#especially when they're the ones doing bad things

[towers-in-starlight]

Musing a bit on how to build more porn-without-plot literary-analysis-community:

On one level: as suggested in the post, set up something like TV Tropes but for porn. I don't expect "more permissive TV Tropes" itself to gather much momentum—All The Tropes tries to be that, but the network effects are against it and it ends up having trouble holding onto an active userbase as a result—but I could see a more focused project, a catalog specifically of porn tropes and of tropes-of-porn-works, maybe succeeding, in much the same way that no one has managed to make a serious general-purpose Wikipedia competitor but people have succeeded at building up a lot of very successful relatively-narrowly-topic-specific wikis.

But trope-centric literary analysis—although I pretty strongly disagree with the no-qualifiers "it's bad" crowd—is only one angle on literary analysis, and there are a bunch of others it would be good to build more community around, too. Theorycrafting, fine-grained analyses of character psychology, fine-grained analyses of theme, et cetera. We don't just want TV Tropes for porn; we also want tumblr for porn.

...at which point I need to stick on some qualifiers, because tumblr already kind of is tumblr for porn. Like, this post is solidly tumblr-permitted and is good porn-analysis. It would be nice to use a site with fewer annoying restrictions pornwise—Dreamwidth comes to mind as a better preexisting option in this field—but, mostly, the problem isn't one of site support—unlike in the tropes case—and is instead one of community. Getting the people who read/view/play/etc. porn to post analytically about it more-rather-than-less often, so that fewer people think of it as something to keep hidden, so that more people post about it, et cetera. Moving social norms towards porn—especially less-plotty porn, since it's more needed there—more in the direction of "thing to build fandom around", basically.

(Where, at the moment, people often build fandom around porn in the narrow sense of "fandoms often produce a lot of porn"—kink memes are a thing, and all—but only infrequently do so in the broad sense where the porn is the thing they're fans of and not just as an artifact produced and consumed in the process of engagement with other nonporn source materials which they're fans of, especially when it comes to the less-plotty side of the porn genre.)

I know, from the ground up, how to do that. Make more fan-posts, especially literary-analysis-shaped ones, about the porn I like, and thereby hopefully inspire others to follow in my footsteps, thus slowly shifting social norms to make it more common. But it's hard, because it needs scale: me alone doing it won't accomplish much, if lots of others don't join me.

So I suppose I'll end this post with a call to arms: for any fellow porn-fans who want more literary analysis of porn to exist, make it! Write your own analyses of the porn you find most in need of analysis! It's through our efforts—not just the efforts of anonymous others in the crowd, but also of you and I—that we can arrange for writing those analyses to be normalized.

while i completely understand why sites like tvtropes have rules against pages dedicated to explicitly nsfw media, i do sort of wish there were spaces to analyze pornography and ecchi content in a literary manner. “all porn, no plot” stories are still stories which still have a history and meaning to them, and they are still worth examining in a critical manner, even if their sole purpose is to titillate.

essentially what i’m saying here is that things like niche fetish novellas are still art and should be treated as such, even if there’s a lower bar for quality and smaller target audience compared to traditional fiction.

[strwberri-milk]

Could you please give headcanons on how LAD men would react if MC is non-jealous? Like they got hit on but MC isn't bothered or phased just stand there n watch the whole thing unfold (you can say Mc is amused at the attempt or smug about it cuz it shows that she had good taste in men) sry if my english is bad

im assuming that this is what youre referring too so ive put them both into one request lol

Zayne doesn't really mind it. He likes that you aren't jealous because he wants to be with someone who's secure in his relationship considering how late his hours are and how he can't be around as often as he would like to be. Knowing that you're more than fine with him focusing on work those days where he really has to focus and can't see you.

He doesn't get hit on too often because of the slightly chilly demeanor he has. People tend to leave him alone, especially with how obvious he makes it that you're dating him by the way he holds you. However, whenever people do try it he's glad that you don't mind it. He doesn't want you to think that he has eyes for anybody but you, even if a very very small part of him his curious to see what your protective side might be like when it comes to him.

When someone starts to insult you is when he starts shutting things down. He's telling them to stop saying things like that because there's no way he'd fall for their weak attempts at manipulation and will honestly start trying to walk away. If you stop minding your own business and start paying attention to him he'll try to guide you away to prevent you from hearing something nasty being said about you.

You gently shush him, smiling to yourself as you listen to the person rant at you. You know that Zayne doesn't want you to draw attention to the two of you so you let them complain before asking them if they think behaving like a child is really how you find a man that's as accomplished and sophisticated as Zayne. You don't really need to say much anyway because they can see how Zayne looks at them with a mild irritation for how they've interrupted your day before simply bidding them a goodbye. They're stuck trying to figure out how to reply to your words, forced to confront their childish actions.

If they decide to continue, following you around and shouting obscenities at you then you simply tell them that they look pathetic begging for him like this and that everybody around you is laughing at them. Public shame is a strong deterrent and they're forced to leave you alone. Zayne doesn't say anything but he does press a soft kiss to your cheek, not wanting to be too affectionate in public with how many eyes are on you but he's also very proud of how you can easily stand your ground.

Xavier likes knowing that he's yours but he also doesn't care too much for giant overt displays. He likes the subtle ways you show your his and he can show others that he's yours. It shows in the subtle way the two of you speak of how intertwined your lives are, just how casual the two of you are with each other. There's this implicit understanding that's shared between the two of you that just makes it seem like you two have been married for thirty years.

He doesn't mind that you aren't jealous over him but he also sometimes wants to see you being possessive over him. He likes seeing how your eyes flash and how you slide yourself next to him. You'll kiss his cheek and smile at him before asking who his new friend is. He typically doesn't entertain conversations with people who aren't you but he's much more subtle about it. People don't notice that he's not checked into the conversation until they suddenly realise he's quiet not because he's listening, but because he's fully just on his phone or started to leave when they looked away from him.

He doesn't get hit on often but when he does it's because people see him as an easy target. They think that he's chill and would be receptive to getting their number when it's totally the opposite. He doesn't even look at people who try to flirt with him, immediately pulling out his phone to text you to come find him faster because people are trying to get his number.

You show up quickly as soon as you hear them telling him how clearly, you don't care about him if you've just abandoned him like that. They're claiming that if you really loved him as much as he says he does then you wouldn't have left him alone like that. They start going on and on as you approach, tapping their shoulder as you gently push them aside to perch yourself on Xavier's lap. He doesn't expect it but he welcomes in anyway, happily returning the soft kiss you give him.

You totally ignore the person flirting with him, rolling your eyes as you tell them that Xavier hates it when people just prattle on and on about nothing like the way they're doing right now. You don't even let them get another word in as you tell him that you're tired and wanna go home now - your day was ruined by them and you didn't feel like staying out anymore.

He likes how you basically just totally shut them down without a second though, standing up with him and taking his hand. The two of you just fully ignore them, heading home as Xavier tells you he likes it when you do things like that.

Rafayel loves being obvious about how much he loves you. He's constantly hit on at parties and generally when he's in an okay mood he won't be as openly hostile about rejecting advances if Thomas begs him not to. He feels bad for the guy sometimes, knowing how difficult he can be to work with but not bad enough to actually be fully nice to everyone at events.

He wishes you were more openly jealous around him, recounting some stories specifically in hopes of getting a rise out of you. He doesn't want to like, actually hurt your feelings but he does want to see you pout and get a little clingy if possible. You know that that's his goal whenever he tells you about another socialite hitting on him and you entertain him by being dramatic in response, Rafayel lightly pouting at how you aren't taking him seriously but he also knows you're doing that because you love him.

When someone is genuinely trying to flirt with him and tells him that you aren't even rich or famous enough to be around him your first response is to just let him deal with it. He's very good at rejecting people but you feel bad when he meets your gaze from across the room, a pleading look on his face as he tries to convince you to come and rescue him. You decide to take pity on him and head over, trying to tell the socialite to back off. They just start to get in your face, telling you that you have no business acting the way you do, going off on you.

You just sigh and tell them that it doesn't matter how much they beg Rafayel doesn't like them and has personally told you himself how much he can't stand these parties because of people like them. You make it quite pointed that Rafayel hates these events and that if it were up to him, he wouldn't be here especially with them. Rafayel doesn't even need to say anything as he just stands behind you, arms around your waist as he just nods in agreement with your words, giving you a kiss as the other person finally gives up and fully leaves the party, embarrassed as everybody started staring at the argument that the two of you were having. The confident demeanor you have while Rafayel drapes himself off of you has everyone chuckling to themselves at how shameless the other party is, unfortunately staining their reputation as someone desperate to climb the social ladder.

Rafayel basks in the attention you showered him in and how hot he thinks it is that you made it so obvious you're his. You never left his side for the rest of the evening and he had fun introducing you to literally everyone. He'll ask you to do it more often if you can, totally obsessed with how you handled the situation so easily.

Sylus is pretty okay about the fact that you don't show any jealousy when he's flirted with. People are usually too scared of him to flirt with him anyway. Internally though, he also does want to see how you'd react when jealous. He doesn't do anything to trigger it but clearly, he doesn't really have to. Sometimes, he might make light jokes about how you don't get jealous because you know he has nothing on his mind but you. You don't have the heart to admit the fact that you know he's obsessed with you, but you also love knowing that he is. He makes it so obvious but he isn't even aware of how obvious he is about loving you, constantly spoiling you in every way.

He doesn't often attend events but he had to this one time, leading to people falling all over themselves to try and get his attention. You know that he can take care of himself but you also can't help the possessive streak that you feel at someone trying to take away something that's yours. He was having the time of his life /s avoiding everyone or making snide remarks as people try to steal his attention from you. You were trying to socialise with some people on his behalf, wanting to be friendly when you saw just how crowded he was with people trying to flirt with him.

His eyes follow you as you come to him, beginning to tell people off for acting so desperate around him. You remind them that Sylus chooses only the best and unfortunately for them, that so happens to be you. He doesn't say anything to you as you continue to tell people off, watching you with amusement in his eyes. You don't even feel his gaze as people weakly try to retaliate against your points, leading to you proving how wrapped around your finger you have him. He barely registers what's happening until he's delivering a plate of food to you, gazing at you with a soft expression that nobody's ever seen on him before. It makes it pretty clear that he won't ever see anybody that isn't you and shuts them up - if their egos aren't already decimated by how crude you were in calling out the desperate behaviour.

He'll tell you later as the two of you are getting ready for bed how flattered he was to have all of your attention on reminding people how much you love him. That overt display of affection is one he wants, obsessed with being shown in definitive ways just how much you love him.

[tossawary]

Every now and again, I'll come across some fanfiction in which an emotionally conflicted character will consult (usually kind of trashy) romance novels or in-universe fanfiction for advice or information. And it almost always snaps my suspension of disbelief.

If it's some terminally online teenage geek character or a hopeless romantic bookworm character? Sure! And, of course, there's great humor to be had in a sporty jock struggling with his queer awakening hesitantly picking up the bodice-ripper that his mum left on the coffee table. There ARE scenarios where "romance novels and fanfic as research" tracks just fine. I also understand the existence of the "I want to give this character I like the hobbies I like" / "I want to poke fun at this type / genre of fiction" aspect on the author's side.

But in any scenario with some normie adult man? Some straight, cisgender guy with normie dude hobbies and no evidence that he even CAN read, much less that he enjoys reading? Then it's a "not only would he not fucking do this, I honestly don't even believe he'd know this course of action exists" characterization situation.

Like, there are an astonishing number of people, especially dudes, who could not even name a romance novel to save their fucking life. No, not even a Jane Austen novel or "Twilight" or something. Their eyes glaze over that section of a bookstore. They are mentally filing that shit out to leave more room for sports or first-person-shooter video games or something. They have no respect for this type of fiction, if they're into reading fiction at all! They unconsciously or even explicitly believe that making eye contact with a bodice-ripper will permanently damage their masculinity, and they would flinch away from touching one like most people are scared of scorpions. They don't know aaaaanything about it! They have no concept of "the good stuff" versus "the bad stuff"; it's all soap operas and pornography to them, not a source of information.

And lots of people still don't even know that fanfiction is a thing. They go through life blissfully unaware of fandom wank. Or if they do know of fanfiction, it holds no appeal for them. Playing with other people's characters, or writing fictional stories about real people, is weirdo fanatic behavior to them! Not a source of information.

(And, to be clear, I'm not saying this tracks for all female characters. No, obviously, plenty of women don't like romance novels or fanfic. Plenty of women who do like those would never look at them as sources of information either, for a variety of very good reasons. It's just really funny when a story has the most normie bro guy to ever bro engage with this type of fiction.)

So, like, no, there are some characters whom I cannot be persuaded would ever read any of this stuff. (Speaking as a terminally online fanatic!) And honestly, there are plenty of more realistic and far funnier options for some normie dude character looking for love advice.

A) Friends and family. Or else colleagues and coworkers. It is almost always hilarious when a character goes up to someone else and says, "Hey, hypothetical scenario: [the stupidest shit you've heard in your life]. Any advice for that?" Also, you can have sincerely emotional conversations between friends! Or else good angst if the friend or family member reacts in a hostile manner or gives bad advice!

B) A magazine or chick flick movie. I can easily be persuaded that a normie dude would at least know these exist, or have one left at his house by an ex-girlfriend who made him watch it one time. Normie dudes are also more likely to consider these big publications more legitimate for advice than random romance novels or fanfic.

C) Some random advice column blog or non-fiction self-help book. Could be legitimately good advice for specific situations by a thoughtful professional, could be a money-grab scam written by a quack! How is some lovesick, emotionally dense guy supposed to tell by a book cover?

D) On that note: a relationship advice TikTok influencer or YouTuber or some random advice forum, probably Reddit or the like. The pros and the quacks are unhelpfully everywhere now! And possibly even have a live chat acting as their studio audience to make airing dirty laundry more toxic than ever. Potentially, you will find the kindest person alive with a terrible username willing to gently walk you through therapy, the online equivalent of meeting a figurative angel in a dive bar, but probably not. Bad advice is much more likely.

E) Doing no research, remaining uninformed, and blustering through the situation based on random pre-conceptions if anything. Honestly, I think some of these guys would just ignore the problem, even a potentially deadly problem, rather than touch a Harlequin romance novel, much less AO3 fanfiction. Sexism and internalized homophobia are a hell of a drug. It's just not happening.

I don't have a clean conclusion for this, it's just a funny thing that I've noticed every now and again. There ARE guys who like these types of fiction, of course! There ARE male characters who own an e-reader full of rom novels, sure, and don't give a shit what anyone else thinks. "This [normie male character who is both pretty offline and worries about appearing sufficiently masculine in a pretty toxic way] is reading a lot of romance novels and/or fanfiction as a form of research!" Yeah, no, that's really hard to pull off. If this guy is touching the internet at all, he's far more likely to make the most ridiculous Reddit post you've ever seen and then start belligerent fights in the comments.

[traegorn]

Is there really any hope with all of these horrible things going on..? I’m so scared and have no idea what to do. All I keep seeing is bad news. How am i supposed to be hopeful and not think that we’re all doomed

Their whole plan is to make you feel scared. They want to overload you and think there's nothing you can do. This feeling you have? That's their whole strategy.

Don't let it work. As long as you're breathing, there's hope.

All of these are executive orders and illegal actions. While the rule of law may be flimsier than most realize, this isn't Eastern Europe in the mid 20th century. Everything they do will either not hold up in a court of law or be something in the long term we can overturn.

Very bad things will happen to people in the meanwhile, but that doesn't mean there isn't hope or that you won't make it through this.

This is what you need to do: Make real, local connections. Find community. This is how we stay safe. Call your Democratic Reps and Senators if you have any and demand they obstruct and investigate. If you have Republican reps, still reach out and demand why they're letting Trump violate our freedoms -- the latter is less likely to do anything, but there's a small chance one of them might listen.

If you're feeling overwhelmed by the news cycle, take a day off. Do not read, watch, or engage with it.

Dan Savage is a controversial figure for a lot of reasons we won't go into (especially on trans issues), but he did say something very good and important that I want you to take to heart:

During the darkest days of the AIDS crisis, we buried our friends in the morning, we protested in the afternoon, and we danced all night. The dance kept us in the fight because it was the dance we were fighting for. It didn't look like we were going to win then and we did. It doesn't feel like we re going to win now but we could. Keep fighting, keep dancing

You need to find joy or else this is going to be too much. Hope is a choice we make every day, and when your enemy wants you miserable, joy is an act of defiance.

Find your joy and rub their bigot faces in it.

[catsshadow]

Yes, "the Church" doesn't like the competition. They want the desperate coming to them and THEM ALONE--certainly not the government! It's one of their best revenue sources, after all. It's really psychological manipulation: help someone when they are in a bad situation and they feel especially obligated <OBLIGATED> to do something in return. And "the Church" is adept at making this "something in return" last a lifetime. People in an emotional state (happy, sad or afraid) are easier to manipulate, which is why they INSIST marriages, baptismals, funerals, etc., need to be held at "the Church" and presided over by "Church Officials". Debt collectors know this trick, too, and they are absolute A-HOLES with it--they are TRAINED to find what buttons to press to get you upset, etc. You get the idea.

Just think of all the sales people, TV/radio/internet commercials or mailers you've encountered offering something for "free". Hell, they'll do anything to get that "free" thing into your hands. Why? Because you then feel obligated to buy something from them. Or better yet, GIVE something to them: "Jesus died for YOUR SINS--can't you just let him into your heart? Is that too much to ask?" And of course, you don't want to be rude, right? They use this psychological trick to guilt you into doing what they want, and that starts you down the path they have very carefully designed for you to follow. This was designed and has been crafted and adapted for CNTURIES. They are sure to follow up and keep coming at you...all in the name of what's RIGHT and GOOD, of course. How could you deny them this little thing they ask of you? Stand firm and just say "no" right from the beginning. Or "NO!" if necessary--they know EXACTLY what they're doing, so DO NOT FEEL BAD! It was very nice of Jesus to "die for me" and all, but I never asked Jesus to do anything, so tough darts.

--CS

I am finding out that a lot of things I thought were common knowledge about Christian Fundamentalism are not in fact common knowledge.

Like with the aid freeze, people were like why would they do this? And I was like cause they want churches to be the only option for aid.

And people were shocked. And I was also shocked that this wasn't like...more well known. I grew up with people who were anti-aid because they felt that belonged to the church and made people behave more worldly if they could get it elsewhere. It was so well known it was a debate topic in my Philosophy of Religion course in high school.

I'm just...I'm concerned at how little some groups seem to know about Christian Fundamentalism. I wish I could help translate more.

[bakdbfi]

This chapter was a fucking soap opera

Spoilersand rambling because yeah

Poor thoma realized he can't have more than one boyfriend. IT WAS A BITCH ASS MOVE TO CUT OFF THE CHAPTER AT THIS PART! WE KNOW THEY Aren't GONNA SHOW US ANY OF THIS AND ITS GONNA BE SOME OFF SCREEN BULLSHIT

They did it with the festival thing, they did it with apparently us comforting lyca and they're gonna do it again here I BET MONEY ON IT.

I'm kinda worried about Jin's mental health, it's already not the best but now he's under the assumption that one of his closest allies has been lying to him this entire time no wonder he was barely in this chapter I'd be pretty fucked up too. Jin isn't close to legit anyone else besides Thoma and we see the way he gets treated.

Leo being a bitch is normal but HOW THE FUCK DOES HE KEEP DOING SHIT LIKE THIS!? WHO DOES HE KNOW!?

He met Thoma once or twice and immediately finds some fucking dirt on him , what are his connections or is he simply that spiteful? Does get some form of dirt on everyone he talks to? I wouldn't doubt it but dang

So how do we feel about kaitos Grandma... It's giving kinda abusive. That's all I have to say

NGL when I met the princess I thought her whole motivation was gonna be that she wanted Jin to notice her or sum shit.

He's the only reason she came to Japan

She immediately rushes to greet him

Refuse to dance with any other man

Learn Japanese just for jin

The dullian tried to attack PC (a woman who's close to Jin)

They were planning on moving her to darwick. (Guess who's also at darwick)

I really thought it was gonna be some yandere shit and this was a ploy to get Jin in someway especially since they talked about it in the earlier chapters. One of those if I can't have him nobody can but I'm pleasantly surprised.

Someone give my girl a hug , it's already bad enough that the characters and plot have to remind her she's getting closer to dying with every month and I got say she's handling it better than me

She's trying her best to help and I really do wish they gave her a more active role. Let her find some shit while investigating! Let her solve a case before the ghouls figure out. I'm glad she was able to have a little part but come on y'all can do more than she got a text from Jin and she showed Thoma.

The chapters are getting so small

Okay I think I got all out of my system.

[starberry-cupcake]

So, I had some chapters ready to recap but I decided to wait because the last bunch didn't get around as they normally do notes-wise and I thought maybe you guys needed a breather from these, I know there's more important things to engage your time with right now, so I thought I'd stop for a bit because maybe I was just posting them too frequently, BUT if I don't keep them up, I can't keep reading, so I'm gonna move on and let it land where it lands ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ at this point, I have to go on even if I'm talking to the void. So, it is what it is.

previously, in nona del 9:

this happened

this is the general tag

CHAPTER 10 (shattered second house skull...yikes)

nona finally tells camilla about the surveillance situation at school

she wants to go back in the evening to help out sriracha girlie with it

camilla, because she's smart, cautious and all around perfect, tells her no

especially not after the whole shooting mess that happened that very afternoon

nona says she feels responsible for the kids and that perhaps the two other people she maybe is would also feel responsible for them

camilla says one definitely would, the other one maybe

I'm assuming the hard yes is gideon

last time gideon was sort of in charge of kids, things didn't go very well, though

rip the fourth

then they go eat and I don't quite get why nona is so picky with food

is it that the food is bad? or is her body rejecting it? or is she just a fussy child?

just putting this out there, if I ask things here, you don't need to tell me, I just ask to the void, it's fine

anyway, in comes pyrrha looking like crap but acting like it's all fine

she asks palmolive to help her get a permanent shave but palmolive says "I had the joy of working on a...body like yours, the once, and I don't want to repeat the process for anything smaller than a brain hemorrhage"

he was about to say 'lyctor', I imagine

not sure I know what this is referring to but please don't tell me

he asks pyrrha if it's "finally kicking off" and she says "not yet"

(wish this was just fiction and we weren't experiencing the imminent brewing of intense social and political tension every single day in so many places of the world)

nona goes to prepare a bath for her while palmolive and pyrrha fight about the people she saw being taken during the altercation she was caught in

she says she saw three adults taken in, no consensus on whether they were from the barracks or found in the wild

palmolive wants to go fuck shit up to save them but pyrrha says they (aka camilla) won't be able to fight against "two hundred motherfuckers with machine guns"

and points out that camolive aren't a lyctor

palmolive wants to upset pyrrha on account of her not wanting to do more to save people, especially since his house followed them there

and apparently camilla's older sister kiki was one of them

kiki is allegedly from the oversight body

which I have learned has nothing to do with the oversight of potentially having lost gideon's body

different oversight and different body

but pyrrha only cares about keeping all of them safe and can't be swayed into letting camolive fight

I get where pyrrha is coming from but, at the same time, I don't think it's realistic to believe she can do that

keep them safe, I mean

camolive are ready to spring into attack if someone looks at them wrong and nona is a child with a knife

but, in any case, you can't ask a lyctor for compassionate thought

not because they're lyctors but because some of them, including pyrrha, where there when this all started and were complicit in the fuckery

we'll go back to that in a bit

so, turns out nona can hear the blue light in the sky and she calls it "varun"

nona also tells camilla that she'd willingly go to the middle of the mess to help out the people they care about because she isn't afraid of dying

which smells like trouble to me, a kid with no self preservation

and camilla asks her why she isn't, to which nona responds that she likes the "letting go"

camilla responds that she doesn't let go, that is her thing

nona goes to have a bath before going to sleep and pyrrha has to remind her to stop flashing her boobs to the unsuspecting crowd

I have a parallel tally going on in my mind of who would be the most mortified about all this and harrow keeps winning every time

which would be extra funny if this is gideon's mind in harrow's body

JOHN 5:18 (ugh this guy again)

"For this reason they tried all the more to kill him; not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God."

when I named him doctor reverend instead of just doctor I didn't know how accurate that would be in the long run

dr reverend emperor john buttface says he doesn't like change

we kind of guessed that by the fact that he does inhumane things to extend his and other people's lives

he continues on his story of how he started necromancy by playing with two corpses he named ulysses and tatiana and how now he can make them do things with their whole bodies

none of this sounds great

gotta say, it's a good way of re-contextualizing the whole thing, though

because book 1 you are thrown right in the middle of the ninth and harrow is doing nasty stuff with bones and you have to just accept it and keep going

and then in canaan house other necros do other stuff that also seems wild but it's normalized, so you go on and you're like "ok, this is how things are here"

but seeing this at a time closer to us than to canaan house really brings it back to a "this is insane" territory

which I think is very effective narratively, especially to do it now

you're not here for literary criticism from me, though, so let's continue

he goes through who of his lyctors was religious to begin with, who took it as some sort of spiritual experience, and who didn't

mercygirl wasn't and was weirded out but moved on from it really fast

if you ask me, everyone moved on from it really fast, but I'm not a lyctor so I have no say in the matter

according to dr reverend emperor john assface, this was because they wanted to believe

because "everyone wants to believe that God's randomly made them on of the X-Men"

and, not to stop in a minuscule quote for too long and give more unsolicited literary analysis instead of memes but, this sentence shows a lot about this man

idk if this was picked specifically or if I'm reading too much into it BUT

out of every other superhero or superhero group or comic book character with powers he could have chosen, it's so interesting that he chose the x-men

because the x-men are notably different from many of them, especially from their time, because they were oppressed due to their powers

it wasn't just that their powers or their saving the world gig made things complicated for their lives, literally a big part of their narrative is that their powers make them a target of oppression to the point of persecution and violence

some of them famously don't want to have powers

and mutants who do have a good relationship with their powers rarely have a good relationship with society

but he overlooks that and only focuses on having superhuman abilities

and I think that says a lot about this man in just one nerdy sentence

because he's either a) overlooking the entire social context in which the x-men operated to only laser focus on their powers without caring about the rest

or b) he believes himself a victim and a target of society as a justification of being "chosen" to do what he did

since we're at it, because I think it fits the current book narrative and worldwide narrative

this is from 1993

ANYWAY

dr reverend emperor john says he knew, by this body moving thing he was doing now, that he could use this power "for good. Could be used to fix everything, used for you"

we still have this thing where he talks to harrow but as if harrow was around back then, so I think he's talking to ice cube barbie?? but I'm not yet sure what's happening

he also says the corpses were his batteries, which doesn't sound to me like doing good in general, just doing good for him, but anyway

they didn't want the people funding them (who had pulled the plug on them literally and metaphorically) to find out because they could be "used for evil"

so they decided to communicate with the people to spread the word themselves without anyone doing it for them

they decided to stream

cue to agustine and mercygirl as mods in the youtube chat prompting the command !sponsor to promote hello fresh ads while dr john shows the corpses

DAY THREE (CORONABEER MENTION)

CHAPTER 11 (fifth house skull, WE'LL TALK ABOUT THAT)

nona keeps talking about the pool situation, which she says is from her dreams

which doesn't line up with alleged harrow talking to dr reverend emperor john each time in between, but we'll continue

she says she's holding the "girl with the painted face" underwater and she is lying there but not drowning

but there are still hands around her, holding her

nona believes she must be mixing moments

I wonder if underwater girl with painted face allegedly harrow is where ice cube barbie used to be?

because a) it'd explain why she's not drowning but still underwater

and b) we ended up at the tomb last time in the end of harrow's book

and harrow went inside the empty tomb

WAIT A MINUTE

when harrow got into the tomb, it was empty

chains were broken and there was a sword and

fifth house erotica courtesy of gideon

IS THAT WHY THERE'S A FIFTH HOUSE SKULL IN HERE?

BECAUSE OF THE MAGAZINE?

pelase don't answer that, don't tell me anything at all, just let me fail

nona reproduces the way in which she's being held in the dream with camilla and says that in there it doesn't feel "sexy"

to which camilla asks wtf do you know about what sexy is

not in those exact words

apparently, she learned it from honesty

and says she thinks a painting of two flowers is sexy and asks camilla what she thinks is sexy

camilla says "eating breakfast"

camilla is sponsoring my apparel, this is the second ace tshirt with a quote from her I make from this book

nona tells her to ask palmolive what he thinks is sexy

my guess would be dying girls he never met personally

camilla says "strong work ethics and high test scores"

I'm getting a wardrobe out of this conversation

pyrrha is making breakfast and upon nona entering the room

or house section divided in a small space they call a room

she asks what they had been talking about because it "sounded fruity"

nona is onto pyrrha's bs though and can tell she hasn't slept, so pyrrha confesses that she went to the park

the park where she asked palmolive not to let camilla go

she says she didn't save anyone in a way that camolive would understand, so she doesn't want nona to tell them she went

nona isn't good with lies and I totally get that

pyrrha also tells nona to be careful about sriracha girlie because she was at the burn cages and keeping some sus company there

nona gets all mad about pyrrha saying that and calling her name "stupid"

I got mad at nona for getting mad in behalf of people she doesn't know anything about instead of trusting the advice of people she lives with

pyrrha doesn't insist much and nona says she isn't going to stop being friends with sriracha girlie because she has 0 self preservation and a death wish

as established in this same recap

pyrrha is then asked what she thinks is sexy and she pretty much describes commander wake

"love a redhead" she says

wonder if she knows what gideon looks like or if she's just still referencing commander wake

because she met her in harrow's body and I don't know if the oversight with gideon's body being misplaced happened after or before pyrrha saw her

DON'T TELL ME

nona says she doesn't think redheads are sexy, which palmolive thinks is important to note down

I also think it's important to note it down because it's more points for the "this is gideon" side of the scale

when asked what he thinks is sexy, palmolive gives the most boring answer yet

"those little outfits nurses wear"

does he have a thing for yami kawaii stuff? nurses outfits, sickly seventh girls? is this a thing for him?

or is this like the regular sexy nurse fantasy type stuff? the spirit halloween type stuff?

or is this silent hill nurse type stuff? the ones that can kill you?

I don't know, I'm gonna leave it at that, whatever works for you, my dude

we don't have time to ask palmolive specific on his fantasies, though

because the door opens suddenly and there's a GUN and a THREAT

love starting the morning with chill stuff

AND WE'RE DONE!! I'll see how I work through the chapters, they end up getting long if I wait too much but I don't want to oversaturate, which I was probably doing. Anyway, sending hugs and love your way ♥

[velvetvexations]

Recently I made a survey for two cis allies - both women, one involved in discourse, one very much not, for contrast - to get a look at their perspective. This is nowhere near scientific, but hopefully it works as a small look at how the cis people in our camp view and relate to us.

Thank you and so much love to the participants. <3 You are vitally necessary.

Questions and answers the cut!

Do you know anyone IRL who’s trans? Co-workers, friends, family?

No, live somewhere more small and rural, so the chance of meeting any queer people, much less ones open about it, is slim.

I knew one trans girl in middle school, and I have a cousin who's a trans woman.

Have you ever considered being trans, or had any adjacent unusual feelings about your own gender?

I have, but I've ultimately arrived at "I don't know, I don't care, whatever". Maybe somewhere agender-adjacent, if I'd have to put a word to it? I ultimately don't consider myself trans, though.

No. I very strongly identify as a cis woman.

Are you a fan of any trans content creators?

I don't think so? I don't consider myself a fan of a lot of content creators in general.

Yes, I'm pretty sure.

Do you feel you think often about trans people’s struggles?

Yes.

I try to think about and participate in activism in a lot of different areas that don't directly affect me, so yes, sometimes.

Would you consider yourself knowledgeable about trans issues?

More than the average cis person, at least.

Not really, but I think that's mainly because I never want to feel like I'm overstepping, since I'm a cis woman.

In what ways do you feel the plight of trans people is similar to the suffering of cis women under the patriarchy? How is it different?

Both trans people and cis women (and a lot of cis men, really) suffer from being forced into a box. You have to be this way, and you do not get any say. If you aren't, you're either broken and shouldnt have agency (for your own good), or a threat. People will dish out violence and try to remove your rights to force you into that box, and punish you for stepping outside of it. I think these issues are heavily linked, and while the specifics of what each demographic faces is different (nevermind intersections), i believe the overall problem is the same; what society wants you to be, and how they want you to be it.

I think it's similar in that trans people are discriminated against and we cis women are also discriminated against, like, on a systemic level. The specifics are different, though.

Do you feel that you've ever contributed to transphobia in society?

Yeah. Especially when i was younger, and haven't examined any of it yet. Growing up in a transphobic society inevitably left me with some stuff to work out, and I've done my best to do so, and i will continue to. That's the important part, i think.

Not that I know of, and I would feel really bad if I thought I had accidentally.

Do you believe trans women or trans men have “male privilege”? 

No, that's a really loaded term. Individual trans people may get some advantages in certain settings depending on how they're perceived, but I don't think any of them can really be considered to get any gendered form of privilege, considering their gender is directly what makes them marginalized. Hiding your identity in order to not be mistreated isn't a privilege, it's a result of being oppressed.

I don't think so. This isn't an issue where I feel comfortable speaking as I said. Not that I know of, though.

Do you think things have gotten better or worse for trans people in the last ten years?

Besides the... recent pushback, as a whole, yes.

I think it's a mixture of both, but that's just my outside perspective.

Are you optimistic about where the struggle for trans rights is headed?

I refuse to be anything but. No matter what happens, there will always be trans people, and there will always be allies, and we'll continue fighting. There's simply no other option.

Once again, it's hard to tell as an outsider. Things seem mixed.

How would you react to a trans person being transphobic in your presence? Forex: misgendering someone they dislike.

Just correct them/express my disapproval as i would if they were cis, really? Transphobia is transphobia.

I would feel uncomfortable. Since I'm cis, I don't know if I would feel comfortable saying something, though.

Do you have any message you’d like to give as an ally?

Don't let anyone convince you you're alone in this, and that cis people are all against you. We're here, we love you, and we'll continue to fight for you. Please, don't give up. The world is a better place for having you in it.

Yeah, just that if there's anything I can ever do to support people I would love to!

[hebrideansky]

How much more useful do you find it than adapting a smartwatch's monitoring? I got one of them in 2019 (major chronic illness surgery recovery) after struggling for several years with pacing (so bad at it omfg), and having read all of your posts about how you were using smartwatch tech for the opposite of what they're intended for.

I sort of twigged that the Visible app was a thing maybe last summer? I think the ME association or somewhere did a couple of articles. But I didn't realise there was a free version at all, and it felt like a really high pricetag for something I couldn't test and didn't know anyone who had, especially not when I was hacking a smartwatch to do similar. I now can't really manage sensible pacing without some sort of tech - I had a watchstrap issue last winter/ spring that took a few months to fix and it was awful and the second I got it back again my ability to do things picked up.

But argh all the settings of getting it to not tell me to move more, and when they do updates that cancel out a bunch... it's a lot.

So yeah, I guess what I'm after is like, opinion specifically comparing the two things? I see from the above that you're still using both - do you think you'll continue to do that? (also what does the upper arm band feel like from a sensory pov?)

I’m still tweaking it, but something the Visible app has hammered home these past few weeks is just how much energy my body expends existing.

Currently lying perfectly still and I’m in the ‘exertion zone’ because I’m in so much nerve pain it's making my heart rate elevate.

Being in pain is burning up my pace points. I’ve used two since I woke up this morning simply by being conscious.

Anyone who dismisses the effects of chronic pain on the body or tells you to exercise to push through it is formally invited to throw themselves into the sun.

[protect-namine]

Ahhhhh your theory about how Vein died is sooooooooooo fucking real. Like I've seen people talk about how Lu Guang might have a secret power? But I feel like that's not the case cuz then we might have seen it play out in S1 and S2. Lg would surely would have used it in the fight with Qian Jin.

for context, anon is talking about this post where I theorize how vein "died." I go into it in more detail there, but the tl;dr version of it is: no lu guang did not kill him vein directly. he just delayed vein from entering the clinic early, thus creating a butterfly effect (hence his whole speech about it) that led to wang qing being awake when vein tries to leave with the notebook, thus creating an opportunity for her to "kill" vein which she wouldn't have had originally. but liu xiao interrupted this chain of events and that's why vein is alive using the faking death ability.

I am linking the reblog version here because other people have added their own thoughts since the creation of the post. I'm not sure if anon has seen it or just the original post, because in my original post I posit that liu xiao has the faking death ability. but after seeing other people's thoughts, I am now more leaning to the idea that wang qing has the faking death ability or perhaps, that a combination of wang qing and liu xiao is what made the "heart attack but fake death" happen. perhaps (unintentionally) they created a power combo-ing effect similar to how lu guang and cheng xiaoshi can create a mind link across time when combining their powers, or how li tianchen can possess people across space by proxy of li tianxi.

a power combo that works across "death" would be interesting, though this is merely speculative at this point. it would certainly provide another perspective to why they're paired up in the ed.

to now address anon: yeah, exactly. even if the addition of non-photo based powers is a recent change in writing direction (that they may not have had foresight on during the writing of previous seasons), it still would be too much of a drastic change for lu guang to be hiding another ability.

as I said in the post, it is unfortunate that we have to rely on information outside of the show to make sense of it, but yingdu really does make more sense when you've seen the recent interview with director li. in particular, it is heavily implied that liu xiao has more than one ability, and the process of gaining an ability (aside from inheritance from parents) is through death or stealing it from others.

while I am a believer in the idea that lu guang is willing to do morally questionable things for cheng xiaoshi, I don't think he would've had an opportunity to just get a new ability so soon after he just got the diving ability from cheng xiaoshi. on the flip side, if he always had multiple abilities since he was a kid, it would be bad writing lmao because then why has he never used it until now? especially when he's been timelooping for who knows how long to avoid a death node. I know link click is possibly retconning some details (2018 is now 2019, they changed the plans for red eyes, etc etc) but I don't think this would be a retcon they'd do because it would change too much of lu guang's character.

I am going to use this ask as a jumping off point to talk about yingdu's storytelling style, and how we should take this into account when analyzing this season. putting this under the cut now since this gets long and is kinda just a tangent now to the ask itself, though it does circle back to lu guang's role in vein's "death" in the end.

part of the reason vein's death is confusing is definitely because of the animation of lu guang puppeteering wang qing. I can totally see how people would come to the conclusion that lu guang was controlling her somehow. but we have to remember that yingdu is not like S1 and S2, for multiple reasons. one, it's a shorter season meant to introduce plot hooks, not plot; it's a setup for S3. two, it's a change in perspective from cheng xiaoshi's more grounded reality to lu guang who has been timelooping for forever. three, it was animated by a different studio than studio lan. fourth, it aims to provide a different story, and the storytelling style reflects that.

whereas S1 and S2 has a storytelling style that focused more on plot details and building up tension; yingdu focused more on relationships and emotions. it heavily uses visual metaphors in its storytelling compared to previous seasons.

in a way, although I have qualms about yingdu's writing, I do think visual metaphors is a valid solution to the problem of, "we only have six episodes to establish new plots and characters and motivations. how do we convey information efficiently in that amount of time without compromising artistry?"

I will mention one metaphor in detail that will be relevant for the lu guang discussion later. one example is glasses as a perception metaphor. this meta was written in YE5, and YE6 continues the metaphor as well because we see lu guang wear clear glasses for the first time, symbolizing that he is no longer stuck in his rose-tinted glasses era of looking into the past, and has decided to look into the future, solidified by his decision to remove vein from the situation and also because he reveals later that this is the last time he can loop.

there are, of course, more examples. idk if I have links for existing meta on this, but we have hands as a metaphor for relationships (hand holding, handshakes, fist bumps, etc) and the power balance of each relationship (with regards to secrets, deals, etc). we have various color theories floating around. we have theater/cinema and chess as metaphors for everyone's narrative roles. lu guang's imaginary clock as a metaphor for how he thinks the timeline should go, and how it's prevented from running by red strings forming the word BRIDON. we even see the clock fall apart in one of the later episodes (I forget which one atm). hell I could write a whole meta on liu xiao's tetris game as a metaphor for how he sees the "game" he's playing and the role xia fei plays into all of it.

side note: I think it's incredibly valid for people to feel that yingdu did not have enough space to properly establish characters, and I feel the same way too. but at the same time, I think a lot of characterization also gets missed in yingdu because it's a season that loves its metaphors and encodes character motivations through it instead of just showing it to us. I have conflicting feelings about this, but ultimately, they only had 6 episodes to tell a story, and I think that's something we should always keep in mind when managing expectations.

circling back to vein's "death" and lu guang's role in it... visual metaphors are gonna be confusing if people don't know this is what yingdu's storyelling heavily uses. I don't think we should be reading yingdu the same way we did S1/S2.

someone could watch lu guang puppetering wang qing and think, "oh he's using her to kill vein directly" but if we stick to yingdu's storytelling style, it is more likely a metaphor for him learning to manipulate the butterfly effect for his purposes (again also symbolized by the glasses metaphor, since he wears clear glasses in the same episode)

scenes should also not be taken out of context. there is a reason he made a whole speech about the butterfly effect first. a small change (delaying vein) results in a big change (killing vein). if lu guang was controlling wang qing or whatever, that is not a small change. that is not a butterfly effect. we literally had a butterfly land on lu guang's shoulder after he made this speech to vein. the point was to create a butterfly effect that would lead to a situation where vein dies.

and for my final tangent: this sets us up perfectly for S3 because I believe lu guang and liu xiao are supposed to be narrative foils.

they both have expressed wanting control over the timelines. liu xiao wants "to make uncertainties into certainties" (whatever this means) and lu guang wants "to make certainties (cheng xiaoshi's death node) uncertain." but as of S1 and S2, lu guang was not yet in a position to properly rival liu xiao over this theming, because we know he's been timelooping and failing over and over to save cheng xiaoshi, while liu xiao has been successfully manipulating people into doing things for him (getting li tianchen to retrieve liu min's phone for him; baiting cheng xiaoshi to go to bridon so he can use him to bait wang qing to revealing where she hid the location of cheng weimin's notebook so vein can steal it).

now, lu guang has shown some semblance of control. and we have seen the effects of it. cheng xiaoshi is still alive and well in a post-S2 post-yingdu timeline.

I mentioned this way back in YE2, but there's also a distinct change in the way we're moving from "closed loops" to "butterfly effects" as a theme in yingdu. yingdu has many objectives it wanted to do as a season, but the main one was lu guang learning to manipulate the timelines through creating a butterfly effect. in keeping with this theme and objective, it just does not make sense for him to kill vein by somehow directly controlling wang qing.

[nakylvr]

dating meifiz and it's just heavenly vocals serenading you, especially when you're mad at them. like imagine them showing up to your house, throwing rocks at your window to get you to listen, megan holding up a boom box and it's playing some romantic song and she starts harmonizing with sophia 😭😭 and you would lowk enjoying it and feel bad enough to let them in and they're allll over you, hands grabbing your waist, head in your neck, mouths repeating "we're sorry" :(( i #needthat

it's nearly impossible to be mad at them for a long period of time because they are 100% doing this or something that will easily make you forgive them (not like you could ever really be mad at them). if you're actually mad about something then they'll do something less extreme than showing up at night with a boombox and singing 💀. but it's the first thing they do if you're upset with them, and they manage to use the perfect song that has you giving in the moment they start singing. you end up letting them in (like always) and they are so clingy all over you apologizing over and over again. you can never stay mad at them for too long, they always make up for it in some kind of way whether it's staying in bed with you all day or taking you out somewhere. most of the time sophia will cook something as an apology, and is much calmer when you're upset. whereas megan is the opposite of calm, she can't handle you being mad at them, so she's dragging sophia with her to apologize and do anything you want them to do. she's definitely the one who came up with the boombox idea.

[ectonurites]

Do you think the use of Ariana was made to prop up timber in the valentine's day special.

And on another note what do you think of the lack off explicit callbacks to tim/steph but callbacks with ariana.

i mean like you have a valentine's day story with tim and stephanie shows up and you mention tim having many gf's in the past but choosing callbakcs and explicit references to ariana but not steph when she shows up.

really hope they don't start doing where any callbacks to tim's romances are his past minor gf's and not steph and pretend they are just friends with no romantic history

"Do you think the use of Ariana was made to prop up timber in the valentine's day special."

I think Ariana was definitely used as a prop to tell this story with little consideration given to her as an individual—the author uses Ariana's family's deli restaurant as a setting and uses her past relationship to Tim as a way to connect things but doesn't actually have her do anything else in the story. Except, well, mention Tim & Bernard's relationship.

Now, to be fair, there really are times in stories (especially short ones as part of an anthology like this) where you just need a throwaway character to do something for a moment for the sake of moving the plot along. Acting like every single character who shows up in a story needs to be Super Important And Fleshed Out In That Specific Story is unrealistic and frankly ridiculous.

But but but but... a character who was once a prominent love interest & supporting character for one of the leads you are writing about isn't the same as a nameless throwaway, you know? Especially when you're mentioning that connection specifically—of her being Tim's first girlfriend (rather than it just being a wordless cameo or something) in a story that’s premise hinges on Tim having dating experience.

Ariana is a character who hasn't appeared since like 1999, so pulling her out of the woodwork to be used for one panel while also... needing to make a huge logic leap with her to make it even work—something the writer felt fine with just explaining as having happened off-panel—is really frustrating and annoying. I'm talking, of course, about Ari just suddenly knowing Tim's identity as Robin. You know, the root of most challenges that they faced in their relationship because he couldn't be honest with her about it. Yeah that's just no big deal now, apparently.

That's what pisses me off about this the most—bringing her back only to brush off the sources of conflict between her and Tim and make everything all okie dokie in a completely unearned way. Now to be clear: I don't think it's a bad thing for Ariana to be like, nice about Tim & Bernard being together now—especially because in her last speaking appearance before this that I'm aware of [Robin #66], the two of them had cleared some air on still wanting to be friends even though they're no longer dating. But I do think using her one speech bubble of dialogue to mention how she 'owes' him and Bernard a dinner feels off.

If there were like... an actual conversation between Ari & Tim and during that she said something nice about Tim & Bernard/something about being happy for him, then I don't think it'd feel so weird. And I will say, this is a short story so I get there not being the page space to resolve Tim & Ari's history in a story that's not about that, I really do. But this is the first time she's shown up in about 25 years! Using her in a story and having a big reveal like Tim's identity and not touching on any of that but making sure you do use her single dialogue bubble to mention her ‘owing’ Tim & to mention the relationship btwn Tim & his current love interest??? That just feels weeeird!!!!!!

It feels like her purpose in this story was largely to show a lack of conflict in Tim's current life and that everyone around him is super enthusiastically pro Tim being with Bernard, without actually considering much about her as a character. Which… again, this story isn’t about her, it’s about Tim & Damian… but… it’s still just frustrating when this isn’t a character we can just go read some other book published in the last two decades to see her actually get used well in, this is a character we very well may not see for another 25 years after this.

"And on another note what do you think of the lack off explicit callbacks to tim/steph but callbacks with ariana. i mean like you have a valentine's day story with tim and stephanie shows up and you mention tim having many gf's in the past but choosing callbakcs and explicit references to ariana but not steph when she shows up. really hope they don't start doing where any callbacks to tim's romances are his past minor gf's and not steph and pretend they are just friends with no romantic history"

Yeah I think that also felt a little weird too. This definitely would have been a time that made sense to bring up their history—but also this story was just weird in regards to Steph overall (with Damian's 'Stephanie is too female' line as to why he couldn't ask her for girl advice...?) so I dunno if it's something to think of as a larger trend or if this was more just that particular writer being weird.

Considering the writer also (in the post I already linked earlier) said this about Tim's past love interests—"I figure Tim probably carried some guilt re: his relationship with Ariana, but less with his other love interests?"—I really feel like he just doesn't have a great grasp on Tim's previous relationships at all. Tim is like the fucking poster child for 'feels guilty about everything he's done ever'.

To act like he's not wracked with near-equal levels of guilt about how pretty much all of his past relationships (esp with civilians) went is nuts. Ariana is not the one I would single out from that bunch as somehow him feeling more guilty about than the rest (the only real justification for that I could think of is if you were to explore his guilt over him starting to have feelings for Steph while he & Ari were still together but from the way the rest of that writer's interaction is talking solely about Robin-identity related stuff, I don't think that's what he had in mind?). What about Zo who he ashamedly broke up with over the phone, feeling as if he'd already let her down too many times? What about Tam who he let think her father was dead for days because even though she knew he was a superhero he still couldn’t fully let her in which caused the slow building relationship between them to explode? Tim and Ari actually had a civil face-to-face break up at school and talked in a friendly way afterwards! Not to say he shouldn't feel guilt there with her because there are reasons he should, but acting like it's somehow a higher level of guilt than he’d have with the others is just odd.

Anyway that's getting a bit off topic. But yes, while I'm very much so not opposed to the idea of Tim's previous girlfriends getting to be referenced/come back in some fashion, I do also hope that it doesn't mean Tim & Steph's history will get thrown to the side. And I'd hope that if they do get to come back, they'd actually get to be... characters, who have dynamics with other characters, rather than just cardboard cutouts there to say one nice thing and then fade back into comic limbo for the rest of eternity.

[pricegouge]

Okay so what happens when Soap joins Ghost and reader and actually gets them to a point where they’re like “oh… oh that actually feels good do that again” does Soap coach them? Do they go off on their own right after and start trying shit out and actually start improving?

I feel like Ghost would rope Soap in a couple more times (to Soap’s despair) and once they start getting good, a flip just switches.

Craving the day the two goobers start actually fucking good 😭

[reference]

see, i think it was always pretty decent as far as simon was concerned, he's just an idiot who didn't know how to read his partner because he's pretty socially inept. so the key is to making reader get her shit together and realize what she's missing out on and of course the best way to do that would be for soap to basically cuck his own lieutenant. sure he's there with permission, get this girl moaning under him with such conviction even simon can't miss it.

but i'm still completely in love with the idea of soap expecting to have his lights fucked out and then being a little let down when he ends up being more of a coach for these two. plus i think it's fitting that they're both so bad at sex, they somehow manage to ruin a perfectly good romp for a guest, too. so i could see soap trying to gracefully refuse the next invite before being absolutely cornered on base one day, scruffed and dragged back to simon's place and thrown back on the bed. ordered to please his girl - slower this time. and it's not that soap's unwilling. you're such a pretty thing, after all, it's just whenever he pictured ghost's eyes on him, watching as he worked himself over, or fucked his bird, or got his guts rearranged, or whatever, it was never like this. never oddly clinical study; as if he could have been replaced with any man who possessed half an understanding of a woman's plumbing.

but it's not all bad. especially not once ghost starts to gain more confidence, climbing up on the bed behind soap to work his hips for him. "she likes it deeper, johnny," he grumbles, as if there's anything soap can even do about that. insensitive arse.

"as if yer the fockin' authority," soap snipes, but his hips still when he feels ghost's fingers against his hole, slick with lube. lower, against his thigh, simon's hard shaft hangs like a damn cudgel. poor lass, no wonder she never had much fun.

"yeah, that part i'm pretty confident on," ghost growls, a low threat. cocky. soap can only roll his eyes. looks like he'll have to teach his lieutenant how to please a man, too.

[dollescented]

˙ . ꒷ ୨love hangoverৎ. 𖦹˙—

𔘓𓂃we say it's over but i࣪ keep fucking with you˖ ִֶָ

｡𖦹°‧semi x fem!reader｡𖦹°‧

synopsis : semi and you has been together as in friendship for a long time, but semi has offered you to be friends with benefits with her after that one drunk night and she can't get over your body. you're stupidly inlove with her that you willingly to give her the consent to touch you whenever she wants and you agree to be friends with benefits with semi. not knowing that's going to ruin you.

falling inlove with someone that couldn't return your feelings back is the stupidest thing you've ever done in your life.

sometimes, it's making you want to cry your heart out when the reality hits you with the fact that semi will never look at you in the same way you do to her. falling inlove with someone that you can't have as yours is the worst, but you can't control your own feelings of the way it's acting to be with someone and your heart choose semi. to be friends with benefits with semi is something you regret to make such a decision without thinking twice, especially when it's making you feel like you're being used up.

but you can't do anything about it when you've agree in the first place, even how many times you've promise to yourself and swear that you'll never do it again, and yet here you are laying on semi's bed and being underneath her as she's eating your pussy out as if there's no tomorrow. while your moans echoing through her bedroom and clenching sound is only making the intense feeling more better, your wrists is tied up with pink ribbons on the headboard not tightly but enough to keep your hands staying still.

you lower your head to look down at semi's eating you out between your legs and you swore that you'll never do it again. the feelings are mutuals because semi has been feeling that way toward you too, she'd promise to herself that she swore she'll never do it again but here she goes with desire and lust for you. it's complicated than it looks.

the way semi's tongue lapping around your clit and flickering with her tongue while three of her fingers inside your hole, she's pumping her fingers in and out of your hole without slowing down. you can feel the piercing cold metal on her tongue when it's running down around your clit and your hole. you'd arch your back slightly off the mattress when semi slipped her tongue inside your hole after pulling out three of her fingers.

you're like a fan for her tongue, sweet tongue for you that knows how to do all the job with your pussy without wasting a second. you can't never get enough of her tongue, the way her hands is touching all over your body, the way she know how to make your mind goes blank and rolling back your eyes with pleasure. it's bad enough that you've been inlove with her.

"semi...i'm gonna come." your voice sound shaking slightly like your thighs and your heavy breathing as your bare-chest is going up and down, it's like a movie scene for semi eyes. she keep her tongue inside your pussy and rubbing over your wall to hit your sensitive spot, causing you to moaning out loud and came all over her tongue.

"fuck princess, you always taste so good." your eyes fluttering close by itself at the exhausted feeling, this isn't your first round with semi. but four rounds all at once and this is the five one which you're hoping it'll be the last round. you want more but it's making you feel exhausted and tired which leading you to feeling sleepy.

you can't never find yourself to resist semi way seduce you to make you in the mood and all wet for her, she doesn't have to touch you and you're already like a fountain down there especially when she's whispering dirty things in your ear with her deep yet gentle voice. it's one of your weakness and semi know it, she always find a way to use it on you knowing you'll melting because of her voice.

aftercare is a must for semi. even they're only friends with benefits but semi doesn't want to make you feel like she's only using your body and left you behind alone afterwards. she's not that kind of person. she'll clean you up properly and prepared you to bed with her pajamas instead if you two are in her apartment. she'll bring a full-plate of sweet dessert that you'd like with hot chocolate. and she'll cuddle you to sleep, she'll holding you in her arms and running her fingers through your hair with gentleness.

the night is quiet as blanket of stars sparkling on the nightsky for a beautiful scenery. the bedroom is echoing with the sound of melody as a lullaby for them to sleep. but at the moment, you were sitting on semi's bed while drinking the hot chocolate she has made for you earlier. your eyes following her movement wearing the black croptop with short hoodie to cover her body and a pair of short underneath.

you can't help yourself but to simping over semi like always. but tonight, you felt like you need to bring yourself to speak up about your real feelings for her. you don't care if you'll get reject by her, all you think about is you only live once and if it's not now, then when? it's enough for you that she'll discovered your feelings than to keep your feelings away in the dark.

"mimi," that's your nickname for semi ever since you two become friends with each other before the whole benefits things started, you've been calling her through the special nickname. she hum in response before she looked up to you and make her way to sit on the edge of the bed when she noticed that you want to talk. "i have something that i feel like i should let you know before it's too late.."

"sure, go ahead and tell me princess." semi says with a small smile tugged on her lips, your eyes glance down to the piercing on her lower lip that make your cheeks forming in blush. your lips parted open again to prepared yourself for your confession to her, only to get interrupted by semi's phone ringing. her hand reaching out to grab her phone over the nightstand and it was her mother's whose calling. "it's my mom, we'll talk later princess."

with that semi left the bedroom to answer her mother's phone call. seriously, everytime you're trying to have a serious talk with semi or to confess your feelings for her, something always get in the way between you two and it makes you frustrating when it keeps happening like a curse. the phone call probably going to be hour long, you knew it already because semi's mother will never stop the conversation unless if semi does.

you put the hot chocolate mug on the nightstand and sighes to yourself while pulling up the blanket and lay your head on the soft pillow slowly. you cover the blanket only around your waist before letting yourself to falling sleep, imagination running through in the back of your mind that you'll get married with semi in the future until you're falling asleep. after an hour, semi step inside her bedroom again just to see you're already sleeping peacefully.

she couldn't help herself but to smile softly at the sight of you has fallen asleep already. she thought that you must be tired for keeping going through the whole night with five rounds, semi slipped herself next to you and lay her head on her forearm to get a better look on your pretty face. her fingers gently tucked one of your hair strand at the half of your ear, she pulling up the blanket to cover your whole body to your shoulder before her lips pressing a soft kiss on your forehead and sleeping next to you.

it's always like this, she always treated you like as if you two were a lovers. as if you're something precious like a diamond in her eyes, as if she's looking at you with the look of love. it's only making you wanna kill her for giving you different kind of treatment, but you'd like it and love it so much that you can't resist or push her away.

and the situation between you two continue like always. you've been trying and keep trying to have a serious conversation with semi about everything that's happening between you and her, especially about your feelings for her but as always. something keep getting in the way between you two that you just give up to confess your feelings for semi. you've spoke to her that it's over, she has said it to you too that it's over between what you two had with the friends with benefits stuff but it's all just a words to you and to her.

you know that you're gonna do it again with her, semi know that she's going to do it again with you. all the promise, the swore to each other self, it's almost like a words to denial their feelings more than a words that they'll keep to themselves and to never do it again. but they know they're gonna do it again and you'll wake up with this love hangover again and again until the curse break to let you confess your feelings for semi.

⋆ ˚｡⋆୨ the end ୧⋆ ˚｡⋆

[hencheri]

shdjdjd i didn’t have anything in mind but ur response sparked some ideas so i’ll share but i defer to ur knowledge cuz idrk what im talking about when it comes to nct😭 /lh

i was kinda thinking about what he’d think about exhibitionism,, cuz one of his recent instagram posts was sooo slutty /pos and i was briefly thinking about him being a camboy? maybe solo stuff because i’m not sure though how he’d feel about his partner (and by partner i don’t necessarily mean romantic just ,, reader insert if ykwim like.. con or noncon…) being shown off to others… i don’t know how possessive he’d be? also could see him like. camming but then having a double standard for girls hehhe

but then i was also thinking he’s into voyeurism. i agree he’s such a perv n i love the concept of like,, he just can’t help himself, he does all these dirty nasty things without thinking or like you’d said, with the encouragement of his friends,, they’re all just feeding into each other’s nasty fantasies /pos he feels very stalker coded? also!! virgin loser incel jisung who wants to lose his virginity sooo bad and he feels he’s owed it, so either in the nohyuck au, jeno and haechan let him use you for ‘practice’ or a similar idea but like not necessarily an extension of that scenario.

i just feel like maybe once he gets an idea in his head, he has to make it reality. he fantasizes a lot but, he also needs to act on it. in one way or another. i’m kinda imagining in college where he takes pics of u in class to masturbate to when he’s at home but it gets so bad, he just throws his hand down his pants in the lecture hall and jerks off to the back of your head. ok i’m going to stop for now😭

also needed to say ur response in total but especially the last couple lines made my brain short circuit in the best way possible /pos pos pos

me reading your ask: 😼

18+ mdni.

warnings: mentions of noncon & stalking.

camboy!jisung is interesting because he definitely wants that attention. he's so horny all the damn time it makes him wonder if he doesn't have a problem, but when he posts short clips of him jerking off, and he gets so many compliments... his ego boosts up so much. jisung's the kind to like the anonymity behind it too, he'd probably answer all his messages, sending nudes back and forth with random girls online.

with a partner, though, i don't think he'd mind! like, what if he gets with a girl as dirty as him? he'd be down to make videos, but just of certain body parts, like the penetration bit, without showing their faces. and kinda toxic!jisung... but he'd do it just for the praises online :/ but the double standard!!! yes, he'd think his girl doing it alone is wrong, like he'd definitely think she's a slut or a seeking attention whore :x like, he'd just find it too dirty for a girl. she's supposed to be good and pure!

jisung so stalker coded, 100%. when he has an obsession, he doesn't let it go easily. his mind doesn't take a break, he's constantly imagining stuff and i know he's too obsessed with knowing what the real thing is that he won't stop. no because nohyuck would give him pussy. as friends, they're here to help him, and they'd let him have you for sure! but tbh, chenle would help him too. takes a girl with him, doesn't say jisung will be there... not that jisung can't pull, but also yes lol.

he makes his fantasies reality without realizing it, i think!? if he manages to be alone with you (with help or not), he'd dive in for a kiss when he thinks the moment is right. but you don't feel the same, so you pull away, but he insists and of course with his ridiculous height, he cages you easily.

but um, in the lecture hall... that's kinda hot. it's so freaky and disgusting, but he would. damn it.

[avianconcept]

Thank you!! Someone had to say it!

I actually liked that they didn't handle it well in the book simply because it made sense in the narrative, and for who the characters are. Its 2007, and none of them (as far as we know) have a frame of reference for Jean's type and scope of trauma. If they responded perfectly, I think I'd honestly find it kind of hard to believe. I'm a fan of authors being very logical in their character's responses like that.

But I'll go a step further, and look at it from a more...emotional? angle. I don't understand why people hate on them for handling it badly. When I read the book, I found it almost...endearing? In the sense that -to me- their occasionally badly executed attempts at handling Jean reflect such a determination to care and to try.

As always, bear with me.

A major theme of the book, in my opinion, is that looking away, be it literally or metaphorically, when something is wrong and someone needs help, is an act of violence. To me, the floozies ‘bad’ handling of Jean’s trauma is just a product of them not looking away. The easier thing is always to look away, or worse, to push the thing that makes you uncomfortable away as fast and far as you can.

Trauma is often reacted to this way. Most people are not used to seeing people get triggered, especially when the resulting behavior is violent or frightening in nature. People aren't sure how to deal with what are clearly serious issues, so they respond to that discomfort by pulling away. They put distance between themselves and this person they don't understand, and in the process, alienate the victim further.

Cat, Laila, and Jeremy seem to be aware that they are in over their heads, with Jean. They can see that he's got shit going on that they have no idea how to deal with.

But they don't drop him, they don't pretend it isn't happening, and they don't hold him at arm's length.

They try.

They use what limited, ill fitting knowledge they have, and they try to meet him where he's at. They do not respond like trauma therapists because they are not trauma therapists. They are twenty-somethings in 2007 who understand very little beyond knowing that there is a person in front of them who is clearly not alright.

Over and over again, they choose to do the uncomfortable thing, and try to offer him what they can. What he needs is probably intensive therapy- but he's has (or will have, come TGR) Betsy for that.

The Floozies are offering something less clean cut than a therapist, but no less well intentioned or valuable. It's friendship, and warmth, and a chance at normalcy. They challenge his harmful thinking, and try to prevent him from retreating within himself so far that no one can get to him. They push him to do new things, and provide a contrast to what he believes life to be.

And yeah, sometimes they mishandle things. They're also young. But they do not quit on him. They very determinedly do not look away, even as the pile of Big Scary Concepts To Reckon With gets bigger and bigger. I think they're meant to be a contrast to the Ravens, in a lot of ways. Instead of picking on his weakness, they refuse to leave him behind. They don't let him stay trapped in his own head just because it would be easier for them.

In my opinion, their well intentioned, somewhat poorly executed attempts at trying are a hundred times better than not trying at all.

"the floozies are terrible at dealing with Jean's trauma!!?!!!"

the floozies are twenty years old