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jasontoddiefor · 3 years

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nobody's keeping score

Ship: HideKane

Summary: In a world where ink stains the white papers of constitutions, damning the lives of ghouls, their existence is no secret or rumor, but a topic of heated debate, protests, and anonymous organ donations in shady alleys. No matter how bright the CCG appears in their white coats, their light cannot reach the dark tunnels where ghouls and sympathizers alike are plotting. And when Hide, after hours of sitting at his best friend’s hospital bed, sees him wake with one eye black and red, the difficult question is not how to get him help, but how to avoid him becoming the figurehead of a conflict threatening to turn into a bloody revolution.

AN: Notes: You ever just take a 4-year break from a fandom and return with spite fic because you remembered how much you hated canon? Yeah. This fanfic is my attempt at corralling the TG worldbuilding into something coherent that makes sense. I will keep some elements of canon, others I will throw out of the window straight away. This is utterly self-indulgent.

“And with the developments in synthetic meat production—”

Hide wanted to groan. They’d been discussing the same question for the last three hours of class and he was, frankly speaking, done with it. People were running out of arguments and circling back to topics that didn’t contribute anything to the conversation they were supposed to be having. From the way their lecturer was glaring at the latest speaker, Hide would say that she was also very done.

“Yoshimura, as stated before, we are not discussing possibilities for ghoul integration, but the mere premise of whether they even deserve the rights needed to legalize their status as citizens. The right of existence of an individual should not be dependent on what modifications would have to be made to accommodate them, but whether they deserve to live regardless.”

Hide had zoned out about an hour ago. His opinion on ghouls had always felt rather clinical, mathematically detached, despite Hide’s history. Maybe too much time had passed since he’d looked at the bloody remains of his father to really hammer home the fear-motivated rejection so many people fell to. Perhaps the CCG investigators, who had dragged him away from his father’s corpse, should have allowed him to get a little more traumatized before the kindness of his new parents had become enough to dull those painful memories.

Some ghouls were no different than brutal serial killers, and they had to be taken down, but the rest seemed to be getting by just fine. If a new legislation would make it even easier for them to go about their everyday lives, perhaps the number of violent ghoul attacks would go down as well. Hide was well aware that this was the view of a privileged person. Growing up in the 20th ward meant that you needn’t be scared of leaving your house when it was already dark. Kamii University prided itself on the fact that it could safely offer evening classes such as the one Hide was attending now. The same certainly couldn’t be said for the other wards. Any citizen between the 9th and 13th wards would probably advocate vocally for the extermination of ghouls. The 11th especially resembled a warzone even during the daylight. Ghoul sightings were nothing unusual there, and investigators’ mutilated bodies were displayed as trophies and warnings alike. Meanwhile, nobody had died in the 20th war for something like ten odd years. Sometimes it felt like waiting for the other shoe to drop, but most of the time, Hide didn’t even think about ghouls.

By the time class was finally over, Hide had taken only one or two more bullet points. They hadn’t really said anything of interest and it reflected in his writing. Usually, Hide would be sending rapid-fire texts to Kaneki now, but his friend was still on his date and Hide didn’t want to bother him. It had taken more than just a bit of teasing and probing to get Kaneki to ask that girl out and he wouldn’t self-sabotage his hard work.

It was good that Kaneki was connecting to people that weren’t just Hide.

And it would be awesome if Hide could do the same.

Codependence needed two people to work and Kaneki was definitely not the only one struggling with independence. Hide had yet to figure out how to let go of Kaneki when his relationship to the other boy had been the only stable thing in his world for the longest time. Nothing said mental health like latching onto an abused child to escape the stifling air of his brand-new foster fathers’ home.

The next time he visited his parents, he’d bring them some flowers to make up for how troublesome he’d been as a child.

Glancing at his phone again, Hide realized he had to hurry if he wanted to take the early bus home. He was just about to plug in his headphones when an unknown number flashed up on the display. Who would call him at this time? Hide was definitely someone who preferred texting. Even his parents knew better than to call unless it was serious. The only person he ever actually called was Kaneki, and that was only because his friend sometimes got so lost in a book, he forgot to text back or didn’t even hear the phone buzz. Hide contemplated picking up for another ring, then gave in and accepted. “Nagachika Hideyoshi speaking, who’s calling?”

“Hello, I am Tanaka Akako, a nurse of the Kanou General Hospital. You are Nagachika Hideyoshi, Kaneki Ken’s emergency contact?”

The blood in Hide’s veins froze.

“Yes, I am. Has— has anything happened? Is Kaneki alright!?”

The nurse’s voice was so calm, steady, and pleasant as if this was a chat between friends. Somewhere Hide knew that it probably helped most people, but it just put him on edge. “Nagachika-san, your friend and another young woman were involved in an accident. Dr. Kanou is preparing him for surgery, but as his emergency contact, we have to discuss the possible options before we can proceed.”

Hide didn’t want to discuss any options. There shouldn’t be any besides Kaneki’s survival. Hide wanted to rush into the operation hall and hold Kaneki’s hand, wishing he could turn back time, tell his friend to remain at his side and consider that girl out of his league so he’d spent the evening with him and not getting sent to ER. This couldn’t be real; he was sick to his stomach.

“What are the options?” Hide asked, panic threatening to strangle him as he rushed to the street, trying to find a taxi to take him to Kanou General straightaway.

“Kaneki-san sustained serious injuries. Dr. Kanou is willing to transplant the deceased Kamishiro-san’s organs into your friend to save his life even if her family hasn’t consented yet. The only consent we can ask for in Kaneki-san’s case is yours and—”

“Do it,” Hide replied immediately. He didn’t know Kaneki’s date, and as much as Hide loved people, argued for a baseline acceptance every day in class, he couldn’t bring himself to care about the wishes of a family whose daughter was already dead. The only thing they were still good for once their hearts stopped beating was serving the living with their remains.

Kaneki might survive because of her; what else could matter? “Do it, whatever you need to save him— you have my full permission.”

Finally, a taxi approached and stopped right when Hide waved for it. He quickly climbed inside and, paying no attention to the driver, told him to get to the hospital as quickly as possible.

“And in case he doesn’t survive, may his organs—”

“He will survive,” Hide pressed because he didn’t know what he’d do with himself if he were to lose Kaneki. He’d built a life around his best friend and how much they meant to one another. Hide couldn’t give up on that, couldn’t let it slip past his fingers. “He’ll survive. I know it.”

Organ transplants took place every day without any complications—

Hide’s eyes widened. “Kaneki has recessive ROS!” he all but shouted at the nurse, startling the taxi driver.

Kaneki’s father had died because of it. If Kaneki got the wrong blood transfusions or anything, his RC cells were suddenly pushed to start acting up, the dormant sickness could turn on and what if Hide had just damned him to a life of wasting away—

No.

Stay positive. Don’t freak out even more. They hadn’t done anything yet, merely asked for Hide’s permission to help Kaneki at all. He was saving his friend’s life; he wasn’t cursing him.

“Thank you for telling me, Nagachika-san. I will pass that on to Dr. Kanou. You have just contributed immensely to the safety of the procedure.”

“I’ll be there in a few minutes,” Hide said. “Just— he has to hold on. Tell Kaneki he has to hold on until I’m there.”

“We will, Nagachika-san, don’t worry. Dr. Kanou will do his best.”

His best.

The words echoed in Hide’s mind. How was he ever supposed to know if Kanou’s best would be enough for his friend? Hide excelled at being optimistic, could see the positive side of most things in life, had learned how to be hopeful at the funerals of people he’d loathed. He just couldn’t allow himself to drown in any negative possibilities.

The rest of the drive passed in the blur, either because the driver had known to speed up after listening in on the phone call, or because Hide was so out of it that he didn’t really register the streetlamps flickering by until the taxi had reached its destination. Hide passed the driver a couple bills, probably more than the transport had actually cost, but he didn’t care. What were one or two skipped meals compared to being there before it was too late? Hide rushed inside the sterile white hospital, eyes immediately set on the front desk.

“My friend,” Hide stuttered as he clung to the counter, holding it as if it were his lifeline. “He was brought in— an accident. He was on a date and there was an accident. Dr. Kanou is operating him?”

The receptionist seemed confused, needing a moment to make something coherent out of Hide’s rambles. “I need your identification before I can tell you anything about our patients.”

“Yes, yes, of course.” Hide fumbled for his student ID card and put it on the counter with shaky hands. “Nagachika Hideyoshi, I’m Kaneki Ken’s emergency contact.”

“Of course, your friend is still in the operating room. You can wait here.”

Hide didn’t want to wait, but what else was there he could do? He hated feeling useless like this, unable to contribute anything productive. The receptionist sent him a kind look and, defeated, Hide crossed the entrance hall to the waiting room where he remained together with other worried family members and patients, clutching his phone so he wouldn’t start screaming. He couldn’t stop moving his legs, stress keeping him wide awake even as the hospital emptied and less and less people sat around him. How long did such an operation take? An hour? Two? Hide had absolutely no idea. He didn’t study anything like this. His major was English literature, which was about as helpful as hot air at this moment.

He could quote enough books concerned with some medical drama and family members in the hospital, but none of them brought him any comfort.

“Nagachika-san?”

Hide looked up into the kind face of an elderly man wearing a pristine white coat.

“Y- yes?” Hide replied and quickly stood up, brushing imaginary dust from his pants. “Are you Dr. Kanou? Is my friend alright? Can I see him?”

“I am sorry to have caused you such worries. The operation went well. Your friend is resting in intensive care right now. He is still asleep, but you may visit him. The presence of loved ones is often very beneficial to the healing process.”

Healing.

A sob shook Hide’s shoulders. Kaneki was alive. He hadn’t died.

“Thank you,” he managed to say in between his sobs. “Thank you, thank you for saving his life.”

The doctor only kept on smiling and kindly put his hand on Hide’s shoulder, squeezing it lightly in what was meant to be comforting. “It is my job, young man. You don’t have to thank me. Nothing is more important to me than saving innocent lives. If you follow one of the nurses, you can see your friend immediately.”

Hide thanked the doctor once more, relief slowly filling the pits anxiety had hollowed out. He followed the nurse through the labyrinth of death, decay, healing, and salvation up to the intensive care station. Quietly, he was led to a room. The door opened, revealing one lone figure on a bed.

From a distance, hooked up with so many tubes and wires, Kaneki was nothing like the person who took up half of Hide’s life. He seemed so much smaller and looked like just one push could snap his connection to life.

“Please remain quiet,” the nurse told him. “And don’t move him.” Glancing at his still trembling fingers, she added, “but you may hold his hand.”

Hide nodded, then quickly crossed the room to Kaneki’s bed and sat down on the chair next to it. Kaneki didn’t move at all; not even a single muscle twitched. Hide would assume they had led him to view his friend’s corpse if not for the steady rise and fall of his chest. Pushing up the sleeves of his jacket, Hide took Kaneki’s hand in his own.

“Hey, Ken,” he muttered, pressing his eye close so no tears would escape them. “You scared me there. Don’t ever do that again.”

Predictably, Kaneki didn’t reply. Nevertheless, Hide imagined that just for a moment, he squeezed Hide’s hand back. Slowly, the tension bled from Hides’s shoulders and he made himself comfortable in the hard plastic chair. This was bound to be a long night and he was starting to feel his exhaustion catch up to him. He tried to keep his eyes trained on his friend for as long as possible, remaining alert for a change to his condition, but it was getting more and more difficult to keep them open.

Eventually, the darkness caught him as he fell. Hide knew he stirred a couple more times during the night, likely when the nurses came to check on Kaneki. Nobody asked him to move and leave, something he was immensely thankful for. He wouldn’t have been able to let go. By the time the sun began to chase away the shadows again, Hide wasn’t sure how much he had slept, only that it had definitely not been enough. But that was alright, he could catch up on sleep sometime later. It was far more important that Kaneki was going to be alright.

Hide turned to look at Kaneki’s face and found his friend awake, staring back at him.

One eye gray like a stormy cloud before the morning rainfall.

The other was blood-red against the night sky.

#tokyo ghoul #hideyoshi nagachika #kaneki ken #tg #hidekane #fanfic #what UP i'm back with spite fic #also on ao3 #but i will add the link later bc tumblr likes to mess up

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hellothere-generalangsty · 3 years

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I HAD A BRAIN WAVE MOMENT

DO YOU REMEMBER WAYYYY BACK WHEN EVERYONE HATED ASOKA? DAVE DID THAT ON PURPOSE SO HE WAS IN CONTROL OF WHAT PEOPLE HATED ABOUT HER. OK NOW THIS MIGHT BE A LONGSHOT THAT HOPEFULLY DOESN’T END UP LIKE LONGSHOT THE CLONE, BUT, IM HOPING THATS WHATS DAVE IS DOING WITH TBB. BEING IN CONTROL OF WHAT THE FANDOM HATES ABOUT IT AND THEN IMPROVING IT SLOWLY BIT BY BIT.

PLEASE IM DESPERATE FOR A EXPLANATION!

(also where’s my explanation about why the clones are white washed, dave? hmm? where is it dave?)

OMG LOOK.

It wouldnt excuse the whitewashing or the weak scenario, because he got us used to some good stuff now (tcw s7, Mandalorian, that kind of things)

But it would make sense - to a certain extent - to work that season as a "cliché team in a cliché scenario" and see how people react to be able for a second season (if there's a second season) to improve it

Disclaimer: I'm a white, abled person so I'm not trying to speak on behalf of poc/disabled people, but I think it's important to support them and listen to the critics they make about SW and it's content

Also this is quite long I got carried away but worth it it is!

I linked some of @rebekadjarin 's post here because I read a bit through her blog today and agreed with her posts; and I invite you to check out the "#whitewhashed tbb" if you want more extanded and developed information about that matter! (As my knowledge on the matter is still quite limited/ incomplete due to my privileges, and this post is more of a summary than a real analysis)

So here, we know that the fans are unhappy about:

- the whitewashing of the Bad Batch (especially since they proved they could animate dark skinned people/ more generally poc with the first seasons of tcw, Kanan in Rebels and the Separatist in the latest TBB episode)

It is a real problem and it shouldn't have happened in the first place. Even if they are different, the Batchers are still clones and it's really not that hard to show their enhancement while keeping Temuera's features and skin colour (I mean, look at all the artists who did and do it everyday on this app; no excuse here)

Star Wars has wasted a lot of potential on numerous occasions because they keep doing stuff like this; and it's quite ironic (and very sad) to see that racism, ableism and stereotypes are prevalent in a universe where people fight for equality and peace...

Here and here are two posts about it (if you're the author of these posts and want me to delete them from my post please tell me so; I took the liberty of adding them because I think they highlight quite well the issue and do a clear job at showing the whitewashing in SW/ around the clones)

- the way Crosshair is treated; both by the Batchers and the writers, he's manipulated by the chip yet no one is talking about rescuing him and we see nothing about the effect of his absence on the Batchers (they don't mention him, don't try to save him, and Hunter is more distraught by Omega's absence than by his own brother's)

And don't get me wrong, Omega is a kid and she's nice, of course they have to take care of her and protect her

But they also don't know her purpose; why is she here? She could be a bad omen (maybe she doesn't even know it! The Kaminoans probably didn't tell anyone about her real purpose and I stand by the idea that the infos they got about her are all wrong and purposefully misleading) and I have the dark feeling that she will be the end/ death of the Batchers by the end of the serie, even if she didn't wanted it that way

But Crosshair is never mentionned, except for when he's needed in the scenario. Which is a shame, because he's a Batcher too even if he's mind-controlled and (for now) working for the Empire. He's supposed to be a main character, and he's a key element to the plot; yet out of 10 episodes we saw him in only 3, and only the moments where he was acting bad (i'm excluding the lonely moment at the end of ep2 because it had a lot of potential about him fighting the chip but that was all we had and i'm still bitter about it lol)

Here is a post about it

- speaking of plot; I feel like it's always the same disk playing since episode 2-3: They have a mission given by Cid, they do it, things go wrong, Omega saves the day and they get the money.

Crosshair is doing bad guy stuff so no need to tall about him (haha right?)

Now. I'm a good public. I know when to activate the Dummie™ in me and enjoy a show about a found family doing crazy jobs for a criminal and raising a newly adopted daughter at the same time. It's fun, it's sweet, sometimes it get emotional and the animation is beautiful (the lights are amazing I am always in awe)

I can enjoy it and be in awe and see Echo sniffing food and Tech smiles and Wrecker playing with Omega and feel happy about it.

But I also expected more. I hadn't any clear idea because I didn't wanted to set expectations (how ironic) but I can't help but feel sad about the wasted potential around Empire! Crosshair and the rise of said Empire.

If you want to antagonize one of the main character, do it, but do it fully and do it well. Show us Crosshair getting really invested in a plan to catch the Batchers and suddenly making a scene for a tiny detail that could blow it up; show us Crosshair and Hunter fighting each other hand to hand after they disarmed each other, and Crosshair getting the upoer hand until something holds him back; just enough for Hunter to take control again

Show us a complex character who suffers but doesn't fully realise it, and show us brothers mourning yet hoping to get the family back again you know?

- the way Echo is treated by the Batchers. And as much as it saddens me, they do him dirty in the show.

Echo is a war veteran, an ex- prisoner and a disabled character. He went through a lot; first he lost the Domino squad, then he lost brothers on Kamino (including 99 who was close to his squad), then the Citadel happened and he lost both his legs, an arm, his freedom, his brothers and probably any hope to be saved.

Then they found him in that freezer, and he probably realised that, if Fives wasn't here to save him, it meant he lost him too.

Then he left Rex to go with a team of 4 because he probably didn't feel like he belonged with "regs" anymore; he chose strangers over brothers because he thought he couldn't find his place there. Which in itself is sad and problematic.

And now he's with the Batchers, and they don't seem to grasp the importance of his trauma. I mean; they always had the 4 of them and never lost a brother (apart from Cross; which is another wasted potential here because they could have exploited that trauma and made a parallel with Echo being so used to losing brothers and them experiencing it for the first time on such a personal level you know) and they do some crappy stuff to him.

Selling him as a droid? Not cool.

Brushing off his trauma for a mission and some credits? Not. Cool.

And Echo can't say anything because he chose them, and now he has nowhere to go anyway because Order 66 happened; and he probably doesn't want to be a burden to Rex, and he probably doesn't want to abandon his brothers especially now that Cross is gone and they have a child to take care of

But yeah there are a lot of things happening - or NOT happening - around Echo and his trauma and his disability that are wrong and people are right to talk about it

Here is a post I read and I agree with it

- Overall, the way the show and the characters are handled; they often feel very stereotyped/ cliché and the basic plot doesn't really help for character development or improvement

I read a post about it and it was really interesting; they linked the whitewashing of the characters with their abilities/enhencement

Tech and Crosshair are the smartest and the whitest in the group (which is bad)

Wrecker is portrayed as the Bid Dummie™ and he's the one with the "darker" skin and the features closest to Temuera/ Maōri features (also very bad)

Hunter is straight up a Rambo with a face tattoo, and Echo - and you guys know I love him - is whiter than a sheet of paper (all so bad)

Not only this, but there is no improvement in their personality or thinking

They don't seem to evolve, and just like their mission, they end up playing the same song over and over again

Hunter is the broody soldier and though people enjoy talking to him as a Dad (count me in) but he's not a good dad for Omega (he calls her soldier and is always acting awkward and uncomfortable around her)

Wrecker could be a better dad for her; but again they display him as a big dummie and give the impression he couldn't take well care of her

Tech is here to be the smart one, we only see him when they need someone to do the smart speaking and the complicated computer things

Echo is the grumpy reg, the "more droid than man" and sometimes the Mom™ but they never show him talking about the Empire or the trauma or how the I am not Freaking Out™ I did came back for this Shit™ he's just here to... Be here and be grumpy and bring the oldest clone wars fans to watch TBB

And Crosshair is almost non-existent.

Here is another post about it

What could it be then?

So either Dave is pulling a Ahsoka on us; but he'll still have a lot of things to correct and explanations to give because I can excuse a bad plot but I draw the line at blatant racism ans ableism (especially when they KNOW the fans and they KNOW what people want and they KNOW it would probably bring more people to enjoy and get invested in the show)

- If he's doing this, he will probably work with the animator to correct the whitewashing (because it really is the only really wrong thing in the animation, the rest of it is quite good to be honest like the light, framing and all)

- Understand that Tbb and Mandalorian are two different shows and cannot be treated the sale way; so he'll get back to the main plot and hopefully work on Crosshair's arc and hos his absence/ him being controlled by the chip affects him/ the Batchers/ their relation

- He'll probably work more on displaying the effect of their trauma; collective and personal, and see how it reflects on their relations (and give Echo the healing he deserves)

- By extension, give the characters more depth and complexity, dig their stereotypical surface and reveal their true nature (show me a ruthless yet easily overwhelmed Hunter; a smart but constantly anxious Tech, a very emotional Wrecker playing the big explosive dummie to protect himself, etc.)

Well, that's what I would do

Or he's just... Doing this and not planning any changes; in which case I'll probably do what I did with SPN s15: stop watching, scroll through tumblr to get some infos and gifs and tell everyone about how dirty they did the characters, and they did us.

But I really hope he's hearing us and taking our remarks into account; the show in itself had a lot of potential and I'm still hanging on the thin hope that the ending could "save it"; but I also have no expectations and am in fact waiting for a disappointing ending

On a brighter note, I'm glad the fandom exists because I see artists and writers and gif-makers and theorists and all kind of people creating and sharing their own content, headcanons, art, writing and they all feel right and better than the canon

Like yes, give me a in-character dark skinned clone who deals with his trauma and the sudden changes around him in a realistic way

Tell me about the real effects of the war on soldiers, and the truth behind the corrupted government taking over the galaxy, and the efforts everyone has to make to survive, exist and live together

If Dave and his team cannot do it, I know you guys can and that's why I'm glad to be here too; you give me hope when they fail to do so 💙

I hope I like... Answered this correctly? 😂 I got carried away but yeah, though I'm usually not vocal about it and try to enjoy it with my Dummie Energy™ I still see and read about what you all think, and usually I agree with you; the show deserved better and we deserved better

Now back to ignoring the canon and writing a fic about my very much alive and beloved Fives 🥰

#star wars #the bad batch #tbb #mesa shitposts #mesa answers #namesmox 💗#thank you for your ask!#it's a long rent #but I'm glad I did it #if you feel like I said something incorrect please do tell me #I am still learning #and I want to educate myself about these matters because it's important #echo #crosshair #tech #hunter #wrecker #omega #personal opinion

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sweetsassymusic · 3 years

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The Long Kaz Rant I Told Myself I Wouldn’t Write, But Here We Are

This is probably an unpopular opinion. And I hope it doesn't come across as confrontational or anything because I don't mean it that way. But I've always been super confused by the way Kaz is accepted, basically across the entire fandom, as either morally gray or straight up villainous? He doesn’t really seem like either of those things to me. On a surface level, obviously there are things he’s done that are normally considered evil. He’s stolen, he’s killed, he threatened a child, he gouged out someone’s eye. And that’s all pretty bad, right? But it completely ignores the context given in the books. (More after the cut because this got too long...)

There’s a difference between doing something evil and doing something that’s shocking, “dark,” or difficult to watch.

Before I read the books, I heard fans discuss all the horrible things Kaz does. And the way people talk about him, I was expecting him to be… Feral Kaz – someone who delights in doing horrible things because he’s just so twisted and angry. The author herself even referred to him on her blog as being utterly despicable. Wow! This guy must really go out of his way to hurt innocent people, huh? So when I sat down to actually read it, I was so surprised. Most (if not all?) the killings were done on some level of self-defense. His “murder victims” were actual evil people trying to kill him or someone he loved. And the reason he threatened a child was because the only alternative was killing her – something he would never want to do. You know, because he’s not evil.

I don’t know if I just have very different definitions of these terms than most people? But to me, the idea of Kaz being “utterly despicable” should not even be on the table to begin with (Leigh Bardugo, you good?) and even the idea of him being “morally gray” is questionable.

When I think of a morally good character, I don’t think of someone who never does anything questionable or always perfectly makes the correct choices. I think of someone who is on a mission–either to protect the world, a loved one, or simply pursuing a personal goal–who at least tries to conduct his mission in a way that either does no harm to others, or (when that’s not possible) does as little harm as necessary to get the job done.

Whereas, when I think of a villainous character, I think of someone who has no regard for others at all. Someone who either relishes in harming the innocent, or pays zero consideration to whether he harms innocents while pursuing his goals (which are usually, in themselves, harmful to innocent people).

And finally, when I think of a morally gray character, I think of someone directly between these two. Someone who is a little bit evil, a little bit sadistic, but not entirely evil. He’s got a few good points too. Maybe he’s someone who keeps switching sides, unsure if he wants to be a hero or villain. Maybe he has hurt a lot of innocent people unnecessarily, but he joins in with the good guys for personal gain, and people don’t mind him there simply because he doesn’t interfere with the protagonist’s goals. Or maybe he’s the “Bad Cop” to someone else’s Good Cop: someone who uses more violence than is necessary, just for fun, but still helps the good side in some capacity, so everyone chooses to look past it.

Under these definitions, Kaz (to me) seems more like a good character. While pursuing his personal goals, he protects people he loves, and yes, he does do “dark” things. But he doesn’t relish in doing them (despite his reputation in-universe of being a chaotic sadist. His reputation is not accurate; he invented it for his own protection). He does them because he has to. If he can get the job done right without hurting anyone, that’s the route he’ll take. But that option isn’t always available. And he’s not the type to lie down and die just to avoid getting his hands dirty (nor should he, imo).

Again, maybe I just have a different idea of what constitutes being morally gray. But I always thought it was meant to be a judgment on the choices you make when you actually HAVE a choice? A morally gray character has the choice to be good or evil, and they choose to do both (which one depending on how they feel that day).

Whereas, if you do something “bad” because circumstances force you to do it–because you or someone you love will die otherwise–that’s pretty much the same as having a gun to your head. You’re not morally gray. You’re doing it under duress. It’s survival, not a reflection of where you stand on moral topics. Like, if you trap a vegan in a room with only a piece of meat, and you leave them there for days, weeks, that person doesn’t suddenly become a “fake vegan” if they eat that meat to avoid literally starving to death. You forced them to do it. When it comes to their moral beliefs, they would still be a vegan if they had the freedom to make that choice. You just put them in a situation where those choices aren’t available to them. Your lack of freedom in a situation shouldn’t define you.

The same can be said for placing a starving, homeless orphan boy alone in the dog-eat-dog world of Ketterdam. The option of being a sweet little law-abiding citizen is not available to him. So is it really fair to define him by something in which he had no choice?

I’ve come across so many GrishaVerse fans who, while sipping on their Starbucks in the comfort of their own home, go “Ugh, Kaz. He’s so DARK, so EVIL!” (Fun fact: while my mom was watching the show, she said Kaz is evil because “he seems to always have a plan.” Oh no! Not PLANS!) “He must be some kind of monster to be able to do the things he does and still live with himself! I could NEVER do those things!” Well…you’ve never actually had to do those things? Your life has never depended on it? Idk, to me, it’s just a very privileged take. And I’m not trying to make this into a big social issue. It’s not like criticism against a fictional character is anywhere near the same level of importance as the issues marginalized people are facing in real life. I’m just saying, it’s very easy to condemn activity you’ve never been forced to engage in for your own survival.

One of the biggest reasons people have given me for why they think Kaz is evil is that he is “for himself.” Even the author said she thinks Kaz is worse than the Darkling (who, I’ve gotten the impression, she believes to be irredeemable) because the Darkling has communal goals (he wants to bring positive change for other people/the world at large) while Kaz’s goals are just personal (he wants to bring positive change for himself and only himself). And for one? It just isn’t true: many (if not most) of the things Kaz does is either for his Crows or for his late brother; he just disguises it with supposed self-interest for the sake of his reputation. And second? It’s…not actually wrong to have personal goals or to act in self-interest. Bettering your own life is a valid desire. It’s not the same as being selfish. Not everything you do has to be for other people.

(And, tbh, this is something Leigh Bardugo seems to have a problem with in general, not just in this scenario. I could write a whole separate rant about other characters that were demonized in-narrative for engaging in “too much” self-care, and how her unforgivingly black and white morality ruined the Shadow and Bone trilogy for me. Worst of all, she even seemed to imply recently that the only reason real-life antisemitism is wrong is because “the Jews didn’t fight back”? [Like, if they had met her criteria of “fighting back”, would that make antisemitism somewhat justified to her? What? Idek, but she should really clarify.] Basically, she seems to take “non-selfishness” to an extreme. I don’t know her personally, I don’t want to make assumptions, I don’t have anything personal against her, and I’m not trying to get her cancelled or anything, I promise. But please, when you read her books, please don’t accept all her ideas at face value, because there’s some Weird Shit™ in there sometimes.)

Anyway, another reason people say Kaz is bad or morally gray is that he wants revenge. “Revenge is a bad coping mechanism! You should want JUSTICE! Not REVENGE!” And again, this argument is wild to me. I mean, yes, there are situations–especially in real life, modern, western contexts–where revenge is a bad coping mechanism someone has developed, and transforming their anger into a desire for justice is a way for them to overcome that and express their anger in a healthier way. But that’s a very specific scenario. When we’re talking generally, the line between revenge and justice is a lot thinner than people think (and in some scenarios, there is no line at all).

For example, real life victims and their families often say they can’t wait to see the perpetrator rot in prison, even wishing (sometimes even fantasizing) that the guy gets abused in prison by fellow inmates. For them, justice and revenge are wrapped up together in one big court-issued sentence. And while some people find that disturbing or take issue with it, it’s…generally considered valid outrage? This guy is evil and hurt them, so it’s okay for these people to want him to suffer. And most importantly, these people called the cops instead of taking matters into their own hands, therefore they’re Good, right? They’re good citizens who obey and rely on the established authority, therefore they are handling their anger in an Acceptable™ way?

But in the world of Ketterdam, if someone has victimized you, or is trying to kill you or someone you love, you can’t just call the fucking cops (and let’s be honest, looking at irl cops, it’s a questionable idea here too sometimes). If we’re analyzing Kaz’s outrage and how he handles it, we have to analyze it in the context of where he lives, not where we live. We have options in our lives that Kaz doesn’t have. So we have to ask, what are the most productive steps he could realistically take in his world?

I see activists and bloggers on websites like this, publicly fantasizing about gouging the eyes out of certain politicians and right-wing figureheads. And they would probably do it for real if they could. On Tumblr and Twitter, this is generally considered righteous anger. The politicians are evil, so it’s okay to hurt them, right? That’s how the logic goes, anyway (I know some will disagree, but it’s a common take here). Well, imagine if, instead of just being a bigot, one of these evil people personally stabbed–possibly killed–your girlfriend. And there were no cops to call, no news stations or social media to turn to, to show people what this guy did. No authority or community on your side. No way to ensure this guy faced consequences for his actions. There’s just you, your dying girlfriend, your helplessness, your anger. What would be the appropriate way to handle this situation, so you were acting out of justice instead of revenge? What does “justice” even mean in a world like that? It’s a world where either you hurt others or you lie down and just let others keep hurting those you love (which, in itself, would be evil). I can’t think of any “appropriate” response Kaz could take. Which, for better or worse, is probably why he just went for the eye. You probably would too in that context. Are you morally gray? I doubt it.

It’s really weird to me how people seem to hold Kaz to this high standard of absolute Moral Purity, but they don’t hold other characters to it. Like, was the dad on Taken being “feral” or “morally gray” when he told his daughter’s kidnapper that “I will find you and I will kill you” and then pursued him with fury? His motivations were personal and not communal. He was coming from a place of revenge, just as much as justice. But most people consider him a hero. He’s not controversial or “dark.” There are plenty of other heroes who do terrible things (sometimes to innocent people! Even when it’s not even necessary!) for the “greater good” or just because it’s convenient. People call them a “badass” and then turn around and say Kaz is just “bad.” Idk, it just seems really arbitrary the way people draw these lines.

If we’re expanding the definition of “morally gray” to include anyone who’s ever done anything questionable, made a mistake, been forced to do something they wouldn’t normally do, done something for personal reasons instead of for the world at large, or wanted revenge for something, then there literally are no heroes in fiction (except maybe a few cardboard cutouts) or in real life.

(Ironically, the most morally gray thing Kaz does, imo, is something most people don’t even have a problem with: the fact he runs a gambling house to “take money from pigeons.” And even that is really mild [no one is forcing the “pigeons” to gamble their money away]. But yeah, that’s one of the few instances I could think of where he actually hurt innocent people unnecessarily. That and the time, as a kid, where he stole candy from that other kid...and even that might be mostly-but-not-entirely excused by the fact he was starving to death. But yeah.)

#Kaz Brekker #Shadow and Bone #grishaverse #tw: antisemitism #Grisha #my meta

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bellamygateoldblog · 4 years

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i will never be over the way this show has continuously tried to frame bellamy and clarke as heroes and good people, or the way the fandom has almost completely embraced and supported that narrative

the amount of times i’ve read “[clarke] saved everyone’s ungrateful asses” makes me seriously consider turning evil. like aren’t y’all bored? don’t you have a different sentence you would like to say for a change?

i want to talk about this but i probably don’t remember a lot of the details of this show so if im forgetting something or get something wrong i apologise, but i never have any desire to rewatch past s2.

clarke isn't even the hero of her own side, she took power of them using the military force of the grounders, someone else’s people, she’s forced them into alliances without their knowledge that weren’t in their best interest (while she literally had no idea what they were even going through because she’d abandoned them after upsetting their entire political structure, and this leader she’s bowing to is responsible for the slaughter of their children, has broken an alliance previously with them, has hung the threat of genocide over their heads, and who isn’t even wanted in power by her own people- dragging skaikru into that conflict, too), she’s sacrificed them and what’s best for them in order to cater to/concentrate on the grounders newest demands or pursue her own personal mission, she’s lied to and patronised them, she’s abandoned them and surrendered them to die while they were under her protection and responsibility, and in Book 2 (and these aren’t her people but in canon she’s their leader anyway apparently despite trying to blow them all up a few days before...) she’s abandoned them again, and is speaking for them without consent or any connection to what’s happening with them again,.........her inner circle/her ‘friends’ have to be extremely careful to remain important to her or on her team or they’ll be sacrificed, harmed or become acceptable losses to whatever her newest goal is too (but hey at least she says she cares about them) all while acting very ‘woe is me’ about the whole crushing weight of responsibility she shouldn’t have.

but she’s the hero, she’s beloved, she’s special, she has relationships that were never built, she and only she saved everyone again and has all the lines telling us so no matter how dishonest those statements are.

like this is where i personally see what you said in your ask most: when it concerns clarke.

bellamy on the other hand...i don’t place him at all on the same level as clarke when it comes to this. clarke has privilege that bellamy just never had as a character. and i think that does probably play into why i like him.

him being a hero to the delinquents/the 48 is completely believable to me. he was the original leader, he got them through a tough time, he chose to put himself on the line for them, and he’s the one who stayed. i also think it’s reasonable that fandom might romanticise him this way because he is one who has been shown to value the one life as well as the many of his people, a guy doing his best and making big mistakes along the way, a mixed complex bag of good and bad, i find him very likable and i love the toxic/pained/vulnerable ones lol but more than anything i find him to be one of the more interesting/entertaining characters on the show (Book 1).

we also see him torment himself with his own mistakes instead of just having other people do it for him/remind him like we see happen with clarke- and we all know fandom loves equating that with a “redemption arc” and as much as i personally dislike seeing pity parties i do like self-awareness and responsibility in characters that goes beyond a 3-second-long puppy dog look or straight dismissal of someone else’s pain, and for the most part bellamy’s expressions of this don’t come across as demanding sympathy from others but from genuine self-loathing and an honesty to himself, internalising the effects of his actions/childhood.

i know i personally prefer The Flawed Protector over The Tortured Saviour nobody asked for (same white male hypocritical moral hero in a woman’s body).

i don’t believe in assigning “hero” to any of them though like that’s the whole entire point of the show lol “there are no good guys.” and i also think a major chunk of fandom/shippers have warped bellamy’s character so much that it isn’t even him anymore, so this man they’re celebrating as a hero/good person isn’t even bellamy sometimes.

all of the genuinely “good” and kind people are dead.

i don't think i'd say bellamy was ever framed as a hero. like he was just never important enough to be, he’s just not put into those positions (despite being the male lead), clarke is. as the protagonist ig. bellamy...he’s the protector/knight of the heroes, but not the actual hero himself (applies to octavia too i think, where she acts and he reacts).

like take mount weather, clarke becomes empowered by her “wanheda” status, bellamy’s (and monty’s) part in that is lost...clarke is “bearing it so they don’t have to” (rme) which simultaneously strips the other boys from claiming the ‘victory’ of saving the 48 while still leaving them with the guilt, like it suits how i see clarke perfectly that she’s the only one to refer to the genocide (and shutting down the CoL, i realised) as “i” while monty and bellamy say “we” and it was clarke’s actions that got them to that point in the first place, but this is one of those times she’s clearly The Protagonist. if that makes sense lol.

bellamy is on the opposite side to clarke in s3 and s7 and he needs to be moved to her side in order to be on the ‘right’ one. now i don’t agree with that one bit mind you (when it comes to s3, idc about s7 lol) and i didnt see it that way but imo that’s how the show wrote it, to the point he was either demonized endlessly by fandom or woobified in a way that denied him his own agency. during s5 i don’t i think anyone was framed in a good light. i can see this applying in s6, though- where he was his absolute worst self yet, betraying his own development, failing at every point to “do better” despite claiming it, but still was given that reasurring line that they did better and saved people and was in that “heroic” position i guess? but is that because he was back to being clarke’s “good little knight” tho? (but do we claim s6??? do we really??? do we claim it ladies???)

s6 was 100% dedicated to making clarke look good/like a 'good' or sympathetic person. the bodysnatching plot (and the s6 sheidheda plot because if it was supposed to be about bellamy and address his s5 actions he would’ve been present to experience/observe those consiquences himself but he wasn’t lmaoooo. instead it was to tell the audience ‘actually clarke was right last season and here’s another reason to feel bad for her and how those ungrateful bitches were treating her’) has no other purpose for existing. clarke's character has consistently been elevated at the expense of everyone else's. but im not sure the writing did a very good job convincing me she was a good person if it was trying to do that LMAO like my interpretation of her is so fitted to canon, and no amount of throwaway lines telling me how good she is did anything to change what i saw yk? and in s6, combined with being patronised by the writers, i found her to be at some of her most obnoxious.

i don’t agree with placing bellamy and clarke in the same boat tbh. like they just come from completely different places and come across differently, especially in the way they interact with other characters.

in my experience this fandom (on tumblr) is extremely skewed in favour of clarke, like ive never seen a fandom so obsessed with their protagonist. there’s A LOT of clarke stans who stan her for being one of those “deserves better :(” characters, selfless and heroic, and support that view that she’s the superior character, entitled to other character’s devotion, love and validation yet doesn’t have to reciprocate any of it. the CL/BC ship war was just a bunch of people fighting over clarke, who deserves her more, which character is more toxic to her, which other character would 100% be her bff supportive of that relationship, treating her as a passive whose actions don’t take affect. im not sure how much i blame the writing for that because if so many of us are capable of recieving her character in this way then...why aren’t so many other people? how is there such a massive disconnect between the ways we see her?

and imo a lot of the bellamy love in this fandom comes from shipping him with clarke too rather than being because of who he actually is.

#the 100

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mrchalamet-mrstyles · 4 years

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(1) Some thoughts I want to share with you: A few days ago a verified Twitter account tweeted about the DOTN trailer and said that "people need to stop trying to make Armie Hammer happen". Then his stans (the 5 of them 😂) started replying to the tweet with hateful stuff (which is not surprising at all) and saying that the author's opinion is dumb because armie "already is happening" in Hollywood and has been acting for over a decade by now.

(2) This made me realize that his stans still don't understand the actual meaning of "trying to make AH happen". The frase Is not related to armie not getting roles in HW, because the truth is that he is already part of it, he is a Hollywood actor and he will continue to get jobs. It actually means that armie has been given the opportunity multiple times to star in big budget films, meaning that the industry wants him to become this huge movie star and yet he has failed to do it.

(3) Mainstream audiences already saw what he has to offer and they were not interested, that's the reason why all his films flop, because people are simply not interested in seeing him in the big screen.

(4) So after all his huge flops, people with common sense wonder why he keeps getting casted in those type of films (like DOTN) and why the industry is still so invested in trying to make him happen (aka became a big movie star) when he should be getting roles in other type of films (low budget/independent films like CMBYN, Free Fire, etc) since he isn't able to provide a box office hit.

(5) Some people say that him being a "good" actor is the reason why he keeps getting constantly casted, but the truth is that HW doesn't care about acting habilities when it comes to box office, they just want actors that provide money (The Rock). The only reasonable explanation to why he keeps getting huge roles is because of white privilege, I mean just look at him.

(6) Also this whole situation is probably the main reason why so many people on Twitter (specially in film Twitter) hate him, they are disgusted of the privilege he has while other more deserving POC actors don't.

Anon, thank you for this message and sorry I didn’t post an answer sooner but there was a lot here to sit and think about, discuss with some pals, before trying to comment with any sort of logical response. I also wanted to wait to see if there was any announcement for who was signed on to play Hawkman from yesterday’s DC Fandome Con, and there wasn’t, sadly. Armie’s name still seems to be floating as a contender for the part, but now also Alexander Skarsgard and Micheal Fassbender have been added to the shortlist as well. For me- and this is purely my personal speculation- I feel this might be Armie’s last chance at making himself “happen”. If he can’t land this role, I can’t imagine there will be too many others in the future that he could be up for, on this level.

I’m not surprised his rabid fans went after this person. That’s how they always react, but it does prove what you are saying- they don’t understand the difference between a “working actor” and being the “It Man” of HW. That’s Tim, he’s definitely “happening”- on the rise and a sought after commodity by many in HW. I mean, neither DOTN or Rebecca are in the top 75 most-anticipated films on Letterboxd, where Tim’s next two films are at the top of the heap. These stans fail to acknowledge they swarm in Armie content because they seek it out and reblog ad infinitum amongst their little ponds on Tumblr and Twitter, but for the rest of the movie-going world, he’s just not a big deal. The “regular viewing audience” looking forward to either Rebecca or DOTN are doing so because they are excited about seeing a remake of a classic in both counts, because DOTN is the next installment in Branagh’s Poirot series. It’s not because of Armie in most cases. And while Dune is also a remake, and anticipated as such to see what Denis can do with it, it’s also a nail-biting wait for a lot of non-Tim stans to see if he can pull it off, the hype to see him as Paul is really amazing to watch grow. TFD has made lots of people anxious to see what he does with Zefferelli, with no one I’ve seen mention any doubt he will be able to hold his own with such a star-studded cast.

Your mention of white privilege is interesting. When you go back and look at all the self-sabotage Armie has done over the years as he continues to get roles pretty consistently, it’s hard to imagine the same being true for someone like Lakeith Stanfield or Daniel Kaluuya if they had said or posted some of the things Armie has done. There is no way anyone of color could have recovered from the toe-sucking vid, or calling someone a cocksucker, or calling out fans, or the grosser allegations of sexual misconduct. They would have been canceled, and rightfully so, but somehow (money, straight-white privilege?) Armie gets a pass. When he makes crude remarks (ie, cocksucker, dick broom) that is not allyship or “testing the waters”, that is homophobic full stop and his privilege allows him to get away with it, time and time again.

I’m sorry, this may have gotten off-topic for you, anon, but again, thank you for sharing your thoughts with me, always.

#armie hammer #Anonymous

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itsclydebitches · 5 years

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Just browsing the RWBY reddit. Seeing your post about Oz on there. The usual backlash against you and the idea that RWBY owe Oz an apology. Honest question. Is it just that their probably teenagers? Not experienced with nuanced storytelling? Think lying is always a bad thing to? It's obvious RWBY are not fully in the right. What fan wouldn't see that aside from just young people? I hate this fuck adults mindset in the fandom. Cordovin should have put them in jail at the end.

All fandoms have a very wide range of ages, RWBY included, so I doubt it’s as simple as assuming they’re all teens. Rather, I can think of a number of different factors, any one (or multiple at a time) that might be at play:

They are in fact teens who identify very strongly with the main cast, to the point where a “screw adults” rhetoric is not just appealing but very logical from their perspective. In the same vein, you have people of any age who have very straight-forward moral views: lying is bad and Ozpin had no right to do it. Period. The problem with this is less the actual belief and more the hypocrisy, as usually the mindset conveniently doesn’t apply to the person’s favorite characters---more on that below.

They’re fans, young or old, who haven’t been trained in/practiced much media analysis. Ozpin’s situation is a complicated one, requiring that fans recall, understand, and are willing to interrogate a HUGE number of details since roughly Volume Two. A lot of the hatred for Ozpin I see here on tumblr is rooted in really simplified “analysis.” e.g. people honestly asking, “How can you root for him when he got Pyrrha killed??” without understanding (or being willing to accept) that “got Pyrrha killed” is a flawed statement on multiple levels.

Connected to the above, fans who are really active in the fandom all year round and become immersed in theories, headcanons, and the like until they feel like canon. We only get RWBY content for a few weeks out of the year. The rest of the time fans are circulating various perspectives, often biased depending on who you follow. So there’s very little material demonstrating Ozpin’s complex nature vs. a great deal of material (fic, fanart, metas, personal posts about how much you hate characters, etc.) painting him as simplistically evil. That’s then the mindset fans are in when the next volume comes along and it’s rather difficult to break. What do you mean he’s a flawed good guy? I’ve been reading Ozpin hate for nine months out of the year.

Fans who are invested in their faves and have no desire to grapple with their more loaded mistakes. Yang is a good example of this, given that she’s one of the most beloved characters while also having a range of flaws. Some flaws---like snapping at someone in frustration---are easy to deal with because we know how close the group is, we know how this show functions, and we know she’ll be forgiven within a very short period of time, if anything as deep as “forgiveness” is even needed. We shrug and move on. More loaded flaws though---like her treatment of Ozpin---require fans to balance a love of the character with a critique of their actions, which a lot of people simply aren’t interested in doing. Acknowledging the ways in which Ozpin might have been in the right and the ways in which the group might have been in the wrong requires that they take a number of faves out of that “cinnamon roll too good for this world, too pure, can do no wrong” category. Few fans want to acknowledge that maybe their perfect Ruby shouldn’t have ripped secrets from a mentor. Or perfect Yang wasn’t justified in her manipulative bird anger. Or perfect Weiss shouldn’t be drawing her weapon on Qrow. Or perfect Pyrrha made a horrendous mistake by going after Cinder, etc. For all the people who claim they want flawed characters, fandom is filled with fans who fall in love with characters and then will simply not hear a word against them, not unless (like that snapping example) their flaws are incredibly easy to get past. They want, “My fave is flawed because she yells sometimes but she’s improving!” not, “My fave is flawed because she bought into the rhetoric of a murderous bandit and has been using that to undermine the team’s trust in their leader for weeks now.”

Connected to the above are fans who are neutral or iffy about Ozpin and thus have a “one strike and you’re out” policy that, notably, doesn’t extend to any other character. You lied? That’s it. We’re done. I was on the fence before but this proves you’re not worth investing in. When others point out that a LOT of our cast has either kept information quiet, manipulated how information is presented, or straight up also lied, they’re exonerated because the fan already likes them. They are invested in keeping them looking pure next to Ozpin’s impurity. And they just keep adding justifications indefinitely. Yang is allowed to keep the Spring Maiden quiet because of trauma with her mom. Oh, Ozpin has trauma too? Well he’s a thousand years old so he should have gotten over it by now. Oh, trauma doesn’t work that way? Well... and on and on.

Fans who believed Ozpin was an evil mastermind for six years and have been waiting impatiently for the day when his duplicity is finally revealed and they can celebrate being one of the ones who weren’t duped. “The Lost Fable” once and for all debunked that theory. Ozpin is a flawed man trying to do good, a subversion of the puppet-master archetype. It’s hard to say, “Damn. Guess I was wrong about his character,” especially after years of investment in his supposed immorality. So they just don’t. They tweak the new information and find ways to explain how he’s still actually, truly evil. It’s just even more horrendous because it’s subtle and sneaky and kinda hard to notice because it looks like he’s a good man most of the time, but I swear to you he’s not...

Fans who are attempting to be socially conscious but haven’t gotten the intricacies of that down just yet. Meaning, there are a lot of RWBY fans here on tumblr and tumblr has always been a site that heavily merges social justice with fandom. You read a RWBY post on your dash, then a post about white privilege; more RWBY, post about domestic violence, etc. Generally speaking that’s great (I’m all for learning in low-stakes environments), but that can also create very simplistic views, particularly for those who are young or who are just learning about such issues. Ozpin (Remnant geography and reincarnations aside) appears white. He’s a man. As far as we know he’s cis. He’s doesn’t seem to need his cane outside fighting and is therefore not disabled. He’s in a very significant position of power. He is, in short, everything “bad” that tumblr fans learn to spot in the real world. Ozpin, in that real world context, has a lot privilege and people automatically conflate that with being an aggressor. The villain. We’re living in a society where white guys are raping women and continually getting away with it. Now here’s this white guy preying on Pyrrha! (Again, no close analysis.) The merging of fandom with real world issues makes it very difficult for some people to view Ozpin with any sympathy, particularly when they only have a narrow understanding of these issues. Ozpin a victim of domestic abuse? Pff, that doesn’t happen. The man always abuses the woman. He can’t possibly be the victim here, so by default he must be the villain who tried to steal Salem’s kids away---because we all know that kids are always better off with the mother. That’s just natural. (You can see then how a lot of outdated assumptions color our readings of fictional characters.)

Straight up trolls. Some people don’t actually care about RWBY. They just enjoy antagonizing others about their views of the show. Or just insulting people for... reasons? It’s not about any investment in the debate. It’s about the rush they feel typing out a curse-laden post about how wrong you are and how much you suck. Are they actually wrong? It doesn’t matter. Saying you’re wrong makes the poster feel right and therefore powerful.

#rwby #rape tw #mymetas #long post #Anonymous

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full-course-identity · 5 years

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Give me your thoughts on uuuh Jake

wew boy

okay. gonna word dump this, and probably other interpretation asks, so I can get the words out there.

from my POV, there’s 3 types of canon Jake + 1 fanon vers + my personal interpretation. lemme explain what they are;

Book Jake, who I don’t have enough experience with bc I STILL haven’t finished the book… >_>;

2River Jake, who is kinda oblivious and very in-the-moment impulsive (not so bad he’s jumping place to place ADHD like Rich, but like, not considering that maybe dropping everything to seduce Madeline or Christine is a bad idea when he clearly really likes Chloe). these are debatably survival mechanisms bc of his family (and wealth, if you want to go into the “being rich actually traumatizes you and locks you into dissociation” theory–but to be fair, this is partially reliant on thinking Jake is Genuinely Rich. … well, not Rich as in… yeah); ignoring any pain he feels in favor of getting dicked down and forgetting about everything for a while. very “I’m not sad, I’m busy!!!!!”

Bway (possibly the new canon general for all Jakes since it sounds like London’s is modeled after him but just… toned down), who is still oblivious, but towards other people’s emotions instead of himself; he’s manipulative, a little impulsive but a lot more malicious about it, and he knows exactly how hurt he is about his parents. this jake’s awareness of himself makes him act worse because he knows this is the only thing that seems to help and it’s basically the only thing he actually has control of. his wealthiness is undeniably present and Bad here because the reason taking what he wants and not caring that it hurts people is his main coping skill is pretty much only because he’s been allowed that privilege all his life. i tend to think this version of him should be done by a white cishet dude (despite jake’s actor on bway being genuinely FANTASTIC) bc being marginalized in a high school should’ve curved a lot of the “endless power and privilege” he gets for being rich (Not That One).

[i… think this jake has ‘better’/more nuanced writing in BWay… but i don’t think it fits the musical nor is it the overall direction i think it should’ve gone. BMC feels best to me when there’s a heavier element of Dark Humor that briefly nods to a Larger and more Fucked Up world behind the bit we see in the musical. making it largely a twisted comedy, maybe even ramping that up further with more whiplash lines like jake’s “which means the house is empty, so that’s fun”]

Fanon Jake is… like most of the fanon characters in BMC, a bit… “bipolar” (like, radically shifting depending on the situation). the BMC fandom has been born with heavy engagement from minors in the current fascist climate of fandom as a whole. as a result, you have three general uses of jake that as “approved of” by somehow the exact same people despite being conflicting in a lot of ways. THIS IS NOT ME SHITTING ON FANON, i actually think most of this fandom is just a casual romp for most people and that shouldn’t be snatched away from them nor mocked nor treated like you HAVE to be logically consistent when this is just a fun hobby for most… but there are still trends i notice:

1: Jake the sweet bi disaster who loves their significant other and is just a little bit hopeless in their silliness and Down For Whatever-esque personality. this is often used for shippy pictures and memes and cute little oneshots, plus, of course, fluff.

2: Jake the tragic abuse victim who is extremely sad and has to learn to love again and has always been selfless, plus or minus a permanent disability post-fire. this is of course used for hurt/comfort, plus in combination kinda with michael in the bathroom-esque posts and tragic art, often also used as an example of the squip being the worst for jeremy or rich guilt trauma. also: aesthetic and moodboard posts.

3: the one I have the least good will towards: Jake the “why does everybody woobify mlm? You can’t portray him without flaws! queer boys aren’t your fetish!!!” with an attached, clunkily written reasons why he was an asshole that is also simultaneously watered down so you don’t think he’s a Monster bc then you’d be vilifying queer men (well, more like they’d feel bad about their cutesy-er ‘emotional support’ art and writing which is Totally Different from all the other cutesy emotional support art and writing).

basically, Meta Trying To Make Jake Reasonably Flawed But Not Evil in this fandom is RARELY genuine–it’s more often than not moralistic hand-wringing made so that they can wash themselves of the guilt for actually enjoying something with a character they portray as mlm, or otherwise the guilt of enjoying anything romantic or sexual involving men or queer people period when we’re apparently not supposed to do that anymore, as decreed by the radfems infesting our spaces.

and, well, or you’re an mlm writing this post, you’re probably young and still feeling extremely sensitive and scared about your identity. i once saw a very wise post by a trans person who had been trans for a long time, who said that when you first come out as trans (or queer in general, but especially trans people who are beginning social or physical transition and coming to terms with themselves) you are obvs on High Fucking Alert and so you’re insecure and scared of anything, ranging from “obvious transphobia” to “just trans people enjoying themselves and exploring transphobia in fiction or else their own sexuality”. again, this can relate to a lot of identities tbh, and as such young mlm either cis or trans can get very Itchy about people enjoying mlm content.

anyway.

wrapping it back around to me: i edit jake on a case by case basis (sometimes i even make him eviler or meaner based on what’s set up during Bway, he’s just not my usual go-to villain), but i tend to think of him as a tragic Mr. Peanutbutter-y sweetheart who kinda knows he feels like shit yet also knows that if he stops to assess it, it would make his life a lot harder in a time where he can’t afford that. his relationship with chloe is extremely toxic (chloe abuses him horribly, specifically), and so he tries to claw his way out of it only to be continually back in by chloe and her bullshit.

this is why he doesn’t really get... well. he genuinely thought the thing with christine was going to be permanent; he wasn’t jerking her around, he thought he was over chloe and wanted a girl as cool and fun and genuinely nice as her. afterward he Gets It, and so feels Really Bad--at a time where he doesn’t have his house, his legs are broken (i don’t tend to put him in a perma-wheelchair), his parents have abandoned him, and he best friend is in the hospital. guilt crashes in on him from all sides, and he just has to... pretend it isn’t, even as he can no longer stop himself from thinking about it.

if i was to do a jake focused story, it’d probably be a dating sim where you play as him and watch his life change in conjunction with his attempts to find happiness again; you can either choose decisions that help him greatly or ruin his life so ver much... hmm. lets file that under hashtag “story ideas i’ll never use even though they could be great”

to wrap this up: i like jake. i don’t... really enjoy most of the written content (fanfic, meta, sometimes even the storylines on ask blogs) in this fandom about him or... really, most of the characters, which i feel bad about--i’d enjoy it more if it was every in conjunction with my usual Wants in a fic, which is, like. extreme angst.

BUT

i do still like jake, and i can super enjoy his portrayal in memes and visual art

he’s just not my total fave, but like, the reason he tends not to come up a lot in my content is more what i’m focusing on and why. i’d be happy to use him in stories if his presence fit.

as a bonus

here’s the ships i’m happy to use him for, generally: deere, michael/jake, brooke/jake, toxic chloe/jake, and of course, different ocs/jake

his identities/labels: cis, bisexual/romantic... tho sometimes i actually go for bisexual and aromantic! outside bway and eviler jakes, i’m good with him being any race, and even then it’s just a matter of suspending disbelief re: privilege theory. also, PTSD probably, and maybe generalized anxiety as a result. maaaaaybe autistic too? adhd would be a hard sell for me since he seems super put together in a way that’d be extremely difficult for every form of adhd, but i can see him being neurodivergent on the spectrum + like dyslexia maybe. oh, and i sorta-kinda think he may be color blind? but really i’d drop that at a moment’s notice if it’d be easier to write him without it lol.

his interests: one is more or less sports in general, tho i think that, unless he went straight for track or swimming or something Olympics (which he probably can’t do now...), that’s a high school or some college only focus for him. so, besides sports, i think he’d kinda like the satisfaction and steady growth of Collecting Rare Things That You Have To Look For, like cool rocks, bugs, etc.

as for careers... some form of doctor something, maybe a businessman of some sort but he’d likely try to curve his power in that field as much as possible; he inherits his parents' assets and company or whatever, but he probably takes a backseat to that and only really has it out of a sense of ‘it’s my job as my parent’s kid to keep the company going--without engaging in the same awful legal issues they did--for as long as i can’. one of my fave jake-is-there stories, vanceypant’s spicy bis-focused fic 1999, has him owning a restaurant, and that was cool as hell.

also jake loves dogs. especially golden retrievers. yes.

#be more chill #bmc #jake dillinger #kadabralin #bmc meta #meta #character interpretations #wow this... is long #holy shit sorry about that

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lightsandlostbells · 6 years

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Skam Austin season 2, episode 1 reaction

Finally, Skam Austin returns, this time without Julie Andem behind the wheel. Honestly, no matter your opinion on this version of Skam, I’m actually quite curious as to where they’re going with this. Noorhelm, American-style? In the #MeToo era??? Will this season be a pleasant surprise and a sensitive rewrite of the original season, or will it just raise my blood pressure?

Episode 1

Clip 1 - Less dance, more cupcakes please

Big establishing shots of Austin and Bouldin High, a “national outstanding high school” according to a banner. Abby talking a selfie with her girls. Tyler and his boyfriend sloppily kissing??? Congrats on being the first gay couple to get the S2 opening clip makeouts! Also, just gotta say, nice that a gay couple can engage in the same PDA as a straight pairing at a high school in a red state, although Austin’s less conservative than a lot of Texas.

Megan and Grace observe the makeout, as well as Shay sitting by herself on the stairs. Megan feels bad for Shay. When Grace asks why, Megan says she’d feel bad if Grace had a boyfriend. HMMM FORESHADOWING. Also, gay. Megan, the solution is to go be Shay’s girlfriend so she’s not alone. (For real, I have kinda mixed feelings on Megan and Shay actually getting together, because while I love their longing looks and hand holding, Shay betrayed Megan’s confidence in a huge way that would require tons of effort to repair the relationship, and I can only really buy it during a Shay season where there’s lots of focus on them. And I think it’s more likely they’ll give Shay an Even who’s brand new. But I wouldn’t object if there was a good story arc for Megan and Shay!)

Grace thinks Tyler’s boyfriend has a long tongue, Megan thinks Marlon’s is longer … well, that statement feels loaded. Like, we-won’t-need-Jonas’-Blue-Monday-power-walk kinda loaded.

Megan and Shay exchange an awkward wave. Almost a year later and things still aren’t normal, I guess. Shay fucked it up.

Josefina has tried to do her own hijab, I guess? Zoya helps her do it properly. It’s really cute. Jo is my MVP of this show. I adore her. They need to make sure to do Shay and Zoya seasons on time so we can squeeze in a Jo season before they graduate.

Kelsey runs up. She made it onto the Kittens! I guess that’s one way to not have a dance team anymore. Some of the Kittens got busted for cheating on tests and got kicked off the team and L M A O obviously this wasn’t planned but I love this development happening now with the college admissions cheating scandal featuring Felicity Huffman and Aunt Becky.

Jo wants to tattoo Kelsey’s eyebrows, continuing the thread of her using Kelsey’s face as her cosmetic guinea pig from the first season.

Kelsey is excited because she can be on both the Kittens and the girl squad dance team. LMAO, so that WAS a thing. Did they actually dance??? It sounds like it. Apparently the team unofficially disbanded when Grace stopped going to the games and parties to focus on the school newspaper.

But I do love Grace being on the school paper; I worked for my campus newspaper so I am unreasonably excited to see where that goes. I’m assuming Noora’s Constitution Day article will become a column that Grace/(Daniel) writes for the newspaper?

Grace says she loves working at the newspaper and Kelsey tries to guilt her because it’s junior year and it’s the year colleges look at, you need to have extracurriculars. You can’t just be good, you have to be amazing. Well, that’s true, junior year is a big deal and the pressure to have a million extracurriculars is real. But lmao, newspaper is an extracurricular, as Grace points out. Kelsey thinks Grace needs more than “repetitive feminist essays” and OK, rude, and I also feel personally attacked. But if you’re going to get on Grace’s ass, Kelsey then what are your other “amazing” extracurriculars? By the same logic, wouldn’t you need more than dance teams? (I should not expect logic from Kelsey when it comes to dance teams, I know. Or Daniel.)

Jo gives this conversation the attention it deserves, which is minimal, because she has a cupcake. Her priorities are accurate. She says it’s the best cupcake in Austin so her search is over. Lmao, that Instagram content paid off. Now she should take on her quest for other top desserts. Megan can assist her in finding the best smoothie in Austin.

They’re talking about spring break. Kelsey needs to get her body ready, a hint toward her body image issues and concerns over her weight. Then Daniel’s voice comes out of nowhere to tell Grace that juniors can’t park in the senior lot. Grace says it’s not a big deal, Daniel says it is. Zoya, BLESS HER, is like, “So what are you going to do? Kick our ass?” YESSSSSSS someone besides Grace is not taking Daniel’s shit.

It is downright uncomfortable how much Kelsey is trying to cozy up to Daniel playing hall monitor and how Daniel just ignores her when she’s right there to flirt with Grace. He says he hasn’t seen Grace in a while. At first I thought they did have their infamous date during the long hiatus - can you imagine not including that scene in a Noorhelm remake - but as it turns out, it still hasn’t happened. He asks about Grace’s boyfriend, and Kelsey blows Grace’s cover by saying Grace doesn’t have a boyfriend. Grace tries to save it by saying it’s her ex. So that’s how she got Daniel off her back. You know, if you lie about a fake boyfriend, that should be a giant clue to back off, dude. But instead Daniel knows she’s single so you know he’s gonna go after Grace again.

Kelsey tells Daniel she’s a Kitten and wants to take a pic with him. God, this is cringe-worthy. Someone stop Kelsey from doing anything. Ever. And it is so deeply awkward how the girls just stop and watch as Kelsey snaps some selfies of her with Daniel. In front of Grace.

Something super interesting in the comments: a few people commented how it didn’t feel like a Julie Andem clip. I assume people who recognize Julie Andem by name are fairly involved in the fandom, but I’m not sure how widespread the knowledge of Julie’s departure was. I wonder if they guessed it on their own.

Clip 2 - First rule of being an Eskild: never lock your door

Grace is cutting up vegetables for dinner. And dancing. I like they had her do this, it’s goofy and humanizing, and in line with her characterization from season 1. Noora would sing to Justin Bieber, Grace loves dancing like a fool. The irony of course being that Grace doesn’t give a fuck about the dance team, lol. She dances for herself and HERSELF ONLY (and sometimes Megan, when Megan needs a pick-me-up).

She talks to Megan, who is with Marlon. Megan told Marlon about what happened with Grace and Daniel, so errrr, thanks Megan? But Grace says she’s going to tell Kelsey everything, presumably about her and Daniel’s deal, so Daniel won’t have anything over her head. Daniel holding something over Grace’s head? Grace thinking Daniel might tell Kelsey something incriminating? Trust is an essential foundation of a relationship, just saying.

Megan asks Marlon for his opinion and this dude clearly could not give a single shit about Grace and Daniel and Kelsey, he just says that if a girl isn’t into you, you just leave her alone. Not looking at the phone (and Grace) at all, just giving Megan some Looks, in my opinion. Based on later clips where he’s got a new girl, I think he’s trying to communicate that he no longer has feelings for Megan, but that Megan keeps hanging around and clinging to him. That would go along with Megan not getting it and saying maybe the guy doesn’t want to be left alone, showing she doesn’t get it (right after Marlon says “I don’t see why he doesn’t get that”). Also Marlon seems to be checking his phone during this chat so he’s not fully invested - my mind went to Jonas looking up other girls with Eva during the original version of this clip.

I will say, good on Marlon for knowing to leave girls alone if they don’t want you. Which is more than I can say for some characters in the Skam universe. Marlon’s probably my least favorite Jonas so this is a point in his favor, even if it is a low bar, lol.

But also IDK if he’s being Woke or if he’s just swapping out Daniel and Grace for him and Megan and hoping Meg gets the picture.

Megan thinks Grace doesn’t want to be left alone and Grace goes into a rant about how Daniel isn’t her type, he’s not smart, doesn’t read, needs to check his white male privilege etc. Tbh it’s kinda cringy and on the nose in execution, like all of that is true and they’re solid reasons for Grace to not want Daniel, but I feel like they’re just stacking up ideas to be debunked about him. We’ll probably learn that Daniel is actually some sensitive dude who reads books and has political opinions and is a secret genius or whatever.

Grace notices her pasta is gone and waltzes into her cousin Eve’s room while Eve is engaged in some foreplay with her lady guest. Gee, Grace, that’s awfully bold considering you didn’t know what state of undress they’d be in. At least their underwear is still on … and Eve’s shoes … why does she have shoes on??

Anyway, LESBIAN ESKILD. Eve immediately establishes that she is some sort of hipster artist and kicks out Grace so she can go back to hooking up with her girl.

Daniel texts Grace that she’s cute when she gets caught, and thanks her for sending him her class notes when he was in the hospital. What was he in the hospital for? I don’t think that was stated on SM, or did I just miss it? (It’s on the Bouldin Beat Instagram: he had a football injury.) Grace said there’s no need to thank her because the teacher asked her to. He makes a joke abut football players not being able to read, which makes Grace smile, so you know ... she’s not so opposed to him as she lets on. But then he suggests they hang out tomorrow and her amusement fades, because that’s pushing things too far. We end before Grace answers.

Clip 3 - Why are we still talking about Daniel? Zoya’s words, not mine

They’re at SXSW for Marlon’s show. The banner says SX Sessions. I was confused as to why Marlon’s garage band would be playing here but looking at the banner for the event, I see something about all Austin bands, so if it’s an event featuring local talent, it makes more sense as to why Clout is playing.

A girl is talking to Marlon. Grace notices and seems to check in with Megan. Who does look great, by the way, in her leather jacket, her peer-reviewed ensemble. Megan’s still hung up on Marlon after almost a year, it seems. But also … lol, barely anyone wants them back together. They’re one of the least popular Eva/Jonas pairings. Possibly the least.

Kelsey is still talking about Daniel because he texted her and invited them to Penetrator Jo’s beach house for spring break. Grace is like mmmm … that sounds far away. I mean, would you want to be in her shoes, stuck at a beach house with the guy who won’t take no for an answer, where people will be drinking, where you probably couldn’t relax and even go swimming because that dude is definitely going to be looking at you in your swimsuit? Megan tries to help Grace by saying Marlon invited them all to a party. Josefina wants to go to be around mostly naked guys while they are also mostly naked. Kelsey and Zoya do not seem to be happy with the mostly naked part. Grace is like, we can just stay at my place and bake cookies instead! That would be my preferred option.

Kelsey wants some quality time with Daniel (is any time with Daniel quality time)and guilts Grace into going. I love that she’s like “We can talk about the dance team in the car” as if that would make Grace want to go. Grace reluctantly agrees and Kelsey tells Daniel the good news. He responds right away. He also texts Grace right away that they’ll be hanging out. No one notices the suspicious timing of the texts.

Kelsey wants to know if Daniel might like her, Zoya wants to know why we’re still talking about Daniel. THANK YOU. Megan goes off to talk to Marlon and block that girl from getting too close to him, like she literally squeezes between them. Zoya lays out what a rude ass Daniel was to Kelsey and Kelsey is like, but he genuinely apologized!!! And she’s a Kitten now!!! Kelsey loves how direct Daniel is and how he knows what he wants. Yeahhhh, about that. He does go after what/who he wants. It’s just not you.

Also, lol, they conveniently didn’t have to film an actual concert for this scene.

Clip 4 - Newspaper time!!!

Grace is doing newspaper stuff at school with a guy (Nic) and Poonam. Poonam!!!! That girl spoke her first line and I remembered how much I enjoyed her overachieving ridiculousness.

Kelsey texts the girls that she had a dream where Daniel asked her to prom. She was wearing her Kittens uniform in the cafeteria and Daniel came up, knelt, and offered a dozen roses. Lol, I don’t think Daniel would do that shit even if he did like Kelsey. But also … Kelsey. Dear. You’re so embarrassing. Being a Kitten is not going to make you a Daniel magnet.

They talk about the launch, so I guess the newspaper is a new thing? Or they’re adding a new feature? Poonam is nervous about the launch and what people will think of her. Grace says she doesn’t care what people think of her. (Or so she thinks ... I think Grace certainly wants people to think she doesn’t care and that she’s strong and independent, for example.) Poonam says if it fails she’ll pretend not to know Grace. Lmao, classic Poonam.

Grace slides over to Nic, the dude who’s there. According to the Bouldin Beat Instagram, he’s the cartoonist for the paper, but their conversation makes me think he does some graphics design, too. He’s listening to a Hamilton mixtape. Grace didn’t know he likes Hamilton, so she obviously didn’t see that Bouldin Beat IG post where it says Nic has the Hamilton soundtrack on heavy rotation. She brings up that her friend Kelsey likes the Hamilton mixtape. (I’m sorry but LMAO, because on the one hand I do find that totally believable, but on the other hand, my God, imagine someone with Kelsey’s level of racial sensitivity being a Hamilton fan.) Nick knows Kelsey and thinks she’s funny. So I think either he’s going to be the Magnus, maybe, as far as being Kelsey’s eventual love interest (although ... lol, see above comment about Kelsey’s level of racial sensitivity), or Grace will see him as a potential love interest for Kelsey and try to hook them up to get Kelsey’s mind off Daniel.

Shay comes in. It is instantly awkward. Grace: “I like your hair.” Shay: “It’s not real.” Lmao. I missed you, too.

However! In the most depressing development ever, Shay is here to see Nic. He gets up and kisses her on the mouth. It is bleak. Shay looks so not enthusiastic. She was staring at Grace in a pretty hard way, too, what’s that about? Did she know Grace saw her texts and showed them to Megan?

Shay’s “BYE” is passive-aggressive as hell. Grace sits there in shock as Poonam is like, they seem like a cute couple. LMAO GOD.

Just throwing this out there: best acted scene of the season so far, however brief. The power of La’keisha Slade.

Anyway. NOOOOOOO. Shayyyyyyy. It’s not unexpected, considering the trajectory of the Isak character in S2, but I thought, since Shay seemed to have an awareness of her sexuality at the end of S1 - she knows she likes girls and she was OK with telling Tyler about it - that maybe we could skip this stage. There’s something really dark about this, too, because Tyler is out there making out with dudes, it’s not like she thinks her friend group is completely homophobic (and yes, people can view gay guys and lesbians differently and have varying levels of acceptance, but I doubt that’s the case with Shay’s friends) so it’s not just about putting up a show for her friends.

What does Tyler think about Shay dating a guy? He’s not the nicest guy overall but he does care about Shay, and he knows she likes girls, possibly that she likes only girls depending on what she told him in the past. Now I’m wondering if Shay started dating Nic in part because Tyler has his boyfriend now, and Shay presumably feels like she’s left out, as Megan said. Damn. Shay needs a hug in any case.

Clip 5 - Cookie baking

Grace’s J. Didion (as in writer Joan Didion) sweatshirt is a nice touch and exactly the kind of thing I think her character would wear.

I enjoy Eve on principle because lesbian Eskild fuck yeah, but I also feel like her delivery is very ... TV-ish. Like someone who has watched a lot of teen dramas and is channeling the same flow/energy of how those shows present dialogue. I don’t think she’s bad, it’s not that, it’s just more when watching this show I feel like I am watching a typical scripted TV show rather than the very natural Skam style - not just with Eve, a lot of the show, even compared to the first season. I just thought of it with Even because when she entered here, it felt more like a wacky TV neighbor kinda entrance, like she was Kramer or something. Is that because Julie isn’t working on the show anymore?

Anyway, Eve tells Grace about some girl who is lighting dildos on fire and that’s the real story here, I want the clip about the dildo pyre.

Eve sees a text from Daniel on Grace’s phone and says he sounds like a blast. I refuse to believe this lesbian would be impressed by Daniel in the fucking slightest.

He did send a cute dog picture to Grace so that’s one thing he has going for him. Grace has a cute dog, too. If their romance was just them walking their dogs, I could warm up to that. Gradually.

Grace says Daniel is some stuck-up asshole and Eve looks him up on her phone, saying she knows him. His brother was in her grade, a wild athlete who broke records, and his sister had some tragedy attached to her. The mention of tragedy gives Grace pause.

Actually, a point in Skam Austin’s favor: if they talk about toxic masculinity and rape culture in high school/college athletics and how jocks are favored and get let off the hook for heinous actions, that would be extremely culturally relevant. I mean, a football player in Texas? Treated like a god. And there have been some high profile rape cases involving athletes. Daniel’s brother has likely graduated and gone on to college, maybe playing college football if he was that good, but it would be a way to make the S2 sexual assault storyline even more suited to American culture.

Clip 6 - Daniel’s going to be on Investigation Discovery one day, mark my words

The girls are at Grace’s house. They must have had a sleepover. There’s a nice nod to OG when the girls mention using a Ouija board the night before. So I guess we’re not getting that cabin episode (understandable because American school timelines would not allow for it, probably). Jo was afraid the ghosts tried to pluck her unibrow. NOOOOO GHOSTS, LEAVE IT ALONE. IT’S MAGNIFICENT.

Grace comes out with nachos and offers them to the girls. Kelsey looks at that plate and is like, shoot, I can’t do cheese, or chips, or beans. And I know this is Kelsey and she has an eating disorder, but like … people have legit problems with cheese and beans, lol. To her credit, Grace doesn’t make Kelsey eat the nachos or call her out. She offers to make Kelsey a kale salad or a turkey wrap, but Kelsey shuts that down, too. (She was also doing jumping jacks while the other girls were reminiscing about ghosts, just saying.)

Megan is upset because Marlon left her on read, probably because he has that new girl, not that Megan knows yet, and Daniel is texting Grace about when she’s leaving. Daniel then texts Kelsey the same thing. Grace texts Daniel to stop using Kelsey to get to her. Daniel is like, wouldn’t have to if you’d answer me! Grace says he’s messed up. I mean, yeah. He is messed up. Grace doesn’t owe him a response, sorry.

While the other girls are talking, Kelsey mentions that she didn’t pack a swimsuit because she doesn’t like swimming, while Jo says Kelsey loves swimming, so another hint about Kelsey’s body image problems.

Daniel tries to call Grace and she declines the call, so then of course he immediately calls Kelsey. Oh my God, it IS messed up for him to do this. It’s so damn manipulative! (I know this all happened in Skam but we get to live this mess all over again, yayyyy.) And of course Kelsey is excited, but then he wants to talk to Grace. Ughhhh.

Daniel says Grace is messed up, and he knows what he’s doing is also messed up, but they had a deal. Oh my God. YOU NEVER OWE SOMEONE A FUCKING DATE. This is such a dangerous idea! You should always be able to back out of a romantic commitment! If Grace had been like “I will buy you something off the Taco Bell value menu if you apologize to Kelsey” and Daniel was calling Grace to be like “I want my fucking cheesy rice and bean burrito already” then I would find that more sympathetic than this. But dating is something you should NEVER have to set in stone, sorry, and I think this is where some of the split comes between Daniel/William defenders and his haters, because some people think a deal is a deal and some people (like me) think a date should not be ironclad under any circumstances. That mentality contributes to rape culture. (The disconnect between S2′s sexual assault storyline and William’s behavior is wild, tbh. But this is discourse that has been hashed out a million times already.)

Daniel whines that he apologized to Kelsey almost a year ago and that Grace made up an imaginary boyfriend so she didn’t have to hold up her end. No, actually Grace making up a fake boyfriend is what women do to get men off their backs because said men will not leave them alone and it’s a sad fact of life. Because men respect other men’s “claim” on their property (aka women) more than women’s ability to say no.

Daniel sounds like a goddamn serial killer when he’s all “just keep your word and go on a date with me.” Grace sounds downright defeated when she agrees. And of course when Grace hands the phone back to Kelsey, Daniel cancels on them for the beach house. Jesus, so we didn’t even get cute girl squad beach antics? Boooooo.

And actually, how shitty is it that he uninvited them to the beach house? I get that William uninvited them to the party, too, but that was just a party. These girls got packed and ready to drive several hours to a beach house, like imagine if they were on the road when Daniel called, or if they’d already spent money on gas and other stuff for a beach trip, or canceled other Spring Break plans with their families or friends to go hang out with these dudes. Beach house was a bigger time/money commitment for them than just a party, and he uninvited them (via a completely obvious lie that he took no effort to hide on social media) just because he got his date out of Grace. Selfish as hell, dude.

Jo complains that there’s too much girl juice happening and not enough sausage, and Megan is like, “You had sausage this morning.” Lmao. Literally all of these girls should embrace the “girl juice” because there is not a single viable male option so far. Nic from the newspaper seems nice but he’s bearding for Shay at the moment.

Good closing song, though (“Nail in My Coffin” by The Kills).

One of the best things about Skam Austin are the comments, and this clip did not disappoint. Some of the highest-rated comments were things like (paraphrased):

“Daniel is being manipulative”

“Grace doesn’t owe Daniel anything”

“you can see the fear in Grace’s eyes when she’s talking to Daniel on the phone, red flag”

“Daniel sounds like he’s threatening her life”

And my utter favorite comment from this clip, verbatim: “daniel reminds me of those guys in criminal minds who call people on the phone and tell them what to do otherwise someone they love will die - aka a creep lmao”

Social Media/General Comments:

I don’t know what the big holdup was with S2 - probably having to do with Julie’s departure - but it was a big mistake to wait so long, imo. I don’t think it was great for building fan momentum, although I notice that the first full episode of S2 has more views already than some of the episodes from last season that have been out for almost a year (not sure if Facebook was hyping this season or not like they did with the series premiere). They’ve also minimized time for future seasons. We can get Shay and Zoya seasons if they get one in for this fall and next spring, provided the show is renewed for those, obviously.

Anyway, Julie’s no longer the director. The director is Phillip J. Bartell, who has a pretty interesting track record: he was the editor on To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before, Dear White People (both film and TV series), and G.B.F. Feels like a decent background for someone to take on Skam; he has experience with teen films and with more diverse fare than just straight white people. He also edited a shit ton of low-budget gay films, most notably the Eating Out series, including directing and writing Eating Out 2: Sloppy Seconds, and I have to include this excerpt from the Wikipedia plot synopsis: The five then start scheming to out Jacob, the closeted leader of the ex-gay ministry, to his mother by tricking him to have sex with Octavio, another member of the ministry, in a portable toilet on wheels. Jacob finally comes out to his mother (after he inadvertently ejaculates on her coat as his sexuality is revealed), and flees with Octavio.

I did get more of a traditional teen drama vibe from this episode, and I do already miss Julie’s style of filmmaking: it was one of the best things Skam Austin had going for it. However, I’m going to give the sloppy seconds guy a shot. Although admittedly, this season of all seasons is one where I’m most apprehensive about handing the material over to a male director, no matter his track record. (Then again, a woman created Noorhelm in the first place, soooooo.)

I feel like Skam Austin more than other remakes has a large percentage of the viewers who watch the whole episodes rather than the clips, or who don’t understand the real time structure (correct me if other remakes have drastically more viewers for the full episodes than the clips). Each clip is flooded with comments telling the show to make the episodes longer or asking where the rest of the episode is. Tbh I find that really interesting because no doubt Facebook wants Skam Austin to be the hip new way to consume media in real time (I mean, assuming you have not seen the original show) but a large portion of the audience does not want to consume the show this way, lmao. And a lot of them cannot figure out how to watch the show! I blame some of that on the confusing Facebook video format, like the original Skam website felt so clean and easy to follow compared to Facebook’s ... everything.

Prior to the season’s start, there was a lot of SM stuff that set up stuff for this season, such as Jo’s epic quest for the best cupcake, Daniel’s car, the Kitten scandal, Abby is dating some football dude who’s one of Daniel’s friends, etc.

They made a point of it being Daniel’s birthday and him turning 18, I wonder if that will be relevant to the plot at all? Because now he’s legally an adult. Maybe if he beats the crap out of someone, like with the Yakuza guys, it’ll matter because he’ll be charged as an adult vs as a juvenile.

Abby’s new football player boyfriend is named Hunter. He has his own Instagram. I’m not sure why so much focus on this guy? I have nothing against him, just not sure why he of all people has an Instagram, compared to like Poonam or another supporting character. Would he be the Niko character since we already know Daniel has a brother? I guess maybe Daniel could hypothetically get in a fight with him over some Yakuza dude? Will Hunter end up dating one of the girl squad instead of Abby? Or does he not have much of a role except to be another of Daniel and Pen Jo’s social circle, lol?

Some information from the Bouldin Beat Instagram:

Grace is a staff writer, Poonam is a researcher (???? do they mean copy editor? if she’s researching stuff wouldn’t she just be a staff writer since ... they all do research ...) and Nic is a cartoonist. And Poonam’s full name is Poonam Para, love me that alliteration. (There’s also a Sullivan Smith and a John Jackson.)

Poonam does write the advice column. She manages to include a reference to Frozen in at least one piece of advice, to no one’s surprise, lmao.

In between reminding students about the 2018 midterms and an active shooter drill, the newspaper took the time to do the most important piece of all, Who Knows Daniel Williamson The Best.

His favorite movie is Dumb and Dumber which is not so subtly a connection to Grace’s IG name (Mary Swanson is a character from that film). So either it’s a thing they genuinely have in common, or he’s been trying to get on Grace’s good side. Or I guess he stalked her, watched the movie, and legit enjoyed it as Isak did with Romeo + Juliet for Even.

Penetrator Jo knows Daniel the best out of those questioned. Hunter does not know Daniel that well. Foreshadowing? Hunter’s a fake friend?

There are lots of horoscopes but I don’t know how to connect them to the characters since I don’t think we know their birthdays.Oh, except Daniel’s a Pisces, but I don’t know if him being so sensitive and “feeling all the feels” fits his personality that well.

The girls took part in the climate strike on March 15 and I do like the show acknowledging youth activism. I’m not sure it’ll play a huge role in the show itself, although frankly it would be a huge missed opportunity to ignore #MeToo considering the content of this season (based on the original).

Meg posted a pic of her with Grace captioned “me and wifey” and I don’t even ship them compared to other Eva/Noora pairings, but that’s just cruel.

There’s a text message and it confused me at first because Daniel says he apologized to Kelsey, and my eyes had glazed over that it was from last June, at the end of season 1. We get a rare glimpse into older texts that happened during a prior season - usually don’t see that with Skams, letting us see what was happening when the previous POV character couldn’t see it.

Anyway, back in the day, Daniel invited Grace for a picnic, she called him a cliche, they bantered, but it seems like she was a little torn about not being into him. He told her he apologized to Kelsey. Eleven days later he asks about their date and Grace says she’s in Dallas all summer and he says that wasn’t part of the deal. She asks if he seriously needs a date as incentive for baseline human decency, GOD, THANK YOU. A Noora finally said it. (Or at this point, it might not be the only Noora who said this. I’m still elated that Grace did.)

In September he texts her “shame about that boyfriend” so either she had a real BF and broke up with him at some point, or she just lied about it. I think it’s possible she said she had someone in Dallas which would be an easy way to keep up the lie. The “my girlfriend who lives in Canada” of Texas. And so that brings us up to now, where he notes she got caught and asks her out again. Daniel, fucking LISTEN to what she said about baseline human decency.

The girls’ group chat is Los Losers, an obvious reference to OG Skam’s girl squad. I got nostalgic as hell reading that, it was a sweet gesture.

I mentioned above that they didn’t stage the actual concert from Clout, which on a practical level I completely understand. But in-universe, it’s pretty far-fetched that there were no concert pics or videos from any of the characters on social media. I guess one of the hazards of Skam’s realism and social media format is that sometimes realism is too expensive to film, lol.

Daniel, Pen Jo, and their crew were all about the beach/spring break selfies this week so LMAO at how people were expecting the girl squad to chill at the beach later and just … that didn’t pan out.

Instead of going to the boys’ beach house, the girls did sheet masks, which is way more fun and also yields terrifying pictures.

If you got this far, thank you for reading!

#skam austin reactions #skamus reactions

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thisdiscontentedwinter · 6 years

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You know, I have come to you multiple times when I have a dilemma / question / input about social issues, but you seem to have everything sorted out… Like you have this inner wisdom haha. Or am I wrong? Do you have someone you talk to when you want to understand a social movement (Like I ask you things from time to time)? If I’m not mistaken, you’re one of the older people in the fandom, so I guess you’re way more mature than most of us, but I’m still surprised at how you seem to understand everything. I feel like I’m so ignorant compared to you. And you seem to be naturally understanding about lots of social problems, even though you’re not part of the ones who experience it. While me? I probably need to ask around & read lots of articles to scratch the surface.

For example, I’m not LGBT+, and afaik, you’re not too. But you seem to understand a lot about LGBT issues.

You’re white, living in a white-dominant country, I’m white, living in a white-dominant country too. Yet you understand white privilege, you understand the need of affirmative action (something that I used to think as unfair action), you understand the effect of colonization & how to combat racism, while I’m still struggling to bite back sometimes when I see PoC being snarky against white people (I remember you once said that we white should be able to receive some snark, since what PoC experiences is way worse than a snarky internet reply).

We’re both cis-woman, but your knowledge about TERF and transgenderism is amazing. I learn a lot about TERF when you had a discussion about it in your blog. I’m like a blank paper when it comes to trans people, while you’re like a dictionary.

May I ask how do I become like you? Like I want to naturally feel & understand things, without asking around first. Having to ask around makes me feel like I’m actually & naturally not empathic, because I have to get people’s opinions first, which means I don’t have my own opinion about the topic, which means I don’t understand the issue enough that I can’t form an opinion. Meanwhile everyone seems to be able to form their opinion & sympathize right after they hear about the issue.

Also, another thing is about fiction vs reality thing. To be honest it’s something that I’m still struggling with. Like I’m with you when it comes that people should write what they want, but I’m still on fence when it comes to fiction not affecting reality at all. Seriously, I’ve asked sooo many fanfic writers when it comes to fiction not affecting reality, and they all have explained wonderfully, but am I that dense and stupid for thinking that fiction impacts reality and sometimes people who write children having sex are actual pedophiles? But this question is for another time (I hope you don’t mind if I ask you this, again? With a more coherent stuff?) My point is, I’m jealous of how you manage to be like “Yes I’m pro X, because Y and Z and A and B and C”, meanwhile I’m like, people have explained to me numerous time about Y Z A B C, but I still can’t get to the X conclusion.

Am I “destined” to be unnaturally empathic / can’t make my own opinion without getting others’ first? Or is it something that you used to experience too? So I would be better with age?

Sorry for the incoherent post, I’m not native in English and it’s almost midnight at my place x_x

Your English is amazing, first of all! And thank you for all your kind words.

Basically I think it’s because I probably am older than a lot of people here, and I have a very diverse group of friends and family--none of him are shy about coming forward with things that matter to them! I have a lot of friends and family who aren’t straight, who aren’t white, who aren’t from my cultural background, so I’ve always been exposed to a lot of different viewpoints. There’s no trick to it at all, except exposure and experience. Nobody is destined to be non-empathetic. It’s just about widening your experience a little.

And when it comes to fiction versus reality, I say that fiction doesn’t affect reality, but what I should probably say is that fiction doesn’t affect reality in the way that antis think it does. Because a good piece of fiction (and by that I mean one that is well written, I’m not making a moral judgement) of course impacts on a reader’s or a viewer’s emotions. It’s supposed to.

You’re meant to read Lolita and feel disgusted at how Humbert Humbert rationalises his actions. But just because he is a pedophile and he attempts to justify that doesn’t mean that you’re suddenly going to look at a 12 year old in the street and say “Oh, yeah, she’ll do!”

Reading Lolita won’t make you a pedophile. Writing Lolita doesn’t mean that Nabakov was a pedophile. If you’re already a pedophile, I’m sure you’ll read Lolita and have a very different emotional response than disgust--you’ll probably find it affirming--but a book can’t make you a pedophile out of nothing, any more than playing a few founds of GTA will suddenly make you think it’s fine to go and steal your neighbour’s car and run over pedestrians.

Antis believe that reading the “wrong” things will mean you suddenly think you have the green light to do the wrong things. Or that somehow you never would have done the wrong things if you hadn’t read about a fictional character doing it first.

And that’s just nonsense. I’m certainly not that weak-minded, and I’m assuming that even the antis aren’t. Because--and here’s the part they don’t often think about--even works of fiction where the good guys are pure of heart and defeat evil still contain that evil to begin with. What if I read Harry Potter and it flips a switch inside of me and I become evil like Voldemort? Even “good” stories have evil in them, because, well, heroes need dragons to slay.

Stories have been a necessary part of the human experience since we were painting figures on cave walls. They’re a way to explore our world, and our psyche, safely. So yes, we can be emotionally affected by fiction, but it cannot change who we fundamentally are. Reading a “bad” book doesn’t mean we will become bad people, because most of us can tell the difference between fiction and reality. And most of us know that cheering on a scene in a movie where a city is destroyed by a tidal wave doesn’t mean that we laugh and cheer when we see tsunamis on the news. Because we know the difference.

In the Hunger Games, for example, I was delighted when those assholes tributes from District 1 got killed. In reality, this doesn’t mean I would be cool with children getting slaughtered for the entertainment of the masses.

I think what would be an interesting experiment would be to write down everything you read and watch in 2019, and then go back at the end of the year. Take your list, and look at it how an anti would. Look at all the “bad” stuff, and then ask yourself if your morals have changed during the year. Ask yourself if your morals and your core values have changed because of the media you consumed.

I’ll bet you’ll still be the same person you are today.

#fiction vs reality #submission

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nonbinarysasquatch · 6 years

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for the critical opinion on ships ask meme: dramione, rethaniel, joshbecca, grebecca?

Ah, yes, let’s see how many people I can piss off in one go. I’ll tackle these in reverse:

Grebecca: Maybe in some alternate universe these two could work out but not in the one we have. They were very toxic for each other and Greg, frankly, deserves better. I think It Was a Shit Show said everything about their relationship that needed to be said. It was terrible and Greg did the right thing by leaving.

While I do think Rebecca loved him, as long her obsession with Josh and her on issues went unaddressed she would’ve continued to string him along and eventually they would’ve hated each other. I think they were a really good example of how love can’t save a toxic relationship and you shouldn’t destroy yourself trying to make a toxic relationship work.

I do think seeing all the shippers who harass Rachel and Aline have soured me further on this ship but I still love Greg as a character. He’s (in my opinion) the most realistically human character the show has had.

Joshbecca: Josh is a sweet guy but he’s not remotely emotionally intelligent enough to be with Rebecca. And frankly, they just don’t have much in common. The main way they connect at all is via his childishness but for Rebecca that’s not healthy (and I’d argue it’s not really healthy for Josh either.)

There’s probably a universe where they could date for a few months and have fun but that’s it. They are just too different and in terms of the actual canon universe Rebecca has beyond treated him awfully and it’s only by the grace of the fact that Josh is the most forgiving and kind character on the show that he doesn’t hate her.

Rethaniel: Oh boy. Are you ever like, “Well, I’m about to say things that literally no one is going to be happy with”?

It’s been an interesting journey tracking my feelings about this ship. On my first watch through I was surprised by how much I was able to like Nathaniel, despite his flaws. But then I rewatched and was better able to analyse his actions (while watching season 3 live it became easy to forget things he had said and done and I didn’t pay attention to fan discussions at all.)

There are definitely Nathaniel moments I like. Actually, I still love his plot in Josh is Irrelevant because I really relate to him getting triggered in that episode for some personal reasons. It’s the only time I’ve found him relatable, though.

The funniest thing is that deciding to check out the CXGF fandom on Tumblr was the thing that really started to bring out my negativity about the ship. Simply because I was stunned to find out so many people... shipped them so wholeheartedly. It made me uncomfortable even though at that point I still hadn’t put an enormous amount of thought into it because frankly: I don’t care about Rebecca’s romantic life at all. It’s not why I watch the show. So my attitude has tended to be “she can have romantic stumbles and bad relationships as long as the end of the show isn’t about her romantic life.”

And I mean, that’s STILL my attitude. I know some people disagree but I’m fine with Rebecca having bad relationships and I know some people REALLY disagree but I think there is value to Nathaniel as a character (DON’T HATE ME LEAH) and deconstructing the privilege and abuses of wealthy straight white men in America.

Now, thankfully, my experience with Rethaniel shippers has all been great and most seem to be lovely people and many of them ARE critical of Nathaniel’s actions. So I don’t hold anything against them, and I’ve been forged in the fires of HP fandom where some truly gross ships are also some of the most popular so...

Anyhow, here’s why I’ve gone from kinda neutral on Rethaniel to them being actually something I’m against:

Look, before we get into any of Nathaniel’s behaviour and meta on his place on the show, I’ll just say: it’s really fucking hard to ignore that every female Jewish fan of the show I’ve interacted with hates Nathaniel. It’s not my place to comment on why that is but when an entire group is like “this dude makes us uncomfortable” I tend to listen.

Meta wise, we now know that Rebecca is Nathaniel’s Josh, aka object of obsession that he’s idealising. Which means that aside from any of his actual behaviour, once Nathaniel can get over that obsession it won’t be healthy for him to continue to interact with Rebecca.

Nathaniel sexually harassed Rebecca while they were trapped in an elevator.

He plotted to deport Josh’s father and to murder Josh’s grandfather so that he could get laid (though it’s debatable whether Nathaniel really thought he would have to go through with these things, I do think if Rebecca had been cool with them he would’ve let them happen and buried any guilt as per usual.)

He repeatedly bodyshames her.

He treats her mental health problems as cute and attractive.

When she breaks up with him he fires her out of spite (something he basically confesses to.)

Rachel Bloom has said that Rebecca is attracted to Nathaniel in part BECAUSE he negs her and that definitely tracks with Rebecca’s low self-esteem. She’s also said that her interactions with Paula’s dad factor why she goes and sleeps with Nathaniel after getting back to West Covina, so erm, unpack THAT.

For me the final clincher is “Nothing is Ever Anyone’s Fault” a song which I should note, I like (as a piece of satire and meta-commentary, which is a case for a lot of the show’s morally not great pieces.) After everything, Nathaniel doesn’t see anything he’s done as wrong. I do think he will eventually but the end of season 3 and the title being “Nathaniel is Irrelevant” to me send a clear message.

I’m baffled that some people think “Nothing is Ever Anyone’s Fault” is a sweet, romantic song when everything about it is the opposite of the message the show is trying to convey. Rebecca and Nathaniel are saying in that moment that part of what has drawn them together is not taking responsibility for their actions and blaming everything on trauma. It’s destructive and toxic, not romantic. And this evidenced by the following scene in the courtroom where Rebecca rejects Nathaniels amorality and chooses her conscience (aka Paula.)

And like, soon I will finish my season 3 reviews and get into why the season 3 finale is genuinely one of my favourite things the show has done (as it was the next missing piece that I wanted the show to cover... they had dealt with what Rebecca’s underlying problems were but not fully dealt with her need to take responsibility for her actions.)

I think there’s hope for Nathaniel as a character. He can grow and be redeemed and learn to use his privilege to help people, rather than using it as a weapon and a shield. But he needs to stay away from Rebecca. I do think they love each other but their love is destructive.

My final thought I want to attach is that... I think there’s something to be said for the relevancy characters like Nathaniel have for Americans. In this country, our real life villains look like Nathaniel and his family. They represent white privilege and and cold, driven capitalism.

It’s not entirely surprising that so many of us find it easy to love Nathaniel and latch onto him as a character. I think it’s something we’ve been conditioned to as a way of coping with life in a capitalist hellscape.

Observe the way people like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos are treated by many liberals. Jeff is, to be fair, a liberal but he’s also the wealthiest man in the world and his company has some serious ethical problems with how their workers are treated at all levels (it’s not just the people working in the warehouses, I’ve known Amazon programmers in the past and the work conditions are nightmarish and not sustainable unless you are in perfect health and have no personal life.)

And Elon Musk is a libertarian who has donated to Republicans who want to take people’s rights away but he still gets weirdly treated like some sort of liberal icon.

And I don’t want to poison the well too much, but I would like to at least make a cursory gesture at our president, who is a privileged straight white man who openly sexually harassed women, is guilty endless racism, antisemitism, ableism, misogyny and has of course been accused numerous times of sexual assault. A complete list of why our president is awful would require an entire novel to itself...

But someone like our president was able to get elected. Half the country voted him in.

And obviously... Nathaniel isn’t wealthy on the level of guys like that (or he wouldn’t be pissing about with a lawfirm like Whitefeather) and he’s mercifully not a monster like our president. But I do think our need to cope with our environment contributes to liking characters like him. If people like him can be good inside and can be redeemed then maybe there’s hope for this country.

But in reality... people like Nathaniel don’t grow and change. But I believe they can. And, for me anyhow, this is the value I see in Nathaniel. They can send a message to straight, white men about privilege and learning to fight back against the patriarchy that lifts you up. He can be a good person. But his road to that might be a little harder because men like Nathaniel don’t change because privilege protects them. Why change when society itself never allows you to fail?

But I think Nathaniel will grow and change. But I think it’s important he does that on his own. Rebecca can’t be his manic pixie dream girl (even though that’s literally how he sees her.) Rebecca’s journey is her own and it’s not about the men.

#crazy ex girlfriend #at least this is so long that no one is actually going to read it lol #please no one hate me!#Anonymous

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ficsbydob · 7 years

Text

Interactions in a Coffee House

Fandom: Disney Descendants

Ship: Bal

Word Count: 2350

Summary: The coffee shop AU no one asked for.

also found on AO3

Every day for the last three months, a dark purple hair petite girl would sit in the same table in the dark secluded corner of the café, drawing and ordering the same “blackest coffee you have” – her exact words. At first she was like every other customer to Ben, except most days she’d pay for her drink with chump change and never get a refill even though she was there twice as long as everyone else. After the first month passed, he started to take more of an interest – out of complete curiosity of course. He noticed that occasionally she would have other people with her, either separately or as a small group. A smaller boy with white hair who always had a dog with him (the owner wanted to do something about it but it seemed that it was a service dog of some sort) who would be doing homework – or at least that’s what Ben guessed – well she drew. Another guy, this one taller with long black hair, who spent most of his time flirting with anyone that looked his way. And the last person was another girl, she sketched almost as much as the purple hair girl did but she also would occasionally have a collection of chemistry books with her.

For two months straight, Ben had to endure constant teasing from Lonnie, the one person who made working at the café bearable, because he couldn’t keep his eyes off the mystery girl. He’d even give her a free refill every once and awhile, saying it’s on the house (which really was just deducted from his paycheck). Lonnie just couldn’t figure out why Ben didn’t just try to strike up a conversation with the girl, ask her on a date or anything for that matter.

Ben wasn’t really sure why either.

But when he came into work after school one afternoon and didn’t see the girl in her spot, he was taken aback. His whole shift he continued to look for her, but she never came. The next day, the same thing. She wasn’t there and she didn’t show up. By the end of the week, though it could be stupid, he was honestly starting to worry for her.

He was behind the counter, staring at her table – occupied by someone else – when Lonnie came up to him. “Missing your favorite customer huh?” She rested her elbow on his shoulder, looking in the same direction he was.

“It’s just weird,” came his reply.

“She’s probably sick or something. Or they moved. Or she died.” Ben looked over at his friend, eyebrows raised with a small, bemused smile. “Not everything is a happy ending King Ben.” She tapped his head and walked away to do her rounds.

He shook his head, rolling his eyes. “King Ben?” The voice startled him, making him turn slightly to see who had spoken. It was the girl. She was staring at him with a raised

He let out an airy laugh. “I was Homecoming king two years in a row, she won’t let me live it down.” She gave a nod, seeming unimpressed. He licked his lips, “Right. So the usual?” As he spoke, he started reaching for a cup, getting ready to fill up a glass with the blackest black coffee they got.

“Yeah.” She leaned forward, “But can you make it to go.” His hand stopped before moving toward their to-go cups, giving a nod.

“One blackest black coffee to go.” He set it down on the counter in front of her, “That’ll be four fifty-three.” She gave him a five and they exchanged change and that was that. It was probably their longest conversation they’ve had since she started coming to his place of work.

Lonnie came back, a smirk on her face, “Did you get her number yet?” He rolled his eyes, ignoring her and heading to the back.

“Chad, let it go,” Ben was walking out of the away locker rooms from Isle High, they had just won their lacrosse game but Chad, a curly haired blonde kid who’s been Ben’s friend since basically their birth, wouldn’t shut up about Isle’s number 8 and the “cheap shot” he took. “Even with that cheap shot,” though truthfully, Ben didn’t think it was, “we won.”

Chad didn’t want to let it go however, and continued to go off about. Ben rolled his eyes, deciding it wasn’t worth arguing about or getting his friend to move on, and moved ahead of his friend. He was turning a corner when he walked into someone. “Oh, sorry!” He moved back and looked down to see a full head of purple hair. “Oh! It’s you. Hi.” A smile appeared on his face as he saw coffee shop girl. Her eyebrows scrunched together, her head tilting to the side. Smile faltering a bit, he opened his mouth again, “I work at –“

“At the Coffee House. King Ben.” His smile grew again.

“Yup. That’s me.” A small pause, “So you go to Isle High?”

“Unfortunately.”

“I’m sure it can’t be that bad.”

She let out a huff, “Yeah, the gang activity really gives it that cozy safe feeling everyone wants for their children.”

He let out a laugh, “That’s fair. I’m sure it can get pretty interesting though.”

She shrugs, “It does keep you on your toes.” He glanced down at his sweatshirt, sporting the Auradon Prep school logo, before looking back up at him, a smirk on her lips. Just than the rest of his team started piling out of the guest locker rooms. “I’ll see you around King Ben.” She tapped his chest before moving along.

And see him around she did, of course, every day as she sat back in her usual spot, either by herself or with her friends. She didn’t talk to him much, outside of maybe thanking him for a refill and calling him King Ben.

He’s starting to regret her overhearing Lonnie.

On one of his days off, he came into his work place with a couple of his friends from school. Lonnie still had to work and after her shift ended the whole group planned to go to some party Aubrey, Ben’s ex, heard about. Lonnie constantly gives Ben crap for still being friends with Aubrey, she was never a huge fan on his ex.

Aubrey had gone up to order everyone’s drink, the money in hand, when she called out “Benny Boo,” across the café. He looked up, eyebrows raised, “What did you want again?”

“White Mocha Latte,” came his reply, not even bothered by the nickname Aubrey won’t stop using on him. It’s not like it bothered him or anything so he didn’t really see a reason to make her stop.

That was another thing Lonnie gave him crap about.

“Hey Benny Boo,” a mocking tone came from behind him. He turned around to see the mystery girl standing behind him, smirk in place.

“Hey,” he gave her a smile in return.

“Who comes to their place of work on the day off?” He gave a shrug.

“We have the best coffee in the city.”

She tilted her head to the side, “Pretty sure you’re biased.”

“And yet, I see you here every day,” he countered.

This time it was her turn to shrug. She gave a once over all his friends before deciding they weren’t worth her time before eyes where back on Ben. He probably shouldn’t be assuming but he felt like it was a safe bet from the look of uninterest resting on her face.

“Guess this means I won’t be getting my free refill.” She crinkled her nose, flashed him a small smile and continued on her way out the café.

From that point on, their interactions almost always happened that way. Some sort of small banter. He even finally learned her name, Mal. He maybe, sort of, really enjoyed how it sounded. Mal.

And he didn’t miss the looks her friend, the other drawer, would give him as he give Mal her free refill. Or when he’d stop by to ask what she was drawing – not that Mal would ever let him see. Apparently he hasn’t earned enough cred with her to get the privilege of seeing her works. He would just shake his head every time she pulled her sketch book to her chest, hiding the sketch from his eyes. But when he would go to clean her table after she left, there would be rare moments that she’d leave one her sketches behind. He might have started to collect them.

A couple more months went by and eventually Ben got familiar with Mal her whole group. He learned the other artist was named Evie, the boy with the white hair was Carlos, and the taller one was Jay. Jay actually ended up being the guy that Chad wouldn’t shut about when Auradon Prep went up against Isle. When Ben found that out he gave Jay a compliment, telling him he was impressed by the hit.

Out of all four of them, he noticed that Evie always had the most money. Whenever they four were together, she’d pay for everyone’s drinks and treat them to a snack of some sort as well.

They were all pretty great, in Ben’s opinion, and he enjoyed when they came in because it was four more people who made working at a café filled with mostly pretentious high school and college kids that much more bearable.

He was bringing them their drinks when Evie looked at him, “Ben.” From the tone of her voice alone, he knew that he wanted out. He was too nice to say that however.

Whatever it was that she was going to say, Mal didn’t seem particularly happy about it. “E.” Her tone holding a sort of warning.

It did nothing.

“Don’t you think Mal would look beautiful in this?” She held up a sketch of a dress. Ben didn’t really know much about fashion and he didn’t have the type of imagination to think of what that dress would look made up, but he could tell that it was a very good drawing of a dress.

He glanced over at Mal, placing down her drink in front of her, “Um.” He looked back at Evie, “I think she’d look beautiful in anything.”

“Awe,” she smiled brightly at him, placing her notebook down. “Not sure how that helps me convince her to go to the dance though.” She shook her head, looking over at her friend.

He looked over at Mal, “What dance?”

Evie answer. “Our Winter Formal. M thinks they’re a waste of time.”

“Because they are,” Mal replied back.

Ben shrugged, looking to Evie than Mal. “Dances can be fun. If you go with the right people. Anyone ask you?”

Mal just rolled her eyes, Evie speaking up again. “A couple of people. But M said no to all of them.”

Ben opened his mouth to ask why but Mal was already answering his question, “Because, E, it’s a waste of time.”

“M, it’s not! It’ll be fun!”

Mal, however, seem very certain in her revolution that it’d be a waste of her time. Ben left them to it, knowing that if he stuck around their table much longer and his manager saw he would get yelled at. Again. He’d look over at them, of course, through the rest of the night but it was busier than usually so he didn’t really get a chance to stop by again.

He also couldn’t get the fact the Isle was having a Winter Formal out of his mind. Honestly, it’d be pretty cool to go to a dance with Mal, he might have even thought about asking her to prom but if she thought dances where pointless it might not even be worth bringing it up.

He was making a to-go drink for some business major who almost always wore some hard rock metal band whenever he came in when Evie walked up to the counter. She didn’t even greet him properly when she opened her mouth to say, “Would you go with Mal to the Winter Formal?”

He glanced up at her, eyebrows coming together, “I thought she didn’t want to go. Y’know, they were pointless and stuff.” He placed the cup on the counter and reached for a lid.

“That’s all true. But!” He looked up at her again, shaking his head and handing the drink over to college kid, “She needs to go! This is our senior year and she’s never once gone to a dance.”

“What makes you think she’d go with me?” He moved back to the machines to clean up his mess.

“She likes you.” He nodded, knowing that was a given. Evie leaned over the counter, “Ben, she really likes you.”

His cleaning slowed down. Looking up at Evie, he licked his lips, “That doesn’t mean she’d want to go with me though.”

“Will you at least ask her?”

He paused, looking over at her usual table where she was watching them with curiosity. “Yeah, of course.”

He did ask her too, he waited until she came up to his counter for a free refill – though he has an inkling that she knows for a fact that they weren’t actually free – and just popped the question. It was no real surprise to Ben that she said no – that didn’t stop the disappointment however. She told him the same thing he heard her tell Evie, that it was a waste of time. But what surprised him is she suggest that instead they do something together. “Go to a movie or something.”

He smiled, nodding his head, “Yeah. Okay.”

She took her refill from him, “Okay. You’re paying.” She winked at him, holding up her cup as if to imply he does with her refills and moved back to her table with Evie.

Maybe down the road he’ll ask her to go to prom with him but for right now, he’ll take what he could get.

#bal #ben x mal #disney descendants #userana #au

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dogsliampaynedoesntinstagram · 7 years

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So I have a lot of somewhat diverging, incoherent thoughts about things you and your anons've said said, and I'll try to whip them into shape. 1) I wonder if there is a some gap between rational acknowledge and subconscious - bias (or if we're being impolite, homophobia) when it comes to these things. Of course, that can be rationalized away to an extent, but what I'm mainly talking about is the subconscious bias that Louis "reads" as gay to a majority of people and Harry does not. 1/

To use external examples, one of my favs from kpop is Zhou Mi from Super Junior M, and it’s pretty much an open secret in his fan base that he’s gay. He got a lot of flack when he and another member late-joined the group which can be attributed to overzealous fans and xenophobia, but Zhou Mi, unlike the other new group member, reads as less straight even in a non-Western context and still to this day (9+ years) gets more hate/is less popular. 2/

OTOH we have someone like Matt Bomer who is publically out, but still has a lot of straight female fans who are outright thirsty for him. They campaigned for him to be Christian Grey, and recently I saw someone describe him as “Can look, can’t touch”. To me, Bomer - and Harry (and Ziam) - doesn’t necessarily read as “straight” but more as “not-NOT straight” (the new Hollywood soft action hero) whereas Louis doesn’t get that benefit. 3/

This has very little to do with their actual sexuality, but again just subconscious bias. Unless if we’re able to acknowledge and confront our bias, oftentimes that can turn into discomfort and hate/anger, which might explain some of the over-the-top reactions we’ve seen in the past against Louis (and Zayn too - his otherness, in more obvious ways). 2) In terms of the straight female fans/queer female fans/desiring - desirability/triangulation of desire conversation– 4/

I just want to make a couple of observations (1) Queer female fans who make up a large part of L’s fanbase also include women / NB individuals who ARE attracted to men, as well as women / NB individuals who aren’t attracted to ANYONE. It felt worth mentioning to be factual and objective that actual ability to desire is not always the issue. Of the ones I follow who identify as bi/pan/other queer, a majority seem to express similar aesthetic reverence towards H and L instead of sexual. 5/

(2) I’ve seen at least one lesbian-identifying blogger recently who recently got a lesbian-identifying anon who said they would be happy to do [explicit sexual things] to Louis despite the fact she was a WLW and Louis is a MLM and the blogger agreed. So there might be something else going on there– But in terms of general fan response, similarly, over many fan polls, Zhou Mi’s fans often cited that they’d rather be his friend than date him. So it might have to do with how Louis/ZM are “read” 6/

3) In terms of your “There’s nothing wrong with a woman fantasising about Harry fucking her.” comment – I might be misinterpretting or overreading your intention with that statement, but it makes me uncomfortable for a few reasons. I respect why you’ve come to feeling this way and for other bloggers “shaming” women, but I inherently disagree because there’s other factors at play. 7/

I think we can readily agree that men vocalizing their violently objectifying and sexualizing comments towards women, especially women they don’t know, is problematic (e.g. Adam going “I’d fuck [Celebrity A]” while joking with his friends, Brad saying, “Her face don’t do it for me, but I’d take her bare on her hands and knees.”) I know that are ways in which the relationship is inversed with Harry because he is white, male, rich, privileged, in an industry where that is the peak of power 8/

That being said, you yourself pointed out that One Direction, and many boy bands, are treated the same way that females in the industry are treated – objectified, devalued for the actual talents they are selling while being told their most valuable feature is their desirability. ESPECIALLY for Harry, who has been given this role despite his vehement objections. For many larries, who are queer women, the violent objection against other [straight] women sexualizing Harry might be commiseration 9/

–as they themselves are often subjected to sexualization and unwanted advances despite their own sexuality or feelings, which is another level on top of just harassment. I want to point out that that commiseration is *empathy* with someone they perceive as a victim of systemic homophobia (also something else they experience) and not necessarily internalized misogyny against women and what they feel as a requirement for reciprocity in order to express desire for another party. 10/

I agree you can’t help who you’re attracted to, and if the fantasy is between you and yourself, then no harm done. However, in my experience on Tumblr, many straight fans of Harry do take it the next level equivalent with the Adam/Brad example I created above, in a way that treats Harry like an object for their fantasies rather than a person with autonomy, and a person who’s expressed discomfort in the past for being made into this object. 11/12

I understand if you disagree with me, but I wanted to offer another perspective that’s more nuanced than “women hate that women have desire because of internalized misogyny which is why they’re angry when women express desire”. Anyway if you read this… uh thanks!

**************

Hi Discluded - thanks so much for your asks. I think they’re really interesting. I think your idea of people being seen as not-NOT-straight is a really useful way of looking at some of the different ways celebrities are read. I think your comments will be really interesting to people who have been part of this discussion. I’m only going to respond tot he last bit, about Harry and het fans.

I’m not sure I agree that Harry has vehemently objected to being the object of desire at this point in his career. He definitely objected to being seen as someone with a huge desire for women, but that’s not quite the same thing. While he’s put some boundaries up (including literally with his wardrobe), his album gave heterosexual fans everything they needed in order to feel desired by him. I’m not saying I know how Harry feels about all this, but I am saying I’m very wary of other fans using a claim that they know Harry’s feelings as a way of bolstering their own reactions.

To your more substantive point - you end with motivations, why people might be objecting to fans who desire Harry. It’s not something I had touched on. If I was going to give a reason for why I wouldn’t talk about internalised misogyny. I would probably start with fandom dynamics - in this case Larries creating a ‘bad’ fan’ to differentiate themselvesselves from. I agree that a feeling of empathy and experiencing their own boundaries is probably a factor for queer women (although I’m not sure I think that queer women are more likely than straight women to express objection to women desiring Harry).

I think that people can have very good reasons for why they respond the way they do and still end up reinforcing existing power structures in the way they express that response (a distinction that tumblr is quite bad at acknowledging). It’s possible that queer women are responding to particular aspects of how particular women express their desire to Harry, but the easiest language to hand is language that shames women for having sexual desires.

For women who are objecting to particular articulations of other women’s desire for Harry then the way to make it clear is to be specific. To name expressions and actions that are crossing the line, rather than focusing on women’s desire.

And while I don’t think it negates your main point since I’ve been thinking about the gendered nature of desire - I also wonder about the example you used. The whole point of hetreosexuality (as like a social instituion) is that it’s not easily reversible. The language around sex gives very little option but to portray men as active and easily ignores women’s consent. I’m not sure that ‘Fuck me in that hat Harry’ in the tags is very similar to your example with Adam and Brad. I’m not sure I think heterosexuality works that way.

Thanks for your thoughts - and I’d love to hear anything else you have to say.

#discluded #I checked before I replied publicly #It really is worth reading all the parts of the ask if you haven't

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anvh89 · 7 years

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Shadow Hunters, Malec and what I consider the biggest issues

So for some time I and some of the TW meta group have been watching Shadowhunters and discussing/ranting about it. It’s been interesting enough to garner interest and rants and continued viewership, mostly to delight in the things that are going on which are nonsense and also appreciating the Malec story (and ranting about it)

I will admit I have not read any other the source material for a number of reasons *couch*plagiarismfanficscandal*cough* and the writing being meh at best, so I’ll keep to what the show has been telling us and maybe the wiki if something had to be looked up.

So a lot of the issues stem from world building problems, much of it is clearly borrowed from HP considering the origin, but beyond this much of the world building is almost random.

Let’s keep to my interest in Malec for the first bit , so early on the budding relationship meets resistance from Alec, he’s shown as very reticent he’s clearly got a crush on Jace but it’s secret and he’s ashamed of it, now could be many reasons, but then he makes the decision to marry for duty and family because that’s “following his heart” (this after an episode where he’s told by Izzy their parents are trying to marry them off and he just goes not a chance), which implies there is probably a taboo about being gay, but the show never brings that up, there is no homophobia it seems which makes it weird how strange Alec was about his homosexuality to begin with.

And just to get back to that Marriage story line and what it implies and which I think everyone will agree makes zero sense and I’ll tell you why. So the implication of the story line is that SH society is feudal, you see that in the way they talk about families, the Lightwoods, the Herondales, the Branwells etc. (This is almost certainly borrowed from the HP universe) so we have this society which values family power and prestige, that’s what we’re told during the marriage debacle, the Lightwoods were circle members who went back to the clave but lost status (but not that much of a loss since they just got bumped out to the NY institute) but the Clary shenanigans made them lose more favour and the solution the parents came up with was marrying off their kids to a family in better standing.

I’m not sure exactly why it had to be Alec, some weird reason for Izzy not to do it like being a diplomat to the DWers which makes little sense, there is no indication that Maryse stopped working when she married her husband, and Izzy was clearly more open to the idea in the first place.

At any rate this is an interesting storyline with far reaching implications about how SH society functions, but then Alec just decides not to go through with it and there are no consequences? This is where the world building fails, for a number of reasons, including “we’re a dying breed”, we’re led to this conclusion that the SH society is very traditional and set in its ways, that families and family ties are important, that SH are dying out. So basically we have a situation where you’d expect marriages to be based on politics and not something you could decide to get out of on a whim and with the Dying out part you’d expect there to be the expectation of no homosexuality or at least the need to perform the duty of breeding new SH’s for the war.

That could have been a very interesting story line, Alec torn between his love for Magnus and his duty to his society and the expectations of his marriage. Marriage in feudal societies and their view on fidelity was very different so you could have had him in a political marriage with Magnus as his lover on the side no problem. Lot of potential there, but instead it was used to leap frog the Malec ship into something totally romantic without having to spend any reasonable amount of time convincing the audience that Alec and Magnus had developed real feelings for each other (we’re talking about a timeline for the whole show of something like 2 months) and that leapfrogging into a romantic relationship really hurt the shipping potential for Malec, because it’s hard to be convinced that they’re so much in love when most of the scenes were Magnus being thirsty for some SH butt and Alec being weirdly maybe into it but also maybe not?

@flower-of-the-desert live chatted the first season recently and had some things to say about that.

Another massive is just how blind the show seems currently to the fact that the SHs are basically white supremacists and the shadow world is a police state.

It’s really blatant if you just pull the veil off for even a second.

Shadow hunters are the pure beings with angel blood so they can wield divine power (and they can be tainted as seen by Izzy not being allowed into the iron sister’s castle thing, another inconsistency, celibate women in a feudal society where the race is dying out…) to protect the mundanes from invisible demons, and also maybe Downworlders which is a horrifically racist word, I mean downworlders? And this is something they call themselves as well? Bad worldbuilding again, I mean surely no one would care to be called downworlder it’s clearly oppressive just from the word down.

I looked at the wiki and the accords is basically the SH and the Clave acknowledging that the DW’s have souls and can’t be hunted and killed for sport.

It’s also clear that because they have demon blood in some way downworlders are looked down upon by the clave and SH and Valentine is just the logical extreme of a fundamentalist who wants to commit genocide on the unpure DW’s (which on the show you might have noticed just how many DW’s are POC, it’s where the show gets their diversity)

Then the show keeps telling us (important the complete disconnect between show and tell on this show) that the new generation is a more tolerant generation and such, but here is the thing.

Banging a Downworlder does not make them tolerant!

Seriously when we’re told they’re more tolerant of DW it’s basically because they’re out there having sex with them, Jace and Maia there in season 2 when he was hung up on Clary was basically him slumming it to get bury his manpain… but the thing is more often than not we’re shown the SH’s exploiting the DW’s for whatever they need at that time, Alec going to Magnus for every little thing, Clary to Luke and Izzy to Raphael and it’s always for something they need help with.

That also goes to the Police state thing, but the most clear examples is during the time where the Seelie woman was killing shadow hunters and making it out to be vampires and werewolves, the shadow hunters decide it’s time to demand DNA tests, to insert trackers in werewolves and Imogen “A downworlder cannot challenge our authority . not in times like these” and then of course there is the fact that Izzy straight up kills the Seelie with impunity and there was no repercussion for her at all. I was stunned I thought oh no now you stepped in it, killing her was the wrong thing to do… but nope and it’s not the only case. They routinely threaten DW’s and such to get their way, Izzy even takes that picture with Raphael’s sister and Simon and that was distasteful too.

It’s especially annoying since we’re presented with the idea that the SH are good, and then we have the way Imogen talks about the downworlders – “Valentine wants those people dead, I am trying to help them” incredibly patronizing and racist it seems almost ripped from the history of slavery (those people can’t think for themselves, they need the help of us good civilized people) and of course her little speech about how Jace is from a line of strong shadow hunters who are revered and feared by those who oppose all that is good and just.

I mean this stuff is so blatant I can’t believe that fandom isn’t in more uproar about it!?

And perhaps it’s because my exposure to fandom has been mostly through Malec and the shiny Malec scenes distract people from the clear truth.

I have to make something clear, I don’t ship Malec, in fact I don’t ship anything on the show, I want to be able to ship Malec, I was all geared up to be able to do so, I appreciate the Malec as a gay relationship and the representation, but the show failed to make me feel the romantic & sexual tension the potential for something more before throwing the two together.

So last episode 219 Raphael and Izzy had more tension together than Malec has had through most of the relationship, even though they should have faced the same issues, and they did, we had a string of episodes where Alec kept fucking up because he didn’t believe in Magnus or he didn’t trust him or he allowed his own privilege to cloud him from the truth of just how awful he was being. Instead of resolving these horrible events in any satisfying way we got the no resolution “Sorry I love you” Smooch that just put Malec back where they started before the episode happened.

That’s not even mentioning how utterly disappointed I was with Magnus big dark secret, what he considers his most ugly side… he’s 400-ish or more years old first we’re expected to believe that he’s never told any of his many loves that he accidentally killed his step-father as a child? And then there is the disappointment that that’s all he is ashamed off? That’s the extent of his dark past? He didn’t have an Angelus period where he didn’t care about human life at all or something, maybe started a war or something… nope all he has to be ashamed off is that one thing and he’s never told a soul for 400+ years…

That’s nit-picky maybe but Magnus has just been continually portrayed as one would a young girl in love for the first time, super doormat and all.

To another nit-picky world building issue

Portals

They make absolutely no sense, when Valentine is being brought to Idris and he gets sprung… when we’re told you can’t enter a portal you don’t know where is going because you’ll be lost.

There are no damn rules about Portals, they do whatever is necessary for plot reasons, sometimes you can enter a portal without knowing, you’ll go where the last person went, but sometimes if you enter a portal you’ll end up where you’re thinking off as you go in…

This is just terrible world building, you have to have a clear rule for how magic stuff works, which brings us to runes and how they’re facing the same problem, they work how the plot needs them to. So the episode where Clary is hallucinating they have to active the healing rune on her to heal her, but instead Jace hugs her and activates his own healing rune and somehow that heals her too? What? And when they were looking for Jonathon they shirtless hug because they can search him out with a new magic rune Clary received from the angels which is terrible deus ex rune writing and could have been done so much better a different way if you’d tweaked the world building and didn’t needlessly have to have the main character be uber-speshul.

But yes they’re tracking jonathan through Clary’s blood and nothing makes sense because they don’t have the same blood or DNA and Jonathon is filled with demon blood versus Clary’s angel blood and don’t even get me started on why Jace had to do it… The whole thing was proxy-sex so they could be weird around each other for no reason, it could have been comedic if they’d have had Alec with them also shirtless hugging because parabatai bs power, at least it would have made it genuinely awkward.

Another thing, where did Luke’s tattoo runes go when he was turned into a werewolf? And why is he not a shadowhunter werewolf? How is it that he’s no longer a shadow hunter because he got werewolf std’d but Jonathon who’s got demon blood out the wazoo and spent years in edamame or whatever it’s called, the demon realm, he is still a SH for some reason.

World building I tell ya.

I’m sure I’m forgetting something but my mind is all ranted out except for the Malec break up, which damn they should have used those old no-resolution slights to make it better and not have focused so much on the lie and the political aspects because while those are big there are big betrayals that were just glossed over during the season that could have been brought forth to really put a wedge between them for them to overcome or not.

#Shadow Hunters #Malec #ranting #meta #maybe slightly #I don't think it's really anti anything?#sure it's ranty #more frustrated that the worldbuilding is lacking

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thecorteztwins · 7 years

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“X-MEN MUTANT EMPIRE, BOOK THREE:(SALVATION)” PROLOGUE + CHAPTER ONE

@malakhvent @hexiva @muffiewrites @magnetician @superiorvengeance @actually-i-prefer-magneto @taintedhero @magnet-dad Hey there folks! For those new to being tagged in my Mutant Empire reading liveblogs, the “X-Men: Mutant Empire” books are a trilogy written by Christopher Golden in the 1990s. They are novels, not comic books, and the X-novels occupy a very shakey/debated place in canon. That said, they're excellent characterization sources (in my opinion), especially for characters that didn't get much in canon, such as Carmella Unuscione or the Kleinstock brothers. The reason I'm tagging you all, however, is because of the Magneto characterization. He is the main villain of this series, having used a reprogrammed Sentinels to take over Manhattan, along with the help of his Acolytes. He has rechristened Manhattan as “Haven” and invites all mutants to live there, while allowing humans to remain if they agree to live by his new rules under which they are second-class citizens. The X-Men are, of course, trying to intervene, both to stop Magneto himself but also to prevent the US military from deploying their own solutions. Magneto's characterized in these novels more similarly to how he's written today than how he was written in most of the 1990s. For a lot of the 90s, Magneto was, to put it simply, terrible. Like the worst he's been since the Silver Age. As in, literally killed THOUSANDS of innocent civilians. He's not movie fandom Magneto, who only ever hurts very bad people who definitely deserved it, and who usually has no other choice. The Magneto of the 90s is dark as fuck, much like everything else in comics was at the time. However, the Magneto of these books is far more complex, noble, and (by comparison) moderate...while also still not straying from the flaws that make him a villain. It's a little-known, under-rated series, and probably only of interest to Acolytes-loving nerds like me, but I think it's valuable for fans of Magneto who seek to balance his good and bad traits into the most accurate picture possible, so I think it will be of interest to you all even if most of you are writing a movie-based Magneto. So, that's why I tagged you all, I thought you'd find it interesting and enjoyable! This is the THIRD book, so if I haven't tagged you before and you want to catch up, the tag on this blog for it is “mutant empire”! Also, everything in here is opinion, you don’t need to agree with the characterization of Magneto in these books or my analysis thereof, it’s just my own thoughts as I was reading. With that preface out of the way, let's began!

PROLOGUE We begin with Manhattan, which is now called Haven. As a mun who writes the Marvel character called Haven, this keeps making me double-take when people say things like “let's go to Haven” or “you're of no use to Haven”. As a note, I don't think Magneto ever knew about the person Haven (though she is shown to know about him) since he was dead during her period of conflict with X-Factor. Anyway, as for THIS Haven, the subway is down and there's very little traffic, but lots of restaurants and small business are open because they have a fuck ton of new patrons coming in. Mutants are pouring in from across the country, across the world. On the good side, a lot of them doubtlessly need a sanctuary like this. On the bad side, Magneto sees their gathering here as a way to enlarge his Mutant Empire. This is typical of Magneto, if often forgotten by fandom: He wants to save mutantkind as a whole, but the individuals are still means to that end. He did the same thing on Genosha---using the population to form an army---and who can forget his “pawns go first” line in X3? Oh, wait, a lot of people, no one likes X3.

But anyway, this is on the first page and I already like the balance going between the aspects of Magneto as savior and villain. Also, I don't think this connection was intended by the text, but I can't help but see an analogue to Xavier here; he offered a home to mutants in need, then trussed up those same vulnerable teenagers as a private paramilitary group. Both these men have good intentions, but they will take advantage of the very people they're trying to save in order to reach that larger goal.

Also: “In less than a day, he had transformed one of the most important cities on Earth so that it conformed to his vision: a planet where mutants were the masters and humans were the servants. It was the only way for mutants to survive human prejudice.” A lot of people will note that Magneto doesn't want to kill all humans, and that's generally true, but the fact is he does frequently still want mutants to be the dominant species. In his early 2D Silver Age days, this was due to just straight-up thinking mutants superior, but in current times (again, this book was really ahead of its time in terms of Magneto) it's more like what he says here, it's to keep mutants safe. Because humans can't hurt them if THEY'RE the ones who are the underdogs instead. As a note, this is the mentality that I write Anne Marie Cortez as having. She looks at history, looks at the horrible things humans have done to each other, at the horrible things done to mutants now, and is like, humankind obviously cannot be trusted to be in charge. She believes that a mutant-dominated society will be better for mutants AND humans. And she doesn't think mutants will be as bad as humans either, because she believes God created mutants not just to be the physical improvement upon the flawed humanity, but a spiritual one as well. She believes that while some mutants are doing “bad things” now due to this imperfect world, they WILL be better than humans are, they CAN be better, once everything is put right (that is, mutants put on top with Magneto leading them) She, uh, she has religious delusions (with Magneto as the modern Christ in this paradigm, obviously >.< Anne Marie no!)

“From the observation platform at the top of the Empire State Building, Magneto looked down upon his Mutant Empire and his heart swelled with triumph, happiness, and pride. The sun forced his slate-grey eyes into a squint, the wind whipped his silver-white hair across his forehead, and Magneto smiled. It was a beginning.” AWWW I ALMOST WANT THE SERIES TO END HERE! Instead, we go to Wolverine and the Beast, whose exchange is irrelevant to the topic of this post (Magneto) and then to Amelia Voght of the Acolytes. Amelia Voght was a past lover of Charles Xavier, but split up with him when he formed the X-Men. She wanted to live a quiet life, and felt that Xavier's means would attract human attention to mutants. Years later, when she had, despite her attempts at a quiet life on her own, lost everything (including her family) to humans, she joined Fabian Cortez among his second-gen Acolytes recruits. Though Fabian is currently dead at the time of this novel, Amelia, like the other Acolytes, now follows Magneto in his stead (and much more happily) Unlike most of the Acolytes, Amelia receives far more complex characterization, and she's not the bloodthirsty sadistic bigot-for-fun that most of them are. She's actually a lot more like Magneto, which might explain why she follows him, despite having her doubts that his way is any more hopeful than that of Xavier. Anyway, now that you know who she is, here's what's going on. She's pretty pleased too, like Magneto. She's also surprised, not that he succeeded but that humans are still in the city. For those who weren't with me for the first two books, Magneto did NOT kick humans out. He said they could leave if they wanted, and stay so long as they accepted his new rules. A lot did leave, but some did stay (I imagine a lot COULDN'T leave, it takes money to be able to move and set up somewhere else ASAP, so there is definitely a class privilege thing going here, which overlaps with race and sexuality/gender. I don't think Magneto intended that, but the reality is that it's the people who are already the most oppressed that don't actually have a choice in whether they go or stay) Amelia is surprised by this, she thought that the island of Manhattan would be devoid of humans once Magneto took over, but reflects that, as I already noted earlier, “But Magneto's intention had always been for mutants to rule humanity, not destroy it. Voght had privately doubted it was possible. On this day, she changed her mind.” Anyway, Voght thinks about how the US government is still on the fence about what they're going to do, but Voght figures that save for a nuclear strike, Magneto and the Acolytes have it “all wrapped up”.

Amelia enters the reception area. There is one woman (the deputy mayor; the mayor himself “abandoned his city without a thought) and three men, one of whom is the police commissioner. Deputy Mayor Perkins is direct and no-nonsense. Amelia takes them all to meet with Mags, but before she does, warns the police commissioner that “As of this day, Magneto is the only law this island knows. He is not in favor of the death penalty, but that does not mean he does not see its uses.” Kinda like on Genosha, when he killed Fabian Cortez and all the good guys are like OMG YOU MURDERED HIM (come on guys, are you really THAT upset?) and Magneto was like “look, I run Genosha, consider this capital punishment, they have that in the USA you know” Magneto is of course “resplendent in his regal purple-and-crimson uniform. Without his helmet he wore during battle, his silver-white hair fell around his shoulders.” Ooooh, we got a long-hair Mags! He doesn't usually have long hair in 616, that's typically an AoA thing. Also RESPLENDENT I love it. Perkins gets right to it with “Why are we here?” and Magneto appreciates that she has little patience for small talk, but invites them to sit all the same, though he remains standing. He says they're here because they're the highest-ranking officials still remaining in the city and “You all need to know how I wish this city to be run, now that I am its sole authority.” So, a moment ago Amelia was surprised at how “amiable” Magneto is being to these people, how “benevolent” he looks, and I think I can say why---because he's won. He's the one giving orders. He can be nice because he's the top dog now. Admittedly, he was never nice to his underlings while running the Brotherhood, and not exactly friendly to the Acolytes either, but that's when, even though he had control of small group of people, he was still fighting against the larger world. Now that he has what he wants, he's willing to be nicer to those below him. Which isn't a compliment, btw; people who are only decent to others when everything is going their way are NOT good people. I think there's also the aspect of responsibility bringing out the best in him too. As cruel as he was to his followers, he was wonderful to the New Mutants when he was their teacher. Partly I think that's because they were children, but also because they were HIS children, tasked to HIM by Xavier. They were his responsibility in a way that the Brotherhood and Acolytes are not. His job wasn't to lead them, but to take care of them. Likewise, he's going to be taking care of this city, even if he'll also be taking some of its members for his own personal army. So I can see him being more benevolent here, even if only in the sense of a benevolent dictator (which he's very clear is the case, he says so himself he's the “sole authority” from now on) I guess I'm reading a lot into it, it's only two seconds of him being friendly and polite, but once my brain started going on it I couldn't stop.

Anyway, he restates that Haven/Manhattan is now “a class system, with all mutants as the nobility, or ruling class” and basically dictates Perkins as in charge of managing the remaining human population “answerable, of course, to me” and that she can appoint the others to any positions she sees fit to help her. He wants no more drugs, no more violent crime, no more corruption, that he wants all of the problems Manhattan had before his rule to be cleaned up. Perkins argues that corruption is inevitable in any system (I would say ESPECIALLY in this system, if the Acolytes are apparently gonna be “nobility”) Magneto counters that the corrupt are cowardly, thus they have already fled Haven, so logic dictates that there's no more corruption and he won't tolerate any. ...Magneto, your logic is not our Earth logic. Alas, this is pretty typical Magneto, he doesn't always, erm, make sense. Th police commissioner, Ramos, says he's not going to be Magneto's lapdog, that he's only going to enforce ACTUAL laws and that the police are NOT going to become Magneto's personal army. Mags smiles, tells him that he already has a private army, that he doesn't need the police “and I most certainly don't need you.” He then raises one hand in a gesture of “amusement and dismissal” and says, “Amelia, would you mind?” Amelia, for those who forgot or are just joining us, is a teleporter. She sends Ramos outside the building. She then thinks about how she could have teleported him high in the air outside and let him fall to his death, how she is “not a hardened killer, but she knew the value of an example. Still, Magneto would have been specific if he'd wanted the man dead. Her lord rarely sanctioned homicide. Much to the other Acolytes disappointment. A few things: 1) For those wondering about the “her lord” bit, that's not unique to her, all the Acolytes consider him to be their Lord. The big difference between the Acolytes and the Brotherhood is that the Acolytes revere Magneto in a RELIGIOUS sense (which I've built on especially with Anne Marie, while giving Chrome and Delgado different motives, I wanted some diversity of motivation in my crew) They even have a Book of Magnus (which I am pretty sure Fabian wrote, not Magneto) I shit you not 2) “Much to the other Acolytes disappointment” As I've said again and again, the Acolytes members that came after the first team are largely terrible people who just wanna kill all the “flatscans” they can. I wonder if they miss the days when Fabian let them go after hospices and school buses? Yes, really. Fabian did not keep a leash on those guys, he ENCOURAGED them to be bloodthirsty anti-human fucks. You could interpret that as anti-human bigotry on his part, I interpret it on using their rage and sadism to keep them happy and make them easier for him to control 3) Amelia, the hell do you mean you're not a hardened killer? You “made an example” EXACTLY like that in the previous books! Granted, said example was done because humans were threatening/attacking her, so it wasn't in cold blood like it would be here, but still, this is something she has JUST RECENTLY DONE

Magneto continues to those remaining that the Acolytes will enforce the law on the mutant population, the human police on the human. He wants Haven to be an example to the rest of the world---no drugs, full employment, a fair wage, no crime, no homelessness, no hunger. Oh Magneto, you're making Anne Marie's dreams come true. Or trying, anyway, but what's that quote about the road to hell? This is interesting though, because we're getting a glimpse of something we didn't with Genosha (at least in what I've read)---how Magneto would run things (or at least, his ideals/goals) when he's in charge. Oh, and the reason he wants Haven to be an example? “So society knows what to expect when we begin our expansion.” So, here's my question to that...Magneto is happy to let humans leave if they don't like his rules...but if he plans to expand...what happens if (as is probably his goal) he takes over the world? Where do they go then?

Magneto's last word to this lot are that “Bigotry will not be tolerated. Bigots are to be deal with most---harshly.” Amelia, like most people in the comics, knows Magneto's personal history as a Holocaust survivor (it's been presented on trial before) so she knows where this is coming from. But she wonders what would happen if she pointed out how a lot of the Acolytes are “rabid bigots” themselves, and she doubts he'll have them dealt with as harshly “but a woman could dream” (Amelia doesn't like Carmella or the Kleinstock brothers, the specific bigots she was thinking of) Now, I realize the kneejerk response here is to point out that hating the people who oppress you is not the same as bigotry, but trust me guys, she's RIGHT in this case. She is really, really right, like I cannot stress to you what a bunch of genocidal eugenicist assholes these people are. As in, they wanted to kill CHILDREN for being human. Carmella even wanted to kill a MUTANT child because he had Down Syndrome! Unlike real-life minorities, mutants not only have the power to be “reverse bigots” they actually even have a leg to stand on to “justify it” it in terms of “genetic superiority” and believe me, THE SECOND-GEN ACOLYTES USE THAT LEG. A LOT. ...also frankly, I don't think much of Amelia for being one of the “good Acolytes” because that means she's still fucking hanging out with these assholes even though she KNOWS better. You don't get points with me for being more moral than your teammates if that “morality” only amounts to “not joining in the worse stuff they do” rather than any actual opposition and/or leaving the team. And the same to Magneto for employing them, even if he tries to keep a tighter leash than Fabian did. So, the prologue ends there. The first chapter follows, and it doesn't feature Magneto at all, but it has some bits that are very, very relevant to current issues (sadly) so I thought I'd include it too since said bits are brief. CHAPTER ONE The X-Men are meeting with government liaisons Val Cooper (pro-mutant, ally, knows Xavier is their leader) and Henry Gyrich (anti-mutant, doesn't know Xavier secretly leads the X-Men but is the first villain I've seen with the sense to suspect it) discussing what to do about the Haven situation. We are told, as in last chapter, that mutants are pouring into Manhattan/Haven. We learn that the army is trying to keep them out, and that any mutants who enter are considered terrorists. So, we've got an oppressed population, many of which are likely refugees with no place better to go, coming to a place that has opened its doors to them...but the government has decided they're terrorists and is trying to keep them out. That sounds a little familiar. I understand the logic, that any mutant in Haven could potentially join Magneto's army, but “potentially” and “actually” are different things. After all, any refugee could “potentially” be a terrorist too, right? Anyway, blah blah blah, Gyrich is a bad guy, then he tells Gambit “You're in America, speak English” and COME ON I doubt I need to spell out the significance of that. And given that it's coming from Gyrich, there's no way it's not MEANT to be significant.

This was written in 1997, you guys.

Okay, so chapter ends, basically the X-Men have seven hours to go into Manhattan and fix this or else Gyrich is going to have the island nuked and the press will claim that it wasn't the President that did it but the result of Magneto's own terrorist plot backfiring on him with catastrophic results. Because Gyrich is a bastard despite having gotten some neat character insight in the previous books . The X-Men are fucking horrified and Rogue even says “Maybe Magneto has the right idea” but since it's now six hours and forty nine minutes everyone decides they'd better bet going instead of chewing him out, and the chapter ends there. I've got to hand it to Golden, he's doing a really good job with this. Not just with Magneto characterization, but this whole set-up in general. There's a lot wrong with what Magneto is doing, and yet the good aspects are such that it's hard not to just forget the bad and root for him, at least for me. Especially since the human government is, well, Gyrich. But also good folks like Val Cooper. And as linked, we get some depth even to Gyrich. In short, Golden is really, really good at making a multi-sided conflict with multi-sided characters and challenging the reader on who to root for. At least that's my opinion. Stay tuned, folks! ALSO ONE MORE THING! I have a big question---where is Exodus? We know he's here, the first book began with him and Magneto (and Magneto thinking about him as a big purple butterfly, which I loved) But he really hasn't been seen since then, and with no explanation given as to why. This is actually pretty common, Exodus just not being in the picture for whatever reason, because he's so stupid OP that when combined with Magneto, it's pretty much game over for anyone in their way. So writers are always having to find a way to either separate them or put on of them out of commission (it's usually a coma) But here, there's no REASON thus far given for Exy's absence, he's just...not there. Even though he was earlier. So I'm thinking/hoping that maybe in this book we get a good in-universe reason for that, rather than him just poofing because Golden realized that he'd just fucking wipe everybody out in the first book if he was around.

#xmen #x men #x-men #mutant empire #magneto #X men novels

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