#either i fucked this part up or these people have terminal not getting it disease

[typederror]

wanna feel deeply and hideously conceited? get misunderstood at a poetry workshop

[ishgardenjoyer]

It's so funny to me to see all this slander and hate on Roman. You all really act like the guy books himself and makes these decisions. It's easy for people to point the finger at him and make him the bad guy when the ones who need to have the finger pointed at them are the people running the damn company. Where's the accountability towards Nick Khan and Triple H? Why don't people hold them accountable the same they did Vince when he was running things? I think people who are upset about last night are just being hypocrites, because if it were anyone other than Roman, no one would bat an eye. They'd be happy for their fave too. Heels cheat to win all the time, but because it's Roman who does it, it's a whole different story.

And sorry to burst your bubble, but AEW isn't any better by a long shot and I'm tired of people pretending it is. I'm tired of the fucking cancer, terminal disease, and toxic poison that is JAS, who do nothing but steal other people's spotlights and take away from those who actually deserve and contribute nothing whatsoever to the show. They can fucking choke for all I care. I'd rather have a whole show revolve around the Bloodline, who at least help elevate those around them and give us compelling stories. Oh, and at least they're good people IRL, unlike certain members of JAS.

At this point, I'm convinced this is all just racially motivated and racism against Roman. If Roman were a white man, the whole narrative would be different.

Oh no my first anon hate :)

First of all, this is absolutely a Triple H problem. I even said, I love Roman Reigns, it's just that this run's gone stale. Through no part of his own, of course. I said WWE torched their golden goose. I said I love Roman, but this is a bad booking decision. If you had any reading comprehension, you'd know I was talking about... how did that one guy put it? Oh yeah, Vince's doofus son in law and the rest of his stupid family.

Secondly, I don't know what this JAS shit is about. Anyone who watches AEW will tell you that JAS is a garbage faction outside of Daniel Garcia. Trust me, most of us don't like Jericho either. I specifically talked about the Blackpool Combat Club and the Elite. Which has given us compelling storylines and elevated those around them, but that doesn't fit your narrative so you brought up something only tangentially related to what I was talking about.

AND FINALLY, THE RACE CARD. First off, I'm a minority myself. I'm from the Philippines, dude. You really don't think that there's any other reason for us wanting Cody to win over Roman? You think it'd be different if it was a white man?

Are we really forgetting about this guy? Who through no fault of his own, ended up burying a lot of talent and was kept protected in the main event? Was always chosen over talent the fans wanted in that spot and was hated for it?

Roman's beaten everyone for 3 years now. He's held the titles for longer than anyone since Hulk Hogan in the fucking 80s. There's no one left. At least with Cody, you could've booked some new feuds. But with Roman, they're just gonna book more of the same. More of your favorites getting fed to Roman, more Bloodline interference after a ref bump. More. of. the. same.

[youngerfrankenstein]

I posted 5,508 times in 2022

That's 4,343 more posts than 2021!

1,715 posts created (31%)

3,793 posts reblogged (69%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@sevarix-blogs

@youngerfrankenstein

@wild-moss-art

@fourspiceblend

@danzafila

I tagged 5,028 of my posts in 2022

Only 9% of my posts had no tags

#fire emblem - 1,413 posts

#fe3h - 1,139 posts

#the great ace attorney - 414 posts

#kingdom hearts - 285 posts

#feh - 242 posts

#frare plays ffxiv - 233 posts

#pokémon - 198 posts

#ace attorney - 184 posts

#tiger and bunny - 156 posts

#*snort* - 112 posts

Longest Tag: 139 characters

#the whole “grabbing hands” and “pulling them apart” is a constant recurring theme in kh and given the emphasis on connection it makes sense

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

Just putting this out into the universe.

421 notes - Posted November 14, 2022

#4

I had a Thought.

431 notes - Posted July 4, 2022

#3

to people out there who hate Dimitri and don’t want good things for him. you absolute fool. all that’s done is make you just like him. Dimitri doesn’t want good things for Dimitri either

539 notes - Posted June 7, 2022

#2

788 notes - Posted April 16, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

I’m in the mood so

Things That Actually Happened in the Professor Layton Series

Luke can talk to animals, this is never addressed.

A man gets so distraught about his crush having a boyfriend his hair and moustache go permanently pointy.

A giant ancient robot army attacks the earth.

An escaped lab rabbit with human intelligence gives you a couple of riddles and tells you to fuck off.

Someone creates a to scale copy of parts of London under the city to create a time-travel hoax for an elaborate revenge scheme.

Someone travels through time.

There was a video game movie and it was good!

Someone leaves a clue to a murder in how a sandwich was stacked.

A talking dog shows up to a woman who is unimpressed, he becomes her assistant.

A machine gun made from old slot machine parts is somehow more effective than the real machine guns in the scene.

A guy sham marries someone presumed dead’s girlfriend so they could wait for him to come back together.

All the main characters of one game die and are ressurected.

A bee saves your riddles for a while, then he gets whacked by a lady who saves them for a while.

Miasma theory of disease is real I guess? Since someone gets cured of a terminal illness with fresh air.

There was a village sacrificing young women to a dragon, except not really, except they thought they were.

An old guy thought he never aged because he was high on hallucinogenic gas for decades.

There’s a man who just shows up literally anywhere because he got lost.

Neither of the protagonist’s names are his given ones, this is something he did not know.

1,130 notes - Posted May 12, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[oatmealaddiction]

OK! Now that the time has run out on this I can go ahead and give everyone the correct answers if you were wondering. If you wouldn't like to be spoiled, definitely go watch FMA 03 on your own. Otherwise, the answers are below the cut!

Let's start with the wrong answers. 1. Alphonse becomes a bomb

This was one the least people voted for, which I guess because it sounds the most plausible? It's a pretty upsetting event though. Alphonse is turned into a bomb by Kimbley (after saving Kimbley's life no less) and has to wait for the metal in his body to activate until he explodes. He's only saved by Scar sacrificing his life (and a bunch of other people) in order to transmute Al's body into something else.

2. There's a character who was modeled after the terminator

So like, in this version of FMA, Kimbley is sort of split into two characters, one of whom is Lt. Colonel Archer. Kimbley spends most of his time harassing Scar and the Elrics, while Archer is more of a big bad for Mustang to defeat, and boy howdy is he nuts. I honestly think this idea mostly came from "what's the must fucked up thing we could use automail for." I don't like Archer as much as I like Brotherhood Kimbley, but he is still very fun just for how batshit insane he looks and the fact he's got a machine gun in his mouth.

3. There's an episode about people turning into rocks

Fossil disease! It's a thing in FMA 03...sort of...for like, an episode...They never really explain what viral infection is causing people to like, petrify, but its presumably philosopher's stone related? Also this episode is great in that it's one of the few that is entirely centered on Lust and the Homunculus and the Elric's barely show up at all. But the rock plague is weird, ngl.

4. Edward turns his arm into a machine gun and goes wild

YUP! Out of context this may seem like an extreme departure from Edward's character, but 03 Edward starts out the series with a lot of big talk about not killing people, but by the end of the series has had to abandon that guiding principal out of necessity, and he isn't that shy about guns either as we see him start to use them more as he grows older. In this scene he is trying to flat out kill the homunculus Sloth, and it is supposed to show that Edward has gone off the rails a bit.

5. Real life Metropolis Director Fritz Lang meets Edward and they fight a dragon

YES AGAIN! One of the things most people know about the 03 universe is that, in the end it is revealed Amestris a parallel version of the real world, and that characters in Amestris have real world counter parts. King Bradley is in fact, real life star director of the Weimar film movement, and pioneer of modern film, Herr Fritz Lang. Edward gets hired as his driver/body guard, and the two do fight a dragon (who is Envy in disguise.) As a Fritz Lang fan who gets excited learning about the Weimar Republic myself, it's incredible. 10/10 no notes. Based change.

6. Edward steps in a puddle and ALMOST becomes God

So this is a weird scene and I'm still not exactly sure what the idea was here, but it's honestly so cool that it's hard to say it's bad or nonsensical. This scene fucks. Edward accidentally steps into a puddle of red-water that's been augmented with dead prisoners in Laboratory 5, and he does it while charging a transmutation and I guess essentially does whatever the alchemic equivalent of getting electrocuted where he becomes a weird conductor of an alchemical reaction. The line from Lust is that, he's charged with enough power to become a God, but in reality its more that he's got so much power coursing through him its melting his brain. He is saved via a hug from Maria Ross, and it's very sweet.

7. An important character has his dick ripped off

This one is true too. Scar's Brother attempts human transmutation in the original anime, and the price he has to pay is...well...

Given the character he is trying to bring back is his fiance, it carries a similar irony to Izumi's punishment. Still though, damn.

8. Winry and Sheshka hunt for aliens

So the wording of this one is a little misleading, but its technically true. Winry and Sheska do team up to go hunting for Maes Hughes murderer, and in doing so discover discrepancies in government documents that suggest some supernatural activity is going on. Sheska *does* think its aliens, but in actuality its just the Homunculus being weird. Anyway, if you want a reason to go watch 03, Winry and Sheska are best friends and its great.

9. Hoenheim's ex wife wants to revenge fuck Edward

She sure does boys and girls! Hoenheim's ex wife Dante (who is thousands of years old) is bitter that he ran off and started another family, and so in order to get back at him, traps him in an alternate dimension and then goes about trying to seduce his sixteen-year-old son and make him her replacement lover/accomplice. I mean...you got to hand it to her, as far as revenge plans go I'd be hard pressed to think of something more fucked up than that.

10. In a speech, Hawkeye thanks the writers for not confirming Royai

So again, this one is a little bit misleading as its not technically cannon. But there is a cute OVA depicting the 03 Wrap party and in it, Riza does thank the writers for not confirming Royai and allowing her to remain single and in pursuit of her own goals (much to Roy's embarrassment.)

11. Lust is a well written character with depth and conflict

This one really surprised me, and I promise I was not trying to be tricky by adding it in. I was mostly worried that a lot of these plot events sound really silly and goofy out of context, and I didn't want people thinking that the 03 anime is a waste of time, so I added an option that might entice people to watch it. I was pretty sad to see so many people thought I was being snarky or ironic with it.

Lust in 03 is genuinely brilliant and easily one of the best characters the series pulls off. Where in Brotherhood Lust is pretty much just a blood-thirsty murderer, in 03 she's consumed with a desire (get it?) to be human, and its interesting to watch her various attempts at gaining humanity and to see her grapple with what being human even means. She also falls in love with Scar, and gets her heart broken by him, and seriously, it's so good, just go watch it.

And that all finally leads us to the correct answer!

Alphonse is crushed by a giant blimp

He is not crushed by a giant blimp in 03. Edward is crushed by a giant blimp. Specifically a Zeppelin.

Thanks for playing! :)

((Edit. Whoops made a mistake on the first one with the title. This is the real poll.

[peopleiveghosted]

It feels like a lot of long-time swifties carry a lot of disdain for newer swifties, especially ones that became her fans after 2020. I get the sense that this is because it became "cool" to like Taylor during her folklore/evermore era, so long-time swifties think that post-2020 swifties who weren't her fans from the start aren't "true fans". I also think there's an assumption that before 2020, the newer now-swifties must've thought Taylor was cringe and basic or whatever, and that's the only possible reason why they didnt become fans until folklore/evermore, when that's not necessarily true.

And honestly...even if that is true...so what? That means that there are a lot of people who may have had a bad perception of Taylor that changed their minds. Isn't that a good thing? Folklore and evermore are seminal pieces of music that captured a very fraught cultural moment, and a lot of people connected to that. This is something we all know and celebrate. Having an influx of new fans is a result of that success. Isn't it kind of hypocritical to celebrate her continual success and then spit on the newer fans that are both the product of and cause for that success?

I only really started listening to Taylor in 2021, and yes, the album that got me hooked was folklore. But this past year I've slowly gone through her entire discography, and while I may not be as familiar with all of it like a lot of long-time swifties are, I love a grand majority of the songs on each of her albums.

It is also true that growing up I had terminal not-like-other-girls disease so I didn't want to be perceived as "girly" or shallow, and did stupid things like making not liking the color pink part of my personality. Naturally, I wasn't a fan of Taylor's at the time. I never hated on Taylor, either, but I was indifferent and didn't allow myself to really think about her or pay attention to her beyond the songs that became pervasive because it didn't fit in with the image of myself that I had and wanted to project. And no, I'm not proud of any of that.

Back then, being a teenage girl was the least cool thing you could do (and I would guess that this is probably still true), and I tried so hard not to be grouped in like that. I suppressed so many things and denied myself a lot because I didn't want to be dismissed just for what I liked and for being a teenage girl. Exploring Taylor's discography has, in a way, allowed me to reclaim a lost part of my youth and embrace aspects of femininity that I had previously considered bad. I don't like Taylor "in spite of" her earlier eras, as many long-time swifties might assume, I like all of her eras! In my day-to-day life I've annoyed all of my acquaintances and practically made "Taylor Swift fan" a core personality trait. And I'm proud of that! She's a fucking musical genius, why shouldn't I be?

And then I come on here, looking for other people to talk to about Taylor because no one I know irl is as obsessed with her as I am, and everywhere I look people are making fun of or rolling their eyes at the "stupid" questions that newer swifties have. It's really discouraging. Can't we just all agree that we love Taylor's music and not squabble so much over who is a real or fake or long-time or new fan?

[ha-hatdog]

daisuke kambe hcs

- what is it like to be dating daisuke kambe/domestic life with daisuke kambe

i hope you don't mind but i slapped two requests together because they were nearly similar. since i am making one post with two requests, i'll try to make this longer. i hope you enjoy this

requested by anon (i just turned my anon ask and i'll just go ahead and presume you want to be anon hehe sorry about that) : Hi, I saw your post. 😳 I just wanna say goodluck to your writing! and I'll be looking forward to them in the future. ❤ (Your anon asks aren't on btw. 😔) And for the request, it can be a headcanon or a short fic/scenario, whichever you like. :3 But can I please get soft/domestic Daisuke to his s/o (which is the reader)? Like, they're taking care of each other stuff. ❤👁👄👁

uwu thank you so much and i look forward to writing more stories for you

requested by @holdmejk : what it’s like to date daisuke 🥺

i wonder too how it would be like to date this rich man so here ya go

__

haru kato is the simple man, simple life

there is no way daisuke kambe can be considered the same. this is the very reason why haru hates the man with a burning passion

waking up with daisuke goes two ways - the normal soft wake up, or the after sex wake up

if you wake up normally, you will always find yourself on his chest, a hand over the small of your back and the other behind your head, pressing you close to him as if you were his leverage to the real world

you never get tired of seeing him peaceful and cute that you kiss him everywhere your lips can touch - his chest, his cheek, his nose, his forehead, but never his lips

daisuke loves waking up to your kisses but what really gets rid of his sleepiness is the annoyance he felt that you never kiss him on the lips

he will lift his head up from the pillow while holding your head and lean forward to capture your lips. no, he doesn't care about morning breath, he cares about your kisses

if you two had sex the night before, it's a different story because it's daisuke who always wakes up first this time around because you know, he tired the hell out of you

he runs his fingers through your matted tresses as the side of his head rested against his open palm, elbow proped up on his pillow

he loves how you look so happy and satisfied and peaceful. he admires your beauty silenty, a small smile on his lips

he'll try to go another round because he can't help himself when you look so enticing but you stop him because you were already so tired

you will drown in luxurious things. this daisuke kambe we are talking about. what did you expect?

you want it? you got it. you like it? you got it. you need it? you got it. your eyes looked at it a second too long? you got it

daisuke believes you deserve the best of the best so whatever you wanted, bam, something much better

flowers? you get a garden. chocolate? you get a factory. movies? you get a theater. cup noodles? you get a ramen shop or the actual cup noodles company. dress? you get your own clothing line that trumps over versace and gucci

oh you think you can stop daisuke from spoiling you just because you begged him and showed him your big doe eyes? he was tempted for sure but there is no way he'll be holding back, especially after seeing your big doe eyes (yup, that plan backfired)

one hard thing about dating a millionaire? you can't buy anything for him

you do not have the money to lavish him the same, and even if you did, it's stupid to assume daisuke can't afford the same things you plan on buying for him. maybe he'll buy something even better

so instead of spoiling him like he does to you, you buy him trinkets that remind you of him

daisuke has no clue as to why items could remind you of him but he still keeps everything you buy for him close to him like in his office so he can always see them

you bought daisuke a goofy looking bobble head and he put it on the dashboard of his super cool looking car and haru was like the hell is that

daisuke sped through the streets before haru could make a comment

daisuke trust you more than anyone. more than suzue, more than haru, more than himself, more than his credit card

that being said, you are the only one he allows to patch him up after a particularly rough day at work

he will literally drive all the way to your shared home while bleeding out, enter your shared room as more blood trailed his face and deadass say "Can you help me? My head is bleeding"

you scold him for being so reckless and for always giving you a heart attack whenever he comes home in that condition

he doesn't mind being lectured tho because he still gets to feel your soft touches and gets lots and lots of kisses from you

he doesn't get why you kiss his wounds after patching him up. like his wounds are dirty? it still hurts? what was the science behind it? he still won't get it even if you explain it to him but he'll take note for reference

when you get injured, you are obligated to tell daisuke that you are not severely hurt that he had to call the hospitals all around the world to come heal you

you had to snatch the phone from him at one point when he tried to contact professional surgeons from america after you scratched yourself from a bush

daisuke at least knows how to use the first aid kit and no matter how little your injury may be, he will always proceed with the basics because he's very worried about you (though his face doesn't show it), that your small wound would get infected, and then you'll be on your death bed saying your last words, and then he's kneeling on your grave -

you had no idea this is what goes on inside his head every time you get injured

he also kisses your wounds after patching them up. he still doesn't understand the reason as to why you and others do it, but he does it because you do it

daisuke doesn't allow you to move a muscle aftee he's done fixing your wounds. he acts as if you have a terminal disease and would check on you every five minutes when he's working at home and calls you every three minutes when doing police work (haru gets annoyed with that habit so you had a talk with him)

dates with daisuke is far from simple. you either go to the most expensive resorts or attractions in japan or you're going out of the country. yes, your dates are basically mini vacations

so that's the reason why whenever you two want to spend time together, you are in charge. you can't always go to malaysia and england every weekend. plausible when you're with daisuke but you're not having it

you try to make your dates as simple as it can be. like what regular couples would do like going to movies (he was irritated because he had to sit near other people because he only wants to be near you), hanging out in the mall ("No, Daisuke, don't you dare buy that Gucci bag for me, I just glanced at it - oh for fuck sake"), and eating food from stands (Daisuke was confused like where will you two sit so you can eat your food properly?)

you two went ice skating and you guided him as he wobbled on his skates. you never let go of him because the first time you let go of him so he can try to balance alone in the ice, he looked very worried and made grabby hands at you

he becomes better at skating after doing it so many times. you were a little jealous because he's better than you now

daisuke his whole life always had a professional chef make something for him and when he began dating you, he also began inviting other professional chefs to make something for you two

but as your relationship grew stronger, you began cooking for him and you made him feel so special and he couldn't react properly

sometimes he watches you cook and helps with the cutting (you stopped him when he cut himself), but most of the time he's at his office and you bring his food to him and he scolrs you because he wants to eat properly with you ay the dining table

bringing food to his office is a no no. eating together at the dining table and sharing stories together is a yes yes

you don't know if the food you make for him is good or bad to be honest because he always has a deadpan face and if it is bad he won't tell because he'll hurt your precious little feelings but he'll be blunt as hell if it was another person

don't even wish that daisuke will cook for you. don't get him wrong tho, he really wants to but he's been pampered a little too much that he can't distinguish onion from garlic. he just thinks garlic is an elderly onion lmao

so yeah, daisuke cannot cook

but he likes cleaning the dishes with you because he can spray you with water and he'll hear your giggles. you always break many plates when you clean dishes and always drenched in water after your little fight

having the same authority with his AI. you rarely use the AI unless absolutely necessary and you can communicate with daisuke through it. you always mess with daisuke and you'll say something to the AI like "dial haru" and AI will go like "contacting haru kato" daisuke will go "cancel dial" and then AI says "cancelling contact" and you'll say "dial haru again" and the cycle goes on

late night walks are common for you two. when he comes home earlier than he originally does, he will insist you to take a walk on his private property and if he's feeling extra generous, he'll let you take him outside and to the park or something

you can take him to the convenience, the gas station, the prison - as long as he's with you, he's fine

stargazing is part of the late night walks. he'll point at a star and you'll say what constallesation that star was part of

"do you want that star"

"no daisuke"

"i can buy it"

"you are not buying a star"

daisuke : (꒪-꒪) ⇨(¬､¬)

he loves kissing you on the lips. your lips and kisses were just so addicting and sweet that he can't find another better place to kiss you

plus your blush is too adorable. he smirks whenever you get flustered. add a soft embrace to the mix, and his heart melts

daisuke will always open the door for you. in cars, in restaurants (he'll pull your chair for you too), in anywhere

he won't let you open a door as long he's there with you cause he's a simp for you

he won't care about any other person trying to enter an establishment after you enter. he'll let go of the door handle and won't even turn if he hears a loud thump behind him

you know what else he loves? hand holding. daisuke always holds your hand whenever you're outside and will only let go if absolutely necessary like going to the comfort room

he likes playing with your fingers while you love tracing the lines on his palm. you'll probably make a cheesy joke that you can see him marrying you in his future and he goes ( ºΔº )

"how do you know i was planning to marry you?" ( ºΔº ) "can you really read palms?"

you always massage each other because stress. when you massage him, he'll let out small mewls that just makes you go omg so cute but when he massages you - he will whip out the best of best stuff for massage

he will play relaxing music for you. you fall asleep whenever daisuke massages you because he's just so good with his hands

you know what else those hands are good for? touching your body in places that'll make you blush but he mostly especially likes cupping your butt because he thinks its so cute

you don't try to do the same because last time you did, you couldn't walk the day after. don't seduce daisuke if you're not prepared for a pounding

you like grocery shopping with daisuke. sure you can always order someone else to do it or you can make use of shopping as a time to bond with each other

you two work out together. daisuke is a boxer and learning that, you begged him to teach you to box but he didn't because what if he hurts you and instead, taught you how to workout and how to defend yourself

he wanted to test out if his self defense lessons were truly learned so he hired someone to pretend to steal something from you

he learned that his self defense lessons was fruitful because the man he hired came back with bruises and such

when daisuke admitted, he slept on the couch for an entire week

in your birthday, you woke up feeling nervous because it's your birthday - meaning daisuke must be up to some expensive shit

then you realized you're not in your bedroom. it was a completely different bedroom

you were scared honestly and you thought you were kidnapped until daisuke comes into your room wearing his beach wear and his shades while holding two coconuts with straws

"happy birthday. welcome to hawaii, my love"

HOW DID HE BRING YOU THERE WITHOUT WAKING YOU UP

you're just very tired the previous night after some fun activities with daisuke if you know what i mean wink wonk you wouldn't wake up no matter how many times you tried

suzue adores you because daisuke smiles more with you and you're best friends uwu so cuteeee

will always be your peace maker whenever you and daisuke fight. she ships you two. her ship cannot sink

suzue: "just hug it out now. hug it out - I SAID HUG DON'T MAKE OUT YOU TWO ARE GOING TOO FAST"

daisuke loves head pats. he wants them all the time. ruffle ruffle his hair. his eyes will close whenever you pat his head

he only wants you to pat his head. anybody else is a no no. maybe suzue but mostly just you

he lets you get all the groceries while he pushes the cart. he doesn't know the brands he sees on the shelves so he depends on you all the time

there's another reason he likes holding hands with you - he doesn't get lost. there was this time when he got lost because you let go of him and someone called you in the intercom and when you went there, you saw daisuke waiting for you with crossed arms and a balloon and its string around his wrist

the person at service said he was frowning the whole time you were gone and so they gave him a balloon but all he did was frown while playing with the balloon. he's mad because he got lost, you were gone, and you let go of his hand

you two are opposite of haru and his girlfriend in grocery shopping

you love it when his hair is down because he's so cute? can a man really be cute and hot at the same time?

the first you saw him with his hair down, you swooned and coddled him and since then, daisuke makes it his point to put his hair down more often now

taking baths together is just as great as massages. shower? you're not some commoner peasant. you use a very large bathtub

you relax with daisuke in the bathtub with bubbles and wine and sometimes he read you a poem from the poetry book he brings at times

you two always go to bathe together. but if you feel like you wanna bathe alone, daisuke will get all pouty aww and sulk aww

he will sit at the toilet seat and stare at you and when he does this, you can't hold yourself back anymore because he's too adorable and just let him join you with a sigh. he's with you in the bathtub in seconds

but if you don't, he'll leave the bathroom after a while and poke his head at the door, staring at you, as if saying this is your last chance and if you still don't allow him, there is a good chance you'll find him sulking on your bed while lying down, back facing you

just cuddle with him, he'll be fine

haru still doesn't believe daisuke got someone like you as his girlfriend because you're so kind and down to earth and you're dating this rich bastard like whaaaat

you try to make haru see the good qualities of daisuke and every single time you do, daisuke does something to piss him off

you made it your personal mission to experience the regular life of a human being without an unlimited balance

daisuke allows you to style his hair whenever you two sit on the couch. any hairstyles, any accessories, he's open so long your soft fingers are on his hair

you have always wanted a dog and begged daisuke for one but he did not relent, saying it was too much work and although it hurts to see you sad, he had to be strong

this is the only thing and time he said no to you and i'm pretty sure you heard haru scream in horror at the distance in disbelief

then one day you and him were walking down a street when a small puppy trotted up to you two wagging its tail and barking happily at you

you bent down and patted it, cooing and daisuke is wary of that small adorable pup. will it bite you? surely the pup has some common sense

you scooped the pup up and it licked your face and you were laughing and daisuke just has a sudden realization - who looked cuter? you or the puppy? or perhaps you made each other cuter?

daisuke rejected the puppy when you tried giving it to him but you forced it into his arms. daisuke and the pup kinda just stared at each other for a long time. you honestly thought you broke both of them until daisuke kissed the forehead of the puppy, hesitantly but softly

you were shooked (you swore you can hear haru screaming again)

daisuke couldn't help himself. something about the puppy just reminded him of you. it's those puppy eyes

"we need to find its owner, daisuke"

"no"

you told him he cannot buy the puppy because the owner must be worried sick

but it turned out it was a stray lil pup and you adopted her

now daisuke comes home to see you sleeping on the couch waiting for him with the pup in your arms. his heart melts every time

his small little family

for now

Daisuke Kambe let out an exhausted sigh as he parked his car in the garage. His hair was tousled, eyelids dropping, and jacket discarded on the passenger seat beside him. The case earlier has proven difficult than the previous ones he had taken. The criminal was harder to catch with his agility and athletic abilities, and was not easily persuaded when beckoned by cash. Not to mention his partner has been rebuking him the whole time, ranting about how justice workes and how money does not solve everything - basically, the usual. He was extremely fatigued, and all he wanted to do was wash up and go to bed with his beloved in his arms.

A tired smile broke his bland visage at the thought of you. The only reason he hasn't decided to spend the night at a hotel was because you weren't there. The faster he moves, the faster he can get to bed with you. Oh, he can't wait to see you and that little puppy of yours and his.

He exited the car, jacket draped over his shoulder. He sluggishly went to the front door and entered. As he delved further into his mansion, he was immediately greeted by a lovely sight. Your slumbering figure was laid out on the couch, the newly adopted puppy curling near your chest and resting with you. Warmth swaddled his heart and his eyes softened. All of a sudden, the exhaustion he felt has vanished, and all he could do was admire this masterpiece before him. You were waiting for him again.

As much as he wanted to see you like this longer, he couldn't let you sleep on the couch. There's a much more comfortable bed waiting for you upstairs. He approached you with quiet footsteps. The puppy perked up, her superb hearing picking up the sound of his advancement. Daisuke knelt down and stroked her head. "Good evening, Chico." Then he turned to you. You looked so peaceful - parted lips, even breathing. He leaned forward and pecked your cheek, smiling a small smile when you shifted. "Good evening, love."

You let out a yawn as you rubbed your eyes, body shuffling. "Daisuke?" You groaned out. "Is that you?"

Daisuke knew you couldn't see him but he nodded anyway. "You don't have to keep waiting for me like this, you know."

To his surprise, you wrapped your arms around him and pulled yourself closer to his body. "But I want to. And I missed you." You yawned through your statement as you nuzzled your head on his neck. "You still smell good after being outside the whole day. How unfair."

Daisuke let out a chuckle. "Come on. Let's get you to bed." He stood up easily even with your form carried in his arms. Chico jumped out of the couch at the same time and followed Daisuke as he carried you upstairs to your shared room, lying you down carefully on the bed. Daisuke made an attempt to withdraw from the withholding grapple of your arms around his neck but his endeavor was less then proliferant as you have established a stronger hold on him, unrelenting.

Daisuke let out a sigh as he tried to adjust from the uncomfortable stance he was positioned in. "I need to change first, Y/N." Badgered Daisuke, hands resting on your back.

Yet his words did no preclude you and you merely shook your head in response. "No," Your eyes shone with defiance, pout manifesting on your lips. "Stay."

"I'll come back in a few, love. I can't sleep in my work clothes." Insisted Daisuke, resolve crumbling the more he looked into your eyes.

"I don't care. Just stay." You grumbled.

Sometimes Daisuke sometimes wondered just how much power you had over him. He couldn't say no to you, apart for that one time when you asked if you two could get a puppy. Looking back at it, he felt guilty that he did not allow you two to have a dog earlier but if it wasn't for his stubborness, you wouldn't have come across Chico.

Speaking of the little puppy, it had successfully jumped on the bed and let out a merry howl. Distracted by the new development of the young dog, you were able to pull Daisuke down on the space beside you and did not think twice before snuggling to his side, arms embracing him tightly as you grinned happily, a happy giggle exiting your lips. You rubbed your head on his shoulders, sighing contentedly. "You're staying here with us."

Daisuke looked down at your beaming face and looked away, redness tinting his cheeks. "If it can't be helped." He stated, but he knew he made his choice the moment you had told him to stay.

Daisuke slowly wrapped his arms around you and pulled you closer, and you willingly accepted his affection. You were so warm, so loving. How did he ever find you?

And then came the cloud of exhaustion. His eyelids gradually drooped over his sockets, his strength withering every second that had gone by until the last thing he saw before sleep overcame him was you and a bounding Chico burying herself in between the two of you.

[mellometal]

Is it time to tear ANOTHER Dhar Mann video to shreds? YOU BET.

I've been sitting on this one for a bit because I wanted to make sure I talk about this tactfully. The subject of parents abandoning their disabled children is a very touchy one.

Parents abandoning their disabled children simply for being disabled is way too common. Like, I understand that not everyone has the resources to care for a disabled child (which is why you reach out for help, and why people like me, who work with disabled people, exist), but it doesn't mean you just walk out of their life. There are exceptions, like if you truly didn't want children or something like that, but just flat-out walking out of your kid's life BECAUSE they're disabled is fucked up.

I know someone personally whose biological mother abandoned her when she was born. Why? Because she's disabled. Physically, and mentally, to a point. I work with this woman on a daily basis. I don't really know WHY exactly her biological mother abandoned her, but I do know that her being disabled was part of it. It's sad. It doesn't affect her, thankfully. I'm happy that she's got her biological dad, her brother, and another maternal figure in her life, at least.

ANYWAYS. Before we get to the topic at hand, I need to put an obligatory trigger warning, like I do with EVERY Dhar Mann post:

This post will be talking about parents abandoning their disabled children simply for being disabled, treating disabilities like they're tragedies (in this case, we're talking about autism...again), divorce, and some SPICY ableist bullshit from an allistic (nonautistic) PIECE OF SHIT.

If any of this triggers you or makes you uncomfortable in any way, you don't have to read this post. This isn't worth putting yourself in a bad state mentally. I would never ask for any of you to put yourselves in that position all for a post. Put your mental health and well-being first. Consume media that sparks joy for you.

As far as my response goes, it's definitely more calm than normal. Funny....since this video is about autism spectrum disorder again. (Third time's the charm, huh, Dhar Mann? NOT.)

LET'S FUCKING GET IT.

The video starts off with these two parents (Gwen and Allen) in a psychologist's office. The psychologist tells the parents that their son (Chance) is autistic, and she tries to explain what autism is to the parents, but Allen cuts her off. Why? Because he teaches at a prestigious university, so he AUTOMATICALLY knows what autism is from that fact alone.

Um, excuse me? Just because you're a teacher at a prestigious university, it doesn't mean you're an expert in everything. It doesn't make you an expert in ASD or anything like that. Unless you SPECIALIZE in that area. Even then, shut the fuck up. The people who know about being autistic are AUTISTIC PEOPLE THEMSELVES! SHOCKER.

Hey, Dhar Mann! QUIT WITH THE VIDEOS ABOUT AUTISTIC LITTLE WHITE BOYS AND YOUNG WHITE AUTISTIC CISHET MEN! I'M SICK AND TIRED OF IT. It's annoying, ignorant, and it feels like you're doing this on purpose at this point to piss people off. If you're so uninformed about autism in women and girls, FUCKING ASK AUTISTIC WOMEN AND GIRLS! DO BETTER RESEARCH THAT DOESN'T INVOLVE AUTISM SPEAKS. The Autism Self Advocacy Network (ASAN) and the Autistic Women and Nonbinary People Network (AWN) are great organizations to go to for any kind of research on ASD in women and girls. STOP GOING OFF OF THE BRAINS OF AUTISTIC WHITE BOYS AND AUTISTIC WHITE MEN.

I don't feel I need to go too deep into the fact that autistic women, autistic girls, autistic nonbinary people, autistic BIPOC, autistic AAPI, autistic LGBT people, autistic teenagers, and autistic adults exist. Y'all already know.

Gwen asks the psychologist if that means Chance isn't healthy. (I understand not knowing about autism, but don't treat it like it's a terminal illness. Please.) The psychologist tells her that Chance is fine, but he just learns differently and might need more support compared to his peers.

Yeah, autism can affect how you learn about certain things (limited and repetitive patterns), but there are other disabilities that can affect learning as well. Like how dyslexia can affect your ability to read, dyspraxia can affect your ability to do math, and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) can affect your ability to focus or on impulse control. Autism affects how your brain is developed, it affects you socially, behaviorally, and how you communicate.

Allen is upset, says that he can't have a son "with a learning disability" (ASD is a neurological disability, not necessarily a learning disability), and treats Chance like he's stupid for being autistic. Gwen tells her husband that autism doesn't make you any less intelligent, WHICH IS SO FUCKING TRUE. ABSOLUTE FACTS. I was totally with her until she began that little monologue with "Just because a person HAS autism". SAY "JUST BECAUSE A PERSON'S AUTISTIC" INSTEAD! IT'S NOT HARD. PERSON FIRST LANGUAGE ISN'T WHAT EVERY DISABLED PERSON PREFERS. Allen says that "they could have another kid" and "put Chance up for adoption". Gwen obviously wasn't down with that. Allen gives his wife an ultimatum that it's either HIM or their son Chance. Gwen says that she can't choose between the two, but she will stand by her autistic son. Allen gets up and leaves the office, saying he wants a divorce.

Years pass by, Gwen is single and taking care of her autistic son Chance, and Allen has a new life with a ✨perfect son✨ (Samuel). He never mentions the son HE abandoned (Chance). He's completely forgotten about Gwen and Chance. (YOU OWE SO MUCH CHILD SUPPORT, ALLEN.)

Hey, Allen, how much do you wanna bet that your ✨perfect son✨ Samuel is autistic too?

There's the SATs, they're announcing a winner, and guess who it is? IT'S OBVIOUSLY CHANCE, OF COURSE. He's got the highest score in the country, with Samuel in second place. Allen is PISSED.

Chance gives a speech about how his mom really helped him, he struggled with autism, how Allen LITERALLY ABANDONED HIM, and THE CROWD GOES FUCKING WILD. Samuel, instead of being a sore loser, APPLAUDS FOR CHANCE. Stay humble, Sam.

My thoughts on the video? If you cannot tell by my tone throughout this post, IT WAS DOG SHIT. This video was insensitive to the true reality of parents abandoning their disabled children just because they're disabled. What do I expect from Dhar Mann at this point?

Here's my response to his video below. Don't worry, I will fully type out my response soon for anyone who cannot read the screenshots easily. It's a lot easier for me to do that on the desktop site than it is for me to do it on my phone.

For anyone who can’t read my response, I’m typing it out for you. Like I said, it’s easier for me to type it out on the desktop site than it is for me to type it out on my phone. It’s a real royal pain in the ass. But because I’m trying to make my posts easier to read for people, I’m doing this anyway. /lighthearted

First, second, and third screenshots (broken up into paragraphs):

Hey, listen, I appreciate the message you’re trying to go for, but can you please stop putting autistic people into a box? Can you stop treating being autistic like it’s a tragedy? Not every single autistic person is a little white boy in elementary school who’s considered “wild and unruly” or “super quiet and makes no friends”, nor are they a young white cishet man who’s a super genius or is how Chris Chan was before she came out as trans. (For anyone who doesn’t know about Chris Chan, there are many documentaries people have made on YouTube, and I highly recommend Geno Samuel’s docuseries, if you’re really interested in learning about Chris Chan.)

Autistic women, girls, nonbinary people, BIPOC, APPI, LGBT people, teenagers, and adults all exist too. 

It’s very apparent now that you get your resources from Autism $peaks, a hate group that spends the vast majority of their money on funding eugenics instead of helping autistic people like they claim, claims that only little white boys and young white cishet men are autistic and ignores all other autistic people who don’t fit that description, have no autistic people on their leader board or on any board for that matter, have members who have actually fantasized about k1lling their autistic children, treat autism like it’s a tragedy or a disease someone can catch (completely false), act like autism should be cured (there is no cure, and ABA therapy is a total shit show in itself), and treats autistic people like they’re broken and need to be fixed. Also, not every autistic person is a Super Genius(tm). That’s so demeaning to autistic people who aren’t seen as intelligent in any way. I’m autistic and seen as smart; however, there are subjects I’m stronger in than others.

If you can’t handle the possibility of having autistic children, or just disabled children in general, DON’T HAVE CHILDREN. If you can’t handle working with or alongside disabled people, including autistic people, maybe find a different profession. Even if you do that, you’ll never get away from disabled people. Disabled people aren’t a disease. We’re human beings just like neurotypical and able-bodied people.

Fourth and fifth screenshots (broken up into paragraphs): 

I would highly suggest getting resources from reputable organizations for ASD, such as the Autism Self Advocacy Network (ASAN) and the Autistic Women and Nonbinary People Network (AWN). Talk to any autistic person who isn’t a little white boy or a young white cishet man. 

Instead of using the puzzle piece, which is a symbol that many autistic people, myself included, are offended by (because of Autism $peaks and other organizations before them using it, plus it symbolizes that only autistic children exist and that we’re “missing a piece” like we’re broken), use the rainbow infinity sign (for all neurodivergent people) or the red and gold infinity sign (just for autistic people). Instead of “lighting it up blue”, light it up red or gold. Do both if you want. 

I’m actually really sick and tired of seeing just autistic little white boys and young autistic white cishet men being represented in the media, and y’all manage to fuck that up too. 

Before anyone mentions Sia’s movie “Music”, that’s also very poor representation of autistic girls. Besides, the actress who played the autistic girl isn’t even autistic. She MOCKED autistic people. I know she’s a kid, but that’s still super fucked up. I hope she’s able to turn that around. 

If anyone would like to discuss this topic with me or ask any questions, feel free to. I’ll answer as best as I can. Thank you and have a good night.

Before I get attacked for mentioning Chris Chan in my response, I bring up Chris Chan because allistic people think that every autistic person is like her (especially before she came out as trans). That person is part of why I wasn't open about being autistic or talking about my diagnosis until this year. I didn't want to be grouped up with Chris Chan because I do have very similar interests to her, I've been seen as cringey for having said interests, and just the way Chris treated autistic people who were formerly diagnosed with A$p3rg3r$ $yndr0m3 (like I was) really made me feel even more alienated.

Also, S1a supports A$ (Autism $p3aks). She's not a very good person to support. Some of her music is good, but her as a person....no. Her movie "Music" was gross, from what I've read about it and seen pictures of.

If you've read this far, thank you so much!

[frostyreturns]

So does poor reading comprehension. Nowhere did I say this has happened I said imagine if and I even explicitly said later on it was something they were trying to do as in...has not happened yet.....I did not say minors were actively being killed for depression I was explaining what it would be like if they get their way and amend the practice like they are planning to. You admit yourself the plan to expand to mental illness is on hold...as in they tried to make it a reality and in part because of the backlash and people being outraged about it they put it on hold...hold not cancelled on hold. But again it took less than a year for them to attempt to expand beyond the terminally ill...and they already have expanded it past the terminally ill to include any disease that in their opinion means a serious decline is life quality....which could be literally any disease. They are also attempting to include minors...with no oversight it hasn't happened yet...does that mean I'm not allowed to post or talk about it or criticize their attempts to push it that way. Also...minors can't be killed so no teenagers can be killed....by your own admission an 18 and 19 year old can be eligible...eighteen...nineteen...gosh whats another word for an eighteen year old....teenager maybe.

I don't know where you got the 14 000 number from was it perhaps the 2 year old article that's the first result on google that was explaining that every year the numbers are increasing exponentially. The 14 000 number was from 2022 alone and that was a 30% increase from the year prior. The 50 000 is since the program began...you quoted 1 year of deaths. And that being said I'm assuming these are conservative estimates because these people are proven liars who fudge their numbers. And even that being said....14 000 people is still 14 fucking thousand people too many. Are we just gonna brush off 14 000 killings?

Nobody fucking cares about your internet edebate muh sources. Your sources are always fucking opinion articles written by state mouth pieces. This isn't debate class, either believe me or don't...and if what you want is to not believe me then threading my posts with sources isn't going to change your mind you'll just argue over the source. I'm supposed to look up sources for everything I say but you can't even bother to properly read the original post or your own source.

I stand by everything i said

Imagine you leave your kid at the hospital for a treatment they have a high probability of surviving like a routine surgery or chemotherapy and you return to visit or pick them up and a nurse tells you that you have to identify their body because they opted for medical suicide after being scared by doctors about what recovery might put them through. The first you hear about this option even being explored with your child is after they have already killed them and you have only their word of honour that this is what your child actually requested and was in their right mind when it was offered to them.

That is the reality in Canada right now. Doctors killing patients on purpose is now a leading cause of death in Canada. The amount of people killed grows each year as of 2023 about 50 thousand people have been killed and they want to expand this death program to include not just people who are terminally ill...not just people who are sick and might die...but to people with mental illnesses. Which can be as simple as a depressed teenager at the hospital on the wrong day. This is legalized murder, it is genocide plain and simple.

[gilears]

for you my darling jamie: 3, 9, 19, 21, 22 (👀), 28, 29, and 33!! <3

THANK U MY DARLING SAV!!!!!!

3. How would you describe your writing style?

all over the place tbh!!!!!! i feel like i can very much be a writing style chameleon based on what the vibe of a piece needs, but i def gravitate to either silly goofy writing with lots of unnecessary asides (like lola fic or my reddie fake married disaster fic) OR like. insane ominous overly verbose dread hours (like o&t<3)

9. Thoughts on cliffhangers.

harrowing!!!!! what if the author never updates again???? i dont ever post chapter fics until ive finished or almost finished the entire thing for this reason, i dont want anyone to hurt the way ive been hurt

19. Share a snippet from a wip without giving any context for it.

“Ah, it’s rather smoky—Kristen, did you make cheese crackers? Is that why you—” He cuts himself off, looking genuinely touched at the idea that Kristen would go out of her way to make him his favourite snack, just the way he likes it (burnt).

She’s not sure how she feels about crushing the hopes of a man who’s had his hopes crushed so many times before, so she decides to just rip off the bandaid. “No, your kitchen’s on fire.”

Gilear’s eyes widen, and he takes one more step out of the hallway to where he can see the kitchen, the yells, “Ahhhh! My kitchen is on fire!”

“Great listening skills,” Riz mutters under his breath.

21. Can you accurately predict how long your fics are going to be? If you can, what’s your secret?

yeah for the most part i can! ive been writing fic for 8 years now (omg) so ive kinda just developed a sense for how long a particular idea will take me. i think it helps a lot that im a pretty heavy outliner, and i typically dont start writing something unless ive got most of the plot figured out

but whenever im wrong about a wc its always that i end up being way over. i have cant shut up disease and its terminal

22. What is it about watching the same two idiots falling in love over and over again?

djkglhbsdlj;ghsdfg woowwww i wonder what ship that eyes emoji is for sav!!!! tbh idk if i have a solid answer for this question! sometimes a dynamic just Grips you and youre like holy shit i have to read and think about these people interacting for the next 5-10 business days straight. when i figure it out ill let you know

28. Any writing advice that works for you and you feel like sharing?

yes! i think you should write whatever makes you happy to write because that will make you love writing more, which will make you write more, which will make you be a better writer. early 2021 i decided i wanted to write more stupid goofy shit and i had SUCH a blast writing it it made me wanna write more stupid goofy shit and i had so much fun writing stupid goofy shit i stopped caring about what would get the most hits/kudos/attention/whatever

also i think the secret to not giving a shit is having friends that are also writers. all my closest friends in fandom have been writers and when u can have people to go to who will Get and celebrate your work no matter what? game changer!!!!! opens up a whole world of possibilities like, "hey, what if i wrote this niche rarepair fic with my friend but its in second person and also the ship only has like 2 fics in their tag and also what if we wrote it in one night?" and then u have SO much doing it and dont even bother to check stats bc u already feel so fulfilled for having created it!!!! and also u and ur friend are so much closer now for it!!!

tldr put on some fun music, do a little dance, tell urself "who give a shit" and write whatever the fuck makes u happy

29. What’s the hardest thing about writing?

writing 💔

33. Give your writing a compliment.

aw this one is cute. mmmm i think im pretty good at capturing specific character voices/cadences/vocabulary in dialogue!!! 🥰

send a number for fic writer asks!

[pochapal]

I hate doctor 11 but ive never been able to explain why in like words lmao. He feels like such a mary sue character imo and like theres something about his characterisation that was always just really ineffective (like the stuff about fishfingers and custard or whatever it was). Imo i'd love to hear you give top 5 worst things about the 11 era because i rlly just love when it gets torn apart

i hold nothing but a seething contempt and loathing for that man. every time he appeared on screen i felt ready to snap like a riled up chimpanzee in my enclosure. i am frothing at the mouth and overcome with a desire to start flinging heavy objects. this might be incoherent and inconsistent but i started this rewatch in feb 2020 and only finished this week so i got through 11′s episodes last august/september time and i refuse to revisit it to jog my memory or fact check anything i’m saying here because this man does not deserve the space in my mind for that.

the first thing is i can’t fucking STAND the quirky whimsy timey wimey bit he has going on all of the time. i can’t even say this is because this is a kids show and i was a teen and then adult when i first properly watched him but actually!! when i was eleven years old i’d sleep over at a friend’s house most weekends and it always coincided with the airing of a new season 5 episode and i remember we watched the finale with the dumb time hopping to get out of the box prison that was never explained and didn’t make sense and i thought at the time “this is really stupid”. and before that my only other doctor who exposure was watching the david tennant christmas specials with another friend and throughout childhood my only opinion on doctor who was “this is a tv show that is not for me but is one that all the boys i am friends with like so i will put up with it to maintain our friendships” but at least those episodes were both suspenseful and engaging enough to keep me watching all the way through. like who the fuck does an end of the world sci fi plot and approaches it with an “oopsy woopsy i am a funny little alien man who is going to stop you all by making you do a hecking silly” like it’s unneeded and self-parodies an already cheesy show to the point where it becomes unwatchable and makes it impossible to ever take this man seriously.

next thing that downright sucks ass so badly is the stupid fucking overwritten constantly escalating plotlines. like everything from season 5 up until his regeneration at the end of season 7 is meant to be this grand interconnected cosmic plot about how...the doctor trying to bring back his planet will end the universe or something so all the top powers across all of reality tried again and again to stop him from doing that except he doesn’t know what’s going on so he keeps thwarting these people who supposedly mean good?? i mean i sure don’t fucking know what they were trying to say!! like for some reason we never get the doctor suddenly becomes this superdemon that threatens everything so these people (whoever they are) decide to, in sequence: suck him through a time rift to erase him from existence, trap him in a prison and remake a universe without him, take his companion’s baby and turn her into a perfectly trained doctor killer, form two(!!) secret societies to hunt him throughout history that are only stopped by his companion splintering herself across his personal timeline to protect him, and repeatedly cause reality collapsing events because it’s a kinder outcome for the universe than what he will do. this grand and terrible event turns out to be...he spends a few hundred years chilling by a rift that leads to his home planet and protects a few generations of children from monsters which convinces them to give him infinite regeneration power then fuck off back to their pocket universe. and it’s like!! what is the point of anything that happens in this man’s era when everything is always “the darkest moment” or whatever the fuck!! i don’t care!! we never get a compelling reason to believe this bumbling clown of a man could ever be a universal threat!! the whole thing is so dumb i hate it!!!

thing number three i hate is how the eleventh doctor is ALSO characterised as this abrasive egotistic male supergenius to the point where he becomes genuinely indistinguishable from bbc sherlock. genuinely who enjoyed seeing this guy constantly tell people their tiny human minds can’t comprehend what he’s doing and then basically just wave his magic wand to solve whatever problem each episode is facing. 2012 is the year of human sin because this fucking shitsmear character archetype somehow became both a redditor role model AND a tumblr sexyman and it’s like!! nobody is enjoying this stop making this seem cool! him saying timey wimey thing any time he does anything is frustrating and dumb and locks the viewer out of giving a fuck about anything that is happening! smartest man in the room syndrome is a disease and the eleventh doctor is terminal with it. like remember how they established river as an accomplished scientist (when she wasn’t being a child soldier or a time paradox or whatever the fuck) and every time that came up mr doctor eleven man was like “oh this thing is obvious because i’m a genius and you didn’t realise because your brain is tiny so get out of the way and let the grownups think” or that time it turned out amy had been replaced with a slime clone for half the season and the doctor chewed rory (audience surrogate) out for somehow not realising this fact we didn’t know right from the start and like. this served no purpose other than to draw into severe question why the doctor is also this super beloved magical figure implicitly trusted by all children everywhere like. mr steven moffat is totally allergic to writing and solving mysteries in his tv show and fuck you for wanting to figure things out as you go along based on the new evidence you uncover at strategic plot intervals just let this asshole man use magical thinking to reveal he knew the answer all along and you’re a fucking idiot for not also realising this thing which had no basis or precedent anywhere else in the show.

speaking of dumb things let us not forget the absolute shitshow that was minority representation in this era. i’m not even talking about the low hanging fruit of how genuinely unironically sexist amy and clara were written where each episode moffat either seemed to loathe them or was incredibly horny over them and they had no character growth or arc or fucking anything. i’m talking about how fucking shit terrible the incidental representation was. god remember how every single fucking gay person who appeared in this era was written as one incredibly fucking stupid joke and how the women were all either sexy dominatrix, feeble girl in love, or Mother (or all three in some really terrible cases) and i’m not qualified to talk about this but also how incredibly white this era was and how on two separate occasions we had monarchs reimagined as sexy girlbosses with a gun played by black women who the doctor leched over. nothing about any of this was good ESPECIALLY coming off the back of rtd who was surprisingly forward thinking for 2005 and did a really good job of positing travel with the doctor as queer allegory. in comparison moffat gave us THE MOST heterosexual shlock i’ve ever had to endure. amy and rory could have been interesting characters were they not hemmed into this domestic bickering young straight married couple bullshit that was in no way changed or altered by traveling with the doctor except for the quasi incestuous river song reveal that was dumb and bad and stupid.

the last major mega gripe i have with the series is moffat’s fucking jingoistic boner for british military aesthetics. this carried over throughout his entire tenure as showrunner but was super terrible vomit inducing in eleven’s era. the unironic admiration for ww2 britain and winston churchill is downright wretched. are you incapable of telling a second world war story outside of churchill’s london and plucky blitz fighters. shit gives me hives so badly. and then!!! that weird church owned army that features in the future that end up being bad not for the concept of what basically amounts to an imperialistic intergalactic rendition of the fucking crusades but because they’re part of the nonsense go nowhere puzzlebox narrative that says the doctor is a not good man who will do bad things to the universe :(. remember how rtd’s doctor was a freshly traumatised man hot off the war criminal press who time and time again vehemently refuses to engage in military violence, but who tragically inadvertently turns every one of his companions into soldiers in his own personal army, and he has this moment of complete horror at the realisation and it is this which causes the downward spiral that ends in 10′s regeneration. and then how there’s this cringe line about how there’s a force of people who are “the doctor’s army, always ready to fight his battles when he’s not around” or some shit and then it turns out this is actually massive literal military operation and we’re meant to celebrate this. fuck off.

bonus round because this needs to be said but i have never hated anything like i hated that fucking human tardis episode. everything about it induced violent anger in me from the sickening overindulgence of that softgoth dark whimsy helena bonham carter tim burton aesthetic to the bafflingly terrible evil carny stereotype of those junk scavengers to the overblown sudden tragic shipbait romance of human tardis and the doctor. every word out of her mouth was trite shit and the fact that the death of her body was presented as this super emotional dramatic scene despite there being no buy in or incentive to care and the fact that every single person on tumblr in 2012 ate that shit up like it was fucking gourmet. i loathe every single thing about that episode so much.

[bottlecapbaby]

Nuka-World Blues | Gage/SoSu

Pairing: Porter Gage/ Fem!Sole Survivor

Word count: 1255

Notes: My first writing for Gage! No one asked, but I delivered. Might be part of a series because god I love him

Warnings: kinda sexual, but it’s just Gage fantasizing a lil. And just a smidge of graphic violence

Sole didn’t like being put on a pedestal, or made into some sort of hero. In fact, it infuriated her. It’s why she refused the position of general for the Minutemen, ducked out of Railroad celebrations early, and didn’t often stick around to see the fruits of their labor. Even when she was married to Nate— and especially when she was pregnant— she felt this invisible barrier between them. Sole knew that she was flawed, like anyone else.

The apocalypse had fucked everyone, but it had fucked her in particular. Turned into a popsicle, husband killed, baby stolen and turned into an old man, and what was she before the war? A fucking lawyer. There was no skill more useless in the lawless, post-nuclear wasteland than that. So why fuck around trying to be nice anymore? It was something she asked herself quite often. Practicing law taught her that people would jump through whatever hoops necessary to prove that they weren’t animals, when they were. 200 years in the future, that hadn’t changed for many people. 

When she went to Nuka-World, she wanted to go somewhere new, somewhere she wouldn’t be recognized. And apparently 200 years into the future hadn’t been far enough. A potential raider paradise wasn’t what she expected to find, but it didn’t disgust her as she expected. These people were so wholeheartedly unafraid of themselves— of their animalism, cruelty, manipulative tactics. It was almost beautiful. In a world where strength and skill are always challenged, Sole could actually take pride in being Overboss. 

She was, at first, hesitant to take yet another readily offered leadership position. Her introduction to the system of power was with a rigged fight, after all. But upon seeing the raider gang leaders leer and scrutinize her, ready to pounce on any sign of weakness? Well, she strangely felt more comfortable. 

———————-

Gage felt like a dumbass, and that was really saying something. When you’re surrounded by raiders, most of whom can’t tell their own asshole from the next guy’s, it’s not hard to think of yourself as the smartest guy for miles. And usually, that’s how Gage thought of himself. 

Until the Overboss was involved. 

They say don’t shit where you eat, or maybe more appropriately, don’t fuck where you eat. Then again, there probably wasn’t a square foot in Nuka-World where the raiders hadn’t done all three of those things, maybe even at the same time. Either way, it didn’t make Gage feel better about wanting to fuck her. 

When she revealed that she was pre-war, he had no choice but to believe it, even without seeing the tacky vaultsuit she had stuffed in the bottom of a bag. She had the curves, the smile, the smarts, the fucking meat on her bones to prove it. They didn’t make ‘em like that no more. It seemed like every new thing he learned about her made her more unlike any woman he’d ever met before. And with that, he felt more temptation. 

Until it wasn’t just temptation. He’d never admit it to anyone, least of all himself, but his desires had journeyed beyond just wanting to get his dick wet. Gage had told Sole things he’d never said aloud even to himself, much less another person, and she listened. Goddamnit, she listened. The one thing Colter never did (if he was being generous) and the one thing he’d always wanted. And the worst part? She trusted him too. Told him about her own rich history in the realm of pain, torment, and regret. She shed silent tears and he extended his sympathies. He comforted her. 

Which is totally not a very raider thing to do. 

Then came the possessiveness. Gage had never particularly liked Mason (the man looked ridiculous, and maybe Gage had his own alpha streak in him), but he had never wanted to butt heads with him as much as he did now. The predatory gaze that subtly raked up and down Sole’s body was not so subtle to Gage. He had to watch her back after all, especially if someone else had their eyes on it. Mags was irritating in her own way before, but her and William’s attempts at getting in the Overboss’s good graces via seduction were infuriating now. Hell, even the rare trade of sadistic smiles with Nisha got him riled up and pissed off at times. 

Then? There was the yearning, and this was when Gage knew he was well and truly fucked. At first, his daydreams were of Sole looking up at him while she sucked his cock, how her ass would feel on his hands when he held her against the wall and fucked her until she screamed. Then, how she would look when she came, and how she would beg for him to touch her. Then, how her sleepy weight would feel across his chest, how her smaller, less calloused hands would feel entwined with his. When you’re nutting at the image of someone looking up at you with a lovelorn, adoring gaze, it isn’t about the sex anymore. 

So there he was, sitting around like a trained dog at the Fizztop, methodically cleaning his guns and patching up his armor, all while Sole slept just a little ways away. Despite having been asleep for 200 years, she liked to take these afternoon naps. Another thing that, in the eyes of the rookie raiders in the park, made her too soft to be Overboss. She didn’t worry about it. Those who were important knew her strength. She welcomed challenges from the greenhorns, she itched to make examples of them at times. It was that mean streak that kept her popular with the people who were smart enough to stay out of her damn way. 

When Colter was around, Gage fucked off pretty much every time he passed out. Wasn’t his problem if the boss got stabbed in the back while he was out cold, not really, not when Colter was as shitty a boss as he was. But the idea of someone sneaking in while Sole was at her most peaceful, most vulnerable? Well, realistically she would use that nasty, freakish blade she kept at her side at all times to pry their ribcage open, but the alternative still twisted up Gage’s guts with worry. So he stayed. If loyalty was a disease, Gage had it terminal. 

The radio was on— low volume so as not to disturb sleeping beauty, but still on. But the old raider wasn’t really listening. He’d long since tuned out to focus on Sole’s quiet huffy breathing. Occasionally he’d look over his shoulder at her, and for much longer than he’d ever admit. Her tousled hair was splayed in a halo against the pillow, curling against her cheek. 

Oh, to share that bed and feel her warm, soft body against him. To know her touch— carnally, tenderly, whatever way she would give it to him. Him, an old raider, scarred to fuck, missing an eye, teeth rotten, and just generally not a nice guy. Her, a pre-war relic with a penchant for animalistic truthfulness and violence that made her a perfect fit for Overboss. Evidence of a time oft romanticized, and proof that it wasn’t all that great. To those in the Commonwealth, her good looks and good deeds made her the very embodiment of old world blues, in every sense of the phrase. To Gage, she wasn’t afraid to be fucked up and wrong, and that’s what made her so right. 

[ohbeaby]

Headcannons about how having pacts helps both parties. It’s always kind of bugged me that the boys just kind of accept having someone control them and it’s never really clear what they’re getting out of it. Soooo...yeah

Lucifer: Avatar of Pride

First off, if he’s going to make a pact with you it’s because you’re strong minded and someone he can see becoming powerful. He probably found you by how confident you were yet unaffected by his influence.

Once a pact is formed he will listen to anything you command of him, but don’t be fooled. This demon will kill you the second his order is complete if he finds you too much trouble to deal with. There are billions of humans after all, he could easily replace you if you attempt to abuse his power.

What he gives: Leadership and convincing people to do what you say. With his pact you will find that holding leadership positions is much easier and as such you will fly up the ranks of whatever industry you choose. You will also gain the ability to convince people to follow your orders no matter what that order is.

What he gets: Prideful are everywhere in places of leadership. He can easily influence those above and below the person he has made a pact with to kill them off or just play with their perceptions of themselves. He mostly just gets to have a condensed area of playthings that all reek of his sin.

Another thing he gets is a small boost in power. The more people he can mess with the stronger his influence will become and the more people he can overtake. This is the same with all the brothers.

Mammon: Avatar of Greed

Similar to Lucifer he prefers making a pact with someone who will be powerful. He targets those already influenced with greed though, so it’s less work on his part. Also similar to Lucifer he will just kill a human who he feels is abusing his power, though he seems to struggle to off the witches that control him in game.

What he gives: Great fortune and can trick people. This isn’t to say that the second you make a pact with him that you’ll win the lottery. You’ll just be offered higher and higher salaries, your bonuses will be much too large compared to everyone else. At casinos you’ll be able to fool people in poker and trick others into giving their money up in stupid bets.

What he gets: Making a pact with Mammon is signing a death wish. Once you start not gaining as much money he will just kill you and take everything you have. This boy is waiting for you to stop being useful to him so he can indulge in his own sin.

As I said before he gets a small boost in power the more people he influences. Though he is a bit too impulsive and impatient to wait to see how far his influence can go, he’s not after physical power after all, just belongings.

Leviathan: Avatar of Envy

Unlike the previous two brothers, Leviathan doesn’t care if you are a powerful person. He just wants to recruit you into his navy because not everyone makes it through his boot camp.It’s either you survive long enough to become a soldier or he just eats your soul.

What he gives: Never wanting and being good at new tasks. You will always manage to find deals on things you are wanting or someone will just happen to get you that thing you really wanted. Any task you pick up as well will be very easy for you to master.

What he gets: Recruitment into his army. Once you have agreed to a pact with Leviathan you have essentially agreed to go to boot camp the second you die. He will come and pick up your soul and shove you into a rigorous training session. Leviathan will not settle for less than the best for his army so if you don’t meet his standards he will just eat your soul and that will be that. 

I would imagine Leviathan would take the most advantage of the power boost he gets from his pacts, after all it’s hard to find good souls for his army so he needs to influence as many people as possible. Reasons we don’t see him actually get summoned all that often is because his pact pretty much just keeps those signed into the contract happy anyways.

Satan: Avatar of Wrath

Satan only cares about how powerful a person is when he’s trying to get back at Lucifer. Otherwise he doesn’t really care. He also doesn’t make too many pacts just because he doesn’t want to have to deal with that many people, very similar to Belphegor in that sense.

What he gives: People can’t get upset with you and wisdom. Whoever does get a pact with Satan will find that people just don’t get mad at the person. They could commit horrible crimes and get off with nothing more than a slap on the wrist if even that. The person will also have a ridiculous amount of wisdom, becoming the person people turn to for life advice since they just always know the right answer.

What he gets: Satan pretty much gets a free show and meal out of the deal. As the Avatar of Wrath he takes great pleasure in watching things get destroyed. He really only participated in making pacts after Diavolo and Lucifer made it so only they could travel freely to and from the human realm because he could no longer cause the destruction he so eagerly wanted to see. Essentially pacts to him are just a giant “fuck you to Lucifer, I’m going to do what I want”. Also sees humans as a free snack once he gets done.

Satan recognizes the boost in power he gets whenever he gains a new pact but doesn’t really see the point in trying to gain more power. He is already struggling to contain his wrathful ways and doesn’t really want to deal with too much of a power imbalance on top of it. He is the only brother that never gets involved with any sort of pact bets between the brothers, where they see who can control the most pacts, because they all know that if he got out of control he could potentially destroy the entirety of Devildom.

Asmodeus: Avatar of Lust

The Avatar of Lust is, unsurprisingly, very popular with celebrities and political figures with ill intentions. He loves to jump on their social media and gain massive amounts of followers.

What he gives: The ability to read people like a book and get anyone to spill their secrets to you. When you make a pact with Asmodeus you won’t even be manipulated or tricked by people and you’ll be able to find out anything you want. Nothing slips past you anymore and the worlds secrets are open to you if you just ask the right people.

What he gets: In short, just more people to sleep and party with. This man is all about living life sleeping with everyone and partying as often as possible. He loves himself and loves to be admired so he makes pacts with people with large followings so he can get the same attention on their social media and at parties. Once he sees that the person is no longer as popular he’ll just go ahead and kill them, after all it’s not like he wasn’t introduced to many other popular people who he can make pacts with. He’s probably the least likely to eat a human once he’s done with them.

Asmodeus probably uses his boost in power just to influence more people into loving and admiring him. He’s not really the type to make a bunch of pacts for more power, he really just wants to be admired and loved.

Beelzebub: Avatar of Gluttony

Beelzebub doesn’t care who he makes a pact with, that isn’t very important to him. Though he stays away from witches and sorcerers because he has seen how tricky they can be. Typically makes pacts with people who are into sports.

What he gives: Physical illnesses no longer harm you and quick recoveries from injuries. With Beelzebubs pact you will no longer get sick from diseases or be affected by terminal illnesses. You will also recover very quickly from injuries and be able to bounce back from seemingly fatal accidents.

What he gets: Power and a free meal always sound nice to him. He’s one of the most physically strong brothers and sees himself as the person who has to break up fights between all of them, he knows that he may need an extra boost in power if the arguments get out of hand. He also isn’t one to pass up on the chance for a free meal later on. When he kills the person it’s completely at random, it’s just whenever he starts craving.

Beelzebub is probably the only one, besides Lucifer maybe, to use his boost in power to keep peace in the House of Lamentation. He doesn’t see a need for more power for personal gain.

Belphegor: Avatar of Sloth

You will be hard pressed to really get a pact out of this guy, he just doesn’t care and would rather sleep than deal with people. He keeps maybe 2 pacts at a time and even then he tells the people not to bother summoning him for anything. Mostly makes pacts with students because they are too busy to even try and summon him so it’s a win for him.

What he gives: Awareness of everything and never wake up tired. You won’t need to be paying attention to anything anymore because you’ll know everything that’s going on around you, who’s in the room with you, what they’re doing, why they’re doing it, etc. You’ll also be able to sleep 30 minutes and feel like you’ve gotten a full nights rest. Very popular with students.

What he gets: Amusment and a free meal for Beelzebub because he just doesn’t care. Belphegor is similar to Satan in the fact that he mostly makes pacts as a “fuck you” to Lucifer. He also kind of finds it funny that the students who make pacts with him don’t always improve in school because they figured the being aware part would make it easier to cheat on tests, which isn’t always the case with everyone gets different versions of the test.

Belphegor is another that just honestly doesn’t care about power and in fact he doesn’t even really care about influencing others. He’s perfectly content just having one or two pacts that he can throw over to Beelzebub whenever he wants to give his brother a gift.

[whitehotharlots]

Andrea Long Chu is the sad embodiment of the contemporary left

Andrea Long Chu’s Females was published about a year ago. It was heavily hyped but landed with mostly not-so-great reviews, and while I was going to try and pitch my own review I figured there was no need. Going through my notes from that period, however, I see how much Chu’s work—and its pre-release hype—presaged the sad state of the post-Bernie, post-hope, COVID-era left. I figured they’d be worth expanding upon here, even if I’m not getting paid to do so.

Chu isn’t even 30 years old, and Females is her debut book, and yet critics were already providing her with the sort of charitable soft-handedness typically reserved for literary masters or failed female political candidates. This is striking due to the purported intensity of the book: a love letter to would-be assassin Valerie Solanas, the thesis of which is that all humans are female, and that such is true because female-ness is a sort of terminal disease stemming not from biology but from one’s inevitable subjugation in larger social contexts. Everyone is a woman because everyone suffers. Big brain shit.

But, of course, not everyone is a female. Of course. Females are females only some of the time. But, also, everyone is a female. Femaleness is just a title, see. Which means it can be selectively applied whenever and however the author chooses to apply it. The concept of “female” lies outside the realm of verifiability. Suggesting to subject it to any form of logic or other means of adjudication means you’re missing the point. Femaleness simply exists, but only sometimes, and those sometimes just so happen to be identifiable only to someone possessed with as a large a brain as Ms. Chu. We are past the need for coherence, let alone truth or honesty. And if you don’t agree that’s a sign that you are broken—fragile, illiterate, hateful, humorless.

Chu’s writing—most famously, her breakthrough essay “On Liking Women”—establishes her prose style: long, schizophrenic paragraphs crammed with unsustainable metaphors meant to prove various fuzzy theses simultaneously. Her prose seems kinda sorta provocative but only when read on a sentence-by-sentence level, with the reader disregarding any usual expectations of cohesion or connection.

This emancipation from typical writerly expectations allows Chu to wallow proudly in self-contradiction and meaninglessness. As she notes herself, explicitly, meaning isn’t the point. Meaning doesn’t even exist. It’s just, like, a feeling:

I mean, I don’t like pissing people off per se. Yes, there is a pleasure to that sometimes, sure. I think that my biggest takeaway from graduate school is that people don’t say things or believe things—they say them because it makes them feel a particular way or believing them makes them feel a particular way. I’ve become hyper aware of that, and the sense in which I’m pissing people off is more about bringing that to consciousness for the reader. The reason you’re reacting against this is not because it contradicts what you think is true, it’s because it prevents you from having the feeling that the thing you think is the truth lets you feel.

And so she can get away with saying that of course she doesn’t actually believe that everyone is a female, the same as her idol Valerie Solanas didn’t actually want to kill all men. The writers, Chu and Valerie, are just sketching out a dumb idea as a fun little larf, to see how far they can push a manifestly absurd thought. If they just so happen to shoot a gay man at point blank range and/or make broader left movements so repulsive that decent people get driven away, so be it. And if any snowflakes complain about their tactics, well that’s just proof of how right they are. Provocation is justification—the ends and the means. The fact that this makes for disastrous and harmful politics is beside the point. All that matters is that Chu gets to say what she wants to say.

This blunt rhetorical move—which is difficult to describe without sounding like I’m exaggerating or making stuff up, since it’s so insane—papers over Chu’s revanchist and violent beliefs. Her work is soaked with approving portrayals of Solanas’ eliminationist rhetoric—of course, Chu doesn’t’ actually mean it, even though she does. Men are evil, even as they don’t really fully exist since everyone is a woman, ergo eliminating men improves the world. Chu goes so far as to suggest that being a trans woman makes her a bigger feminist than Solanas or any actual woman could ever be, because the act of her transitioning led to the world containing fewer men. Again: big brain shit.

I’ll leave it to a woman to comment on the imperiousness of a trans woman insisting that she is bestest and realest kind of woman, that biological women are somehow flawed imposters. I will stress, however, that such a claim comes as a means of justifying a politically disastrous assertion that more or less fully justifies the most reactionary gender critical arguments, which regard all trans women as simply mentally ill men (this line of reasoning is so incredibly stupid that even a dullard like Rod Drehar can rebut it with ease). Trans activists have spent years establishing an understanding of transsexualism as a matter of inherent identity—whether or not you agree with that assertion, you have to admit that it has political propriety and has gone a long way in normalizing transness. Chu rejects this out of hand, embracing instead the revanchist belief that transness is attributable to taking sexual joy in finding oneself embarrassed and/or feminized—an understanding of womanhood that is simultaneously essentialist and tokenizing. When asked about the materially negative potential in expressing such a belief, Chu reacts with a usual word salad of smug self-contradiction: 

EN: You say in the book that sissy porn was formative of your coming to consciousness as a trans woman. If you hadn’t found sissy porn, do you think it’s possible that you might have just continued to suffer in the not-knowing?

ALC: That’s a really good question. It’s plausible to me that I never would have figured it out, that it would have taken longer.

EN: How does that make you feel? Is that idea scary?

ALC: It isn’t really. Maybe it should be a little bit more, but it isn’t really. One of the things about desire is that you can not want something for the first 30 years of your life and wake up one day and suddenly want it—want it as if you might as well have always wanted it. That’s the tricky thing about how desire works. When you want something, there’s a way in which you engage in a kind of revisionism, the inability to believe that you could have ever wanted anything else.

EN: People often talk about the ubiquity of online porn as a bad thing—I’ve heard from lots of girlfriends that men getting educated about sex by watching porn leads to bad sex—but there seems to me a way in which this ubiquity is helping people to understand themselves, their sexuality and their gender identity.

ALC: While I don’t have the research to back this up, I would certainly anecdotally say that sissy porn has done something in terms of modern trans identity, culture, and awareness. Of course, it’s in the long line of sexual practices like crossdressing in which cross-gender identification becomes a key factor. It’s not that all of the sudden, in 2013, there was this thing and now there are trans people. However, it is undoubted that the Internet has done something in terms of either the sudden existence of more trans people or the sudden revelation that there are more trans people than anyone knew there were. Whether it’s creation or revelation, I think everyone would agree that the internet has had an enormous impact there.

One of the things I find so fascinating about sissy porn is that it’s not just that I can hear about these trans people who live 20 states away from me and that their experiences sound like mine. There is a component of it that’s just sheer mass communication and its transformative effect, but another part of it is that the internet itself can exert a feminizing force. That is the implicit claim of sissy porn, the idea that sissy porn made me trans is also the idea that Tumblr made me trans. So, the question there is whether or not the erotic experience that became possible with the Internet actually could exert an historically unique feminizing force. I like, at least as a speculative claim, to think about how the Internet itself is feminizing.

Politics, like, don’t matter. So, like, okay, nothing I say matters? So it’s okay if I say dumb and harmful shit because, like, they’re just words, man.

Chu can’t fully embrace this sort of gradeschool nihilism, though, because if communication was truly as meaningless as she claims then any old critic could come along and tell her to shut the fuck up. Even as she claims to eschew all previously existing means of adjudicating morality and coherence, she nonetheless relies on the cheapest means of making sure she maintains a platform: validation via accreditation. This is all simple victimhood hierarchy. Anyone who does not defer all of their own perceptions to someone higher up the hierarchy is inherently incorrect, their trepidations serving to validate the beliefs of the oppressed:

I like to joke that, as someone who is always right, the last thing I want is to be agreed with. [Laughs] I think the true narcissist probably wants to be hated in order to know that she’s superior. I absolutely do court disagreement in that sense. But what I like even better are arguments that bring about a shift in terms along an axis that wasn’t previously evident. So it’s not just that other people are wrong; it’s that their wrongness exists within a system of evaluation which itself is irrelevant.

Chu has summoned the most cynical possible interpretation of Walter Ong’s suggestion that “Writing is an act of violence disguised as an act of charity.” Of course, any effective piece of communication requires some degree of persuasion, convincing a reader, listener, viewer, or user to subjugate their perceptions to those of the communicator. Chu creates—not just leans on or benefits from, but actively posits and demands fealty to—the suggestion that her voice is the only one deserving of attention by virtue of it being her own. That’s it. That’s what all her blathering and bluster amount to. Political outcomes do not matter. Honesty does not matter. What matters is her, because she is her. 

This is the inevitable result of a discourse that prizes a communicator’s embodied identity markers more than anything those communicators are attempting to communicate, and in which a statement is rendered moral or true based only upon the presence or absence of certain identity markers. Lived experience trumps all else. A large, non-passing trans woman is therefore more correct than pretty much anyone else, no matter how harmful or absurd her statements may be. She is also better than them. And smarter. And gooder.

Designating lived experience and subjective feelings of safety as the only acceptable forms of adjudication has caused the left to prize individualism to a degree that would have made Ronald Reagan blush. And this may explain the lukewarm reception of Chu’s book.

While they heaped praise upon her before the books’ release, critics backed off once they realized that Females is an embarrassingly apt reflection of intersectional leftism—a muddling, incoherent mess, utterly disconnected from any attempt toward persuasion or consensus, the product of a movement that has come to regard neurosis as insight. The deranged mewlings of a grotesque halfwit are only digestable a few pages at a time. Any more than that, and we begin to see within them far too much of the things that define our awful movement and our terrifying moment.

[repmet]

Fic: Iris

For FowlFest2020: Obscure Character Appreciation Day. Iris is actually an OC, but her family is mentioned so... that counts right? Shoutout to @ms-nothingspecial for betaing  and listening to me stress about word choice for far too long.

--

The fairy shuttle port at Tara was an impressive operation. Ten thousand cubic metres of terminal concealed beneath an overgrown hillock in the middle of the McGraney farm. For centuries, the McGraneys had respected the fairy fort's boundaries and, for centuries, they had enjoyed exceptional good luck.

- Artemis Fowl: The Arctic Incident

--

Iris McGraney is born at midnight on a full moon, which for a McGraney is the very best of luck.

The birth goes smoothly and without complications, and Iris is born quietly, wailing briefly to let the world know she’s arrived, before settling on her mother’s chest, quietly basking in the comfort of her family around her.

Iris McGraney is born lucky. Then again, her family always has been.

--

When Iris is 7 she gets sick, as children do.

Plans are made to see the doctor in the morning, but McGraneys have a certain way of treating illnesses first that most others don’t.

Iris is well enough to listen to her Dad tell her to keep the bedroom window open all night, even as he bundles her up in blankets and turns the heater on.

He puts a note on the sill along with a single gold nugget, just in case.

“We’ve invited them in before, but it’s better safe than sorry, isn’t it? And you should never ask without offering something in return. It’s rare they take it but it’s only polite.”

The McGraney’s were always digging up gold, especially near the fairy fort. Iris knew it was a secret though, or else everyone would want to come dig on their farm which would make the cows sad.

“Now, go to sleep,” her Dad tells her, tucking her in tight. “You’ll feel better in the morning.”

Iris doesn’t wake all night, and in the morning, the note is gone, the small piece of gold now sitting on her night stand.

Iris picks it up and runs to the kitchen.

“It moved, Daddy!” she announces proudly, the picture of a healthy child. “They didn’t take it but it moved.”

Her father laughs and hugs her.

“That’s how they let us know they were here.”

--

When Iris is 14 a severe looking boy in a suit sits down across from her at a cafe she’s in, and puts a phone on the table.

Iris recognises the model, it’s seven months away from being released and the hype is already intense.

“For a moment of your time.”

Iris stares at him.

“My parents are gonna think I fucking stole this.”

The boy sets a letter down on the table as well. Iris has a brother so she ignores the letter at first and continues staring at the boy, hoping to unnerve him. He seems unbothered, maybe he has siblings too. She picks up the paper and reads a very official looking letter from the phone manufacturer congratulating her on being selected to test an early release prototype.

It’s fake of course. Iris isn’t an idiot, she is however a teenager in a tiny village with not much going for it. In short, she’s bored and whatever the hell this is, it’s interesting. Also her parents don’t know shit about technology or how major releases work.

She shoves the phone in her backpack.

“What do you want?”

“The fairy fort on your property, I want to know about it.”

Iris raises her eyebrows, that’s hardly top-secret information.

“I don’t know, man, it’s been there for ages. We take care of it, respect the boundaries, and we get lucky.”

“In just the past fifty years your family has uncovered a lost work of Holbein the Younger, a sword owned by Íriel Fáid and seven seperate stores of gold. You’ve also never lost an animal to bovine spongiform encephalopathy in all the history I could find of your farm.”

Well it was more gold than that at last count but they’d stopped being so vocal about it and also-

“Yeah... what’s that last one?”

The kid gives her a disdainful and patronising look. “Mad cow disease.”

“Right.” This dude is a dick. “Like I said. Lucky.”

“It seems a bit more than lucky.”

Iris shrugs. “Look man, you don’t need to believe in the People if you don’t want but you’re in the wrong town. We eat that shit up here, the Hill of Tara borders our farm, there’s three fairy-dedicated gift shops in this village alone.”

He looks interested now though, leaning forward in his seat.

“The People?”

His eyes are weirdly intense, Iris can’t wait to tell her friends about this. Orla is super into vampires right now, she’s going to love it.

“Fairies, the fae, the fair folk, aos sí, whatever you want to call them. Maybe it is just luck, I’ve never seen one-” She frowns, a memory bubbling up then she shakes her head, brushing off a dream of a small winged figure on her windowsill one night. “The People is what my grandparents called them though. Capital P.”

“What else did your grandparents tell you about them? Did they have any superstitions specific to your family?”

Iris doesn't even need to think on that one.

“Grandpa Rob had this thing where he would make everyone wash their hands after we came back from church. Said it was not to harm the People with the holy water, but no one else I know does that, even the Creideamh Sí families.That means -”

“The Fairy Faith,” he interrupts. “Yes, I’m aware. I’ll need to know anything else your family knows about them.”

He pulls a laptop out of his bag which looks like nothing Iris has ever seen and her family is pretty well-off (selling lost works or art tends to help).

“This is getting to be more than a moment, dude.”

“I can take the phone back.”

Iris laughs, he’s not wrong that the phone is worth more than a short conversation, but the threat is just plain funny coming from a pre-teen who looks like he’d never seen the sun in his life and a stiff breeze would knock him over.

The man standing behind him, who Iris initially assumed was his dad but now isn’t so sure, clears his throat and there’s something in the way he does it, or maybe the way he glances down at her, that makes it very clear this tiny undertaker looking child would be leaving with either his answers, or the phone.

If Iris were older or wiser, she would be suitably unsettled but today she just waves a hand at the mountain of a man.

“Chill, I don’t mind, just weird to be honest.”

“You’re welcome to whatever opinion you please so long as you answer all of my questions with as much detail as possible. Now, tell me more about the holy water.”

This phone better be worth it. (It is.)

--

When Iris is 19 the world ends.

Kinda.

Her PlayStation is ruined at least which is annoying as shit.

More importantly, the fairy fort is gone and there’s an actual fucking fort there.

“I always thought it would be a bit less… concrete.”

She’s not sure who she’s talking to, her brother’s moved to London and her parents are out at lunch with friends. But it’s rather the sort of day where Iris thinks she might not believe anything at all if she keeps it just in her head.

The door gives a loud bang and Iris yells and leaps backwards. The banging continues and she realises there’s someone on the other side.

“Are you okay?’ she calls, trying to keep the sudden nervousness in her chest from coming through the words.

“There’s a fire in here, and the suppression systems aren’t working.”

Iris takes several long breaths, processing several things. One, her family is not mad, fairies do exist. Two, they do in fact have a fort on their farm. Three, she might be about to meet them for real. Four, it’s kinda ugly and dull, she expected a bit more… magical?

She looks up to try and centre herself and catches sight of a plane, trailing smoke and flying disturbingly low before it disappears over a hill. In the distance there’s the sound of thunder.

Right, the world is possibly ending, perhaps that should be higher on the list. That part is plain not registering in her head.

She tells herself she imagined the plane, there’s no room in her head to process the alternative right now.

“Who are you anyway?”

Iris’ head snaps back up at the question. Right, fairies trapped in a burning building. Focus.

“Iris McGraney! Stand back, I’ll kick the door in.”

“This door is built to withstand more than you, human.”

Iris frowns, annoyed. “You prefer to suffocate?”

There’s a long pause then, from what sounds like a distance, the voice calls back, “Alright, give it a go.”

Iris is a farmgirl through and through. She’s been stacking hay and climbing fences and eating well her entire life, she wouldn’t be carrying the Dinnie Stones any time soon but she could best all the local boys in an arm wrestle and carry a small calf several fields if she had too.

Her first kick connects with a satisfying crack. The second gives more of a crunch and on the third the door snaps and slams inwards. It’s a pretty cool moment, Iris wishes the day wasn’t so surreal so she could bask in it more.

Smoke starts to billow out as soon as it meets the outside air and there’s a lot of yelling and organised panic as thirty-odd fairies of differing colours and various sizes of small come pouring out, most coughing.

One, in an official looking uniform, makes a line for Iris.

“You’re a fairy,” she tells him.

“Yes, a gnome if we’re getting technical.” He pulls out a handkerchief and starts dabbing at his forehead. “Thanks for that, by the way, Frond only knows what’s going on. One moment we’re getting the call that Haven’s locking down the next the electronics start sparking and melting off the walls.”

“The same thing happened in the house.” Iris tells him, rapidly compartmentalising, there was far too much to take in today. Fairies sure, but gnomes? She pushes it in a box for later. “My phone melted, and the TV almost started a fire.”

The gnome shakes his head worriedly. “This is not good, not good. No contact with Haven and all our tech going bust. I bet it’s that Koboi pixie somehow, right crazy one she is.”

Iris nods for a moment, then shakes her head. “No, I don’t know what that means.”

“Not good, is what it means.”

Iris looks across the fields to several columns of smoke rising in the distance, the further she looks in every direction the more there are.

Not good at all.

--

When Iris is 32 her parents die.

It’s sudden and so plain, after a life of quiet magic and unrelenting luck. Her mother took a turn too fast and hit a patch of ice.

They didn’t suffer at least.

She blames the People at first, but even as the anger bubbles inside her she knows it’s only grief behind it. She’s learnt over the years they’re just people themselves, no capital letter. They can do extraordinary things but miracles are miracles for a reason.

After the wake is passed and the friends gone home, her brother reluctantly back across the channel, promising to call that same night, Iris is at a loss.

She had expected to be but still.

The knocks at the door are so frequent she doesn’t even startle when another comes. She’s not sure she’s in a mood for more well-wishers but she’s not doing well alone either so- she sighs and goes to open the door.

On the other side is a black-haired man in a three-piece suit, still pale but Iris felt less concern now that he might combust if the sun ever does manage to find him.

“Artemis Fowl, I didn’t expect us to meet again.”

“You remember me.” He doesn’t seem surprised.

“Being interrogated by a ten year old tends to stick in a girl’s mind.”

He smiles. “I was 12.”

Iris invites him in and makes tea.

It’s a welcome distraction right now because you have to be living under rock in Ireland not to know how just very extraordinary Artemis Fowl the Second is. Three doctorates, Time Man of the Year at 22, already one Nobel Prize and smart money’s on a second soon.

If anyone could have done it at 12… well.

For a moment she almost hesitates, but Artemis gives her a real smile, as if he already knows what’s on her mind.

(In the years ahead she will come to know him well enough to realise that’s exactly the case.)

She hands him a cup and sits down.

“Tell me, Dr. Fowl, did you ever find the People?”

[finsterhund]

Hey I fucking broke my ankle lmao

“I could really use a break right now” I say as I struggle with my dog having terminal cancer, my roommate pushing my limits, my money being nonexistent, and barely getting one meal a day.

A finger on the monkey’s paw that is me ever wanting anything in life curls again. Must have been a pretty fucked up monkey because there’s a lot of fingers on this thing by now.

So yeah, life thought I wasn’t going through enough already so it added broken fucking ankle to the list of Finsterhund suffering hours.

“I wish I wasn’t broke” is another good one. “here have a different broke then lol. go fuck yourself you rotting corpse of a victorian boy piece of shit”

here’s the goods. Got ex roommate to take photo of the screen. Doctor did not let me email the high res version to myself.

I did not go “waaaiii” on the way down, unfortunately. Life just isn’t like a video game. Probably didn’t look funny either. In reality I am a silent faller/injurer/whatever. Survival instincts of child abuse survivor I land and stay there as quiet as possible. I “grew out of” signals for help before teenage years. Which is a blessing in disguise because I don’t like people looking at me when I am hurt. it’s the “baby deer waiting for mom to come back instinct” I hide from predators.

My brain didn’t really process it when it happened. I just fell and heard a SNAP. If I had watched a video of it happening to someone else I would have found it gross but fortunately my brain just let me ignore it.

I was mostly immediately scared that I had somehow damaged the FIFTY DOLLAR dog calming aid that I got for Cazza in the pet store. I needed something like it for her and just seeing it in person and not having to pay 30 dollar shipping I was like “yeah. getting it here” fortunately the only fragile part is a little plastic capsule that imitates a heartbeat, which was packaged inside the toy inside the box. I hope. I have not opened it.

But the reason I fell is because I was also carrying giant bag of dog food. You see my vet recommended I switch out her food in light of the potential heart disease link. So I got the biggest bag of the best chicken stuff they had. My roommate might try saying that it was because the bag was too heavy. It wasn’t. I could lift that shit just fine. Bag was impossible for my impaired depth perception cringe fail line of vision to see around. The same visual impairment that prevents me from being able to drive a car made me think that I could put my foot down on the curb of the sidewalk. Dumb ass thought I was stepping OVER the curb.

Fortunately the bag of dog food broke my fall. Otherwise I’d have probably smashed my nose and teeth on the pavement. I really hope the expensive puppy calming toy is unharmed :( I say as I have a fucking broken leg.

So yeah. If you’ve seen labyrinth where David Bowie playing Jareth the Goblin King walks over all those weird ass fucked up stairs and ledges that are all a manner of odd angles? Specifically where he just takes steps that are at an angle that you cannot actually walk? Yeah I fucked up Jareth platform stairs walked over the fucking curb and snapp my legs

yes, I said legs.

Only my left is technically broken. It’s a Webber A something or other. I have a sick as hell photo if you wanna see. It’s included in this post.

But my right foot also got fucking fucked up. That one it snapped a tendon or a ligament or whatever the fuck. Get this, it snapped off a small piece of the gottamn bone. It’s not a break but it’s like it came off like a splinter. I made a joke in the hospital about how it’s like when you throw a sticky hand at the wall and when you pull it back a piece of the paint comes off with it. That was really fucking funny but nobody laughed. My friend’s group chat thought it was funny though. I did not get a photo of that foot and the tiny cringe sticky hand paint sliver bone.

I am on pain meds better than my normal pain meds. I can barely feel the legs in bed now.

So back to the parking lot. I landed on the dog food bag. I am hoping the calmeroos puppy is not broken or damaged in any way, I heard the snap but my brain is not registering the snap. This hurts “like a normal fall” I think at first. It hurts a lot of course, but I have the pain tolerance of a truck (thanks for this one Will) and a “heartwarming” story from my youth is that my mom didn’t believe my arm was broken both times it happened because I wasn’t “in pain enough” so I’ve got the firsthand experience to back that up.

Yeah then I try to fucking move my goddamn legs. Left one, broken one, there’s noises. Like cracking pop sounds. And pain. God fuck. It feels like the foot is loose and it’s only connected by fleshy flesh and muscle and skin. Aka like how my dislocated shoulder (that my mom also dismissed because I didn’t scream enough... after the lifeguard had alreayd put it back in...) had felt when I was 12.

So I’m like “oh god oh fuck oh god oh fuck I can’t get up or move” yeah my first response was “how the fuck am I going to escape?” I attempted to better myself to get up but absolutely not. Right foot feels like when I roll the damn thing which happens a lot. That *WAS* my bad ankle. sidkfjsdkfjskdf not anymore!!!!!

So an important note is that I’m technically better about my severe agoraphobia that my roommate can let me go into a store by myself provided he’s no more than a couple stores away. So while I’m waiting for a predator to pick my weak ass off outside the petstore he’s in the dollar store next door where I was supposed to meet him after putting the dog food in the car. The car I am now sitting next to. I have no way to get his attention because my phone is dead and also in my bedroom because it’s useless when not plugged into the wall.

Luckily the people parked next to us come out the store and see Mr fuck leg the fucked leg boy sitting on his bag of dog food between the cars and bless this family they help me out. By trying to get roommate out of the dollar store. Which doesn’t work. So they get the dollar store manager. Who then gets roommate out of the store. I was probably sitting there for 10 minutes or so. They had kids so I’m really trying not to let them see how fucked up the rapidly growing ankle balloon is.

But yeah. Eventually roommate come out the dollar store. And get this, he does the same shit my mom did every time anything ever fucking happened to me and is all “okay if it were really broken you’d be screaming right now” as I’m finally able to prop myself up enough to get into the car. That fucking triggered me real bad and I had a breakdown in the car while he went back into the dollar store to continue shopping.

Then we went to get food.

Then we went to costco.

He said that he would take me home and then if it was “still bad tomorrow” he’d take me to the ER.

So he tries to help me out of the car to the house.

I cannot put weight on the right leg either. It is agony. He’s trying to support the bad leg but the other leg need support too. A weaker man would have screamed but I just dropped to the parking lot ground and cried.

Made an attempt to crawl to the house but the gravel on my knees was just too much on top of everything else.

So FINALLY the ER is back on the menu. Ex roommate comes out because I need someone to support each foot. And they take me to their car and they drive me to the ER and I’m trying to eat a baconator while my foot is reminding me that we should have stayed as tiktaalik. you know, not fucking biped I want semi aquatic too please please please youre nothing

The wheelchairs in the ER are designed to offer full body support but the damn things are so hard to maneuver around and cannot be user operated. So I was sitting there having to get pushed around feeling like a dumb fuck because I hate needing assistance to move I hate it I hate it I hate it. I kept reaching down expecting to find the wheel handles but they weren’t there.

ER was... fun. There was a cool cartoon I’ve never seen before “Craig of the Creek” playing on the TV. I really want to see more of it I really liked it. But a fucking anti vax guy (YEAH REALLY) was swearing and bitching because there were kids shows on the TV This show was the only comfort I fucking had. Craig was spoonfeeding me comfort with his little freeze to death without your winter clothes adventure (RIP to him but I’m different)

But yeah. Once being treated it was all really nice. My ability to make constant jokes about fucked up injury death and suffering is a really good stress relief. Shout out to the xray tech who totally understood I use dark humor to cope and in response to my joke about how if I was a horse they'd just shoot me that I would “make wonderful glue” the other people were also very kind but I kinda felt they were intimidated by how “jovial” I was about the whole thing. Like yeah. I’m “handling it well” because that’s my whole strategy. Inside I’m screaming “please not the plates please not the plates please not the plates” (I am scared of having metal plates and screws.) Fortunately the stupid little cringe bone broke just low enough on the bone that I don’t have to get the plates and screws. I was literally begging Spot and she answered.

In my moment of weakness I decided that the true nature of the “Spot Power” is that she makes it so that when I’m going through shit I’m always “being so brave about it”

I kept thinking about how Cazza thought I had abandoned her though and while roommate did give her her evening walkies she was stressed and puked on the walk. Which fucking ruined my life and I cried more hearing that than the fucking leg.

So yeah. In canada crutches and the foot boot actually cost money. I’m out like 100 dollars. Plus like 30 because roommate wanted gas. I’m just used to it by now. I definitely need to plug Cazza’s gofundme again now though. Have no clue how I’m even going to take her to her appointments. I am hesitant to hope that roommate will give her as good walks as she needs.

There were more tears over the fact that I was going to fail Cazza than that I actually broke my fucking ankle.

This shouldn’t be a shock. I knew that eventually my visual impairment and my physical disability were going to team up on me and fuck up my body even worse somehow. Always thought it was going to be stairs though. A small comfort is apparently the x ray department has had four other people come in about the exact same curb. Yeah I kid you not. The curb between the redacted dollar store and the redacted pet store confirmed for Heart of Darkness 2: Andy Ankle Adventure

They were supposed to give me more pain meds but I guess I didn’t pick them up or they forgot or something. My brain is fried so i have no idea at all.

Crutches are a massive learning curve for someone with depth issues and balance issues. I almost fell face first on the goddamn crutches several times. If I wasn’t broke and you know, if I couldn’t fucking not leg broken walk leg I would go to hardware store and make a wheeling seat thing like those scooters in gym class and then I’d have Cazza pull me on walks. That would work.

Big issue is in and out of our place is fucking stairs. Yeah. I crawled up them on hands and knees. No way in hell with my already fucking broken mobility could I go crutches up them. I have to hold onto railing or I fall down stairs so crawling it was.

I can technically take the boot off to sleep but the tightness makes it so much better so fuck that. Wish I had the rolling elementary school gym class scooter so I could drag myself around the house.

Cazza doted on me like nothing else. She tried to brace me going up the stairs but she’s not big enough for what I’d need with this fucking leg problem. She helped me change out of my clothes though. Even though she’ll never be certified she’s still my everything.

The she cuddled close to me until I had calmed down and now she’s fast asleep in her bed. I am so glad I ended up giving her her bath before going out.

I am going to attempt to make it to my bloodwork appointment tomorrow. I have rescheduled that due to chemo appointments too many times.

I can’t remember if I’m forgetting anything else. Honestly my roommate telling me the exact same shit my mom did just fucking hurt so bad. I think I know my own body better than you do. Like I’ve told him about how she didn’t believe me and I had to beg her to take me to the hospital and he ended up doing the exact same shit. All because I didn’t outwardly exhibit being in enough pain apparently.

I just hate how being disabled you always have to fucking prove you’re disabled. Like I was expected to somehow walk back to the house and up the stairs but when I got to go to the ER yeah fucking broken lol.

I just wish I had parents. I need taking care of. I always did and I never got it.

I’m scared for the future. I don’t know how I’m going to manage or how I’m going to provide for Cazza.

I wish breaking my ankle could have made Cazza’s cancer go away

[alex51324]

Understanding COVID-19 vaccine headlines

7/15/20 You may be seeing headlines like this one that talk about promising results in studies of potential COVID-19 vaccines, and while this is genuinely good news, it’s important to understand that the process from a promising small-scale trial to the vaccine being widely available to everyone, so that we can all go back to our normal lives, is a long one, and for good reasons.  

(Please note that I am not a medical expert; I just read a lot.) 

A vaccine is, as most of us probably know, a bit of virus that teaches your immune system how to beat the disease that the virus normally causes.  A vaccine can either be live/attenuated or killed/deactivated. 

 An attenuated vaccine uses a strain of the virus that has been selectively bred to be too weak to cause illness--basically, we’re talking about domesticating the virus.  Since viruses breed fast, this process is a lot quicker than domesticating, say, those foxes in the Russian “how to build a dog” experiment, but it still takes time. 

A killed or deactivated vaccine, on the other hand, uses virus that has been damaged just enough to stop it making you sick, while still creating an immune response.  Not-so-fun fact: a killed vaccine often uses a strain that has been selectively bred to be even stronger than the wild one.  So, again, it takes time, both to do the selective breeding and to find just the right way of killing the virus. 

So this is the big first step of making a vaccine:  you need to find a strain of virus (and/or a method of damaging it) that will cause an immune response but not an illness.  When a lab or group of researchers thinks they’ve got one, they--of course--have to do tons and tons of testing to find out whether it actually works and is safe.  This starts with laboratory tests, and if everything goes well, moves on to trying it in actual people, in human trials.  The human trials start with making sure that the vaccine doesn’t give people the disease (or do anything else bad to them) and checking that it produces some kind of immune response.  

The study linked above appears to be at that stage: they’re pretty sure that it won’t hurt you, and that it will cause you immune system to do something.

The next big step is finding out whether the immune response actually stops people from getting the disease.  That means injecting people with the stuff, and then exposing them to the disease.  Moving on to that stage is a Big Fucking Deal, for obvious reasons.  As of this writing, no potential COVID-19 vaccine has gotten this far in the US vaccine approval process.  That doesn’t mean that the vaccines currently being worked on won’t work, just that it’s too soon to say whether they will or not.  

But let’s say that they do.  Once they know that the vaccine is safe and effective, there’s one more big hurdle to actually getting it out to the people: mass producing it.  Because viruses are alive (sorta--it’s complicated), and a vaccine is made out of viruses, you can’t just manufacture them, you have to breed them.  If the first stage was domesticating the virus, this stage is, like, setting up a virus puppy-mill.  

And if you know anything about puppy mills, you know that when you try to mass-produce a living creature, sometimes the traits that you selectively bred for go straight out the window.  So once a lab or group of researchers know that their virus strain works, they have to figure out the right conditions for it to reproduce rapidly without mutating into a different strain.  

As an extra wrinkle, because viruses aren’t completely alive--they hijack parts of another organism’s living cells to do their thing--you also have to find the right kind of cells in which to set up your virus-farm: a type of cells that are readily available, that the virus likes, and that doesn’t have any other diseases.    

The first and second of these were substantial problems with the first Rubella vaccine, which was developed in the 1960s.  They first used live monkeys to grow the virus, which was a problem because A) they quickly ran out of monkeys, and B) some of the monkeys had hepatitis.  Fortunately, that problem led to improvements in techniques for virus-farming in cultured cells (as opposed to a whole, live animal), so monkey-hepatitis probably won’t be a big concern with the COVID vaccine. 

(Not-so-fun fact: when it comes to cell types that human-infecting viruses like, and that don’t have other diseases, you really can’t do much better than...human fetal stem cells.  Thanks to the aforementioned improvements in techniques, the US is still using cell lines that came from 2 medically-necessary pregnancy terminations that took place in the 1960′s.  And if you think that ought to be enough to make their use uncontroversial, you probably don’t live in the United States.  All of which is to say, it’s easy to imagine a scenario in which a COVID vaccine is developed in, say, China, and the US doesn’t use it Because Abortion**.  Issues of cultural acceptability can also arise with using pig cells, etc.)

(**If you thought the Mask Wars were fun, keep your fingers crossed that the COVID vaccine grows in chicken embryos or something.)

Moving right along, if it’s a killed/deactivated vaccine, you also have to find a way to scale up the the process by which you damage the virus.  Many of the methods use to deactivate a virus involve heat, and, as you’ve probably noticed in everyday life, a big container full of something changes temperature at a different rate than a small one.  

This very factor led to one of the biggest vaccine disasters in US history.  The first polio vaccine to be developed was a killed vaccine.  One of the manufacturers authorized to start producing it, Cutter Laboratories, messed up the “killing it” step, and ended up sending out thousands of doses of vaccine that contained live, extra-strong polio virus.  They didn’t find out until they started seeing outbreaks in communities that had just had mass vaccination campaigns.  Many children got sick, and ten died*.  

(*If this has you wondering whether vaccines really are safe after all, a few facts:  This was a massive, well-publicized disaster on a scale that hasn’t happened before or since, and it was correctly treated as an emergency.  It happened in April, 1955, which was the first month that polio vaccine was available to the public.  All vaccine from Cutter Labs was pulled from the market before April was over, and the system of intense scrutiny and rigorous safety checks for vaccine manufacture that we have today was developed.  Another result of this disaster was that work continued on developing an attenuated polio vaccine--they were in development at the same time, with the killed-virus one slightly ahead--which is the one commonly given today.)

Keep this in mind: in spring of 1955, parents were absolutely clamoring for a polio vaccine.  Polio spread in warm weather and left children dead; it was absolutely terrifying.  Researchers, manufacturers, and regulators hurried to produce the vaccine in sufficient quantities to meet demand--and it backfired spectacularly.  

When you hear that there’s a COVID-19 vaccine that has been effective in human trials, but it won’t be available to the public for six months, or a year, or whatever it is, this is why.  Scaling up to mass production requires a lot of additional testing to make sure that the vaccine is still safe and effective, and those tests have to be repeated for every manufacturing facility.  Those are some of the safeguards that were put in place after the Cutter Incident, and you absolutely should want them to stay in place.  (Remember those defective COVID-19 testing kits that were sent out in March/April?  You really don’t want that happening with a vaccine.)