#even ostensibly people i agree with generally

[bogunicorn]

I'm in a mood right now and I'm going to load my queues back up soon so my blogs are more than just bland salt, but truly fandom was a mistake, I don't think I'm having fun with it at this point, and I want to just go back into my hole where I reblog or RT fanart and shitposts and just avoid anything with a whiff of discourse.

And, yes, that means avoiding the legitimate conversations, too, bc a lot of people don't know how to act in the mentions of those. I want to be ignorant of fandom shit, the real world already sucks so much ass.

[vagueiish]

oh my godddd, the college i go to has a fucking turning point usa chapter

[ms-demeanor]

Knowledge Fight anon again - thank you for the list and recs! I look forwatd to checking them out. I was excited to see there's a West Wing podcast because I enjoyed that show, but yourself and the hosts hate it so maybe not for me lmao. Though I will still give the first episode a listen - very curious to understand why our feeligns about the show differ so vastly. And if you -want- to rant about why you hate TWW - feel free! I'm genuinely curious - I'm European, have never lived in the US, so for me it was one of the biggest tools of learning how US politics work, which made it absolutely fascinating to watch.

Anyways! I'll be looking at the other podcasts as well, they all seem very interesting, and the common-denominator format you describe them having does jive with me. Thanks again!

My very republican father and sister very much wish that all democrats would act like the democrats in the west wing. It's touted as a point of honor and a great example of compromise when Democrat Jed Bartlett appoints a republican justice to the Supreme court, any time there's an environmentalist or a union supporter on the show they're painted as extreme and uncompromising, in the later seasons the Jimmy Smitts character is running as a democrat on a pro-school-vouchers, anti-tenure/union (so anti-public school, basically) platform, the show as a whole is against entitlements (free college especially is something the ostensible dems in the show aren't even interested in enough to lament).

Idk at a certain point it gets frustrating to see anti-abortion, anti-gay marriage, anti-healthcare republicans being praised as the mature compromisers in the room with complicated motivations and good points when every time a leftist protest shows up it's a warehouse full of people without enough message discipline to talk to to cameras without erupting into a shouting match and getting brushed off as whiny babies by toby zigler.

"Oh, we need CJ to look a little loopy, let's have her agree with these cartographers who are pointing out that the mercator projection privileges the global north." "Oh we need to present something that's a ridiculous waste of money, how about a wildlife crossing that would prevent keystone species injuries in an area of urban incursion, that's bullshit that we shouldn't spend money on." "Oh, we want to explain why big pharma can't provide free HIV meds to african nations in 2003, let's suggest that it wouldn't matter even if they did because *Africans don't have clocks and can't take meds 12 hours apart.*" "this hollywood producer is pushing too hard for gay marriage in 2007, let's lecture him about how you need to slow down and respect the process instead of being an activist about it"

There's this interview with Aaron Sorkin where he's saying "America used to be the world's heroes, when my dad was a soldier people would say 'thank god, the Americans are here' and they don't say that anymore and it's because of Donald Trump" - Sorkin totally ignores US imperialism and the way that people in Vietnam and Iraq and Afghanistan wouldn't say 'thank god, the americans are here' to an extent that is genuinely startling, and that shows up in the show. At one point in the show president bartlett okays the assassination of a foreign leader and says 'today we enter the league of ordinary nations' as though the US hasn't backed coups or assassination around the world, as though the CIA isn't a thing, as though Henry Kissinger isn't a thing, and it's *bizarre* from a show that is supposed to be politically aware.

I'm actually super hesitant to recommend the west wing thing to general audiences because i don't always agree with the hosts or their guests but as an analysis of the surprisingly right-leaning politics of the show it's a worthwhile listen.

It's honestly something i could rant about for way too long because I had early warning signs about it. My sister *loves* this show and its politics. She's got a "my president is Jed Bartlett" sticker that she keeps next to her signed copy of one of Ann Coulter's books. If my sister thinks your liberal character is reasonable and level headed and has good policy positions, your liberal character isn't all that liberal.

The show is steeped in American exceptionalism and imperialist apologia but it's got a tearjerker soundtrack and maybe the best and most charming cast ever assembled so you ignore it when CJ wants to brush off constitutional protections against illegal search and seizure or cruel and unusual punishment (she's a huge fan of cops and intelligence agencies and not a fan of oversight) or when she shits on affirmative action (she believes her father lost his dream job to a less qualified candidate who was selected due to minority status, and that that job loss led to his mental decline - CJ Craig thinks that DEI hiring practices killed her father) because Allison Janney is an incredibly talented and charismatic actress who is elevating the hell out of her character.

But, you know, it would be kind of fucked up if a Democrat president's chief of staff was cheerfully on-record about the fact that she thinks intelligence agencies are more effective when nobody knows what they're doing so we should leave them to their own devices.

Thank you for the opportunity to rant i cannot fucking stand this show and i kind of want to do an episode-by-episode breakdown of various flavors of bullshit but there are much better things to do with my time so i don't but it's nice to have a chance to yell about the stuff that makes me crazy off the top of my head.

That said: if you want a podcast that is less vitriolic but does actually get into how parts of the US political system work, check out 5 to 4, which is a podcast by 3 lefty lawyers talking about Supreme Court decisions. It's great!

[paperbackribs]

Tags: steddie, getting together, featuring the chaotic friendship of Eddie & Dustin

🤎🌱🤎

Steve's hands are already at his hips, “Eddie, what are you doing down there?”

Eddie glances up from the hole he’d dug in the woods beyond Steve’s backyard. Looking at the dirt nearly up to his shoulders he belatedly realises that he may have become a tad fixed on his big idea.

Dappled sunlight falls through the tapestry of foliage above and the chirping of birds nearby cheerily fill the lush landscape, but none of it seems to distract Steve from his concern as he squints down at Eddie.

“Where’s Dustin?” Eddie counters like he doesn’t currently resemble a cartoon villain digging traps for the native wildlife. He resists twirling an imaginary moustache over his bare upper lip, but Steve must have an idea of his thoughts because he squints suspiciously over his arms as he folds them.

“I don’t know,” Steve says slowly from high above, “should he be here while you create what looks like your own grave?”

Eddie props his arms over the lip, tilting his chin up and aiming for charming. Playful even. “Now, why would I do that, Stevie? Life is a magnificent thing, worthy of delight and whimsy.”

“Whimsy,” Steve repeats sceptically, “like you practically digging up my backyard. You know, someone could fall and sue me, right?” Despite his scolding tone, Steve bends to kneel on the ground, his delicious thighs by Eddie’s folded hands and head hovering over his.

Eddie flutters his eyelashes as Steve waits on him, nearly close enough to kiss if he would just tilt down a fraction. “You could get in here with me, make it so there’s no room for anyone else.”

Steve’s bright hazel eyes flash and Eddie wishes he could get a handle on whether it’s because of Eddie’s suggestive tone or if it’s that Steve is simply annoyed with his antics.

Just when the silences stretches for a second too long, enough that Eddie thinks Steve might lean forward, close the gap and take Eddie’s lips in what would surely be a spectacular first kiss, he instead smirks, slyly pushing a handful of loose dirt into the hole from the high mound above Eddie’s head. It rains over Eddie’s right shoulder, which he shrugs fatalistically — he’s fairly covered at this point anyway.

“Eddie, tell me why you’ve dug a hole near as tall as you by my backyard.”

“Or what, you’ll bury me with all the other bodies out here?”

“Something like that.” Another handful rains down and Eddie sighs, “It’s a compression hole.” Steve’s hand halts, “Like the socks?”

Eddie takes the opportunity to reach out and clasp Steve’s hand, ostensibly to stop it from pushing more dirt over his shoulders but really just taking the opportunity to touch Steve. Hold the warmth of his hand within his own, stroke the silken back of it with his thumb.

Eddie steals many moments like these and Steve always lets him, but he never knows whether it's because of Steve's generous nature or if it's because he wants Eddie touching him, specifically.

“Like the socks,” he agrees, eyes sharp as Steve’s cheeks flush a faint red. Yet he retains a sceptical mien about him so Eddie further explains. “Dustin has this book���”

Steve snorts, “Here we go.”

“Dustin has this book and it says that the Aboriginals from Australia have known for ages how to take care of deadly snake bites.”

“With a hole.”

Eddie is always fascinated to see the evidence of Steve’s smiles in the shine of his eyes, and he delights in being one of the few people who often brings out its brightness. “With a hole,” he agrees with a cheeky grin, happy at Steve’s amusement.

“Bit by a Red-belly then you're in the hole for x amount of days. By a King Brown then for an nth amount of days. Placed in the hole and buried up to your neck, the compression of it all works the venom safely through your system.”

He's sad to see those pretty eyes hidden from him as Steve closes them with a deep, bracing breath. “Eddie,” he begins in a warning tone, drawing his hand away, “is Dustin finding a poisonous snake to bite you with.”

“No, definitely not,” Eddie hedges but at Steve’s stern look he squirms, “because poisonous would mean that I can’t eat them?”

“Venomous then!”

Eddie thinks that maybe he’s losing his capacity to charm Steve if the ire rising in his eyes is anything to go by. He shifts uneasily on the hard dirt below him, feeling particularly trapped as Steve’s frown deepens while looking like he’s considering burying Eddie without the bite and definitely above his head.

The sounds of eager feet crunching over dry leaves and fallen branches sound behind Eddie and he tilts his head in time to see Dustin fly through the trees with a long, wriggling animal in his hands. “Found one!” He calls triumphantly, the curls around his face bobbing in excitement. There's a smudge across his cheek that Eddie suspects was made by crawling through the dirt and bushes to find his captured prey.

About twenty inches long, thin with yellow stripes framing its scales of green and brown, the garter snake wrapped around Dustin’s left arm tastes the air in front of it with its pink forked tongue. Simultaneously looking unhappy at being captured while utterly disinterested in the humans surrounding it.

Dustin’s face crinkles in confusion as Steve starts laughing behind Eddie’s back. “What? What is it?” He asks Steve who, Eddie looks over to see, has fallen back onto his butt, head tilted to the sky as he snorts and chuckles at the harmless animal Dustin has procured for their experiment.

“Never mind,” Steve waves an expansive hand towards the two of them, “carry on. As you were.” Humour dances over his brow and broadens his smile, “Here, I’ll even help. Pass it over, Dustin, I’ll throw the terrible monster at Eddie myself.”

It’s Eddie’s turn for his cheeks to flush now and he might be more embarrassed if it weren’t for Steve catching his eye, sharing a look of amusement with him rather than at him, and Eddie finds himself charmed by Steve Harrington once more.

It's not the first time and he knows that it won't be the last. Steve has had Eddie firmly wrapped around his little finger for far too long to say now, and Eddie's only waiting for the barest hint to step forward.

He sighs and turns back to Dustin, “Let the snake go, it’s a bust.”

Dustin opens his mouth to protest, but Eddie heads him off, explaining that the only creatures in danger of the carnivore in his hands are worms and maybe a mouse or two.

Eddie reckons that if Dustin were a mouse his tail would drop in disappointment right now, looking as sad as one can as he trudges away to release the snake in a safer place deeper in the woods.

He turns back to Steve to find him crouching now, braced with a hand outstretched towards Eddie. His eyes are still bright from his earlier laughter, but an invitation now winds its way through them.

“How about I help clean you up?” Steve asks in a dark murmur and Eddie lights up, finally finding an answer to the question that's been jittering in his heart.

“Why don’t you,” Eddie grins in agreement, clasping Steve back and pushing up to meet him halfway. As he scrambles out of the hole, Eddie pats the lip of its edge in affection as he continues to hold onto Steve’s hand. He silently thanks the soon-to-be-forgotten experiment and winds their fingers together, following Steve home.

💚 More steddie here

[ifightformyfriends]

You seem to have some thoughts on the matter. How do *you* feel about Baldur's Gate 3

Not really any opinions on BG3 specifically, except that it's clear that Larian put a lot more effort into balancing the game than WotC ever has, and it's unfortunate for Larian that the game's development was used to harbor Zac S accomplice Mike Mearls so that WotC could state he was no longer on the D&D design team when people were calling for consequences for his roll in bringing on, enabling, and protecting known serial sexual abuser and transphobe Zac S as a heralded consult in 5e's development.

Mechanically I've seen a lot of talk about how...not even true RAW, but improved RAW 5e just isn't as fun for people when there's not a DM to handwave things or allow cool off the cuff "Greentext" moments that have nothing to do with the actual ruleset being ostensibly played and paid for. Even with some added stuff for Martials to do there's no "Describe your attack" or "Make a called shot" that is so often used to downplay that Martials are on a whole different, lower magnitude of agency to exert influence on the world around them. And this is after Larian went out of their way to improve them! Buffed Action Economy, setpiece combat with interesting interactions, some semblance of giving them actual abilities, but it can't make up for the fact they're 5e Martials. It is hilarious seeing people brought face to face with the actual ruleset for the first time instead of what their DM does to make the system a fun experience.

And I just saw earlier today, it's got people talking about how there's so much Fantasy Racism if you play a Tiefling that is just so unnecessary except for the fact that it is RAW and how the game is presented without your DM and table going "But we're going to ignore that".

Which is very much the same in that it is people being brought face to face with the actual system WotC produces and sells for the first time instead of their DM's system they've agreed to give WotC credit for. I maintain that 5e was a system designed for passive revenue generation because D&D is the property Hasbro got as a free gift when they bought Magic the Gathering, and it was designed specifically for DMs who were used to 3.5's brokenness and doing the heavy lifting to run games for new-to-TTRPG players and that's why the true north of the ruleset development was to not look intimidating to new players. And for that narrow purpose, it succeeds! But then it got popular and the system was not prepared for such wild ideas as "New DMs wanting to run games without an internalized encyclopedic knowledge of the system". To use a car as a metaphor, WotC realized they could design a game that used the DM as the engine instead of the driver's seat, saving a ton in development costs in doing so. And BG3 has some people realizing that what they thought was a car was actually just a frame they paid full price for.

TL;DR: No significant thoughts on Baldur's Gate 3 really, same thoughts as always on WotC and 5e that people will awkwardly ignore and sweep under the rug until their NEXT big PR fiasco that they'll shallowly ask forgiveness for and people will somehow give them and the cycle will begin anew.

[amostexcellentblog]

Finally watched Wings (1927) for the first time, and oh my, it really is that gay, it wasn't just that one kissing scene taken out of context.

The entire film turns on the relationship between the two men, progressing from romantic rivals to ride-or-die comrades under the duress of wartime. The ostensible female romantic lead is entirely unnecessary, tacked on at the behest of studio executives who wanted to boost box office. She appears in only a few scenes, does nothing to drive the main plot, and is absent from large portions of the film and at all the key moments. The actress, Clara Bow, knew the film was beneath her, once saying it was "a man's picture and I'm just the whipped cream on top of the pie."

I guess Top Gun did not, in fact, invent the military-pilot-rivals-to-friends-to-implied-lovers trope after all.

It's literally WWI Icemav. (Maybe an Ice-Lives AU where, freshly retired and bored out of his mind, Ice agrees to go to a museum exhibit with Bradley and Jake on the history of LGBTQ people in the military, where he stumbles on a picture of two unidentified WWI flying aces, standing close with their arms draped around each other in a way that could be friendly but somehow is more than that. Ice knows the pose and he becomes obsessed with finding out who they are.)

Using his contacts and military history knowledge he's eventually able to verify that the men are David Armstrong and Jack Powell. They came from the same town, but different social classes. Jack was impulsive and loved fast cars. David was more reserved. They were described as the closest of friends by their fellow soldiers. David died in the war, Jack returned home and married his childhood sweetheart, they had no children. When Jack died, he was buried next to David. That's all Ice can find, but it's enough. He sends his findings to the museum, then drives to the hanger just so he can hold Mav in his arms, but first he calls Bradley...

"You need to marry that boy."

"...I thought you didn't like him."

"I don't, but... But if he makes you happy then that... Jesus Bradley, you and Jake are the first ones, the first generation who can live your lives openly. Don't waste that chance, so many of us never got that, never even allowed ourselves to imagine what it would be like."

"Well, good news. I proposed a month ago and we've been trying to figure out how to tell you. We actually thought the museum exhibit might soften you up, but you got so fixated on that damn photo you forgot we were even there."

[syn0vial]

touch-averse or touch-starved? an analysis of boba fett's attitudes towards physical touch in legacy of the force

a sufficient number of people expressed interest in this topic that i'm finally making this post! i find this facet of fett's characterization quite fascinating and naturally wanted to share, especially bc it's so unexpectedly nuanced in a lot of ways. so here it is, for the consideration and enjoyment of fic writers, expanded universe enjoyers, and general fett fans alike!

touch is (ostensibly) unbearable because it's a form of compassion. throughout the series, if there's one thing we learn can put fett into the fight-or-flight reflex, it's compassion. at multiple points, his gut reaction to someone showing him compassion is to either lash out at them to get them to stop (as he does with jaina), or if he's not willing to do that, get away from them as fast as he can (as he does with sintas and occasionally beviin early into their friendship). fett explicitly equates more intimate forms of touch (such as hugging, or taking his hand) with compassion and states outright that he has no idea how to respond to such gestures. yet, fett's attitude towards touch cannot be boiled down to simple aversion, because

fett's reactions to physical touch read more like someone who is touch-starved, not touch-averse. despite the attitude towards compassion explored above, when fett is actually faced with compassionate touch, his reaction is not what one would expect. in contrast to when people try to verbally show him compassion, which will get the aforementioned fight-or-flight response, compassionate touch provokes much more ambivalence. for example, when sintas reaches out to take his hand, he initially "dreads" it—yet, when she actually touches him, the text tells us, "He needed her to let go of his hand; but he didn't want her to." similarly, though fett seems to express relief that mirta isn't the type to hug him or take his hand, in the very previous book, we seem to have evidence contrary to all parts of this statement. namely, mirta places her hand in his to reassure him when he's undergoing a very painful treatment for his fucked-up-clone-DNA disease, and his reaction is to immediately take her hand and, when the doctor starts lining up the needle, to squeeze it with such force that mirta "thought he'd break every bone in her fingers." these do not read as the reactions of someone who is averse to touch, but rather, someone who is actually quite touch-starved.

(note that it is not at all uncommon for fett's actions/emotional responses to be at odds with the image he projects. he is not at all a reliable narrator of his own internal experience. for example, at one point he claims to not feel ashamed of anything he's ever done, despite the fact that we see him explicitly grappling with feelings of deep, paralyzing shame for how he treated sintas. beviin even teases him for this habit at one point, responding to fett's claims of professional detachment in the face of his obvious care for others with a cheeky, "'course, i believe you 😉")

furthermore, as we see with mirta, fett can get downright clingy when he's worried about someone. in revelation, fett and mirta both take part in a mission that eventually forces them to split up into separate strike teams. fett is, to put it mildly, rather anxious about this. he fears that something will happen to mirta when she's on her own, and that furthermore, it will be his fault for agreeing to take her along on the mission in the first place. significantly, the separation is book-ended by two instances of fett physically grabbing mirta. first, when mirta begins to climb up into the other part of the ship, fett grabs her by the ankle to try and slow her departure, a result, we're told of his "sudden fear for her." he doesn't let go until she shakes him off. later on, when they're reunited, with mirta covered in someone else's (though fett isn't yet aware of this) blood, jaina observes that he grabs her tightly by the shoulder "as if he was going to shake the daylights out of her." both of these reactions seem to be purely instinctive and visceral; it seems fett's first, kneejerk reaction to the fear of losing someone is to physically grab and hold onto them. again, his actions don't align with the detached, touch-averse image he sometimes portrays.

finally, the characters who know fett best seem to know to offer physical reassurance in the face of painful/distressing situations. specifically, we see beviin and mirta offer physical touch as reassurance; beviin places his hand on fett's back when he's watching sintas suffer from carbonite thawing sickness and is anxiously waiting to see whether her mind is still intact, and, as mentioned above, mirta places her hand in his when he's receiving treatment for his genetic disease. and that's not to even mention how sintas's first reaction to seeing him in emotional turmoil is to try and take his hand. for all that fett tries to put on a distant, untouchable facade, the characters he cares about most and vice-versa can see through it within the text itself.

in conclusion, i feel like if a character he cared about actually hugged him, fett's reaction would be something along the lines of this image:

thank you for coming to my tedtalk

[ghostpalmtechnique]

Why your criticism of "capitalism" is so tiresome

I usually disagree with criticisms of "capitalism," but there are different reasons for this due to underlying terminological confusion: you can think of this as a 2x2 matrix where the quadrants represent "I agree with your premise {yes/no}" and "the thing you are angry about is actually capitalism {yes/no}".

There is a small class of genuinely radical leftists that object to all private investment, market transactions, etc. (Category: no/mostly yes) I do not believe that the planning problem is solvable even with currently-unavailable tech such as superhuman AI, nor do I think the "people respond to incentives" problem would go away even if you did otherwise solve it. (It's pretty notable that every example that people can point to of societies that ostensibly don't display this behavior are near-subsistence economies .)

There are people who think the welfare state is too weak. "We should be more like Scandinavia." (Category: yes/no) The US is a mixed economy. Denmark and Sweden are mixed economies. We could move the dial on tax-and-transfer a lot and still be capitalist, just like Scandinavia is.

There are people who think "capitalism is the reason poverty exists." (Category: no/no? This thinking is so confused that it's hard to categorize.) The default state of humanity is poverty. Our ability to climb out of that has been dependent on productive investment. The major modernization pushes in Communist USSR and China depended on market-based exports to the rest of the world and would have failed faster and harder as an attempt at centrally-planned autarky. They were free-riding on capitalism.

There are people who think capitalism is bad because it's a impersonal system where people are transactional and don't care about other people. (Category: mostly no/no) First of all, this isn't a distinguishing feature of capitalism. Mercantilist and communist states have been equally suffused with impersonal bureaucracy. Second of all, a system where your ability to get things you need depends on your ability to pay for them and/or fill out the right paperwork is almost always safer and better than a system where your ability to get what you need depends on having the right connections and/or being well-liked (or just likeable). To actually *be* better, of course, requires certain public measures to ensure everyone has the resources and knowledge to access them; however, see previous paragraph.

There are people who wouldn't actually be able to articulate a general criticism of capitalism because their actual complaint is "the status quo gives me personally less wealth and status than I think I should have." You can probably guess what quadrant this is in.

[mdhwrites]

https://www.tumblr.com/everysongineverykey/709979889023008768/the-owl-house-was-really-like-oh-yeah-by-the-way-a?source=share

Thoughts on this post?

So my immediate thoughts were two things: One was that I always feel awkward responding to other posts because I try not to shit stir most of the time. Two though was that I just agreed with it. The reality of the Hexside kids is purely played for laughs despite being horribly traumatizing on pretty much every level. That's just true.

Then I saw the tag saying it wasn't a criticism.

So was it okay for Hexside to be treated like this? Wartwood had a similar rebellion and it had its own silly things like a themed food Friday and people still being their quirky selves. It works there however because while dealing with what life throws at you is a theme of the work, trauma specifically isn't really. It's there, I've talked about how smart Amphibia is with it to keep its tone consistent but that subtlety also makes it so that not dwelling on it is fine.

If I were to give TOH S3 a theme of some sort... It WOULD be trauma. I don't think it does this theme well, at all, but it is a consistent motif. Hunter's trauma about Belos, Luz's trauma about... Fucking everything if I'm frank but her core trauma is resolved at least once in each episode, technically twice in the finale. They graft on trauma out of nowhere for Willow. She's never dependable Willow, soft spoken and never complaining at all times, but now she is so she has some sort of trauma to deal with while also dealing with Hunter's new trauma of losing Flapjack. One could even argue that Belos has it running throughout because his desperation is potentially fueled by trauma of losing his brother and having his world shatter around him by his brother betraying what ostensibly would have been both of theirs core beliefs. You even have the Collector going through his shit with having been trapped alone for so long.

And then you have Hexside where no one cares about how traumatic all of this has been... Except Boscha. And Boscha is played subtlely, much closer to Amphibia, rather than the capital t TRAUMA that the rest of the cast is going through. As such, most people who watched didn't give a shit and just saw it as a half baked redemption arc rather than continuing a theme because yeah, why would you? What does she even have to say about trauma? That you'll get kicked even harder while you're down and the only option is to move on by yourself and just pretend like it didn't happen?

And that's honestly a problem with the theme in general. So much of the answer to "How do I deal with this," for TOH is to go "I'm awesome and amazing and fuck you for ever thinking otherwise!" It's the conclusion for Hunter's trauma with Belos, we don't get a conclusion with Flapjack really, it's the statement that Luz makes for her character finish of just how much she wants the entire world to recognize she's a bombass nerd -_-, and it's even how the series wraps up with only Luz getting the Titan's power and only her, while she quotes her favorite books, actually attacking Belos. This is your reminder that all the co-op attacks with King and Eda were done far away from Belos, fighting random slime for literally no reason besides the fact that both Luz and the show got lost for about a minute. Willow is the only one where compassion for needing to actually, you know, process your pain and be supported and helped with it might be the answer but again, it's not a core trauma to the character. It's a clumsily grafted on element that also has Willow force Hunter to confront his trauma with Flapjack which IS the answer for him so it's also contradictory. It's not given nearly the same weight as the stuff with Hunter and Belos or ALL OF LUZ where their answers are just 'deal with it'.

(Bonus points to Luz's core problem theoretically being that she was WRONG about Philip and at least two of the endings to that trauma, with her friends and with the Titan, are her being told "You're wrong for worrying," like that would help at all.)

So then you have Hexside where their trauma is ignore and played for laughs so you can just do normal fantasy rebellion stuff mixed with teen rebellion stuff. It's not bad when measured that way but it's contradictory to many of the points that the whole abridged season is trying to make. It's an element that conflicts with your core theme. It's akin to how we're supposed to take Hunter leaving the EC seriously and as this grand pain of his... And then also have people mocking Lilith for it and even having her go "I'm realizing I was bad at my job" back in S2 because fuck her and her trauma I guess.

And don't tell me it's because it's a kid's show. Boscha could have easily been the surrogate for all of Hexside and then you kick out Miki and just have Boscha to deal with. Focus the episode around getting her to open up, be defenseless, maybe almost get turned into a puppet for it as it seems her fears were justified... Before she looks up to find she's behind one of Matt's pillars and everyone is coming out to help protect Boscha. Because the only reason they've gotten through this is together and while they're happy Boscha has actually helped them despite her pain, she shouldn't be dealing with this alone. All of them will do better if they share this pain and so we get them kicking the ass of one of the Collector's hunter stars and the plan be to ride it up to the Archive for the main crew before they get snatched off of it. It has more to say about the complexities of trauma and how you can't just power through it, allows an acknowledgement of what this world has done to these people, all while still allowing the rest of Hexside besides Boscha to be silly and upbeat because they've been doing what they need to handle all of this.

So yeah, I think the blog itself is correct. I think calling itself not criticism though means ignoring what all of these conflicting elements mean for the season overall. Yeah, it's a cute segment as is but when you have a show like TOH that is trying SO HARD to say something... Shouldn't we be critical of when it's failing to do that or even muffling it's own voice?

Because the hex on this side of the Isles could have been used to do something more but instead was treated like a cute charm to fill time. That's not okay. See you next tale.

======+++++======

I have a public Discord for any and all who want to join!

I also have an Amazon page for all of my original works in various forms of character focused romances from cute, teenage romance to erotica series of my past. I have an Ao3 for my fanfiction projects as well if that catches your fancy instead. If you want to hang out with me, I stream from time to time and love to chat with chat.

A Twitter you can follow too

And a Kofi if you like what I do and want to help out with the fact that disability doesn’t pay much.

[yaoist]

and the thing i really have to agree with Getty for is the fact that people often ascribe unrealistic and even absurd levels of political manipulation to Stalin (Kirov is a great example of this, but it's definitely not the only one). He absolutely did make grand empty gestures, manipulate everyone around him, and have a good grasp on what people wanted and how to charm them, but i cannot stress enough that Real Life Is Not Anime and real politics are exactly as unpredictable and completely confusing as they are right now looking at our world political situation. this is generally part of my "you are analyzing these historical figures like they are from a (mediocre) novel and not like real life people" rant but i think it's really suspicious that people are capable of making these grand claims in ostensibly serious books

[zipzin]

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Critical Role Rating: General Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Chetney Pock O'Pea & Imogen Temult, Laudna/Imogen Temult Characters: Imogen Temult, Chetney Pock O'Pea, Laudna Additional Tags: Campaign 3, Crack Summary: Forget time, forget Ludinus, forget the gods, forget Predathos. She was going to fucking kill Chetney for mentioning her name and the title assistant in the same breath.  Then maybe Dorian, after all he was the one who started this farce.

“-the assistant of C-POP Industries? I’m trying to get in touch with him and he isn’t answering. Has the master craftsman passed away?”

Imogen was wrenched from sleep as a grating voice she didn’t recognize split open her brain. “What?” she croaked out and sat up, “Did you say Chet’s dead? What’s going on?”

It took her a couple blinks to realize that she was staring at the dark red rocks of the Ruidus tunnel, one last night of, well, the closest thing they could get to peace before they entered Kreveris. Laudna was asleep, eyes open and arms tangled with hers while Ashton and Fjord were sitting ten feet away, ostensibly on watch.

They’d almost agreed against it, the only thing that would be out here would be one of those giant worms and if that was on them, it didn’t matter if someone got a shout off. They’d all know about it and they should all hope they’d be swallowed together.

And she was talking to no one.

“You good?” Ashton shout-whispered at her, “It’s not quite next watch. Bad dream?”

“No, not that” Imogen rubbed her head, “I don’t know, weird dream.”

He nodded and she laid back down and felt her body begin settle again.

“Will C-POP Industries be making a statement at Pop-con about the death of the master craftsman? What will become of his last collection?”

Imogen sat back up and sighed. What fucker was sending her? About Chetney of all people?

“How did you get in contact with me?” She growled and could see Ashton and Fjord both turn and frown at her. “And why are you asking me about Chet?” His snores were filling the tunnel and she squinted to try to make out his tiny form in the dark.

“Our sources are confidential,” the voice was smug, “But once he didn’t answer and with the weird feedback we’re receiving we thought it was best to check with his assistant.”

“Fucking Waylon,” Imogen swore, “Look, he’s not dead. We’re sleeping alright, I can see him breathing and everything. We’re on the moon. Who is this?”

There wasn’t an answer and she itched to send right back at him, but she had no fucking clue what they even looked like. Or their name. And now was not the time to be using spells for frivolous sending reasons. 

Imogen sighed and stood, gently extricating herself Laudna’s arms. “I’ll take next watch.”

Ashton shrugged, “I promised to wake up Fearne.”

“That’s fine.”

“Is everything okay?” Fjord asked.

“It’s fine, just Chet assistant stuff.” Imogen sighed and rubbed her head. “Some dipshit is probably gonna keep sending to me.”

He frowned while Ashton snorted beside her and stood, walking carefully over to Fearne and shaking her awake while Fjord gently shook Caduceus.

“Imogen?” Fearne frowned at her, “Are you joining us?”

“I woke up,” Imogen shrugged, “And I feel fine, all recovered, so, figured I’d just join ya on the last watch if that’s okay?”

“Of course,” Caduceus rumbled, his eyes stopping on Laudna for a second before moving on. 

Imogen put herself between Caduceus and Fearne, he seemed nice enough if you ignored his uncommon interest in Laudna, and she was half-nervous Fearne was going to say or do something that would change his interest into something more sinister. Neither of them talked, and Imogen sat with a strict back and narrow eyes waiting for the asshole who dragged her out of bed to annoy her some more.

After about thirty minutes of silence, she had almost made her mind up to return to Laudna’s arms.

She sighed loudly.

“You can go back to bed,” Caduceus rumbled.

“Maybe-”

“Can you comment on the state of your relationship with Mr. Pock O’Pea?”

“Oh what the hell!” She stood and at the two’s confused gaze, whispered to Fearne, “Make sure he doesn’t mess with Laudna.” And then strode down the tunnel, “Now, who the fuck is this?”

There was a beat of silence.

“We are a collective who are interested in getting the answers to Exandria’s burning questions. Now, how do you feel about Mr. Pock O’Pea?”

“He’s a-” she cut herself off, as her sleepy brain seemed to click on and she gritted her teeth. This was some fucking reporter. And why were they asking about Chet? How many C-Poppers were there? How had this grown so quickly? “He’s a very skilled craftsman. That’s all I have to say.”

“Are there any associates that would be interested in talking to us? Feel free to give their description and name?”

“I’m not tellin’ ya shit. You haven’t told me anything about you. How do I know you’re a real reporter?”

“We’ve been told that there’s a dangerous green haired faun around him. Was the attack from her?”

“Attack!?” Imogen yelped, “What attack? He’s fine! And she’s not dangerous. To him.” Imogen hastily added.

She waited, but there was no response, and clenched her fists. She was going to kill Chetney. This stupid lie that she was an assistant just because she could message people! And she never even had to message Waylon! Who fucking sold her out to some reporter?!

She let out a harsh sigh and then stomped back over to Caduceus and Fearne after ten minutes of fuming.

“Everything alright?” He asked.

“It’s fine.” Imogen said.

Fearne eyed her carefully and then clasped her hand. Imogen squeezed it back trying to ease the tension that was building in her neck.

Orym woke first, and in a gentle cascade the others began to stir and get ready for the final march. 

Imogen stomped over to the snoring Chet with haste. After a particularly loud snort, she reared her foot back and kicked him with, well, not all of her strength, but she’s done with this farce.

His snores immediately stopped and she heard Laudna’s vague, “Darling? Are you alright?” behind her.

“I know you’re up, Chetney.” Imogen leaned over him.

“You could of killed me with that kick!” He yelled.

“But I didn’t!” Imogen pulled back the blanket and stared at him. He frowned back, bushy eyebrows furrowed and what little hair he had sticking up in strange directions.

“It’s not my fault there’s not a private room for you and Laudna in this long ass tunnel!”

“What?” Imogen sputtered.

“Why else would you be kicking me awake?”

“The hell Chetney! No! It’s because some reporter woke me up because they thought you were dead!”

“What?!”

“Apparently Ruidus gives sendings weird feedback and you snore through them! So they decided to contact me!”

“You’re my assistant!”

“Assistant?” She heard Beau mutter.

“Chetney!”

“Wait,” he moved to a sitting position, “dead? What did you tell them?”

“That you were asleep!” Imogen rubbed at her temples to ease the oncoming headache.

“Good,” he nodded and then stared at her, continence easing a bit. “I’m sorry you can’t sleep through messages, but it isn’t my fault.”

“Fucking Waylon passed my description along! That makes it your fault!”

“Are you dissatisfied in my employ?”

“You don’t fucking pay me Chet!”

“I gave you 200 platinum yesterday!”

“Oh wow, that’s a lot of money.” She heard Jester say.

“That was for diamonds! For all of us!”

He shrugged, “You could spend it on anything you wanted.”

“And you stole it from Allura!”

“I didn’t steal anything! She gave it to me!”

Imogen stared at him and her hands raised up as she thought about casting psychic lance until he really did keel over. She let out a half-scream and then stormed back to the group.

“Are you his assistant because he’s so old?” Jester asked and then in a half-whisper, “Do you have to help him stand up?”

Imogen stopped and stared at her and with a moment’s deliberation answered, “Yes.”

She glanced back at Chet, but he was just shrugging with a smile, “Helps keep me fresh and breathing another day.” He looked down at his sitting position and then held up a hand, “Assistant?”

“Ugh!” Imogen jerked him up with her telekinesis, grabbing the back of his collar and forcing him into standing position and stormed away to where her bed roll and bags lay. Laudna pulled her into her arms and began to rub circles on her back.

“You were at the key,” Beauregard said, “Were you his assistant then? Did you come as a package deal? I thought your mom was wrapped up in this?”

“Imogen’s quite capable,” Laudna said.

“Actually,” Dorian piped up, “She was my servant first.”

Oh, they were both dying. Painful, brutal, flung out into the astral sea where no one could rescue them.

“Servant?” Fjord muttered.

“You know what I remember from then?” Imogen shot back, “That you and Fearne are engaged.”

Dorian blushed and hid behind his pack while Fearne just flipped her hair, “I have many bonds across Exandria.”

Ashton snorted, “That’s putting it lightly.”

“Um,” Caleb said, “I think we should get going.”

“Gladly,” Chetney fruitlessly brush some red dirt off his pants, “After my wonderful assistant.” He waved Imogen forward.

“Chet, I swear to you. If that damn reporter sends to me when we’re facing Ludinus I’m breaking Predathos free and killing you.”

“Only if you respond first! Can’t ruin my reputation!”

“Darling,” Laudna carefully wrapped her up and Imogen sunk into the coldness that’s brought her comfort more than anything, “Maybe we don’t decide to fundamentally change the cosmos because we’re mad at Chetney.”

“He’d deserve it,” She grunted out and buried her face into Laudna’s shoulder. She let Laudna’s scent wash over her.

“Maybe,” And Imogen knew by the almost laugh Laudna let out with each word that she thinks she’s being ridiculous, “But we need to approach this with clear heads. Okay?”

“I know,” Imogen grunted and pressed a kiss to her skin, “I know. I just, they woke me up! Because he was snoring through their messages and they thought he died! I should have just let them.”

“You can do that next time,” Laudna said and kissed her temple.

“Yeah?”

“Yes, whatever you want.”

“Oh yeah,” Chetney called back, “Whatever you want.”

400 years was a life long enough, right?

[greenerteacups]

do you have any thoughts on luna and harry as a potential couple post-canon? i was reading your post on harry/ginny and i really loved your perspective on it, especially when you said your vision for harry post war was basically just lots and lots of big dogs (i LOVE that mental image and i agree it would be SO good for him!!) but i was wondering if you'd consider luna and harry to be a good match for each other? personally i have a sort of soft spot for the pairing because of how fond harry is of her in canon, and i think if anyone was going to understand and be unfazed by all the difficult trauma responses and long healing process he's going to be dealing with for years after the war, luna seems like a good fit :)

My love for Harry as a character is kind of unusual to me, considering I go pearl-diving for ships when I read things, and I fall in love with dynamics as a conduit to falling in love with characters. That said, I don't really ship him with anybody. I just genuinely adore That Weird Little Dude. Same with Ron; I'm just as pleased to see them with a range of people, because (A) I believe they're good partners and can have great relationships with many people (Ron Weasley get behind me they could never make me hate you Ron Weasley), but also (B) I don't see either of their canon relationships as Definitive. Some characters I ship together because I sincerely believe they are (non-deterministic) soulmates, in that they bring out parts of each other that make them the freshest, happiest, most interesting versions of themselves. With other characters, I'll look at a couple and go: "Huh. Could work!" and smack my giant rubber [APPROVED] stamp on it, then get back to work on my blorbos.

Luna and Harry are one of those couples for me. As I mentioned in that other post, I think Harry's primary requirement in a partner is someone who can treat him normally, i.e. will be generally chill about the Became Wizard Jesus Twice situation. Which is a big ask. Luna is uniquely capable of doing that because Luna is not normal at all, and so treats all things, extraordinary and ordinary both, as uniformly dazzling and delightful. I believe this is why Harry enjoys her so much in their friendship, because he gets to feel valued and treasured without feeling unusual or othered — a hard line to toe, and one even Ron and Hermione occasionally trip up on. He seems to like hanging out with her a great deal, and I think it says something sweet that he asks her to the Slug Club party instead of any of the girls in Gryffindor from his year, whom he'd ostensibly know better.

Luna is a bit of a cipher to me, I admit. We know she's the daughter of an eccentric and probably traumatized single father, raised without a mother; deeply lonely, because of how she's been ostracized for her beliefs and hobbies, and the victim of some degree of bullying for it; and yet full of a passionate, almost effortless wonder and joie de vivre. She's also intensely loving (cf. painting her friends' faces on her bedroom ceiling) and very hard to embarrass. She likes Harry for understandable reasons; they share most of those qualities (Harry's more sensitive to others' opinions, understandably so), and the only point where they diverge is their actual hobbies and interests. Harry seems pretty fond of her nonsense, and I bet she could sell him on crumple-horned snorkacks given some time — maybe if Hermione took a vacation to Switzerland and left them alone together.

In general, what I find sweet about the idea of these two is they're so chill. These are two people whose chief ambition is to hang out, enjoy their hobbies, and see some cool magical shit. Date night is so fucking easy for these two. Plus, Harry is a hothead a lot of the time, and Luna just... vibes. Literally never bothered. Insane levels of not fussed at all times. Very helpful for Harry, who has a bad tendency to bottle up his feelings and then blow up at the first person to sneeze at him. Conversely, I'd hope that Harry would age into the kind of genial, confident dude who would be able to rock up with a function where people were talking shit about Luna and be like :) My wife? You mean my wise and beautiful wife? Surely you are not talking about my wise and beautiful wife. :) instead of doing what he'd do from age 15-17, which is get mad and stomp around sulking. Which, again: teenager. Orphan. Non-stop trauma gauntlet from age 2-18. Excuses are made. But still. Would think it best if Luna's husband were not perhaps so keenly sensitive to gossip, for Luna's sake.

Anyway, these are just some dissembled thoughts. There's also something in there about Harry, boy under the staircase, falling in love with the magical world and ending up the Most Magical person, i.e., the person who took believing in magic to such an extreme that she imagines magic that doesn't exist yet. And Luna ends up with the one person who's inarguably stranger than she is.

[dog-park-dissidents]

I’m a queer anarchist, and your music has really helped me accept myself, so here goes…what advice do you have on loving my radical self? I find myself trying to look respectable and chill to avoid being a stereotype, opting out of actions to please my family, and just internalizing a lot of BS about what it means to be an anarchist in the world. Thank you so much!!

David Graeber, RIP, guy at Occupy Wall Street who coined the slogan "we are the 99%," often said he was a "small-a anarchist" and that anarchism was a thing he did, not an identity. That is probably the healthiest way to engage with anarchism in a modern world where political identities and political language have been turned into sports teams and brands, completely divorced from anything that the words behind them actually mean. US politics at least have turned into "are you a LIBERAL or a CONSERVATIVE" which sort of means something but also means nothing, and its meanings contradict each other to the point of uselessness. They're not real ideological frameworks, after all. Nobody can give you a coherent manifesto of US American "Liberalism" but it's the thing you're supposed to agree with if you don't think gay people should die?? Maybe??? It doesn't even have any connection with the philosophy of classical liberalism, which is closer to stereotypically Republican fiscal politics, EXCEPT for when the ostensible "left wing" liberals actually agree with that shit? Anyway yeah it's a mess and it's no wonder why the younger generation is desperately trying to find an alternative way of labeling themselves so as to signal that we're outside of all that bullshit.

So don't do that. Actually be outside of all that bullshit instead of coming up with an edgier sports team to root for. Not that you're necessarily doing that, but just, remember not to do that.

Focus on the material circumstances you live in: the state and money and laws and all that shit are just things somebody made up one day before you were born. You exist in a world you had no say in constructing. Your goal is to figure out how to survive, and then to thrive, and then to be happy, under these circumstances. And ideally make them better for everyone else.

Now as for opting out of actions to please your family. Sounds like you're stuck in a family situation where you're not free to go where you want and be yourself without scrutiny, and that sucks. From the perspective of an effective anarchist, remember that it's from each according to their ability, and you don't have to feel any guilt about not doing your part to change the world.

But from a queer perspective? That queerness sounds a lot more like what's causing your tension about making yourself look more respectable. And that plays into this feeling you have of being trapped by family, or by capitalism, or whatever forces are making you feel the need to put yourself in a box. Obviously you've woven your queer identity pretty deep with your anarchism, which is good, but that definitely makes the desire to express your anarchist identity a whole lot stronger. It can feel like the same thing as your sexual orientation or gender when it's such a deep part of your worldview.

And that makes for a big contradiction in a world where political labels have turned into deep personal identities at the expense of any coherent intellectualism. Whoops. Everybody else has been forced to pick a vapid red or blue choice and here you are with an extremely deep sense of pink and black. Uh oh.

But that's the great thing about queerness, is to be comfortable existing as a contradiction, as category-defying, as someone that doesn't need to be intellectually consistent because you simply ARE. So be you. Don't feel like you have to debate the chuds in your head to explain your existence.

[fayrobertsuk]

Making Differences

Long post. tl;dr: you never know where your earnest words may end up, and what they might accomplish, so keep putting them out there. (Also: I wrote a guide to nonbinary identities a little over two years ago and I’m still very proud of it.)

Back in August 2020, I emailed my day job line manager: “Hey, so, I’ll be coming back to work [after the world’s worst-timed unpaid, year-long sabbatical] in three weeks... we should probably have a plan...?”

He agreed, and decided to do a long-overdue video call that week. In our defence, we’d had a lot of Other Things to think about in that period.

Approximately 15 seconds before the call connected, I remembered that my beard had been growing out for about 6-8 weeks by that point and was not something you could pass off as a trick of the light, if you were so minded. What would this nice, supportive, but ultimately cishet, Christian, family man have to say about my incontrovertibly gender non-conforming appearance? I’d never even told him about being non-binary, always swerving when conversation got close to the topic.

Arrgh.

As the video image expanded, he leaned into the screen, put one hand to his own hairy chin (very different from the clean-shaven man of memory) and said “Huh. It’s not as good as mine!”

Me: “Well, uh, hah, to be fair, you’ve had longer to, uh, develop yours.”

Him: “How long have you been growing yours then?”

I’m not sure that there could have been a better response, if I’m honest.

We moved onto different topics after that but, like a two-ring circus, I was chatting about the departmental shifts, the changes in personnel, how everyone was coping with permanently working from home... and thinking: “Could I finally come out completely at work? Like: COMPLETELY? Would that... I hadn’t even... what...?!” and said, just before signing off, with utter lack of articulacy, that it would be good to talk about, uh, pronouns, and changing them in work, sometime.

“Oh. Okay.”

We worked the mechanism out between us, me slowly revealing my new appearance to close colleagues one at a time, most of whom were either a) relieved that I wasn’t telling them I’d suffered horrendous burn scars (thanks for that very specific leap of imagination!), b) cis men complaining mildly that my beard was better, or c) having to be dragged back a step from the notion that I was transitioning to a man and would be changing my name, etc., d) or some combination of the above. And then we decided to use November 2020’s National Coming Out Day as a good point to aim for. I was already set to write an article about coming out as nonbinary for the organisation’s LGBT+ Network (due to be shared generally with anyone in the business who cared to read it or any of the others for that day – apparently mine made some people cry).

In the meantime, I searched out the announcement that a former colleague’s line manager had made to the business when she came out as trans and forwarded it to mine – here’s a good template, and yes: the annoucement coming from you will help legitimise it. At which point, it became clear that my boss and colleagues were going to need some further guidance from me.

“I was thinking of writing a thing about how to use pronouns...”

“Oh!” He was nakedly relieved. “Yes, pronouns. That would be great. Thanks!”

No problem. I knew how to use my own, and how to communicate that clearly. No worries. One page about ze/zir/zirself, with a general background on neopronouns. Coming right up.

It occurred to me that I didn’t know whether any of my (ostensibly uniformly cishet) colleagues had any idea why why someone would use third person singular pronouns other than she/her or he/him, so I added in a bit about nonbinary identities. A couple of pages should be fine, right? The nonbinary identity section grew, and split into subsections: definitions, history, legacy, how much more common such a thing is in cultures other than “Western” ones.

Maybe it needed more context. After all, to understand nonbinary, you probably need to understand binary trans identities. A new section blossomed.

In order to understand transgender identities, you need to understand gender identity. Okay. Another section. Let’s throw in all the definitions re: sex, gender, cis, trans, nonbinary... with some links to other resources.

You know what this needs? Diagrams (id in alt-text). And a contents page. And a glossary.

Honestly, I’m amazed it’s only thirteen pages long...

Anyway, thing is: it’s gone a LOT further than any of us ever imagined. It started with people on Facebook saying “Well, I don’t understand [non-binary people/ the need for gender-neutral language]!” in various groups/ on other friend’s posts, so I’d sweetly offer them the guide. (Turns out treating what can look like huffy denial as a good faith request for more information (with bonus diagrams) gets many more positive results than you’d imagine.) Then I idly posted the link in a couple of more friendly places. And THEN it started getting weird. “Can I share this with my colleagues?” Sure. “Can I bring this to my kids’ school?” Go for it. “I’d like to circulate this as a resource at the NHS Trust I work for.” Uh. Okay! “So, I saw [the guide] on Twitter. Can [organisation I greatly admire] use that as guidance for our organisation?” Buh, uh, yeah! Please! “My wife is a prison psychiatrist, may I share it with her?” Blimey. By all means.

And then the more personal stories started coming back: “You made me realise something about myself.” “I shared this with my family and they understood.” “We’re in love and your paper helped me reconcile that.”

Wow.

This little guide has gone a lot further than I ever imagined it might.

Today a senior colleague told me, in passing:

fwiw I shared your pronoun guide with my (very old white cis hetero) choir and it has generated SO many good questions

so there are choir grandkiddos all over the world thanking you for their grandparents being more awesome

Which, considering I was braced for an awkward business change management conversation, was not where I was expecting to end up this afternoon, emotionally speaking.

If I was doing this from scratch now, I suspect there would be differences (a longer glossary; an excursion into intersex identities, maybe? definitely better diagrams...), but then, a lot of what I know now came from doing the research for the guide, so maybe not so much! But one thing is for sure: I’m never going to take the impact of words shared freely quite so lightly in future.

[reachexceedinggrasp]

yeah, I love BATB, 'true' ETL, but a common problem I run into is that the female protagonist just isn't interesting. I think it's partly because she's the shining face of purity in the face of ostensible evil and that evil gets complexity she doesn't, probably part self-insert, probably also partly because writing 'complex' or interesting female characters is difficult enough as it is (and difficult enough when dealing with the reception of them, which can lead to sanding off the edges).

And generally writing interesting characters is hugely difficult in and of itself - villains begging for redemption are kind of interesting by nature of having a set archetypal struggle.

It was an issue for me with Reylo in particular, and I really liked the more possessive (scavenger) elements of Rey, her snap judgements, her loneliness, but that's harder to find in fic.

There are a lot of BATB/ETL-esque ships coming out now that my mutuals/people I follow are latching onto, and I just don't care, because none of the female characters are interesting lolllll. Hence my interest being piqued by your description of Lucy!

Yeah, for the dynamic to work, it has to be a mutual thing where Beauty is equally in need of saving but in a different way. When the B&tB is really good, it's because the Beast challenges Beauty and helps her to actualise into the best version of herself while she shows him the compassion he needs to realise he is human. Both are set free from bondage, both recognise each other. Beauty's most important qualities are that she is able to see the truth which others don't and that she is compassionate, but a lot of people seem to confuse being compassionate with being weak or simple.

Totally agree with you about Rey. I've talked about it many times before, but it always frustrated me in fic when people would flatten them into a morality chain pairing or a sunshine/grumpy stereotype. Not just because I hate morality chain 'redemption' on principle, but also because it's specifically so wrong about who Rey is. It's basic to the story that Rey is a fucked up person too, that she's alienated and standoffish and avoidant. Fics would make her this completely well-adjusted healthy adult who is emotionally available to her friends and has all her psychological needs met, and it's like not only is that not Rey, that person is not going to have the kinship with Ben which forms the entire basis of their connection. He understands her so perfectly because they have a lot in common.

Sometimes it's motivated by fear of letting her need him as well as fear of letting her be flawed, but like, that's the whole thing. This is the whole concept of romance. You have to be willing to allow your characters to be vulnerable and to need each other or it will always ring hollow. She's going to save him, she's already in a position of power and autonomy in the narrative, you don't have to make her a boring ubermensch getting nothing out of it in order to give her agency.

Lucy is a great example of a character who is the classic naive and compassionate protagonist without being at all boring or predictable. She's weird to the bone, stubborn, truly kind yet pigheadedly ruthless in doing what needs to be done. And even that naivety is a lot more bizarre and complicated than you might assume.

[friends-to-lovers-tournament]

Friends to Lovers Tournament: Quarterfinals, Match 1

propaganda under the cut!

Makoharu:

They are the first ship that comes to mind when I think of friends to lovers. I know Free! hasn't been popular since 2013, bug I just love them so much... Makoto's devotion to Haru. There's even a movie that flashes back to when they're kids when Makoto says "I love swimming and I love Haruka". Soft...

Fuyupoly:

Submission 1:

they're from the winter troupe of the mankai company, and unlike the other troupes they're all adults. that said, they all have varying degrees of trauma and emotional stuntedness. it takes them some time to fully open up to each other bc they're all very cautious of each other's boundaries and don't want to cross any lines which initially led to some issues in the group's formation. over time they've learned to bridge the gap while still being mindful of hard boundaries. at one point they have a discussion about what exactly their relationship is (gay) cuz they were talking about how the other troupes have clearly defined dynamics (spring=family, summer=besties, autumn=rivals & teammates) but they don't,, and homare deadass says they're "people bound by a common destiny" which in and of itself sounds very Gay (like why are you as a man bound to other men by a common destiny), but it goes even further because homare starts spouting WEDDING VOWS: "In sickness and in health, for better or for worse, we shall share our laughter and our tears as those with an intertwined fate... How beautiful we are!" THIS IS A DIRECT QUOTE FROM THE GAME AND THE MC EVEN REMARKS "i can already hear wedding bells in the distance..." 

gradually they become closer, in individual sub-units based on who's paired up as co-leads for a play, and as a troupe overall. also two of its members are childhood friends who had a messy 'divorce' in their young adulthood and it took the game breaking its genre to introduce a timeloop for them to finally make up if that means anything to you. one of their troupe songs "precious to us ~bokura no kisetsu" has some pretty beautiful and fruity lines: "The many kindnesses born in me here / Never fail to breathe life into my chest / Even all the pain and bitterness / Have now become dear to me (Ah…Stay with me)", "No matter how many times our season passes / Let us keep living together / Holding our hands, without ever letting go / Let us open up the curtain of tomorrow", "There is no need for words, because once our gazes meet / Joy sparks a light in your eyes", "Our journey, may it be a brilliant one / As our breaths overlap as one"

a lot of their plays has a LOT of homoerotic tension between the two leads too. their first play has tsumugi and tasuku play angels, and it's heavily implied that tasuku's character has an unrequited crush on tsumugi's character. their third play has azuma play a vampire and tasuku play Just Some Guy and it's generally agreed in the fandom to be one of the gayest, if not THE gayest, play A3 has ever written. obviously the vampire thing is very fruity, but there's also how the vampire was longing to bite the human but was holding himself back, and when the vampire left the human in the end, the human was absolutely HEARTBROKEN over it and was swearing they would reunite one day. the stage play of this takes it even further by having the vampire embrace the human from behind and BITE his neck. the fourth play is a watered-down adaptation of Phantom of the Opera where they genderbend Christine into Chris among other things and change the relationship between Chris and the Phantom to one of friendship.... ostensibly so, because there's still a lot of homoerotic undertones in their interactions. i could go on but this should be enough of a sampling taste 

Submission 2:

the writers rlly said "let's take 2 normal guys who are childhood friends and have been into theatre since their school days and have them go through a pre-canon messy divorce, an eccentric poet with a potentially controversial haircut, an amnesiac sleepyhead who can only be awoken with marshmallows but is also somehow extremely athletic despite doing nothing but sleeping and eating marshmallows all day, a man who is so beautiful and mysterious he breaks gender, and a supposed android from a fictional south asian country, and throw them into a blender, oh and for good measure let's throw in some theatre and angst and gay and angst and gay" and the end result was marriage. i mean it took them a lot of awkward fumbling around and conflicts to get there but they got there and thats what matters. ok *technically* in-text they're all rlly good friends and kinda found family BUT they are found family via marriage papers i do not make the rules chief

Submission 3:

The reason why they are so friends-to-lovers to me is because their relationship is founded on quiet and unconditional acceptance of each other—regardless of how flawed they may be or how heavy their burdens and trauma may be. When the troupe first formed (sans Guy who was in another country at the time), they didn’t have any major clashing personalities at the very beginning and generally they were mindful of each other’s boundaries, unlike the other troupes that came before them. However, it’s BECAUSE they were too mindful of said boundaries that it was difficult for them to break down their walls and bond as a team—and there were a LOT of walls to break down, as all of them had varying degrees of emotional baggage and trauma.

In fact, it’s only three plays in that they finally truly start opening up to each other, with Azuma getting the ball rolling by opening up about the deep loneliness that haunted him ever since his childhood. It’s during this conversation that they also discuss what their relationship as a troupe is, because the other troupes have defined their relationship as a team (Spring is family, Summer is best friends, Autumn is rivals & teammates), and Homare goes on to declare that they’re “people bound by a common destiny” and goes on to spew wedding vows: "In sickness and in health, for better or for worse, we shall share our laughter and our tears as those with an intertwined fate... How beautiful we are!" I mean… it can’t get any more obvious than this, really. They are married.

But anyway, Tsumugi says he wants their relationship to be one where while they respect each other’s need for space, they’ll also be there for each other and share their pains and burdens—or in his words: “supporting each other when our burdens become too heavy to bear on our own”—which I think is really sweet because it carries this idea of quiet, unconditional acceptance; they don’t push each other to share more than they’re comfortable with sharing, but with whatever they ARE comfortable with sharing everyone carries the load and pain because pain is easier to bear when you’re not bearing it alone <3 

A later part of the story focuses on Hisoka, a mysterious amnesiac, being terrified of regaining his memories and facing some “sin” from his past that has led to another character, Chikage, trying to take revenge on him. When he confesses this to the rest of the Winter troupe, Homare asks, “How heavy is this sin you bear?” and Azuma suggests, “Perhaps it’s just heavy enough for the five of us to carry together.” (at this point Guy hasn’t joined yet). The stage play adapts this scene into a song called Key to Memory. The key (pun unintended) part is 1:27 where there’s a back-and-forth between Hisoka and the other Winter troupe members (sans Tasuku because he wasn’t in that particular play)

Hisoka: “I’m scared…”

Tsumugi, Homare, Azuma: “It’s okay.”

Hisoka: “My unforgivable sin…”

Tsumugi, Homare, Azuma: “Let’s carry it together.”

Hisoka: “I might not be me anymore.”

Tsumugi, Homare, Azuma: “It’s all right. We understand and we accept you, so let’s go together.”

And it ends with Hisoka singing: “I was afraid to open the door of my locked memories. But if everyone is here, I believe I can do it.”  In both the game and stage play, Hisoka fully regains his memories and reconciles with Chikage (long story). He tells Fuyupoly he can’t go into detail about his past with Chikage because it’s dangerous but he’ll tell them when the time is right, and they accept this saying that no matter what his past is, they know and love him as their Hisoka which obviously is a very sweet thing for friends to say, but it’s also very Marriage-coded to me.

Later, Guy is introduced as an android from Zahra (a fictional South Asian country) and joins the Winter troupe as a temporary member—because he’s stuck in Japan for the foreseeable future—until they find a permanent member to replace him. The other Winter members have a conversation among themselves and agree that regardless of whether he’s really an android or a human they’ll accept Guy for who he is and help him improve his acting, which again harkens back to the idea of ‘unconditional acceptance’. Eventually it’s revealed that Guy is in fact a human who has forgotten his memories of the past and his emotions. He recovers his memories all at once which shocks his system and causes him to pass out. When he wakes up in his room, he finds the rest of the Winter Troupe asleep around the room—which I believe is symbolic of their whole theme of “quiet acceptance”: they don’t want to push Guy to share beyond what he’s comfortable with, but they’re always there to listen to him and share his load if that’s what he wants. He opens up about the memories he recovered, and they don’t treat him with pity like he’s a lost child, but still extend gentle empathy and understanding. They also emphasise that it genuinely doesn’t matter to them whether he’s human or android because he’s Guy first and foremost. It’s at this point that Guy truly lets himself become part of the Winter troupe/Fuyupoly and not just as a temporary stand-in member, because he’s found a place where he’s found himself again and people who will accept who this “himself” is, whether that be an android devoid of emotions or a human brimming with vivid beautiful emotions.

[Mod note: There’s a LOT more but we’re afraid of crashing the post. I (Deli) summarised it the best I can since I’m familiar with A3, but if you want to read the full thing you can check it out on this google doc)