#can't believe it took me going to a comic class to get stuff done this is the first actual ref I do in literally years

[ai-higurashi]

Finally had the push to sit down and do an actual Caprikon ref!

I wanna try having the color palette figured out too by this week, but I'm struggling so much finding one that makes her fit well with the others. Also, I am not un unbiased observer, she looks great in everything I tried so far XD

Bonus sketches I've been doing this past months trying to get the design right under the cut!

Plus a little something I started working on recently that I hope I can finish on at some point:

[paperboy-pb]

Now that the prologue is done, I can't thank the fans of this series enough.

No, we haven't hit any particular follower milestone. The story has just begun. And most of you haven't given me any sort of financial support to help me out, either. (And that's alright! I haven't asked, lol.)

I'm thanking you for just being apart of the audience.

I started PB in a little blue notebook during the summer of 2015. It was originally meant for my eyes only. And a big part of the reason why was that, when I googled things like "Special Ed makes me feel bad," there wouldn't be much of anything coming up. There were Quora forums! A couple of YouTube videos. Articles here and there.

But it wasn't a lot. Not enough to help me out for long. And it only hammered the idea further into my head that I was alone in what I endured. As I got older, grew up, and away from the program and people who took my disabled youth, I constantly felt this urge to talk about it. What SpEd had put me through. What I'd lost. What I'd seen & heard. The things I did and didn't learn. Even though I was never a very open kid, let alone teenager.

I hated that no one was talking about it. And how nobody knew what happened to kids like me behind closed doors. At 13 and 14, almost none of the new friends I made had ever heard a life story like mine. And I've always found that wild: I had a LOT of friends! (Still do!)

So I kept drawing it out. Kept working on the story in notebooks, sketchbooks, my friends' DMs, and anywhere else words could go. Sometimes, my family would catch glimpses of the concept art. Sad sketches of Matthew crying, freaky drafts of Monster, or tense moments between what would become Class 7-C.

And one of my parents would be like, "Why is your art so depressing?" They'd roll their eyes. And they'd add on, "People's parents aren't gonna like it!"

No, I never told them what the story was about. I never even told them it was a children's media (because it kinda isn't! I'd personally put PB as 13+?) These were judgments made with just one glance at computer papers covered in pencil strokes; sketchy and shapey little kids who didn't look like they were having fun.

I knew they were wrong. But the audacity still pissed me off. There aren't many times where it's appropriate to boss somebody else around in how to tell their story, you know? Not only that, but I also worried about not having an audience back then. Sure, all my friends loved my work. But at the time, I was the only one who'd really experienced anything "Special Education" in life. Thus, these were General Ed kids watching it unfold. Able-bodied eyes and (as far as I knew back then) neurotypical minds, watching and learning from whatever I made.

And I liked that. But that wasn't the only group I wanted to be seen by. I wanted disabled people, especially youth in their teens and twenties, to see it. That's my primary audience. And shit like that made me wonder if I'd ever find it. Had me second-guessing myself a little, you know?

But I shook it off. It's like that thing teachers always say in class. "If you're confused or have a question, ask: whatever it is, you probably aren't the only one thinking it!"

And I searched for stuff like PAPERBOY, hadn't I? Yeah. I had. So by that logic, other people definitely would be, too.

So I stuck to my guns, and... check it! Y'all showed up!

One thing I've noticed ever since publishing part 1 is that the PB Nation is pretty damn devoted. You guys have been patient, passionate, silly, and unapologetically yourselves since the get-go. And the response to every old promotional comic or post I've made has been OVERWHELMINGLY positive and curious. I've gotten fucking fanart, man! More than once! I've had the honor of meeting a few of you in person already! And for the ones who haven't caught me out with my friends in New York, believe me, I REMEMBER who comments what.

By the way, you guys should spam my comments more. Fuckin' love that shit. SPEAK TO ME, lmao. Even if it's like, the most irrelevant PB question ever. Keyboard smash in my comment sections. Send me disability reels you like. Tell me what you wanna see from the story. Whatever, as long as it doesn't bleed into parasocial territory!

I've gotta have one of the best audiences out there. So thank you! For just... being around. Here's to hoping y'all enjoy the journey we're aboutta go on.

[btsficsforthehumble]

adj.: 1. Modern, unfamiliar, or different

2. Not based on or conforming to what is generally done or believed

pairing: reader x ot7

genre: college au; angst, fluff, smut, poly, ot7

Summary: You begin your first year at a prestigious university, set out on achieving your academic goals when a series of men step into your life that change the way you view the definition of love.

A/N: Small s/o to Fae from sope-and-shine for giving me great inspiration for this chapter!

Part Three

Warnings: none in this chapter

Word count: 1.8k

You continue down the street, noticing yourself hold a faint smile from your time with Jimin. You have a feeling Intro to Comp will be more fun than you anticipated with him to keep you company. You really appreciated his easy-going nature that allowed playful digs to seem second nature between you two, even if you had just met.

You glance up at the sun, now starting to feel more intense as it approaches midday. Noticing, you slip your sunglasses out of your backpack and look at your phone to double check directions --- you weren’t too confident getting around campus quite yet. As you are looking at your GPS app, you see a text pop up from an unknown number.

*Hi y/nnnnn it’s your favorite seat partner from intro to comp!! Hehe*

You roll your eyes at Jimin’s text, and save his number.

*You are my only seat partner from intro to comp, Jimin. It’s been one day.*

*:( Don’t be a meanie, y/n. You know I’d be your favorite no matter what :DD*

*Who's to say? Maybe next time I’ll sit closer to Yoongi*

*GASP. You wouldn’t dare*

*Are you willing to put money on that?*

As you text Jimin, you follow the directions on your phone and end up at a cute little grocery store, with a built in cafe off to the side. When you notice it, you get some spring in your step. After seeing the coffee that the other students had in class you were yearning for a cup of your own, especially after your hectic morning.

The barista sent you a smile as you read the menu. Deciding on a nice warm cappuccino, you tell her your order and walk over to the side to receive your drink when she finishes.

She rings you out, and as you wait for your drink you begin running though your mental grocery list. Thankfully your apartment had a decent kitchen, which you knew you’d get good use of as you enjoyed cooking when you had a chance. Not to mention, your parents owned a small bakery in your hometown which meant you were well versed in the art of baking, and often found yourself baking during stressful moments in your life as a distraction. Maybe while you were here you’d pick up some basic supplies for baking… sugar, flour, baking soda, vanilla extract….

Your train of thought was quickly cut off by the barista, sliding your drink across the counter with a smile. You give her one back as you thank her, and stroll over to where you think the baking aisle would be. You take your time, checking out the products in each section to make sure you got everything you needed, beyond just your baking supplies.

As you near the paper goods aisle, you barely see a figure swing around the corner and run smack-dab into a paper towel display, which happened to be less than a meter from you. Unfortunately, the collision caused several of the rolls to go flying --- and one flying hard enough to knock the fresh coffee right out of your hand.

The chaos of the moment causes you to stand a little open mouthed while you stare at the now half-empty cardboard coffee cup rolling on it’s side away from you.

Toward the top of your field of vision you see a pair of men’s sneakers, which causes you to scan up towards his face. He is looking at you with the widest doe-eyed shocked expression you have possibly ever seen. His arms are half reached out, as if he wants to help, but can’t as he already caused the damage. One of the arms reaching out at you has a patchwork of black ink, trailing down over his toned muscles to his knuckles. His oversized grey t-shirt and loose jeans seem to swallow him a bit, which only adds to the almost child-like innocence of his wide eyes. Wavy brown hair frames his face, accentuating his masculine jawline.

Once your eyes connect for a few seconds, surely both wide in shock, he makes a squeaking noise and bends down to collect the scattered rolls.

“I’m so sorry, I wasn’t watching where I was going and I took the turn too fast, I’ll go buy you another coffee as soon as I pick these up---” His voice, while speaking rapidly, remained soft and delicate, obviously embarrassed at his mistake. When you bend down to join him in collecting the runaway towels, he cuts himself off to again look at you with a wide-eyed expression.

You smile at him, the surprise from the situation fading as you stretch your upper body as far as you can to grab one that rolled particularly far. “It’s okay, we all can be clumsy sometimes. I promise it’s not that big of a deal, it was just a coffee.” You give him a warm smile in reassurance, wanting to ease his obvious anxiety.

You both stand up, having collected the spilled display and him grabbing your abandoned coffee cup. “Um, what were you drinking? I’ll get you a new one, it’s the least I could do.” His blush deepens with his question, and he nervously glances off to the side as he grabs his elbow of the hand holding the empty cup to make himself smaller.

“It was a cappuccino… but honestly, you really don’t need to, it’s okay.” Sending him another warm smile, you hope to convey your ease at the situation.

“No, I want to. I’ll be right back, okay?” He holds your gaze for a second, seeming to double check that you weren’t going to run away on him.

“Okay.” Once you let out your reply, he sends you a quick smile as he turns around and lightly jogs away from you, back the direction you came from.

You can't help but notice the subtle ripple of his muscles across his shoulder blades as he does so. For being so meek, he sure had quite the muscular build under those baggy clothes. He definitely was “yummy” to use the word Jimin so aptly applied to Yoongi earlier. At the memory, you couldn’t help but let out a small chuckle under your breath.

You scan the area quickly, making sure your run in with the boy didn’t leave a mess anywhere in the store. After seeing it clear, you glance back over your shoulder to watch him talking to the same barista. You could tell, even from this distance, that he seemed slightly embarrassed and had a pink tinge to his cheeks. The duality of this guy honestly is blowing your mind… his tattoos and muscular physique would give the impression that he would be super intimidating and confident, but by the way he blushed at attention so easily and was so timid when he apologized to you showed that he was was really a big sweetheart.

As he was now waiting for the barista to remake your drink, standing in the same spot you occupied a few minutes ago, you felt awkward hovering in the spot of the incident. After a quick glance back at him, you thought he would be able to find you pretty easily if you ventured down the aisle further. An aisle down from the paper goods, you found yourself in the exact aisle you were looking for.

Your mind quickly abandoned any prior thought as you took stock of the baking supplies the store had to offer. It looks like you’d be spending more on groceries today than you had anticipated.

“Um, here’s your coffee…” The boy from earlier had returned before you realized any time had passed. Caught, you looked at him, now looking at you, with a hesitant look on his face, as he saw the almost comical amount of stuff you had balanced in your arms. Now embarrassed a tad, you realize you have no hand to take the coffee from him, and it seems like it had just occurred to him too. He looked back and forth between the coffee in his hand and your ridiculously full arms and quickly offered, “I’ll be right back. I’ll get you a basket.”

“Oh my gosh, thank you so much. I’m sorry, I guess I got carried away!” You sheepishly respond to his kind offer. It was above what a normal person would do. He nodded his head quickly and did his half-jog thing again to go back to the front of the store. You weren’t getting tired of the view, to be honest.

Before you even knew it, he was back and gently removing items from the tetris you created in your arms of baking supplies. “Thank you so much, you really don't have to do any of this…” you feel slightly guilty for the boy’s kindness.

“No, it’s really okay, I shouldn’t have thrown paper towels at you.” As he speaks, he catches your eye and gives you a smile you could only compare to a cute bunny or other small adorable creature. You couldn’t help but fall just a little in love with him right there in the aisle. Now comfortable enough to joke with you, you left out a surprised laugh in response. You tip your head back slightly and feel your cheeks squish up without warning.

“I suppose you got me there. Maybe try to lower the aggression levels on your next grocery store run,” you egg him on slightly, a teasing smile remaining on his face.

“What would be the fun in that?” His eyes hold contact just a millisecond longer than normal, and you swear you see a glint of mischief in them. Ah, so bunny-boy knows at least a little how much of a hunk he is.

“Do you flirt with pretty girls at the store by knocking the coffee out of their hands for fun then?” Your eyebrow is raised slightly, and your tone stays as a teasing lilt.

Apparently at his banter limit, he blushes and gapes for a second. “Just teasing you. Thank you again for the coffee,” you reassure. Full basket and fresh coffee in hand, you flash him one last grin before you make your way around him to head towards the register.

As you leave the store, re-entering the street, you can’t help but hope you run into that guy again. He seemed like a genuinely sweet person that you’d love to be friends with. Starting towards the direction of your apartment, you ponder the chances.

You also ponder what baked treat you were going to throw the rest of your afternoon into. After some mental deliberation, you settled on muffins. Easy to take with you for that pesky morning calculus class. Ugh, at the thought of calculus you groaned inside a little. Not only did you have to grapple with the boring math, but you now have to grapple with the decidedly not so boring boys in your class.

[beebubb]

William grossman: becoming a pasta

(also i mention my OC amari here but they're just friends and roommates here. No romantic things)(also this might be kinda long and I mention some stuff about my creepypasta AU so if you don't wanna be confused you can check it out!)

Like I mentioned in an old post, will and LJ went on a lot of self discovery adventures for Will.

It was always will's dream to become a popular killer like Jeff but sense he couldn't actually bring himself to kill someone, he would doubt himself a lot and would sometimes just be so upset or angry at himself

Will: maybe coming to the underworld was a mistake.. I shouldn't have come here...

LJ: come on bud! There's gotta be something here you're good at!

They had literally tried many things.

Will worked for a surgeon for literally a day before he got fired. He couldn't bring himself to dissect someone. Yes he had seen dead bodies before out on the street but he couldn't bring himself to be the one to actually commit to doing it

He also tried to be a bounty hunter/hitman but, ended up quitting immediately after he was told to kill a family

He even worked at a black market that was hiring someone to just care for the oragans they sold. It was going pretty well but, lets say it was will's first time seeing an actual beating human heart

Will: what else could I be good at?!? Everything here involves killing! And I can't even kill someone if it depended on my damn life...

LJ: you could still try for your dream of being a slender proxy!

Will: but being a proxy involves killing! Maybe I should just go back to the human world... I don't even have my mark! I didn't get a permanent smile like Jeff or red bleeding eyes like ben!

Amari: I don't have any cool marks either!

Will: but atleast you got skulls shapes on your eyes! I didn't get anything! Maybe I just wasn't meant to be here...

Amari hated seeing will so upset. She knew his dream was to work for slenderman, and obviously, she wanted him to achieve it. She got lucky and worked for him from time to time, so she was sure she could talk to slender and see if will had a chance.

How he met slenderman

Amari went to see her boss a few days later. AKA slenderman. She explained to him his situation and, he actually wanted to meet him!

Slenderman isn't judgemental like many in the underworld think he is. He can see potential in someone even at their lowest.

She obviously went to the apartment to tell will the good news

Amari: will! You aren't going to believe this but i talked to slenderman about you and....he wants to see you!

Will: what?!? Are you serious?!

Amari: yep!

Will: holy shit!! Let me take a quick shower then!

Will took a shower and once he was ready he followed amari to the slender mansion.

Once they got there, masky did the regular check for weapons on him (it's normal for them to check new people that go into slenderman's meeting room just to make sure of any weapons or suspicious items)

Will was calm but was holding in his inner fanboy.

"I can't believe I'm seeing slender's most valuable proxy!!! Holy shit!!!"

LJ wasn't all that excited sense he already knew pretty much every pasta and knew what it was like living in the mansion/manor.

LJ: "what a hassle...."

LJ wasn't really aware of all the dangers the proxies tried to prevent. He just saw it as a way to show off their wealth and to think they were better than others

Once they were clear, masky took them to the meeting room

Even if will wasn't sure if he could get a chance working with slenderman, there was one thing he was definetly certain of.

Get their autographs

No way he was gonna waste his visit to the slender mansion and NOT get their autographs.

Masky: you may go inside

Will: um....could i get your autograph please?

Masky: oh, yes

Will: yes!! *takes out a scrapbook he made* here!

Masky: *signs in* there

Will: thank you so much!!!

LJ: come on! You look like a dork!

Will: ok ok! And I'm not gonna waste my visit and not get their autographs *goes into the meeting room*

Once they got in they were immediately greeted by slenderman

"Glad you came here william, please, take a seat"

William was so excited by seeing slenderman in person but was also terrified about what he would think of him.

Will became really shy and nervous while talking

Slenderman: so i heard you were interested in working with me later on but you had a few doubts on your own abilities, could you tell me more?

Will: i um....*fidgeting with his fingers*

LJ: he wants to be a proxy but he has trouble actually killing someone. So we wanna know his chances of actually becoming one

Slenderman: ah I see, well I'll have to look at some other assets, do you have any school documents?

Will: *nods and takes out a folder with his school papers*

These kind of meetings were actually pretty common so slenderman already knew what to look for in school documents

Will's grades weren't that good tbh

He had many subjects he struggled with. On his report cards, pretty much every subject had D's and C's, and the occasional F's. Only is P. E he had a B.

Slenderman usually looked for atleast a B average

Though the only straight A's that will got, were in chemistry

Slenderman: I see you're proficient in chemistry, how come that's the only subject you get A's in?

Will: well um.... It's pretty much the only subject that I like....

Slenderman: may I ask what your under realm mark you for when you arrived here?

Will: i didn't get anything...

Slender seemed kinda surprised at his answer.

He opened up a locked drawer on his desk and took out a heavy book and went through the pages and stopped at one with a picture of a hand with lines

Slenderman: may I see your hand?

Will: uh... Sure? *shows him his hand*

Slenderman seemed really intrigued with will's hand.

LJ and Amari were extremely confused.

Amari knew pretty much the process of these type of meetings but when she was applying as an apprentice for slenderman, slender didn't ask to see her hand like he did with will

Once slender was done checking will's hand, he looked through more of his records

LJ: um.... So what do you think? He has a bit of potential right?

Slenderman seemed lost in though for a second but replied

"William, have you ever took any.... Magic classes or considered taking one?"

The three of them were surprised.

Like, magic? They knew that magic existed in the underworld but why would he think will would Want to study it?

Magic is a really complicated subject and depending on what element you were granted or want to control, it takes a lot of discipline and training and it is rarely recommended to the top students at the institution sense it was pretty much college level

LJ: why do you ask that?

Will: yeah I mean... I'm barely passing and I don't know if my grades are even good enough for me to graduate this year.

Slenderman: well i don't know how you didn't see this before but, look

Slenderman turned the book to their direction

LJ and amari were shocked

LJ: will you?!?

Will: *looking at the book and at his hand* wait....holy shi-i mean oh my god! I have powers?!

Slenderman: i looked through your records and i see you're part of the grossman family.

LJ: uh yeah he had a great grandpa but how does that explain this? He never had any sort of contact with magic

Slenderman: maybe not him exactly but, she did

Slenderman pulled out a picture from isaac's record folder (all demons and rulers from hell and the under realm have a record of their citizens) and pulled out the picture of a woman

Slenderman: she's ida grossman. Isaac grossman's great grandmother. She was killed for practising witchcraft. It would explain why will was granted magic here in the under realm.

LJ: sense he has this power, how come i never saw it before? I've been with him ever sense he was born!

Slenderman: well his power is still undeveloped sense he never had any proper training or took any classes. He has the mark on his hand but if he wants to actually use his abilities, he'll need to start practicing.

LJ now understood, and was happy for will

LJ: how can he start?

Slenderman: well,i have a proxy named sherry that knows about this, she could be will's tutor. Also I have been really interested in getting an apprentice with magical abilities but it has been difficult finding one, but if will wants to work with me then..

Slenderman took out an apprentice application

Slenderman: I could take him in as my personal sorcerer

LJ: well, what do ya say bud? Do you wan-

Will: yes!!!!!

Will didn't even think twice on his answer. Of course he wanted to work as slenderman's apprentice in magic.

He felt like his life had literally no direction but now everything was changing. He felt more confident than ever

LJ: do these classes have a price or somethin'?

Slenderman: it's usually 50 per class in a normal school but it depends if my proxy wants to charge for them or not sense she teaches them individually.

Will: oh....

Amari: ah don't worry i can pay for them!

Will: you don't gotta do that!

Amari: it's fine! You're my friend, we should help each other out

Slenderman: so I'm guessing that it's settled then?

Will: yeah!

Slenderman: alright then, I'll just need a signature of your parent or guardian on the application

LJ gave his signature

Slenderman: thank you. Well you're ready to go. All you need to do now is finish your last month at the institution and once you're done, I'll have amari bring you here again to start your training.

Will: yes! Thank you! Um one more thing, could I get your autograph sir?

Slenderman: oh yes of course!

Once slenderman signed his notebook they thanked him and were free to go

Who knew that will was more special than many thought he was.

I hope you guys liked this! I'll be making more parts!

Also i know will wasn't really developed in the Creeps comic so I kinda let myself create his character more.

Also this was inspired by a headcanon I saw where will was granted powers so I wanted to include that into his character.

[mayfriend-archive]

Totally understand if you're not up for it and fully recognize the ronald mcdonald dom/sub anon vibes which is an AMAZING post btw but like...now i'm curious, what the hell did Lord of the Flies anon DO that got him blocked for the discourse? like...i just can't wrap my head around high school lit being...uh...that inflammatory i guess?

Okay so, I'll start by saying I've had a new anon from apparently the same anon saying they are NOT the person I blocked, just a rando making the same points, but I'll answer your question anyway just to set out why this person in particular got blocked, out of the several thousand who reblogged/commented on that very successful addition to the LoTF post I made.

First off, I added the 'real life Lord of the Flies' story because I thought it was a good story. I had read about it only a couple days beforehand in Humankind and, after reading out the entire chapter to my parents who weren't very interested, I was excited that there was not only a post where it would be relevant to post, but that I wouldn't be hijacking it, as it was already rejecting the widespread interpretation taught in many schools, that humanity is inherently savage.

When making the addition, I a) did not think it would get more than a couple reblogs, because the post was already at 50k notes and I figured anyone that might be interested would already have seen it, and b) I did not know the very specific context that prompted William Golding to write the book; all I knew was that he had been a teacher at a public school (basically, the poshest schools in the country - think Eton, Harrow, very 'old money' places that pump out Conservative politicians by the bucket-load 🤢) who hated his job and the boys he taught (which, valid), and new information I'd been given in Humankind - that Golding had said to his wife one day, "Wouldn't it be a good idea to write a story about some boys on an island, showing how they would really behave?" - which had no mention of The Coral Island by R. M. Ballantyne, which I have since learned was the text that Golding loathed enough to write an entire novel in refutation of - and included what I considered a very telling letter from Golding to his publisher, in which Golding wrote of his belief that 'even if we start with a clean slate, our nature compels us to make a muck of it.' Another Golding quote that I believe portrays his belief in humanity's 'innate savagery' is that "man produces evil as a bee produces honey."

Obviously, the author of a book putting forward the case for humanity's inherent goodness was going to oppose Golding's hypothesis; Bregman not only noted Golding's literary accomplishments and beliefs, but his personal life.

When I began delving into the author's life, I learned what an unhappy individual he'd been. An alcoholic. Prone to depression. A man who, as a teacher, once divided his pupils into gangs and encouraged them to attack each other. "I have always understood the Nazis," Golding confessed, "because I am of that sort by nature." (Humankind by Rutger Bregman, p. 24-25)

I have bolded the part about him as a teacher, because it is incredibly relevant to the original post that I commented on, which begins with a comic of a teacher locking her class in to see them 'recreate' Lord of the Flies, something which the follow up comments before mine staunchly reject as both misunderstanding the point of the book, and the fact that it took the kids in Lord of the Flies a significant amount of time without adult supervision to go 'savage'. This misreading of the text is widespread enough that when Golding won the Nobel Prize for Lord of the Flies, the Swedish Nobel committee wrote that his book 'illuminate[s] the human condition in the world of today'. Whether or not they misread it is beyond my expertise - they do at least mention the factors of the outside world neglected by many when analysing the book, but still seem to believe it says something about human nature as a whole rather than just, to quote thedarkbutbeige 'British kids being rat bastards' - but Golding quite happily took his Nobel prize on this basis. Which, in fairness, I would too. It's a fucking Nobel prize.

It was with this knowledge, and this knowledge alone, that I stated in my now very, very widely read comment that Golding 'wrote the book to be a dick', in response to the tags of the person I reblogged from. As I said, I now know that Golding did not write the book (solely) because he hated the kids he taught, but as a response to The Coral Island and the general idea that clearly the British were inherently civilsed, whilst the people they colonised and enslaved were inherently savage. So. That's the background.

The anon - or rather, the person I thought was anon - was the sole exception out of dozens of replies, who instead of telling me about The Coral Island politely decided it was time to go ALL CAPS and regurgitate points already made by thespaceshipoftheseus, and implied that the only reason that the real life Tongan castaways didn't go all Lord of the Flies was because they weren't British. Not because they weren't surrounded by violence like the boys in Lord of the Flies, or there wasn't a World War ongoing, or that they weren't the upper, upper, upper crust of a class-obsessed society like Britain - but because they weren't British. A complete inversion of the concept that Golding was trying to get across - now, instead of all of humanity being equally prone to savagery in the right conditions, it was solely nationality that determined it. As in, the British were inherently savage, but nobody else was.

I, trying for humour, made the terrible mistake of replying to them.

I won't lie, I was absolutely blown away that this was real life. What I think they were trying to do was be that Cool Tumblr Person who, after somebody's been shitty on a post, goes to their blog and sees something Damning in their about/description. In an ideal world, I imagine I'd have gone nuts or done something Unforgiveable. In what I can only call the rant that followed, they stated several times that I needed to go back to high school to get some 'proper literary analysis' skills and that the story of the Tongan castaways was completely unrelated to the point at hand which. I mean, I disagree, considering that I made the addition, but I couldn't get my head around how commenting on a post that was already rejecting the thesis that the 'point' of Lord of the Flies was that humanity was inherently savage and was, in fact, about how kids - British or otherwise - learn how to function from the adults around them, and that traumatised, terrified children aren't going to create a mini-Utopia, and put forward a real life example of how without the key additions of an ongoing world war, a colonial Empire and the subsequent mindset of thinking you are 'inherently civilised' and therefore can't do anything wrong, actually, people just want to take care of each other.

A friend has since asked me why I even have 'england' in my description. To be honest, it's a timezone thing - I talk to a lot of people online who don't share my timezone, and it generally makes me feel like if I don't reply immediately because it's 3am, they have the tools to see that I'm not in their timezone and not just ignoring them. I did consider changing it to 'british' or 'uk' after it was... 'used against me', I guess, simply because I didn't want to deal with it, but you know what. No. Not gonna do that. I am from England, and I have never hid that fact. I have a tag called 'uk politics', during Eurovision I refer to the UK's act as 'us' (even if I really, really don't want to. Because James Newman slaughtered that song and it was downright embarrassing), I regularly post stuff in my personal tag about where I live (and mostly complain about this piece of shit government). If people really think my nationality makes every point I make null and void, then they don't have to follow me or interact with my posts; tumblr is big, and I am one medium-small blog very easily passed over.

I did reply to them, trying to explain the above, but their next response really just doubled down. Because I used the word British instead of English - foolishly because the posts above mine focused on Britishness, and also because although Golding was English and taught English kids, the pro-Imperialism author of The Coral Island, R. M. Bannatyne was actually Scottish so, ding ding ding, falls into the 'British' category - they then decided that I was somehow trying to pretend I wasn't English and made all the same points, before ending with this doozy:

At this point, I knew there was nothing to be gained from replying, because if we're whipping out conditions like they're pokemon cards then there's no actual conversation anymore, and I'm not going to start mudslinging like an identity politician. They made up their mind, and I figured there could be no harm in letting them think that they 'won' by blocking them instead of replying.

Until the ask. INNATE ENGLISH SAVAGERY did, I'll admit, make me think it was them, back again. I even thought up a really good response approximately 12 hours after I replied, I was that sure. Until the second message came in, and said they were just someone who came from the post and made the same point by chance. So the saga draws to a close... for now.

It may have been them, it may not have been - the anon feature makes it impossible to be sure, but as the second message I got said, we're in a heatwave. It's too hot to argue. And I've just written a goddamn essay about a book I dislike anyway.

My pasty English ass is going to go melt. If there's Disk Horse, do not tell me. I am Done™