#but I do welcome discourse

[miraculouslumination]

You know sometimes it just hits you that so much of queer "discourse" is basically one group of queer people trying to cultivate a subcommunity for themselves and their identity while another group of queer people cry and scream about how that group, who is just trying to exist and have their own bubble, is the cause of all their own group's problems

[bixels]

So i have a small nicpic i wanted to share with you about your interpretation of spike in the au and i want to make two things clear before i talk

1) i havent watch the series for a little while as of now so i might be misnterpreting a aspect of this chatacter that might have never been there and only apeared in fan content and personal interpretation (since that whats been keeping me on the fandom)

2) this is not a big problem about the au i matured enough to not get angry at a interpretation of a fictional charater

Now here i go

I feel spike being the same race as the rest of his familie makes him lose a part of his character that might have not been central but was still something interesting about him and is the idea of not mayhering how diferent he looked from his adoptive family (and his cominty as a whole) he was he was still seen as part of it

Again this isnt a big problem with the au as a whole its just a small nicpic that i have about the au and its not going to make me hate the au

This was just my opinion that i wanted to share and im interested to know your opinion about what i said

I understand this criticism and agree that having Simon/Spike be a different race than Thea could speak to their relationship in the original show.

My reasoning for designing them both to be African American is this. I believe Simon's adoption is enough to explore the feelings of separation and exclusion he may have with Thea and her family. The original show doesn't bring up Twilight and Spike's racial differences much because they originally didn't consider Spike to be a part of Twilight's family. As far as I know, there's no moment where someone says, "Wow! You're telling me you're related to Twilight Sparkle? But you look nothing alike!" because Spike was more so Twilights... familiar than anything.

Later episodes that explore their familial dynamic poses the conflict through Spike's adoption. There's one episode where Spike's "biological father" returns, and Spike accuses Twilight of not being his real family, which breaks her heart. There's another that delves deep into Spike's feelings of exclusion from Twilight and Shining Armor's siblinghood. Basically, in discussions of family dynamics, the show places more emphasis on Spike's identity as an adopted sibling rather than a dragon.

I really do believe a multiracial family would be good representation, but the racial dynamics would not be something I'd be interested in getting into. That's not to say I find real multiracial families problematic or uninteresting or unappealing or unimportant. I just wouldn't be interested in having to explain in-text that Simon (non-black) and Thea (black) are related over and over; it would grow tedious. It adds an extra level of writing complication and opens up racial discourse (discourse that I feel is unrelated to their relationship in the original show) that I don't want to concern myself with, especially because I have no experience in navigating such discourse.

[torchickentacos]

i will always shout praises of bi4bi but given recent discourse I feel the need to say that I love bi4het too! I just love bisexuality in general in its many forms, and anyone who only likes it when it's 'queer enough' for them is biphobic. Bisexuals should be able to bring their LaMe CiShEt BoYfRiEnD to pride without being made to feel like spectators and outsiders to their own event.

[rainbow-neko-main]

Okay so controversial topics about the new Fiona and Cake episode. Children avert your eyes I might be on the wrong side of history here.

I dont see a problem with the Simon x Winter King shipping.

Did anyone bat an eye when we were shipping sandersides together? Those were all just peices of Thomas so whether you like it or not thst was just Thomas x Thomas shipping.

Would you, or would you not, kiss a clone of yourself? It's an entirely FICTIONAL thing that humans have no way to replicate, and so the internet has asked this question for a long ass time. This isn't something that could happen, so fictionally, would you kiss a clone of yourself? Because the awnser for me is that I think I would, because it sounds like a very healing self love learning process.

What caused us to think makeouts or romantic relationships with an alternate version or clone of OURSELVES was morally wrong? What about it is wrong??? Like /gen I am struggling to find a reason why it's wrong and would love if someone could give me the run down on the opposite side of this argument. Is it egotistical? Yes absolutely. Is it weird? YES. BECAUSE ITS A FICTIONAL THING THATLL NEVER HAPPEN. But is it wrong and deserving of being cussed out and ridiculed? I think not!!!

Do I think the internet may have trauma regarding the onceler and sans aus and its causeing everyone to overreact and lose their bloody minds? Yes. Yes I do.

[necrotic-nephilim]

i recently remembered DickTim Week 2024 is happening very soon and i looked at the prompts again to see if i could get anything out for it and. the Hades & Persephone AU prompt for day 1 has got me really thinking so here's a vague concept i plan to write.

i've been pretty burnt out on modern Hades & Persephone retellings because of how they always seem to fall into the same generic "innocent wide-eyed girl runs from her evil mean mother into the arms of a dark mysterious man because actually she went willingly and chose to marry him" which has gotten repetitive for my tastes. (for clarity i don't care if this retelling is your cup of tea personally, so long as you're not actively trying to rewrite the original myth and claim untrue things about it, if this is your favorite flavor i sincerely hope you enjoy the buffet i just have little interest in it since it feels overdone for me and exhausted of it's supposed commentary atp)

but? but. biblically accurate Hades & Persephone AU has me all kinds of interested. because wait listen so hear me out right. Hades!Dick and Persephone!Tim, obviously. i feel it'd be more loosely inspired by with themes and imagery (though playing with death and nature powers could be interesting, i haven't decided) rather than explicitly making them gods and all. but. something dark and fucked up where Dick and Bruce are especially estranged. maybe to do with Jason's return, maybe to do with them just clashing and having their usual explosive arguments. and Bruce knows the peace needs to be kept, if he and Dick are at odds then everyone starts to pick sides and things just fracture so he needs a peace offering.

and the peace offering is Tim.

Bruce (the stand-in for Zeus) offers up Tim. agrees to have Tim move to Bludhaven and be Dick's... whatever Dick wants him to be. knowing that with the implication comes the likelihood of Dick grooming Tim. and Tim has no real say and is hesitant to put up a real fight. he doesn't want this, he knows what this is going to imply Dick will do to him, but he also knows if he says no things have the possibility to just... fall apart. so he's the unwilling bride, dragged off to the metaphorical underworld (Bludhaven) with Dick, away from his family, his friends, the life he built.

and on the flip side, i think weirdly enough, your best pick for the Demeter stand-in is *Jason*. just, hear me out on that. not necessarily on the side of it being motherly, but on Jason being just estranged enough from the Batfamily to be the one willing to call it out for being bad and wrong and raising bloody hell to get Tim back. maybe it's because Jason wants Tim for himself, maybe it's truly out of a concern for Tim to have autonomy, i'm toying with the idea of it primarily being Tim's POV and him genuinely not knowing which of these is true. (and the truth possibly ends up being a complicated middle ground) and because i like Helena, i think you can use her as the Hekate stand in, the one who strikes a tentative alliance with Jason and tries to go find Tim and bring him back. Tim stuck with Dick, getting groomed and hyperaware of it, possibly even getting fucked the whole time as well, knowing he can't go back without causing massive issues for Dick and Bruce because well, Bruce did promise him to Dick. so he has to adjust his whole life, try to figure out being a vigilante in this new city with Dick breathing down his neck the whole time.

and then much like the ending of the myth, a sort of compromise is struck that's a shaky deal for everyone involved. Tim is put on an essential timeshare, going back and forth between Gotham, where he has friends and family and a support system, then getting dragged right back to Bludhaven with Dick in this brutal cycle that he slowly gets used to and stockholm'd into even liking it. Dick isn't so bad, once he gets used to the quirks of their unbalanced 'relationship'. the sex is even something he can adjust to as well. not quite a happy ending but one that sits in this realistic grey area that becomes Tim's life.

i will write this, eventually, but i don't know if i'll get to it before DickTim Week ends so by posting the idea i'm essentially putting it out into the world so the peer pressure holds me accountable. i just. really like the potential of making Hades/Persephone AUs as fucked up as they can be simply by adhering to the source material and making it a raw story of being stolen away and forced to like this new home you didn't ask for.

also a less fleshed-out aspect of this idea i have ties into Persephone becoming the Queen of the Underworld when she's taken and how the transition from Kore to Persephone could be reflected in Tim. how he makes the best of the worst situation and becomes something far more dangerous and dark when he's in Bludhaven, possibly takes on a new vigilante name/identity and leans into the worst quirks of his personality he tries to tamper because there's no point in not going full tilt Obsessively Weird if he has no choice anyway and it being one small way he takes back his autonomy, and that inevitably making Dick *more* into him, because he gets to see Tim finally just. let loose.

[diueliz]

at the end of the day I think I failed to have a very strong reaction to the substance – positive or negative. I'm still collecting my thoughts on it a bit but one thought I keep coming back to is that I don't think it had that much to say about its subject (even if the things to say are sleazy and demented), or that it didn't have enough fun or do anything particularly interesting beyond its premise. once you have the premise, you kind of have the whole film do you not, and I think that got tiring after a while. In a similar way, I don't think I find it a successful exploration of a particular emotion or feeling, for example rage, as someone suggested; if that's what it's doing, it's not raging enough, I think the polish can have its purpose but it's not dirtied enough. Ok in a literal sense, everything does end up covered in blood, which on a surface and purely base level I could enjoy, but it also makes me think of how much harder it could hit with a bit more emotion behind it. I did really like demi moore though, and i think i even appreciated qualley more here than in anything else I've seen her

[statementlou]

I feel like when people ask famous personalities to participate in activism, they may be influenced by the parasocial relationships they have formed with these celebrities and not that they really care about what is going on. They expect famous individuals to act as role models or representatives of their beliefs. That's why I think, it is crucial to maintain a critical perspective and not depend solely on celebrities for activism. This can result in a passive approach to social change and disregard the significance of collaborative action and personal engagement. The majority of celebrities don't care lol even who speak up about it publicly. Their reality is different from ours, like Gigi Hadid also drank Starbucks the other day, Bella Hadid worked with a lot of Zionist brands and did a photo shoot with them recently, etc etc. And let me not start on stans culture... the worst thing ever

Okay this is fascinating because yes! I agree with you so much! But then I was completely floored by the choice of the HADIDS (literal Palestinians who never shut up about the cause) as examples- but actually I love it because I think it opens up two really really important points that maybe get to the heart of the whole issue. Gigi and Bella Hadid are, as I said, literally Palestinian, and have throughout their public lives (not just recently) never been silent or backed down in defense of Palestine even when it has very publicly lost them (Bella primarily) jobs and opportunities, and they both continue to be outspoken even while literally targeted and threatened by zionists. Pretty much everything anyone has wanted or asked for from any celebrity, right?! But here we have, first of all, Gigi having all of that discounted because she bought Starbucks, a brand that is not even an official boycott! I feel like this is a perfect example of prioritizing performative and symbolic activism over actions with material impact, if someone who has been so consistent and stalwart can see all that dismissed because they spent $5 on a coffee (that, again, has no material financial relationship to Israel). I personally think that on a scale of good done vs harm, Gigi can afford a lot of problematic coffees, and this is not even getting into the Hadid families finances which involve huge amounts of money being used and moved around in ways that do more to help the cause than any image choice can unbalance. And then you say that Bella has worked with zionist brands- I don't know anything about this so I can't speak to it. Given that we are also apparently considering starbucks a zionist brand despite the company not operating in or having any ties to Israel, I would question what this means. But it doesn't matter- I think the point is that consumer/ individual purity isn't possible! No one is making pure consumer choices, no matter how many brands they boycott, and certainly no celebrity can continue to be one without having unsavory connections. I think that BY DEFINITION no celebrity is politically pure because if they cut all those ties, THEY WOULD NO LONGER BE A CELEBRITY. Whether the pursuit of purity is realistic or desirable is a much bigger issue, but the point is that as you say, looking to celebrities to be activists will end only in disappointment. Their job is to entertain in specific ways and they do that; if that's not working for you, then consume some other celebrity's product (persona). As I have said from the start, if you want to stan Louis because he is talented and hot and kind and smart and fun then you are in luck! But if you are looking for an activist spokesperson, he is not going to be that, and yelling at him (or people who don't consider that a deal breaker) isn't going to change that.

[rwbyrg]

Am I alone in feeling mostly relieved our side of the FNDM is as small as it is? Of course, I'm not opposed to any new fresh meat coming in to join the fun, but at the same time, I think the scale of the RG corner kinda means we have less weirdos, and more genuinely talented and passionate people carrying on creativity for the other half to enjoy. Something something limitations breed creativity.

While I don't think you're alone in feeling how you do, I do not feel the same way... because I, myself, am a weirdo. Sorry. 😳 nah but fr, i know this ask is probably harmless and well intended, but I'm not keen on this way of thinking.

There are a lot more rg supporters than it seems. Most of them just don't engage with it publicly because of how unsafe the fandom landscape is these days; and that makes me sad. i can't count the number of people that said me or others being vocal about the ship finally made them feel comfortable enough to post about it. can't count how many more left the community because the harassment and lack of support just became too much to handle.

which is also part of the reason why I'm not keen on separating people into a "weird vs. normal" or "us vs. them" mindset.

Weirdness, talent, and passion, are not mutually exclusive of each other. Plenty of very skilled creatives have strange interests, make weird art, write inappropriate stories, or have been harmful to others. A person's artistic skill or creativity is not an indicator of their integrity, morality, or actions behind closed doors. That train of thinking is a very slippery slope, and I'm speaking from experience here when i say it can hurt you and people within your community if you're not careful.

I'm a weirdo to people who don't engage with fandom for having a blog dedicated to two fictional characters. I'm a weirdo to antis because those characters happen to be rg (which makes us weirdos-in-arms, dear anon 😘). I'm a weirdo to other rg shippers for not shipping it the same way they do. I'm close friends with a few creatives here, and on bad terms with a few others. Most of them are weirdos in one way or another. Some are kindhearted, earnest, and lovely individuals that have been cancelled, called out, and harassed for the most vanilla, harmless, and ordinary things you can imagine. Others, despite their talent, are assholes whom you could not pay me to be in the same "room" with again. And those jerks have and do say the same things of me in their own spaces.

If anything, I think these sorts of mentalities are the reason there are so few of us here in this little garden. We're treated like the blacksheep of the FNDM at large. We're unwelcome, ostracized, and chased out of most general spaces even when we aren't doing anything wrong. And because of that, these narratives and pressures around being "normal" or "one of the good ones" seeps into our spaces and only divides us all further.

Weirdness is subjective, people all have their own quirks, and being in fandom wasn't even considered "normal" until very recently. So, as far as I'm concerned, so long as you're not hurting anyone, we're all weird here.

[musings-of-a-rose]

I've been a Joel supporter since the game came out and after watching that episode, and especially now that I've become a mom since the game, I still stand firm in my choice to support what Joel did.

For those saying "But he lied to Ellie!" - yeah. He did. But you know who else did? The Fireflies. Marlene. She even had the balls to say to Joel "You're not giving her the choice because you know what she'd choose." Implying that she would choose to be operated on. But you know what? She didn't give Ellie a choice either. Marlene even said they sedated her and told her nothing so she wouldn't be afraid. That right there says Marlene doesn't know for sure that Ellie would choose self sacrifice, so she withheld that rather important piece of information from her.

Ellie is also 14 years old. This sort of decision is way too much to put on her shoulders, and I say this as a very mature 14 year old when I was that age.

"Ok, but this is the fate of the world!" Says who? What they didn't give you in the show was the letters/notes Joel finds in the hospital saying Ellie wasn't the first immune person that they've performed lethal surgery on to poke around in a brain. And you know what? None of it worked. Could Ellie have worked? Maybe. But it's a slim chance in hell it would and that just wasn't worth it to Joel.

You also can't vaccinate a fungal infection. It doesn't work that way, which is why doctors give people creams and hope for the best when they have fungal infections.

Also, this was ONE doctor with some nurses. A doctor and a scientist are not the same thing. Granted, a doctor would be better at figuring something out, but that wasn't his area of expertise. He'd need a whole team of experts to even hope to find a cure IF it was there. They also had no equipment, no mri's or cat scans, nothing. Yes, they were in a hospital but right before Joel enters the room, one of them asks "Do we have enough power?" They're not even sure they can power the room to perform the surgery - how ar they going to spend countless months and years on a supposed cure?

BUT let's overlook all of that and say by some miracle they find a cure. How are they going to mass produce said cure? They most likely don't have the resources for this as everything is shut down and 20 years old. And even if they did, how to mass distribute it? Marlene said the Fireflies would, but so many people distrust them so who's to say they'd accept it? Not to mention Joel, by himself, took out an entire building of them.

Marlene also had the audacity to say to Joel that she understands his plight because she was there when Ellie was born so she gets it. No, you don't. You took your friend's baby out of obligation and put her in an orphanage and straight into a FEDRA school/camp. Marlene came back when Ellie was bit, chained her up in a room for weeks, and kept performing experiments on her to see if she would turn. She didn't raise Ellie so she couldn't possibly have known that sort of connection.

In the end, Joel chose love because he loves Ellie like he loved his daughter. And if I were in his shoes, I 100% would've made the exact same decision.

Thank you for coming to my TED Talk.

[aeruthien]

People: we want companies to be fair to their employees, create good content and be socially active!

Company: alright, to do that we need money, probably a bit more than you are used to spend because the cheap companies don't pay their employees well

People: no how dare everything should be free >:(

[clawsextended]

in my perfect world everyone makes so many lesbian muses the men then have to deal with the exact same behavior when every single post ever written isn’t about dick.

[bi-chimneyy]

sorry but,,, lol. lmao even. what the fuck did you lot expect??? you’ve been out there perpetuating violent homophobia and hatred of queer men since *day one* of bucktommy, of course people around you think shit like this is okay

[max--phillips]

Anyway I just saw a post saying that the protests here in the US are “taking away attention” from what’s actually happening in Gaza and “LARPing oppression” as if 1) the whole point of the protests is to put attention on Gaza and call for a ceasefire and 1.5) shows they’re exclusively getting their news from mainstream cable networks and 2) it’s not the fuckin media’s own fault they’re more interested in covering protests than the actual genocide, and 3) the students are somehow not facing oppression ???????

For one, what’s the solution here? Tell these students who feel very strongly (and rightfully so!) about this issue to just give up and go home? Who exactly does that benefit? Oh, right, the universities who are benefiting from this genocide, as well as the federal government. Good plan.

For two, I realize that the university at the center of this is an Ivy League school, and that the students who are there are privileged in many ways. However, that does not change the fact they are facing violence from the university and from police. That does not change the fact many of these students are Palestinian, Jewish, or other minorities. Beyond that, Columbia is not the only school where protests are happening. Emerson, USC, Yale, Harvard, MIT, Tufts, Cal Poly Humboldt, NYU, Vanderbilt, Brown, University of Michigan, UC Berkeley, Emory, Indiana University, Purdue, George Washington University, UCLA, Northeastern, Ohio State, UT Austin, Arizona State, Washington University St Louis, Cornell, University of Pennsylvania, Stanford, University of Georgia Athens, Sonoma State, San Francisco State, Sacramento State, University of Washington, Virginia Tech, Princeton, University of Minnesota, UConn, USC, University of Illinois, University of Utah, McGill, Portland State, UNC Chapel Hill, Tulane, University of Florida Gainesville, University of Colorado Denver, Case Western Reserve, City College of New York, Rutgers, Johns Hopkins, University of Maryland College Park, Barnard College, Pomona College, DePaul, Georgetown, University of Delaware, University of Arizona, University of New Mexico, University of Wisconsin, Virginia Commonwealth University, Oberlin, UC San Diego, University of San Diego, and I’m sure many others have or are currently participating in protests. Many of these schools are not elite universities only the best of the best (or the most money) get in. For crying out loud, my ass got into Indiana University.

That begs another question as well. Yes, these students at Ivy League schools have privilege. How else would you prefer they use it? When one has privilege, it is imperative to utilize it for the benefit of those one has privilege over.

Anyway. Free Palestine. Defund the police.

“Taking away attention from what’s actually going on” this is like saying the university protests against the Vietnam War were taking away attention from what’s actually going on in Vietnam. (Which I’m realizing now was probably an actual talking point at the time, but sounds ridiculous now.)

[miz-chase]

I jus think it’s fun to read Booth/Brennan through Han/Leia and follow it through to the logical conclusion:

Divorced bickering passionate deep-feeling situationship separated often by geographic and professional distance

Brennan always jetting off, the senior overseer of historic digs across the globes, taking short residencies at the most prestigious institutions, while Booth keeps his ass planted at Quantico, training young agents.

what young adult Christine gets up to, one can only imagine. I like the idea of her being so smart that she gets bored in school and does poorly. Neither parent will let her join the military and she loses interest in college. Ends up, through an entirely different path, following her mother’s habits, doing Peace Corps and/or WWOOFing. Neither parent is particularly thrilled but she has the stubbornness of her parents combined. There’s no changing her.

Hank is a good student. He becomes a very stable chartered accountant. He collects tropical fish. His Uncle Jack adores him.

[sadtiredboy]

Ace people making silly posts about how they didn’t get allos during the peak of ace discourse were not in fact being homophobic (especially not the teenagers). You try feeling alienated from every community and not making some jokes about how it’s actually everyone else who is weird

[swords-of-a-soilder]

Genuine questions what are your feelings on the QSMP right now I was trying to watch some vods and found myself miserable and empty, I'm curious if anyone else feels the same..

You whether or not you mained forever or just liked him as a background character. hearing that somethings will be changed in the server and there's a possibility that buildings relate to him might be moved watching the qsmp now knowing about the accusations and knowing that Forever have been removed as a result how are you feeling?

Did you still get the same excitement you used to get watching it knowing all of this whether or not you believe the acquisitions?

Does it still fill you with joy every time you draw a characters or are you drawing them soley because well you feel like you have?

After putting an entire year into this fandom do you now it find it difficult to do anything else because you don't know what else to do?

Do you truly generally still love this fandom after everything that's happened?

This post is a safe space whether or believe the accusations feel free to vent, please don't debate with anyone