#i dont know how to phrase this in a way that doesnt make me look like the 'huh i wonder who that's for' garfield meme

[rioblitzle]

i agree with the sentiment in a lot of posts making fun of the attitude of those people who (potentially incorrectly) self-diagnose themselves with autism but then try to police how other autistic people behave by centring themselves in all conversations about neurodivergency, but i can't lie as someone who believes i have autism but is currently trying to get a diagnosis in my 20s on the years-long nhs waiting list it makes my impostor syndrome kind of insane. oh god what if that's actually me. see im doing it right now

[berrymeter]

genuine allergic reaction to ppl who make yamato look super masc im sorry wheres the love for trans men w feminine features

[rotthepoet]

Continuing my mean lorenzo berkshire brainrot, he is so enemies to lovers coded.

Like he’s a 1990’s movie bully. Yknow that scene where Malfoy sends Potter a little animated note of him being struck by lightning??(i feel like it was prisoner of azkaban) yeah imagine that being thrown at your head. Like. Everyday in class

Hes like mean and pathetic and its WILD dude.

He so just shoves you when no ones looking- straight up pushes you into a fountain-

You dont even know what you did to get on his bad side! He doesnt even remember!

Its probably because this pretty(gender neutral) person(you) showed him up in class after he answered a question embarrassingly wrong. He wasnt a fan of that. No one can be that good looking and smart at the same time, that bitch is cheating!

He will be your downfall if you let him. Like. Sabotaging all the way. Your life will be hell.

His friends kinda noticed how hes different around you tho. Like he can be mean but not VIOLENT.

Its Theo that figures out its a crush. And he doesnt let him live it down.

“Ohhh there goes your girlfriend, gonna go trip her again to see up her skirt you creep?”

Things like that but im not a posh Italian boy in a British boarding school so, like, phrase it better.

There are two ways you could get him to stop.

Slapping him or crying infront of him.

Both would make him slow tf down and short circuit.

1. If you slap him, hes going to look down at you with the dumbest look. Like. No thoughts behind those wide eyes. Scream at him, shove him, stomp away. he raises a hand to his cheek and grins so big because you touched him! He lowkey gets a little bit ✨freaky✨and imagines it all over again later. The bullying stops. He cant stop staring at you and following you everywhere though. Youre not sure which is worse lmao.

2. Bless your heart if you cry infront of him. He feels so bad suddenly its not even funny. Hes like half hugging you awkwardly to ‘comfort’ you and is lowkey trying to apologize without saying the words “im sorry” its kinda just pathetic and weird. If you run away crying he feels like a dick and leaves you alone for a bit :/ the cutie is crying and its his fault wtf this is so twisted! He might buy you a little treat to make up for it.

Once he falls he falls HARD. like downright obsessed. Blaise had to knock him upside the head because he wouldn’t shut up about you.

He’ll be talking to a girl and see you and literally push her away by the head so he can walk and talk to at you.

“Hey hows your day going? Did you do something with your hair? Youre going to potions, yeah? Let me walk you.”

And youre like. What?? He was telling you that you reek not even a month ago?? Is he gaslighting you? This new form of bullying is weirddd

and then he starts presenting you with gifts and trying to hold your hand like wtf?? He blows you a kiss from his broom on the quidditch field. Steals the damn mic and says “this win was for ___” and points at you and youre like “hello??? Who are you?? Get away from me?”

But eventually you fold and it turns out hes a nice guy. Somehow. You sometimes look baxk and think “how did i get here?? Where the hell am i??” But then he gives you a big ol smooch and it all gets better.

[lunatic-fandom-space]

I just saw a very interesting post about the difference between how todolf shippers look at todolf as a fantasy vs how elisatod shippers look at elisatod as a fantasy and i wanted to throw my two cents in regarding elisatod in canon, but Im feeling a lil shy so Im not reblogging it, and this is a pretty small fandom so Im sure youve already seen it or will see it if you just keep scrolling down. In case you havent, the gist of it is that for a lot of elisatod shippers (and for a lot of the people in charge of the more recent german-language productions) one of the biggest appeals of their dynamic is this idea that death doesnt love anyone except for Elisabeth which makes her special, whereas with todolf its more like. Im having a hard time summarizing it in my own words, I guess i personally would say that its literally just the inverse where todolf shippers think that death has a romantic relationship with everyone (or at least everyone who thinks a lot about death and dying) so the 'specialness' of it doesnt matter/doesnt factor into it, its basically just about their dynamic in a vacuum, but i dont think thats what the post was saying ? Whatever, we're talking about elisatod rn so it really doesnt matter

So, for me the most important thing about the love between Elisabeth and der Tod is that its pretty much unrequited until the moment she dies. Like, we have a brief moment of mutual interest when they first meet and she sings the little Wie Du reprise and (in the 1992 prod) he gives her this suggestive look after shes done, but after that its basically all him pursing her when she clearly does not want that, until Rudolf wo bist du where she is finally ready to give into him, but now he doesnt want her, and then they only really fall in mutual love when she dies and they basically have no other choice. This friction where they can never really be in mutual love because Elisabeth never wants to lose her agency or control over her life until she doesnt and tries to give it up, and Tod only "wants" her when shes clinging on to life and rejecting him, is the core of their relationship.

Now, you'll notice that i put the word 'wants' in quotes when i was talking about Tod and thats because i dont think he, as originally witten in the vienna productions, is capable of wanting anything because hes not a person, hes a reflection of the people around him and because of that, his behaviour in any given scene is determined by the context around him. I know thats kind of a clunky way of phrasing that, but I have to do describe it in such a broad and vague way because his behaviour is really not consistant. For an example of what Im talking about, in Elisabeth mach auf mein Engel, he tells Elisabeth that he loves her but hes only doing that in contrast to Franz Joseph; her husband comes up to her trying to burden her with his own problems when she's feeling bad and in need of comfort herself, meanwhile death is offering her unconditional love. Another example that I like is in Die Schatten werden länger reprise, where he has to start the song because Rudolf is too paralysed by fear to articulate his feelings until he has his support

But the moment of death's behaviour being influenced by the people hes interacting with that I find the most interesting, is his introduction during the prologue where the people he's interacting with are the audience. Because during that part of the song, hes essentially playing into the audience's expectation that Elisabeth and death will be a traditional soft tragic romance, hes talking about her in a very gentle and wistful way and in way that subtly implies that she was the only person he ever loved, but then during the actual story, hes treating her very aggressively and their relationship is honestly pretty unpleasant, and we can clearly see that she was not the only person he ever loved because his and Rudolf's relationship is just as intense in a similar overtly romantic way (and arguably more so because its mutual and requited). But then obviously we got Kein Kommen ohne Gehen which essentially contradicts all of this and severely clashes with the entire rest of the elisatod relatio ship, but its late and if i start complaining about that, Im gonna add another 2 paragraphs to this post

So yeah, these are some of my thoughts about elisatod, i have a lot more but its 2am and i just soent two hours writing this and I can feel my brain turn into mush, so yeabh. please let me know what you think

[serejae]

I DONT FEEL LONELY WHEN I SEE HER | SEOK.MATTHEW

WHAT ! - matthew bf thoughts for my menda😇

WHEN ! - (warnings) fluff, kissing, petnames

WHO ! - i get you. ill be completely new to a group but THATTTTT one is my man. ANYWAYS I HOPE YOU ENJOY MENDA BOOKIE SNOOKS😇

! - dating matthew is like a breath of fresh air, he isnt too distanct nor suffocating

! - i think thats mainly based on the fact that he took time to study and know you before he asked you out. by the time it was your 1 month he already (been) knew the temperature you like certain drinks, how much milk is too much in your cereal, and if we wanna be normal, when you need space

! - i feel like the trope that most resonates with matthew to me, is bestfriends brother. him and his sister have such a cute bond that i feel like he’ll recognize some of his sisters friend, but when it was you it was different. he couldnt pull himself away, his sister quickly caught on and realized what he was up to (before helping you both out)

! - matthews favorite parts of his day is definitely the morning and nights time. how he’ll wake up with you in his arms taking some time to admire you before carefully sneaking off and getting ready for the gym. he’ll wait for the clock to go off at a certain time that he memorized to start making your breakfast and drink, cause by the time you get ready and freshen up it’ll be the perfect temperature

! - speaking of gym, i see some people describe matthew as friendly, in which yes he is BUT HE DOESNT HAVE EYES ON ANYOJE BUT YOU. in his mind you guys already have a white fenced house with a dog and 3 kids running around. but i digress, he’ll call you and work out while talking to you because there’s nothing that gets him more pumped than you. if any other person tries to talk or hit on him he’ll act like he cant hear them through his headphones as he speaks to you

! - he loves the night time, because after a long day or you both being tired and stressed at least he knows he can come home to you and relax with you in his arms again. he loves how his day begins with you and ends with you

! - if hes away he’ll definitely buy a stuff animal that reminds him of you before the trip and take photos of it doing the most basic things “look were on a breakfast date:)” captioned to a photo of a breakfast platter with the stuff animal sitting infront of it sitting straight up (he adjusted it making sure ur postures always right)

! - his family loves you, they hear all abour you 24/7. his family knows that when matthew cherishes something he means it. mattthew has a big heart that he doesnt take for granted , he’ll try to bring you over to canada as much as he can to bring you to his family, talk about his childhood town, as well as trying his favorite childhood snacks

! - you dont have many arguments with matthew but when you do, he does get rather defensive wanting to defend himself but after a couple arguments with you he learned that being defensive wouldnt get him anywhere, so he tries to keep his composure. on those days he does slip up, he reflects why and what made you two get here. afterwards he’ll try to start a convo so you both can go back to normal and the way he missed

! - sometimes to matthew he gets tired of the basic ways of showing affection. he loves physical touch yes, but he knows you know he basically latches onto anyone he loves. so he decided to make a new system for you, and just for you. he loves you more than the words i love you, i love you isnt enough to describe his love for you so he tweaks it a little. he’ll say phrases that make your heart flutter

“i wanna be with you in every life time”

“you make me believe in love”

“you make me feel safe”

“you look like the in bloom instrumental”

! - matthew would love to indulge in your interest, could be as adventurous as rock climbing to as calming as bird watching. he never complains. if you like it , he does too

! - he loves to try new things with you. he wants his first to always be with you, if the members invite him to go to a new amusement park he’ll drag you along or go later with you because he knows he’ll constantly be in a state of mind of “yn wouldve liked that”, “i wish yn couldve seen that”

! - please. before there was rizz king matthew, the amount of tries he took on you. you were his first victim at all his flirting attempts. more of them making him look silly than 🫦🫦 but youd never tell him that. for all he knows he is your rizz king❤️

! - everything always relates back to you somehow. if someone asked him what happiness meant to him the conversation will lead back to you. if someone asked him if he knew the technique of how to make the best slime, its still gonna lead back to you

! - yeah sure you’ll have to fight jiwoong and gunwook every so often for your own boyfriend but hes worth the fight right? or at least thats what he constantly tells you 🤨

! - when matthew loves you you know he does, not because he tells you all the time but its the little things he does that remind you “im right here if you need anything”

[insertdisc5]

The tumblr q&a is over, but I was curious! I love all the different phrases the characters in isat/sasasa:p use--If it's something you can say, where did inspiration for "gems alive" and other phrases come from?

THANK YOU FOR ASKING BECAUSE I GET TO TALK ABOUT WORLDBUILDING AND SWEAR WORDS AND BRANDON SANDERSON

long post ahead

ok so when I was figuring out the world, I found this lecture on worldbuilding by Brandon Sanderson (go watch it, and also go read his books), and (im gonna paraphrase heavily here) one thing he mentioned is that, to make a memorable world, one thing you can do is pick a couple areas of culture, and go real deep with it. So like, pick fashion, and architecture, and interior design, and develop those a bunch, and bam! you convinced people you have a whole dang world, even though you only developed 3 areas of this world. hollow iceberg everyone thinks is a real iceberg.

he also mentioned the idea of like... getting weird with it? and develop based on a weird detail? for example, in his book The Stormlight Archives, one detail is that women have to hide their left hand at all times. ok, so what does that mean, whats taboo about a left hand? is the left hand shameful, or lewd somehow, the same way ankles were for us? what about fashion, what does women's fashion look like? and how do you live your every day life, knowing you can't show this hand, can you carry things the same way? etc

SO, for me, one of the Big Worldbuilding pillars i picked was, uh, swear words lol. or language and common expressions, more generally. i went on a whole journey where i was like... ok swear words in a LOT of languages (including french and english, both languages i speak fluently) are either sexual, or about gross bodily discharges. you know what words i mean!!!!!

and, well, i also didnt want the game to be full of those words, mostly because i think its a tightrope to use those words without seeming cringe, and also because i have a Core Memory of showing a comic to a colleague and she said "well i wouldve liked to show it to my kids, but you said fuck 12 times in there" and i didnt show my face to her for a week. family friendly family friendly family friendly

so what swear words should my characters use, that arent the same ones we use? and could those swear words actually tell us something about the world they live in? could i actually use those swear words... to show the characters come from different cultures???

and what COULD swear words be like, if theyre not about sex or body stuff? well irl they're usually about religions or belief. "oh god", "goddamnit", etc. as a sidenote, stuff like "oh my god" or "geez" arent used, because jesus christ is not canon to the ISAT universe. alright

i decided very early on i wouldnt have those in the game either, but i COULD have them be about the religions specific to this world. and for insults, i could have them be about stuff those beliefs would see as lesser.

anyway instead of talking about "gems alive" lets talk about "crab"

isabeau+mirabelle+bonnie use "crab" as a swear word because they follow a religion all around change, bettering yourself, evolving, and, the crab meme,

for those who dont get the joke, its about carcinisation, and about how a bunch of non-crab-like forms somehow evolved to a crab-like form. which would be horrible, for a religion all based around change!!! you mean we change and evolve, but theres a chance we might all become crabs??? CRAB!!!!!!!

anyway having "crab" kinda reads as 1. swear word 2. thats funny and weird (sets the tone) 3. tells you they know what crabs are (world not that different from ours, AND means they live close-ish to the coast, aka not land locked) and 4. crabs are somehow hated/feared, even if as the player you dont get why, it shows this country has its own culture (even if you dont get the crabs joke, which uuuh apparently doesnt work as well in countries that dont have this specific meme. WHATEVER!!!!)

(a few people came to me saying "heh, i get it, because crab and crap are very similar words" and um actually i did not think about that. crab is just a funny word on its own, and also i am a comedy genius without even trying)

anyway tldr: swear words as a worldbuilding tool. soon in theaters

[angy-grrr]

idk about translations or anything like that -but the attempt for Ochako explaining her pain after Himiko died feels so... analytical in English. It feels anticlimactic in comparison to the fan translation by Pikahlua, and it kind of makes a reference to her feelings for Izuku? Which doesnt have to be a bad thing, but it is weird to me to change it like that -idk if the official English translator was thinking about "preparing" the audience or something??

Idk if im just looking into things but when I read it it felt bad to me, so I checked the official Spanish translation to see if it also made a reference to past actions:

Fan translation: That's why... I'll put away even this wound that hurts all the time.

Official English translation: That's why... just like before, I'm dealing with this lasting pain... by shutting it all away.

Official Spanish translation: That's why... I've been repressing it... this wound and its pain...

Im guessing my problem comes from the over explanation that shifts the focus into, what I think is, the wrong thing: the official EN makes you focus on how she shut down her feelings for Izuku and how she is doing it again, while the fan translation and the SP are more about her repressing/pushing away specifically her pain for Himiko represented by her wound.

EDIT: I know she does have more moments where she cries when she's alone or with her parents only, I know, but lets be real, that paired with the shutting it away + Izuku appearing in the end makes you think more of that scene instead.

We understand then that the stab makes her unable to forget her, and thinks about a crying and smiling Toga during her sacrifice, while the official EN kind of forgets about it? It feels less powerful to me by skipping a mention of the wound, and by adding "just like before" it makes it look like her putting away her feelings for Izuku left a "lasting pain" at the same level of Himiko Toga dying, which. That's just wild to me?? As if her not confessing was causing her a lasting pain???? IN THE SAME LEVEL AS GRIEVING??

Im the only one reading it like that?

Under the cut im going to ramble a little more about the meaning of the stab wound:

When Himiko stabbed her, she fundamentally rejected Ochako.She claimed they were built different, and while ppl like her are able to live blessed lives happily, their rules dont allow ppl like Toga to even be close to that, and just get pitied instead. She did it angered and with flashing images of all the people who rejected her and pitied her existence going thru her mind; in that moment she cant see her caring for her genuinely, or even loving her as she "already" rejected her when she didnt understand her phrase "what do you wanna do to me?",too.

Even tho it was an action to get her away and to push her feelings down -her own love for Ochako, and instead focus on a villain like goal even tho all she has wanted is be herself happily- Ochako doesn't see it that way.

So, Himiko stabs her screaming to not be pitied, and Ochako keeps pushing it, going against what she thinks in order to be honest with her own feelings. Ochako's fear and sadness from before is revealed then to be related to not understanding Himiko's genuinely happiness. She finds inspiration in her and, I argue probably also Izuku, to then declare what she loves with her whole face: her lovely smile, and how much she wishes to be able to be like that too. Free like her.

What is that stab for her, when she sees the sacrificing Himiko? Because in that part she explains about loving someone to the point of giving herself her blood instead of taking it, I believe this is the face of pure reciprocal love. I wondered while reading the leaks why not choosing the "you think im cute?" face instead where she has the biggest smile, so my idea is that it represents something different. That moment was about Himiko being loved by Ochako, and the other about Ochako being loved by Himiko, using each other's languages -Ochako offers her blood not because Himiko needs it to survive literally, but because that's the way she can get closer to the other person; when she tells her she is the cutest in the world Himiko finds for the first time the love she always looked for without even asking for it.

Himiko gives her blood because she can't live in a world without her, but also because for Ochako sacrificing yourself for someone else its what she admires and loves. The best part about this is how they both arent doing it because they "have" to, their hearts already wish this and to do something for the other. It's genuine, it's heartwarming, and so bittersweet.

When Ochako feels that pain, she doesn't see an angry Himiko, or a sad Himiko, she sees Himiko doing an act of love for her. And that just hurts even more.

[pineappleparfaitie]

AAAAAAAAA

Person made response and mentioned me so ya

Lots of shit under cut

lets go

1

Screenshot from OPs post

Person is refering to this

My takeaway:

While I think this specifically was blown out of proportion by op who ill call Vee - I do agree this isnt the best way for Suzy to conduct herself. However this isnt like the torture commentx i use slapping someone with a wet fish as a joke and its exaggerated. This also applies to Suzy here however hers is much more violent and no one expects her to be able to pulverise anyone into red paste. However i admit it isnt a good look.

2

Screenshot of Vees post:

my takeaway:

While i agree however most NSFW blogs use tags that are only used by nsfw vore accounts and dont use stuff like extreme cuddling for example to separate themselves from the SFW crowd. Most people who are artists are well aware that genitals ≠ NSFW , ive seen many statues, paintinfs ect as part od my school program with genetelia. Does that make it porn?No . Thats the first bit

Second bit is if the OP INTENDED for this to be sexual they should use nsfw tags or sexual ones if thats their goal. Seriously why tf would a fetish acc tag their shit as anything other than kink,fetish amd nsfw?Your example doesnt make sense as ive stated genetlia isnt a good comparison here. Its a fetish.Its on THEM to tag their shit accordingly.

Third. Yeah no i agree with the 2nd half of the post most of it anyway. The reason they say well respected person i. THe community is cause I said that in my previous posts regarding this. I said that not Vee

3

Screenshot of Vees post

my takeaway:

Heres why /why not:

Vore is a latin word first of all. Its used as a slang term for vorarephilia. Its in reference to the act of eatinf another.

Heres where stuff is different.

Eating someone alive is a trope used in cartoons for ages , Tom and Jerry, Miss Frizzles magic school bus, Disney shows have it, Nick shows act ect ect. Its a trope in media.

Diapers ,Feet, Pee is not a trope in media. These are not thinfs that are tropes and common accurances thag are explored. If its used its for comedic purposes in kids cartoons.

Vore is one thing as it can be nonsexual and sfw.

Diapers ,Feet and PISS fetishes should not be exposed to minors - sexual or not these are not things minors would even remember seeing in csrtoons growing up.

And Sadomasochism/sadism/masochism is just NO. This is not okay this is shit kids should not look at as it will cause them to see this stuff as okay and fuck them up it is the pleasure in ones or another pain its fucked kids should not even know about this

Alao this is so stupid its not a kink or fetish anymore if its nonsexual its a different thing for God sake. Kink is something that has to do with sexual fantasies and whatnot. Fetish is simmilar but its more to do with objects and certain situations.

If its not sexual, then you dont have a fucking kink or a fetish you just enjoy that shit.

4

Screenshot of Vees post

My takeaway:

Yeah this is true Suzy did do this however i wasnt able tk find any dates on the archived posts that could help me see how recent some of this stuff was. One post/reblof a friend helped me out with was from June 27th . However if Vee can provide dates to the archived posts or tell me howtl to see em on the links provided that would be great.

5

Screenshot of Vees post:

My takeaway:

Vee, thats not ableism

Ableism definition

When i said that both sides were not the sharpest tool in the shed- i meant this.

Vee youre anonymus i dont know if youre disabled or not.

It is mot ableist to call someone stupid for doing a stupid thing. It is not ablesim if i say a commonly used phrase to say someone isnt very bright.

Im not saying this cause i think people with disabilities are lesser ik for a favt that byllcrap ik multiple disabled people who sre smarte than me and better than me. But by your logic if i aay the word IDIOT its ableist?

Idk how Suzy feels about me rn, i still have respect for her and see her in a positive way but i will call my friends stupid when they do something stupidm i will say they werent smart for doing something idiotic.

As for the last bit while your intent was good Vee you are deflecting from the main issue if you not reaching out in DMS before making shit public and adding baseless accusations of ableism to actually suported claims.

I will say it AGAIN

BOTH SIDES, DIDINT DO GOOD. NEITHER ARE IN THE CLEAR IN MY EYES.

Intent was there but the execution was shit.

Both of these people fucked up but one left to take a breather and maybe even process everything while the other keeps postinf amd reaponding to people.

If you WERE concerned about the safety of minors- Vee ehy did you ONLY focus on where i wasnt on your side when i AGREED with you on others?You are nitpicking and trying to still come out on top or at least make yourself seem smarter.

Was that your intent?Probably not but thats how youre coming across.

That was the end of the post i am so tjred GOD FUCKING DA-

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

aita for treating my grandmother rudely

i am a female, 16 years old.

long history of events but here's the gist-

loves me a lot (i know she does, it is very apparent).

2. i meet her extremely rarely.

3. when i was 9, i had gained quite a bit of weight and she constantly and sharply  commented on it, to the point i gradually developed severe ed and body dysmorphia over the ages 10-16 (i had reached a 'normal' weight at the age of 11, but both of the issues still persisted and worsened over time)

4. by 14 i was quite underweight, still had ed and body dysmorphia, still am suffering from both (she was the instigator but not the reason they persisted)

now heres the thing the last time i had met her before this year was when i was 10, so when she saw me, she instantly started fussing about my weight, and it was not out of health concerns but mainly comments like 'you look so weak, who will marry you' etc etc.

moreover she has been staying over for 4 months now and constantly force feeds me oily and processed meals in order to make me gain weight. she uses phrases like 'you dont even like your grandmother now. i am going to die soon, you should listen to me' etc. so i give in to her but this has triggered my ed extremely bad (i was recovering). 

apart from that she regularly talks about how my parents should 'marry me off to any guy they like as long as the babies i will have are healthy'.

i have been sexually harrased since i was 11, by peers and older guys, which has made me averse to the idea of everything me being involved in anything romantic and sexual.

i am also been stressed because of multiple university entrance exams this year, so her constant nagging just heightens it.

my parents become visibly uncomfortable when the marriage stuff comes up but they dont stop her at all because she is older.

body shaming is very normal in my country espl when it is coming from elders. and so are arranged marriages.

this started from the day she put her foot in our house, and because i dont want to snap at her, i stay in my room and give her very curt responses when talked to, admittedly my tone is sharp but not my words.

i have snapped at her twice, did not say anything hurtful though (just asked her to stop), but my voice was very loud.

i constantly ignore her, and my actions very easily give away how much i dislike her even though my words dont.

i feel so disgusted with myself because i know she is coming from a place of concern and she truly does care about me. and she probably too was subjected to all of this. and i know i am going to regret my actions down the lane and i am terrified it would be too late. she genuinely doesnt realise she is wrong and i don't blame her.

also i was always very kind and respectful to her whenever she used to call but i have no clue what changed when i saw her in person. just looking at her makes my blood boil.

aita and if any of you have any tips on how i can get my anger under control, please send some my way.

What are these acronyms?

[transfemlogan]

this will not be constructive criticism this is just me complaining like a 6 yr old & also i just woke ul

virgil is a hypocritical annoying asshole . i geetttt he was treated baadlyyy or whatever but all he does is whine & whine. i understand he has very interesting lore to his character and why he acts the way he does (eg. treat the dark sides the same way he was treated, treat logan & roman the way he does, act how he did in embarrassing phases tho arguably that was thomas' fault 4 not knowing how 2 write) but hes given SO much attention w/o any input on his lore that its just like . unbearable 2 even watch

this got rlly long im putting a read more

he doesnt like when thomas tries 2 accept the other dark sides, but he was once a dark side & wanted 2 b accepted . the entire way he treats roman & logan in the puppet vid is SO ANNOYING. i swear 2 god theres this 1 line where virgil tells roman not 2 like. overreact in a mean way 2 logan or whatever his phrasing was & then he IMMEDIATELY DOES IT 2 LOGAN. he dislikes when ppl mess w/ his look, in making some changes, but then does it 2 the rest of the sides in embarrassing phases YEARS after it happened so i dont even think it could be written as like a "revenge" thing hes been accepted for AWHILE. so hes just purposefully being weird & a dick 4 no reason. "but revy it was for—" i do not care

and dont get me started on the fact that hes thomas' fave little boy so all of the fucking content is about him. hes not even the most interesting side to write about !!!! oh, he used to be viewed as bad but wasnt the whole time but became bad bcuz he thought he had to? ok megamind, i have HEARD it & i do not care. lets talk about fucking patton hes the most interesting character in the entire fucking show . lets talk about ROMAN. ANYONE.

like virgil could be a really interesting character but the way thomas' treats everything abt him it just makes him so bland and downright annoying. his hypocrisy could be used in a way that makes him Not annoying but i highly doubt thomas is ever going to even touch on anything he does. i jsut. i want to grab his neck & squeeze it & shake him back and forth if i ever catch virgil irl im beating his ass

& virgils personality cannot be written One Way. it changes every episode. correct me if im wrong bcuz i just woke up but i swear 2 god theres not a single episode whwre he is in the wrong & needs 2 apologise or has done something thats not okay. like all of his actions r always put into a good light bcuz obviously he is our pure little cinnamon roll angel anxiety 😍. am i crazy is there actually no episode where he is wrong. i know theres episodes for logan, roman, & patton.

(edit: THE CHRISTMAS EPISODE i 4got he was mean 2 roman there but i think thats it is it or am i just making shit up 2 hate virgil /j)

[tangyangie]

Hii! Honestly thank you for all your works!, they’re so good and feel so accurate, you embody the characters so well😫‼️.

I dont know if ur taking requests right now but i was wondering if you could do a karma x enfp reader head-cannons? I saw you did an isfp one, idk if you’ve done any other, but Thats alright if not of course!

Reader is really bubbly and loud, she makes alotta dirty and crude jokes with Rio and similarly, she has good grades she just doesnt try. She’s girly (loves being feminine) but that doesnt stop her from getting dirty, Shes very much a hopeless romantic and goes feral for some loving.

— 𝐊𝐀𝐑𝐌𝐀 𝐗 𝐄𝐍𝐅𝐏 𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐃𝐄𝐑 ⊹

desc. karma x enfp!fem!reader, who's loud, playful, and talkative, yet stubborn, smart, and romantic.

notes. i'm preeeetty sure i'm an enfp (or infp), so a lot of these traits reminded me of myself!! so, this one was pretty easy to write, and i hope you like it!!

he's drawn to you from the beginning.

you're funny and joke about everything with him. oh, someone fell out of a tree? oops, you guys are literally on the floor.

you guys never have a dull moment. you always have something to talk about, and your conversations usually end up lasting hours.

physical touch is biggg for you guys. it's rare to see you guys not hugging or being close in some way.

he loves your outfits. no matter what you wear, though, he will be completely infatuated by you but he does like seeing you in dresses.

he picks you up a lot. piggy-back rides, carrying you bridal style, over the shoulder... any way that your feet aren't touching the ground.

you guys bounce around a lot. like, people mistake you as children for how energetic you guys are—you're constantly running around places.

you guys are constantly texting. it's kind of funny how much battery is wasted, even though you two are in the same room.

you guys also play gamepigeon a lot together. you've both gotten really good at the word games, and you're constantly competing. your screen is lit up like a christmas tree because of just how much you guys play together.

karma and you are both stubborn, and so you guys are like a rainbow brick wall with bubble guns at the top. it's the most accurate description of your personalities together that i can give.

when it comes to school, you guys are one and the same. you've got good grades and stuff, but you do not pay attention.

you will have an assignment that was given at the beginning of the week, and you're finishing it literally morning of. and then you get a perfect score.

you guys spend a lot of time outside together. whether that's looking for cats in sidewalks, going to playgrounds and parks, or finding a lake and skipping rocks together. you guys definitely feed the ducks, too.

you kiss him a lot. he definitely doesn't mind—he welcomes it. while, of course, throwing in a few teasing phrases.

you guys make a lot of dirty jokes together. it's crazy you guys haven't been reported to the police for the amounts of looks you guys have gotten.

you guys collect stuff for each other. you collect stamps and he collects rocks, so you guys trade each other stuff. if someone doesn't have enough to trade, you pay in affection.

you guys climb on stuff a lot. it's a normal occurrence to see you guys on the roof or hanging off a window of a 6-floor tall apartment building.

notes: every time i write these i get reminded of my nonexistent social life 🫶

also i'm so sorry for taking so long ☹️ been feeling v unmotivated to write but i did see the spider-man movie so i'm feeling much better (and in love w miles oh m y god)

[trans-axolotl]

hi so ive been reading a lot of your mad liberation stuff (i think thats the term i cant actually remember atm) and im having trouble understanding some of it so i want to like ask this for clarification

is it like. not quite antirecovery but that "recovery" shouldnt be the default? like mad ppl should be able to live as is, and if they want to seek recovery they can but shouldnt be looked down on for not doing that?

or that like. "recovery" doesnt look like psychiatric definitions?

sorry i dont know if im phrasing things right im pretty dissociated lol

ty for your time tho!

hi anon!

I'm always happy to answer clarification questions. I know when I was first learning about antipsych stuff, there were so many terms and concepts that were new to me, and I'm always still learning more.

A lot of what you've said is stuff I agree with! When I'm thinking about the concept of recovery, it feels important to me to really analyze what people really mean when they say "recovery" in the current psych system. I might ask questions like:

Who gets to define recovery? Is the mad/mentally ill/neurodivergent person supported in setting their own priorities and goals, or is the only thing prioritized the mental health professional's ideas about wellness?

How do ableist concepts of normality and conformity contribute to our ideas about recovery? What ways might recovery frameworks get in the way of radical acceptance of mad/MI/ND people's traits? How do ideas of recovery contribute to stigma and violence against mad/MI/ND people?

What ways does the psych system enforce recovery, even at the cost of bodily autonomy and freedom? What ways does psych treatment use violence to enforce recovery?

Within the current psych system, I think that "recovery" is not a neutral concept, and I think it's one that contributes to a lot of fucked up patterns within the psych system. There's so many ableist and sanist ideas that label mad/MI/ND people just existing as a threat, and force cure on us instead of building a society that embraces madness/MI/ND. The language about being a "danger to yourself and others" reveals the ways that mad/MI/ND people are often labeled as inherently unsafe if we're existing in public, if we have nonconforming behaviors, if we talk to ourselves in public, if we stim, etc. There's this pattern set up within the psych system where unless we're actively compliant with treatment, unless we're institutionalized, unless we're taking our meds and going to therapy and doing every little thing the psych system asks us to, we're labeled as dangerous and unstable.

In a system where "treatment" is often violent, coercive, and oppressive, I think that the way recovery is defined is a really harmful framework. Recovery in the psych system is more about compliance then it is about actually listening to our needs. It treats mad/MI/ND people as unworthy unless we're doing every single thing that the psych system wants us to. And I think that mindset is super damaging to mad/MI/ND people. It makes us feel like we're not deserving of support, care, accommodations, and community unless we're willing to give up our autonomy, conform to ableist ideals about "normal" behavior, and give up so much of ourselves. I'm much more interested in separating morality from our ideas of health and wellness, meeting people where they're at, and embracing the idea that it is totally fine to exist openly and fully as a mad person. We do not have to change ourselves in ways we don't want to. My mad community is always going to be one that embraces + prioritizes people who have no interest in recovery, who want and need to keep using behaviors labeled as dangerous, odd, and crazy, who don't comply with treatment and who demand the right to exist anyway.

I think that as mad/MI/ND people, we should have the room to define healing/coping/resistance/resilience/care in a way that is affirming and supportive for us, instead of just being restricted to "recovery." Our distress, pain, and hurt is very real, and we deserve support, skills, resources to help us navigate that in a way where we aren't shamed and aren't forced into coercive treatment. We should be able to set our own goals and priorities about what actually feels important for us in making our lives better/more tolerable. I'm not super interested in telling mad/MI/ND people to stop using the term recovery because I think for a lot of people it's a familiar shorthand to sort of describe a lot of different ways of healing. But I think it really is worth critiquing the concept, doing self inquiry about what it actually means to us, and analyzing the ways we use recovery in our communities and who that might exclude.

Personally, I don't like to use recovery language around a lot of my own madness, because it's important to me to be able to validate and affirm the ways I exist as a crazy person in the world. I think of my bipolar & psychosis as fundamental ways that I engage with the world, and I'm really glad that those are the ways I experience my life. I don't think of my bipolar and psychosis as a transient state that I will "recover" from and wake up one day and have all that taken away from me. I find a lot of value and meaning in my psychosis and my mood cycles, and I think I would lose a lot if I no longer experienced them. At the same time, there are ways that my psychosis and bipolar have changed the way my bad days look, ways that my self harm has really caused me a lot of distress and was really debilitating, and ways that my relationship with suicide is incredibly, incredibly difficult. I've been able to find support, healing, and care from places outside the psych system in a way that feels more meaningful for me than the psychiatric systems definition of recovery. Every time I go into the mental health system and try to express that I don't want to stop having hallucinations, that I want to use harm reduction for my self harm, and that I don't want to go on meds, I am labeled as noncompliant, antirecovery, dangerous, and incapable of living outside of institutions. This is despite the fact that I have worked really hard in building up a support system, access tons of resources, have found a bunch of coping strategies that work for me, and have built a life that accommodates my madness.

So to answer your question, I am against the ideas the recovery should be the default and I am really critical of the way the psych system uses recovery as a foundation for coercive treatment, but I fully support mad/MI/ND people's right to find healing, support, resistance, care, coping skills, resources in whatever way makes sense to them and fits with their needs and autonomy.

Summary: The current concept of recovery in our mental health system is based on ableist ideas about normality and labels mad/MI/ND as dangerous for just existing as mad people. Coercive treatment like psych wards tries to force ideas about recovery onto all mad/MI/ND people, and makes us feel like we are unworthy if we aren't doing everything we can to be compliant. Mad/MI/ND people have the right to define what healing/coping/resistance/care means to them, and if that means rejecting ideas of recovery, treatment, and conformity, our autonomy should be respected.

Feel free to ask any other questions!

[iiusia]

This is me asking you about poetry. Please tell me about poetry.

YAYYYYY I WOULD LOVE TO!!! now ngl this is very general..... so yk what i will simply give u my Top poems (for the moment!!) and why i like them heehee

OKAY!!!!

on our backs looking up by jan-henry gray

now something about me is that i LOVE run on poetry and this one has been my favourite of the kind for a while now... i dont know i just really love how it starts with the cockroach, ostensibly something so mundane and then links it and links it and links it and links it. like. does it make sense? not really. but at the same time it just Fits Together until it gets to the end with a link right back to the beginning, a neat little knot. I DONT KNOW MAN. i think that with run-on poetry you always have to keep in mind what your Goal is and where you want to bring it in the end because its SO easy to get caught up in just going and going and going and then getting lost in it esp since there's not really strict formatting. i think this is a really really good example!! (like just choosing a favourite part was hard because everything just fits together its SO hard to choose where to cut it off)

favourite line: in hotel beds, two windows facing south, ghosts of last night's feast, the smell of rot from the soil, on your floor, there is protocol and survival, torn foil, an entire body slackening, exhaling,

2. january 2 by zakaria mohammed

okay. okay!! i really like this one because of how meta (i guess?) it is? like it breaks the fourth wall. it KNOWS that its a poem it doesnt try to obscure the fact. it knows that everything that's inside it is for the Sake of the Poem.... if you know what i mean (Here, a gazelle is a poetic necessity, nothing more.) i just LOVE the idea of undercutting the Expectation of what a poem is (metaphor and simile and imagery) and Bringing attention to it i just think it gives SUCH a good dimension to the poem. its also VERY hard to do convincingly and not just sound ironic.... like yeah it's aware that it's a poem but in no way is it scornful of that fact... you know....

favourite line: There, you’ll find my will, and you’ll grab the gazelle by its horns.

3. ALZ ghazal by rebecca foust

okay this one is INSANE to me. a ghazal is basically a form of poetry where (in its most basic form) the last word/phrase of each couplet is the same (in this case, it's "repeating". and LISTEN i tried to write one and its INSANELY hard !!! (i gave up lol) DO YOU SEE HOW LONG THIS ONE IS??? thats CRAZY talent. other than me admiring the fact that she was able to go on for so long without it feeling over the top, i LOVE how this poem progresses. like it starts super mundane (It’s the same house, same rugs, same wallpaper, and bedroom repeating) and then devolves like you can FEEL it getting more frantic as you read on. its like. the familiarity of everything being the same -> the horror of Everything Being The Same and yet forgetting. I DONT KNOW I JUST THINK ITS KIND OF INCREDIBLE!!

favourite line: O trochee, lilting your 10-beat line. O river, O iamb repeating the tide. Bishop called loss an “art.”

4. to my mother by mahmoud darwish (honorary mention)

im including this as an honorary mention because im not AS insane about the poem itself (even if it is VERY good) but more about this video of mahmoud darwish reading out the beginning. it has just lived in my head rent free since i heard it like 4 months ago. i don't know theres something that i love a lot about hearing in the original language (fully realize it might not have the same effect on someone that doesnt understand arabic LMAO) like idk i feel like theres a Touch to it that is lost when i just Read it in english..... but translation is a WHOLE other topic i will NAWT get into right now or this will become a full essay.

ANYWAYS!!! THANK YOU SO MUCH i will keep my promise i now love you forever..... MWAH

[a-court-of-moonlight-and-ire]

I made a mistake last time, I said that I read chapters 22-30 when I only read 22-29, but now I have read chapter 30 and also chapters 31-34 so lets talk about those

Its so frustrating how Im more than halfway through this 700 page book thats ostensibly supposed to be about Feyre and Rhysand's complicated relationship developing and theres been no development because the things that should make their relationship complicated have just been completely handwaved. Like, if this book HAS to focus so much on Rhys to the detriment of Feyre, and he also just HAS to be morally good, atleast give him some kind of character arc of bettering himself, right now Im basically just looking at this stagnant statue of a guy through someone elses eyes which doesnt make for a rewarding reading experience

Ive also been noticing more and more weird retcons and idk what to call it, justifications for why Rhys is better even when hes doing the same shit as Tamlin I guess? The two big ones being, when Tamlin blew up that room after Feyre told him that he was suffocating her he did it out of anger, and, Feyre is fine with wearing dresses for the night court because she knows she can go back to wearing Illyrian leathers anytime, which is not how it was at the spring court.

First of all, I keep saying this, I am not a Tamlin girlie, I dont like him that much and hes doing a bad job dealing with Feyre, but you dont need to make shit up to make Feyre's choice to leave feel justified. Like, he was not punching the walls in anger, he felt so bad and guilty about hurting Feyre when all he wants is to keep her safe that his magic went haywire over it. And thats bad enough! I mean Feyre, who has a lot of trouble communicating her feelings, finally managed to tell him everything thats wrong and makes her feel bad and makes healing from her trauma difficult, and he reacts by basically having a panic attack which makes his magic react in a dangerous way. Idk about you, but I would not feel comfortable or even safe expressing my feelings to him, even if he didnt react like that out of anger

Like, Feylin could have just not worked out, it couldve just been disfunctional without being portrayed as abuse but it cant be, I guess because it needs to be abuse in order to justify Feyre leaving him. And thats so strange to me because the idea that women need any kind of ("serious") justification for leaving a relationship is completely anti-thetical to the themes of feminism and choice that this book is trying to go for. Like, why cant a woman just break up with a guy because she stopped feeling it, theres no reason not to break up with a guy who makes you feel bad even if hes not being outright abusive. Although, in this particular story there actually is a reason, which is that if Feyre left Tamlin without a "good" justification then Amarantha would win, she would be proven right about the fickle nature of humans and the pointlessness of their un-eternal love from beyond the grave and that would be a bummer because the first book is about how Love Conquers All, as is the case with pretty much all great romances. So Tamlin's unambigiously abusive now so that that beautiful idea of Love Conquering All doesnt end up being dragged through the dirt. ACOMAF essentially posits that the Love that was supposed to Conquer All isn't real because neither Feyre nor Tamlin were willing or able to truly love each other through their trauma, ergo it didnt actually Conquer All. Thats also why Rhysand isnt meaningfully affected by what should be traumatic events; because while Feyre can love someone through her own trauma, she cant seem love someone whos traumatized themself

I feel like the way I phrased that was pretty harsh, but I do think its kinda true, in a way. Idk man, the thing that makes talking about Feyre's new UTM trauma so difficult is that everyone, including the narrative itself, is expecting her to have worked through it within less than half a year when its like, shes immortal and also living in a world with no therapists, she can take a bit longer than that. I mean hell, everyone in the inner circle is like 500 years and all of their major traumata happened when they were very young and most of them have still not learned how to actually cope with them aside from killing/avoiding the people who caused it (atleast from what Ive seen, especially of Cassian), Feyre might honestly be doing better than all of them but she keeps dogging on herself which, remember, her perspective is objectively correct as of this book, so that sucks

Alright, three paragraphs to talk about that first point, lets move on to talking about the dress thing. I have already observed that it seems like Feyre might stop wearing pants entirely at some point despite how much this particular book keeps going on and on about Tamlin forcing her to wear dresses in conjunction with going on about Tamlin forcing her into a subserviant mother-role, implying that dresses are inherently depowering, and well. I hate that for Feyre but I do love being proved right

And like, okay, I think Feyre hating dresses is another ACOMAF retcon, but its a retcon in a weirdly circular way. Let me explain; in ACOTAR I didnt get the impression that she hated dresses, I thought she just preferred pants because its what she was used to and because for a pretty large chunk of the book she was thinking about fleeing or was in situations where she needed to run away from something and pants were just more practical for that. But when she trusted the fae a bit more and a special occasion came up or she wanted to make Tamlin feel flustered (? that one doesnt make that much sense to me tbh), she did ask for dresses to wear and only felt a little embarrassed about it because she didnt usually wear them. I didnt even get the impression that she hated the impractical rich noblewoman dress they put her in when she was sent back to the human world, just that she found it really silly and unfitting for her. And I do think her being willing to wear dresses was supposed to be a signifier of her healing journey and her learning how to be gentle and let herself be loved in that book

Then ACOMAF comes around and she suddenly hates wearing dresses, which also ties into her suddenly becoming some kind of adrenaline junkie when she previously wanted to live a peaceful and comfortable life. Now, granted, the difference is that in ACOTAR she wore dresses that she explicitly asked to wear, whereas in ACOMAF Tamlin just assumes that she will always wear dresses by virtue of her being a woman without asking Feyre about it at any point (I know Ianthe was actually more involved in the dress-stuff, but the narrative is making Tamlin responsible for it so Im just gonna go along with it for simplicity's sake). Thats reasonable enough

But then a little further into ACOMAF we have Rhysand doing the exact same thing, hes assuming that she will wear dresses for the sake of keeping up appearances and helping him with his politics (and also, he's assuming that she will let herself be sexualized via the apple-breast comment in front of Tarquin (and later the CoN-UTM reeanactment scene)) and hes right, because of course he is. But the reason its fine when Rhysand does it, I guess, is because he keeps reassuring her that she has a choice in these matters when she really doesnt. Like, did he pack some illyrian leathers just in case Feyre didnt want to wear the dresses he got her? If he did, theres been no mention of it. Theres also been no mention of him asking her if she preferred to wear pants or a dress for the Summer Court mission, even though it seems to me that harem pants are considered to be unisex in the Night Court while they seem to be considered distinctly masculine in places like the Spring Court

And then we get to the thing about this dress-stuff that makes me call it a 'weirdly circular retcon'; while Nuala is dressing Feyre up for her date with Tarquin, for lack of a better term, she looks at herself in the mirror and thinks about how maybe, after everything shes been through that forced her to become hard, shes starting to heal and can finally let herself be feminine and soft and pretty. If you'll recall from a few paragraphs ago, that already happened to Feyre in ACOTAR except it was more subtle, I dont remember her just straight-up thinking about it like she does in this scene in ACOMAF. So its the same thing, but instead of her wearing dresses that she excplicitly asked to wear, shes wearing dresses that her new bf picked out for her and all but made her wear

And honestly, thats a really good way of summarizing the differences between Feylin and Feysand and the way Feyre gets treated in these book, which is why I wrote so fucking much about this pretty insignificant detail

Surprisingly enough, Im not done with this monster of a post yet, because I have some stuff to say about the Summer Court

The way Cresseida was introduced and treated made me have what Im just gonna call an angry epiphany. Like, before she came along I just thought the feminism of this series was very shallow and very white, but after her introduction I was just angrily thinking to myself "How the FUCK is this series considered feminist in any way?! The three types of women that exist in this story are literally Protagonist's Sisters (characterized as Haughty Bitch and Infantilized Clueless Cinnamon Roll Who Can Do No Wrong respectively), Protagonist's Slaves Servants Who Are Inexplicably Always Darkskinned Women and Promiscuous Bitches"

Varian seemed fine, but I dont like that he seems to have something going on with Amren. I know I said I didnt particularly like her, but I did still kinda latch onto her as my aroace rep so I find that very disappointing. But I guess thats on me for having expectations like that of the most amatonormative book series Ive ever read

So, from observing this part of the fandom prior to reading the books, it seemed that if sjm critical people dont like Feylin, theyll usually like Feyquin as an alternative to the horrible but canon Feysand. Despite that, I didnt have the highest expectations because honestly, it not much harder for a character to be a better love interest than ACOTAR!Tamlin and Rhysand. Like, the thing about Tamlin is that he was a really boring guy but hes a very good love interest, and the thing about Rhysand is that hes also really boring and hes a very bad love interest, so I thought "okay, I know Tarquin is the youngest and he has that whole thing about actively wanting equality for faeries but no one taking him seriously because everyone thinks hes inexperienced, OBVIOUSLY hes more interesting than the guys who can access their power with no issue, and then he'll just be kinda flirty towards Feyre, as SJM MaLeS usually are and that makes him a decent enough potential love interest I guess" and thats all true but idk, actually reading about him made me like him sooooo much. Like, him and Feyre telling each other theyre easy to love? Mwah, gorgeous. I bet Rhys is really glad he has that mating bond because without it his sorry ass would NOT be able to compete with Tarquin

So now my list of m/f Feyre ships goes Feyquin > Feycien > Feylin and Feyre/Azriel are on about the same level to me I think > Feysand (not including feyssian bc I think its a crime to ship cassian with a woman sry)

I specify m/f Feyre ships because if I included all of the Feyre ships, Feyanthe would be at the very top followed by Feyre/Amren. Idk, I know its obscure, but when she was describing how Amren was wearing a crop top she said something like "a sliver of skin was left exposed, as tempting as a calm lake" and I was like oh? 👀 Those guys have potentialllllllll I mean who needs Mates when youre both Made amiright fellas. Also, Feyre/Mor would go above Feysand

Anyway, thats it from me again, I hope you enjoyed this

[spicybylerpolls]

I mean... people act differently in the bedroom. Just point blank, if you look at your friend and go "she would never do that nah." Its possible, she could be a closet freak. No one acts like themselves in the bedroom. So nothing is really out of character unless there is canon material for how they act in such situations.

i just found this on a reddit thread that complains about smut being out of character in fandom in general and it seems like these debates we have re: byler (esp top and bottom, sub and dom) happen everywhere, and tbh, that fact alone speaks volumes? the above argument has been used for byler on this very blog! while it is technically true, it also seems to me to be a bit too obvious and a crutch/excuse for bad writing. for example, the duffers could have said 'mike has never been in a mall before s3, who knows how he'll react?' and then he's opening s3 just twerking on the mall fountain while waving his top around cos he's so excited about all the new shops and the free cinema trips and ice cream. i mean, technically its possible, but is that really mike?

thats a very infantile example because sexuality is complex. but my point is: I KNOW people do act differently in the bedroom, because it brings out another side of people, but the point stands about what 'out of character' actually means, and in writing you need a set of rules decreeing the boundaries of a fictional character - a personality outline - because otherwise their edges blur and they become everyone and no one. and i think this is the problem with lots of smut, as this user wrote:

It's sex scenes where characters stop being themselves and just start being people who are having sex. The sex scenes that feel very could-be-in-any-fandom. Like, for example, when people stop talking like themselves, and not because it's dirty talk or kink or whatever.

THIS! the amount of smut i've read where mike and will could suddenly be interchangeable with any character from any story anywhere, because theyre just two bodies doing sex acts. there are carbon copy phrases and buzzwords (apparently there's even a famous essay on this, says one user: 'you may enjoy ariaste's one finger/two fingers/three fingers/cock rant...')

this is what i mean when i say bad writing. someone on the thread explained that 'A lot of fanfiction is wish-fulfillment, and many of us want to believe the characters we're attracted to are sex gods, even if there's no canonical evidence of it.' the idea of mike and will being sex gods made me laugh and i think very few people who discuss byler seriously here believe they would be, but the operative phrase here is 'characters we are attracted to.' i think this is an unspoken part of fandom, and what divides fans who create fanworks, and original creators. the argument 'the duffers aren't creeps for writing teen sex so why are we?' does hold much water, not because writing smutfic makes you a creep, but because fans are infatuated with characters in a way that original creators usually aren't.

but why not? i dont think it's weird or bad to fall in love with a character. but this still doesnt answer the question of why many writers choose to lean towards this tried-and-typical smut style rather than aiming to emulate the characterisation or writing style of the original creators. so....

why do people think this might be? here are some of my suggestions, and i would love if some of the people who respond are also people who have written/thought about writing their own smut and answer honestly about their thought processes! choose the best that applies to you. thanks to all who partake!

A) the only access to erotic literature i've had in general is via fanfiction, so i can't see any other way of writing it.

B) i've read published erotic fiction and i end up emulating that rather than fanfiction, so i dont think my work is tropey or fanfic-typical.

C) i've read published novels that include sex written in a way i like, so i try to take inspiration from that instead.

D) i write sex the way I have sex/think about sex i've had in real life.

E) i write sex the way I imagine/want to have sex in real life, and this is mostly influenced by porn/fanfiction fantasies.

F) i write sex the way i imagine/want to have it in real life, and this is mostly influenced by my own individual imagination/life experience rather than porn/fanfiction.

G) i prefer the writing style in much of smut fanfiction (e.g. tropes and well-used phrases) because i find them genuinely realistic to character.

H) i prefer the writing style in much of smut fanfiction (e.g. tropes and well-used phrases) because i find them hottest and i typically prioritise this over realistic characterisation.

I) i worry that if my smut is too personal or doesnt read as familiar, people won't like it and i typically (but not always) prioritise audience response over artistic expression or experimentation. i want to add to the canon of byler smut in a familiar way.

J) i try to prioritise what i genuinely think the characters would do during sex rather than my own fantasies/projections/aspirations for either the characters or for myself.

K) i don't usually think this hard about smut.

L) i believe that smut fanfiction, including tropes and well-used buzzwords, does make genuinely compelling and wonderful reading, and i'm happy with the state of smut in general.

Please note that the purpose of this blog is not to be creepy or to make anyone uncomfortable. That's why I created the #spicy byler tag (I will tag all polls with this). If you don't want to see this blog or anything related to it on your feed, please block that tag. Not everyone is comfortable with this sorta stuff, and that's okay.

[nerves-nebula]

Sorry bout this thing but I kinda wanted to tell my thoughts about your stuff. Im kind of hoping this will get drowned in your inbox honestly, since this is just a really long unsolicited rant of mine.

Sometimes when i scroll through your account and I encounter csa, incest and mentions of suicide in your posts I get uncomfortable but then I remember that one phrase that goes something like "Art should comfort the disturbed and disturb the comforted" and I just feel kinda bad bout myself.

When I was a kid my nannys bf forced me to kiss him in the lips whenever we met. I was 6. It was uncomfortable. I never did tell my nanny about it. My parents are both police people and my mother had long explained the concept of rape and how unconsensual touch is bad and you shouldnt allow that but something prevented me from telling anyone what was happening. I dont know why. I know they would immiedietly jail that guy if they did but somehow it felt like no one would believe me. I never told them until now, then when I was what, 6-8 years old? I cant even remember. Yeah somewhere around that, he molested me when my nanny was few feet away and asleep and for the next 4 years of my life i felt dirty. Desecrated. Stupid. I couldnt even look down at my naked body when i shower back then, but somehow I managed to trudge on living by trying to forget the fact it happened. Its been 8 years since Ive last seen him. Ive told anyone who I knew who doesnt care enough to be friends with me but cared enough to listen about it but my Parents are none the wiser and i plan on keeping it that way.

Also. Im a year away from being legal now. Ive thought about killing myself or just generally not wanting to exist anymore many times since then, cuz lifes equipped with motolov cocktails of "get fucked dumbass" and i somehow managed to get a coupon for at least a million of them.

(I hope that line made you laugh if you read this).

Coming back to the phrase i mentioned earlier, it feels weird whenever i feel something similar to the feeling of being triggered while looking at csa being depicted. By definition, i would be considered a victim, and id of course would be comforted by seeing similar experiences happen to people because relating to something usually induces a positive feeling. I dont. I see your art and it guts me. It guts me and the fact that it does also guts me, because what does that mean? I am supposed to be the comforted? Despite the fact that I was taken advantage of as a child and spent night after might thinking how stupid i was and why I let that happen to me even when I was equiped with the information that makes me less vulnerable than other children? So i do I correspond more with those who are defined as comforted then, was i not disturbed after all? Was i victimizing myself all along? Am I a bad person for thinking i was? No wait, that doesnt make any sense at all. Its all wrong. Why am I so guilty about this? Why am i subjecting myself to this?

And then it repeats.

I still go through your blog because well, i love tmnt, i love your artstyle, i love the way you tell stories, I love how you dont sugar coat csa, incest and other darker topics like body horror, erotism and sadism, i hate how much it haunts me, i love the fact i can relate, i hate how much you hurt them, i love the fact that you dont hold back, i love how you show the ugly sides of healing, i love how you depict how much people can change and struggle. Its comforting to me. Its discomforting to me. I stick hand into the fire knowing I would be burned, then I do.

And i like it. I like it somehow, like taking a nice smoke break when you have mild asthma, but like, better. Its a nice change of pace to feel so conflicted like this, its a nice change of pace to feel anything at all really.

But yeah. Tldr. Sorry for the trauma dump and your art makes me feel complicated. Its neat 👍

lot to reply to here! also, unfortunately for you, i check my inbox obsessively and dont get nearly as many asks as you seem to believe i do.

so firstly, no snappy saying is meant to encompass all of human experience, and you certainly shouldn't judge yourself for not fitting into it. easier said than done, i know, but still. i'm gonna try to address some things here, not gonna touch on all of it, but just know that i appreciate you sitting down to write me this.

(I hope that line made you laugh if you read this).

it made me smile, but i laughed at this, because it's a very sweet look into you writing this. puts into perspective how, even though this is public, it was written TO me. like a letter in victorian times or something. that's sweet, i like that.

and id of course would be comforted by seeing similar experiences happen to people because relating to something usually induces a positive feeling. I dont.

you're making a lot of assumptions here that are kind of wild in that "this thought process was clearly designed by your mind to upset you specifically" sort of way. I mean, would you say this to literally anyone else when they feel uncomfortable or triggered about viewing media that relates to their trauma? There's really no telling what a survivor will feel comforted by and you aren't Doing It Wrong by having a different reaction.

there's a reason i tag it as "csa tw" and that's so people can AVOID it as well as search it up.

how stupid i was and why I let that happen to me even when I was equipped with the information that makes me less vulnerable than other children?

i know you recognize at the end of the thought process that this is not true, but i feel the need to reiterate: there is no such thing as being less vulnerable than other children through your own actions. you can try to equip kids with knowledge that might protect them, but that doesn't make them any less vulnerable.

my dad told me about rape and molestation all the time, but he never accounted for the kinds of scenarios i was actually the most likely to fall victim to, partly because i don't think he actually knew much about childhood sexual abuse, and partly because he was more obsessed with the idea of me being kidnapped and raped/murdered than he was about forms of sexual abuse he'd consider more "mild"

No wait, that doesnt make any sense at all. Its all wrong. Why am I so guilty about this? Why am i subjecting myself to this?

i can't answer that one, unfortunately. personally, i like to feel gutted, it's cathartic to me. might be something like that to you, based on how you go on to describe it, but you might also be doing some kinda self harm.

I stick hand into the fire knowing I would be burned, then I do.

saaaaame. i triggered myself into a breakdown in class once cuz i'd been reading fucked fanfiction before class and i got SAD lol.

Its a nice change of pace to feel so conflicted like this, its a nice change of pace to feel anything at all really.

we are shaking hands over this.

anywho, no need to apologize! i am glad, if nothing else, to provide you with a strange and upsetting experience that is not entirely bad.

I really do adore hearing how my stuff makes people feel. it's like, a solid one third of the reason i do this. i still make stuff that doesn't exist to be shown off but WOW showing shit off and getting a response feels FANTASTIC. like, i'm in your head now!! you have been CHANGED by my ART. it's maybe the best part of being alive.