#but maybe i'm being too sensitive

[inkskinned]

we were sitting on the floor and i was cutting out tiny pictures to make a collage for a friend's birthday. you were on your phone and you laughed about something, and i was still in love with you then, so i asked what had you giggling.

"sorry. i was just..." you took a moment and went back to texting. "i was telling someone about how you're afraid of the dark."

i'm afraid of the dark because something bad happened. "oh." i felt a little slinky of shame crawl down my throat.

you glanced up, and maybe it showed on my face, because you rolled your eyes and held the phone to the side casually so i could see the group chat. "what? was it a secret?"

i looked down to the scissors in my hand. "i just..." no, it's not a secret. it just felt like something private, something serious. saying why would you tell someone that just feels like an accusation. it's unfair. i honestly am not even ashamed of it, it's just a fact about my person that i don't usually share.

what a strange experience. is this a human thing or a generational thing? for our grandparents: did they need to worry about how quickly someone can just... share your personal information? again, i didn't even really have a true objection. what could i say? i want any person in my life to feel they can be honest with their friends. it's not like i said don't tell anyone this.

i cut out another letter to complete the rainbow happy birthday, started hunting for the exclamation mark. i heard you sigh dramatically.

"don't make a big deal about this," you said.

this entire conversation was a pattern for us, and this was when we got to my least favorite part of the pattern. i would get my feelings hurt in some oblique not-technically-terrible way, and then it would be making a big deal about something. you'd get frustrated for me for being soft, but i was born soft. you knew i was soft when you pierced me. it's one of the things that made controlling me so easy.

"i'm not," i felt my voice crack. the question came without my wanting. "why are you guys talking about me?" and why are you saying that thing? why not like - i'm telling them how you're generous and kind and pretty.

you let out this low, tragic groan. "oh my god." you tossed the phone away from your body. "there, see? i just won't talk to them if you don't like it."

the rest of the hour went the way it always went, between us: i said i don't actually mind if you talk to your friends but -, you found a way to call my minor expression of discomfort "being dramatic." you got upset that i had been offended. i ended up apologizing, even though i hadn't actually done anything.

afterwards, you picked up the phone again. after texting for a little bit, you snorted. "okay," you said, "but it is kind of funny you're afraid of the dark. i mean, when you think about it."

[thekittyokat]

you ever just have a lot, a LOT of feelings all at once about a character and not even remotely enough words or brainpower to FORM the words to describe everything you're feeling. so it feels like you may explode. yeah

[enemywasp]

I HATE tiktok and the Internet in general rn for the obsession with "oh this person's smellyyy" "Brother it STINKS over here" "BOO 💧🧼🧽🚿" and stuff like that. I wish I could put into words how demeaning and patronising that whole idea is and people implying anyone they don't like doesn't wash.

For one there's something grating about being insulted in a manner like we're in nursery again. But also WHY is that the go to insult. Why do you associate these things? Especially to those you deem "chronically online". Like I don't want to sound pathetic but it feels so nasty to me.

is it extreme to say this feels tied to ableism? And classism too?

[guhbwuh2]

Soft reminder that some artists may not be comfortable with ask/rp blogs chatting in character on their art! I'm always thankful for the support and love seeing people have fun! but it can be a little jarring 🥹

[mulders-too-large-shirt]

discussion question: are there are folkloric or supernatural figures not included (or done poorly) in canon that you think would have made for an amazing monster of the week episode of the x files?

bonus points if it's from your culture or area of the world!❤️👻🛸

[nobodysomeday]

It's obvious to me that Jason doesn't want to be in tabloids. I mean what normal person does?

But he probably doesn't care enough to make a fuss and draw more attention. Just a quiet acceptance that this is still something he has to deal with every few months, sometimes longer. He might not always know it's happening but when he does find out it's the kinda thing that can ruin a day

[ozarkthedog]

this isn't towards any one person, it's literally to every writer.

"Moodboard is for aesthetic purpose only. Reader has no physical descriptors."

idc what you say it's still putting a certain body image in the minds of those who come across your fics. There have been many posts written about inclusivity over the years. How and why are we still seeing headers featuring images of obvious physical body types when it's supposed to be "reader insert"?

If you can write a fic without any physical descriptions, you can most certainly find inclusive images to use for your headers.

[triaelf9]

ugh I reallllyyyyy didn’t want to get in on this but like

The assumption that all atheists are people who’ve “never touched a religious text in their life” basically says to me you have a specific view of atheists and have probably not known many.

Most of them grew up IN the system and DO know the text and THAT’S why they walk away. 

If you’re gonna make a whole post on ppl not using nuance with CR stuff right now the least you can do is use nuance yourself and not paint an entire group of people with a brush that TV taught you, or a bunch of white men into power *cough* Dawkins *cough* coopted a movement in a society where to not believe in god is synonymous with being immoral.

So just keep in mind, the representation of people without faith that you see on TV or twitter isn’t the majority and 9 times out of 10 isn’t correct at all.

thanks ^_^

[deoidesign]

I'm sorry if what I say is wrong in any way, I don't mean to offend you, it's just something I'm not completely sure about. Does Adam use he/they or they/them pronouns? I think I saw a post of yours where you said that Adam uses he/they, but it was a while ago and now I'm not completely sure (and I don't want to use the wrong pronouns)

I know you don't mean anything by it, but I am sad that so many of the asks I get start with people saying "I'm sorry, I don't want to offend you" or some variation thereof, followed by completely normal questions. I think I may have been responding too harshly to too many things and given the impression that I'll jump at people for being wrong...

But asking clarifying questions is always okay. I mean, it's also okay to be wrong and even offensive. What matters is if you learn from it when someone points out that it was wrong or offensive. I won't stop telling people they're saying something hurtful if they are, but I don't want that to lead people to be scared of me or something.

Correcting people is always just about correcting them, not hurting them. It's okay to need to be corrected, were all learning new things every day.

Anyways Adam uses he/they, you remembered correctly

[batsplat]

#and i don't really ever like to touch this unless i absolutely have to but... early 2012 cannot have been an easy time in his life#cf his profile pic at the time

Just technical curiosity since i haven't seen the original, what was valentino's profile pic at the time?

Also, I don't know if you have talked about it or if you would like to talk about it, but I wanted to hear from you about Sic and his riding style. And if you have any opinion on grief and how it affected Vale. Of course its sensitive and if you have any qualms talking about it please feel no pressure!

and... idk man, idt I have anything particularly insightful to say about him either as a bloke or his riding style. obviously some tragic irony to the general opinion that he'd calmed down a fair bit by the time of his death... but I don't know what I could meaningfully say about him that isn't common knowledge anyway. when people say he was the highlight of the 2011 season - both in generating talking points but also just in terms of racing - they are right... just another element that makes the 2011 season not particularly enjoyable to me, for all my love for its champion

about the impact his death had on valentino, sure, I have my thoughts. I think valentino has tried to strike a delicate balance between honouring his dead friend and running away from that grief as best he can. I think riders have to become very good at compartmentalising those feelings. racing in welkom in 2003 a few days after daijiro kaito had passed, a bloke valentino had known for years and had gotten drunk at honda events - the work done after that to establish the safety commission. tragedy outside of racing, like the suicide of valentino's stepfather the day before the race where valentino quasi-sealed his last title at phillip island 2009 - a death he was asked to comment on after saturday practise. misano 2010 and standing in silence on the podium with jorge and dani in front of the jubilant crowd celebrating his podium, having just been told of the death of moto2 rider shoya tomizawa in parc fermé. valentino obviously wanted a good race at valencia 2011, but instead he was taken out in a multi-rider pile-up in the first corner - one that must have been particularly scary at the time. not long after he was involved in the accident that killed his friend. I think it won't have been easy during a period when he was struggling anyway, and I think it's telling how much the persistent rumours about his retirement after sic's death clearly bothered him. I think he tried to remove himself from the loss as much as possible, and I wouldn't be surprised if the stories of him keeping his distance from sic's father in the aftermath were true. I think that the experience of losing sic did hit him hard, did probably change some things permanently for him, will have continued to affect him going forwards. I think it will have made his relationship to fear, which he believes to be a non-negotiable element of his profession, no less complicated. I think it's very like valentino to integrate it into the story of forming the academy: a positive way of paying tribute to sic, a way of sharing his emotions in only the most restrained and narratively neat way - he missed sic, he'd been searching for meaning, this had given him something, sic was the first student of the academy - and I think it probably did help him process for himself what he had gone through

but above all I think that it is none of my business how he dealt with it. obviously, when I read this stuff, it's not like I can shut off my brain - and I do have my suspicions about the effects it had going forward. which is all well and good, but it's also where I personally draw the line. I don't want to do my usual process of playing cluedo and reading the tea leaves over two throwaway interview lines over the response to the death of a real human being. similarly to how I don't want to speculate about parental relations beyond what riders themselves have willingly told us, at the end of the day I am going to limit myself to what valentino has actually said on the matter. it was a painful loss, he wants to honour sic, it did not make him want to retire. valentino clearly doesn't want to pour out his soul to the public on this matter, and honestly I think that's probably the correct choice. he is entitled to dealing with his grief in his own way, he is entitled to the privacy of his emotions. this is one subject where I have no wish to pry

[milfbrainrot]

.

I feel like in the past the mix of this site being used for both activism and fandom helped contribute to a lot of unhinged politicized fandom discourse where yeah ofc there's a political tie to media but ppl used it as... a form of activism where it was given disproportionate importance compared to other activism discussions? Whereas now we're swinging to the opposite site of How Dare You Care About Meaningless TV Shows When Politics.

Like... we can have a mix of realizing there's more important stuff to focus on than shipping discourse in the world at large without also minimizing the insane doxxing and death threats behavior going on in fandom that people in fandom have to take into consideration to be able to do their hobby, esp given how those attitudes stem from irl political climates at times in ways that are telling to study. Hobbies are kinda how we prevent activism burnout also. Crazey how that works.

[wretcheddoll]

"omg Armand and Marius's relationship just like Hard Times by Ethel Cain 🥺"

Um no it's not?! like at all?! hello?!

[blamemma]

.

[draconicdependency]

mmmmgh. "i want to talk to people but i don't know how" "okay! *has entire conversation in my room*"

[ID: A headmate banner reading "This post was made by Ananas! Pronouns - he/they. Anti-endos + proshippers DNI!" There is a picture of Ananas Dragon Cookie to the left, and the background is an image of honeycomb. End ID]

[musical-chick-13]

I don't really like to talk about my time in the Catholic Church since it was so bad (and is the root of...a lot of what I'm struggling with today), but I think ultimately it boils down to: "So many people want to criticize the institution that hurt me, but it's rarely done in a way that suggests they care about the harm done to me and others like me. It seems like everything I and other ex-Catholics went through is reduced to edgy memes and pithy quips. And when that's all I see, it starts to look like this is only done to join in on a group dunking session because that's The In Thing™--and not to express sympathy or request restitution or enact meaningful change."

[lesbionia]

My friend's boyfriend looked at me during Scrabble then played the D slur 🙃