#i do agree with certain things but clearly its all up to interpretation i guess

[mellohiizz]

im more complex about the episode then everyone else seems to be apparently. imo they all sucked this episode.

for one, i am actually a dean sympathizer. lets be real parrot and wifies both treated him badly. i wouldnt have told parrot either when he was there constantly repeating the exact same things ash said to blackmail dean; and wifies isnt much better for affirming the shit ash told dean either, infact i would argue wifies was even worse then about it. if i was there hearing "ash was right. youre a burden, but thats ok." and "ash was right. your a burden, we should be leaving you for dead." i wouldnt want to risk jeopardizing my one source of safety either.

before the reveal that dean was actually involved in the leaking of their location wifies just came of as a semi-controlling dick. there were a million better ways all of them could have done things this episode. i dont really like the wifies glazing as if he was perfect this episode and didnt treat a fellow victim who lodgically didnt have a choice like shit. wifies is smart enough to figure out dean didnt want to sell them out. imo he had no actual reason to reason to treat dean with as little empathy as he did, especially when wifies knows exactly what its like to have his existance used to get to parrot in the exact chain of events parrot referenced after the compass was burnt.

both sides of odessy were being hypocritical and hurtful as hell and thats been a theme of uu the whole time. theyre all flawed, they are make mistakes and are selfish and hurt others doing what they think is righteous or best or safest. uu is the dichotomy of perspective, about how everyone does what they think is best and how more often then not that best hurts atleast someone. and guess what? thats life. thats actually pretty normal, especially if youve been through your own shit or are traumatized like the characters of uu are.

they all suck and hurt people, thats the moral of the story. the moral that feels very lost on most of the fandom...

-🔍🏰(f:▶️🥊)

honestly, good take. kind of made me rethink some things that happened in the episode as well.

to be fair, yes, obviously dean was treated badly the whole episode. even i noted that wifies was a bit too harsh with how he approached things the whole video. he knew that dean was leaking information, didn't tell parrot, and still tried to put basically the whole blame of it on dean. "you could argue i hid it from you" yes, wifies, you did keep it from parrot, knowing that parrot would've tried to look for a different solution.

parrot was obviously not any better. he brushed off wifies despite the other very clearly showing signs of concern and he did also openly called dean a burden. which is, yes, he was slowing them down, but i feel like there was a nicer was to go about it.

and yes, i do sympathize with dean, but he did hide a piece of pretty crucial information from them, keeping a leverage in the compass, and then ran away after being confronted. it's fair, i'm not saying he was entirely wrong for that too, but i feel like it wouldn't be fair to say anyone was fully in right/wrong.

and yeah, you're are right, the morality of characters is a pretty obvious focus on the whole uu, and obviously all of them are very flawed. taking wifies's words, we just need to try and look at things from all of their perspectives. they're all understandable, and in some ways even reasonable, but there were much better ways to go about the whole situation, but the problem was exactly that. perspective. they were all focused on their individual goals and didn't try to see everything from the perspective of others. and that's what separated all of them.

[jaydude1992]

(For @chloe-caulfield94. My take on Max leaving the Jedi Order for Chloe.)

“You wish to leave the Jedi Order?” asked Jedi Master Michelle Grant, not unkindly.

“I’m sorry, Master.” The figure sitting across from her - Michelle’s apprentice Max - was a young Zabrak woman with brown hair and freckles. At present her head was bowed low, though whether it was out of shame or deference, Michelle wasn’t sure.

Michelle smiled. “Look at me, Max,” she said, wanting to make sure her apprentice could see that she was not going to be judged over what she’d just said.

Only when Max looked up did Michelle speak again. “You don’t have to apologize for making that decision. Being a Jedi or not is your choice alone. But if you don’t mind me asking, why do you wish to leave?”

Max took a deep breath. “Do you remember Chloe?”

“The Twi’lek girl we met on our first mission together? Yes, I do.” Michelle’s smile became a knowing one as she connected the dots together. “You have feelings for her, don’t you?”

Max’s eyes widened. “I…what?!” she exclaimed, having clearly not expected to get found out in this matter.

Michelle laughed at her apprentice’s reaction. “What, did you think it was a secret?” she asked. “I don’t know if you’re aware, but our way of life does tend to make you quite good at figuring other people out.

I’ve known you’ve been crushing on her ever since you two first met. And that’s before Mr. Jettster told me that you’ve been frequenting his diner ever since Chloe and her mother started working there.

She closed her eyes while continuing to smile. “I sensed such a day would come long ago. That you would make a choice between the Jedi Order and Chloe. You love her.”

Max decided not to try and deny things at this stage. “If you knew about my feelings for Chloe all this time, why did you never say anything?”

“Why would I? To love is a key part of our way of life.”

“And yet the Jedi Code forbids attachments.”

“To forbid something doesn’t necessarily mean we condemn it in its entirety,” Michelle explained. “Max, in the context of the Jedi Code, an attachment means a desire to possess, a reluctance to let go. Which isn’t in itself a bad thing, provided you handle it in a healthy manner.”

“So why are attachments forbidden?”

“Because to be a Jedi means more than just knowing how to use the Force or a lightsaber. It’s about selflessly serving the people of the galaxy, and putting the needs of the many above your own desires. Loving is fine, until it serves as a distraction or hindrance in regard to that.”

“So I guess I’m a terrible Jedi then.”

“I wouldn’t say that. You’ve certainly never let your love for Chloe impede you before,” Michelle replied. “But even if you were a terrible Jedi, that wouldn’t make you a terrible person. Many of the kindest, most noble and selfless people I’ve ever met have never so much as set foot inside a Jedi Temple.”

Max looked down. Something still nagged at her. “I don’t get it,” she said. “Even if I accept the Jedi Code’s version of attachment, how is that different from love? Wanting to be with someone, not wanting to lose them…I’d have thought that would be the textbook definition of love.”

“It can be one interpretation of it,” Michelle agreed. “But what about simply being happy for someone? What about wanting the best possible life for them, even if that doesn’t necessarily involve you? Is that not an equally valid form of love? I’m not saying that to try and get you to stay with us. I’m just sharing my thoughts on the subject.”

Max believed her. Unlike a certain Jedi Master whose last name was audibly similar to Kessel Run, Michelle Grant would be happy for her regardless of her choice in the matter.

She bowed her head. “I’m sorry Master. But I want to be with Chloe. I’d be lying if I said otherwise and still claimed to love her.”

Michelle nodded her head. “Then I will accept and respect your decision, and I wish only the best for the two of you,” she replied.

Max reached for her belt and took out her lightsaber, intending to hand it over. Michelle however rejected it.

“Keep it,” she said. “Like I said earlier, being a Jedi is more than just knowing how to use a lightsaber.”

After a bit of hesitation, Max put the lightsaber back on her belt. “Thank you for everything, Master,” she said.

Michelle decided to overlook the fact that she technically wasn’t Max’s master anymore. “You can thank me by giving me an invitation to the wedding,” she replied.

“Master!”

===

Chloe was cleaning one of the tables of Dex’s Diner when Max entered the building and approached her.

“Did you really leave the Jedi Order?” she asked, looking up at the brown-haired Zabrak with sheer disbelief. Even though Max had offered to do such a thing for her, and even though she’d taken Chloe up on that kiss dare long ago, it still seemed too good to be true.

“I sure did,” Max replied.

“I…How did your master react?”

“She was nothing but supportive. Said she only wanted the best for us.”

“Are you sure she meant it?” Chloe asked. “Because from where I’m standing, it looks like she hates me for tempting you away.”

Max followed Chloe’s gaze and saw Michelle standing outside a few meters away from the diner. Her arms were folded and her eyes were narrowed as she looked at the two of them through the window, and she stood in such a way that made sure they could see her lightsaber on display on her hip.

The Zabrak managed a laugh. “Oh, it’s actually the opposite,” she said. “She’s making sure you don’t try and push me into ditching you and joining back up with the Jedi. We both agreed you’re selfless like that. Heck, you’d probably try to make me sacrifice you for the sake of Hutt Space if need be.”

Chloe managed a smile. “It’s just so hard to believe. That you’d go so far as to leave the Jedi Order for someone like me.”

“Well, you’d hella better believe it,” Max replied. “Chloe, I love you, and I’ll always choose you over the galaxy.”

Chloe’s smile became deeper, as she accepted this was really happening. “I love you too, Max.”

===

At the time of writing, my understanding of attachment in the context of the Jedi Code is that it means a desire to possess things and a reluctance to let go of them. I will concede that - in moderation - this isn’t necessarily a bad thing in of itself, but a key part of being a Jedi is choosing to put the needs of others and the greater good above yourself and your own desires. This is not to say that failing to live up to the Jedi ideal makes one a bad person.

[twistedtummies2]

Barnaby - The Three Best of the Worst

“Babes in Toyland” is a very strange case when it comes to Christmastime staples. Most people haven’t even seen or heard the original operetta created by Victor Herbert (who was inspired by the works of L. Frank Baum), and the actual story changes depending on which of the many televised adaptations (and even a few newer stage interpretations) you look at. Certain things do stay the same throughout them all, but virtually none of them have any real faithfulness to the source material, instead mixing and matching different elements to create their own unique version.

The one thing that practically every version of “Babes in Toyland” keeps, however, is its central antagonist: Barnaby, the Crooked Man of Mother Goose fame. Barnaby is a classic melodrama villain; a pure evil nasty of the highest order, who is entertaining in how unrepentantly and enthusiastically wicked he is. While elements of his character do change throughout different versions, he is an archetypal baddy in every rendition, and while other things in “Toyland” change from version to version - the names of the protagonists, the plots of the stories, and even the songs featured - Barnaby is a presence in every single one. Toyland just isn’t Toyland without its resident nasty ol’ Crooked Man. Out of the numerous takes on “Babes in Toyland,” and numerous takes on Barnaby in turn, everybody has a personal favorite of their own. Today, I just wanted to present my three favorite versions of the character. By extension, you can basically call this my three favorite versions of “Babes in Toyland” as well. Again, there are others out there - a cult classic 80s version starring Keanu Reeves, an episode of the Shirley Temple Show which featured Jonathan Winters as Barnaby, etc. - but these are the three nearest and dearest to my heart. So, without further ado, allow me to present my picks for My Top 3 Favorite Portrayals of Barnaby!

3. Ray Bolger, from the 1961 Disney Film.

The Disney version is probably the best-known take on “Babes in Toyland” nowadays (most likely because it IS the Disney version, so to speak). While the film is a bit clumsy in places, it’s still a lot of fun. Most people agree that the two best parts of the film come in the form of two actors/characters. One is Ed Wynn as the bumbling Toymaker…mostly because it’s Ed Wynn. The other, of course, is Barnaby, played by Ray Bolger. If that name or face seems familiar, Bolger - almost two decades prior to the film - was one of the main characters in a little film from the late 30s I’m sure none of you have heard of called “The Wizard of Oz.” Yes, boys and girls: that’s the Scarecrow! And ironically, I think he and the Wicked Witch would get along splendidly in this outing. Bolger’s charisma is a big part of what makes his Barnaby such a joy; the performance, writing, and direction all REALLY ham the character up to the Nth degree, take this already melodramatic archetype and making him a pure pantomime villain. He breaks the fourth wall, he dances, he gets into a swordfight, he makes all of the crazy faces you’d expect, he even speaks in rhyme! He wears the cape, he twirls the moustache, he’s everything you’d want out of a bad guy like this in spades. Bolger is clearly having the time of his life with this over-the-top slimeball, and it’s just a joy to watch him work. My only problem with this Barnaby, and the reason he’s the lowest in the ranks, is that while Barnaby has always been a hammy character with a humorous side to his personality, I think I prefer it when there’s a bit more balance between the humor and the menace. There are one or two moments where Bolger’s Barnaby is actually pretty threatening (the aforementioned swordfight is a good example), but for the most part he’s just a riot. That’s not a bad thing, because he truly is a ton of fun to watch, I guess I just like it when the character is a LITTLE more menacing.

2. Christopher Plummer, from the 1997 Animated Film.

This TV film adaptation of the story (or is it direct-to-video? There seem to be conflicting accounts there.) is not highly regarded, and admittedly for good reason. Of the three versions listed here, it’s probably the least well-made of the bunch. It’s not God-Awful, but it’s very…“generic 90s animated kids movie,” if that phrase gives you any idea. However, I have a soft spot for this film, largely because it’s actually the first version of “Babes in Toyland” I ever saw. And even as a kid, my favorite character was always the villain of the story: Christopher Plummer as Barnaby Crookedman. (Yes, that is literally his full name in this version, as if his identity needed to be spelled out.) Plummer brings that extra little touch of menace to the part that I felt largely lacking in Bolger’s interpretation; he’s still overall a melodrama villain, but here there’s a bit more balance. In a weird way, Barnaby here feels more like a Disney Villain than…well…the ACTUAL Disney Villain version of Barnaby is! Something else I admire is that they actually give a small amount of empathy to the character in this version: it’s strongly indicated that the reason Barnaby is so cruel and nasty is because, as a child, he was never shown love. He’s never had any friends, never had any toys to play with, and that’s left him crooked both inside and out. However, don’t go thinking that means there’s much reason to sympathize with or feel sorry for Barnaby: this version does some of the absolute worst things of any take on the character, and shows no sign of remorse for any of his actions. There’s no redemption for Barnaby, no matter what his origins; he’s too far gone. Plummer gives a solid performance in the role, and this remains among my Top 12 of his characters just for the sheer nostalgia of it all. Again, the movie overall isn’t too great, but this is one of the first versions I still think of when I think of Barnaby.

1. Henry Brandon, from the 1934 Laurel & Hardy Film.

Laurel & Hardy’s “Babes in Toyland” was first released in 1934 in black-and-white; later the film was re-released in a colorized format (as you can see via the pictorial reference) and retitled “March of the Wooden Soldiers.” (I have no idea why.) What I love most about this film is that, despite being a Laurel & Hardy venture, this actually isn’t a parody piece: unlike some later films of a similar nature, such as “Snow White and the Three Stooges” or the Abbott & Costello Meet the Monsters series, which are basically comedic satires of the characters or stories involved, “Babes in Toyland” is treated more like a straightforward fantasy/fairy-tale film. It definitely DOES have a comedic side to it, of course, but rather than mocking the universe in question or contrasting it sharply with the silliness of the comedians involved, it just treats Laurel & Hardy as if they are just characters in the story, so to speak. The film isn’t afraid to get a bit dark and intense at times, and this is most evident with Barnaby. Played by Henry Brandon (nee Kleinbach), Silas Barnaby, as he’s called in this version, definitely has some humorous scenes. There’s absolutely no subtlety to the role at all. But unlike Bolger, Brandon brings an edge of danger and something bordering on the edge of insanity with the character, which makes his Barnaby feel far more intimidating. He gets involved in some slapstick, but the shrieking laugh he lets out as he tries to summon man-eating monsters, the almost animalistic ferocity he shows in his duel with Tom-Tom Piper, and near-demonic expression he has on his face as he leads his forces to invade Toyland at the climax, all give him a definite darkness that no other version of Barnaby has really been able to match. On top of that, there’s a sort of unintentional empathy to this Barnaby, as well: it’s a long story, but contemporary audiences have noted there are elements of Brandon’s performance and the script that hint there might be a soft side to Barnaby under his devilish demeanor. While likely not intended by the actor, nor the writers, they’re still interesting to note. In other words, this Barnaby has everything both of the previous Barnabys I’ve spoken of have in spades, and he’s in a generally better (albeit older) movie! This is the version I now think of first and foremost when I think of Barnaby, or even when I think of the Crooked Man from Mother Goose. That, above all else, earns him the meaningless title of My Favorite Portrayal of Barnaby from “Babes in Toyland.” Happy Christmas Eve, everybody!

[lemonhemlock]

So it seems that the executive producers/writers couldn't agree on certain things (evident in Alicent's characterization being all over the place). Perhaps Helaemond falls here. One side wanted to make them a thing and the other didn't. They included some hints but still ambiguous. Up in the air for s2. Just like Daeron's inclusion (it's obvious they initially hadn't decided if they were going to keep him or cut him). If I had to guess, Helaemond was probably an idea from Miguel's faction (apparently his wife came up with the Alicent and Rhaenyra same age/best friends storyline). So I don't think it's gonna be a thing in the end.

so this question made me go fishing for this old ask i didn't get a change to reply to about an helaegond love triangle (see below). in the meantime i already went more in-depth into the helaegon portayal on my blog and i do agree with the anon below on that & the fact that our aegon is not a clone of aegon iv

i do think it's possible that the aegon/helaena/aemond dynamic took its inspiration from the infamous aegoniv/naerys/aemon situation, not in the sense that it's meant to be a 1:1 recreation, but bc it would be a pretty rich playground for a lot of angst and pathos. it's not as likely we're going to get a whole show about aegon iv - it would be a "problematic" adaptation, so to speak, because a lot of his story is rooted in pretty lewd misogyny and i'm not really sure if modern audiences would necessarily enjoy a revolving door of mistresses while aegon iv terrorizes naerys in the background. the market is quite saturated with henry viii content as is (the same story at its core) - as we know, The Tudors was already a very popular show that went on for many seasons and there's also the more recent The Spanish Princess.

so i can see them thinking that they might as well extract the love triangle aspect of it and use it for HotD

disclaimer: i have no way of fact-checking which faction decided to include helaemond, but to relate this back to the ask above, i don't think ryan should be sidelined as a contender for introducing helaemond either. i say this bc he says he's been a fan for 20 years, so, as opposed to miguel, he would be more aware of the aegon iv / naerys / aemon dynamic than miguel would have been. unless this decision was just a huge coincidence & no one bothered to open TWOIAF at all. though i remember ryan saying he made everyone read FB + the 5 ASOIAF books, i don't know if he included TWOIAF on the reading list

Anonymous asked: Obviously a ton of speculation for there being a love triangle between the green siblings stems from a claim that the writers wanted to apply the Aegon4/Naerys/Aemon triangle. And there's definitely the fear that because of that they'll just end up making Egg2 just as bad as Aegon4 and continue to heap abuse onto Helaena when she's already the victim of so much violence. buuuuut the more hopeful interpretation would be that the writers are only planning to apply the love triangle in its bare bones. Since in the books it's never implied that a love triangle was present, the fact that a set up of "older brother and sister married unhappily plus younger brother being close to sister" exists at all for Egg2/Helaena/Aemond is already clearly taking a page from that pairing without needing to stick to the details. Basically the green siblings don't need to be a 1:1 parallels to the other love triangle for the similarities to still exist, nor do they need to end up exactly like them. In fact, their show characterization is significantly different than that of Aegon4/Naerys/Aemon, so if the writers want to smart and original I think they should resolve the helaegond drama through dysfunctional polyamory. I don't think that's been done yet in Targaryen history (except for maybe the conquerors themselves, but then that would give the green siblings even more parallels to them which is cool and sexy!) Also Helaena doesn't seem terrified by Aegon at all, just pretty indifferent. And considering how Alicent reacted to the Dyanna situation, if Aegon was as bad to Helaena as Aegon4 was to Naerys I don't think she would just slap him, she would've beaten him within an inch of his life. So like, besides the sex aspect (which neither of them seems to be into so it's like... Mutual non-con?) there's nothing in their relationship that implies severe abuse or even an escalation to that, because they both seem very disinterested in each other.

love the suggestion of dysfunctional polyamory though!!!

[sleepii-moth]

the fact that fnaf after everything with its creator still has adult fans and is getting new merch, games, and other things made for it is wild to me. regardless of how you feel about death of the author or whatever, the new fnaf content that is being made is getting less and less coherent plot wise and the gameplay is getting repetitive. From an objective standpoint i think that the first fnaf game was never meant to be what the series became. As someone who has a general knowledge of how games are made, especially when it comes to narrative driven games, it was clearly meant to simply be a gameplay focused horror game with a little story thrown in to give some cool backstory and add some mystery, and then maybe there'd be a few more games in the series that expand on the mechanics and elaborate on the story a bit but its pretty reasonable to assume that the story of the game was meant to be mostly up for interpretation and that as a series, it wouldnt be too long. Unfortunately though, it ended up gaining fame and people reading more into it which definitely contributed to the series being what it is now (and also yknow.. money is another reason.) It sort of ended up having a certain Supernatural (tm) effect where it kept getting worse but people still watched it which i guess answers my question of why people still like it (because people arent willing to let things they like go even if theyre bad) but that is an unfulfilling answer to me and theres definitely a more fulfilling one

so im wondering now.. are people (not counting kids for a reason) who still like fnaf holding onto the series because they liked the concept (of animatronics, a sprawling mystery, and other things) and have never found or heard of other things that share those same concepts? Or is it really just simply holding onto things that are nostalgic to them? Im genuinely curious because i have been into things that just got bad because they went for too long or tried to do convoluted things with the story that i just moved on from. I still remember when i was younger i watched supernatural with my sibling, and did really enjoy it, we got pretty late in the show before my sibling told me they thought it was getting worse and didnt want to watch it anymore. Of course as a kid who didn't really even know how to tell if a form of entertainment was bad, i was a little upset and didnt understand why but agreed anyway. And so we stopped watching supernatural and watched other things together like steven universe that we ended up liking way more. Occasionally there would be tv show or anime that just ended up sucking and from then on we just stopped watching it and watched something else.

I think the reason i fully stopped liking fnaf was partly that i recognized the content i was watching for it (like lets plays or theory videos) were getting worse and i also just grew out of it? As the years went on i got into other games like half life or portal that had way more fulfilling stories to me that i enjoyed a lot more so fnaf just became something i didnt care about. fnaf is like the cracker barrel of video games to me, i went there as a kid because other people liked it so i was supposed to also like it and mostly really liked it because it was restaurant food and to a kid thats better than anything you get at home (and also they have little toys), and then one day when i was older and had gone to more different places i sat down, ate my food, and thought "wow this is bad actually," and never ate there again. And all of that is to say i really do wonder if the majority of adult fans of fnaf still like it because its one of the few games theyve engaged with in their life, and that if they were to expand their palette, try new things, and look back on their interests, then theyd be able to more easily accept its (and its creators) problems and move on from it as purely a thing of their past. because i promise you, there are better things out there, not everything is cracker barrel or supernatural, theres genres youve never even heard of, games that no one knows about waiting to be played, theres the sprawling mysteries of Outer Wilds, the gut wrenching horror of Devotion, the captivating characters of Psychonauts, the expansive world building of Half Life, there are so many better things out there made by better people. Letting go of something doesnt hurt as much when you have more things to enjoy. There are better things out there, you just have to stop looking in the same place.

[divinekangaroo]

(Reblogging so I can vainly try to keep a hold of the final thread, no need to respond)

The war and impact: yes. It gets so complex, too, when I consider what did pre-war trauma do to him as opposed to what might just be general characteristics (and then that gets into the conversation about how much of sexuality/sexual behaviours are, erm, nature? rather than nurture). I love how blurry and between the lines the series actually represents a lot of this, because there's no way to really represent the full complexity of what a person experiences. T

I remember somewhere early in S2 I had a gut-thought of, ugh, the poverty trauma/childhood trauma was just as large for this man as the war, only that the war almost...had such a distinct hard line in the traumascape it's almost like Tommy drew that hard line and kind of 'forgot' or repressed everything that went before, and only ever pointed at the war. At least the war was shared cultural/societal trauma instead of the 'thou shalt never speak its name' trauma of childhood, and, while not *understood-understood*, was *understood* because so many other people had it too. I forever hear so many references to their childhood in that 'Arthur and I don't have the words' speech (he even brings up 'we should've stayed in school' which had nothing to do with his and arthur's war timeline? i really don't think that was a continity error in such an important speech XD) -> this sense that war trauma and childhood trauma at that point are completely blurred for him. S5 onwards that thawing you speak of, which actually destroys protective behaviours, also destroying that barrier to his childhood traumas too.

--

Ah - by the misreading sexual cues I meant he struggles to tell the difference between other people's cues of 'i want to fuck you' versus 'i want to fuck AND connect with you', not so much that he can't detect sexual desire. OR MAYBE (now that I think on it), more like he can read it clearly but he might distrust what he sees/where it might go where it comes to him personally being made vulnerable by the connection? that holding back or wanting to frame things up front as transactions so he doesn't fall into a deeper connection. Agree fully with the 'At the same time I can see him being more shy around people outside his family and friend circle as a kid/young man'. Imagining a guy very very good at reading people when it comes to (if we lean into the stereotype of fortune telling/street magician) reading micro-cues about how they are reacting to his verbal and micro-physical cues yet second guessing his own interpretations where it comes to something that might make him vulnerable if he were to take his reading at face value.

Then there's that difference between, pre-war, maybe he was shy/unconsciously this way -> especially in my mind where I add in a certain sexual over-awareness from a very young age from his upbringing, and a hesitation around where that line is for others. Post-war all of it codifies into a very protective, blunt and very conscious behaviour.

--

I've got some thinking to do about 'I do think the way he treats sex as a transaction was most likely not the case before the war' because I feel the groundwork for this was laid in familial/ethnic/class and poverty trauma (as part of the subaltern coding where body is the base commodified unit); but do agree/think this transactional approach was definitely 'frozen in' and almost hardwired as that kind of protective/defensive traumatic behaviour post war.

final response to this post by @divinekangaroo!

“some of these might be considered trauma responses but my preference is to think he is/was always going to be this way *somewhat*#because he is this way.the particular traumas he went through were able to be framed in ways that allowed him to continue…for a while Also curious about this -- what do you think are the characteristics he has that were "always going to be this way" The key ones:  - That he struggles with actually connecting deeply with people, reading sexual cues/flirtation, because he actually connects too deeply – he holds back to avoid embarrassment if he’s misread something. Some of this leads to an inclination to prefer sex that is openly a transaction (prostitutes) because it relieves any dialogue around intimacy or connection. He can treat sex as a physical need without having to think about the other.

I can see him possibly struggling to read sexual cues/flirtation as a young man though I don't actually think he has that problem at all as an adult, post-war. I think he's just very blunt about bringing things out in the open -- and can be awkward about it in his bluntness (or doesn't care if he's being awkward/borderline rude). His reasons for doing so (with May, for example) are interesting to dig into. He does not misread the cues that Mosley is giving him; but in this case he does *not* bring it into the open bluntly.

In May's case he absolutely knows she wants to fuck him, it's not in question. He's more about putting it out there on the table as something he doesn't want to dance around (since they're alone and there's no worry about propriety). There's a lot of class stuff going on there, I think; all the talk about working class cock from his brothers and from Ada. What he isn't sure about is *why* she wants to fuck him and what she wants to get out of it. Which is why he asks if he represents something to her.

I'm not sure about him struggling to deeply connect with other people as a young person pre-war. One of the ongoing themes of the series (especially in s1) is how drastically he's changed by the war, how unrecognizable he is to his family and the people who knew him before -- it suggests this inability to connect is a result of the war and not something that was present before. At the same time I can see him being more shy around people outside his family and friend circle as a kid/young man, so I don't fully disagree I guess! Maybe it's that whatever struggle he had before the war it became terribly compounded after when he couldn't really feel anything period, which puts up a barrier when trying to connect to people. The idea Knight and CM talk about Tommy "thawing" throughout the series comes to mind. He's so emotionally frozen (and the strength of this isn't consistent; he thaws a bit and refreezes in reaction to circumstances).

Part of his aversion to connecting to people this way has to do with this 'traumatic freezing' I think -- by s5-6 when he seems unable to prevent himself from thawing, the result is increasing instability, anxiety he can't control, moral injury he can't ignore, and spiralling mental illness. So the 'freezing' of the earlier seasons served as protection even as it kept him more isolated from connecting to people. He's not really able to connect well even after he starts 'thawing' because by then he's feeling totally out of control.

Sorry that was a digression, I think.

Either way I don't think he holds back out of fear of misreading something; I think he's quite good at reading people and situations and that doesn't seem like something that wouldn't have been present pre-war.

I do think the way he treats sex as a transaction was most likely not the case before the war.

- Deep connection is unrelated to sex, and that he’ll always look for deep connection with someone over the sex. If both, ok wonderful, but if the sex makes the connection complicated he’ll ditch the sex and find that elsewhere. (I really think of Alfie in this space.)

Yeah I think this could work both pre- and post- war.

- Connection comes before physical/sexual attraction. People are physically neutral to him until he feels something for them first. For example, he couldn’t be seduced by a hot woman into a vulnerability in the way, say, Arthur or John probably could?

Yeah, absolutely.

I think of both Grace and Tatiana here. With Tatiana and no or limited connection, he pretty much flips her attempted seduction on its head and notwithstanding the essentially of them having ‘sex for the cause’, his sexual participation instead forges that double (is it triple by this point?) cross with her instead for their mutual benefit, rather than her sexual seduction exposing vulnerabilities in him for her people to exploit. With Grace, the connection comes well before the sex and it’s connection which exposes him/makes him vulnerable, not the sex.

Yeah. Any potential subtext about sexual trauma aside, I do think it can be difficult to untangle how he may have been prior to the war from how he was after -- it's such a profound impact on him, including on his sexuality and his ability to connect to people.

[wolf-queer-discourse]

Adventures in Aphobia #3

My last two Adventures in Aphobia both took on similar flavors of eye-rolling at shameless, obvious bigotry to anyone willing to look or care. But today, I found a different type of aphobia, and I’m actually eager to talk about this one. Have a read of this first.

Look, the bar of respect for ace people is so low it’s all the way in hell, but I mean, to many people, especially allosexual people, they may look at this post and think, “No, this isn’t aphobia. The poster wasn’t blatantly cruel.” But what some fail to realize is that politeness can be the thinnest of veils over the ugliest of takes. Polite bigotry gaslights the victims into thinking they can’t be upset about this.

So what’s the deal with this post?

PARAGRAPH #1 starts off innocently enough, saying ace discourse wouldn’t exist if people recognized complex relationships to sex and relationships. Even taken on its own, I do not agree with this. Ace discourse ranges all the way from outright denial of asexual existence to the strong hatred for and exclusion of aces from the queer community. Nearly everyone recognizes people have complex relationships to sex...that...that doesn’t mean ace people won’t be discriminated against. In fact, it’s an argument aphobes use constantly to try and gaslight ace people into erasing themselves. Ace discourse comes from a lot of places, but at the end of the day, it all stems from people’s refusal to acknowledge ace people and their unique experiences. This poster absolutely does not get to say “IT’s CoMpLicAteD”, and expect ace people to just disappear. Honestly, it’d be better and more honest if they said “Lol, ace people should go fuck themselves and hop to the back of the line with everyone else.”

PARAGRAPH #2 and #3 are not very objectionable on their own. Everything said is true. Society has very complicated views on sex, and life happens to all people. The ugly part of this is that the poster is setting up an argument here in which they will hand wave ace people into the “everyone else” crowd and pretend as if we’re all just too similar and no labels should even exist.

This is literally what enby-phobes do. They say “Well, gender is COMPLICATED”, which is true, but then they say “So like...aren’t we all really nonbinary when we think about it? Why should enby people label themselves?” I swear we’ve all seen this. The poster is agender. This argument could easily be whipped in their face. Different forms of bigotry can share very clear overlaps, and it’s very important to acknowledge where these arguments come from and why they exist. It exists as a way to shut people up. It happens to bi people too! Every day, people come out as bi and someone tells them “pff, everyone thinks girls are hot. I had a crush on my best friend once, that doesn’t mean I’m not straight! All people are like this!” Let’s call out this erasure where we see it. It’s not the same thing, and if anyone saying stuff like this truly believes what they’re saying, maybe they’re the ones who need to reevaluate their own identity.

PARAGRAPH #4 dips its ugly toes straight into blatant aphobia, having the gall to call ace and aro people “obsessed” with pretending their relationships with sex and romance are wholly unique and different. Nah, fuck right off with that bullshit. The poster even goes on to say ace people have created entire new social classes. Uh...WHAT? Is there some secret ace society with a caste system living in the shadows?? What is this person talking about?? I suppose you can’t be a true bigot unless you have some vague grievance to weakly hand-gesture at that you couldn’t prove given 20 years to do so. For the love of my sanity, just say you hate ace people! It’s okay! (I mean, not actually, but Jesus Christ does it save us all some time). They also say things like “somehow excluded from”. Replace asexual people with nonbinary people and take a joyride through this section, because the arguments are scarily similar. What would it take for this poster to acknowledge ace and aro people have their own experiences? Seriously, what? What holds you back from doing this?

It’s also funny to note the actual lack of substance to this argument. The poster is not giving any specific examples or even bringing up what being ace and aro mean. Yes, there is a pretty noticeable difference between feeling sexual attraction and not feeling sexual attraction. How many “allo” people do you know that say they’ve NEVER experienced this? Come on. The poster reduces asexuality and aromanticism down to allo people’s, in their own words, hyper-specific contexts where they don’t want sex or love. At least the poster admits any circumstance that allo people are comparable to ace people are extremely specific. But for real, are we hinging a whole argument on a few very specific examples of allo people having some similarity to ace people?

“Nothing about your relationship to sex or love makes you more or less LGBT. If you are gay and don’t want to have sex, ever, you are still gay. “

Mini strawman alert for the idea any ace person thinks you’re less gay if you’re also ace. And bonus points for an aphobe who refuses to use the definition of asexuality: not experiencing sexual attraction, and instead goes for “don’t want to have sex”. For the last. Fucking. Time. Not wanting to have sex and being asexual are NOT the same. Don’t make me pour gasoline in my eyes every time I see this.

After this, the poster goes on a tangent, which by the tone, seems to think it's very inspiring, and says no matter how you want to have sex (including only certain days of the week), you’re still straight! It’s so fucking condescending and gross to talk ace people out of their own identity like this.

“EVERY person who is heterosexual is different in how they perform or experience.”

Oh. My. GOD. THEY DIDN’T EVEN SAY STRAIGHT. THEY SAID HETEROSEXUAL. WUGGYUEGYUG. God help me. Can one be both bisexual and heterosexual? No…? Okay. So then. How is one both asexual AND heterosexual? What single brain cell in this poster’s head was responsible for this Chad of a sentence? I—

*deep breath* 

So. It’s interesting how the poster says “perform or experience it”. Asexuality is an identity. It is not a performance, and it is not defined by your actions. A straight person not having sex does not become asexual. And sure...people with the same label can experience their sexuality differently, but...to a point, guys. You can’t experience your sexuality out of the DEFINITION of the label. Heterosexual: Sexual attraction to the opposite gender. Asexual: Sexual attraction to no one. If a “heterosexual” isn’t sexually attracted to anyone, they are by definition, not heterosexual. It takes insane mental gymnastics to make this argument, so A for flexibility, I guess? 

“Gayness, straightness, and bisexuality are not defined by HOW you do or don’t want sex or HOW you do or don’t want to date, it’s just defined by WHO you want to be with.”

The first part of the sentence is correct, but it also defeats this person’s entire argument. Ace people AGREE with this. Being asexual is not the act of not having sex!! It’s not experiencing sexual attraction! You can google this! The second part of the sentence is mostly correct, depending on your interpretation. The issue is in part with the words the poster used: gayness, straightness and bisexuality. These words are not all equivalents. Gay could refer to sexual and or romantic orientation. Thus an ace gay person. Straightness is not actually an equal word to gayness. This is because straight is an exclusive term for a normative sexuality (in society’s eyes) in terms of sexual and romantic attraction. Some ace people DO call themselves straight, though it’s inaccurate. Ace people can be heteroromantic, but because being straight is so exclusive, you need to be both sexually AND romantically attracted to only the opposite gender.

The post basically ends telling ace people they’re all actually straight and were just confused the whole time. Lovely. And an erasure of gay aces too! Believe it or not, gay ace people do not like having their ace identities erased. Who’d have guessed?

Honestly, if anything this post is just kind of sad. A sad reflection of what people believe and how they truly do not see their own bigotry. They believe they’re freeing ace people from an incorrect label. They’re the heroes.

They’ll say “it’s okay, you’re not asexual” as if they've like...lifted a burden off of ace people. Like, “Oh, you think I’m not asexual? Cool, cool. Glad you cleared that up for me!” It’s sad how aphobes think, some very genuinely, that asexuality is just some high school party that went off the rails, and we’re all just coming out of the drunken haze, ready to go home. Ready to all laugh about it later, tease one another about how wild and silly it all was. 

Having your identity erased like this is fucking horrible, and I hope people like this can take a look in the mirror and see themselves clearly. All ace and aro people have a right to their identity, whether gay, bi, heteroromantic or anything else. End of story.

[robotwrangler]

Thinking a lot of postgame Yes Man thoughts tonight.. I have so many ideas about the development of his personality and morality depending on what sort of person the courier happens to be?

(Putting the rest under a cut because this post got kinda long)

So like.. to preface this, I’ve seen it said by a few people (and I agree) that, because it can be completed no matter what your courier has done beforehand, the independent/wildcard ending has the potential to be either the best or the worst ending for the Mojave depending on your courier’s actions leading up to it; it’s all dependant on what sort of a person your courier is, their moral compass, what they’ve done. A wildcard courier could be any sort of person; they could be the dumbest idiot, an absolute saint or the cruellest bastard who ever lived. And one thing that I think should be explored more is the way that this relates to Yes Man.

Yes Man doesn’t really seem to know anyone else. He knew Benny, of course, and possibly Emily Ortal to some degree, but there’s not really much evidence to show what their relationship was like; he seems almost a little scathing or resentful of Benny here and there, but mostly speaks about him in an indifferent, ‘just stating the facts’ sort of way that makes me suspect that they weren’t very close. His opinions on a few of the factions are actually quite different to Benny’s, so it seems his values are mostly his own and didn’t just rub off on him from Benny. As for other people knowing him, Benny is the only person in the game to mention Yes Man by name, so we can assume the courier is the only other person he’s actually spent any time with.

In a way, I guess you could say this means that Yes Man goes from Benny’s workshop being his entire world to the courier being his entire world, and this is where it gets interesting to me.

Everyone has different interpretations of what Yes Man means by upgrading himself to be ‘a little more assertive’ at the end of the game. Sure, word of god said something about it just being intended to mean that Yes Man would no longer have to answer to anyone but the courier, but I like to think that it could be interpreted differently, depending on what sort of a dynamic that particular courier has built up with Yes Man.

As much as I always roll my eyes at the ‘Yes Man is actually evil and manipulating the courier in order to rise to power and then betray them’ types of theories, Yes Man is clearly capable of forming his own opinions and feelings towards things and people.. so, after the battle of Hoover Dam, once his upgrade is complete and he’s no longer forced by his programming to submit to the whims of whoever he speaks to, would he really choose to remain loyal to just any courier?

Despite his people-pleasing tendencies, Yes Man always makes his preferences pretty clear when he presents choices of action to the courier. There’s usually one choice he seems enthused about, and another choice that he presents as undesirable, whether that’s because it’s a bad choice for the future of New Vegas, or just less appealing to him, personally. For example, his disdain for the BOS appears to be at least partially out of concern for his own wellbeing - if the courier tells him that they’ve sided with the BOS, his immediate disappointment seems to be mostly based on his concern that the BOS will really want to blow him up or scrap him for salvage; he almost seems insulted that the courier would side with a faction that would wish harm on him.

Anyway, this post is getting too long already because I have too many thoughts and I’m not capable of being concise ever, so I’ll try and get to the point: the unique dynamic that each different courier has with Yes Man could deeply impact the sort of person he becomes once he has more free will. Once Benny is out of the picture, the courier is presumably the only person in Yes Man’s life, so the way that they treat him and maybe even just their own personality could both seriously influence the direction he takes as a character.

If the courier consistently disregarded Yes Man’s wishes, perhaps by getting cosy with the BOS and blowing up the securitron army and whatnot, would Yes Man hold resentment towards them for it? What if they were openly hostile towards him over the course of their partnership; would he really remain on their side once he finally had a choice in the matter? If they treated him cruelly, and he later killed them or left them once he had the free will to do so, would he then be more likely to hold distrust and resentment for humans in general as a result of his limited experience with them being so unpleasant?

On the other hand, what if a courier was kind and considerate towards him, and treated him with respect as though he were just another valued friend they’d made along the way? Would he enjoy their company, and choose to stay by their side even once his upgrade was complete and he was no longer obligated to help them?

Something else to consider is something I find especially interesting; what if the courier’s overall morals and their treatment of Yes Man weren’t exactly aligned? For example, a very good karma courier who happens to hate robots and only sides with Yes Man as a last resort, due to it being the only way to achieve an independent New Vegas, but doesn’t actually like him or befriend him? What would become of their partnership once the courier succeeded at the Dam?

Or, possibly my favourite concept, the complete opposite.. what about a courier with very evil karma who’s basically an irredeemable, bloodthirsty sadist, but they happen to really like Yes Man & think he’s neat so they become inseparable friends with him? What would Yes Man himself be like if the courier he was so close to was objectively a monstrous person?

And that’s one of the things I find the most fun to theorise about. Yes Man’s own morals are sort of a blank slate; despite how friendly and harmless he appears, he’s still really a big, formidable robot who seems to have accidentally been made far too self aware, and he may have a few opinions about certain things but when it comes down to it, Yes Man on his own is neither good nor evil. However, I think that depending on the kind of person the courier is, and the nature of their relationship, his morals could either remain quite neutral or develop considerably in either direction, so there are tons of ways to portray his postgame personality and they‘re all equally plausible because he’s just such a uniquely flexible character in that way.

Perhaps he picks up a mean streak from his evil courier friend and they have an absolute blast terrorising the wasteland and its inhabitants together! Or perhaps his loyalties lie with a kind and idealistic courier who tries their best to help people, and he comes to understand the importance of such things as he helps them achieve their goals! Either way, he’d still be the Yes Man that we know and love; the difference in him in those scenarios purely depends on the company he keeps and their actions towards him.

Anyway, that’s all I have to say about this stuff for now; I’ve been wanting to write about this for about a year, so I hope you’ll all excuse how long this post got. This is still all total speculation, since there's really no way of knowing for sure what Yes Man would be like after the upgrade or even the extent of the upgrade in general, but I just feel like there's so much unexplored potential for character development and postgame story stuff. The most important point I’m trying to make is I guess just to remember to have fun with the dynamic between Yes Man and the courier! The wildcard storyline leaves so much up to interpretation in regards to him, so it can be really fun to experiment with that. And it’s cool to think that, in a way, the Yes Man that your courier interacts with is unique to them, because no two couriers are the same!

[toujourspur13]

The Black family / Walburga Black / canon.

As I said before I do not care that much about canon/fanon/headcanon because transformative works by definition include a wide variety of different interpretations. However, I am forever perplexed when I see uncompromising opinions on the Black family - particularly the unwavering certainty that Sirius Black’s parents were psychotic abusers. All personal opinions aside - why is this so popular?

I mean - it’s absolutely ok to headcanon this version and to play with it - but saying 'don’t you dare say they did not physically and emotionally abuse Sirius' is a little strong, isn’t it?

This is a mystery to me. So…let’s discuss my favourite subject…Again.

Let’s stick to the facts. The frequently cited things proving the abuse in the Black family are as follows:

Sirius said his parents were awful maniacs (pureblood ideology)

he ran away from home

he was severely depressed in OoTP

Kreacher

Portrait

So…when you say that Sirius’s parents were abusive…you mean exactly what? These people got cold feet when they saw the real nature of Voldemort - I guess it somehow implies that they did not share his methods…that they were against violence as a tool to get purebloods in charge.

But then it usually goes this way: ‘well at least he was verbally and emotionally abused by his family’ - but is it so? Is this based on the portrait of Sirius's mother? She insulted strangers who took over her house and her runaway son - how does this prove anything about how Sirius and Regulus were raised and treated when they were kids? I agree it’s rather impolite - jkr did a good job showing how purebloods perceived others ( those below them) -but in all honesty, this has very little to do with Sirius and his childhood.

Why to make Sirius a victim at all? - c’mon he was tougher than this, he spent 12 years in Azkaban; are you actually saying that a portrait throwing insults at everyone is worse? I doubt that. And is it such a surprise that a mother who lost her son (that said son actually ran away and abandoned his duty) would be that furious at him when seeing him again...even if it’s only a portrait...I believe it to be a rather unpleasant experience for a parent when a child runs away.

We already talked about the portrait a lot - I don’t even want to mention it here- - I feel we should rather pay more attention to the fact that Sirius himself was not an angel.

I am not saying the colourful vocabulary of Walburga Black should be used…but Sirius himself upon seeing Snape  immediately  recognised his weakness and went for it without any hesitation …we are talking about Sirius who in fact was quite a renowned bully ( I mean - we know for a fact that from time to time Sirius and James got carried away)…

And it was Sirius who sent Snape to meet and chat with a real werewolf (yes, I agree - he was not thinking this through - he probably was just vexed and fed up with Snape and thought he wouldn’t go there, would get cold feet or idk run away…But it actually changes nothing. If a drunken driver hits someone it will be 100% his fault whether he means it or not. Whether he is in a fragile mental state or not - such situations are definite. It’s the same with Sirius - even if he did not mean anything bad he should have understood the cost of his mistake - all teenagers make silly things but not all of them send their classmate to meet a werewolf - James thought it not a very good idea as I recall… -

So we see that Sirius was not an angel from the start and I can hardly believe he was a victim by nature. His behaviour loudly manifested that he used to get what he wanted with no thought of the consequences.

And all those pictures of bikini-clad girls on the walls in his room prove that he was quite a spoiled boy who had nothing to fear from mum and dad. Harry himself noticed «Sirius seemed to have gone out of his way to annoy his parents». All this shows that Sirius was not afraid of his parents at all. What kind of masochist would suffer for motorbike posters? That would be ridiculous.

Let’s move to Kreacher: If Sirius’s mother had been a monster why even mention her heart?  JKR wrote this for a purpose and this heavily implies that Sirius's situation was never meant to be ‘the abusive heartless parents vs the poor helpless victim’.  

The fact that Sirius ran away and hence broke his mother’s heart says against the popular idea that he was not loved by his family, that he was always the second one, that they abused him. I’m 100% certain that Kreacher told the truth in that scene. Why would he say something like this if it were not the truth - something like…that his beloved mistress having been so upset over Sirius running away that it broke her heart. Just tell me one reason that would have justified such a lie - why to say this at all?

Then this: “Leave?” Sirius smiled bitterly and ran a hand through his long, unkempt hair. “Because I hated the whole lot of them: my parents, with their pure-blood mania, convinced that to be a Black made you practically royal … my idiot brother, soft enough to believe them … that’s him.”…. “He was younger than me,” said Sirius, “and a much better son, as I was constantly reminded.”

I’ve already said it before - this ‘better son than me’ is exactly what insecure 14-year old kids like to say. Well...he’s a bit older but it’s not as if he had a life and a chance to mature. Moreover, I don’t know if it comes as a great shock but a lot of teenagers like to badmouth their parents…usually, it involves something like ‘those bloody uptight retrogrades know nothing of the real world’ (it fades away when they get closer to thirty).

To be serious, I find that it’s just another example of similarities between Sirius and his mother. They clearly did not know what it means to be composed, polite, and respectful. Yeah…I think that, on the whole, parents are owed their children’s respect (unless they are completely inadequate - somehow I don’t believe this was the case). Someone should teach both of them what mutual respect means. Anyway, there is nothing in this quote that says that Sirius was subjected to any forms of abuse - it’s about how Sirius justified his running away,  how he saw the situation.

There’s also the fact that Sirius was incredibly unhappy because he was back at his childhood home and having to spend time around anything that reminded him of his family: “Hasn’t anyone told you? This was my parents’ house,” said Sirius. “But I’m the last Black left, so it’s mine now. I offered it to Dumbledore for headquarters — about the only useful thing I’ve been able to do.” Harry, who had expected a better welcome, noted how hard and bitter Sirius’s voice sounded”.

Here it comes…the severe depression that makes people question the severity of his abuse… I have thought a lot about this because it is the reason why some consider ‘the abusive blacks' canon while others believe it was more of a tragedy of the family rather than the banal brutality.

Of course, Sirius was upset in that house - but I don’t think he suffered the memories of his unhappy childhood - I think he suffered from the strong feeling of guilt. Being in that house meant an everyday reminder that he was a failure. And it’s not even a lie. If you look at his whole life you’ll see that he literally failed everyone in his life: he failed James and Lily - they were dead and he unwillingly became the reason. It was his plan that turned everything into a tragedy.

And, to some extent, he failed Harry- he was not around him like James and Lily would have wanted. Sirius did not give him the real family - he only promised they'd be the one «when it’s all over».

And finally - he failed his parents, his brother, his own family.

Is it possible to live with so much guilt in your heart?

I don't think that Sirius completely forgot who he was born to be. If the family keeps traditions and can trace its existence back in centuries you can't shake it off even if you want. I doubt Sirius switched it off just because he had griffindor friends. He was the last Black - it is tragically poetic that he was once the hope of his family and then this family died with him. If Sirius had heart (and I truly believe he had a heart) he knew exactly what it meant to be trapped in the house that represented the death of his family. A constant reminder  that he was the last one.  

“The others’ hushed voices were giving Harry an odd feeling of foreboding; it was as though they had just entered the house of a dying person”. 

I think that the scene when he threw his father's ring away - he threw it away because it was all over for his family. It was the end of the dynasty - and for him it was all over long before he met Bellatrix for the last time.

Well, I admit Sirius' situation is open for wide interpretation but I don’t think the abusive black household is a canon thing - of course, it’s fanon. It makes Sirius a hero who broke the chains when in fact he ended up being a victim of his own life.

You know, it always seems strange to me that fandom when discussing Walburga usually overlooks the simple truth of life - that even if you are clever enough and mean good for your loved ones it is still possible to end up on the losing side, on the dark side.  However, mistakes don't automatically turn humans into monsters.

To some extent Sirius’s story represents the consequences of war.  No-one is protected; the whole families could be wiped off the face of the earth. It’s a simple yet profound idea. It correlates with the main idea of hp books far better than the ‘abusive psychopaths’ (there are already Voldemort and Bellatrix - there is no-one who can beat them in this department).

All I say - it’s okay to imagine them bad if you want- your right - but don’t write everywhere that it’s canon because it is not.There is no need for such inflexibility especially when it comes to the fandom - a place where everyone should be welcomed and their views on the books be respected.

[saucy-egg-merchant]

Full offense, @rjalker? Is that really necessary for an ‘argument’ like this?

I did in fact read all the books. As a critic you should understand that even still, after reading the same source material, our interpretation of it can be wildly different. Yes, too much skirting around proper etiquette when asking for pronouns in media is annoying, but I still don’t think totally dismissing TMB is fair or entirely adherent to your stated dislike for unrealistic behavior either.

Frankly I think you’ve overstepped on this rant against me personally. I clearly wasn’t attacking you as a reader, just that I didn’t like the way your post suggested that the Muderbot series somehow violated reader’s expectations for how gender and pronouns should be handled in fiction. To me that seems like a fair trade of opinions between people with a common interest.

Before you react so strongly again to what I am about to say now, I would like to admit that I indeed did not have the books conveniently open in front of me as you did when I wrote my previous post, and perhaps I spoke with too much certainty. I had re-read them only a few days ago and had been quite certain in my mind I recalled the exact wording correctly. A mistake for sure, to rely on memory alone. But if the issue of how the text is interpreted in terms of its representation for how to ascertains character’s pronouns really was just a ‘pet peeve’ as you claimed you shouldn’t have reacted this indignantly either. Calling out my error is one thing, straight up patronizing and swearing at me is another entirely and I hope you’re aware of that. I have only disagreed with you, I had not belittled or insulted you in any way. Your post just happened to be on my dashboard, I had no reason to know what else you post or even guess that you have a 1300 word paper floating around somewhere on you account, nor am I the same person/persons that have made an assumption on you posts before. Do you really need to funnel all of that aggression at me? Do you think I commented because I wanted to slight you for fun?

I would also like state to that I’m inclined to agree that there is something to be said about how Martha Wells skirts around gender essentialism, but I doubt you would like to entertain that conversation with me after this incident.

With that aside, here is my response to your assumption that I’m making bullshit statements just because the word pronouns wasn’t specifically used:

What I attempted to recall in my post was the term ‘gender signifier’, which I interpreted quite literally as an entirely separate marker to one that signifies biological sex. Because it specifically says gender signifier, not biological sex signifier. Hence my reading of all interactions thereafter being that gender is the information available on the feed and not a character’s sex.

And to you other point regarding how the books assume people’s pronouns are solely based on the characters’ physical presentation:

Murderbot itself states multiple times that many of the people it encounters have no idea what genitals a SecUnit has or if SecUnits have genitals at all, and are likely to have false expectations based on what they’ve seen in media.

With Ancillary Justice in the mix it makes sense that, since Brek came from a genderless society where genitals and pronouns had no significant connection, her perception of those two parts of her identity are much more separate. Whereas in TMB most of the communities that it encounters have some differentiation between genders, though they definitely appear less absolute than real life. It is never stated that they are completely free from entrenched assumptions based on genitalia. Hence, whenever Murderbot follows up it’s statements that it has no gender by referencing it’s lack of genitalia, that sounded to me like the way people who use pronouns that don’t necessarily match what a gender essentialist society dictates should be easily know from their appearance say to dissuade others from trying to use their genitalia as an argument for what pronouns they think is proper. I too have am emotional investment in this series, and while I didn’t write an exhaustive essay about it I do empathize with the way discussion of gender is often tied to the sex people were assigned based on their genitals, and hence why I am personally less put-off that they are often mentioned together in this series.

And to address Murderbot not having its gender listed, I agree with you that it’s likely oversight by the author, I’m happy to entertain both our interpretations of it at once. But it also makes sense to assume that the other characters that interact with it are defaulting to how they speak to bots and constructs, I.e. a non-human AI. Both ART and Murderbot do not object to being referred to by it/its, which i strongly believe, considering their personalities, they would have if they had perfected something else. To me at least it’s less so about the lack of genitals and more about the non-human aspects of the characters. And to be clear, I am making this statement regarding Murderbot and ART, not of all the characters in general. I assume you have a better record of that than I do.

Please excuse the typos and the format, I’ve been up since 6am and it’s currently 2am. If you wish to chat about this further, I’d be open to DMs instead, as this post is getting way too long. Or block me, I don’t particularly care.

[ID: The Marie Kondo version of the yes/no meme format.

The yes section shows her saying, "This one sparks joy", with a smiling emoticon added in.

The box for this yes section reads:

"The Imperial Radch series starting a discussion about pronouns and gender as a concept within the very first scene and then continuing to address this over the course of the story, showing that gender is a social constuct that varies from culture to culture and you cannot know someone's pronouns or gender just from looking at them because even within a culture gender presentation varies and trans people exist and the only way to know someone's pronouns is to ask them because it's not something you can just magically know by looking at them!"

The no section shows her gesturing with her hands, and says, "This one does not spark joy", with a sad emoticon added.

The box for the no section reads:

"The Murderbot Diaries literally not containing the word "pronouns" in any form because literally no one ever asks anyone for them or introduces themselves with them, or even thinks about them at all, even though the protagonist literally uses neopronouns. Despite no one ever asking or being told what someone else's pronouns are, they all just magically know somehow just by looking at people and assuming their gender. Despite the fact that no one ever tells anyone else what pronouns they use, not even the protagonist, no one ever assumes wrong or needs to be corrected."

End ID.]

[btsandvmin]

Answering asks in regards to my recent post about shipping

Ok, so I got a few asks which I think are all responses to my recent post How much do we really know?

I got a few others but these are the ones I am choosing to reply to.

If you follow me and have done so for a while you probably understood my post already, and thus most of these replies might not be that interesting to my general readers. This for the most part just a reply to explain the points I felt got completely misunderstood by these particular anons. But I also go through some others that asks as well. Those will be at the bottom of the post if you want to skip the explenations.

Here goes. So the first ask I got was this:

Anonymous asked:

You mentioned in a post that during the billboard Vlive V suggested that him and Jimin “sleep together casually.” But the very next day Jimin said in a press conference that he was with JK all night and cried with him over the #1 spot. Do you think you ignore things JM says or does to fit your Vmin narrative? There just seems to be a big confirmation bias. A lot of your evidence seems to come from V’s songs but that’s entirely your analysis based off your perception of their relationship. (Not that I don’t agree with you on some of it.) How do you step back and look at things unbiasedly or rationally?

First of all, yes I did mention this but I didn't say that Jimin and Taehyung slept together that particular time/day. I am not 100% sure the post you read was the "How much do we really know?" but if it was, I said this:

"....or that Vmin seem to casually sleep together in private (if we take Tae’s words for it in the Billboard vlive)..."

Meanwhile in that vlive this is what Taehyung said.

"I told him to sleep next to me" followed by "...as he's too lazy to come to my place" it makes it sound like they normally would have gone to either place to sleep together, but both were too lazy to do so this time. Thus they didn't sleep together this instance, but the way Tae talks makes it sound like they casually ask each other to sleep together at times and like it almost was a given that one of them go to the other.

Worth noting is also that the way Taehyung says it (though there is always room for error since I don't speak Korean) it seems he was asking Jimin to come over first, and he wasn't even aware of the Billboard result. He also asked Jimin to do this on JK's birthday, so clrealy it didn't seem like a big deal at least from Tae's side to ask Jimin to come over to him on this particular day.

What I said in my post applies even if they didn't do it that day. Because it doesn't matter if Jimin went in the end or not, Tae still "casually" asked Jimin to come to his place to sleep.

You can look at the whole vlive (1st in BILLBOARD! Gather ARMY!) from September 1st 2020 and get your own understanding, it's not that long and it's full of cute moments.

But if we get into Ji/kook a little bit, the way I understood the situation from what they said is that of course yes, Jimin did tell JK about it. He said as much and of course I will believe him when he says it.

I never said that Jimin didn't say this, so I don't understand how my post would in any way imply that I ignore what Jimin says or does to fit a Vmin narrative. I didn't even mention Jimin, because it wasn't what I was talking about. Jimin's situation didn't matter in that context, just that Tae asked Jimin to come sleep with him.

Sadly I can't include all pictures because there is a photo limit, but Jimin also says he wasn't prepared for the news, and he was talking with Taehyung, and then he started to cry as he got the news. To me it seems he might have told Tae first (and that they already were on the phone when Jimin got the news?), and that JK likely wasn’t with Jimin when he got the news himself, but that he told JK at a later point.

But aren't you ignoring how they told the story a bit as well if you see this as a pure ji/kook moment?

The thing is that to me, no matter what ji/kook did that night doesn't even matter for what Tae said. It still indicates Vmin sleep together casually in their private time even if they didn't end up doing it that particular day. And if Tae could say that and ask that on the night leading into JK's birthday then how does that make Ji/kook seem like likely lovers even if they were together? Of course it doesn't mean that Vmin automatically becomes real, but I never said that either. Maybe the two ships cancel each other out, but in the end the fact that Taehyung said this, said it like it was normal, and suggested it the night before JK's birthday says something to me.

It's fine if Ji/kookers love the fact that JM told JK, I don't blame them, but they in turn need to take Tae's words into account as well. The whole point of my original post was to say I don't understand how shippers can feel confident in their ship being real, and this is a perfect example of why focusing in on one thing and ignoring or not noticing another makes these beliefs based on too little information.

You also seemed to ignore the rest of the post (if that was indeed what you were reading) where I state that I do have a bias and where ALL shippers use narratives that fit their ship to tell a certain story.

You also mention me ignoring moments and having confirmation bias, and sure I can't truly get rid of that, but again... I didn't ignore Ji/kook. I never said those things didn't happen. If anything I keep saying all ships have moments and shippers focus on them so much they don't see others have similar moments. Likewise I won't deny ji/kook moments when they clearly exist, that was a big part of the post, if you actually read it and didn't just get stuck on the small details. But it's good you are curious about and know confirmation bias. I have brought it up as a problem many times as well, and I will surely talk about it more in the future too.

Then, moving on to your point about "evidence" I would once again like to say (like in the post) that there is no such thing as proof or evidence for ANY ship. Just moments that shippers put together with their interpretations into a narrative. So you saying "A lot of your evidence seems to come from V’s songs but that’s entirely your analysis based off your perception of their relationship. (Not that I don’t agree with you on some of it.)" is why I felt you somehow misunderstood my whole post.

Of course it’s all my analysis based on my perception of their relationship. That’s the WHOLE POINT about how all shipping analyses work. Not just mine, but all.

Also, yes Taehyung's songs is a big part of why Vmin is suspicious, but it's far from the only reasons I have to question them. I simply used Tae's actions as an example in my post because they are quite many and out there. Many facts tied together, but of course what they mean is always a guess. Which I also stated clearly. I literally brought up a lot of examples of Vmin and said they make a lot of sense, but that doesn't mean we can be sure or "know" Vmin is real.

So, yes, I do feel you misunderstood me on several points, and it seemed you didn't read properly at all but rather got stuck on the details and then used Ji/kook moments to "refute" me even though it in my opinion wasn't relevant to the post at all. Which is why I in turn posted this reply:

It didn’t take long for someone to misunderstand my posts and get caught up on the details and examples instead of the general message. While they were at it they decide to throw in a good “accusation” of something I legit have said I am many times and no one can avoid. Good to know some people just don’t want to understand. 😗👍

Not only you but less interesting/good asks as well might have made me feel a bit annoyed, so I replied like this, I suppose I misunderstood your intentions too.

You also asked "How do you step back and look at things unbiasedly or rationally?" and my personal belief is that I can't. I am biased towards Vmin, and I do try to see things from many ways and to get content in its full context. But simply by consuming and remembering more about Vmin than other dynamics I will still remain biased. I don't think any shipper can truly remain neutral.

Then I got a a second ask (Edit; I now know this is by another person than the first ask).

This isn’t me trying to misunderstand you, I’m just genuinely curious how you ship vmin while also questioning Tae’s honesty (your BB night comment) and thus also Jimin’s, and also hand over the best tools to anti-vminnie who can use your words as proof that “well even vminnie don’t believe vmin so why should we?” And if all ships are basically equal, why ship at all, or why ship vmin? They have the most conclusive things and yet the more we get the more you question and doubt them.Why?

And suddenly there came a whole new additional set of problems.

I suggest reading my post Shipping vs Believing because if you knew my stance you would understand that I think there is a huge difference between shipping and believing and that you can ship whatever you like and it doesn't have to be tied to reality at all.

In general this ask makes you sound like a delusional and defensive believer, so I perhaps suggest reading my post Can shipping turn into conspiracy theories? as well. This additional ask is why I replied with this second short post:

You say I question the honesty of Tae or Jimin's words, but hopefully you understand this is not at all true since I explained what I actually meant in my original post. Tae asking Jimin to sleep with him is just as true as Jimin telling JK about the win. These two things don't contradict each other and I trust both of the statments to be real.

Also, how am I "handing over tools" to anti-vminies? These things are all out there, and I wasn't even talking about anything negative? Just because I have a more healthy approach than "Vmin is obviously real" that doesn't mean my words should be interpreted as "shipping Vmiin is pointless". However, you did get it right that I don't believe in Vmin, but you seem to have the wrong idea of why I have that stance to begin with. Which again, was part of the message in the original post which you here continue to not understand in other ways.

Me not talking as if Vmin is 100% real doesn't mean I hand out tools to antis. Personally I think that's a weird interpretation of my text, but I can't do anything but try to explain my view on shipping, which I feel that I have many times.

I also don't personally think all ships are equal, but I do think many ships have similar moments and that those moments either get ignored or hyper focused on in a way that makes shipping analysis less trustworhty and always biased and not based purely on facts and the full context. Basically yes, a lot of ships seem to cancel each other out, but that shouldn't stop anyone from shipping. BUT it should make people careful about calling moments "proof" and be sure their narrative is the only possible truth.

I also don't think it's fair to say "They have the most conclusive things and yet the more we get the more you question and doubt them.Why?". I've always tried to keep a distance between shipping and analysis and while we do get more and more for Vmin it's not that I start doubting them more... It's just that I remain open to other things despite more things happening that fits in a Vmin narrative.

I honestly can't tell if you have read a lot of my posts before or not, but it doesn't seem like it, and thus it feels even more unfair for you to lay this judgement on me as well.

Then I got a third ask (edit: which was a second one from the first anon):

Anonymous asked:

I think I’m the anon you responded to. I did read more of your posts where you question things a bit. It’s nice to see you still have a healthy view point on things. I wasn’t really disagreeing with your posts, just wondering if you felt everything was being considered when coming to conclusions. Have a good one !

All this drama, and for what? :P But have a good one too I guess. Thanks for taking the time to read more and trying to understand my point of view.

I also got this ask from another person, and I hope you might understand what I meant after reading my reply to the first anon.

Hi I am sorry I am confused. Can you tell me why specifically you think Vmin alluded to sleeping together during the Billboard Vlive? Didn't Tae say he was talking to Jimin on the phone and told him to come over? Then at the press conference Jimin said "I was with Jungkook" and they were sitting stroking their phones. I am not a shipper or an anti shipper or anything like that. I just would love to see the receipts on this if you have them?

Again, I didn't mean Vmin slept together that day. But the fact that he asked and it seemed like a very normal (even perhaps expected) thing that one of them would go to the other, I can still express it as Tae alluding to Vmin sleeping together at least sometimes during their private time.

Now onto another anon, with a very different take. :)

Anonymous asked:

Spot on. Shipping is one thing but how can some people "believe" in a ship, I'll never understand. People need to realize that even with all the content we get (from concerts to DVDs to Run to BV to interviews), we only see them for maybe like 2-3 days (total) out of 365 days. Like? They visit a country for 7 days and we only get 10 hours of content from it. Do we have any idea what any of them is doing right at this moment? "Supporting" a ship is stupid even if you're right at the end.

Thank you anon. I don't fully agree that we get as little as 2-3 days total out of a year, but we definitely don't see the majority of their lives. And while you are a bit crude, I agree... Even if a ship is real, supporting and believing and being convinced of only one ship is at least in my opinion not the right way to go about it. Which is why I say let's speculate but also support them all whatever the truth might turn out to be.

There we go... It ended up being a lot of drama made out of nothing else than a small misunderstanding. Anyways, I hope I made myself clear. Thanks for the asks, sorry for the somewhat annoyed attitude and I hope you understood what I tried to say.

Thanks for reading. If any of you had the patience to do so all the way through I salute you. <3

[l-sincline]

I talk about a big plot hole of SBI not being canon and also why it would work as canon and ALSO what problem saying SBI isn’t canon actually reveals under the cut because I’m very torn.

(Also I’m very much so rambling from a writers perspective, there’s definitely a lot more at play that I’m glossing over lol)

Why is it at all meaningful that Phil was the one who stabbed Wilbur?

By taking away the father son dynamic (even if it is just found family) you lose a lot of the emotion in wilburs death, because now it’s just some guy who came on and went “Oop- time to die!” You lose a lot of the trauma behind Wilbur’s death, being killed by your own father and some man who just felt like he was doing a moral good are two very different things. Though part of Ghostbur’s trauma is certainly the result of his own actions, parts can also be attributed to those around him, especially being killed by his own father in a pro-sbi world.

And the argument that SBI itself creates plot holes doesn’t really work here either- a big part of the dream smp is that no one really has a fleshed out backstory. Even with Ranboo, all we know is that he seems to have some form of memory loss. A lot of time in the dream smp is spent focused on the present, which is great, the story doesn’t really need to delve into the past.

When it does, it’s just tidbits of information that don’t really have their own story behind them, such as everyone’s favorite fish mom, sally (or the lesser favorite, Samsung smart fridge.) We don’t NEED to see Sally or get a ton of detail about Sally and her relationship with Wilbur, we just know that she’s Fundy’s mom. And that’s really all we need to know, should need for more information about Sally arise, it can easily be inserted because she wasn’t given some big elaborate backstory.

In its best case scenario, it would’ve been the same with SBI. By just saying “yeah they’re all related” (once again, in a found family situation or not) you can leave ends open to interpretation until you need to fill them in. Obviously at some point the disconnect between the family would need to be addressed, but that isn’t really as hard as it may seem. We already see Phil and Techno having a clear fondness for each other, Tommy clearly cares about Phil’s opinion and him in general (even if he isn’t as open about it) Wilbur generally seems to only hang around and enjoy their company as well as trying to bring them all back together (there’s also that mention from earlier of the importance that Phil is the one who killed Wilbur) and deny it as he may, Techno came to help Tommy (and Wilbur) out of their pogtopia situation at the drop of a hat, and also continues to shield Tommy despite knowing it could get him in big trouble.

As it stands, the family dynamic is clearly a little broken, but there are many, many events in the plot that explain this. Tommy has a pretty deep distrust of techno- duh, he watched this man (brother?) who he thought was on his side murder his best friend infront of an audience at their enemy’s command. (I won’t even get into the withers, that’s a whole other can of worms that goes way deeper than SBI) Phil clearly prefers techno- well unfortunately he did kill one of his sons and the other one got exiled, he is kind of stuck with techno only, though I must also mention that every parent has a favorite child (if you think this is untrue: congratulations, you’re the favorite) Overall, there are a lot of events in the plot that would lead to the family being a bit dysfunctional right now, Wilbur seems to be the one trying his hardest to get them back together. We can assume this is because he lost his memories and doesn’t really understand why they aren’t all of good terms.

At the end of the day, as much as I love techno (blood for the blood god, E, whatever other nonsense you want me to spout) it does actually seem that he’s the only one actively pushing against the dynamic. (Tommy seems to just... exist within it. Not really for or against. Unless he states otherwise in the future in which case hoo boy) Phil seems pretty content with his role as ‘dad’ never really actively denying it while also seeming to refer to the rest of the boys as kids. (I mean, really, the checking in on Techno and then seeing Tommy there and saying that it’s been awhile and he’s glad they’re together and talking?) Wilbur has also confirmed things in reference to the SBI family (Technos older than 2 minutes... right?)

The denouncing SBI issue ends up less as “guess the family isn’t canon?” And showcases more that there’s some communication not happening behind the scenes. I mean truly, if they all decide “yeah that isn’t canon” then there really isn’t much you can do, but the box Technos opened is that there’s communication not happening- and that’s what’s causing plotholes. Storytelling through roleplay can be extremely riveting (trust me, I role played for many years) but there are certain things that need to be agreed upon between all members, sbi being a big one right now. While Phil and Wilbur are off dropping bits of SBI lore, Technos busy saying it’s not real. Looks like Sleepy Bois Inc might need to have a little chat? Who really knows. Hope it sorts out like the Tommy finding technos house thing did lmao.

[jonthethinker]

Does the Cerberus Assembly need to be reformed, or destroyed? And can it really be either?

Let’s start with an opinion we can all agree on; Trent Ikithon sucks. He’s clearly a very bad person, and our collective hatred of him is one of the rare things this fandom seems to actually agree on. What he’s done to his “disciples” is horrifying, and his general ideology is monstrous and abhorrent, although not surprising considering the role he plays in the Empire. We can, on this, agree that the world would be a better place if he was removed from power, correct?

Now this is where I start explaining my probably very divisive opinion.

A lot of people would say that all it takes to make the Cerberus Assembly better would be to replace the members like Ikithon with Good People. Maybe Caleb Widogast, for instance. If you simply put someone with a stronger moral character into that position, then its output in turn will also be Good.

This, whether knowingly or not, implies that institutions, even those like the Cerberus Assembly, are by their nature at the very least morally neutral. That all it takes to make an institution like the Assembly be Good is have Good People run it. You do that, and with time, all is well.

But what if institutions did have a moral character? what if the responsibilities and powers given to a body like the Assembly and its requisite components are not Good or even neutral, but instead very, very bad? And what if the incentives the people deciding who stands on the Assembly, namely the members of the Assembly themselves, are actually antithetical to any ideas of a substantially reformed Assembly in the first place?

Let’s think for a minute about Trent and his job. We are all horrified by his methods of creating his Volstruckers. But as much as it bothers me, what bothers me more, personally, is what they are for. While we tend to view them as arcane assassins, what they really are is a wholly unaccountable means of performing all of the Assembly’s, and by extension the Empire’s, dirty deeds not meant for public notice. And seeing as they fall under the sole purview of the Archmage of Civil Influence, this is largely going to translate to “managing dissidence and discontent” in the polite language a body like the Assembly would use to describe its work.

What this means is that its job, and the job of Trent’s office as a whole, is to keep the wrong ideas from getting too popular and the people from getting too loud about the awfulness of their everyday lives, and inside a broader system like the Empire, this is usually going to be dealt with by means of coercion and outright violence. While it’s easy to feel sorry for the incredibly abused and tormented people under Trent’s power, like Caleb and Astrid and Eadwolf, I feel like I’m one of the few in the fandom who has really considered the true extent of terror being unleashed on so many whose faces we’ll never know.

Peasant farmers’ organizing for lower taxes on their grain sales. Laborers gathering to raise hell over the low wages they receive from mandatory state projects. Citizens concerned about the unchecked brutality of the Crown’s Guard. Religious worshipers worried the Empire is straying from the path set by their gods. The mentally ill and other people who simply don’t comfortably fit into the grand scheme of things. Races of folks seen as outsiders suspected of conflicting allegiances. How many people like this have vanished in the night, either to be imprisoned or tortured or killed, or I guess in many cases, all three? How much suffering has been caused, hidden away from any measure of accountability?

And this brings me to my next point; While Trent is truly awful, his title, and the role he plays, are also awful, and I think you don’t get into a position like that in the first place without being someone like Trent. I say this because we’ve gotten to meet a handful of people on the Assembly outside of Trent, and they’ve all generally had the same things to say about him; he gives them the creeps and they don’t like him personally, but he has his uses. I interpret this to mean he performs the responsibilities of his office well enough, and while his methods and general demeanor may be off-putting, it isn’t worth causing a fuss about so long as the work gets done. If they simply ignore what he’s doing, they get the benefits of a suppressed polity with very little of the personal hangups of what it requires to make that happen.

So let’s say, for some reason, Trent dies or is imprisoned and disgraced, and Caleb assumes his role. Caleb has experienced a remarkable amount of personal growth, although not without his own stumbles and set-backs like any victim of severe trauma such as he. He is, in my humble opinion, a Good Man. I know if given the power of this office, he’d be motivated to end the traumatizing of children, and killing of parents, and perhaps even the wholesale disbanding of the Scourgers itself. He’d maybe seek to alleviate the suffering of those his office is meant to contain instead of inflicting more pain upon them. And wouldn’t that be nice?

But when you’ve got this entrenched elite like the Empire does, those sorts of efforts are not going to go unnoticed, and in many cases, are going to cause one hell of a backlash among the powerful, who more often than not believe in their heart of hearts that those lowly commoners deserve their lot in life, and to spare the lash is to spoil the child, and soon you’ll have a bunch of peasants thinking they can go so far as to ask for actual power, actual control over the direction of their lives, and for any empire, but especially this one, how do you imagine that’s going to fly?

I’m reminded of an anecdote out of Brazilian politics. Former President Lula da Silva is one of the the most popular Brazilian political figures of all time, and managed to massively alleviate poverty in Brazil while also working with Brazil’s entrenched elite to make sure not to piss off the wealthiest of the wealthy. But the comfortably upper middle class, or “petite bourgeoisie” as Marx would call them, were disgusted that all these poor people were suddenly climbing the ladder. According to some folks, they complained “The airports are starting to look like bus stations,” because for the first time, working class people in Brazil could actually afford to fly. This discontent among the comfortable led to a chain events ending in the false arrest and imprisonment of Lula and the rise of their current terrifying president Jair Bolsonaro. I learned from this, and other tales like it, to never underestimate how angry some people will become when their special status ain’t so special anymore.

This is to say, that while Caleb is an undoubtedly brilliant man, without the potential intervention of DM magic, I don’t see someone with his lack of political savvy either holding power long or holding onto his convictions long enough to do anything meaningful, if someone like him is considered for the job in the first place. AND even if he does accomplish all those wonderful things through this office and survives until he’s old and gray, he will eventually die. And judging solely on the general quality of character among the wizards we’ve met thus far, I’m not so optimistic about his potential replacement.

This example does spill out my major beef with the whole “Good Person in power” idea of reform. Good People either can’t live up to their values and actually wield power, or the clock itself defeats them and everything they ever stood for. This is also my problem with governmental models overly dependent on norms, as all it takes is someone willing to just completely ignore them,and for the people in power around them to have no incentive to stop them, for things to completely go off the rails. This is why reforms generally don’t last unless they universally redistribute power itself, from the top to the bottom, and even this is going to come with its own backlashes, and it generally doesn’t happen from polite attempts at reform by well meaning leaders, at least not all on their own, but through the sheer force of mass movements or outright revolutions.

And its not just Trent’s office that has this problem. It’s every single seat on the Assembly. His is just a particularly egregious example. Vess DeRogna didn’t get her job by being polite, of that much I’m sure. She’s clever, devious, and patient, not to mention her skill set and interests directly line her up for the role as Archmage of Antiquity. I don’t really think her sole interest is making sure nobody gets hurt by all these artifacts lying around, and neither do I imagine the Empire itself has any intention of keeping her discoveries behind lock and key; they pretty clearly want them mass produced where they can and immediately wielded against their enemies, both foreign and domestic.

And I’ve hinted at this earlier, but if you think Trent is a unique monster in the halls of Dwendalian mages, I’m going to have to disagree. I’m certain there are more than a few wizards in service of the Assembly and the Empire, who if not already believing similarly to Trent, could easily be convinced of his convictions, and ready to use his power themselves in an eerily identical manner. People like Trent aren’t as rare as we’d like them to be, and they’re all ready to grab power just as soon as they can.

So it would seem I come firmly on the “burn it all down” side of things. If only I believed it were that simple.

You see, I see the Cerberus Assembly as an institution that exists, in its entirety, for the cementing of power of the Dwendalian Elite and the progression of its interests. It protects them from threats both from inside and out, it teaches their children magic, it helps negotiate its trade, it aids in putting food on its table, and makes sure its armed for bear with the deadliest of magic only the Age of Arcanum and ancient elves could provide. It’s very reason for existence is to uphold the way of life for those on top. Even if it competes idly for who sits at the head of the table, it very much is invested in maintaining the structure of that table.

So if it were sundered and destroyed as an institution, what is to stop its functions from simply being absorbed by the broader Empire? What’s to stop the Empire from simply recreating the Volstrucker program under a different name? What’s stopping them from hiring its wizards to perform their original tasks, just under the sole discretion of the king? So I’d wager the problem isn’t the Assembly, but the very distribution of power required to maintain an Empire like Dwendal’s in the first place. The assembly is an immoral institution upholding a much larger, equally immoral institution. And you can’t truly solve the problem without tearing the whole damn thing down.

Do I think this campaign is going to be one in which our lovely players start a revolution? Hell no. I expect Trent at least to die or be deposed, and with the aid of some DM magic, things will get a little better. But Matt has given enough consideration to the political forces present in his world building, that I wanted to treat his world as if it were subject solely to the forces and motivations our own is. Just to see how things could turn out without a generally kind god like Matthew Mercer at the helm.

Plus I just really love trying to understand how fantasy political structures would really work. It’s usually a lot less depressing than real political structures, at least in so far as there are no real consequences for their abject failures. But I’ve rambled long enough. Thank you to the poor souls who read this ramble. You’re truly wonderful.

[yoificfinder]

Hey love, hope you are doing well ✨ I was wondering if you have any recommendations regarding side characters (personality analysis, friendship etc.) I absolutely adore all the side characters in the YOIverse however there are not many fics revolving around them so if you know any good ones, it'd be great!! Thank you so much in advance 💟

Hey dear nonnie! This took a long time, I hope you're still here. I combed through ao3 to find fics I remember that fit your request and discovered new gems along the way! Many of these are not popular/underrated but I guarantee that they're good reads so I hope you (and anyone else who finds this) enjoy! If only for that reason alone, I really hope this rec list becomes one of the most popular posts in this blog (I would really appreciate a reblog!) so these fics/authors can receive more love! Plus this is the most exhaustive and time-consuming rec list I've made so far (but I still feel that I missed a lot so other recs are welcome!).

Without further ado, here are some great YOI side-characters' stories in canonverse:

(Don't) Give A Damn by @forochel [T, 9K]

Mari, through the years.

an open door by tripcyclone [G, 8K]

Lilia never wanted children of her own, but caring for Victor gives her a glimpse into the life she chose to pass by.

Beautiful In Knowing by @val-creative [T, 1K]

Sara knew she was a girl, even if nobody else did or believed her.

She ordered Michele to call her "Lady Sara" from now on. He would roll his eyes and grumble, but never attempt to misgender her. She liked "Sara" — it meant "lady, princess, noblewoman". And she would never go back to her deadname.

by any other name by iguanastevens [T, 2K]

"A rose by any other name would smell as sweet."

Yuri's life as told by the names he's given; or, how Yuri's names direct his life.

Feathers on the Ice by Kiranokira / @kyashin [E, 79K]

After dinner and a bath and quality hamster time, snuggled in bed cocooned within his eight entirely necessary pillows, Phichit indulges himself and investigates Seung-gil's hashtag. There isn’t much from Seung-gil himself, but Seung-gil's fans are many and dedicated. Amid the photos of Seung-gil at competitions or practicing and the few candid shots of Seung-gil in airports or out on the streets of Seoul, there’s a very recent professional video uploaded by user andjoy_studio.

Phichit clicks on it, and his life changes.

fermata by perbe [T, 3K]

When one is patchwork of growth plates and bruises, it is inevitable that one must admire boys with words a size too big, as if they know down to their bones that they are meant for something greater.

I used to burn for you, Otabek thinks.

(A character study on Otabek's reaction to his placement at the Grand Prix Finals.)

Go On Ahead by @kiaronna [G, 2K]

Sour, grouchy Yakov didn’t understand sparkly purple skate outfits or wanting to eat your weight in sweets or having crushes on boys.

But Viktor did.

Gossips, Chinese whispers and misunderstandings by womanroaring [M, 8K]

Series of short stories relating to how certain (often perfectly innocent) scenes in Yuri On Ice would have looked from the outside. And just the gossip and stuff that would have surrounded them.

I am Yuri Plisetsky by rinsled05 / @dreaming-fireflies [M, 1K]

Who is Yuri Plisetsky?

He's not Agape.

Not a “prima donna” ballerina.

And definitely no Russian fairy.

No, Yuri Plisetsky is an angry, loud, in-your-face, Russian tiger who will take to the ice and give you a brilliant gold-worthy performance you will never forget.

... a piece on Yuri's rationale for skating to "Welcome to the Madness". Rated for the actual foul-mouthed language in the story itself, courtesy of one Yuri Plisetsky.

if friends were flowers i'd pick you by windupbirdgirl / @tanpopori [G, 4K]

Yuuko thinks of Yuuri’s skating, beautiful and flawed. She thinks of Yuuri sitting with the girls instead of the other boys at practice. She thinks of Yuuri and Viktor, the posters of him he asks her to buy him for birthdays. The posters he wouldn't ask anyone else to buy.

“Oh, Yuuri.” She bites her nails, ruining the carefully applied polish. She doesn’t care at all.

Sitting in that tiny bedroom, she makes a big decision.

if love is king, who wears the crown by @crollalanzaa [G, 1K]

“Second is seen as nothing,” Christophe had derided.

“But that moment you glide onto the ice, that hush of the audience, and that expectation, isn’t that worth something?”

“You speak as if you know. You used to skate?"

Past tense. It still stung, even if it was expected.

Minako knows exactly what it's like to be at the top of your game, and she remembers the descent just as clearly.

if she wants me by renaissance [G, 6K]

Hiroko and Minako, then and now.

kagura by night by seventhstar / @pencilwalla [T, 1K]

The world around her is like the mountains.

A mortal lifespan is narrow; mortals watch the mountain’s unchanging faces, unravaged by the same measure of time that takes a human from dust to dust, and think them immortal in comparison. But stone erodes, just as flesh decays. It just takes longer.

If she watches long enough, everything changes. Languages drift until all the words she learned before are meaningless. Technology changes until she ceases to believe in magic because human ingenuity is more infinite than the stars. What is beautiful, what is polite, what is wrong, what is right—time, given its way, reshapes all.

But Minako’s body remains as it has always been. That’s why she loves to dance, she supposes; it’s the one thing time cannot take from her.

Katsudon by @azriona [G, 8K]

Hiroko doesn’t need to see to coat pork cutlets in egg and panko. She has made this dish for her family for over thirty years; she’ll make it another thirty, if she’s lucky.

Now she makes it for Yuuri and Victor as they fly home from Barcelona, with silver around their necks and gold around their fingers.

keep me steady as we go by strikinglight [G, 3K]

When Isabella stood and crossed the room to where he sat she saw her notebook open in his lap, turned to the last page of their to-do list, all but three items crossed off with less than a month to the wedding date. License. Ceremony. Everything after. She saw the angle of his gaze, too, not on the words but straight ahead, staring blank and glassy and brittle into some invisible place she still wasn’t sure she could follow him to, yet. And yet she had been the one who’d promised to try—and to keep promising, forever and forever.

Kooks by BoxWineConfessions [G, 3K]

Mari clasps her right hand across her left hand and rests them both atop her growing stomach. “I guess you’re just lucky that your father, I mean your other father, my brother-“ Mari giggles. “God, it all sounds so weird, doesn’t it? Do you care? Do you care that we’re all so fucked up and we don’t care at all?” Mari laughs again. It’s all she can do when she hurts this much, and wants a cigarette this much, but can’t stop smiling despite the fact that her body seems to hate her so much. “Well he means the world to me. That’s why I have you.”

Living in the Maybe by @adrianners [T, 6K]

It wasn’t hard to spot a 180cm platinum blond in Fukuoka International Airport. Especially when he was the only person wearing sunglasses. Indoors. At night.

Mari picks Viktor up at the airport when he returns from Moscow. Without Yuuri there to play his usual role of interpreter, they learn to communicate around their linguistic, cultural, and personal barriers.

post tenebras lux by @alykapediaaa [T, 1K]

“Which skater would you say has inspired your skating the most?”

The question catches him unaware, so much so that he’s rendered speechless. It’s only when he sees Yakov lean towards the microphone to answer in his stead that Yuri blurts out the first name that comes to mind.

“Yuuri Katsuki.”

The Best Men by @kiaronna [Not Rated, 5K]

Just as Viktor lives to surprise, Christophe Giacometti lives to scandalize, to sensationalize. But innocent little Phichit Chulanont is proving to be an impossible victim.

OR: where Christophe tries very hard to get under one Thai skater’s skin, and instead finds himself all over the younger skater’s Instagram feed and wrapped around his finger.

the city of bridges by @stammiviktor [T, 5K]

After three flights, a train ride, and dinner at the Katsukis' table, Yakov finally sees Hasetsu through Viktor's eyes.

The First Cut by BoxWineConfessions [E, 27K]

People made divorce seem like this long drawn out and ugly process, but it really wasn’t. He bought the town home for Isabella as a gift, and so it was hers. The flat down town would go to him, as it was closer to the rink. They paid off her medical school loans last fall, so that was done too. He had a few cars, which she unanimously agreed were his to keep, so long as she could keep her Corvette. She changed her vanity plate from Dr. Leroy to Dr. Yang. He saw it parked out front of the courthouse.

trials of Coach Yakov series by @naraht [T and M, 40K]

Summaries of fics in the series:

1. Forced to share a bed with Victor at the Sochi Grand Prix Final, Yakov learns more than he wants to know.

2. Yakov attempts to prepare Yuri for his transition to Seniors. Yuri doesn't care to listen.

3. No sex while you're competing – this is Yakov's rule. His athletes often have other ideas.

4. In 1980, Yakov Feltsman is the USSR's skating hero. At a dull official reception, he defends his loyalty to the motherland – and makes the acquaintance of a beautiful young dancer from the Bolshoi.

5. In which both Victor and Yakov have to remake themselves – Victor after his first Olympic gold and Yakov after his divorce.

Tz'ror by athoroughlybakedpotato [T, 3K]

Yakov changes much slower than the times do, but steadiness is not always a bad thing.

---

ETA - Other people's rec:

curtain of lies by @mandolinearts

JJ's Bizarre Adventure by Falahime

Landscapes of Spring and Summer by @myyoitrashblog

The Melancholy of Georgi Popovich by Falahime

+ a lot more recs on this reblog!!

Thanks for the rec, @vilchen, @genuine-firefly, @adrianners, and @kaleidodreams! ❤

[silver-wield]

Omg. Your body language analysis is so on point it makes me go uwu. If you're still doing it, will you make one for the scene where Cloud catches Tifa while Barret shoots his damnest at the heli? I have my own analysis but very curious what's your take on it.

Heya, I'm guessing you don't mean the scene with the hand catch, but the one after it where they reach Barret's position on the stairs. Although I have many thoughts about Rude too and why he first of all directed Reno's attention to Tifa, but then noped them away when Reno was about to shoot her. He had an interesting microexpression – teeny facial tic – that hinted something different to the OG “he's crushing on her” angle.

A lot of these “action touches” get discounted by you-know-who because in those situations it's impossible not to touch? I don't get the reasoning and I'm not gonna try and figure out just what counts and what doesn't. It's non-optional. Isn't that the only argument that matters?

Ok, spoiler warning for ppl who haven't played (I tag FF7R spoilers as final fantasy 7 remake spoilers) and it's gonna be a long one so prepare to scroll.

Also, this is one person's interpretation of the scene, so if you disagree that's cool and we'll agree to disagree.

You're also gonna have to excuse the janky quality on some of the screens, I'm grabbing them from Youtube and it's frustrating af trying to get the exact moment I want.

Other analyses if anyone's interested.

Shinra HQ vision scene (Cloti/plot analysis) 

Chapter 3 (Cloti reblog) 

Tifa character analysis 

Aerith Resolution (plot analysis/theory) 

Train graveyard (not really an analysis, but I got some sweet screenshots of Cloti) 

Clotiscrew tunnel analysis 

Cloti reunion analysis 

The Promise Analysis 

Andrea's approval (Cloti ask response) 

Now, strap in and enjoy the ride.

Quick recap. Cloud and Tifa are reunited after that hand catch scene (smug? Me? Nau) and they're heading up to find Barret after seeing Jessie “die”. The mood is not good. This is not romantic, okay? This is war.

Ok, so already we have touchy touching here. You can argue it's high tension/stress moment and Cloud is making sure Tifa's safe, but he doesn't do that with Barret, is all I'm saying.

Cloud's got hold of her entire arm, not just her wrist or hand, he's got hold of her as securely as possible giving they're in motion. He doesn't want to lose her. She's got her arm on him, braced and using his body as a shield, which he is clearly fine with because he positions her partly behind him while he turns to check the threat from the stairs – possible further collapse of the platform they're now on. He's protecting her. Obvs. I shouldn't have to spell this out. It's not romantic, but it's telling of their trust and reliance on each other as partners. This is a clear pair.

Ok, so moving on from Cloti – cause action scene and this isn't a romance game – we get Tifa hearing Barret behind her. She turns and there's her concern for her friend. Obviously, she cares. It's her entire motivation for leaving the safety at the bottom and hauling her ass up those stairs.

Her face here hits me hard in the feels. She's so grim and worried and doesn't want to lose anyone else. She's caught up to Cloud, but then she lost Jessie – right in front of her and she couldn't do a thing about it. Now, she sees Barret facing down a helicopter.

Take that in. It's a dude – ok he's got a machine gun on his arm – fighting military spec weaponry on a fucking helicopter. Of course she's frightened and worried that she's about to see him get shot. Someone else she couldn't save.

Remember, FF7 has themes of loss and failure. The heroes don't always win or if they do there's a cost. How much of that threads into Remake is still to be seen, but since this scene is following canon we can assume it stands for now.

Tifa's character is often motivated by the desire to not lose people. She even says as much to the Shinra middle manager that she doesn't want anyone else to die. She stops Cloud killing the security agents and Johnny. This is a girl who fights because she wants people to live, not die.

Ok, so now we've got her running to reach Barret, leaving the safety of her bolt hole beside Cloud, who immediately turns and is all wtf when he sees her playing chicken with a chopper. Tbf, Barret doesn't sound that pleased about it, either. It's a crazy impulsive move likely driven by the desire to not lose her friend. If they're together they can stop whatever's coming. Tifa is very teamwork oriented if you recall all her actions from chapter 3 and how demoralised she was when she had to agree to disagree with Avalanche.

Cloud for his part doesn't take too long to dive to the rescue again. I think by now he's pretty much fulfilled that childhood promise and this is way more than just helping out a colleague or friend. He's not hesitating for a second to put himself in front of her with nothing but a sword for a shield.

Sorry, I just stopped the vid on this moment and it looks so damn cool I couldn't resist adding it. All it does is reinforce the above statement that Cloud has zero reservations of putting himself between Tifa and certain death. He's her hero without even stopping to think about it. The framing is stunning. Barret in the background, Cloud in the middle distance and Tifa in the foreground. Cloud has lined himself up with Tifa so that she's as protected by his position as he could possibly get. That takes skill. Tifa's half crouched to make herself a smaller target, but Cloud's body language is open, defiant. He's basically saying “come at me”.

Ah and now I'm sure some people will be all “but Cloud left her in the middle of the platform”. Well, yes, it's called diversion. He's the bigger target, the better target. And by making the chopper follow his progress, he's taken its sights away from Tifa's position. It now has less chance of hitting her when it next fires. Remember, Cloud knows tactics. He's not a dumdum. You can see that on his face as he's deciding his next move. The chopper won't wait for him to stop and explain what he needs to do, it's gonna fire. He's gotta move quickly. He also needs to trust that Tifa can get herself out of trouble. So many people's complaints about how she's not a damsel and should take care of herself. Well, this is Cloud trusting her not to be a damsel. He helped her out, and now he's gotta rely on her helping herself too. If he took her by the hand at this moment and dragged her along with him, she probably would've died. Tifa got herself to his position alone, she's clearly capable. He knows how much ass she can kick.

After that we've got the typical checking for danger and guy banter. I'm loving the development of Cloud and Barret's relationship. They went from outright hating each other to friends over the course of this game. It's beautiful and develops even further in their resolution – I love their one, it's so sweet and sad and such a guy bonding moment. Male friendship is important too, especially to Cloud who doesn't have many friends.

Now, despite the banter, Cloud's head turns at this point, back to Tifa. He's made sure the immediate area is safe, checked in with Barret and now it's back to his primary focus.

I love that Barret calls himself the leading man. It reminds me of Balthier in FF12.

And you'll see that Barret is still in the middle of that line while Cloud is stretching his hand out for Tifa. Could be a “I gotta grab my teammate” move, but I mean, really? Are we that delusional? He didn't have to do any of this. He could've relied on Tifa to get herself over there and not put out a hand for her. Barret didn't grab him. You could say that Barret doesn't like Cloud enough for that, but it's a high action moment. They're comrades and being shot at. Any helping hand is appreciated. Maybe Barret thought Cloud was capable enough not to need help. But then wouldn't the same apply to Tifa? Why does she need helping just cause she's a woman? She can kick ass.

And what about Barret? His attention isn't on Tifa at all. His focus is the helicopter, so he's either relying on Tifa to be ok without that level of help or he's expecting Cloud to support her.

Yes, she is literally throwing herself into his arms. That's how much she trusts him to catch her. Again, Cloud is going for a full arm grab – a hand or wrist isn't secure enough in this situation and he wants to keep her safe.

Tifa. Well, she looks scared. Shocker. She just got shot at by a helicopter. Ofc she's scared and leaning on Cloud. She's taking strength and reassurance from him. I mean, she could've just grabbed his arm and pulled herself to safety. There's no need for this depth of touch.

You'll notice this all happens within miliseconds while Barret says that leading man line. This is very quick action, very decisive. No hesitation on anybody's part.

I mean, this is full upper body contact between them. I don't know what else to say about it. There's no need to get this close. He could've pulled her over and then let go. He didn't. They both prolonged contact. This is relief they're ok for the moment. They’re united in how they feel.

Oh look, eye contact. I've pointed out before that Cloud doesn't do eye contact with people very well, but he does with Tifa, no matter the situation. Looking at this I'm like damn get a room. It's an intense look between them and even though there's shit hitting the fan around them you can see they have attention for each other, too. He's pulled her to safety and now he's meeting her gaze to gauge if she's ok. She nods. He nods. Back to the action. They don't have time for a drawn out romantic bit. They've got more serious things to think about, but even during the most high tension action scenes they have this energy about them that speaks to their close bond and affection. He's comfortable with her touch in every situation – if I'm wrong about this then someone point it out to me so I can see plz. He's still got his hand on her after they separate from their action hug and then when he drops his hand he braces it against the pipe beside her. Still close to her, though not actually touching.

After Barret asks if they're ready, Cloud looks around then looks at Tifa again. Did he need to do that? Idk, but he didn't look at Barret before they hauled ass.

Conclusion:

Kinda obvious. Even in high tension situations Cloud has part of his attention on Tifa. He's hyper aware of where she is and whether she needs him at any given time. It's sweet af how much he focuses on being her hero without even really knowing why. This instinctive need to protect her comes from the real!Cloud part of him. The one that made the promise to her. The one that has a crush on her.

Some people can say these kind of moments don't count because Cloud has no choice(?) but to touch her, but actually, he has no reason to touch her the amount he does. There's ways to execute these moments without this much unnecessary touching. He does it this way because of an instinctive need and desire to touch her this much. It's what he wants to do.

[falling-chandeliers]

atla and tlok should’ve had more desi rep.

WARNING: SPOILERS FOR ATLA AND TLOK BELOW.

hey! atla and tlok are two of my favorite shows, and they’ve accomplished so much. i love the diversity, the messages, and all the representation that they’ve given us. the water tribe is based off of inuit culture, and it’s kind of heavily implied that the fire nation was inspired by east asian culture. and this is amazing!! i love it so much. i’m not quite certain which culture inspired the earth nation/kingdom, but it does seem to be the most diverse.

it is, however, clear that the air nomads’ culture has many aspects from buddhism and some from hinduism. therefore, i believe that we should’ve had more desi rep in the show. both religions have strong roots in india (before you come at me that hinduism spreads across the world and is one of the oldest religions, please remember that it started in india. also note that the founder of buddhism, if that is the term, was prince siddhartha, an indian prince). 

the term avatar itself is literally derived from the sanskrit “avatra”, which used to be one of the major languages in - you guessed it - india. in hinduism, avatars are humans with a god’s spirit in them, to put things simply. lord krishna was the avatar of vishnu, just like how aang and korra are the avatars of raava. the show also uses the buddhist concept of elements: earth, fire, water, and vacuum, which can be interpreted as air or space. 

also in avatar is the concept of rebirth, which is a common hindu belief. it is referenced many times when tenzin asks korra to “reconnect with her past lives”, and there are many other instances as well. 

in atla, aang tries to unlock his chakras with guru pathik. in both hinduism and buddhism, chakras  are the center of your life force, and have a lot of vital energy.

“but roy, i could already see all that! the atla universe is based off of many cultures and its characters are so diverse. besides, guru pathik was clearly desi, if not explicitly indian.”

and you’re right. atla, and subsequently, tlok, universe has a lot of diversity and i love it. however, it still has flaws.

it’s safe to say that aang is the main character in atla. the show is literally called avatar: the last airbender, and aang is the avatar and the last airbender. so, to some extent, this makes airbending/air nomad culture important too, right?

right. and as i very clearly explained above, the airbending/air nomad culture is heavily influenced by hinduism and buddhism. which brings me to my final point:

why don’t we have more hindu and buddhist characters?

you can argue that the original air nomads appear to be buddhist. i agree with you, as many buddhist monks are light-skinned. however, where the hell is our desi rep?

hinduism was literally founded in india. most of its followers live in india, are indian, or are connected to india in some way. i’m calling these people desi, which i believe refers to brown skinned people from the indian subcontinent and around it, including pakistan, nepal, bangladesh, and bhutan, to name a few. 

one thing most of us have in common is our brown skin. so where’s our rep? the ONLY character in the entire show who is almost 100% desi is guru pathik. the only one, out of so many characters. kinda fucking terrible, if you consider the fact that the main characters entire culture derives from the culture of desis. 

in tlok, the only person who looked desi was swami, who was literally equivalent to an extra. thanks, atla and tlok creators. really appreciate the great desi rep.

and yeah, i’m pissed about this. desi culture was used in a show which had probably two (2) desi characters.

but do you know what really gets me? the fact that combustion man and p’li have the eye of SHIVA on their forehead. the eye of SHIVA, ONE OF THE MAIN THREE GODS IN THE HINDU TRIUMVIRATE. this is strictly hindu, and you can’t weasel your way out of it. and yeah, you can argue that combustion man appears to be desi, and i’ll probably agree with you. his race is not as easily discernible as guru pathik. but p’li? p’li is clearly not desi. she could very well have desi genes, but it doesn’t show. she is 100% not brown, and she has the motherfucking eye of shiva on her forehead. shiva, a god from a predominantly desi religion. call me crazy, but i believe that someone who has the eye of a hindu god on their skin should at least look hindu.

there isn’t nearly enough desi rep in normal tv shows, let alone animated shows. and if they do, they’re more often that not heavily stereotyped. one example that really irks me is slav from voltron. he had a heavy indian accent, and was one of the smartest people in the entire show. why? 

if you haven’t figured it out by now. i’m indian. i was born and raised in america, but my parents are immigrants from india. my father is a hindu and my mother is a sikh, and i grew up learning a lot about both of their cultures. and yeah, people still make fun of me in school for my grades, my skin color, and what i eat. the last time someone told me a joke, it was about curry. people call my brother curry-boy, and he’s in his senior year. we grew up seeing racism first hand.

the first time i saw a desi character on animated american tv, i cried. she wasn’t even confirmed indian, but it was clear that she was desi and had my skin tone. the character was mermista, from spop, and she was the first desi character i had ever saw that was completely normal. i mean, clearly, she wasn’t normal because she was like, a princess and could turn into a mermaid, but she wasn’t affected by the many indian stereotypes going around. 

the second time i saw a desi character in tv was quite recently. lila pitts, from the umbrella academy. she too was not affected by the many indian stereotypes. she was simply a badass character with dark skin.

so yeah, it hurts that tv doesn’t normally have desi representation. but it hurts even more that atla and tlok’s desi characters can be counted on one hand. both shows are heavily influenced by desi culture, and don’t have the characters to show for it.