#content warning just about everything

[gingermintpepper]

Day 4: Aristaeus

Interpretation notes and trivia below the cut!!

All rise for the entrance of my president !! Honestly, of all the figures and characters that were up for debate when I first started thinking about this story and who I wanted leading the charge Aristaeus was not one of them. Originally, I'd always known that Asclepius and Orpheus would be worked in somehow - they've always been favourites of mine in terms of children of Apollo (even if Orpheus as the child of Apollo and Calliope is less popular classically) and I expected my pick for the third child of Apollo to be involved to be similarly mortal like Iamus or Tenes but the more I looked into Aristaeus the more I fell in love with him! Ultimately, he's meant to be both a foil and a reflection of his father - a boy who grows up thinking his father's footsteps would always be warm only to realise that following in them would lead to death and destruction. While his status as a rustic and hunting god is still important here, Aristaeus' interpretation is much more focused on his connection to the Etesian wind and his quelling of the dog star Sirius which is why his hair in particular is so long and spiralling. All in all, more than any other figure I've chosen to interpret and represent in my work Aristaeus is the god I hope more people get interested in and research! I think there are a lot of important stories in his various myths and travels and I definitely want more people to discover and fall in love with them as I have!

Some fun trivia:

Apollo's firstborn son. Because he was born mortal on account of his very mortal mother, Apollo immediately took him to Olympus to eat ambrosia to begin his transition into divinity. Apollo would continue to feed Aristaeus small amounts of ambrosia and nectar for the next ten years until the child fully shed his mortal skin and was reborn as a god.

Due to the nature of making mortals deathless (namely the fun part of the process where they are completely remade and lose their mortal memories) Aristaeus spent most of his early life with his mother and siblings where they all pitched in to reteach him his family, his hobbies, his favourite things and ultimately how to live and love. Aristaeus was very attached to his maternal family because of this and his early acts of ingenuity were mostly born from his wish to make things easier for his family.

Aristaeus is the only one of his children Apollo hand raised full time. In those days, Aristaeus adored his father and believed him completely upright and blameless, the true face of a benevolent deity and the kind of man he aimed to be when he was full grown.

They would later have many bitter arguments and conflicts, the first and perhaps most impactful of all being their disagreement over Actaeon, Aristaeus' firstborn son. He wanted Apollo to teach him stating that it was a normal thing for a grandfather to do but Apollo vehemently refused to have any part of Actaeon's rearing, stating that he was not his child and that it was highly inappropriate for him to educate another god's son. When Actaeon later dies, Aristaeus blames a not insignificant part of that on Apollo - something that only worsens when he learns that it was Artemis who cursed the boy and that Apollo was always aware Actaeon would die young.

Spends most of his time travelling from place to place. Doesn't really like Olympus and prefers to spend his time minding animals or tending to fields. Is on wonderful terms with Demeter and Persephone and often makes decadent exchanges of olive oil and preserved meat for exotic flowers and fruit for his bees.

Big fan of wind and percussive instruments. Never liked the kithara because of how finicky it is and far prefers the hand drums and reed flutes of his mother's country. Exceptional dancer.

Will sell prized cattle for high quality and highly unique jewellry. Doesn't much care for gemstones but is an absolute gold fiend and has a massive collection of bracelets, anklets, nose and lip adornments and rings. Has never been north enough to hit India but got a ton of rare and different adornments from his Phoenician in-laws when he was married to Autonoë.

Hates dogs but doesn't mind wolves. Not a big horse fan either

Unlike other winds, he cannot transform into various animal forms. He's close enough to the Anemoi that he keeps up with the gossip but he's only really friends with Notos. Gets along poorly with Zephyrus whose preference for pretty youths has often led to them getting into physical altercations when they were younger. Aristaeus still holds a bit of a grudge about it.

Has a big stupid crush on Dionysus which is embarrassing because Dionysus also put him out of a job. Due to Dionysus' relative youth, he feels a bit conflicted about such feelings - mostly because Dionysus is on extremely good terms with Apollo and Aristaeus doesn't want him to get burned.

Despite kinda despising his father, Aristaeus is a pretty decent eldest brother and regularly keeps in contact with a lot of his siblings. He often delivers mead, flavoured honey and olive oil and uses it as an excuse to chat and catch up. Currently in a bit of a tiff with Asclepius because he's worried about him and his family.

Favourite colour is the rich gold of purified honey, favourite food is lokma and his favourite time of year is winter.

[erosology]

y’all expecting us to spoon-feed you content but not bothering to interact with us on a human-level is a big reason why your faves don’t hang out here anymore just sayin

[tauforged]

Just 10 hours later I have finished the new war. Dawg what the fuck is going on. Holy shit. What the fuck.

YEAH. YEAH. i am so sorry it took so long but also YEAH THATS BASICALLY IT. welcome to warframe under the new creative lead!!!

[poppyseed799]

btw I don’t know if this is a thing anyone is thinking about but I’m not gonna stop drawing Jimmy as a canary. It’s a lovely bird. It’s still something that’s been really important to his series. There’s no reason to drop the canary headcanon just cuz Lizzie fell into the void.

[wlwvampirism]

You ever just see someone have a take so bad that’s born out of the inability to be compassionate for others?

[alltimefail-sims]

Getting online when T Sw**t does literally anything...

Every tag. Every fandom. Fanfic titles. Retconned characters (this character is a sw***ie, this character is this song coded, this ship is so that song coded and so on). Fan Edits out the ass. Audio clips, lyric quotes, hot takes on Twitter/Instagram/Tumblr/YouTube/TikTok. A cruel, unending slew of exposure you did not ask for lmfao

[avaantares]

(yet another) rant: Please stop with the frivolous Trigger Warnings

(Note: If you want to skip the recipe blog intro and get to the actual important stuff, scroll down to the header that says, "Which Warning to Use on Your Post")

Sooo I made a text post that had a few words in capital letters mixed in for effect (the rest of the text was in standard formatting). Someone reblogged it with the tags "tw: all caps" and "tw: capital letters."

The existence of these tags, specifically in the form of a trigger warning, struck me as weird. I mean, I can see why someone might be uncomfortable with an all-caps text block, if they've dealt with abusive/angry capslocked emails or something, and I can see how large blocks of capitalized text could be difficult to read, and some users might prefer to avoid them. But...

Limited capitalization as emphasis (e.g. dropping OH WAIT in the middle of otherwise lower-case text to indicate a shift in tone) does not present the same issues as a solid block of capslocked text;

I have not encountered this tag in the plethora of posts that employ the meme/joke format of subverting standard case usage or alternating case (yes, the SpongeBob meme is a thing with an actual academic definition, and it also predates the existence of SpongeBob by some decades); and

Most importantly, while formatting definitely affects user experience and can be worth tagging for that reason, I wouldn't have escalated it to the level of a trigger, which is a term with a pretty specific definition:

The concept of ‘triggering’ describes the re-experiencing of unpleasant PTSD symptoms such as intrusive thoughts being evoked by exposure to materials which spark traumatic memories. Hence, content warnings have a long presence in psychiatric literature. [source: Typology of content warnings and trigger warnings: Systematic review]

(Full disclosure for anyone who hasn't already learned from reading my rants: I have a background in behavior science, so I'm all about scientific definitions and correct application of same.)

But I thought that maybe I was misinterpreting what was being tagged, and I like learning what I should tag in future posts, so I thought I'd look deeper into those tags and see if I was missing something.

Welp. It sure was educational.

Turns out there are established "trigger warnings" on Tumblr for all of the following (not a comprehensive list; these are just the ones I also saw when scrolling through the caps tags, since many of those posts had more than one thing tagged):

any text with two or more capital letters in sequence

any text in italics

any text underlined

any text in boldface

any text in a font other than the default

any text in a color other than the default (as well as tags for each individual color)

images in black and white

images in color (how dare color exist)

images with... subjectively brighter? colors

images without ALT text

posts containing emoji

and my favorite entry, which for obvious reasons I can't describe by the content it's supposedly protecting us from:

"tw just in case"

O_o

So... where to even begin.

I guess I'll get the promised rant out of the way (for those of you who prefer to stay positive, skip ahead two paragraphs): It's no wonder that much of society mocks the very concept of trigger warnings, when they're used this... I have to come right out and say frivolously. Heck, even I'm having trouble taking the greater Tumblr community seriously right in this moment, and I've been part of it for *mumble* years and practically live here. Who in the academic/corporate/entertainment/quote-unquote real world is going to honor a request for content warnings when they see that the """kids these days""" consider italicized text a psychological trigger they need to be protected from? And you can just imagine some dudebro saying, "Wow, these special snowflakes are so fragile they're even traumatized by seeing color, lulz. We should see what really freaks them out!" ...and that won't end well.

The obvious rebuttal to that point is to argue that these tags aren't intended for use by the outside world, most of which already thinks Tumblr died years ago. Not that this has ever stopped Twitter and Reddit and Facebook users from screenshotting Tumblr posts to claim ownership of mock before, but honestly the extra-Tumblr world is the less important concern here, so I won't labor that point. The more immediate issue is how this affects Tumblr users, the Tumblr community, and the experience we're all so proud of being able to curate for ourselves.

The critical point is this: Tags exist for Tumblr users to find things of interest and avoid things they don't want to see. Warnings exist for Tumblr users to protect themselves. Conflating the two can cause not only confusion, but the opposite of the desired effect of being able to curate your experience.

Please note that it is not wrong to tag any of the things listed above. By all means, tag everything in your post! Tag away! Tag your text formatting and images and colors! Use that whole tag space so people can find/not find your content as desired! But none of these things should be categorized as trigger warnings. Trigger warnings, content warnings, and tags are all separate things, and should be used appropriately so people know what to look for/avoid in a post.

Now, you may well ask: Why do the semantics matter? If something's tagged, why does it matter how it's tagged? Isn't it better to warn people about anything and everything that they might possibly not like?

For those affected by PTSD, trauma, phobias, anxiety, psychosis, optically-sensitive medical conditions, etc., being able to trust tags -- and the community's overall reliability where they are concerned -- can be critical to their health and well-being. When the community's tags become imprecise, sloppy, or unspecified -- for example, when people start throwing tags like "tw just in case" on their posts instead of actually describing what is in the post -- it becomes unpleasant or even dangerous for those people to exist in that community. And although doubtless well-intentioned, the kind of overzealous helicopter tagging that labels things like text formatting or the presence of emoji as a trigger does two things: First, it can confuse filters and sandbag search results (for search purposes, tags are treated like a word bank, rather than individual line items). Second, it fosters a general lack of regard for real, life-threatening triggers. If Tumblr users get used to seeing every tiny little thing called out as a "trigger" -- trigger warning, there's a picture of a bird in this post! trigger warning, I can't spell so there's probably a word misspelled in this post! trigger warning, someone used a heart emoji in this post! trigger warning, here's a photo with the color orange in it! trigger warning, there's a banana in this post! Self image trigger warning, I'm having the worst hair day, lol! j/k! -- then subconsciously, "trigger warning" becomes synonymous with "lots of things random people find mildly annoying, so tag stuff if you happen to think of it" instead of "a few important things we should be diligent about tagging because someone's life might quite literally depend on it."

I know categorizing tags can be confusing, and in recent years there hasn't been much consistency in usage on Tumblr, so here's a cheat sheet to help you decide what warnings to use (and to be clear, I didn't make these up; these are sourced from academic literature and teaching guides, and were -- back in the Olden Days -- also more widely used on Tumblr.)

For a more thorough description of the most common types of content to post warnings about, see this PDF.

Which Warning to Use on Your Post:

Trigger warning (TW): Used to denote content that may trigger a PTSD episode, a severe psychological reaction, or a physiological reaction due to a medical condition (e.g. epilepsy). Broadly speaking, this warning is intended to mitigate risks that may exist because of a viewer's personal experience and/or medical status. Examples of things that should be tagged TW: sexual violence; child abuse; flashing gifs

Content warning (CW): Used to denote sensitive material that may make viewers uncomfortable or upset, or that some viewers may prefer not to see, but not necessarily invoke a traumatic personal experience. Broadly speaking, this warning is concerned with a viewer's comfort level. This can include general concepts (e.g. discussion of homophobia) as well as specific instances (e.g. use of homophobic language). Examples of things that should be tagged CW: racism; nudity; death

Descriptive tags (not warnings): Used to describe the content of a post, without value judgment, so that it is searchable and/or avoidable. (And also to write rambling comma-free essays, because Tumblr is just Like That. But that's a whole separate thing.) Examples of things that can be (generally) tagged: the themes or topics being discussed; black and white images; capitalized text; insects; the color green; memes; rainbows; digital art; literally anything else that appears in your post

Can people still dislike/be upset by things that aren't on a broadly-accepted TW/CW list? Absolutely. But that's not quite the same as a trigger, and that's why we also have general tags.

Here's an example of the difference between disliking or being triggered by content (source: "The right way to use a Trigger Warning," emphasis mine):

Trigger Warnings are here to prevent people who have experienced traumatic experiences to be exposed to something that might trigger a physical and/or mental reaction. Trigger is the key word here. “Trigger*” is used to talk about PTSD and mental illness. “Triggered” and “offended/upset” are not the same concept. I can be upset if I see a picture of a beautiful cake because I cannot bake, but it won’t trigger a post-traumatic reaction. 

You aren't going to be able to anticipate every single person's likes and dislikes, phobias, emotional associations, and so on. There's a temptation to try to cover every base imaginable, but that's actually... less than helpful. Actively unhelpful, in some cases. In addition to the reasons I cited earlier, here's an example of how "I'll tag it just in case someone doesn't like a thing" warnings can be confusing:

Let's say I have two followers: WingHater96 has a deep phobia of butterflies, while ButterSuperFly78 adores butterflies. Tagging a post "butterflies" helps them both navigate my feed more efficiently: WingHater96 can block the entire "butterfly" tag, while ButterSuperFly78 can search for it.

However, let's say I tagged that post in the form of a warning like "tw: butterflies" and hid it below a Read More just in case someone following me didn't like butterflies. WingHater96 would still have that post blocked, because it contains the word "butterfly" in the tag. It would also still appear in ButterSuperFly78's search results for the same reason -- the presence of the warning doesn't affect search results at all. But when ButterSuperFly78 sees the warning tag, they might now be confused about whether the post is full of pretty butterfly photography (which they would like to see), or if maybe the reason I put a warning on it is because it's about butterflies being harmed, because why else would you warn someone about butterflies when they're the best things ever? But wait, does OP know that they're the best things ever? Is the warning there because OP secretly hates butterflies?? Do they need to unfollow OP now because they're a butterfly-hater??? and ButterSuperFly78 would not know whether to view the post or scroll past until they psychoanalyze me to determine my personal feelings on butterflies.

Adding the warning provided zero additional benefit for the person who already had the tagged thing blocked, but it caused additional problems for the person actively seeking out that thing.

Obviously this is a bit exaggerated (...though, speaking from experience, only a bit), but it's a lot more efficient to just list the things that are in a post in the tags without framing them as warnings. That way, people with different likes and dislikes can curate their own experience more easily, and know to take trigger and content warnings more seriously when they DO appear.

-

TL;DR Trigger warnings exist to help people avoid PTSD or adverse psychological/physiological reactions. Casually throwing the word "trigger" in front of things that are not triggers makes people stop taking the need for warnings seriously, and can confuse people trying to curate their Tumblr experience. Reserve TW and CW for actual triggers/sensitive content and use standard tags for other things.

[sniflig]

number 1 rule of ratr is to never ask me what my target demographic is. idk man anyone who will read really

[feline-evil]

Being into some game series's is a constant cycle of going 'ok, ok maybe this'll be the one we'll be so back on, maybe THIS time it'll be good' and getting hit in the face w how joever it is hard enough to make your ears ring every time

[cauli-flawa]

looking at fear and hunger stuff and am surprised to see how wholesome/memey it is like actually

meanwhile us here in the kirby fandom

[repurposedmeatlocker]

Who are your favorite YouTubers that make the horror/lost media/etc content

Oh boy! I have so many!! Get ready for a long list.

I've been invested in horror/lost media content on youtube for a LONG time now, so not all of these people are as active as they used to be, but I still recommend them : )

blameitonjorge - lost media along with some scatterings of other unusual internet-based and historical-based phenomenon

ScareTheatre - not as regularly active as he used to be, but he still posts some things. He is the og creepypasta/internet mystery debunker and generally just has a really good approach to his videos. His more recent stuff tackles a lot of unique subjects and the videos are not too long.

ReignBot - internet horror and arg analysis but largely focuses on "true crime" related subjects now. I personally find the way she approaches the topics are a lot better and more respectful compared to other "true crime content creators".

Nexpo - Does good breakdowns of args and fictional horror content online. His analysis on "dark sides" of the internet are also good, although recently I've been leaning more towards the following creator more.

Nick Crowley - exploration of "dark" content and subjects online, but in a really respectful and well-researched fashion.

Fredrik Knudsen - This guy probably has some of the BEST content of all of these people. His production value and narration are so good and delves into a lot of niche topics, many I had never heard of beforehand. Super engaging. I recommend all his videos.

Atrocity Guide - Similar vein from the previous. Super interesting and engaging topics of all types. All videos are recommended.

Barely Sociable - Long, but very in-depth analysis on various topics.

Sakura Stardust - Focuses on horror content and lost media from Japan specifically. Lots of good research goes into her content.

Goose Boose - Topics kind of vary, combination of real-world mystery analysis and nostalgic horror experiences. His narration is a standout for me. I just find how he talks super entertaining and engaging.

Eudoxia Mysteries - This guy's stuff is more on the recent side, but I do like that he discusses lots of things that I haven't heard of before, a lot of them focusing on reddit posts, but it isn't exactly narrated like he is just "reading off" the reddit post. Some analysis is there as well which I appreciate.

Debunk File - Nothing extraordinary by any means, especially in comparison to the other people on this list, but I thought I would give a mention just because some of his videos talk about things that I've never heard of before.

Whang! - His videos kind of vary. Mostly focuses on internet pop culture, but there is some lost-media and horror content mixed in.

SomeOrdinaryGamers - He posts kind of about anything at this point, but I felt I should give him a shoutout since I started watching him early on for his "deep-web" explorations. He has a good realistic and sensible viewpoint about these things and does not feed into conspiracy at all which I appreciate.

Izzzyzzz - Kind of focuses on a variety of media, particularly nostalgic online pop culture, but there is some horror elements sprinkled in.

Nyx Fears - I wouldn't exactly call her stuff...horror content in the same vein as the other people on this list, but I love her stuff so I have to give her a shout-out. She is probably my favorite online film analysis person (?) and has a lot of really entertaining breakdowns of disturbing media.

Now, I cannot say ALL of these creators are perfect. Doing your own research and analysis is the best approach to these kinds of topics. I do feel that I enjoy the way these people approach these themes most of the time and regularly keep up with their new videos.

[deus-ex-mona]

little brothers and their will to #slay, man </3

[princekirijo]

I beat Elden Ring 🧍

[tiredsadpeach]

Why is he just talking to me like normal sometimes

[nossumusmanus]

Leave your weapon on the table, wrapped in burlap, barely able Don't get angry, don't discourage, take a shot of liquid courage Leave a light on if you're able 'Cause we both know you're unstable Call a doctor, say a prayer, choose a god you think is there;

[1roentgen]

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