#how mainstream was it because this was my childhood

[aceforwhatevenisthis]

you: i want more ghost files! me: quiet, we have ghost files at home ghost files at home:

[vanrougenui]

i cant believe we lost christian horse girl kpop the purest art form left us to never be seen again

[genderkoolaid]

Recalling her Depression-era childhood in an Italian section of Brooklyn, poet Diane di Prima noted the following: “This pseudo ‘white’ identity... was not something that just fell on us out of the blue, but something that many Italian Americans grabbed at with both hands. Many felt that their culture, language, food, songs, music, identity, was a small price to pay for entering the American mainstream. Or they thought, as my parents probably did, that they could keep up these good Italian things in private and become ‘white’ in public.” But such worlds blurred, and the costs were heavy. “America became white,” James Baldwin has written, “because of the necessity of denying the Black presence, and justifying the Black subjugation. No community can be based on such a principle—or, in other words, no community can be established on so genocidal a lie.” The “price of the ticket” for Italians and all immigrants was to learn how to demonize and reject. “And in the debasement and defamation of Black people, they debased and defamed themselves.” Assimilation into whiteness brought a whole host of material privileges and rewards, but it required distorting and disowning that which most resembled the dark other. It was often those active in the radical subculture who struggled to point this out, because embracing whiteness severely limited Italian Americans’ ability to dismantle the systems of inequality that threatened their very lives.

— Living the Revolution: Italian Women’s Resistance and Radicalism in New York City, 1880–1945 by Jennifer Guglielmo

[lizbetlovesbyler]

my biggest personal byler proof is just how much they remind me of my first queer relationship before we started dating

queer characters are incredibly easy to fuck over, even without intention. often spelled out or intensely sexualised to prevent misunderstandings for a mostly heterosexual audience, queer storylines are exaggerated and thus become unrealistic.

stranger things doesn’t do that with its queer characters. take robin:

this scene is done beautifully. genuinely beautifully.

robin admits her feelings for tammy and how she locked them away, not just because tammy didn’t like her back, but because she is a queer girl in the 80s. her feelings are unnatural and unwelcome in hawkins.

steve’s acceptance of robin in this scene makes people forget how horrifically this could have ended:

As for Mike and Will

you don’t write a perfect representation of mutual teenage queer pining between childhood friends by accident.

queer pining is quiet and suppressed (especially for young people and ESPECIALLY in the 80s). It is unhealthy to suppress these feelings the way queer people tend to, it’s beyond the typical “secret crushes” straight people experience. queer pining can destroy people when they’re not supported.

through robins character, and wills arc in season four, we can see clearly the duffer brothers understand the nature of queer love, and wish to do it justice.

will ending up with some random last minute jock is unrealistic and does not do his character justice.

mike staying in an insecure relationship, constantly worried his girlfriend will grow out of him and leave him, rather than accepting will’s unconditional love for him, accepting his own love for will and letting himself be who he is, does not do his character justice.

even so, if they tried to set up byler in a way that would come across clear to the GA, it would, by default, become unrealistic and unrepresentative.

neither are yet able to admit to close friends and family they are queer, but they are supposed to convey that part of themselves to an (understandably) dense/heteronormative mainstream audience?

queer teenage love is not the same as straight teenage love, it doesn’t shock me that the majority of the audience isn’t able to pick up on byler beyond wills feelings, and they’re not supposed to.

we all say what we see, they don’t see the queer love brewing because they’ve never experienced it, they’ve never been mike and they’ve never been will. they’ve been max and lucas and nancy, steve, jonathan, etc etc

doesn’t make their heteronormative perspective accurate, they are just straight. they understand will and mike the same they do lucas and dustin. mike says they are friends, they have no reason to think otherwise. they do not know what queer love actually looks like, the duffer brothers do. the actors do. we do.

you are not delusional. you are queer.

if byler was widely agreed upon at this point in the story, it would not be an accurate representation of queer romance. that is the point.

my moneys on the latter and they better get every award for it.

[mermazeablaze]

This video is doing numbers on TikTok, but I wanted to share it here because I am so proud. The man being featured is my uncle Steve Smith.

Steve has been building drag racers & custom cars his entire life.

My grandma before passing away would tell the story of how when he was 10 or 11 years old - she came home to him taking apart the engine in her secondary vehicle (reserved for fancy outings).

She asked him why & he said he wanted to know how it worked outside of a schematic. & she told him that as long as he put it back together the way he found it, it was fine by her. & what's more - he put it back together from memory without even looking at a diagram!

If anything went wrong with the car, my grandma had him fix the car & it was that way until my grandma passed away. She never paid for a mechanic in her life again.

When Steve was a teenager he spent most of his time at the OKC Racetrack & raced with drag racers he built himself.

Also, as a teen he won the Bethany, OK wheelie championship by riding over a mile nonstop on his motorcycle on a single wheelie position.

All throughout my childhood he always had cars around in various stages of fixing up.

The city of Bethany refused to sell him the property next to his house to open his own auto garage. He had worked for Diffee Motors most of my life up until then. So he moved out in the country & opened his own garage.

Steve has been on several mainstream auto shows being featured for his custom work. He also built a custom car for one of the guys on Duck Dynasty. He was also offered a permanent role on an auto TV show, but he turned it down because it required moving out of state.

My uncle Steve is one of the sweetest, kindest & most generous people you will ever meet in your lifetime. He's as smart as a whip, has never met a stranger & gives the best hugs!

It just makes me so happy to see him getting the recognition he deserves.

The picture below is of him at a family function sitting next to his wife, Nancy.

[oreo-oro-orero]

Look i don't wanna sit here and get up on my soapbox and start being preachy but i just find it funny how certain sections of the fandom treats TB and by extension Ekko and how that ultimately just shows an underlying problem in shipping culture that honestly only seems to have gotten worse.

TB is such a impactful ship at least in my opinion because i feel as though this is one of the rare occasions where a ship staring a black character is not only loved and praised but also has a view in the mainstream. Most of the time black character when involved with shipping are either cast aside, mistreated or used as a stepping stone for the white character to find their "True Love" so to see TB be loved and praised is genuinely such a amazing and important thing to see and how some of this community reacts to them has shown me that despite this love there is still a major problem with Anti-Blackness.

Now I'm not saying that you have to ship TB or that your Anti-black/racist if you ship them with other characters but from some of the stuff i've seen it seems like its less about the fact that you don't like ship and more about the fact that you don't like Ekko and specifically you don't like Ekko with Jinx. The way some people try remove the importance Ekko has in Jinx's life at this point comes off a malicious. We have people out here describing Ekko as "some random black boy she knew" and it's like okay that's such a one layered look at their relationship and when he is granted the privilege of being apart of her life by some people his role is minimized and relegated to "oh well he is there and he was a small part of it but her ACTUAL motivation was...." and listen, you could make the argument that he wasn't the only thing that spurred her into action but to sit here and act like he didn't have a large impact on her and her subsequent call to action is just lame.

Now S2 in general can be looked at as the blame for why his impact is questioned by some people and i won't lie and not act like seeing them in a couple more scenes together wouldn't have been nice and just seeing Ekko in general more wouldn't have been nice but considering the fact that this community loves to analyze things to the bone i just find it a bit odd how apparently this specific relationship is looked at on such a surface level by some people. Ya'll will sit here and analyze eye movements but then call the bridge fight "just a cool scene" and ignore the weight and impact of it. Ya'll will sit here gush about this loving and deep connection Jinx forms with Isha who she's known for no less then 3 months but apparently her childhood befriend/enemy/crush/lover is just a open and shut book.

One thing that really bothers me as well and I'm gonna use Mel in this section is that her and Ekko are not allowed to be loved. What i mean by this is that the love that their respective partners have for them is always called into doubt. Jayce's love for Mel is doubted because "Well she manipulated him" and that she was just using him and Jinx's love for Ekko is doubted by "oh well she's to mentally unstable to feel that way towards him" and "she tried to kill him" as if a good 85% of the arcane cast hasn't tried to kill or at least physically harm the people they care about. Ekko and Mel are not allowed to be yearned after and loved by the two of the favs of the show despite the fact they are are in fact yearned and loved by these favs. Jinx is over here drawing hearts around this man every chance she gets, her voice lines in game towards him, drawing his symbol on her stuff. Jayce despite all the chaos automoically going to check on Mel and see if she's okay, his voice lines towards her in game and yet despite all this, some of the fandom just can't seem to fathom that their favs are in love with a black character.

Idk man, maybe I'm reading to deep into this all and maybe I'm just yelling into the void but i just find it odd how all these doubts and excuses and reasons for why it wouldn't work only seem to get brough up for ships that involve a black character and a usually white fav.

[hyperlexichypatia]

This post reminded me of it, but my partner has observed that in contemporary gender discourse, maleness is so linked to adulthood and femaleness is so linked to childhood, that there are no "boys" or "women," only "men" and "girls."

This isn't exactly new -- for as long as patriarchy has existed, women have been infantilized, and "adult woman" has been treated as something of an oxymoron. Hegemonic beauty standards for women emphasize youthfulness, if not actual neoteny, and older women are considered "too old" to be attractive without ever quite being old enough to make their own decisions. There may be cultural allowances for the occasional older "wise woman," but a "wise woman" is always dangerously close to being a madwoman, or a witch. No matter how wise a woman is, she is never quite a rational agent. As Hanna K put it, "as a woman you're always either too young or too old for things, because the perfect age is when you're a man."

But the framing of underage boys as "men" has shifted, depending on popular conceptualizations of childhood and gender roles. Sometimes children of any gender are essentially feminized and grouped with women (the entire framing of "women and children" as a category). In the U.S. in the 21st century, the rise of men's rights and aggressively sexist ideology has correlated with an increased emphasis on little boys as "men" -- thus slogans like "Teach your son to be a man before his teacher teaches him to be a woman."

Of course, thanks to ageism and patriarchy (which literally means, not "rule by men," but "rule by fathers"), boys don't get any of the social benefits of being considered "men." They don't get to vote, make their own medical decisions, or have any of their own adult rights. They might have a little more childhood freedom than girls, if they're presumed to be sturdier and less vulnerable to "predators," but, for the most part, being considered "men" as young boys doesn't really get boys any more access to adult rights. What it does get them is aggressively gender-policed, often with violence. A little boy being "a man" means that he's not allowed to wear colors, have feelings, or experience the developmental stages of childhood.

This shifts in young adulthood, as boys forced into the role of "manhood" become actual men. As I've written about, I believe the trend of considering young adults "children" is harmful to everyone, but primarily to young women, young queer and trans people, and young disabled people. Abled, cisgender, heterosexual young men are rarely denied the rights and autonomy of adulthood due to "brain maturity."

What's particularly interesting is that, because transphobes misgender trans people as their birth-assigned genders, they constantly frame trans girls as "men" and trans men as "girls." A 10 year old trans girl on her elementary school soccer team is a "MAN using MAN STRENGTH on helpless GIRLS," while a 40 year old trans man is a "Poor confused little girl." Anyone assigned male at birth is born a scary, intimidating adult, while anyone female assigned at birth never becomes old enough to make xyr own decisions.

Feminist responses have also really fluctuated. Occasionally, feminists have played into the idea of little boys as "men," especially in trans-exclusionary rhetoric, or in one notorious case where members of a women's separatist compound were warned about "a man" who turned out to be a 6-month-old infant. There's periodic discourse around "Empowering our girls" or "Raising our boys with gentle masculinity," but for the most part, my problem with mainstream feminist rhetoric in general is that it tends to frame children solely as a labor imposed on women by men, not as subjects (and specifically, as an oppressed class) at all.

Second-wave feminists pushed back hard on calling adult women "girls" -- but they didn't necessarily view "women" as capable of autonomous decision-making, either. Adult women were women, but they might still need to be protected from their own false consciousness. As laws in the U.S., around medical privacy and autonomy, like HIPAA, started more firmly linking the concepts of autonomy with legal adulthood, and fixing the age of majority at 18, third-wave feminists embraced referring to women as "girls." Sometimes this was in an intentionally empowering way ("girl power," "girl boss"), which also served to shield women (mostly white, mostly bourgeois/wealthy) from criticism of their participation in racism and capitalism. But it also served to reinforce the narrative of women as "girls" needing to be protected from "men" (and their own choices).

I'm still hoping for a feminist politic that is pro-child, pro-youth, pro-disability, pro-autonomy, pro-equality, that rejects the infantilization of women, the adultification of boys, the objectification of children, the misgendering of trans people, and the imposition of gender roles.

[mx-pokirby]

Alright, let's get pretentious.

I've come to start resenting those super popular Mario 64 hacks as of late, like B3313, the multiplayer mod, Mario 64 with Shotgun.

People came out of the woodworks making videos and articles about them, and I kinda hate how those are now "the mainstream", relatively speaking.

And it also sucks because they're all great hacks! But the fact that that if you asked most (relevant) people to think of what a Mario 64 hack is, it's either just the base vanilla game "with a wacky YouTube Content-y™ Twist" and/or within the ballpark of just creepypasta (/derogatory)/beta content.

Aside from Star Road back in 2011, which while groundbreaking had some pretty mixed design, the general online populous who even still cares about Mario 64 have no idea about the game's entire massive & passionate modding scene, full of incredible and original standalone experiences, both in gameplay and narrative, for free.

Elise, a beautiful Yume Nikki-like with cutscenes and voice acting, borrowing the base game's sense of exploration as a jumping off point.

SM64 Kingdom's End, a genuinely haunting story about Mario struggling until the last moment to save a dying world.

Mario Party 64, our childhood dream of wishing we could play in the boards & minigames of Mario Party like an actual platformer brought to life.

Detective Mario: Murder on Ice, mapping the genre of text-based murder mystery (complete with typing in commands) into a 3D Mario level with surprising twists and required deduction skills.

Mario breaks EVERY BONE IN HIS BODY (case sensitive), a hilarious Monkey Ball-like

Ceaseless Climb, exploring a tricky, warped reality beyond the game's infamous Infinite Staircase

My Dress-Up Darling 64 which, and I quote from the game's Romhacking.com page's description, "being the first hack to use HVQM full-motion video"

There's rhythm games, Zelda-likes, horror games, shitposts, puzzlers, slide hacks, what-ifs, massive collabs, the absurdly sized Star Revenge *series*, huge hacking competitions with cash prizes and often dozens/hundreds of submissions meant to incentivize newcomers to try, Mario slips on a banana peel and fucking dies 64, and literally hundreds more I could name

I'm just really passionate about this little niche internet community, and I'm sad it only got the thinnest spotlight once a tiny piece of it ended up being profitable for content creators. There's so much more than what most people see.

Besides. It's free video games; Surely that alone makes it worth checking out, right...? Everything is suuuper accessible/user-friendly nowadays~

[moonbyulsstuff]

Hi, could you please write a Dg, Jaeha and Sikyung x male! Reader who is androgynous, (he has an alt style) the reader always looks bored and cold but when you know him he is very affectionate and sweet, I hope I don't bother you and I really like what you do, thank you very much for your work 💙

Male Reader Who's Androgynous and Has an Alternate Style Headcanons.

Male Reader.

Requested.

Request Rules.

Masterlist.

I don't know if you want it headcanons or scenarios so I made it headcanons instead. I tried my best to mention the alt style and the reader being androgynous, I'm sorry if I did bad. And I don't know if you mean androgynous by physical characteristic or emotional but I did physical.

Jaeha Han:

You two were childhood friends as far as Jaeha could remember.

Due to your looks of looking like a boy and a girl, you were the target of bullying back in kindergarten.

Ever since the 1st day, you were constantly teased. You hated going to kindergarten.

But it all changed thanks to Jaeha, though he was one of the kids that constantly teased you about your looks. You were only one of the kids that didn't break the promise of playing with him.

He had a reputation of beating up the other kids if they ever broke a promise with him.

But you were the only one who didn't break that promise.

So, Jaeha has been protecting you from the other kids.

And that's how your relationship was until middle school when Jaeha had a revelation of going through the realization that he had a crush on you.

Especially when you started dressing in a way that was called alternate style, outfits that aren't on the main stream.

You looked hot and Jaeha never thought of being interested in another boy, but oh boy, ever since you started dressing that way.

It awakened his gay side of him.

Jaeha was overprotective of you, especially since you started to look handsome or beautiful.

Like you could pass of as a girl and you would still have girls falling over you.

And especially with your attitude of not caring a damn but you actually do, it just made girls and some boys attracted to you.

Jaeha didn't like that, so he constantly had a wall surrounded you whenever someone shows an inkling of interest in you.

And it got amplified when you two started dating.

It was clear as day that Jaeha was overprotective of you.

But you didn't mind since it wasn't overbearing and Jaeha tried to make sure that he didn't go overboard.

He always admired the outfits you put on, and always accompanied you whenever you go out shopping for new outfits.

And he protected you like always whenever someone mentions your look.

Diego Kang (DG):

Diego thought you were a woman at first when he first saw your photo for a song collab.

But he was completely wrong when you showed up, the deep voice was obvious that you were a man.

But the way you look made him think you were a girl.

You were a popular idol but Diego never really took a 2nd closer look, your songs were beautiful and you had a large fan base.

And he could tell why.

Not just with your look, the way you present yourself too.

Most idols follow whatever is trendy but for you, you don't follow those trends.

You make your own, and that is best resulted in your style.

Your outfits were what makes you stand out from the rest of the idols.

You dressed in your own style, in a way that South Korea mainstream wasn't used to.

But you caught Diego interest, the way you just didn't seem to care at all.

Bored look on every photo and photoshoot, not interested at the tiny bit at whatever was happening around you.

You seemed cold and uninterested.

The only reason why you worked with Diego was because your manager told you so.

You weren't a big fan of the mainstream k-songs, and Diego just fit right into the mainstream.

But you sucked it up because your manager told you so.

And to your surprise, you two worked perfectly well. Diego didn't care much too, and just what is best for him and in his own interest.

So when the news of you two having a collab broke out, fans were sorta mixed.

They felt excited and happy while others felt it was abrupted for two musicians from different genre to collab.

While you two worked on the music, you two grew to know more of each other.

Diego could see even if you looked cold and bored, being nonchalant. You do care, you care deeply.

You were kind, and caring to other people.

You made music for the people and always encourage people who have different tastes to embrace themselves.

You two spent so much time with each other to the point, Diego doesn't even notice that whenever he thinks of you. A smile appear on his face.

And he doesn't notice it until someone points it out.

Maybe he had a grown close to you...

Ryu Sikyung:

He didn't think someone could actually have physical attributes of both genders.

That was until he saw you.

You were a man but you have both attributes of both gender, Sikyung never really thought it was true but here you were.

You were an evidence to Sikyung that people like you do exist after all.

It always amazed him, so when he first saw you. He began to constantly follow you, asking you questions.

It always annoyed you since he followed you everywhere you go.

And always asking you about your weird outfits.

You were a weirdo in his words, having both physical of a man and woman and dressing "weirdly".

It was like having a parrot follow you, asking the same questions over and over again.

But you slowly got used to it and just ignore him like he's a ghost.

And Sikyung slowly started to get used to seeing you dress "weirdly".

In fact, he started to anticipate what outfit you would wear each day.

He began to like to see what outfit you would wear today, tomorrow and the next day.

In fact, he even gifted you outfits he knew you would love.

It's not like you two are dating or anything, cough though he catches feelings for you and he realized that faster before anyone else cough.

He was in shock but quickly got over it and accepted when he realized he has feelings for a boy, and that was you.

He can't deny it, it's the truth after all.

And it's the truth he doesn't want to hide.

[sodachalice]

id really like 2 hear more on your thoughts on kin stuff

hmmmhmhm. i wouldnt even know where to start really. i think that almost all kinning is a form of dissociation (not in a disordered way but in the way "Spacing out" is also dissociation, it is a coping mechanism you can choose to engage with that can get out of hand if relied on too heavily) and i think that the reason kinning was so popular in early 2010s tumblr specifically in the way it was is because there was a rise in the type of abusive households that would encourage dissociation (strict rules, neglective parenting, rejection of trauma, trauma from the internet, unrestricted internet access, recession, rise in fascism, lack of third spaces, increased trauma in schools due to gun violence, the popularity of internet grooming and the lack of awareness around that topic, encouraged dissociation due to split internet/in person lives) and i also think that because of these things this has also increased the amount of people who have OSDD/DID/some form of plurality or at least increased the awareness of these disorders enough for people who are experiencing this dissociation to be able to be properly diagnosed. i think that the line between kinning when it is serious and spiritual and these disorders are very blurry and grey.

i think that kinning can tell you a lot about yourself and how you feel about yourself and your position in the world not specifically due to the character in the canon itself but your interpretation of the character and how you specifically feel about them and feel like they symbolize, but i also think that characters are written with specific people and tropes in mind and that many times paying attention to these tropes and threads between characters you kin is more important than the characters themselves. i also think that people could find a lot of freedom and fun in using fictional characters like fursonas and using them to communicate ideas that go beyond canon and are personally symbolic to them especially now in sort of a post-kin internet where a lot of people in my age kinned in their childhood but not as an adult, and i think that could be a good creative outlet for people especially if they spent a lot of time writing fanfiction or making fanart as a child.

i feel like psychological and emotional (and spiritual, but also to be clear, im very much not a spiritual thinker. it doesnt come to me naturally. i usually talk purely psychologically/politically, but im also someone who does have personal beliefs i like to keep to myself) ties disabled and autistic people develop towards fictional characters is something that is insanely important in general just as like a literal societal keystone, i think people forget how media used to be ran and how it was almost always spearhead by autistic people who were obsessed with a specific idea. most mainstream modern "iconic" series come from a source like that. i also think that people don't understand how delusions and hallucinations tend to work, and don't understand how religious delusions and fictional delusions such as kinning can be the same, but they both offer magical/fantastical escapes from reality that allow you to live a split life in a different place that is better or more symbolic or has more closure and clear concise beats to it than reality. abstractly, they fill the same role for a lot of people.

uhhh. i think thats just a lot of listing my beliefs and not really explaning them but i kinda just wanted to play my cards and show off what i think about irg to kinning. i would say its a special interest. like i said growing up my parents were convinced i was an earth angel, and there are a lot of reasons in their past that traumatized them into thinking that way. one thing i always found fascinating was my athiest dad was extremely into fandom, hes a furry himself and very strongly identifies with a small group of characters he obsessively collects. my family all agree that hes autistic, even if he isnt diagnosed. he treated his favorite characters (Spiderman, ash from evil dead, luke from starwars) exactly the same way as my mom treated any of her intense obsessions with imaginary figures (jesus/angels, ghosts, spirits, the government) as a very spiritually psychotic person, and growing up and out of my intense "spiritual" kinning phase when i was living in that household, i realized i was treating it the same exact way as my mom was treating her religious delusions. except the thing is i did it with homestuck characters so i was labeled histrionic and attention seeking instead of like you know. struggling with delusional thinking, which i very much was and is something i struggle with still now. not in a "im on alternia" kind of way but in a "im a fictional character and nothing i do has consequences so i regularly neglect myself" kind of way. i was homeschooled and msot people ive known havent been very kind to me, this has changed but my habits havent. and my i think people sort of overlook my habits bcause instead of looking like something insanely drastic its just sort of like. i kind of just disappear, and its because im thinking Of The Character. and its like a huge problem. and i kind of think its a big problem for a lot of people, but kinning is one of the pieces that goes overlooked in discussions about it because people are embarrassed. well im not. i like my guys and i like my connection with them. so

[genericpuff]

Hi! So this is coming from a place of genuine concern, LR Persephone isn't going to have DID right? I know you probably can't reveal much but DID is already a very stigmatized disorder so I'm always worried when I see the Signs, I hope you understand lol

I understand fully your concerns, and I hope I can reassure you in my own intentions regarding Kore / Persephone that the goal is not to demonize or stigmatize DID in any way. I actually do regularly interact with a family member who's currently seeking an official diagnosis for it, and have my own firsthand experiences with my own mental health and symptoms of childhood trauma that are intersectional with that of DID. Of course, that doesn't mean that I'm immune to stigmatizing, but rest assured that I am aware of the stigmas surrounding DID and the misconceptions that a lot of people have about it, no thanks to how it's been portrayed in mainstream media.

If I can add some additional and necessary context as to why I chose to write Kore like this, much of how I'm writing her is based on how she was initially presented to us in S1 of LO, particularly through the personification of her wrath:

I really liked this concept and was subsequently disappointed when it seemed to get left behind (though considering how LO turned out, maybe that was for the better lmao) I've always enjoyed these "inner conflict" character dynamics, but I also understand from years of writing characters like this that much of these types of tropes are often intersectional with common misconceptions and stigmas surrounding personality disorders and mental illness.

Within the context of Rekindled, Kore does not specifically have DID but her experiences are clearly intersectional with it. Ultimately my goal is to empathize, not demonize. As much as "Persephone" may be currently presenting herself as a sort of snarky "alter ego" of Kore, she is not evil, no more "evil" than Kore herself, because they're ultimately of the same mind and body, flaws and all. Persephone is often speaking truths that Kore is simply not willing to admit or able to face, the worst of which we've yet to uncover, but will be necessary to overcome. There will certainly be times when Kore's actions - spurred on by the voice of Persephone in her ear - may be ugly or wrong, but I hope in the end that I'll achieve my goal in expressing that everyone - even immortal gods - can always have another chance to heal, to forgive themselves for their past, and to do right by themselves for the sake of a brighter future. This will apply to other gods in the story as well, many of whom also share Kore's struggles and experiences.

And, assuming I do my part and deliver on my promises, there will be closure for Kore/Persephone, the readers who relate to their struggles and experiences, and many of the other characters who were hung out to dry in the original comic. That's definitely one of my biggest goals with this retelling, at least! (•̀ᴗ•́)و It's definitely one of my riskier moves as the nature of the subject is very sensitive, but I'm giving it my all in the hopes that it pays off in a more nuanced and in-depth character arc for Kore/Persephone than what we got in LO that can hopefully be embraced as a message of acceptance and self-love. And y'all can hold me to that (๑•̀ㅂ•́)و✧

[starrycassi]

I think a lot of young queers folks (like me. Not trying to be all elderly about this I'm literally a gen z) today need to watch the good oldies about our community.

⚠️: I don't mean, in any way shape or form to insult the newer queer shows/movies. I love SPOP. I love TOH. I read and loved Heart stopper. However, because of the restraint of mainstream media, they have a very... palatable?? way to portray the community. I am NOT blaming the creators (who I'm sure would love to go a bit further down on their portrayals if given the option)

SO! I have nice recommendations that I, personally, enjoy a lot. They're in no particular order.

A classic, for starters. But I'm a cheerleader!: Very campy, barbie-y, funny and free on YouTube. A cheerleader is sent to a conversation camp when her social circle realizes that she might be into girls. (It has a very unrealistic portrayal of conversation camps, though. Very cartoony) my comfort movie fr fr

Priscilla, queen of the desert: A trio of drag queens travel across the desert on a big, old bus. They fight, there's some falling in love. They talk a lot about gender identity, queer childhoods and similar topics. I've only been able to find this one (and most of the ones on this list, since I don't have any streaming devices) on illegal websites. There's very, very direct homophobia, SA, physical abuse, child neglect, yk, the American dream. The queens are the funnier thing ever, the romance plotlines are absolutely delightful and well-rounded. Focuses a bit more on the community itself and interpersonal relationships. All around, a solid 10/10.

Kinky boots: A very prude, engaged man inherits a shoe fabric. He's running out of ideas to stay in business, until he meets a drag queen. Same warnings (and themes!) as the last one. This one has a stronger focus on how the characters become more accepting and how our queen navigates being faced with them. I've rewatched it like a hundred times.

The birdcage (2000's) or le cauge aux folles (1970'): A gay couple runs a drag club. Their son brings home a conservative girlfriend and her family. This is more comedy lenient, but funny as fuck nonetheless.

Paris is burning: this one is a documentary, btw. Focuses on the life of drag queens in the 80's. Nothing I didn't already say on Priscilla tbh.

Saving face: A chinese-american girl that lives in a VERY conservatory and secluded community is trying (and failing) not to fall in love with a ballerina. At the same time, her mother (a widow, how scandalous!) gets mysteriously pregnant and gets kicked out of their family home. This one will hit close to home if you're from any ethnic, homophobic household. Cried a lot. Then cried some more. Happy ending, though!

D.E.B.S: THIS IS THE FUNNIEST, CUTEST MOVIE EVER. It's a full on romance comedy for when the mind is a bit too tired! The main plot is that, in a school of girls being trained to be top-notch spies (very totally spies type) a girl who's the top of her class falls in love with the biggest villainess they ever faced. More of a coming of age thing, that also explores the good old dilemma of choosing what the hell you're supposed to do with your life once you turn 18 (relatable tbh)

And now, for a book (in Spanish, though) we have "Las Malas": Narrated by a trans, poor prostitute. Extremely realistic in its narrative voice, cruel and very hurtful sometimes. This is actually one of my favorite books ever, it's so fucking underrated that I'm going to die if no one reads it. There's EVERYTHING. It genuinely drives me crazy to read this. We have queer moms, a child found in a freezing park, suicides, literally anything happens. I love it.

If anyone has any suggestions PLEASE drop them. I'm begging u

[mattelektras]

Jessie since you're the authority on all things Elektra, I wanted to ask what's your opinion on all her live action adaptations?

there's a clear favourite i cant lie

daredevil 2003 / elektra 2005

now people may laugh but please know i am being soooo fucking serious when i say that in terms of characterisation, these movies were dead on

casting is. fine i guess. don't really see it. can't imagine elektra with lighter hair but she does have a great jawline

outfit.... the silk and leather flares. peak early 2000s

from a personal perspective.... solo movie elektra has outright ocd. like it's named and documented. my toxic murderous ocd rep

the story itself in the elektra solo movie was... questionable. BUT it does work for her. protecting a young girl reluctantly because she sees herself in her

VISUALS. the white sheet fight scene

the MYTH of her in it is just so fucking perfect. she's treated as this like... urban legend and people aren't even sure if she's real or if she's still dead or whatever

the opening scene is straight from a comic book

she's sullen, she's weird, she's a bit of a dick to people. she's has her vaguely offputting girl swag

i think what makes both daredevil 2003 and elektra 2005 ultimately good adaptations is that even with changes being made to the lore or whatever, its still the characters you know

i rewatched her solo w some friends recently and i like to think they saw past the weird shit and saw the charm and accuracy that's in there deep down

like is the movie GOOD? god fucking no. is it stupid and charming and is there some actual CORRECT lore there for once? yes!!!!!

also lest we forget, my girl had the FIRST real mainstream comics solo female superhero movie and they will never take that away from me. women say thank you

netflix daredevil

to begin with. elodie yung can do no wrong in my eyes. she loved elektra and being elektra and she did such a good job with the absolute NOTHING she was given to go on

they completely ignored her origin which is what resulted in the further issues with the adaptation. fundamentally, if you don't give her the right beginning, you can't do much else

they just dumbed her down imo. like she enjoys murder which just isn't... how it is. she doesn't feel bad about it, but i dont think the show is intelligent enough to show that

she's too easily used by stick and others. she's an intelligent woman who has been on her own for so long, she should not be forced into the schemes of these freaks

she always has her own motivations and plans, but in the show, it just feels like she's manipulating... for no reason. like. what does she WANT through this whole show. she especially wouldn't manipulate matt for no reason like its just not in her nature to treat him like a dumbasss

on top of that, there's this whole idea that she makes him worse. she brings out his worst qualities, and even aside from that being a point of like... sexism that a man cant be responsible for his own behaviours...... the point of the two of them is that they are fundamentally the SAME. same ideals in childhood, same beliefs and goals. the point of them is that they would be in the same place, probably together, had this one thing not happened to elektra and changed her trajectory. but it's always framed as.... she went off the rails and now she wants to drag him down too

which like i said, is because they didn't get her origin right. all of this show's issues wrt to her characterisation could be solved by giving her the right origin, or it would at least give her an actual reason for being how she is

i've talked a lot about the issues w this show regarding elektra i can't find all my links right now!!!!!

anyway long live daredevil 2003

[puella-ae]

———2025-05-29 11:01——— ... I want to say something Controversial but I'm not entirely sure what it is yet that sentence is so much funnier in context than I intended. I was reminded of a post I reblogged a little bit ago and I have half a thought about it but it feels kind of dangerous to get wrong And I'm not really in a #ramble mood yet

———13:31——— The spirits are telling me to so here we go

[[ITT: thinking too hard about these six words.]]

Online "littlespace" [age regression in general] is heavily dependent on its signifiers—diapers and pacifiers, cribs and nurseries and playrooms, and especially brands catering to infants and toddlers There's a lot of littlespace, so to speak, because it's easy to depict distinguished from adulthood Yes, there are feelings associated with it—simple comforts, thoughtless pleasure—but to a certain extent you can just sort of throw up those signifiers on a moodboard and viewers will add those feelings in themselves

I don't think middlespace [as in regression to later childhood, "tweenhood"] has those signifiers. Because that age is around the time where you start opting in to mainstream society, casting off those earlier attachments ["I don't like Elmo, that's for babies"] and looking for something new to call your own Media-wise, you start listening to music on the radio or getting songs from your friends, you start choosing what to watch on TV or whatever personal device you may have rather than sitting down and staring dead-eyed at whatever got put in front of you, you have the physical and mental capacity to play games or draw or write and interact with the world in doing so Socially/psychologically, you're developing an identity distinct from your parents[' image of you], taking cues from peers and role models, trying things on and going through phases

Late childhood/early adolescence is very much defined by [insufficiently] imitating adulthood Signifiers of middlespace are (signifiers of signifiers of adulthood)—which, done right [done wrong?], are just signifiers of adulthood in themselves, hard to distinguish from regular online behavior I posted this because this feels like middlespace. Tagging along on errands with your parents and feeling like you (could|should) be part of their world but you're just... not? That's tween-coded It's just not sold as such because so many people have that experience without being able to put the words to it

I think the best you can do is this art style/movement, and even then this really calls back to a specific moment in [cyber]space and time Middlespace looks+feels like kids playing at being mature, (pretending|assuming) they [we] know what they're doing, and making+being something special by having a foot in both camps This account gets that right. I think the difficulty is that getting that right means really digging into how you interact with your signifiers, what exactly they make you think and feel, not just the images or objects themselves

art is hard.

On this [[middlespace signifiers]], because it just popped into my mind: doesn't help that our world [that is, online American-adjacent secular society] doesn't really have visually-apparent rites of passage for childhood > adolescence the way it does for infancy > childhood and adolescence > early adulthood ABs and littles can make a lot of noise about nursing > potty-training > learning letters and numbers, and I'm sure better essays have been written on the societal fixation on learning to drive > senior year [prom especially] >= losing one's virginity I don't think people talk as much about, like, starting puberty [and/because I think people look at you kind of weirdly if you do.]

The exception there seems to be trans people starting HRT and embracing the idea of "second puberty" [even then, I don't know how common that is], and that obviously doesn't carry the same connotations even if the process is similar enough that you could imagine a lot of middlespace indulgence stemming from it …actually, wait, I think I mixed two different points there

I think, if the component feelings and experiences of puberty are taken as signifiers of tweenhood, then trans second-puberty could be another instance of (middlespace not recognized as such) [or at least the art and commentary surrounding it could make for good middlespace-posting.]

[fish-in-need-of-a-bicycle]

I’m gonna repost this because I want more people to check my work. This is my racial development model for Ashkenazim, which I made for my child development class after learning about racial identity models that psychologists have made to show stages that people tend to pass through as they learn about their racial and ethnic background.

So, Jumblr, tell me what you think!

[ID: Infographic titled, “Ashkenazi Jewish Identity Model”. A bubble says, “White Identification”, with a paragraph saying, “Starting in childhood, the individual begins to notice racial features and identify themselves as white. Even when not necessarily passing as white, the individual sees that other community members who they identify with do pass as white and that they themselves don’t easily fall into other categories”. An arrow points down to the next bubble that says, “Exclusion Realization” with the paragraph, “The individual starts to see that white groups reject either their culture or ethnicity as not white. This can occur a number of ways, including exposure to hate crimes or through noticing how intertwined whiteness and Christianity are.” An arrow points down to the next bubble that says, “Racial Framework Conflict” with the paragraph, “Usually beginning in adolescence, the individual realizes they do not benefit from the full privileges of whiteness but are instructed by society to identify as white. They have similar experiences to other marginalized groups but are rejected by them as a privileged class. They want to learn about social justice and white privilege, but struggle to reconcile how their experience does not align with whiteness. The individual seeks to move into one of the next phases to resolve feelings of isolation, mis-fitting, and cognitive dissonance.” An arrow points to a triangle where the corners are labeled “Identification”, “Assimilation”, and “Insulation”. Next to Identification is a paragraph that says, “The individual embraces and takes pride in Jewish culture and resilience, possibly becoming more observant. They see themselves as being in a unique position to add nuance to discussions of identity. They feel assured in their values, even if those values are shared by people who reject them. They are conscious of the present dangers of antisemitism but remain confident in the continuation of their people”. Next to Assimilation, it says, “The individual rejects aspects of their Jewish identity to find belonging in a part of mainstream society, such as a political group. Their acceptance by the group is precarious and may be contingent on denouncing Judaism or maintaining the label so they can be tokenized”. Next to Insulation, it says, “The individual concludes that the Racial Framework Conflict is a consequence of there being no place in mainstream society for them. They take comfort in their Jewish community and may become more observant. They may catastrophize as a way to mentally prepare for rising antisemitism. They disengage from any political or activist spaces that discuss racial or ethnic identity”.

Extra visual details, feel free to skip: The “White Identification”, “Exclusion Realization”, and “Racial Framework Conflict” are light gray. The triangle has a horizontal color gradation from purple to blue to green. The corner labels are in bubbles that are the same color as the corner. “Assimilation” is purple, “Insulation” is green, and “Identification” is blue. There is a light blue-gray diagonal watermark saying, “fish-in-need-of-a-bicycle”.]

[artist-issues]

What other movies has chris sanders done? (Also- watched Wild Robot. It was phenomenal)

If I have my timeline right, he worked in some capacity on each Disney movie during and after "The Rescuers Down Under." I know he made big contributions to Beauty & the Beast, The Lion King, and Mulan...but his big one, the one he came up with and wrote and directed and did the storyboarding and voices for, was Lilo & Stitch.

I know he left Disney because he was working on Bolt, directing it, and it was too zany and out of pocket and they wanted to go a different direction, so they gave the project to Byron Howard (who also did Tangled, Zootopia...he's great too.) So then Chris Sanders left Disney

AND WENT TO DREAMWORKS, where he directed How to Train Your Dragon (the first and best one) and then The Croods, and now The Wild Robot.

I'm told he also directed Disney's CGI-Live-Action adaptation of The Call of the Wild on Disney+ here recently, but I never watched that because I don't think Chris Sanders' storytelling style lends itself to such a savage story and the "weird mirage of maturity" people expect to come with "Live Action." So I was afraid watching it would taint my love for The Call of the Wild, AND force me to watch Chris Sanders bent out of his natural habitat.

But maybe it's good, and I'm wrong, I haven't heard much about it.

Then he did The Wild Robot!

I don't know if that is a good official list—you can also check out his IMDB page—but to my knowledge he doesn't really miss.

I mean. To give you an idea.

If Lilo & Stitch isn't impressive enough for you? Please consider that the scenes Chris Sanders came up with were "Simba meets Mufasa's ghost" and "The Beast dies" and "Mulan jumps across the fence posts instead of walking on the bridge because she always has her own creative way of doing things."

And he conceptualized Timon like this:

which has nothing to do with anything but like. look at him.

If people considered animation directors with as much mainstream limelight as they do live-action films, Chris Sanders' body of work would place him next to like, James Cameron, Stephen Spielberg, those sorts of guys. But as it is he's just the cackling genius behind a huge and memorable chunk of our childhoods and nobody knows it.