#cause i literally didn't need them to progress to the next level

[dukeofankh]

I mean, nothing I said was suggesting that nothing can or should be done. I have a couple things I can think of but people are already rightly pointing out that my experience, like all experiences, isnt universal. Calling out a shallow take isn't something I'm doing because I'm so so wise and I know how to fix everything.

I have heard the take that part of the fix for this will probably be a lot more white men with podcasts, and that is almost definitely *part* of the fix. It is legitimately difficult for young men to find content about random ass basic hobbies that isn't being served to them by low-key fascists. That needs to change. When talking with other progressive men, something that came up a lot was after school programs, especially ones that bring boys in more contact with their communities and expose them to different kinds of people in positive ways. Hate breeds in ignorance and isolation.

You already seem very anti-terf, which is great. That is also part of it. I don't honestly think that women are the cause of this problem but like, in terms of fixing this and convincing men that feminists are on their side, yeah, some small part of it is probably looking at the state of feminism currently and recognizing that it has devolved in many very public online spaces into reactionary gender essentialism and that radical feminism takes up a lot more air than anyone would like to pretend it does. "Sure I wholeheartedly reblogged something that claimed that any man who seems decent is just trying to let women's guards down to make it easier to assault them, something all men are trying to do to women at all times, but that's just venting. Ignore that broadside that me and my friends just unloaded on you and everyone who looks anything like you, if you think that your hurt feelings about that matter, that's on you for not recognizing that our pain justifies saying literally whatever we want" (to call up a random example) is certainly a standard that it is possible to enforce in some more isolated corners of the internet, but there has been a serious breakdown between the personal and the public, which is hell for messaging as a movement. This is no longer drinks with friends, this stuff gets broadcast worldwide to men who are trying to get a sense of what feminism is about. At some level, what is cathartic to say will have to give way to what is tactically wise to announce. The only men who will willingly share space with that sentiment if it is core to this movement are either convinced that they are personally exempt from examining their own privilege, which is its own problem, or men who agree wholeheartedly that all men are evil, them included, and are trying to atone. I've interacted plenty with both in male feminist spaces. It's not a winning team. I am aware how hard that will be. 4B type political lesbianism/lesbian separatism seems to be having a moment (at least as a meme) right now as people process their grief in this moment. That's understandable. But it's not wise.

Considering this is happening in the wake of the US election, and I'm saying this as a Canadian, it's also worth gently and precisely noting that even if the harm is the same, someone who voted for trump didn't necessarily do it because they despise women. If we're just looking at the raw numbers and saying "we're doomed", that's probably not helpful or, luckily, accurate. The project of changing the cultural narrative is huge and depressingly long. The rise of reactionary right wing populism when a society starts failing its young people economically isn't. That is a different, and much easier project. If you don't want people to vote for right wing populism, you need to give them left wing populism, and infiltrating the democratic party and pulling all the same tricks the right did but towards economic policy that will provide the next generation of men with the opportunity to own homes and pull their weight supporting families will do a hell of a lot more in a much shorter time than systematically changing each and every man's heart, especially considering a lot of the people who voted for trump weren't men. This project will outlast us, but MAGA doesn't have to.

If your vision for the deradicalization of right-wing men begins and ends with "other men telling them that that's gross and to stop it" then I'm sorry, you do not understand how masculinity works.

"Men who hold patriarchal status" and "men who are feminists" are two groups who overlap less than you want them to. I'm sorry. That's not solely because men are so happy with patriarchal status that they don't want to risk it by policing misogyny/queerphobia/racism, It's because being misogynistic, queerphobic, and racist, end expressing other forms of toxic masculinity(and often abusively so) are part of how people establish and maintain patriarchal status. The men who have the ability to stop this via nothing but peer pressure are the very people who are doing it. That's by design. And engaging in feminist intervention is, in and of itself, usually the abrupt end of that status and its associated power to persuade misogynistic men.

Like, I have worked in blue collar jobs as a notably queer person. It was pretty much a constant deluge of verbal abuse. In my experience, most blue collar work environments are exploitative, abusive, and bigoted, and very gleefully so. On the occasions I have spoken up about someone saying something that was super fucking out of line (asking me which of the girls walking by was hottest. We were installing a portable classroom at a middle school), believe it or not, they completely failed to be shamed! Because nobody else on the crew gave a fuck. *I* was the weird one. They ghosted me. A full blown company ghosted me. I suddenly didn't have a job anymore because they just straightforwardly stopped telling me where the next job site was.

Like, this doesn't mean that it's your job to do it, but this vision you have of these big groups of men where everyone is on the fence and there is precisely one shit stirrer who can be shut down by a brave feminist man who can single handedly set the example for all these other guys...you are high. You are describing an "everybody clapped" level absurd scenario. Most of these truly virulent misogynistic guys either have zero friends, because, you know, our society is atomized to fuck, or they are in a group where the feminist guy is actually the weirdo who can be shut down and ostracized much, much easier than the misogynists, because there is no such thing as a man misogynists respect who stands up for women.

You might be saying "well, we're talking about longstanding personal relationships, actually. Like, they need to have to want to spend time with you and then, as a side effect, you can mind control them out of being a threat to us."

Problem with that being:

1: Many feminist men also have no friends, see the atomized society above.

2: Feminist men already stopped hanging out with men who make rape jokes because why the fuck would we want to spend time with them.

3: That isn't just because we respect women so hard. We are in many cases talking about men who are also deeply queerphobic, heirarchical, violent and abusive to other men. What initially drew me to feminism and women was a lack of heirarchical squabbling and constant bullying, and the ability to be openly queer. A lot of men who came to feminism did so because they knew that the patriarchy was not a place they would find success or acceptance. These are not the men who are gonna be able to change right wing minds.

4. Men do not view themselves as a monolith. There is no universal brotherhood of men. The actual meaning of the term "Fragile masculinity" is that men are constantly expected to prove that they are deserving of the status of being a member of their own gender. There are large swathes of men--including most of the men who you'd look to as examples of good, feminist men who you want to undertake this project--who are considered failed men, sissies, f****ts, soyboys, ect. They are. Not. Going. To. Convince. These. Men. Of. Jack. Shit. Much less successfully *shame* them. Jesus.

I know all of this sucks. I know it would be cool to be able to just point at a group and have them be responsible for the work. But nah. It's gonna have to be a societal project, one that will probably outlast all of us. Sorry. The thing you want these men to do is, absolutely, the morally correct thing to do. But presuming that it would be effective is, and once again I am so sorry about this, just ignorance of how these social groups function.

[zincbot]

just beat chants of sennaar! beautiful game

[set-wingedwarrior]

My most important sapphic ships post before Pride Month ends

What the title says, studying kept (and still keeps me) busy so we gotta go fast lol

Bumbleby (RWBY)

to the surprise of absolutely no one, they get first place (despite me not going in a particular order) because of reasons. They're perfect. Soulmates. Slowburn of all time. Yin and Yang. Eyes the color of each other's souls. Truest OTP to ever OTP in my book. ∞/10

Konosetsu (Negima!)

I already talked about them in their own post, this scene changed my life leading to my self-discovery and it still lives rent-free in my mind.

Kyosaya (Madoka Magica)

I'd also add MadoHomu but I'm trying to keep it to just one for each fandom. That said, they still make me mentally unwell. I love them, and I did for a long time now. I can't wait for the next movie to come out and suffer.

Ruby and Sapphire (Steven Universe)

These bitches had the first cartoon gay wedding and kiss DO I NEED TO SAY MORE???

Korrsami (Avatar)

Still down the queer cartoons making history path, these two made me insane back in the day because I still didn't understand I was queer and lots of sapphic couple were starting to appear in media, and I remember jokingly say how "lesbian ships were hauting me". All I can say now is "Thank you" lol. Anyway, they were incredibly important and all the people criticizing how little queerness there's in the show will never understand just how massive this scene was.

Catradora (She-Ra and the Princesses of Power)

Friends to Enemies to back to Friends to Lovers. Iconic. I still want a movie with their adventures bringing magic back to the universe.

Hollstein (Carmilla)

My third beloved blonde with a cat gf ship. I miss this web-series every day. Also, Natasha Negovanlis played an immense role in my gay awakening.

Ellie and Riley (The Last of Us: Left Behind)

Ellie and Dina are adorable and I love them, BUT I just will never get over these two. That dlc fucked me up. (also, they're in the same category with Korrasami as "gay ships that hauted me before I realized I was queer" lol)

Lumity (The Owl House)

I remember starting this show feeling it as the successor of Steven Universe, at least to me. We could say that at level of mistreatment from its parent company, it defenitely surpassed it, but at least I'm glad I was right and we got Luz and Amity becoming canon. I love these two and not a day passes without me yelling at Disney for what it did to them.

Bubbline (Adventure Time)

I actually watched Adventure Time fully only recently, but I always loved them even when I watched the show randomly when it appeared in tv back in the day. Getting to see the progression properly just made me love them even more.

Yasammy (Jurassic World: Camp Cretaceous/Chaos Theory)

Incredibly recent addition, but I am so glad that I checked out Camp Cretaceous and got into it. It's a nice show and these two are a really cute couple, their confession and especially Yaz's internal turmoil were just so on point. I was really happy to see them go still strong in Chaos Theory, and I can't wait for next season.

Pricefield (Life is Strange)

These two caused me pain in the best possible way. I felt literal heartbreak at the Bay Ending, and I was just as emotional at the Bae one (Bae > Bay Forever) I hope the new game will respect their relationship OR ELSE.

Wow, this is quite the list. I do have an amazing taste, if I do say so myself, ahah!

Well, I guess this is it for now, glad I could make it before Pride Month was over! Knowing myself I might have actually forgotten some though, so keep an eye out for possible updates (what makes me even think that you'd care? lol).

That would be all, be gay and do crimes! Bye!

[dimonds456]

Billford and Abuse: An Analysis

Honestly, as someone who ships both Billford and Fiddauthor, the thing I like about the toxic yaoi ship is the fact that it IS toxic. Like, the jokes are great, but its depiction of abuse is so, like... genuine. Without getting personal, I've been in a really fucking bad toxic (platonic) relationship before, and Billford deadass helped me come to terms with it.

Cuz here's the thing: most fictional abusive relationships just start with the abuse itself. It shows the victim and the perpetrator at the height (or almost at the height) of the abuse, and we see as either one of them is destroyed by it or the victim becomes free. But Billford actually shows the WHOLE timeline.

Something that bothers me about a lot of fictional abuse reps is the fact that you cannot sympathize with the victim aside from "aw that's horrible :(". Cuz it just starts AT the abuse. We don't see how they got there or what's causing the victim to stay. We just know they need to escape.

But with Billford, we see EVERYTHING. How it started out as something Ford genuinely loved, seeing Bill as a friend and someone he could trust, how it made him feel better because he was actually making progress on his research and he wasn't lonely anymore.

To Ford during those early days, Bill was the highlight of his time in Gravity Falls. We can follow his train of thought exactly to where he let Bill possess him with basically no strings attached (pun intended).

That's what makes it all the more devastating. Bill isolated Ford from everyone. He sabotaged his friendship with Fiddleford by planting that seed of doubt in the engineer and pulling Ford further and further into his plans. Then the thing with the portal happened and Ford had NOWHERE to go. Plus, Bill kept trying to get Ford to stop thinking about Stan, to move on and let him rot. So he kept planting seeds of doubt in his own brother as well, causing Ford to further and further slip away.

Then Ford confronts Bill. And the monster is unleashed.

Once Bill realizes he's lost control of Ford's devotion and the illusion has shattered, Bill just LEANS into it. In order to take control back, he started tormenting Ford and just being horrible to him, to try and make him fall in line. Love and fear ARE right next to each other in the brain, after all. And there's NOTHING Ford can do but just fall further and further into paranoia.

Bill demonstrates many real-world abusive/manipulative tactics on Ford, the big one being isolation, since that allows the rest of the everything to even happen, but the way he turns Ford against LITERALLY EVERYONE using paranoia is really true to real life.

Now obviously your toxic boyfriend cannot possess random strangers irl. But you know what he CAN do? Start spreading rumors behind your back. Stalk you. Harass you. Make you feel unsafe everywhere except home (which isn't safe either, but it's better than the outside world). He can spend your money or break your things. Slash your tires. In Ford's case, LITERALLY abusing his body. There's the sticky notes, the threats, the roof incident, all of it just piling one atop the other.

I cannot imagine how fucking terrified Ford must have been to finally send that postcard to Stanley. He was at a point where he assumed Stan would hate him, or at the very least wouldn't respond so why even bother, and he'd just gotten the "steal your eyes" threat. He was out of options, and was absolutely sure he was putting Stan in danger by getting him involved (another irl abuse thing that happens).

He was scared to reach out for help because 1) he didn't want others getting hurt (like Fidds had), 2) he was ashamed he'd let this happen, and 3) he, on some level, felt like he deserved this.

Justified? To a paranoid, scared, abused, irrational brain: Absolutely. In reality? Never. But HE'D built that portal. HE'D allowed Bill to possess his body basically freely. HE'D basically helped start the apocalypse. And that shame would have lead to SO much self-hatred and despair.

His reaching out to Stan was his last resort, his only way out. THAT'S what intrigues me about the ship so much.

I do not want them to make up and get back together. They're horrible for each other. But I do enjoy exploring the dynamic of it, fully seeing the cycle and how it happens, and seeing a whole new side to Ford that we only caught a glimpse of in the show and Journal 3. Plus Bill but his side is more comedic and sad to me I do not take him seriously FSDGHJ

The jokes are great and I love it here, but if I ever write a fic or draw art for these two it's going to be toxic as hell man. And not in the fun way fgsjd

[skunkox]

Let's Talk About Turning

Let's go in order of Listeners. If any of the recounted information is incorrect, please let me know.

Bright Eyes:

From retelling from old fans, Bright had literally no say (possibly idea of) the turning till after it was at least in progress.

Lovely:

They were in a life or death situation. They chose to continue living at the cost of losing the power they worked so hard to learn, along with the normalcy of everyday life.

They seem to be taking everything in stride, but I'm worried for them. They seems to be an optimist except for when it comes to their image to others. (That's a post for another day)

Darlin':

Has been given the option to be turned. They still have the option to. But there's 3 things pointing in the no direction. In chatacter wise at least.

Sam still intends to stay with them regardless of how they age. They finally feel their place in the pack. Why lose the original link that made them a part of that family? Last and finally, Sam won't be living an eternal life, regardless if Darlin' wanted to or not with him.

I'm personally a believer that Darlin' wants to keep a mortal life for Sam's sake. Giving him a natural life time line. I hate to think about it, but I think we all see how that's all ending. At least we know that if that's the route Erik has chosen, when shit really his the fan with the meridian, these two are safe. Right? Right.

Treasure:

Let me start off by saying we don't know much about them because their story is quite literally two videos deep so far. What we've seen so far is that Treasure appears to have a dependency or rather a need to do for others. Regardless if they might feel uncomfortable or just not enjoy the sway of their company. Old company we should say.

I think we've mostly come to the agreement that if Treasure hadn't wanted to go off with Porter, they wouldn't have. They were there for their at the time, friends. The night at the club very well could have been the last straw.

All this to say I believe Treasure will be getting turned. Treasure is at the beginning of a break out from their own shell and making choices that benefits themself. There is some level of care and joy between Porter and Treasure. If that grows, wouldn't they want to stay together? If the first person to truly make Treasure happy is gonna live forever, wouldn't they want to too?

There are other ideas of Treasure being a Stealth cause the bitch didn't seem to freak out over Porter being s blood sucking play boy. Erik seems to be leaving empowered reveals of his characters to listener characters to the listeners, for the most part.

There's also the chance Erik could kill off Porter's character. There's a rule of 3 for character stories, it seems. We lost Fred from a listener standpoint and gained Porter. We have 3 wolves. 3 vampires, and 3 d(a)emons that have consistant romantic undertones at the very least. Vega is dead, but he can be brought back. I don't think he's killing Porter off but it's not impossible?

We're at the calm before the storm boys. I swear in the next 4 months, shits gonna get real and all he'll will break loose. Or Aria? Through the meridian. I'm rambling.

But yeah. Totally think that Treasure will get that choice and will be turned.

Again, if my information is wrong, let a bitch know. We gonna suffer through this together.

[markantonys]

Someone on Twitter:

"Have we even had a scene showcasing Rand's potential/ power? Neither the Eye of the World nor the "battle“ with Ishamael felt like Rand's accomplishments I think."

I'm tired. 1. The Eye absolutely counts. 2. Okay I was underwhelmed with the Ishy battle I wanted it to be more flashy cause that was supposed to be his declaring himself Dragon moment and that definitely didn't land for me because of that. 3. Did Turak and his soldiers not count? That was brutal and efficient and definitely shows his potential imo. Rand doesn't even reach the same power levels that he does at the Eye bookwise til at least Knife of Dreams so like...I think people need to chill

man i'm so tired of people who have no idea how power progression is supposed to work lmao if they want rand to be having flashy big showdowns in the first 2 seasons then they'd better be prepared for him to feel stagnant and/or like a letdown in future seasons 🤷 you just know they'd be going "but why isn't rand able to do X in this season when he could do it LAST season?" if the show did exactly what the early books did in constantly giving rand a big blowout moment at the end of one book and then resetting him to being a helpless baby channeler at the start of the next one.

as for his ishy showdown not being ~flashy~ enough or not being ~his moment~, that's literally the point. it's a pyrrhic victory for rand - he was able to defeat ishy, but absolutely would not have been capable of it without his friends & moiraine assisting him (and risking their own lives to assist him, at that), and i'm sure he's very aware of this. this will motivate him to be desperate enough to improve his channeling skills that he's willing to get training from a forsaken. simple as that. if he was already skilled enough to have a big exciting moment of self-obtained victory in 2x08, then why would he need asmodean to train him in s3? audiences wouldn't buy him being desperate enough to resort to something so drastic.

especially since the show has upped the threat level of the forsaken massively and is actually making them frightening villains. book!asmodean is sad wet and pathetic for all of his onscreen-time despite his evil backstory, so it doesn't feel that risky for rand to take him as a teacher, but if show!asmodean is made more competent & scary in the same way as ishy, lanfear, and moggy (based on her one scene) have been, then that means rand is taking a much bigger risk in the eyes of the audience and we thus need a much stronger reason to believe he would be wiling to take such a risk. rand needs to consistently fail in the early seasons so that he's motivated to improve his skills by any means necessary in s3, same as how nynaeve needs to consistently fail so that she's motivated to break her block by any means necessary. basic cause and effect here, people! basic character progression! characters need to fail so that they can grow, and people who do not understand this have no business criticizing the storytellers who do understand it (not directing this at you here anon haha just at the annoying crew whining about rand and nynaeve Not Getting To Succeed At Anything).

"bUt EgWeNE-" egwene is not the same character as rand, and thus is not developing at the exact same rate as rand, and thus is allowed to have her victories whenever it suits HER progression, even if rand hasn't gotten his victories yet. egwene's victory came in 2x08 because s2 is when her biggest formative storyline of the early books occurs, whereas in s3/TSR she takes a step back while rand comes to greater prominence with HIS biggest formative storyline of the early books. and egwene sure as hell had her share of failures in s2 before getting her victory, just the same as rand even if he needs to cook a little longer before getting his own victories.

[rosieblogstuff]

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

44 😲 in my main AO3 account. 2 others in my older account = 46!

I didn't realize I had that many things!

2. What's your total AO3 word count?

270,883

3. What fandoms do you write for?

All 44 of those works in my main AO3 are MacGyver 2016. One is a crossover with The Rookie. The other two at Star Trek TOS and Star Wars fics.

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Table + Flashlight + IEDs

Mac + (Wilderness + Training + Survival) + Jack

Lost Causes

Lake + Stick + Fever

4 Times the LAPD Didn’t Pull Jack Over + 1 Time They Did 

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

I try to! I often respond to a chapter's comments when I post the next chapter of a longfic. And sometimes I just space on it and respond a year later when I notice I failed to respond.

6. What's the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Oh definitely my X-ray + Penny flashfic, Bad Penny. Most of the comments are variations on HOW DARE YOU!!!

There are a couple other flashfics with pretty ambiguous endings, too.

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

That's a hard one. Most of my fics have a happy or at least comforty ending. Maybe... uhh.... Electricity + Combustion ? which I literally labeled "whump with a fluffy ending". I also have two Jack Lives fics so that's always a happy situation at the end...

8. Do you get hate on fics?

I haven't. A few weird comments but I mostly scratch my head and ignore them. Anybody who hates on my fics will be getting a very long and nasty reply, followed by their comment being deleted.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

Nope, no smutty fanfics here. I did have a romance I posted for another fandom awhile back (and never finished), and I've written fade-to-black stuff in my orig fic novels.

10. Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written?

Just one! My Macgyver 2016+The Rookie cops-vs-spies crossover, in which some LAPD officers keep coming across a black GTO involved in shenangains around LA: 4 Times the LAPD Didn’t Pull Jack Over + 1 Time They Did

It's probably the funniest thing I've ever written, and the ending is one of my very favorites. Also possibly the only gen fic ever posted in The Rookie fandom, although I don't look over there much.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Yes. Somebody stole all my completed fics from FF.net last year. There was a big Tumblr post about some site full of stolen fics, and sure enough, there mine were. I asked to have them remove, got not reply. I haven't posted anything to FF.net since then.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Not that I'm aware of.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Yes, but not for a long time. I used to frequently co-write fics in my first fandom.

14. What's your all-time favourite ship?

I'm going to go with Washington State Ferry M/V Wenatchee. Who doesn't love a good ferry boat? It's an irconic style, fun if you're walking on, handy if you need to drive on, saves you hours of driving around Puget Sound by land. Also just a very nice-looking ship.

15. What's a WIP you want to finish, but doubt you ever will?

Ugh, wow. I have a couple dozen things I kinda like but might never finish. My favorite, and least likely because I've made the least progress on it, is a MacGyver fic about Patti having plotted out her revenge better, and tring to fuck over the team by having listed Jack as her replacement... which of course gives him access to high-level secrets like Oversight's identity. Much drama ensues.

16. What are your writing strengths?

Ramping a story up. Characters. Make a story fully story-shaped.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Endings. 😫

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic?

Hmmm I don't think I've ever needed to. Like most things in writing, I'm not against it in theory, but it can be done well or badly.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Anne McCaffrey's Pern, back in the paper fanzine days. Prior to joining AO3 in like 2019, I had 0 fanfics posted on the internet but a few in zines listed on Ebay. 😂

20. Favourite fic you've ever written?

This is IMPOSSIBLE to answer. I could answer it differently every day for the next couple weeks. Anything I already mentions plus a couple more!

[seth-shitposts]

"Next time they make a move, we'll be waiting for them to snuff out that spark before it catches fire."

-Kallus [s1e1]

-

"I never asked questions."

"Well maybe you should start. Or are you afraid of the answers you'll get?"

-Kallus & Zeb [s2e17]

-

"You have the heart of a rebel."

"I'll take that as a compliment."

-Thrawn & Kallus [s3e21]

-

"You disgust me, traitor."

"The day I betrayed your empire, Governor, is the day I finally stopped betraying myself."

-Pryce & Kallus [s4e15]

---

Alex: I'm dumping a theory essay / speculative thoughts here, and I am solely pulling from my memory which isn't always 100% accurate, but here's some of my thoughts on aspects of Alexsandr Kallus’s core character. (This is just what I think, of course, don't take it as facts. I'm literally just dumping words. And parts of this is strongly headcanon, as we dont have much canonically for his backstory.)

I believe that Kallus has always had "the heart of a rebel".

I believe that he's always had a strong sense of justice and values. Or maybe one that he built from scrap himself and with the resources available to him. (And, of course, just because one has a strong sense of justice, does not make that person automatically correct.)

He himself has said and believed [back before he searched for answers and became disillusioned from the empire] that the empire brought about justice and order to the galaxy. That's what he believed he had been supporting, it's what he was placing his loyalty into.

I feel that Kallus may have always had a twinge here or there, a feeling that something was off or a seed of doubt. But it was always just small and it would have been easier to push it aside and let himself believe that somethings cannot be helped, that sometimes the ends justify the means. This is what he would have been taught in his IBS training, given the nature of his job.

If Kallus was indeed from the lower levels, then he would have been witness to not only disorder and wrong doings on a daily basis, but also higher levels of violence as well. So when the empire did recruitments with promises of what would have allured the citizens of the lower levels to join the academy, it would have been in character for Kallus to have joined at the chance to bring change for the better to the galaxy, to places similar to where he came from.

And the contrast between the lower levels and the academy would have been a huge culture shock, one that would have taken some getting used to. So he probably started right off the bat with observing, trying to figure it out. And then there would be minor things here and there that he may have felt somewhere was off. Maybe he even questioned it, but would immediately shut the train of thought down if it were even implied that he was being disloyal or didn't have faith in the system.

And even of it felt wrong to him to do some of these things, that it was causing internal conflict, he would snuff out the doubt, extinguish the questions, because there was a goal that needed to be met. Even if he found something distasteful, he would ignore it until eventually he didn't feel that recoil anymore. Because he believed that the empire was right, that if he tried hard enough, he would accomplish what he had set out to do. And over time, he snuffed out that spark. And the fact that he had lost those who were close to him, all in one fell swoop on what was supposed to be just a routine mission probably made it easier to dedicate himself to a system that made promises of justice and order. So he probably really should stop questioning things, it would've been in his best interest.

Over the years, it would have been a slow progression of the Empire's tactics becoming more and more extreme, just enough small changes building up so that it would have seemed that increasing the iron grip was the best course of action. It produced the best results, the Empire would have become more powerful, and therefore allowed the empire to expand its reach even further and cover more ground. Stopping rebellions at the roots, ending a small spark before it has the chance to burn down a house. And maybe in this twisted perception, Kallus would have thought that the way to make sure another massacre like what happened on Lasan didn't happen again would've been to do this. To snuff our sparks before they become so big that the Empire's only response is to end the whole situation through brute force and overpowering numbers. There was most probably a part of Kallus that knew something about what had happened to Lasan was wrong, but he chose to override that and continue on the mission.

Despite how hard he had been throwing himself into walls to capture the ghost crew and to "finish what he started" there was still that something there, as it would have brought him to feel the need to say something about it to Zeb on the moon. About how it wasn't supposed to be a massacre, but he realized the empire wanted to make an example. Part of him would have had to of known that it was wring on some level, but he still chose to snuff out the doubt. Because the doubt would only lead to the need to ask questions and asking questions would only lead to being accused of disloyalty and doubt in the entire empire itself.

But then came the point in Legends of the Lasat when Kallus had to face the realization that no matter what he did, he wasn't going to catch the rebels, he wasn't going to catch the ghost crew. He had been chasing this group for well over a year at this point and every time they still managed to evade capture, to escape, to survive, to live. They will only ever remain out of reach, even when he throws caution to the wind. In that moment, something deep in him knows that it's not going to happen. It doesn't stop him from trying again, but there's that little seed that remains.

And then Zeb tells Kallus that maybe he should ask questions. Or is he afraid that he'll find the answers and not like the harsh truth? To have to face the fact that for nearly two decades he had been devoting himself to a system that has only been oppressing the galaxy, that he had been betraying his own morals and values for false promises.

Zeb saying that to Kallus would have dragged back every bit of doubt, every question buried alive. It re-lit a spark. So Kallus took the borrowed courage, because stars knows that he had been too much of a coward to do it himself up to this point, and chased down some answers. And those answers we his worst fears confirmed, that he had betrayed the fibers of his own being and committed terrible acts for lies. And rather than run or slip into despair, Kallus immediately took to following what he thinks is right. The best way to help others is to do what he can to help the rebellion.

And he doesn't change allegiances for anyone but himself. Because it's what he believes to be the right thing to do, and it is. Finally having forced himself to swallow his pride he looked to the whole truth for what it was. And even though he may not have liked what he saw, he still had to face it and do the next right thing.

And even though there was the pain and guilt of the fact that he had done what he did, there may have also been this sense of relief. While it was still suffocating to have learned the truth, there was a part of him that was finally allowed to breathe again. A part of him that came back full force.

[haloguyfttp]

Welp after giving at a try after at least 5 years, I have now re-quit HI3rd.

That's about it. I never mentioned it because I was never sure if I'd even continue and sure enough here I am. I started because of the HI3 X HSR thingy, and thought it was a good time to try it out again anyway. If you're curious why I dropped it, under the read more. Time to get all this out of my system.

To put it as shortly and simply as I can, the main issues for me were (and for the love of god this is all in my opinion. With how some more "hardcore" HI3 fans are I feel obligated to remind you of that right now at the top)

Lack of future direction. Nothing to build or farm that I can see, and while there's weapons and stigmatas I did not find how to get them besides gambling. Either way, the next point is why i didn't even bother looking.

Lack of content. Specifically, a lack of any reason to want to build anyone. Allow me to mention my favourite one, Star Rail's progression. In HSR I wanted to build characters to survive the increasing Equilibrium Level. After that, wanted to tackle Simulated Universe, then the endgame modes like MoC PF & the new Apocalyptic Shadow. Even after all that, I just wanna build characters because I want to use their unique kits and play around with them. Clear progression of targets. "I need ST DPS", "I need AoE", "I need Harmony". HI3rd just had trial characters for every story quest, and no real goal outside of spamming the Main Story. Sure there's other modes but the game never even tries to ease you into them, they're just... there. Besides that, there's nothing much to build. Every character you have is ancient so unless you skip straight to Pt 2 story there's no reason to build anyone except maybe the free Herrscher of the Void. Anyways next point.

Story didn't connect. I'm gonna get crucified for these last two points anyway, but to be brief, the only character I was interested in (especially in Ch 9) was Fu Hua. And upon starting the game you are greeted with "You can spend some money and get a Herrscher of Sentience", which you promptly find out is Fu Hua. On top of that the remaining Fu Huas are all mild variations of her basic form. Pretty obvious what happens. Kiana and the rest's story never connected with me, a lot of it just felt like I was missing a chapter between every... well chapter (eg. Bronya talks about Seele in a few parts despite Seele literally never appearing in the story until AFTER these reminiscing mentions are long forgotten). While WuWa suffered from too much exposition, HI3 did the opposite and threw every term and faction at you and never explained any of it. By Ch 9 with That Part, it just felt like anything fucking goes. Yes it was emotional, but on a greater view like... Who cares if a Herrscher is super OP if apparently someone in a really strong Battlesuit can take them out anyway. Why do I care about any stakes if the universe lies in the hands of macguffins. Gives me bad shonen vibes where there's like infinite power scaling.

And finally, the gameplay was mid. Ch 10 - 12 was just... so incredibly slow because the combat was just spamming left click until it finally ended. Punishing Gray Raven was way more fun.

These last 2 in particular suck, because HI3rd fans have been universally praising how good their story and combat is (and often trying to dunk on the other games simultaneously), but really HI3rd had combat only mildly more complex than Genshin, while HSR provides far more interesting teambuilding and progression. ZZZ is far closer to the difficulty I expected from HI3rd. And this is obviously personal preference but I much prefer HSR's story over all the others.

Maybe my expectations were too high thanks to how much the HI3rd loyalists praised it to the moon. But that's that. I tried to stick around but I just... don't have any reason to. The only character I like has no other versions, and out of everyone combat wise I only like Dreamweaver cause her Ult is extremely cool to me.

HI3rd does have 1 advantage, which is it has the flashiest in-game animations of all the Hoyos. But that's the only thing I concede. Anyways that's my ramble over. Sorry HI3rd fans, it just didn't hit right.

I should mention I did not play Part 2. I want to do shit chronologically, but even if Pt 2 is super good, having to skip almost 40 chapters from the 1st chunk "to get to the good part" doesn't exactly sound like a good pitch.

[deewithani]

Minor spoilers (not from the current episode, btw), quick thoughts post about 'The Acolyte' overall.

Note: I had more real-life drama stuff to deal with yesterday and I haven't seen the finale, but I've seen the spoilers so I know what happened.

Also note: This is not a post to bash it. I didn't hate the show, but there were definitely some problems that brought it down.

The major problem was the runtime and amount of episodes. The ideas are there, but everything was so rushed that no one got any real chance at being fleshed out as real people. Characters seemed to make decisions that would have made more sense with more background time for those characters, but with the short episodes they felt more "well, that was unexpected" instead of a natural progression.

I'm going to refrain from speaking on specific actors' performances. I definitely thought some were better than others, but I only have surface level knowledge about the past performances of the main cast. I don't know if my opinion would be expected on past performance, or if the issue is with the show itself, and if so, what specifically caused the issue.

Another issue for me was the writing. I think they leaned in too hard with the callbacks at times. I didn't like the scene on Khofar where Mae and Osha speak together. It felt very forced for them to conveniently go to that clearing, like they were literally picked up and placed there instead of walking there. This is another place where just a few more seconds of screen time may have made a difference. Plus, the callback to Anakin and Obi-Wan was a bit too much here. That was an important scene for those characters, and instead of it being a scene that should have stood on its own it felt like it was hitched to a much stronger scene to make it stronger instead of simply being written to be a strong, emotional scene.

Back to the runtime, the show suffered again by not being released at one time, in my opinion. Episodes were simply too short for the storytelling method that was chosen for the series. It needed to all be bingeable. I enjoyed the episodes, and I waited each week for the episodes, but the only two episodes that made me go "I can't wait for next week" were 'Day' and 'Night'.

All that said, I love Star Wars, and I liked the show. I hope we get a season 2, or a book, or something that continues to fill in the space between 'The Acolyte' and TPM. If we get a season 2 I hope they look at some of the weak areas from season 1 so they can see where improvements can be made.

[enbyleighlines]

Leigh plays Tellius prt 15

It's the final chapter! I had Ike give his speech, because I love it, even if he's clearly uncomfortable giving it. I literally muttered, "you're doing great, sweetie" at this moment.

What a wild time for Ashnard to confess this. I'm surprised Bryce wasn't more upset by this, honestly, considering he was a loyal retainer to the last king for fifteen years. But I suppose it's possible that his loyalty was more for the post, rather than the man himself.

We never do learn much about the previous King of Daein. This amazing post theorizes that Ashnard was perhaps an illegitimate son of the king, which is why he was never mentioned in any talk of succession prior to the "plague" that killed off the rest of the royal family. I really like this theory, because it explains why Ashnard was so obsessed with strength over bloodlines.

I put Soren up against a dragon laguz, and he completely decimated it through a combination of crits and adepts. Then I felt really terrible afterwards, considering that Soren might have indirectly been the cause of him becoming feral, since it's possible that this was one of the dragon laguz that traveled with Rajaion to rescue Almedha and infant Soren.

As expected, Soren capped his magic before even reaching level 20, so I didn't have to use a spirit dust on him. Fantastic job, Soren!

Ilyana reached level 20 not too long afterwards. However, she was unable to cap magic and speed on her own, so I used both a spirit dust and a speedwing for her. Hopefully this makes part 1 of Radiant Dawn just a teensy tiny bit easier.

Unfortunately, Soren and Ilyana were the only two units I was able to get to level 20. I severely overestimated how much exp was available on this map. Even more frustrating, I got Jill all the way to level 19, but then I ran out of enemies to pit her against.

I very nearly got Mist to level 20, too, through using a physics staff to heal Ike. Unfortunately, I forgot to unequip Ike's ragnell and he defeated Ashnard with aether before I could get Mist all the way to level 20.

I unironically love Ashnard's dying words. There's no disappointment, no anger. He's just so happy to meet someone who proves to be a formidable opponent. I suppose he was getting bored. I suppose it makes war less thrilling when you wear invincible armor.

This reveal is sooooooo gooooooooood. I love Ena and Rajaion.

A closer pic of them because man they are too cute.

I wish Rajaion had survived. Unfortunately, they didn't make it very clear that he died, so when I first played this game, I thought he had survived until I played the sequel.

I love this image! So many cute and unique laguz designs.

Ike and Elincia's friendship is so good, so pure.

A moment of silence for my least used characters. Rhys, Volke, and Brom, you are great characters, but I didn't need you, I'm sorry. Sothe, I will see you in the next game.

And that's it! The end progressed too quickly for me to take too many screenshots, but I did record who my top 5 units were:

Jill came in at 5th. No surprise there. I worked really hard, trying to get her to level 20. It's a shame I never did.

Soren was 4th. I'm a little sad he didn't rank higher, but I suppose it makes sense. Once he classed up into a sage, I mainly used him as a healer, since he was such a higher level than everyone else.

Rolf was 3rd. I'm also sad I didn't get him to level 20. He would have been so buffed with those transfer bonuses. Oh, well.

Ilyana was 2nd. Again unsurprising. She lagged behind for a while, but I managed to get her to level 20 with 4 capped stats, so all the extra effort paid off.

And of course Ike was in 1st place.

And that was Path of Radiance! I'm going to take a break to work on my Big Bang fic, but I am excited to get into Radiant Dawn. I wish I had gotten more characters to level 20. So far, I have Ike, Ilyana, Soren, and Ranulf all at level 20. Ike has capped 5 stats, Ilyana and Soren 4, and Ranulf only the 1. Perhaps I should have played on hard, so there would have been more reinforcements. Additionally, I could have farmed several bosses for extra exp.

Oh, well. Overall, I did manage to achieve all 5 of my goals. No one died, Ike and Soren are at an A rank, Ike and Ranulf at a B rank, Soren and Ilyana capped speed, and Ranulf capped strength.

Next time: we meet the Dawn Brigade!

[curestardust]

Dust Watched: Jujutsu Kaisen Season 2

Genres: Shounen, Action TW: body horror // 23 episodes // S01 (x) M01 (x)

GodDAMN!

✧  story  ✧

Season 1 of Jujutsu Kaisen starts out with about 5 episodes covering the "Hidden Inventory" arc which is a flashback to Gojou and Getou's time as students and the events that lead to them being who they are in the present. While this arc is loosely connected with the rest of the show, it sets a tone for the rest of the season. As opposed to Season 1 which played around mostly with the hallmarks of Shounens that are more comedy and combat centric with low-stakes due to it being the introduction to the series, this season goes absolute balls to the wall from the get-go.

Both "Hidden Inventory" and the following "Shibuya Incident" arc, which the rest of the season covers are grim, brutal, bloody, and unforgiving. Plot armour? Forget it. This is an outright war. People die and the next second we're already back to fighting because otherwise, they're next.

I'll honestly say, that no anime had me literally on the edge of my seat almost every episode in a LONG time. 90% of this entire season are high intensity fights with high-stakes. Although, exhaustion does seep in near the end of the anime. We spend a tad bit too much time with the same characters fighting the same enemy in the same (bland) location. But aside from that, and a very few slightly weaker episodes, this season was absolutely top notch.

✧  characters  ✧

I don't have much to say here as everyone is an established character. Character progression and introspection does happen to a few characters but I don't want to name names cause even that could be a spoiler.

✧  art  ✧

I think we all know about the unfortunate conditions that were revealed to be happening at MAPPA. It was noticable in some episodes but especially the last few that aired after the news came out. However, any quality drop is the fault of the higher-ups and NOT the animators. The stuff the team put out with JJKS02 is absolutely phenomenal. The OPs themselves will probably go down as some of the best in the 2000s. Throughout the anime itself, the use of colours was gorgeous and the amount of insane fight scenes is mindboggling. Honestly just... I've no words.

✧  sound ✧

Besides the obvious bangers for the OP/EDs and the OST, I really want to shout out the sfx team. That scene where the sound of the shower slowly morphs into the sound of clapping literally gave me goosebumps (because I suffer from a mild form of psychosis and this is LITERALLY what it's like and I've never seen it shown this accurately.)

I didn't know where to put this but I also absolutely need to mention the way they set up the atmosphere. Some scenes were near psychological horror levels of suspenseful. I loooooved it.

✧  overview ✧

Season 2 of JJK had a great start, an insane middle, and very slight decline in the end. If the final fight with a certain someone was cut short by maybe 1-2 episodes, I think the pacing would've been much better. Still, what a ride this was, and the set-up for S03 is looking insane already. (Just treat your staff as damn human beings MAPPA, jesus christ.)

My Rating: 9.5/10

[medicinemane]

Just had the most absolutely dog shit experience ever in lotro

Like I've progressed passed being mad to just being tired because... I mean this is unacceptably bad design combined with a mission breaking bug, and they'll never give a shit so... who cares

Was playing with my dad, was running a new character of his through and area that had only recently come out so I needed the achievements for my max level character. Some I'm doing this mission at level 30 while I'm 140, so I run it as a 6 man instance for more xp for the character I'm helping

Everything gets vaporized up to the final boss (as it should be)

The final boss melts me, cause it turns out he gets a power that removes 10% of your health everytime you hit him (and gives him 99% resistance to all damage). That's strike one, should never be a percentage, a max level character shouldn't be able to be killed by something 110 levels below them... seriously, like I've soloed old raids, and like... that's how it should be

So the way to beat him is you have to remove 10 levels of the effect, with a power that has either a 15 or 30 second cool down for me. Then... he reapplies it to himself, so I have to take another 10 levels off. After that he doesn't matter, but he made me so pissed with how unbeatable he is for a nobody, and then it's a slog

Well, here's problem two. We were only doing this cause it's involved in a questline. I completed my quest, by because lotro constantly forgets it's an mmo, my dad didn't get to talk to the person cause they walked off

Always good in your mmo when being in a group can me you can't complete your quest because someone else in the group did it

Anyway, I say fine. We do it again, this time as a 2 man cause I'm not spending another like 10 minutes kiting him around... well this time he just sat at 1 hp forever without going into his next phase, like for literal minutes

So all and all it's just a badly designed piece of shit mission, that on top of that is a buggy shitty mess

I'm serious that it had me sitting there thinking maybe I should just quit playing lotro, just if this is how bad at making games they are at this point that they think this is acceptable to put out and don't see what they've messed up with. Like do I want to deal with that from people who will never ever listen to feedback?

Like I'm probably not gonna quit, but you know you did good when that's what's on your player's mind as they quit for the night

Whoever made this should be fired. I'm not even saying that with malice, but I'm serious. They should get a job in something that doesn't require decision making or planning. Get em a good job on an assembly line or something, but they shouldn't be doing anything where they have to think, because they're clearly very very bad at thinking anything through

(I legit wonder if they ever even really test anything these days, with like how much pets get caught on pathing issues in places like that)

[nicanario]

this post is a product of its time

tw: discussion of racism, homophobia, misogyny and a short mention of sexual abuse.

ok, this is basically gonna be a very long rambling post about my not fully developed thoughts on the justification many people give to bigotry when talking about the past: "it was a product of its time"

it would be fair to say, with me being a raging SJW socialist scumbag, that I don't think this is a very good argument and is most of the time actually an excuse to not think about the problems inherent to our society, historical or not, and, by extension, the problems with ourselves. but I do think that sometimes, just sometimes, this can be a valid point, or at least one that raises some interesting questions.

I'm going to cite examples from several pieces of media, but fear not, I'll try to make this as accesible as I can.

so, let's take Star Trek: The Original Series (TOS) as our first case study. this show has, correctly, been called progressive by everyone except for clueless people who don't know much about Star Trek's history, Star Trek's crew, Star Trek's cast, or, frankly, Star Trek. because if you ignore the clear, sometimes in-your-face political history and present of the franchise, I don't think you know much about it at all. I do think you can call yourself a fan if you like it, you may have watched every single episode for all I know. but lots of mental gymnastics are needed to ignore the political progressiveness Star Trek has had since its very beginning.

episodes like Let That Be Your Last Battlefield are obviously anti-racist, at least in their intention. but the episode in question really is "a product of its time," and at the very end fails to uphold its ideals. the episode ends with the two aliens (who are LITERALLY. BLACK ON ONE SIDE. AND WHITE ON THE OTHER. BUT IN THE OPPOSITE SIDES.) fighting each other on their devastated planet, and the crew is like, "oh yeah if they both would give up on their hatred that they both share both of them equally" when it has been firmly established that one is the oppressor and the other one is the oppressed.

and that's a lot of Star Trek, not just TOS. even Discovery, one of the most recent series, has done Bury Your Gays (and Trans) TWICE (though both times literally rectified it, which is cool). there are episodes of the franchise that are overtly racist, or misogynistic, etc. TOS is lauded, mostly justifiably, as very progressive, especially for the standards of the time. they put a woman of colour as one of the senior staff, for fuck's sake. of course, when you analyse that same character, as with most of their intentions at being progressive, you'll see that she was relegated and sometimes even outright mistreated when she had the potential to be much more. but, at that time, it was a lot.

I had a friend (emphasis on "had") who, after I told him about TOS's both progressiveness and constant misogyny, told me something like "imagine feminists trying to complain about a show from the 60s." so, with unearned spite, he was, in some way, trying to make the argument that it was a product of its time.

you could say Star Trek, all of Star Trek, is "a product of its time" in the sense that it's not always perfect. uh, yes, I would agree. but that doesn't mean people have to accept it. well, I mean, the show is kinda over, you have to accept it's that way. but you don't have to accept that it's not wrong just because it was a product of its time.

H. P. Lovecraft, as another example, was a greatly influential writer whose works still shape a lot of people's ideas to this day. I have only ever read like one of his stories, so don't expect me to have an opinion on his works. but I can have an opinion on what I know about him as a person (he did have a life outside his writing, after all). and, yeah, he was a huge asshole. if you want to know more in depth about the subject, please watch Hbomberguy's video on him: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l8u8wZ0WvxI

but basically, he was incredibly racist & homophobic. some people might even say, "he was a product of his time." well, there are two possible rebuttals to that. the surface level one, and the one that examines why that argument is wrong to the core.

The Surface Level Response to "it was a product of its time": um, no it wasn't. Lovecraft was more racist than a lot of people even in his time. he wasn't just a guy who carried the racist beliefs of his society like everyone else, he was a reactionary who actively thought and discussed how racist he was, and how right he was for being that way. but that's only applicable to Lovecraft. one can't argue the same for Star Trek: TOS, because TOS did try to be more progressive and more anti-racist than the rest of its society. that leads us to the next response.

The Response that Actually Deals with the Fact that No Matter How Progressive You're Trying to Be, Your Failings Can Still be Criticized: the thing is, trying to excuse Lovecraft's or Star Trek's bigotry because they were "products of their times" misses the fact that racism is still wrong, and some people knew that in those times as well. people from these times weren't all naive or stupid or whatever. they had the capacity for rational thinking. they could stop and think, "hey, maybe what we're doing is wrong." and the fact is, some people did. not perfectly, not to our standars, but they did. everyone could have stopped and think. but most of them didn't, and we can criticize them for it. racism, homophobia, sexism, etc. HURT PEOPLE. horribly. massively.

also, even if you agree with the "it's a product of its time" argument, some people aren't criticising people's or work's bigotry: they're explaining why they don't want to experience it.

The Talons of Weng-Chiang is a 1977 Doctor Who serial, and it's one of the show's more racist stories. almost all the villains are Chinese, every single Chinese person is a villain. there's yellowface, slurs, stereotypes, the Doctor speaking nonsense words instead of actual Chinese, and a general belittling of Chinese culture.

note that I'm neither Chinese nor of Chinese descent. I have been searching for hours for a few posts I've read a while ago (some by people who are of Asian descent) about this episode and I can't find them. sorry.

suffice it to say, even though I love Jago & Litefoot (the audio series and the characters), it's not an acceptable episode at all. but it's also important to remark that, because of it, some people aren't going to want to watch it. sometimes, people aren't saying "the episode shouldn't be this way," which causes others to answer that it was "a product of its time." sometimes, people are just saying, "this is an episode that attacks real people. I don't want to see it. I don't care if it was common in that era to be racist, i don't want to experience it."

however, there is an interesting point to the "it's a product of its time" argument. after all, everything is influenced by its society, for better or worse. and we can't change it anymore. TOS sometimes didn't quite understand the political themes it wanted to explore. Lovecraft was a horrible bigot. Talons was racist towards Chinese folks. and that's that. I don't think we should change the episodes/stories or anything. edit them in any way. that would be, in a sense, changing history. and we wouldn't learn anything from it, about how we can do better.

I think there are two solutions to this:

1. warnings before starting the text: this was done with The Talons of Weng-Chiang. on Britbox, where you can watch Classic Who, this serial has a content warning before the start. that's good.

2. the removal as a whole of the text from some places: I think before applying this one, there should be a lot of thought put into each case. I don't think removing a whole serial of Doctor Who or Lovecraft's stories from anything would be, well, fair. especially on tv episodes a lot more people worked on those, not just the writers and the directors. Lovecraft's writing influenced thousands. we shouldn't erase them or anything. but sometimes, for some cases, we should.

those in the US might seen a Confederate statue being taken down. that is, in a way, a form of removal of a piece of history.

but that is a good removal. statues glorify. one sees a statue and probably thinks "this was a person worthy of admiration." they should be taken down, maybe even with a permanent mark of why this was done (a plaque that reads "a statue of X was here, but he didn't deserve it because of Y" could be put in place of the statues, for example).

another example is the removal from DVDs of the short episode A Fix with Sontarans, a Sixth Doctor minisode that featured Jimmy Savile, a presenter who was later found out to be sexually abusing children.

the removal of that minisode is good, actually. it's not a full episode (it's not even Doctor Who). some might say that's "erasing history" but, like, you can still find it online or information about it if you want. this minisode deserves removal from DVDs and Blu-Rays and whatever more than content warnings. it's not an important part of the show and it prominently features a horrible person who did horrible things during that time.

so, after all that, I have explained why I don't like the "it's a product of its time" argument. it is an interesting point that deserves to be examined, but it's not very good.

I have had this in Drafts for so long I've probably forgot some of the points I was going to make, but eh, what can you do? hope you enjoyed reading this.

bye

[claymotif]

spare wip essay pls??? i would LOVE to hear more about sasha + co and also relatedly what the tsh casts various perspectives on fate + free will are

YES oh my god thank u for asking <3 sorry it took me so long to answer again <3

first up the main trio's thoughts on fate/free will (more or less):

delwyn literally does not believe in fate. "he's the chosen one" yeah whatever. he understands in theory how prophets' magic and divination witchcraft works, but as far as he's concerned those magics show a very rough draft of the future which can be influenced and changed by any number of ppl and decisions a la the butterfly effect

for obvious reasons he starts to question this as the story progresses and they keep getting closer to the apocalypse despite their efforts to stop it. for him this presents as a lot of "maybe we're just making the wrong choices" (which. not a great feeling) but it eventually culminates in him accepting and embracing his foretold destiny

chan is a little more complex. he knows on an instinctual level that his visions are. like. the most probable set of events based on the choices that everyone's currently making/most likely to make. it's not necessarily set in stone, and chan's changed the outcome of his visions before, but he's never in his life had a vision about an event on such a large scale. usually his visions are like "you get an F on the next math exam" and he says oh shit and actually studies therefore changes the story and doesn't get an F. for an apocalypse-scale vision he's not even sure how that would work. how many ppl's choices would he have to change? how far in advance are the key choices made, if there are any at all? he's literally never done this before but he has to try!! he would never forgive himself if he had the ability to stop it and didn't

junhee is. to put it lightly. completely unhinged. he doesn't really believe in fate so much as he believes in magic. and, like, he can see magic. so magic is, according to him, sort of akin to a distant god. it's this all-powerful force that could completely sap humanity of its free will, but most of the time it doesn't care to. by and large, daily human lives go on unremarked and unimportant. but if the magic wants* something, all it has to do is pull, and humans are powerless to resist it.

( "want" is a very human feeling and magic as a force is very much not human, but we're approximating here )

tl;dr junhee believes in free will given to humanity by merit of an apathetic guardian. sort of. he doesn't really think magic is a guardian to humanity, because of, like, all the fucked up visions and stuff. but whatever.

this also leads to an interesting dynamic between the three of them b/c chan is digging in his heels, kicking and screaming and fighting the whole way down whereas junhee has accepted that all of this is inevitable. they fight a lot and delwyn is like "guys PLEASE i am trying not to cause an apocalypse over here"

on to sasha and co.:

except im actually starting w/kei first because i think that's simpler. kei is a divination witch, and as i mentioned before that means her magic is less precise than chan's. it's sort of the difference between chan seeing "a hurricane is coming" and kei seeing "a natural disaster is coming" or, worse, "something terrible is coming". a lot of the time it gets her the info she needs, but it's not an exact science. because of the imperfections of her system, she's never seen a prediction followed by an event that she couldn't rationalize as having been predicted, which means she is a firm believer in fate and has had several existential crises over the concept of free will. seriously don't mention it to her she'll start crying again

(aside from her weird obsession with divination magic in particular, kei is actually like a completely normal person. like she has friends and a social life and interests besides her magic and studies. it's weird)

sasha is a they/them from southern cali who is like insanely good at blood witchcraft. they spend like 50% of their time volunteering at hospitals and free health clinics and blood drives and such, but they can also put their magic to more sinister uses (including tracking rituals which they use multiple times to find delwyn's crew). sasha has Seen Some Shit, and that includes watching ppl make bad decisions that had some pretty dire consequences. thus they fully believe that delwyn will cause the apocalypse (although to start with kei's divinations aren't that precise) even if it's by accident, even if maybe he's the kind of person who would never normally cause an apocalypse. it's sort of like. good people make bad choices sometimes. that sort of philosophy.

hana is one of sasha's dearest friends; she doesn't actually have any magic of her own, which is part of the reason she ended up in socal despite originally hailing from georgia; when they realized she wasn't born a mage/seer, her parents tried to encourage her to study witchcraft in one form or another. she refused, cut all contact w/them the second she turned 18, and skipped town the moment she graduated and she got herself a nice degree in cs/ux design. she hasn't seen or heard from her family in 6 years lol

anyway she does not believe in fate (she hates the idea that some grand plan for the universe could be okay with individuals suffering so greatly for it) but she tags along anyway when sasha announces their plan to find the source of kei's divinations. the only reason she's okay with it at all is b/c sasha literally lies to her about their intentions lmao.

everything comes to a head when sasha reveals their plan to like actually kill delwyn around the same time that they. u know. find him. and hana learns that one of delwyn's "world-ending psycho friends" is her baby brother (chan), for whom she harbors incredibly complex eldest-daughter-trauma type feelings.

so the three of them are like. "sasha and co." they're the three who are in on the plan (insofar as sasha feels like letting on to them) and the ones traveling across the country for sasha.

so YES this has been "tsh cast's thoughts on fate" as well as a (relatively) quick and dirty intro to sasha and their friends!! thank u again for asking i love you <3

[thatonegirljessy99]

Loving Myself and You (pt.1)

Work Count: 1,600+

Warnings: none

Summery: Tsukishima and Y/N have been something for a little while how. What were they exactly, definitely more then friends, but not even close to being together. You finally have had it with whatever this is and decide it is time to move on and put yourself first. So with Tsukishima out of the way, how will you progress with the friendships you never really got to form?

A/N: It is 4 in the bloody morning, and yes this is exactly when I got the idea to start a series. Have mercy on me cause I haven't written in a hot minute and I should definitely be asleep by now 😅

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“You guys have been doing great in the tournament!”

“Yeah, the team is actually doing really good for once! Hinata looks like he never seems to run out of energy!”

There were a few laughs and giggles coming from around the corner. It has been happening for the team from time to time now. Other students were starting to realize that the Crows were starting to fly once more. The volleyball club was no longer just some random sports club at Karasuno and it was amazing!

Kinda.

You laughed a little thinking it could be Daichi getting noticed by the underclass girls again. Last time it caught him off guard as he was coming back from the restroom when a group of girls came up to him in aw.

“Yeah, I’m glad he is on our team because it would be a pain to try and block him,” you heard a voice laugh making your stomach drop.

All you could do was keep your head down as you walked by Tsukishima, not wanting to make eye contact. It isn’t like you could do anything even if you were jealous. What you two had was a secret, unknown to the world or anyone at the school. These days you also didn’t know exactly what you and Tsukishima had to begin with.

You were so caught up in your own thoughts that you didn’t even hear when the group dispersed, only snapping out of your thoughts when you felt someone pull you into an empty classroom causing you to sigh as you fixed your blazer. You didn’t have to look at Tsukishima to know it was him.

“Can I help you, Tsukishima?” you said glancing up at him before turning to face him.

“You haven’t talked to me recently. I tried talking to you when we came back from out last game-”

“At training camp, I know. I’ve been busy. School and stuff,” you rolled your eyes a little before looking up at the tall blonde,"I see that you've been busy too. I shouldn't keep Karasuno's great blocker for too long."

"Y/N, come on. You really believe I care for any of the fan stuff," Tsukishima smirked moving closer to hold you hand but you took a step back while crossing your arms.

"It doesn't matter what I think. I don't have time for this right now. I have to get to class and finish my work if I want to make it to dance on time after school. My recital went fine by the way," you huffed before opening the door to the class room and walking out as if nothing had happened.

 In all truth, it really annoyed you the fact that he hadn't even bothered to text you good luck while away at the training camp. Volleyball was everything to him even when he said he didn't care for the game. And it was nice to see him actually getting into it finally but it was a bitter feeling since you were the only one getting excited about things.

He's such an idiot… all he's good at is blocking. Volleyballs, people….

You couldn't stop thinking about how Tsukishima seemed to be getting more attention. Not as much as the upper class men but enough to light a fire in your soul. There is really no way of knowing how you were even able to get anything done at school as you avoided Tsukishima for the rest of the day until it was time for you to go to dance. You went quickly into the girls bathroom to change into your leotard, putting on your gym sweatpants and a hoodie on top before starting your jog three blocks down the street.

Once you were practicing however, all you could focus on was the music. Even though you had just finished your recitals, your school was holding their next show in two months. Your role, Princess Aurora in Sleeping Beauty. You had already been practicing your part for a little over a month so the moves came easily to you, your movements flowing swiftly as you practiced Aurora's Act I variation. It was a relief to be able to just rely on things that were set in stone, your feet moving on there own at this point from the hours you spent practicing.

"Don't have your arms so tensed Y/N, remember to keep them light throughout the performance," your teacher called out to you midway though your practice, only earning a smile from you as acknowledgement.

"Watch that transition into the chaînés!"

Miss Nakamura, one of the best ballet instructors you could find in Miyagi. She had known you since you were 3 and your mom put you into ballet. Her love for dance led her to stay single for her whole life, saying she never needed a partner to feel happy when she had her children to teach everyday. She truly looked out for her students and thought of each of them as her own kid from how long they were under her care. She was now in her mid sixties, still with all the energy of a thirty something. Her hair having turned white in her late forties, she wore it down with a beautiful gold hair clip holding it back during class.

"You have improved a lot since we last practiced this in class. I'm glad to see all of you have been practicing the Sleeping Beauty pieces even with your recitals keeping you busy. I want to see the fairy variations next and I want you all to be going over act one while I focus on this group. As per usual, the studio across the hall is open and I expect all of you to practice. Tomorrow we start working on act I."

*****

After practice all you could feel was sore, the warm night only making you wish you could rest in the grass before making it home. But as you got closer to your home you saw a familiar shadow standing under the streetlight waiting for you. The closer you got the clearer Tsukishima's features got. He looked irritated, probably due to the fact you had shut off your phone for most of the day to avoid contact.

"Y/N."

"Tsukishima."

"We need to talk," he spoke in a cool tone, letting you know that no wasn't an answer right now.

"Tsukishima, I am tired. I just got out of a four hour practice and just want to get home, take a hot shower, and eat some soba my mom made," you sighed adjusting your dance bag while keeping eye contact with the tall man child," plus I have nothing to talk to you about."

"Really? Cause I think you do. What was this morning about in the hall?" He questioned starting to let his temper show in his voice as he adjusted his glasses.

"What is literally anything about?!" You snapped at him," you say you care for me and are sweet to me when it is just the two of us but literally the second a bird flies into our immediate area you turn into all this!"

As you gestured at him you dropped your dance and school bag before taking a step closer to him, your high difference meaning nothing to you since your attitude made up for it. You had been holding back since this thing started a few months back but now your damn was finally breaking.

"I talk to another guy and they get daggers glared at them. Some girls compliment you and it goes straight into your ego! I can't even hang out with any of YOUR teammates because you don't want them to know about us! But, I mean, is there even an us?! What are we?! You kiss me goodnight and then you act like I don't exist in school or anywhere that isnt under this stupid light post!"

What happened next only put the final nail in the coffin as you watched Tsukishima scoff and smirk at your remarks as if they were a child's complaint. He leaned down to get to eye level with you before speaking, watching as your eyes never left his for a second.

"You knew I didn't do commitments since we were kids. You and I were never anything serious. You wanted affection and I provided it while getting some myself," he explained in the most matter of fact tone ever, almost as if he expected you to simply accept that answer and just continue with things as they were," my studies and myself are my first priority. And if I glare at some guys trying to talk to you it's because I know they aren't convenient for you."

"Yeah, well guess what. You don't get to decide what is convenient for me. And from now on I will make myself my priority as well as my happiness," your voice seethed with anger, catching Tsukishima off guard as you had never talked like this to him before.

Normally you two would fight, you would give in and apologize, and then Tsukishima would buy you food to make you happy. This however, was not how this conversation seemed to be going. You ran your fingers through your hair before smirking and picking up your bags without looking at him.

"This, whatever it is, is over. Interfere with my life and you will regret it Kei. I don't need your affection, and I don't need you. From here on out, I will talk to whomever I want, regardless of what you want," you spoke in a confident voice as you stood up straight before walking past him, only stopping for a second before walking by him,"let's see if this shows you how your priorities are what make you so miserable in life."

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Part 2

A/N: Oh look at that, a part 2! Maybe you should click on it.... just maybe...