#have a conversation' post. and likes in this site are the opposite of a conversation.

[a-minke-whales-tale]

Metacommentary on "TikTok Therians" - A Curious Observation

There is currently a lot of discourse regarding tiktok therians and I have noticed something odd. Often when I see people here complain about "TikTok therians" it is their lack of education and not taking things seiously and their views against physical nonhumans and CLCZs (clinical lycanthropes/clinical zoanthropes). Then often in replies there are comments from young therians expressing their frustration that they -do- put in the work and -are- serious and express acceptance of clczs. Today in a discord server someone was complaining of "TikTok therians" and their lack of education and their pushing of holothere and physical nonhuman identity.

This is rather curious naturally as you have two seperate groups hating "TikTok therians" for opposite reasons but similar justification. However, I see plenty on tumblr attacks against physical nonhuman identities, and often even when acceptance is expressed it is done so in a pretty belittling and invalidating way. However though, I have only seen other CLCZs express frustration with this situation. I think for most people on tumblr, you can pretty well curate your experience, and for myself as a CLCZ, it should be little surprise that most of my feed is people either in that community or adjacent communities and largely express support.

I admit I have never used TikTok nor do I have any interest in it or shortform content in general. It makes me wonder though if either "TikTok therian" has simply become shorthand for "a -bad- therian" or if this might be a case of selection bias. Inside my ecosystem on tumblr there is a good amount of support and acceptance of people like me; however should a post come in from outside my ecosystem, it is not uncommon for the person to be against the inclusion of our voices and think that we need therapy and pills or hospitalisation (which I have had all of and I am still a whale). This does though beg the question - do these posts represent a large portion of belief on the site? Or alternatively - has this post entered my ecosystem because someone in my ecosystem got cross about the post and shared it to express their anger? And conversely - is my experience on the site being generally accepting of physical therian identity a result of the site being broadly accepting? Or have I instead simply curated my experience through liking and following people with similar views to me and blocking those who cause me distress and other people blocking myself? It is to be honest hard to know, and it would be honestly difficult to measure.

Conversely to the previous experience, is TikTok in general a platform with low acceptance and tolerance of physical identity? And if so, why then did that fellow from the first paragraph have the opposite experience? I am not myself a TikTok user, thus my experiences of TikTok are primarily others expressing their opinions or sometimes sharing a video clip. Generally if someone is riled up enough to express something that happened on another platform it is going to tend to be anger, and given my ecosystem that will be anger against people condemning physical identities.

This makes me ask - is "TikTok therian" simply a pejoritive meaning "the bad therians"? Do users of the site see those against physical identity and identify them as "TikTok therian" but see users aligned with them and see them not also as a "TikTok therian" but a comrade fighting the good fight? Negative expriences stand out more in the mind, do we simply only see those opposing us and forget the others? Or is the selection bias purposeful, not on our parts but on TikTok's part? There is a collective agreement TikTok is a hellhole, from both therians and the general public alike. This also applies similarly to other social media sites like twitter and facebook. There was at one point information that came out with facebook, I believe, that they would purposefully show things that made people angry because it would drive up use time and interaction. Could TikTok be doing the same? And if they are, is this divide in the community genuine, or exasperated by an algorithm trying to maximise profits for its owners?

On tumblr I have near complete control over my feed. At least my following feed, the people I see there are all my favourite people on the site and is usually the content I want to see, with the only exceptions being advertisements and tumblrs "because of your/your-followed-blog's likes" which I normally either follow, block, or tell tumblr I am not interested aftering seeing it so many times. From my understanding TikTok is entirely a feed, and though I think you can like, follow, and block, much of what you see is determined by an algorithm, and it would be to me entirely expected if that algorithm showed you things that make you angry because then youll watch it longer, you may even comment and share it beyond (and even if not malicious this would be the natural outcome of an ML algorithm targeted to maximize interaction and use time).

I really question if "TikTok therians" as we concieve them in our heads meaningfully exist. Yes there are of course many therians on TikTok and many of them are particularly young; however there are also very many young people on Tumblr as well. While there are a few of us in our 30s or older, there are far far more minors and quite young minors. We should also not forget that while we sit here now, that Tumblrkin was really not so long ago the same concept as current "TikTok therians" and most people here at least would like to consider this a more serious place for therianthropy with the days of the forums behind us. I think in the end, the kids will be alright, and should they find themselves here, for those who are earnest in their therian identity, I will welcome and accept them same as I would one from tumblr or discord or from the forums before.

~Kala

[maulfucker]

they weren't lying that likes to reblogs ratio in fanarts is insane (awful)

[wowevenmoreloveonearth]

You know what? I have become a gaylor sympathiser

This is going to be a long post, sorry! Please read the full post before even thinking about commenting.

Over the past few days I’ve seen a few posts on my dash about taylor swift and her fans that have left a bad taste in my mouth.

I know that a lot of people think that some fans of her are “trying to make her gay” and I just wanted to put the record straight and defend some people after actually looking at what’s going on. And I know I’m probably opening myself up for tumblr’s poor reading comprehension but before I start I’m going to say this:

I do not think taylor swift is a lesbian

Ok? Now let’s have a conversation.

First of all from what I’ve seen most of the fans who talk about Taylor swift and queerness do it from a point of literary analysis and learning queer history. This is a huge part of the community and lots of people have said that they never would have learnt so much about queer history without reading taylor swift’s works through a queer lens.

Adding on to that point, it seems a little hypocritical for the gay site which loves queer readings of books, tv shows, songs, musicals, films etc to be bullying a pretty small group of people who are mainly doing queer readings of lyrics. Especially when those people get near constant death threats. Instead of bullying these people (who don’t think or do what you think they think and do) why don’t you go outside and think “does this affect me? No. Do I agree with them? No. Am I going to cyber bully them because of this? No.”

Secondly, for the people who believe that any speculation on a real persons sexuality is 100% wrong. I used to think this too but I have changed my mind a bit about this recently after stopping and thinking about it properly. I’m not trying to change your mind at all I just want you to stop and think for a minute.

If you only get mad when speculation is queer in nature, then maybe think about that for a minute. Why is it totally wrong to think a person might be queer. We probably do it in our daily lives with people we know and they likely do it with us, back in the day that’s how queer people found each other-by speculating on sexuality. Would you be upset if you found out someone that you know thought you might be queer? I wouldn’t, maybe you would but if you would, why? Why is it terrible to think someone might be queer (this is NOT about hounding a person to admit to being queer like shawn mendes, this is just thinking in your head and on your small blog that the person will likely never see). Also this is literally the website where we talk about historical (real people) being gay even when they would have never said something to the equivalent.

An addition to this point before people start saying in the comments is that this is NOT the same situation as with kit connor. The issue there was people assuming that he was straight and taking that role away from a queer person. Speculating that he was queer was the opposite of what happened in that situation. So this is not an example of what happens when you speculate queerness.

Final things to say:

1) don’t believe every post you see with someone looking insane about taylor swift being gay, a lot of them are fake.

2) before anyone says “they should listen to real queer artists instead” most of them very much do. There’s a lot of fans of Hayley kiyoko, girl in red, Janelle monae, tegan and sara, zolita, kehlani etc.

3) there are some queer flags that are there. Sorry but there are. Hairpin drops, lavender, the ladder, flag colours, songs about women, friend of dorothy reference. Whether they are intentional is a different matter.

4) shipping real people is not what is happening for the majority of the people in the community. Also this comes back to queer vs straight again. Plenty of swifties ship taylor with men she’s been seen with and no one goes into their inboxes and sends death threats even when they are the ones making taylor swift all about the men she may or may not have dated.

5) taylor swift has never stated her sexuality. I know this may be hard to belive based off of how some people act, but it’s true. She has made vague statements which could have many meanings but she has never clearly stated anything. When gaylors get upset with taylor it is not because she said she is straight, it’s because they are getting death threats and doxxed and she seems to either be unaware of it (which is unlikely given how she seems to be a little terminally online) or she doesn’t care enough to tell her fans to stop.

6) if she does explicitly say she’s straight then there will probably be disappointment in her use of queer history and flags and her potential queer erasure (as we saw with lavender haze, with straight women describing their relationships as lavender) and centring herself in queer spaces (like the you need to calm down music video) but no one will be angry that she’s not gay. And a lot will probably be grateful that she actually explicitly stated for the record to absolve any confusion. The main issue would likely be other fans ramping up the death threats and bullying.

In conclusion: these people who do queer analysis of Taylor’s work are not trying to out her or make her gay etc. if you don’t understand it that’s fine it’s clearly not for you and you can go quite easily without seeing any of it. It’s not illegal to read works through a queer lens and if it means more people know about queer history then I think that’s a very good thing.

I changed my mind after looking at what a lot of people are actually saying rather than what people perceive them to be saying and maybe you will too?

Just be kinder to people online please and if you don’t like what people are saying block them and do not engage!

[vaspider]

It seems like you might be having a bad day? That AITA post was a really lighthearted promo and faux links ala Rick Rolls are an established part of internet sillies. It wasn’t malicious and the subject they linked to is free.

You’re generally a more level headed person so I was surprised to see how aggressive you got. But based on your reaction the author is getting doxxed which does feel unfair given the nature of the post.

Okay, no. Absolutely not.

First of all: This is the last thing I'm saying about that post. Anybody trying to continue this conversation with me in any way after this response will be blocked.

We're not doing that nonsense up there. We're not doing the "Spider is responsible for someone else's behavior" thing. I've been very, very clear that I don't endorse harassment or doxxing, and I've also been very clear that I'm not responsible for what other people do. Saying, "I don't like deceptive links, and this has done the opposite of interesting me, it's upset me and made me not want to read this; heads-up, y'all, this isn't a legit AITA post," which is all I ever said, really, isn't in any way an incitement of doxxing or harassment, and it's absolutely shitty of you to try to lay that at my feet.

Are deceptive links (commonly called "RickRolls" even when they don't link to the Rick Astley video) a fun and hilarious part of internet culture? Not really, actually. Most links on the internet that don't lead to where they say they lead aren't fun and cheerful little "memes" (the post wasn't a meme, but we'll use the word the OP used) inviting people to read a free queer book: they're usually part of social engineering phishing campaigns.

What makes the original RickRoll sometimes acceptable is a) the fact that you immediately know you've been "got" because an Original RickRoll is unmistakable after the first time you experience it, b) the link serves as a punchline to a specific kind of internet joke, usually along the lines of "click this link for news that seems too good to be true," which reinforces the idea that you have to be careful about believing what you see online, and c) it's unique. It actually isn't funny, cute, or cool to put deceptive links up online, with the possible exception of a well-executed Original RickRoll. That's the entire point of why Original RickRolls work.

Deceptive linking is a behavior that is illegal in some jurisdictions & is also grounds for banning from a lot of sites, including, wait for it:

Deceptive or Fraudulent Links. Don't post deceptive or fraudulent links in your posts. This includes giving links misleading descriptions, putting the wrong “source” field in a post, setting misleading click-through links on images, or embedding links to interstitial or pop-up ads.

Tumblr.

Got that? It's actually against the fucking rules here. It's really, really clearly written in Tumblr's User Guidelines section of the Terms of Service. You know, the rules everybody is supposed to be following to be here?

So, no, I'm not "having a bad day," except that people keep being asshats to me for saying, "I don't think it's cool that you did this thing (that breaks the ToS on the site and uses a technique commonly used for spearphishing) to promote your book, actually," doubling down on it by trying to shame me by using the fact that it's a queer book as an emotional lever, and now I've got this ask both trying to make me responsible for other people's behavior and acting like me saying "hey, this isn't cool, and no, that response isn't cool either," and then blocking the person and moving on with my life is somehow not "levelheaded."

tl;dr:

Deceptive linking is against TOS, actually.

I'm not responsible for other people's bad behavior. I did not invite or incite that behavior. I just said "this thing you did isn't okay."

I have expressly disavowed doxxing and harassment for years, both because it's shit and because I've been a repeat victim of it.

How dare you, actually.

I blocked the OP after my second response. I'm not going to talk about this anymore. Anyone sending me any further asks about the subject whatsoever or attempting to continue this conversation with me in any way will simply be blocked.

Fuck's sake.

[workersolidarity]

🇺🇸 🚨

UNITED STATES CONGRESS PASSES SERIES OF ANTI-DEMOCRATIC AND PRO-WAR BILLS DESPITE PUBLIC OPPOSITION

The United States Congress and Senate passed a series of bills, including three controversial anti-democratic and pro-war bills, two of which were tied together, on Saturday, bypassing public opinion and popular opposition to the profligate, pro-war, globalist, Neolib/Neocon agenda currently driving United States domestic and foreign policy.

Included in the bills passed was a bill to force TikTok to divest from its connections with China at risk of being banned immediately, which naturally was tied to a Foreign aid bill.

However, as even Republican Senator Rand Paul mentioned in an opinion piece in Reason Magazine, the Bill is almost certain to lead to more power for American political elites and their administrations to pressure companies like Apple and Google to further ban apps and sites that offer contradictory opinions to that of the invented narratives of the American Political class.

Before long, Americans, many of whom are already poorly informed, and heavily misinformed by their mainstream media, could lose access to critical information that contradicts the narratives of the United States government and corporate elites.

Horrifically, this only the start. The US Congress also extended the newly revised FISA spy laws, which gives the United States government the power to spy on the electronic communications of foreigners, while also conveniently sweeping up the conversations of millions of Americans, as we learned years ago thanks to the sacrifices of whistle blowers and journalists like Edward Snowden, Chelsea Manning and Julian Assange.

The new FISA Law goes further than this, however, granting US Intelligence agencies the power to spy on the wireless communications of Americans in completely new ways.

A recent Jacobin article describes these new powers as a, "radical expansion of government surveillance that would be ripe for abuse by a future authoritarian leader", or it could just be used by the authoritarian leadership we have right now, and have had for decades.

In fact, when one commentator described the new powers as "Stasi-like," Edward Snowden himself replied with a long post in which he remarked, "invocation of "Stasi-like" is not only a fair characterization of Himes' amendment, it's probably generous. The Stasi dared not even dream of what the Himes amendment provides."

The amendment in question just "tweaks" the current law's definition of an "electronic communication provider," which is being changed to "any service provider," something extremely likely to be abused by the government to force anyone with a business, a modem and people using their broadband to collect the electronic communications of those people, while also forcing their victims into silence.

The government could essentially force Americans to spy on other people and remain silent about it. Cafe's, restaurants, hotels, business landlords, shared workspaces all could get swept up into the investigations of the Intelligence agencies.

Worse still, because picking out the communications of a single user would be next to impossible, all of their victim's data would end up being surrendered to the authorities.

Sadly, the assault on Americans by their own political elites didn't end there, to top this historic day in Congress, at time when the United States public debt is growing at an astounding rate of $1 trillion every 100 days, US lawmakers also passed a series of pro-war aid packages to American allies (vassals) totalling some $95 billion.

Included in the foreign aid bill are aid packages totalling $61 billion for the Ukraine scam, $26 billion for Israel's special genocide operation in the Gaza Strip, and $8 billion to the Indo-Pacific to provoke WWIII with China, at the same time we're also provoking a nuclear holocaust with the Russian Federation.

Also buried in these aid packages is the authorization for the United States government to outright steal the oversees investments of the Russian Federation, and thereby the Russian taxpayers.

Astonishingly, and in direct opposition to the wishes of their own voters, Republican support was won without the possibility of conditioning the aid to any kind of border security, this despite the issue being among the top biggest concerns of Republican voters.

Although much of the money is to be used replenishing the heavily depleted stocks of America's weapons and munitions, it remains unclear where the munitions are expected to come from, as US defense production has remained sluggish and slow to expand despite heavy investments and demand in recent years, despite the rapid urgency with which the policy elite describe the situation.

It bodes poorly for working Americans that only a relatively small handful of lawmakers opposed the bills, producing unlikely bedfellows like Senator Bernie Sanders and Senator Mike Lee in the Senate, opposing the FISA bill.

While in the House, the loudest opposition to the foreign aid bill mostly came from populist Republicans such as Marjorie Taylor Greene, Thomas Massie and Paul Goser. Only 58 Congresmembers voted against the Foreign Aid Bill in which the TikTok ban was tucked.

Not one word from American politicians about the need to raise the minimum wage, which hasn't been increased since 2009 despite considerable inflation, nor a word about America's endlessly growing homelessness crises, property crime increases, or the 40-year stagnation of American wages, the deterioration of infrastructure, and precious little was said besides complaints about border security over the immigration crises sparked by American Imperialist adventures and US sanctions.

What we've learned today is that we are highly unlikely to see any changes to the insane behavior of the US and its allies any time soon, neither with regards to the absolutely bonkers Neocon foreign policy leading us to the edge of abyss, nor the spending-for-the-rich/austerity-for-the-poor Neoliberal domestic policy of the last 45 years.

#source1

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@WorkerSolidarityNews

Blue: titles are opinion pieces or analysis, and may or may not contain sources.

[skatingbi]

WELCOME TO PART 3 OF MY SANJI WITH HETEROCHROMIA SERIES!!!!

Oh my god. Yall are insane. 700+ Notes for part one of this series alone is crazy (Crazy? I was- *gets shot*). So heres part 3. I'll probably have to publish all this onto AO3 soon bc shits getting outta hand, but I like posting on this silly little site so I'll still be posting on here.

Uhhh this was posted WAY later than I anticipated bc i had a gnarly depressive episode and had to enroll into uni, but there aint no way id abandon this series, its too fun and i love experimenting with my baby writing style as i call it.

Okay thats it, just thank u all sm for enjoying my silly little series :) u guys are so sweet!!

P.S. Constructive criticism is OKAY! I havent written fanfic in like...10 years so since middle school. Im a baby at this and I understand if I may have several errors so pls lemme know if theres grammar mistakes!

Sanji With Heterochromia Series Part 3 below 🔻

Sanji lied. He does like the idiot. More than he's willing to admit. A few days after their conversation, Zoro distances himself. It leaves a nasty feeling in his gut similar to nausea but different from actually wanting to throw up. It feels apprehensive. He's waiting for something, but he doesn't know what yet. Sanji hates it. He hates how confused he is and how much he actually wants Zoro to touch him again. He hates the burning linger of scarred knuckles on his cheekbone that follows him wherever he goes.

He hates these feelings because he never learned how to really process them. He doesn't know if he has to blame himself, his shitty excuse of a father, or Zeff. Well, maybe not Zeff. The old man had enough on his plate while raising him as it was. Sanji decides to blame it on Judge because honestly, the root of most of his issues stems from that shitty old man anyway. Placing the blame on someone does little to actually help, but it's a distraction from his growing realization of how much he cares for Zoro.

He cares for Zoro. No, he holds an unreasonable amount of affection for the scarred swordsman that haunts his thoughts now more than ever. Fuck questioning sexuality when it's undeniable that he's absolutely whipped for the big idiot. Theres no room for denial anymore, not when his touch had become branded across Sanji's skin for the foreseeable future.

Stress cooking does little to soothe him and it's the same with smoking. At least Luffy gets to enjoy snacks to his hearts content. Its the little things, he tries to tell himself. He also reflects on his conversation with Zoro. How he honestly felt afraid of what he felt when the swordsman confronted him. He felt afraid of someone genuinely caring for his emotional wellbeing. He's anxious over what that means, what it would do to him if Zoro truely meant what he said. All the things voiced about him and the implications that he's...handsome in the eyes of Zoro.

Sanji is emotional. It comes with him being sentimental as well. He's the black sheep of his biological family in every way. He loved too hard, and got hurt too fast. He loved even when it ended in betrayal. Secretly, he loves unconditionally. What would happen if he loved Zoro like that, and what if it already happened and he's too late to stop it? Would Zoro hurt him just like everyone else has? Would he be pushed away eventually after the thrill of their theoretical short lived relationship?

It keeps him up at night, that conversation replaying in his head as he stares at Zoro's sleeping silhouette. He falls asleep to his breathing, echoing throughout the room over everyone else's breath and snores. He wakes up every morning before the sun greets him and pretends nothing happened in his dreams where Zoro's gentle touch and admiration lingers softly over his mind.

Zoro knows. Well, not exactly. He's not a mind reader like how Luffy seems to be, but he knows that distancing himself from Sanji is actually doing the opposite of what he thought it would do. At this point, the swordsman isnt sure where to go from here.

Sanji's actions contradict his words. Sanji stares at Zoro. Not so much that it's s uncomfortable but it's enough to be noticeable. Sometimes he swears he can see Sanji's eyes dart across his face and down to his lips before looking away. It's confusing. Didnt Sanji hate Zoro's advances towards him? Because thats what they were in hindsight.

Zoro was unconciously flirting with the cook in his own weird way. And yeah, he's a little stupid for not realizing the implications behind his actions at first, but it all started as genuine curiosity. He didnt mean for it to affect their rivalry. Now, he's not sure where to go from here.

It's driven him between a rock and a hard place and unforfunately for him, Nami decides to intervene again. This time, Nami drags Zoro to her and Robin's shared room on the Sunny for privacy and possibly interrogation. He's certain that this time he wont be able to escape. Unfortunate.

"Okay, so heres how this is gonna go," Zoro and Nami are now seated across from each other, where theres two beds and enough room for decent sized dressers on each side. Zoro sits on what he assums is Robin's bed with his arms crossed, "You will tell me everything- And i mean it! I will know if youre lying -and I will help you. Im sick and tired of you both being miserable and gay! It's giving everyone second hand embaressment." She demands, narrowing her eyes with a challenge for Zoro to protest or say no.

Zoro is smart enough to know what is and isn't a losing battle. This is one of those. Nami can be terrifyingly persistent once she sets her mind on something, and today it seems to be resolving the weird and awkward tension between him and Sanji. The swordsman resigns himself to his fate quickly and prepares himself to be trapped here on Robin's bed for the foreseeable future.

"Fine witch," Zoro sighs, "But if you tell anyone I will not be responsible for my actions." He huffs out in acceptance for his inevitable interrogation.

"Oh please like that'll actually scare me. Plus besties never snitch." Nami rolls her eyes. She gets comfortable on her bed and look at zoro expectantly. He rolls his eyes and relaxes his posture a bit.

Zoro starts talking, beginning with the first instance of his realization of Sanji having dual colored eyes, leaving out a lot of "unimportant" details. He mentions the second, and the third instance, and their conversation from a few days ago and how he tried to respect Sanji's establishment of a boundary and how he's confused now that Sanji stares at him. Nami listens with her chin resting on her fist and nodding along the way, surprisingly not interrupting once. He finishes speaking and he knows his face is red with embaressment, but he feigns nonchalance and waits for Nami's input.

"Zoro," Nami sighs, "Youre the dumbest bitch I know." She says while giving the man a look of sympathy, but not one that actually means it. More like the look of someone who is so incredibly done with your shit that they have no choice but to tell you so.

"What the fuck, Nami!? Im not dumb!" The swordsman retorts loudly.

"Anyways," his best friend ignores his arguing in favor of getting to the task at hand, "Luckily, this is fixable. For making the entire crew feel awkward for two weeks, I'm adding a 200 percent tax increase to your debt." She smiles mischeviously, and thats when Zoro realizes that one, he's never getting out of debt, and two, he's been forced to accept Nami's help in unfucking up his unconcious attempts to flirt with Sanji.

"First order of business is that you have absolutely no game." Nami begins with a shit eating grin to match the absolutely insulting statement. Zoro briefly reconsiders their friendship.

"Shut the fuck up I obviously do." He rolls his eyes. Nami gives him the look. The one where her eyebrows are raised and her chin is tilted down slightly, matching the frown. It's that look she makes when she's trying to say 'Are you sure?' or 'Reconsider what you just said.' and it grates at Zoro's already increasing agitation.

He decides not to entertain her with a reply.

"Anyway," Nami sighs, massaging the space between her eyes with her thumb and forefinger to stave off a growing headache, "Im teaching you how to flirt. No, you cannot work out in front of Sanji- dont give me that look you muscle brained idiot!" She says while looking at Zoro's ever increasing looks of annoyance and audacity, because first of all, no he definitely was not going to do that, and second of all, it could hypothetically work. Probably.

"Fine," He huffs. He'll let the witch do whatever. It's not like theres anyone else he can talk to on the ship about this anyway, "No promises that I'll actually do what you tell me."

"Fucking- oh my god why am I friends with you?!" Nami complains before flopping down on her bed, groaning loudly at Zoro's malicious cooperation. Zoro basks in the momentary power he has in this situation.

For the next few hours, Nami allows Zoro to stay in the womens quarters for the sole purpose of learning how to actually flirt. He's not sure if shes a reliable source, being a lesbian and also having a girlfriend already, but if he voiced this opinion out loud the redhead would probably kick him out. He only restrains himself because this room is the only one so far where he feels the least amount of awkwardness regarding his situation with Sanji.

Robin stops by every now and then and gives him a smile. It doesnt make him feel very comfortable but it's the thought that counts. She doesnt say anything about him being there, anyway. He makes an effort to at least not lay on the bed he's sitting on, though. He may be lazy but he does hold enough respect for the women in the crew to not fuck with their shared safe space.

Suddenly, it's the evening and dinner is around the corner. Nami shoves a barely enlightened mossy swordsman out of the womens bedroom to finally be free of that headache. Also known as a crash course to flirting with your rival/friend/whatever the fuck else they got going on.

Zoro makes his way to the gallery, taking his time to look out and observe the oncoming sunset that bathes the sky in shades of pink, orange, blue, and yellow. It would be a pretty sight to fall asleep to, he thinks, but the cook would kick his ass off the ship if he decides to sleep through dinner again.

Entering the gallery, everyone except Nami is already there. She's right behind him a second later and taking her seat at the kitchen table.

Numerous conversations are heard as food is served. Franky and Usopp are wildly talking about different types of projectiles the sunny could use, Nami and robin are talking amongst each other in low voices, giggling in between sentences. Chopper and luffy are laughing together, and Zoro goes to sit next to luffy like he usually does. Just as he sits down, the cook lands a kick to his mid back, making Zoro scowl.

"The fucks that for!?"

Sanji rolls his eyes while placing plates of food down for the crew, "For being late, dumbass."

"Nami is late too!"

"And? She'd never be late on purpose, Marimo." as Sanji speaks, he dodges the hilt of Zoro's sword to his side instinctively and has the audacity to give a cheeky grin.

Dinner passes by normally. Everyone's loud conversations meld together gradually and soon everyone except Sanji and Zoro leave. Zoro takes his usual spot beside the cook, drying dishes and leaving them on a towel afterwards so they can both put them away.

Zoro has half the mind to bring up Sanji's staring, but decides against it. It leaves the air silent, neither him nor Sanji speaking up as they finish their side work for the night. Even then, Zoro's unable to speak when Sanji immediately leaves afterwards without a word.

The kitchen feels empty without their bickering, and Zoro is determined to bring that life back into it. He just needs to figure out how.

Despite Nami's advice, Zoro has an idea. If the idiot cook doesnt see what he sees (His pretty face first of all, but Zoro thinks of his strength too. How Sanji easiely brushes off conflict like it's nothing despite the injuries that'll heal far faster than his own), then he'll make him see it. Frilly words never were Zoro's style, anyways.

One night before they all go to sleep and Zoro takes night watch, he corners the blond in the bathroom. Nami would probably be kicking his ass because of his timing, but a mirror is needed for his plan to work and the bathroom is the only place with one other than the women's bedroom.

When Zoro enters, Sanji turns to look at him before going back to washing his hair, his back towards Zoro. "Leave me alone, Moss, I'm im not in the fuckin mood," He grumbles to Zoro, who stands there waiting for Sanji to stop talking.

"Nope, I need a mirror for this and for you to listen for five minutes." Zoro replies, and when Sanji turns to argue his protests are gone from his lips when he sees a look of determination. Confused, annoyed, and also curious, Sanji doesn't reply.

Zoro walks up to Sanji until he's standing right behind him. The swordsman moves to kneel so they're relatively at the same height, but the stool makes Sanji slightly taller as he sits there and eyes Zoro warily.

"Whats going on with you, Moss? I'm trying to wash my hair." Sanji says, and Zoro can tell an insult dies on his tongue when he places his hands on Sanji's shoulders.

Zoro turns Sanji in front of the mirrior in the bathroom, the stool Sanji is seated on creaking lightly and scratching against the tile. Sanji remains speechless, still unable to brush off Zoro's palms on his bare shoulders like how he'd usually do.

"Tell me what you see, cook" He says, uncharacteristically soft underneath the edge his voice always seems to have. Sanji flinches when the swordsman's calloused hands tuck his frings behind his ear, displaying his face to them both.

"What the hell is up with you? Did Luffy hit your head too hard?" Sanji furrows his eyebrows at the mirror and looks at Zoro. Zoro huffs and rolls his eyes.

"Just tell me what you see about yourself, shit cook, I'll leave ya alone after or whatever." He grumbles back, the baritone of his voice vibrates against Sanji's back. It reminds him of Zoro's compliment, his face too close to his while they stand on the deck of the Sunny just days ago. He chooses to ignore how it makes him shiver.

He looks at himself in the mirror, and his first instinct is to look away. Zoro, being the perceptive bastard that he is, notices and squeezes his shoulders in a way thats strangely reassuring.

"It doesnt have to be fancy, cook, I know you like to use big words 'n shit so don't make your brain fuckin explode." Sanji bristles a bit at that but bites back a nasty insult so he can entertain Zoro's weird exercise on his own self reflection.

In the mirror he always sees his mom at first, but with both eyes uncovered and his hair pushed back for once, he sees himself. The first thing he sees is his eyebrows and eyes. He decides not to bring up his eyebrows.

"Well, for your information I see my eyes, but you already know that."

Zoro stays silent, and Sanji shuffles in his seat. He's suddenly aware he was literally in the middle of rinsing his hair of shampoo a few minutes ago and the entire situation is both awkward and uncharacteristic of Zoro in multiple ways. It's out of character, and he should have kicked out the moss ball when he had the chance, but now in the too small bathroom of the Sunny he feels like it's only him and Zoro. It leaves a weightless feeling in his chest, settling in with the creeping anxiety of looking at his own reflection. The contrasting feelings make him hesitate before he speaks.

"I see.." He hesitates, not knowing exactly what Zoro is getting from this or what he wants to hear, "My eyebrows, I guess. Wait, you've never seen both at once." Sanji chuckles at that, because his eyebrows are certainly something. The curl points in the same direction, but it's unnoticeable with how he wears his hair.

"Yeah, they're weird as fuck." Zoro mumbles, and the blond has to laugh or else the swordsman's voice would get to his head.

"Okay, I also see freckles. Those are new. Only started showing up when I joined you all." And Sanji now notices how the freckles cluster on the bridge of his nose, his cheekbones, and his shoulders. They're scattered everywhere else on his body.

Sanji starts to realize the point of Zoro's questioning now. He looks at the fogged mirror, just visible enough to notice how his blush not only spreads across his cheeks but also down his neck. Embarrassing. This whole situation is embarrassing not only because of where they are but also because he's realizing that Zoro is trying to make a point that is too close to unearthing his insecurities. He would have expected this from Luffy, but sometimes he forgets how Zoro's intelligence is masked behind his swordsmanship and how much he sleeps during the day.

And he's naked, but honestly thats the least of his problems at the moment.

"I see my hair, I guess?" Sanji tries to only focus on his face. Its not easier, but it also sets up a mental boundary. Zoro hums, looking at Sanji through the mirror. Sanji hesitates before speaking again, "My hair is actually wavy," He thinks about his mom's wavy blonde hair, and how he always thought it looked pretty even before she passed, "Its damaged, though. Straightened to hell and back with one of those hot combs."

Sanji thinks back to the hot combs. They were old as shit, the kind that needed to be heated up with a flame. The memories make him chuckle a bit, and Zoro smiles back. The same smile he wore when they sparred on the deck, with his dimples visible yet again to confirm to Sanji that he does have them.

His smile makes his heart skip a beat, like drums he'd hear in one of those old instrumental CDs he kept in his room as a kid. Before he has the chance to back away, to push Zoro out the door and forget this ever happened, Zoro straightens his back again.

He turns in his stool to look up at Zoro and he's not sure what the swordsman sees right now, but he's afraid to ask as his gaze is soft. So damn soft as he looks at him and his hand reaches again to pull his hair hair back over his eye like it was before. Stringy strands of heat damaged locks fall back into place.

Then he leaves. He just...leaves. The damn idiot just turns around and walks out the door like nothing even happened.

Thats the second time this has happened yet the first where Sanji is the one on the receiving end of it, and it makes him grab his towel to bunch it up in his fists and let out a scream into it as he processes everything. He processes how he was forced to notice how Zoro looked at him, and it was Zoro's own weird fucking way of saying "You're beautiful".

"He's so fucking ridiculous oh my god.." Sanji mumbles into the towel. His hair routine is officially long forgotten.

[aemiron-main]

creelarke and the tunnel scene

So, I’m working on more analysis posts about these two, but this parallel caught my eye today:

They put Scott and Henry in the same place on screen right during their respective lab tunnel scenes- scott and henry are both on screen left when looking at the scene from outside the tunnel, and both are on the same part of screen right when looking at the scene from inside the tunnel.

Scott was also the one who found the piece of hospital gown near the tunnel:

They could’ve chosen any character for this scene- but they chose Scott. Scott, who canonically went to school at the same time as Henry, who happens to have a convenient knowledge of parallel dimensions.

And speaking of the lab- why the hell are there multiple lab-associated extras who look eerily similar to Scott?

There’s also just. Something gnawing at me about the way that Scott stares towards the lab in this shot:

I know part of it is likely due to him possibly having suspicions of Will being in the lab/going through the tunnel, but it’s interesting that they chose to focus on Scott for this shot rather than Hopper in that regard. Almost like it’s about more than Will. Almost like he’s remembering something- or someone.

And also, going back to the fact that Scott and Henry would’ve gone to school together, take a look at this conversation between Scott and Hopper during the search party scene:

They’re talking about shared classes/teachers, (even though hopper and scott didn't go to school in the same years, they seem to have went to the same school And henry and scott Did go to school in the same yars) and also talking about a dead child (Sara)- Henry and Scott would’ve had shared classes, hell, Henry likely had Ms Ratliff specifically, AND, Henry was pronounced dead on site to the public after the Creel murders, even though Victor was somehow made aware of Henry’s coma and that Henry “died,” a week later, when you look at the newspaper articles, it’s said that Henry’s body was found at the Creel house with his eyes gouged out and that Victor was immediately charged with three murders. The public believed that Henry was killed the night of the Creel murders, but what about Scott? What did Scott believe? If him and Henry were friends, did he ever try and visit Victor in prison? Did he think Victor killed Henry? Did he somehow hear about the coma thing the same way that Victor did?

And speaking of bad teachers, not only do we have confirmation that Scott had a bad teacher, but we have the same for Henry, with a teacher calling him "broken".

And also, during that scene, Hopper has his “mummies never die,” line- just like how Henry isn’t dead and likely CAN’T die because of his regenerative healing.

And also “I never needed to look elsewhere.”

“I just didn’t look hard enough.”

Like. The fact that Max frames it as if she disappeared, even though she WAS still physically there, just emotionally distant from Lucas- it’s giving me “Henry disappearing” vibes with the Creel murders, especially considering the Will-Henry parallels and how Mike notices that Will didn’t show up to school on the day that he vanished. I wonder if Scott noticed something similar with Henry.

I wonder if part of why Scott’s helping search for Will is because he had suspicions that Henry wasn’t dead, but never followed through on those suspicions enough/didn’t look hard enough for Henry. Much like how Hopper felt like he didn’t need to look elsewhere. Maybe Scott was so focused on the Creel houses and the weirdness going on there and investigating THAT (after all, it looks like quite a few objects have been moved around in the Creel house since we last saw its interior in 1959) that he didn't even think about the lab/didn't think to look elsewhere.

And then we also have this scene of Scott finding out that Sara was actually dead- the opposite of Henry. Scott was led to believe that Sara was alive but then found out that she was dead, whereas Scott would’ve been led to believe that Henry was dead, but may have somehow figured out that he’s alive/may figure it out in S5.

That last shot where it focuses on Scott is especially interesting to me, because why focus on Scott? Scott and Hopper aren't particularly close, it's not a particularly huge revelation that someone (Hopper) might lie to someone he doesn't know very well (scott, they don't know eachother well, scott introduces himself initially and says he doesn't think they've met before) about his traumatic past/loss of his daughter, so why focus on Scott and his reaction? Why not focus on Hopper and the grief he's feeling in that moment? I think it might be because there's subtext here regarding Sara's death vs Henry's death and Scott having known Henry- and Scott may have been in denial of Henry's death initially because he noticed that things were odd about the Creel murders (the newspapers all have conflicting details, for example), but didn't look hard to resolve it/find Henry, much like how Hopper is in denial of Sara's death, and is now motivated to search for Will (we see Sara mentioned by Joyce in the context of trying to get Hopper to search more for Wiil).

Either way, I just think it’s interesting that we get a scene of Scott and Hopper talking about shared classes and dead children (especially lies about dead children) before a scene of Scott and Henry paralleling eachother. Especially considering the parallels between Will and Henry but also Sara and Henry and Sara's cancer and how Henry's regenerative healing seems to work like cancer. Much to think about. Creelarke real, I can feel it in my bones.

[cowboybrunch]

spooktober: hatch

You're good at making yourself fit. In conversations, in too-crowded rooms, in vents capped by fans with whipping blades. Your greatest achievement is a red ribbon (gathering dust on the back of some closet shelf in some house that you haven't lived in for over a decade) that reads Hide and Seek Champion, Franklin Elementary, 1993. That's why they chose you for this job—not for your prepubescent victory, but for your ability to squeeze, to shimmy, to shift.

You may have found the job posting, shipped your resume, wrote a sniveling letter expanding on your talents, and fidgeted in an ill-tailored pantsuit while they asked if you were willing to relocate if the position required it, but they chose you. Not they, the person who interviewed you, but they, the faceless entity funding this expedition, the fat cat behind the desk throwing cash at cracks and tipping up their nose when your colleagues go missing, the benefactor only referred to as—

"Boss wants it mapped by the end of the week."

You flick your eyes towards your supervisor, a burly woman you call Ecto (though you're almost certain that's not her real name) and then back to the crevice. A meter tall and half as wide, spat on the cave wall by the filthy mouth of God (you don't believe in God except for when you pray) (and praying got you out of worse situations than a conversation with Ecto so maybe you do believe in God) (mostly your feet hurt and you're hungry and you need a shower but you're stuck in a cave with a woman twice your size and a hole a quarter that) (you're not stuck, not really, you can leave any time you want, you know that right, it's important that you know that) or, more likely, erosion.

"Sure thing." You trace your finger over the tiny cracks that stretch from the yawning center, imagining that they tremble under your touch. They don't, because dirt doesn't have sentience, it doesn't, even if it presses against your body, even if it's like a hug, sometimes. You wonder if Ecto would hug you if you asked and decide that she would, which is somehow worse than the opposite. "What's in there?"

Ecto doesn't laugh. Not now, and as a general rule. "That's your job, isn't it?"

It might be a genuine question. You don't know what Ecto's job is either, only that she started at the same time as you did and ends up at the same sites and never has dirt on her clothes and you don't think she sleeps either, come to think of it. You've never heard her cry. As far as you know, her assignment is to point at holes and tell you to crawl inside which is an easier gig than you've got, so good for her really.

And you do. Crawl inside. It takes some effort but not more than you're used to, a shoulder popped out, a body turned sideways. It's dry earth at least, dustier than you'd like but not so much that you can't breathe. You do that, too. Breathe. Dirt clings to the shirt that clings to your chest when it expands, pressed against one wall, your back against the other.

"It's a dead end," you shout to Ecto, or would if you think she'd hear or give a fuck. You slide further in, laying your cheek against the wall and imagining it's a palm or a pair of lips, Ecto or Boss or God, it doesn't matter. Your next inhale is chalky and sour, and that doesn't matter either.

You're not doing this for the money. At least, as much as anyone doesn't work for money. Not for pride either, or a sense of purpose. You're doing this because you're good at it, because you can, because you're the last of your cohort except for Ecto but Ecto doesn't count seeing as she's currently standing full-height out in the open. You don't hate her for it, really, as much as anyone doesn't hate their superior (you don't hate Boss either, if you're being honest with yourself) (you usually are when you're trapped between earth and earth) because Ecto's doing this job for the same reason you are. So's Boss, you assume, as much as you can assume anything about Boss.

Your foot catches on a rock as you try to move further in, or at least you think it's a rock until it corrects you with a tink. You exhale, making yourself small enough to slide until you're horizontal, one hand outstretched, holding the not-rock, the other pinned against your stomach. It's metal, definitely, and so is the square it juts up from. "Found something," you shout to Ecto, or would if you could get air in your lungs that wasn't lined with— right. Dirt. But you can't stand, or you could but if you went to Ecto now she'd just send you back and tell you to get the fuck in there then, so you decide to cut out that middle bit and pull.

Nothing happens. You're not sure what you expected, divine intervention or the walls to start shaking or a boulder to roll towards you as some high energy royalty-free music starts blasting (don't be stupid, a boulder can't fit in here, you can barely fit in here) but you're disappointed nonetheless. You sigh, and it gives you just enough space to find your feet, to start moving back to Ecto and open air. Best to come back tomorrow, you think, with fresh eyes and maybe a flashlight if you can manage it, if Ecto can talk Boss into splurging on batteries. If Ecto talks to Boss at all.

You're a forearm's distance away from the not-rock when it clanks, calling you back. Air whistles from below, almost like a song (not the one you were promised with the boulder but softer, like a lullaby) (or what you think a lullaby would sound like) (would Ecto sing to you if you asked?) and you press your ear against the earth to listen. There's not enough room to turn your head and look, but it's open now, it must be, and something's awake down there, or something wants you (you decide she would, which is somehow worse) to go down there.

You take a step which is more like a slide which is more like a tumble, back where you came from, not to Ecto but towards the promise of the not-rock and the not-dirt, the whisper of a palm or a pair of lips. You might be walking or falling or flying or praying but it doesn't matter, not in the dark, not when your gasp is echoed in clear air and a song. Ecto might be calling your name (she's not, she doesn't know your name) or maybe you're screaming hers (she'll report the incident to Boss, and Boss will say nothing, if Boss even exists) or maybe you're making no sound at all.

happy halloween!

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Don Moynihan at Can We Still Govern?:

Trump has normalized unfounded attacks on lots of people, but public servants in particular. We have seen this at every level of government, whether it be librarians, school teachers, public health or election officials. Whether Trump wins or loses, I worry that this practice will remain a feature of the contemporary American state. Trumpism has fed an era of sustained harassment of public officials even when he was not in power, and for state and local officials that the federal government has no control over.

This is happening while we are seeing an interesting conversation happening about how to revitalize American state capacity. But I don’t see how we can have that conversation while ignoring that more and more American public servants are being asked to live under conditions of terror. Previously, I wrote about the attack on federal employees by Tom Jones and his slime machine, the American Accountability Foundation, funded by the Heritage Foundation and the Conservative Partnership Institute. Jones is conducting opposition research on civil servants with the intent of identifying those that Trump should fire once he returns to office. He has since started releasing the names of “targets”, starting with Department of Homeland Security. “Targets” is not exactly subtle.

A nothingburger case for firing federal officials

The site posts the civil servants name, picture, title and salary. But the actual accusations are weak tea. This is the evidence for firing the “top 10 targets” who we must assume are the worst of the worst, providing the most damning cases:

Worked for American Bar Association, Catholic Charities or other “far left” organizations which help immigrants

Praised Anthony Fauci in a tweet

Worked as an immigration lawyer or public defense attorney

Has credit card debt

Worked for immigration advocacy groups

Said that “homegrown extremism” and “misinformation” were homeland security threats, or served on a disinformation board

Supports DC statehood

Has donated to Democratic politicians in the past - including $10 to Elizabeth Warren in 2019

Donated to LGBTQ supportive groups

Spoke on a diversity panel, spoke on a panel called “The Role of Social Workers in Immigration Legal Services Organizations.”

Was listed on DHS press releases as a point of contact to provide more information about administration policies

Implemented Biden era policies, like setting up virtual screening processes for immigrants, or adding third gender option on citizenship documents

Social media posts critical of Trump and his immigration policies, supportive of immigrants, acknowledging systemic racism

Wrote a law review article critical of the treatment of mentally ill immigrants in detention facilities

Guilt by association: “is on good terms with notorious bureaucrat”

Won an award for excellent performance in her job (I’m not kidding, see below), which means she can't be trusted. Another won an award for helping Afghan and Ukraine refugees resettle in the United States.

So, no actual scandals! The officials are criticized in many cases for simply doing their job, or expressing generic liberal opinions. (If you think I am misrepresenting anything, here is the link to the profiles). Having job-relevant experience is bad, if its suggest any empathy with immigrants. Being good at your job is bad (so much for the claim that Schedule F is there to weed out poor performers). Sharing the same views of homeland security threats that the FBI does: also bad! In no case is there any claim that the actions are illegal, or the statements the employees made were wrong. Without Schedule F, no career official could be fired for these actions. With Schedule F, they are gone.

[...]

Terror and formal power go hand in hand

It is also a categorical error to distinguish between formal powers (in this case, the proposal that Trump use Schedule F to fire the employees) with informal modes of intimidation. When I talk with people studying government, both journalists and researchers, they focus a great deal on the formal authority. But I don’t think MAGAworld sees it in those terms. They see the use of intimidation as central to their goals.

Jones is already well connected with Project 2025, and people who will staff a second Trump administration. He could simply hand them a list of names of the people he thinks should be fired. But the publicity is part of the point. They can’t fire everyone, but they can scare a lot of people into submission. For terror to work, it needs public executions. It needs guillotines. It needs fear. They can weaponize the conservative information ecosystem — from the more respectable media like Fox, to followers who will leave threatening emails and voicemails for people they are told are their enemies — to achieve their full effect.

Jones is not an outlier. Likely Trump appointees have been explicit in threatening career officials. Robert F. Kennedy, the anti-science kook who has said that Trump promised to give him control over health policy, with oversight of HHS, CDC, FDA, NIH “a few others” and the USDA, told FDA officials to “pack their bags.” In the real world, RFK would not be trusted to run a school lunch program. In Trumpworld, he will not just have the ability to impose his whackdoodle ideas on real scientists; he can fire the ones who dare to call him on his bullshit.

[...]

For example, the same people who brought down Harvard President Claudine Gay, and who specialize in accusing Black scholars of plagiarism, recently went after Kamala Harris with the same accusations. The project of surveillance, control and threat includes encouraging students to engage in snitch culture, in the hope of getting their fellow students or faculty into trouble. Charlie Kirk’s operation started with creating a watchlist of “radical professors” before Turning Point became a huge organization fueling campus surveillance. Some states have changed the law to encourage students to record professors to report ideologically suspect comments (they do this in China too). American Accountability Foundation encourages people to send in reports about rogue bureaucrats to its tipline.

Don Moynihan has a solid piece on how Donald Trump seeks to remake the civil services in his fascistic image if he elected again.

[sungbeam]

spread some love !

talk about your favourite mutuals and why you like them

hi anon! thanks for sending this in :') im always so bad at posting these things, but i can def do this one. i don't know if i would classify them specifically as favorites, but more so people i've interacted with the most 😭

@justalildumpling : i don't even need to go on besides saying that this woman is my soulmate. "in another life" but we're gonna beat the universe and meet in every life, type of connection. the girl who has seen me at my worst and has still treated me with as much kindness and compassion and care as she did the first time. i feel like in certain ways, we're kind of polar opposites, but also the same? i mean, on paper we can be so different, but when we talk abt what we like and dislike, when we laugh together, it all becomes something of the same and she restores my faith in other people again. she's the person who constantly makes me want to be a better person.

@ethereal-engene : one of my two beloved 姐姐's on this site skfnrknf but i remember talking to ash so many nights abt just any and everything. i am so happy that we're comfortable enough to be able to joke around, share our niche interests, have deep conversations, and even pen pal!! like i think it's crazy how SIMILAR our families are; we could legitimately be long lost sisters haha but also the blood of the covenant runs thicker than the water of the womb sometimes, so that makes sense. she's one of my comfort people, and honestly, i feel like we both come out of nowhere with some topics, but either person will hop right into the convo regardless and just vibe 🤧

@winterchimez : my second 姐姐 on this site !! my older sisters def take care of me well and i am so grateful for that :')) ally is always so supportive and yet so energergizing to talk to. she's def seen a lot of my brainstorming and i feel very comfortable bouncing ideas off her. she's always so generous with me too, like care packages??? RAH 😭 obviously, i love her for reasons besides the material goods, but it's a love language nonetheless. ally is prob one of the warmest and most welcoming presences on this hellsite tbh, so if ur ever looking for a new friend/mutual, she's the best.

@loveliestfelix : nana is another reason why im still around. i like to thank that beomgyu drabble every day for kickstarting our friendship because i have never met someone i have had such lengthy and fun brainstorming sessions with. nana is the type of person i would love to meet irl and just share stories over coffee with, though i feel like i always associate her with train rides and coffee now HAHA she's also one of my greatest writing inspirations, like i was and have always been blown away by her mind, and her word counts. i love calling her the queen of angst, and you will never be disappointed when reading something of hers.

@jaehunnyy : chip's been here for a really long time, like guys, no one can compete when she's been here since i had park jisung as my pfp and she had jeno as hers 😭 i think i really treasure our friendship and how much it's grown over the past two years :')) so much has happened over that time, and i think that if i met her in real life, i would just be blown away by how pretty she is like TT anyways,, i always love talking to her because of how much chaotic energy we create when we do, like i feel like we can power an entire city grid with how much chaos we make, and it's all the better for it. i love her very much, and i hope she understands just how wonderful of a person and friend she is.

@mosviqu : oh, my beloved bar, i love u to bits and pieces. i think recently you've become one of the few reasons why im still here writing and posting. like i am so utterly, from the bottom of my heart, grateful for all of your support and the love you've given and shown me. and even when we moved to dms to converse, i just realized how cool you are as a person, and how similar we are (in the best way possible). it's really nice to be able to connect with a person on multiple levels, and im really happy that was the case with us :') as soon as i saw ur love for tomorrow by chanyeol, i knew there would be something more to our friendship. i am so very fond of you, and your writing blows me away every time i read it.

@zzoguri : moni :( i hope ur doing well, friend, and i know you haven't been active here lately but i do wish you all the best. i love how passionate and committed you are to improving in writing and developing your own creative writing style, and it's so impressive to read your writing in general :') i love the confidence you advocate for yourself, and how real you are. thanks so much for being a friend; i just really appreciate all the support and hype you've given me during my time on deobiblr, like thank you for being such a thoughtful person.

@wuahae : cat and i have definitely interacted more off this site than on this site, but i felt that it was dire she was included here nonetheless. like bro, thank you for literally being the reason i come out of my apartment (or in most cases, invite people to my apartment), and for thinking of me! i think i once told you how hard it is to find friends in college, but you've made my experience here far less lonely. i love getting dinner with you, planning outings, and making weird animal noises together on the streets 😭 also, cat's writing is literally so poetic, and just her explaining to me her plot ideas tears visceral reactions out of me TT

@yunhoszn : i feel like me and fawn are low-key on the same wavelength a lot of the times, but in general, i think fawn's just such a rad person. i've told her once or twice before but i genuinely love her writing style because it has so much personality in it. it just makes reading her fics such a fun and enjoyable experience. also even off this site, i have so much fun interacting with her, like just commenting on her instagram posts like the gremlin i am, i know she's gonna hit me with the best response back skfnkejd (waiting for the day i go to where u r so u can do my makeup low-key... ur so fly, pls do my makeup...)

@goldenhypen : em, my lovely twin :')) i know our interactions have def decreased, but i don't think that's decreased the fondness we hold for one another. i remember when em first started interacting with my works and then followed me, i literally rolled off the couch cuz i started fangirling 😭 and she is one of the most genuine and brightest presences here. she is a follow forever, bro, you better follow her forever. i just adore her compassion for others and her absolutely adorable fic concepts, and omg don't even get me started on her work ethic 😭 i wished u the best everyday you had requests, i don't know how u did it. you are literally superhuman.

@hqrana : i haven't spoken with noa in quite awhile, but im guessing it's cuz she's girlbossing her way through to that nursing program 🤧 my favorite woman in stem girl in this hellsite, she is my beloved xnonie 😭 i think i just appreciate noa's undeniable presence and character so much, like she brings so much energy to my inbox whenever she's here, and her support of my ideas and fics just makes me 🙇🏻‍♀️ like thank you for being here. and to know we both love marvel and taylor swift? i feel like she has to be like,, my best friend? like she needs to be my best friend?? sending hugs and well wishes your way, always.

[imptwins]

Why making any concessions to puritan rhetoric is a bad idea

(note for the uninitiated: 'anti' is short for 'anti-shipper', 'anti-ship', or 'anti-fan'; in this context it refers to people who get very vocally militant about opposing dark kinks/problematic ships in media, especially creative fandom spaces. Proship is simply the opposite, people who vocally believe people should be free to make/indulge in whatever as long as a line is drawn between fiction and reality.)

(note 2: this was written for cohost, i cbf rewording it lol)

I very often see people - both websites and individuals - making a concession to the people who come up to them yelling about problematic kinks and guilt by association and 'why didn't you block this person' blah blah blah. It's happened with a few BNFs (big-name fans) in the UTDR scene lately, I've seen it from artists I respect, from friends, hell I used to be in this camp myself. And, of course, it happened to this website about a year back, and the conversation has come up again recently due yet another tumblr exodus.

It makes sense. The most common stuff that antis go after is stuff very few people are into: lolisho/cub, ferals, heavy gore, heavy noncon. It's niche, the real-world applications are unquestionably vile, it's very easy to just say 'I also find this icky regardless of whether I really believe that all people into it are secret criminals, so, I'll just block the people who they say are bad and move on.' I can't tell you the amount of times I've seen someone respond to proship/antiship discourse with "I'm an adult with a job." Going to bat for this content is high risk, low reward. You're not going to make friends, you're going to lose them. YOU WILL LOSE SUBSCRIBER, etc. As a result of all this it's very easy to assume that anyone defending it must be into it.

But I'm not. I'm a writer who often deals with darker subjects, but most of the first-on-the-list anti stuff, I'm not into at all. I'm not into ferals or gore period, noncon I like purely as character exploration, lolisho I can enjoy from the perspective of what I call 'trauma repair.' There's probably a proper term for it. But the tl;dr is I've never been actively aroused by any of these things, not in fantasy and especially not otherwise. Whenever I write them, it's just fascination or character analysis. Whenever I have a 'this character can be any age you want' fic, in my head, they're 18+. Writing noncon is a weird challenge for me because I'm constantly battling with the alternate ending in my head where the victim breaks free, beats the shit out of their captor, etc. This isn't me trying to claim virtue through this, just stating my position.

So… Why do I go to bat for these things? Why do I get annoyed when websites block lolisho, when artists have 'proship DNI' in their bio, etc? It's lost me a couple friends, it's certainly cost me followers and general reach, it's gotten me blocked by countless people I respected the work of. It's earned me a few callout posts, multiple with 1k+ followers, and one particular obsessed stalker who tells anyone who will listen that I actually groomed a child (despite all evidence otherwise). It's caused me a really significant amount of trouble. Why die on this hill?

The answer's kind of simple, when you boil it down: fictional fantasies either affect reality, or they don't. This is why I go to bat for things I'm not into, but it's also why whenever you see someone making concessions to antis, it's never enough. Cohost banned lolisho last year (I believe it's still banned?? Unclear), but the antis still make constant callout posts about this site and its owners. Some of the team have even gone out of their way to state very firmly that they're against these things, they've gone above and beyond just 'ban the bad thing' and broadcast their views about the morality of it. You'll frequently see artists write some huge apology or clarification when a callout post hits, usually involving some variation of 'I do not condone x y z and think it's disgusting.'

It's never enough.

But it makes sense, when you think about it. By drawing a line, you have essentially agreed with the core angle of the people screaming at you: that a fictional fantasy affects reality. That it's dangerous. You will, by necessity, now have people start to work down the list. Incest, ferals, gore, noncon, sure. Any relationship with any kind of skewed power dynamic. Sibling-coded, minor-coded, postminor nonsense. All of these things are less easily agreed to than lolisho, I've seen countless porn artists concede with the core idea that lolisho is immoral, then they act like it's unreasonable that people just keep going until they're being told that a knot on a furry is bestiality, or a 23 year old dating an autistic 21 year old is pedophilia. These are genuine examples of things I've seen people dogpiled for. Seriously look up "postminor" if you want to see how bad this can get, on top of being absurd it's one-for-one the kind of gross ableist shit that Autism Speaks gets into.

But YOU AGREED TO THEM. You agreed with the core concept, that the fantasy must reflect reality. Of course they're going to keep demanding more; by the logic you used to agree with them, you are doing immoral things. If fictional lolisho is immoral, so are the rest of them. It's way easier to look at your average pic on baraag or inkbunny and go 'oh, eugh, vile,' but at the end of the day the cutesy played-for-laughs sleeping kiss, the dubcon bondage that you don't call dubcon, or the meet-cute where they're a bit too drunk, they're all immoral fantasies.

That's not even to get into non-sexual stuff. If the lolisho fantasy is wrong, so is running down civilians in GTA. Suddenly your notifs are full of 16 year-old Jack Thompsons with rainbow flags in their bios.

This really is an all-or-nothing debate. If fictional fantasies affect reality, then even the immoral fantasies that you're personally comfortable with, the cutesy coy playful ones, must be immoral. If fictional fantasies don't affect reality, then even the ones that make you uncomfortable, the ones that have you scrambling to close your browser in case the feds are looking, must be fine.

It should have become very obvious over the last decade that you cannot fence-sit on this. There's a huge internal disagreement going on among progressive/queer/compassion-minded people, on whether these kind of things affect reality, or whether they don't. You can learn to apathetically dismiss stuff that squicks you, or you can learn to sanitize everything you ever make so there's not a trace of contentious theming left. Immoral fantasies are immoral, or only immoral actions are immoral.

You're going to have to pick one.

[moonturtlephilosophy]

I replied to a post yesterday about 'radfems' talking about that radical isn't just for transphobic and or man hating women, because it's a very brought descriptor.

And my enteire coment chain was deleted/restricted even tho I didn't day anything wild? I just asked a question and then stated some facts? I am not entierly sure how this site works yet but I feel like someone shut my mouth against my will. I don't like it.

Hell, feminism as a whole is radical, for fucks sake.

---

radical

adjective

1.

(especially of change or action) relating to or affecting the fundamental nature of something; far-reaching or thorough.

"a radical overhaul of the existing regulatory framework"

2.

advocating or based on thorough or complete political or social change; representing or supporting an extreme or progressive section of a political party.

---

Wanting to change and or abolish the partiarchy is, most of the time, radical. These 'gender criticals' are the opposite of radical since they pick and chose outdated features of the patriarchy like bioessentialism, genderessentialism, the binary myth, stuff like that and enforce them, aka try to stifle actual progress. Progress always starts as a radical idea.

For feminism that probably started with the then radical idea that women are, in fact, people. And should be treated as such. As women got more legal protections and rights, queer women entered the official conversation with the then radical idea, that they too, are people. And deserve rights. And so on.

The main radical idea now is probably that men need to be included in the conversation/ true intersectional feminism. Be it men/mascs in general or the conversations around trans men/mascs. And thats were the zeitgeist is at. Thats why those who focus on feminism but are stuck in their mindset/unable to evolve, tend to be terfs and stuff.

Intersectional feminism is oposed to bigotry and small mindedness, not being radical.

Now, some people don't stop at 'let it stay like it is' and actually want to revert backwards/against the direction of progress and if they go far enough, they could be right wing radical (yk, like fashists). To be fair, thats a lot of terfs. But that still doesnt mean they 'own' the term radical.

Aside from feminism, radical ideas are the cornerstone of all progress. ALL. I know public schools avoid the topic or tell you about "bad radicals" at best to scare you off, but that capitalist propaganda is something you should decode for yourself.

Yk, messages like "radical means so out there it's absurd" like.. bruh

Also, extremism and being radical are also two different things that many actors in out current climate wanna see muddled together. Learn the difference.

Moral of the story: men are and always have been included in real feminist conversations and feminism is inherently radical. Otherwise, what are you fighting for? What do you acomplish by NOT changing anything??

[mushroommushy]

Please please tell me your ideas I will be so normal about it I am not at all desparate for Broken Masquerade content

Boy I have so many ideas I actually need to put this in a draft to list all of the brainrot things I’ve had circling in my head!! This does include some negative things so feel free for me to ask to tag.

All of the colleges (Particularly Harvard) adding Thaumaturgy to their classes is extremely cool in the canon and I think there should be many more schools

Site-43 College beloved I want to go there so badly please be real c’mon :[

Those Facebook mom groups…oh boy there’s so much drama

Lord help all the poor kids with minor anomalous power

Segregation with schools, even restaurants

A lot of anomalies end up in homeless shelters because not many jobs are willing to take the backlash of anomalous employees

Shitty parents faking their kid having a dangerous anomaly so they can send them away

Because they think the foundation would just kill them because of all the propaganda

You know that the cults are gonna take advantage of this to try and grow their numbers

Chaos Insurgency propaganda against the foundation

A flag that shows your support for the foundation, GOC, anomalies hanging outside your home

New Genders from the tumblrinas like us

Twitter DNI’s are a genuine hell

‘DNI IF YOU SUPPORT SCP’S/THREAT ENTITIES/OBJECTS’

‘Block me if you call anomalies SCP’s that’s a slur’

Speaking of slurs there’s probably a lot more

COTBG members constantly calling the Nälkan’s Sarkics just to piss them off

And Maxwellium members getting real pressed over internet drama

Someone trying to make the nicknames the Serpents Hand has into a slur

Dr. Glass walking down the street and just has someone scream ‘JAILER’ at him and he is desperately trying to not commit a crime

Also Twitter being Twitter

‘Is it wrong to kin SCP-076-2? I’d murder too if I was under the ocean.’

Extremely dangerous TikTok trends involving anomalies that makes both the GOC and SCP have collective heart attacks

Some girl posts a video from a foundation site doing Macarena during a breach and is just immediately cancelled on every platform

You know there’s gonna be dumbass teenagers trying to find some real dangerous shit to seem cool

‘Oh a lake full of bodies that makes you enter through mind control??? Sounds cool and not totally dangerous I’m gonna find it and go swimming’

Gonna readmore this it’s getting long lol

Five missing teens later the foundations getting slandered even though they did nothing

Articles with the ‘How to tell if ‘X’ is an anomaly’

Of course they’re bullshit and usually offensive

Charities to support anomalies

An actual cult around 2662 that didn’t spawn anomalously

You fucking know that the Christian’s will either take 343 well or absolutely horrifically

There’s also two sides of people when it comes to Cain and Able

The ones who hate Cain and think Able is reasonable and the people who think the opposite

Cain’s also not allowed to leave site-17 for more than just the fact he’d kill plant life it’s for his own safety tbh

Meri does get chances to wander the woods! Just..not in public because they rampage that would happen with the amount of broken phones and cars would be horrible

Iris gets to go home because she deserves it

I feel like Gerald would become a meme in general and people pay his hospital bills for him lmao

Parents keeping their kids out of school and switching to online or homeschooling to keep them away from anomalies

Conversion camps to send your kid to so people can ‘release them from their curse’

Those got the serpents hand real heated

Speaking of them they have the snarkiest Twitter account ever and just roast the living hell out of every word that comes out of the foundations mouth

Podcasts

So many fucking podcasts

There already is a writing on the broken masquerade hub of the foundation making a video with outdated slang to appeal to kids

But I think Dr. Gears should just stare at a camera and say swag with a straight face it would be beautiful

Kondraki, Clef and Gears get called dilfs and not a single one of them knows what it means

‘Kain’s the goodest boy’ even though he’s morally corrupt as fuck is very common

But he will Fuckin run if you even try to touch him he does not need his fur messes up

Ok I don’t want this to be a mile long so I’ll stop here but!!!

If you want more dm me so we can talk 👀👀👀 I need SCP friends

[goodluckclove]

FINAL BLIND TRUST SNEEK PEEK

The results were close enough that I decided to post something that I think is happy and sad. I also don't think I've posted anything directly about Regina Mustard Kaufner, matriarch of the Kaufner family. This feels like spoilers and kind of is but kind of isn't because even in context it leaves you with more questions than answers.

Enjoy reading the start of the mom I really wish I had. I like her a lot.

Seriously guys I need to stop revealing more of this novel before it comes out. I'm just so fucking excited aaaaaa

“I’m going to take them.”

“What?” Enoch said from the other end of the phone. “Mustard, no. That’s kidnapping.”

Regina leaned back in the car seat and kept her eyes on the doors to the University. “Yes,” she confirmed. “I’m going to kidnap them.”

“Fucking hell – that’s…” Enoch trailed off, and when she spoke again she was much calmer. “We’ll call the police. If we have proof of abuse we can call the police.”

But we don’t have proof, Regina wanted to point out. All we have are the visions of my son and some bruises that’ll be covered up by an organization with authority near to that of the Catholic church.

Enoch clicked her tongue anxiously, as if she were right beside her waiting for class to get out. “I don’t like this,” she said. “You said the parents refused to meet with you. What if they’ve tracked your license plate?”

“I’m being very discreet,” Regina tried to assure her.

“Well if you’re still in the Doctor’s car then no, you aren’t. Regina, you can’t keep taking these kinds of risks. You have children to think about.”

The doors pushed open and released a sea of purple-suited children all around Scott and Tenzin’s age. Regina immediately stopped paying attention to what her love was saying. She shifted the phone into her opposite hand and got out of the car, standing to peer through all the faces and dissect the crowd into parts. Looking for the smaller body. The larger set of eyes.

Because yes, Regina did have children. And right now, one of them needed her help.

Once the crowd started to thin Regina began to worry. Did she miss her chance? She was starting to consider pulling off and circling the surrounding city blocks, but before she went any farther with that line of thought she caught sight of a familiar face she was seeing for the very first time.

They were smaller than the other kids and walked a little slower – not from noticeable depression, just deep in thought. They had a young face that was still slightly older than what made sense for their age, with large, deep-set eyes hued a warm shade of brown.

This child matched Scott’s description of Eddie. What identified them for certain, however, was the feeling that flooded Regina’s system as soon as she caught site of them. Her love for those around her came in varying colors. For Enoch it was a bright emerald green, while Tenzin was more of a comforting blue-gray. It was always different for everyone – always – and yet when she looked at the child absently making his way down the stairs she felt the exact color of love she felt whenever she looked at Scott.

Sunflower yellow. Every single time.

It had to be them. Eddie.

Enoch was in the middle of explaining some kind of Louisiana legality when Regina hung up on her without a word. She got out of the car and fidgeted, unsure how to do this. She had no intention of stealing them if they didn’t want to go with her. It would help to find a way to explain who she was in a way that would make sense to the child – but in a way that didn’t encourage them to strike up conversations with frantic strangers in the future. Everything that made sense before Eddie walked outside now felt just as wrong as everyone had been trying to tell her.

This wasn’t Scott. Regina had to remind herself that. This was the other fragment of the being that ended up developing into her son. Was she truly as responsible for this half of his spirit as she was for him?

Not seeing a gap in the sidewalk, Eddie stumbled and scraped his knee against the concrete. From across the street Regina could see the wound, a grating of skin just deep enough to swell blood. It was the type of thing Scott would proudly show off before washing clean with a hose and bounding back off with his day. Eddie, however, stayed still. They did not move. Staring down at the blood, they broke down immediately in quiet tears.

No one was helping them. A few purple-suited adults looked at them as they passed, but did nothing. Regina bore this sight for maybe ten seconds before she grunted in annoyance and ran over to their aid.

“Oh wow!” She exclaimed. “You really tumbled, didn’t you?”

Eddie shrank even smaller on the ground and turned his face away from her. Horror weighed her heavy in place, and Regina knelt down and adjusted her attitude.

She started by speaking much softer. “Does it hurt?” She asked.

“It – It’s scary.”

“The blood?” Regina glanced down at the trickle of red running down just below the hem of his shorts. “Yes. You don’t like blood,” she smiled vaguely. “It’s kind of spooky isn’t it? Do you think it means that something bad happened?”

The child nodded. They lowered their arm away from their face, though still kept their eyes focused down from Regina’s direct line of sight. A sign of respect from Academy children, she learned some time ago. It disgusted her to think about.

She rifled through her bag and pulled out a few paper packets. “I keep sanitary wipes on me,” she said, tearing the top off of one. “They’re for my son. I don’t think he would mind if I used a few to help clean you up, though. Would that be all right with you?”

At first Eddie didn’t respond. He wiped at his eyes and took a deep breath. Then he nodded.

“The thing about scrapes like this,” Regina told them as she gently wiped away the blood up his leg, “is that they feel a lot worse than they actually are. You’ve really only hurt a few layers of skin – and you have many layers of skin, Eddie – so you haven’t gone deep enough to cause any permanent damage on it’s own. This might sting a little bit, buddy.”

Regina pressed a fresh sanitary wipe over the wound. Eddie’s face scrunched up without making much of a sound, and once again she felt the sunflower yellow of adoration for her child.

“You’re being very brave,” she murmured. “Anyhow, it hurts because under your skin has things called nerves. And that’s how you feel things – most things, at least,” Regina was quickly reaching the borders of her medical knowledge. “You didn’t hurt your body. It’s more like you triggered the alarm system that lets you know that something bad could’ve happened. Does that make sense?”

Somewhere in that explanation Eddie gathered the nerve to look at her. They seemed uncertain, and yet more than a little curious. She got a better look at his eyes, and at the iris coloboma that gave them the quality of something antique and wise.

She supposed that meant they could see hers as well. She wondered if Eddie would ask about them.

“How do you know my name?” They quietly questioned her.

Regina’s eyes widened slightly. Did she call them Eddie? Was she so preoccupied with comforting them that she forgot to make any effort to do things subtly?

She thought about Enoch. She should’ve let Enoch come with her.

“My name is Regina,” she said. “But you can call me Mustard if you’d like. Wouldn’t that be funny? It’s like the flower, but it’s also a sauce.”

Regina stood up and pulled her wallet out of her purse. Eddie followed her lead and got up on their own accord. Still, they didn’t drop the issue. “Do you know my mother?” They asked.

She thought about the cold voice that spoke to her on the phone and shivered. “No,” she said, forcing a smile. “I’m actually...I’m Scott’s mom.”

“...Scott?”

There was a photo in the inner fold of her wallet. It was new, printed by Enoch only a week before Regina drove off on this terrible road trip, but already the creases were well-defined from folding and unfolding. It was of Scott and Tenzin, each only half-visible and under a pillow fort that collapsed over them mid-nap. Regina smiled at the image, then turned it to Edgar and pointed at Scott’s laughing face.

The recognition was stark. For a moment it was frightened. Then that broke away, and Eddie’s brown eyes once again welled with tears.

“He’s real?” They managed weakly.

-

in short, regina's entire perspective towards edgar could be summarized by this old nedroid comic:

if you have shit parents she probably would do the same for you.

[aeternallis]

Your recent post reminded me of what has been bothering me for a while about the portrayal of the Kimchay dynamic in the fandom. I love reading fic about these two, but in most fics nowadays I cannot even recognize the characters I came to know and love when I watched the show. It’s like they bear the name of Kim and Chay but act nothing like them😅 People are of course allowed to write characters any way they want (after all, it’s not that serious, fandom is supposed to be fun:D), but I think this is the first time I’m in a fandom where the fanon characterization has overthrown the canon characterization so completely. The prevalence of submissive!Kim and Dom!Chay just throws me off, when the characters are nothing like that in the show (actually it’s quite the opposite lol). When the show aired and until around mid-2023 the majority of fic etc. portrayed Kimchay pretty accurately with only the odd mischaracterizatiok here and there, but after that? It’s like the fandom collectively decided to throw canon out the window XD.

These days I’m just living by the ”don’t like,don’t read” philosophy, which unfortunately means I have to clock out of 80% of Kimchay fic lol. I see something like ”Kim whimpered” and am like ”nope, he would not” and then yeet myself out:D

Hello, thank you for your message!

Meh. The idea of fanon characterization overthrowing canon though isn’t unique to the KPTS fandom, yknow? I feel like most fandoms face that inevitability as we get further away from the date of original release. Having said that however, I would actually disagree with you, nonnie. XD Politely, of course!

It’s just that…I’m not necessarily sure fanon characterization has overthrown canon completely, or if it’s more along the lines that those who like the fanon characterization just tend to be a lot louder, especially on this site. It’s harder to discern people’s true opinions on here, not necessarily for lack of communication, but more along the lines of iffy communication due to knee-jerk reactions, imo. And again, that’s not just the KPTS / Kimchay fandom in general, I feel like that’s how it is for most fandoms that have some community over here that’s still alive and kicking.

In any fandom, there will always be people who take certain opinions a lot more personally over others due to their own emotional attachments over the fictional characters in question, and that just inevitably makes communication (as in, actual discussion and engagement)…not worth it. At least, not to me, haha!

Fandom is supposed to be fun, but let's be real nonnie, for a lot of people, it's more than just fun: for a lot of us, it's an escape from our day-to-day lives, a place to engage freely in a piece of media that we otherwise wouldn't have in RL.

Furthermore, canon vs fanon in terms of what that means to an English-speaking majority fandom community and as it relates to a non-western piece of media is…honestly, all kinds of landmines to talk about, if you know what I mean. A lot (not all, of course, but a significant chunk of them) of fanon specific to KPTS and Kimchay are due to ignorance of the cultural context, as well as certain ideas gaining traction, because of the western lens it’s viewed through.

Not to mention, the cringe habit of mixing up actors and their characters, but that’s a different conversation all together.  

At the end of the day, I say be the change you want to be, nonnie~ If you don’t like fanon, say it loud and proud! I’m ngl, I certainly don’t!

All opinions in regards to any and all fictional characters ought to exist equally on this hellsite, and that should be the end of it! :3  

[contagious-watermelon]

I've seen some people complaining about this phenomenon before, but it always ends up being couched with the ever-present "but of course everyone is valid and I would hate to erase such a vital part of the community, etc etc" sentiment that is proliferent throughout this site. I absolutely abhor the never-ending pressure people put here on queer people to be "less" queer, in whatever way that may be.

And obviously they never say it like that; in fact they usually imply the opposite — under the argument of sexuality being better when it's fluid, usually.

Trans people are expected to not transition, or not transition fully, or to still act like men or women (whichever one is our assigned/coerced gender), or even to still have sex in the way someone of our birth sex would. Non-transitioning people (particularly those who have no intentions of doing so, i.e. not those who are closeted for safety) are touted as the epitome of genderqueerness and "fucking with gender," so on and so forth. To the point that transitioning medically and legally, passing as cis, going stealth, getting bottom surgery; those are all seen as "capitulating to cis people" or "assimilating." And so, if you want to be accepted into those groups you need to not do so much of that stuff — effectively, you need to be more in line with what society wants from you. That doesn't change just because people on the internet say that it's transgressive to do it.

Aromantic and asexual people are pressured into relationships and sex, respectively. The asexual community is full of people insisting that it's okay to still have sex and be asexual, talking on and on about the many different ways where you might be pressured to choose to have sex with your partner despite being asexual, how you can (and should) still totally experience sexual attraction and desire if you're asexual.

Aromantic people are pressured into relationships not only by society but by the aromantic community itself. Endless posts about how aro people still can be in relationships, and how many different ways it's possible to still date someone as an aromantic... And, barring that, we move on to QPRs, which at this point are just promoted as an "aromantic" replacement to romance, for those who don't want to be in a relationship but still feel the pressure by society to do so. It's almost always assumed that if you're aromantic and not interested in dating (which is insane to me that those have to be stated separately), that you would of course want a QPR. It's pushed to the extent that you're practically excluded from the community if you don't like QPRs at all.

And I would say, it's crazy that "not attracted to any gender" is not seen as synonymous with "wouldn't date/sleep with anyone," that's like saying that gay men and lesbians can and should still date women and men respectively... except I have seen many people say just that. I'm not gay, so this section will be briefer, but it seems a touch homophobic to me when people insist that you can still sleep with a man as a lesbian. Arguments presented, while technically true (because yes, as someone with free will you can of course sleep with someone you're incapable of being attracted to, though one can argue that you nonetheless shouldn't) still result in gay people being pressured into straight relationships. It's not "more queer" or "breaking the binary" to suggest that gay people can date the opposite gender, it's the same thing that people tell you in conversion therapy.

And honestly, this in perpetuity eventually will erode the words we use to describe ourselves until they get closer and closer to the societal ideal, as close as they can be forced that way. "Trans" becomes de-facto a description of someone who doesn't transition, who looks identical to a cis person of the opposite gender. "Asexual" and "aromantic" shift from meaning attracted (romantically/sexually/both) to no one, to saying practically nothing about a person at all. "Gay" becomes indiscernable from bisexual and "bisexual" becomes almost synonymous with straight.