#decadent society sans

[bunningchaos]

Don't ask why, just have some more plushified skeles.

Cable belongs to @createbellatheartist

Miramoonli belongs to @miramoonli

Misconduct belongs to @ask-misconduct / @sigsams

Sapho and Nyx belongs to @emjoyzhos-ej

Ichorverse (Cross, Nightmare, Horror) belongs to @ph0enix-themother

Decadent Society Sans belongs to D4niztic, on Tumblr

Thordis belongs to @a-furys-code (Or Snowdrop, but they requested NOT to be tagged)

Pollen belongs to the wonderful @neverniko101 / @ask-phantasmverse

[debossmoo]

Decadent Society Sans

[insultedaxe]

yeah recent doodles

axe is mine.

aXe is by spiral_works on discord. (horror x cross sans)

[supper122]

DECADENT SOCIETY: Villan

(for @thelunarsystemwrites 's superhero/villan thingy)

gah! what a meanie....

Powers:

-Summoning Chains

-Wealth

-Intelligence

Weaknesses:

-Easily Angered

-Pretty Depressed

-Coughs Alot (due to smoking)

Villan Name(s)

-Shackles or Cuffs (he doesnt really care)

[landiosreal]

The rain pours like tears.

rare landios shaded sprite

also might make this have a bg idk

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Palantir’s NHS-stealing Big Lie

I'm on tour with my new, nationally bestselling novel The Bezzle! Catch me in TUCSON (Mar 9-10), then SAN FRANCISCO (Mar 13), Anaheim, and more!

Capitalism's Big Lie in four words: "There is no alternative." Looters use this lie for cover, insisting that they're hard-nosed grownups living in the reality of human nature, incentives, and facts (which don't care about your feelings).

The point of "there is no alternative" is to extinguish the innovative imagination. "There is no alternative" is really "stop trying to think of alternatives, dammit." But there are always alternatives, and the only reason to demand that they be excluded from consideration is that these alternatives are manifestly superior to the looter's supposed inevitability.

Right now, there's an attempt underway to loot the NHS, the UK's single most beloved institution. The NHS has been under sustained assault for decades – budget cuts, overt and stealth privatisation, etc. But one of its crown jewels has been stubbournly resistant to being auctioned off: patient data. Not that HMG hasn't repeatedly tried to flog patient data – it's just that the public won't stand for it:

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2023/nov/21/nhs-data-platform-may-be-undermined-by-lack-of-public-trust-warn-campaigners

Patients – quite reasonably – do not trust the private sector to handle their sensitive medical records.

Now, this presents a real conundrum, because NHS patient data, taken as a whole, holds untold medical insights. The UK is a large and diverse country and those records in aggregate can help researchers understand the efficacy of various medicines and other interventions. Leaving that data inert and unanalysed will cost lives: in the UK, and all over the world.

For years, the stock answer to "how do we do science on NHS records without violating patient privacy?" has been "just anonymise the data." The claim is that if you replace patient names with random numbers, you can release the data to research partners without compromising patient privacy, because no one will be able to turn those numbers back into names.

It would be great if this were true, but it isn't. In theory and in practice, it is surprisingly easy to "re-identify" individuals in anonymous data-sets. To take an obvious example: we know which two dates former PM Tony Blair was given a specific treatment for a cardiac emergency, because this happened while he was in office. We also know Blair's date of birth. Check any trove of NHS data that records a person who matches those three facts and you've found Tony Blair – and all the private data contained alongside those public facts is now in the public domain, forever.

Not everyone has Tony Blair's reidentification hooks, but everyone has data in some kind of database, and those databases are continually being breached, leaked or intentionally released. A breach from a taxi service like Addison-Lee or Uber, or from Transport for London, will reveal the journeys that immediately preceded each prescription at each clinic or hospital in an "anonymous" NHS dataset, which can then be cross-referenced to databases of home addresses and workplaces. In an eyeblink, millions of Britons' records of receiving treatment for STIs or cancer can be connected with named individuals – again, forever.

Re-identification attacks are now considered inevitable; security researchers have made a sport out of seeing how little additional information they need to re-identify individuals in anonymised data-sets. A surprising number of people in any large data-set can be re-identified based on a single characteristic in the data-set.

Given all this, anonymous NHS data releases should have been ruled out years ago. Instead, NHS records are to be handed over to the US military surveillance company Palantir, a notorious human-rights abuser and supplier to the world's most disgusting authoritarian regimes. Palantir – founded by the far-right Trump bagman Peter Thiel – takes its name from the evil wizard Sauron's all-seeing orb in Lord of the Rings ("Sauron, are we the baddies?"):

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/01/the-palantir-will-see-you-now/#public-private-partnership

The argument for turning over Britons' most sensitive personal data to an offshore war-crimes company is "there is no alternative." The UK needs the medical insights in those NHS records, and this is the only way to get at them.

As with every instance of "there is no alternative," this turns out to be a lie. What's more, the alternative is vastly superior to this chumocratic sell-out, was Made in Britain, and is the envy of medical researchers the world 'round. That alternative is "trusted research environments." In a new article for the Good Law Project, I describe these nigh-miraculous tools for privacy-preserving, best-of-breed medical research:

https://goodlawproject.org/cory-doctorow-health-data-it-isnt-just-palantir-or-bust/

At the outset of the covid pandemic Oxford's Ben Goldacre and his colleagues set out to perform realtime analysis of the data flooding into NHS trusts up and down the country, in order to learn more about this new disease. To do so, they created Opensafely, an open-source database that was tied into each NHS trust's own patient record systems:

https://timharford.com/2022/07/how-to-save-more-lives-and-avoid-a-privacy-apocalypse/

Opensafely has its own database query language, built on SQL, but tailored to medical research. Researchers write programs in this language to extract aggregate data from each NHS trust's servers, posing medical questions of the data without ever directly touching it. These programs are published in advance on a git server, and are preflighted on synthetic NHS data on a test server. Once the program is approved, it is sent to the main Opensafely server, which then farms out parts of the query to each NHS trust, packages up the results, and publishes them to a public repository.

This is better than "the best of both worlds." This public scientific process, with peer review and disclosure built in, allows for frequent, complex analysis of NHS data without giving a single third party access to a a single patient record, ever. Opensafely was wildly successful: in just months, Opensafely collaborators published sixty blockbuster papers in Nature – science that shaped the world's response to the pandemic.

Opensafely was so successful that the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care commissioned a review of the programme with an eye to expanding it to serve as the nation's default way of conducting research on medical data:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/better-broader-safer-using-health-data-for-research-and-analysis/better-broader-safer-using-health-data-for-research-and-analysis

This approach is cheaper, safer, and more effective than handing hundreds of millions of pounds to Palantir and hoping they will manage the impossible: anonymising data well enough that it is never re-identified. Trusted Research Environments have been endorsed by national associations of doctors and researchers as the superior alternative to giving the NHS's data to Peter Thiel or any other sharp operator seeking a public contract.

As a lifelong privacy campaigner, I find this approach nothing short of inspiring. I would love for there to be a way for publishers and researchers to glean privacy-preserving insights from public library checkouts (such a system would prove an important counter to Amazon's proprietary god's-eye view of reading habits); or BBC podcasts or streaming video viewership.

You see, there is an alternative. We don't have to choose between science and privacy, or the public interest and private gain. There's always an alternative – if there wasn't, the other side wouldn't have to continuously repeat the lie that no alternative is possible.

Name your price for 18 of my DRM-free ebooks and support the Electronic Frontier Foundation with the Humble Cory Doctorow Bundle.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/03/08/the-fire-of-orodruin/#are-we-the-baddies

Image: Gage Skidmore (modified) https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Peter_Thiel_(51876933345).jpg

CC BY-SA 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/deed.en

[letterful]

Romanticism is the primitive, the untutored, it is youth, life, the exuberant sense of life of the natural man, but it is also pallor, fever, disease, decadence, the maladie de siècle, La Belle Dame Sans Merci, the Dance of Death, indeed Death itself. It is Shelley's dome of many-coloured glass, and it is also his white radiance of eternity. It is the confused teeming fullness and richness of life, Fülle des Lebens, inexhaustible multiplicity, turbulence, violence, conflict, chaos, but also it is peace, oneness with the great `I Am', harmony with the natural order, the music of the spheres, dissolution in the eternal all-containing spirit. It is the strange, the exotic, the grotesque, the mysterious, the supernatural, ruins, moonlight, enchanted castles, hunting horns, elves, giants, griffins, falling water, the old mill on the Floss, darkness and the powers of darkness, phantoms, vampires, nameless terror, the irrational, the unutterable.

Also it is the familiar, the sense of one's unique tradition, joy in the smiling aspect of everyday nature, and the accustomed sights and sounds of contented, simple, rural folk — the sane and happy wisdom of rosy-checked sons of the soil. It is the ancient, the historic, it is Gothic cathedrals, mists of antiquity, ancient roots and the old order with its unanalysable qualities, its profound but inexpressible loyalties, the impalpable, the imponderable.

Also it is the pursuit of novelty, revolutionary change, concern with the fleeting present, desire to live in the moment, rejection of knowledge, past and future, the pastoral idyll of happy innocence, joy in the passing instant, a sense of timelessness. It is nostalgia, it is reverie, it is intoxicating dreams, it is sweet melancholy and bitter melancholy, solitude, the sufferings of exile, the sense of alienation, roaming in remote places, especially the East, and in remote times, especially the Middle Ages.

But also it is happy co-operation in a common creative effort, the sense of forming part of a Church, a class, a party, a tradition, a great and all-containing symmetrical hierarchy, knights and retainers, the ranks of the Church, organic social ties, mystic unity, one faith, one land, one blood, `la terre et les morts', as Barrès said, the great society of the dead and the living and the yet unborn. It is the Toryism of Scott and Southey and Wordsworth, and it is the radicalism of Shelley, Büchner and Stendhal. It is Chateaubriand's aesthetic medievalism, and it is Michelet's loathing of the Middle Ages. It is Carlyle's worship of authority, and Hugo's hatred of authority. It is extreme nature mysticism, and extreme anti-naturalist aestheticism. It is energy, force, will, youth, life, étalage du moi; it is also self-torture, self-annihilation, suicide. It is the primitive, the unsophisticated, the bosom of nature, green fields, cow-bells, murmuring brooks, the infinite blue sky.

No less, however, it is also dandyism, the desire to dress up, red waistcoats, green wigs, blue hair, which the followers of people like Gérard de Nerval wore in Paris at a certain period. It is the lobster which Nerval led about on a string in the streets of Paris. It is wild exhibitionism, eccentricity, it is the battle of Ernani, it is ennui, it is taedium vitae, it is the death of Sardanopolis, whether painted by Delacroix, or written about by Berlioz or Byron. It is the convulsion of great empires, wars, slaughter and the crashing of worlds. It is the romantic hero — the rebel, l'homme fatale, the damned soul, the Corsairs, Manfreds, Giaours, Laras, Cains, all the population of Byron's heroic poems. It is Melmoth, it is Jean Sbogar, all the outcasts and Ishmaels as well as the golden-hearted courtesans and the noble-hearted convicts of nineteenth-century fiction. It is drinking out of the human skull, it is Berlioz who said he wanted to climb Vesuvius in order to commune with a kindred soul. It is Satanic revels, cynical irony, diabolical laughter, black heroes, but also Blake's vision of God and his angels, the great Christian society, the eternal order, and `the starry heavens which can scarce express the infinite and eternal of the Christian soul'.

It is, in short, unity and multiplicity. It is fidelity to the particular, in the paintings of nature for example, and also mysterious tantalising vagueness of outline. It is beauty and ugliness. It is art for art's sake, and art as an instrument of social salvation. It is strength and weakness, individualism and collectivism, purity and corruption, revolution and reaction, peace and war, love of life and love of death.

— from Isaiah Berlin's The Roots of Romanticism.

[thelunarsystemwrites]

Inviting other artists!

So I've just made a superhero AU for utmv. Right? Well, I really only wanted to design one guy, Lust. Sooo I'm opening the AU (WHICH LITERALLY HAS NO LORE YET SO NO WORRIES) for others to partake in!

Here's like, the basic lay out.

Choose one Sans AU to turn into superhero/villain. Please refrain from using a Sans someone else claimed.

Make them into a superhero/villain themed after something specific. (Example: A plant themed superhero, or even a cactus one!)

Keep powers balanced with weaknesses, please make them relate to their theme!

Give them a civilian identity! You don't have to draw this one, but make sure to mention their civil job and name!

Give them a Superhero/Villain name as well!

Wait, supervillain?

OH YES! You can choose the mortal alignment of your claimed Sans! Super hero, villain, neutral, vigilante? Just pick whatever you want!

Of course headcanons are welcome, it's Canon to YOUR design! Make them trans, gay, autistic, whatever! (Human designs are allowed too!)

Wait.. what do I (the artist reading this) Even get out of doing this?

Well I'll tell you! For one, its a fun artist challenge where you personalize and create a whole new hero/Villain to your preferences!

You also get to imagine their lore, and incorporate their personality into the story! They'd all be canon part of the AU. (Note: if someone claimed a sans first and you did it anyways, yours wouldn't be Canon unless issues occurred with the OG/they gave you permission.)

I dunno, I just wanna make an AU with a ton of people, ya know? I think it's be fun for us to work together on this.

CLAIMED LIST:

Lust: Hero. Complete. By @thelunarsystemwrites.

Reaper: Vigilante. Completed by @solusminds.

Outer: Vigilante. Complete by @dzasterdumpterfire

Ink: Retired Hero. Complete by @lix88888

Error: Supervillain. Complete by @its-paperd

Dust: Claimed by @billygoat26

Farmer: Claimed by @absurdumsid

Cross: Claimed by @weirdest-worlds

Geno: Claimed by @eldritchcats

Shattered: Claimed by @genderfluidyellowocto

Nightmare: Supervillain. Completed by @analexthatexists

Killer: Claimed by @a-menacetosociety

Dream (and core frisk): Claimed by @thenocturnenarrator

Blue: Superhero, complete by @createbellatheartist

Fell: Supervillain, complete @underrrtaleee-freakk

Quantum: Superhero. Completed by @nashdoesstuff (Also made an OC for the AU, Dreamshade! Superhero.)

Horror: Neutral Evil. Completed by @it-came-from-mount-ebott

Ccino: Claimed by @some-aroace-chaos

Fresh: Claimed by @nightmareishomophobic

Die sans: Claimed by @dustsansm1

Bill: Supervillain. Completed by @endless-emptyness (OC Nanno made by sane person!)

Epic: Claimed by @dtdrawz

Fatal error: Claimed by @spookyboris2

Swan: Claimed by @glitching-moon

Sci: Claimed by @joonebugg

Dance: Claimed by @dv-reblogs

Swad: Claimed by @shinanigans-art

Littletale: Claimed by @somehhuuuhh

Possession: Claimed by @b0nerific-individual

Alter: Claimed by @annabel184

Paperjam: Vigilante. Completed by @papple

Decadent society: Supervillain. Complete by @supper122

Green Sans: Claimed by @xxcross-is-a-helicopterxx

Roulette: Claimed by @ant1quarian

On the claimed list, if you claim a Sans (By commenting or reblogging saying "Dibs Blank!" Or "Can I do blank?" Etc! I'll add it on the List saying: "Sans: Claimed by User"

Once it's made, please tag me so I can see! Then I'll update it to "Sans: Moral alignment. By User." And link it on this post! [Please only claim one, we want enough to go around! However you can claim variations! So one person could make dream, another could make shattered!]

[Note I do not claim any ownership over your designs for the AU, nor will I use your design w/o permission.]

With all that said! Anyone interested? [And hey, if you're not interested? It's okay to just not join. Or ignore this!]

Asks! (Questions regarding the AU!)

Can we make our own lore woth other characters?

Secondary claims?

Only two grabs?

Can we have OCs?

Can we use our own AUs?

[fandom]

Come on, Barbie, let's go party.

We're not saying Barbie is the cinematic masterpiece we as a society have been craving for decades, but, well...we'll let you draw your own conclusions. Combine it with the biopic Oppenheimer and you've got yourselves one explosive double feature. The WGA writers and SAG-AFTRA actors are striking against major studios and streaming companies after contract negotiations failed, and in a stunning surprise, the LA City Controller's office is investigating the unpermitted trimming of trees near the picket line. That's right, y'all: it's tree law time. San Diego Comic-Con gave us a slew of trailers, including ones for One Piece, Adventure Time: Fiona and Cake, and the second season of Interview with the Vampire. Finally, book 5 of The Dragon Prince is here—welcome back to Xadia, friends. This is Tumblr's Week in Review.

Barbie

The Writers Guild of America Strike

Tree Law

Twitter

Oppenheimer

Artists on Tumblr

Barbenheimer

One Piece

Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse

Margot Robbie

Ryan Gosling

r/196

The Screen Actors Guild Strike

Adventure Time

Nimona

Interview with the Vampire

The Dragon Prince

The Welcome Home ARG

What We Do In The Shadows

Hobie Brown | Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse

[nerdygaymormon]

The Queerness of the Oz movies

The 1939 movie The Wizard of Oz is considered a queer classic, even though most of the queerness is subtext. The 2024 movie Wicked stands alongside it as a queer movie.

The Wizard of Oz

Television became part of American homes in the 1950s & 1960s. Unlike today, the options of what to watch was limited to only 2 to 4 channels. The Wizard of Oz was aired annually on television and soon became a familiar part of American culture. The movie was noted for its over-the-top characters, jubilant songs, lavish costumes and production design, and fantastical performances. It’s very flamboyant, no wonder it caught the attention of gay people.

Because the movie was so familiar, it could be easily referenced with the expectation everyone else would understand. For example, a store catering to the gay community could sell T-shirts with an image of Glinda and her words from the movie “Come out, come out, wherever you are.” Or a poster of Dorothy standing at a crossroads and the Scarecrow saying, “Of course, some people go both ways.” “The Wiz,” a Broadway musical produced by a Black gay man and adapted as a film starring Diana Ross, occupies an important place in both Black and gay culture. Patti LaBelle continues to sing her own empowering version of “Over the Rainbow” at LGBTQ events and Todrick Hall’s “Straight Outta Oz” explores his experiences as a young, queer man of color through identification with various situations from the movie.

The main character of the movie is Dorothy, a girl from a small community who is misunderstood by her family. She sings the song "Over the Rainbow," which is about longing to go to a place beyond the rainbow where the dreams that you dare to dream really do come true. Soon a tornado picks up her house in Kansas and sets it down in a land called Oz. The scenes in Kansas are filmed in sepia tone, which is when black-and-white photos are stained a brownish color, and the land of Oz was shot in technicolor. The journey of Dorothy going from Kansas to Oz reflected queer people's desire to leave the black-and-white limitations of small-town life for a big, colorful city like New York or San Francisco, full of quirky characters who would welcome them.

The whole aesthetic of the characters in the movie can be seen as over-the-top and have inspired drag acts for decades for their camp style. Plus, let's not forget all that drama over a pair of shoes!

The three male characters who become Dorothy's travel companions in Oz are stereotypes of gay men. The Scarecrow was too loud, the Tin Man is the sensitive type, and the Cowardly Lion is like a befuddled old bachelor who even refers to himself as a “sissy” and “dandy lion” ("sissy" and "dandy" being adjectives to describe gay men). Dorothy easily accepts and welcomes them even though they were different. Dorothy created her own "found family" just as many do in the queer community. The phrase "Friend of Dorothy" became code used by gay men to identify themselves to each other. “Oh, you don’t know Bob? He’s a friend of Dorothy.”

The Scarecrow, the Tin Man, and the Cowardly Lion, aren't just hanging out with their campy friend Dorothy, they go on a journey to find their true selves, to understand that they are not who others told them that they are.

Judy Garland, the actress who played Dorothy, became iconic within the queer community. She was proud of her gay fans and welcomed them. Despite her immense talent and impressive career, her personal life was fodder for the newspapers as they eagerly told of tragedies and failures. Judy withstood those hard things, she was seen as a survivor, which having a life of perseverance was admired by the queer community, especially in the 20th century when they were at risk in many ways from society. Judy was also famous for being vulnerable, sharing about her mental health, her addictions, and her self doubts. That humanness let her queer fans feel connected with her. Even to this day, gay men will refer to a good friend as their “good Judy,” in honor of Judy Garland.

Judy Garland's funeral was held on June 27, 1969, which later that night the Stonewall Riots erupted. Not that the two events are related, but it was seen as symbolic that her death also marked the passing of the era of secrecy and assimilation. We moved into the beginning of the queer-rights movement for liberation. Subtext and secrecy would give way to openness and unambiguousness.

Harvey Milk, the first openly gay elected official in the history of California, challenged San Francisco queer artist Gilbert Baker to come up with a symbol of pride for the gay community, something positive as an alternative to the pink triangle. The pink triangle had been used by Nazis to identify and persecute homosexuals, and was reclaimed in the 1970s as a bold symbol of remembrance and action against persecution. Rather than a symbol of oppression forced onto us, Harvey wanted us to choose a symbol of our own. Gilbert created the Rainbow Flag in 1978. The song "Over the Rainbow" did not serve as inspiration for the flag, but many people tied the two together. The rainbow flag represented hope that we can make a place of acceptance and compassion, just like the song lyrics.

Wicked

The overall theme of the movie is about being "othered" but embracing your own true self, and this resonates strongly with queer audiences.

And there's the central relationship of the movie, the one between Elphaba and Glinda. While the movie never outright positions them as romantic partners, their connection has a depth and intensity that feels queer coded as it seems somewhere between friendship and love. Even when the male love interest is introduced, it's the relationship between these two women which is most interesting. The monumental moment at the dance is these two women dancing together. When Elphaba goes to meet the Wizard, she takes Glinda with her, not the handsome prince. Likewise, after discovering the Wizard has no magic powers, Elphaba wants Glinda by her side when she flies off to the West. Not to mention all the casual handholding and touching in the movie. Together they take the space in the film that normally would be filled by a romantic couple. The queer possibilities of their relationship will inspire countless pieces of fan fiction.

Elphaba is ostracized for her green skin, which is something she was born with and can't change, and it's seen by many as a metaphor for the experiences of marginalized groups, including LGBTQ+ people. Elphaba learns to stand in her own individuality and otherness and embrace her true self, and that makes her powerful.

Glinda gave a weird hat to Elphaba who wears it only to have everyone laugh at her, but Elphaba makes this accessory her signature look. Wearing clothes that are a bit different from the mainstream and having your hair colored in vibrant colors are both queer tropes, and so having Elphaba make this accessory part of her personality feels very on point.

The Land of Oz is a place where queer people simply exist. Some of the Shiz students wear skirts, some wear pants, some a combination, in a definite show of gender inclusivity. The environment lets everyone individualize themselves and figure themselves out. In the ozdust ballroom are men wearing makeup. Queerness doesn't seem to be a problem in this land, which is wonderful.

Another theme of the film is the danger of having systems of oppression set against groups of people. The government declares talking animals to be the enemy and uses its power to ostracize them and to remove them from positions of power. The symbolism of saying those who are different need to be silenced is chilling and relevant. Having laws limiting what the the goat professor should teach and then forcibly removing him from the classroom reminds me of the "Don't Say Gay" and anti-trans bathroom laws which have been passed across the USA.

Then there are the songs! "What is this feeling" has Glinda and Elphaba sing lyrics which seem to depict a crush. What is this feeling so sudden and new? I felt the moment I laid eyes on you. My pulse is rushing, my head is reeling. Yeah, well, my face is flushing. What is this feeling? Fervid as a flame, does it have a name? A song about these confusing, conflicting feelings for each other feels very love-at-first-site, but the punchline is that they hate each other. But come on, they lie awake at night thinking about each other as they sing this song, in a few years they'll look back and recognize this obsession was a crush.

Regarding the song "I’m Not That Girl," Jonathan Bailey, the gay man who played Prince Fiyero, stated “’I’m Not That Girl’ is such a queer anthem. I mean, the thing is, the themes in this resonate with everyone, but that thing of being born into a world that tells you that you’re not worth, you’re not worth anything or that you’re unlovable. And to harness that and to know that actually that will and is your superpower. And it’s about the people you meet along the way and the relationships you forge which helps you strengthen that. And yeah, I hope all queer kids can see this story and know that they are going to be okay.”

The climax to the movie Wicked is the song "Defying Gravity" The character Elphaba sings of how she wants to live without limits, going against the rules that others have set for her. Queer audience members identify with the character Elphaba because of her journey to accept that she’s different from others and this changes what she expects and desires from life.

And finally, the casting of so many actors who are openly queer:

Elphaba is played by Cynthia Erivo who identifies as queer and bisexual and is currently in a relationship with the actress Lena Waithe. Having a queer, Black woman play the role of Elphaba makes her character's journey feel even more personal and adds depth of meaning to the feelings of being othered & ostracized.

Elphaba's sister, Nessarose, is played by Marissa Bode who has a girlfriend. Having her in the film provides queer disability visibility. I love that both Thropp sisters are played by queer actresses.

Prince Fiyero is played by Jonathan Bailey who is gay and launched the charity The Shameless Fund which aims to help members of the queer community across the world "live authentically, love freely and thrive." Fiyero shows up to Shiz University and seduces most everyone with his glances, touches, and winks. No one is safe. A bisexual king.

Pfannee is played by Bowen Yang, who is gay. Pfannee wears a skirted uniform and reacts to Prince Fiero by saying "You can do anything to me."

ShenShen is played by Bronwyn James who has a wife. So both of Glinda's sidekicks are played by gay actors although they don’t play these characters as the stereotypical “gay best friend,” but being the catty “mean girl” is also a gay trope, so it fits.

Dulcibear, the bear nurse who raises Elphaba, is voiced by Sharon D. Clark who is married to Susie McKenna. Having Dulcibear voiced by a queer woman gives added meaning to her choice to raise Elphaba after she was rejected by her father. During the song "What Is This Feeling," if Elphaba had written to Dulcibear instead of her father, maybe she'd have gotten the response, "It sounds like you're in love with her."

Even the straight actors in this cast are kind of queer adjacent. Ariana Grande who plays Glinda is considered a gay icon for her singing career and her brother Frankie Grande is gay. The Wizard is played by Jeff Goldblum who is campy and he was even a guest judge on an episode of RuPaul's Drag Race. Madame Morrible is played by Michelle Yeoh who in every scene looks like she is doing Marie Antoinette-inspired drag and both Elphaba and Glinda both want her attention more than they want Fiyero's.

[covid-safer-hotties]

Also preserved on our archive

A lot of good sources linked in the original article!

By Bruce Mirken

As the dangers of Long COVID become more recognized, the country's going backwards on preventing new infections.

While I’m far from the only person worried about Long COVID and our society’s general inclination to look away and pretend it’s not there, people like me certainly feel badly outnumbered. It’s beginning to feel reminiscent of how people with AIDS and their loved ones felt circa 1986—and maybe it’s time for the same kind of response.

For those of you lucky enough not to have lived through that era, by the end of 1986, AIDS had killed nearly 25,000 Americans, but president Ronald Reagan had yet to speak the word “AIDS.” His press secretary had joked about it and the White House press corps laughed. While individual scientists were doing important work, the bureaucracies running the NIH and FDA seemed very much to be in business-as-usual mode. Because the casualties had largely been gay men and injection drug users, it seemed like no one with any power cared whether we lived or died.

So, a group of New Yorkers – mostly gay men – decided it was time to start raising hell. Calling themselves ACT UP, they disrupted the New York Stock Exchange and, as chapters sprang up nationwide, they staged protests that shut down the FDA and NIH. Eventually, people like Anthony Fauci began to see they had a point. I joined the Los Angeles ACT UP chapter in 1988 and ended up getting arrested half a dozen times in protests at the LA federal building, the County Board of Supervisors and the U.S. Capitol, among others. We won major improvements in HIV/AIDS care in the Los Angeles County health system, which cared for thousands of people with AIDS who had no health insurance. When I landed in San Francisco in 1993, I connected with ACT UP Golden Gate.

Here I am (with my late boyfriend Tim at the left) at one of the protests in that L.A County healthcare campaign. Most of my closest friends from that era have been dead for decades.

I get that COVID has played out very differently than HIV/AIDS. AIDS ramped up slowly and seemed not to affect “normal” people until it killed closeted gay movie and TV star Rock Hudson in 1985, and even then officials largely looked the other way. Only scientific breakthroughs in the 1990s finally stemmed the tide of death. In contrast, the much more highly transmissible SARS-CoV-2 virus came on fast and furious, turning Americans’ lives upside-down almost immediately.

But now, we’ve arrived at what seems in some ways like an eerily similar place. When needed precautions to curb a highly infectious airborne virus spurred frustration and political pushback, officials largely threw up their hands and gave up. Even measures that don’t involve mandates or restrictions on behavior have mostly either been dropped or never happened in the first place.

LONG COVID’S GROWING TOLL

Unfortunately, the virus hasn’t gone away, even if the initial wave of mass death has receded. In August, as a summer surge peaked, US COVID-19 deaths exceeded 1,000 per week, though the latest September data suggests the numbers have begun declining toward pre-surge levels, when deaths were generally in the 300-400 per week range. That’s still equal to a 9/11 every eight to 10 days. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention tracking of SARS-CoV-2 levels in wastewater—probably the best data on US viral prevalence now that cases aren’t being reliably tracked—showed 15 states with “very high” levels and another 19 rated as “high” as of Sept. 19.

But COVID is not just a matter of cases and deaths. The disease’s long-term effects have disabled millions of Americans, and the numbers keep growing with each new wave of infection. An updated review published in Nature Medicine puts the current global number of Long COVID sufferers at 400 million and estimates the worldwide economic impact at a staggering $1 trillion.

We now have plenty of people experiencing repeated SARS-CoV-2 infections. The good news, if you can call it that, is that these reinfections may produce fewer new cases of Long Covid than a person’s first infection – but they absolutely produce some, and the Omicron variants circulating in the last year or two seem to produce more Long Covid than earlier viral varieties. Every time you get COVID, you roll the dice with your health – maybe for the rest of your life.

If I sound alarmed, well, I am. As longtime readers may know, I have some first-hand experience with Long COVID, though in milder form than many experience. My January 2022 infection left me with peripheral neuropathy—painful nerve damage—in my legs and feet. It’s incurable and nearly impossible to treat, as conventional pain drugs don’t help. I will likely never live another day without pain and walking more than six or seven blocks at a stretch is a struggle. I used to enjoy hiking, but will probably never do it again. Still, I don’t have the more debilitating symptoms like crushing fatigue or dysautonomia—disruption of the part of the nervous system that controls automatic functions like heartbeat, blood pressure, digestion and breathing—that afflict some Long COVID sufferers. Lots of people have it way worse than I do.

We know that COVID can have lasting impacts on many parts of the body, including the brain. A recent study of 52 COVID survivors—about half with mild to moderate initial illness and half with more severe disease—found that compared to healthy controls, both groups “had a significantly higher score of cognitive complaints involving cognitive failure and mental fatigue” 27 months after their original illness, with no significant difference based on the severity of that initial illness. On a series of tests, researchers found “changes in brain function” that may explain the reported problems.

Just as scary, a study of people aged 65 and up just published in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease reports that “people with COVID were at significantly increased risk for new diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease within 360 days after the initial COVID diagnosis.” This review of the medical records of over six million patients found that the risk escalated with advancing age. As with many of these long-term impacts, the mechanisms involved remain unclear.

Survivors of an initial SARS-CoV-2 infection also have increased rates of high blood pressure, now documented in multiple studies. High blood pressure increases your risk of deadly cardiovascular complications like heart attack and stroke.

I can’t help but wonder whether these issues have affected me, but there’s no way to be sure. My blood pressure, well-controlled for a dozen years with a very low dose of medication, began ratcheting upward about a year and a half ago, necessitating three medication adjustments since then. I’m also definitely more forgetful than I was, mostly little things like walking into a room and forgetting why I went there. But those things can happen to older people with or without COVID, and it’s hard to know cause-and-effect in a given individual.

But I sure as hell know I don’t want to get this virus again and risk these and other issues getting worse. Unfortunately, avoiding it is getting harder by the day, and neither government at any level nor public health authorities seem to care.

PREVENTION? WHAT PREVENTION?

While there’s some evidence that the antiviral drug Paxlovid can reduce the likelihood of Long COVID if administered early enough, the results so far are mixed and not overwhelming. The best way to avoid Long COVID is to not get infected in the first place. As a society, we’ve pretty much stopped trying.

The government is still encouraging vaccination, as it should. But it’s been clear for some time that while the vaccines are very good at reducing the chance of severe illness and death if you get infected, they offer only limited protection against getting infected in the first place. “Vax and relax” can prevent mass death, but it can’t prevent mass infection and an ever-growing number of cases of Long COVID, even if most people get vaccinated. And vaccination rates have been declining for a while, with a new Ohio State University survey reporting that only 43% of U.S. adults have gotten or plan to get the new COVID-19 shot.

And in a bit of absolute madness, Florida’s Ron DeSantis-appointed Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo has actually advised against use of the newly updated mRNA vaccines. In a post on Mastodon, Yale epidemiologist Gregg Gonsalves called this ���beyond irresponsible. It is malpractice.”

Ladapo is an outlier, but even his saner colleagues around the country downplay the fact that we don’t have to limit ourselves to vaccination. It’s an airborne virus, so there are two main ways to stop it from spreading: 1) Get the virus out of the air, or at least reduce its concentration to a very low level, and 2) Protect yourself from breathing in any virus that’s in the air around you. We know how to do both.

Masking works, but the type of mask matters. As the Mayo Clinic notes, “Respirators such as nonsurgical N95s give the most protection. KN95s and medical masks provide the next highest level of protection. Cloth masks provide less protection.” Two and a half years ago, a CDC study found that those who reported regularly wearing an N95 or KN95 respirator in indoor public settings had an 86% lower risk of catching COVID-19.

Recently, during my first return visit to San Francisco after moving in early 2022, I met my nieces for lunch at the Ferry Plaza. It was a Saturday, Farmers Market day, and the place was jammed. In three-plus hours I saw no more than half a dozen people wearing any sort of mask, and only a couple were N95s. In my new hometown of Hilo, masking is only slightly more common. At the supermarket, I see barely 10% of customers and staff in some sort of mask. In some venues, it’s less.

A recent Ipsos survey found that half of Americans believe they’ll never get COVID again. Only 20% described themselves as “trying to stay as safe as possible.”

None of this is a surprise—people are simply responding to the messages they get from the people supposedly leading on health issues. The CDC promotes vaccination but barely talks about masking anymore; it acknowledges the value of indoor air quality but doesn’t seem to be doing much about it. In interviews, CDC Director Mandy Cohen regularly urges vaccination but almost never brings up masking or air quality and says little about Long Covid. Political leaders mostly talk about COVID in the past tense and pat themselves on the back for a job well done in prior years. The result is what you’d expect: Most Americans now treat COVID like a common cold, disregarding most precautions and not bothering to test when they get sick.

Back in 2022, when public policy on COVID was still relatively sane, the Biden administration published indoor air quality guidance and made congressionally-approved funds available that “that can be used in schools, public buildings, and other settings to improve indoor air quality.” It’s unclear exactly how much of that money has been used and for what, although some school systems have definitely made HVAC upgrades. But we’ve never had either enforceable indoor air standards or a coordinated plan to implement them. As Science noted in July, “The COVID-19 pandemic has clearly shown the vulnerability of society to the spread of infectious diseases. At the same time, with frequent outbreaks in elder care facilities and school classrooms, it became clear that it was a fatal mistake to largely neglect the recommendations of scientists and engineers regarding minimum standards for ventilation and indoor air quality.”

In any case, those federal dollars were aimed at schools and public buildings. It’s been left entirely to the private sector to do, or not do, anything to reduce airborne pathogens in supermarkets, theaters, clubs, malls and other privately owned spaces. Local groups like Chicago’s Clean Air Club and Austin’s Clear the Air ATX have tried to fill the gap by lending HEPA filters and other clean air equipment to arts and performance venues and other gathering places.

A RADICAL IDEA: DO WHAT WORKS

We know what to do. As Clean Air Club founder Emily Dupree and co-author Shelby Speier wrote in Sick Times in May, “We possess the technology to make public spaces safer. Studies show HEPA air purification and far-UVC lamps drastically reduce the number of airborne pathogens in a room and therefore lessen the likelihood of COVID-19 transmission. When combined with other layers of protection, these tools have the potential to finally make our shared spaces more accessible during an airborne pandemic.”

A key word here is accessible. Failure to address indoor air quality and other prevention measures makes public spaces seriously dangerous for those at highest risk, including the elderly, the immunocompromised and those with long-term health issues, including Long Covid.

Such simple, factual messages are rarely heard in official statements about COVID. “What I find the most frustrating about official handling of COVID and prevention is the lack of care, education, and honoring the science around COVID,” comments Clear the Air ATX founder and Long Covid activist Katie Drackert. “Telling people to ‘stay home when they feel sick’ for a virus that spreads asymptomatically? Well, they are just straight up ignoring science.”

Admirable as they are, the small, volunteer-driven efforts of groups like Drackert’s and Dupree’s are not remotely comparable to the scale of the problem. For now, people must take matters into their own hands. “In the year 2024, people still need to be wearing a well fitted KN95 or above for optimal communal and individual protection,” Drackert says. In the absence of reliable information about air quality in indoor spaces, she suggests getting a portable air quality monitor, which can be reasonably affordable. “High CO₂ levels indicate poor ventilation, which may lead to higher concentrations of aerosols that could contain the virus,” she explains. “Some air quality monitors track particulate matter (PM2.5 and PM10), which are small airborne particles. While COVID is smaller than these particles, high PM levels may indicate poor indoor air quality.”

Most of us can’t entirely avoid being in spaces with poor air quality, and that leaves us with masking, which the country has largely abandoned. Worse, we’re starting to see bans on face coverings in public spaces being enacted—for example, in Nassau County, New York, and North Carolina.

These laws typically contain exceptions for people masking for health reasons, but, as New Jersey’s Star-Ledger noted in a recent editorial opposing a proposed mask ban, “t leaves it up to the cops to decide whether someone has a legitimate medical reason for wearing a mask at a public gathering. “How will they know that? It’s subjective. And based on past experience, we know what that means: Police will disproportionately stop and question Black and brown people, who have also been the most likely to continue wearing masks to protect against COVID-19.” It’s hard to imagine a more demented public policy than making disease prevention illegal. And it’s not hard at all to imagine a COVID-19 prevention framework that would make a meaningful difference without causing a nationwide freakout: Encourage masking. Even if mask mandates are a political non-starter, there’s still plenty we can do. First, officials can talk about it and actively encourage people to wear high-quality protection like N-95s when in busy, indoor spaces. They can remind people of its importance—that COVID is not over, not just a cold, and that even a “mild” case can change your life forever. Federal, state and local governments could distribute N-95s or KN-95s free or at minimal cost. Get serious about indoor air purification. Build on what the Biden administration started a few years ago: Develop medically informed, enforceable indoor air quality standards and create a verification system so that people know when a building they enter meets them. Start with public buildings and the largest, busiest private venues, like sports arenas, concert halls and theaters, and move on from there. Give business owners generous technical and financial support in meeting those standards, and a reasonable amount of time in which to do it. While this program is ramping up, fund the local organizations now struggling with limited resources to fill the gap. None of this is that difficult. It’s not even that expensive when you consider that the federal government is in the process of spending $634 billion to upgrade nuclear weapons that with any luck will never be used. What’s missing is political will, and that won’t be there until people scream bloody murder. That’s why I think it may be time for a new version of ACT UP focused on COVID-19. The issues are somewhat different, but less so than you might think. While the original ACT UP focused a lot on research, treatment and care, it also addressed prevention. ACT UP chapters around the country started syringe exchange programs, handed out condoms at high schools, and sometimes succeeded in shaming the system into doing the right thing. And of course, there are issues to tackle around Long Covid research that I haven’t addressed here, but which I will try to cover in a future piece. The fundamental problem is much the same as people with AIDS faced in 1986: a system stuck in neutral, politicians stuck in denial, and a public closing their eyes, covering their ears and shouting, “I don’t hear you!” The first task must be to break the system–and the broader population, as much as possible–out of its present inertia, complacency and denial. I honestly don’t know whether ACT UP tactics like occupying the CDC and disrupting state and local health commission meetings will have the same effect they did decades ago, but at this point I don’t know what else to try. Nothing good lies at the end of our current path.

[akashis-waifu]

An Eternity of Mind Games with You (Aizen Sousuke x Reader)

Canon-divergence one-shot, set years after TBYW. Female reader is the Soul King, so is Aizen if you squint hard enough. Your first name is "Hana" for plot-purposes.

Tags: Domestic!Aizen with usual sass, wholesome, fluff, cringe but we embrace it. Immortal x immortal, enemies struggling with new established co-dependency. This might seem slightly out of character, but we've got Kyoka Suigetsu to blame. Contains spoilers on the ending of TBYW and CFYOW!

"Oh please, dear wife."

You raise an eyebrow at your self-proclaimed husband. The two of you have only been together for a decade as Lord and retainer — co-rulers, if you squint hard enough — after Aizen Sousuke tricked you into absorbing the Hougyoku, which apparently had long merged with his spirit. In effect, the man became a part of the Soul King and is now able to use your authority, as long as you agree to it.

In return, you get to wield one of the greatest Zanpakuto, Kyoka Suigetsu. You see it as an absolute win, the Central 46 doesn't.

As to why Aizen insists that you two are husband and wife, he argues that "A system where a man and a woman govern together is called monarchy. And it goes without saying that a King and a Queen are married." He seems to have put the cart before the horse, a very uncharacteristic blunder for the renowned war criminal. You simply guess that the fusion might have caused him brain damage.

"I swear, I haven't used Kyoka Suigetsu for a long time. There is literally no reason for you to act delusional."

He feigns to be hurt at your words. "You are the king, I am the queen. How can we not be married?"

"It's crazy how you easily admit to being the queen now." During your ascension, you had to repeatedly remind him that the Soul King was you. If he insisted on his god-complex-driven monarchy delusion, the Queen would be him.

Aizen shrugs. "As the human saying goes, let me cook."

Chills run down your spine. Something is wrong. "Maybe I'm the delusional one."

"Took you a long time to realize."

A shattering sound awakens you. After adjusting to reality, you glare at Aizen Sousuke who has successfully swiped the two Heavenly Tickets out of your hand.

"Please stop using Kyoka Suigetsu on me."

He chuckles mockingly. "You have a funny mind, I can't help it."

You try to take the tickets from him. Those are your mode of transportation to Seireitei! "It's Rukia's inauguration today. We really need to go!"

"You can go by yourself."

"I can't leave you here alone!"

Aizen smiles. He knows that it is a matter of distrust — that he might destroy the Soul Palace in your absence — but teases you nonetheless. "What a caring wife you are."

"Is the illusion not over yet?"

"My apologies. I'm simply not in the mood to head to Seireitei today," he explains briefly, before turning around. "Feel free to go without me."

You watch with curious eyes as Aizen leaves the room. He has undoubtedly mellowed out compared to 10 years ago. Memories flash through your mind.

At the end of the war, you were supposed to absorb Yhwach, become the Soul King, and be sacrificed as the new linchpin of the Three Realms. If Aizen hadn't given you the Hougyoku that granted your divinity as the Soul King, you wouldn't have gained the authority to banish Hyosube Ichibe.

If it weren't for Aizen, you would've been mutilated into a thoughtless doll. You may not express it, but you are eternally grateful to him.

Standing at the edge of the Soul Palace, you stare at the boundless sky below. It is almost time for your departure.

"He tells me to go by myself, but he knows I hate jumping all the way down to Soul Society. He could have at least returned my ticket to me." You sigh and jump anyway.

Upon arriving at Seireitei, you use Kyoka Suigetsu to disguise yourself as a white butterfly. You dispel the Shikai after reaching the 13th Division.

"Hana-san! Ah, I mean, Soul King!" Kuchiki Rukia hastily corrects herself. She then invites you to a celebratory dinner and you spend some time with the Thirteen Court Guard Squads.

The party ends late. Rukia offers the Kuchiki residence for you to spend the night in, but you decline, worried that someone might wreak havoc in your palace if left alone for too long.

She suggests to escort you to Shiba Kuukaku's hideout, aware that you would need the cannon to return to the Soul Palace. Still, you refuse, "No no! No need. It's already late, Rukia, go to sleep. I usually disguise myself as a harmless butterfly when I go around Seireitei to avoid unnecessary attention. Don't worry!"

On the way to the hideout, you feel that you're being followed. You instantly regret declining her offer.

When Aizen finds you in the middle of Seireitei, you are already bleeding from a large cut on your torso. He rushes to your side and activates the Hougyoku to accelerate your healing. As if to laud his effort, you soon regain consciousness.

"Aizen...?" you ask, vision still blurry. "What are you doing here? I... I thought you didn't want to go."

"You're not adept at using Kyoka Suigetsu yet. An incident like this is bound to happen."

"I see," you chuckle weakly. "No wonder she saw through my disguise."

His grip on your shoulder tightens. "Who was it?"

"Candace."

"Candace?"

You cough out blood multiple times and reach out to caress his cheek, as if ready to utter your last words — which would be if he doesn't take the joke lightly.

"Can deez nuts."

Aizen deadpans. A shattering sound takes him out of his reverie, and he looks over his shoulder to see you fiddling with the tickets that he had previously hidden in his sleeves.

Of course, the whole farce was an illusion. He should've known since the Hougyoku grants instant regeneration. He sighs in annoyance. "I'd like to take the Hougyoku back. You're too insufferable."

"Is that a request for divorce?"

He smirks. "So, you acknowledge our marriage."

"Hell no!" You click your tongue, frustrated that he always has the perfect comebacks. "Can't you act normal for once? What happened to Aizen Sousuke, the war criminal?"

"You prefer that version of me?" He pushes his hair back. You aren't used to that sight since he always has his hair down when you're alone together.

You visibly cringe. "Stop doing that. What would you do if people recognized you?"

"We're using Kyoka Suigetsu. From their perspective, we are nothing but butterflies attracted to beautiful flowers basking in the moonlight."

You frown at him. "We're literally walking on concrete. Not a single flower can be found here."

"There is."

Aizen raises your chin, staring directly into your eyes. "Hana."

Too stunned to speak, you allow yourself a moment to think.

You finally understand why Aizen was so popular when he was still with the Thirteen Court Guard Squads. His strength, intellect, charisma — the sultry voice and handsome features that you will never admit to his face — he used everything at his disposal to manipulate everyone.

It will never work on you, though. Not today, nor in a million years.

You are good, he is evil. You are yang, he is yin.

You are pure, he is corrupted.

The Soul King can never let Aizen Sousuke dye Her in his color, for that would mean the end of the Three Realms.

You give him a thin smile. "Would you like the Hougyoku back? I can hand it to you now."

"Oh, you jest." Aizen feels the sudden shift in mood and lets you go. That's enough teasing, he muses to himself.

With an eternity to look forward to, he doesn't mind biding his time. You are the Soul King, the strongest, most benevolent, and most dangerous being in the Three Realms. It goes without saying that you are the greatest challenge he will ever face. It could take hundreds or thousands of years — even millions — but he knows that you will submit to him one day.

It's not a matter of if, but when.

You extend a hand at him. "Let's go home, Sousuke."

But, he has to make sure you don't win him over first.

[debossmoo]

100 Sans Aus

I've spent soo long makin this

AU Credits:

Undertale: Tobyfox

Beta Sans: Tobyfox

Handplates: Zarla

Science Sans: ?

Green Sans: goinks

Underfresh: CrayonQueen/LoverOfPiggies

Epictale: Yugogeer

Circustale: maromp

Dancetale: Teandstars

Trainertale: FurryLord

Underswap: popcornpr1nce

TS!Underswap: Team Switched

Inverted Fate: Dorked

Storyshift: Voltra

Altertale: friisans

Dream Sans: Joku

Passive Nightmare: Joku

Nightmare: Joku

Shattered Dream: Drawingerror

SwapDream: Song_A

Underfell: victhefella

Flowerfell: Siviosanei

Hardtale: CedDrawsNear

Negativetale: ValenSealover

Decadent Society: ?

Decadent Society Redesign: d4niztic

Undertale Rusted: PootStaBlook

Afterglory: onezhazha

Negatale: ArtsyGum

Anxiety Sans: hheisa

Asylumtale: Furgemancs

Renewed InsanityTale: SoilingQuasar

Insanity Sans: Zero Danteero

Axetale: uhhbananafrappe

Purgatory: Lumpy Touch

Pick Me: Sour-Apple-Studios

Horrortale: Sour-Apple-Studios

Dusttale: Evan Streblow

Something New: Rahafwabas

XTale: Jael Peñaloza

Outertale: 2mi127

Birdtale: Greyscales (sablescales)

Frosttale: Ssgt Frost

Hypothermia: wiizp_ (idk this one)

Icebound: LuciiiDLL & __b

Flowey Possesion: Jitterz

Naturetale: Valavender

Undersail: MTT Brand Undertale

Oceantale: Forte

Underfell Stories from the Sea: Ozone2005

Reapertale: Ren

Aftertale: LoverofPiggies

Fatal_Error: Xedramon

Error: LoverofPiggies

Wiki Sans: Painted Hen

Ink Sans: Comyet

Steamtale: ?

Renewed InsanitySwap: debossmoo (me!)

Underdolls: debossmoo (also me!)

Tear Sans: EriScary

Sudden Changes: Spouting

Mafiatale: Cutthroat-Jutsu

Cowboy Sans: debossmoo (me)

Freedomtale: ?

Farmtale: GuinongTale_AU

Flufflytale: black-nyanko

Sugartale: ?

Candytale: BabyAbbieStar

Sweettale: hheisa

Smore Sans: debossmoo (me)

VHS Sans: Iamaboss0

Boneliest: Frakture

Echotale: Yoralim/Sansxs

Ultratale: AnimatedZorox

Toxixtale: Loruxsaart

Underlust: NSFWShamecave

Bill Sans: Hwamyong

Color Sans: superyoumna

Undertomb: Shorty

Underworld: CoulsArt

Snowy: SnowyB

UndeRewind: WishingStarInAJar

Mechanic (Sans): SaturnHere

Fargo: varigo

Park Sans: A_lotta_socks

Undertale Overgrown: _sploogezz

Pumpkin: roxies.rox

Bolt: @KevinZheChair

Webcore Sans: @KevinZheChair

Gummy: Lilmadshep (fren)

c0nfus!0n-tale: Satori (also fren)

Crookstale: Crooks (another fren)

Lupa: dusty_ccino (last fren)

DB!Dreamtale Selene: debossmoo

DB!Dreamtale Phobos: debossmoo

Anxietyfell: debossmoo

Sourtale: debossmoo

Outer Error: debossmoo

Horrorfell: debossmoo

and finaly Toxintale: debossmoo

I thried my best to credit everyone but i did miss a few so sry about that.

Hope u enjoy since this took like 2 hours to type…

[skzdust]

Arrange These to Spell Love

Chapter One: Lilac, Purple

Welcome to my new series, Arrange These to Spell Love! @felixs-voice-makes-me-wanna requested a San enemies to lovers fluffy smut, and I kind of took off in a completely different direction... but there will be enemies to lovers and there will be fluff and there will be smut, so I hope you enjoy it regardless! I even decided to include the Yeosang from one of my recent fics... Your Boyfriend, Yeosang. He isn't your boyfriend now, though, of course ;) Thank you for the request, it really kickstarted my creativity!

A few little notes: The flower language book I'm referencing is available through the internet archive here. It's pretty cool, you should check it out! Also, each chapter will be titled after a flower, with its meaning and associated poem at the beginning, to set a tone for and foreshadow the chapter.

Shoutout to Rem, @rems-writing, for the title and for beta reading, and of course my bestie @palindrome969 for beta reading as well!!

Summary: You run Beehive Flowers and Enchantments in your small beach town... and the attractive and infuriating Choi San runs the competition, Seaside Floral. When he calls you asking for help learning about Victorian flower language, you agree to help him. Little did you know what was to follow... involving your town's harvest festival, a wayward enchantment, and your best friend with benefits, Kang Yeosang.

Pairing: Kang Yeosang/Choi San/afab reader love triangle

This chapter includes: unexpected phone calls, "I hate him I swear", wine night with best friend with benefits Yeosang, a family spell book, and Victorian flower poetry

Word count: 1.8k

Taglist (Comment on a post/send an ask if you'd like to be added): @weirdowithaphone, @caught-in-the-afterglow, @palindrome969, @skzstan12345, @katsukis1wife,

@hyunjinsjeans, @somethingkindazainy, @silverstarburst

Network:@mirohs-aurora-society

Reblogs, likes, comments all appreciated!!!

Part 2

Masterlist

-----

LILAC, PURPLE: Too well-known to need description. Flowers purple and white.

FIRST EMOTIONS OF LOVE

"How sweet and rapturous 'tis to feel/ Ourselves exalted in a lovely soul!--/ To know our joys make glow another's cheek,/ Our fears do tremble in another's heart/ Our sufferings bedew another's eye!"

-SCHILLER

"As the little floweret hideth/ By the woodland stream,/ So in youthful hearts abideth/ Love's first witching dream."

-MISS J.A. FLETCHER

San and you were rivals. There was no other word for it.

You owned Beehive Flowers and Enchantments, a flower and spell shop which had been in your family for decades. Your grandmother had run it, then your dad, and now you had taken over. You were the only store that sold flowers or magic in your small beach town, and business was steady.

At least it had been, until Seaside Floral had opened last summer, run by the most attractive man you’d ever seen: Choi San. Unfortunately, he was also the most hateable. He was sweet to customers, but you saw him as smug and deeply competitive.

You’d seen it when you and your mom had brought him a bouquet, last summer, when San had first opened his store. It had been a beautiful arrangement, made of bright yellow, orange, and pink blooms. San had thanked you with a huge grin, but a couple of days later, you saw the flowers in their trash can.

Ever since then, San was number one on your ‘people I dislike’ list.

Sure, he didn’t sell everything you did. Your customers came to you for sleeping potions and home protection charms as much as they did for arrangements. But that didn’t mean he didn’t irk you endlessly.

The shop phone rang as you were removing the leaves from some lilies. You set down the flowers and picked it up. “Hello, Beehive Flowers and Enchantments, this is y/n speaking. How can I help you?”

“Hello, y/n, it’s Choi San, from Seaside Floral.”

You were immediately on the defensive. “Hi, San. What can I do for you?”

“I—” He sighed. “I want to ask you for a favor.”

You bristled. “Why do you think I owe you a favor?”

“You don’t, you don’t.” San rushed to say. “You don’t. I just think another florist is the only one who will really be able to help me.”

“What is it?”

“Can you come to my shop tonight? I think it’ll be easier just to explain in person.”

You sighed. “I’m… I don’t have anything going on. I’ll be there after we close, so probably around 6:30.”

“Perfect. I’ll see you then.”

“Okay.” You sighed. “Bye.���

“Goodbye.”

You set the receiver down and just stared into space for a moment. The Choi San you knew would never just call you for help for no reason. You wondered for a moment if there was some flower-related subterfuge going on, then banished the thought. That was silly. And San wasn’t that creative.

The day seemed to fly by, and soon enough you were locking up the store. You glanced at your phone. You’d get to San’s a bit early, but that was fine.

You walked through the town to Seaside Floral, trying to predict what San was going to want, but truly, you had no idea. You arrived at the shop at 6:20, and looked in through the front window, past their CLOSED sign.

San was standing behind the counter, his tongue sticking out the corner of his mouth as he snipped the bottom of a rose. He set it in a vase full of foliage and tilted his head at it, moving a few of the flowers and smiling at it.

He looked adorable, and your smiled before remembering that it was San and adjusting your expression to be stonier. You walked to the door and knocked.

San opened it a second later, wiping his hands on his apron, a stray leaf sticking to the front of him. “Y/n! Thank you so much for coming.”

“What do you want?” You raised your eyebrows, stepping into the shop. “I must say, I was a little surprised at your call.”

San laughed. “Yeah, I know we haven’t been very cooperative with each other, but I want to change that. I think if we did some events or promotions together it could be good for both of us.”

“So you want to plan something?”

“Maybe a flower stall or something at the harvest festival, we could both sell stems and you could have some fall themed enchantments or something… but no, not tonight.” San locked the door, and you followed him to the counter. “One of my customers wants to use Victorian flower language in the centerpieces of her wedding. She seemed pretty confident in my abilities to do something with it, but I’m… pretty clueless on that topic.” He smiled sheepishly. “Maybe that makes me a bad florist. I thought you might know, though. You seem like you’d be into meanings of flowers. So, I was wondering if you’d teach me.”

You blinked. You weren’t sure what you’d been expecting, but it certainly wasn’t this. “I do know about Victorian flower language.”

“So, you’ll teach me?” San’s smile was hopeful.

“Why don’t you just, like, google it?”

“I feel like this is something that should be taught, not googled.” San picked up a stem, twirling it between two fingers. “And I feel like you’d be a good teacher.”

You hesitated for a moment. “That’s white jasmine, which means, like… kind love, sweet love.”

San beamed. “I feel like I should be taking notes!”

“Don’t take notes.” You shook your head. “You should try to memorize them. It makes you look like more of an expert when a customer asks about it.”

“No notes, then.” San pulled out his phone. “Here, I’ll give you my number.”

You couldn’t believe it, but you typed San’s number into your phone.

He was acting so nice. You couldn’t let him fool you.

—

Your took another sip from your wine glass. “Yeah, and then he asked for my number.”

“Your number?” Yeosang lifted his eyebrows. “Really? Did he need that?”

“I don’t really think so.” You shook your head.

“Why are you helping him, anyway?” Yeosang asked. “I thought he was the competition.”

“He is.” You looked down.  “I’m… I don’t know, I’m accepting the olive branch.”

“Why?”

You shrugged. “He said he wants to do a flower stall come autumn, for the harvest festival, and maybe he’s right. It would be good for business.”

“That sounds like a lot of work.” Yeosang scooted a bit closer to you on the couch. “You’d have to be on your game to have something at that festival, it’s so popular.”

“It sounded like he’d thought a lot about it, even mentioned enchantments I could sell. I don’t know what he’s trying to do.” You mumbled, looking into your glass as if the wine would tell you San’s true intentions.

“I do think you should keep him at arm’s length. He’s kind of been a dick in the past.”

You nodded. “Oh, I have no plans to be best friends with the guy.”

Yeosang nudged your shoulder. “As your best friend, I’d hope not.”

You looked at him, smiling. “I could never replace you, Sangie.”

“You better not.” Yeosang winked.

Your heart jumped. Yeosang was your best friend with benefits, but you’d agreed that outside of occasional really hot sex, you couldn’t become more. You’d dated for a bit in college, when you’d lived together, but when you’d both moved back to your hometown, you’d broken up. Neither of you wanted to risk your relationship as best friends.

But you’d be lying if you said you didn’t want to wake up with him every morning, instead of just every so often.

—

You got unreasonably excited about your first flower language lesson with San as you flipped through the pages of the 1850s botanical book that your mother had given you, passed down from her family. It was one of your most valued possessions, and it was where you’d learned all you knew about Victorian flower language, as well as being the family spell book. It was reassuring to see all of your knowledge written out in old ink on old pages. It also soothed you to see the loopy handwriting along the edges of the pages, spells and recipes written out in the book. It was proof that generations of witches were on your side.

You didn’t bring the book with you as you got your things together to go to Seaside Floral that evening. It was too precious to risk something happening to it. Instead, you took some flowers from the shop that you wanted to tell San about. You would go into this lesson prepared.

You knocked at the door right at 6:30 this time.

“Stressed?” Your eyes flicked to San’s hair when he opened the door, which was messy, like he’d been running his hands through it repeatedly.

He gave a short laugh. “You could say. I’m just rushing for this wedding.”

“Then I guess I’ll start with flowers that represent love.” You carefully pulled a white flower with long petals out of your bag. “Lemon blossoms for fidelity in love.”

San picked up the bloom. “Lemon blossoms… I didn’t know that even flowers from fruits had meanings.”

“Oh, almost every plant has a meaning.” You held out a vine of ivy next. “Ivy is also fidelity, but it has a slightly different meaning… ‘I cling to thee’… which might sound bad, people think clinginess is bad, but it was actually quite a sweet and desirable The lemon blossom has the connotation of lemon, which means zest, so it’s a bit more enthusiastic in its commitment, whereas the ivy is more sentimental.”

San took the ivy from you, looking at it thoughtfully.

You went on. “Some of them have poems, too. I have this… this book that’s full of all of this information. It’s old, but the poems are nice.”

“Is there one for ivy?” San looked at you.

You cleared your throat. “Yes… it’s pretty… um… sappy. That’s how a lot of Victorian poetry is, I guess.”

“Do you know it?”

“Yeah.” You sighed. “Long have I sought, and vainly have I yearned to meet some spirit that could answer mine; then chide me not that I so soon have learned to talk with thine. Oh, thou wilt cherish what some hearts would spurn, so gentle and so full of soul thou art; and shrine my feelings in that holy urn— thine own true heart.”

San smiled. “It’s not great poetry, but it’s sweet.”

You shrugged. “Ivy often reflects matrimony, so it’s very lovey-dovey writing.”

“Ivy… matrimony.” He nodded. “Perfect for a wedding bouquet, then.’”

“Yeah, you’re getting it.”

“This is interesting.” San stared at the ivy. “I wonder if anyone will get it.”

“Probably not.” You grinned. “But you’ll get it, and I’ll get it, and I think it’s fun.”

“It is fun.” San looked back at you. “Show me another one.”

You left the shop wanting to hex San much less than usual.

[feminist-space]

"After spending the past three decades of his life being totally unable and unwilling to engage in any meaningful way with the world around him, James Parker, a local guy who sucks at being a person, told reporters Thursday that he saw huge potential in AI. “While it’s still in its early phase, artificial intelligence will one day accomplish things that humans could have never even dreamed of doing,” said Parker, who, by all accounts, has never stretched himself to do something he found difficult; has never created anything truly original; and, deep down, has absolutely zero understanding of what makes things good, enjoyable, or rewarding.

“Just yesterday, I asked an AI program to write an entire sci-fi novel for me, and [as someone who will die an empty shell of a man who wasted his life doing nothing for the world and, perhaps, should never have been born] I was super impressed. Soon, humans won’t need to do anything at all! Awesome.” At press time, Parker added that as someone whose contributions to society would almost certainly be measured cumulatively as a net loss, he also saw great potential in the future of the metaverse."

[storkmuffin]

The Magic of San (6/n)

Marilyn Monroe Sidebar #4/4 ( Sidebar 1, Sidebar 2, Sidebar 3)

No but seriously, you guys, there are so many similarities between Marilyn Monroe and Choi San. Please agree with me.

On and off.

Marilyn Monroe was fabulous at being a movie star. She could turn it on or off at whim, according to at least one friend (Lee Strasberg's daughter). She was invisible just walking along the street in normal clothes in New York City, dressed simply, and nobody noticed her, beyond maybe, Oh that's a pretty lady. Then she asked her friend, Do you want me to become her? and the person who witnessed it happen couldn't actually articulate what it is she did, only that she did something and suddenly Norma Jean was gone and Marilyn Monroe was there, in the same clothes and get up but nevertheless suddenly present, and people swarmed.

Marilyn was also apparently absolutely delightful to fans. Anyone who ever saw her at a movie premier had a wonderful time, because she loved the red carpet, loved her fans, and really 'performed' being a movie star for them.

In his TokToq Live on 2025.1.19, San said that he sometimes has this feeling that he is 'not himself' when he's performing on stage. (TBF, I have heard Beyonce say this too, actually, and she names her stage persona entirely different from her actual name). Furthermore, he is often told that he "looks like San of Ateez" but nobody ever actually clocks him. This has led him, in his characteristic way, to wonder "Is my flesh and blood self not very exciting?" (내가 실물이 별로인가?) but I think possibly, he has this "on" persona and an "off" persona. "On" San is immediately recognizable, "off" San just looks like a boy who looks a lot like San of Ateez. There's a great post that makes the distinction between San and "Sanimal." I wonder if all great stars have this??

San shows a lot of deliberation about what it means to be an idol. There are expectations for how he is supposed to behave. San has learned what the rules are, and wants very much to adhere to them. He's paired with Wooyoung a lot, who also is very aware of what the rules are, and gets off on deliberately flouting them. San will calmly lecture Wooyoung about his failure to behave like an Idol, insisting "remember you're an Idol" when Wooyoung purposefully acts against the role of model citizen that S. Korean society demands of Idols.

On a different live, (2025.1.27) San has addressed when the fans in attendance who were apparently cursing at him to get his attention. He laid out his boundaries: He can tolerate 미친 but beyond that is a bit difficult to stomach. He said note that since many foreigners are all intentinoally learning Korean swear words, he tries to accept the strong language when it is used as adjectives - as in 'fucking' is fine if it's in the context of "I fucking loved the show" perhaps, but a straight up, aggressively intended "fuck you" would not be ok. Then he said, as a statement, 여러분은 평생 내가 욕하는 거 들을 리 없겠지만. (You would never hear me swear your whole lives.) I thought this was an extraordinary statement for a guy who's 25 and planning to stay in the public eye decades to say. How would that be sustainable? But he intends to see it through - of that I have no doubt.

Studious

Both San and Marilyn are hardworking people, sure, but I actually think most people are hardworking if you give them something with even a modicum of meaning. What San and Marilyn are, actually, are studious, almost bookish.

Marilyn had a major intellectual hunger that was never actually fulfilled, mostly because given the combination sexism and resentment that her great beauty inspired, she was so relentlessly mocked for her intellectual curiosity. But she read, challenging herself to difficult texts, wrote, had considered and rather brave political opinions. Towards the end of her life, Marilyn was trying to figure herself out by making recordings of her thoughts, going to therapy, taking difficult acting classes, and for a while, very reliant on a strict acting coach. Marilyn and Natasha Lytesse are still speculated on as being lovers, which I don't really care about, but Marilyn did insist on having Natasha present on her sets and listened only to her. This too was mocked, but I assume Marilyn's reliance on this coach wasn't just the usefulness of whatever coaching she got - Lytesse was possibly the only person on set who took Marilyn seriously as an artist. Marilyn kept wanting to get better, and be serious, and make art.

As a bookish person who also loves the idea of expanding my inner world by taking in external stimulus, it always hurts me that Marilyn never had anybody take her intellectual yearnings seriously - not Joe DiMaggio, not Arthur Miller, very few of her male costars, even fewer directors. She was just born at the wrong time, in so many ways. I feel like her equivalent may actually be Nicole Kidman - a superlatively beautiful actress who wants to make dark material. Kidman of course was raised in a stable, intellectual home.

San has exhibited a similar lack of pride and hunger for artistic achievement. It can't have been easy, necessarily, to be a stiff, slightly awkward dancer with mostly a martial arts background asking for coaching and attention from very near peers. It speaks to a lackof unnecessary pride, which I think is rare to find in very young people. San's dance performances are to my eye the most 'ballet' to me, in terms of his having absorbed whatever classes he got in formal dance training and insisting on keeping those in his body. San is, along with Hong Joong, the only singer in this singing group that seems to just constantly burst into song. (I have not seen a long of Jongho footage, tbf). Whenever he's bored, waiting for other people to get ready for him, or his mood improves, he just starts singing. Other members have said that he's a bit of a practice nut, constantly working on improving himself in a way they found transformative and inspirational.

And one more thing -

Throughout the European concert tour, San has discussed his continuing to study English. He devotes 30 minutes per day every day to studying, and he does it using a very standard textbook. I found this so moving, that he would tell people about it (creating external accountability) and be so sweetly proud of the progress he was making in his book.

San is gifted at languages by the way. I too am gifted at languages, so I am the authority on this. This Atiny on Tumblr has noticed it too, that he has an ear and a knack for correct pronunciation ( in this case, German). His English pronunciation seem like real accomplishments to me. I assume that his being a gifted singer has something to do with this - he can hear with great attention to detail, so it helps him replicate the sounds better. During their Japanese TV special, San made a concerted effort to try to speak Japanese with the people that he met as well as the crew, even if it's imperfect, because this is how you improve. (Yunho seems the most fluent in Japanese, but that's just ... Yunho, to be good at all the idol things lol, which in Kpop includes speaking Japanese).

The encouragement and admiration that San's fans express for him when he talks about studying English or Japanese is something I'm so happy he has, and I wish Marilyn had had something like that too. **

**Though I don't know -would she? If say, another (I think) very smart, sexy little blonde (say, Sabrina Carpenter) went on social media and talked about how she was teaching herself German so she could read Goethe, would her fans support her?