#i don't think it's an emotional or moral failing if someone's criticism of your personal work made you Feel Bad

[bogkeep]

i feel like a lot of people say they are "bad at taking criticism" because the idea of sharing something something very personal and vulnerable online means you might get lots of feedback and criticism from a crowd of strangers, and accepting and catering to all of them seems daunting, maybe even impossible. that's because it is, and you do not have to do that!

like don't get me wrong, accepting criticism is a Skill - one you can train and practice - that requires being able to separate yourself from your work enough to not take it personally, being able to think critically about what you want to achieve with it and whether or not the feedback aids in that goal, and sorting valuable feedback from the unhelpful. and it's hard!!!! i think most creatives have a fraught relationship to feedback, and the people most adapted to it have simply had the most practice and experience.

there's a time and place. if you are working, professionally, on a project with other people, then yes. taking and incorporating feedback is crucial. if you are posting silly doodles for free on the internet, you don't actually have to take Stranger26284 seriously. you don't know their taste and credentials, so whatever they have to say is likely completely useless to you. i know we have an internet landscape where we do media criticism for fun and often bemoan how if only creators LISTENED to their AUDIENCE, the Thing would be Perfect. maybe it's even true, sometimes. but we don’t know what the circumstances of the creation was, nor can we retroactively demand something already created to have been created differently. we can take our own observations and thoughts into our own work, or maybe you should be so lucky to be someone's trusted editor or feedback buddy or beta reader. but like. idk! people create different things, differently, for different reasons. you're not a bad creative if you don't take unsolicited criticism very well - you didn't ask for it.

[zeroducks-2]

People hating evil characters is weird to me. I guess the only characters I actually hate are annoying ones cause usually that’s not a point of their character in the story, they just happen to be infuriating. Like Slade being a bad guy is cause he’s a bad guy, that’s like his whole point as a character. Yeah he can be nuanced and worse at times but he exists to be an antagonist. It completely makes sense to me that the Tara thing makes people uncomfortable but he’s still a fictional antagonist, it’s not really a moral failing on the part of the creators.

Tbh if you've experienced these characters in any way (read TJC or watched the more recent animated movie or read Deathstroke 2016 or watched Teen Titans 2003, or whatever else features their interaction) and you don't like Slade, that's fair enough.

Loving and hating characters (and every other emotion) happens all the time and it's part of the experience. HOWEVER, I do take issues when it's people who do not know the character, who have barely ever seen them and just heard "stuff" from other fandom people, who go on crusades against said character because "they did bad stuff".

You see it in people who hate Tarantula "because she raped Dick" and they have not read one single comic in which she appears - they have no idea what she even looks like or what's her real name, but they "hate her" because they read a post in which the sexual assault was mentioned and since she "did a bad thing" they "hate her now". This has to be the most shallow fucking thing, but it's convenient because if you hate on the "bad guy" it must mean you're morally pure and upstanding and you're one of the good ones.

Back to your point, hating on a character without any kind of reasoning or nuance only because they did "bad things" is the death of critical thinking. But people out there act like characters who do shit that's even vaguely considered unethical or morally reprehensible irl need to be hated, and like their existence is some sort of moral failing from the writer's part, and it's so fucking annoying and childish.

Which leads me to my second point which is a tad more controversial, but hey I'm a bitch with insufferable opinions so here we go I guess.

I'm bothered by people who pick a character and use them as their scapegoat, and I mean collectively as a fandom. It kind of is the case with Slade but he isn't the perfect example, however the principle is the same: hating on the villain, especially when the villain is very human and makes very human mistakes, using them as the only person who is capable of doing evil and therefore acquitting every other character of anything they ever did.

With Slade it becomes that Slade is the only bad guy of his story, who hurt Grant and hurt Adeline and hurt Joseph and raped Tara and killed and maimed and tortured, and therefore Grant has no blame in what he did to himself, and Adeline is just a poor innocent woman who was hurt by her unfaithful husband, and Joey did nothing wrong and everything that happened to him is solely Slade's fault, and Tara wasn't already a mercenary hitwoman for hire who lied and cheated and killed - rather she was just a poor innocent girl who was manipulated and corrupted by the Big Bad Guy.

I don't know if you see what I mean with this, but it's very much a thing in a lot of fandoms, especially when it comes to horror media where there is a cast of controversial, "imperfect" characters. One example of this is Mouthwashing, in which (spoilers ahead of course) there is a cast composed of people who range from being downright horrible to having very human but very noticeable flaws - every single one of them is "guilty" of something, and the protagonist in particular is also the one with the most prominent antisocial behaviors. But he's not benefiting from them - Jimmy isn't someone whose life is made better by his piece of shit behavior, rather this is a person with issues and who struggles with mental health (he's suicidal and has very strong delusions), giving him a very hard time keeping his life in order. Which of course doesn't make any of the horrible shit he does less horrible, but I think it's interesting how he's (mostly) not acting out of convenience, rather he's acting out his own demons. And what the fandom did was deciding that this guy is the only one to blame, and that his shitty behavior absolves everyone else of their sins. He's effectively the scapegoat and everyone else - it doesn't matter if they act selfishly, childishly, violently, cowardly or anything really - is guileless and has never done anything wrong in their lives. Jimmy is the only one who's to blame, and the rest of the cast is made of pure perfect angels.

I've seen this happen in many many cases. And it sort of turns into a mob of people whose only fandom personality is to hate on this one guy and gather Upstanding Morality Points, and of course the natural consequence of this is bothering or even outright harassing people who instead are fans of such flawed characters.

I hate it. I'm not saying anyone should have to like a character in particular, but the way people hate on the "easy to hate" guy instead of trying to understand them, especially when it's a complex character whose action make them suffer as much as the people they're hurting, distances me from fandom spaces. People will see a feral beast of a character with their leg caught in a bear trap hissing and growling while in the process of chewing their own limb off, and will toss stones at them and call them disgusting and weird. It's so unkind and I hate it so much.

[here-there-were-dragons]

just read the new hatchling skin rules and am having Some Type Of Initial Emotional Reaction and am now writing down said Initial Emotional Reaction uncensored as i currently Strongly Feel A Type Of Way and Require Venting. i cannot word this more politely. i do not have the capability to render this rage into polite borderline corporate-speak for the sake of the damn rules that act like anything short of apologizing for being alive to make up for having even the most constructive understanding friendly criticism or even personal mild non-critical dislike of something like a color or a breed is tantamount to personal targeted hatemail. i cannot wait until i cool into calm bitterness later because if i think about this enough to write about it again i will just go right back to being furious and the fact that everyone ielse who's complaining is focusing entirely on the lolita fashion thing and not on in my opinion the far more significant and offensive part is pissing me off even more. extremely angry unedited ranting ahead

fr having it's own "female presenting nipples" moment right now, not that i'm particularly surprised, they've been a prime example of "conservative protestantism in a lefty-language veneer" for a long while now.

"don't adultify" is such a fucking vague and easily selectively interpreted rule, not to mention insulting for a number of reasons,

but putting that part aside the whole idea of "nothing that suggests that the dragon is an adult in a young body" is. look, i'm not exactly fond of the "adult who looks like an anime schoolgirl" trope myself, but i fail to see how in the absolute FUCK having it be canon in-universe that it is both possible and legal for someone to be forced to stay as a child permanently, is somehow LESS creepy than just saying eternal youth dragons have dwarfism. also, fuck you to anyone with dwarfism apparently i guess?

and "no zombie baby dragons" is just stupid. even fucking minecraft has baby zombies, and microsoft has steadily butchered that game into one of the most t for toddler babymode things on earth this side of cocomelon.

and "no scars on hatchlings" so fuck you to any kids with scars too apparently, even though that's way more common than anyone seems to realize. you hear that, kids? if you're under 18 and have scars your very existence is too obscene for public view. 13+ year olds will be irreparably traumatized if they have to know you exist at all! fuck you disabled kids and fuck you amputee kids and fuck you any kids that have suffered anything ever at all for not appearing as a perfect unspoiled image of conservative christian child-doll innocent purity. flight rising staff says your body and existence is inherently too nsfw to even be acknowledged as existing much less visually seen. everyone knows REAL children don't get damaged at all, and if they do then they're too horrifying and defective at their job of Being A Child Properly to exist in public spaces! how dare ugly things that might make us uncomfortable with their existence by contradicting out ideals about aesthetic moral purity be allowed where good respectable normal people can see them!

i don't say any of these words lightly, and i'm very much not the type to go around calling people whatever-ists and in fact find that kind of thing extremely annoying, useless, reductive, and more or less only ever see it used as a blunt cudgel to shame people into line so they don't question you, and have historically found it especially annoying when people pull out the accusations-of-ism card on fr staff over things that are far more likely just completely understandable (if dubiously competent) issues of certain things simply not occurring to someone on code and design level due to lack of sufficient exposure to the idea, and have always been of the belief of giving them the benefit of doubt (even if often that just means i think they either most likely made an understandable mistake that i would likely also make, or, when i'm feeling less kind, that they're simply not particularly competent rather than actively hostile) so understand how much it means coming from me when i say- flight rising staff, sincerely, from the bottom of my heart, fuck you, you ableist batch of pricks, so far up your own asses with your performative veneer of vaguely lefty-flavored language that you don't realize how fundamentally extremely conservative all of your actual beliefs underlying them are. for every update you make that i approve of there's another that does twice as much damage as the good update fixed (and i'm starting to wonder if you maybe know what you're doing with that too-always batching the fucked up shit on the tail end of some big thing you know people will be excited about, always hiding these controversial moderation changes under something shiny and new, to the point that now i dread any new good update that genuinely seems a step in the right direction and/or is something we've been wanting for awhile because i'm just constantly expecting the knife hidden behind the footnotes afterwards, the fucking "ban tiktok/gay marriage/strip rights from this population/end net neutrality/whatever/ect" clause stapled onto the end of a bill about something entirely unrelated functionally holding a change people want hostage until they allow the fucked up part through. i've been here most of the site's 10+ years and i've seen this sort of thing happen far, far too often.) and every year the shit that gets pulled on the management and moderation end of things makes me more and more almost glad i've never had an income to spend on this, and the fact that apparently the moderation behind every single other petsite in existence is somehow significantly worse fucking astounds me. the only reason i stay around here is because It's Free Dragon Pictures, because it's literally the only actually good petsite game i've ever played and not gotten sick of within a week or so (and really the only good low-energy game i've ever played in general, which i'm increasingly convinced is in spite of it's management), and because somehow, despite all of this shit, i still genuinely love the game itself, because unfortunately by some accident of creation it seems they apparently stumbled purely by coincidence into making an actually good game idea no one else quite has. and after all the fuckery that gets constantly pulled, i refuse to believe the game being good is anything other than, much like many of the of the incidents i think they're unfairly accused of malice and -ism over, an accident.

Disabled children too obscene to fucking exist. fuck you. good to know half the child population's existence requires a trigger warning to even be allowed to be acknowledged as existing to you. good to know if the heart surgery i had when i was 11 had left any visible external scars i would be considered inherently too obscene to exist to you. good to know if the overhealed and benignly potentially cancerous scar on my back from whatever actually happened when i was a toddler (i don't trust either of my parents to ever be accurate about something like that) was in a more visible spot you would demand i have a trigger warning to post selfies online. good to know if any of the shit that's broken me emotionally left visible physical marks you would think it was good and right for me to be forcibly hidden from good normal people's view and considered too taboo for even the slightest discussion without hiding it with makeup and lies, just so i don't make good, lucky, undamaged, normal people uncomfortable, god fucking forbid. should we hide the gays too, since they also make so many people uncomfy? i imagine it won't be long before disabled adults are too obscene for your polite societytm sensibilities too. i've had the feeling for a long time that amputee and disabled skins were living on borrowed time with your rules, kept technically not explicitly dissalowed where all other forms of injury and ""body horror"" are banned simply out of fear of the backlash it would cause to include them, and well. the doomsday clock on that one just got a little bit closer to midnight, huh?

the only reason i wasn't a (physically, visibly, externally) scarred kid was pure sheer fucking luck. the only reason you weren't a physically scarred kid too is pure sheer fucking luck. the only reason you're not some type of disfigured or ugly or amputated or visibly injured or whatnot is pure sheer fucking luck. you're lucky. nothing more. if having to contend with that fact-the fact of how easily it could have gone a different way and there is nothing they would be able to do about it- makes good normal tm people uncomfortable, then well, get the fuck used to it, other people children very much fucking included don't exist to cater to the aesthetic sensibilities of a lucky perfect few. the only thing that separates you from the damaged ones you find too obscene is a bad day and an unlucky hand. and one day, even if you were lucky enough to escape being damaged when you were young, you and i will both be just like them too.

more festival skin winners slots is good. elemental swords sound fun.

[giddlywinks]

An Evangelical clown troupe could convince anyone to support genocide, and y'all could not even convince yourselves to get off your phones long enough to see that you MUST rectify your communication towards conservatives! You have to convince them of you through empathy and accesible communication! They hate you, and they are the majority. You really thought saying you hate them, think they're idiots, or delusional over and over to have that thrown in their face for almost a decade would make them say you were right? And CHANGE their minds???

And although many of you would like to believe your common sense makes you superior, it doesn't! You are just as uneducated as them. Do you know how insurance companies work? The stock market? The FDA? FEMA? The Fed Reserve? Crypto? International history and US Politics? The way local governments work? Etc. No, you don't, but you believe that pretending you do, while someone whom you've never met, from a pool of options you didn't choose, advocates for you about those issues, is going to produce the outcome you would like. You are not wise! You are just as exploited by your own willingness to be both angry and uninvolved.

You need to heal your trauma and communication with those who are within your network to be able to reach them in their confusion, fear, and distrust. Anger and words don't produce solidarity! Education, literal support for others, refining communication to be accessible and to be logically sound is what convinces others that your ideas are worth their time. That posturing of pseudo-superiority, both intellectual and moral, while handing the left's ass to the mouth of a shark, is why the tide has shifted devastatingly.

Do y'all know who Audre Lorde is? The master's tools of fearmongering and anger were the ONLY platform of the Democratic campaign before even Harris. Why did you all believe that you could sit at home hating and shitting on millions of people, somehow be better than them, and then be able to convince them they need to make the choice you would make in an election they barely understand in most of the geography of this country! You have got to get it through your mind that they are the majority and they always have been.

Stop being assholes to assholes like that convinces everyone to be and act differently or better. Stop wasting time on the bullshit of everything needing to be correct or appropriate and start being effective instead! It's civil disobedience, not "look at us and know we are right." Stop thinking you can only do a little march, an emotional social media post, or any other out-of-touch political action a couple times every year and change the world. You can't! Start taking actual political action on personal and community levels to dismantle the systems that privelege you in some convenient areas and plot your death in others. Stop thinking you just don't know how to get involved. Educate yourselves and make it up! Stop giving people/corporations your money when they hate you. Stop making the hatred for the left grow larger. Stop wasting your time in fear and excuses while you're wiped off the map.

This happened twice because none of you learned a thing! Grassroots movements in solidarity with rural communities NOW NOW NOW!

I wrote multiple versions of this post that Tumblr kept saying failed to post, and I clarified in those, but I'll do so here, too. It's important. I want to clarify that my criticism is towards the hypocrisy of the bitter left to project blame and assume that's a win for progress. It's not a win for anyone. My criticism is NOT directed towards the countless, tireless, emotionally brutalized, progressive activists who desperately tried to bridge solidarity while working within the awful, unstoppable fact that harm reduction is all we can do now.

[techmomma]

Things that are very difficult to reconcile with:

sometimes abuse and trauma makes us selfish and self-centered. Sometimes it makes us prideful--because we are wounded, and trying to cover up a wound.

I don't mean in a "turns us into our abusers" kind of way. Obviously, that can happen. But even when we decide not to be like the ones who abused us, we can end up focusing entirely on ourselves--losing track of the world around us.

Sometimes this comes as "thinking no one else in the world understands our pain and trauma." Your pain and trauma is important. But it is not unique. There ARE others who have experienced what you have.

Sometimes this comes as exceptionalism, even if in a negative way. "No one is as terrible and awful of a person as I am." You are not the worst person in the world. You are, at most, middling average.

But for some victims of abuse, the idea of being average--that is, nothing special--is almost worse than being the worst. At least if you're the worst, that's something, right? You're different, even if it's in a bad way, because you're afraid of never standing out, or being neglected, again.

Sometimes it looks like being sensitive, even defensive, against even light constructive criticism, because that criticism touches on those feelings of shitty self-worth. Touching them means having to acknowledge they're there.

Sometimes it means doing or saying things to others that we cannot tolerate ourselves. Touching others and hating to be touched. Criticizing others and not tolerating criticism in return. Making fun of other people and being unable to handle being made fun of. This is again wound-covering but it's also an aspect of regaining control that we do not think we have or control that we crave. There's also a catharsis to it: we were criticized mercilessly, and no we do it to others, but the wound remains, and so cannot tolerate it against ourselves. The inequality, itself, becomes a way to get back that control we're desperate for because we are afraid of the lack of control, yet again.

Sometimes it looks like failing to see, or ignoring, the role we play in problems. Saying "everyone else controls this, not me," when we have more control than we can see or are willing to admit. Saying "other people make problems" when you had the ability to walk away, or put down a boundary.

Sometimes it looks like being so focused on our own feelings and pain that we cannot see it in others. Not just in people we don't like, but in our friends too.

Sometimes it does come out as entitlement. "My pain was terrible and yours isn't as bad." As seeing someone else's problems as "lesser" because they weren't as bad as yours. Creating tiers or hierarchies of pain, comparative to yours. Saying "why do I have to eat my humble pie when no one else did? when I already suffered so much?"

Sometimes this comes as clinging to a victim mindset. That other people need to fix you, that someone else needs to come in to save you, because that's fucking unfair to be hurt by someone else and have to fix the hurt they gave you, yourself. But that is the unfortunate reality: no one is going to save you when it comes to your emotional wounds. No one is going to fix you. You have to fix it, yourself. You can go to therapy to get the right tools to do so and friends can tell you that you're wonderful, but the only person in the end who can heal your wounds is you.

People who've been abused and traumatized are not any more morally or emotionally mature than anyone else. They don't get to slack on introspection--in fact, sometimes, we have to introspect more than most because we did not learn how to do so in a healthy way, so we are just as prone to falling into the same traps as the ones who hurt us. No one is immune to perpetuating the same hurt dealt to them.

We affect the people around us. You are not immune to hurting others because you did not take care of your own wounds.

[marveltaughtmetoread]

I think the crux of the disconnect between Prequels era fans is that the Jedi supporters believe the Jedi are good and right, and it is on this that we should support, and the Jedi critical fans are like no one in this era is good and right, including the Jedi, and the fact that you won't admit the Jedi are wrong is driving us insane

Because frequently when Jedi supporters are arguing with me, they are dismissing the notion that the Jedi could ever do anything wrong and then bring up how awful Anakin is as a way to say I am wrong, because I support Anakin

Which I don't support Anakin????

I like him, he is an incredibly compelling character especially as someone who knows what it is like to repress your feelings and want so badly to hold onto the ones who care for you

But I don't support him, it's actually because I relate to him that I don't, I wish I could save him, I have compassion for him, but he killed people, he committed genocide, twice??? In the Prequels??? He is exactly the type of person who terrifies me in real life, I don't support him

My love of his character writing does not mean that I am overlooking his clear moral failings or even that agree with him, because I don't, I actually love his character more because he is written to be so flawed morally, he is an exploration of emotional repression and how wanting power, even if it is to save someone else can still make you a bad person, it is this complexity that drew me to him as a character

I am drawn to morally complex characters in spite of the fact that their actions go against my morals, because I personally find morally complex characters to be more compelling

So why then, if I like morally flawed characters do I have such an issue with the Jedi and their morals in particular

Quite simply, it's the way they aren't written (especially in the Clone Wars) with that same moral complexity, they are written as if they are moral good

And it is this framing of them that a lot of Jedi supporters have clearly sided with and made their reason to support the Jedi, they believe the Jedi are good and believe that fans should support morally good characters so they can't understand why I wouldn't support them

But the Jedi aren't morally good and I find the inability to acknowledge that alarming

The Prequels movies do a much better job of showing how their inaction leads to bad things, but even in the Prequels there isn't a full of acknowledgement of how far they have fallen

Whereas the Clone Wars just doesn't acknowledge it, at all, they flatten the story down so it has no moral complexity, they have clear cut good guys and bad guys, the Jedi are the good guys, no matter what, the bad guys are the Sith, their is the occasional attempt at making the morality of the Clone Wars more grey but it is inconsistent, and overall the approach is a binary

The issue is, in painting the Jedi as morally good, the Prequels era glosses over how they aren't, they aren't objectively good, no one in the Prequels era but in pretending that they are, you make the meta around the canon morally complex

You have people defending the Jedi's use of the clones, choice to ignore slaves and chain themselves to the Repiy, handling of Anakin and the Padawans in general, involvement in the war and everything else because the Jedi are framed as good guys

I have yet to meet anyone defending Anakin's actions because he is so clearly framed as the guy falling to the Dark Side, we are meant to mourn his fall but we aren't meant to think he was in the right

Not everything the Jedi did is bad, but enough is that placing them on a pedestal and calling them the heroes, acting like they don't deserve this slander when Jedi critical fans are just pointing out how the Jedi are morally compromised, is messed up

There is no moral high ground when it comes to the Prequels, everyone compromises themselves (including Padme, she stayed with Anakin,), but some fans want to act like there is and so we have a disconnect

[lasi-nariyoyoreads]

ask 1: there is so much going on w soobin txt can you do true personality reading on him?

ask 2: so seeing how the internet is flaming soobin's ass rn how does the industry ig or the general public feel abt him rn (im talking about the whole made in the abyss situation)

Squeezing these two asks together because they're about the same person. I'm not too entirely aware what this scandal is about, I thought it was related to that insta live drama but actually it's a new one about an anime. I'm 100% everyone will forget about this in a couple of days and those who remember will just be reminded that kpop stans' mental age is 2, nothing new here.

Nothing unexpected came from both readings either, his personality is pretty coherent with what he shows on camera, general public reaction is coherent with what I assume is happening on the internet.

Disclaimer:

My readings are made for fun and you should read them for fun too. So don't take them seriously.

His personality

Cards: 9 of pentacles, rev the star, queen or cups

He's an independent and successful person, someone you could admire.

He's hardworking, but also someone who knows how to enjoy his success. You might say there's a good work-life balance.

He isn't too needy when it comes to people, I guess he either sticks to his old friends or wait for others to approach him. He's very self-sufficient.

He might be moody, too pessimistic or too optimistic. He might fail to look objectively at his reality. He might think he's ok when he isn't or he might have a very negative view for no reason.

There might be phases where he feels like he's in a slump, where he lacks creativity and self-confidence.

But overall he's a caring, warm and generous person. He's sensitive and considerate of others. All good qualities that makes sense for someone who was chosen as a leader.

There's a very mature energy coming from these cards, also strong feminine energy, he's a supportive person overall who cares about the well-being of those around him.

Overall it's pretty coherent with what he shows on camera, he's not that interested in projecting a certain image or acting as something he isn't.

About the anime drama

Cards: rev 7 of wands, rev knight of cups, 5 of cups

Some think he's an incoherent person, as in "he seems so nice and calm, but actually he's completely different".

Rx 7 of wands usually indicates lowering your moral standards or giving them up.

I think it's pretty much what some people are criticizing him for.

Rx knight of cups again points to someone who is disloyal or with chaotic emotions.

There's this kind of betrayal energy in all these cards. I honestly don't know exactly what this manga is about, but kpop fans love to jump on the smallest thing and make it a massive case, it will definitely be forgotten in the next two weeks (unless someone else drags him in a new """"scandal"""") and I don't need tarot card to know it, just be a kpop fan for a bit and you'll get used to these patterns.

5 of cups is the card of sorrow, I think it generally indicates the common feeling of his fans, those angry at him are disappointed, those who side with him are sad that such a big drama exploded.

[rollercoasterwords]

rae im sorry i just need to rant and i feel like youd get it but. god this is like the 50th time ive come across a post trashing atyd’s characterization of sirius, calling him extremely sexist or misogynistic for going out w so many girls??? saying hes repulsive, “barely held back puke every time he spoke” “im so glad i never read that shit” like ??? idk the unfair amount of scrutiny this fic gets makes me so mad. just bc something doesnt ascribe to your personal characterizations doesnt give you the right to start bashing writers left and right all over the internet. breaking news: flawed characters exist! that doesnt make the writer or writing “problematic”! not to mention all the gross ableist comments ive seen regarding remus’ emotions and actions surrounding his disability lol or all the “why is he so angry all the time” comments idk babe u try living as a poverty ridden orphan, second class citizen w chronic pain to boot, lets see how u like it. its. literally so easy to just . Stop reading a fic if you dont like it!

u are welcome 2 rant 2 me abt this any time <3 it frustrates me too honestly i just click away or block anyone who i see reducing the character to "ewww he was sexist!!" bc i think it demonstrates either an inability or an unwillingness to engage with literature beyond a surface-level glance and also a tendency to virtue signal on the internet for attention. neither of which are necessarily morally corrupt but both of which are annoying so i don't want 2 deal w it lol

like if a character is behaving in ways that are sexist "ew this character is sexist" is just about the most boring take u can have. anyone who reads the story can understand that this character is behaving in ways that are sexist; some interesting questions to ask about that are:

- why does he behave this way? what cultural influences and personal feelings are contributing to his actions?

- how do those around this character respond to his behavior? what does that tell us about them? about the world the story is set in?

- how aware is the character of his behavior? does he understand why he acts this way?

- does the character change or grow? why or why not? what influences him to regard his behavior differently? what enables him to ignore his own bad behavior?

- how does this behavior contribute to the narrative? does it help drive plot points? conflicts? does it set up or contribute to character development? how does it tell us things about the pov character [remus] based on his reactions to the behavior?

- how does this behavior challenge readers to think? are you meant to sympathize with this character in the instances where he is behaving badly? what does it mean about the readers' own self if they sympathize with a character who sometimes behaves badly?

honestly i think that everyone could benefit from those discussion questions at the bottom of english textbooks like....we are all supposed to be making those discussion questions in our own head when we read. if somebody doesn't understand that then either someone has failed them somewhere in their education or they are still in the process of learning how to read critically--which is like....fine. but again i just personally don't want 2 have 2 deal w it lol

[hussyknee]

As someone with OCD who has been driven to breakdowns about twice a year over the past ten years of being on this hellsite, here are some things you need to see and internalize:

There is not a single personal preference or emotion that has moral value.

Your tastes, kinks and feelings are 200% value neutral. They have fuck all to do with social justice.

Fandoms and ships have no moral value. they do not make you any sort of sexual predator.

You are not a bad person for liking problematic media. You dont need to justify or redeem it to enjoy it.

"Problematic" just means "has problems that merit thinking about". Not "bad evil wrong freakish".

Your consumption habits under capitalism does not make you a bad person. Systemic issues are not A hypodermic needle you are personally pushing.

You get to decide what goes on your blog and what you can handle paying attention to.

Not doing exactly what someone tells you to do is not the same as not listening to them. Nobody else is living your life but you.

People have the right to anger. that does not mean it's yours to absorb or carry. You have the right to block or ignore or scroll past anything you want.

You are well within your rights to avoid groups and minorities have hurt or traumatized you in the past, regardless of privilege. You're not hurting anyone by not engaging with topics and people that make you anxious.

Inducing guilt is completely useless and unnecessary for social justice and actively counter-productive.

However.

White guilt is still a thing. An extremely misconstrued one. White guilt doesn't mean it's wrong to feel guilty. It means you need to process whatever feelings that arise when racism and racial microaggressions are brought to your attention by yourself.

The majority of this website is neurodivergent, queer, Western and white. The minority is neurodivergent, queer, of colour or non-Western. Neurodivergence does not mean you get to accuse minorities of "making you feel guilty" when we get angry.

"Please consume these things critically"=/= "you are an oppressor if you like this".

"It's really fucking hard to see 73817 memes and 2 info posts about the thing killing us" =/= "how dare you make memes".

"You need to listen to us"=/= "if you don't do exactly as we say you're a racist." "

This thing you do is racist" =/= "you are a racist and bad person".

If we do explode it's because we are at breaking point and you are only seeing 1% of what it's like to be us. We would much rather you scroll past than attack us because you felt shitty.

Yes it's hard to negotiate this when we have OCD, but just as PoC can be ableist and try to make you feel guilty for your feelings and tastes, you can also be racist by accusing us of ableism when we speak up. Ableism is something that is most often weaponized by white disabled/neurodivergent people against people of colour. Oftentimes, both parties have OCD or other neurodivergence that make us hypermoral. Nuance is key.

Most of this website is frankly power-tripping assholes who think screaming at and dunking on whoever they've assigned as "problematic" constitutes social justice while patting themselves on the back about how inclusive we are. It's a culture of acceptable targets. Which makes it all the more important that you lead with compassion and stick to a personal code of behaviour regardless of who you're talking to. Kindness is really fucking hard, and I personally fail at it more often than not, but it's the only way we can stop hurting each other for no reason.

this site really hates people with ocd

[alsjeblieft-zeg]

396 of 2023

Unpopular health and wellbeing opinions

Chiropractic is (for the most part) a load of bullspunk. Lemon water’s supposed benefits are completely placebo effect and based on bad science. Motivational authors/speakers are frauds scammers and salesman. Packaged foods can be healthy. Some forms of religious ritual can be very beneficial to mental and emotional health (others are utterly toxic). Noise (especially vehicle noise) should get way more recognition and priority as a public health issue. To feel well is nearly impossible when your brain is very loud and destroy everything also the rare "good" moments. Way too much health and wellness media is literally fucking up people's wellness by fear-mongering about certain foods being horrible for you. It's fun to laugh at alternative medicine, but it's also important to recognise that a lot of people turn to it because the medical system has failed them. A person's weight is a poor measurement of their health. Public spaces should have areas that are friendlier to people with sensory issues. Sometimes an action or product that's physically not very healthy is still worth using if it has psychological and emotional benefits. Moral prohibitions against partial nudity are bad in general. Intentionally only sleeping 4-5 hours a night (as in for bragging rights, not because you don't really have a choice due to responsibilities, insomnia, etc.) isn't impressive, it's dangerous to others. Every dollar spent on seeing a naturopath would probably do you more good if you flushed it down the toilet. Citalopram is (edit: usually) just the 'we don't know what the fuck to do with you anymore' pill. Most of the evidence against diet soft drinks is flimsy. Everyone should be offered the option to communicate with their therapist via email/text/writing, partially because of anxiety but mostly because things can easily get twisted to make a person look 'unstable/incompetent' unless it's in writing When it comes to health and wellbeing misinformation google is probably a bigger offender than facebook. Being self-critical and thinking about all your own mistakes is a disease in itself that I will never be able to defeat. It's very bad to self criticise based on the expectations of people who don't know you and don't know your life. You're not obligated to do things you can't do because other people think you should do those things. Your wellbeing matters more than appeasing other people's ignorance, especially when their ignorance dehumanises you and serves power and privilege against you. The glycaemic index is a little overrated (unless you're diabetic). It is important to skip breakfast and give your metabolism an extra few hours of rest. Eating fruits is not as good for you as people think it is. Overeating is way too normalised in our society. Obesity has little to do with genetics. It is mostly a lifestyle problem with too much highly palatable ultra-processed food and no portion control. Starvation mode isn’t real and is used as buzzword. Therapy is not as useful for everyone as most people think, especially if you are already self aware about your problems and where they stem from. People like to tell people to just go to therapy when they have problems and ignore that its not accessible to everyone and that having access to therapy is a privilege. Healthy at every size is a logical fallacy. Therapists can be dangerous because they can make people believe things about themselves or their patients which are not necessarily true. Stereotypes are harmful and you shouldn't assume things about other people's health. Examples are assuming all east asians are naturally skinny or all quiet people are depressed. Just because someone is fat or even obese does not mean they have an ed. Doctors should find out what the cause of the problem is before prescribing medication. Children should not have to change in order to not be bullied. As of recently, having ADHD has become a 'quirky' personality trait for many and it's what makes people who actually experience these issues silent sufferers. Mental illnesses are not a trend.

[itsclydebitches]

Yeah, there's also things floating around about how the rigging team in RT was crunched specifically, and how mishandled they were by management. But I keep thinking that if vol. 9 doesn't come out, then RWBY ended literally with the four protagonists falling to their deaths, after being the people who decided to destroy two cities. Like, Salem didn't crash Atlas into Mantle, Ruby did. If vol. 8 is the end then this story led up to Ruby committing genocide and then dying.

You know, as messed up as it would be, I kinda wish we could have that ending. In reality though, if we consider all official promo material part of the story (which I personally do), then our ending is more that they "died," ended up in some strange world with a talking mouse, and... that's it. That's all we get. Like don't get me wrong, ending the story on the heroes' failure of Volume 8 is #NotGreat when your story isn't supposed to be tragic (totally different case if RWBY had always been aiming for an unhappy and/or ambiguous ending), but at least it's about as wrapped up as a story can be when it unexpectedly gets cancelled. Team RWBY went to Beacon to become huntresses, got caught up in a war, tried to fix things by taking a classically heroic route that prioritized ethical perfection over morally gray practicality, utterly failed, died, doomed a kingdom to drowning/death by grimm, and the villain is poised to end the rest of the world on the heels of that failure. The End. As someone who has been reading RWBY through the lens of what the story is actually saying as opposed to the thematic intention of the writers, there's something compelling in that. Whether RT realizes it or not, they'd have written a cautionary tale about "simple souls" leading the charge in a world that is not, in fact, a fairy tale.

Instead though, we'd end up with a muddled, "They totally survived and there's still hope because it's heavily implied through storytelling expectations that they'll escape this world and go fight Salem again! ... You just don't get to see that lol." RWBY Volume 8 is arguably a complete story, regardless of how awful we might think that story is. RWBY Volume 8 + promo material for a presumed Volume 9 is a mess of implied information with no actual resolution attached and I personally find that to be the more frustrating option of the two. Especially when said promo material is currently defined by problems that hypothetically might never get resolved: Why does Ruby only get two seconds of tears after she's lost everything? Why is our only nonbinary rep a mouse? Why did we heel-turn back to Jaune as the emotional cornerstone of the story? Everything that currently makes us go, "Yeah, it looks like a potential problem, but I'm sure the Volume itself will fix things!" would never get that chance to improve. This is all we've got and what we've got from Volume 9 so far doesn't stand well on its own imo.

To be clear, I don't actually think we're losing RWBY. At least, I won't think that until I've seen concrete evidence that these revelations (unlike many previous revelations) are actually threatening RT's position. Until then, this is just another round of, "RWBY is dying!!" a claim that crops up during every hiatus and, of course, amounts to nothing. But yeah, if we did end the story there with no possibility for even a quick conclusion through a movie, special, etc. it'll be severely disappointing. For those who still love RWBY and for those who have been critical of it.

[fanficdumbchic]

Hey there! I love your work :) Was just wondering if you would be able to do a dating hicks and Hudson from Aliens headcanon <3 separately if thats okay.

Love , P.

What It's Like to Date US Colonial Marines

Headcanon - USCM x Reader - SFW

AN: Thank you P.! You're a sweetie. Here's a dating headcanon for each of the main marines. Hope you enjoy! Look forward to more requests from you. :)

Private Drake

Drake is so balls-to-the-wall supportive of anything you do, especially if you're being bad ass as shit.

Drake does not mind being overshadowed by you at all. He's just happy to have you.

He is great in bed and actually gives a fuck about what you both want.

He's not just your partner, he's like your best friend. He's loyal as fuck and devoted as fuck when he finds you because you're his person.

He would do anything for you (within reason) without question.

But he's not going to put up with your shit either. He calls you out when you need to be more aware of what you're doing and has very healthy boundaries. And like wise, even if he is very emotional about a certain happenstance, he is still very self-aware and able to hear reason when you call him out too.

Drake has no toxic masculinity bullshit to deal with, he is incredibly confident in himself and dismisses ridicule for anything considered ‘unmanly’.

Drake is not a full dom, he prefers to switch because he wants both of you to feel powerful.

Definitely the male counterpart in a power couple.

Lieutenant Gorman

He is very closed-off and stand-offish at first.

He takes himself and his job very seriously and he isn't great with handling criticism.

He has hardcore humiliation trauma.

He's not good at functioning under pressure but always tries to do the right thing when it really counts.

He's someone where it takes you awhile to get past his cold, serious exterior, but once you do, he really is a sweetie.

He's slow to trust, but once he trusts you he is loyal to a fault.

He has a lot of trust issues but he tries really hard to work through them.

He realizes that he's not very physically or publicly affectionate but tries his hardest to make sure you feel loved regardless.

He shuts down during arguments and fights. Being yelled at immediately sends him into a panic attack.

However, he doesn't avoid your problems, he just has to be in a calm environment to deal with it.

He will not cry in front of anyone, even you. This guy has some emotional trauma but again, he's working on it. He most likely comes from a strict, military family and that's his baggage.

Even if he's not the easiest partner to have, he makes up for it where it counts and loves you.

Corporal Hicks

Hicks is just such a wholesomely good guy.

He has hella respect for strong women and actually listens.

While he closely follows the orders/instructions of those he knows are more qualified to be making the decisions, he still thinks for himself and sticks to his own moral compass.

He is very non-confrontational except in extreme circumstances.

One of his flaws is that he is a giver to a fault. His main thing is making sure everyone around him is good before he thinks of himself.

He will sacrifice for you and the people he cares about without a second thought.

His affection towards you is subtle and sometimes awkward but so sweet and thoughtful.

He wants nothing more than to see you thrive even when he's not.

He would rather everything remain calm and struggles during heated confrontation. He can be non-confrontational to a fault and fails to see any purpose in it.

Yet, it doesn't change the fact that he is always willing to face issues and work through them with you. He just doesn't feel conflict is the way to achieve that.

He definitely dotes on and spoils you, wanting the best for you and nothing less.

He just wants to be your hero.

Private Hudson

He definitely is reminiscent of the 'lovable asshole' archetype.

Hates when things don't go according to plan.

Humor is definitely his coping mechanism and love language.

He picks on you in a loving way but sometimes hurts your feelings with it. When he realizes that he went too far, he apologizes and stays away from those areas in the future. He really doesn't want to hurt your feelings.

He loves bickering with you like an you're both an old married couple. It's part of the fun for him.

He can be really stubborn and pigheaded sometimes and it can take awhile for him to get over his pride and admit you had a point or were flat-out right. But he always gets there.

He's incredibly cocky but takes his lumps without complaint when his ego is deflated.

Sometimes he is genuinely clueless about what he did wrong even if you think it's obvious. He's not the smartest boy.

Always dtf.

Loves to randomly smack you on the ass and see you blush.

When things go really wrong, you definitely have to be the calm one and keep him turned down a notch. But again, makes the right decisions when it really counts.

He loves to call you baby doll or baby girl or sweetheart.

Can you tell he's my favorite?

Private Vasquez

Unapologetic bad bitch.

Tough as nails and def has trauma she is not dealing with it.

Her philosophy is to suck it up and always push through it.

She is definitely the dominant partner and while she loves and cares for you, she does not like depending on others.

It takes awhile for her to trust and depend on people, you included.

Her love language is taking a bullet for you rather than being super lovey dovey. But affection is not something she shuns completely.

When she is vulnerable with you, she is deeply vulnerable with you.

She understands that she can be a really intense partner but she's not changing for you or anyone. That's who she is and she needs someone who's down with that.

She definitely is always trying to prepare for the worst case scenario and she hates surprises. They stress her out.

She never lets you feel unappreciated and notices even the little things you do.

She is a beast in bed.

She's one of those people where when they finally open up to you, it feels really special because you understand it takes a lot for them.

Like Drake, she is ride-or-die. She will not leave your side through even the worst shit. She goes hard af for the people she loves.

[funkymbtifiction]

I always got a 1ish vibe from you also. You reflect on your behavior, yes, but reflection is different than self-analysis and anxiety; it's like you're trying to find a deeper meaning, a moral rightness of behavior in yourself or others to measure by.

Valid. That's why several friends and other typists consider me to be a 612. But I said I wasn't going to talk about tritype anymore. :P

I suspect some element of Fi is involved as well, because I intend to live as a person of integrity, and that involves a lot of self-reflection, analysis, and beating myself up when I fail to live up to my own high standard. I can be critical of others who compromise their morals and angry at myself for not standing up for what I believe is right, out of a desire to avoid being attacked for it. I do reflect on my behavior all the time, and my default is to detach from my emotions and attempt to intellectualize them. Scrutinize them. Figure out why I am doing this, what my motive is, why someone else would do this, what their motive is. I seek intellectual understanding above all. I shut down my emotional or gut reactions to go into head-mode. Why am I doing this? Why are they doing this? What does it all mean?

To further your argument, if you read any of my novels, fantasy or otherwise, purity of intent and ethics are a huge recurring theme; I love to put my characters into situations where they must choose between their integrity and the easier path. I love morally ambiguous characters and to explore them without judgment, but I want the good guys to be above reproach (at least, to make the right decision most of the time) and of high personal integrity. Either my hero is morally gray and on the path to redemption, or he has a strong personal character. I'm also drawn to 1s in fiction out of admiration for their integrity (like Elijah in The Vampire Diaries / The Originals).

I've read how hurt you've been when others have been dismissive, moved away or acted in ways related to behavior, rather than a sense of safety. You can't make sense of WHY they would do that. Your own sense of self, of your own morals, is intact. A 6 is implicated and affected by others' actions; its integral to them.

I think it's 6ish though in the sense that I no longer feel safe with them. Among like-minded people who share my beliefs or morals, I am safe to share my strong opinions, but when that dynamic shifts, I can't trust them anymore to be receptive to me. I don't mind being the only person in a group to hold X opinion, but I'm also not going to share it for fear of being attacked. I won't compromise me for you and I am not okay with a lot of things/behaviors. In matters of morals and ethics, I always know what the right thing to do is, but when it comes to the rest of life, I founder around full of self-doubt and fear.

The WHY is important. I ask questions constantly to try and make sense of people and their dynamics and decisions. But most of the 1s I know just say "nope, that's wrong." They don't then intellectualize and tear it apart in an attempt to understand the why of it, or what would make someone do that awful thing. Gut types seem solid in their "no," it's instinctual and I question and measure and weigh arguments and read conflicting information to come to a consensus, and half the time I conclude there is no solid truth in certain things, it's all a matter of opinion, and go on about my day.

This is just a very slight hunch also, but there's something Hermione esque about you, and you have always had an affinity for her also. Certainly she's anxious - but in a conscientious way, not in a 6 way. And from what I recall, you briefly considered her to change from a 1 to a 6? I wondered if that might be your own type being attracted to and pulling away from 1?

Maybe. I like her the most because she was the most sensible and made many decisions that I would (not shoving SPEW down people's throats, though) in terms of obeying the rules and keeping her friends safe. Turning over Harry's new broom to a teacher for investigation was the rational decision (and then they got mad at her, and I got annoyed at them for being stupid about it, lol). I put a lot of emphasis on being rational. This could also support the 612/triple super-ego theory that some people are operating off of about me...

Thanks for your thoughts. It's fun reading them, and is giving me a nice break in-between rewriting massive sections of my WIP. :)

[farfarawaygirl]

Hey Emma,

Hope you’re feeling okay! The weather changes where I am isn’t being friendly to my migraines.

This episode just wasn’t good. I get that it was fine to some people and it made sense to some. For this one, it’s as if we don’t like it, we automatically get called for bad takes. I’ve seen a couple things today where people said that we could keep our bad takes inside our brains. That doesn’t fly, we’re entitled to an opinion too.

I thought we were making progress and we were getting some of the old Tim and Lucy back as individual characters.

I was wrong. Tim just didn’t seem like Tim. I know him and the subject of fathers don’t get along for good reason, but that doesn’t excuse how little he tried to help Lucy. Like “call your mom and have that hard conversation”. That’s common sense and Lucy probably already thought of that. Prickly!Tim during Isabel’s downfall would have been more helpful and supportive! He could have gone with her for moral and emotional support when she went to talk to Aunt Amy! He could have volunteered to help Lucy dig for info on social media. There’s so much more that Tim could have done. As a friend, he did the bare minimum.

Lucy broke my heart this time. That’s understandable considering the situation. Yet, no one picked up on it. Yes, Tim asked her if she was okay, but outside of that, no one really tried to be comforting towards her except Tamara.

All of this makes me miss Jackson more, he would have at least been there for Lucy.

Then we get to the whole Patrick thing. Seriously? The same name?

Thank you for checking in! Weather certainly knows how to mess up a brain.

Honestly, the thing that is most import here - is that we are all adults and as such, should respect each persons autonomy to have their own opinion about how they are feeling. Instead of just calling something a bad take, why not create an environment where discourse is both fun, and a little bit persuasive! I like a lively discussion, and really do think that most (not all - use your common sense to draw the line) takes, are a valid. For me, it all comes back to being critical of the media you consume - that absolutely includes understanding your perception, and your biases, as you take it in.

Feel free to quote me on this, telling someone to leave a take inside their brain is rude at best, (based on feedback I have decided to change a word here - this was done in the interest of transparency) needlessly antagonistic, dismissive and a whole host of other problematic things at worst. Genuinely, we could all stand to be kind to people, and I try (and fail) to do that in my life. I didn’t see anything like this, but I am not always in the tags these days! 

One cool/fun/super shippy take-away that I haven't seen discussed yet happened in the little conversation that Tim and Lucy shared when she got Patrick Walsh's name. I don't know if anyone else had caught this specific detail, but I did see it giffed (thank you gif makers!) - Tim, in the show, on duty, called Officer Chen, Lucy. I still get a kick out of this. Obviously, this sticks out to me the most! In an episode where I was not blown away by Tim, this little use of her first name was a nice surprise.

Tim was not his best self this episode, in a show where we have seen him make himself vulnerable, and seen him push the limit with Lucy, a half joke about Dilbert didn't move me. This is not a shipping issue, this is a character issue, because Tim has been radically inconsistent in season 4. He is soft one moment, buddy buddy, dismissive, eye-rolling - and yes, everyone can interrupt those actions differently, but for me, Tim has consistently missed the mark, and lost his edge. Not in a character growth kind of way, but in a writing discrepancy way. This may not be surprising as by season 4 some of the actor would have bled through into the character and in how the writers might view Tim. Not cataclysmic, but annoying.

Had the writers wanted, it would have been an easy insert to have Tim be in the Tamara roll - which leaves me wondering, do they not want that level of intimacy with Chenford now, or are they building something more with Tamara? Lucy lost her best friend this season, and her biggest emotional highs and lows have been with Tamara. I think there has to be a reason for that, even if I don't know what.

Is this the end of Patrick Walsh? Does this springboard us into a real Vanessa and Lucy conflict? Why do both of Lucy's dads have the same name? As always, I have so many questions.

Here are some of my Tamara questions - is she a surrogate sister, or best friend? Is Lucy reparenting herself through Tamara?

Thank you for this lovely, thoughtful, kind and honest ask. This made my day. As always, be critical if the media you consume, and be kind!

[brawltogethernow]

So, I don't think I've ever asked you this... what IS the whole point of the Spider-Sense? It really seems like something that only exists for writers to ignore or work around when they want to inject Legit Tension into a story.

I’ve thought about this power so much, but never with an eye to defend its right to exist, so I needed to think about this. The results could be more concise.

Ironically, given the question, I have to say its main purpose is to ramp up tension. But it’s also a highly variable multitool that a skilled creative team can use for...pretty much anything. It does everything the writer wants it to, while for its wielder always falls just short of doing enough.

I went looking through my photos for a really generic, classic-looking example to use as an image to head this topic, but then I ran into the time Peter absolutely did not reimburse this man for his stolen McDonald’s, so have that instead.

A Scare Chord, But You Can Draw It

That one post that says the spider-sense is just super-anxiety isn’t, like, wrong. It’s a very anxious, dramatic storytelling tool originally designed for a very anxious, dramatic protagonist. I find it speaks to the overall tone of the franchise that some characters are functionally psychics, but with a psychic ability that only points out problems.

Spidey sense pinging? There’s danger, be stressed! Broken? Now the lead won’t even KNOW when there’s a problem, scary! Single character is immune to it? That’s an invisible knife in the dark oh my god what the fuck what the fU--

Like its counterpart in garden variety anxiety, the only time the spider-sense reduces tension is in the middle of a crisis. But in the wish fulfillmenty way that you want in an adventure story to justify exaggerated action sequences, the same way enhanced strength or durability does. Also like those, it would theoretically make someone much safer to have it, but it exists in the story to let your character navigate into and weather more dangerous situations.

For its basic role in a story, a danger sense is a snappy way to rile up both the reader and the protagonist that doesn’t offer much information beyond that it’s time to sit smart because shit is about to go down.

Spidey comic canon is all over the board in quality and genre, and it started needing to subvert its formulas before the creators got a handle on what those formulas even were, and basically no one has read anything approaching most of it at this point, so for consistent examples of a really bare bones use of this power in storytelling, I’d point to the property that’s done the best job yet of boiling down the mechanics of Spider-Man to their absolute most basic essentials for adaptation to a compelling monster of the week TV series.

Or as you probably know it, Danny Phantom. DON’T BOO, I’M RIGHT.

DP is Spider-Man with about 2/3 of the serial numbers filed off and no death (ironically), and Danny’s ghost sense is the most proof in the formula example of what the spidey sense is for: It’s a big sign held up for the viewer that says, “Something is wrong! Pay attention!” Effectively a visual scare chord. It’s about That Drama. And it works, which won it a consistent place in the show’s formula. We’re talking several times an episode here.

So why does it work?

It’s a little counterintuitive, but it’s strong storytelling to tell your audience that something bad is going to happen before it does. A vague, punchy spoiler transforms the ignorant calm before a conflict into a tense moment of anticipation. ...And it makes sure people don’t fail to absorb the beginning of said conflict because they weren’t prepared to shift gears when the scene did. Shock is a valuable tool, too, but treating it like a staple is how you burn out your audience instead of keeping them engaged. Not to go after an easy target, but you need to know how to manage your audience’s alarm if you don’t want to end up like Game of Thrones.

The limits of the spider-sense also keep you on your toes when handled by a smart writer. It tells Peter (everyone’s is a little different, so I’m going to cite the og) about threats to his person, but it doesn’t elaborate with any details when it’s not already obvious why, what kind, and from what. And it doesn’t warn him about anything else-- Which is a pretty critical gap when you zoom out and look at his hero career’s successes and failures and conclude that it’s definitely why he’s lived as long as he has acting the way he does, but was useless as he failed to save a string of people he’d have much rather had live on than him.

(Any long-running superhero mythos has these incidents, but with Peter they’re important to the core themes.)

And since this power is by plot for plot (or because it’s roughly agreed it only really blares about threats that check at least two boxes of being major, immediate, or physical), it always kicks in enough to register when the danger is bearing down...when it’s too late to actually do anything about it if “anything” is a more complex action than “dodge”.

Really? Not until the elevator doors started to open?

That Distinctive, Crunchy Spider Flavor

The spider-sense and its little pen squiggles go hand in hand with wallcrawling (and its unique and instantly identifiable associated body language) to make the Spider-Person powerset enduringly iconic and elevate characters with it from being generic mid-level super-bricks. Visually, but also in how it shapes the story.

I said it can share a narrative role with super strength. But when you end a fight and go home, super strength continues to make your character feel powerful, probably safer than they’d be otherwise, maybe dangerous.

The spider-sense just keeps blaring, “Something’s wrong! Something’s wrong! God, why aren’t you doing something about this!?”

Pretty morose thing to live with, for a safety net! Kind of a double edged sword you have there! Could be constantly being hyperattuned to problems would prime you for a negative outlook on life. Kind of seems like a power that would make it impossible for a moral person to take a day off, leading them into a beleaguered and resentful yet dutiful attitude about the whole superhero gig! Might build up to some of the core traits of this mythos, maybe! Might lead to a lot of fifteen minute retirement stories, or something. Might even be a built in ‘great responsibility’ alarm that gets you a main character who as a rule is not going to stop fighting until he physically cannot fight anymore.

Certainly not apropos of anything, just throwing this short lived barely-a-joke tagline up for fun.

One of my personal favorite things about stories with superpowers is keeping in mind how they cause the people who have them to act in unusual ways outside of fights, so when you tell me that these people have an entire extra sense that tells them when the gas in their house is leaking through a barely useful hot/cold warning system that never turns off, I’m like, eyes emojis, popcorn out, notebook open, listening intently, spectacles on, the whole deal.

It also contributes to Peter Parker’s personality in a way I really enjoy: It allows him to act like an irrational maniac. When you know exactly when a situation becomes dangerous and how much, normal levels of caution go out the window and absolutely nothing you do makes sense from an exterior standpoint anymore. That’s the good shit. I would like to see more exploration of how the non-Parker characters experiencing the world in this incredibly altered way bounce in response.

It’s also one of many tools in this franchise hauling the reader into relating more closely with the main character. The backbone of classic Spidey is probably being in on secrets only Peter and the reader know which completely reframe how one views the situation on the page. It’s just a big irony mine for the whole first decade. A convenient way to inform the reader and the lead that something is bad news that’s not perceivable to any other characters is youth-with-a-big-exciting-secret catnip.

Another point for tension, there, in that being aware of danger is not synonymous with being able to act on it. If there’s no visible reason for you to be acting strange, well...you’re just going to have to sit tight and sweat, aren’t you? Some gratuitous head wiggles never hurt when setting up that type of conflict.

Have I mentioned that they look cool? Simultaneously punchy and distinctive, with a respectable amount of leeway for artists to get creative with and still coming up with something easily recognizable? And pretty easy to intuit the meaning of even without the long-winded explanations common in the days when people wrote comics with the intent that someone could come in cold on any random issue and follow along okay, I think, although the mechanic has been deeply ingrained in popular culture for so long that I can’t really say for sure.

It was also useful back in the day when no artists drew the eyes on the Spider-Man mask as emoting and were conveying the lead’s expressions entirely through body language and panel composition. If you wiggle enough squiggles, you don’t need eyebrows.

Take This Handwave and Never Ask Me a Logistical Question Again

This ability patches plot holes faster than people can pick them open AND it can act as an excuse to get any plot rolling you can think of if paired with one meddling protagonist who doesn’t know how to mind their own business. Buy it now for only $19.99 (in four installments; that’s four installments of $19.99).

Why can a teenager win a six on one fight against other superhumans? Well, the spider-sense is the ultimate edge in combat, duh.

Why can Peter websling? Why doesn’t everyone websling? Well, the spider-sense is keeping him from eating flagpole when he violently flings himself across New York in a way neither man nor spider was ever meant to move.

How are we supposed to get him involved with the plot this week???? Well, that crate FELT dangerous, so he’s going to investigate it. Oh, dip, it was full of guns and radioactive snakes! Probably shouldn’t have opened that!

Yeah, okay, but why isn’t it fixing everything, then? Isn’t it supposed to be why Peter has never accidentally unmasked in front of somebody? ('Nother entry for this section, take a shot.) That’s crazy sensitive! How does he still have any problems!? Is everything bad that’s ever happened to characters with this powerset bad writing!? --Listen, I think as people with uncanny senses that can tell us whether we are in danger with accuracy that varies from incredible to approximate (I am talking about the five senses that most people have), we should all know better than to underestimate our ability to tune them out or interpret them wrong and fuck ourselves up anyway. I honestly find this part completely realistic.

*SLAPS ROOF OF SPIDER-SENSE* YOU CAN FIT SO MANY STORIES IN THIS THING

The spider-sense is a clean branch into...whatever. There is the exact right balance of structure and wishy-washiness to build off of. A sample selection of whatevers that have been built:

It’s sci-fi and spy gadgets when Peter builds technology that can interface with it.

It’s quasi-mystical when Kaine and Annie-May get stronger versions of it that give them literal psychic visions, or when you want to get mythological and start talking about all the spider-characters being part of a grand web of fate.

Kaine loses his and it becomes symbolic of a future newly unbound by constraints, entangled thematically with the improved physical health he picked up at the same time -- a loss presented as a gain.

Peter loses his and almost dies 782 times in one afternoon because that didn’t make the people he provoked when he had it stop trying to kill him, and also because he isn’t about to start “””taking the subway’’””’ “‘’“”to work”””’’” like some kind of loser who doesn’t get a heads up when he’s about to hit a pigeon at 50mph.

Peter’s starts tuning into his wife’s anxiety and it’s a tool in a relationship study.

It starts pinging whenever Peter’s near his boss who’s secretly been replaced by a shapeshifter and he IGNORES IT because his boss is enough of an asshole that that doesn’t strike him as weird; now it’s a comedy/irony tool.

Into the Spider-Verse made it this beautiful poetic thing connecting all the spider-heroes in the multiverse and stacked up a story on it about instant connection, loss, and incredibly unlikely strangers becoming a found family. It was also aesthetic as FUCK. Remember the scene where Miles just hears barely intelligible whispering that’s all lines people say later in the film and then his own voice very clearly says “look out” and then the room explodes?? Fuck!!!!

Venom becomes immune to it after hitchhiking to Earth in Peter’s bone juice and it makes him a unique threat while telling a more-homoerotic-than-I-assume-was-originally-intended story about violation and how close relationships can be dangerous when they go sour.

It doesn’t work on people you trust for maximum soap opera energy. Love the innate tragedy of this feature coming up.

IN CONCLUSION I don’t have much patience for writers who don’t take advantage of it, never mind feel they need to write around it.

[onewomancitadel]

How would you feel if Jaune ended up with someone besides Cinder? Is there anyone else you think makes sense as his romantic partner or even "could" be his romantic partner?

Hi anon, thanks for your ask. I hope you've had a good day so far. <3

Well, I think the latter question is more important than the former, and I like to think that my feelings about the show do come from a place of trying to take the story seriously. That is to say, you kind of can't really have a story without emotional response. :D

I don't think we're in any position where I would consider the story writers being misleading with Knightfall, though, just Cinder's redemption. If she doesn't get redeemed, I think they critically failed her characterisation and backstory in V8 in particular. (Not even just showing it: the particular framing, and the continual, repeated scenes of her torture).

However, I do consider Jaune as a pretty critical piece in her redemption; I don't actually know how they'd get from Point A (Cinder hates Ruby and is terrified of her silver eyes, the major weakness of the so-called boon Salem has given her) to Point B (Ruby purifies Cinder of the Dark Curse). It requires a complete shake-up of Cinder's worldview and for her to realise that the Grimm arm is hurting her and she doesn't deserve that. It's already been shown in V8 that the 'power of friendship' was insufficient to help her, but I actually don't think that means she's too far gone, because she still didn't let anybody in at all, maybe only Penny a tiny bit.

I kind of maintain on that front that romance is involved in Cinder's redemption since we've got it only teased with Ilia's one-sided feelings for Blake - which tbf, at the time was a very compelling ship for me for obvious reasons. XD But I feel like with the style of redemption arcs being built up, one of the most complicated and interesting in the show involving all of those earlier elements... ? That makes a lot of sense.

I mean, even arguably Emerald's redemption involves romance (in a fashion): Mercury leaves for Vacuo with Tyrian. So again, I expect some type of healing reprisal of this theme, particularly if V8 decided to show Cinder learning the lesson of friendship... wrong. I think Cinder's redemption arc is distinct on this front because she doesn't just need some gestural and moral help, I think she needs someone totally 100% committed to her above all else, and the narrative irony of that being Jaune makes me very happy. I know, I know, friendship can do that too, but so far they haven't written the friendships that way and I literally don't know who else could fill that spot except Jaune (unconditionally, and unreservedly) and it would be silly not to make it romantic.

As you can see, I do think Knightfall is wrapped up in more than just whomever Jaune and Cinder end up with.

I consider it to be thematically critical and answering a lot of what's there in the story, which you can see in my Knightfall masterpost. Given that Cinder really hasn't been set up with anybody else, her endgame doesn't seem to interest people as much, and Jaune's endgame seems to be more of a question of personal interest, but to me both of their endings answer ideas in the story in a really, really interesting and salvific way.

Because of this, I would feel like it would be a critical misstep not to capitalise on the pair, and I would feel that I completely misread into the themes of the show, which is pretty devastating, or if they tick all of the boxes except Knightfall and Cinder's redemption, I would wonder why they left them out. It would just be incoherent then, and some sort of clear, embarrassing line about being 'too evil' they decided not to cross...

But the really critical thing wrapped up in this question is whether the story is doing things with intertextuality that we think it's doing, and in particular for me, whether the Jungian storytelling is actually there. The reason I really don't like Jaune/Weiss - other than that it's lazy - is that it totally breaks Jung, it breaks the intertextuality, it breaks the colour-patterning, it breaks Reverse Ozlem, it breaks all of it, and it would mean essentially none of it ever mattered, which would thereby weaken the story and overall weaken the complexity of the relationships.

So there's virtually no other Jaune pairing I can see that would work if he's paired up with anybody but his anima, like all of the other romantic pairings (there are some familial sets of animus/anima to be fair, but Jaune and Cinder aren't related). I can't even see an intelligible argument for why it ought to be pattern-breaking; the new relationships of this cycle-breaker should be healing and positive compared to Ozlem. I would really wonder why they would, say, commit to linking Jaune to his anima and then not have him fully reconcile/accept her when the rest of the anima are romantically paired... and when Ozlem were romantically paired. So no, there's no one else he can be paired up with.

I've written a post before trying to read Weiss as his anima and it doesn't work. So I would have to accept R/WBY isn't using these narrative and character structures, which would be heartbreaking, because I can see the clear evidence of them and most importantly in Cinder's respect, I can see her intertextuality with Rhodopis. The details of Rhodopis and Sappho's brother falling in love are, um, particularly damning. You could argue there's room for subversion, and I think there is, as I remarked in the Knightfall masterpost: Joan of Arc's end.

On a taste level? Nothing hits like Jaune and Cinder. It's unexpected. It's exciting. It's different. It's salvific. It's redeeming. It's knight and Maiden, saint and heretic, good and evil, healer and killer. It's got the most dramatic potential. They would be really fucking funny together. It's the thing I've shipped more than anything else ever in the history of ever. It answers the themes of the story. It's the long way around to a happy ending. It's not too late and you could still come back. It's not about fighting what you hate, but saving what you love.

I used this screencap to break the text up, and evoke the feelings of the pairing, but I do want to note I think it's extremely significant that this idea is specifically explored with Cinder here and presented to her, and we later get this idea explored with Penny again, and the mercy-killing.

To be quite frank, I would be emotionally devastated if it didn't happen, but I would also be prepared to accept it. Ironically enough, I'm not insecure about the way I feel about stories anymore. As I've been kind of talking about recently, the viewer who invests themselves and takes a story seriously is not at fault or inherently deficient in their approach. I do accept that if you negate the proposed themes of the story, the apparent narrative and character structures, Jung, the intertextuality, the fairytales of the story itself, and pretty much everything, and instead put on a much more cynical lens, you get a very different answer to the ones I've proposed on my blog...

Yet this is why I remain intrigued. Because as easy as it would be to say you're too evil and it's too late and nobody will ever love you (just like the lyrics of The Truth which plays during Cinder's backstory... so it can't be true) and the world is actually a cruel and dark place and there's no room for hope and you'll never be forgiven and it was stupid to be compassionate and there really isn't a happy ending after all that loss and happy endings are stupid, too, I actually don't think any of that sentiment holds up to scrutiny in R/WBY. At all.

I just can't see how you could redeem the Maiden powers without Cinder. I can't see how a show like R/WBY would say that the legacy of the Maiden powers will just forever be corrupt. I can't see how they wouldn't capitalise on that major theme of Oz and Salem's daughters, once slaughtered, now symbolically living on through the power. Something beautiful which came from Oz's grief. That alone is enough to make me wonder.

So no, there's no relationship with Jaune and Cinder outside of each other which makes sense. It's more than just ship drama or me being a romantic, it's actually narratively critical. There is absolutely no way you get the same narrative effect with any other Jaune pairing or any other Cinder pairing. It's not subject to the individual whims of the viewer because they think Weiss should stop being a bitch and notice Jaune, or Ruby and Jaune should stop pretending that women and men can be platonic friends, or Jaune and Neo apparently have things in common and Neo is secretly a major character in the show, it's got to be saying something just like the other romances and just like generally well-written romance. (No offense if you ship those just for the fun of it, but this is not the approach I personally take and I'm obviously not talking about people who do ship those ships without canon consideration).

This includes Jaune never ending up with anybody and staying pining after Pyrrha. That would just be so damning to his character and it would be depressing, and honestly after V6 I don't even see how that's an option at all.

To summarise, I think there are serious thematic considerations as part of the Jaune/Cinder pairing which makes other possibilities simply unviable. I also think the pairing would be exciting. I think that if they didn't go that direction, I would wonder how they manage to pull Cinder's redemption off - since there's some key connecting her getting to Ruby, and I really don't think it's anybody like Emerald - and most importantly I would wonder why her, out of all of the characters, doesn't get a romance, when we're told directly that a chorus which sings for her in her backstory - arguably something which she remembers, just like Without you, I am nothing - tells her that nobody's ever loved her. Love her. Love her. You've got to subvert that, you have to, it's the law.

I hope that's a sufficient answer! Romance is serious business.