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dezznuggz · 11 months ago

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Friendship Test |Joe keery × reader

~ Rumors spread about you and Joe keery dating based on the little clips they see behind the scenes and when you guys are out together in public. While y'all film a video about friendship testing, you guys seem as if you're both head over heels for each other.

Warning: readers pronouns are she/her, usage of y/n, brief mentions of stranger things

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"I feel like I'm pretty close to him, I mean I think he knows me pretty well and I know him pretty well." You say to the camera as you describe your and Joe's friendship and what your perspective of it is. The people behind the camera laugh, since they heard something completely different from Joe.

"she bullies me, she's mean to me and she calls me names" Joe says to the camera with a straight and concerned face which causes the people behind the camera to go quiet, "I'm joking, none of that's true" Joe says as he cracks a smile to calm down the people behind the camera.

"when I first met him, I had so much fun with him on set, he might look scary and serious but once you get to know him or talk to him, he's like a black cat, if that makes sense..." You describe how you see Joe and how it was like when you first met him. The people behind the camera laugh again as they notice how you and Joe seem to be the same people but different fonts. (No wonder people ship y'all).

"I first met her and I was super scared. I mean she looked intimidating and she kinda looked like she knew what she was doing, which made me a little insecure until she talked to me and ever since then, she's been like a little golden retriever if that makes sense." Joe describes you as if you were something precious and valuable.

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You and Joe finally get back in a room together and you both can't stop smiling. It's like you're both much more happier to just be in each other's presence. The people behind the camera then ask y'all to write 3 things that you like about each other.

"Jesus I gotta think about this one, there's really nothing good to you" Joe says in a joking way and acts as if he's thinking real hard, "ha ha very funny, you know you're not the most interesting person either" you say back in a sarcastic tone as you notice Joe already writing stuff down real fast. "Woah you're writing a lot", you say while looking from your paper to Joe writing a whole essay, "yes Im practically writing a novel over here" Joe replies back without looking up which causes you to laugh at his comment.

Once you and Joe finish, Joe then says "ladies first" and has you read your paper. "Joe, I think that you're one of the most calmest person I know when it comes to any situation" You finish reading the first part of your paper with a bright smile that makes Joe's heart melt. "Y/n...you are like a big ball of sunshine that can light up a dark room" Joe says as he looks up from his paper to see your reaction, "aww wait that's actually sweet I wanna redo mine" you say with a cute puppy face that Joe adores seeing every time. "Joe, I think your sarcastic humor can make any situation feel comfortable" you look up at Joe with a bit of a sour face not knowing if that's a compliment or not but Joe seems to relieve your unsure feeling, "well that's what I'm here for" Joes comment makes you let out a small scoff.

"Y/n, although you have a child mindset, you are very responsible when it comes to situations" Joe then looks up from his paper again only see you have a faint smile on your lips, "that's actually really nice". "Thank you" you and Joe say to eachother. "Joe I think you have a heart of gold, you have a super kind personality that everyone loves" you say as you look into Joe's eyes since they're staring deeply into yours, "thank you very much" "you welcome" you and Joe say to eachother again with bright smiles, "y/n, you are a very welcoming and trustworthy person, I feel like you're very open to everyone and you make people feel comfortable very easily" joe says while moving his hands around to explain how he sees you, "thank you thats really sweet" you reply to Joe's compliment with a warm smile.

"I actually like getting compliments, they make me feel better" you say while looking at the camera with a bright smile. "That was actually really nice, you know it's not every day that you look someone in the eyes and give them a compliment" Joe says as he looks in your eyes again, "yea usually it's brief short and simple but doing this made me feel better, did it make you feel better" you add onto to Joe's statement then ask him a question which he answers pretty fast, "yes honestly i enjoyed all this" joe moves his arms around his area to show that he's enjoying the whole 'interview' thing while purposely hitting you gently, this caused you to swat his arm away from your face and push his shoulder as joe laughs with the camera people.

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Next the camera people had you and Joe stand Infront of each other and stare into each other's eyes for 4 minutes straight. You and Joe then look up to make eye contact but then you burst out laughing when Joe says that it's going to be awkward, "no no don't smile cause you're going to make me laugh" you say while trying to hold in your laugh. You then cool down from your laugh and now it's you and Joe staring into eachother eyes in complete silence, now that you're actually looking at him close up, he's actually really handsome and when did he get so many moles? (they still look cute). Joe admires your eyes that are big and sparkly, he notices how Everytime you blink, you look at his other eye. Joe then sees how your lips always have a little curve at the end, and how your eyes look almost identical to fox's eyes but that just makes your eyes look even more beautiful.

"You know it's not every day that you stare into your best friends eyes for 4 minutes" Joe break the silence with a statement which causes you to laugh, "yea I don't really do this often, I have trouble making eye contact with people" you say with a faint smile on your lips, "I know you do, that's why you keep looking from one eye to the other" Joe then points back and forth from his left eye to his right eye, "okay okay sorry I'll look at the right one", you say as you try your best to stay focus to one eye, "it's okay, it's fine" Joe says in a quiet tone for only you to hear.

"Your pupils are really small" you tell Joe, "I haven't even been looking at your pupils, I didn't even know they were there" Joe says with realization that he's been focused on you instead of your eyes, this causes you to laugh and almost break eye contact which Joe then puts his hands on both sides your shoulders to hold you still from moving around from laughter. "Don't make me laugh then I can't concentrate" you say while trying to hold back your smile

"And time" a person from behind the camera says which doesn't cause you and Joe to break eye contact, "okay stop stop" you say as you look away while covering your face, "I can't look away, I don't want to look away", Joe says while looking at you turn away from him, "no look away" you reply back to joe as you fan your face to stop it from turning red.

"That was great honestly" you say as you sway from side to side and bumping shoulders with Joe. "That's definitely something new to her" Joe says while pointing a finger towards your direction, "yes completely new but it was honestly relaxing for some reason" you nod your head after adding on to Steve's statement, "it was kinda crazy how our bodies would connect like how you would laugh which would make me laugh but once you stopped laughing then my body suddenly stopped laughing too", Joe says as he tries to explain how his experience was while still not looking away from you (you were making brief eye contact towards him). Joe then wraps his arm around your shoulder with a smile and almost out of instinct, you wrap your arm around his waist and pose as if it was a family (or a couples) picture.

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You and Joe then were told to do a trust fall with eachother. It sounded more exciting than it actually was.

"Okay promise to catch me, don't play a stupid joke" you say as you finally look deep into Joe's eyes, "okay I won't drop you" Joe says but then side eyes the camera which you notice then makes you hesitant, "no joe dont do that, promise not to drop me" you say as you playfully hit Joe's shoulder to tell him to cut it out but then you stick you pinky out for joe to intertwine. "Okay okay I won't drop you for a stupid joke" Joe intertwines his pinky with your but not before rolling his eyes playfully.

You then have your back faced towards Joe with both your arms crossed over your chest, "okay ready?". "Yes I'm ready go" after Joe says that he's ready you let your whole body go and fall backwards, Joe catches you with ease and then he pushes you back up in a playful but forceful way which caused you to almost fall forward, you then turn around and smack him on his chest as he tries to block himself from your hits, "okay okay I'm sorry, we'll do it again" Joe says as he still tries to block and defend himself from being "abused", "okay but this time done do anything stupid, I mean it Joe" you say as you point a finger in his face, trying your best to scare him but he just found you cute.

Your back is facing Joe again but this time you're putting all you're trust into him, I mean it is called 'trust fall' for a reason, you then fall backwards and Joe catches you with ease again but then he squats down while still holding your weight which makes you lean back further, "okay Joe STOP!" You almost scream out as you reach your hands Infront of you in hopes of grabbing something to prevent you from falling backwards.

Joe pushes you back up while laughing at your reaction, you on the other hand was not a fan of it as you kept smacking him on his back or wherever you can hit him as he kept moving and blocking your hits. Your hits were nothing to Joe, it almost felt like he was getting hit by a baby, your punches were weak even if you were putting all of your strength to get back at him for almost making you fall twice. You and Joe then get everything together and have Joe take his turn. Now Joe's back was facing towards you and as a joke, Joe threatened to put all his weight and jump on you hoping that you catch him.

Joe waits for your signal to let him know that you're ready but behind his back you're mentally and physically preparing yourself for the amount of weight you're about to catch. You were stretching and shaking your arms as the camera crew laughed at your actions which caused Joe to look back confused with all the laughter. Joe then sees you warming up which caused him to roll his eyes playfully at your antics. "Okay I'm finally ready go" you say as you have your arms extended out waiting for joe to fall backwards.

"Okay I go?". "Yea go". "Now?". "Yea dude I'm ready". "Alright..." You and Joe went back and forth as joe was a little scared that you were gonna sabotage him as he did to you and you were scared that you were gonna drop him and you'll both go down together. As you wait for joe to fall backwards he continued acting foolish, "okay I go now right?" Joe says as now he's acting silly just to hear your laugh as it was music to his ears. "YES JOE GO!" You say loudly while laughing at his actions then unexpectedly, he fell backwards and you caught him successfully but not without you struggling a little.

Joe laughed at your little grunts that he could hear behind him as your struggle to push him up. Once you pushed him up, you let out a loud breath, "okay again?" Joe says as he prepared to fall backwards on you again, "no no no no" you say frantically as you speed walk away from him to avoid from getting squished by him. This caused Joe and the camera people to laugh.

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You and Joe then decide to close out the video by saying your goodbyes. "Yayyy we're done, now we're the bestest of friends" you say in a sarcastic joyful tone as you hug Joe's arm, which caused him to touch your arm with his left arm (the arm that you're not holding), "yea I'm pretty hungry, you down for sum pizza later?" Joe asks you which you respond with your face lighting up, "I don't know if I should eat pizza right now, it might make me lose my muscles" you say while releasing your hold on Joe's arm and flexing your arm to show your non existent muscles. Joe chuckles but then plays along with you, "yea sure, matter a fact I think I have bruises on my back cause of you" Joe says as he starts to turn around and prepare to lift his shirt to show his back but then he gets interrupted by you, "nu uh alright guys that's all for today byeee" you say with a bright smile and standing with your arms open Infront of Joe to block out anything that the camera could catch of Joe's toned back.

#joe keery x reader #joe keery #steve harrington x reader #steve harrington imagine #steve harrington #stranger things #celebrities #friendship #shipping

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iamnotthere-idonotdie · 11 months ago

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i saw a youtube comment today on a video essay about the batman (2022) and i just felt the need to screenshot and share some things on it:

i’ve had thoughts about this for a while.

i wrote in a draft a while ago about how i love the costume design in the batman because it made each character feel like real people and i decided i might as well share those thoughts now.

the costume design in the batman was one of the key elements that drove this film home for me. it made it so much more gripping, because it humanized these characters we’ve grown to see as just drawings on a page. these aren’t superheroes and supervillains. they don’t have powers, they don’t live in a fantasy world. they’re people who wear combat boots with their capes and cut holes out of their cat-eared ski masks and wrap cellophane under their army/navy-surplus store hoods. they’re just people with skills and agendas and trauma who are just trying to fight their way through life in whatever way they think is necessary and right.

they don’t rely on their suits as their strength.

and to touch on the point the commenter made in the first part, about how bruce wouldn’t be a “master of dual lives”: i think that’s a perfect way to sum up this character at this point in his life. he’s only been the batman for two years. and during these two years he’s been acting as vengeance. he still harbors a lot of anger in him and it’s been radiating through the batman. he hasn’t learned how to compartmentalize those two sides of himself, if he ever will.

we’ve seen a little bit of this in other batman movies and other media, but not to this extent, in my opinion; not so that it is defining him as a character in this significant of a way. it adds so much more complexity and depth to bruce wayne and it makes it so much more realistic and believable.

one thing i think shows this really well is how bruce and batman ride the same bike throughout the film. it’s not an expensive bike. it’s not specially made with gadgets and a bat symbol, we don’t see a new bike for batman until the very end of the film.

the batman is no longer vengeance, he’s hope. and hope doesn’t hide in the shadows. hope isn’t waiting to find a fight. hope is a beacon, not a warning.

the dark knight trilogy was a turning point for superhero movies. it showed that they didn’t have to be campy and comic book-y. it showed that they can be gritty and poignant and cinematic. the batman just took that thought and elevated it to an even higher level by making these characters feel like real people. by adding even more complexity, more richness, more gravity to these characters we all know and love. and in a market as over saturated as batman, this take on the story was like taking a sip of water when you wake up in the middle of the night at three am: refreshing as hell.

i don’t know, maybe i’m rambling and maybe this is kind of all over the place. but i just love the symbolism in this film and i literally cannot wait to see what more incredible and genius moves matt reeves and the rest of the cast and crew make in part two.

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thewalrusespublicist · 2 months ago

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What do you think about the Lindsay Ellis essay on Yoko?

Hi anon,

Ah, this is a toughie as Lindsay Ellis' video was actually the video that got me interested in the Beatles! So on that front .. I must have really enjoyed it at the time and I am grateful/embittered to it for leading me down this chaotic rabbit hole!

That being said, ughhh the video. On the one hand, to actually deal with the topic at hand she needed much longer than the run time of the video to actually get into it with enough detail, so it was always going to be simplistic. I did like some of her points about the other competing factors in the break-up and how Yoko really shouldn't be blamed for the overall break-up. I also liked her comparisons with Courtney Love and how women get blamed in these scenarios unjustly. However, my problem is she was presenting herself as an informed authority on the subject when to be honest, she doesen't actually show that great depth of knowledge. The not knowing about the nitty gritty about Northern Songs is one thing but clumping May Pang with those desperate for fame or clout ... I found either ignorant or disingenuous. That wasn't the first time I've noticed that with Lindsay's work. Not going to lie, I stopped watching her for ages after I watched a video where she was talking about British media and somehow managed to call John Hurt a low-rate tv actor and said that Blackadder was pro-the class system which I'm sorry, was ignorant to the point of stupidity. So yeah, I think Lindsay is great at conveying information but maybe also perhaps conveying incomplete information as if she was an expert in the subject.

This next bit might be a tiny tiny bit controversial but I don't really care. Knowing what I know now, I found the entire video to be partaking in an outdated and reductive type of feminism which doesn't actually allow women to have any flaws or be real people. Yoko was massively over-hated for all the wrong reasons, but it seems that in reaction some fans including Lindsay refuse to look at her with any critical view and dismiss any dissent as rooted in sexism. As a born and raised from the cradle feminist, I find this approach not only exhausting but sexist in and of itself as it strips women of agency and complexity. In the case of Yoko, the two extremes has meant that we've only recently been able to have honest conversation about her. No Yoko didn't break-up the Beatles, but she was a contributing factor and was a massive factor in why they didn't reunify in the 70s. Not because she sat on the bloody amp but because of nearly everything else she did. To say that she had no impact is terrible source-work and practice as it requires dismissing most of our sources from the period and from multiple primary perspectives in order to fulfil an ideological agenda. This in May's case is also silencing the voice of a female employee in a vulnerable position power-wise to sanitise her much wealthier boss' public image. I don't like that. I also want to make it clear that I don't think a lot of Yoko's actions were borne out of malicious intent but due to her extremely complicated personality and trauma, a personality that gets completely flattened if she's just a bit of cardboard jutting out in the corner. There are no winners if you refuse to engage with women as real people and through a modernised Madonna complex lens.

So ... a well-presented video with some great ideas but at the same time quite a basic overview that showed a lack of understanding of some key elements and a refusal to actually engage with the material to push a particular agenda.

#Lindsay-Ellis #sorry guys #but an actual discussion about the real complex Yoko would have made for a much better video #Submarine Postbox #anon #ask #ask me anything

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kikiwooo · 6 months ago

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i’m the anon that asked about xavier and fredrinn tag teaming me and i haven’t been brainrotting about fredrinn lately but i’ve been thinking about xavier as a camboy alot 😭 idk the idea just appeals to me. and i’ve been trying to think of other characters that would fit this trope, like i could totally see lancelot, yin and gusion as camboys HAHAHA

MANNN GODDAM Y'ALL HAVE SOME QUITE INTERESTING FANTASIES 💀😭 I kinda didn't liked what I wrote and some parts might be short because I died

notes; gn! reader, camboy! mlbb boys

Gusion

lmao gus after his brother didn't give him enough money or overall he doesn't have enough money for himself, quite pitiful indeed. Let's jump straight into it cuz if I ever go into detail that would be an essay +he's paxley so probably there's like lot who knows him and his ego just wouldn't allow him

He probably does challenges about how big and deep he can take in and people just following cuz he's not only a new face but a pretty one too+he's also stubborn. He reads every donation out loud, also those shitty and troll ones too, he's that gullible but he learns it after it happens a few times. his eyes does go wide and his system stops for a few seconds after receiving big ass donation (while having a big ass dildo up his ass, his challenge not mine) will also smirk if the person who donated him challenge to another thing and says they'll pay him even more if he does this and that, Gus will do it no matter how impossible it is. (is that dragon di-

Will frequently invite you to his streams or videos if you guys are in relationship irl, but if you only watch and donate and maybe sing in membership(he has the silliest emotions of himself) he'll favor that one person(it's you)

Yin

INEXPERIENCEDDD I TELL YOU, but somewhat he's pretty good with those dildos, bro's born for it. Lieh is tired of hearing Yin's sloppy whimpers and half moans which he tries so hard to hide.( They're twins) most of the people favor him and only him cuz he's cute.

He recording videos cuz he heard it from Lieh that one makes so much money from it and only it. Yin was insecure at first so he first talked it with one of his very very close friend(you), but like super duper close, he can't handle anyone else other than you so you're his go to. He's pretty vanilla but from time to time he doesn't skip to try new things (𝓯𝓻𝓮𝓪𝓴𝔂), also somehow gets lots of donations even if he does literally nothing and just sits in front of the camera (you know the deal shh)

But if you're one of his viewers, and probably the nicer one than those of the perverts and just keep him in his ground and offer him to do new things to not lose the attention+also keeping him updated about literally everything going around, somehow Yin even offered you a private video just for you- or just a simple invite (lieh didn't liked that)

Lancelot

ALRIGHTTT, lance is experienced and probably has been in this camboy things for years, he's pretty proud of his own body and shamelessly shows it into the camera without any hesitation maybe that's why he's so popular.

Though he's open to the camera, you can never get anything from him real life, he shuts the topic really fast that you can't even argue back. If you're one of his viewers+have membership probably the earliest one, yeah lance over here has a VIP room for y'all like the first seats of the cinema. Lance cares about what his viewers want because that's where the money comes from, no?

Lancelot is actually fond of tight clothes/gears?? Like how they squeeze is skin so deliciously(he knows his chat loves it, he also himself likes them so win?)

Everyone's literally there for his girly moans what are you talking about.

Xavier

Y'all how we got him on here, 's like we won the lottery???? despite being quiet both irl and in front of the camera, we can hear soft grunts and gasps whilst he's taking it hard(I'm not the one salivating no it's you) AHHHH HE'S JUST, PERFECT??? the way his waist and they way he turns around to check, the way his muscles mmhmmmmhmhmhm. Though he likes you interrupting his streams when you come behind him to tease, he scolds you from after the stream (damn). if one of his viewers with membership, he quietly thanks those people (he whispers, asmr fr) at the beginning of the video/stream, doesn't show much of a reaction at the donates, he's doing it for it anyway, but his eyes will visibly widen whenever reaching such lot donations with cute messages(his fandom is 🎀yes both genders),

He's always sore after the streams and videos, no matter how he took it from low, he always ends up sore which he complains about it, but does he make money? yes so so much and he doesn't thinking about giving it up any time soon.

#mlbb #mlbb x reader #mobile legends #mobile legends bang bang #mobile legends bang bang x reader #mobile legends x reader #gn reader #gusion #gusion x reader #yin #yin x reader #lancelot #lancelot x reader #xavier #xavier x reader

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talenlee · 2 months ago

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Decemberween 2024 — Youtube Academia

Hey, I’m in academia, here are some people I look to for ‘how to communicate and make a point in academia and what you can use it to do.’

First up, hand over heart, this is going to have a real sampling bias. I’m going to point to three diferent academics who make stuff in spaces I can participate in and all three of them are dudes, and white enough that my dad would mostly consider them white. He’d probably be on the fence about Daniel Immerwahr. This is a problem in academia in general and it’s a problem with me in the specific: The stuff that I’ve gotten attention to, even the stuff that is explicitly about broadening my access to and understanding of nonwhite cultures and the nonwhite parts of the world is coming to me through white guys from academia. I’m not wild about it but it’s better in my mind to acknowledge it and present the sources then pretend this isn’t where I’m coming from.

Anyway, hey, here’s an essay titled Why Hip-Hop is the Most Important Artistic Movement In Human History.

Why Hip-Hop is the Most Important Artistic Movement in Human History: A Professor Skye Video Essay

Watch this video on YouTube

I think this is a good starting point for Professor Skye’s work.

Professor Skye presents three kinds of work. One is album reviews, where he breaks down and analyses components in how albums work and what they present in their messages, in a way that explicitly is not seeking to centre his interpretation but rather academically recognise a useful generalised language bridge for people like me who use the term ‘generalised language bridge.’

Second to that there are kind of larger, high-concept comparisons, where he provides a meaningful explanation to people outside of hiphop interest as to what’s going on. This led to him going extremely viral thanks to explaining the Kendrick/Drake beef this year which, god that was a thing, wasn’t it. The third thing that Professor Skye does is historical and academic contextualisation of music media. That can be things like ‘here’s iconic stuff from the 1980s,’ and it can be ‘behold as I use Proust to discuss this album.’

In each case I think there’s a sort of meaningful value to ‘doing the readings.’ Listening to the albums he talks about or the songs he talks about as and when he starts to talk about them means that each video is a sort of expository piece to accompany the text. I watch media analysis all the time of stuff I have not and never will watch, like Victorious, but in that case, the analysis is explicitly trying to present the text so you don’t need it. That’s not what Professor Skye is doing. This is not a channel trying to convince you to enjoy a thing or to enjoy the thing without the thing. It is a textual engagement with the album, and that is a really cool thing to do. You might not even have the mental muscles practiced for that at this point.

I'm What the Culture Feeling

Watch this video on YouTube

By the way, if you listen to Skye and go ‘oh hey, this is interesting and I’d like to know more,’ here’s a video essay from FD Signifier which is long, yes, but also extraordinarily good, about the same kind of topic and coming from inside the culture. If Skye makes you think ‘hey, I could be interested in this,’ then you should probably then check out FD Signifier.

Your Grammar Is Basic Compared to Black English

Watch this video on YouTube

But hey while I’m talking about language bridges (I was, honest), what about a language expert to talk about distinct grammatical differences between English (as I am used to calling it) and Black English. Language Jones is an interesting guy with a specific skillset, which is expertise in linguistics at an academic level, specifically the way your brain picks up and relates to linguistics. When you do that, you stop having to focus on formal and proper structures and instead get a lot more inclined to seeing the way language slops into the grooves in human brains and social spaces. Sometimes that means explaining to you and me what a wug is, and that’s interesting, but I find it much more interesting when he does dives like this one.

In this video, what Jones is doing is picking apart Black English into the toolkit I have in my head for understanding proper English, with terms like subjunctive and participle, and then demonstrate that the way Black English works is entirely a coherent grammatical structure, it’s not vibes or habits or attenuating with a specific person, it’s a whole other form of English and it’s really fucking nuanced. There’s a degree of fineness in Black English that is simple absent from Proper, Formal English. Formal English that I was taught is structured such that there are a host of unintuitive, hard to maintain stiff forms for completely correct conveyance of intent (“can I” vs “may I”), while Black English instead has a coherent grammatical structure that gives more fine control for intention, tense and position and the listener is there to interpret it rather than to enforce it.

This is not totally surprising, and if you talk to uh, any Black people, you probably already know this. What this gave me is a useful toolkit for reconstructing the grammar form. Really interesting stuff!

Daniel Immerwahr How to Hide an Empire

Watch this video on YouTube

Look, I’m sure I’ve talked about Daniel Immerwahr’s work in the past. I share this video from him every time I want to get people to think about American colonialism in the ways that make them uncomfortable. It’s a good talk, it uses its time well, and it also highlights a topic and the relationship of ourselves to the way things communicate their identity through their names and symbols of themselves.

Oh and if you don’t like that, check out Daniel Immerwarh’s podcast talking about the real world histories of Dune. Talks during the pandemic were restricted, but dang some of them were on wonderfully untypical topics.

There’s more. There’s always more. Dr Kipp Davis shows up when I look for academics I follow, but his interest is in Biblical studies. He’s part of the Diablocritics, which means Dr Jennifer Bird is on there, and it’s a way I can check out her work in a way that I find very accessible and interesting, and the other members of the Diablocritics are there, too.

Still, sometimes something academic is just something interesting. I don’t think Josh Worth is a doctor or professor or something. I think technically, he’s just a designer, as in a User Experience designer, that kind of specific discipline of having a clear, meaningful purpose for a visual expression. I share to you this graph Josh Worth made of the solar system if the moon, our moon, was a single pixel.

Check it out on PRESS.exe to see it with images and links!

#Academia #Media

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moonshynecybin · 8 months ago

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what would you consider essential marc and rosquez watching? i don’t mean races but the stuff happening around it, there seems to be so much and idk where to start 😭

BIG ass question. i think it depends what you want outta this and how you best interact with content slash consume information. for me (not to brag but. winner of multiple historical essay writing competitions in high school. for context on the kind of freak i am bringing to the table here.) the research is kind of the fun part ! like i just started googling shit! i would go to inactive blogs and just search 'marquez' on them to see what would happen ! a lot of the times that works ! but it also takes a lotttt of time lol so i'll chuck some good resources your way, why not...

okay im not sure how basic we're talkin here but um. background. so the documentaries are, i think. the best place to start. theyre entertaining and offer a good amalgamation of clips to provide context for the actual racing. and like i know you de-emphasized racing (which is fine lol who cares) but it really is like the most important thing in the world to these fools and its a pretty visual sport so i think its at least helpful. like yes sepang IS about the press conference, but its also about the conversation they have ON the race track using their motorcycles. which is also somewhat a conversation that they HAVE been having all year long...

i'd start with hitting the apex (2013), its a GREAT introduction to the "characters" that does a lot of legwork to contextualize everything. lays the scene for where vale is at coming into his relationship with marc (both personally, wrt to marco simoncelli, and career-wise concerning his flop at ducati), and also how insane marc's whole deal is in general. the second half is. materially a study on what him entering the premiere class did to the sport as a whole. the introductory chapter in many respects

marc marquez: all in. MY introduction and blissfully free online. marc comma in his own words, with all the implications of that. a self-produced documentary where he is giving feedback about the edit of said documentary straight to camera and no less vulnerable because of it which is very marc imo. revealing both intentionally AND unintentionally about his whole deal with injury, vale, and his image.

motogp unlimited. im gonna be real kind of boring. like i would still watch it ! but do it kind of later, once you know the major players so youre automatically more invested. it doesnt really give you more than marc says himself in all in tbh, and i get the sense him and vale were NAWWWT interested in doing more than the bare minimum for it.

marc's rookie doc. free and subtitled on the youtubes. the first half of this is deadass just him wanting to fuck vale so bad while every comment from vale has me saying GIRL. out loud because the foreshadowing would be genuinely shocking if this was fiction. anyways the laguna seca of it all....

next i would hit up PODCASTS ! i think it makes sense after the documentaries, because these are all podcasts that arent strictly about rosquez (even if they are in many ways the main characters lmao) and personally it helps to put faces to lesser known names that might pop up before i listen to a purely audio product and get lost in the soup of sounds. the paddock pass podcast has two retrospective episodes about the 2015 season that are really good at context, oxley bom pod has a fun recent episode on valentino that i love, again just poke around a lil

videos. these guys have never filmed a lot of content together tragically. what i wouldnt give for someone to make them do an escape room. anyways ranch visit HERE (post explaining the ranch visit here). sepang presscon (sowwy) here. vale unhinged podcast interview the month after marc's documentary came out here. vale retirement interview where he gets asked about marc here. vale talking about asking marc to the ranch here. vale postrace at argentina 2018 here. UCCIO postrace at argentina 2018 here. theres a lot moreeeee just go on my blog archive and filter for rosquez and vids its easier lol

journalism. hello. okay so you should genuinely spend some time reading through mat oxley's stuff he can write (theres a paywall but you can run that shit through wayback machine). he also loves an insane comparison which i do enjoy.... again this is one that can be solved by googling his name and tacking on 'marquez' or 'rossi' or a specific time period or race it will probably reap some dividends. in terms of specific ass articles this one is kind of load bearing in terms of sepang and some of the interpersonal competitive tensions at play. that being said there are manyyyyyy crazy interviews and snippents of articles from other journos floating around motogp tumblr (like literally too many to link) adn its fun to dig around to find them, but mat oxley gets a shoutout because i was reading this article TODAY !

other content. honestly one of the best resources I'VE found for plotting out the arc of their relationship is @kingofthering's everyrosquezpodium series. you can REALLY see it play out lol. also her tagging system rules she very neatly lays out years and races... so if something jumps out at you, CLICK ITTTT ! also all of @ricciardoes fave presscon moments series. insane.

all this to say a small little rpf fandom like this rewards some digging! i would just recommend following narrative threads that interest you ! its also a small fanbase that is pretty research oriented, so if youre ever confused about somethin, just shoot an ask or run a search on someone's blog (@kwisatzworld has endless vale resources and @batsplat is one of the most thorough researchers ive ever seen, for example) like for real theres so much... i also have a primer that i made forever ago that has some links on it so you can peruse that if you so wish. but frankly a lot of it is just using those research muscles and being sufficiently deranged enough to be screenshotting reddit threads at one am so you can post them to tumblr because they mentioned marc and vale in the same sentence and that lit up some of the neurons in your brain

(and i know you said outside of races but i think theyre good benchmarks as turning points soooo you should do some diggin on laguna seca 2013, jerez 2015, argentina 2015, ASSEN 2015, sepang 2015 obvi, argentina 2018, and misano 2019. those are the big tentpoles of insane rosquez relationship drama imo. i mean theres many more but. im limiting myself.)

#i also. found stuff bc i did a lot of digging around in blogs archives from 2013-2015. but this was because i was unemployed #and my migraines made reading books (my FAVORITE THINGGG) kinda hard for like 6 months #so i was acting like a border collie that hadnt been walked in two weeks but like. mentally. and we got here.#tumblr didnt hurt my head so much NOOOO idea why #motogp #callie speaks #asks #rosquez

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delta-lethonomia · 3 months ago

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ok depresso week is over, back to deliberate hyperfixation on bg3:

It is absolutely wild to me that people take Astarion to the foursome with the drow twins (romanced, spawn, post-cazador) and are shocked, shocked I tell you, that he has a bad time. But it leads me to think that there's an interesting conversation to be had here about morality applied to video games. I'm going to be using what's a bit of a strawman tbh, what I would consider an archetypical, "good person" gamer for this niche example.

(3k essay under the cut about irl morals vs video game behavior, my take on why Astarion agrees to the orgy, beating the dead horse of Astarion discourse now that the fandom has cooled off enough I might not get flogged for it, and all my election stress being translated into an increasingly bitchy narrative voice that I hope is at least mildly amusing.)

"Good Person Gamer" romances Astarion. They're probably female, which I am mentioning exclusively so I can turn that into "Good Girl Gamer" 😏, or G3. G3 picks nice dialogue options. G3 tries to support their companions, and finds diplomatic and moral solutions to problems. G3 saved the tieflings. G3 still romances Astarion because he's hot, and vulnerable, and it's not like he forces you to be evil - he just complains a bit when you save kittens stuck in trees, but you get that approval back anyway just by being nice to him. Talk him out of Ascension and you've proven to yourself he's got a good soul under all that attitude anyway. He'd healed! You banged on his grave! It's all good now!

The brothel is fun. The drow twins are hot. It's always fun when games lets you do spicy things like have threesomes and orgies! We're sex-positive! Look, the drow twins said they love their job! It's totally fine! G3, as most people, probably does not do these things in real life, but that's the fun in video games: you get to be someone you're not.

And then Astarion noticeably dissociates. He throws himself in the center and lavishes everyone with attention; he's a professional, you know. Even an unromanced Tav/Durge notices something's off, and Astarion replies something along the lines of "you don't have the right to look at me like that," presumably with worry, distress, or sympathy.

G3 is upset. They did everything right - they didn't want to hurt him, and Astarion himself said he wanted this. Why couldn't they stop midway through and remind him that he doesn't have to hurt himself? Why couldn't they talk about it afterwards, and clear the air? LARIAN WHY DO YOU HURT ME

Now, to all the G3's out there: if you were dating a person with extensive sexual trauma, having been raped literally thousands of times, would you suggest having a threesome/orgy? With prostitutes, if that's better or worse? Putting them on the spot before your mutual friends? Would you wait a few years to mention the idea, or would you do so only weeks/months into a relationship? Your first "I love you" might have only been yesterday.

And most people, I think, would say "No." Writing that scenario outside of the lens of a video game makes it sound insane - of course you wouldn't! I'm not saying that they should never have group sex or that it can't be done, but I think most people instinctively get how that would be a shitty thing to do in that context, especially without discussing it in depth beforehand and making sure you're both on the same page.

And this is the meat of the issue. Most gamers play good-aligned characters: there's a strong culture of wanting to play the hero and saving the day. But tied into that cultural monomyth, in society itself, is the idea that sex is a reward at the end. You get sex at the end of the romance arc. The date where you have sex is one of many milestones, and you're not really dating if you haven't done it yet. Some people don't have sex until their wedding night. Threesome scenes especially are a video game classic: old-school God of War, for instance, had a hidden room in every game with scantily-clad women just waiting for you to button-mash away, a little treat for the player's keen puzzle-solving abilities.

Not all romances in BG3 have sex or end with sex, (some even start with sex), but that is because BG3's character writing tries to ground itself in reality despite being a medium people utilize for fantasy. Role-playing a "good" character is mostly easy: you typically know which dialogue choice is the ethical choice, can chide Astarion for being racist, can save the numerous children with moral ease - and BG3 rewards this: a good playthrough is more fleshed out, because you haven't killed off half the cast. You get better gear. You have more allies, better allies. You know what to do.

Or, well, mostly. BG3 is kind of special imo because even the good choices have a lot of nuance, where two people can make different choices but still feel like they both picked the most ethical one. Take Shadowheart's parents, for example: they beg for her to let them go so they can die and save their daughter. Saving them leaves Shadowheart in Shar's clutches - she will experience pain for the rest of her life, but regains her parents, and with luck, Selûne will claim her soul when she dies. Kill them, and Shadowheart is free - truly free, to live her life on her own terms, free from Shar and Selûne both. Both can be the ethical choice, depending on your morals.

"But if Astarion didn't want to have the threesome, the game should have let me stop midway through/made it clearer that this would happen. He said no before Cazador - why couldn't he say no again? Why would Larian put me in this position and make me feel bad when I thought everything was alright? I wanted to be good and have fun, not feel like I pressured my boyfriend." - Strawman G3.

Because BG3 treats it's characters like people. Multiple companions make choices outside of what the player character decides for them - Shadowheart's decision to save or kill her parents, kill or save the Nightsong, or Gale, to go for the crown or not depend on what events they are there to witness personally, or can be informed by conversations you have in camp about unrelated issues. You can fully let them make their own decisions and be surprised each time as they develop into different people with each successive playthrough. A lot of people are surprised when Gale goes for the Crown of Karsus without their input. In my last multiplayer playthrough, we could not prevent Shadowheart from wanting to kill the Nightsong, and so we were forced to kill her.

Astarion is not like that. The way he talks about Ascension changes depending on your relationship. If you're merely friends, he acknowledges it's probably a bad idea, even, in direct contrast to the somewhat obsessive and frightening way he pursues it in a romantic relationship. But Astarion can't decide what to do at the end: he has no hidden point system, no hidden flags - he will always pursue Ascension even if he knows it's a bad idea, because Astarion does not trust himself, has no experience trusting himself, and needs help. As counter-intuitive as it may sound, he needs support to make his own decisions, because in that moment, he cannot be objective.

(If Astarion is ever objective is another story....)

So much of Astarion's reactions and opinions are instinctive and unthinking. "Don't let the pixie out of the lantern, are you an idiot?" -> "A pixie! And honest-to-goodness pixie! *giggles*"

"We don't need a urchin hanging around." -> Astarion approves if you help Yenna

etc. etc. etc. There's so many times he says one thing, the cruel thing, the "fuck everyone else, I've got mine"-thing, and then approves when you do the good thing. Astarion does not live in line with his values (besides pursuing a growing need for freedom) and he frankly does not really know what his values even are.

Astarion doesn't react with glee to finding all the people he seduced - who inadvertently raped him, though they didn't know, some lowlifes and scoundrels and people having a bad day and even some sweet, naive virgins like Sebastian, who took that smoking hot Elf on his word and followed him home, probably in disbelief someone so gorgeous would pay them any attention at all - tortured and locked in a dungeon underground. He's crushed by guilt. He's in pain. Astarion delights in you causing others pain (the torture scene) because it aligns with his worldview, the joy of seeing someone else suffer for once. But he's not a cold-hearted murderer. (And yes, I am differentiating between "adventurer kills a bandit" murder and "deliberately killing someone you know for reasons/no reason" murder.) He doesn't hurt anyone in camp - Shadowheart and Lae'zel are far more dangerous than him. You never have to stop him from drinking anyone else to death. Even if you never feed him again, never use his bite attack, he never bites anyone in camp. Despite being a vampire, Astarion is, effectively, harmless. (Bite night was about checking whether or not Cazador's old command's still worked. It's his first real attempt at freedom, proving to himself that he's free from compulsion. Hence why the roll to get him to stop is a 5, giving you a 75% likelihood of succeeding. He doesn't actually want to kill you. And you get two chances!!!)

Astarion doesn't enjoy death for the sake of death. He's terrified if you side with the goblins and kill the tieflings despite goading you into doing it. I don't doubt that he could hurt others (god knows he's got enough feelings to work out that way), but there's a significant difference between a little knife play and condemning thousands of people to be tortured in the Hells for all eternity. Sacrificing his siblings is different, because they, like him, are guilty, and deserve their deaths. He agrees to sacrifice his fellow spawn as an act of self hatred, of self harm. But all those other people stupid enough to want to sleep with him? Given a day to think about it, I think Astarion would agree that that's not right - and that's why he thanks you for preventing his Ascension. That much murder isn't him. He can be thoughtless, cruel, and unkind, but Astarion isn't a psychopath.

Take him to the brothel, and slipping back into that role, the seductive rake, it as easy as breathing. I don't think Astarion has ever thought about if he's the type of person to enjoy group sex, or even if he wants it. I don't doubt that Astarion enjoys sex, that he wants to have sex (he is, after all that, still shockingly horny), but he's just discovered the idea of having sex with someone he loves. He's riding that high. Of course he says yes: not only is he a different man now (he's free!), it's something he's done a thousand times already - maybe it'll be different this time, maybe something has changed - or maybe, an orgy was on offer, so of course Astarion is there. It's his purpose. He's been doing it for 200 years. Where else would he be?

What I'm saying is that Astarion didn't think about what sleeping with the drow twins meant for your relationship, or how he would feel about it at all. He just went for it. He had a bad time. You then don't discuss it because that would mean admitting that he finally made a choice by himself and it backfired. He didn't think, or maybe he did, and it turns out he just doesn't know himself. Why discuss it? A relationship with G3 apparently means group sex. They probably asked twice. They backtracked all the way to Wyrm's Crossing post-Cazador. Will they ask again? How many times can he say no?

In reality, in the real world, the act of asking can be the problem in and of itself. If your significant other/spouse/lover asks you to do something you don't want to do, be it a threesome, anal, opening the relationship etc, these actions have consequences. The act of asking doesn't happen in a vacuum like it does in video games: there is a cost associated with it, a gamble, and while it may pay off, it may not. Some people get worn down and agree to things they don't want to do. Sometimes you break up because the act of asking is so inherently disrespectful you can't reconcile your differing wants and needs. If you're dating someone who has experienced the gut-wrenching pain of being cheated on, you don't ask 2 months into a new relationship if you can fuck other people. This should not come as a surprise to you, to G3, to anyone. It's common sense.

BG3 giving you the opportunity for a foursome with Astarion not only to give the player their hot'n'spicy sex scene (then playfully bops you on the nose by making it a fade-to-black, you naughty little perverts, you), but also to continue its theme of treating the player like a mature adult, who is dealing with other mature adults, and who can and should live with the consequences of their own actions. Subsequent patches have watered this down, I admit, but I do believe that that was the ethos guiding their work from the beginning. BG3 wants you to interact with the characters like people. If you roll over and tell them what they want to hear, you will Ascend Astarion, and he'll enslave you in turn. If you agree with Gale on everything, he will kill himself and you - or, he'll become a god, becoming the exact sort of god he used to rail against. Agree with Karlach, and she will rather die than go back to the Hells. You get my point.

"But Larian could have let me check in on Astarion midway through. Maybe it was a mistake to ask, but they should have let me check on him and stop it all if he wanted. I was trying to trust him to make his own decisions." - Strawman G3

Ok. We add a dialogue option. "Astarion, love, are you alright? We can stop at any time if you want."

Astarion disapproves (-5)

He's not backing out. Thank you for asking, darling, but fuck off. (I don't think he'd actually say fuck off but the implicit message would be there. I can't see Astarion stopping midway through, nor appreciating you doubting him. Nothing changes.)

"But I still feel bad." - Strawman G3

And I completely understand that. It's a video game. Don't worry! Of course you should get your sex scene - it's a reward! You got their approval high enough! You have enough charisma points! In DA:O, you can also have an orgy, unlocked by giving your companions enough gifts! It's a game! You have enough points, you get the thing!!! You killed Cazador - you win! Have your cake and eat it too! Congrats, you unlocked your hot slutty vampire elf who's basically a trained courtesan, who needs you to be his moral compass, who will never leave you so long as you don't actively rape him - enjoy all the fun orgies in your future!

Your actual choice - the choice the game gives you - is to realize that taking what's essentially a human trafficking victim to a brothel is a dumb idea, but they didn't want to punish you for it.

"Well, Astarion should have said something then. He said no before, he can say no again." - Strawman G3

If you go through life pushing peoples boundaries and expect them to verbally tell you what you're doing wrong, you're gonna be friendless and have a bad time. This ties back to both Astarion having difficulty knowing and defending his own values, BG3 trying to let you make your own decisions without setting out a clear "good or bad" path on occasion, and the hope that you'd use your own morals to make decisions. G3 would never behave in this way irl, and that's where the shock comes from, the guilt from committing an action they thought was without consequence in a risk-free fantasy scenario, and then feeling unpleasantly surprised when called out.

But it's a video game, and you didn't get the little zap, the little sting of an Astarion disapproves in the corner that told you you made the wrong choice. In fact, because he doesn't disapprove, it's not actually the wrong choice!

It really was mean how the Narrator made G3 feel bad, wasn't it. They didn't mean to hurt him. Astarion doesn't mention it, so it's probably fine.

... have you talked to Halsin yet? Surely he had a good time. Right?

CONCLUSION

People think they're good and moral and will typically behave "heroically" in video games. Games support this and reward players for doing so. The "good path" is expected to be clear. However, video games are not real life no matter how much they play at immersion, and multiple games have trained players in a linear "do x, receive y" type fashion. Sex is a reward in games, and is treated that way in real life as well, so players expect the Sharess' orgy scene to be a reward, and are then shocked when Astarion/Gale/Halsin etc reveal during or afterwards that they had a bad time. This is because Larian wants you to treat BG3 like a role playing game and interact with it seriously, and isn't afraid to boop you for your actions in ways that mimic real life relationships. This ethical dissonance makes people uncomfortable especially when they play games to role-play as someone better than themselves, and are surprised when they aren't herded down predetermined "good" paths via instantaneous approval/disapproval mechanics or unlockable "ideal" dialogue.

It is absolutely possible that someday Astarion might be into meaningless group sex with prostitutes for fun and pleasure. However, that is the sort of thing you'd probably either wait for him to bring up by himself organically, or discuss in a long-term trusting relationship after he's had potentially years to process the idea of not immediately hopping into bed with someone, as well as disentangling his instinctive "beaten-in" sexually available behavior from his actual desires. People much more emotionally mature and undamaged than Astarion have destroyed their own relationships by inadvertently pushing a partner (or themselves) into various forms of group sex or other sexual acts. It's not something you do on a random Tuesday on a whim.

Or maybe it is, and I'm just chronically boring and surrounded by boring people lmao

TO THE POSTER THAT INSPIRED THIS: I'm so so sorry if you ever see this, not trying to call you out at all hence no linking, I just wanted to pick apart why I think you felt that way. The thoughts just finally bubbled over after a year+ lol

#I deliberately waited for discourse to calm down before writing any Astarion essays so be nice pls #I don’t like fighting people on the internet #delta.txt #Astarion #bg3 astarion

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lo-shouldve-been-an-email · 10 months ago

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Why Dionysus was actually clever but got botched.

Okay,this is my first big LO essay so please don’t mind a bit of awkwardness.

The thing with Dionysus is that on paper it’s actually really smart.

Let me explain-

To understand why Dionysus in particular was chosen we need to understand the original myth of his birth,or welll,the original myths.there’s technically two of them but I’ll explain it later-

Let’s start off with the simpler one,aka:

Semele is the mother.

The myth goes like this:

Zeus falls in love with a mortal named semele,and tells her he’s Zeus.

Semele gets pregnant and Hera gets jealous.

Hera turns into an old lady and implants the idea that Zeus might be lying to her about being Zeus,so she must ask him to show her his divine form.

Semele does this and is-unsurprisingly- burnt to ashes,but Zeus saves baby dio and puts him in his thigh until he’s born,by then being upgraded from demigod to straight up god.

Who raises him afterwards depends on the story,sometimes it’s Hermes,sometimes it’s nymphs,and sometimes it’s-you guessed it-Persephone.

So you already have some inkling on why Persephone is raising dio,but oh wait there’s more.

So let’s gets into another version:

Persephone is the mother(?)

Okay,so have any of you played hades?go play it.

But,there’s a character that has an story tied to Dionysus,and people who’ve done a certain side quest might already have an inkling:

Zagreus,the prince of the underworld.

Now,you may be wondering wtf zag has to do with this but I can explain.

Basically here’s the ancient Orphic version of the myth:

Persephone and Zeus have a son named Zagreus.(it’s important to note that hades didn’t really exist at this point or at least he was merged with Zeus,hence why it’s Zeus and Persephone and not hades and Persephone,since yes Persephone actually predates hades)

Zagreus is the golden boy of Olympus and Hera gets jealous.

Hera RELEASES TITANS FROM TARTARUS and they tear Zagreus apart,the part remaining being his heart.

And dio is made with that.

There’s more to the general ancient Orphic origins of Dionysus but that’s just the basics.

I highly recommend overly sarcastic productions video of Dionysus if you want an in depth look at this explaining his origins to his cult.so yeah.check it out.

Why it fails within LO.

I admit,dio is a good reference.

He’s a good nod and a fun idea,it’s just the execution that leads it to having as many positives as a house fire.

First of all,it definitely wasn’t planned from the start.

Other have talked about this but RS has a habit of bullshitting things into the story to reference a real world date.

In this case,dio was supposed to be a Mother’s Day thing,but when matched up to the timeline?well…I don’t know why it’s such a bad decision on Persephone’s part…may be it’s because HER AND HADES HAVE BEEN MARRIED FOR LESS THAN A DAY.

Also the whole thing comes out of nowhere.

Zeus just bust into persie’s house,says he’s giving birth and instead of going to a doctor(Asclepius isn’t the only one,zeus)

Then,Persephone straight up refuses to give him to Zeus AFTER HE GAVE BIRTH and takes the baby for herself because “he looks like hades”.

Never mind the fact he’s literally purple-

After that Persephone realised she’s fucked up and ignores hades,but he bursts in and she explain how she basically kidnapped a child.

And it’s supposed to be romantic.

Anyways,I’m probably gonna make another of these rants soon,just with Apollo,but this is why the dio plot point…frustrates me.

On paper it’s an interesting reference but in the end it just ends up being stupid.

#anti lore olympus #anti lo #lo critical #lore olympus critical #lo criticism #lore olympus #lore olympus persephone #Lore Olympus Dionysus

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kirkwallguy · 13 days ago

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verilybitchie's comment on taash's non-binary identity within the narrative spoke to me so bad. so i will say that plain representation is just "here you have your cake too" when it's giving... no context. like what kind of gender confusion a rivaini-qunari can have? this is a question that can only be answered if we can get an answer for what rivaini see gender as. is gender nonexistent and only thing that matters is the genitalia, functionally? is being a man or a woman just about who's giving birth and nothing else, not even clothing? like what are they giving. you cannot connect any dots because there's no dot to connect with.

not only there's cultural context to such things there's also the way of experiencing confusion/questioning depending on that IS so interesting to write, read and think about.

so i feel similar to sexuality representation. like what affect does it have for them and to their life. through dorian (and krem, in gender topic) we could even learn about tevinter culturally and politically that ties to class, poverty, money, and how did they effect them. it's not even about "struggle" it can be a culture that is totally fine with LGBTQ+ but like experience-effect is still experience-effect, negative or positive, and where does a character's own personal takes lie in them. it makes it feel real and fleshed out.

god ykw i STILL haven't watched that video despite meaning to for ages. when i do you'll probably know because i'll go into annoying essay mode lol

but yeah i completely agree. it's really weird because rivain's main narrative function is to contrast the negative points of qunari society. if rivain and the lords of fortune are majorly queer friendly, then why has taash never considered that they might be non-binary before? why do they need to go to tevinter to find trans people to speak to? (even having that initial conversation about not liking being a woman be with isabela might have felt slightly more cohesive lol.) then again, if it ISN'T a society that's welcoming of trans people, then why is the qun the only one whose issues are explored? obviously this is mostly due to the writers' (ie: weekes') weird hangups about qunari society and insistence on demonising them as a regressive "other", but it also feels like it flattens rivaini society in a way that does them a massive disservice imo.

honestly i wrote out a long thing on how dav feels less interested in exploring transness than it does representing transness but it got long and i was rambling. but anyway, i really agree that it's about portraying culture more than struggling, though. as much as i don't like the way bigotry is pushed aside in dav because a lot of queer culture COMES from struggling, there are so many ways to explore how queerness can exist in a society beyond having characters be called slurs. language is one but that's off the table ig. it's nice that they wanted to go with more casual trans characters and did "person who just happens to be trans if you dig into their backstory", but it's also weird and unnatural what these trans characters choose to tell and what they choose to withhold when prompted. i mean, tarquin gives us his entire coming out story but wont give us the name of the healer who prescribed him fantasy minoxidil for his beard? that's just kind of rude. (and indicative of how transness in vg is paper thin. we aren't supposed to think about it deeply enough to consider how a character could transition despite that being kind of an important thing for lots of trans people to do)

obviously this isn't just a dav problem. i feel like I'd give the first three da games slightly more slack given that queer rights (especially in gaming) was a different landscape 10 years ago, but if we look at bg3 we can see pretty much the same issues. i don't really think aaa games are capable of tackling these issues anymore, even if it feels like they were once able to at least try to.

#ask #anonymous #i hope this is coherent i have a headache and kept getting distracted while writing 😭#one day i will definitely write an essay... but i have too many thoughts and they all just come out in a massive jumble when i #try to write them on tumblr like this is word doc levels of commitment

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the-glorious-evolution-fanart · 2 months ago

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Was watching schnee's video essay on why arcane's characters are lonely from around 2 years ago and at the 1:17 timemark we see a scene from s1 where Heimerdinger praises Stanwick Pididly to Jayce. I was like why does he sound familiar? Then went yooooo it's that bitch who stole credit for making Blitzcrank from League Viktor!!!!!!

Damn, Viktor really is the opposite of a creator's pet.

Got a complete revamp instead of just getting an Arcane skin like the other champions that were in Arcane, was written in a very ableist way in both seasons, doesn't have his disability or terminal illness named even though it's a big part of his character, lost his agency for most of season 2, got confirmed as ace after the show ended because one of the showrunners hated jayvik, didn't form any meaningful relationships in the show outside of Jayce, isn't properly credited for making the Hexgates in the show, had actually cool concept art for his transformations into the Machine Herald just to have it scrapped and now the guy who wronged Viktor the most in his lore and is the actual reason why he started to self-harm as well as the main reason he completely embraced "Glorious Evolution" is treated like an outstanding dude 🙃

Plus it's not just Viktor. They deleted Jinx's schizophrenia in season 2 and screwed over any complexity Vi had in order to get her back together with Cait by act 3.

Yeah, Stanwick Pididly was an NPC in old league lore who not only stole the credit for creating Blitzcrank from his doctoral students, he also stole Viktor's earlier research and designs for prosthetics and used those in the process of revival and reconstruction of Urgot in the collaboration with Noxus's Bleak Academy, of course presenting those as his own. He also went to Piltover to advertise "bringing Urf back from the dead" while Piltovians were mourning Urf's passing. Unsurprisingly, he was kicked out. He later became a councilor on Zaun's Board of Directors. An absolutely deplorable person.

And what did Arcane do? It turned him into a hero, a founder of Piltover way back in history and Heimerdinger's friend.

One could argue that a viewer would have to think about worldbuilding to come to conclusion that whoever was involved with Piltover was directly involved in creating and perpetuating suffering in Zaun, thus Pididly is portrayed as a villain... and that theory could hold water, if literally any Piltovian was actually fully held accountable by the narrative for what they did to Zaun. Yet none of them, other than Marcus (whose crime was also hating Caitlyn!) was. Heimerdinger is a silly little goofball who might have been too serious earlier and "stuck in his old ways", but he felt sad when he went to Zaun (once? For the first time since Piltover started oppressing Zaun?) and narrative instantly treats him as fully redeemed. Jayce's moral dilemma disappears in S2. Caitlyn is not held accountable.

Arcane does a very poor job of actually following through with its portrayal of brutality Piltover enacts on Zaun which was shown through enforcers in Season 1. It is shown, yes, but the narrative doesn't always frame it as bad. Oftentimes it behaves like it's the case of "it is what it is". Which means there's no strong basis to say that Stanwick Pididly was portrayed as anything other than a hero.

For the rest of your points, I have nothing to add because they're all true, other than the ace argument - bear with me - if you view it through the lens of "it's a tool to deny jayvik", it may seem to you as something bad. But ace people are real, one of my best friends is ace and as an orientation it's not good or bad, it just is. It really shouldn't be used as a negative in ship wars.

#viktor league of legends #arcane viktor #arcane critical #anti arcane #old 2011. lore

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whereserpentswalk · 4 months ago

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I don't know why people like Contrapoints. I mean I know why, she's charismatic and is good at convincing right wing people to look into the left (sometimes, more so in the past). But it's very clear her view of trans people and trans rights only includes passing binary trans people.

Like, her entire "transtrender" video, where she has a Douge Walker style clipless review of whether or not nonbinary people deserve to exist. The first part is literally a fake debate with herself, where the version of her playing an enbyphobe makes actual arguments, and the version of her arguing for trans rights is a cartoonish stereotype of a nonbinary person that the audience is meant to laugh at, that wouldn't be out of place in a Steven Crowder skit. Then after the fake debate, she has a centrist voice of reason explain to her sympathetic transphobe character that passing is what makes trans people valid.

Like, if you're ok with that, would you be ok if she made a video called "cripples" where she played a eugenics supporter making actual pro eugenics arguments, and the character (also played by her) arguing for disability rights is a parody of how disabled people look and act? If you wouldn't be ok with that but you're ok with her transtrender video, might I ask why it's more ok for you to argue against one groups rights but not another's? And this is just one video I'm talking about, have you seen her entire shitty voting video which treats leftists like children that need to be taught to fall in line? Have you seen her newest video where she claims being male or female and being allo are inherent human traits?

And the worst part about being critical of her is she puts so much effort into making being critical of her hard. Like, doing Channel Awesome style sketches in your video essays is a very good way of taking stances without actually having to confirm that's what you believe. Or her canceling video, which while making some good point, frames all online criticism of her as a personal attack, which makes posts like this seem immoral to anyone reading them whose seen that video.

Maybe it's just the transandrophobia denial that seems to come from her way of thinking that's making all of this seem so real to me. Like, I don't want anything bad to happen to her, but if you're reading this, I want you to really consider why you and so many other people on the left consider her important, or why you want her to be the main voice of the trans community when her view of gender very specifically excludes people like me from having rights.

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vamp-orwave · 1 month ago

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OC Deep Dive 🚬 Lex Kelly

what common/uncommon fear do they have?

I guess you could call it anthropophobia, but really it's only for other vampires. Vampthropophobia. She gets serious anxiety being around licks she doesn't trust, and even those she does are on thin ice. Because the fact is, any of them could eat her, at any time, with no warning, and it might not even be their choice. Because of this, she hates being touched, cornered, crowded, or towered over, which can make Anarch gatherings a real gauntlet.

do they have any pet peeves?

When Malkavians, Caitiff or Duskborn (aka 3/4 of her coterie) are stigmatised by the other Anarchs. She doesn't care whether someone has a good reason for it. Equality or nothing -- or what else are we fighting for, exactly??

what are 3 items you can find in their bedroom?

A grimy adaptor board, sockets filled to bursting with plugs for her phone charger, pedestal fan, laptop/tablet, router, and TV / a depression nest made out of loose clothes, towels, and stained sheets piled atop a second-hand floor mattress and peppered with trash / a very sturdy bucket full of cleaning supplies hey that's cheating those are all groups of items!!

what do they notice first in a person?

How tall someone is, whether they look strong enough to overpower her (someone tell Lex [SHE KNOWS] that anyone can learn Potence), and what their eyes do when they see her. After that, it's class signifiers, then anywhere they could be concealing weapons.

on a scale of 1 to 10, how high is their pain tolerance?

She doesn't enjoy pain exactly, but she can't stomach any pleasurable physical sensations without a 1 or 2. Sometimes she'll go looking for the grounding and catharsis of a 4 or 5, though preferably not inflicted by others. When facing enemies it can get to a 6 before she'll even complain, but an 8 would have her on the ground for the rest of the night, and a sustained 7 or higher would make her crack within a couple minutes.

when under pressure, do they go into fight, flight, freeze, or fawn mode?

Typically she will freeze, relying on Cloak of Shadows to keep her safe until the danger passes. If there's no waiting, she'll flee, and try to make an exit for others if necessary. If there's no fleeing, she makes an (unsuccessful) attempt to support combatants. If she's on her own and can neither run or hide, she knows fawn can buy her time.

how would a stranger likely describe them?

Unkempt, dumpy, and shifty-looking. Nerd-adjacent NEET loser. Probably on something.

do they have any hobbies?

Digital painting, ink and pencil sketches (which you can find here), beach bumming, video essays, guerilla stickering, online leftist infighting, and junk food.

I was tagged by @kavalyera!

I'm tagging @superfastsquiddle @garygoldenbignaturals @craigthetourguide @lealdog @pretend-pretend-vampire

@sarahrune @iravaid @grauline @witchknightblack @spookebee

AND the person reading this! 🫵🏻

dividers by sarahrune and animatedglittergraphics-n-more, art by yuzu-zi, heroforge, @balketh, and unknown

#vtm #malkavian #lex kelly #drugs #tag games

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spacingoutforever · 8 months ago

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PLOT THEORY FOR S2 - Fallout

**MANY FALLOUT SPOILERS AHEAD - read at your own risk**

i have this weird theory that the juxtaposition we see between Cooper's outwardly grim appearance vs his morals being intact, and then Max's outwardly normal appearance vs his morally neutral choices, might be a way of telling us more about looks being deceiving for future developments.

hear me out.

Max is knocked out as soon as he finds out about Shady Sands, but he was definitely intending to do some damage, revenge had its hooks in him from the beginning. it was always there, whether it be to regain the honor the Brotherhood took away from him, then evolving into being part of the trio that was now after Hank. the man who robbed him of his home, family and hope for the future.

i saw a video essay discussing the moral choices of Lucy and Cooper's characters and i really liked the criteria they created for measuring it - ill link it below.

she says there's 2 main parts:

1. loss of control

2. being unrecognizable after enduring hardship

whether you agree with this criteria or think there's more to be added, i like how simple of a base it provides, when approaching these complex characters.

so if we then apply this to Max, he is the only member of our main cast who exhibits both points.

1. loss of control:

this is distinct to me in the Philly shoot-up, where he isn't able to control the T-60 power armor enough to put up a fair fight against The Ghoul. literally crash-lands it and then gets flung into the atmosphere LIKE PLS

he mistakenly attacks the people of Vault 4, once again losing control of his power.

the chicken-guy .... trying to derail that argument but saving the wrong person ><

Note: it's FASCINATING if you look at his character metaphorically, because the power armor is someone having the means for good but not having the understanding of what true 'good' means to them, yet. the power armor is LITERALLY his OUTWARD POWER like who is he really, underneath it??!!!!

we don't have this problem with Cooper and Lucy right now, their power is shown to be INWARD. the Ghoul's experience/connection to the beginning, and hers is her obvious moral strength and perseverance. they overlap.

i feel that his character is supposed to lean into the apprentice archetype, where he is currently lacking a proper teacher to show him the ropes. at first we expected Lucy to fit this role because of her inexperience on the surface, and yet when given a 'mentor' she not only challenges him but proves she can handle herself. ruling that one out, and leading us to believe the fate-intertwined aspect of ghoulcy has a touch more to it. implicit rather than explicit.

2. being unrecognizable after enduring hardship

Max to me fits this point too, because we still don't get a glimpse into who he truly is, besides knowing his past. from the beginning, his goal is to be a Knight of the Brotherhood, that's how he defines himself currently.

when he fights off the gulper, he reiterates this line to himself: "i am a Knight of the Brotherhood of Steel".

he says it AGAIN in response to Lucy's advances in the vault. which is a clue into how much he relies on it for his moral code, to the point where it crosses into his personal decisions. not just for 'missions' or survival.

this is like foreshadowing a tipping point for me, because without the Brotherhood, what does he want? he's acting in alignment of the code that was pushed on him, but it always feels like he has to remind himself to BE that.

that it doesn't come naturally, the way the other characters' do. we see this at the start where he gets the answer wrong in class, he's bullied, an 'outcast' within his own community (for lack of a better term).

by comparison, the Ghoul isn't even a real 'outcast' in the way cowboys are stereotypically portrayed, because he fits in the wasteland better than anyone.

so point 2. becomes relevant when he gets the armor and is unrecognizable from where he started. this is a point he never thought he'd get to, but he sacrifices his real identity to get there.

SO ALL THIS TO SAYYYY...... that's where i feel his character will be vulnerable to a villain-arc!

in the ending, he gets accepted as a Knight, but his expression betrays him. there is a continuous inner conflict within Maximus that is SO SUBTLE and its written so beautifully. i think we're going to see ghoulcy pushing each other in the right direction. their shared journey seems to be about regaining HOPE.

but for Max, i feel in my bones that something darker is coming for his arc, it feels like revenge. the goofy, lovable boy in the clunky armor, may very well end up having the darkest battle to face. and it's because he's alone in doing it.

this was a lot to digest, so if you made it this far i thank you from the bottom of my heart!!!!!!!

AND if you have anything to add i would love to hear it :) !!!!

youtube

#fallout prime #the ghoul #ghoulcy #cooper howard #lucy maclean #maximus #fallout theory #spoilers #fallout spoilers #vaultghoul #Youtube

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