#i considered hijacking a previous post

[translatemunson]

cat and mouse for a month or two or three • ttfd

chapter eight of the tortured firefighters department

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cw: fem!reader, afab!reader, no descriptions of reader, brains is recovering, idiots in love, short chapter after a huge hiatus I'M SORRY OK , no proofreading otherwise i’d never post this (lmk if i missed something)

A new routine took place. You spend most days inside your apartment, classes online since they were checking all the buildings on that side of the campus, on medical leave from your job because, on top of the broken ribs, they wanted you to recover from the burnout you got yourself into. That also meant you were taking mandatory therapy sessions, and maybe after a month they could let you work again. It was like being grounded from what kept you fueled in your late twenties.

Their first mistake was giving you way too much free time while bored. You wrote pages upon pages of your thesis in your first week. The moment you hit send and sat to wait for your professor’s notes, you found out you couldn’t reorganize your home because it was considered too much effort for your broken ribs. Your kitchen became the latest victim.

But a real victim to all your boredom was one door down the hall, who probably regretted giving you a copy of his keys — to be used just in case of an emergency.

“What the hell are you doing, Brains?” It was the third time this week that Buck arrived at his home and found out you were there, just casually chilling,

“Reading!” You were upside down on his couch, a romance book in your hands.

“I don’t think this position is good for your ribs. Can you sit like a normal person?”

“No. It’s boring. Also, I’m gonna babysit Chris tomorrow, so I’m hijacking your Xbox.”

“Why aren’t you doing that at your place?” He pointed to your silly reading position.

“Because I needed to tell you about your video game. Are you hungry? There’s some lasagna in your fridge.”

“Did you make it?”

“Yeah. Now shut up, they’re finally confessing their feelings for each other.”

Buck turned the TV on just to get some noises into the silent apartment. You were too busy with your book, he was too afraid of doing something he would have regretted later. Somewhere between his first and second plate of lasagna, you put the book aside and started to pay attention to the news.

“Big rescue, hm?”

“I don’t know why they keep building towers with paper thin structures and too many glass windows with shitty fire alarms. What happened to the good ol’ bricks and stones?” He was eating at the table, probably destroying the food in record time.

“Excellent question. I’ll look it up and give you an answer tomorrow”

“You’re really bored, aren’t you?”

“Oh, what gave it away?”

“It’s definitely not the same book from yesterday, you cooked a lasagna as big as the ones Bobby feeds us, you’re gonna babysit Chris on Eddie’s day off.”

“He needs to run some errands, and Chris hasn’t been feeling good lately, probably just the flu. So I offered my services for the day. What’s wrong with that?” You stared at him. Was he cuter upside down than the other way around?

“Nothing, it’s just… are you ok?”

“Please, don’t pull a therapist on me, I already had my mandatory session today. I swear I’m ok, I’m just bored of doing nothing. No adrenaline, no deadlines.”

“You’re really addicted, hm?”

“What can I say, Buckley, I wasn’t made to stay still.” As soon as the local news was over and football started, you moved back to your book. Buck got up and went for some beers. “I’m just gonna finish this and I’ll see myself out.”

“I’m gonna charge you rent for my couch.” He sat on the floor, right next to your face. Third time in his living room was a charm, right?

“Wasn’t the lasagna enough?”

“I thought that was for my Xbox. Want one?”

“No, thanks.”

You opened your book again, but the sudden proximity with Buck was the only thing you could focus on. The five o’clock shadow, the red birthmark on the left side of his face, the brightest eyes you’ve ever seen… Staying alone with your thoughts for too long was making you think of things you once judged impossible.

It was a split second, but he caught you red handed, staring at him. You smiled and moved your eyes to the pages of your book, not sure where you left off.

One big hand snatched the object from you. You turned to your side to complain and retrieve it, giving Buck the perfect opportunity to bring your lips close and kiss you. It barely turned into a deep kiss before you took some space to process what was happening. Your action made Buck a little confused, blinking his eyes and nervously messing with his own hair.

Your ribcage started hurting, so you moved your body carefully until you were sitting on the floor, face to face with him. Giving him enough time to change his mind, to say he actually didn’t mean it. Because how could he kiss someone like you?

You thought you’d never see a glimpse of fear on the eyes of one of the most fearless men you knew. Buck was too stunned to say anything, his full, pink lips slightly open. Your hand found the curve of his neck, your cold skin over his boiling hot veins.

You leaned in for another one. He pulled you closer carefully. However, it was nearly impossible to avoid the messier, helpless kisses. Evan Buckley was finally taking over your mind, maybe even your whole body.

Both of you had to move back a little, taking quick breaths after such intense kisses. You rested your hands on his shoulders and smiled.

“Did it really take me getting trapped in a burning building for us to have the courage to do this?” You bit your lower lip, trying to avoid him noticing your blushed cheeks.

“I don’t know about you, but I wanted to do this for a long time,” he confessed.

And it caught you by surprise. So Maddie was really telling you the truth.

“Wait, how long?” He avoided eye contact and you laughed. “No, Buck, please. Tell me.”

“Do you remember that shift I got your number with Eddie? So,” he took a deep breath, “I was planning on asking you out that day, but I just… I chickened, ok?”

“And right after that you ate all my cupcakes when I was at Maddie’s. Off to the best start, Buckley.”

“Not my best move, ok?” He laughed. “How many months ago was it?”

“No clue, to be honest.” You pecked his lips again.

Buck’s arms held you close, not willing to let you go. His lips were just inches away.

“Should I remind you of my doctor’s orders?” you whispered.

“You’re never walking into danger on my watch again.” Buck finally let you go, but it was written in his face it wasn’t what he wanted. His touch lingered a little longer, a little too deep. And you were sure you were mirroring his actions.

“I know.” You got his video game console and your book. “See you tomorrow?”

“Sure thing, Brains.”

You leaned over, leaving a goodnight kiss and a promise to come back to whatever you just started.

+++

“Ok, do you want some snacks? I,” you checked your storage once again, noticing how you should’ve added “do groceries” to your list. “How are we feeling about popcorn?”

“I love popcorn!” Chris replied, his focus on the TV screen.

“Popcorn it is.” You turned the machine on and measured the serving. You heard knocks on your door. “Just a second!”

Maybe Eddie was back because Chris forgot something in the car? No, he had everything in his backpack. You opened the door, but your eyes stayed on the kid on your couch. “Really, Eddie, don’t worry. I can watch him for as long as you need and… Buck.”

“Hi.” Even if he looked like he just left the shower, his voice sounded like he ran a marathon and stopped at your door.

“Buck!” You both heard Chris from the couch. “Are you joining us?”

“Only if Brains let me.” He smiled, waiting for you to invite him in.

“How could I say ‘no’? Come in, we are playing video games and having popcorn.”

“You can play with me!”

“I’ll be there in a sec, Chris. I just need to talk to Brains first,” he pulled you aside and out of Chris’ view. Not like the kid is paying any attention to you, anyway. “Hey there.”

“Hi. Why do I have a feeling you’re here to babysit me?” You move to your kitchen, rushing to find the popcorn bucket in your cabinets.

“Can you blame me? You have two broken ribs, self diagnosed burnout syndrome,” you mumbled, “ok, your therapist said you have it, and you’re babysitting Chris on a day you’re supposed to wake up after 3.”

“It’s just for a few hours, and he’s not like Jee-Yun,” you pointed out the reality: Chris was just a little bit sick and Eddie didn’t want him to be alone. “So you’re here to see if I have plans for today.”

“Kinda.” He opened the top cabinet and gave you the bucket. “Do you?”

You elbowed him on the torso, playfully.

“Watch your step, I know his reputation.” You pointed to Chris over your shoulder. “But the answer to your question is no.”

Buck smiled, satisfied with himself. “Hey, Chris, orange or apple juice?”

“Apple, please! I’m crushing you!” The kid's voice indicated a promise to end Buck’s character.

“Ok, buddy, if you say so,” he turned to you and whispered, “so it’s a date?”

“Yes, Buckley. Now are you gonna help me with Chris or not?” You served two glasses of apple juice.

“Sure thing, but I might need to run some errands later because,” and he stopped himself. “You’ll see.”

a/n: hi is there anyone here still? i know guys, i was gone, no sign of life, but hey, i'm back (i hope so). IT FINALLY HAPPENED! i had to make this chapter shorter than usual because otherwise it would be too big. so that's it. see ya soon!

[damnfandomproblems]

RE: The guy who said white and Asian people should be blocked by all Black POC and that Asians are not minorities. Coming from an Asian person:

OP doesn't know about the Internment during WW2. Heck, even the phrase "Stop Asian hate" that appeared due to Asian murders during COVID got hijacked by people who claimed "Asian lives don't matter until Black Lives Matter."

It's fandom. If you want to block people based on their favorite ship being your NOTP or because their headcanon isn't your thing, then go for it. More power to you.

To block someone because their skin is too light? That's racism. And don't spew that "reverse racism doesn't exist/black people can't be racist" nonsense with us, because you're evidence that it does.

It pisses me off, because I want to think this is a troll who got mad that [insert dark-skinned character] isn't black. But I've also seen people who truly think this, and that's scary considering it's so many steps backwards from the equality that our ancestors fought for.

Posting as a response to a previous ask.

[orangepeetals]

OVER THE INFLUENCE

(pt5 of ‘playlist for a star’)

PEETA MELLARK X AFAB!READER

previous part - next part soon

summary: You were rescued from the capitol and you were taken to the 13th district but your reunion with Peeta Mellark was different from what he wanted.

a/n: Hi guys!! i expected post this in the week but a stupid coward guy stole my phone while i returned to my home after work >:( fortunately i’m fine now and at least i recovered my stuff and buy a fucking new phone, definitely peeta mellark never treat me like this -.- happy xmas !!

(y/n’s pov)

Every cell in my body hurt, I was so drowsy that I had already lost count of how many times I had been lucid or unconscious, I have lost my idea of time and my life more than anything else. My last lucid memory was me about Peeta, hitting him until everything went black, my biggest fear was not to have killed him, Peeta Mellark should not be here free as if he had not hurt me, as if he had not destroyed everything around us. The light (of what I suppose was the hospital) felt too blinding to allow me to open my eyes suddenly, so I fought to open them for a few minutes, the voices were clearer and I felt my head hurt once again, I was already getting used to the feeling.

I tried to move, anxiety took hold of my body when I felt my limbs tied to the bed, this couldn’t be happening to me again, was this a Mellark’s plan? Did you want to rescue me to finish killing me here? My desire to be dead increased every second, I no longer remembered what it was like to be without that desire. Possibly they will have seen me fight, because it took a few minutes for Haymitch to enter the cold room, I didn’t know how to feel, for a moment I felt happy to have someone who maybe didn’t want me dead but my fear and distrust couldn’t disappear so easily.

“What are you doing here?” I whispered with weakness, I felt that I would burst into tears, it was the only thing I had been able to do without restrictions in recent weeks. “I came to see you, apparently if it was as terrible as they told me... do you know what happened?” I wanted to laugh at his words but it was more like a grimace, I shook my head, I knew that I had tried to kill Peeta Mellark but beyond that, I didn’t know anything, I didn’t know if he had died, I didn’t know where I was, I also knew that Peeta Mellark was being the face of the revolution and I was suffering the consequences, of the rest of the winners I didn’t know anything, I just know that they rescued us from the capitol.

“This is Peeta Mellark’s fault, you know? He was stupid, he got into this revolution and thanks to that I’m tied up here, I’m not even sure what they did to me or where I am! I hope I killed him!” The beeps of the monitor indicated that my heart was racing, I was shaking and my voice was barely audible, I felt helpless, full of anger and anguish, I just wanted to feel safe, I wanted someone to protect me, I no longer had anyone to trust.

“Don’t worry, y/n, they subjected you to a type of torture called hijacking, they give you tracker jacker’s venom while they alter your memorices so that you feel fear or danger with things related to that, that’s why you attacked Peeta and that’s why you want to kill him, I need you to remember who he is and what it is for you, I assure you that Peeta has never wanted to harm you, he didn’t know about the plan of the revolution” Haymitch’s voice sounded honest, I wanted to believe him, I needed to believe him but my fear was bigger, what if Peeta came in and I was unarmed? What could I do? I’m not really the strongest person and I’m a little shorter than him, considering that I’m malnourished, doped and weak, although I remember that when I attacked him, he didn’t do anything to defend himself, he simply allowed me to hit him even knowing that I was at a clear disadvantage.

“Is Mellark still alive?” I didn’t even want to say his name, I had to feel far from him, far from where he could hurt me, I wanted the answer to be negative. “He has some bruises but he’s fine, he’s been seeing you all these days, he’s like crazy for not being able to do anything... when you recover and you can return to normal, you’ll appreciate not having killed him, y/n” Why was he seeing me? I knew it, he’s waiting for the moment to kill me.

“He’s going to kill me as soon as he sees me, Haymitch, you need to stop him, you need to kill him before he kills everyone!” I twisted in bed while I cried and screamed, I felt again how my head was filled with voices and memories without stopping, I couldn’t do it, I couldn’t fight my fear, I fought against the ties until my wrists bled, the sound of the door made me out of the trance.

Haymitch had left the room, instead, I found the presence of Peeta Mellark, watching me astonished and with sadness, he looked bad, his dark circles quite marked, his hair was messy and some bruises of the beating I had given him a couple of days ago were still visible, my heart shuddered, I didn’t know what I was feeling but he looked vulnerable, I wanted to throw myself into his arms and be in his chest while caressing my hair, the memories attacked my mind, some were beautiful and others horrible, I wanted to move those thoughts away but he couldn’t, he He had hurt me, it was all his fault. “You look terrible, Mellark,” I spat, trying to settle in bed, thinking of some way to defend myself if he approached me.

He sketched a sad smile and just as he expected, he approached a little but he did it slowly, he knew that I was alert. “You look as beautiful as ever, y/n, I am happy to know that you are here, safe, I will do my best so that you can be calm again, I will never forgive myself for this” His voice was so sweet that I felt that I would fall into his game, it was what he wanted and he was not going to give in.

“You should have thought about it before letting them take me, your role as a loverboy is over and it wasn’t with me who you should play it with, so you don’t need to come and tell me nice things because I don’t believe you, you’re a liar!” I could barely speak, crying and anguish had opposed my position of being hard, I was being vulnerable again and worse, I was being vulnerable in front of the person for whom I had become like this.

“Y/n, this is not a game, I love you from the first time I saw you and you know it, look at your hand, you still have the ring, you and I are secretly married, don’t you remember?” I looked at my hand, the damn ring was still there, it didn’t even seem to have any scratches, it was intact even after everything that had happened. I remembered that night, I remembered the warmth of his arms and the honey taste of his soft lips, I missed that feeling, inside me awoke that feeling of protecting him and loving him madly.

“Peeta Mellark, I will regret offering myself for the quarter quell until the end of my days, I should have let you enter there alone, I would have saved myself a lot of pain if I had not offered to enter with you, ‘cause you were going to enter as it was, you should have died there” It was the last thing I said before seeing the blond burst into tears and almost running out of the room.

————————

I did not see Peeta Mellark again the rest of that week, luckily I had already been allowed to leave the room accompanied by people or handcuffed in case I was alone, with a lot of therapy and a lot of crying, I could remember some things and I learned ways to discern the real from the false, although of course I had days when I did not know who I was or where I was, I was still unstable despite the fact that it was no longer as terrible as it had been at first, I began to realize that therapies and all those things were working when I could Having good memories with Peeta Mellark, I was enjoying those memories in the meadow and our sunsets together but all that was part of my mind, I didn’t know how I would react if I saw him again.

I would have liked to have enjoyed my calm and being taken care of all the time but apparently Coin decided that it was a good idea to send me to the battlefield along with the rest, they mentioned some propos.

My arrival at the squadron was not particularly pleasant, what did you intend to send me there? Right now I was only a malnourished and traumatized little girl, if I didn’t have my daggers it would be of no use and the only thing they gave me was an unloaded weapon, so the confusion was even greater, I was received with Katniss and Gale pointing at me while Peeta Mellark watched me with a look that this time I could not decipher, I assumed that for him my income was as spontaneous as it was for me.

“President Coin has sent to y/n to help us with the propos, she will be given an unloaded weapon and we will have turns to watch her, is that okay? He’s here to let you know that he’s on our side” The boy named Boggs or something like that spoke, everyone nodded to the orders without saying anything except Peeta, who offered to take care of me, the alarms went off in my head, maybe this was his time to kill me, I tried to think rationally and think that I wouldn’t be able to do something like that.

Or maybe yes.

————

taglist: @mellaurks

[valle-de-sombra-de-muerte]

Homestuck Reread: Act 4, Part 1/4 (p. 1358-1522)

Read the previous post here.

After a brief diversion with the Midnight Crew and Felt, it's time to go back to the story proper.

Oh fucking yuck it's that other walkaround flash that uses the story sprites. This one has jank ass combat mechanics in addition to having the same clunky controls as the one in Act 2. Just like that one, this one is also a waste of time. There's no point traversing this and its big ass map.

Wait, is this a Shoop da Whoop reference? God I feel old.

And finally we see Jade's "patron black celebrity": Charles Dutton. Look, I have no clue what Hussie means by any of this. It's just a pattern that I've noticed and nobody else has talked about it before.

Unlike the other kids, Jade always has a somewhat repulsed look on her face whenever she sees her black celebrity. I think she might just be racist, which would explain why she's so xenophobic toward the trolls.

Okay, okay, I'm just joking. Look, Jade is in desperate need of some character traits. At this point, even a negative one would be preferable to nothing at all. Anything to give her modicum of depth.

I wonder what kinds of conversations Vriska or Gamzee would have with Jade. These are things we will never know!

Vriska in particular should've had some meaningful interactions with Jade considering she's the one responsible for her narcolepsy. I'm dumbfounded we never got to see her act more outwardly malicious and cruel toward Jade, or even take a more active role in fucking with her beyond simply putting her to sleep. Vriska isn't exactly known for her subtlety, after all. If she really wanted to put her name on the kids' session and be responsible for all the key events in it, she should've went whole hog.

Perhaps if Hussie had actually planned all this out from the onset, we could've gotten something with more payoff. Recall my earlier post when I said Jade had the makings of a twist villain in these early stages of the story? I'd like to alter and expand upon that with this scenario that I would've implemented in Hussie's place.

Picture this: what if the reason Jade is such a shallow character is due to no fault of her own? What if Vriska had been the one manipulating this human like a meat puppet as her means to infiltrate the kids' session? Pushing the kids to play Sburb in the first place? Her reluctance to give away useful information? All of her intents and motives being masked with overbearing cheerfulness? The fact that she needs "reminders" to keep track of her litany of superficial interests? All Vriska, baby. She has hijacked this kid's brain and is using her as a vehicle to drive the plot forward.

This is back from Act 3, but let's look at how Jade initially reacts to each of her friends and then filter this through Vriska's perspective. John's utter incompetence and Dave's crush on Jade would make them useful idiots in Vriska's scheme. So naturally she reacts positively to both of them.

But she perceives Rose with a single, terse sentence. Rose is the only one who is actively curious about Jade's knowledge of things she shouldn't reasonably know about. This makes her a threat. Vriska would have to put a lot of distance between them in order to keep Rose from uncovering the truth.

And then there are the other trolls. Unbeknownst to them, their efforts to stop Jade would've actually been an internal struggle against one of their own. Vriska would shut them out entirely, not wanting to risk getting them involved with this. All the while, the "real" Jade never gets a chance to express herself because she has been constantly suppressed by an outside agent. Her shallowness would be by design, rather than a consequence of poor writing.

... But I think I'm getting carried away with this tangent. At this point I'm talking about an entirely different comic when this is supposed to be focused on Homestuck. Let's just move on.

So Jade knew about Sburb the whole time, okay. I don't know why it was presented like she didn't at first, but fine whatever. She still continues to be smarmy and coy while John continues to have rocks for brains. Every conversation between these two gives me new insights to the amount of bullshit I'm willing to endure to finish this comic.

I love this line from Dave. Can I get a so true oomfie?

Jade fumbles the SBaHJ reference when someone like Rose could probably recite the entirety of SBaHJ verbatim. In fact, if Rose had fudged up a quote like that, Dave would've shown her no mercy. He holds Jade's hand through it, though, because he's a dumb teenage boy thinking with his dick.

"i got served like a dude on butler island" is a great line. Also, Jade is dismissing Dave getting beat up by Bro as "drama" which, if we're meant to take Dave's domestic situation as legitimate abuse and not a joke, is pretty fucked up.

Dave repeating the whole meteor bit is shut down swiftly because Jade is incapable of keeping up with his patter. Not that I wanted the joke to be repeated anyway, but it's a telling example of how their dynamic works.

Even though Jade and John pesterlogs might be the worst combination out there, Jade and Dave conversations are also pretty damn bad. Dave is normally an entertaining character, but he's squandered in these instances. Jade offers no fun chemistry with him in the same way Rose, or even John sometimes, does. Instead of bouncing his jokes and sarcasm back at him, her obliviousness and naivete causes them to fall flat. She's less a springboard and more of a foam mattress (or smuppet ass, to use a more appropriate metaphor).

And since Dave has a crush on her and wants to appease, he rolls with it and moves along to the next subject without comment. It's like a painfully embarrassing comedy routine where one partner is letting the other flounder on stage.

The trolls act as if certain behaviors like laughing and sarcasm are exclusive to humans, despite us later seeing that such things are normal in their society. It's such a silly bit and I do like it a lot.

Karkat's trolling scheme really is the dumbest plan ever. Also some unfortunate foreshadowing for when he does eventually make shitty diagrams later on.

We needed more moments with the Exiles hanging out and getting to know each other, instead of being pawns to fulfill stupid plot contrivances. It'd make this side-plot infinitely more enjoyable to read.

Note how it's nighttime here when the previous panels with the Exiles were all during the day. This means they must have spent several off-screen hours together by this point. What were they talking about to reach a point where they're all chill with each other? Eh, Hussie deems it unimportant, so we move on!

This is actually a funny moment where Dave allows himself to be a bit of a jerk. I guess even his patience with Jade is wearing thin at this point.

Oh? Rose sounds a little jealous it seems. Dave and Jade get to have a relatively stress-free time playing server and client together. But Rose didn't get to have any of that quality time with Dave because he didn't install his disc until it reached a point where they had only seconds to save her life.

I'm once again thinking about how nice it would've been if Dave had connected to Rose earlier and we could've gotten a lot of banter between them as they navigated the game. Instead we get a lot of toothless slop with Dave and Jade. We were robbed.

Oh shit and Dave snipes right back. He has been getting ignored a lot by both Rose and John, so it's easy to see why he's frustrated. He's mad that Rose isn't putting him as her first priority? God, get a room already.

The last time we saw a conversation between John and Dave was 1,108 pages ago, back in Act 2. John has been ignoring Dave's messages since then. I don't buy the friendship these two supposedly share. If anything, it's extremely one-sided on Dave's end.

This series of pages where PM takes control of the console shows us all the key stuff from the walkaround. This makes it even more unnecessary to actually play it.

This love triangle between the Exiles gets no further attention beyond this moment. Personally I'd have solved it by making all three of them form a polycule, but unfortunately I'm not the one writing this story.

You know, I never gave it much thought before, but why is Grandpa Harley suddenly alive? He doesn't have a dreamself or anything. Nobody revived his corpse. He's just inexplicably wandering the Medium now. If this is ever explained later, I don't remember it.

I know this isn't Mom Lalonde saying this but man... I think it would've had more of an impact if she did say it. Rose never gets to see her mother again, so all she's really left with is this sobering moment of insight that, wherever it is Mom sailed off to, she's doing it for her benefit. That perhaps she's not the cold-hearted, drunken shrew Rose thought she was for her whole life and instead, was just a heavily troubled woman trying her best to be a parent. You never truly know the kind of people your parents are until it's too late, I guess.

None of the kids ever get any closure with their guardians and that's a shame. We never get to view things from their perspectives and they're just glorified NPCs. Bro in particular definitely needed some insight into his inscrutable mind, but Mom also continues to fascinate me. This woman is so full of mystique and contradictions, yet all we ever see of her is fragmented shots from Rose's (heavily biased) point of view.

I wonder what exactly Mom thinks is "best for her child," though. Helping her win the game, surely. She had to have been planning for this moment for most of her life, having known about the countdown in the lab. I wonder if she knew the full extent of what Sburb was going to do, where to go once she got there, and how to help the kids win the game.

Anyway, this panel is definitely a top 10 Rose moment. Or perhaps a top 10 general Homestuck moment, since it has to do with both Rose and Mom. I should be keeping track every time I say this line.

It's very cute how AR contributes to WV's model city. "Begrudgingly" oh come on dude, we all know you're loving this.

These imps must be weak as shit if they're getting bodied by a teenage girl with a pair of blunt knitting needles.

These are some awkward steps transitioning back into the main story, but I remember liking Act 4 the most out of these early Acts. It always stuck out in my mind as what "peak Homestuck" really is, so I can only hope things will get better as we move along. I will say that if we're devoting as much time to Dave and Jade fucking around with the Sburb mechanics as we did with John and Rose, we're in trouble.

Read the next post here.

[ordinaryschmuck]

I saw a post about how Carmen Santiego has great character designs and diversity through race and body types. I considered it a good post and one that makes a good point...And then below it was a reblog about how a person went "If Carmen Santiego can have a diverse cast of HUMANS, then what the hell is up with Hazbin Hotel and Helluva Boss?"

First of all...What the hell do either of those two things have in common? They sure are animated shows, I'll give you that. Except that one's a children's animated spy thriller and the other two are adult musical comedy dramas in Hell. Stylistically and tonally, neither of them have anything to do with each other and you just randomly made a point because...you hate Hazbin and Helluva? Cool. Congratulations. Now get a new personality and just fucking watch something else if these two shows made your hatred this obsessed when you randomly attack a show through a post that has NOTHING to do with it. The OP wasn't attacking Hazbin Hotel or Helluva Boss. Unless they constantly attack it and they made that post to prove a previous point, something that does NOT come across in that original post, there's no reason to go "Hey, why didn't these completely different shows with their own styles take notes of this kids show with ITS unique style?"

And here's the thing: I like Carmen Santiego. I like the way that it looks, and I think its style really is unique compared to other animated series that have come out around the same time. And I do agree that it has a great diverse cast that shows off a lot of body diversity where every single character looks unique in their own way. But here's the thing: I would not go out of my way to attack other shows, to the point where I'd hijack someone else's post to say, "Yeah, this show is WAY better than this other one I hate." And if I had in the past...I'm sorry. I really am sorry. I hate that I acted that way and I will try to do better. Because that's what I do with media criticism or talking about stuff I don't like. I try to act BETTER than I have in the past because that's not how you talk about media. Whether you like it or hate it, it's never a good thing to talk about something you hate when the discussion is about something someone else loves. Sometimes it makes sense, as there are often two products that are similar to each other. Like Marve/DC, Star Wars/Star Trek, and The Owl House/Amphibia. Those are media where there's a lot to compare and contrast, with people being unaware that the main reason why they like the other basically boils down to personal preferences when it comes to consuming media. But with Hazbin/Helluva and Carmen Santiego, there's really NOTHING to compare and you're just going out of your way to talk about something you hate when it's not relevant to the conversation. It's like people who hyped up Puss in Boots: The Last Wish just to shit on Velma. Yeah, The Last Wish is a thousand times better than Velma, but there's nothing similar about both products that make the discussion worth it. You're just using something you love as a weapon towards something you hate.

I get it, people like some things and hate others. It's how we're wired as human beings and I can't stop that. Nor do I think I CAN stop it. But just feel like this is making media discussion worse when all we can think of to do when discussing something we love and bringing in something we hate into the conversation. It's not necessary, and you're feeding the creators that thing you hate by still talking about it. You want to know the best possible way to react to "objectively bad" media? Stop talking about it. Stop watching it. STOP ENGAGING.

If you don't fucking like it, stop consuming this piece of media and go watch something you enjoy instead. Give THAT your time. Show how THAT does everything right and sing its praises. Raise up this one thing that you believe is "objectively good" so it can effectively overshadow this thing you consider "objectively bad." There's a way to discuss media without shitting on something you don't like.

[crydentialzz]

PART 2 HERE hi hii hello!! twiddlefinger has been rolling around in my nbrain like marblses soo have my take on the disease :3 - oh also if u like this consider taking a peek at my fan species i made for the nuggets of the max design pro universe here - idrk what warnings specifically would fit this since this is more like a breakdown of the virus itself, but just be warned there are itty bitty mentions of blood. lmk some suggestions for the warnings tho, would b very helpful ^w^ - (i based this off of being a opposite (kindof) to hanahaki disease since they r both emotion related and hanahaki is probably one of the most popular forms of "illness-due-to-feelings" which i thought was cool. oh also b aware that this is all copy-pasted from a doc i wrote up at infrequent times at night when motivation was high. i went through the entire thing and made sure it was coherent, but i doubt i caught all of it so apologies in advance for any parts that may be weirdly written or phrased, feel free to ask questions to clear stuff up. if u guys like it ill probably post more. this in parts since its so long, this 1 is the introduction and first 2 stages of the illness. aaaaanyways enjoy!!!!)

Inquies cupidinem or it's nickname “Twiddlefinger” is a parasitic disease that hijacks the dopamine system in the brain that activates when in love, causing an intense obsessive drive to keep their partner with them by any means.

Instead of illness being borne of unrequited feelings / love, Inquies cupidinem is from requited feelings and its connections to obsession, greed and or desire for a partner (these all vary in intensity). It can also be created from requited yet repressed feelings yet to be expressed to an established partner (or partners), or even from an intense fear of their partner leaving.

The disease manifests itself as a type of parasite, often located in the Jugular Vein or hidden in the arteries and veins in the lungs, and appear as black, oily growths. Its placement in veins and blood vessels is due to the disease hiding in blood cells to travel around the body and infect their host fully.

Stage 1 The disease will start out small. Little things like a temporary sore throat, cough, lower / higher body temperature, and will last a few days (3-5 days). Slowly as the illness grows, the host’s physical appearance may begin to change in a variety of ways, most notably being thinning fur around a certain region or fur patterns changing color to become muddier / darker; for those with dark fur this will be the opposite, patterns will become lighter in color / washed out. This begins about 2-5 weeks into having the previous infrequent symptoms, mental health is stable, but the patient may experience moments of memory loss, fuzziness / brain fog or deja-vu. The infected may also start to have odd behavior around their partner such as stealing / hoarding items owned by their partner or asking excessive questions about things their partner likes (these actions all act towards getting closer to their lover which temporarily satiates any need for their partner the patient may experience early on). Stage 2

Thus begins the second stage in which the internal decay rapidly increases. The body is stuck in an internal fight, the physical constantly decaying and losing mass while the infection wants to keep growing, increasing mass and keeping the body alive with its growth and amplification of muscles (this overall leads to odd looking body variations, oftentimes looking somewhat muscular and dangerously thin at the same time). The host will get strong instincts / urges to keep their partner close, even escalating into violent overreactions when said partner interacts with others. This is controllable for the most part, but the feelings will only grow stronger the longer they are unaddressed or ignored. The sickness increases, now comparable to an elevated high fever; constant shaking, occasional dry heaving / throwing up large amounts of infected blood, high irritability and intense muscle spasms most commonly occurring in the hands and fingers (the brain will send signals to grab their partner and keep them close, think something similar to alien hand syndrome but a little more controllable as this command can be averted with other stimuli). In terms of physical symptoms, the thinning fur will have targeted one area at this point, covering it in the oily substance of the infection. The muscle and tissue underneath may begin to rot away as well, leaving exposed bone (if it doesnt rot immediately, it at least is very loose, barely connected to the host and has high chances of simply tearing away if injured or touched too much). This stage is usually where contact with the patient will be limited as, against their instinct and drive to be around their partner, they will most likely try and lock themselves away from the public in fear of harming loved ones, or depending on the patient's situation will spend less time around family / their partner often opting to cover the area temporarily and distract themself. At this point mentally, brain fog has increased; the patient will find it difficult to get their mind off of their partner as they slowly grow more obsessive, even revealing some OCD symptoms (notably “Pure-O”, “Real Events OCD” and “Relationship OCD” mix). Symptoms such as repetitive rituals, replaying events over and over / flashbacks, intense overwhelming feelings of shame / guilt / fear / embarrassment, worrying that actions have caused others harm, thinking they dont deserve their partner (or idolizing / putting their partner on a pedestal), and much more. The infected will also often experience Hyperthyroidism + Polyphagia symptoms as the obsession grows from just a want to a physical (carnal) need. This will occur directly after or in the middle of the 2-5 week time-frame for the second stage is up as the disease quickens its spread.

[bonaesperanza]

Being part of the Jedi Order or any other community cannot be considered equivalent to any kind of therapy

Reply to this post because I didn't want to hijack it with my long-ass essay.

While I agree that portraying Jedi culture as cold and detached and oppressive is plain incorrect and frankly bizzare (I love the Jedi culture and think that overall it's really neat), I think that everyone in the post I linked to is severely misunderstanding how therapy works, which is kind of fatal for a discussion whose main purpose is to determine whether something is or isn't adequate therapy.

Because living in a community by definition cannot be therapy.

Therapists aren't allowed to provide therapy to people with whom they have preexisting relationships outside of therapy. Nor are they allowed to begin a different kind of relationship with a patient. Now, you may say that this is because of the great potential for abuse of power but actually, no, while that's part of it it's actually not the main concern.

The main concern is that all forms of therapy - even those that are not "traditional talk therapy" (traditional talk therapy being psychoanalysis and the like 🤢) rely heavily on the relationship between the therapist and the patient. Many studies have shown that this is an integral part of therapy regardless of the therapeutic modality (i.e. the actual content of the therapeutic approach) and accounts for as much if not more of the variance in outcomes as the actual theoretical underpinnings of the therapeutic school (do with this as you will re what this says about therapy). What a therapist does is basically assess where you're at and then scaffolds a better way of functioning - the therapeutic modality just determines in what way they scaffold it, and they also have to have honest input from you in order to tailor it to your particular needs.

Now, here are the issues.

(1) For proper trust to develop so that all of this can be accomplished, the therapist-patient relationship must be devoid of both prior baggage and external incentive structures that might conflict with the goals of vulnerable self-disclosure on the patient's part.

Simply put, it's very hard to, for example, talk about your anger at father figures or your irrational reactions at certain innocuous behaviors coming from father figures when your therapist is also your father figure. It's very hard to talk about your nasty irrational emotions if the therapist is also someone you have a personal relationship with and whose good opinion you care about, or if the therapist is your boss, or someone who is personally close to a bunch of people you are also personally close to, because you might think "Hey, I'm angry at our mutual friend but I can't talk about that, because what if my therapist likes them better and is secretly on their side" or something similar.

A community by definition cannot fulfill this purpose because all communities have a) a power structure, formal or informal and b) social norms. A community might raise a child to follow psychologically healthy tenets of emotional regulation from scratch, and this is what the Jedi do. Here there's no conflict of interest, because when you're raising a child from a very early age trust is more or less the default because the child is still in that malleable stage where they naturally look to their environment to learn this, and your good example and the healthy interactions between you (whether you are one person or several people raising the child communally) and the child will probably be enough to give the proper scaffolding for healthy emotional regulation to develop properly.

However, to move on to Anakin specifically, when you have a child that comes to your community at age 9 with a shitton of preexisting trauma, this does not work because they have already built their behavior and assumptions about the world and way of regulating themselves based on their previous experiences.

Therefore, when you move them to a new environment, they will naturally continue operating according to these assumptions, even if they are deeply irrational and contradicted by plenty of your actions. They will have ugly and dysfunctional thoughts about themselves and others and ugly and dysfunctional behavioral patterns and they will be filled with lots of nebulous fear and/or rage that will be regularly triggered by things that are not deserving of it or that the child is blatantly misinterpreting in light of their previous experiences. They will interpret everything you do according to the preexisting notions that they've picked up from their abusive environment.

If a child is used to being regularly punished, rejected or exposed to threat (which a traumatized child will inevitably be), they will also likely be severely averse to emotional risk and hypersensitive to threat (unless the punishment was so inconsistent or all-permeating that they become completely disregulated in a "you'll punish me whatever I do/there's no way to control when or how you'll punish me because it's completely uncorrelated to my own behavior, which means I may as well do whatever the fuck I want" kind of logic). They'll also be likely to interpret ambivalent stimuli as threatening.

This means that if a child sees you as someone with the potential to wield punishments or the kind of moral or social judgment that leads to social rejection or exclusion (which is basically equivalent to pain for the human brain because we have a natural need to belong), it is impossible to develop a proper therapeutic relationship with that child, no matter how correct your philosophy of emotional regulation and mindfulness and et cetera is.

In broad terms, this is why a community cannot provide therapy- a community by definition must have a mechanism for selecting its members, and also a set of norms or moral criteria the members agree on, because otherwise it'd be overrun with exploitative assholes. Even if it would never cast away the traumatized person in question, they still by definition have the power to do it, something that a person with a hypersensitivity to threat and a history of people treating them badly will be deeply aware of. If you are part of a community, you also by definition care about their opinion and their very disapproval hurts. This can be kind of alleviated if the community in question has few norms about the members' emotional expression because it revolves around another thing entirely - this is why youth groups where the membership is around, say, a shared hobby, can often be helpful - but a community that is a cultural or spiritual community will by definition address these questions and have opinions on them.

Now, to go back to my favourite terrible murdery boy and his relationship to the Jedi, the Jedi are structured in such a way that they are... inevitably authority figures who are pasing judgment on the younglings/padawans. In fact, Anakin's first interaction with Jedi who aren't Obi-Wan or Qui-Gon is in a context of the Jedi evaluating him in order to decide whether he should be accepted or not. This is antithetical to a therapeutic relationship.

Because a situation where they are evaluated and might be rejected (and put back into their abusive environment) will kill any developing trust, immediately activate the abused child's fight or flight instincts, and put them on a track of probably suppressing their emotions and focusing on what they should do and say to please you or, alternatively, being defiant in an attempt to actively and preemptively defend themselves from you.

It doesn't matter whether the Jedi were "mean" or "harsh" in that scene as some people (IMHO unnecessarily and exaggeratedly) complain about - the incentive structure of the situation is the problem. It's like when you go to HR and the nice HR lady with the psych degree asks you how you're feeling about your new position and whether there are any problems - you're gonna say no no matter how nice or enlightened she is. And if this nice lady is your therapist, she won't be able to help you if you're not honest, because she can't tailor the therapy to your needs if she doesn't know what your specific problem is.

Furthermore, the Jedi then become a) Anakin's community, i.e. his only source of companionship, emotional validation, etc. b) The only people providing for Anakin's fundamental physical needs and c) his teachers. As his teachers, it is their overt and explicit role to assess the state of Anakin's learning - including how well Anakin is adopting Jedi teachings about emotional regulation - and then decide on whether they will promote him to the next phase or not or when, all of which determines Anakin's standing in this community and what he is or isn't allowed to do.

This is antithetical to a therapeutic relationship.

OF COURSE a traumatized child will just try to please you as best they can, and you are probably pleased when the child appears well-regulated. But the child doesn't know how to regulate themselves, and they need to be dysregulated for you to show them how, and because emotional regulation is an internal thing they need to express what they're feeling in some way so that you can help them work on it in order to demonstrate. But if they are too scared of your disapproval to express it, you will never get to demonstrate it, and they will never learn. They'll just learn to mask or suppress what they're feeling. And if you have a lifetime of regulating your emotions, they will never see you become dysregulated to the degree that they do, so they can't learn from YOUR example either. And emotional regulation really, really isn't a thing that's easily taught by making someone follow a series of standardized steps - if it were, we'd be living in paradise! You can say that of course getting angry is normal etc. etc. but a person - especially a traumatized person with an internal model of the world that presumes everyone will hurt or reject them - will not internalize this based on words only.

Things become worse when you realize that the Jedi teachings also contain the notion that, "If you are not regulating yourself well enough, you become succeptible to a malevolent corruptive influence that turns you EEEVIL and the antithesis of all we stand for that few if any people recover from".

Now, is this the material state of reality for the Jedi? Yes. Is this also a deeply threatening and fear-inducing scenario? Fuck yes! It contains a threat of a) severe moral judgment of the self as Bad, b) rejection on the part of the community that provides for literally all of your needs, c) the looming threat of a scary malevolent thing controlling you. This is a very threatening scenario for someone with no clear sense of identity or a very negative one, who doesn't know how to regulate themselves, and is also hypersensitive to threat. The very notion of this will be further deregulating for this person, and because it also contains a strong component of perceived social judgment, that they are also hypersensitive to and prone to interpreting in the worst light possible in a way a mentally healthy person wouldn't, it will reinforce the abovedescribed pattern where they must suppress it all and no one must know.

Does the Jedi philosophy on emotions and the Dark side have more nuance than "If you are not regulating yourself well enough, you become succeptible to a malevolent corruptive influence that turns you EEEVIL and the antithesis of all we stand for that few if any people recover from"? Yes. Is the Jedi philosophy right on uncontrolled emotions being a road that leads to hell? Fuck yes! I overall agree with the Jedi philosophy, actually. Will a traumatized child that is put in a state of fight or flight by the very notion and probably had little in the way of formal education be able to pick up on the nuance and properly consider it in a calm and rational way and then also adopt and internalize it on an emotional level? Fuck no.

(2) Another reason your community cannot provide therapy is because, well, have you noticed how I talk a lot about how therapists "scaffold you" and "tailor their approach to your experience"? This is because when you're a therapist, it's a job. Which means that you are putting all your personal needs and preferences aside for the time being and focusing on what the patient needs, interacting and communicating in a way that best facilitates their recovery and not in the way you would genuinely like to communicate. This is why therapists get paid. It's a people-oriented job.

Even if the patient lashes out in a way that is hurtful or offensive, you must react in a way that best serves them, not in a way that mends your feelings or personal dignity. You can't just change the subject if what they're talking about bores you, you can't zone out or decide that hey, their personality is actually kinda annoying and makes me feel bad and I don't want to be friends with them.

This is the whole point of why therapy is different from simply, you know, having a friend - any other relationship is a two-way street and it's shitty and abusive to expect the other person to completely adapt their behavior to your needs and your personal growth. But if you're already set in a dysfunctional pattern, it will often be a self-perpetuating cycle: you get scared and then you get angry and unpleasant to be around and then they leave you and this hurts you and with the next person you are even more scared and even more angry and even more unpleasant... etc. If people with deeply seated issues could just be fixed by having meaningful relationships and practicing mindfulness, we'd be living in paradise!

What a therapist does is construct their interactions with you in a way that slowly leads you to change your behavioral patterns by basically some combination of selecting what kind of stimuli you're exposed to and then giving you the tools to interpret your reactions to them (and the way they do that depends on the modality/school), which means that the relationship is completely one sided and their needs and personal preferences are 100% not in the picture, which is why you're paying them. To expect someone to do it for free and all the time (and this is another reason why you're not supposed to have personal relationships with your patients - you're supposed to provide consistency and behaving one way in therapy and another way outside of it is confusing and disorienting for the patient) is not really good for the person that you are expecting it from.

So it would be really really shitty to expect someone like, say, Obi-Wan, with his own needs and his own personality and perhaps his own emotional baggage (because he's, say, processing the loss of a loved one) to play the part of a therapist for Anakin, because a therapist is fundamentally a different thing than a loved one, brother, father, friend, community member.

Now, if the Jedi Order had some kind of a designated therapist Jedi or similar spiritual advisor who didn't live with or was personally close to the other Jedi that Anakin knows and that Anakin went to regularly (for actual therapy), it would be a way different thing - but correct me if I'm wrong when I say that I don't think they do, in canon? But that still doesn't make "being part of Jedi culture" actively therapeutic.

Does this mean that the Jedi culture isn't wise and beautiful? Fuck no. I think that the Jedi culture is absolutely wise and beautiful. Does this mean that the Jedi deserved to be genocided or are in any way at fault for the fact that they were? They did not and are not and if you think differently kindly fuck off.

But the notion that just... existing within a culture is equivalent to DBT or any other sort of therapy is completely wrong and I felt the need to dispute it.

I also think that knowing how to recognize and practice good emotional regulation and knowing how to change someone's emotional regulation from terribly dysfunctional to good are two vastly different skill sets, and quite frankly the way the Jedi are structured means that they wouldn't have much need to learn the second one, because they hardly ever or never have to deal with raising traumatized children. They just exclude them by default. I suspect that not knowing how to deal with traumatized children and them consequently going dark is a large part of why they set that rule in the first place. The only reason they accepted Anakin was because of the Chosen One stuff and because Qui-Gon insisted.

Which doesn't make their teachings or their culture wrong, nor does it make the Jedi bad people. At all. (I actually think the Jedi culture is beautiful and leaves plenty of room for individuality and expression and plenty of my favourite characters are Jedi.) The Jedi can be 100% in the right about all their teachings (and probably are) and they can still be of little to no therapeutic value to Anakin. These two things can coexist.

Which means that listing "key focuses of DBT" doesn't tell you anything about how they go about facilitating said focuses in the patient or what kind of broader relationship structure is necessary to facilitate that, and that part is what really makes DBT special and adapted to people with really difficult to deal disorders like CPTSD or NPD. Not the key focuses, which are more or less similar for a bunch of different approaches, because they're kinda just common sense about what makes for good mental health.

Could the Jedi teachings be adapted to be better suited to someone like Anakin? Probably, with some mistakes along the way as they're learning (and actually admitting Anakin in the first place can be seen as the first step towards that). How you feel about the risk vs. reward ratio of that when the bad ending creates you a Sith lord is up to you to decide I guess.

[queen-mabs-revenge]

Anyway just sent a support ticket to staff about the new lightbox. Feel free to crib some/all of it if you want to send your own

Hi there,

First of all, I do want to say that there have been some amazing updates to this site of late -- polls stands out as something that has absolutely enhanced the Tumblr experience, and they've been implemented in a really thoughtful and clear way. These have made me happy to be a paying ad-free user.

However, I have to give feedback about the new lightbox feature that has been rolled out on mobile. I find it so hostile to the user experience that I've actually deleted the mobile app and am now accessing tumblr through my mobile browser.

When I click on an image, it's with the intention of removing all other distracting app features so I can focus on the image. With the new feature, the permanent post detail overlay covers part of the image/video and creates a cluttered and distracting experience. Also, if the image is of text, the text overlay makes it impossible to read the text in the image.

Also, I often click on an image with the intention to zoom in to either read small text or look at image details. The new lightbox feature destroys the capability to do either of those things without going through the circuitous process of clicking 'more' and then accessing the post through the person's blog rather than the dash. This makes the experience of viewing images actively difficult and circuitous instead of easy as it was with the previous lightbox experience. It deeply reduces accessibility.

Clicking on a video used to bring the video into focused view with sound automatically unmuted and gave the ability to scroll through the video by pulling left or right and pause with a tap. The new lightbox forces mute when opening a video, and the inability to easily track back and forth means that one is unable to rewind to hear the missed sound. Also, the ability to scrub back and forth through a video is essential for people who need more time to process sound and language. Again, the new lightbox removes accessibility.

With the new lightbox feature, the standard motion of flicking up to exit an image/video has been hijacked to introduce algorithmically-served content. The reason I am here on tumblr is because I can very carefully curate the content that I see. I choose not to use any other social media site because I find unavoidable algorithmically-served content hostile to the experience I would like to have online. I have chosen to pay for Tumblr services because I so strongly support the idea of a social media site where algorithmically-served content is not pushed onto you as a user. Not only has this lightbox feature removed a standard one-handed motion now requiring two-handed browsing, but it's actively antithetical to why I chose to financially support this site.

All of this added to the fact that on mobile images are still being served tiny and not being scaled up to full-width as they were previously, and the alt text indicator is still so dark and in a position where it's likely to cover text, means that the lightbox view is more important than ever. I was unhappy with the small images and obscuring alt text tag, but was able to push past that with the old lightbox view. Now the mobile app is unusable to me, hence deleting it.

If this is something that remains permanent, I can't see going back to using the mobile app and subsequently would drop my ad-free subscription.

I really hope that you consider going back to the previous iteration of the lightbox - it was simple, intuitive, accessible and didn't push algorithmically-chosen content. That's what people come to Tumblr for.

Thanks for your time and all the work you do,

queen-mabs-revenge

[alarrytale]

I’m ashamed to say it but I’m on Twitter quite often over the years and the homophobia allegations haven’t been a thing on there for a while now. Even with the denials, the comments were that they knew he was gay anyways. So many people commented that he didn’t actually deny it lol. His efforts just created more Larries from what I’ve seen there.

Harries hijack his articles or posts and say all kinds of things but that’s expected from them. There’s this breed of Zarries that are also particularly nasty. How people genuinely believe H & Z were and are currently in a relationship is mind boggling. But they’re there posting their “proof” under Larries comments every chance they get. It’s very odd.

The general public was very much involved in the grey hair debate & the Glastonbury articles but I didn’t see homophobia remarks about him, just that they didn’t know him or didn’t know that he was a soloist now. I think that is his biggest struggle, people don’t know him or they don’t know he’s still singing on his own. But you’re absolutely correct also when you say how he’s torn with this 1/2 indie & 1/2 pop music. And unfortunately the stigma of being a previous boy band member doesn’t exactly fit that type of indie audience, no matter how good his music is. Unfortunately, it’a going to be an uphill battle if he chooses the indie route.

Hi, anon!

I'm on twitter too, and i see it from time to time. It's always worse after the "denials" and i agree that most of the people who pull the homophobia card are people who don't like him for one reason or another. Having said that, i read the comment section on a Buzzfeed article after his last "denial" and the categories of comments from people (that i considered to not be in fandom) were;

"He's still on about larry? That's so 2013"

"Wait, there are still larries? Hahaha"

"He's so jealous of Harry’s success and he's namedropping him for clout, meanwhile Harry probably hates him because he's homophobic"

"Why can't people leave him alone about this already, he's obviously uncomfortable with it".

"Why is he so bothered? Someone explain"

"They obviously must have broken up, move on already"

I think most people do recognise that his "denials", straight confirmations and lashing out at fans is overcompensation, most likely from insecurity or from being closeted. I think the number of people who thinks L is actually homophobic is not a lot of people. Most of them are members of the queer community or have it out for him already because he's connected to H. Also, even if people don't talk about it as much anymore, doesn’t mean that they're not of that opinion. His past comments and denials is homophobic, even if he's gay and closeted.

About the indie/pop topic. I wonder how his next era will be in terms of picking a side or keep trying to be both at the same time. Do they have a goal, a plan and a strategy? We'll have to wait and see.

[whythehellnaut]

Why's Furiosa review

Not to be negative, but I do want to give my thoughts on Furiosa as well. It's another movie that sounds great on paper- a prequel to Mad Max: Fury Road focusing on the deuteragonist, possibly making her just as iconic as Max himself, but where Fury Road was masterful in its execution, Furiosa is lacking nearly everything that made it's predecessor the success it was.

It starts out pretty well, with a prologue involving Furiosa's mother hunting her down when she's kidnapped as a child, resulting in plenty of gratuitous bloodshed, but once that chapter is over, I expected to see Furiosa as an adult, played by the cover girl, Anya Taylor-Joy. To my horror, we spend nearly an hour with Furiosa as a child, watching her do next to nothing, saying maybe 3 lines in total, and being far from the feminist hero I wanted to see, if not the stark opposite. Instead, we see Chris Hemsworth ham it up as the villain, who's charismatic and gives an entertaining performance, but feels no more despicable than any other villain from a similar post-apocalyptic movie. The plot is nearly an hour of Hemsworth playing politics with the villains of Fury Road, with little action or humor. It's borderline unbearable when you preemptively know what you want to see in this movie. This 45 minute chapter in the story could have easily been summed up in a minute long narration, which the movie doesn't shy away from, so it wouldn't be out of place. Think of how fast-paced Fury Road was, how the action was nearly nonstop through the whole film, and put that side by side with this, and it's a jarring difference.

I'll give it that the movie has great camera work and cinematography for the most part. Action scenes are greatly enhanced by the way drone cameras are used, especially in what is arguably the best scene: a raid on a moving big rig in the middle of the movie. But this scene, as cool as it is, illustrates traits that I dislike about the movie as well- in particular, it's hard to follow. It's not easy to identify who the viewer should be rooting for. I would have assumed we want Furiosa and her pale-faced crew to win, but I could have sworn I saw the white faces fighting on both sides of the battle. Furiosa spends the first half of the fight on the underside of the vehicle seemingly doing repairs, but she doesn't speak to anyone until the end, so I couldn't tell if she was helping the driver or hijacking him. How does the titular character get sidelined so hard in her own movie by characters whose names and personalities are a mystery?

This brings me to what I think is my biggest complaint, and that's the lack of characterization. I don't remember a single new character's name besides Hemsworth's. Furiosa hardly has any lines and remains stone-faced throughout. Taylor-Joy is a good actress who does a good impression of Charlize Theron for the few times she speaks, so she's being wasted here. She has a comrade, whose relation to her is beyond me. Is he her friend, boyfriend, acquaintance, blackmail victim? I have no idea, because nothing about their relationship is fleshed out. Furiosa herself is so bland throughout, compared to her previous iteration, and so lacking in her namesake fury, that I'm not even concerned for her. How do you take such a great character and waste her this badly? It frustrates me that she could have become an iconic character with her own series if they nailed this, but after all this time, it seems there are still no men in Hollywood that understand how to write female characters.

It boggles my mind that this movie cost $168 million to make and is considered a failure for making about $32 mil in its opening weekend. It was shot in a desert and has only two big names attached, besides the director, who is long past his prime. The visual effects are of noticeably poor quality, which might have been funny if it was an intentional choice like George Miller's earlier works, but it seems like they're actually trying to make the effects work instead of aiming for campy charm. I can only imagine that they padded the story with so much dull political drama that they dumped their budget into useless background effects for the extra hour of footage unnecessary for the film to work. This is something I'm concerned about in both movies and in gaming: companies are too concerned with making their products "big" instead of simply good. In their attempt to make an epic saga, they lazily came up with a big waste of time that I can't recommend.

[iwonderwh0]

Not sure if it can work this way, but if you can transfer one Connor's mind into the body of another, switching their places, why can't it also mean, that it would work between different models?

So let's say there's this Traci model suspected with a crime, she willingly stretches her hand to share her memories about the incident, but while Connor is going through her related memories, she transfers herself into his body, and the moment he notices It's already too late.

"Nothing" says Traci with her new body in Connor's voice, "Let's get out of here" she nods to Hank and moves away.

Hank follows her as Connor is shocked with sudden realisation.

This post ended up being longer than expected, read it at your own risk. I am not even sure that I should even post it, but fuck it. I may or may not delete it later

"Hank, don't let her get away!" he exclaims looking at what he used to know as himself leaving. (I imagine there's some sort of barrier between them with holes big enough to stretch a hand, but not enough to fit through entirely)

"I'll wait in the car" says Tracy with Connor's lips moving forward without stopping.

"Don't listen to her, it's not me!"

Hank looks confused from Traci to Connor whose heading away, he looks back at Traci to witness her concerned expression, hands pressed against the barrier.

"She transferred herself into my body." Connor finally explains and Hank's expression shifts accordingly. He rushes away to catch the Tracy, but she'd already started the engine, Hank looks at her driving away. Not only she hijacked Connor's body but also Hank's vehicle.

"Gone" says Hank when he finally returns back to the barrier separating him from Connor on the other side, "She won't get far, not in my fucking car, police is already trying to track it"

----

Hank's car was found relatively fast, it was left only a few blocks away from the original place it was carjacked, however no sign of Tracy, or, what looked like Connor, was there to track.

New body feels foreign, but at the same time it's weirdly exciting. Thinking about it as temporary is relieving. Considering the possibility of it being permanent on the other hand is not something Connor even allows himself to think about. Of course they'll find her and get his body back, this will definitely happen, eventually, after all there's only one active Connor model so it shouldn't take too long to spot it, but for now, why not explore this body. At first it gave Connor a hope that it'll make it easier for Hank to like him — he was always much more kind and polite around pretty woman, or what looked like pretty woman, so maybe, just maybe it'll change something in a way Hank perceived Connor. And it did indeed changed, but not the way he would like it to. Expectedly, Hank started to act a bit more awkward and considerate around him, but instead of making it easier to get closer it made it much harder than it used to be before instead. Hank started avoiding him – Connor wasn't getting any kind of physical touch anymore, not a pat on the shoulder, nothing. Hank deliberately avoided getting anywhere near close to him to touch even on accident . It wasn't the only change. He started to act kinder to him, more patient, there were no usual teasing and jokes that could be considered insensitive by someone else. It was as if there was this Tracy standing next to them at all times, although Connor WAS the Tracy.

In a way, this change of character was offending. It was only the body that changed, not who's inside of it, but this change was big enough to completely alter the way Hank interacted with him, the kind of friendly connection they used to have before now turned into awkward alienation. The way he looked at him, or, instead, the way he avoided looking anywhere near him, the way he tried to be more polite. Previous excitement from a promising opportunity to change something in their relationships disappeared, the change that happened was frustrating to say the least, and after a while Connor started to feel completely repulsed by this alteration in Hank's behaviour towards him.

Expectedly, all DPD rights associated with his model was revoked, but no new rights were granted. Now he would have to ask for help every time he wanted to access some parts of the building or files on the computer that required any authorisation that he no longer had because his Tracy's body wasn't registered within the system. Processing power was also lower, he couldn't process information at even half the speed he was normally capable of, attempts to force it was causing the overheating, making even the casual attempts to preconstruct something or analyse painfully slow. It shouldn't have come as a surprised when the attempt to analyse a sample didn't bring any results - he confused it with a glitch at first, but after another sample didn't bring any results, realisation that the reason for that wasn't actually a malfunction but just the whole absence of according sensors in Tracy's model hit him. Each day he would discover another missing piece of him that he would previously take for granted and gradually it turned into resentment. Towards this new body of him, towards Hank who kept avoiding him, towards the Tracy who hijacked his body and towards himself for not spotting it in time, for letting it happen. For everything that followed. For a glimpse of previous excitement he allowed himself to feel while still thinking it would only take a few days at most to get his original body back.

Finally, after about two weeks Tracy possessing Connor's body was spotted with one of the security cameras as a result of attempted robbery. Why would she even need to rob any place at all? Not like androids needed much more than a bag of thirium every two weeks or so depending on their model and energy efficiency. Was it for pure excitement or for some other reasons?

The moment they got the news, Connor's thirium pump increased its rate impatiently. Here it was, the moment he waited, it'll soon be finally over when he finally face that Tracy again. Burning excitement mixed with rage bubbled inside him during the whole ride to the place that Tracy was last spotted, just to be replaced with complete emptiness the moment they arrived to see the aftermath of the events. The owner of the place shot the intruder and the trace of blue blood left with an attempt to escape eventually lead them to what once used to be Connor's body. Dead and damaged.

Even so Connor couldn't resist the urge to touch it, grab it around the wrist in a desperate attempt to interface, to transfer back, even if it is for the imminent death. In this moment he would much rather preferred to be dead in his own body than trapped within the one he got instead, the one he learned to resent. He wished to destroy and corrupt it the moment he saw his own expressionless face beneath him. Fixing Tracy's body would be easy, the model was widely popular and had a variety of places that offered a repair or spare parts. Connor's model didn't have a luxury or spare parts — if it was damaged it wasn't replaceable, not anymore.

As Connor was clinging to the body he once owned, processing the loss, he felt the weight of Hank's hand on his shoulder - the first time the man finally found the courage to touch him in weeks. It didn't bring any comfort, instead it only served as a reminder of what he lost along with his original self.

[mayedays]

I keep trying to figure out why I’m still so irked by (a) what Tamsyn Muir is doing with John and (b) the fandom reaction to John (despite the fact that I’ve accepted, at least intellectually, that she means for him to represent both the Father and the Son and therefore he is not simply meant to be: a Christian projection of Christianity’s flaws onto the “God of the Old Testament” that needs to be fixed by Jesus (supersessionism FTW!)).

Warning for me spending a lot of time hand-wringing about something that probably isn’t that important and possibly me putting my whole foot in my mouth and sticking my nose where it probably doesn’t belong. Simultaneously! And possibly incoherently! [In case someone unexpected stumbles across this (and the previous paragraphs weren't clear enough) I feel the need to clarify: this isn't a callout post for Tamsyn Muir, this is me trying to work through and analyze my complex feelings about her work and the fandom response to it. As such, it may contain statements that are presumptuous and you shouldn’t read this post if that’s likely to upset you.]

I think there are a disparate things going on that continue to grate. I think one of them is that, as a Jewish Atheist, I don’t consider God to be real and therefore I don’t consider him responsible for Christianity’s sins (e.g. imperialism/colonialism, child sexual abuse, etc). I consider *Christians* to be responsible for it, so to have Jod be simultaneously a “Christian” Emperor, Space-Pope, and a diagetically unambiguously real God all at once...it feels kinda weird that they are all being conflated/merged into one character, since I only consider two of those three to be real and therefore accountable for the violence of Christianity (obviously there have been many popes and Christian emperors, I’m treating them as one for simplicity). I also wouldn’t want to blame Jesus for this, like, yes! let’s blame the Jewish man murdered by the Roman Empire for the Roman Empire hijacking the religion he inspired and using it as a tool of Imperialism, and then the British Empire also using it as a justification for Imperialism, etc!! And since John is also a Jesus figure, this is another angle where the choices seem weird, because I keep going “is she trying to blame Jesus for it?!” even though I know that that’s stupid and simplistic. Of course, if she genuinely believes/believed in God-as-told-by-Catholicism, then it makes sense that she would blame him (and Jesus) for Christianity’s sins--he’s an all-powerful figure! If he’s real and he didn’t want Christians to commit evil, why didn’t he intercede? But for me it just feels a little like absolving individual Christians of their choices

So: I don’t much like seeing a Christian author hang the responsibility for Christian violence on the Christian God/Jesus because it feels like its absolving the Christian masses of how they interpreted God and used God to justify violence. And I’m not entirely sure that this is what she’s trying to do...but it does seem that this is how its being received by the fandom, many of whom hate Jod with maximum vitriol (I am still bitter about the fact that the first time I dared venture into the John Gaius tag, I only made it to the third page before I  found a long character-hate screed that end with the writer hoping he would be tortured forever. I will always be bitter.) but often don’t hate the other Ninth-house characters with near as much passion. Abigail, and Magnus, and Harrow, and Gideon, etc. are typrically all approached with a degree of sympathy despite being implicated in the Nine Houses’ colonialism--they are not the people at whom the buck stops, and they are actively being prevented from understanding their world accurately by Jod, who is lying to the entire Empire.

Additionally, because I am a Jew and therefore a member of a group that has historically been one of European Christianity’s primary victims, I feel some amount of...idk, resonance? kinship? (is it presumptuous to say this? god, probably, but I hope any readers will bear with me while I try to explain further) with aspects of the Māori experience as victims of Christianity. Like, obviously there is a lot of difference between the experience of being Māori and subject to colonization and being Jewish and subject to Christian persecution, perhaps there is more different than there is similar, but both communities are still in the “screwed over by white Christian society” camp.

This in turn means that it feels kinda upsetting to see someone who is probably white (or Pākehā, more specifically--caveats on this in the next paragraph) creating a Māori man as a symbol of the moral transgressions of Catholicism and Imperialism. To put it another way, I probably would have rage-quit the series if John was revealed to be a Jewish character (who converted to Catholicism) instead of a Māori one. Maybe that means I have hopelessly plebeian (or pedestrian) tastes, but I would not be okay with a Christian writer doing with a once-Jewish character what Muir is doing with this Māori one (although, I suppose “Jewish person dies and becomes Christian God” is literally Jesus’s arc, so). So I’m kinda in a constant state of “what! the fuck! does everybody else know! that I don’t! that makes them comfortable with this!” and “maybe I’m just being absurdly rigid and dogmatic?!?”.

But to be fair, It is entirely possible that Muir could actually be Māori, and that she is simply private about her ethnicity/ancestry, which is her right. I agree that she has a right to privacy! And yet, this means I can’t put my anxiety to rest, because it puts Muir in a state analogous to a quantum superposition--because I can’t make the measurement, she is both Māori and not Māori at the same time. I could just cut the Gordian knot by saying “anyone can write what they want, but how they handle it is open to criticism, and one’s ability to handle fraught material is not solely determined by ones identity markers” thereby making her identify irrelevant (which I suspect is her view on the matter) but I can’t simply say that because while its true that anyone has that right and that perhaps identify should be irrelevant...that doesn’t mean they are entitled to me as audience and there are certain narratives I don’t want to read (if the makes my tastes hopelessly plebeian/pedestrian, so be it!), and I have to decide if I’m willing to risk reading Alecto the Ninth without knowing if Alecto the Ninth is going to confirm that this is the narrative she is writing. I think my best bet is to walk away from the Gordian knot by saying ‘I don’t want to read Alecto the Ninth’ (or ‘I won’t read it until someone with my same intuitions about this says they think its fine’). And yet, I just kinda keep spinning...somehow this doesn’t lay to rest this issue. I suppose its because I really do want to read it, and I keep trying to bargain for an outcome I can tolerate by reiterating the argument about why she would never write my worst-case (or adjacent) scenario. But I can’t control what Muir writes, so there isn’t any point in endlessly mentally bargaining with the universe. Its also likely that I don’t really believe “I don’t have to read this, I don’t owe her anything”. Because she’s right in that interview, marginalized authors really ARE put under greater scrutiny...and therefore I feel bad about refusing to read something because “it might offend me”. Obviously the loss of my single purchase for AtN won’t make or break anything, but I still have the sense that I’m being part of a problem.

And the stupidest part is, intellectually I can’t really bring myself to believe that Muir would be so crass as to make a Māori character as a scapegoat/symbol of Chrisitianity’s sins (or the British Empire’s sins) so he can be brutally punished for the catharsis of the (probably mostly white) audience. But I have Anxiety! The Condition and I also don’t really trust my own intuitions about this. Maybe its my judgment that’s borked, or there is an angle I’m overlooking.

And then of course there is the problem that I find some of (what I presume are) John’s emotional/self-esteem problems painfully relatable (which may be a sign that I’m just projecting) and therefore am doing a bad job of maintaining separation and so taking everyone’s hatred of him as judgment of myself (despite the fact that I have never done anything nearly as bad as John). So...that part is fun.

[randomclam24]

ESL

Update - Paul Joseph Watson is known as the zeitgeist of our alt-Right that's "really wonderful" for forward compatability In reality some middle eastern leader is quoted claiming that the European definition of democracy is a country run by jews In reality Europe is known politically as the society that could not survive American culture In reality these people who are coming out saying you're not democracy *are* the jews Update - I found the source of the projection https://www.smashjt.com/post/crazed-sweet-baby-inc-employee-says-their-goal-is-burning-the-games-industry-to-the-ground They conspicuously changed archive.is (Technically if these were tweets, which seems to be the basic unit That last sentence would be an update Update - an alternative was Stillio, it is impossible to share direct links, they must be downloaded and uploaded Update - The truth is, they're not crazed, the source for the leftists needing to deliberate

https://files.catbox.moe/v4tql8.png In summer 2021, it was probably surreal entertainment that released, basically, "do you want Mark Zuckerberg's Sweet Baby Ray's

Update - oh yeah this is the source of the welfare queen worship (hence we're living under a military firmament

(Not just SOAD - "We're all living in America" vibe is truly bad if about the people and not the military This is the country where the current is backed up after being deleted

Update - It's not just one time, and bravery doesn't exclude smarts, either: If you want to pick on a normie, consider pic related, which I titled "this doob" like the meme

Get the full page and zoom in

It really would be categorically Members Only

Update - So we're getting closer to Germ Theory being the ultimate cause for the Corona virus (fiasco

Some guys posted about whole milk being "triggering" read the fine print - it leaves those with weak immune systems vulnerable Update much later - not sure how I got roped into this, but black people on shoes All I have to do is mow the lawn - otherwise I wear sandals I actually chose recently All Star Converse update - tennis shoes Also, while the iron remains hot - I got my mom to get me a dinner SANDWICH for doing it having drawn it out https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FnEQbKbNWEw on the previous topic. Update - I won't be here for immediate responses, but I used to keep Smarties cut with my thumbnail like a Pez dispenser to equate the sense of bile Update after mow - I'm starting to get the sense that the old game Acno's Energizer's BALLs has the Google Chrome logo appeal Update later - current pasta The Decline of "Oldfag Culture" and the Dark Influence of Zoomers on 4chan

In the digital underworld of the internet, there exists a realm that once stood as a bastion of unfiltered chaos, sharp wit, and unapologetic subversion—4chan. It was the birthplace of memes, the launchpad for subcultures, and a refuge for those who sought to operate outside the strictures of society. But in recent years, a new generation—Zoomers, or those born roughly between 1997 and 2012—have begun to infiltrate this once-pristine territory, altering the very fabric of its culture. What was once an unrestrained haven for the "oldfags"—those who navigated the site's darker, unpolished corners—has, over time, been slowly but surely hijacked by this younger, more easily offended generation.

This shift has not just been a change in membership demographics; it has been a profound erosion of 4chan’s ethos, from an anarchic, unrelenting force of online rebellion to something less recognizable, more curated, and dangerously fragile. The digital pulse of "oldfag culture" has been dulled, replaced by a new order that is often perplexing, disorienting, and—worst of all—predictable. The Rise of the Zoomer Infiltrators

For those who lived through the early years of 4chan, it was a place governed by an ironic distance from mainstream society. Humor was cynical, self-deprecating, and dark. Offensive content was common, but it was often wielded with a knowing wink—an acknowledgment that nothing was sacred, and everything was fair game. 4chan wasn't a space for niceties. It was a sandbox for chaos, where anonymity allowed the true, untamed nature of its users to thrive. "Oldfags," the veterans of 4chan, prided themselves on their immersion in the site's unique culture. They were the gatekeepers, those who could decode the endless layers of inside jokes, trolling, and subversive commentary.

But with the arrival of the Zoomers—those who came of age in the age of social justice, oversaturation of memes, and hyper-commercialized online spaces—the foundations of this culture began to crack. The new wave was accustomed to a very different internet: one that catered to their social awareness, political correctness, and easily consumable viral content. To them, 4chan was not the home of unfettered freedom, but a place to argue over boundaries and ideology, where "safe spaces" were suddenly in demand and "cancel culture" wasn't just a buzzword—it was a weapon. The Death of Anonymity and the Rise of "Performative Radicalism"

Anonymity was the lifeblood of 4chan's culture. It allowed users to engage in unfettered expression, explore taboo subjects, and embrace the most absurd forms of self-representation. The oldfags who built this subculture were proud of their facelessness. In a world of curated Instagram photos and endless Facebook profiles, they reveled in the freedom to exist without identity, where every post was a cipher, a throwaway fragment that could be made, broken, and remade anew.

But for the Zoomers, anonymity was a concept that didn’t resonate in the same way. Their lives were defined by the constant curation of their online personas across social media platforms. They were children of the algorithm, trained to post with purpose and with awareness of consequences. The anonymity that was once sacred on 4chan became increasingly irrelevant to them, as they began to reveal parts of their identities even within this most chaotic space. Whether it was their gender, their political leanings, or their unyielding need to prove how "woke" they were, the new generation began to reshape the culture of 4chan into something unrecognizable.

What emerged was the rise of "performative radicalism"—the idea that to be truly radical or countercultural, one had to display the most extreme and outlandish views for the sake of online clout. In this environment, the subtlety of humor, once a hallmark of 4chan, began to fade. What replaced it were shallow, shallow takes on complex subjects—posts that lacked the nuanced edge of the oldfags’ biting irony. Instead, the focus became louder, more abrasive opinions, curated outrage, and an obsessive need to fit into an ever-shifting set of cultural codes that often contradicted the very spirit of anarchic expression 4chan was built on. The Erosion of Humor and the Death of the Meme

Memes, as they are understood today, are far removed from the visceral, raw energy of the memes of old. A few years ago, when a new meme emerged on 4chan, it was a bizarre, underground creation—an inside joke built from a pool of shared knowledge and a rich history of in-jokes. It was a meme for the initiated, a symbol of belonging in a space that was intentionally exclusionary. The humor was dark, often nihilistic, but it was always self-aware. It was the kind of humor that only those who truly understood the absurdity of life could appreciate.

But the Zoomers—the children of viral social media and mainstream meme culture—are not interested in these kinds of memes. Their humor is louder, faster, and more surface-level. TikTok-driven memes are less about subtlety and more about virality, often driven by trends and challenges that lose their meaning as quickly as they gain popularity. The edge is gone. The crude and rebellious nature of old meme culture is diluted, watered down into easily digestible content for the masses.

The result is a twofold tragedy: on one hand, the humor itself has become less inventive, leaning into worn-out formats and cliches. On the other, 4chan’s original function as an incubator for subversive creativity has been extinguished in favor of increasingly bland, corporate-friendly meme aesthetics. The Fragmentation of 4chan and the Oldfag Exodus

The death of oldfag culture on 4chan is not merely an ideological shift—it has caused a mass exodus of the site’s original denizens. The users who once defined the tone of the platform have migrated to smaller, more niche communities, seeking refuge from the encroaching tide of new blood. They no longer feel at home in a place that has become dominated by the values of the very mainstream they sought to escape.

It is impossible to ignore the dissonance between the platform’s past and its present. Once a wild west of internet freedom, 4chan has now become a space where moderation, censorship, and groupthink creep in under the guise of "keeping the peace" and "protecting the community." The oldfags have largely disappeared, and in their place stands a fragmented collection of subcultures, each vying for attention in an increasingly crowded and sanitized ecosystem. Conclusion: The End of an Era

As the Zoomers continue to dominate the conversation on 4chan, the once unassailable fortress of oldfag culture fades into memory. The site is no longer the chaotic, creative powerhouse it once was, and what remains is a hollow shell, curated for a generation that, while tech-savvy and hyper-aware, lacks the irreverence and anarchic spirit that made 4chan a true online force.

The decline of 4chan's culture is not just a simple generational shift. It is a death—a slow, painful unraveling of a community that once thrived on the ability to speak freely, without fear of judgment or consequence. The Zoomer invasion has taken this freedom and turned it into something… less. Less raw, less daring, less dangerous.

And so, the oldfags—those who once stood at the vanguard of internet rebellion—retreat into the shadows, as the Zoomers take over the ruins of what was once their home. The internet, like all things, has moved on—but for those who remember the golden age of 4chan, the change is not just disappointing. It is chilling. The soul of the site, and with it the heart of online irreverence, has been suffocated by the very generation that claims to embrace the chaos.

In the end, perhaps it is only fitting that the decline of "oldfag culture" mirrors the rise of the sanitized, bite-sized internet we see today—shiny, quick, and ultimately forgettable. Update after above Temp Spawned from Stuart K Reilly's review claim of GBA Duke Nukem, I actually considered gauging the uncanniness of each port of Doom by how they rendered Deimos Lab Update - here's why I said it temp SNES won out Update - Apparently, the take on the sharty is that millenials are listing the trauma they are because they're in the mentality of just paying off their student loan Update - If you just sit there, the most active thing ever since daytime television is porn

[fallingintheforest]

'cuse me for hijacking this post, but this is my Thunderdome, and I have opinions....

While I think the Spring Court tends to favour fiddle and Celtic-style music, the Autumn Court is all about the classics.

re: previous tags - I def agree the Autumn sibs all are trained in an instrument or two. I do think they are all classically trained in piano, which serves as a gateway into other instruments. Although their skill level in piano may vary, they are all at least proficient.

I like to think Autumn is a very musically inclined court. They hold competitive music festivals that are as snobbish as they are prestigious, full of tradition and elegance. Nervously sweating in your finest clothing before performing is a rite of passage for most young Autumn fae.

I think most of the Vanserra siblings branch out into instruments like the viola, double bass, or lute. I 100% hc that LoA plays the harp, and Beron is an organist. I unfortunately also think Beron has a lovely singing voice (imagine the Captain from The Sound of Music).

Eris and Lucien, however, primarily focused on piano. Eris is good enough to be considered a concert pianist, and likely dominated at the music festivals in his youth. He probably gets invited back as a guest adjudicator. RIP the students in his class. Lucien, on the other hand, I think very quickly became sick of the "boring classical" stuff and loved to play blues/jazz and ragtime. Lucien just loves to jam out and has amazing natural rhythm.

HC that when they were younger, Lucien would constantly pester Eris to play four-hand piano pieces with him.

Honestly, the few good memories the brothers have are from playing music together. However, that doesn't negate that some of their most vicious fights were sparked from one of them consistently playing out of time. Let’s just say, each of them has had a tuning fork thrown at them at least once.

Lastly, I like to think the Autumn Court has its own symphony. Beron def has royal box seats. Attending a symphony performance is a major cultural event, and everyone dresses in their finest. The annual performance of the Second Waltz, complete with a complement of trained dancers, totally captures the refined elegance of Autumn society, and I go freaking feral for it

So you're telling me that Lucien lived with Fiddle-master Tamlin of the Spring Court for HOW LONG and he isn't proficient in pianoforte or lute or the goddamned harp or something and they didn't have drunken jam sessions into the wee hours of morning here and there?

[maxladcomics]

Deviantart || Ew who uses this || bluesky  || Overpriced Commissions (They are overpriced because I don’t want to do them btw)

ABOUT MAX

I am a Papyrus-focused artist, don't ask me about his brother.

I draw Papyrus-focused comics, and make Papyrus-focused lore/theories, if you ask or comment about an AU version of his brother there is a very good chance I'll kill him. 

- All my content will be free forever

- You can turn it into memes*

- You can make comic dubs*

- You can make a translation*

- You can reference it for your own art*

- You can make content based off of mine*

* Please @ me or msg me because I want to see it or link to it, unless it makes Papyrus stupid, then I don't. But I won't stop you from making it.

COMICS

Story comics - Comics that follow the lore/worlds/multiverse I have, foreshadowing heavy, generally. Watch out for the foreshadowing tag and see if you can find it. 

Shenanigans and Shitposts - FULL - Generally short comics about dumb things that SHOULD be funny, shouldn’t be any surprise angst, and rare foreshadowing.

Random comics and MTT Legs - Mostly short pages, extras to the story comics, creepy/horror type comics and angst, some foreshadowing, probably.

More recent comic pages - New storage page, will have descriptions on all the pages to let you know if they contain angst, swearing, etc

MAXTAGS

Maxart || Fanart || Friend art ||

Maxask || Maxramble || Maxstop - Asks with varying degrees of length, Maxask is my normal ask tag, Maxramble has at least 2 paragraphs and Maxstop is probably an essay if I knew anything about writing.

Reference - Undertale AU infodumps, designs, etc, the tag is Character reference because the reference tag has bots stalking it

Tutorial - Self explanatory

Undertale Theory - Generally essay level theory posts that gives the maxstop tag shame. Unhinged rambling and unimaginable stretches ahead, beware.

MAX AU’S

I made my own versions of Underfell, Underswap and Outertale but there’s others I have blogs, or actual character references for: SwapfellMax - My version of Swapfell

Fellswap Purple - My version of Fellswap, some roles are swapped, mostly chaotic AU I threw all my ideas I couldn’t use, into. Undercurrent - AU where the monsters are pirates but not really GraveMistake - Horror themed AU, neglected to death [I lied, here’s a reference sheet] Gravel - Murder AU where the monsters eat dust for some reason..

FAVOURITE MYSTERIOUS PAPYRUS CONTENT

PAPYRUS IS GASTER - Theoried myself into a corner and now everyone has to suffer with me being smug about it

Papyrus being suspicious around light/fire

Papyrus is a liar || Papyrus is a liar full version

Papyrus has vaguely implied (with diversion tactics/LYING) that he has been inside the lab

Papyrus is the only one to change your entire GUI during the hangout/date

Papyrus repeating sentences intentionally -super vague implying he knows he’s in a game, which wouldn’t mean anything if he didn’t also imply knowledge of how events and characters also work in a game

Papyrus seems aware of the cameras around snowdin

Papyrus and Riverperson

Papyrus tells heaps of puns in the game

Papyrus’s battle body?

The number Three

Most important Papyrus meme

TO DO LIST

Fellswap comics/profiles That Child

Previous contest - Papyrus likes puns

Next contest - Unknown when, but it’ll be about Undertale Papyrus as usual

[sanjarka]

What do you think about Hijacked Peeta storyline in Mockingjay?

Is it narrative-ly satisfied for Peeta's arc?

Thank you,

@curiouspeetamellark

i already written about this in a previous post of mine, but it's pretty long so I'm just gonna copy the parts about peeta's hijacking here:

/@curiouspeetamellark i tried my best to only keep the most important parts. i just have a lot of feelings and don't know what do with them/

the tragedy of peeta's hijacking and how he was unconsciously preparing himself for it.

i am not implying that it was his fault or responsibility, and i don't believe it was necessary, nothing was. however, there is a reason why certain narratives include certain people.

and when we look back at the story, we can see how it was almost predictable. that it was foreshadowed, not only by the conversation on the roof in the first book, where he tells us that he wants to prove that the capitol doesn't own him, but also by who he is as a person. then we can see how his hijacked and true selves are entangled with one other.

although he appears to be more emotionally mature than katniss he is still just a child. he still traumatized, insecure, stubborn, lonely, prideful and scared. he is also trying to survive. it just looks different. his emotional maturity wasn't created from a good and safe place. he grew up with an abusive mother, a father who repeatedly betrayed him by failing to protect him, distant brothers, and as a result of that he feels insignificant and unneeded.

much as katniss survived by numbing herself out, in the years after her father's death, by letting her feelings happen outside of her, i feel as though peeta did the exact opposite. that he grew fixated on attempting to comprehend everything and everyone. that he became obsessed with overthinking and overanalyzing his thoughts rather than feeling them. his drawings and paintings are an escape form and that's his ways of surviving.

it feels like there is this sense of loneliness that follows him, is stuck to him, and that affects the type of relationships he builds with other people - distant ones.

while katniss's walls are so obvious, peeta's are unexpected and hidden. peeta goes through life hiding from others whilst katniss hides from herself.

it takes actual hard effort for him to let people and in many ways i think that katniss is the first one with that privilege. that she is his exception. and that it wasn't instant. that it did happen slowly.

so when i think of him, i don't picture a guy who wears his heart on his sleeve and is naturally open. we can see how good of an actor and liar he is. him being open is him making conscious decision to do so and not something he can't control.

other people see his love for katniss, not because he doesn't know how to hide it, but because he wants them to see it - it's the only time honesty was beneficial for him.

/we rarely see him being comforted by katniss and being the "weak" one. and it has nothing to do with her. he's the one who isn't prepared for it. he is apprehensive about being looked after. katniss may be challenging in this area too, although not as much as peeta. because her home was once a happy and safe place and being with peeta reminds her of those times while peeta is experiencing feeling safe for the first time. that's terrifying. he must be strong and and he must be capable, must be perfect, before he can even consider himself worthy of love. so it will take a long time for peeta to break that, to allow himself to show sides of him that are fragile,messy and ugly/

the loudest flaw of his is exactly this tendency to hide from others which results in bottling things up and letting them fester inside of him, particularly anger. we almost never see peeta lose control of his emotions and considering the situation that he is in, i don't think it's a positive trait really.

he never learned how to express anger in a healthy manner because, after all, it's supposed to be terrible, right? however, anger should not be associated with hurting or lashing out at people. the way to deal with anger is to let yourself feel it. not to repress it. but how can i expect peeta to be any different when the first attribute he would give to his mother would be anger? and the one thing he wants to prove to himself is that he isn't like her.

his hijacking is a tragedy, not only because he dreads becoming a piece in their games as a form of defiance, but also because it creates a complete lack of self control in a character who prides himself on it - the one thing he's certain is entirely his.

take an abused boy and abuse him some more, then take away his agency, rendering him powerless over emotions that aren't even his, while giving an outlet to those that are, that had been waiting for a moment like this one. take that anger, that he is so deathly afraid of, and make it his primary way of communicating. make him hurt the one person he trusted the most, felt safest with and then blame her for everything. make his hurting her fault and her responsibility.

and clearly, we know that the only real culprits of this crime are snow and the capitol and no one else but them, but hijacking works with the already existing insecurities and fears of its victim. it feeds off of its host. and considering that, it couldn't have found a better one.

-–-–-–-–-–-–-–-–-–-–-–-–-–-–-–-–-–-–-–-–-–-–-–-–-–-

the tragedy was the point. to have both katniss and peeta experience their worst case scenario (outside of loosing each other). this was just my way of explaining why i think peeta loosing self control is equivalent to katniss loosing prim. was it absolutely needed and did the story absolutely had to go this way? not really but isn't that the point too.