#but like it's completely arbitrary and a Me Problem

[coimbrabertone]

Closing the Doors is Bad for Indycar

Today, Indycar has announced its charter system.

On face value, I see the case for this being a good thing. The likes of Ganassi, Rahal, Coyne, Andretti, and Penske themselves have been in the sport for decades and I see this as a way of giving back to them. The teams that have been in Indycar and contributed to its great moments and iconic races deserve some sense of security and a financial safety net should they choose to cash out.

I mean, the fact that such historic names as Newman/Haas and Forsythe are completely gone from Indycar racing is pretty sad.

That part is good, however...the problem I have with the charter system is the numbers.

There will be 25 charters.

Of these, 22 charters will receive leader circle money.

Additionally, 27 grid slots will be the norm outside of the Indianapolis 500.

I disagree with every single one of these numbers. 25 charters is an arbitrary number and it has caused a 3-car limit to be instituted in Indycar, leading to Chip Ganassi Racing having to cut two cars and fire a whole bunch of people.

2024 Rookie of the Year Linus Lundqvist looks like he'll be out of a job for 2025.

2023 Rookie of the Year Marcus Armstrong is getting farmed out to Meyer Shank Racing, which will have a technical alliance with Ganassi for 2025.

Meanwhile Kyffin Simpson, who is 21st in points in the same team that won the championship with Alex Palou this year, is expected to take over the chartered CGR #8 because his father owns Ridgeline Lubricants which is a major sponsor of the team.

This is what the charter system is for? Getting people fired and ensuring a paydriver keeps his seat? Ridiculous.

And three of these charters not getting leader circle money...quite frankly this rule only exists because of Penske Entertainment being cheap and not wanting to spend more money than they already do. It makes absolutely zero sense to have chartered cars not getting leader circle money.

The purpose of the charters is to give back to the teams that have made Indycar what it is? Well, only giving money to the top twenty-two doesn't do that.

And twenty-seven grid slots at races outside of the Indianapolis 500...this part arguably pisses me off the most, because there is no reason for this rule.

Garage space at Mid-Ohio? There were thirty-six Craftsman Trucks at Mid-Ohio in the 2023 O'Reilly Auto Parts 150 last year, you can find a couple of extra pit stops.

Toronto has a weird pitlane ever since that hotel got built? Move it. Hell, a few years ago we had a pileup, and the pace car took the cars under the Princes Gate and onto a closed road over there, make that the pitlane! How cool would that be? Cars peeling off underneath a neoclassical arch to get into the pits.

You can make more than twenty-seven cars work.

Indycar just doesn't want to.

They want twenty-five charters and the two Prema cars for next year, that's it.

Furthermore, it sounds like the plan is to decrease that limit to twenty-five cars total, so every car left will be chartered.

This rule, along with the money for the top twenty-two, makes me think that the plan is for Prema to eventually force out and buy out a Dale Coyne or an Ed Carpenter Racing.

So much for protecting the owners, huh?

Thus, this rule isn't really about protecting the owners, it's about producing artificial exclusivity. The same kind of shit that Formula One has pulled to Andretti, and now the series that Andretti races in wants to do that as well. It's cynical, it's hypocritical, and it's not good for the sport.

Zak Brown of McLaren has said a lot of good things when it comes to Indycar's future, but one thing he said that really irritated me is that idea that quality is better than quantity when it comes to racing.

First of all, quality and quantity are not mutually exclusive here.

Second of all, quantity sure spiced up the show at Milwaukee with the amount of lapped cars that the leaders needed to negotiate, providing for constant drama and always giving chasing cars the opportunity to close in.

Third of all, Indycar is not Formula One, and it should not try to be Formula One.

Indycar is great because it races on so many disciplines: road courses, street circuits, short ovals, superspeedways, all of it. But another thing that makes Indycar great is how open it has been in comparison as well.

Formula One has limited teams to running two cars, Indycar has traditionally allowed teams to run as many cars as they want. Some teams ran one, some ran as many as five or six, and that's beautiful. It's given teams the flexibility to expand and add a car if they want to, meaning that it was always theoretically possible for a big team like Penske, Ganassi, or Andretti to pick up your favorite driver.

That's going away.

All the teams in 2025 will run either two or three cars, with the small teams generally running two and the big teams generally running three. That's not fun.

And with this charter system capped at twenty-five and more inclined to shrink rather than expand, it doesn't give any flexibility for the future.

Ed Carpenter Racing could sell tomorrow to the infinite money glitch that is the Saudi Public Investment Fund, and they'd still only have their two cars available, with limited options to ever acquire a third.

Limited options to ever climb to the level of Penske and Ganassi.

Thus, it only serves to reinforce the stale duopoly that has dominated modern Indycar.

I don't want to be negative about Indycar. I want to unconditionally love this sport, I want to be excited about seeing 235 mile per hour laps at Michigan, Pocono, and Fontana, I want to see drivers cutting through the streets of Surfers Paradise and Vancouver, I want to see a classic photo finish at a Chicagoland or a Kansas.

I want to see Arrow McLaren taking the fight to Penske and Ganassi, I want to see RLL get better and bounce back on the ovals, I want to see Andretti Global come to the Indianapolis 500 with an armada of five or six cars like they used to.

I want to see competition between chassis manufacturers and engine manufacturers, I want to see cars that look fast and innovative but can still bump and bang side-by-side or protect a driver in a high-speed crash. I want a series that doesn't tuck its tail and run away the moment football season starts.

Instead, Indycar wants to be aging cars that look like crap racing around street circuits in Dallas and Denver (for the third time) with one of Will Power, Josef Newgarden, Scott McLaughlin, Scott Dixon, or Alex Palou winning.

And you don't even get the benefit of running an ancient formula because of this arbitrary limit on the number of cars. There are 60-65 Dallara DW12s in current service amongst the teams, more if we count older chasses, show cars, and rebuilt tubs, so why on Earth are we insisting on only racing twenty-five of these goddamn things?!?

I could understand if there was a new car in limited quantities, but this car is old and there are a lot of them out there, so if we can't get a new car, at least, at least, let us experience the benefit of this 13-year-old car but running as many of them as possible every race weekend.

But we don't.

The series continues to make the most mediocre decisions possible while hoping that great racing can make us forget about all their mistakes.

That doesn't really work when you have an offseason from September to March full of your bad decisions.

In other news, MotoGP made me happy with a tense battle between Jorge Martin and Enea Bastianini in the closing stages of the Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix at Misano ending with Bastianini barging his way through to take his second win of the season. While in F1, Lando Norris dominated at Singapore and even managed to lead the first lap from pole position.

Baby's first good race start...I'm so proud.

NASCAR at Bristol Night also happened, but uhh...yeah, the less said about that, the better.

[threadsun]

That's absolutely understandable about the discord! I'm the same way, aside from wanting to be the one in charge, I am scared of conflict but my anger in situations does sometimes bring me into it. I'm in the server and it's nice and all, but with it's probably 50+ channels it's overwhelming, and being the kind of writer that I am I refuse to talk in it. There are certain things that they don't allow to be talked about in certain ways and unfortunately for me that takes out a lot of the nsfw things I would want to talk about, so I'm just there for announcements. It's sad I don't feel comfortable interacting but, that's the way it is :<

Oh yeah, I know that they're very much not about dubcon/noncon stuff, which is a valid limit for them to have. But unfortunately that's where a lot of my interests lay wrt writing and yanderes so like. Not the place for me, and I recognise and am okay with that! I think Moon is technically in the discord server, but they also only look at the announcements.

I'm just an argumentative person, and also like... idk I'm big on making the spaces I hang out in comfortable for myself? Which means I'm liberal with the block button. Whenever I get people on here trying to argue with me, I kind of work on the idea of "if you can't find the unfollow button, then I'll just use the block button."

But yeah, if I was running an 18+ only yandere discord server, I'd be super picky about rules and generally making it a place I want to be, and that probably wouldn't draw in enough people to make an actually active discord server. Like I know that a decent number of my mutuals and followers align with my interests and ideas and stuff, but idk...

I just wouldn't want conflict because I'm only here for fun. And I know I'd be a tyrant and people would have to be okay with that. Which... a lot of people probably wouldn't be idk. People have no reason to trust me to be the judge jury and executioner of the server, so like I wouldn't be surprised (or upset) if they didn't. But it's what I'd be more comfortable being because I hate petty arguments and prefer to just block and move on.

I think I'm just too self-centred to be part of a discord server maybe? idk.

[twilightarcade]

spins around

[juney-blues]

other trans women can put it better than me but there's this, tension, between "radical genderpunk you can be whatever you want forever-ness" and "trans woman as politicised identity"

one views any engagement with your assigned gender at birth as like, being trapped in a prison of your own making,? as using the tools of the enemy or whatever. and the other is "yes my assigned gender is a prison, it is a prison the outside world is constantly enforcing on me and i would like to be able to talk about that a little thanks"

so you get this tension, where one side (made up of predominantly people who aren't trans women) says "the ideal world is one in which you can be whatever the fuck you want forever! so call yourself anything you want as long as it makes you happy, you can be an afab trans woman if you want it's all made up :)" and the other side says "hey hi yes i broadly agree with you on the whole ultimate gender liberation front, but we do not live in an ideal world and transfemininity is uniquely demonized even as far as trans identities in general go, so i would appreciate it if maybe you didn't act like our identity and oppression was something made up that you could just put on and take off whenever you like? we sure as fuck can't do that."

and then the other side goes "hey all these trans women are invalidating us! why are they gatekeeping and being so exclusive! assigned gender at birth shouldn't matter so why are you acting like it does!?"

and they say this while we live in a society where your assigned gender at birth very much does matter, and if you're a trans woman it is borderline impossible to escape that.

it's like an is-ought problem where since we're not acting like we already live in a gender utopia where one's relationship with assigned sex and gender is completely arbitrary, we're treated like the enforcers of the gender binary.

this is where you get stupid bullshit like people calling trans women radfems

[nope-body]

.

[janmisali]

what do you think of tone indicators in general?

unfortunately my thoughts on tone indicators are somewhat nuanced. fortunately, this is tumblr not twitter, so I can just write out my full thoughts in one post and be as verbose about it as feels necessary.

speaking as an autistic person (and I know there are other autistic people who don't hold this same view, this is just my perspective), I think as an accessibility tool, the extended set tone indicators in current popular use is fundamentally misguided.

the oldest ones, /s for sarcasm and /j for jokes, make sense. their notation isn't the most intuitive thing ("does /s mean sarcastic or serious?") but it's not too difficult to explain what they mean. I've had to spend my whole life learning by brute force what different tones of voice mean and what they change about how I'm supposed to interpret something, so I already know what "read this in a sarcastic voice" and "read this as a joke" are supposed to mean. my existing skills can be translated into the new form without too much effort.

the same thing applies to emoji and emoticons. I know what facial expressions mean, because I had to learn what they mean. figuring out if :) is sincere or not from context is a skill I've already needed to develop. it doesn't come naturally for me, but it's something I already at least somewhat know how to do.

most of the tone indicators in current use uh. don't work like this.

tone indicators like /ref or /nbh don't correspond to specific tones of voice. I don't have a "I'm making a reference" voice or a "I'm not talking about a person who's here" voice that I can picture the sentence being read in. these do not indicate tones, they're purely disambiguators. they clarify what something means without necessarily changing how it would be read out loud.

and on paper, that's fine, right? like, it's theoretically a good thing to take an otherwise ambiguous statement and add something to it that clarifies what you meant by it. the problem is that these non-tone tone indicators are not even remotely self-explanatory. it's up to me, the person who is being clarified to, to know what all these acronyms are supposed to mean, and how they change the way I'm supposed to interpret what something means.

it's, quite literally, a newly-invented second set of social cues that I'm expected to learn separately from the set that I've already spent my whole life figuring out, and it works completely differently.

sure, these rules are (in principle) less arbitrary than the rules of facial expressions and tones of voice and how long you're supposed to wait before it's your turn to speak, but they're also fully artificial and recently invented, which means they're currently in a constant state of flux. tone indicators go in and out of fashion all the time, and the "comprehensive lists" are never helpful.

in theory, I appreciate the idea of people going out of their way to clarify what they mean by potentially ambiguous things they post online. if it worked, that would be a really nice thing to do.

however, sometimes I imagine what the internet would be like without them. what if instead of using /s, the expectation was that if you're sarcastic online there's no guarantee that strangers reading your post will know what you meant? what if instead of inventing more and more acronyms to cover every possible potentially confusing situation, we just... expected one another to speak less ambiguously in the first place?

so, I on paper like the idea of tone indicators. I think it's good that some people are trying to be considerate by being extra clear about what they mean by things. but if tone indicators didn't exist, and people who wanted to be considerate in this way instead just made a point of phrasing things more clearly to begin with, I think that would be vastly preferable to even the most well-implemented tone indicator system.

also /pos sucks because there's something deeply and profoundly wrong for an abbreviation that means "I don't mean this as an insult, don't worry" to be spelled the same way as an acronym that's an insult

[neofelis----nebulosa]

Maybe a bad take but I think it’s ok to arbitrarily categorize animals as long as you acknowledge that’s what it is. Like it’s ok to group a bunch of species with similar appearances together under an umbrella term, even if their morphological similarity has no genetic or taxonomic significance.

[drdemonprince]

I was never really certain about my transition in the way that most gatekeeping hormone prescribers and curious members of the public demand that a trans person be. I didn’t “always know” that I was not cisgender. I haven’t “always known” anything about myself. Very few truths about me have always remained true, my existence is too interpersonal, contextual, and ever-evolving for all of that. (So is most everyone else’s, I think). I don’t think that the fact I’d eventually choose to exercise my body autonomy at age 30 by taking hormones is a decision I could have foreseen when I was a child. All that I knew about being transgender when I was a kid was a fact that most children intuitively know: gender assignment was a violation of my freedom, of everyone’s freedom in fact, and it was wrong. As an infant and then a child and teenager, people kept imposing labels on me; they kept forcing me and my body into prescribed gendered boxes, and while the specific labels and boxes never really felt like the right ones, the most disturbing part about it all was the forcing. No coerced identity would have ever felt right. Children can tell when secrets are being kept from them, and when adults are restricting their choices. They notice that they and the other children are being lined up boy-girl, boy-girl, without ever being told what a girl or a boy even is. They can see their parents frowning when they reach for the doll with the shimmery hair, or climb atop the neighbor kid on the playground. Kids know that they are forbidden from sitting with their legs spread wide or flicking their wrist, and their gender illegibility is shamed in them, long before they get any answers about what gender means or where it comes from or why it’s so important that they make themselves easy to understand.

Like the cloned children in Never Let Me Go who grow up being conditioned for a life of forced organ donation, children in a cissexist society grow up conditioned to fall within certain gendered boundary lines, and by the time they learn that the reason for this is almost completely arbitrary, they can’t imagine any alternative. Not until some of them hear about gender transition and find the prospect very compelling, for some reason. You can say that reason is because some of us are inherently trans, but there’s absolutely nothing in the way of brain science, genetics research, or even sociological data to back that up. Besides, the search for a biological “reason” that people are transgender or queer runs counter to the goal of queer liberation in the long run. Science only needs to explain the existence of transgender people (or queer people more broadly) if our existence is in some way aberrant or a problem. If queerness is accepted as a form of human diversity that simply exists, then there is no need to excuse it by claiming that it is never a choice. It can be a choice, if a person wants to make it, and hopefully it satisfies them, but maybe it won’t. Freedom to choose means freedom to forever be dissatisfied, to search endlessly for more, and yes, to capable of making a mistake. I would say that viewing myself as transgender was a choice. I decided to break away from the straight, female categories to which I had been assigned, and doing so allowed me to view the legal and societal power structures that had restricted me more clearly. It helped me better understand myself. But that does not mean the actual act of breaking away was always the truest reflection of who I am. The version of me that transitioned was a person on the run — and how a person behaves, thinks, and self-conceives when they are fleeing is not a great reflection of whom they might be if they were safe. If we all lived in a world free from mandatory gender assignment, and where our bodies were not mined for meaning about the kinds of sex we liked, the clothing we should wear, the personality qualities we have, the roles we should play in society, and the connections we are allowed to form with others, who knows who each of us might be. But none of us get to live in that world, or ever gets completely free from the frameworks of heterosexuality and the gender binary. These frameworks shape every legal institution we encounter, every school we attend, every item of clothing we put on, every substance we take into our bodies, every piece of paperwork that ever gets printed about us, and every look another person ever gives us. And so we make due with rewriting and recombining those frameworks as best we can. It should come as no surprise that those us who break away from the binary have to experiment and revise how we understand ourselves quite a bit — sometimes getting things “wrong,” sometimes searching forever for the semblance of something “right.” Sometimes reveling in the “wrongness” of all the available options is kind of the point.

I wrote about my detransition, retransition, and the eternal dissatisfaction that is probably the corest truth of my identity. It's free to read or have narrated to you on my Substack.

[velvetvexations]

Since I'm not transfem, I prefer to present this as a question, sparked by observations about many transradfems.

Do you think bæddel-adjacent / TIRF / transradfeminist people kind of sweep under the rug all the parts of transmisogyny where perceived manhood/masculinity and hypermasculinization are weaponized against transfems?

Like, so much focus on the femininity/womanhood part, but like... Radio silence if anyone brings up how radfem views of men or masculinity can and will harm transfems in basically any part of their transitions due to every negative stereotype of men being thrown at them 10-fold?

And that bringing up the latter would be treated as if it's misgendering.

Just like transmascs being treated as deviant women being talked about gets treated like we're misgendering ourselves, coming from the same people...

Absolutely. Transradfems treat gender identity like hard laws-of-physics reality and completely forget that our categorizations of ourselves are still relatively arbitrary just the same as assigning gender based on sex. If someone hates trans women because they see us as men, transradfems see that as hating women - which they should, of course, because it is literally that, but the problem is taken to be seeing us as men and seeing us as men alone. It's just the miscatagorization. The irrationality of the hatred in and of itself is not questioned, because, you know, rather choose a bear and all. They can't understand how their own attitudes towards men reinforce the paranoia and scrutiny over the possibility of male infiltrators.

It makes me wonder if part of the reason they minimize TERF harm towards transmascs as a weird form of jealousy. I don't want to get too dark, Velvet Nation, but my family (not me personally) has a history with bad things happening to one person and that being taken by someone else as a sign of favor. I can imagine someone being irrationally upset by the fact that people who are born with the gift of acceptance as a female not only waste it but protest against it, and then if they detransition are seemingly (all TERF benevolence is a lie) welcomed with open loving arms in a way that's unobtainable for them when they go from M to F.

[oversensitiveandoffputting]

So I actually like how Blitz’s and Stolas’ prejudices are written. It feels a lot more real and like something they have to work on and overcome.

Too many stories have their protagonists just completely unaffected by the world around them. “Damn, racism is a problem? Well that’s bad! Someone as good as me can’t be racist!”

Which…oh my god. Now that I’m typing it out, does explain so many antis. Literal child shit.

But anyone of a marginalized status can tell you that’s not how it works? Even the bestest best boy will internalize racism, classism, sexism, homophobia, antisemitism, Islamophobia, ableism…all the -isms. You can’t “good person” your way out of being affected by your culture.

As an autistic person, I still get annoyed when people don’t make eye contact. Because I’m making the effort to mask, damn it, why aren’t you putting in the effort to hide something shameful like I am? And then I have to take a moment to remind myself that autism isn’t shameful and eye contact (or lack of it) is morally neutral and culturally relevant.

And when media portrays bigotry and prejudice as The Thing Only the Bad People Do and not a series of systems, behaviors, and thoughts that divide people based on arbitrary characteristics, it feels disingenuous. People that may have some unfortunate opinions on things, like “rap music is bad” and “gay people are fine when they’re not being cringey about it” and “men shouldn’t cry” (*coughStellaStanscough*) will never look inside themselves if they think of these systems as “The Good” and “The Bad”

[intrulogical]

🍊: The Semantics of The Orange Side

Explaining his function, understanding his role in the narrative, and debunking/dissecting common notions about the Orange Side.

To be honest, this essay was inevitable. I've had thoughts about Orange brewing since 2020, but only recently has it developed into something more concrete. For the longest time, most meta surrounding Orange began with theories about his role as a side, then extended towards narrative and side mechanics later on. I, for one, have been a victim of this pattern. 

Then, I realized that asking who Orange is is a terrible opener for theories.

There are many important questions glossed over if we start that way. For example, what is Orange's role in the overarching theme of combating black-and-white thinking? What does it mean for Orange to be a side? Who is he in the context of the Dark Sides? There are many crucial things to consider when it comes to predicting who Orange is, and I feel like concrete theories can only be made if we can establish the semantics of how Orange works.

This essay definitely won't be perfect— this is literally my second draft— but I will try my best making it in a way that flows, somehow. Some sections will discuss general ideas I have, some will try to dissec popular preconceived notions to reorient our logic surrounding Orange. As always, I'm open to discussion! My words aren't gospel.

Important notes: All mentions of Thomas refer to him as a character. Moreover, I acknowledge that Remus is a flawed depiction of intrusive thoughts. Technically, he acts more of a mix of intrusive thoughts, forbidden creativity, and impulsive thoughts. Because of this, when I talk about Remus in the context of his role, please be assured that I am talking about all his functions at once, not just intrusive thoughts. 

(Full essay under the cut! I worked hard on this, so I'd definitely appreciate the read. <3)

i. Orange as a Dark Side

The ways fans have characterized and defined Orange has always seemed to be rooted in their perception of what being a “Dark” Side is. That is— they are edgy, and somewhat suppressed. They are more “morally questionable” compared to the rest. More fics would even go as far as depicting Orange as morally black, in that he has no role in the narrative other than being a stirring force of conflict; a villain that needs to be defeated.

It is unfortunate to see such a surface level perspective on who the “Dark” Sides are and what they mean as an oppositional force to the “Light” Sides.

My stance on the “Dark” and “Light” sides has always been the same (if you read my past essays, you'll know). Like what Logan said in CLBG, the labels are arbitrary because no side can be argued to be “good” or “bad”. Although, it would be a complete lie for me to say there's no distinction. Rather, Thomas’ black-and-white thinking literally created one. But the distinction does not lie within the sides’ morals, rather it lies in how big their influence is on Thomas. Because the “Light” Sides are welcomed, Thomas will entertain their contributions more than the sides Thomas considers as “bad” or “taboo”.

In my opinion, Orange being morally black makes no sense in a series that is a.) thematically focused on dismantling black-and-white thinking, and b.) a man vs. self conflict. The villain is the problem of Thomas not being able to cope with his mental struggles properly. It would be odd to blame a portion of his brain as the evil of all evils. Although, I'd like to clarify that while Orange most likely wouldn't be morally black, it wouldn't be a surprise to me if he is just as dubious and mischievous as the other “Dark” Sides. After all, if they are the most suppressed sides, they would have to stick to unconventional tactics (aka looking scary) to get Thomas’ attention.

I'll explain more later when I get into what I think Orange actually does as a side. For now, I want to focus on Orange in the context of the “Dark” Sides, because I genuinely think it's an overlooked idea! While nothing is explicitly confirmed, the “Dark” Sides are implied to know something the other characters and we, the audience, don't know about. 

Janus and Remus share this sense of meticulousness. They always feel like they're scheming something. Janus, for example, took his time from CLBG to SVS.R to successfully impart to Thomas that acting out of self-interest isn't the worst thing in the world, especially if your mental health is crumbling. Remus is even in on this plan, although his motivations for assisting Janus aren’t actually explicitly expressed yet. Even if Remus wanted to challenge Logan's self-restraint in WTIT to prove how much it was harming Thomas’ long-term mental health, we still don't know if Remus is doing it out of care for Thomas, or just… ‘cus. Either way, it's important to know that whatever Remus is doing seems to point to the same direction Janus is going, which is to break Thomas’ black-and-white thinking.

Assuming Orange is another “Dark” Side, it feels crucial to understand who Orange is in the context of this undisclosed plan. More than anything, because the “Dark” Sides want to be heard, it would make sense if they unionize to achieve that goal together. If they dismantle Thomas’ horrid perception of them, then all three of them would benefit. Thus, it would make no sense for Orange, if he were not morally black, to act solely out of individual interest. Yes, the “Dark” Sides seem to be introducing themselves one by one, but I feel like that's because a.) narratively, it's to pace, b.) it would scare Thomas for three strangers to pop up to him only for them to be shunned as a collective by the “Light” Sides, and c.) Janus and Remus seem to be performing specific roles in this overarching plan, so while they work separately, it's mostly for the same cause.

So, what does that mean, exactly? Like I said, the “Dark” Sides have an overall goal of being heard, strengthening Thomas’ mental wellbeing, and breaking his black-and-white thinking. If my theory is correct in assuming each “Dark” Side has a specific role for this plan, then pinpointing Janus and Remus’ roles may help us factor out Orange's role.

Here's what I deduced: Janus is there as some kind of soft launch, to set the principle. Janus mirrors Patton in that sense, although in the opposite direction. He breaks apart Thomas’ preconceived notions of the world and bandages it with better, more nuanced foundations. On the other hand, Remus somewhat acts like an alarm clock. While not all his contributions are worthwhile, his mere presence is a reminder that something has to be done. In the series, it's to cater to his deteriorating mental health. He checks if the principles Janus provides aren't being followed, and makes a good fucking clamor about it if it doesn't.

Orange, I'd argue, serves as a means for Thomas to externalize these principles. It would make sense that the last thing Thomas would need to do is to put everything into action. Janus points out how one can be disenfranchised, Remus points out when he is being disenfranchised, and Orange ensures Thomas can express his discomfort when he is disenfranchised. Makes sense, right?

Speaking of externalization.

ii. Personal and Narrative Purpose

If you’re a fan that pre-dates the release of WTIT, you're well-acquainted with the idea that Orange represents Rage or Wrath. This theory came about in cahoots with an old notion that each “Dark” Side needs to have a “Light” Side counterpart, especially if you share complementary colors. Thus, many people assumed that Orange is Logan’s foil. Consequently, most interpretations of Orange depict him as emotion-centric, specifically Rage, as that’s what most people assume is an oppositional force against logic. Moreover, because a portion of Logan’s arc revolves around accepting one’s emotions, it would make sense if Orange, as an emotion-centric side, would be part of that. We’ve gotten two hints from the series itself that confirms this: 1.) a fight sequence in SVS.R showing “Blinding Rage” as one of Thomas’ attacking options, and 2.) the infamous orange eyes in WTIT that appeared when both Thomas and Logan felt angry simultaneously. 

What’s funny is, if you really think about it, we literally only have two pieces of evidence that point to this widely accepted fan theory. Although, unlike the previous section, I’m more inclined to actually believe these theories because it… does make sense! Especially narrative-wise. At the moment, miscommunication amongst the sides are at an all-time high. This is mostly because each side refuses to express their thoughts, especially since they’re at the midst of a complete paradigm shift in terms of morality and principles. Everything’s just a little too fragile, and it does not help that Thomas’ mental health is also at the brink. After SVS.R, the sides have acknowledged Thomas is on edge, but they’re still doing nothing concrete to actually fix it.

WTIT is my favorite episode of the series because it encapsulates the entire conflict so well. While Logan isn’t perfect, much of the useful suggestions he provided since DWIT never last past the moment he suggested them. Did Thomas ever see a therapist? Not really. Did Thomas find someone to talk about his issues with? Doesn't seem like it. Is Thomas taking his time with his mental health recovery? Nope. More than anything, the “Light” Sides and Thomas are very reactionary towards their problems. It’s even worse when you consider that Thomas is opting to pursue a relationship in the middle of this mess. WTIT showing us Thomas getting irrationally angry at Nico for not replying to his texts is… an interesting Chekhov’s Gun for future episodes, lemme tell you that.

Now, why am I relaying all this? It’s mostly to prove that something, or someone, needs to snap. There are grievances between the sides and Thomas that they are consciously suppressing that need out. Roman, Logan, and Thomas, specifically, need some sort of outlet for their frustrations— a way to justify them, in a sense. Logan’s eyes glowing orange while he snapped at Remus speaks so loudly of what Orange may offer. Externalization, justice, “cathartic release,” as my friend Orb (@orbmanson7) put it. Presently, Orange as an externalizing force is needed so they can actually do something about this damn issue! 

And if not, I also see Orange’s role similarly to Remus’. As I’ve explained earlier, Remus’ presence acts as an alarm clock for Thomas to be aware of his deteriorating mental health. If Orange isn’t there to assist in an all-encompassing externalization of a side or Thomas’ deepest grievances, the mere presence of Orange as an emotional force can act as another kind of alarm clock. What I mean is, if we’re feeling mentally low, for example, we don’t need to express our grievances in the most eloquent way possible. Sometimes we just need to get angry. To cry, to shout nonsense. And that alone would be enough to prove that we need help. We need to do something about this. 

To summarize, I think most depictions connecting Orange to emotional externalization are not off. There’s a lot of objectivity surrounding it, both when it comes to the narrative and his semantics as a side. We need a driving force that can topple the sides and Thomas over the edge to fully process the depth of Thomas’ mental health issues. 

But, how does he, a supposedly, emotion-centric side, differ from Patton?

iii. Orange’s True Identity

Now that we laid our foundations, I think it would be a good time to entertain the question of: well, who is Orange?

Truth is, I have my own guess on what I believe Orange to be, but I cannot say my opinion is conclusive. My theories on Orange literally change every two months. So what I'll do, I suppose, is first, explain what makes a side a side. Then, I'll explain my own current predictions about Orange. Lastly, I'll list some popular fan theories I've heard about Orange and give you my thoughts.

a. What is a Side?

First— what constitutes a side? To me, there is no real basis in the conception of a side. Like what my friend Orb once explained to me, the interactions between sides are mental processes personified. This doesn't mean we should simply view the sides as metaphors, by the way. They're a hundred percent characters in their own right. But what I mean by “process personified” is that if we view one of Thomas' conflicts on its own— as in, without the sides— can we imagine the mental processes he's undergoing? To make it clearer, let's use an example. In WTIT, we see Remus and Logan battle out on who gets to influence Thomas more. If we saw this without the sides, we can think of it like— imagine you're having a bad mental health day. You wanted to do a list of chores but your mind is in the gutters right now. You feel guilty because of your demotivation. You try doing what you planned, but you still suck at it, and now you're spiraling, thinking about every insecurity you have, but you're also trying to combat that by rationalizing it.

I'm not gonna say that this definition solves who Orange truly is, but it does help when it comes to understanding how the sides work. Another characteristic of a side would be their multifacetedness. No side embodies one thing alone. They can have roles that are adjacent to each other, but not the same thing. For example, Roman embodies both the ego and creativity. Not the same thing, but it works in tandem in Thomas’ context. Same goes for Remus with intrusive thoughts and dark creativity. It is important to entertain the idea that Orange can encompass more than one role. 

The last thing to consider would be the technical difference between a “Light” Side and a “Dark” Side. The division was created for Thomas to compartmentalize and suppress sides of himself that his Catholic upbringing taught him to believe is bad. If we assume Orange is a “Dark” Side, he must be embodying something typically thought of as taboo. 

b. Who is Orange?

This brings us to our earlier question of, how does Patton differ from Orange if they both embody emotions? In DWIT, Logan confirms Remus was born from the categorization of certain thoughts as good or bad. I think it wouldn't be farfetched to suggest the same happened to Orange if he did embody emotions at a certain capacity. One of the biggest arguments I hear against this suggestion would be, if Patton already represents Thomas’ emotions, why do we need another side who does? The answer, again, lies in the themes of black-and-white thinking and compartmentalization. If Remus embodies the thought of committing a “sin”, Orange could possibly embody the actual emotions of wanting to do so. Anger is merely one possibility in Orange's roster of emotions. There are other emotions as well deemed “sinful” by Catholicism— pride, jealousy, hatred, greed, grief, etc. It would make sense that Patton would try omitting these out of himself when he was younger because he viewed them lowly.

So, what is my actual guess on who Orange is meant to embody? Well, I mean, I think my stance is pretty clear from the past 2500 words written literally before this. Simply put, if Remus is meant to embody forbidden thoughts, then Orange embodies forbidden emotions. Anger is merely one of many. He aids both Thomas and the other sides in externalizing strong emotions that seep past their efforts of suppression.

This is, of course, under the assumption that Orange is his own separate entity. I'm more inclined to believe this because Virgil confirms in CLBG that Janus has “Dark” Side friends (as in, plural). It also just feels more balanced this way if we consider the forbidden thoughts vis-a-vis forbidden emotions parallel to be true.

c. How could Logan be Orange?

But, of course, I've also considered the possibility of Logan being Orange. It's not my theory of choice but as someone who was balls deep in this theory a few months ago, there's definitely some merit to it. Here's the link to the post if you want to read my theory in full. It's pretty lengthy, but to summarize: This theory operates under the assumption that Thomas’ suppression of certain sides (ie. making them a “Dark” Side) makes them develop an additional role— the role Thomas perceives them as. 

To explain better, let's use Remus as an example. Logan explained that, originally, Remus separated from Roman as Dark Creativity. Because Thomas refuses to entertain any creative thought he deemed bad, any suggestion provided by Remus was immediately labeled as intrusive. Thus, he became intrusive thoughts via Thomas’ low perception of him. Same goes for Janus, but to a lesser degree. As a side, he mostly acts out of the interest of Thomas, somewhat like self-preservation. But, because Catholic upbringing teaches that selfishness equates to evil, Thomas perceives Janus’ role of keeping things hidden as deceitful.

Thus, if Logan is Orange, then that means Logan’s role as logic is warping due to Thomas’ low perception of him. It’s no secret that Thomas views Logan as a “strict” side. In this scenario, I wouldn’t exactly say his additional role has something to do with externalization. Moreso, it has to do something with assertion or strict discipline. Think of an authoritative figure, like a teacher. Usually, when an authoritative teacher isn’t being respected in a class, they resort to meaner tactics like passive aggression, manipulation, etc. to impose their power. Logan doesn’t really transform into anything opposite to who he is as Logic. Rather, he has an additional role that coincides with Thomas’ perverted perception of logic. I’m not actually sure what this role is, but if I were to guess, it has something to do with restriction, discipline, or conformity. 

Narratively, Logan becoming a “Dark” Side makes sense when you realize that his entire character arc is about him losing his sense of self-assertion. I made an essay last year that explores this if you want something to read later. To explain, WDWGOOBITM establishes how it’s important for Thomas to balance his practicality (needs) and aspirational desires (wants) for him to function as a human being. At the same time, we get LNTAO where Logan realizes that he failed to contribute to the discussion as usefully as the other sides. This creates a scenario where Logan concedes a lot of the decision-making to Patton and Roman’s hands. The result: Logan’s presence is minimized. Even in the episodes where he “saves the day” (DWIT and the Frozen episode), Thomas refused to consider his suggestions until the latter halves of the episodes. WTIT emphasizes this even more when we see Thomas prioritize his date with Nico to keep himself happy instead of focusing on the chores he promised to do. Even if we don’t know if Roman had anything to do with this, it’s obvious Thomas is naturally more inclined to do things Patton and Roman would prefer than something Logan does.

Thus, it makes sense that Logan becomes a “Dark” Side. But, and this is an important but, I don’t really agree with depictions of Logan suspending his role as logic to become a “Dark” Side. Logic is such an integral part of who we are as people, that even if you’re an intuition-focused person, you’d still have logical facilities in your head that connect one thing to another. Basic knowledge and all that. I can only see Logan be a completely new role if someone takes his place as Logic. Personally, I don’t like that idea, but you can make your own takeaways on this.

How “Dark” Sides are conceived would still be a mystery. The closest we’ve gotten to an explanation is Remus’ origin story, where he and Roman originally started as one creativity until they separated. In this sense, becoming a “Dark” Side didn’t really uproot Remus’ original role. He just changed a little. I’d like to assume the same for Logan, because if he is literally born as Thomas’ Logic, then he as a “Dark” Side would still have similar roles, just with minor changes.

d. Other Theories

Now with the main theories out of the way, let me speedrun through other theories I’ve heard and give my thoughts on it:

Procrastination: I feel like this is too surface-level for a side. As in, hHow would Procrastination justify itself to Thomas as a side that wants to help? Yes, Procrastination would be a good foil to Thomas, but Thomas’ inability to work doesn’t stem from Procrastination. It stems from bad solutions to his mental health crisis. Anyway, too cheap.

ADHD: This feels like… it’s prone to problematic territory. For real, ADHD is so multifaceted in itself, and is literally a disability? I think it makes more sense to have ADHD traits sprinkled amongst the sides rather than one character representing it as a whole. To make it its own guy is like suggesting the other six sides are divorced from Thomas’ ADHD characteristics, which feels wrong to me.

Hatred and any other suggestion that relates to “taboo” emotions: See my argument on Orange encapsulating forbidden emotions as a whole instead of Rage/Wrath on its own.

Justice: I actually liked this idea and sort of incorporated it with my idea of Orange as a means of externalization! To enact justice means to externalize your deepest desires— cathartic release. 

Regret: See: the last two points, since it’s very similar.

Repression: Your heart’s in the right place, but most theories that subscribe to this literally just describe Janus. Keeping things secret because you think it’s unbeneficial? That’s one of Janus’ roles. 

Insecurity: That is literally Remus’ role. While intrusive thoughts shouldn’t be viewed as meritable, intrusive thoughts base itself on a person’s sensitivities and insecurities. I also have an essay detailing how Remus is incredibly perceptive about everyone’s insecurities here.

That's about all the other theories I can recall, but if anyone else has other suggestions, send it to my inbox and I'll give you my thoughts. 

Now that we understand Orange's fundamentals and who he is as a side, the question to ask next is what is he capable of as a side?

iv. Powers and Influences

Now we get to the part where I am! The most unsure about! As of the time I'm writing this, I literally just had a conversation with Orb trying to understand how Orange “possesses” Thomas and the sides, and nothing conclusive came out of it. Even if we are shown one instance of how Orange influences the others (ie. Logan's orange eyes), we actually do not know how that works at all. 

I suppose we can start by asking ourselves how Orange embodies forbidden emotions. I see his insistence for Thomas to perform a certain emotion similar to how Patton would do it. It's impulsive, reactionary. They undergo a situation, then they make Thomas feel an emotion they deem apt for that situation. The only reason Orange isn't utilized as much as Patton is because, of course, Patton is who Thomas is more familiar with. I'd also like to argue that the emotions Orange would possibly encapsulate aren't ones that are constantly expressed. Most of the time, we are in a state of happiness or contentment, emotions covered by Patton. If not, we experience sadness, another common emotion covered by Patton. I would imagine Orange's roster of emotions are only experienced rarely, or if put in a continuous dire situation. Immense anger, for example, would pop up if you feel continuously disenfranchised by something. See: Thomas’ mental health crisis.

Ergo, Orange allows Thomas to feel “taboo” emotions when the situation calls for it. Pretty straightforward. But we're not done yet, because we have to consider what it means that Orange also assists other sides in externalizing their own emotions. We can't use the same argument we gave to Thomas because the sides… aren't each others’ sides. They're Thomas’. If Orange assists in the externalization of the other sides’ repressed emotions, then it has to work differently.

A widely accepted theory or headcanon I see in the fandom is that Orange “possessed” Logan to make him get angry. Or, Logan made a deal with Orange, and now he has angry spurts he doesn't understand. While I appreciate the efforts to make juicy angst, I'm not fond of the idea that these theories basically imply that Logan's anger in WTIT was not his own. In reality, it was. Logan suppressed his frustrations about everyone ignoring his suggestions, and now he snaps. Making it seem like he can't achieve these emotions on his own volition implies he has no frustrations about his predicament to begin with.

The real question is, then, why did Logan's eyes glow orange if his emotions at that moment were genuine? Well, like other segments of this essay, it's hard for me to say something conclusively. We literally have nothing else to work on, guys, pardon me if I can't be a hundred percent certain on my assertions. But if I were to guess, I'm inclined to believe that Orange cannot make the sides feel emotions that they don't already have. Rather, he's responsible for enhancing it. In Logan's situation, for example, his frustration is completely his own. But when you submit to something like, let's say, blinding rage, sometimes you lose your sense of control and simply act. In this case, Orange possibly assists the flow of emotions the side in question would be experiencing.

I'll admit though, I literally have no clue how Orange does that, how he assists the other sides to feel their repressed emotions better. Again, we are working with practically nothing here. Although, one thing we can entertain is the idea that Orange has something to do with a side's state of being. Just like how Janus causes the sides to cover their mouths when expressing a lie, the sides’ eyes could possibly glow orange just because they're feeling an intense, “taboo” emotion. If you don't want to imagine Orange as its own side, you can also factor in the popular fan theory that Orange is simply a state of being the sides experience, no additional side required. Either way, while we cannot dive deep on the semantics of the glowy eyes thing, we can at least confirm there is a link between a side externalizing repressed or “taboo” emotions and Orange himself.

v. Relationships With The Sides (Especially Logan)

Another thing I wanted to discuss is the relationships Orange shares with the other sides. The most accepted depiction of Orange shows him distanced from the “Dark” Sides, while also having a crude fascination with Logan. We've discussed enough of how I view Orange in the context of the “Dark” Sides, so I'd like to focus more on what it means for Orange to assimilate with the “Light” Sides, especially Logan.

Because Logan's first to be seen with these orange eyes, many are quick to assume this is an isolated case. Fair enough— we don't have other examples to compare this with. At the same time, I think a lot of people aren't considering the idea that, if we go by the assumption that Orange is connected to states of being, then any other side can also experience the orange eyes. I won't even be surprised if it happens to Roman in this coming season finale.

But is the much entertained idea of Logan being specifically targeted by Orange unfounded? I would say no, not necessarily. The “Dark” Sides and Logan have always had an interesting relationship. Logan in particular is shown to be the side most unbothered their presence. Again, he's the side who argued that no side can actually be categorized as “good” or “bad”. He's the most sympathetic to the “Dark” Sides, but also… isn’t. 

There's an explainable contradiction here. Even if Logan is nicer to the “Dark” Sides compared to the others, he also has the reputation of being able to easily and successfully shut down their suggestions. He completely opposed Janus’ side in SVS out of Thomas’ interest. He shut down Remus not once, but twice, to protect Thomas. But that's the thing— he does not shut down the “Dark” Sides’ contributions because he disagrees with them. Moreso, he does it because he thinks that's what Thomas’ wants. For example, he admitted in SVS that even if he wanted Thomas to attend the callback, he still preferred if Thomas attended the wedding instead because he thought that was what Thomas would have wanted.

And, well, we saw how Janus responded to Logan's decision— he was confused. It's like he had trust Logan would vouch for his side. Let's remember the main goal of the “Dark” Sides: to be respected, to break Thomas’ black-and-white thinking, and to get him out of his mental slump. This goal can only be achieved if they restore the balance of want and need lost partially due to Logan's diminishing self-assertion. They know Logan can do something if he lets himself loose. That's why Remus and Janus teased him in the Secret Santa gift exchange about wanting to express his frustrations. That's why, after Logan's outburst in WTIT, Remus says, “Gee, Logan, now you're speaking my language.” 

They want Logan in on their plan. For that to begin, they need to make Logan in tune with his own emotional wants and needs, to make him more assertive. Thus, Orange would have to step in. There is merit when fans joke about the “Dark” Sides wanting Logan to go apeshit— it's because it's true. It's because it benefits them.

I can only provide things to consider when it comes to the other sides:

With Patton, think of the point I made earlier about Orange being “bad” emotions divorced from Patton, in a similar way Remus and Roman were created. The main difference between them would be that Patton has more faculty over principles, since Janus has that covered for the “Dark” Sides. While Patton, influenced by Catholic morality, thinks emotions and morals are intertwined, it would make sense for the more cynical sides to view them as separate.

Roman, as aforementioned, may also be susceptible to Orange's influence as the other side tends to hide his emotions from the others. With how the narrative is building up, I won't be surprised if Roman's frustrations with the whole debacle about morals heightens in the finale, especially if something Interesting happens between Thomas and Nico. You can't use Nico as a distraction forever, Thomas. Remember Thomas’ anger at Nico not responding to his messages, remember Chekhov's Gun.

Virgil is an interesting case because he would be more familiar with Orange compared to the others. That begs the question of, is he aware of the “Dark” Sides current goals and plans? My idea is, yes, but only to a certain extent. This can go down many paths. There's the possibility that Virgil was the first part of the plan, but accidentally grew closer with the “Light” Sides before he fully completed it. This explains why he hasn't disclosed the plans to the others, especially since it may incriminate him as someone who was part of that plan. There's the possibility that he knows nothing of the plan, but is familiar with the “Dark” Sides’ antics. Thus, he can't do much but stay suspicious of the sides. Either way, we still don't know enough to conclude how much Virgil knows, but I doubt he would get along with Orange.

I pondered about Janus a little because, if Orange is meant to embody externalization in some form, what does that mean for him, the embodiment of self-preservation and secrecy? I don't have the answer, but while we know the “Dark” Sides have to work with each other, we don't actually know how close Janus and Remus genuinely are with Orange. To be fair, Janus and Remus are complete opposites and they get along fine. I'd definitely prefer it if all of the “Dark” Sides were actually close because it creates such a perfect juxtaposition to the “Light” Sides’ crumbling family. 

I also thought Orange and Remus would make interesting parallels as two forbidden versions of feeling and thinking respectfully. Like I said earlier, Remus can only suggest, but he never actually embodies the emotions of wanting to do taboo things. Orange, however, could. No other points except for the ones I mentioned about the “Dark” Sides in the previous bullet.

vi. Long-Term Presence

Originally, this essay would end here and already be posted. I even went through at least half of it for beta reading. Then, Orb started a discussion where they asked what I thought Orange's purpose was, especially since most theories (even the one you're reading right now) are more centered on Orange in the context of the current conflict. There was actually a part I wanted to write during the second segment where I disclosed what I thought Orange would contribute in the grander scheme of things, but I omitted it because it felt too out of place.

I replied to Orb what I was going to write; I thought that Orange was going to be the final push for Thomas to go to therapy, and make Thomas stand his ground more instead of asking the sides for advice every time he has an issue. I've always thought this, especially therapy, was one of the ways the series would end as a whole, because it means Thomas would stop talking to his sides. Or at least, in the way we see him do it in the show. That sounds a bit cynical, I know. Why would I suggest that Sanders Sides end by Thomas cutting ties with the sides?

Well, I'm not. Not entirely. I'm not advocating Thomas does. What I mean is, an underlying conflict to the current conflicts we have now is how Thomas internalizes his problems. This is literally how the series functions. Thomas has a problem, then consults himself about it via the sides. Even c!Joan mentions it in CLBG. This issue of the problem aversion Thomas has would be fine in the former parts of the series, as the things he consulted the sides about were small. But as the series progresses, we're facing issues that call for an entire paradigm shift in morality. Of Thomas putting himself and his friends in the infamous Trolley Problem. Of Thomas facing horrible intrusive thoughts he opts to combat alone.

I once called Sanders Sides a psychological horror because we see how a normal dude's mental health crumbles as he deals with life-changing situations alone. To find a solution for this main, underlying conflict means the show has to end— internalization IS the series’ foundation!

And so Orb suggested the most batshit idea— what if Orange was Thomas’ foil? Not in a sense that confirms the Opposite Sides theory. Rather, Orange, if his role is externalization, is literally the antithesis of how the sides work. As Orb put it, Orange is there to “completely wreck the format”, making Thomas realize that consulting the sides for help has its limits. He has to literally go out and touch grass, talk to his friends about his moral dilemmas, consult a damn therapist. That is what I think Orange's true purpose as a side is.

vii. Closing Statements

In the end, I can't say that everything I've stated in this essay is pure fact, but this is the most educated guess I can give considering what we're given and what we can expect to happen in canon. While most theories I've seen easily pinpoint different issues the sides and Thomas are facing in the series, these theories would then guess that Orange would be the cause of these issues. That's where theories like Procrastination, Repression, Regret, etc. come from. More than anything, I want you to see that Orange acts in response to these issues rather than in tandem with it. 

The best advice I can give you when theorizing about Orange is: ask yourself what needs to be seen in the series. Remember, Sanders Sides is a narrative. Episodes will continue to happen past Orange's inevitable reveal. Think of Orange in this context, as his own character with motivations and wants for Thomas. Only then you can make educated guesses about him.

Anyway, thank you for reading my incredibly extensive essay on Orange! Again, my words are not gospel, so if you want to discuss anything further, add onto this post or send me an ask! Please read this post though before you send me anything. And If you enjoyed this, PLEASE reblog, I'd definitely appreciate it! If you want to read more stuff from me, here's a carrd masterlist of Sanders Sides meta I've done. Happy reading!

[thatdogmagic]

Remember this smug as hell post?

Well, keep it in mind.

I'm going to give some people here the benefit of the doubt and go into this post with the assumption that they genuinely don't know how fucking awful the Tumblr """"porn filters"""" are for images deemed - or reported by users as - 'NSFW.'

This is a rehash of everything I wrote out before, but it's going over all of it in one big post, because this issue with community labels moves well beyond debates over what is and isn't NSFW. There are doublestandards within doublestandards, and no way at all for artists and creators to know for sure if their post is going to get blacklisted.

We're not merely talking about the fact that these filters exist. We're talking about the fact that they are wildly inconsistent, and that reported images aren't seen initially by a person so much as an extremely stupid algorithm. That's why there's the option to say 'this ruling was made in error.'

There are literally no set guidelines for what qualifies as NSFW, and what doesn't, when it comes to nudity, and to what characters those guidelines actually apply. Staff rulings do not match up to one another. They legitimately do not make sense. You cannot divine how a ruling is going to end up, and it is infuriating that staff is jerking us around like this when the platform very clearly wanted artists like us back.

Not only that, they were, yes: that fucking smug about it. In case you forgot, that 'cheater' picture is talking about people who fled the NSFW ban specifically.

Examples follow:

Both of these images were caught by the filters, and then appealed. The first one was (visibly, as you can see) downgraded to Everyone, in spite of the character showing more secondary sex characteristics than the first (breast, visible nipple).

Similarly, a male character showing a pube fluff was left alone, even in spite of being cited in my appeal on the second image.

Last, there is, as noted, this readily available image of Felicia, that you can find by searching 'darkstalkers Felicia' on the search bar. Did people forget that she's bottomless, and those aren't panties?

Using fluff to cover junk is an age-old trick for characters like this. And it clearly isn't a problem with the male character.

Further, you can go through just about any archive and see a ton of images that were not subject to community labels, many of which are much more racy, and much more legitimately "NSFW."

So, yes, beyond the disgust of Tumblr staff treating any body like mine as filthy and inherently sexual in nature, this is also about a system that is arbitrary, penalizes artists for no good reason, and has deeply opaque standards. You never know when a piece of yours is going to run afoul of a bot, or what a staff ruling will ultimately be, or why the ruling is there in the first place.

And that's bullshit. If you think it's anything other than bullshit, you're being a contrarian ass. Especially since a forced label absolutely WILL kill your visibility, where compared to implementing the label yourself. It is punitive, it is punishing, and I will say again: it is completely unnecessary to jerk us around like this when the platform very clearly wanted us back.

And now that we are, we're back to being treated like garbage, constantly having to guess what the rules actually mean, how they apply, and to which sorts of bodies they apply, all while watching our viewcounts on contested posts eat ten kinds of shit.

tl;dr, do not talk to me about 'following rules' when the rules are so ill-defined as to be quite literally useless, to me, and to every other artist on this website.

[blubberquark]

Why Not Write Cryptography

I learned Python in high school in 2003. This was unusual at the time. We were part of a pilot project, testing new teaching materials. The official syllabus still expected us to use PASCAL. In order to satisfy the requirements, we had to learn PASCAL too, after Python. I don't know if PASCAL is still standard.

Some of the early Python programming lessons focused on cryptography. We didn't really learn anything about cryptography itself then, it was all just toy problems to demonstrate basic programming concepts like loops and recursion. Beginners can easily implement some old, outdated ciphers like Caesar, Vigenère, arbitrary 26-letter substitutions, transpositions, and so on.

The Vigenère cipher will be important. It goes like this: First, in order to work with letters, we assign numbers from 0 to 25 to the 26 letters of the alphabet, so A is 0, B is 1, C is 2 and so on. In the programs we wrote, we had to strip out all punctuation and spaces, write everything in uppercase and use the standard transliteration rules for Ä, Ö, Ü, and ß. That's just the encoding part. Now comes the encryption part. For every letter in the plain text, we add the next letter from the key, modulo 26, round robin style. The key is repeated after we get tot he end. Encrypting "HELLOWORLD" with the key "ABC" yields ["H"+"A", "E"+"B", "L"+"C", "L"+"A", "O"+"B", "W"+"C", "O"+"A", "R"+"B", "L"+"C", "D"+"A"], or "HFNLPYOLND". If this short example didn't click for you, you can look it up on Wikipedia and blame me for explaining it badly.

Then our teacher left in the middle of the school year, and a different one took over. He was unfamiliar with encryption algorithms. He took us through some of the exercises about breaking the Caesar cipher with statistics. Then he proclaimed, based on some back-of-the-envelope calculations, that a Vigenère cipher with a long enough key, with the length unknown to the attacker, is "basically uncrackable". You can't brute-force a 20-letter key, and there are no significant statistical patterns.

I told him this wasn't true. If you re-use a Vigenère key, it's like re-using a one time pad key. At the time I just had read the first chapters of Bruce Schneier's "Applied Cryptography", and some pop history books about cold war spy stuff. I knew about the problem with re-using a one-time pad. A one time pad is the same as if your Vigenère key is as long as the message, so there is no way to make any inferences from one letter of the encrypted message to another letter of the plain text. This is mathematically proven to be completely uncrackable, as long as you use the key only one time, hence the name. Re-use of one-time pads actually happened during the cold war. Spy agencies communicated through number stations and one-time pads, but at some point, the Soviets either killed some of their cryptographers in a purge, or they messed up their book-keeping, and they re-used some of their keys. The Americans could decrypt the messages.

Here is how: If you have message $A$ and message $B$, and you re-use the key $K$, then an attacker can take the encrypted messages $A+K$ and $B+K$, and subtract them. That creates $(A+K) - (B+K) = A - B + K - K = A - B$. If you re-use a one-time pad, the attacker can just filter the key out and calculate the difference between two plaintexts.

My teacher didn't know that. He had done a quick back-of-the-envelope calculation about the time it would take to brute-force a 20 letter key, and the likelihood of accidentally arriving at something that would resemble the distribution of letters in the German language. In his mind, a 20 letter key or longer was impossible to crack. At the time, I wouldn't have known how to calculate that probability.

When I challenged his assertion that it would be "uncrackable", he created two messages that were written in German, and pasted them into the program we had been using in class, with a randomly generated key of undisclosed length. He gave me the encrypted output.

Instead of brute-forcing keys, I decided to apply what I knew about re-using one time pads. I wrote a program that takes some of the most common German words, and added them to sections of $(A-B)$. If a word was equal to a section of $B$, then this would generate a section of $A$. Then I used a large spellchecking dictionary to see if the section of $A$ generated by guessing a section of $B$ contained any valid German words. If yes, it would print the guessed word in $B$, the section of $A$, and the corresponding section of the key. There was only a little bit of key material that was common to multiple results, but that was enough to establish how long they key was. From there, I modified my program so that I could interactively try to guess words and it would decrypt the rest of the text based on my guess. The messages were two articles from the local newspaper.

When I showed the decrypted messages to my teacher the next week, got annoyed, and accused me of cheating. Had I installed a keylogger on his machine? Had I rigged his encryption program to leak key material? Had I exploited the old Python random number generator that isn't really random enough for cryptography (but good enough for games and simulations)?

Then I explained my approach. My teacher insisted that this solution didn't count, because it relied on guessing words. It would never have worked on random numeric data. I was just lucky that the messages were written in a language I speak. I could have cheated by using a search engine to find the newspaper articles on the web.

Now the lesson you should take away from this is not that I am smart and teachers are sore losers.

Lesson one: Everybody can build an encryption scheme or security system that he himself can't defeat. That doesn't mean others can't defeat it. You can also create an secret alphabet to protect your teenage diary from your kid sister. It's not practical to use that as an encryption scheme for banking. Something that works for your diary will in all likelihood be inappropriate for online banking, never mind state secrets. You never know if a teenage diary won't be stolen by a determined thief who thinks it holds the secret to a Bitcoin wallet passphrase, or if someone is re-using his banking password in your online game.

Lesson two: When you build a security system, you often accidentally design around an "intended attack". If you build a lock to be especially pick-proof, a burglar can still kick in the door, or break a window. Or maybe a new variation of the old "slide a piece of paper under the door and push the key through" trick works. Non-security experts are especially susceptible to this. Experts in one domain are often blind to attacks/exploits that make use of a different domain. It's like the physicist who saw a magic show and thought it must be powerful magnets at work, when it was actually invisible ropes.

Lesson three: Sometimes a real world problem is a great toy problem, but the easy and didactic toy solution is a really bad real world solution. Encryption was a fun way to teach programming, not a good way to teach encryption. There are many problems like that, like 3D rendering, Chess AI, and neural networks, where the real-world solution is not just more sophisticated than the toy solution, but a completely different architecture with completely different data structures. My own interactive codebreaking program did not work like modern approaches works either.

Lesson four: Don't roll your own cryptography. Don't even implement a known encryption algorithm. Use a cryptography library. Chances are you are not Bruce Schneier or Dan J Bernstein. It's harder than you thought. Unless you are doing a toy programming project to teach programming, it's not a good idea. If you don't take this advice to heart, a teenager with something to prove, somebody much less knowledgeable but with more time on his hands, might cause you trouble.

[animentality]

Trans exclusionary feminism is stupid for many many reasons but the most damning reason for me is its inherent belief that all women everywhere are victims, and women throughout all of history have been oppressed victims, and this universal victimhood can be shared by all women of all ethnicities and cultures throughout all of time in memoriam.

Equally and universally.

Not only is this not true, but it's especially ironic because terfs tend to be straight white cis women who are ideologically, as well as genetically, related to suffragettes whose main platform was "Why should black men be able to vote? White women are more important."

It's honestly laughable in between the tragedy.

Like oh, women everywhere know the same pain and experiences?

Yes, white women living on a luxurious 3000 acre plantation actually have the exact same experiences as enslaved black women serving under them.

Yes, white women in South Africa had it just as hard as the black female victims of apartheid.

You're so right.

Idiot.

Trans exclusionary feminism isn't just trans exclusionary. Its intersectional exclusionary too. It's white feminism.

But that isn't shocking.

Terfs tend to be middle class white women whose greatest problem is deciding between a Samsung or an iPhone.

And between a Maserati or a Tesla.

I think of that Bill Burr quote.

Where he says that white women have completely taken over the civil rights movement, by swinging their Gucci booted feet over the line and stepping in front of people of color.

That's what I think when I see terfs here and everywhere else trying to insist that "women" are wholly anything.

The fuck they are.

No group is wholly anything.

People are very complex individuals and there is no fucking hive mind of humans anywhere.

Your labels are arbitrary and pointless, as is your Swiss Cheese of an ideology.

[jjkamochoso]

JJK Characters and Songs that fit their Love Lives

Warnings: none, but some lyrics in the songs are a bit suggestive!! Also I’m mostly just an anime watcher so if this info isn’t up to date on what’s going on in the manga I’m sorry!!

Choso: I Wanna Be Yours by the Arctic Monkeys

Choso would do anything for his partner and would also be absolutely obsessed with them!! He would try to prove his worth at every given second and acts of service is for sure his love language. He’ll be anything his partner want him to be, as long as they call him theirs.

Gojo: Boombastic by Shaggy

Y’all already KNOW this is Satoru’s jam!! He’s a chill dude that lives to please his partners, romantically and otherwise. Smooth like silk and can take rejection like a champ (though, let’s be real, who’s rejecting him?), he is Mr. Lover Lover!!

And here’s a more serious one for him because I feel like people sometimes only focus on silly Gojo

Gojo Pt. 2: Hanging By a Moment by Lifehouse

Even though he has a happy go lucky side that usually shows, Satoru is a man that feels and cares so deeply. I feel like this song represents the part of him that’s trying to find himself beyond being a strong jujutsu sorcerer and the right partner could help him through those anxieties. He would want a partner to live in the moment with him and be the missing pieces to each other’s puzzles.

Geto: Roll to Me by Del Amitri

Suguru, though he’s been through a loooot, still has a good heart imo. He would be there wholeheartedly for the person he wants to date. Like in the song, he’d be there day or night to talk or be ready to support the person whenever something goes wrong.

Shoko: My Friends Over You by New Found Glory

I had a younger Shoko in mind when I chose this song but I feel like it still kinda applies to older Shoko as well. If she was seeing someone, it most likely would be low commitment and not that serious. Her friends come first, always. If her partner was dragging her down and boring her, she’d have no problem cutting them off asap!

Nanami: My Heart I Surrender by I Prevail

If there’s one thing I associate with Kento, it’s YEARNING. Yearning for a life he truly wanted, yearning for the safety of the youth. Would it be fair to assume his love life follows that pattern? He wouldn’t know if the person he liked returned his affection but that wouldn’t stop him from giving away his whole heart as he waited for the answer.

Yuji: The Way You Are by Babe Patrol

Yuji is great for this song. He holds strong conviction for doing what’s right and is always supporting those around him. As seen with Yuko, he appreciates people as they are and doesn’t expect them to change or conform to arbitrary standards. He would love his partner for being completely, unabashedly themselves.

Nobara: Wake Me Up Before You Go Go by WHAM!

Nobara is filled with fun energy and loving (in her own way) vibes so using one of the literal meanings from this song, I would think she’d be so down to go dancing with her partner! I could also see her complaining of a fast heart rate around her crush since she’s always hyped up and being around that person certainly wouldn’t help.

Megumi: And I Love Her by Kurt Cobain

Megumi is a straightforward, low key moody, no nonsense man so this song is perfect for him. It doesn’t dance around feelings at all and tells the audience like it is—a love between him and his partner will never die.

Panda: The Power of Love by New Found Glory

Panda has endless amounts of love for his friends and I know he believes in the power of love, 100%. He’s surrounded by it every day—Yaga, his classmates, even his teachers. Panda has a lot of love to give and isn’t afraid to show it!

Maki: SUGAR by Brockhampton

This song has a lot of lyrics that mention not needing anyone help and being able to do things individually and that’s Maki’s core belief. However, there are some mentions of learning to be okay leaning on a partner and I think that’s how she’d be. If she ever opened up to a partner, it would have to be her and them against the world forever.

Toge: Josie by Blink 182

Inumaki would need a partner who was there for him, no matter what. Someone who would laugh at his jokes, because let’s be honest, he’s hilarious, and someone who would bring him food just because they remembered his order. He would also love someone who shares the same crazy sleep schedule he has so if they were up at 3am watching “Vacation,” like mentioned in the song, that would be his dream.

Yuta: All 4 Love by Color Me Badd

This whole song SCREAAAMS YUTA!!! This certified lover boy would do anything for his partner and be their knight in shining (white) armor (jacket). He would never fail to tell his partner how lucky he is to have them and how attractive they are as well!!

Todo: She’s So High by Tal Bachman

I am 1000% convinced Todo would treat his partner like royalty and hold them in the highest regards. His passion for literally everything is unmatched and I absolutely expect to see that in his love life. Like in the song, he would equate his partner to icons like Cleopatra and Aphrodite because he thinks so highly of them.

Mai: I’m Thru With Love by Marilyn Monroe

Mai is definitely through with love. I feel like she’d fall in love once and completely give up the idea of finding someone else if it didn’t work out. She can’t stand being vulnerable and warm to others so this song is high key perfect for her.

Noritoshi: If I Could Ride a Bike by Park Bird/Chevy

Noritoshi deserves better!! There, I said it!! My boy doesn’t get enough love and that’s reflected in this song choice. The pressure to be a perfect member of the Kamo clan is a lot for him and having a partner that fits those same standards to be accepted is impossible so he’s left imagining what it would be like to love and be loved. I think he would want nothing more than to wake up and see his partner’s smiling face looking back at him and be able to go on carefree adventures with them.

Kokichi: Heaven, Iowa by Fall Out Boy

Poor Kokichi :(( I went a bit literal with the relation of the lyrics “scar crossed lovers” since his whole body was littered with messed up skin but I do feel like this song captures his vibe well. I feel like he wouldn’t ask anything of his partner and would just be beyond grateful he finally had someone there for him. He was doomed from birth with his heavenly restriction, thus having a dark outlook on life and further relating to the lyric “kiss my cheek, baby please, would you read my eulogy?” since I think he would like his partner to be there for him even after his death.

Miwa: Everywhere by Michelle Branch

I feel like Miwa is a hopeless romantic so she would relate to this song in that no matter what she does, it relates to her partner. No matter if it’s closing her eyes to sleep or keeping her partner in her thoughts wherever she goes, Miwa has a big heart and just needs to be hugged!

Momo: One Love by It’s Benzzo

I don’t know much about Momo but I know she can’t stand sexism so her partner would have to be open minded and kind, never failing to make her smile. She would just want someone to treat her right!

Yuki: Kiss Me by Sixpence None the Richer

This is the perfect song for Yuki imo. She seems like a flirtatious girl and would love a partner that went all out in romance for her. I think she’d like to get dressed up and then get swept off her feet every date night. Telling her partner to kiss her under the stars would be a great way for her to end the night!

[cetaceanhandiwork]

the conversation around generative neural networks is a dumpster fire in a dozen different ways but I think the part that disproportionately frustrates me, like on an irrational pet peeve level, is that nobody in that conversation seems to understand automata theory

back before most of these deep learning techniques were a twinkle in a theorist's eye, back when computing was a lot less engineering and a lot more math, computer scientists had worked out the math of different "classes" of computer system and what kinds of problems they could and couldn't solve

these aren't arbitrary classifications like most taxonomy turns out to be. there's qualitative differences. you can draw hard lines: "it takes class X or above to run programs with Y trait", and "only class X programs or below are guaranteed to have Y trait". and all of those lines have been mathematically proven; if you ever found a counterexample, then we'd be in "math is a lot of bunk" territory and we'd have way bigger things to worry about

this has nothing to do with how fast/slow the computer system goes; it's about "what kinds of program can it run at all". so it includes emulation and such. you can emulate a lower system in a higher one, but not vice versa

at the top of this heap is turing machines, which includes most computers we'd bother to build. there's a lot of programs that it's been mathematically proven require at least a turing machine to run. and this class of programs includes a lot of things that humans can do, too

but with this power comes some inevitable restrictions. for example, if you feed a program to a turing machine, there's no way to guarantee that the program will finish; it might get stuck somewhere and loop forever. in fact there's some programs that you straight up can't predict whether they'll ever finish even if you're looking at the code yourself

these two are intrinsically linked. if your program solves a turing complete problem, it needs a turing machine; nothing less will do. and a turing machine is capable of running all such programs, given enough time.

ok. great. what does any of that jargon have to do with AI?

well... the important thing to know is that the machine learning models we're using right now can't loop forever. if they could loop forever they couldn't be trained. for any given input, they'll produce an output in finite time

which means... well, any program that requires a turing machine to run, or even requires a push-down automaton to run (a weaker type of computer system that can get into infinite loops but that you can at least check ahead of time if a program will get stuck or not), can't be emulated by these systems. they've got to be in the next category down: finite state machines at most - and thus unable to compute, or emulate computation of, programs that inhabit a higher tier

and there is a heck of a lot of stuff we conceptualize as "thinking" that doesn't fit in a finite state machine

...I suspect it will some day be possible for a computer program to be a person. I am absolutely certain that when that day comes, the computer program who's a person would require at least a turing machine to run them

what we have right now isn't that. what we have right now is eye spots on moths, bee orchids, mockingbirds. it might be "artificial intelligence", depending on your definition of "intelligence", but prompt it to do things that we've proven only a turing machine can do, and it will fall over

and the reason I consider this an "irrational pet peeve" and not something more severe? is because this information doesn't actually help solve policy questions! if this is a tool, then we still need to decide how we're going to allow such tools to be built, and used. it's not as simple as a blanket ban, and it's not as simple as letting the output of GNNs fully launder the input, because either of those "simple" solutions are rife for abuse

but I can't help but feel like the conversation is in part held back by specious "is a GNN a people" arguments on the one hand, and "can a GNN actually replace writers, or is it just fooling execs into thinking it can" arguments on the other, when the answer to both seems to me like it was solved 40 years ago