#did any of that make sense or am i just saying stuff.

[joedirtymadre]

Honeymoon Phase

AIZAWA X READER! (FLUFF!) Hope you enjoy! (Accepting requests!!)

You laid across your couch, reading a new book you grabbed after work. You sighed to yourself, you tried to concentrate on your book, but couldn’t shake off your built up frustration… “Ughh, I’ve reread this page 4 times already and I don’t even know what it’s about!” You groaned as you tossed it onto the side table. You sat up and immediately began bouncing your leg, “It’s been 2 months… 2 whole months… I know the honeymoon stage dies, but this badly?” You sighed as you sat back.

You stared at your wedding photo of you and Shota, “We’ve always been obsessed with each other… but he’s died down drastically… in the span of 2 months. We’ve barely been married for a year and he’s already tired of me? I miss the nights he would…” you felt your cheeks burn as you would think back to those long nights. You stood up and walked over to your bathroom, staring into the mirror. You analyzed your face, body, and hair, “Maybe he thinks I’ve let myself go…” You said to yourself softly.

Suddenly an idea popped into your brain. “I’ll surprise him! Though he hates surprises… but it’ll be fine! Where’s my makeup?” You asked excitedly. Hoping you would finish your plan before he arrives home.

You raced to put on some light makeup, a nice black dress, and fixed your hair. You checked the mirror and nodded, “Now onto the kitchen!” you beamed as you raced over to throw on an apron. You decided to make some curry with rice. After cooking you set up the table and placed two hot plates on the table. You looked over at the clock and rushed over to throw your apron in the laundry room. With a minute to spare you topped off your glasses with some wine and stood excitedly by the door. 

Right on time your husband slowly opened the door, “I’m ho-” he stopped himself as he was surprised by your presence. “(Y/N)?” He asked, confused. “Hi honey,” you smiled. “Hey… what’s up with the get up?” He asked as he placed his stuff down. “I-I just wanted to look nice for y-you…” you trailed off. “Ah,” he nodded. “I also made some food,” you smiled excitedly. “Oh no thanks, I had a pretty big lunch at work so I’m not hungry,” he said as he put on his slippers and headed towards the restroom. “O-Oh…” you said softly. “I’m gonna go wash up,” he said as he shut the door behind him. “Kay…” you replied. You slowly walked over to the table and stared at the plates. 

You grabbed them and decided to toss the food in the garbage. “I’m not hungry either…” you whispered to yourself as you cleared the table. Once finishing you headed towards your bedroom to undress and remove your makeup. “So much for a surprise…” you sighed as you looked into your bedroom mirror and stared at your pajamas. 

You walked back to the living room seeing Shota lounging on the sofa reading a book. You decided to continue yours, you grabbed your book and sat on the opposite end of the couch. “Did you put the food into the fridge?” He asked. “No,” you replied. “Did you eat it all?” He asked. “I tossed it,” You responded, not once looking up from your book. “Huh? Why would you do that?” He asked. “You didn’t want it, I didn’t want it. Why wouldn’t I toss it?” You asked. “I would’ve taken it to work,” he replied. You glanced over to him, and noticed the perplexed look on his face. “I wanted to surprise you with a meal, you didn’t want the meal. So I got rid of it, I didn’t want to see it later and think of how you paid no mind to my efforts,” you said coldly. “Efforts? You’re not making any sense (Y/N),” Shota said as he inched closer. 

“What am I saying that’s making it so hard for you to understand? For the past 2 months I’ve received nothing from you, you’ve changed… You used to bring flowers, desserts, tell me I’m pretty, small things like that. But recently everything stopped, I thought I was the problem… Maybe I let myself get too comfortable or let myself go… so I wanted to surprise you, I got dolled up and made a nice meal for us to sit and catch up. But-... It’s fine, it doesn’t matter…” you explained. “(Y/N)...” you heard him trail off, you felt him move closer to you. But making sure you glue your eyes to your book. “(Y/N) please look at me,” he pleaded. “For?” You asked. “(Y/N), please,” he said softly. You knew he was sitting right next to you, you moved your eyes slightly towards him. “Yes?” You asked softly, hoping your voice doesn’t crack.

“I’m sorry… I’ve been so busy with work and the students that I didn’t notice you felt this way,” he said as he cupped your face. “I said it’s fine… Everyone says the honeymoon stage doesn’t last forever. Of course you’d eventually get tired of me,” you said softly as you stared into his eyes. “I would never get tired of you. Please forgive me, I didn’t mean to make you feel like I don’t care about you. You know I’m obsessed with you, I love you,” he said softly as he inched towards you. You placed your finger over his lips, “What makes you think I’ll give you a kiss? 2 months with no kissing, hugging, spooning, or…” you felt your ears burn red as you avoided his eyes. “I’m sorry, please forgive me. I want to make it up to you,” he smiled softly as he placed your hand in his and kissed it. 

“Hmph,” you turned your face, wanting to hide your blush. “Thank you for dinner, it looked delicious,” he smiled. “It did…” you replied. “And… you looked beautiful, I had to hide away in the restroom or else I would’ve…” he trailed off. “Huh?” You asked as you turned to face him. “Well you always look amazing, but you wore that dress I love. How else would you expect me to act, but normally I always keep my cool around you. I didn’t wanna scare you,” he replied as he cupped your face again. “You noticed? I was afraid you thought it was just any black dress,” you laughed. “Of course I noticed, but I’m sorry I didn’t notice how much I’ve been slacking these past few months. I’ll do better, starting now,” he said as he stood up. 

“Right now?” You asked. You watched as he extended a hand out to you, you slowly placed yours in his. He slowly helped you up, but you were soon tossed over his shoulder. “W-Wait! Shota?” You gasped. He then walked towards the kitchen table, “And we’ll be needing this,” he said as he grabbed a wine bottle. “Now let’s go,” he said. “Go?” you asked. “Yeah, you said I haven’t been showing you any attention for the past 2 months. Well I’ll make up for that, right now. Hope you’re ready (Y/N),” He said as he headed towards your bedroom. 

You felt your face burning. Feeling nervous for the night ahead, but you can’t lie to yourself, you’re also really excited for what’s about to come.  

[thecoolerliauditore]

Pls tell me about Scott's views on women in general pls I'm begging you

o7 and I'm sorry

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

fyi, the post itself isn't NSFW, but I'll be getting all gender theory in this bitch so I'll be referencing a lot of things and putting in pictures of naked ppl sometimes. maybe skip this one if you don't like that

(long post)

Disclaimers

An explanation for the tweet up there

I usually don't write these because I assume the people on my blog have enough sense to realise when I'm talking about the characters vs the CCs or are comfortable enough being a little confused, but I feel the need to extra-clarify here and expand on how I specifically view C vs CC because I think it differs a little from the average person.

To me, C and CC are two separate entities but not entirely disconnected. What differs (e.g. the exclusion of irl relationships -- their wives, kids, etc.) is poignant enough to severely detach them from the people they originated from, at least in my eyes, but there's also the fact that these are not scripted characters, just creators being themselves with a hint of behind the scenes drama-adding and improv thrown in.

For example, CC Pearl is a car nerd. So I assume her character is too.

This is where I state very clearly that yes, a lot of these thoughts come from things I've seen on Scott's twitter, which is undoubtedly the CC and not the C. However I, to me, am still talking about the C because any observations/judgments I could make on actual irl youtuber CC guy Scott Major would be tabloid at best and slightly invasive at worst. I'm seeing these statements within the context of "the death game guy would say this too and I'm writing this based on that", not "this is the inner psychological workings of the youtuber because I, as a fan, can totally tell".

TLDR I don't consider this post RPF but you might. This is a little more RPF-y than my usual stuff. If you don't rock with it we cool.

Everyone is weird about women, and that's okay

One short-hand I've used in the past to talk about Scott and women is just by saying that he's "weird about women" which I'm sure isn't exclusive to him.

(shitpost I made awhile back)

I see a lot of people now who love "villains" and "evil" but when it comes to any traits resembling real life evil (e.g. misogyny in this case) they suddenly become insecure. Just a couple of days back a saw a post on twitter essentially asking for permission to continue liking CC Scott in spite of the "bad things" he did.

And I think, in order to present an analysis like this, I must address that mindset first.

This is not a judgment on Scott's morality, nor is it trying to dissuade you from liking him. This is not saying that he is any more misogynistic than any other player in the series. This is just me pointing out Scott's attitude towards women and what I read it as, nothing less or more.

The feelings that me pointing these things out - be they apathy, disgust, anger or, what I would hope to see most, interest - are your own. I'm not here to tell anyone how to feel and never will try to police that on my blog.

Scott's Relationships with Women

aka. oh yeah this is about minecraft.

Scott and Cleo || "Yeah, you can kill me."

Scott and Cleo's alliance is arguably the strongest in the entire series, spanning through all five seasons and remaining unbroken with no (serious) drama attached. You'd expect from this that they two have a very settled and stable understanding of eachother, yet this isn't a case.

Their power dynamic shifts dramatically from one season to the next.

3L's initial Widows Alliance began on fairly equal footing, built on the mutual agreement that they were waiting for their respective partners to die. Both understood they were eachothers' "plan B" and felt comfortable in that arrangement.

Come LL, Cleo does what she couldn't in 3L, and initiates that plan, going to Scott after her last alliance, the fairy fort, fell apart. Scott requests nothing from her in return.

DL is the longest the two spent as eachothers main ally. Cleo is the one who initially proposes teaming up to spite their "cheating" soulmates and Scott agrees. Cleo admits to Martyn in private that she's aware she's taking advantage of Scott (which I've always interpreted as her talking about all seasons, not just DL). Due to the time they spend together, it's here where it becomes apparent that their initial assumptions during 3L were not entirely accurate, as Scott shows a level of gameplay competency much higher than Cleo's (e.g. teaching her how to axe-crit) but despite this Scott never berates her or thinks any less of her value as his ally.

LimL is probably this pairing at their most unhinged, as Scott, despite once again asking for nothing (or very little -- I'll be honest I'm a bit fuzzy on this) in return from Cleo, allows them and their allies to butcher him repeatedly for time. He gives more time to the Clockers than he does to Martyn, his closest ally that season. Despite this, Scott is never ever considered as a "family member" by the Clockers, despite them giving that title to even temporary allies (like the Bad Boys being their cousins) -- even Martyn gets a title with Scott completely unattached.

SL is relatively more chill, but shows that the two inevitably end up teaming together even despite their oath to avoid eachother that season.

The point being -- again and again, we see Scott literally and metaphorically making sacrifices for Cleo, with the only real transaction he requires from her being that she continues having his back when times get rough. This is despite that he's aware she isn't any more capable than he is and the fact that so far it has only been Cleo in rough times (LL, LimL and SL) and never Scott.

Speaking from a purely transactional perspective, Scott is not getting a bargain here -- and even Cleo seems acutely aware of it, judging by her comment during DL as well as the way she tends to speak of her survival capabilities very lowly in general ("rubbish pvp skills and spiffy one-liners"). I'm speaking in this sense because I've seen discussions in the past about the transactional way Scott views relationships but rarely does Cleo get brought up.

This is at stark contrast to how he treats Jimmy, whose predicted death was what spurred on Scott and Cleo's alliance in the first place.

Scott assumes Jimmy is "incompetent", where he assumes Cleo is capable. When Jimmy messes up, he reprimands him, when Cleo struggles to crit him, he patiently teaches her. When LL begins, Scott's first instinct was to look at Jimmy's lives and note that he was "useless to (him)", but holds no objections to Cleo joining his alliance despite her already having enemies being a potential liability. In SL, he jokes about how Cleo and him being allied is a given and pretty much expected of them, whereas in LimL he explicitly requests from Jimmy a recognition that he still cares ("say love you back!") before he will help him.

Scott and Gem || "You HAVE TO kill me, Gem,"

In SL, Gem settles in very easily in a leadership position within Gem and the Scotts due to her trying to live up to her reputation but also due to Scott and Impulse's more laid back, passive playstyles.

Both Scott and Impulse let Gem kill them for extra health this season, although Scott is arguably much more subservient than Impulse is, with him not only insisting that she kill him in the final episode but also not fighting back (and only yelling for her to stop) when she starts hitting him with a sword during the episode where her task was to literally kill everyone on the server.

Once again comparing her to Jimmy, Scott in 3L had a tendency to brush aside Jimmy's concerns over alliances (e.g. Jimmy questioning if they could trust Cleo) while in SL Scott runs his plans by Gem (and Pearl and Impulse) in terms of who he wanted to team up with (specifically excluding Joel from the potential mounders alliance) implying he held her opinion in some form of regard.

Before this becomes less of an analysis of Scott's treatment of men vs women and more of Scott's treatment of Jimmy vs everyone else, I think it's notable enough to mention that he and Martyn also lacked this sort of communication in LimL. He would inform Martyn of his plans, but rarely was it ever framed as a request.

SL almost feels as if Scott has slid Gem into the slot he had previously designated for Cleo in 3L (his girlboss ally) as he provides her and pretty much forces onto her by the end the acts of service he'd become accustomed to performing for Cleo.

Scott and Lizzie || "You killed her! I don't.. I don't know what to even say!"

Relatively shorter section because this is the one woman he hasn't teamed with, but there's still some interesting stuff I wanted to touch on.

In LL, one of the first thing Scott does is yell at Pearl to revenge-kill Joel for boogey-killing him. Pearl does as she's told and Joel's wet miserable pathetic LL life gets worse from there.

Several episodes later, the roles are reversed -- Lizzie lies to both of them and manages to isolate and boogey-kill Pearl. Scott, instead of reacting with the anger he had for Joel, is almost in a state of shock as he asks Lizzie to let him down so he could collect Pearl's belongings. He doesn't act aggressively towards Lizzie at all, with his most antagonizing act against her being to lie about his intentions when giving her a wither skull.

In SL, he's the only one aware of her early permadeath, but keeps quiet about it almost as if he's in a state of shock akin to when he saw Lizzie kill Pearl in LL. It's not until the others have noticed when he finally brings it up.

Scott and Pearl || "Tilly death do us 'part"

I wrote a whole post just for their relationship alone so for the sake of my sanity I'll be leaving this here.

So now I get to dedicate this section to the meat of this post -- how the way Scott treats women in general impacts his relationship with Pearl and how I view his heel-turn on her as seeping with relevance to Pearl's perceived gender.

In all three of the previous sections, the running theme is that Scott is 1. kinder and more patient with women, regardless of their competency and 2. someone who likes to be in a supporting role to women, occasionally aiding them more than he aids himself and his closer male allies (e.g. Jimmy and Martyn). As shown with Cleo, he assumes that girls have it together, but even if they don't it's not a big deal. When a girl's actions are truly disastrous, such as with Lizzie's, he goes into a state of shock and doesn't really react, preferring to swallow it down and not acknowledge it.

With the amount of times he sacrifices himself, I don't think it's a reach to say that Scott values his own life less than he values the lives of his (female) allies. This specific point actually does extend to his male allies too, shown when he's happy when Martyn literally backstabs him in LimL, but just as with the Martyn post where I point out his victim status-ing doesn't end at only women but includes all the women, Scott has pedastal-ed all the women he's teamed with.

Lizzie is, once again, the exception here due to his limited interactions with her. However that's actually somewhat patched over if you look at adjacent series (such as x-life) where he definitely shows her a level of admiration and respect.

Back to Scott and Pearl.

Their relationship during LL is very standard of how Scott treats women. While the power dynamic between them is obviously more caused by the initial life trade agreement, I don't think it's a far reach to say that Scott is somewhat comfortable in the arrangement.

However, this is also the first thing that sets their relationship apart from Scott with Cleo or Gem -- Pearl is the one making sacrifices, not Scott. She is the one "sacrificing" her lives to him, just in a more non-violent way as allowed by the season's mechanics.

When viewed through this lens, Scott trying to make it up to her and wanting his effort acknowledged makes even more sense. This is suddenly uncharted waters for him. His assuming that Pearl doesn't value him as a person goes hand in hand with him valuing himself less than her.

What Scott has with Cleo or Gem, situations where the other party is clearly uncomfortable with how he treats himself (Gem) or actively aware they are taking advantage of him (Cleo), is equalized to him because he is inherently worth less. What he has with Pearl, on the other hand, looks more equal to most people (lives vs labour) but is wildly imbalanced to him.

It's one of the many factors I see going into Scott's weird decision to abandon her in DL.

An Interlude, Before We Get to DL

La Pieta, Michelangelo

So this has been a lot of words so far and some of you might be wondering at this point: why say Scott is "weird" about women when so far this has been describing how he values women more, is kinder to them, is more patient with them, etc.? How is any of this behaviour remotely misogynistic?

And I would feel horrible if I forced you to read through all of my DL thoughts before I clarified this -- Scott is not your classic wifebeater "women are lesser" misogynist, Scott is someone who subscribes to misogynistic schools of thought and probably considers himself an ally to women, when in reality his beliefs are still rooted in dehumanizing them and these beliefs end up harming the women around him as well as himself.

After all, seeing women are your superiors is still not seeing them as your equals.

I know it's a bit of a meme on this blog at this point. But. Sigmund Freud identified what we know refer to as the "madonna/whore complex", which he described as a pattern of behaviour in men who separated women into being madonnas (pure, holy and admirable) and whores (debased, sexual, deviant). We'll be focusing on the former, the madonna, as it is more relevant to Scott's character.

Freud proposed that the madonna figure was something men projected onto women as a replacement for maternal love. These women are sacred and untouchable, literally as the projection of the maternal role onto them also makes it so that the sufferer cannot feel any sexual attraction towards her (keep this in mind for later).

Scott projects the madonna figure onto his female compatriots -- they are to be protected, served and supported. They are goddesses, queens, but they are never human. The madonna role in of itself is not inherently harmful to the woman, as seen with Cleo who takes control and advantage of it. However, it is enforced, as seen with Gem who at first revels in the superiority but almost breaks down when Scott offers him up as her sacrificial lamb one last time.

I linked this Utena AMV awhile back when vaguely talking about Scott and women, and this was the point I was alluding to.

Girls are beautiful and pure. They don't spit on the street, they don't piss on the street, they don't build hierarchies -- they subvert all the expectations of masculinity that I hate having to deal with. They are my escape.

But what about the girls who do spit on the street? The girls who piss on seats? Who build social hierarchies, who size up their competition?

The girls Scott interacts with are all painfully human. Cleo weaponizes his beliefs and take advantage of him. Scott is smart enough to know and accept this. Gem's playing into a role she has been assigned into by not only Scott but everyone around her. Scott supports the character she plays. Lizzie reflects traits he hates in Joel and Jimmy, but for her, he looks the other way.

Are they "demons", as the song says, or are they no longer girls at all?

(demons, gods, but never humans)

Weaponized Femininity and Women In Total Control of Themselves ;)

Hylas and the Nymphs, John William Waterhouse

Historically, weaponized femininity I'd argue is one of the oldest tropes in storytelling. Whether it's nymphs or sirens or witches or succubi or even more roundabout cases like Helen of Troy, there's countless stories of men's sexual attraction to women leading them to disaster.

One way to view these stories is to see them as warnings, don't let womens allure be the end of you.

There's a lot of good writing done on the femme fatale trope both in the context of weaponizing femininity and as a sexist way to argue against victims of sexual assault, as these stories often say that men who experience attraction to these "evil" women no longer have agency over their own actions.

Look at the painting above, for example - is it the nymphs who are responsible for drowning Hylas, or is Hylas climbing into the lake of his own accord?

Despite the fact we all know sirens, nymphs and succubi aren't real, the belief that men will simply lose control of themselves when encountering a particularly alluring woman persists to the modern consciousness. That there's something inherently dangerous about women and attraction to them.

(this is not 100% applicable to Ninja saying he won't stream with women, but it's the real life example I felt most comfortable putting in here)

Now, let's combine this with what's been said so far -- let's say you don't hate women. You love women, in fact, and you hate the way men treat women. You hate men, in fact.

Yet, you still believe in this inherent power women hold by being female and the loss of agency that men experience when attracted to them -- how disgusting.

It quickly becomes easily to not only demonize men for sullying the holiness of women, but also men, masculinity and attraction to women as a whole.

(apologies for using twt discourse in the meta post but this flew by my TL and i had to grab the irl example of mens non-violent attraction to women being used to frame them as misogynistic before the stupid app refreshed and i lose everything forever)

"To Venner" is a student film exploring a world set within this belief, where all the women have vanished and the men have become monstrous figures as a result of their pent up sexual frustration. fyi this is one of my favourite student films (and ive watched a bunch), but I do think its messaging is worth breaking down (especially its juxtaposition of dirty horrible monstrous sexuality vs pure and beautiful romantic love)

NOTE: this film is super graphic, lots of violence and nudity. have fun. or not

I admit this section is a bit hard to gauge as everyone in the series is gay as fuck. The closest in-series example I can think of is Scott reacting to Martyn's antics in DL with a sort of indigence but otherwise I can't really think of an example of a man expressing attraction to a woman at all, let alone one Scott reacted to. However, I do think it's still worth talking about because it opens up some interesting trains of thought in regard to Scott and Pearl.

For Scott, he himself has never been part of the picture. He's gay, after all, which gives him an edge over the bad straight men who objectify and assault women. Likewise, there's little evidence to suggest he finds the expectations of masculinity frustrating, but I don't think it's too far a reach considering how common of an experience that is for gay men and his adapting of more feminine mannerisms.

Double Life and Corruption

As mentioned in my previously linked post about Scott and Pearl's relationship, I do think Scott experiences what he would name as attraction towards Pearl, so my writing will reflect that.

Pearl is. ahem. not like other girls.

Not actually. But to Scott, she probably isn't like other girls.

She remains unaware of his different standards for her (how could she when she had nothing to compare them to), she acts out, sometimes violently, against Scott's urging (such as when she stole from Scar's wagon). She maintains their already irregular dynamic, and while she appreciates his care for her, she never quite falls into seeing him as a source of subservience the way Cleo or Gem do.

At the end of LL, right before the 1v1v1v1, she monologues to herself that she no longer has to feel bad for killing Scott. Which, in turn, implies she expected Scott to give it his all against her as well.

She entirely fails to embody the madonna with her immature naivete and her questionable morals. She is unpredictable, she doesn't take what she is owed, she is a monster in a lot of ways.

Scott, too, is a monster, to himself, for how he feels about her.

The very foundations of your understanding of yourself being ripped apart aside, let's rewind to the madonna/whore complex. To sexualise the madonna is to corrupt her and make a monster of yourself. Suddenly, you are no better than the men around you, the ones you've grown to hate. Suddenly, you are the grotesque figures in films like To Venner. You are Hylas and she is the nymph. And you are so stupid. Your worldview crumbles around its flawed foundations.

Scott is, however, immune to this corruption. This is a theme that appears in Empires as well, but throughout the traffic series he's prided himself on being loyal and kind and good. His monologue leading up to LL's 1v1v1v1 summarizes it quite well.

He can't let himself or anyone else see this side of him, but the energy needs to go somewhere. To defy fate, abandon your soulmate, is to admit you had a fate in the first place, is to acknowledge that she was your soulmate in the first place.

I've previously talked about how fate and romance are very ingrained in Scott's belief system, if it was anyone else it would've been amazing. He could've been like Bdubs and Impulse or Ren and Bigb, diving into domestic life and performative romance with a stranger. Or the world could've made his happy ending from 3L real, as he got to be Jimmy's husband all over again. I think it says something that he accepts Cleo as a "soulmate" before Pearl.

So what do you do with all that energy and tension, clearly apparent to yourself and everyone else, when you can't let them observe your feelings?

You project them.

Shout-outs to @/legally-allowed-to-slime for pointing out Pearl's comment early on in DL that she "feels like (she's) been broken up with" confirms she never saw Scott in a romantic sense. The "crazy ex-girlfriend" and "this is why I'm gay" comments really did come out of thin air, or perhaps insecurity.

Pearl is the crazy one. She's insane, because she wants me. She wants to be with me, so she does all this crazy stuff. She's lost control of herself because she wants me. She's disgusting.

I mentioned before that Scott is not your classic misogynist, but this is where the gears start turning. Scott's views of Pearl echo that of other players, most prominently Ren and Martyn, that Pearl has been overcome with some sort of corruption. She has become the witch, the demoness, the whore, in their eyes. Scott does not want to be the same as these men and I think his overcorrecting his behaviour in SL makes sense when you view it from this angle, but for now he has to rely on more traditional misogyny in order to navigate this new obstacle.

"Corruption" also implies that she had to have been pure (or at least pure-er) beforehand, something Scott personally knows is not true, but it falls in line with defaulting women to being "madonnas".

This is a Scott post but. shout outs to Ren for being all of this about Pearl but without the complexity of Scott like he literally accuses Pearl of seducing Bigb what the fuck man.

Pearl is, of course, none of that. But she plays into the role of being the witch much better than she fared playing into the role of the madonna.

Sidenote: I know I'm looking at this from a Scott/Pearl POV but I do feel like you can omit Scott's attraction if you look at it from a purely "pearl not performing to standards of femininity I expect and she makes me realise I don't view women as a whole as human which makes me feel weird so now we have to do this" POV. Like idk I think the exact reason he abandoned Pearl is going to be lost on everyone forever so any analysis I could perform is going to suffer at least a little bit of making-shit-up-itis.

I do also think there's something to be said about Pearl being pushed until she performed a role, any role and generally failing at Being A Girl tm but that's another post i think. yknow shes um. a bit. 🏳️‍⚧️ (but also very much not at the same time idk that's gonna need its own post)

anyway yeah uh the minecraft movie looks crazy huh

[purpurussy]

I feel like the "dan is bi" anon is trolling but just in case they're genuinely confused: yes dan said in BIG that he loved and felt attracted to his high school gf (although he also made it pretty clear that they did not have sex so idk where anon is getting the idea that he has slept with "multiple women" 💀), and he alluded to his attraction not being confined to a specific gender in the part where he talked about labels, but you're completely taking all of that wildly out of context and missing the point of the whole video by calling him bi. I feel like this is probably the part that's frying their brain:

(shoutout to the legend @goldenpinof for this transcript!)

But firstly, imo it was very clear from BIG, as well as other stuff he's said over the years, that he just doesn't like labels. Which I find very valid, it took me a long time to figure out how to label myself. I still don't know what my gender is lmao but I started saying "bi" for my sexuality because it's a widely-used term that gets the point across. And I think that's the thing here: he came to the conclusion that the labels "gay" and "queer" are the best descriptors of his identity, which do the most accurate job of approximating something extremely psychologically complex and multilayered and nuanced in a simple everyday term that gets the point across to other people.

Obviously words mean things and it doesn't make sense to just pick a label at random (like for example it wouldn't make sense for me to identify as a lesbian, since I definitely feel attraction to men as well as women and everything outside the binary, and am interested in acting on that attraction at times, so I wouldn't be conveying accurate information to other people if I used the label lesbian for myself) but a label is just supposed to serve the task of conveying relevant information to other people (if a lesbian feels some kind of abstract attraction to dan and phil, that doesn't mean that the alphabet council needs to immediately revoke their lesbian card!! Since the word "lesbian" still does a perfectly good job of conveying relevant information to other people. Likewise if a straight dude has a fun little gay dalliance with his college roommate, but has absolutely 0 interest in men beyond that incident, it wouldn't be remotely necessary for him to start calling himself bi if he didn't want to, because what would be the point in that if he's only interested in women? Like if he told a gay dude who found him attractive that he's bi, only to backtrack... Do you see what I'm saying here?). It's perfectly valid for Dan to use "gay" and "queer" as umbrella terms that in his opinion do the best job of describing him, out of the language that's available. If he's like essentially a kinsey >5 and decided to just round it off to a 6 at this point, who are you to tell him he can't lmao

(shoutout to the legend @goldenpinof for this transcript!

Human sexuality is often way too complicated to boil it down to a single label in a way that doesn't erase any of its nuance, and I feel like this is something he's struggled with in the past, especially with him being a public figure. He's mentioned multiple times that feeling like he had to choose a label was a factor that prolonged his decision to come out.

And this is not even getting into the impact that his trauma from his childhood and also from spending a chunk of his formative years in the public eye probably had on the way he identifies or the way he chooses to label himself. It clearly took so much courage and strength for him to finally be able to call himself gay/queer please have some respect for our brave troops

Ultimately the point is that he uses the labels "gay" and "queer", not "bi", and it really shouldn't be difficult to respect that. It's also not biphobic for him to choose not use the label "bi" (again speaking as someone who uses that label). It's just that he feels "gay"/"queer" are better descriptors for him and nobody gets to determine that except him!! :) He wants people to know he's gay so he calls himself gay and that's that on that.

There are definitely people on here who are way smarter and more well-educated than me who would've done a much better job eloquently discussing this topic without rambling all over the place but that's my take (if anyone would like to add to this please do so, I'm always open to learn more about topics like this. And I'm also not saying that the way I see it is the only objectively correct opinion, but anon is definitely wrong so 💀). Thank you for coming to my ted talk

[silusvesuius]

this tree from my new drawing looking goated afffffff 👑👑

[capybaraonabicycle]

Doctor: Huh, is that who I am now?

Donna: It was never that far from the surface, mate.

Doctor: frowns Yes, it was! You know I used to be a woman. And that made people... assume all sorts of stuff. And - and pretending to be Graham's wife for five minutes was bad enough but - Byron? That was torture. Does the man ever stop talking?

Donna: Takes one to know one

Doctor: Oi! I just mean, there were all these men people assumed I would be into and I - and I just - I just wanted -

Donna: I know, darling.

Doctor: softly I just wanted Yaz.

Donna: I know. - There was one man, though, remember?

Doctor: No, there wasn't! I don't fancy the Master!

Donna: ...

Doctor: Okay, fine. But the Master isn't a man. He's like me! Flexible - uh - timelord gender and stuff.

Donna: Sure.

Doctor: So, anyway, I have always been primarily into wom-

Donna: What about Jack Harkness?

Doctor: - Jack doesn't count, everyone fancies Jack.

Donna: ...fair enough.

[solei-eclipse]

okay. hello guys. my bad for not responding to stuff or being as active recently, had a lot of work to be done and other stuff to focus on that took a lot of my time. I wanted to make more art, but I unfortunately had to put that energy into other things (which got to the point where I could not put them off any longer and had to stay working on it). I know I missed a lot of stuff and I'm sorry for it

[howtobeamagicalgirl]

✨️

[navree]

the streets saying that team green is more compelling and has the more interesting to follow storylines and that tgc is the breakout star...........don't ask me how it feels to lose because i never know, i always win

[xamaxenta]

It’s difficult to not feel discouraged sometimes when your partner is also an artist and happens to be faster than you in every conceivable way

This doesn’t bother me often because everyone is different and comparing production time and skill against each other or anyone is detrimental mostly and its ok to have your own workflow

but it does weigh on me vaguely sometimes sometimes that she can finish 2-3 full coloured pieces within a week and ive been painfully scratching out the same number but theyre only sketches that ill never revisit within a month

None of this actually matters in the long run, it just makes me feel bad on occasion

[mejomonster]

Creating stuff is so weird. (This time im talking about writing) like. U plan a story. U have an idea or vague vision at least in your mind. Then it comes out of your hand. Scenes expand, new scenes emerge that you didn't even know would be there, which lead to new realizations of what this story Becomes as it starts to exist piece by piece. And word choice, you didn't predict any of it, it came out on the spot, each moment a new surprise at what words your mind supplies, the options it offers in the second its demanded to give you a way to describe what you imagine. New descriptions come out, the words tack on bits of the moment you didn't see in your imagination until they come out, and now in a new light this scene is so much More than you ever imagined. It exists now on a page or screen, it is an imprint of this moment of contemplating it. Because any other moment, other words might have poured out from your hand and mind, because close as it might be to the silhouette you imagined initially weeks or months ago, or even a few seconds ago when the new possibility revealed itself, as it is written down it's taken on the qualities of this moment. Of right now. You never would have made precisely this, you won't make anything quite identical to it again. The image in your head that has existed forever long kept morphing, blurred at the edges or at the minimum in how its details spiraled out to connect to other scenes, and each time you contemplated it was just a little bit different. Close sometimes. And when you finally write it down, the blurred bits solidify into something this moment creates, unpredictable but you've tried to shape it up to this point and even as it happens you're trying to guide the thread of it into a more detailed rendition of what you meant initially or better. And then you finish writing that chunk. And are in awe of what came from a blurry idea.

Even the messes. Even the bits that come out of your hand and you're like: how in the fuck did this turn out so Far Away from what I wanted it to be? Even if you scrap it lol. There is a bit of wow there too, in how some moments your brain just refuses to cooperate or the words dont come and the slightly blurred picture in your mind turns out like when i draw a person and my hand isnt warmed up and i cant even get an oval shape right. In all that mess its like, how did what we didnt want even pour out, whys it in us to begin with, is there any gem in the disaster worth keeping. Is it so off the rails we decide the scene we imagined isnt what we thought or hoped itd be, and decide to throw it out all together and try a new scene entirely.

[fingertipsmp3]

So the x-ray went fucking terribly

[crossbackpoke-check]

what are ur thoughts on the winners room trope?

ooooo okay surface level analysis: i like winner’s room fics :)

etwas tieferes: i think it’s cool that it’s (afaik) unique to hockey fandom and i enjoy the way it integrates a lot of unspoken rules in hockey with desire/makes them a physical/tangible reality… also the narrative potentials/world-building it opens up can be fun because there’s not really a set of rules for the “winner’s room” trope. are there in-universe rules? who gets chosen? who’s exempt? who gets to pick? where’s it going down? is it the entire room or one guy? what if your (ex)boyfriend is on another team? does somebody need to be taught a lesson or do you need to remind someone who got traded you still love them? also, most important, winner’s room gives you the chance to put two random-ass guys you saw interact for 0.002 seconds and went “hmmm. interesting” about into a Situation and i love that

[stuck-in-the-ghost-zone]

what the hell is happening rn

[opens-up-4-nobody]

...

[stupidnaturals]

.

[infizero]

its been said a thousand times before but god desertduo rlly were insane for the double life cheating plotline