilded admits that there was, and Van Zieks snaps at him some more for using convenient excuses. Ryu is forgotten here for a moment. The whole smoke bomb thing happens, Van Zieks confers with McGilded and Gina in his own chambers, then the trial resumes. McGilded testifies, then Gina testifies… The jury votes not-guilty, buying into McGilded’s story about protecting a poor young pickpocket and Van Zieks loses it. He slams his heel down on the bench, pointing out that this is why he doesn’t like the jury system; because emotions are ruling where evidence and facts ought to be paramount. He points out while the cubbyhole Gina had been hiding in was empty now, it had been full of the coachman’s belongings during the police investigation. Someone tampered with the omnibus. This is where things get interesting, because Van Zieks addresses Ryu:

He’s giving Ryu the benefit of the doubt here. He’s offering an option for Ryu to be truthful about this matter. And that’s curious, because any defense attorney would naturally say what’s best for his client- or so it’s assumed. It puts Ryu in a difficult position for sure, but for some reason Van Zieks put the question forward anyway. The game responds as follows:

For the sake of argument, I attempted all three options. So when Ryu says he didn’t look, Van Zieks says: “Hm… Perhaps I credited you with too much intelligence.”

So when feigning ignorance, Van Zieks is kind of a scumbag about it. He is correct in his expectation that any attorney worth his badge would thoroughly examine the details of the evidence, but he didn’t need to be such a jerk about it. Now, when outright lying and saying it was empty, Van Zieks instead says:

The lines are very similar, which is an interesting note. It adds a feel of these responses being 'rehearsed', in a way. Just a default for him to fall back to. But the real kicker comes when Ryu tells the truth and says it wasn’t empty. Van Zieks is actually speechless at first with no more than a “...!” Clearly, he wasn’t expecting Ryu to respond like this. Everyone in court is baffled, McGilded gets angry… Van Zieks is a bit rattled now.

“Your task is to defend the man in the stand. Why would you say something to compromise his position?”

So really, it seems as if Van Zieks had only ever offered the question to Ryu with pessimistic intentions. He too had assumed there was only one answer the defense could give and was prepared for just that with his silly little wine analogies, only to be shocked when Ryu defies his expectations. Ryu confesses that he’s not entirely sure on where he stands in the matter, to which Van Zieks replies with “... Interesting.”

So now the jury members are doubting themselves again, with some offering guilty verdicts. Van Zieks decides to honor the ‘Scales of Justice’ once more now that they’re back in his favor, like the hypocrite he is. Gina testifies, Ryu points out an inconsistency, Van Zieks takes that opportunity to turn the tables back in his favor by implying Gina is a liar… He passive aggressively thanks Ryu for saving him considerable trouble and whatnot with some more “my learned Nipponese friend” remarks in there… Ryu turns the tables once more by insisting the victim came into the omnibus through the skylight, Van Zieks demands evidence and points out that furthermore, if indeed such a thing had happened, the witnesses on the roof would’ve seen it. McGilded hops into the conversation to imply that the witnesses themselves were the killers, which sends the court into a frenzy. Both Van Zieks and the judge shift the responsibility of the accusation towards Ryu, even though he never said a word to directly accuse the witnesses. Kind of a douchey move. Barok even states that Ryu’s ‘command of the English tongue must be wanting’, since

Yeahhh, that's pretty unfair. McGilded was the one who dropped that implication. However, since the judge basically accuses Ryu of the same thing, it’s a narrative choice to warn Ryu he needs to anticipate where his reasoning will lead him. Fairplay and Furst testify, pandemonium ensues. McGilded eventually gets what he wants when it’s revealed the skylight can open and there’s blood in there. Van Zieks once again turns his attention to McGilded:

He knows McGilded is at the root of all this tomfoolery and evidence manipulation. McGilded is the real enemy here, in Van Zieks’s eyes. The conversation shows this by having Van Zieks point out that he’s well aware of McGilded’s involvement in dubious matters and that evidence is often ‘adapted’ to suit this guy’s stories. And now, once again, he turns his attention to Ryu. Once again, he’s giving the defense the benefit of the doubt:

The game gives you the illusion of choice here. If you choose to say it’s ‘out of the question’ that the evidence was tampered with, Ryu will refuse to say it out loud. If you say it’s entirely possible, Ryu will admit to that.

This is probably baffling to Van Zieks. It would’ve been so easy for Ryu to insist the tampering couldn’t have happened, but he doesn’t. The game won’t even let him. No matter what you choose, Van Zieks is clued in on the fact that Ryu doesn’t condone the deceit that McGilded is resorting to. But it gets even better, because a short time later, we get:

Another option to either draw attention to forgery, or to feign ignorance. Once again, I chose both options for argument’s sake, but having Ryu say he has no idea doesn’t get us anywhere. Susato will instead object to say it for him. With “I have an inkling”, Ryu says it himself. Van Zieks once again confesses, in his own words, that he’s caught off guard.

Ryu clarifies that he thinks the blood stain inside the omnibus is decisive evidence, but he can’t say for certain whether it’s genuine. McGilded loses it and by this point, is outright branding Van Zieks an enemy. Since the player at this point doesn't know whether McGilded is guilty or not, it leaves Van Zieks in a bit of narrative limbo. One might think: 'if the prosecutor is so intent on taking down a murderer, shouldn't we be on his side? Is he perhaps not as bad as he seems?' Unfortunately, McGilded points out that recollection and memories don’t matter, only evidence does. And… Well.

Which means they can’t rule on a guilty verdict and will have to let McGilded go. Van Zieks admits that he has no more witnesses or evidence to present. He’s out of options. As a formality, the judge asks the defense’s closing statement and we get one last option. Do we believe him to be guilty or not-guilty? When claiming he’s innocent, Van Zieks says:

It seems he means “abject” in the sense of “without pride/respect/dignity for oneself”, which… You know, is fair. By this point it’s very clear that McGilded is guilty, and since Ryu has already admitted that the evidence may be forged, insisting otherwise is indeed pretty spineless. Scumbag points to Van Zieks for continuing to draw attention to the fact that Ryu is from Japan, though.

Let’s instead just admit that we can’t say for certain McGilded is innocent. Unfortunately, we don’t see Van Zieks react to this, which is a bummer because this could’ve been very telling. The judge questions Ryu’s sanity (no joke) and McGilded laughs because it doesn’t matter; it was just a formality anyway. The judge scolds Van Zieks, saying that his case was flawed and it was his job to keep the evidence secure. Instead of objecting, Van Zieks just outright takes the blame for this and apologizes. Very interesting reaction, here. He stops pointing the finger to McGilded, he doesn’t attempt to accuse anyone else… He just admits his performance was flawed. Ryu tries to interject here:

(A badly-timed screenshot if I’ve ever seen one.) Ryu is making an attempt here to defend Van Zieks, the guy who has built up like 20 scumbag points by now. Ryu sincerely doesn’t hold a grudge against him. That’s very interesting. It doesn’t matter, though. The judge won’t hear of it, Ryu thinks it’s unfair, Van Zieks warns McGilded that this isn’t over and then we get the not-guilty verdict.

Hurray??? Profit??? It’s a victory that’s bound to leave the player feeling conflicted and jarred.

But after all’s said and done, we get one last cutscene to establish just how ominous Van Zieks really is. The omnibus is on fire, someone is inside and we know McGilded went into the courtroom earlier to investigate the omnibus in question. So really, by putting two and two together we can already guess what’s going on here. Van Zieks approaches the scene and watches silently.

It’s a good reminder to us that every defendant he prosecutes is ‘damned’ and he’s called the Reaper for a reason. Really puts the finishing touch on the eerie undertones of his character.

All in all, a pretty typical first time against a new prosecutor. Now I just want to draw attention to the fact that the first time we face Van Zieks in court… he’s actually on the right side of the courtroom and Ryu is not. Van Zieks presumably specifically returned to the court after those five years to target McGilded, as he knows about this guy’s shady reputation when it comes to ‘adapting’ evidence. Barok is 'cursed' in such a way that every defendant he faces is damned. So long as he stands as the prosecutor, McGilded can’t get away with his crimes. No matter how much forgery is done, the Reaper will go after McGilded and it seems Van Zieks was banking on this happening.

He likely also expected Ryu to have been bought off by McGilded; to say whatever’s convenient for his case. Turns out, Ryu is actually a man of integrity who’s invested in the truth and near the end of the trial, Barok has seen evidence of this. So what will happen next? We’ll have to play The Clouded Kokoro and find out! Stay tuned!

#dgs #dgs spoilers #tgaa #tgaa spoilers #barok van zieks

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erac12 · 4 years ago

Text

Hello there! Might be I shouldn’t said anything about this topic and I shall keep my opinion for myself but I think I can add something constructive to this discussion at the same time I invite to the dialogue. Ok, now, to the reason of this post: Dinluke, racism and other concerns.

First at all, I don’t have any authority in sw so, yes, you can ignore me and my opinion if you want to. Also, please, remember always be kind and polite and try to be opened to receive criticism. Viceversa, if you wanna make any contribution to this post, in favor or not, please keep it polite. Not personal attacks and don’t death wishes agains my persona (I have enough with my own death wishes, ok?)

Now, to address this issue, I gonna show to different postures. Yes, it will be long but, please, bare with me. The goal with this is to expose the phenomenon and you, as reader, creator or just occasional fan of dinluke, can take a decision with this information.

On one hand, we have the issue of dinluke by itself, not any other element add, being racism because it portrayed a man of color and a white man being together. This implication come for the idea of only seeing the POC as a sexual entity and an instrument for the white pleasure. The former implies the use of the stereotype of the Latino and Hispanic man in which the POC is impulsive, over sexual and misogynistic in this ship.

On the other hand, people in the fandom have expressed that this is not the case (myself included).The reasons behind this defense are the next ones:

1. The reason people started shipping Din and Luke because Luke is one of the favorite, also protagonist, of the Saga.

2. Follow the previos one, people has always wanted Luke being gay (shipping him with Lando, Han, Ezra, etc.) and they are starving for Luke content since the bad writing of the sequels.

3. Din is a good man (yes, he is a bounty hunter but he had a code) who is likable and who represented good masculinity. He respects women, love children and he also has complex personality as a result of his lifestyle, his culture and trauma. So, people wants his favorite character with another excellent one. (They also shared one minute in screen)

4. Also, the ships are the connection of two cultures (mandalorians and Jedis) that fan loves and they have seen together in the past as friendship or romantic relationships. The frienemies backstory of their cultures only attracts more fans.

5. They being together implies that Din would continue seeing Grogu and being happy with him.

6. They being together means that Grogu has two dads.

7. The mayor of the fandom, even if they recognize that Pedro Pascal is beautiful (because he is and you can fight me in this), he being Din is not the most Important thing in terms of racial identity of the actor and his person is not the center of the ship or the representation of the character in the ship. Din is mandalorian, Luke is jedi. Only in some modern AU, the hispanic element is used.

Now, the reason number 7 has brought us to another problem as currently Dark Din has became a popular prompt in the fandom. And we could use the logic of the statement 7 and say that it doesn’t have anything to do with him portrayed by a POC. That is because mandalorians are a culture of war and warriors or that people wants to make Luke suffered as a martyr. But, we cannot ignore that the reason we (Hispanic and brown people) like Din and his repercussions in POC representation was because it was the antithesis of the model of misogynistic Latino man.

In conclusion, I understand that you want to make drama and torture Luke but you need to analyzed if you using Dark Din characterization is because you just want to built melodrama or it has something more in the root. We cannot forget the importance of representation in these times and how damaging a bad stereotype could be. I am not saying you cannot write it but try to be self conscious and find out if the real reason behind your fascination for Dark Din has something to do with external aspects of the fictional world building or not, only you would know it.

I personally cannot write Dark Din because the reason I like the ship was because Din is represented as a good man. Although, I have to admit that I have read it. Will I continue reading it? Probably.

This ramble is not to change anyone mind. I am just expressing an opinion. You can act as you free will demands and participate in the fandom as you wish. Just be kind, ok? Bye, ER out.

#dinluke #er rants #er rambles #opinion

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hello-yue-here · 4 years ago

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Yuetara, zukka, and maiko

yuetara

ship

1) its not one of my main ships. i dont rlly read fanfic for them but if i see a cute fanart of them ill enjoy it and i think i first started shipping it because of good fanarts for them.

2) i like yuetara because of how similar they are. theyre both women from the water tribe. they both understand the misogyny that they have faced. and they both said f sexism im gonna be a strong woman. i also love the tui and la parallel. moon spirit and ocean spirit parallel COME ON. YUE IS THE MOON. KATARA IS THE MOST POWERFUL WATERBENDER. THEY ARE THE OCEAN AND THE MOON. the push and pull they could give eachother. that dynamic ftw.

3) i guess if i didnt like something about this ship would be the fact that if i read a fic or see a fanart w yuetara then than means in that particular au i wont get any yuekka and yuekka is probably my second favorite ship. but then again if i get yuetara than i could get a plethora of other sokka ships to go with it so my sadness disappears in like two seconds. gosh shipping is hard sometimes until you remember ‘hey i have like fifty different universes in my head. all ur ships can coexist in ur brain olivia’ other than that i really see no downsides to this ship. maybe i wish it had more content. maybe if it had more content id ship it a lot more but its not one of the more popular ships so the content is kinda few n far between on my feed.

zukka:

SHIPPP

1) my boys. my babies. my loves. i watched this show for the first time when it came out on netflix and when it ended i really didnt ship anything other than kataang. i came onto tumblr to find fun atla content and one of the very first things i saw under the atla tag was zukka content. i was like oh? whats this? zukka? interesting... i was intrigued so i found a list of fic recs and i fell in love with the ship. the rest is history. its probably my number one ship because it was my very first ship here and im nostalgic

2) oh boy there is so much i like about this ship. i relate to a shit ton of characters in atla. but sokka and zuko may be the ones i relate to most. i relate to sokka because i tend to feel second best a lot to my friends. i try to stay positive but things rarely go the way i plan or hope for them too and while im happy for my friends and their achievements i oftentimes find myself thinking why cant that be me? and i see this a lot in sokka especially in sokkas master. i dont feel special a lot and idk seeing sokka feel the same way and then realizing he is special kinda helped me realize that im special too. on the flipside i relate to zuko because i have wild anger issues and difficulty dealing w my emotions a lot as well. i get broody and short tempered and insecure very often and i tend to push people away and i refuse to ask for help (the amount of teachers and adults and therapists who have told me its okay to ask for help ur not any weaker because of it is astounding. do i listen to them? .....im working on it.) and i saw a shit ton of this in zuko. book one and two zuko rarely asks for help as seen in the blue spirit and zuko alone and he pushes away uncle so many times and even when the gaang iffers to help him in i think its the chase he tells them to leave. when he finally has his redemption and joins the gaang and lets them kinda become a better person i was so happy. i want that for myself yk. seeing him finally win the agni kai and overcome his family that always told him he was nothing was such a win. my sister and i get along but when we were children we were very much like zuko and azula. it was extremely competitive all the time and there was so much toxicity and sibling drama to a concerning extent. we get along great now which im very happy about but yeah their sibling relationship hit a lil too on the nose for me. seeing as i relate to these character so much and want them ti be happy i want to live vicariously through them so seeing them together is amazing for me to project into them. i love projecting onto fictional characters and with them i can project onto BOTH so its a winwin. plus so many zukka fics are so well written and heartwarming and heartbreaking and emotional and fluffy anf UGH the talent here us astounding.

3) what do i not like about the ship? again the list is long. oops. mainly the toxic shippers. there are so many toxic zukka stans that sometimes make it hard for me to enjoy this ship but hey! thats what the block button is for:) i despise how often people infantilize zuko and completely ruin his character for the sake of making him a soft weak lil boy who needs protecting. thats just not zuko for me. and ive seen many many accounts even state that this kind of portrayal of zuko is rooted in racist stereotypes about asian men (now i am white so i personally have never experiences racism but i feel the need to bring that up because it is wrong and attention needs to be brought to it because a lot of poc fans have criticised this) and the same for sokka. some ppl rlly skew his character and make him a big strong brute and hypermasculine and once again poc fans have said that this take is rooted in racist stereotypes. again! these are just my opinions! this is my favorite ship! but i think its important to acknowledge some of the bad parts of our ships as well and be critical where criticism is needed :))

maiko

ship

1) I LOVE MAIKO. “i dont hate you” “i dont hate you too” BRUH. my little heart just burst into flames. im sorry guys but maiko is so cute. they hate everything except eachother. BRUH that is one of the cutest tropes. i shipped them the moment i saw them together onscreen and i was so happy when zukos face lit up in the finale when mai came back.

2) “i hate everything but i have a soft spot for you” TAKE MY MONEY I AM A SUCKER FOR THIS. they are so cute together. like zuko is rarely happy in a majority of atla but mai makes him happy and i- 🥺🥺 HE DESERVES IT. and mai is always so supportive of him. when hes stressing out about the war meeting she tries her best to comfort him. and zuko cares about her too. he may not be the best at showing it but oh my god hes TRYING HIS BEST. i think its a very accurate portrayal of teenage relationships because they arent perfect and they do fight but like,, every teenage relationship does that. and even after everything and how he left her in the fire nation she still had his back at boiling rock. she still risked her life against azula to save his butt.

3) the thing i hate about maiko isnt even about maiko. its about antis who think mai is toxic and that zuko deserves better. that has got to be the worst take ive ever heard. they had a fight in ember island. that is NORMAL. they are teenagers. they are not perfect. but underneath all the rough edges and things they need to work out they still care about eachother so freaking much. i genuinelt believe that neither of them would do anything to intentionally hurt the other and i think thats what matters the most. if anything mai is the best girlfriend in the entire world because zuko fucked up like,, quite a few times. he got rlly jealous and dumped her thru a letter and ppl always say that mai was toxic for being mad at him for those two things. umm she had every right to be mad at him for both of those. and while zuko is allowed to feel his emotions and be angry sometimes as well sometimes he needs to think things thru and realize that hey maybe some if this jealousy is unfounded. BUT EVEN THEN. HE RESPECTED HER FEELINGS AND DIDNT TOUCH HER WHEN SHE SAID DONT TOUCH ME. HE RESPECTED HER. so i hate toxic maiko takes because they are literally so wrong in my opinion.

again all of these are just my opinions!! feel free to agree or disagree but please be respectful!! i will respect whatever u think as well because this is all just for fun :)

#atla #avatar the last airbender #zukka #yuetara #maiko #ship game #ask game #long post #wow i wrote a lot #also if anyone wants to talk ships feel free to message me!

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absynthe--minded · 4 years ago

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opinions on the recent russingon meta? tbh i love russingon, i love black fingon headcanons, but i do agree that it's a little weird when fingon gets totally sidelined in fics as just Maedhros' Emotional Growth or the Black Nanny. i mean, russingon really lends itself to hurt/comfort, which is fine, but i think ppl sometimes neglect fingon's arc. thoughts as a russingon writer? (no accusations, love your work, but wanted your perspective on other ppls russingon works)

(Wow this got long, lol.

Full disclosure - I haven’t read the recent Russingon meta, or offered any substantial response to it. Quite a lot of people I know have, but I’ve not had the time and my brain hasn’t been cooperating with me to read large chunks of text over the last couple of days. I have opinions on your ask as I’m seeing it now, and that’s what I’ll be responding to. I’m also not black, though I’m not white either - my ethnic group is one that has troubling stereotypes associated with it of caring for white people/acting as sage dispensers of advice/etc, but I can’t speak to the breadth and depth of the black experience when it comes to being a ‘black nanny’ in fiction, and I’m not going to try to.)

So, Fingon being a cardboard cutout/emotional support animal for Maedhros and Fingon being perceived as black by large portions of the fandom are two things that arose completely independently of one another. Fingon being Maedhros’s support animal is a trope as old as Russingon itself, and possibly is as old as the published Silm itself. I’ve read Russingon fics that were almost as old as I am, Russingon fics published last week, Russingon fics that vilified the Nolofinwëans, and Russingon fics from the turn of the 21st century when the Fëanorians were seen as uncomplicated villains. Fingon being a cardboard cutout is ubiquitous through all of them. It doesn’t matter how old the fic is, it’s basically guaranteed.

The reason for this is that Maedhros is far and away the most popular character in the Silmarillion, and his pain and angst and mental strife and trauma are front and center in many writers’ lists of priorities. If it’s not Fingon propping him up, it’s Maglor, or another brother, or an OC - this is a very common genre of Silm fic and it’s not limited to Russingon.

But.

This is my least favorite Russingon trope and it’s the entire reason I’m writing Blessed Hands and why all my Russingon fics are at least majority-Fingon POV. I can’t fucking stand it, and it completely kills my interest in a story. I’m super picky with my Russingon fics because of this trope, and because of its ubiquity, and I’ve talked about it on my blog many times before. For me to love a Russingon fic, it has to be about how they anchor and support one another, and how their mutual and equal investment in their relationship is the foundation of their lives. This trope’s not nearly as common as it used to be, thank Eru, but it’s still around, and I cannot talk enough about how I Hate It, lol. It’s also old enough and omnipresent enough that the majority of fics feature it, and - interestingly - the majority of fics also feature white Fingon.

Alongside this, Black Fingon arose out of a non-Russingon intracommunity discussion among the artists of the Silm fandom, in about 2013. I saw this play out in real time on my dash, and so while I can’t source posts reliably, I can promise this is as accurate as I can make it.

The paradigm shift came as a result of content creators realizing that several of their number weren’t white, and quite a few people in the fandom weren’t white, and yet 100% of art and fics featured white elves with zero real diversity (and a number of very troubling, somewhat stereotypical older illustrations of Men as the only significant examples of people of color in Middle-Earth). There was concern as to why this was being accepted as the norm when there was ample opportunity for representing both one’s own ethnicity and other people of color (and a lot of concern about unexamined racism in white artists who found themselves unable, for various reasons, to picture heroic elves as anything but fair-skinned) and the general consensus was that we had more consistent information from HoME draft to HoME draft about hair color than skin tone, so why were we all picturing our heroes as white?

Fingon in particular was headcanoned as black due to a discovery by a fan (whose URL escapes me, sadly) who I’m certain was black themself. There’s a passage in The Peoples of Middle-Earth describing Fingon as wearing his hair in plaits braided through with gold, and this fan made the comparison to hairstyles worn by IRL black people. The idea was that he was the most uncomplicatedly brave, heroic, and noble person in the Silm, and look, he could be a man of color! There was also a sort of gentleman’s agreement to refrain from making explicit connections beyond that to real human ethnic groups/cultures/races. The logic behind this was that if the generic Eurofantasy aesthetic was kept, white artists would be encouraged to draw diverse elves without concern for cultural appropriation, as well as steering racists away from caricature and the ability to twist a well-meaning effort into a stereotypical attack.

When these ideas first emerged, there was a lot of resistance. Arguments were made that those of us who advocated for diverse elves and specifically black Fingon were discreetly accusing other artists of being racist, or were acting purposefully holier-than-thou, or just wanted to start drama. There were some people who claimed we’d attack anyone who didn’t agree with us that elves were brown. This was an exhausting mess to deal with and it was a major part of my disillusionment with discussing racism in the Tolkien fandom - the majority of voices were reasonable people but the minority was loud and obnoxious. I bring this up to say that diverse elves were genuinely progressive and forward-looking in 2013, even when it was more or less explicitly stated that they had no real ties to existing human races and they had no change to their characters.

Black Fingon, agreed upon outside the Russingon fandom, and Fingon the cardboard cutout, the most reliably present version of Fingon in Russingon fic, sort of ran into one another. No real change was ever made to Finno’s character upon making him black - this would have been seen at the time as unnecessary because his character was just fine as-is, and the whole point was that he could be exactly as he’d been before and be black or brown, that men of color had the exact same range of emotion and depth of character that he did when he was perceived as white.

The problem is that there hasn’t been much examination of the idea that Fingon being a black man who exists to prop up a white man is uh. Really racist and kind of fraught.

All I have to say really is that this wasn’t a conscious decision by anyone to be racist - the opposite, actually. As I mentioned above I can’t speak for black people, or for other BIPOC, but my opinion is that it’s an unfortunate and unconscious choice that has nothing to do with Fingon’s race and everything to do with the fact that his character has been seriously neglected for decades now. It opens the door to a lot of really frustrating tropes and plotlines that smack fans of color in the face with how bigoted they are, and it’s something that I’m glad is being discussed, if only because I’ve been trying to push for a reevaluation of Fingon’s personality and general role for a long time now (though of course I’m also glad that this is actually getting acknowledged as a harmful thing real people now are at risk of doing).

My solution? Same as ever - “write Fingon like a real person with interests and desires and goals of his own, and treat his family like they matter, and flesh out the world he lives in. Listen to people of color if you’re white, educate yourself regardless, and learn to avoid harmful tropes.” If that becomes the fandom norm? I’ll be a happy Absynthe.

#replies #anon replies #RUSSINGON #absynthe's meta

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voxofthevoid · 4 years ago

Text

Taking It Up The Ass Isn’t Character Growth - A Rant

So, in response to an ask a while back, I said I had a rant brewing on fandom and sex positions, and well, a lot of you wanted to see it, so here you go. You literally asked for it.

Disclaimer: This is going to talk a lot about top/bottom roles in slash fic and fandom attitude towards them and is heavily filtered through the lens of my own tastes and experiences with fandom. I’d also like to be upfront that I am 100% in favor of people writing whatever fictional content they want, and it’s not what fandom does with characters that bothers me but rather how that translates into attitudes towards real, live people. Also, this is the essay version of a slow burn AU because I regurgitate my entire fandom history before getting to the point. Beware.

I discovered fan-fiction around a decade ago, had no clue what the hell it was, got hooked and dived deeper. I started participating in fandom circa 2013, and I was fairly young and also completely inexperienced both sexually and romantically. The fandom in question was Hannibal and my ship of choice was Hannibal/Will. It was/is a very chill fandom in general, but we had our drama. And chief among the contentious topics was—you guessed it—the top/bottom debate. I can’t actually remember any other topic that was discussed and argued for so ardently in that fandom, at least in those days. Even after I drifted away, I came across a few posts on the matter.

Generally, you had two camps—people who supported strict roles and those who were in favor of switching*. And because we’re a society plagued by illogical assumptions, the strict role camp mostly had people who thought Mr. Big Bad Cannibal in the Fancy Suits wouldn’t take it up the ass because he’s older, more experienced, more mentally stable, and of course, more ‘dominant’ in personality. Yes, that sentence is chock full of problematic shit. I am aware. Lots of people were aware and argued strongly against attributing top/bottom roles to personality. I don’t remember anyone arguing as enthusiastically for Top Will, but those voices were also there. But the general idea was that assigning strict top/bottom roles to a male/male couple was casting them in a heterosexual mold and thus, the progressive option was to make them switch. Strict roles also garnered comparisons to “yaoi” and uke/seme stereotypes, which was of course bad and fetishizing and we, the Western media fans, of course had to do better. Stealth racism is fun to untangle.

Anyway, I lapped up the woke juice. Partly because I was a baby queer from Buttfuck Nowhere, Asia, who had zero exposure to LGBT+ communities and what queer folks did with each other. Partly because it was the stance taken by most of my favorite writers so it seemed like a good position to emulate.

Emulate it I did. Most discussions I had about this happened in private with the handful of close friends I had in fandom. Where it really showed was in my writing. I made sure to write switching—maybe not in every fic, but then I alternated between fics. Thing is though, I did have a preference. I liked Top Will. I created and consumed a ton of Top Hannibal, and sometimes it was okay, sometimes it was not, but I couldn’t pinpoint why it made me uncomfortable. Back then, I thought I was a cis questioning/bi girl and once again, the impression I got was that not being MLM, having a preference was automatic fetishization. So I tried my best to justify my preferences, to my friends at least. I think what I said was that fandom was skewed towards Top Hannibal, and I liked the opposite because I’m a contrary fuck. Which I am, to be fair, but this was just me desperately trying to figure shit out without being offensive.

That’s the line I touted all the way until 2018, which was when I fucked off to grad school in A City, finally freed of Buttfuck Nowhere and able to actually date. At this point, I was settled in my sexuality (girls only) and questioning my gender (non-binary or trans guy). I had also tentatively figured out during undergrad that I’m an exclusive top and a Dom. Actual attempts at dating cemented that, yes, those are my preferences, about as flexible as a steel rod. Cue motherfucking epiphany over my fanfic tastes.

And see, over these years, I was engaging intermittently with fandom. I dutifully wrote switch couples. I also continued to have rigid tastes and continued to explain it away as being a contrary fuck—to be fair, until Steve/Bucky, my preference did seem to be the opposite of the larger fandom preference. But correlation, as we know, isn’t causation. Until Steve/Bucky, I continued to write versatile couples because I honestly didn’t have the guts to just say I liked it just one way. I do now but even then, I feel compelled to add that it’s because I want to see my own taste reflected in fic, so I write/read the character I relate to as a top, it's not that deep etc. Would I be as forthright if I didn’t have that reason? Would I have such strict preferences in fic if I didn’t have strict preferences IRL? The latter’s a mystery, but the former isn’t—I wouldn’t be because fandom is still entrenched in the same ideas that got me to this point to begin with.

In every fandom I’ve been in, I’ve seen some version of this debate go around. Sometimes, it’s one party saying “why would you write Character X as a bottom, he’s so Reason A” and a reblog chain that insults the OP and/or extols the virtues of switching. Sometimes, it’s a general-ish message that says they don’t understand why people have strict preferences when we all know real gay couples switch. Sometimes, it’s blanket statements that accuse anyone with preferences of fetishizing. Sometimes, it’s the same reasoning that gets you “Character Y is a top because of Reason B” transposed on versatile couples except this takes the form of “they switch because they’re equals.”

Ya’ll, I’m fucking tired.

I have long since lost count of the number of stories I’ve seen where an exclusive top learning bottom and liking it is character growth. Where a character who prefers to bottom taking a turn on top is empowering.

Isolated, these are fine. But I’ve seen enough of such stories that it’s distinctly discomfiting and a major squick. Sometimes a trigger, if I'm too immersed in the story. I’m not going to try and burn an author at the stake because they pissed me off. I am just going to close that window and quietly handle my shit. People can write whatever they want. But this one theme hits too close to home, as you can see from this 1.6k rant.

My friend (also my ex-girlfriend) and I had an all-out bitching session about this the other day. Both of us are kinky fuckers who have rigid, complementary roles we prefer and we have both had our grueling days of struggling to reconcile our sexual tastes with our ideologies precisely because of how these things are frowned upon in conservative and progressive circles. Seeing that in fandom, of all places, is both insulting and exhausting. Topping and bottoming aren’t personality traits. Neither is D/s. It’s sexual preference and power play. It really does not have to be that deep. I am not exorcising childhood trauma using the bodies of women. My partners, former and current, have not been brainwashed by the patriarchy. We will not become better, more complete individuals once I magically stop being a stone top and my partners embrace the joys of a strap-on.

I have, with my own two eyes, seen someone say that in a really committed relationship, of course the couple will switch.

Bullshit.

It’s transparent bullshit. This does not get attributed to cisgender M/F couples. Even when the automatic assumptions of woman = bottom and man = top get addressed, switching isn't presented as the default. No one’s saying “oh, if you really love your husband, you’ll peg him”. I do know butch/femme sapphic couples get their own share of shit. Because it’s all heteronormativity, right? Can’t have any other reason for top/bottom roles.

You have two extremes with “so who’s the woman” on one end and “it’s woke only if they switch” on the other, and as far as I’m concerned, they’re equally damaging. There shouldn’t be a pressure, however subtle, to conform your taste in fiction to some arbitrary idea of progressiveness. People are going to like whatever they want anyway; all this does is create an atmosphere where those likes can’t always be freely expressed without a lot of mental gymnastics. We’re seeing so many versions of this in the pushback against so-called problematic content, but smaller, subtler versions exist too.

Fictional characters aren’t real. They can be whatever you want them to be. And yes, other people will often want them to be the exact opposite of your ideas, but that’s just how things work. Meanwhile, the people behind these usernames? They’re real. No one should be throwing real people under the bus to ‘protect’ characters that don’t exist. Hannibal Lecter doesn’t care whether he gets fucked or dismembered in Author B’s fanfiction, but the discourse that surrounds the dick up his ass? That does affect flesh and blood people.

I am not claiming that this is the only attitude in fandom. Middlegrounds do exist. Plenty of people abide by fic and let fic and there are folks who pipe up to say not every RL queer couple switches. But it’s often the extremes that reach most people. That was certainly my experience, and I’m not the only one.

I don’t really know how to end this post. It is 100% a rant and one that’s been building up for a while. Bottom line is that people’s sexual behavior varies wildly and whenever you attack sexual tastes in fanfic by saying it’s unrealistic - or worse because let’s be real, that’s a very tame word choice - please remember that there’s likely someone out there who practices it.

* I’m using switch and versatile synonymously in this post. It’s mostly concerned with top/bottom debates. A lot of what I’m saying is also echoed in portrayals of and discussions surrounding D/s dynamics, but I’m not addressing that as much for now.

#fandom #top bottom discourse #wow that's a tag #here it is the rant i promised #because i don't quite trust tumblr i feel compelled to add that this is ofc not some kind of attack on actual people who switch either #you do you man #live your best life #vox has opinions

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bluecrusadearcade · 4 years ago

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Harrison Osterfield is not your regular irregular

By Baker Street, Gentleman’s Journal quizzes the star of Netflix’s new drama on world records, Sherlock Holmes and his golf swing…

Draped in a silk shirt and paisley scarf, Harrison Osterfield is shivering his way across a brisk Regent’s Park. But he’s not complaining. Why would he? After all, the 24-year-old has dealt with worse. In his latest television series alone — Netflix’s The Irregulars — he’s tussled with demonic crows, paranormal serial killers and even the occult. So a little nip in the air? Nothing to worry about.

“I do have my eye on that jumper, though,” beams Osterfield from behind a bold pair of sunglasses. I don’t blame him. It’s a chunky-knit, funnel-neck number from Connolly, and the next piece of clothing lined up for this al fresco photoshoot. But, for now, the young actor must grit his chattering teeth — and continue striking willowy poses in that billowy shirt.

And those poses are turning heads. Dog-walkers, taxi drivers and tourists are all picking up on Osterfield’s energy; a coolly British blend of big grins and bouncy enthusiasm. He swings from a lamppost! He dances through daffodils! He feeds the pigeons! NW1 hasn’t seen this much action in months…

And we’ve come to Regent’s Park for obvious reasons; Baker Street snakes down from its south-west corner. And, on that famous thoroughfare, sits the fictional digs of Sherlock Holmes. But The Irregulars, a supernatural-tinged drama named for Holmes’ gang of trusty street informants, wasn’t shot in London. Rather, it was filmed on the authentically old streets of Sheffield and Liverpool — the same cobbles walked by the Peaky Blinder boys. So this, Osterfield grins, is a fun opportunity to see the real thing.

“All of the rest of the cast,” he admits, “are really big Sherlock fans. I’ve never really read any of the Sherlock books. I’ve seen maybe one Robert Downey Jr. film? So I was very new going into it.”

Today, then, will be a crash course. Because, after we get Osterfield out of the park (and into that jumper), we’re heading to the Holmes Hotel for a coffee and a catch-up. It’s a relatively new hotel just off Baker Street, decked out with knowing nods to the world’s greatest detective. There’s a bronze bulldog guarding the door, pipe-patterned wallpaper and signature cocktails at the sadly-closed bar (anyone for a ‘Case Closed’?).

But, though there are only suggestions of Sherlock in the Holmes Hotel, Osterfield explains that they’re even subtler in the show. Because The Irregulars, in a nutshell (wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma), sidelines the sleuth, and shifts the focus onto Osterfield and his fellow gang members. The actor plays one of the show’s leads; frail runaway nobleman Prince Leopold. All sullen glances and broken bones, his story is the heart of this first season.

“And it’s been a long project in the making,” says Osterfield, noting that filming on The Irregulars began almost two years ago. “That’s quite daunting. When you’ve spent that much time on something and you’ve got no idea how it’s going to turn out?

“It means that, now, it’s crunch time,” he continues, face creasing with mock-worry, “and I have no idea how people are going to react. But I’m really proud of the work, and that’s what I’m taking away from it.”

The Irregulars may be Osterfield’s first lead role — but he’s been acting for years, popping up in several short films and the George Clooney-directed adaptation of Catch-22 before Netflix took notice. His first role came at 11-years-old, when he was cast as Tiny Tim in his school’s stage production of A Christmas Carol. “It’s funny, actually,” says Osterfield, “because it’s quite a similar physicality to my role in The Irregulars”.

“But that’s where it started,” he continues. “And the real reason I got into acting was because there was this girl in the drama class who I really liked. I thought, if I joined up and impressed her, I could take her out on a date. That didn’t happen. But, although she wasn’t interested at all — the acting seems to be going okay!”

It certainly does. But, like actors all over the world, it’s been a very slow year for Osterfield. He returned to set in September to finish filming the Netflix show — but the rest of his lockdown was eerily, cannily familiar to everyone else’s.

“I went back to my home in Kingston,” he nods, “where I was living with three of my best mates who are also actors. Quite a few of my friends are in theatre, and they had a really tough time of it — not knowing what was going to happen next. I was very lucky, knowing that I was going back to finish something”.

The actor says it was strange being locked-down with fellow performers. With sets closed around the country and curtains falling on theatres, it was one of the first times they had all been at home together. But, even with the additional pressure, he says there were no problems. And there never have been, according to Osterfield — as it’s rare that he and his friends ever compete for the same role.

“We’re all very different castings!” he laughs. “Which is good. It’s a mixed bag, really. But it’s very useful when you’ve got to self-tape an audition and there’s another actor literally upstairs. Also, we’ve all known each other for ten years, so we’ve grown up together and, luckily, know when not to push each other’s buttons.”

With no work, Osterfield spent most of his 2020 getting stuck into lockdown. And he shamelessly tried every self-isolated stereotype. He binge-watched every sports documentary from Drive to Survive to Last Chance U. He upped the frequency and intensity of his workouts. He even tried his hand at cooking. He tried everything.

“I did try everything!” the actor laughs, fizzing once more with that lamppost-swinging, daffodil-dancing energy. “Really! I think I went though every lockdown activity there is. I gave baking a go for two weeks — that didn’t work out. I made a banana bread and that was it. I’m not going to be delving into that any more…

“We were quite lucky, though,” he adds, “because we had an outdoor space. We built a homemade golf net in our garden, by putting up two wooden poles and hanging a blue screen we had left over from filming. That kept us entertained most days”.

But, despite the failed banana breads, closed-off golf courses and Irregulars anxiety, Osterfield says that the worst thing about lockdown was missing his family.

“Because we’re a very close family”, he explains. “Massively so. And, usually, we’d have family gatherings every other weekend – my whole family are in East Grinstead and closer to Brighton, so real countryside. I’m honestly just looking forward to the day, with summer on the horizon, that we can do some good barbecues outside.

“We even tried family Zoom quizzes over lockdown,” he adds, “and they all figured out that I’m not that clever. The rest of my family all seem really, really intelligent. I don’t know if they were just revising beforehand, but I was definitely last a couple of times…”

And Osterfield’s most inspiring family member — not to mention the most irregular — is his 89-year-old grandfather. Despite the young actor upping his own fitness levels during lockdown (“I started doing handstand push-ups. That’s my new skill!”) Osterfield’s grandfather put those athletic achievements to shame.

“He’s fitter than me!” laughs Osterfield. “He’s been kept at home for most of the time and, as a family, we’ve been quite worried about him. But I struggle to keep up with him. I’ll ring him up and ask how his day’s going and he’ll say ‘Oh, hi Harry. Can I call you back later on? I’m just doing some exercise’. So he’s doing better than okay!”

But the exercising, Osterfield says seriously, has been a real lifeline. It’s kept both him and his mind busy during lockdown — and has motivated the actor to pursue more physical, active roles in the future. If he can look back at a body of versatile work, measured out in marked body transformations, he says he’ll be happy.

“I’ve been doing a lot of bodyweight exercise over the last year,” he nods. “I thought it would be quite cool, while in lockdown, to break a world record for something — so I’ve been trying lots of fitness challenges. I’m very close to getting the most burpee chin-ups in under a minute. I’ve got to knuckle down on that.

“I also tried to eat an apple in under 38 seconds,” he laughs. “Which sounds like a long time, but it’s actually quite difficult. And, with apples, I eat everything. Even the middle bit. Even the stem. I just chuck it down. I’m a big fruit bat, so I eat everything apart from the seeds.”

There’s that bouncy energy again; that fun-but-utterly-sincere enthusiasm. It’s an odd thing for an actor, to be so happily unabashed by everything — but the 24-year-old is as animated when talking about his acting as he is about his apples. And that’s nice to see. He’s clearly relishing every opportunity to better himself, and just getting started with what promises to be a very exciting career. Harrison Osterfield, it seems, takes every bite of the apple — literally. Talk about irregular.

#Harrison osterfield #the gentlemans journal #the irregulars #interview

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opbackgrounds · 5 years ago

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As many of you noticed, the other day I posted Part 1 in what has become a series on my thoughts on sexism in One Piece. If you are somehow seeing this post first, I would recommend clicking the link as I’ll be adding to the foundation I built there.

I already had some pretty strong thoughts on this topic before receiving the original ask, but in the spirit of not wanting to sound like a douche academic integrity I decided to do a little cursory research into what other people meant when they said that One Piece is sexist. Here’s a collage of some of my favorite hot takes

As much as I’m...confused? Unsurprised yet somehow disappointed?...I don’t want to mock or belittle the people who feel this way. I think one of the most dangerous things in our modern internet age is that discussions only get surface deep before they devolve into shouting matches, and when the other side is vilified as ignorant or immoral or whatever it only serves to divide people into groups that grow evermore hostile to one another as the shouting matches get louder. It’s a short jump from your opinions are stupid and bad to you are stupid and bad for having them and I really don’t want to go there.

Tl; dr: I don’t care if you disagree with anything I’m about to say, but if you send me harassing messages please know that I will laugh at you for presuming to think that I care.

Dropping the S Bomb

So first things first, a couple definitions. Sexism is prejudice, stereotyping, or discrimination against a certain gender, in this case women. Chauvinism is excessive or prejudiced support for one's own cause, group, or sex. Misogyny is dislike of, contempt for, or ingrained prejudice against women.

I start with definitions, because there are an astounding number of people who misuse these terms when making arguments. When talking about things like character design, Oda’s typical hour-glass figure is leaning into a stereotype that leads to the objectification of (fictional) women. An argument could be made that One Piece is sexist in that way.

But it’s not that cut and dry, and I am always of the opinion that context matters. I argued in my previous post that there would be a wider variety of female character designs if there were more women, and the exaggerated aesthetic of the series lends itself to the exaggerated busts and butts typical of One Piece ladies.

There’s an interview that came out around the time Strong World was released that I think is helpful when talking about this sort of thing.

I approached it thinking that since I’m drawing for a boys’ comic magazine, then it’s my job to make sure they enjoy what they’re reading. When you actually do become a professional you’ll start getting fan letters and other things and you’ll soon find that the overwhelming majority of them are from girls. Boys just aren’t the type to pick up a pen. (laughs) They don’t have things like stationary or stamps and they don’t think about going through the ‘grueling task’ of writing someone just to say, “That was cool.” Boys are a life form that enjoy something but won’t bother to tell you that they actually do.

So I learned that girls will flood you with their opinions and when I took at step back and looked at the world of manga, I realized that there are a lot of people out there that made me think, “This [author] is really just going along with the girls’ opinions.” And ultimately, if you’re considering those opinions as the ‘needs of the customer’ when you write the story, you’re just left with a girl’s manga. (laughs) It’s like, if you do that, you’re only writing to entertain girls, and that’s just wrong.

Oda writes for his target demographic, pre-teen and teenage boys. He doesn’t seem to care much for the opinions of his female audience, which again could be perceived as sexist.

And to an extent maybe it is, but I also think it’s smart. You only have to look at the mess that is the new Star Wars trilogy to see what happens when a storyteller tries to appease a fan base. The end result is that everyone goes home from the theatre miserable.

Humanity has been telling stories since time immemorial. They’re so ingrained into into the collective psyche that we have developed certain metanarriatives, types, and archetypes that have in turn been refined and distilled and applied to certain types of stories meant for certain types of people. The “rules” for telling a “boy’s story” are different than the “rules” for telling a “girl’s story”, just like I would not expect a romance to be told in the same way as one of Shonen Jump’s battle manga.

Incidentally, this is part of the reason why I think many romances in shonen fall flat. Stories best suited for fighting, camaraderie, coming of age, and growing into the best version of yourself are forced to try to include tropes and story beats that just don’t fit, and the end result is often just...bad.

And, yes, these rules are arbitrary. They can and do change. Just look at shonen battle manga of the 80s vs the titles that were popular when One Piece started in the 90s vs what’s running today. The fact that Oda maintained an audience for over two decades while writing for a demographic that ages out every few years is nothing short of incredible. He clearly has a pulse on what his audience wants while maintaining a clear vision for the direction he wants One Piece to go.

Nor is this an individual effort. Oda works with his assistants and editors when it comes to making these decisions. It’s impossible to say how much he’s been influenced by these other voices, both in the past and now, even if he is ultimately the person responsible for what does and does not get put to paper.

What’s more, society changes. What is considered sexist now would not be thought of as such a generation ago. Our descendants will shake their heads at all the crazy, backward, terrible things we think are normative, and that’s not even taking into consideration differences in culture that not only exist between generations, but nations. America is going to have different ideas of what is and isn’t appropriate behavior than Japan, which undoubtably influences Oda’s sense of humor, which in turn influences the sorts of gags he puts into his comic.

I want to walk a fine line here, because I think there are objective standards that people should be held to regarding sexism while also acknowledging that getting people to agree to those standards are is impossible. If people truly feel as strongly about Oda’s character design and fan service as they make it seem online, then by all means comment on it. It’s not going to change Oda’s mind, but maybe with increased awareness the next generation of storytellers will be better.

At the same time, I think that the indignant masses need to take a deep, hard look at what they’re calling sexism. Are you really going to claim, as I’ve seen, that all fan service is sexist? Are you really going to say that Robin and Nami are weak characters because they don’t get fights? Are you really going to say that Oda’s the most sexist mangaka out there, using, Fairy Tale as an example of female characters done right?

Because if you are, you’re setting yourself up to be thought as just as vapid and uniformed as those who are only reading for tits and ass. There are legitimate criticisms to be had, but just because you don’t like a thing doesn’t mean it’s bad storytelling. Just because Oda puts something out there that you don’t approve of doesn’t make it sexist. Audiences need to be better at thinking critically about the media they consume and learn to look past the sensationalism of click bait articles to truly explore the issues at hand.

This is getting long again, so I think I’m going to split this into another post where I’ll dive into some specific examples within the series itself. Once again, thank you for your time. I promise I’ll wrap this up soon and move onto other, hopefully more positive, things.

#long post #one piece #things like this make me realize why I'm so bad at twitter #I am literally incapable of being concise #sexism #sarc talks

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oh-boleyn · 4 years ago

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POC queens in six fanfiction

[DISCLAIMER; I’m white. I don’t have any particular first-hand knowledge of racism. Commentary and criticism on this post from Fans of Colour is welcome. It is my opinion, but also it has no weight in this discussion. I’m just trying to bring some light around this problem.]

Note: I said something yesterday and decided to make a post about it

Stats.

I’m using this post about race in casting tendencies. Talking about principals 77% of Aragons are POC, 70% of Boleyns are white, 100% of Seymours are white, 70% of Cleves are POC, 92,3% of Howards are white, 100% of Parrs are POC. Based on that I will consider Aragon, Cleves and Parr

as POC, and Boleyn, Seymour and Howard as white.

Left are characters in fanfics (with and withour ships), right is characters in fanfics without ships.

There’s a drop in fanfics, mostly about POCs when you don’t add ships. The ones which their fanfics drop the least are Seymour and Howard (30,26% and 31,31%), followed by Aragon and Cleves (31,90% and 32,64%). The queens with the biggest drop are Boleyn (34,74%), and Parr (37,15%, also from being the second most written queen, to be the second less written queen).

Out of 830 fanfics, white queens are average tagged in 75,18%, while POC queens are average tagged in 69,36%. When we take the ships away, we get 566 fanfics, in which the white queens are average tagged in 74,68%, while POC queens are average tagged in 67,14%.

Passing on to relationships, I’ve decided not to take stats, since the three white queens are heavily related to each other I don’t think we would see a tendency of shipping them together (or at least I hope so). But I did take stats of friendships.

It only showed the top 10, but further research proved that White&White friendships had 47 tags used, while POC&POC friendships had 18. This is excluding any romantic relationship.

About fanfics with only one queen tagged (excluding any OC, kid character or LIW), Boleyn has 10, Howard 8, Seymour 4, Parr 3, Aragon 2, and Cleves has none.

I also want to add, that I don’t know what is not tagged. This statistics can be wrong if someone has tagged a fic in a different way or decided not to tag. Take them as approximations.

The problem with POCs in fandom.

The thing is: fandom is kinda racist.

No, I’m not calling the Six fandom racist, nor whoever is reading this probably, but fandom culture as a whole is usually kinda racist. It can be seen from CW shows that clearly have issues (I’m looking at you, Supergirl), from KPop stans, from books or other plays, but I'm going to consider the Six fandom specifically here.

I will mostly focus on headcanons and fanfiction, since it’s what this sort of essay is about.

The one that is more obvious is probably the angry black woman stereotype, usually pushed on Aragon and Cleves. Luckily for Aragon stans, Soft!Aragon has become an important part of the works about her in fanfiction, a counterpart for the stereotype, featuring her being more maternal, a chill and down to earth figure, like in the play.

Because that’s another big issue, usually we don’t portray the queens as they are in the play. While in the case of Boleyn, Seymour or Howard that is a good change (making them smarter, or just overall more complex, giving them more depth than their songs can capture) when it comes to Cleves or Aragon it gravitates towards them being angrier, sometimes even the antagonists.

For Aragon, it also relates to religion. She is sometimes even pictured as homophobic, against Parrlyn or other ships. She’s angry and defending her own ideas. There are a lot of fanfics about her treating Boleyn horribly or just hating on her; when play-wise she calls her “babe” and grows with her and the rest of the queens.

For Anna, apart from the idea of being angry, the stereotype of sassy black woman applies commonly. Another point that can be arguable is how she’s portrayed as having problems with her self-image, even when her song is about her not having them. That is more open to interpretation rather than a straight up problem, but it’s also something that has been pointed out in fandom.

Shipping also plays its part.

It came as a pleasant surprise for me when I realized the amount of fics Catherine of Aragon has, but there’s still an issue; in most fanfics with her (or any of the other POC queens), the focus is on a different character. The POC queens are more featured in ships, rather than just by themselves, and a lot of times their stories revolve around their white partner.

No, I’m not going to start screaming about “the whole play is about them knowing they don’t have to be with their white partner!” or about “shipping is wrong!” because that’s a whole other discourse. But what I’m trying to ask is, why is Catherine Parr mostly used in relationships with any of the white queens? (Parrmour, Parrward, and mostly, Parrlyn are the three we know best).

There is another big issue in fan fiction - when the POC queens aren't angry, because they are only used as a plot device for their white partners. Their stories get erased for the sake of serving the other queens, to help them along the way even when the other queens commit mistakes. It ends up with an unidimensional character, again, but this time it’s not angry black woman, it’s supportive girlfriend who is simply there, and has no personality.

It comes from the casting and translates to the fandom.

I’ve seen other accounts talking about this (I personally chose not to tag other people since this is my point of view), but it’s true that the problem comes also from casting choices. Six does a good job having lots of POCs actresses, but they still rarely get cast as Seymour or Howard, who are the more vulnerable characters. Are there bigger issues with other shows? For sure, no doubt, but Six prides itself in being “woke” (I’m lacking of a better word), while still having some problems.

There have been a lot of other problems — the way people treat some actresses (here we can also add colourism, fatphobia and probably other activism points), the way some people headcanon some queens, or jokes made around them. I understand that most of the time this is caused by ignorance, or the intent to just make a joke, but I also agree that it is part of a bigger issue. Everything becomes more than “just an innocent joke” when it gets repeated time and time again.

But! I don’t want to write about them!

I’m not saying you have to write POCs, but rather you have to think how you write them if you do. A good post about this is But!: A Response to Responses. Check how you write them, what things do you add to them, what elements can be controversial (and how many of them you add, Cleves doing a sassy remark, or Aragon getting angry in a justified way is not racism, but it being the only thing they do can sit bad). Try to see if a character makes sense or is only revolving around another. I’m not trying to say anyone is racist, or that if you don’t write or project on certain queens you are. My point is that there is a trend going around, and that’s it’s good to critique your work in light of the wider issues in the fandom.

Not everything is bad.

When I first started writing this today, I thought I was going to find a problem, like a clear issue in which the numbers are scandalous. To be honest, I found that things are actually better than what I was expecting, and while yes, there’s a lot of problems, people are also actively trying to change it. From writing more complex ships, to Soft!Aragon week or making more fanfics Anna-centered. I am not doing this to say “all the fandom is racist!” but rather point out the issue that has been around for a long time.

#six the musical #six the musical fanfiction #mentioned: shipping the queens #mentioned: the liw #mentioned: catholicism

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loominggaia · 3 years ago

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“Okay New York Anon here. I’m really sorry about this chapter and regret writing it, the way i did. Thinking about it post production I’m realizing I made it come off as transphobic and tasteless. Angry guy was supposed to be a parody of the stereotypical sjw you’d see in a cringe comp violently going off on people for accidentally being mis gendered. Sorry if this train wreak of a chapter offends anyone.”

Anon, I’m so honored that you would spend the time to write fanfiction about my series. Not everyone is a perfect writer (I’m sure not), and personally I don’t believe that every piece of writing has to “set a good example” when it comes to politics and morality. The Looming Gaia series is for ages 18+, not preschoolers. I think adults have the mental capacity to differentiate between right and wrong and form their own opinions when they’re reading something (at least I hope they do), so I’m going to go ahead and post your story.

But I also care about my followers’ well-beings, so I’m going to compromise and: 1) Put this chapter under a cut so they don’t have to see it if they don’t want to. 2) Put a content warning ahead of it so they can decide if it’s worth the risk.

If anyone proceeds from here and gets offended, that’s 100% their own fault. I care a lot about writing an inclusive series that doesn’t alienate anyone based on race, gender, sexuality, and so on. At the same time, I’m hugely against censorship, so I always welcome fan content even if it’s off-color or I don’t personally agree with what it’s trying to say (barring anything illegal or blatantly hateful towards any group; i.e. glorification of pedophilia or abuse, calls to real-world violence, supporting real-world hate groups, etc. I will never accept that kind of content. If anyone comes in here praising nazi ideaologies or calling for action against LGBT folks, they can fuck right off.)

Readers, you’ve been thoroughly warned.

You can read the other parts here.

CONTENT WARNINGS: This fan content contains scenes of captivity, mental hospitals, depictions of violence, off-color depiction of a transgender individual, and (censored) racial slurs. While reading this, I personally didn’t get the impression that Anon meant any harm. It comes off as goofy, edgy, over-the-top satire to me, like something you’d see in an episode of South Park. Use your best judgement and proceed at your own risk.

(content under cut)

The crew had squatted in an abandoned building on the outskirts of the city that night. They already knew that only humans existed in this world and the reaction that lady had to seeing Elska only compounded the need for stealth. Their only plan right now being find Evan and get back to Gaia. That morning the crew split up, Alaine and Lukus where to continue searching for Evan, Issac and Jeimos where to go shopping, Elska would search the outskirts out of sight and Zeffer would search at night.

Evan was not mad at doctors for keeping him hear. He knew they where just doing their jobs and where concerned for him, since magic, elves and werewolves where fictional to them he understood he looked like a crazy person to them. That didn’t take away from how annoying it was to be trapped here in this stupid hospital. Knowing his crew was out their somewhere he knew he needed to leave and contact them somehow, he needed a escape plan.

He had two plans so far, plan A was to butter up the therapist into letting him go. Behave himself, take his meds, admit Gaia’s not real and say he’s feeling better. Hoping that upon seeing this drastic improvement the therapist will approve his release and he can finally go out and find his friends. Plan B was in case plan A failed. He would bust himself out of here and go on the run. He really didn’t want to hurt anybody, just slip out unnoticed, but he had a feeling it wouldn’t be that easy.

Issac and Jeimos wandered around the city streets aimlessly in absolute awe of the sights and sounds all around them. Jeimos was getting more unnerved by not being capable of feeling any magic in their surroundings and was starting to wonder if it was just all the iron nearby or something more? Not being able to read any of the signs around them made trying to find a store to stock up on supplies difficult. Finding a food place with golden arch’s they go their as their first stop.

The pair enter this strange restaurant, the place smelling of grease and fry oil. Theirs quite the line so they just wait, taking a look around and absorbing the experience. They see a lot of interesting people and things from pictures of a clown holding a burger, groups of people on strange devices and messy families eating, an extremely obese man the two mistook for a troll horking down a massive pile of greasy food. Kids running in and out of a indoor jungle gym. This place had it all.

They waited their turn almost at the register, waiting behind a mother and her kids who kept changing her order every three seconds and trying to corral her kids. The cashier, a young man around issacs age but with a tired, dead look in his eyes that made him look as if he’s seen a war zone rang the lady up and ushers our pair to the register, asking in a flat, apathetic voice what they would like to order. Neither of them can read the electronic menu so using the numbers and pictures they order

The disgruntled cashier rang them up, totaling their order up to over $55! Him not being pleased by Jeimos’s constant questions and issac playfully asking for a kids toy. They try to pay, placing some gold coins on the counter. The cashier just looks at the coins then back to them, and, in an even more annoyed voice, told them they only take usd, not foreign currency. Telling them they can either pay in cash or card or just leave, the line was building up behind them and getting restless.

Jeimos trying to salvage this, nervously ask if theirs anything they can work out. Not wanting to have wasted their time. The cashier breaths deeply, saying he’ll get the manager, leaving the counter behind. The people in line are angrily starting at the two, Issac having a ball and Jeimos being highly uncomfortable with all the staring and swearing from them. The cashier returns with a fat, sleezy looking middle age man, presumably the manager. Him asking what’s going on here?

The cashier explains the situation in his most annoyed, apathetic tone with the manager glancing over the two. He repeats what the cashier told them, they only take usd and if they can’t pay then just leave, their clogging up the line. Jeimos try’s to explain this is all they have and is about to give up when Issac speaks up and tells them the coins are solid gold. That catch’s the managers attention, who in a greedy smile picks up the coins to check, seeing yes, their real gold!!!

His greedy smile grows wider and he tells them they can understand work something out! Snatching up the gold coins and apologizing for the inconvenience, talking about his no good employees and starts berating the cashier right in front of them for being “rude and unhelpful” to such fine paying customers! The cashier takes one look at his boss, takes off his hat and apron shoving them into his bosses hands and just says, completely monotone “I quit” and walks out without a second glance.

Meanwhile, Lukus and Alaine where walking down the streets through the massive crowds looking for any sign of Evan. Despite trying to keep a low profile they where gathering a lot of attention, walking through down town in medieval armor and brandishing weapons tends to do that. While walking outside a storefront Alaines eyes are caught by a beautiful blue dress, he being mesmerized by. “Nice cosplay” she hears suddenly from behind, Turing around to see a short, well dressed women behind her.

Alaine jut awkwardly thanks her for the compliment. The women also compliments Alaines scales, believing them to be a make up design for whatever cosplay she’s doing. The women introduces herself as Kimi and ask if she was looking at that dress in the window. Alaine answers yes and now both are both gawking at and gushing over the dresses beauty. Kimi complaining about the ludicrously high price tag but before their conversation can continue Lukus calls back to her, wondering where she is?

Alaine snaps back on into mission mode as Lukus returns. She apologizes to Kimi for leaving and tells her their looking for someone, asking if she’s seen a large blonde man with a metal leg. She says no but wishes them luck on trying to find their friend. The two head off once again search the city streets for Evan and once again have no luck, it didn’t help that a lot of people where stopping them, asking for photos of their “costumes” and asking what characters their dressed as?

After hours of searching and coming up empty handed both where rather hungry. Stopping at a cafe looking place to grab a quick bite. The place smelled of coffee and a sign outside had a picture of a twin tailed mermaid on a green background. As they where waiting in line observing all the weird people around them they saw a familiar face ahead of them, Kimi. She had a coffee in her hands and was thanking the barista but didn’t see them. Neither did she see the weird guy she bumped into.

The guy she bumped into looked ridiculous to Alaine and Lukus, having fluorescent pink cloths, big goofy glasses and a oversized beanie I’ve this colorful hair. The guy yelled at her to watch where she’s going, she apologized but then she said sir. The pair could already sense this guy would be trouble as the moment kimi said “sir” it looked as if the weird guys was about to explode. SIR!!! He screamed, grabbing everyone’s attention, his face beat red and eyes bulging in rage!

To say he exploded on Kimi would be an understatement, he started loudly screaming at her “ did you just misgender me”!!! The screaming got even louder as he started listing off a bunch of gibberish and loudly insulting her, calling her sexist, anti-lgbt, telling to kill herself and die in a hole. His screaming getting more incoherent and seemed to be literally frothing at the mouth. Kimi was just backing away, scared and trying to apologize but the guy just kept screaming over her plea’s.

(Feel like I need to put a trigger warning for this one so here it is. Trigger warning for Lukus and Alaine getting in a fight with ‘that kind’ of trans guy, the kind responsible for all the negative stereotypes about the trans community. And Issac being called a racial slur. You have been warned.)

Alaine and Lukus stepped in to stop this dude from hurting Kimi. He seriously looked like he was about ready to punch her. They stepped in and tried to diffuse the situation, putting themselves between kimi and the angry man. They try to explain to him that how could she have known he wasn’t cis, that’s it’s an honest mistake and to let it slide. That only seemed to pissed him off more as he threw a drink in Alaines face and shoved Lukus in anger, wrong move.

Just as Lukus was winding up a punch Alaine beat him to it, knocking the asshole clean to the floor in a single strike. He went down like a sack of potato’s and was laying out cold. The three just left, taking Kimi and leaving. Alaine was fuming but if she where calmer she would have noticed it was water he threw at her, and would have also noticed she didn’t flop to the floor in her aquatic form, she was too pissed off the notices.

Kimi thanks them for saving her from that crazy guy and try’s frantically to explains to them she’s pro-lgbt, always try’s to respect peoples pronouns and is actually a lesbian herself. They cut her off, she didn’t need to explain herself to them. On the flip side Jeimos and Issac are carrying back their huge bags of fast food back to the groups hideout waiting to hear any news. Issac see’s a downed old man and the street and rushed to help him.

Just as Issac was reaching out to help him the old man swats him away, screaming at him. “Keep your hands off me you filthy N@$$#r”! Heads turn and people stop dead in their tracks in pure shock at what they just heard. Issac and Jeimos had no idea what that weird word meant but it guessing by the crowds reaction, it was really bad. The old man gets himself up and goes off on a racist rant, accusing Issac of trying to steal from him, calling all his “kind” low-life scum and just screams at him.

First of all Anon, your depiction of working at a fast food place is a whole-ass mood and I felt it lol. I’m interested to see what role this character Kimi plays! Maybe she has ties to the hospital? Seeing the crew clash with real-world culture is very interesting. I’m enjoying their adventure so far. TO BE CONTINUED…?

#fanfic #looming gaia

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treeni · 4 years ago

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Sanders Sides Theory, The Sides That Aren't Pt 1: Remy and Emile

Theories Master Post

So my sick and feverish brain had an epiphany when researching a theory on Roman and Remus (two epiphanies actually) that involved revitalizing a scrapped idea and latching onto something that initially started as a joke and then accidentally found evidence for. So let’s talk about that.

So let’s start with that scrapped idea here in part 1.

Let’s talk Remy and Emile.

These are two characters who are constantly associated with the sides in fandom in various interactions and ways, and yet why? Shouldn’t they be dismissed as just two random characters that Thomas and co made in the seemingly endless number of videos they’ve created? I mean, the two supposedly live in an entirely different universe than the sides. So we shouldn’t be “reading” them as sides, logically speaking.

So why such a big part of the fandom is latching onto these characters as sides (or equivalent to sides) despite the fact that they don’t actually appear in Sanders Sides (or at least haven’t yet, but we’ll get to that)?

Well, that answer is a bit layered.

The first and obvious answer is color theory, which I talked about in my Orange side theory. Essentially the audience knew for certain the sides were following color patterns from the moment Janus made his appearance with his bright yellow gloves. Patton and Logan’s colors existing independently of each other was what brought initial hesitation to that model because they were both blue, but they aren’t exactly, instead both primary color sets (Red, Blue, Yellow) and (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow) are being employed as well as the secondary color set (Green, Purple, Orange). (Yes, yellow is included in both primaries, which is part of the brilliance of it being used for Janus because it only adds to his character as existing in binaries.) You’ll notice however, that to complete the (CMY) model, you need the Magenta. Visually speaking, it’s easy to pick out the pink tied Emile to fill that role.

As I’ve already stated, I’m not the only one who thinks Emile’s the perfect slot for that ideology, there’s a reason why he keeps appearing in fan art and fiction related to the sides. Is it his tie alone though that pushes the audience into placing him into that role? No. If it were that simple, I would simply point out that c!Thomas is also often slotted into the “pink spot” and leave it at that because c!Thomas is clearly already included in the Sanders Sides as we see him there. No, instead I’m here to tell you that assigning pink to c!Thomas is a mischaracterization.

But again, the answer of how and why is a bit layered, so let’s move onto Remy for the moment and circle back to Emile.

Going back to color theory for a moment, (CMY) is actually an incomplete version of that primary model. It’s actually (CMYK), with the K standing for Black. So in truth, to fulfill that model we actually need both a Magenta and a Black side. You are likely already predicting what I’m going to say, but Remy is indeed the perfect fit for that role and not simply because of his outfit choice.

To start off by defining why Remy is a side, we need to understand what the sides are and what differentiates them from the “shorts sides”.

For those of you who are unaware, the Sanders Shorts has a set of characters (Teacher, Anxiety, etc.) who have their own names that call back to their roles in a simplified, easy to remember way (Teacher=Teal, Anxiety=Andy, Dad=Dyad, and Prince=Pryce). These four in particular are characters that the audience immediately connects with the main four sides from Sanders sides, but can also immediately recognize a dissonance between them.

For example, Virgil and Andy are not at all synonymous with one another. Andy wears Virgil’s old jacket, it’s true, but he also has a very relaxed attitude whenever he’s not specifically “giving” anxiety. He also is different than Virgil because he clearly does not suffer from the symptoms of anxiety he gives. Instead, he simply turns up, does his job and is satisfied in that accomplishment. Andy is more like what Virgil tried to be in the first season, but failed because he simply cared too much.

Andy is more of a one dimensional character who fulfills a single role, he isn’t shown to have specific likes, dislikes, hopes, wants, dreams, or fears like Virgil is. Virgil is a complicated, multi-faceted character who cares, quite a bit. He has as much, if not more anxiety than he gives because he cares about the result of c!Thomas’ actions. He wants to protect c!Thomas and the other sides, he likes the color purple and MCR, he dislikes being patronized, but he yearns for love and acceptance as who he is.

What ultimately differentiates the Sanders Sides, from the Sanders Shorts sides is their dimension. The Sanders Sides are characters with layers, depth and personality, while the Sanders Shorts sides are flat characters in comparison.

So what does that have to do with Remy?

Remy is a multi-dimensional character. He’s defiant and rebellious, he likes to stay out late and party, he likes lavender, loud music, pumpkin spice, layered clothing, autumn. He’s over dramatic sometimes and funny. He stands out from the one dimensional characters in the Sanders Shorts because he is much more layered than them.

However, Remy’s stuck in the Sanders Shorts videos because of how c!Thomas sees him, as Sleep. How is a character who represents Sleep meant to help c!Thomas in his everyday life afterall? Except, c!Thomas historically simplifies and misunderstands his own sides. Patton is more than morality, he’s at the center of a whole range of emotions, he’s the heart. Logan isn’t just simple logic, he tries to be considerate of the others, he’s hopeful and has a deep understanding on a whole range of subjects that often go outside the bounds of simple, logical knowledge. Saying that Patton is Morality or Logan is Logic is an oversimplification of what the characters represent, that was done specifically by c!Thomas. Then, understanding Janus as Deceit was in many ways a flat out misunderstanding of what the character represented. Patton told the audience from the beginning that Janus is self-preservation. Lying is one of the tools Janus uses to achieve that end. (More on that in another theory.)

I believe that Remy being labeled as Sleep is a misunderstanding of him by c!Thomas. (I also believe that this is an intentional move made by Thomas & co.)

So, if not Sleep, then what is Remy? Well, as I’ve stated, that answer is complicated because all of the Sides are an array of things. They’re complex characters who can’t really be simplified to a single term and doing such is a fallacy, but as it helps audience understanding I’m going to do it anyway.

In simplest terms, Remy is Apathy. Consider for a moment that at his baseline c!Thomas is someone who cares a lot, like a lot about everything. The whole nature of Sanders Sides as a show is literally how much he cares. However, caring too much can be a problem, leading to emotional over-exertion. People need a certain level of apathy to be able to sleep, to push all their problems away for a little while and take time to decompress and recharge. This would be why Remy is associated with sleep. He gives c!Thomas the mindset to be able to sleep, rather than being the function itself.

We can also see evidence that Remy is apathy in the character itself. Remy lives a very “in the moment” kind of life. He parties, constantly drinks coffee, and generally seems to do what he wants, even when it gets him into trouble. (Like getting completely lost.) He plays on his phone when people talk to him too long, he gets bored with being chastised, and essentially shrugs off criticism. It’s because he’s apathetic. He is essentially the embodiment of “fuck it” behavior. In real life it’s the often people who party most nights that care the least about their lives because they’re unhappy and a little dead inside. The partying “in the moment” behavior acts as a distraction from the nothingness. Sort of like simulating emotions with physical rushes (high amounts of caffeine or alcohol, loud music, crowds, essentially anything to drown out the “nothingness”). On top of that, Remy also embodies some gay stereotypes in a way that many of Thomas’ characters don’t. Again, it’s because he doesn’t care about being stereotyped. He’ll say want he wants, act how he wants, and live how he wants.

Even his name is evidence. While we might be drawn to the conclusion that Remy is a play on the Rem-cycle (and that is almost certainly part of it given the Sleep connotation, though the Rem-cycle is actually the point at sleep where the brain is most active and a person is easiest to wake from sleep) You should also be aware that it’s a nickname for the name Remington. Remington is derived from the old English word “hremm” that meant both “raven” and “settlement”. While a raven is the perfect association for the black color-scheme and some of his personality traits, the literal and metaphorical meanings of the term “settlement” I think is the perfect idea to associate with what I believe Remy is meant to embody. Both the literal place to stop and rest, a safe place, but also the settlement of the mind, being able to push all of the emotional and literal fatigue of the day away. The fact that Remy is gone so often is very telling in the stressed and emotional state that c!Thomas is in.

Also in regards to names, Remy and Emile are intrinsically connected. While both have name meanings that are very important to their characters, they’re also the names of the brothers from Ratatouille. (A movie basically about pursuing your dreams when the world and even your family are against you.) Their names and the connection between their names is evidence that the two characters were designed together as a tribute.

So let’s get back to Emile for a bit. Like Remy we know he’s more complicated than many of the characters from the shorts. For example, we know he loves cartoons, references, and jokes. He’s generally seems to be a happy person and is a therapist (or at least plays one). So, what exactly is he if he’s a side? Well, as I’ve said none of the sides are so simple as to signify one single thing. On top of that, I think his lack of appearance in almost anything besides Cartoon Therapy is evidence to the fact that c!Thomas doesn’t understand him. Like, I think he has some grasp on Remy, despite misunderstanding him, however I think he simply has no connection or understanding of what Emile does/represents. Yet, if I had to label him with a single trait for simplicity sake, it would be Acceptance, essentially the other reason why Sanders Sides exists (or at least has conflict).

There is so much that c!Thomas hasn’t accepted about his life, his career, but most importantly about himself. It’s why the debates go on with each new episode and why the sides struggle to accept each other. It is also why Emile would not have yet made an actual appearance yet in Sanders Sides, I would consider him to be a rejected and repressed light side. Also, embodying acceptance, it would be his job above all else to listen to the other sides. A good therapist does not add their own voice and opinion into the mix until their client is ready to hear it. They need time to get through it all and process. That is exactly what Sanders Sides is already doing for c!Thomas.

Let’s get back to names for a moment, as I said, Emile’s name meaning is also incredibly fitting for what I believe that he represents as a Side. Emile literally means “coming from the Aemilian family” which is in turn derived from the Latin word “aemulus” meaning complete.

My theory is essentially that Emile is going to be our last surprise, maybe coupled with Remy or maybe directly after Remy. Remy, the “darkside” who is often AWOL because he’s self aware of how dangerous he can be in too high of doses and Emile, the “lightside” who is repressed. Essentially, Apathy, reminding him that it’s okay to let go of things for a while and Acceptance, teaching him how to accept himself above all things.

I had initially scrapped this theory because a friend told me Thomas and co had already denied that Remy and Emile are in the Sanders sides universe and I have a little bit more to say about that in particular in part 2 (which should be coming out in the next couple days, so keep an eye out) but also I want to just set a reminder that you shouldn’t believe much about what a creator denies about their work. Of course they aren’t going to reveal secrets or surprises to you early. Do I know for a fact that Remy and Emile are Sides? Absolutely not, all I can do is align the evidence and present to you my findings.

(Also general shout out to @candied-peach for listening to all of my insanity to get me to this point. Seriously, thank you.)

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surveys-at-your-service · 3 years ago

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Survey #420

lol blaze it (i’m funny i swear)

In your opinion, which fast food place has the best fries? Without a doubt, Bojangle's. Good. Shit. Are there hurricanes where you live? Yeah, they're common here. What do you hate the most about yourself? I'd really rather not get into this right about now. What song are you listening to right now? "Beast of Gévaudan" by Powerwolf. What was your first concert? Alice Cooper. Also my only concert. What’s your favorite Johnny Depp movie? Alice In Wonderland. Who did you last say “I love you” to? My sister. Do you like pumpkin pie? Anything pumpkin-flavored is a hell no from me. Do you know anyone named Austin? Knew, rather. Do you know anyone who is having a baby? My friend recently announced she and her husband are having their second child in December. What was the last thing you cried about? Just PTSD. Do you prefer regular or chocolate milk? I like both, but I prefer chocolate. Do you think you are an argumentative person? Definitely not. How many deep dark secrets do you have? Two or so, idk. What was the spiciest thing you’ve ever eaten? Some wings at Buffalo Wild Wings with one of the hottest sauces. Wanted to die. ... Yet I continued to get that one whenever I went for years lmao. Who last called you sexy? I don't know. Would you class yourself as a good role model? In some ways, but in a lot of other ways, no. Are you scared of the dark? No. Do you have a motto? No. Who did you last see on webcam? The doctor that overlooks my TMS progress. Do you need a haircut? I need a trim for sure. How would you react if your mother told you that she was pregnant again? Well, considering 1.) she's way past menopause and especially 2.) she's had a complete hysterectomy, y'know... that's kind of impossible. She also hasn't been with a guy in many years, so she would have to be joking. You log into Facebook and see the red ‘1’ notification next to the message icon. Who do you want it to be? -___- Would you rather exercise alone or with other people? ALONE. You will NOT see me exercise in front of other people. What is the most difficult or involved video game you’ve ever played? The most involved is DEFINITELY World of Warcraft, and I guess you could consider it the hardest too, given some of the much more difficult things I've done in it. It itself isn't a hard game whatsoever, but you can pursue some really hard achievements. Ever watch the show Supernatural? If you have, then what’s your favorite episode? I used to love it, but just stopped watching eventually. My fave episode... Man, it's been too long to remember many. Probably one of the funnier ones. I remember I specifically liked the bit where they were in your everyday comedy show, as well as the one where I THINK Dean kept trying to prevent Sam from dying. I just remember the "Eye of the Tiger" bit that is pure gold. Ever heard of flavored honey? If so, what’s you’re favorite flavor? Oh, no, but that sounds good. Do you remember what your favorite show was when you were little? Yeah, Pokemon. Do you put anything besides cheese on grilled cheese sandwiches? Besides butter, which I think is pretty standard, no. When it comes to books, what do you think is the “perfect” amount of pages? Uh, I dunno. It depends on the book. I don't really care about page numbers. Would you ever be interested in going scuba diving? Yeah. Out of all of your friends/relatives, who would you say has the best vocabulary? Girt, probably. Are any of your fingers or toes deformed? What about the nails? I don't think so? When is the last time you cried? I was sobbing earlier today, fun stuff. Would you ever date somebody that has been divorced more than once? Most likely not. ESPECIALLY at my age. What are some stereotypically nerdy things that you like? Oh god. WoW, M:tG, big glasses, anime (does that count? idk really), video games... a lot of stuff, really. Have you ever attended a wedding that ended where the bride and groom didn’t actually get married? What happened? Y I K E S, no. That would be SO uncomf. What scares you the most about becoming a mother (hypothetically, if you don’t want to have children)? Actually raising it properly, physically and emotionally. Would you ever want a job in fashion? What would you enjoy about that type of job? No. Would you ever be a surrogate mother? No. What do you think would be the best and worst parts about being a twin? It'd be cool to have someone you feel an almost supernatural connection towards, but I'd also feel like I wasn't as "original" as I would be if I was born alone. Do you feel that your childhood was more rough compared to others around you? I mean it wasn't awful at all, but sure, in some ways compared to at least someone. How would you react if you found out today that you were actually adopted? Well today I'm a wreck, so don't tell me. I want to know that I wasn't lied to for 25 years. Have either of your parents ever cheated on one another before, that you know of? How would you react if you found out today that one of them cheated? I'm not entirely clear on this, but I'm 90% sure Dad cheated on Mom with his now-wife. Dad also accused Mom of cheating, but I HIGHLY doubt that's true. Do you like cleaning and organizing? Not really. How would you react if you found out you were infertile? If you don’t plan on having kids to begin with, what is a long-term goal you’d be crushed to find out was impossible to achieve? Fuck having kids. I'd be a terrible mother. So to answer the other question, I'll be pretty, pretty sad if I can't get permission to spread Teddy's ashes at Yellowstone. Would you take your dream job if it were out of the country? Well, obviously not considering my dream job is a meerkat biologist, and I'm not moving to Africa. Have you ever been robbed? No. Is anyone close to you an alcoholic? Not anymore. Dad was, but he's recovered. Have you ever dumped anyone? Yes. What kind of tea do you drink? I hate tea. Do you know anyone in a gang? No, and I hope I never do. What’s the sweetest thing anyone has ever done for you? Risk his fucking sanity and health to try to hold my fucked up self up. What is your orientation? Gay? Straight? Metrosexual? Anything other? Bisexual. I've kinda been questioning pansexual of the late, though. I don't know. Have you ever done anything really dangerous or illegal with friends? Not to my memory. Name three feelings you’re feeling right now: Regret. Hopelessness. Loneliness. And the reasons for these feelings? Take a wild fuckin' guess. How do you feel about your life right now? It's an actual dumpster fire. Is it easy for you to like yourself? Why or why not? Fuck no. Because there's just not very much TO like about me. Even on my good days, I see flaw after flaw in myself. What subjects come naturally to you? English, some aspects of science. What subjects do not? Math, economics, politics, history... Do you read more fiction or more non-fiction books? Definitely fiction. When I read a book, I want an escape from the real world. How has today been for you? BOY HOWDY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! What did you do? Went to TMS therapy. Sat on the Internet. Cried. :^) Are there any candles lit in the room you’re in? No. Are there any lava lamps near you? No. I want one, though. Do you like cats or dogs better? Cats. Are any of your friends a pothead? Yes. What’s a goal you’re trying to accomplish soon? Start losing weight again. That'd be pretty goddamn grand. Are you a high maintenance person? Definitely not. The last time you yelled as loud as you could, what was the reason? I was having a nightmare. Have you ever been heartbroken? For sure. Who did that to you? First Dad, then Jason. Did you go through an ugly stage as a kid? Boy, did I. The last type of sandwich you made or ate: A pb&j. The last time you spent most of the day in bed: Literally every day. I do just about everything in bed. Pathetic, I know. The last friend or acquaintance you made: Ummmm idk. The last thing you took pictures of: A hydrangea bush. The last time you were scared: Now. The future is terrifying, my friend. The last thing you looked up online: The definition of a word to ensure I was using it correctly. The last thing you disagreed with: So I've been watching John Wolfe's old stream of him playing Alice: Madness Returns, and he went on a total soapbox about smoking being okay essentially because we're all gonna die eventually from something, and I really disagreed with it. Does your house have a separate laundry room? No, just like a closet. Do your parents still help you financially? I'm still entirely dependent on them. Does your car have a backup camera? No. Have either of your parents ever been in trouble with the law? Not to my knowledge. Have you ever had a pet that lived to be really old for its breed/species? REALLY old, no. Teddy was definitely up there, but beagles have lived longer. What was the last strong scent you smelled? Lysol. Have you ever told someone to their face that they were ugly? Christ, no. Is your bed against more than one of your walls? No. Have you ever been attracted to someone’s parent? Don't think so? Have you ever pole danced before? No. Have you ever broken into someone’s house? No. Have you ever seen a live bat? Yes. What is the most amount of money you’ve spent on a meal before? I dunno. Have you ever taken a woodshop class? No. How much time do you spend on Facebook, if you have one? Funny you ask, because as of today I decided to take a break from it for awhile. I've found it's nothing more than a breeding ground for envy and making me feel like a horribly incompetent adult. Has a teacher ever made you hate yourself/your work? I had one photography teacher in college that I was NOT a fan of. He was super, super hard on everyone, like to an unnecessary degree. We were students, not pros. Have you ever been on the barrier or front row at a concert? No. Are your parents supportive of you? Somehow.

#survey #surveys #random questions

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