#does anybody still read my garbage

[buggywiththefolkmagic]

Personal Do Not Read Witchy Author List

There will be a google doc with updates as I find more authors to avoid. These are all my own personal opinion and I do take the author's actions into account when judging their ability to write legitimate information.

TW: Slavery, serial killers, racism, TERFs, creeps, neonazis, asylums, and a slew of other super unsavory things. I tried to make this list as PG as possible while highlighting the issues with these individual people. 

*Alestier Crowley. *

   He's a literal piece of garbage. Misogynistic, thief of a toooon of closed practices, has entire cults still dedicated to him, called himself a voice of God (both Abrahamic and apparently like 5 Egyptian deities??? I mean excuse me sir how about no??) He also declared himself ‘above’ Gods back in 1922 calling himself Ipssissimus. I hate Crowley so much I have literally stuck a picture of him to a dartboard before. He can suck an egg in the afterlife. He also put his own wife in an asylum for 'alcoholism’ because she wanted a divorce. The only thing he ever did right was get kicked down a flight of stairs at a temple once by a poet.

*Anastasia Greywolf*

   Appropriates at least Jewish practices if not every Indigenous practice there is. Wholeheartedly encourages people to use magic instead of going to a doctor for things like oh I dunno EPILEPSY And claims she has spells for like Marvel-level super powers which uh no Ana. You don't. Lots of Christianity for a supposedly FULL pagan and wiccan author. Her spells are all controlled like...so wrong. So, so wrong. Don't ask please. I can't begin to describe it. Advocates for smudging and uses phrases like "Cherokee Rituals", and the Romani G-slur. 

*Gerald Gardner*

   Made his own branch of wicca, the first technically, and his own coven had to make rules just so he wouldn't spill everything to any reporter that asked. Used Crowley as a main resource.

*Jason Miller*

   Claims to do Hoodoo. A horrible formatter, and generally super dismissive of being a rootworker and other potentially closed practices, has not been initiated. Has claimed that anyone can petition/pray to Papa Legba without initiation because "Vodou is a congregational religion/practice". From the Vodou and Haitian Vodou practitioners I have talked to that is VERY incorrect, it may be congregational but you still have to be involved in the community to be trusted with those practices because so much of it has been bastardized for media and racism purposes. He is also a student of Catherine Yronwode, who is another SUPER problematic figure in the Hoodoo/Rootwork community.  

 A link of his own words on culture appropriation which includes mild inaccuracy towards Indiginous Peoples and that they don’t ‘own’ certain practices when it’s very clear the wording of those practices DOES in fact come from those peoples. He’s fine with people being Yogis, or Shamans, or calling satchel spells mojo bags, and other such phrases and won’t correct people if they use such words out of context because “language changes”. Also says if someone within a practice says it’s closed to go to ANOTHER AND ANOTHER until you find someone willing to teach you??? That’s not how it works sir.

Source: https://www.strategicsorcery.net/on-cultural-misappropriation/

*Lisa Chamberlain*

   Not an actual person. This is a ghost writer name for a bunch of garbage literally copy and pasted from wikipedia into books. I wish I was kidding. 

*Lisa Leister/Lester/whatever other spelling she's used.*

   Such a major TERF. Like JK Rowling level TERF. Claims magic comes from a womb so anybody that doesn't have one isn't a real witch. Like WTF lady.

*Raymond Buckland*

  Where to start...uses the G-slur often. (His grandfather was romani so it blurs the line of blood quantum.)  Very sexist and obsessed with the idea of a woman getting uh...undressed for rituals while men stay dressed and more things I cannot say ina PG space??? As magic?? VERY anti-minor and LGBTQA+. Toxic, just plain toxic. Can't do it. I have read his Blue Book and it's the least problematic thing he wrote. I'm alright with it.

*Silver Ravenwolf*   WhOOO boy. So super anti-christian, which is fine and dandy...if you didn't claim to be in a lineage of braucherei/hexerei. Wiccan, like the type of wiccan that says no other witchcraft exists and yet has written folk magic books??? She really needs to make up her mind. Claims Satanists don't actually exist. Claims most Jewish powers worshiped "the Goddess" (whoever that is)??? Very cult-like language about "not telling friends and family about your new life/reality/experience/whatever". Also SO MUCH APPROPRIATION. SO SO MUCH. She also gets her history wrong, on a lot of basic information that most non-witches know about like say the Salem Witch Trials.

*Catherine Yronwode* Ooh man. So Catherine Yronwode’s career started as a comic book artist. She’s worked on such things like the Elvira comic, DNAgents, and a gaggle of super controversial trading cards which included the Kennedy Assasination, a serial killer collection, and the AIDS epidemic. Of which she was sued for using one half of the Hillside Stranglers duo in said killer trading cards without his permission, the judge sadly threw the case out because and this is a quote, “ If Bianchi had been using his face as a trademark when he was killing women, he would not have tried to hide it from the police.” There were two more from her comic days, but those aren’t super relevant besides the one that pushed the envelope of what sort of trading cards should be sold to children. On the magical side of things, I will be blunt here: As one of the ‘big bads’ of the Rootwork/Folk/Hoodoo community? I really REALLY dislike her. She has made numerous false claims about New Orleans/Haitian Vodou and that it’s only a very recent practice, non-religious, and slaves never used it because it didn’t exist yet??? History books and entire generations will disagree. An example would be this link of an open letter to her written by a New Orleans Voodoo practitioner and someone she wrote a whole article about: https://conjureart.blogspot.com/2013/10/open-letter-to-cat-yronwode-and-lucky.html

She owns a few different websites namely https://www.luckymojo.com/, has written numerous Hoodoo based books, and actively has accused numerous people who have asked her for sources and or disagreed with her of plagiarism and has slung more mud that you can shake a stick at. 

She also praises a book on Marie Laveau and yet discredits herself by calling New Orleans Voodoo a new religion/neopractice??? She’s just confusing as all heck to me.

*Christian Day*   This guy’s just a creep. One stuck in the early 2000s mall goth phase even though he’s over 50. He also appropriates Hoodoo and owns two Hoodoo shops as well as multiple other witch shops in Salem and recently New Orleans on the French Quarter (Which is pure tourist fodder and not a reflection of true New Orleans Voodoo/Vodun/Rootwork). He has also harassed ex-employees so badly it’s landed him in court. His book The Witch’s Book of the Dead also reads very much like a list of accomplishments rather than anything useful. All about his television spots and experiences doing that. (Did I mention he was in an episode of Ghost Adventures? Yes, that one with Zac Bagans??? And it did not make us witches look too great, honestly speaking.)

Sources for Harassment Claims: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/salem-witch-gets-protective-order-against-warlock/

https://www.wcvb.com/article/warlock-christian-day-ordered-to-stay-away-from-salem-witch/8228072

*Yvonne and Gavin Frost*   I dunno how else to say this, I really don’t. These two? Pedophiles. Multiple writings of theirs included not-safe-for-work-or-children rituals that must include minors. Avoid. AVOID AVOID. AVOID ANYONE WHO USES THEM AS A RESOURCE! This should NOT be okay in any circle. They are VERY used within the Wicca religion so please be careful!!

*Orion Foxwood* Some of his information is very sound! I can’t fault him there. He does have a tendency to blend different traditions without actively TELLING you he’s blending them though. He’s and this is a direct quote, “He is a witch and Elder in Romano Celtic-Traditional Craft, High Priest in Alexandrian Wicca and teacher of the Faery Seership tradition. He is also the founding Elder of Foxwood Temple and a primary founder of the Alliance of the Old Religion, a national network of covens in his line that have united to preserve the ways of his Elders. He was the co-director of Moonridge, a center for metaphysical, Craft and Faery studies in Maryland” That’s an awful lot of traditions to juggle and not only write on but actively teach. He also performs conjure, which in of itself might not be an issue but Conjure usually blends into Hoodoo really quickly if one isn’t careful! A lot of the traditions he talks about from his family sound quite familiar, he’s clearly from Appalachia but his books on the subject blend in his other practices instead of keeping them separate. 

*Starr Casas*   She’s in the same category as Orion, only she doesn’t necessarily give her credentials to be teaching Hoodoo, and even wrote a whole book filled with Hoodoo love spells. She also co-owns a French Quarter Conjure Shop, which if you ask any practitioners from New Orleans...is catered to pure tourists and not a true example of the crafts from the area. 

*Shawn Engel*   I’m gonna be blunt here. More appropriation of the Jewish practices, Hoodoo, and other information that is just plain UPG without saying it’s UPG and encourages throwing hexes at political party members solo. I read The Power of Hex and had to put it down numerous times just to gather myself and not throw it away, I don’t know if it was tone or sheer level of appropriation...likely both.

*Kate Freuler*   Of Blood and Bones is chock full of Hoodoo, full stop. Only acknowledges that something comes from Hoodoo once and also gets basic mythology information on the Deities she mentions wrong in some cases. Also a lot of the book seems to be UPG because the bibliography is super small for a 300 page book.

*Dorothy Morrison*   I picked up Utterly Wicked once. A very odd book full of Hoodoo and Vodun spellwork and misinformation, the author is also Garderian Wiccan so even the writing of a book full of hexes is slightly...concerning compared to the Wiccan traditions and redes. Odd is the best I have to describe how I personally feel. I will say this again: Voodoo Dolls are not used to cause pain, stop bastardizing that single aspect of the practice. Thank you.

*Helena Blavatsky*

 I dunno how else to say this either, her philosophy and occult knowledge, called Theosophy is a portion of what inspired Hitler. Pure unadulterated racism veiled in a ‘Atlantian Race Theory”. Horrible stuff, read for a class project once and felt disgusting.

*Christopher Penczak*Whoo boy. On the surface he seems alright, one of the first ‘male’ witches I had ever heard of except for Scott Cunningham. But the more you dig into his work the more inaccuracies and Christian bashing you see. For example: Christianty was the first patriarchal society. Uhm...I believe you’re kinda forgetting the men who ran Rome and Greece there sir. He also fully proposes the ‘burning times’ were like a ‘witch holocaust’. NO! NO IT WAS NOT. You can’t compare the hundreds of years and MAYBE a thousand-ish people dying to the millions that died in the short timespan the Holocaust was a thing. Fuck Christopher for that comparison and also for claiming it was a ‘burning time’ to begin with. (History says that most were hung...or tortured. Burning is a very small number of that list in general. 

He makes a lot of sweeping statements and sees witchcraft as a religion and NOT a practice. He whitewashes, fully harps on the Wicca = witchcraft = religion thing and THEN hones in on the difference between “white and black” magic and how cursing is evil and yet highlights certain practices that actively practice...cursing...as they have for generations??? He (atleast) doesn’t demonize Satanism but does still backhand the idea anyway, that they CAN’T be witches because witches only ‘heal’. Cultural appropriation and fetishization of ‘Native’ practices while calling them primitive all in the same breath, I just can’t with this guy. I really can’t. 

*Amy Blackthorn* 

Owns a tea brand called ‘Blackthorn Hoodoo Blends’ she is white. When questioned by BIPOC individuals she complains and blocks them instead of explaining why she chose the name Hoodoo for just teas. TEA. She is also the author of Blackthorn’s Botanical Magic, Sacred Smoke (A book on smudging yikes on trikes), and Blackthorn’s Protection Magic. 

Proof of blocking: https://thisblackwitch.com/2016/04/01/blackthorn-teas-whose-culture-is-it-anyways/

*Tarl Warwick *

Is more commonly known as Styxhexenhammer666 on youtube and other social media sites. Has written a pile and I mean a PILE of occult based books including ones on Hermetic magic, ritualistic magic, demons, solomon, folk plants and healing, Kabbalah, and many MANY more. 

He makes no claim to being Jewish, and given his political wishy washiness, and multitude of controversies which includes claiming the Holocaust wasn’t ‘that many dead’, Charles Manson deserved release because he was ‘extremely innocent and didn’t kill anyone’, and fairly recently also wrote and published a book on Critical Race Theory and why it’s ‘garbage’. I can’t support him no matter how accurate some of his information may be (if any at all). 

*Temperance Alden* This really pains me to say, Temperance in her Wheel of the Year book made a claim that birth control “stunted her magical abilities” because it affected her hormones…in OTHER words unless you are a perfectly hormone producing WOMAN you don’t have great magical power. AVOID. AVOID. AVOID. That is a slippery slope to claiming medication will harm you, not to mention how TERF-y it is AND completely disregards that magic is for well…everyone. Such a stupid gatekeep-y concept. 

*Sarah Kate Istra/Dver*

Advocates for using ‘spirit animals’ regardless of Indigenous beliefs and concerns. Is also a known ally with the Piety Posse, a neo-nazi group of pagans who claim the term polytheist can only apply to them and if you aren’t a Hellenistic pagan…you aren’t pagan at all. They also advocate for animal sacrifices, blood tests to prove purity, and other horrible HORRIBLE stuff. 

*Sannion/H. Jeremiah Lewis*

Obvious Neo-nazi, keeps images of swastikas on his personal blog, and not the ones that the nazis stole from, the nazi one. And super SUPER transphobic.

*Edward P. Butler*

Major persecution complex, spends half his twitter complaining about how monotheists are destroying…I dunno…everything? Also defends Krasskova quite heavily. Antisemetic as well.

*Galina Krasskova*

Hellenic pagans watch out. Defends the AFA. A ringleader of the Piety Posse. There’s a lot more horrific stuff about her and I won’t go into extreme details. But TW: Romanticizes SA with deities, human sacrifice, animal sacrifice. Compares debating to the holocaust, lots of victim blaming, gatekeeping, and screams folkish. 

*Diana Cooper*

Racist. Hard stop. Also appropriates chakras. Has a weird belief that food controls skin color and that Africa will never be a good country because it’s the solar plexus of the universe…or something like that. I got 20 pages into the book and literally couldn’t go any farther. Did I mention this book was supposedly on dragons???

*Judika Iiles* So much appropriation, advocates for making altars and working with closed deities. Lots of incorrect information including dangerous spellwork like obsession spells. And one in particular that has roots in a racist stereotypes. Avoid please! 

[meretrifles]

further public library of ruina rambles (i've got plenty of time to think about this shit and new material every workday):

it starts when a fairly high-ranking city official stumbles across her when she's just barely started, someone powerful enough to make it very clear the city could wreck angela's shit at this stage if they chose to. but you know, they say instead, it's interesting that this is a library. actually by law we're supposed to have a public library, but we haven't managed to keep one open in quite some time. if you took on the role, we might be persuaded to ignore these... irregularities. what do you say? angela knows full well this is a trap, but doesn't have much choice if she wants to live. also, a would roll over in his grave, not that she thinks about that or anything.

the abnormalities are still there. in fact they're still booked and put on the shelf where anybody can find them. who knows, maybe they were looking for a pug monster.

angela tosses any measured plan she had to wake up the librarians directly out the window within a week, they're all out by the time roland shows up. she takes a management role and does not look back. do not ever call her 'manager', though.

all the librarians technically have their own roles, though they can also get pulled into whatever is needed at any time; in irl libraryland, this is known as the "other duties as assigned" curse.

angela is still trying to reclaim the light, but due to the public libraries act, she can't book anybody unless they actively attack staff, guests, or library property while in the library itself. this throws more of a wrench into her plans than she expected but still happens with depressing frequency.

as a result of the vast amounts of emotional stress and instability added by all this, librarian meltdowns are back. which generally trigger angela because a) everything and b) excuse me, you dare pull your fucking bullshit for the eleven billionth time WHEN MY SUFFERING IS RIGHT HERE REEEEE. so it turns into a giant 3-way fight between librarian, angela, and team could we maybe not die today tyvm. they all know approximately half of each other's buttons (and think they know 3/4), it's a giant clusterfuck but everyone lives and maybe at least some of them learn something.

roland figures out like the equivalent of halfway through something that was really just as true in canon: he can't top this. none of his plans were truly worse than this garbage fire. and now he's trapped in it too. his mental breakdown is slow and inexorable.

the irl public libraries in general... are desperate to fill all the gaps and cracks in the infrastructure they see. we do all want that one perfect book. the answer to the question. what that book with the blue cover was. to be a place where kids can run screaming freely and people can study in quiet. to give mittens to the cold and find housing for the lost. we want that one perfect answer. it doesn't exist. it can't, it isn't possible. the book you loved in childhood won't read the same as an adult. the children who can't keep quiet will hurt the children who can't stand noise. you can't have both the drug dealers and the people trying to get clean, the marginalized and the bigots, all equally welcome. there is no one perfect book. so what i wonder is... what happens if you stop looking. if you stop trying to be everything, and be what you are without regrets. i suspect that what you are (that "just a library") is actually quite enough, and if you stop focusing on doing more than you can, you'll find that around and within you are the answers you actually need. this is both literal, a metaphor, a political statement, and a statement of the theme/endgame of the AU.

[yes0another0outsiders0blog]

Damn, this next alphabet is kicking my ass and then I have so many more to do-- (I'm excited to do them, I love long form headcanons and overthinking things into essays and covering a lot in one post, they just take so long especially when my brain ain't working--)

Anyway, have the rest of my sexuality headcanons!!

The Outsiders Queer Headcanons : (Part 2)

Tim -

gay, 100% into men.

has dated/hooked up with women because he's "supposed to," but they always have to make the first move and he never really enjoys it.

pretty open about it. not really the type to bring it up unprompted, keeps his personal life personal, but if asked he sees no reason to hide it

what's anybody going to do about it, fight him? okay, he'll kick their ass. he ain't scared of what anyone thinks about what he does in his own free time. they're the ones that brought it up, they can mind their damn business.

Curly -

unlabeled, if asked he'd just shrug. he likes guys sometimes, he's pretty sure he's liked a girl or two before.

no thoughts, head empty. he has put zero thoughts into it.

maybe somewhere on the arospec, his romantic interests are really muted

still there, just not strong

for him, a partner is more of a MAJOR best friend that he happens to be physically attracted to as well

"wait, do any of the Shepherds like girls?" you ask

well, I just said that Curly likes girls sometimes... but let me introduce yall to

Angela -

pan and proud as FUCK

and has MASSIVE game, more than her brothers combined

poly as well, loves group dates and having partners that interact with each other especially

gets really into queer spaces/community, will actually seek out lgbt spaces and such

loves going to drag performances, she's loud and social and likes dramatic make up and costuming, she has a natural draw to drag queens.

Sylvia -

bisexual, prefers men, might go her whole life without even thinking of herself as anything but straight outside of modern au

like, in modern day after hearing about different sexualities then she might clock the feeling after realizing that being attracted to women is a thing

but her attraction to women feels different than her attraction to men, so she would probably just think "oh, we're REALLY good friends and I'd totally kiss her if she wanted to, but that's just how girls are right??"

it isn't even preference so much as it's intensity of attraction, has more small crushes on women and few bigger crushes on men

Evie -

aromantic, bisexual and slightly prefers men

not very romantically affectionate (is platonically affectionate), but is okay with having a partner that is. she just won't initiate or crave it, but she doesn't mind it. romance neutral in general.

does want to date still, loves a good qpr, will communicate with her partner about her lack of romantic attraction but doesn't feel the need to be open about it with others. she's in a relationship, it can be read as a romantic relationship, she isn't correcting anyone

Sandy -

straight

homophobic in an ignorant way

"no, I don't have a problem with the gays, I know some gays!!" girl, NO.

won't be intentionally mean, doesn't like when people are blatantly homophobic, but also won't put effort into changing herself and won't call out other's around her. might give an eyeroll and a "stop, be nice!!" at most.

thinks that since it doesn't actively affect her it isn't really her place or business

Cherry -

bicurious, but probably ultimately straight

is such a girls girl, very platonically affectionate, thinks girls are so pretty, so the thought of dating a girl has crossed her mind

also, she has ass taste in men and has definitely said "a woman would NOT treat me like this" but, boo, I have met women that would treat her like that and if she would just date a man that isn't garbage then she'd see that it's her standards that are the real problem

does try dating a few ladies, really isn't feeling it, feels really bad for leading them on and ends up staying longer than she should because she really loves them as friends and doesn't want to lose them

is the super pretty, casually flirty straight girl that 99% of sapphic people have unfortunately fallen hard for.

Marcia -

aromantic and asexual

has fallen into a lot of comphet, has absolutely dated a handful of men because her friends all were in relationship

slightly romance repulsed, thinks it's all just so boring

but is BOMB at coming up with pick-up lines and stuff, is witty as hell and will get flirty sometimes. she just doesn't want anything even slightly serious. it's a mental exercise, some friendly back and forth, nothing more. anything seriously romance-heavy gives her a major ick

sex-neutral, is interested in anatomy and artistic nudity (think figure drawing), she's not squeamish around the idea of sex and isn't even strictly against having it

just very... scientific about it. not very emotional, will work out theories or ideas in practice. likes to see what the human body can do, likes playing with dynamics, sees it all as research

doesn't really like the idea of a long-term relationship, likes her independence too much

[the12thnightproject]

Loved the "Warlords Watching Teletubbies". May I ask (if you're not to busy) ask for something similar like the Warlords watching "Sesame Street"? I so think that Ieyasu reminds me of Oscar the Grouch (lol), Mitsunari of Big Bird, and Mitsuhide and Hideyoshi as Ernie and Bert.

Sorry Anon about taking so long! I’ve had a busy busy winter. And um, this sort of turned into Ikesen Warlords AS Toddlers Watching Sesame Street…

Due to a Massive Wormhole Event (MWE), MC is suddenly dealing with the influx of toddler warlords (plus a tween Kennyo) in a tiny, tiny apartment. And truly, this apartment is not big enough for all of them… would never be big enough, especially since…. “Kenshin stop swinging that sword around, NOW,” and “Shingen get OUT of my chocolate stash!” ….

At her wits end… MC does what all parents since the last quarter of the 20th century have done to entertain the children: she turns on the television (and then goes into her room to read hide).

The following is what she hears through the closed door…

The sound of Keiji and Ranmaru singing the theme song to Sesame Street.

Hideyoshi:  Shhhhhh! MC told us to watch this! Shhhh! I can’t watch with you singing so loud!

Nobunaga: MC! I can’t find Bearsace! He has to watch this with me.

Kenshin: MC? Are there any rabbits in this?

Masamune: Hey! Ieyasu! That orange thing that lives in the garbage can is just like you! I’mma gonna start callin’ you Oscar, ok?

The sound of Keiji and Ranmaru singing the theme song again.

Hideyoshi:  Shhhhhh! Stop singing. You’re going to bother MC!  SHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Shingen: Kennyo? Are you sleeping?

Kennyo: I am meditating. I am meditating. I am meditating. Zzzzz.

Ieyasu: MC! I left my sourdough starter in the Sengoku! How many days is it until we go home?

Sasuke:  You have a sourdough starter? Tell me more! How do you make it? What do you like about it? What did you name it?

Kenshin: Sasuke! Are you paying attention to someone who is not me?

Kanetsugu:  Sasuke! Are you paying attention to someone who is not Kenshin?

Shingen: MC. What is a cookie?

Sasuke: It’s a sweet pastry with cho-

Nobunaga AND Shingen:  MC, where are your COOKIES?

Hideyoshi:  We’re not supposed to eat sugar. Nobunaga, GET AWAY FROM THE COOKIE JAR!

Yukimura:  Shingen, you too! Also. GET AWAY FROM NOBUNAGA.

Mitsunari: I don’t understand why no one else can see the Snuffleupagus. He’s right there?

Ieyasu: Where? All I see is the giant yellow bird.

Hideyoshi: Osc- er, Ieyasu! Don’t tease Mitsunari!

Shingen: NOBUNAGA DID YOU TAKE THE LAST COOKIE?

Nobunaga: *crunch* *crunch* No. *crunch* *crunch*

Mitsunari: (in the same accent as The Count) One. Two. Three. Four.

Masamune: Yip yip yip yip yip  yip yip….

Kenshin: If they can make rubber DUCKIES why not RUBBER BUNNIES?

Masamune: Yip yip yip yip yip  yip yip….Nope nope nope nope nope nope nope.

Motonari: MC! They keep touching me!

Yoshimoto:  MC, CAN I play with your MAKE UP?

Masamune: Nope nope nope nope nope nope nope.

The sound of Keiji and Ranmaru singing the theme song again.

The sound of Mitsunari singing the theme song too.

Hideyoshi:  Mitsunari….. whyyyyyyy?

Mitsunari: It is stuck in my head. I don’t know how to get rid of it.

Keiji: That HAPPENS TO ME ALL THE TIME. You just have to sing it more.

Mitsunari: Ok.

The sound of Keiji and Ranmaru AND Mitsunari singing the theme song again.

Motonari: If anybody sings again, I WILL SET YOU ON FIRE.

*Click*

Yukimura: What happened?

Kanetsugu: The remote stopped working.

Nobunaga: Who unplugged the TV? Kicho!

Kenshin: PLUG THE TV BACK IN. THERE MIGHT BE BUNNIES STUCK IN IT. PLUG IT BACK IN!

Kicho: Make me!  OOF! GET OFF ME!

*Click*

The TV sound returns now EXTRA LOUD.

At this point… MC has ominous realization that the one voice she hasn’t heard is Mitsuhide’s. In a panic, she comes running out of the bedroom, to discover that Yoshimoto has done a makeover on the sleeping Kennyo, Mitsunari (still singing) and Shingen have taken apart the toaster, and Mitsuhide…. is nowhere to be found.

From somewhere outside… not too far away… is the sound of a siren.

@lorei-writes

[skyloftian-nutcase]

Sorry if you’re offline or just don’t want to see this but I has question:

As the resident hurricane family mother, how does one healthily cope with sadness, depression, and self-blame? Because most of us are dealing with these and I have absolutely no healthy coping mechanisms, so I was wondering if you’d know anything?

I was just offline because of work, that’s all. 👍🏻 This is kind of difficult to answer but I will do my best. Please reblog this, lovelies, and add your own healthy coping mechanisms so we can have as much good advice in a post as possible. ❤️ I’m gonna ask y’all to bear with me and read this whole answer because some things might sound like “meh that’s not for me” but if you stop reading then you won’t find other things that might help.

First, my faith is a big pillar of strength for me. I know not everyone shares my beliefs, but if you have any inclination to try and pray at all, prayer helps so much. Not because it gives you an instant fix, but because it gives you an ear to talk to, it can let you scream and cry and breathe and listen and reorient. God’s always listening. ❤️ If anyone is ever unsure how to pray or anything of the sort, you can always ask. ❤️

Now as I said, not everyone shares my beliefs, and there are so many coping mechanisms out there! Journaling your thoughts helps you put them out of your mind and onto something you can look at and physically touch. It gives you a moment to pause and reread it and parse it out. I find exercise helps me a lot too - and I’m not even saying you need to go to the gym or punch the air, just a walk makes a world of difference. Can’t go outside? Pace back and forth and listen to music. I put in so many steps I sometimes “walk” for miles just from pacing back and forth.

Find yourself a support system. I have different people who I go to for different things. My family is always there for me but I don’t always tell them everything that’s bothering me. And I don’t have to! I actively avoid telling them some things because I don’t want them to worry, but I will tell others. Different people can be there for you in different ways. I have work friends who go through hell with me and we can talk about it with each other because we get it. I have close friends who may not understand what I’m going through but can still lend an ear when I’m at a breaking point and can either let me vent or offer me support. I have my family who honestly just knows the periphery of big stressors for me but can read when I need to be alone and when I need love.

Know your limits. We all want to be everything for everyone. We all want to help and support each other. But sometimes things are too much. Sometimes you can’t be in righty places and have energy for six other people in crisis and still put a smile on your face. Know when to step away and take a break. Know when to put down the phone, or not contact that one person who drains you more than usual, or avoid that one place that’s going to stress you out.

Know when something is or isn’t in your control. Sometimes your brain is garbage and makes you feel that way. Understand what that is - stress, trauma, faulty wiring (darn neuro chemicals), hormones - and understand that you can’t necessarily stop the reaction but just ride the wave. Some days all you want to do is lie in bed. Those are the days to each out and say “hey can someone poke me to get up and brush my teeth/eat/drink.” Some days everything makes you think you’re a failure. Recognize that it’s your brain being stupid and say “all right, fine, I feel like shit, doesn’t mean it’s true. So anybody want to tell me what they see in me? What makes me a good person/friend/writer/artist/whatever I need to hear?” Recognize that your perception of yourself is not what the world sees, and recognize that when you’re lost in a fog and depression has you blindfolded in the dark, others are not blindfolded and therefore can see you for the beautiful person that you are.

Let your mind rest! Read something you enjoy. Draw! Watch a movie! Whatever makes you happy.

Have a creative hobby. Something that you can look at and smile and be like “I made/free that!” Gardening, sewing, writing, art, something with an end result that you can see and touch.

All right, that’s most of the stuff I do or have been told to do. Now reblog, lovelies, and add your own advice if you like!

[nytehavyn-circle]

A few OOC things people should be aware of with me. Some good, some bad, some that explain stuff, etc...

I have a very bad memory. I have PTSD, severe social/generalized anxiety, bipolar depression with psychosis (meaning I have hallucinations; mine are not bad and not even invasive... I see bugs around my peripheral vision a lot, but I know they're not really there), and I'm on two mood stabilizers/antidepressants, Xanax for my anxiety. and a medication that helps reduce my PTSD nightmares. Not to mention the fact that last September, I spent about 2-3 weeks in a small coma thanks to pneumonia that put me on a ventilator.

All of these things together have left my memory shoddy, full of holes, swiss cheesed, and given me brain fog. There's a lot of shit I remember, but a lot of shit I don't.

This includes RP. Some threads from a while back I remember what happened, some I've completely forgotten, some ships I remember, and others don't ring a bell...

So, where that's concerned, if I ask you about a plot, or something about what's happening, any of that, and it's something I should remember because it's happened before, please don't be upset. Gently remind me and if I still don't remember, we can always do it again.

Where I am concerned OOC...

I have a very strong personality. For a very long time, I pushed myself, my spirit, down to accommodate other people in the RPC, and walked on eggshells so as to hopefully not offend or upset anybody.

That's stops.

Now, while I still don't want to offend anyone, and I don't want to make anyone uncomfortable, chances are that's it's going to happen. As stated before, I have a very strong personality, and I'm tired of pretending to be meek. I will probably say and do things OOC that will offend and upset, and I will probably do things in RP that offend and upset...

I can get very sexual on the dash and such OOC - there are days I am hypersexual, and there are days that I have no interest in it AT ALL - which is due to my meds. I get very friendly OOC in messages - I will bother you a lot, even if you don't message me back for a while, I'll still bug your IMs a lot, just because that's how I am. I don't do it expecting you to message me back instantly, I do it because I just do. You can read/respond to the messages as you see fit. I will flail/rave/yell about our muses, our threads, and our ships an awful lot. I will also lovebomb you because that's how I am. I like to let my mutuals know I care, I like to make friends, etc. That's who I am, and I can't apologize for being me. Sometimes I can try to curb it, but that won't happen often. And whether it's OOC or IC, I will TRY to remember to tag the threads.TRY! There's no guarantee I will, because, as I said, my mind is in an almost constant brain fog.

I will definitely lose followers for this because it happens every day. However, this is me asking you to PLEASE let me know SOMETHING about why you want to unfollow/block me to last least give me a chance to apologize and correct the offending behavior.

Yes, yes, I know you "don't owe anyone anything." This has given way, given permission, for people in the RPC to treat their mutuals like garbage, like shit, and toss them aside whenever they see fit, no matter how long they've been RP partners, and no matter if they're actively RPing and threading. It's cowardly to do this.

Yes, you curate your own online experience but give your mutuals a chance to explain themselves. The unfortunate thing is that people on here seem to think if someone does something inappropriate OOC, or other muses do something inappropriate IC, then that person is s horrible person regardless and must be blocked. This is a cowardly way when you can't even tell your mutual, "Look, this made me uncomfortable," and give them a chance to apologize and possibly curb their behavior - because I can promise, 8 times out of 10, they might not even realize they're doing something wrong.

No one in the RPC here wants to communicate and it makes RPing difficult. And it makes it difficult if you refuse to even chat OOC to your RP partners. No wonder a lot of new RPers here don't want to reach out, and it's starting to happen even with veteran RPers here where they've just stopped reaching out because they're tired of the bullshit.

I - and I know of a few others - who have difficulty RPing with someone they never talk to OOC. Most likely, if we don't chat OOC, I will probably end up dropping our thread(s) and letting you know.

It's gotten to the point where RPers don't even want to TRY to have respect for even their RP Partners. People on here love to go on and on about respect, but no one ever wants to give it.

This really has to stop and change for the better. WE need to be better, as a whole.

To wit: I am 48 years of age. And a lot of muns in the RPC are significantly younger. I will not be offended if someone comes to me and tells me my age bothers them and they feel uncomfortable RPing with me. If this does apply to you, please come tell me. I can't change it, but I can at least understand why you're unfollowing and wish you well. But this is also why I prefer to RP with anyone under 21.

Also, as I've stated in another post... if you don't like what one of my muses does in an RP, come to me, talk to me, and we'll see if there's a compromise - we can even try new muses. I have quite a few, with more being added all the time. Don't come to me blaming me and yelling at me for what my muse does IC.

I refuse to nerf my muses for any reason, UNLESS it needs to be done as a plot point, to fit the story. I will not diminish their abilities, and I will not turn my jerk muses into suddenly decent people unless it's part of a whole character arc. I won't turn my powerful muses into weak kittens just to satisfy another RPer's desire or because they don't like RPing with strong muses. I don't expect ANYONE to nerf their muses for me, I don't want anyone to expect it from me.

Mun =/= muse, and muse =/= mun. Now, a lot of beliefs and thoughts overlap OOC, but this does not mean we condone the behavior or most of the behavior and thoughts of our muses. If you've been in the RPC long enough, you'll come to realize that the muses have developed a mind of their own and will do WTF-ever they want. lol

I didn't make this post to upset or offend, I made this post for understanding and explanation. I am not going to speak for everyone, but I do know there are a handful who agree with me on what I've stated above.

Please, just communicate. Talk to each other. Talk OOC, and make friends. Make a found family. Stop ignoring each other.

[dotslashchloe]

I remember running a terrible Zoostorm laptop when I was 12 and It had 1GB of RAM in a time when machines came with at least 2 as a standard option, and some people believed that you'd never need more than 4GB for anything.

Image source

My parents bought me this thing because I had caused a little bit of an issue in our house, and that was my constant need for floppy disks post year 2000. We ran an Amiga 1200 in the dining room of our home as it was what my parents both used to code on in the mid 90's. We had tons of software for that thing but the coolest by far was a programming environment called AMOS. It used a proprietary (read: now unsupported) programming language called AMOS BASIC and the only resources we had for the language was whatever my dad remembered and the official language guide which, if i remember correctly, was thick enough to beat a goat to death with.

Image credit

The guide was sometimes really good at explaining language features and best use cases for mid 90's game development methodologies.

You can actually still download AMOS and run it on a Windows machine, or OSX and GNU/Linux if you have the tools to run applications meant for windows.

I moved from an Amiga sporting 2MB of chip RAM and 8MB of fast RAM to a Windows 7 laptop with a whopping, for the time, Gigabyte of Random Access Memory.

I couldn't wait to see the types of software that I could make with 32 bit technology and how I could use new... Oh, it crashed.

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Windows 7, at least on my machine, was a garbage fire. Somewhere along the way when we transitioned from floppy disks to hard drives and hard drives to solid state, programmers suddenly forgot how to make good decisions. The amount of driver errors, lag spikes, and crashes I experienced on that platform made me hate Windows, and even to this day, I really don't trust it.

I once turned my laptop on to find Windows using 90% of my available RAM, and it wasn't even running anything.

This frustration led me to look further afield. I knew that I liked the UNIX like systems from helping my dad run a FreeBSD server, and because of that, I very nearly bought a mac. Nearly. I still like to have a usable computer and do things that Apple don't want me to do, like change my settings in a way that matters.

Image credits

I finally found out enough to flash Arch to my USB drive and install it using a guide i found on a reddit thread. after editing all of my settings, i pressed enter, sat back... And bricked the fucking thing. Archinstall was a blessing from the gods, but we didn't have that yet.

2nd choice was Debian. Not only was it pre-configured out of the box, it had a package manager that made sense and came with development tools already built in. I played around with a few other distributions over the years until i discovered that they're all either Debian or Arch with a different package manager and desktop environment.

GNU/Linux blew my mind. The fact that all of this software was just out there for free fort anybody to use and change astounded me, and it still does to this day. You need to run a piece of hardware that nobody has made a driver for in about 20 years? Debian probably has it built in. You want to make video games? Debian can do that flawlessly. You want to play video games? Steam installs natively and comes with Proton!

By the time I was ready to go to College at 16, I was using Linux full time, and Archinstall had been added to the installation ISO (thank god). I used arch for all of my studies there, and all of my studies at University. I passed my degree because my software was free. I even had a C# compiling and running for my Programming 101 classes.

I do occasionally run Windows at some point from time to time, but i always make sure that WSL is installed. I do not see the need to download a piece of software to do something when Debian has the command built-in.

If it were not for the FOSS community, and GNU/Linux as a whole, I probably would not be the programmer that I am today, and I wouldn't have been able to learn many of the complex topics I needed for the field I have worked in due to the closed, corporate nature of the vast majority of software out there.

Sorry for yapping.

[wack-ashimself]

There's two terms that are stupid and nobody realizes it. Hate crime. And War crime. Because hate in itself is a crime if you hate hard enough to the point where you harm them, and war itself is a crime against humanity. The fact that we try to differentiate crime when it's all fucking crime is why an island of pedophiles get away while somebody who falls asleep at the wheel goes to jail for life. I want both in jail. Or at least I want the jail sentence to match what the crime was. I'm sorry but scaring people and saying mean things is not the same as what cops get away with. What our politicians get away with. Our bankers get away with. I'm just saying that 8 years for yelling at somebody and getting physical with them seems pretty fucking harsh when there was no permanent damage. And I'm not saying this cuz he's white. The guy looks like a piece of garbage. I am saying though I would not want anyone, not a single one of you, reading this right now to do something in the heat of intoxication, and it costs them eight years of their life. Punishment should be served, and I'm sure there's better ways to make sure it's served. If I'm wrong then how come we have the largest prison population in all of history? If prison reformed, it would have a lot better success rate. This just seems like people wanting to hit somebody with a stick who hit them first. That's fine. You get a couple whacks. Not 8 years of somebody's fucking life. He's 47. He's going to probably die in jail. I'm just saying I have said and done some horrible things in my life, thankfully never to this degree, but would I think my worst mistakes are worth 8 years of my life? No. Again I've never really assaulted anybody except my siblings when we were kids. But still. 8 years of your life for getting drunk and making the worst mistake of your life. But he didn't kill anybody or cripple them. Not even PTSD. He was just an angry belligerent selfish prick. And he does need to be put in his place. However making somebody feel like shit is not the same as permanently scarring somebody for life. And I'll tell you 8 years in jail will scar them for life too. I am in no form saying I know what the exact punishment should be nor would I want to make that judgment. But the fact that eight years was thrown out so quickly makes me feel like this is going to be used for other reasons to put people in jail for lesser crimes comparatively. Crime is crime people. And if you want to honestly stop crime, you start at the top, not the fucking bottom. There's so much crime on the bottom because of the top. Never forget that. The worst criminals on the planet are not at all in jail. And that seems Island continues at a new location. We'll find that one in probably another 30 fucking years.

[nebulousfishgills]

Random ask bc I was thinking about it and now I'm curious:

What is the most unique power, skill, or trait that you've given an OC, and how does it impact their story?

(alternatively, share the most unique trait of EACH OC, if you'd like to be a bit more thorough with it :D )

Well, you know me and being thorough! So we're gonna do that!

I'm apologizing in advance.

We're gonna go in order, so...

-Olivia Iridottir-

If I had to pick her most unique trait, I think it's summed up susinctly enough in these excerpts from "Time Variance Detected:"

-

Olivia is a being who is equally capable of both good and evil depending on the universe she's in and it can massively impact her story. "A Song of Stars and Magic" covers the nitty gritty of this and the reason why that story in particular is unique... which, sidenote, someone left a really sweet comment on it the other day and I was flattered and a bit shocked bc I didn't expect anybody to read it in the year of our lord 2023, let alone like it.

I really plan on remastering it at some point since before Diplopia, THAT was my masterpiece of fiction. It's an inside joke among my knowing friends that it just never ends. 2020 was when I started it, I posted all of its chapters in like, early 2021 (so it was very much a covid pet project) and I finally stopped nitpicking it in July of 2022, and that was because of, you guessed it, Stranger Things.

But I really enjoy the lore I came up with for that story, especially with how this particular Dark Variant of Olivia seemed like... reaaaallllllyyyy bad. It was because of that Accident, but also because of how volatile of a being she is naturally.

-Keira Browning-

I mean, obviously she's *puts on the garbage Boston accent* Wicked Smaht, which gets her to her position in her story. She's smart enough for MIT, smart enough for Oscorp, and smart enough that it catches Norman's attention before they even formally meet. Her life was set for this trajectory, it's really her own decisions after the fact that set her on that darker path.

Ironically enough, her logic failing her gets her into this mess to a point where it can't get her out of it. I even say as much before they test the Performance Enhancers in the lab and it All Goes Wrong:

Which, obviously her smarts can only go so far at my own behest. I'm smart but not as smart as she is. So, you know I come up with bullshit frequently and call it Keira Being Smart. It's comic book science, it doesn't have to make any sense, really.

But you know, obviously a pregnancy hormone is the way to go here, good job, me.

-Emily Ripley/Many Last Names-

I mean, obviously her lab grown (maybe) abilities are the big one, but rather than talk about those, let's talk about the reason why they seem weaker than Henry's and how the OG 002 and 003 factor into it.

Obviously I don't think Brenner knew what he was doing with the initial experiment trials since the nature of Henry's powers were still a mystery. A blood transfusion was all it took, but I really think the Mind Flayer had something to do with it. As it stands in my theory mind, the Mind Flayer fused with Henry and physically put its particles into him like the other hivemind creatures. These particles could have been in his blood, which explains how the transfusion worked at all and how 002 and 003 got powers as well.

But I don't think they ended up being as powerful as Brenner wanted, which is why he was rather dismissive when they escaped. Admittedly that's a loose thread on my part, but I think a proximity to Henry also exacerbates it, like the Hotspot in my Bluetooth metaphor. Maybe after they ran away their powers just... faded away, maybe they're still out there, who knows.

But Emily. I think Emily's time in the abandoned Creel House allowed the Mind Flayer access to her as well, just not as much since she only spent so long in there compared to Henry. Then she gets her own blood transfusion and it gives her powers. Probably more powerful than 002 and 003, but less than Henry since there just isn't enough Mind Flayer in her...

And her continued attachment to her humanity. Henry always likened himself to a predator superior to the human race, Emily had human relationships post banishment when she would go to the Overworld. And I think only she was able to create gates because the Mind Flayer allowed her to. She was doing spy work for it as much as she was doing it for Henry since the goal is to get Eleven and, later on, Will. Having a woman on the inside (or outside, depending on her perspective) helps massively. But that connection to her last shreds of humanity is what's ultimately holding her back from her true potential.

Notice how Emily doesn't get all that tired during the Massacre when clearly if she's weaker than Henry, she probably should have. She wasn't behaving fully human, the Mind Flayer took over (as what I believe happened to Henry) and it granted her more strength and power the more she killed and absorbed for her and it. But I think after she undergoes her transformation at the end of The Piggyback (what Nancy called "the Upside Down poisoning Emily") and fully gives up her humanity and sort of "surrenders" to the Mind Flayer like Henry had, she'll get much stronger.

I expect that rot will spread. Where we leave her she still looks Emily-ish, still somewhat human, just with wings and a few vines. Maybe by the end she'll be a whole lot more powerful and look closer to Lilith from Diablo 4:

(Ooo now I kinda wanna draw that)

Basically I think in Season 5/HTM Part 2 (we'll see what I end up titling it) Emily's gonna go full Beast Mode with the Mind Flayer becoming her puppet master just as it became Henry's.

***

For the fun of it, let's dive into one small trait/power/etc for my smaller OCs (at least the named ones at the bottom of my masterpost... I have others I wanna make at some point, I just need to sit down and do it.

Lydia Roberts - Her mastery with dough and going rogue to make berry pies when meat is in short supply is the only reason Mrs. Lovett's business has lasted as long as it has.

Irinerys - Obviously she's an RPG stand in and can only do as much as she's coded to do, but I think despite the fact that she started her story as a former slave turned acolyte, with the power she's gained over the course of her story/the campaign I believe she's incredibly vain and gets very good at hair and make-up to make herself seem more important than her humble origins would have you believe. Since Ashara is the only female companion, Irinerys does her make-up as a bonding thing when not on missions, but absolutely used Andronikos as a canvas at some point. He's a space pirate, she 100% gave him some Jack Sparrow type eyeliner at some point.

Aneadora Fír - I haven't played actual D&D with my friends in a bit since we've been doing Thirsty Sword Lesbians instead, but she's a Reborn Tiefling (we were all undead creatures) and has some Sally from Nightmare Before Christmas stitches and various body parts (they all look grey compared to her blue skin). I feel like she'd sometimes undo the thread holding her pieces together and change their colors, so now her arm is held in place by pink stitches.

Marlina Nerys - So, fun fact, I was the first one of our party to get romantically entangled (literally I got laid in our first session and now it's a gag where I get laid every session). But she had a past as a Reformed Villain and in one of our last sessions (we're on break for summer) she learned a horrible secret... her ex, literal partner in crime, killed her parents after they tried looking for her (she ran away from home as a child). Determined to keep Marlina to herself, her ex tracked her parents down and killed them, never telling Marlina that her parents were even searching in the first place... TSL is a goofy system and nine times out of ten it gets very silly but our DM always has to give us something angsty. I came up with the secret, but she was the one who had me do so... it was either this or forget my girlfriend so I'd rather the horrible secret any day.

[swallow17]

My hair still smells like a rotting corpse.

Or at least I feel as if it does. I've washed it relentlessly since Wednesday afternoon, over and over. I used lemon shampoo, put some rosemary oil on it, then rose essential oil. And then I washed it again. I have a lot of hair, long and thick. And it smells like a rotten cadaver.

My friends insist it doesn't anymore. They say I smell like flowers and perfume, but I still can smell it.

And it's fucking disgusting.

Whatever I had imagined, it was way worse. My uncle had been dead for some days, lying on his bed, in a heatwave in the middle of the Spanish summer. The neighbours complained about the smell and they called the police. The police called the firefighters and they climbed up and forced a window. I've been told that they didn't need to go inside to know he was dead.

The town doctor refused to enter the apartment to pronounce my uncle dead. The police had to drag her upstairs, and once she was there she puked and fainted. My parents arrived at some point around those moments, when the police was calling a forensic team. That was when I heard of it. Of the fact that my mother's brother had been lying dead on his bed for days, rotting quickly without anyone thinking of him. Slowly becoming a thousand flies.

Only one of the policemen entered the room where my uncle was. He didn't allow anybody else to go inside, 'cause apparently the image was too much to bear for anyone. My grandparents' flat is quite big, and my uncle's room was on the oposite wing from where the firefighters opened a window. The doctor fainted without having crossed the corridor. Only one of the policemen was brave enough to go there and check the situation.

The coroner also entered, of course. He arrived and, as the policemen and the firefighters had done before, put some Vicks Vaporub on his upper lip and nostrils. And then proceed to question my mum, who was having a meltdown. Why did nobody realize my uncle was missing? Well, he had cut all of us out, both family, friends and neighbours. Was it possible that he had committed suicide? Well, no, no one thought so. He was selfish and ruin, but not suicidal. Not that we knew, of course. Was his mental illness part of the situation?

What mental illness?

The funeral home workers arrived short after. Luckily for us, the owner of the Funerary Home is dating one of my second aunties, so he was exceptionally nice about all of this. He went upstairs without the Vicks Vaporub thingy, or a face mask, and he evaluated the situation. "We have to cremate him immediately," he said without hesitation. "As soon as anyone touches the corpse, it will fall apart." The coroner said they needed to run an autopsy, in order to rule out a criminal offence. My auntie's boyfriend simply shrug. "As soon as anyone touches him, he will fall apart."

So they tried to find the cause of death without touching what was left of my uncle, trying to navigate the thousand flies and maggots, the stench and the tons of garbage flooding the flat. And they found a blue folder with medical records.

"Appart from the diabetes, he had liver cancer," read the coroner. "That's natural causes. You can take him to the crematory."

So they tried. They lifted the mattress and tried to tip it over the coffin which they had barely managed to carry to the room, crossing the narrow hallway after climbing two floors without an elevator. My auntie's boyfriend was right; as soon as they moved the corpse, it crumbled. And most of my uncle fell into the coffin.

Most of him.

That was what was happening while I was considering if I still loved my uncle or not, while I was deciding if I should go for a swim in the time my brother finished his shift. The firefighters evicted all the neighbours, 'cause the fact that a cadaver had been rotting there for four days was a health hazard. They left all windows open, closed the door and sealed the building. My mum was still crying at the building's main door, without being able to enter her childhood home, apologizing desperately to all of the neighbours. Then, my dad took her home. My brother and I arrived soon after.

That afternoon, my dad and I tried to find a company that could disinfect the flat as soon as posible, so the neighbours could go back some. The thing is… they all refused. Some of them demanded pictures of the situation and warned us that the waitlist was, at least, three weeks long. Others said that we needed to remove "anything organic" before they went to fumigate. Other simply refused.

Dad is a farmer. He was raised in the countryside, he never went to a proper school; the teacher came down to the farm and taught the kids of the workers, and my dad grew up "doing what had to be done". He has never hesitated. I guess this wasn't the time for him to do it.

I am my father's daugher. When he said that he would be the one going in to clean everything, I said I would go with him. Chin tilted up, clenched teeth, brave face. That's been me around my dad since I can remember. He raised me to be strong no matter what. Never to flicker. So I wasn't going to do it.

But my fiance refused. He said I wasn't going in. He said he knew I would do it and I'd do it right, with my tight lips and my clenched fists and doing what had to be done. But he simply didn't want me to. He wanted to protect me from that, he said. He's a soldier and, in the past, he worked in a funeral home. So he knew what was inside that flat, what we were facing. And he didn't want us to face it alone.

So he asked for a day off his work, and the army apparently thought that helping his father-in-law to clean up the mess a rotting body left behind was a good enough reason to miss work. He bought all the supplies and, Wednesday at 6:00 am sharp, my dad and him went in.

The thing is.. there were things we still didn't know. My fiance knew what was to be expected from a corpse lying in a bed after four days in a Spanish heatwave, but we didn't know about my uncle's mental illness. We didn't know about his diogenes syndrome.

I waited in the street, right by the tractor's trailer my dad had brought to take the matress. Right by my mum, who was relatively calmed by then. Until she saw my fiance and my dad coming down to the trailer over and over, in their safety overalls and wearing the facemasks covered in Vicks Vaporub, bringing one bag after another. And another one. And another.

We didn't know about my uncle's mental illness, but we knew about the hatred he felt for us. We knew that flat, that was entirely his after the death of my grandmother, wasn't going to be our inheritance. We're sure that his testament is done and that it cuts us off, and we're perfectly fine with that. We've been working our entire lives; we have homes of our own, savings and a good life. The cleaning of the flat was being done to help the neighbours, to avoid the three weeks waitlist.

But when I saw my father and my fiance bringing outside bag of garbage after bag of garbage, I thought about whoever will inherit the flat.

And of what will they do with the memories there.

I didn't care about the jewerly or all the expensive gadgets I knew my uncle had bought along the years, but I thought of a picture of my grandfather that I had seen a million times in my grandmother's living room, when I was a child. I wanted that picture. I didn't want anybody else to have it.

So I told my mother I'd be right back and I tied a handkerchief to my face, covering my mouth and nose, as I had done four years ago, in the first days of the pandemic.

And I went in.

I cannot even start describing the stench. It was so dense that I could almost chew it. Clenched teeth, clenched fists, chin tilted up, brave face. First door to the right, the living room. And the living room was full of garbage.

My uncle had kept every container of every little thing he had bought since my grandmother's death. Astonished, I contemplated the piles of empty egg cartons, empty drink cans, old Amazon boxes. Every centimeter of the room was full of… of everything.

Clenched fists, clenched teeth. My grandmother had been fighting this her entire life, keeping my uncle's illness at bay, keeping it a secret to shameful to be brought to the light. She kept my uncle's dignity until the end, becoming a slave to his needs to the point it brought her to her grave, preventing him from getting the help he so desperately needed. And he could not survive without her.

Clenched teeth, clenched fists. I tried to take a deep breath, but I hurled immediately. I don't know how I managed to keep it in, but I bit the inner part of my cheeks until the taste of blood masked the stench. And I entered the living room and started the pillage.

I only took those things without economic value that were priceless for my family. The old pictures of my great-grandparents and grandparents. My mother's braid, that was chopped when she was a kid. My grandfather's smoking pipe. I kept my lips tight, my teeth clenched. In the middle of the garbage I was wading, I saw a teddy crab. It was purple and small, surprisingly clean in the middle of all of that. I wondered if it belonged to my grandma. I felt sorry for the teddy crab, alone in a flat that stank of death. But my hands were full and the little crab was so far away. I left it behind.

The little teddy crab made me cry.

I went up and down several times, wading garbage in several rooms, looking for my great-great-grandfather's gun, the cuckoo clock my grandfather broght from Andorra. I couldn't find most of those things. Meanwhile, my fiance was facing, alone, the task of remove part of a corpse from the ground. My dad, who had known my uncle years ago, who was friends with him, couldn't face it. My father was cleaning the rest of the rooms, trying to remove anything that could serve as food for the thousand flies around us. When we crossed in the corridor, he carrying a bag full of more garbage, I carrying a photo album, he looked into my eyes and I guess the dread I saw was in my eyes too. He glanced at the end of the corridor, where my fiance was facing the horror alone. And he nodded.

I guess that, if my parents approved of my marriage before, now they're sure of it.

I don't remember clearly what came after. I stopped looking for memories when my fiance told me it was over, his very blue eyes sad and tired behind the protective glasses. He took me outside while my father started to fumigate the flat, trying to kill the thousand flies that my uncle had become.

I was tired, and dizzy, and desperately sad and lost. But when I saw my mum outside, with her teary eyes and her hands holding tight one of her parents' pictures I had rescued, I felt a little bit of peace. She hadn't need to go there and see her childhood home in that state. She probably will never do it, so she will keep the memories of the flat my grandmother kept pristine clear. Now, I can't think of the memories I had of my grandfather playing with us in the living room's floor without feeling the hurl in my throat, but I still have other memories. He wasn't my brother. She's suffered enough.

I did what it needed to be done. Just like my dad.

My hair stenchs like a rotting body. I have washed it over and over. When I close my eyes, I still see the mattress my dad and my fiance brought downstairs to the trailer, full of brown, yellow and black stains. I still see the living room where I played with my brothers and my grandfather full of garbage. I still see the little teddy crab.

But the worst is over. That very same afternoon, my auntie's boyfriend gave us an urn with the ashes of (most of) my uncle. The priest in our village held a service, and now my uncle is with my grandmother again, in the cemetery, next to her Elm Virgin's chapel.

And I hope that, this time, my uncle can be at peace with my grandmother and the rest of them.

The worst is over. My relatives gave us their condolences and congratulate us for the wedding, saying that they were happy that next time we reunite will be for something happier.

My hair still stenchs. But I have happy days ahead. When I take a deep breath, I still smell the rot; but it's but a memory.

This too shall pass.

Clenched teeth, chin tilted up.

Life goes on.

[a-simply-simping-simp]

bout to get myself cancelled...but please read to the end or you won't understand...

Hey, hi! Ok so, this post may be considered offensive to a lot of people, and to be honest, I don't even want to say it at all. I'm scared and worried and I'd rather shut up, sit back, and watch but I can't. I can't because I was called to say this by my God and as much as I want to not say it, I kinda have no right to deny him.

Ok so first of all, I want to make a full disclosure that I mean no ill will at all. I can understand the feelings of those who read this because I too have dabbled in the exact same thing before. Please read the whole thing before you say anything, because I promise it isn't the arguement you think it'll be.

I will not be judging nor slandering any individual nor group and will simply be explaining the mindset of christianity to society. I feel that there is a big misunderstanding in the world right now and at first I was going to simply let it be as it did not involve me. However, God keeps calling me to speak about it and I'd rather be cancelled online than cancelled by a literal divine being.

So, ONCE AGAIN, I AM ONLY EXPLAINING THE REASONINGS, MENTALITY, AND ALSO A MESSAGE TO CHRISTIANS AND NON BELIEVERS. I AM NOT BASHING NOR JUDGING ANYBODY. READ THE FULL THING OR YOU WON'T GET THE FULL PICTURE AND I PROMISE IF YOU DON'T, IT WILL LOOK LIKE A HORRIBLE AND UGLY ONE.

You have been warned.

________________________________

For a long time, those of the LGBTQ minority have been opressed and wrongly treated by not just non believers but by many other religouns as well. In their place, I sincerly apologize. They had and still have no right to opress anyone and judge them in such a horrible way. Everybody is equal. We all have our differences, but with it we are equal. That garbage man? Equal. The leader of a country? Equal. That murderer? Equal. I know, why the murderer right? Well, they were created and molded by the lord himself and in their lungs he breathed the breath of life. They are God's children, therfore, they are equal.

As equals, nobody has the right to claim themselves worthy to judge someone else. For every "wrong" thing with the person you judge, there is one for you as well. Only someone who is perfect can judge and that would be someone who never sins. Someone who doesn't make mistakes. Someone who is just and holy. Someone like God. Too many people have tried to claim this title without even realizing it. Because of that, people of all kinds have been opressed and shunned. For that, I apologize for them.

In those God wannabe groups, christians are very involved. We constantly judge others in the name of our God but we have no right to do so. This has caused many misunderstandings on BOTH sides of this coin. So God has called me, this coward and excuse of a christian to tell you his word. Both have misuderstood, and so both need to hear this. Christians, atheists, and every other religoun. Even if you do not want to turn to God, though it would be awsome if you did, that is not really what this post is about. It is simply and honestly here to clear misunderstanding.

Like I said before, the LGBTQ community have been horribly treated and still are, though in less severity, being treated in such ways by others today. The people who due to religoun are opposed to their ways obviously being the worst of them all. Chritstians vs. LGBTQ...why? Why does it have to be like that? God never intended this bickering and fighting nor did he intend this sitting back on the bleachers and watching people tear eachother apart cuz your too scared to get involved. Intention matters. For someone who is perfect, it matters.

So as christians constantly bash and scorn those who are LGBTQ, those who are LQBTQ mock those who believe in God, and those who are lukewarm and don't know how to respond in the face of either group, I have sat back and watched. It's ugly. It's really really REALLY ugly. I was too scared to say a thing.

I understood what the LGBTQ community felt. I've seen girls before and all I could think was "Wow. I could imagine her as my girlfriend so bad rn." I've prefered woman to men before, though it was subconciously, I knew. If I did not believe in my Lord God, I would be a bisexual, she/they, demisexual queen. But I also had the obligations to uphold my father's wishes as a Christian like everyone else. In the middle, what do I do? Many people have been in this situation. Many haven't. Those who have, are stuck in the middle. Lukewarm. Those who haven't, are cold or hot.

The reasons that christains don't agree with LGBTQ is because the Lord has forbidden it. Many christians and non christians use the excuse, "If all people were gay, there would be no more children in the world!" This is false. You could have a sperm donor. You could donate your body for pregnancy. You could impregnate someone and then raise the child with your significant other. Adopt. It's solvable. However, this creates problems. What if the woman wants to keep her child? What if the husband resents the child for not being his? What if the woman does not properly love the child because she knows it is not hers? Those issues could arise. But that is not the true reason God says no to LGBTQ.

I mean, yes they are reasons, but the real one is because it was not as he intended. It does not hurt anybody, so how can it be wrong? I get it. I've been there.

You have a rock collection. Each one is special and in it's own way, beautiful. You painted each and every one of these rocks. That one is pink. That one is blue. That one is brown. That one is green. They are all perfectly created. They are as they should be. You place them in an order. The pink ones go next to the green ones. The blue ones go with the yellow. It makes a beautiful color order. But then someone takes your collection and repaints the rocks. The blue one turned purple. The pink one turned green. The yellow is orange AND red. It was not as you wanted. It was not as you left it. But that wasn't all. They changed the order too. The one that used to be yellow is with the greens now. The pink with pink and the brown with brown, Colors you never created are with eachother now too. But nobody got hurt. Everyone is ok. The rocks are unharmed. But they are no longer how you intended. You spent 5 hours painting that rock blue. The perfect shade for that specific rock. Now it is pink. But nobody is hurt. You placed that yellow one next to the blue one. But now the beautiful contrast is gone. It is now paired with the green. Nobody is hurt. But it is not how you intended. The person responsible looks at you and says they like it better this way. They say you made a mistake making that one green and that it should be pink instead. That the yellow should be with the pinks and not the blues. Nobody is hurt. But it is no longer how you intended. Nobody is hurt. But it is no longer perfect. Nobody is hurt. But you made a "mistake". Nobody was hurt. But you wasted 5 hours painting. Nobody is hurt. But you, someone who knows color theory and has been making these rocks for years was just told by a person who knows nothing about it and has never made these rocks before that you did it....wrong. But nobody is hurt so it is good.

With this analogy, can you imagine the feelings of the Lord? Imagine making every single rock with care and perfection. Now imagine them changing it. Now imagine them saying you made a mistake. Now imagine them saying those delicate strokes, each brush stroke perfectly angled to make a different and beautiful pattern each time were wrong. Now imagine that with us. God COULD just force us to be the gender he intended. God COULD just force us to love who he wants us to love. God COULD force us to follow him. God COULD force us to do anything. But he doesn't. He gifted us with the gift of choice and free will. We would be robots otherwise. We would feel what he wants us to feel. We would do what he wants us to do. Not because of love but because we have to. And he wants love. Obedience because we love him.

God doesn't want us to change the way he intended it to go. God does not make mistakes. He does not make bad decisions. This is the true reason he does not favor LGBTQ. Not the people, he favors them for they are his children, but the sin. Not only did he not intend it to be this way, he said so in the bible. With that being said, it would also count as dieobedience and purposefully turning from him.

Now before I get cancelled and stoned online, I have yet to finish this loooong text. I have explained to those who do not obey the lord. Now I must adress those who think they do...

Do you know everything? Are you all seeing and all knowing? Do you have everything put together? Are you perfect? Are you God? No. You are his child. Do not discriminate and scorn your siblings but do not sit back and watch them unkowingly walk into a lions den. Warn them of the dangers. Warn them of the reasons. But in a respectful way. Let them know what they could be getting into but in a kind way. Let your reasonings not be of judgment and self proclaiming, but of love and truth. Do not force the Lord upon them. But do not withhold him from them either.

Too many christians I have seen that look in disgust of those who are LQBTQ and too many I have seen that are scared to even call themselves a christian in front of a queer person. We are all sinners. We have no room to judge. We make a bad name for ourselves and wonder why we are judged in return. Why should anyone walk in fear? Gay, trans, queer, crossdressers, allies, asexuals, christians, musslums, jews, atheists, any other religoun or beliefs. We are all children of God even if not all of us realize it. As someone who has been blessed the wisdom of the Lord, christians, stop being rude and discriminatory. Do not make them walk in fear. Atheists, stop mocking those of the christian belief as well as any other belief. LGBTQ, understand that not all christians are out to bite you. Everyone, please just be kind to eachother. Love and respect eachother.

All we can do is agree to disagree. If our warnings fall on deaf ears, do not jam a hearing aid into their face and start screaming at them. It just makes them turn farther from God. If you do not agree with us, please do not mock us like we are idiots. If we do not agree, then we can do nothing. It is not our jobs. It is not your jobs. It is our jobs to love and to follow the way of the lord the way he wants. With humility, humblness, and love. Not hate, judgment, and pride.

So for those who decide to cancel me today, I rest my case. I pleade guilty. I am guilty. I have done what needs to be done and said what needed to be said. I hope both sides understand now and no longer have to be at eachother's doorstep with a buttload of disrespect and hate. Once again, there is no judgment nor ill will in this message. I understand both sides. I have been on both sides. I was lukewarm but with my christian awakening, I have chosen to be hot. You can be hot without burning everything you touch. I will not apologize for my beliefs. I will not pretend to not have one. I'm sorry if this is considered rude to anybody, but not for what I said. So, yeah. Thank you for those who read. Love you ALL. Bye 🫰 :)

[thisaintascenereviews]

Aaron Lewis - The Hill

Sometimes I want to torture myself by listening to a bad album, or at least what I perceive will be a bad album. I don’t listen to a lot of what I consider bad anymore, and most of the “worst” albums I listen to these days are just kind of okay or mediocre. Every now and again, though, I find something that my curiosity draws me to that I know damn well is going to be awful. I listen to it, anyway, because I’m curious to see how the album may sound, and maybe it won’t be that bad. I’ve listened to a lot of albums that are considered to be bad, but are actually okay. What album did I find this time? That album is Aaron Lewis’ The Hill. Lewis is the frontman of Staind, a butt-rock / nu-metal band from the 00s that I never liked, especially after Lewis came out as a diehard conservative some years ago, and ever since then, he’s joined the League Of Conservative Rockers that include Kid Rock, Ted Nugent, the guy from Trapt, and whatever other D-tier musicians you can think of.

Since Staind went on hiatus in the 00s, although they reunited a year or two ago and put out an album no one listened to, Lewis started making country music. He’s from Vermont, but wants to act like he’s “country.” Already that’s a red flag, but he really leaned into that within the last few years by making really bad conservative country music that most country fans (read: old white people) really like. His new album, The Hill, is more of that, and it’s not just one of the worst country albums I’ve heard, it’s one of the worst albums I’ve heard period. This thing is top tier garbage, it’s not even funny. Whether it’s due the white nationalist and the Trump worship lyricism (the rest of the lyrics are bad, too), the awful vocal performances, and the bland instrumentation and sound, this album is terrible in every way.

Lewis is mainly known these days as being a conservative singer, and this album has its awful conservative lyrics, and they don’t even make sense. The album opens up with “Let’s Go Fishin’,” and from anybody else, this would be a song that is about leaving the problems of the world behind and enjoying nature, whether it’s fishing, hunting, or just being outside, but of course he throws in a “let’s go Brandon” reference that was already dated the second that catchphrase caught on, and “make America great again,” which doesn’t make sense because the song is supposed to be about leaving politics behind in favor of going fishing. You’d think that this song would be about bringing people together through fishing and having a good time, but it’s still somehow about being a Trumper.

A good chunk of this album is about just that, whether it’s the hilarious “Outlaw” that has him paint himself as an outlaw for being a conservative and blatantly admits he won’t listen to anyone who thinks differently than he does (he says “I won’t listen to what the left side says”), or the awfully racist “Made In China,” where he says he’s totally American, guys, and he isn’t made in China for some reason. I guess he says that because a lot of our products are made in China, but what does that have to do with anything? You can buy things made overseas and still be patriotic, or you can be an immigrant and still love America. It’s a weirdly racist song that has Lewis simping for America. It gets better, though, because on “Up To Me,” he says that he wants America to be a Christian nationalist country if he were president, and then uses that mysterious “they” all conservatives want to paint as an imaginary enemy. This song is such a strange fantasy by Lewis, because he doesn’t even say anything that’s an actual policy.

This album in a nutshell is a bunch of conservative buzzwords with an acoustic guitar. The following track, “That’s My Life,” is literally just that — Lewis tries to act all high and mighty and say “you live your life the way you want and I’ll live mine,” which is a great idea, but in the same song, lambasts drag queens, ANTIFA, CRT, the LGBTQ community, and then goes onto say that he “doesn’t care,” and that “I don’t hate.” He says that like he hasn’t spent this whole album (and the last few years) being a huge bigot and whining about everything conservatives do. If you didn’t care, or hate any group of people, why are making a song about it and then complaining those things in the same song that you claim to not care about or hate?

The few songs here that aren’t your average bigoted conservative bangers, they’re some of the most bland and uninteresting lyrics I’ve ever heard about how he’s so sad or not over an ex, or something or the other. It’s hard to care how sad he is about stuff when the rest of this album is spent whining about drag queens, the LGBTQ community, or this country not being Christian nationalist. They’re also just badly written, and Lewis is not a good vocalist. He has this gruff voice that admittedly sounds better in rock and metal, but in country? It sounds awful, and he sounds on the same on every song. The only credit I will give this album, and it’s not much, is that the instrumentation isn’t bad. Does that mean it’s good? Oh, not at all. This is some of the boring, generic, lazy country / folk? All of these songs sound the same, but it’s tolerable. If you don’t listen to the lyrics, this would be some lazy country that no one would certainly care about, but the bigoted lyrics and his awful voice make this album one of the worst I’ve ever heard.

[bridgespider]

The way this post makes my brain explode should be studied. It honestly seems so privileged to not have to know about how truly hazardous pregnancy is for anybody, at any age. Really, I wish I could live in a world where I could think like this, but I do not. Everyone is allowed to have their own opinions; I may disagree with yours but that's okay! That isn't what annoys me about this post. What does in fact annoy me is the blatant ignorance towards pregnancy as a whole, and how much everything can affect it.

Before I start, did you know that in 2017 alone The World Health Organization estimated that about 300,000 women died because of pregnancy-related causes? Did you know that amounts to 808 women a DAY who died because of it? Do you believe all those women were in their 40s or 50s?

Now I've read through your post, and I won't lie it isn't all complete garbage! I could skip over all of your incredibly insane rambles about the fact that there needed to be another adult who groomed Anakin to make it interesting. Or the fact that someone in her mid-twenties, deciding to have a relationship with her 'dead' husband's brother figure, (who btw has had no interest in her) would seem like, as you have stated "doesn't feel like a decision she's making so much as the circumstances acting upon her" which then treats her as if she's too immature, and I won't lie to me feels like it's almost slutshaming, there would still be so much that would piss me off about this.

Now let's start at the top, shall we?

"-like already in the original she shouldn't have kept the baby but the movie is christian and the audience too the vibe is "noo pregnancy is beautiful its luke and leia awww"." Yes, I agree there should be nervousness surrounding the pregnancy, you aren't wrong about this. What they are doing is treason, it will jeopardize their lives. What blows my mind is genuinely how hysterical this take is though. Did we watch the same franchise? The reason these two did not keep the baby is not because "the movie is Christian" The reason they kept the baby is because these two were married!!! They were in love!!! They wanted to have a family together but knew they couldn't!!! That's why this situation wasn't planned!!! Yes, they could have had an abortion, and that should always be a choice. If you actually understood their characters, you would understand why they didn't!!! They genuinely wanted their baby!!! These two never would have started a family because they knew how dangerous that was!! Once they actually were having one though, and they assumed the war was ending, this was a blessing for them! She didn't keep the baby because "it's luke and leia awww" She kept it because this was the next step, they had DREAMED of getting to have one day.

"-like young padmé is healthy and rich, she'll have the best medical care theres no reason to think her pregnancy will have complications" The only part about this sentence that has truth to it is that fact that Padme being rich may help her out. A big part of pregnancy-caused deaths is because of lack of healthcare and help. Since Padme has money and was a Queen, she would have support that could help her. Really, that's the only backbone to this entire part of your post. Padme being "young" and "healthy" does not matter. Yes, this gives her more likely odds of having a safer birth and pregnancy, but also means jack shit in the grand scheme of things. Did you know that 25 to 34 percent of women have traumatic births? May I repeat my question, do you believe all these women are in their 40s-50s? My own mother was about the same age as Padme was when she gave birth to the twins, and she was healthy when she gave birth to me. Her own birth was so traumatizing that neither she nor my father can remember big chunks of it because their brains physically locked it away.

You may not understand this, which is why I am almost 100 percent certain you are not a female, but every single pregnancy is incredibly dangerous. Every single body is different. Some people's bodies, they're completely healthy, it may seem so on the outside, but inside there are things that happen. Complications can so fucking easily happen it's terrifying. There are so many little things that can go wrong. Parts of yourself not fully developing. Hiccups in pushing. Parts of your baby get stuck inside of you, and it's slowly killing both of you. These things happen to everyone. They will continue to happen to everyone. It's terrifying. You could be 17, 23, 34, or 45 and all of these risks are the same. Did you know young pregnancies are as dangerous as older pregnancies? There are so many reasons for people to believe that complications could happen. Yes, she seemed healthy, and yes she was younger, but that DOES NOT MEAN COMPLICATIONS CAN'T HAPPEN!!!

"She died of grief while fully healthy which i think everyone can agree was fucking stupid." Now this is the age-old debate. What it seems everyone can't seem to handle in a franchise about space wizards. Yes, this situation may seem 'boring', people may have theories they prefer, that's okay! What I can't stand is you saying that everyone can agree with it being "fucking stupid."

A lot of people do not realize how dangerous stress can be to not only women but their babies when pregnant. Can you imagine how much stress she must have been under while being a politician during a literal all out galactic WAR? This is at the bare minimum something that could have been stressing her out for MONTHS before Anakin ever came back.

There are two ways you can look at Padme's death. She either died of a broken heart, or from the pure stress put on her. BOTH are just as understandable and logical.

If you go the stress route, this poor girl was stressing for MONTHS because of the War going on, the fact that her Husband, the father of her baby was out there fighting and may not come home is another contender for her stress levels being way worse than normal. Dude, the stress she went through alone could have easily pushed her into premature labor and caused so many dangerous complications.

If you go the broken heart route, there's even more understanding of why this could have happened. The first thing that happens on the night she dies, is she watches the Jedi Temple be burned to the ground from her apartment. She KNOWS this is happening, she watches it, and she's terrified that Anakin could be hurt.

Then, she has Obi-Wan come and tell her that Anakin killed all the younglings. The love of her life, the father to the almost fully conceived child in her stomach just slaughtered almost every single Jedi child. The love of her life, her other half just slaughtered every single child that was in the temple. Kids that looked up to him. Children that he may have gotten to meet in passing. She doesn't know he hesitated; she doesn't know that he almost let them go.

Then, she on her own, she thought, went to go find him. She had to witness firsthand how he's changed. How the person she loves is gone. Then, when he's angry at her, HE STRANGLES HER. He cuts off her airflow for at LEAST ten seconds, if not longer. Do you understand how dangerous cutting off airflow can be?? If you're cutting off her airflow then guess what, you're cutting off the BABIES' airflow. There are so many factories that could have played into her death. She hit her head on the ground. Her throat probably swelled up from being choked out. And then she was left there while Obi-Wan took care of Anakin.

Then, Padme had to go through labor almost alone. She had Obi-Wan there, but the father of her children were not there. This can really affect some women!!! Not having their support system there can really fuck with you!!! Obi-Wan just left his brother to die in his mind!! He is not doing alright, and he is not going to be able to help out much here.

This all could have very easily broken her heart!! Which is a genuine thing that happens!! Stress and grief can actually cause so much stress on your heart that you can actually break it!! No, it does not break in half. What happens, is small tears can happen to your heart, and it can kill you. It isn't a high percentage, I can admit that, but do you think with all the stress on her, the pure grief of losing her Husband, the physical things she's gone through, and the fact she is in ACTIVE LABOR could easily have a large factor of making her apart of that percentile? Because I sure do.

Now, this was the end of most of your incredibly ridiculous pregnancy takes, and ignorance. But you know, you just kept going. You just kept saying the most ridiculous and out-of-pocket things I've ever had to witness reading.

I'm going to speedrun this part hopefully, because I don't know if mentally, I can't handle these fucking takes anymore.

"Now they're making strange, emotionally driven and unexpected decisions instead of following the script-" Do you think committing treason by falling in love, getting married, and having a baby is on script? Do you think these were not strange, emotionally driven decisions? Do you think we as a watcher of a movie where this happened would not see it coming just because she's "Old"? I promise you, most people who have eyes can usually pick up on hints, I'm so sorry if you aren't able to do that. Though, it would make sense, since you don't have comprehension skills.

God, Jesus fucking Christ now we're here to this part. This part genuinely makes me wonder if you were fucking high when you wrote this.

Okay, let's start this crazy ass trainwreck I've had to read several times. "delicious wonderful scenario where obiwan and padmé have an affair after anakin joins the dark side" First, let me tell you how stupid this is. Yes, things can happen because of grief. It is not unheard of for people, especially a widowed wife and a husband's brother to hook up. These characters though would just genuinely never?? We now have concrete evidence with Ahsoka and The Mandalorian that YES, the Clone Wars is canon to live-action Star Wars. All those dudebros that don't believe that can finally let that debate go. Let's start with the fact that Obi-Wan has loved one person, and that was Satine, who IS canon. As well as Padme who truly loved Anakin with her entire being because she saw what good was in him. Neither of these would ever have an affair. That would butcher their ENTIRE characters.

"Giving in to emotion is what a romantic heroine is supposed to do. But older padmé sleeping with obiwan after losing her extremely young husband to the dark side while at most 5 days away from giving birth is like" I got to say the fact that you're saying they're having an affair when she's FIVE DAYS AWAY from giving birth is genuinely so fucking funny. Yes, people can have sex when pregnant. The fact that you're already basing this off of such a fucking crazy idea and then saying 'Yes!!! These two-grieving people!! One who is in her late 40s or early 50s who is also grooming another person is having sex while she is 5 days away from giving birth!! With her husband's brother/father figure! They're grieving, that's why this is happening!" Genuinely makes me want to rip my eyes out of my fucking skull. Like?? What does any of this have to do with anything? Is this you saying you wished this happened? That you wanted a grieving Obi-Wan and Padme to fuck? Because truly there is no other reason for this to be brought up. Literally, nobody asked.

Then you go on to talk about how it would be an actual decision as if all of her other choices were not 'actual' decisions. It's just so fucking ridiculous and honestly fucking stupid. "For the THIRD time, she acts out of feeling instead of reason and seals her fate." What? You needed a 'third times the charm' to completely butcher her character?

"its kind of a misogynistic character arc but i don't care" This genuinely made me laugh, thank you for at least truly getting a laugh out of me. Makes me feel like my time wasn't fully fucking wasted. I just find it so funny because you're saying it's misogynistic when your entire fucking take sounds misogynistic. It's just lowkey confirming what I bet a lot of people thought about this post.

I've already written so much and yet have barely scratched the surface of how you basically turned her into a groomer. You're saying that you wouldn't change much other than her age. Does that mean a 7-year-old meets a grown-ass adult and ends up marrying her? Do you understand how fucking gross that is?? Like I barely even touched on it, but you made such a vile scenario.

I just. dear lord, I'm so happy this is over. What a fucking journey of having to live through these horrendous thoughts you spit out onto this damned website. Normally I'm not this rude but normally I don't run into this level of stupidity. Maybe if you weren't so ignorant about pregnancy, I wouldn't have even cared to make this, but I had to at least correct the blatant stupidity in this post.

Had Padmé been 20-30 years older than anakin instead of 2-3 it wouldve fixed a significant portion of the franchise, including padmé's own chracterization

[industrialbirddog]

I hate when people are like "others say they depressed as kids but when i was a kid all i cared about was legos"

This isnt directed at anybody, but i am so gen SICK of hearing this bullshit, so heres a rant on what i think. Small little warning it IS cringe.

ALSO TW There is small mentions of things like abuse, neglect, and child harm. If these may be triggering dont read this.

Cool dude, cool. I remember crying on the playground on multiple occasions bc it i was coming to the realization that no one, not even my family actually cared about me. I was thinkin about how i was completely alone, and how i was basically an observer. I came to terms with my 'quiet dude in the corner no one talks to and forgets is there' role in like 2nd or 3rd grade, and i cried in the car because even then i knew everyone i cared about was gonna leave me but yeah bro, rock on, i love legos.

I mean, its almost like kids can have bad lifes? OMG! CHILDREN HAVE PROBLEMS?! type shit annoys me. Just because someone is young, think any age of minor doesnt mean that they dont have something going on in life and it certainly doesn't mean you should belittle literal CHILDREN for being self aware about how bad their situation is. Thats how you get kids like me, i have such little confidence i cant tell you a SINGLE thing without being like 'but dont quote me haha!' like, i could just point at a cat and be absolutely sure it IS a cat and tell you 'oh hey thats a cat, but dont quote me bc idk' instead of being a dick to children who tell you somethings wrong you should idk, use your fucking ears and listen to em? Like, thats what you have ears for right? I could outright tell people that i was neglected as a kid and they'll be like 'your still just a kid, you dont know what neglect is' like yeah yeah cool, wasnt starved, didnt get medically neglected, totally got all the emotional support i needed and wasnt just ignored or literally beaten for having any type of emotion sure. Ppl act like they know EVERYTHING, invalidate you, mock ya, belittle you and then when you tell them the details they go all "sorry i didnt know" yeah, you didnt. So why were you such a fuckin dick abt it? Why did you all high and mighty go "I KNOW BETTER THEN U!" if you knew nothing?

Like, the fuckin legos statement. Does no one realise people can have VERY different childhoods? and that truama actually EFFECTS PEOPLE? like holy shit! that traumatized boy acts traumatized! why would he do that? its not like IM traumatized so why would he act that way?! like im very happy that you werent treated like garbage as a kid, atleast some parents still treat their kids with respect and not everyone in the world suffered like i did but jesus fucking holy hell get your shit together, you dont have to be a dickface just bc youre not traumatized.

SAME FUCKING THING WITH PEOPLE WHO SAY THEY DONT BELIEVE IN MENTAL HEALTH. Like we have FUCKING EMOTIONS. How do you not believe in LITERAL EMOTIONS??? like you even see it in animals, you beat an animal enough for doing something they wont do it anymore bc you traumatized the fuckin animal, you see literal evidence of it everywhere. People show signs of being traumatized and then these fuckwads r all "UR BEING DRAMAITC!!!!!1!1!11!1!!!1!!!11" and then they'll go and mention how their parents slapped them once and they werent traumatized, like sorry that happened to you dude, but that is not at all anything like being beaten everytime you cry. They make huge problems out to be the tiniest of bumps in the road like they turn a moutain into a pebble all bc "they were being dramatic-" ever heard of people not lying? like, theres people out in the world that dont lie about or exaggerate their trauma, i literally in my 17 yrs of life not met a single person who does that. I bet those people exist, and i feel bad that thats the only way they feel they'll be taken seriously or the only way anyone would care. We focus a LOT on those type of people, and i get why but that doesnt mean EVERYONE who talks abt being truamatized is exactly the same.

Theres a large list of types of people i dont like, and these are just two of them. But, i dont want to keep writing abt this bc as i mentioned before i literally have zero confidence in myself and will stop while im still comfty enough to post this.

Also, can someone help me understand tags m lost [new to tumblr dweebis]

[buck-yyyy]

i keep telling myself that the reason i'm not doing the things that i love and enjoy is that i'm so overloaded with college work that i just don't have time but like. that's just not fucking true LMAO. i get home from school and i don't have the energy to do anything but lay in bed and scroll on my fucking phone and then suddenly it's dinner time and then suddenly i have to shower and then suddenly it's 11:30 and i've spent approximately 0% of my time doing anything i actually care about or even working on college applications and then i have to go to sleep. then it's the weekends and suddenly whoops! i have to recover from the week, guess i'll just lay in bed some more so long as i don't have plans with anybody, i'll draw later i'll read later i'll write later and then guess what it's dinner again and then i have to shower again and then i have to go to bed again and i still haven't done anything i ACTUALLY FUCKING CARE ABOUT, except maybe a brief 20 minute blip where i planned out something i wanted to do then ended up just laying on my side in bed with all the materials a mess in the sheets (they won't move anywhere else for days, not until my mom finally does it or they end up knocked on the floor). and my room is a mess, i can't even bring myself to pick up the literal actual fucking garbage on my nightstand, and my bed has so much random shit in it because the idea of putting that book away is so absolutely horrific that i can't comprehend expending the energy to move it so i guess i'll just sleep with it there and try not to kick it off and if i do welp guess it lives on the floor now. my planned out quilt is a mess on the floor and everything is a disaster and i'm sleeping with literally stained clothes because i cannot just get up and put them in the hamper and i just want to cry about all of it and i haven't even realized that everything has gotten this bad until RIGHT FUCKING NOW. the only time i ever do something i enjoy that requires effort is when i'm putting off schoolwork in school. and even then, it's only writing three sentences of fic, or spending 30 seconds on a NYT game, before just switching to my phone because it's all too fucking much and i'm tired and i just want to rest FUCK

[luisishere]

Searching: Writer’s Voice

Some of my favorite writers include Chuck Wendig, John Scalzi, Catherynne Valenti, Delilah S. Dawson and Wil Wheaton. What they all have in common is they also write great essays, blogs and tweets that people respond to. They are able to express thoughts and emotions with so much potent energy that it’s impossible to NOT read, because they also keep it interesting.

In Chuck Wendig’s blog TERRIBLE MINDS, he defines voice as follows: The writer’s voice is the thing that marks the work as a creation of that writer and that writer ONLY. You read a thing and you say, “This could not have been written by anybody else.” THAT is voice.

He further states “It’s also a component of practice and maturity.”

That’s the part that hurt the most to read. I already knew this. In fact, I’ve experienced that in my creative life.

I’ve been a graphic designer for over twenty years. I know about artistic voice. I understand that these things take time and effort. In my case, it takes constant time and effort. To get to where I am today, I’ve had to grind for a long time. In fact, sometimes I still feel like I’m grinding. For me, graphic design is a constant creative struggle, but I’ve found ways to punch through and persevere, with (mostly) positive results.

So, why do I feel like finding my writing voice so difficult?

My fiction, my prose, my blogs… there’s a lack of substance, emotion, punch, zeal, authenticity, anything to make it interesting. Even in the handful of articles that have been published, I feel like I could have done a better job of making it more interesting. Granted, in those cases, my editors were a big help.

Mr. Wendig also states that we mimic our writer influences, because we write like those writers we most frequently read. Eventually we stop doing that, but their influence can still exist in our writing, and that’s okay. I know that I don’t write like Chuck, or Mr. Scalzi, or Ms. Valenti, but they have certainly been influential.

So, this is why I’m here: to sharpen my writing teeth (is that a thing?) To spurt out this boring garbage in the hopes that someday when I write, my true self will emerge, and I won’t have these thoughts of “how does Scalzi do it!?” …and just let my voice flow on the page.

Time, effort, and confidence. We’ll get there. Hopefully.