#i feel like a lot of my analyses are based on specific wording in the scenes i'm talking about which may actually be completely different

[transmascutena]

there are several different translations of rgu and sometimes they make sentences have completely different meanings between them and it drives me a little bit crazy

like this moment in the first episode.. these things are both accurate insights into utena's character and motivations but they're also completely different from each other. idk which is more accurate to the original japanese, maybe it's a sentence that can mean both depending on context or something?

[xxscarletxrosexx]

Kiss Distance: When Feelings Can't Reach | Linguistic Analyses on Rick & Rachel's lines foreshadow for TwiYor, DamiAnya, and Marthanderson from Ch. 105.5 (PART 1)

This is gonna be a take from the linguistic + literary lens regarding Rick and Rachel's lines from Spy x Family's Ch. 105.5.

Spoilers beware.

So let's talk about the film: Kiss Distance.

On X/Twitter, all I said was my analysis senses were tingling. There was a strong linguistic and creative writing/literary devices indicating foreshadow from the movie, and this just surprisingly got attention.

So now, I'm finally addressing this specific section in a long analysis post.

I cannot stress how much I love Endo-san's short chapters. There are so many things going on in terms of literary devices, and now, I think he plays with linguistics in them. I believe that the last time he did this was during Ch. 90.1 when we learned that Ania's name turned into Anya. I remember freaking the hell out that linguistics was touched upon, cuz honestly, what manga does that? Someone is finally paying attention to linguistics in a story, and it's just further pulling me into my rabbit-hole fixation and obsession with Spy x Family.

Although the chapter is only 5 pages long, it has SO MANY THINGS TO COVER. I won't be able to do that in this post, but I DID cover the entire thing in a video analysis that you can watch here:

What I will mainly cover in this post will be the film: Kissing Distance and the characters (Yor, Anya, Becky, and Martha) watching it + post-watching it. I cannot stress the ridiculous efforts embedded in just 3 pages, so I need to divide these sections into a linguistic lens (part 1) and a literary lens (part 2).

Let's start with the linguistic lens.

Spelling reflects language association + cultural history + maybe it's a meme too.

Spelling reflects language association

At the top right corner of page 2, we've got some English texts on the movie's billboard. "Interesting" and "Entertaining" are stacked on the left while "Movie" and "Theater" are stacked on the right.

Of these words, the word that stands out the most to me is Theater. English experts recognize that there are 2 spellings of this word: theater and theatre. These spelling tell you that it is either American (theater) or British (theatre).

I'm no expert on geography, but I believed that Ostania and Westalis were loosely based in Europe. I think I read someone talk about the architecture in Berlint also reflected European style houses--I'm so sorry that I can't recall who addressed it. The wars also felt like they were influenced by WWI and WWII. But what I do know is English it's my goddamn expertise. I'm not gonna be an uptight ass about pointing out every nook and cranny of inconsistent English, because that's just a whole lot of work for a creator and his team can do, realistically speaking. If Endo-san wanted perfect control in the language he's portraying in SxF, then he would need a dedicated team of linguists to help with translations. It may surprise you but there are many variations of a language (ex: English has AAVE. It's still English but used by this group of speakers--more on this later). But this is a hell hole of work, so I'm giving him so much slack on it as well as the translators handling the translations (like, really. No hate. Thank you for your services <3).

Another caveat: the English translation may also be a reflection of the translators. Maybe they favor American English than British English--who really knows? But I digress.

I'll stick to what I already know of the Ostanian language: It's English (variety is unspecificed, feels American) + Japanese.

Spelling shows cultural history

Next, let's address that these are adjectives slapped on a movie billboard. Normally, American movie theaters do not post adjectives. They post about the movie, the actors, etc. Comments about movies theaters being "family friendly" are subtext under the current film, etc. Here's an example of a movie theater from the 1950s found on gettyimages:

So this brings me to consider that English is being used as kazari eigo which means 'decorative English' in Japanese. In Chris Broad's (AbroadinJapan) words:

"... English in Japan is most commonly used as a form of cheap decorations and prestige, or value to a product and because so few people here understand it, the companies that plaster English all over their products and items rarely bother to check that it makes any sense." Reference:

Maybe it's a meme

This chapter, overall, felt really silly. There were silly drawings, silly play on words, silly foreshadows, etc. I couldn't help but think that maybe Endo-san was throwing in something amusing in these small things (cuz he's got attention to detail). Is it:

Interesting Entertaining Movie Theater OR Interesting Movie Entertaining Theater

It reminds me of:

Endo-san does have a tendency to incorporate memes into his manga/anime. Like... was Anya's jump not a Jojo's meme...? //sweats

I don't know if I'm severely poisoned by JJBA memes but, yeah, I saw it since the day this chapter came out. I just thought:

ANYA = DIO BRANDO

Anyway... whether it was intentional or unintentional (for this section), I love when mangakas incorporate something meme-y

2. Ricky's English Variety

This is where I went berzerk in this chapter with all of these small linguistic details. Ricky's speech says so much about him.

His introduction of himself is that he's a broken razor. Essentially, he's painting the bad-boy ML image. But he's not just any bad boy. He's a bad boy with issues controlling himself/the situation. In other words he's toxic and not good for us healing men/women //joking. However, out of all of these words, the one that stands out to me is shaddup. His speech suddenly changed because romance conflicts need to have a wall between the main couple. In this case, other than Ricky's pompadour, it's his speech. What we have here is a clash between English varieties.

To understand what is variety in linguistics, you might be familiar with these words: language, dialect, vernacular, and accent. Language is the most obvious, but dialect, vernacular, and accent can be a lil confusing to distinguish. So here's a definition and a chart I made to help distinguish them:

- Language: a system of communication that uses words, grammar, and spelling to convey meaning, languages can be spoken, written, or signed-- Ex: English, Spanish, Arabic, etc. - Dialect: is a variation of a language that is spoken by a specific group of people, such as a community, culture, or region. It includes differences in vocabulary, grammar, and how the language is used -- Ex: American English vs. British English vs. Australian English - Vernacular: is a type of dialect that's used by the "common people" of a region. It's a non-standard dialect that's spoken rather than written. Vernacular language is often made up of slang or regional terms -- Ex: African American Vernacular English (AAVE) - Accent: is the way people in a specific group pronounce words, which is also know as the prosody of speech. Prosody refers to the tone and musicality of someone's speech -- Ex: Boston accent

In Summary (a simplified version of the above info): Language is the standard language (aka what you learn in grammar class and in public speaking class) Dialect is born from language where it becomes variations of the language and adopts different grammar, vocabulary, and language use (like American English vs. British English vs. Australian English) Vernacular is a type of dialect used by "common people" and often include slang words and regional terms (think African American Vernacular English, or AAVE) Accent is a type of dialect that is mainly focused on prosody, or how a person pronounces a word (think Boston accent)

Now that you understand the linguistic terminologies, here's a fun exercise to show you what I see:

Ricky predominantly uses the standard English language in the film:

The moment a language's word has a (legitimate) spelling change, it automatically turns into a dialect (which touches on my previous topic about theater vs. theatre).

These are Ricky's English accents:

Finally, this is Ricky using an English vernacular:

POP QUIZ!

Now that you know what English variety is, can you guess which one Ricky has? If you guessed dialect, then you're half a step there. If you guessed accent, you're so close! But the correct answer is vernacular. This is because accent overlaps with vernacular, but accent stops at word pronunciations. Vernacular has accent and slang.

3. Discourse Analysis on Ricky's Vernacular

You should now have a good understanding of Ricky's vernacular, but now let's talk about why this is significant in discourse analysis.

Linguists who specialize in discourse analysis are responsible for analyzing why and how people speak a certain way. Many linguistic features are observed (lexicons, syntax, phonology, semantics, etc.) but what they share in common is who it's presented to. They're looking at the relationship between interlocutors (people who take part in the dialogue/conversation). In other words, depending on who you converse with, the way you speak is affected.

You may have already realized that Ricky is code-switching (a speaker switches between one or more languages and/or varieties) between standard English and his English vernacular.

Now, pay attention to who Ricky speaks to and when he code-switches.

We can observe in the above panel that Ricky uses standard English when speaking to Rachel. This is because Ricky has linguistically profiled her.

How am I so sure that he's linguistically profiled her? Well, because the majority of human beings unconsciously linguistically profile their appearances. Linguistic profiling does have a similar general word: stereotype. The only difference is that based on appearance, we make a split-second assumption and decision on how we talk to that person.

In this case, Ricky spoke first (exercising dominance through initiation) and used standard English. From a linguistic lens, Ricky is telling me: hey, I know I look like a bad boy, and you may have linguistically profiled me as someone who didn't have good education, which would have reflected in my speech, but I'm more than competent to use standard English. And because I can use standard English, I'm on the same equal playing field (metaphorically and linguistically speaking) as Rachel.

But then, notice the moment, Rachel tells him that she hates Ruffians like [him], Ricky's replies with an accent of shuddap (shut up). Linguistically, he's drawing a line between them. This also indicates that they're no longer on the same side before adding his threat: "I'll cut you!"

In this scene, notice Ricky's accent comes back again, but who is it directed to? An enemy or someone from his linguistic background. He uses this accent with an interlocutor of the same English variety background to make it clear to the person he's beaten up that he's speaking in the "language" that they both completely understand.

But, the moment Ricky speaks to Rachel, he reverts back to standard English. What this means is that Ricky is linguistically assimilating/aligning himself with Rachel to show that he's on her side. This can also mean that he's making himself appealing to her through discourse. On the other hand, Rachel makes herself appealing through physical means (her taste in clothing has changed--more on this under literary analysis).

In this scene, Ricky changes appearance (more on this under literary analysis) and he speaks using standard English. But the moment he loses his pompadour, guess what happens?

Ricky goes back to his true self and shows it through using English vernacular.

Rachel has never changed in her English, so she's always been true to herself. It's Ricky who goes through these changes. And it becomes a beautiful and romantic moment of a man undergoing change not only visually but linguistically.

4. Language parallel/mirroring between the anime and the manga

The fact that Endo-san decided to give Ricky an English vernacular in the English translation of the manga reflects his attention to details between the manga and the anime adaptation.

Linguistics in Anime (what you hear)

Maybe you've noticed, maybe you haven't, but Takuya Eguchi, Loid's voice actor, ingeniously incorporated different prosodic features when assuming roles for [redacted], Loid Forger, Twilight, and Robert. Catte-b covers this in her Leitmotifs in the Spy x Family soundtrack. Piracytheorist also provided a video demonstrating Loid, [Redacted], and Twilight's voices. In both posts, Eguchi's changing voice is called timbre (Catte-B and Piracytheorist have a music background). Timbre is defined as:

In other words, timbre is an individual's voice quality or vocal signature. It's how listeners can recognize a singer regardless of what song they sing and how anime watchers can identify a VA's voice by the character's name in another anime--there's just a certain quality in a person's voice that makes them identifiable.

Because of this definition, timbre is unfortunately not the correct terminology. Using vocal/voice timbre when describing vocal register, at the end of the day, is just pitch. Catte-B and Piracytheorist, however, are not wrong in their analyses. They have correctly identified one of the characteristics of speech and even provided vocal qualties (sharp, flat, soft, etc.) but the more appropriate term should be prosodic features.

I want to highlight the most important thing about prosodic features and it's the features that make it up: intonation, stress, rhythm, pitch, and pauses.

Intonation: is the variation of pitch across a phrase or sentence. > in a way, it's creating a melody when speaking. > its purpose in spoken language is to convey meaning. This is usually the case in tonal languages that require a specific pitch to indicate a word. However, in English, intonation is present when we ask a question (the last few words tend to be higher-pitched) vs. a statement which is either consistent in pitch or can sometimes be lower-pitched. Stress: involves giving prominence to one or more syllables in a word. This is achieved through increasing the length, volume, or pitch of a syllable, or by changing the vowel quality. > stress is important for helping listeners understand meaning / word class and distinguish words during rapid speech (ex: address, graduate, permit etc.) > it can be used to emphasize a specific word of a sentence (ex: Where did you go last night? vs. Where did you go last night? vs. Where did you go last night?) Rhythm: refers to the sense of movement and flow of speech. It's a combination of stress, length, and number of syllables. > mostly concerned with syllables and larger parts of speech rather than phonetic segments like consonants or vowels > important for making speech sound flow well and helps us understand what's being said > 2 most common types of rhythm in language are stress-timed and syllable-timed (English typically uses a stress-timed rhythm) Pitch: indicates highness or lowness of sound. > A person's pitch can reflect friendliness and warmth from the upper register (higher pitch spectrum) to mysterious and sexy with the lower register (lower pitch spectrum)--or at least, this is a consensus opinion that I've heard in English-speaking communities when it comes to the opinion of an individual's vocal pitch for both men and women. Pauses: a break in speaking or a moment of silence that can help add structure to the speech. Pauses have several functions: > gives listeners time to comprehend and digest the information > can be used to emphasize words or ideas > helps speakers transition between ideas > prevent rambling > can signal speech breaks, especially in languages that utilize pausing as a prominent cue > can denote high-information content

There are more prosodic features listed like juncture, loudness, duration, and tempo, but this is where it'll get too specific. Rhythm kinda already accounts for duration and tempo. Juncture is relating to annotating pauses (like indicate when a pause is greater than a certain milisecond), and loudness could kinda fall under the category of rhythm.

Timbre isn't listed as a feature, but I think it should simply because timbre is what makes your voice your voice. And because timbre is the "vocal signature", the shouldn't change--not unless you're as vocally talented as Tara Strong, who can easily change her timbre with different characters.

Eguchi-san does, however, have some roles where his timbre does change, specifically as Shuuji Hanma from Tokyo Revengers and Kazuya Kujou from Gosick (he does have some moments when he slips back to his familiar timbre).

Now that you have an understanding of what prosodic features are, you'll be able to hear that Eguchi-san's timbre doesn't change as [redacted], Twilight, Loid, or Robert. I believe Eguchi-san intentionally kept the same timbre for [redacted], Twilight, Loid, and Robert because they're all staying close to home. You can still recognize it's still the same person. But what changes are other prosodic features (intonation, pitch, rhythm, stress, and pauses). The following video is from Piracytheorist's post and the YouTube video is from Calle-B.

Here are my descriptions of the 4 voices:

[Redacted] - Intonation: N/A. Japanese is not a tonal language. - Stress: vowels and consonants are even for syllables - Rhythm: slow and steady - Pitch: low register, feels like it can be the middle (makes sense since this is the voice he's born with) - Pauses: frequent pauses (also, no way in hell you can convince me to measure the mili-second of his pause) - Tone: warm and soft - Other quality(-ies): reminds me of slight head-mix dominant (60% - 70%). In singing, a mixed voice is when a singer mixes his/her/their head voice and chest voice together (you might commonly know this as belting). But with mix voices, the singer can choose to make it an even mix of both head and chest, or leaning to either more head or more chest. Twilight - Intonation: N/A. Japanese is not a tonal language - Stress: consonants, vowels, syllables, and long phrases are rushed - Rhythm: his speed is fast. it's like water gushing out - Pitch: low(est) register. This is probably the deepest voice he can go while maintaining his timbre - Pauses: They only exist when a completed thought is finished. Twilight, BREATHE, man - Tone: cold and sharp - Other quality(-ies): sometimes his low register have a bassy quality to it Loid Forger - Intonation: N/A - Stress: His consonants and vowels are spoken fast in some syllables but also have a slight elongation typically towards the last few words of a completed thought - Rhythm: fast like Twilights, but has an upbeat rhythm to it - Pitch: upper register (it's the customer service voice lol) - Pauses: It's a mix of Twilight and [Redacted]'s. He has moments where he pauses after a long completed thought. Sometimes, he pauses in between a few words/syllables. Pauses feel irregular here--like he doesn't know if he should relax of speed up (as if he's being pulled to either Twilight or [redacted]'s pause pacing) - Tone: sounds cheerful - Other quality(-ies): 80% head-mix voice. The chest voice is still there, but head voice stands out Robert - Intonation: N/A. Japanese is not a tonal language. - Stress: elongated vowels and consonants -- similar to [redacted]. - Rhythm: originally slow and drawl. But as soon as he realizes that "Robert's mission is over", he starts speaking fast like Twilight - Pitch: low register and soft - Pauses: He has similar pauses to [redacted]. There seems to be a lil bit of longer pauses to indicate passiveness (reinforce the boring image of Robert) - Tone: monotone and soft - Other quality(-ies): head voice. The chest voice seems to be absent (chest voice is perceived as the power in singing and speech) as to reflect Robert as someone who is small and doesn't have much personality (as to not stand out during this identity). This voice is achieved by keeping your voice low but above a whisper. When "Robert's mission is over", the chest voice emerges and his head voice becomes head-mix.

Prosodic features are best accurately portrayed in discourse, meaning it's exclusively for speaking, not writing. So, how can Endo-san incorporate any linguistic feature in writing? We've already answered that with the analyses above: spelling.

Linguistics in the manga (what you read)

I've already went into great detail about spelling reflecting dialect, so I won't regurgitate what I've already covered. Instead, I want to focus on the fact that Endo-san actually acknowledges and uses prosodic features to mirror the 2 mediums of Spy x Family. This is significant because it reinforces the mirroring characters between Ricky and Loid. After all, it's going to be a foreshadow. Normally, I'd talk more about foreshadow under a literary lens, but for once, foreshadow is illustrated through linguistics.

In discourse analysis, the way you speak almost always portrays your identity.

Ricky's English vernacular is his real speech. > [Redacted]'s voice is Loid/Twilight's real speech, which often came out in the presence of Yor Forger.

Ricky speaks in standard English to mask his real voice and make himself more appealing to Rachel. > Loid's voice is used to mask both Twilight and [redacted].

Ricky gives up his pompadour (the most important thing in his life--which also happens to be a part of his identity) to destroy the "barrier" between him and Rachel. In doing so, he goes back to speaking with his English vernacular. > FORESHADOW: Loid will give up one or two of his identities for Yor (it might be Twilight and/or Loid). In exchange, [redacted] will come back.

Another possible foreshadow is what Rachel says about recognizing the importance of Ricky's pompadour to him. Because Rachel is a parallel character to Yor Forger, it can be implied that Yor would recognize how important Loid's identity is to him. In a previous analysis, I mentioned that Ch. 90.1, is the closest thing to an identity reveal. When Yor carved out Anya's name as Ania, she never once questioned it. She also didn't question when she had to carve another sign and spelled it with Anya. I'm aware of the caveat in this claim, such as Yor lacking education in Ostanian orthography which is why she doesn't react.

Be it grasping at straws or not, Yor has the emotional maturity to bounce back from the shock of an identity reveal. Yes, Yor would be sad and hurt to find out that Twilight is a spy from the opposition, but she would understand. They know they're both orphans because of the war. Yor already has a positive bias towards Loid based on observing his behavior at home, in his efforts to provide a better future for Anya, regardless of blood relationship. The point is, Yor is already infatuated with him and her feelings for him will influence her compassion and understanding for the person he's become, so bouncing back from feeling betrayal (not the romantic kind) would be faster for her than Loid.

Loid, on the other hand, may have more reluctance towards accepting the identity reveal (this is also mentioned in my Ch. 90.1 analysis). This is mainly because he's been conditioned to be skeptical and overanalyzing. So, he'll definitely need time to brood and reflect on their situation. Or, maybe he just might have already reached a point where he's just tired, and deflatingly accepts the situation. He'll self-loathe himself for being Westalis's best spy only to have married a legendary Garden assassin--seeing both as a win and loss (he'd be the type to say that he should be dead right now because his identity was revealed to the deadliest enemy). The confession of their love for one another just might be the thing to smooth out the wrinkles.

Someone once commented that, technically, losing Twilight as an identity isn't technically a loss. Twilight was born from a sacrifice. Loid technically isn't a loss either since he was born as a role for Twilight to play. Which leaves [redacted]. Like the film for Ricky, [redacted]'s foreshadowed arrival is just an opportunity for him to come in full circle.

PHEW.

This was a long linguistic analysis of these few pages, and in real-time this took me 8 hours to write. I did lose a night of sleep cuz my brain hyper-fixated on writing this. Help. But we're not done yet. The knowledge that you've acquired will definitely be beneficial through a literary lens in part 2.

I'll update this post with a link when Part 2 is finished.

[spiralling-spires]

Guys something happened and im back on my she ra nonsense. Help all my recent tabs are tma fanfic i need to go deep in my bookmarks to pull out the she ra stuff and follow a ton of she ra posters bc its been like two years since i was substantially aware of she ra BUT THE HYPERFIX IS COMING BACK I CAN FEEL IT AAAAGH

Its 12:44 am and i’m going to write all my thoughts and theories and you are going to enjoy them

1. Beast island is actually sentient and the reason it makes that signal is because it’s achingly lonely and doesn’t want its new friends (anyone who comes to the island) to leave. Little does it know it’s forcing its depression upon everyone that visits

2. Etheria and Eternia are actually twin planets, the First Ones are humans, and Eternia is far-future Earth (idk, Earth got a neighbour and then we colonized it? Sure sounds like humans to me). This explains why the First Ones’ language is made up of English phonemes and includes English words, and why Adora looks human.

3. Horde Prime used to be an Eternian, a very long time ago. His current form is the result of hundreds of years of incredibly vain genetic engineering and experimenting. He still isn’t fully pleased with his appearance and tweaks his clones every generation in an attempt to find “purity”.

4. Hordak’s “defect” is a result of this tweaking. Imagine inbreeding, except it’s one guy who keeps turning random genes on and off and switching out base pairs to see if it’ll make him prettier. Turns out there were some nasty genetic surprises in Hordak’s version of the code. As with any other clone that had such genetic conditions, Prime tossed him out in the next major fleet movement without running any analyses first. Running an analysis would force him to confront the fact that he (gasp) made an error!

5. The “general” thing wasn’t actually complete bs. Prime threatening to take Catra’s body as his own, was. See, Prime really wants to be this one perfect thing. Why would he waste time being a cat when he could be perfect? He has a special line of “generals” whose sole purpose is to house his mind. They have two additional eyes, the ability to grow those weird chin/cheek spikes, and the capacity to be much taller (all hidden unless he gives them specific hormones in preparation for inhabiting them). All this to say: Hordak might just wake up with four eyes open one day and promptly freak himself (and everyone else) out.

6. Entrapta has been in the center of a lot of explosions (esepcially when she was a teenager and hadn’t figured out the right balance of “pursue knowledge” to “lab safety” yet) and has replaced a startling amount of her body with prosthetics covered in a synthetic skin.

7. Hordak’s body wasn’t repaired by Prime in season 5. Prime just injected him with a bunch of painkillers (not enough to not be in pain, but enough to function) and covered up the arm holes. About an hour after the finale, the painkillers wear off and Hordak all but collapses. Having a chronic muscle/joint condition + being electrocuted + being possessed hurts. Man, he really went through it, didn’t he?

8. Based on Wrong Hordak, it’s going to be… really hard for the clones to get used to being outside of the hivemind. They will form cults. They will make new pieces of technology that will mimic the hivemind. They’ll scrounge for the chips and try to implant them in each other. They will find and beg (or threaten) Entrapta and Hordak to put back the hivemind. Hopefully people will have enough compassion for them to help them get used to being individuals.

9. All Eternians have the capacity to activate the Sword of Protection and become She-Ra (or gender-correlated equivalent). Horde Prime is, initially, Eternian, based on the other headcanons here, so he hypothetically could. Any clone could. Hordak could.

Wow! I forgot about some of these headcanons! This was pretty neat. Hope you guys like em too. Also I haven’t watched canon in like a year so there might be some inaccuracies, but at some point I figured that holding onto the thoughts until I rewatched canon just wasn’t worth it. And lo and behold now you can see all my random thoughts too!

[wisteria-lodge]

*slightly* exploded bird primary (badger-flavored system) (unhealthy badger primary model) + rapid-fire/actor bird secondary

Hi Wisteria! I’ve been loving your thoughtful and in-depth analyses and no one else in my life is familiar with the SHC system, so it’s been hard to get some outside perspective. English is not my first language, so please forgive my grammar/awkward phrasing at times. For my sorting, I am thinking Bird primary, though I’ve considered Lion and Badger primaries. I think I am not a snake primary. I have never felt there was an intrinsic moral hierarchy when it comes to people I care about. I still care for them, but at the end of the day, I think we are all living conscious beings who deserve equal treatment, rights, and consideration.

Definitely getting Idealist primary here (Bird or Lion, and I see why you're thinking Bird. Your whole position is well-thought out and well articulated.) I will say that 'all living conscious beings deserve equal treatment' is kind of the Badger mission statement,' but when we're in generalities that big, that thought could just as easily be coming from a Bird with some Badger in their System, a Paragon Lion, or even a really expansive Snake.

I also think prioritizing your own group is often dangerous.

This bit here could describe a Snake or a Badger equally well, depending on how we're defining the "group" we're talking about here.

A Loyalist would probably say that protecting the group is the only thing you know for sure you can do well, and when things get too big and Idealistic, they become unreal, hypothetical, and unsafe. But you seem perfectly fine with that level of big-picture stuff, so I'm happy to say Idealist for you. Also, there's an undercurrent of... suspicion, directed at Loyalists.

I guess I could be a snake that only includes themselves, as I do act in self-preservation a lot of the times

That's a human thing. If someone is *struggling* with turning on the self-preservation, that's a problem, and probably a sign of Burning, or a very immature Badger.

and struggle to trust people.

That can also come from a lot of different places.

I sometimes have an attitude of turning people bad in my head as soon as they act against me, or in a way that reveals their “true character”

Honestly, this kind of sounds like it could be a *Badger* thing?

Because Badgers have opt-out morality, they will often do this thing where you're one of their people, until you break the rules (or the social contract) badly enough. And then you're out, because you're a threat to the rest of the group.

(this is often a projection) and then tend to self-isolate.

Hmmm. And now you're back to being philosophical. Distancing yourself from the emotion of cutting people off. Much more Bird.

I thought bird primary because I do change my ideas about the world and morality quite often and refine my worldview as I discover new ideas. I am also very receptive to scientific ideas and do put logic and reasoned morality above intuition.

You also seem very chill about this whole process, which makes me say Bird again. (Not Lion. The process just tends to be a lot messier and a lot more emotional with Lions.)

However, my tendency to prioritize the perceptions of the group, my need to serve a larger purpose and my desire to be useful to society do feel quite badger-y.

They do. "Prioritize the perceptions of the group," especially is a very Badger thing to say. Badgers also like being useful to the group. But 'need to serve a larger purpose' is a big enough statement that it could work for almost anyone.

What Badger and Bird have in common is that they're both External primaries. What the world thinks is important, and you care about that in a way that Lions and Snakes just kind of don't.

As for lion, I do often act based on heuristics, especially if I haven’t thought out a specific issue yet.

Yeah, this isn't lion. For one thing - you used the word "heuristics." For another, you're stressing about the way you only rely on these "well xyz worked in past" mental shortcuts when you haven't "thought a thought out a specific issue yet." Implication being that, in a perfect world, you would have time to think it out completely every time. (Birds hate having to make snap decisions.)

I can also pretend to be more rational than I am, and tend to live life in automatic mode, by relying on assumptions and facts that sound good. I think I do this less than other people, but that is still a flaw I’ve noticed.

You rely on these "automatic" shortcuts less than other people, but think that you should use them less, and feel bad that you use them at all.

I wonder if you're a Bird primary living in a very Badger community. Or the flip, a Badger living with a bunch of Birds.

As for my secondary, I am a little bit lost. I am very much in my own head and not very action-oriented, so I feel like I lack the data to identify my secondary, or I am burned and just using whatever works. I usually just use stress to motivate action and procrastinate until the last minute.

Oh, the neurodivergent special. Save the non-preferred task for the last minute, and then use the adrenaline that generates to hack your brain into getting it done really fast. Definitely not the only person here doing that.

Childhood: As a kid, I was extremely quiet, sensitive, and introverted. From early on, I remember being very artistic and curious. I would dress up and improvise plays in front of my family. I also loved to draw, write poems, walk in nature, and learn about the world (I was especially fascinated with animals). I also loved to get lost in imaginary worlds, and I remember writing fantasy stories, and believing I had magical powers or was an alien/magical creature.

When I was in school, I remember not connecting very well with my peers. I think people could feel I was different. I was soft spoken, sensitive, and I excelled at school.

I mean so far, *I*could have written this. And I'll take it all into account, but this isn't a system for describing personality, so much as it is one for describing method/motivation.

I didn’t like sports like other boys, and it wasn’t acceptable to hang out with girls, so I just kept to myself. I was already doing good in school, so I just kind of developed that aspect of my identity. I didn’t get along with many other kids and ate lunch with my teachers a lot. I still had friends, but few of them were close.

You're describing constructing your identity in a very deliberate, conscious way, which is more Bird than Badger. It's honestly Bird secondary - like this how you get Actor Bird, deliberately developing one 'version' of yourself because it's useful in certain situation. I'm hearing you enjoyed acting and costumes, and (flash forward to present day) you "pretended" to be more rational than you are. I think you might be an Actor Bird.

It was validating to be so good at academics, and to get teachers’ and parents’ approval. Even if some other kids resented it, I didn’t care because it gave me worth.

This hits every child to some degree, but it hits External primaries very hard. This could describe a young Bird or a young Badger equally well, and now I'm wondering if any of these authority figures especially Birdy or especially Badgery?

Getting good grades, being the perfect child, being “mature for my age” were a big part of my personality.

"Perfect Child" is often an Actor Bird construction. "Mature for your age" is something I usually hear said about young Badgers. Are you maybe a Bird primary, with a very Badger-flavored System? It would fit everything I've read so far.

I also knew deep down I was queer

oh thats brutal

but I eventually became really good at self-editing, and I began to embody a version of me that was acceptable. I was the successful, responsible, smart kid, and I eventually started playing football in high school so that of course meant I was straight. I fully made myself believe the mask I was putting on at that time (badger-like?). In high school, I was tired of being an outsider, so I tried fitting in. I became much more agreeable, sociable, and started becoming more popular. Honestly, it felt good to be appreciated by my peers, and I did play into the character I was projecting. I was still hyper-focused on academics, but for the first time, people actually liked me.

Okay, so I do see why you're saying Badger. Badgers (especially young badgers) can just adopt the group's identity, and lose sight of their own individuality in the process. But I don't think that's what's going on here.

To me, this sounds like it could only be Actor Bird. I know English isn't your first language, so I'm not reading too too much into the word choice... but you do refer to this "Acceptable Self" as a "character," that you "embody." Building this "mask" was a deliberate, conscious process, and it sound like you lived in this persona for a while. Also, not ignoring the fact that... it worked. Wanting to be more popular, and then building a persona that is more popular... that's not something everyone can do.

This actually makes me think of a sorting I wrote for Blackbeard of Our Flag Means Death, and the Actor Bird-specific angst of building a character, spending a little too long in that skin and then feeling that people only like you/you only have worth because of a role you play... and then becoming trapped, because your character is too simple, and it's stifling.

I eventually came to accept my sexuality and had a friendship that made me confront the lack of authenticity of the mask I was putting on. After that, I explored my authentic self while still enjoying my newfound social skills and ability to attract people.

I love that. You built a "popular" persona, and then realized that you din't have to wear it all the time.

I also started getting interested in social justice, philosophy, and politics, which made me question a lot of preconceived notions and ideas I held true about the world.

Oh that's a very Bird primary list of interests right there.

As I became more informed, ethics and morality became a big corner stone of my interactions with the world. I was always interested in finding the “right” way to be, even as a child,

This almost seems like a version of the "book fantasy," which is something I've heard from several Bird primaries at this point: "When I was younger, I wished that there was a magic book that would tell me the 'right' way to act in every situation."

but this meant I could figure out what that meant in more objective terms, and for myself instead of what adults thought. Paradigm shifts were exciting (and still are).

I absolutely love that for you. Bravo.

Family dynamics:

In terms of family dynamics, I always went along to get along. I was checked out emotionally, especially since a lot of family members would say homophobic things, and I never felt completely comfortable with them. I stuck with easy topics and didn’t go into my personal life, and I was content with the image of the golden child they had of me. Even with my parents, whom I love, I never felt I could completely be myself. This led to a lot of secrets and lies to conceal my real self. I was never that rebellious or troublesome to begin with, and I kind of acted like a little adult.

Okay. That makes sense. Sounds like you built a pretty robust Badger primary model that was useful for keeping the peace with your family. (It also sounds just, incredibly necessary.) This explains why a lot of your descriptions of your younger self read as super Badger primary to me: "little adult" "mature for your age" "farming the approval of authority figure."

I also thought a lot of their views were outdated, although I rarely argued with them. My dad had the idea he had to be strict, which was just not the best fit for me. I learned to be extremely secretive, sneaky, and find ways around the rules. I was not very wild to begin with, but I did value my freedom. I just kind of passively agreed, and then did it behind their backs.

Sounds possible you might have a little bit of a snake secondary model?

Although my dad was very sensitive and affectionate, a thing that hurt me a lot was his inability to deal with others’ emotions. I was not allowed to express negative emotions or cry, and he justified this as him being “old school”.

Ah yes. As we know, boys should only have Cool emotions, like Anger and Science. Wondering if your *Dad* might be a Badger primary, with this focus on Tradition and Rules.

This was extremely frustrating to me, as I never understood how tradition could be a valuable reason for anything, or how sticking with old values and refusing to adapt was acceptable.

A little bit of that Bird primary 'make it make sense' thing.

My mom, though more accepting of my sensitivity, was also very critical. She used the status quo to judge what I did, which was also very frustrating. If something I did was weird or impolite, she would use a kind of circular reasoning (this is bad because it’s not socially acceptable, and it’s not socially acceptable because it’s bad), which was also confusing to me.

I love that you can now identify that as classic circular reasoning.

I just wasn’t super interested in developing a strong connection with anyone in my family. I just felt that it was all too arbitrary,

Definitely don't think you're a Loyalist, because I don't think a Loyalist could do a break this clean. There'd be some sense of something... some guilt, some emotion, some residual thing.

and I was more interested in exploring my friendships with people who understood me more deeply. I felt my parents’ (especially dad’s) rules didn’t make any sense, and I wanted my freedom as soon as possible. Since I moved out, our relationship has been a lot better, though I still hide aspects of my life from them.

Very true that just not needing to be around your family 24/27 makes things so much better and easier to deal with.

Problem solving: In terms of problem solving, I like to think I am strategic, and a good contingency planner. I generally understand things well, and how they work together, and am quick to find a solution. When thinking about solving a small problem, I will usually think of the “goal state” first (i.e., what is the ideal I am trying to achieve in this situation). Then I can break down what I need to do. This usually starts with evaluating resources at my disposal (i.e., time, space, material, or mental resources), and what is in the environment. Then, I can come to a solution implicitly by connecting the dots. Finally, I will mentally play out the situation and see if it works, or if there are any roadblocks. This all happens quickly though. Planning is fun, but so is throwing away the plan or finding a clever way to get out of the situation.

What a fantastic breakdown of how to solve a problem. It's also extremely Bird secondary. If it happens fast enough, and you're comfortable enough with it, it looks like it even gets into Rapid-Fire Bird territory (probably why I was getting a little Snake secondary energy up there, Rapid-fire birds can look extremely Snake.)

Am a little bit side-eyeing your decision to call yourself "not very action-oriented" up there. You seem perfectly comfortable with problem-solving to me.

Whenever the unexpected happen, the path becomes really obvious to me. Priorities become salient, and things that are useless fall to the side. It’s more in situations where I’m forced to make a controlled decision that I’m a nervous and indecisive wreck.

Bird primaries HATE making snap decisions.

I can get stressed out if there is missing information, or if the expectations aren’t clear. Travel is especially stressful because of the number of unexpected events that can affect the rest of the trip.

I mean, no one likes missing information or unclear expectations. But it really gets to Birds. (Both primary and secondary honestly. and I'm really thinking that you're a Double Bird.)

With all the information, even if it’s bad news, I can manage and find a solution. But my brain will keep spinning scenarios if I don’t know for sure. Even at school, uncertainty was always worse than bad news.

I hear this. It really goes back to that classic Bird primary fantasy: "but I want to know EVERYTHING"

Not knowing where I stand with someone, with a group, or with a supervisor also makes me nervous. I like knowing what they think of me and what people need from me so I can provide it (or not bother if they dislike me for no reason).

I do think that you have a Badger model, or a Badger flavor to your system. Honestly, you very likely have bOTH. You took in the parts of your parents worldview that made sense to you: it IS useful to know what people want from you, and to know that you aren't making any social faux pas (that way, if someone is acting weird at you, you know it doesn't have to do with you.) But you also have this much more performative Badger model: this is who my parents expect me to be, I don't agree with it, but I can put it on and let it run.

In terms of interpersonal problems, this is where I am most terrible. I am often an absolute doormat and will not vocalize problems and internalize everything. My issue is that I don’t feel confident that I am right and doubt my ability to argue my point and stand up for myself without absolutely ruining the relationship.

Unfortunately, I can't say I'm *surprised,* since you grew up in an environment where arguing was very frowned upon, and it's not like you can win an argument with someone depending on circular arguments and logical fallacies.

You also built a large part of your *identity* around this Perfect Child, Invisible Badger who just does not cause problems. In the language of this system, you built a very intense Badger primary model as a coping mechanism, and now it's run out it's usefulness... but is still hard to punch through, because old models get sticky.

If something bothers me, I will mull over it and eventually let it go because it becomes too late.

Okay, *this* is why you thought there might be some Burning going on. There's this aspect of the way you relate to people that just feels very unsafe, and so you... shut it down.

I think the problems here are uncertainty, and lack of control. When I am in a situation where I know all the elements, have resources, and plenty of time, I am good.

That is absolutely Textbook Double Bird. But (as I'm sure I don't have to tell you)... it's also a fantasy. Very often, you will be lacking in either resources, info, or time. This is why a lot of Double Birds build models, or look like Lion secondaries whenever they don't have time to prep.

If there is an unknown, I can’t do anything.

In the language of this system, that's a Bird primary that's Exploded a little bit, this idea that you can't possibly act if you don't have all the information. It's very Chidi from The Good Place.

In social situations, I can’t control the volatility of relationships or other people, so I just control my reaction.

Pretty much all you can control, so good.

Often, instead of doing something when something is bothering me, I will basically force a paradigm shift to see the situation in a better light, and then move on.

Bird primaries are known for the superpower of just being able to *decide* to like something, or *decide* to be interested in something. That is absolutely what you're doing here. It's *a* way to solve that problem, I guess. But it doesn't seem to make you feel free/powerful.

I kind of have an addiction with the process of solving, and an intolerance for doubt. When I was questioning my career choices, I would reflect on all aspects of my personality, of my goals for the future, I would take endless career quizzes, read the descriptions of jobs over and over, would ask my friends what they thought I should do, etc. I would run in circles, never deciding. I even started deconstructing the philosophy of work, to determine if it was even possible to make a good decision.

Very Bird. Very *exploded* Bird. Of course you went from "what job do I want" to "is the concept of work philosophically moral."

Other questions: My future plans is to live a relatively quiet life out of the public eye, surrounded by books, and having plenty of free time to research or practice my hobbies. I want a stable job, with money so I don’t have to think about those things, and I want to be intellectually stimulated and to be able to add value to the world in the best way I can. I want two dogs, a partner who is fine with my need for space. I also want to live in a walkable city that has an interest in art and culture, and access to nature.

That sounds lovely.

Mostly, I want to be satisfied that I am a good person and be able to do what I want with relative freedom. Now, to be honest, I am very unsatisfied about the real world. It seems so monotonous, and I have always had the secret desire to escape into a fantasy realm. Unfortunately for myself, I don’t believe in the supernatural.

It gets better. There are a lot of cool things out there, and it all gets much less linear once you leave school. I would probably say though - knowing you and your tendencies - maybe a little less focus on being a good person (because that's a can of worms) and maybe a little more on doing things that are a net positive to the world around you.

I feel most powerful when I surprise myself. I once prepared for a grad school interview by reading hundreds of questions and preparing answers for them. When I practiced with a friend, it just came out forced and clunky, and I found myself trying to repeat exactly what I had written. I had accepted I just wasn’t going to get in. When I went to the actual interview though, I just went off script and took risks. I told personal anecdotes while maintaining the image I wanted to project to them, which got me an offer.

You are absolutely a Rapid-Fire bird, which is very cool.

When I speak up in class, when I stand up for myself, when I make impulsive decisions, and especially when I do something scary, I also feel this way.

I like it. Lean into that Lion secondary energy. I know a lot of Birds, especially Double Birds, find it extremely helpful.

I also feel powerful when I feel competent. For instance, when I fix issues at work, when I get good grades, when I manage to problem solve in a clever way.

All of this is very Bird secondary. And honestly, a very effective-sounding Bird secondary.

In high school and during the pandemic, I also was obsessed with personality systems and would read and introspect for hours trying to determine my type. But there was never an answer satisfying enough because the process of introspection was the addictive part of it, and even a sliver of doubt would send me into another rabbit hole. There is a kind of poking at it until it becomes mush effect. I literally made excel sheets with my results on different quizzes, over multiple weeks, to see if there was a pattern. By focusing so much on figuring out who I am, and the intricacies of my own psyche, I just end up losing the big picture and not being able to contextualize the information I’ve gathered. Sometimes it even becomes hard to identify anything since I’m focusing on such a tiny part of myself, and the human mind is so kaleidoscopic and changing, so it stops making sense and just becomes a big blob of behaviors and thoughts. I’ve had a hard time figuring out my MBTI and enneagram because of this as well.

I have been there before, trying to navigate the difference between what is useful introspection and what is navel-gazing indulgence. I accept that people are incredibly complicated, and any categorization system is inherently imperfect. I also accept that words to describe your inner workings are extremely helpful, and honestly, necessary. One thing I like about the system is the cleanness of it. So much of it has to do with cutting through the noise and the *presentation* we are presented, and just going - okay, how do we work, why do we work?

Thank you to Lorangutan for such an excellent submission. If you'd like a Sorting of your very own, commissions are open on my ko-fi. :D

If you'd like to read more about the system I'm using, my explanation is right here.

[idontwanttospoiltheparty]

I love your nuanced takes. They are always a joy to read.

I'd be curious which songs, beatles or solo, do you think they wrote for/about each other and their situation (beatles&solo).

You don't have to go into great detail on them if you don't wanna.

Hope you have a great day. <3

Hi anon :) Glad you enjoy my takes! Hope you have a great day too <3

Preface that while I think this is fun, I really don't generally think songs are a good vehicle to extrapolate about the real life of these people. So, I try not to base my analyses of them as people on these songs, even the ones I feel more strongly about.

I'll categorize these by how certain I am about them (and I'll leave out confirmed stuff like Too Many People, Early 1970, How Do You Sleep?, Run of the Mill, Here Today etc.)

If you have a question re: why some specific song is in this category and not the other I can try to explain, though some of it is admittedly just vibes (and since I try to separate this from the Main Analysis™, I feel okay utilizing the vibes as a justification at times lol) If I left a song off you'd like my take on feel free to ask as well.

Close to positive:

Day Tripper is imho at least partially about Paul. This one feels so obvious to me, given what John said about it and the timeline (written squarely before Paul took LSD, conveniently after the whole LA fiasco), yet I rarely see people talking about it. Sad! It could also be partially about Cynthia.

Tug of War: Paul said it was about John in 1982 but then retconned that. IDK why he did that but. Come on!

I Know (I Know): I nearly put this one a tier lower but the I've Got A Feeling intro and the way it fits in the timeline. The Getting Better reference. It matching up with Paul's description of them tripping together + "share in each other's mind". It's too much.

A compelling case can be made:

In My Life: it makes a lot of sense. But Paul isn't the only likely muse IMO. he might be the most likely one, I'm not sure. I Know (I Know) makes me tend more to it though, admittedly.

3 Legs: yeah. Probably! It's not entirely clear to me what he's expressing outside a feeling of betrayal though.

Oh! Darling: Likely about John, but perhaps actually about the band as a whole.

The Answer's at the End: the way George quoted that same saying when asked about Paul in that live chat… THE IMPLICATIONS! (at least that maybe George came to associate the song with Paul later on?)

Remember: I tend to think this song is specifically about running away from the Beatles. There's more sadness in it, given John references Bring It On Home in the lyrics.

Who Can See It: this one also appears to be about George's general relationship with the Beatles. I don't think this is a hot take but no one talks about this song lol. I love it!

Cafe On The Left Bank: the song referencing Charles de Gaulle making a speech does place this quite firmly in the 60s. It's not really a love song though so I don't get why people consider this one such a win lol. It seems to mostly be about the city of Paris itself.

I like to think it's true but am admittedly not sure:

Call Me Back Again: it's a vague song, really. But damn… those mellotron flutes.

#9 Dream: IDK. this versus "The dream is over". the production-style. I like reading this song as a reconciliation with The Beatles as a concept.

Little Lamb Dragonfly: the whole being haunted by the dragonfly even though you're trying to move on thing :/

No Words: COME ON??????? but the Denny writing credit does puzzle me lol.

Crippled Inside: it would be soooooo devastating @ Paul!!! (probably only partially, possibly also self-directed)

Could have been inspired by the other but not necessarily in the way people think:

Some People Never Know: I do think Paul felt John was cynical in the way he's describing in this song. (I don't really think I Know (I Know) is a response to this song btw)

Silly Love Songs: ditto. He is Not fucking saying "I love you" (romantically) to John in the song he's duetting with his wife lol. but it could be a cheeky lil nod.

We Can Work It Out: I believe Paul when he says this was written about a fight he'd had with Jane. But Paul was also in conflict with John at the time (again, the LSD thing), thus I think that might have in some way informed his outlook when writing this. And John may have been thinking about their conflict while writing his part.

Let Me Roll It: it sounds a lot like John, yeah! but idk about the lyrics.

Look At Me: it could be about Paul, but it could be about the whole world, really. It's more a wish to be seen and understood really.

Dear Boy: I'm annoyed by people insisting Paul is lying when he says the inspiration is Linda's ex-husband. She's co-credited (and she actually isn't credited on every Ram song. I don't think the credit was "handed" to her, at least not at this point in time)! That being said, Paul may have bonded with Linda over feeling unappreciated in their previous life situations.

Yvonne's The One: Look. I think John's death really shifted how Paul felt about telling people he loved them. That may well have influenced the lyrics song. I don't think it's necessarily that literal.

However Absurd: ditto. This song is even more abstract so it feels even less literal.

?????? Who Knows

If I Fell: usually I think no it couldn't possibly. But�� (And I don't find that Valentines card very compelling, no. but it's just like: well then who else would this song John called very personal about? I guess, for all I know, it could even be Brian. wow!)

Girl: I mean. Maybe! Sort of. They also said at the time it was about religion, and that makes a lot of sense, but it could still be that the character of the girl was inspired by how John felt about Paul at the time.

I'm So Tired: it seems equally likely to be about Yoko to me.

Don't Let Me Down: ditto. Actually. this one's more likely Just about Yoko tbh.

I'm Losing You: maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaybe. but also. Yoko.

Now And Then: genuinely who knows. this one's admittedly stranger for Yoko but… they did "interrupt" their relationship often, requiring to "start again". Also May is an option.

The Pound Is Sinking: Mostly, I don't know how straightforward it is.

Honestly… Not really

(Just Like) Starting Over: the "My Love", "Another Day", "Wings" thing has never compelled me, based on those being OLD songs by 1980, plus none of the phrasing or word choice is particularly conspicuous to me. But I also don't feel very strongly that it's not about Paul. It could be, though I don't know that I'd assume it was meant as a direct declaration of love then. Also the line before being a reference to Through The Looking Glass is neither here nor there. Since when is John Lennon dropping Lewis Caroll references only reserved for Paul? that feels like putting the cart before the horse, based on one single lyric in Glass Onion.

I've Got A Feeling: I think he's just saying words here, tbh.

Real Love: if it's about Paul that's fucking depressing. But I don't think it is really.

[alexandraisyes]

A small ramble about Eclipse's therapy

Okay, so this is all copy-pasted from Discord where I was going through it minute by agonizing minute and just rambling my little heart out

This episode. Specifically this one. Ramble under cut.

Reminders before I talk about this! Eclipse is confirmed to have ASPD in canon. I also have ASPD. I do know things on that topic because of this unfortunate fact. For some in-depth things on Eclipse's sociopathy, I suggest popping over to these two analyses! Eclipse Is a Sociopath - Traits of ASPD

Eclipse obviously doesn't even want to be here, we know this from the very start when Moon is literally shoving him to get him into the room

Eclipse attempts (and fails) to intimidate both Moon and Solar. First with the comment about Lunar, which was meant to get under Moon's skin but when he didn't get a reaction he brushed it off with a 'whatever'. Next with the stand-off with Solar "Name is Solar" Technically correct, as we know from earlier episodes that his name is "Solar Eclipse" and Lunar is "Lunar Eclipse" The 'eclipse brothers' (Which is only further supported by the fact that a blood moon is a type of eclipse) Of course, we all know this was not the answer Solar was wanting. (Solar gets his own petty revenge by dragging the process out. Moon also gets petty revenge by mocking Eclipse. This is honestly a good reminder that they all came from the same base personality.)

Eclipse was flabbergasted. Absolutely gobsmacked. Shook When Moon told him upfront that he does need therapy. I think this stems partly from the fact that this is Moon and Moon has never tried to do something that would benefit Eclipse And then just being told what he already knows by someone else probably caught him off guard. He doesn't want to go to therapy because he thinks that therapy means he is weak. We already know how Eclipse feels about being weak and needing to rely on others for literally anything. We see this on a lesser extent with Solar who doesn't ask for anything because he doesn't want to be seen as a burden.

I do think it's important that he calls Solar the 'inferior version' right after calling him the 'better version' of himself. He called Solar better than him and then immediately change his words. Possibly because he can't stand the fact that Solar actually is better than him. Not necessarily in what one thinks of when we do comparisons like that, but more of Solar's more stable than Eclipse. He has a family to lean back on. . . unlike Eclipse. The one person that Eclipse cared about (at one point but now claims to hate) now hates Eclipse but loves Solar, which is just. . . another version of Eclipse. And that knowledge has to be painful, even for Eclipse.

It's also possible that Eclipse actually does think that Solar is inferior due to the common mindset that socio/psychopaths tend to have about 'normal people' around them. We pity people on a superficial level for being held back by fickle things like emotions and guilt, while also blatantly ignoring our own issues that make our own lives 582390458234098x harder due to the packaged deal that is ASPD

(To briefly summarize the "package deal" - along with socio/psychopathy toss in Anxiety Disorders, Paranoia, Dissociation/Derealization Issues, PTSD, ADHD/ADHD-symptoms, and Depression)

Back to the analysis

Eclipse immediately starts to mock Earth's office. He tends to mock Earth a lot in the past, because she's a very reactive character. It also used to be a lot easier to make her insecure. Someone who is insecure isn't going to press a hostile party for conversation/information.

Earth, like the girl-boss she is, calls him out. Kudos to Earth

Okay let's step back from Eclipse a second because MOON This is probably the worst possible timing for him to bring Eclipse in for a therapy appointment and he knows it and even though Earth says it's fine he's still apologizing and genuinely sorry and I think that's a huge step from how he was falling apart a little bit ago and slipping back into what Old Moon was Moon's also always had a soft spot for Earth (Big brother syndrome except Moon is technically the youngest sibling)

Okay back to Eclipse. After a failed attempt to get under Earth's skin he goes for Moon again. The man really do be flabbergasted that the two most reactive people he knows aren't giving him the reaction he wants.

And then back to Earth. He honestly spends the first bit just trying to get a reaction out of everyone because that's what he's good at. He's exasperated when Earth starts asking him questions, and gives her his normal sarcastic a-hole response. He's purposefully unnerving and trying to make both Earth and Moon uncomfortable because he doesn't want to be there.

He skirts around the abandonment question, which just lets everyone in the room know that he does indeed feel abandoned. He deflects the question honestly horribly in my opinion. "Abandoned, why would I feel abandoned?" Proceeds to list off reasons that he would feel abandoned but phrases them as questions. Sir? Try harder.

Moon plays a common tactic when dealing with unwilling peoples. "The sooner you play along the sooner you can leave." Common courtroom/interrogation tactic. Gives a goal to work toward while also implying that they're willing to stick around for as long as the person in the room is willing to bullcrap them. This may be a familiar tactic to the audience because parents love using this when teens are lying to them. So do teachers. "Just tell us what we want to hear and then we can be done. But if you sit here in silence then I'll sit here in silence with you."

Reminds me of parole. A lot of people who've gotten in trouble with the powers that be are required to participate in active therapy if they want to get out of a heavier charge. It's a common requirement of plea deals

Watch me ramble Back on track

Plsplspls and then Eclipse says the same thing I FORGOT HE SAID IT CUT ME SOME SLACK IM TYPING AS I WATCH THIS FOR THE SECOND TIME ITS BEEN A WHOLE DAY I've got the adhd my memory is not that good sir

I'm only 6 minutes in are you bored yet

Earth does irritate him by making assumptions about him that are wrong. It's a small blow to the pride. He's not acting like he doesn't care, he just doesn't care. And then he just starts bullcrapping so I'm gonna call him out on his bullcrap

He didn't just care about the star

Someone who doesn't care isn't going to be hurt by rejection so lets go over the list

Getting back to Moon. Remerging their code which is where he felt like he was supposed to be. Moon shoved him away, rejected him, and that made him upset

Lunar. Lunar wasn't just a means to an end because Lunar had just the right traits, the right level of whatever to make Eclipse care about him. Think of it like this. Eclipse was barely offended by Bloodmoon attacking him and ditching him. But he went out of his way to blow Lunar up because Lunar, in his eyes, betrayed him

The star to an extent. He cared less about the star itself and more about being able to make a world perfect for him and those around him. He was a Lawful Evil type back then (Dances in DnD language)

Eh that's honestly all I can think of off the top of my head. I'd argue he also cared about Sun to an extent because he used to be Moon, but probably not as much these days lol But yeah CUT THE CRAP ECLIPSE GRRR WHOO LOW SELF ESTEEM "You'd all just immediately try to find a way to kill me" He really do think that everyone would just go out of their way to kill him even if he was existing peacefully. He's half right

Sun didn't really want anything to do with it. Solar was just going along with it because Moon's his best friend (and Solar himself is insecure whoo). Earth isn't confrontational. Ruin (who probably brought eclipse back, btw where did he disappear to we haven't seen that cockroach for a while) didn't hop on the kill Eclipse train until after he was 'kidnapped', and we all know how sus that was. Lunar, yeah, but that's Lunar. Moon also was immediately like "omg kill this guy" but also, that's just Moon. Like I have talked about how self-centered those two are before, haven't I? Monty also wanted to kill Eclipse on sight but he's literally worse than Moon so he don't really count. Monty is literally an awful person who is only semi-decent because of Earth

Eclipse describes his death to Earth as if she wasn't literally there. Again. Reactions. As well as the weird complinsult which she has no idea how to process. Is it an insult? Is it a compliment? It's both honey. It's both. Take it or leave it. Once again frustration and insecurity at the lack of control Eclipse has ove everything. From being monitored, to being brought back, to literally being in a brand new body that he had no say in. The physical lack of control bleeds into the mentality that he has no control over anything, including his own thoughts and emotions. And what's sad is it's kind of true. . . he can't even control his own actions some of the time because of the directives. That just makes him feel paranoid and hopeless, and while he doesn't say it explicitly, it shows. He doesn't think he can change in his mentality because he can't change anything else around him either. That's part of why he thinks therapy is pointless.

10:30 This is where I argue he takes off his metaphorical mask. Not because he trusts Earth, but he's trying to see where her breaking point is. She's been patient and kind and making an attempt to be understanding and it's curious because no one has ever just sat there and asked him questions and let him ramble. He's trying to make her uncomfortable still, but he's also curious. This is a button that has never been presented to him before, how many times can he press it before it's taken away from him. At first he's thinking about his answers, calculating his responses, but it feels honest.

12:20 And then he realized that he was getting ahead of himself and that he was just rambling because he's never had someone to talk to and he stops. Whether it's because it's something he doesn't want her to know, or Moon to know, or it's just something he isn't ready to say out loud yet, he changes topics.

And then he's back to deflecting and getting the focus off of him and poking at Earth again

(Side note: Earth calls him an idiot in a roundabout way and it made me giggle both times watching it)

"You would take more pride in-" Pauses video Gestures frantically PRIDE UGH THE FALLING POINT OF A SOCIOPATH IS OUR PRIDE Yes he would take more pride in it being about information gathering. He'd probably be more complicit if it were for that purpose instead of 'inner healing' because going to therapy is a BLOW TO HIS PRIDE IM Ignore me as I go insane Presses play

Eclipse breaking the fourth wall like-

He's very cynical about the idea of trust and it's because the few times he put his trust in someone/thing it's failed him. AND THEN MORE DEFLECTION ECLIPSE PLEASE- Just stay on topic I'm begging you I know it's hard but LET ME HARVEST YOUR BRAIN MAN STOP DEFLECTING

He's so gobsmacked when Earth claims that we aren't defined by who makes us. Which must be hard to hear for Eclipse because for a while there his entire identity was defined by the fact that he was made by Moon and left behind.

He presses Earth for further detail about this and it makes me wonder if this was the first time he's ever heard or conceptualized this

It's fun to hear Eclipse (I think for the first time) finally verbally disown Sun and Moon. "I don't care to make it right anymore. They've cast their stone and now I'm stuck in my own ship." AKA They had their chance to give him a chance time and time again and each time they shunned him. Why would you go back to someone who has only caused you pain? Eclipse is in a similar situation with Sun/Moon that Lunar is in with him. Part of him wants to be back with them because he was made from them, they will always be part of him just how Eclipse will always be part of Lunar. Violence begets more violence.

I do think it's interesting how Eclipse doesn't acknowledge that he blew up Lunar and it's probably because he didn't blow up Lunar. The Eclipse before him did. Just like how Moon didn't reject him, the Moon before did. (I'll come back to that later)

Earth has to point out that Lunar got ka-boomed and then Eclipse laughs "Oh yes, I did, right." Because, again, he didn't. The Eclipse before him did. It feels like he's trying to avoid taking accountability for that (and good on him because he's technically innocent it's not his fault he has the corrupted memories of a dead man)

HOWEVER ON THAT NOTE

It does feel like with every day that passes by those memories become more of who he is now, and he's slowly accepting them as part of his own identity because he's kind of stuck with them. If you woke up in a random place and someone handed you a broom and said 'you're bob the janitor' and that's all you knew you'd probably believe it (/ref)

(If someone gets that reference I will love you forever)

"Do you really. . . not care about him?" - Earth Eclipse: Doesn't answer the question, answers a question with a question which is DEFLECTING

Sir? You do too still care don't you?

"It's kind of hard to empathize with you" - Earth Me: Runs up chat to grab something

"a normal person cannot relate to a sociopath because our life experiences are so vastly different. You (general you) will never be able to understand what it’s like to be physically unable to care about someone to the point that it hurts because you want to care. And a socio/psychopath will never be able to understand on a visceral level what it’s like to be able to connect with another person or be able to feel things all the time or to do the right thing simply because something compels you to and not because you had to ask yourself “is this morally good or bad behavior” because you just know" - Me four days ago

Do find it interesting how Eclipse has no comment when Earth says he doesn't like her He probably likes her just fine, if I'm being honest. Probably likes her more than most other characters. He's just kinda a jerk and likes to press her buttons because it's funny

When she does manage to hit something right on the nail "It must be scary, right?" And "You just never have a sense of control" He makes a kinda-joke "Are we just going to keep talking about how sad we are" to change the topic AND SHE LAUGHED SHE LAUGHED AT HIS JOKE 👑 Ma'am you dropped this

I do personally Eclipse's sense of humor because it's pretty on point with my own, but I also really enjoy people being uncomfortable with it as well because that's half the fun. So I'm getting a small amount of dark enjoyment of Earth being uncomfortable at the boom joke

((Earth did awesome considering the circumstances. I can respect the fact that she is communicating her own emotional and mental needs even while dealing with someone who's not exactly pleasant for the general populace. She's gotten a lot better at setting boundaries))

Eclipse walks out because he's irritated with Moon. It's a power play. "I may have been forced to be here, but you can't make me sit and listen to you." He honestly had no idea what Moon would have said at the moment, and I also don't think that it would have been the best timing for Moon to drop that on him. They need a calm environment where neither of them is worked up to start touching that topic. Also MOON He's apologizing for something that isn't even his fault and while I can respect that, I almost wish he wasn't taking the blame for something a past self did. Just like how Eclipse is trying not to take accountability for what dead-man Eclipse did. They're two people who have been hurt by the actions of their predecessors and are playing out a game that was set into motion long long before their time. Now the only question that remains is who is Romeo and who is Juliet

Anyway that was the episode

Am taking inquiries and demands as well as bounties for my head

[karamell-sweetz]

rui kamishiro, the alchemist - an extremely jumbled overanalysis

⚠️ LONG POST AHEAD ⚠️

hello rui fanclub. instead of doing schoolwork i think about rui as the alchemist. what’s new with me i know.

but why is he an alchemist specifically?

because if you look at it simply, rui’s jobs in the shows could also garner the title of ‘mechanic’. where you take a lot of metal and make it into something functional, or fix it so it works again. fundamentally that’s what he does right? with all the robots and staging ideas? and to some extent he could also be a ‘poet’ or ‘philosopher’ because we know he and tsukasa write the shows (during the pxl arc anyway) and he’s constantly coming up with new show ideas. there’s stuff like ‘magician’ or ‘wizard’, which could also be used to describe how he does things with such ease — and we’re not even going to mention ‘genius’ or ‘whiz kid’, okay?

so with all of that said, rui haters /j can essentially say that rui’s title of ‘alchemist’ is just him trying to sound a little cooler — and to some extent they might be correct. like have you seen this man

but let’s get to the nitty gritty of today’s wall of text, because there’s no way sega would call him an alchemist and not know what that entails. putting on my swirly nerd glasses.

✨alchemy✨ according to the merriam-webster kids definition is as follows:

“a medieval chemical science with the goals of changing less valuable metals into gold, discovering a single cure for all diseases, and discovering how to live forever”

and is commonly cited by most articles i read on the topic to have been a mixing of science and magic, having been the predecessor of modern chemistry. that part sounds like rui, doesn’t it?

and honestly, that alone should be enough to stop me from yapping, BUT WE NEED TO HIT THE BOTTOM. HAND ME MY SHOVEL I’M GOING IN /lyr

by the way!! i am completely aware of the more metaphorical meaning of alchemy where it’s essentially synonymous with magic, e.g. “he performed his alchemy o’er the pot and the water became soup”. but since wxs are often cited as the guys with the whimsical references to olden times (gestures wildly at revival my dream) i have no reason NOT to analyse him from the philosophical perspective.

so basically the alchemist has three main goals as we said before and just for my sanity (and my english teacher’s approval even though she’s not ever going to look at this) i’ll use them to organise my thoughts.

⚠️ DISCLAIMER: this post is not properly structured or organised and may be hard to understand. if you need any clarification on anything i say here please let me know! and ofc feel free to add your own ideas! also this is not too serious or in-depth ⚠️

websites used for research have been linked in underlined words :D (ex. wikipedia)

the transmutation of metals a.k.a. turning ‘lesser’ metals into gold

this one is pretty straightforward. rui is somewhat of a metal manipulator by making his robots, and while he doesn’t turn them into gold literally he DOES make them more valuable by giving them something better — life.

now obviously your life is more valuable than gold — although capitalism says otherwise! /j

also, as wxs’ alchemist specifically, rui’s job is to take them as they are — let’s say, their base forms — and make them shine through his directing, thus making them into something brighter, like gold! (addition for all the ruikasers in chat: gold shares its alchemical symbol with the sun and the sun is a star and guess who’s a star COUGH)

something else interesting though: according to the royal society of chemistry:

“To the medieval alchemist's mind the different elements were but the same original substance in varying degrees of purity. Gold was the purest of all and silver followed closely.”

it kinda gives a bit of weight to rui’s character and (just because i have to revise it for school) his relation to the general human experience in a way. we know that rui’s been outcasted for most of his life because of his interest in shows — but at his core he is still human, just like everyone else. i keep thinking about that line from rmd whenever i think about rui and the human experience, where little rui says “i am me, people are people”. it’s not wrong per se — but he’s just as human as everyone else, is he not? that’s why his story (especially pandemonium) hits so hard imo. it also then makes sense why rui treats his robots as his “little darlings” and gives the plants so much care, because all the world is made of the same stuff — according to the alchemist, at least.

…sorry that was me extrapolating. MOVING ON

finding a single cure for all diseases

now we get into the stretchy parts of this analysis.

getting rid of all diseases would theoretically better the entire world, at least in a medical point of view. now what does rui use all of his fancy robots for? as a catalyst for making people smile with his shows, of course! as we all know, laughter is the best medicine, and a smile can brighten someone’s day (so they say).

and furthermore, all of rui’s little exploits, and generally just his character overall, work for the good of others. i don’t know if i’m using this term correctly but i feel that he’s sort of a chaotic good person: working for what is good and just, even if it goes against authority. i mean, we see this right from the start of the game’s story — making nenerobo so nene can continue pursuing her dreams; the mall area conversation where he makes a balloon stegosaurus when the employee isn’t looking, claiming that it’ll be a much better present for the lucky kid who receives it; doing his robot shows in public even if the police chase him and nobody stops by to watch it all anyway, perhaps in the hopes that just one person will be even lightly amused by his antics. even when he intended to work alone, he sought to better other people’s lives, even if they didn’t appreciate him for it. (which ofc makes me so sad)

finding the elixir of immortality

now this one i initially struggled to get a good argument for because there’s a lot of things you can talk about here. the immortalisation of an individual is one of them — in making a show or story you essentially make a permanent memoir of the ideas you had for it, or the world at the time in which you wrote it, and i suppose in the case of the wonder stage immortalising the memory of a person in keeping grandpa otori’s stage alive.

but then it hit me.

rui wants to immortalise a *moment,* not necessarily one person. the time he has with wxs. which we are all aware that they are running out of.

this isn’t that clear in the early story because he’s not as attached to them yet — which i suppose leaves a hole in my argument since he’s used the title since before the main story. but maybe he only gained this goal in its full extent after joining wxs. curtain call and our happy ending make it very clear that rui wants to be with wxs, ideally, forever. and let’s not even MENTION the fact that they worked in phoenix wonderland which is supposed to be an immortal bird!!

i suppose at its core the idea of immortalisation is to spend time with the immortal individual forever, so that they can continue to have all the wonderful moments of life. everyone fears death to some extent, after all. so therefore: rui’s current alchemic quest, alongside/after the wxs training arc, would be to find that elixir for wxs and somehow find a way to make shows with them forever… even though realising that he *needs* to let go is probably going to be the most groundbreaking part of his character progression.

rui’s philosopher’s stone (not the harry potter book)

you might be wondering why i’ve titled this section this way but i promise i’ve got a point

so the philosopher’s stone is basically related to all three of the alchemist’s goals in some form. apparently if you put it in the ground it produces metals faster? (because apparently they thought it just grew like that. you DO get stones from the ground so i guess that checks out. AND THAT’S WHY RUI IS A GEOLOGIST IN THE KIRAPIKA SET.) i think i saw an image with its symbol that called it the ‘end of all ends’. so it’s kind of a miracle object in the sense that, once discovered or created, will instantly fulfil the aims of alchemy.

now obviously being in the modern age, rui isn’t looking for something that can solve all the world’s issues forever, because that’s proven impossible. but maybe there’s something that can do the next best thing — and for rui, that’s doing shows. it might sound silly (and i’ll come back to that in a bit) but rui knows how wonderful shows can be, how they make people smile and forget their ailments for just a small moment — they don’t get rid of them, of course, but they offer the next best thing he can give. that fateful little mermaid show gave him a purpose in life, basically, something he could work towards that could affect people in ways that a robot on its own simply couldn’t.

and i suppose, in that sense, all of wxs are alchemists, too…? well, if we apply this to some sort of medieval fantasy game, they’d be in his party and help him out, right?

the alchemist as an outcasted figure

so basically from most of the stuff i read, alchemy was generally frowned upon (and even outlawed in england) due to being associated with fraud, with con artists of the time utilising the transmutation thing for their own personal gain, and just generally looking for something impossible. i think in some way this could be connected to rui being ostracized by his peers because of his ideas — he’s not a fraud, but the actual alchemists of the time tended to receive the same reputation as the con artists. and i imagine the alchemical experiments were pretty dangerous back in those times, so there’s that whole thing with people not trusting rui’s ideas to be safe and practical.

bonus related discussion: do you think maybe people were envious of rui’s ‘genius brain’ and wished he would use it for something other than shows… like scientific endeavours? idk this is just a half formed thought i had after writing this particular section. in the same way that alchemy started to become an old practice, did rui’s love for theatre and whimsy grow to be seen as farfetched at any point? maybe in that mysterious elite high school— okay that one is just me grasping at straws. but it makes you think, right?

main conclusion

the role of alchemist really fits rui to a tee, right down to the context of the times. and i’m karamell, chairwoman of the rui fanclub. and there are literally so many things that sega could play with in regards to card symbolism (COUGH the alchemic symbols COUGH COUGH) that i secretly hope to see in the future!

(and now you, dearest reader, have some completely impractical information about a bunch of pixels under your belt. read and flourish!)

bonus: planetary references

in ancient alchemic writings the planetary symbols were actually used for alchemy as well, as in they were used to identify some of the main metals. as such most of the metals are associated with the solar system as well, notably gold with the sun, silver with the moon, and mercury with, well, mercury.

now… what is rui’s colorfes card themed around?

that’s right: SPACE.

now this could be entirely coincidental bc its implied in the story that his colorfes sekai was based on one of his favourite sci-fi books (show? movie? i’m a fake rui fan what text type was Trip to the Moon) but sega likes their extended metaphors and symbolism.

so anyway that’s the REAL end of the post. that will be all. no, i didn’t need to write all of that, but i did because isn’t that what my training is for?

[cwarscars]

i do love how much more militaristic heid is in the remake universe. and how he's got much more valor / honour. it's obvious my portrayal of him is entirely based on the remake / rebirth version of him. however, my lore is a mix of the original / rebirth. i love the original so will draw from it a LOT.

but one thing i appreciate massively in rebirth with heid is that everything we see of him is actually good. like, they've actually added the nuance i wanted to his character. though he's in fewer scenes than i'd like, it warms my heart to see his character expanded on in a way that isn't entirely negative.

in remake, we see him as a bully. he's brutal and cruel - he's a villain in every sense of the word. but, since writing him and analysing his scenes - i told myself 'no, this character is a WAR veteren - he isn't just a moustache twirling villain as people like to say', i tried my best to write him as a character with flaws, good and bad. i wanted to portray a sadistic, brutal man who holds grudges and scars. who is as capable of being loyal and brave as he is a monster. and i do appreciate rebirth for giving us the humanity that i wanted so desperately to portray in my portrayal -

like; i love his interactions with the soldiers. as @ivory-paragon said on my last post; that pride he gets from his soldiers doing a good job in his own seeking approval from his new boss. like, if they do a good job - he does a good job ( at least, he sees so ). it's nice to see him appreciate them, even for a second. and its good to see him pine for rufus' attention. he wants rufus to know that he's competent and doing a good job. at a later point in the game, when rufus demands his directors prove their loyalty. admittedly, i found it a little odd. heidegger has already given his blood for the company and for him specifically. this is a post ill make another day, im sure.

and during the ceremony, we see both a much more professional conduct from him AND a more heroic side of him. i made a post analysing his actions and suggesting they could be a mix of valour, self preservation, bravery or kindness. i see it as all of the above.

in later scenes, we see heidegger openly berate a traitor / show disgust over someone being a traitor. he resents it. i love that because it once again shows us his code of honour. his thoughts and feelings toward the military and how passionate he is to those he serves. heidegger is a low of things but a coward is not one of them, i love that rebirth has confirmed that.

idk, i got a lot of feelings. im sad that i didnt get more of my boy. of course i am, i played the game watching dyne and dio and thinking how tempted i am to try and take them up but also, heid has such a strange, special place in my heart.

since writing him, i lost my dad and my best friend - nina. i've grieved so much and been through so many life changes from graduating uni to changing career all while writing this character and idk, he's always been a consistent place for me to channel emotion through writing / analysis. so, it's nice seeing him again and even nicer having some of my own theories confirmed to me.

[purinrinrin]

A guide to AI art for artists

When AI art first hit the web I was amazed by the technology. Then later, when it came out that these image generators were trained on images by living artists scraped from the public web with no consent or compensation, my opinion of it was soured. It took a lot of effort for me to push past that distaste in order to properly research the technology so that I could help myself and others to understand it. This is why I’m compiling all the information I’ve found here. I hope you find it helpful.

Terminology

To start off, there are a lot of different terms out there when it comes to AI nowadays so I’m going to try to define some of them so you can understand what people mean when they use them (and so you can tell when they’re full of shit).

AI

Artificial Intelligence. AI is a big buzzword right now in the tech sector and at times feels like it’s being thrown at anything and everything just to attract investors. Cambridge Dictionary defines it as:

the use or study of computer systems or machines that have some of the qualities that the human brain has, such as the ability to interpret and produce language in a way that seems human, recognize or create images, solve problems, and learn from data supplied to them

It’s kind of what it says on the tin - an artificial, that is, human-created system that has abilities similar to those of intelligent life forms. (I’d argue comparing the abilities of AI solely to those of humans does a disservice to the intelligence of many non-human animals but I digress.)

At the moment when you read things online or in the news, AI is likely being used to refer to machine learning which is a type of AI.

Algorithm

The word algorithm describes a process based on a set of instructions or rules used to find a solution to a problem. The term is used in maths as well as computing. For example, the process used to convert a temperature from Fahrenheit to Celsius is a kind of algorithm:

subtract 32

divide by 9

multiply by 5

These instructions must be performed in this specific order.

Nowadays on social media “the algorithm” is used to refer to a specific kind of algorithm - a recommendation algorithm - which is a kind of machine learning algorithm.

Machine Learning

Machine learning is a term used to refer to the the use of a computer algorithm to perform statistical analysis of data (and often large amounts of it) to produce outputs, whether these are images, text or other kinds of data. Social media recommendation algorithms collect data on the kind of content a user has looked at or interacted with before and uses this to predict what other content they might like.

I’ll explain it in very simple terms with an analogy. Consider a maths problem where you have to work out the next number in a sequence. If you have the sequence 2, 4, 6, 8, 10 you can predict that the next number would be 12 based on the preceding numbers each having a difference of 2. When you analyse the data (the sequence of numbers) you can identify a pattern (add 2 each time) then apply that pattern to work out the next number (add 2 to 10 to get 12).

In practice, the kind of analysis machine learning algorithms do is much more complex (social media posts aren’t numbers and don’t have simple relationships with each other like adding or subtracting) but the principle is the same. Work out the pattern in the data and you can then extrapolate from it.

The big downside to these algorithms is that since the rules behind their decision making are not explicitly programmed and are instead based on data it can be difficult to figure out why they produce the outputs they do, making them a kind of “black box” system. When machine learning algorithms are given more and more data, it becomes exponentially harder for humans to reason about their outputs.

Training Data and Models

Another term you’ll come across is “training” or talking about how an AI is “trained”. Training data refers to the data that is used to train the model. The process of training is the statistical analysis and pattern recognition I talked about above. It enables the algorithm to transform a dataset (collections of images and text) into a statistical model that works like a computer program to take inputs (a text prompt) to produce outputs (images).

As a general rule, the bigger the dataset used for training, the more accurate the outputs of the resulting trained model. Once a model is created, the format of the data is completely different to that of the training data. The model is also many orders of magnitude smaller than the original training data.

Text-to-image model AKA AI image generator, generative AI

Text-to-image model is the technical term for these AI image generators:

DALL-E (OpenAI)

Midjourney

Adobe Firefly

Google Imagen

Stable Diffusion (Stability AI)

The technology uses a type of machine learning called deep learning (I won’t go into this here. If you’d like to read more; good luck. It’s very technical). The term text-to-image is simple enough. Given a text prompt, the model will generate an image to match the description.

Stable Diffusion

Stable diffusion is different from other image generators in that its source code is publically available. Anyone with the right skills and hardware can run this. I don’t think I’d be incorrect in saying that this is the main reason why AI art has become so widespread online since stable diffusion’s release in 2022. For better or worse, open-sourcing this code has democratised AI image generation.

I won’t go deep into how stable diffusion actually works because I don’t really understand it myself but I will talk about the process of acquiring training data and training the models it uses to generate images.

What data is used?

I already talked about training data but what actually is it? And where does it come from? In order to answer this I’m going to take you down several rabbit holes.

LAION-5B

Taking stable diffusion as an example, it uses models trained on various datasets made available by German non-profit research group LAION (Large-scale Artificial Intelligence Open Network). The biggest of these datasets is LAION-5B which is refined down to several smaller datasets (~2 billion images) based on language. They describe LAION-5B as “a dataset of 5,85 billion CLIP-filtered image-text pairs”. Okay. What does “CLIP-filtered image-text pairs” mean?

CLIP

OpenAI’s CLIP (Contrastive Language-Image Pre-training) is (you guessed it) another machine learning algorithm that has been trained to label images with the correct text. Given an image of a dog, it should label that image with the word “dog”. It does a little bit more than this as well. When an image is analysed with CLIP it can output a file called an embedding. This embedding contains a list of words or phrases and a confidence score from 0 to 1 based on how confident CLIP is that the text describes the image. An image of a park that happens to show a dog in the background would have a lower confidence score for the text “dog” than a close-up image of a dog. When you get to the section on prompting, it will become clear how this ends up working in image generators.

As I mentioned before, the more images you have in the training data, the better the model will work. The researchers at OpenAI make that clear in their paper on CLIP. They explain how previous research into computer vision didn’t produce very accurate results due to the small datasets used for training, and the datasets were so small because of the huge amount of manual labour involved in curating and labelling them. (The previous dataset they compare CLIP’s performance to, ImageNet, contains a mere 14 million images.) Their solution was to use data from the internet instead. It already exists, there’s a huge amount of it and it’s already labelled thanks to image alt text. The only thing they’d need to do is download it.

It’s not stated in the research paper exactly which dataset CLIP was trained on. All it says is that “CLIP learns from text–image pairs that are already publicly available on the internet.” Though according to LAION, CLIP was trained on an unreleased version of LAION-400M, an earlier text-image pair dataset.

Common Crawl

The data in LAION-5B itself comes from another large dataset made available by the non-profit Common Crawl which “contains raw web page data, metadata extracts, and text extracts” from the publicly accessible web. In order to pull out just the images, LAION scanned through the HTML (the code that makes up each web page) in the Common Crawl dataset to find the bits of the code that represent images (<img> tags) and pulled out the URL (the address where the image is hosted online and therefore downloadable from) and any associated alternative text, or “alt text”.

A tangent on the importance of image alt text

Alt text is often misused on the web. Its intended purpose is to describe images for visually impaired users or if the image is unable to be loaded. Let’s look at an example.

This image could have the alt text: “A still image from the film Back to the Future III depicting Doc Brown and Marty McFly. They are stood outside facing each other on a very bright sunny day. Doc Brown is trying to reassure a sceptical looking Marty by patting him on the shoulder. Marty is wearing a garish patterned fringed jacket, a red scarf and a white stetson hat. The DeLorean time machine can be seen behind them.” Good. This is descriptive.

But it could also have the alt text: “Christopher Lloyd and Michael J Fox in Back to the Future III” Okay but not very specific.

Or even: “Back to the Future III: A fantastic review by John Smith. Check out my blog!” Bad. This doesn’t describe the image. This text would be better used as a title for a web page.

Alt text can be extremely variable in detail and quality, or not exist at all, which I’m sure will already be apparent to anyone who regularly uses a screen reader to browse the web. This casts some doubt on the accuracy of CLIP analysis and the labelling of images in LAION datasets.

CLIP-filtered image-text pairs

So now, coming back to LAION-5B, we know that “CLIP-filtered image-text pairs” means two things. The images were analysed with CLIP and the embeddings created from this analysis were included in the dataset. Then these embeddings were used to check that the image caption matched what CLIP identified the image as. If there was no match, the image was dropped from the dataset.

But LAION datasets themselves do not contain any images

So how does this work? LAION states on their website:

LAION datasets are simply indexes to the internet, i.e. lists of URLs to the original images together with the ALT texts found linked to those images. While we downloaded and calculated CLIP embeddings of the pictures to compute similarity scores between pictures and texts, we subsequently discarded all the photos. Any researcher using the datasets must reconstruct the images data by downloading the subset they are interested in. For this purpose, we suggest the img2dataset tool.

In order to train a model for use with stable diffusion, you would need to go through a LAION dataset with img2dataset and download all the images. All 240 terabytes of them.

LAION have used this argument to wiggle out of a recent copyright lawsuit. The Batch reported in June 2023:

LAION may be insulated from claims of copyright violation because it doesn’t host its datasets directly. Instead it supplies web links to images rather than the images themselves. When a photographer who contributes to stock image libraries filed a cease-and-desist request that LAION delete his images from its datasets, LAION responded that it has nothing to delete. Its lawyers sent the photographer an invoice for €979 for filing an unjustified copyright claim.

Deduplication

In a dataset it’s usually not desirable to have duplicate entries of the same data, but how do you ensure this when the data you’re processing is as huge as the entire internet? Well… LAION admits you kinda don’t.

There is a certain degree of duplication because we used URL+text as deduplication criteria. The same image with the same caption may sit at different URLs, causing duplicates. The same image with other captions is not, however, considered duplicated.

Another reason why reposting art sucks

If you’ve been an artist online for a while you’ll know all about reposts and why so many artists hate them. From what I’ve seen in my time online, the number of times an artist’s work is reposted on different sites is proportional to their online reach or influence (social media followers, presence on multiple sites etc). The more well known an artist becomes, the more their art is shared and reposted without permission. It may also be reposted legitimately, say if an online news outlet ran a story on them and included examples of their art. Whether consensual or not, this all results in more copies of their art out there on the web and therefore, in the training data. As stated above, if the URL of the image is different (the same image reposted on a different website will have a different URL), to LAION it’s not considered duplicated.

Now it becomes clear how well known digital artists such as Sam Yang and Loish have their styles easily imitated with these models - their art is overrepresented in the training data.

How do I stop my art being used in training data?

Unfortunately for models that have already been trained on historic data from LAION/Common Crawl, there is no way to remove your art and no way to even find out if your art has been used in the training.

Unfortunately again, simply deleting your art from social media sites might not delete the actual image from their servers. It will still be accessible at the same URL as when you originally posted it. You can test this by making an image post on the social media site you want to test. When the image is posted, right click the image and select “open image in new tab”. This will show you the URL of the image in the address bar. Keep this tab open or otherwise keep a record of this URL. Then go back and delete the post. After the post is deleted, often you will still be able to view the image at the URL that you saved.

If you have your own website where you host your art you can delete your images, or update their URLs so that they are no longer accessible from the URLs that were previously in web crawl data.

HTTP Headers

On your own website you can also use the X-Robots-Tag HTTP header to prevent bots from crawling your website for training data. These values can be used:

X-Robots-Tag: noai

X-Robots-Tag: noimageai

X-Robots-Tag: noimageindex

The img2dataset tool is used to download images from datasets made available by LAION. The README states that by default img2dataset will respect the above headers and skip downloading from websites that use them. Although it must be noted this can be overridden, so if an unscrupulous actor wants to scrape your images without your consent, there is no technical reason they cannot do this.

Glaze

If you can’t prevent your images from being crawled, you can prevent all new art that you post from being useful in future models that are trained from scratch by using Glaze. Glaze is a software tool that you can run your art through to protect it from being copied by image generators. It does this by “poisoning” the data in the image that is read by machine learning code while keeping the art looking the same to human eyes.

Watermarks

This defence is a bit of a long shot but worth a try. You may be able to get your art filtered out of training data by adding an obvious watermark. One column included in the LAION dataset is pwatermark which is the probability that the image contains a watermark, calculated by a CLIP model trained on a small subset of clean and watermarked images. Images were then filtered out of subsequent datasets using a threshold for pwatermark of 0.8, which compared to the threshold for NSFW (0.3) and non-matching captions (also 0.3) is pretty high. This means that only images with the most obvious watermarks will be filtered out.

Prompt engineering and how to spot AI art

We’ve covered how AI image generators are trained so now let’s take all that and look at how they work in practice.

Artifacts

You’ve probably gotten annoyed by JPEG compression artifacts or seen other artists whine about them but what is an artifact? A visual artifact is often something unwanted that appears in an image due to technologies used to create it. JPEG compression artifacts appear as solid colour squares or rectangles where there should be a smooth transition from one colour to another. They can also look like fuzziness around high contrast areas of an image.

I’d describe common mistakes in AI image generations as artifacts - they are an unwanted side effect of the technology used to produce the image. Some of these are obvious and pretty easy to spot:

extra or missing fingers or otherwise malformed hands

distorted facial features

asymmetry in clothing design, buttons or zips in odd places

hair turning into clothing and vice versa

nonsense background details or clothing patterning

disconnected horizon line, floor or walls. This often happens when opposite sides are separated by an object in the foreground

Some other artifacts are not strange-looking, but become obvious tells for AI if you have some experience with prompting.

Keyword bleeding

Often if a colour is used in the text prompt, that colour will end up being present throughout the image. If it depicts a character and a background, both elements will contain the colour.

The reason for this should be obvious now that we know how the training data works. This image from LAION demonstrates it nicely:

This screenshot shows the search page for clip-retrieval which is a search tool that utilises an image-text pair dataset created using CLIP. You will see the search term that was entered is “blue cat” but the images in the results contain not just cats that are blue, but also images of cats that are not blue but there is blue elsewhere in the image eg a blue background, a cat with blue eyes, or a cat wearing a blue hat.

To go on a linguistics tangent for a second, part of the above effect could be due to English not having different adjective forms depending on the noun it’s referring to. For example in German when describing a noun the form of the adjective must match the gender of the noun it’s describing. In German, blue is blau, cat is Katze. “Blue cat” would be “blaue Katze”. Since Katze is feminine, the adjective blau must use the feminine ending e. The word for dog is masculine so blau takes the ending er, making it “blauer Hund”. You get the idea.

When a colour is not mentioned in a prompt, and no keyword in the prompt implies a specific colour or combination of colours, the generated images all come out looking very brown or monochrome overall.

Keyword bleeding can have strange effects depending on the prompt. When using adjectives to describe specific parts of the image in the prompt, both words may bleed into other parts of the image. When I tried including “pointed ears” in a prompt, all the images depicted a character with typical elf ears but the character often also had horns or even animal ears as well.

All this seems obvious when you consider the training data. A character with normal-looking ears wouldn’t usually be described with the word “ears” (unless it was a closeup image showing just the person’s ears) because it’s a normal feature for someone to have. But you probably would mention ears in an image description if the character had unusual ears like an elf or catgirl.

Correcting artifacts

AI artifacts can be corrected however, with a process called inpainting (also known as generative fill). This is done by taking a previously generated image, masking out the area to be replaced, then running the generation process again with the same or slightly modified prompt. It can also be used on non AI generated images. Google Pixel phones use a kind of generative fill to remove objects from photographs. Inpainting is a little more involved than just prompting as it requires editing of the input image and it’s not offered by most free online image generators. It’s what I expect Adobe Firefly will really excel at as it’s already integrated into image editing software (if they can iron out their copyright issues…)

Why AI kinda sucks

Since AI image generation is built on large scale statistical analysis, if you’re looking to generate something specific but uncommon you’re not going to have much luck. For example using “green skin” in a prompt will often generate a character with pale skin but there will be green in other parts of the image such as eye colour and clothing due to keyword bleeding.

No matter how specific you are the generator will never be able to create an image of your original character. You may be able to get something that has the same general vibe, but it will never be consistent between prompts and won’t be able to get fine details right.

There is a type of fine-tuning for stable diffusion models called LoRA (Low-Rank Adaptation) that can be used to generate images of a specific character, but of course to create this, you need preexisting images to use for the training data. This is fine if you want a model to shit out endless images of your favourite anime waifu but less than useless if you’re trying to use AI to create something truly original.

Some final thoughts

The more I play around with stable diffusion the more I realise that the people who use it to pretend to be a human artist with a distinctive style are using it in the most boring way possible. The most fun I’ve personally had with image generation is mixing and matching different “vibes” to churn out ideas I may not have considered for my own art. It can be a really useful tool for brainstorming. Maybe you have a few different things you’re inspired by (eg a clothing style or designer, a specific artist, an architectural style) but don’t know how to combine them. An image generator can do this with ease. I think it’s an excellent tool for artistic research and generating references.

All that being said, I strongly believe use of AI image generation for profit or social media clout is unethical until the use of copyrighted images in training data is ceased.

I understand how this situation has come about. Speaking specifically about LAION-5B the authors say (emphasis theirs):

Our recommendation is … to use the dataset for research purposes. … Providing our dataset openly, we however do not recommend using it for creating ready-to-go industrial products, as the basic research about general properties and safety of such large-scale models, which we would like to encourage with this release, is still in progress.

Use of copyrighted material for research falls under fair use. The problem comes from third parties making use of this research data for commerical purposes, which should be a violation of copyright. So far, litigation against AI companies has not made much progress in settling this.

I believe living artists whose work is used to train AI models must be fairly compensated and the law must be updated to enforce this in a way that protects independent artists (rather than building more armour for huge media companies).

The technology is still new and developing rapidly. Changes to legislation tend to be slow. But I have hope that a solution will be found.

References

“Adobe Firefly - Free Generative AI for Creatives.” Adobe. Accessed 28 Jan 2024.

https://www.adobe.com/uk/products/firefly.html

Andrew. "Stable Diffusion prompt: a definitive guide.” Stable Diffusion Art. 4 Jan 2024.

https://stable-diffusion-art.com/prompt-guide/#Anatomy_of_a_good_prompt

Andrew. “Beginner’s guide to inpainting (step-by-step examples).” Stable Diffusion Art. 24 September 2023.

https://stable-diffusion-art.com/inpainting_basics/

AUTOMATIC1111. “Stable Diffusion web UI. A browser interface based on Gradio library for Stable Diffusion.” Github. Accessed 15 Jan 2024

https://github.com/AUTOMATIC1111/stable-diffusion-webui

“LAION roars.” The Batch newsletter. 7 Jun 2023.

https://www.deeplearning.ai/the-batch/the-story-of-laion-the-dataset-behind-stable-diffusion/

Beaumont, Romain. “Semantic search at billions scale.” Medium. 31 Mar, 2022

https://rom1504.medium.com/semantic-search-at-billions-scale-95f21695689a

Beaumont, Romain. “LAION-5B: A new era of open large-scale multi-modal datasets.” LAION website. 31 Mar, 2022

https://laion.ai/blog/laion-5b/

Beaumont, Romain. “Semantic search with embeddings: index anything.” Medium. 1 Dec, 2020

https://rom1504.medium.com/semantic-search-with-embeddings-index-anything-8fb18556443c

Beaumont, Romain. “img2dataset.” GitHub. Accessed 27 Jan 2024.

https://github.com/rom1504/img2dataset

Beaumont, Romain. “Preparing data for training.” GitHub. Accessed 27 Jan 2024.

https://github.com/rom1504/laion-prepro/blob/main/laion5B/usage_guide/preparing_data_for_training.md

“CLIP: Connecting text and images.” OpenAI. 5 Jan 2021.

https://openai.com/research/clip

“AI.” Cambridge Dictionary. Accessed 27 Jan 2024.

https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/ai?q=AI

“Common Crawl - Overview.” Common Crawl. Accessed 27 Jan 2024.

https://commoncrawl.org/overview

CompVis. “Stable Diffusion. A latent text-to-image diffusion model.” GitHub. Accessed 15 Jan 2024

https://github.com/CompVis/stable-diffusion

duskydreams. “Basic Inpainting Guide.” Civitai. 25 Aug 2023.

https://civitai.com/articles/161/basic-inpainting-guide

Gallagher, James. “What is an Image Embedding?.” Roboflow Blog. 16 Nov 2023.

https://blog.roboflow.com/what-is-an-image-embedding/

"What Is Glaze? Samples, Why Does It Work, and Limitations." Glaze. Accessed 27 Jan 2024.

https://glaze.cs.uchicago.edu/what-is-glaze.html

“Pixel 8 Pro: Advanced Pro Camera with Tensor G3 AI.” Google Store. Accessed 28 Jan 2024.

https://store.google.com/product/pixel_8_pro

Schuhmann, Christoph. “LAION-400-MILLION OPEN DATASET.” 20 Aug 2021.

https://laion.ai/blog/laion-400-open-dataset/

Stability AI. “Stable Diffusion Version 2. High-Resolution Image Synthesis with Latent Diffusion Models.” Github. Accessed 15 Jan 2024

https://github.com/Stability-AI/stablediffusion

[stranger-chichka]

Hi! So, first of all, you are one of my favorite blogs and i adore your analyses on ST. So, because of that i thought i could share this thing i just found out a few days ago... sorry in advance if it gets too long.

I'm a computer science student, and a few days ago in one of my classes my professor started talking about the evolution of technology and specifically computers (i know this sounds irrelevant but).. as he was talking he mentioned one specific company that caught my attention - Sinclair Research Ltd.

Since i'm obsessed with everything Stranger Things, i decided to check on it. Apparently the were big in the scene in th 70s-80s these days they mostly do research. Since it was computer related i decided then to check for Henderson, since he is the one most related to computers.

This took me nowhere, but i was adamant to find something. Anything. So i decided to move on to the next.

I looked for anything Wheeler related in computer science. And get this;

In the 50s, David Wheeler invented a way to jump through different parts of a code to do different operations. Like, if in the middle of your code you want to sum two numbers, and that's something you'll need to do over and over, instead of writing the same code for the operation over and over (which would make the program heavier) you create a subroutine, you leave a trail to follow, say, a dummy number. The program jumps, to where you want it and then after it it goes back to where it was before, or wherever you want it to go.

Now, the interesting thing about this jump in the subroutine is its name.

This is called a 'Wheeler Jump".

Now, since the upside down is stucked in 1983 and to hide from Vecna you need a happy memory, a memory of light, which implies the past, how we are thrown off by the painting being of the party and not the swingset as many Bylers believed, the weird monologue which i find like a bad copy paste from the one in the shed and how Vecna is related to clocks, i believe Mike is gonna jump. Here could go some thought about Mike jumping from the cliff in season 1 and how Ted asked Mike in s2, if one of his friends jumped if he would jump too. I do not even know what could any of that mean but I've read theories on Labyrinth, Back to the Future, flickergate, and Mike going missing and lettergate. It could be any of those, or none of them, because a coincidence could actually happen.

My personal bet goes to:

We've seen Mike trying to send a message-a code- (his real feelings), but because of dummy actions they were sent the wrong place (his platonic feelings were sent to were the romantic ones were suppose to go and vice-versa).

Anyways, Mike jumping could possibly have a lot of meanings, so i thought to share a weird base (?) for anyone wanting to use it in any theory or something.

Hi, anon! <3

I’m not that of an analyst really, but thank you for your sweet words and I appreciate someone like the stuff I come up with at times.

The things you wrote about are SO INTERESTING, thanks for sharing it with me!!! I’m sure there MUST be connection between “Wheeler Jump” and Mike’s character, especially considering that Mike has got that poster of a man with computer in his basement. The man who happen to be Charles Babbage. The one who is credited with inventing the first mechanical computer. The one who is referred to as “father of computing.”

What made me even more excited about everything you’ve mentioned is:

- David Wheeler is credited with the invention of the subroutine, which is referred to as the CLOSED subroutine (and Mike is in the CLOSET), and gave the first explanation of how to design software libraries (I see librarygate everywhere, lmao);

- he was born in Birmingham and the Cali crew went to Bingham’s house so Suzie could help them with the number to trace the computer’s location in s4 (Mike comes up with that idea). Not to mention Suzie was the one who told Planck's Constant in s3 which was the code the commies used for the safe in which two keys were. The keys needed to stop the machine from opening the gate. To CLOSE the gate. And in the beginning of s4 Suzie also hacked into Hawkins school computer program to change Dustin’s grades (he is later shown discussing it with Mike during).

“Mike trying to send a message/a code (his real feelings), but because of dummy actions they were sent to the wrong place (his platonic feelings were sent to were the romantic ones were suppose to go and vice-versa).”

So, basically, Mike got lost in his own feelings because of his closed subroutine that theoretically should’ve made everything easier for him??? Suzie helped him with the number (the number=Mike’s feelings) and there’s one person in the show who says “I’m good with numbers.” Erica Sinclair. Erica, who drinks Minute Maid Grape Juice that is a reference to Queen’s music video on the song “I Want To Break Free.” Erica, who refers to Lucas as Jason’s boyfriend in the most careless and normal way possible. And there’s so much more. She mentions Nintendo to Jason and then the Cali crew (Mike & Will in particular) is lying to Suzie about the same goddamn Nintendo (oops, sorry, Americantendo). Erica, who’s on the poster RHE HEART with the rest of the party (x).

Also, Will’s school project was about Alan Turing - mathematician, computer scientist and codebreaker.

Unfortunately, I can’t go deeper here because I’m a total zero at IT and maths but everything you’ve mentioned is related to the code and one more code in the show is “when blue meets yellow in the west.” What also serves as a code in ST? Music. I already wrote about how the Duffers use the songs and original soundtracks to tell us more about what’s really happening in the show and to deliver the message that is somehow sensitive. Something they wants to make a huge plot twist for the GA. Mike’s orientation. He is in the CLOSET. If music is a code for us to better understand the show and the characters, it means that characters’ Spotify playlists are as much important as the show itself. @lesbianmindflayer analyses both Mike’s and Will’s playlists so I highly recommend to subscribe on her YouTube channel and follow her here. Almost every song on Mike’s playlist is about running. He’s running form his true self. Do I even have to mention “Smalltown Boy” being the first song on the playlist?

In s4 it’s said “Music reaches parts of the brain words can't.” The Duffers don’t use plain text to say “Mike Wheeler’s gay” or “Byler endgame”, but they use music for that. “Being in the Closet (at Rink-O-Mania)” is one of many examples of how they’re doing it. Not to mention other queer coding such as ONE WAY sign, closets etc.

@bylerschmyler @there-was-a-hole-here-itsgonenow your additions always make every post better so I’m really interested in your thoughts on it!

[wildissylupus]

I really love all your analyses!! tbh i think in overwatch but especially in blackwatch cassidy was seen as "low maintenance" when it came to physical and mental care because he was so used to having to fend for himself that everyone just assumed so

Couldn't put it into better words myself. But it isn't just the fact that he's always had to fend for himself, yes it started that way for everyone else but with Cassidy he was always responsible for someone else. In the Crisis he wasn't able to let himself feel, he needed to survive, that was the goal, in Deadlock he was responsible for Ashe, Julian and Frankie, making sure they didn't get caught, injured or kidnapped. In Blackwatch he was responsible for Genji, he also became the "big brother", the role model to a lot of the younger characters, specifically Tracer and Pharah. At that point he wasn't allowed to feel, to mess up, to make mistakes or fully let himself relax because people were counting on him, looking up to him. And then no one listened to him when he told people the things happening with Blackwatch, with Reyes, with Moira.

Then Gerard died, Ana died, Mina died, Mei and Sigma went missing, Echo was put into quarantine, and he was everyone else's shoulder to cry on. He most likely comforted Reyes when Gerard, Ana and Mina died, he comforted Pharah when Ana died, comforted Mercy when Mei and Sigma disappeared and he most likely only let himself feel anger when Echo was put into quarantine. Everyone else around him was falling apart so he needed to stay strong, after all he could take care of himself, right? He was low maintenance. He was surrounded by death and betrayal his entire life, he could handle it.

Then the Swiss Base incident happened and he spiraled. I've gone into some details about this but it's heavily implied that Cassidy is a functional alcoholic (getting blackout drunk at various bars, a lot of his interactions/voice lines involving alcohol), it's also somewhat implied that Cassidy has relapsed back into smoking (his old voice line with Mercy and his behavior around Ana). He was taken away from every support system he had and now that he finally needed one it was gone. He was a wanted criminal with a 60 million bounty on his head, he couldn't talk to anyone, he didn't want to put them in danger.

I think the only people who know and understand what Cassidy has gone through are Angela, Ana and Sombra.

Angela is very similar to Cassidy in that people view her as low maintenance, she's the golden child, the medical prodigy, she's the support for everyone around her, a golden light of hope for the future. It's why you will always see me say that Angela and Cassidy are each others comfort person. They've known each other for 20 years, have been in Overwatch for the same amount of time, they were used and lied to by the people they thought they could trust. There's a reason Ana had to talk both of them into joining Overwatch again.

Ana has only recently realized how everything affected Cassidy, and there is now doubt in my mind that she feels responsible for what he's gone through. She's the only one out of the Old Soldiers Trio who doesn't glorify Cassidy's time in Blackwatch, whereas both Reaper and Solider have voice/elimination lines that indicate they don't grasp the fact that Cassidy was more negatively impacted by his time in Blackwatch.

Then there's Sombra, we don't see much of they're dynamic in cannon but the fact that Sombra has seen Cassidy blackout drunk at a bar, has seen his search history (listen, I know it's a joke but she defiantly saw some concerning stuff in that search history), and is the character with the most similar backstory to him. Orphaned survivor of the crisis joins a gang then ends up working for a big organization.

I defiantly think that Cassidy is on his last footing, which makes me worried for when he finds out about Reaper. Cause either Angela is going to tell him or he's going to figure it out on his own. And as much as I'm of the opinion Cassidy isn't going to be merciful towards Reaper, I don't think he's going to have a healthy reaction.

Hopefully the New Blood crew will help him when he starts to spiral, because they are all very similar to him.

Sorry for the rant and thank you for enjoying my analyses!! There are defiantly more to come.

[enneamage]

was wondering if u had advice on how to do this, like the whooole critblr (was wondering if you could define that as well because i don’t actually know ;-;), since i havent seen one for tina or niki (analyses and info) and i’d like to make it

Critblr as a whole is kind of the outer rim of the 2020-era mcyt streamer content following. 

The funny thing is there's not really 'rules' for how to be on critblr as much as rules for how to be on main (people who are on mainstream, visible accounts and can be seen by the CCs) that people on critblr tend to break. As a sub-group it's kind of not held together by much other than gossip, and some of the blogs here wouldn't be considered that out of the ordinary years ago before we got "boundary culture" where people got more careful with what they said or did in high traffic, cc-visible spaces. Overall (to shorten the lore a lot) critblr happened because the forced positivity / happiness mandate of main was too narrow and caused a backlash. Now it's worth giving you the heads up that parts of critblr are associated with doxxing and fishing for personal / ‘forbidden’ information, so this is a sketchy part of town. (Mage fact: I actually didn't figure this one out until a bit after I made a blog, whoops.) 

I do something very specific by crit blog standards, I use what I know about Enneagram types to cross-reference why people act the way they do. My 'skills' (if I can call them that) are based on a handful of books and like 10 years of observing people in the wild-- this entire blog has been me trying to put that to use/words so I'm not sure if I could do a general enneagram outline beyond what I've written here. 

I'm also not sure if I have all-around advice for developing intuition / noticing patterns beyond giving yourself the chance/permission to do so? Psych (even pseudo psych) is a massive rabbit hole and it can take a while to learn things, let alone start getting useful results from them. One of the things about streamers is it truly is just you observing them for hours. If you start to notice a pattern or a logic to what you're seeing, or on the opposite end are confused and want to know more, that can be a good place to start your 'search.' 

If you feel you have opinions or insight into what those two are like, feel free to give it a try, as long as you think it's worth it. Critblr is a bit less popular than it used to be so there might be some blogging into the void, but people tend to appreciate good posts.

[wistfulweaverwoman]

From this post

You understand the characters and setting. When reading your fics, I believe the elements you add beyond cannon. Further, your character’s actions are the most in-character versions I’ve read.

District 12 is a grim place. Your words convey that but infuse a warmth/nostalgia that make it feel oddly beautiful.

I’ve loved them all!

Oh wow!! Seriously this is the most wonderful set of compliments!! Thank you anon!

My main goal is to write the kind of story I’d like to read.

Before I discovered fanfic I spent a ridiculous amount of time working on character analyses for Katniss and Peeta. Like I wrote essays. I spent months pouring over the books to glean as much insight into them as I could. One of the many things that I love about the books is that we get a limited view of what’s going on, but lots of clues to piece together so much more narrative.

When I first started reading fanfic I’d sometimes come across stories with characters that were so ooc that I couldn’t keep reading the fic. So that was a pet peeve before I ever considered writing my own stories.

The unfortunate side to that, for me anyways, is it makes the writing torturously slow. I’m either constantly overthinking every word or I’m free flowing and have to edit a bunch because I’ve written something ooc (because I just want these two lovebirds to be happy already).

When I write chapters for The Awkward In-Between I kind of write them in layers. I probably go through 3-4 edits of adding, removing, switching around dialogue or narrative to increase the flow. I like to set the scene, like when she goes into the dress makers shop it’s vaguely dusty smelling because it’s 12 and even merchants can’t afford new clothes often.

I constantly reference the source material, specifically quotes that I feel are key to defining the characters, or defining how they feel. I’m also constantly thinking about the story structure and how certain moments are underlined with their importance based on where they’ve taken place in the narrative. I’ll probably write a post on this particular point in the next week.

I stumbled across a post earlier this week where someone asked if Peeta was fighting for his love for Katniss in 13 or if he’d given up. They wondered about the love triangle and why Katniss was so awful to Peeta. I think they were specifically asking from a movie perspective, which is just such a different beast than the books because we don’t get any of Katniss’s inner monologue and there’s not a great way to get across what she’s thinking/feeling without voiceover. Anyway, their questions got me thinking all week about how I interpret the text and how I’d answer their questions. Hence the post I’ll be making soon.

[nua-fashion-blog]

Reflective summary:

For my reflective summary I'll be talking about the 3 projects I have done.

The first thing I had to do was a 1000 word trend report to do and to help predict the future of a trend of our choice. I chose relaxed tailoring in menswear. The second thing I had to do was a photoshoot involving trying to convey a message or something similar to the audience. I chose to do religious iconography. Their wasn't really a certain message I wanted to get across. I did what I wanted and I'm going to let people interpret the photos how they want. For my blogs I talked about a VC lecture I witnessed (BORA), an industry guest lecture I attended (Beth), an exhibition I looked at online (KCI's digital archive) and talked about a historical aspect of fashion specifically to do with Star Wars. I chose the original Stormtrooper armour designed for A New Hope.

When writing the trend report I was excited to write up about a fashion trend of my choice. It was nice to look into various fashion styles particularly in menswear since menswear doesn't tend to get talked about often. There was quite a bit of analysing to do and research and it did get overwhelming at times but I powered through and got something together. The more data I gathered the more confident I felt in my ability to write up a mediocre trend report on relaxed tailoring in menswear fashion.

When I did the photoshoot I was nervous when planning it because I am horrible when it comes to planning things. I tend to go off script because I feel like I'm being restricted. I tried by best regardless. I was nervous taking photos in public since people stared at me and I got very self conscious. I doubted my ability as a photographer despite only just starting out. When I did finally complete the photoshoot including the editing, I felt ok with how they turned out. They were mediocre at best but I felt relieved that it was finally over.

When writing up my blogs, I had a blast doing them. Writing essays has always been something I enjoyed and since I could pick to do almost whatever I want to talk about, I felt content and I am really happy with how my stuff turned out. It was probably my favourite part of this project.

The trend report I think did alright in analysing relaxed tailoring and predicting the future of the trend for spring/summer in 2025. I covered the necessary bases to draw a conclusion about the future for relaxed tailoring in menswear fashion for 2025. I could've involved more images since I only added in some photos to support what I was saying rather than putting in a lot more images to help convey my trend report better.

For the photoshoot I did receive positive feedback for the final pieces however I did face challenges such as lighting since I took photos in a church where they didn't allow flash photography and the lighting was very dim. For future projects like photoshoots, I will bring my own artificial light to help brighten up the scene.

The blogs I think I did good on. They are informative and I made some of the blogs sound more conversational to help with engagement since a lot of Gen Z and Gen Alpha tend to have shorter attention spans nowadays. I struggled to maintain a coherent voice and tone across my blogs which is something I will have to work on in the future.

Overall, these projects have been a an eye opening experience. It forced me to step outside of my comfort zone. The trend report helped me work on my analytical skills as well as research and citing the right sources, the photoshoot helped me figure out my weaknesses in creating such media and forced me to think outside of the box on how to achieve what I wanted. The blogs helped me improve my communication and pointed out flaws in the way I present things. It also forced me to experience new things and made me feel more in tune with the world around me.

These projects have made me understand myself better as well as the fashion industry as a whole and helped rekindle my passion for creativity and writing. I have learnt many important skills and these will be improved on in the near future.

[thefaultinoursprinkles]

I just don’t think a lot of you on here have enough of a theoretical foundation to be discussing oppression in the way that you do. like in an academic setting, words like “oppression” and “intersectionality” and “equity” have specific meanings that aren’t necessarily accessible to laypeople.

that’s not to say that I think you need to have an accredited degree to discuss your personal experience; in fact, I’m a huge proponent of making information accessible to all but realistically we cannot have a meaningful discussion about oppression if your understanding of oppression as a concept is based on personal/anecdotal experiences rather than proven theory. like even if the resources are available you still have to read and understand them to have an in depth discussion and personal experience will never be a substitute for a true analytical framework.

it’s the same reactionary impulse that the “anti-sjws” had to learning about the academic concept of “privilege”. if you understand “privilege” only to be “an advantage over another” you get bogged down in discussion of personal experiences; I.e., “well I worked hard”, “I was poor growing up”, “I’m gay I can’t be racist”, etc. attempting to explain/excuse their “advantages over others” with their personal hardships.

and that fine or whatever but it’s not useful when talking about trends or relationships on a societal level. in that context, “privilege” specifically refers to “identity based oppression one is not subjected to” but if you don’t understand the underlying concepts about the types of oppression, how oppression manifests, how it is enforced, why it is enforced, or under what conditions one may or may not be subjected to that oppression, you can’t meaningfully analyze the situation in that way.

and again in casual discussions, that isn’t an issue. people can express what they experience in any way they choose and it’s better to elevate those voices than it is to silence them in favor of “civilized” writing/discussion from the “academic elite” who likely have the theoretical understanding but often don’t experience the impacts of this oppression first hand. also why we need to continue investing in education for historically marginalized folks but that’s another post.

I keep seeing a lot of similar arguments being brought up in this “transandrophobia”/trans MRA discourse as there were in the “asexual” discourse and the “can gay people be racist” discourse. it all boils down to the same thing: the feeling of oppression (e.g., ‘people are mean to me interpersonally’, ‘society at large doesn’t cater to my personal values’, etc) taking precedence over any real analysis.

that’s why we see people saying things like “if asexuals aren’t oppressed, why did my aunt ask me if I had a boyfriend at thanksgiving even after telling her I was asexual?” and “if trans men aren’t oppressed then why do transphobes call us confused girls?” I don’t deny that those things are uncomfortable and marginalizing, but at the core it’s not about your lack of desire for sex as an asexual or your masculine identity being questioned as a trans person, it’s a result of the broader power structures in society and the way those structures shape our experiences.

so then, we see this pattern of opinions and analyses that amount to “anything that makes me feel bad is identity based oppression”, which is, of course, not true. if you follow this line of thought to its logical conclusion, it results in a belief that “anything that makes me feel bad is identity based oppression, therefore anyone making me feel bad is oppressing me for my identity”.

if one’s underlying assumption is “anything that makes me feel bad is intentional oppression based on my identity”, when presented with a post that makes the individual “feel bad” it is retroactively contextualized to fit the narrative of identity based oppression, inherently assigning a “victim” and an “aggressor” to the interaction.

once someone has been assigned this role, it serves to retroactively justify any action taken against them as the “perpetrator” of the oppression in question.

then we get takes like ‘taking about sex online oppresses asexual people’ because the person making the post

1. Saw a post about sex

2. The post made them Feel Bad

3. Due to their marginalized identity, they concluded that the post that made them feel bad was made intentionally to make them feel bad (“oppress” them)

4. Thus, the post was specifically crafted to make them feel bad about their identity, and as the perpetrator of that oppression, any action against them is justified/righteous.

you can follow the same pattern of thought for other hot takes like “using she/her pronouns in my presence is oppressing me” and “telling me I’m racist is literally homophobic” and “when trans women talk about transmisogyny it is oppressing me”.

anyways all of this is to vague post about something I saw and say:

asexuals are not the most oppressed members of the lgbtq+ community because your aunt keeps asking you if you have a boyfriend at thanksgiving. that’s the result of societal misogyny and not your asexual identity. exemplified by the many people who aren’t asexual (women, lesbians, NB, people, etc) who get asked the same questions because it is all related to the core issue of misogyny and the grotesque veneration of the nuclear family.

[wuffgang-ameowdeus-moozart]

I saw the impersonate you invitation and I'm not very good at impersonations, but I will tell you what I think you are like based on your blog!

First of all you love Lucy from Fairytale, and have a lot of fun playfully obsessing over her.

I say playful, because you have a suprisingly nuanced understanding of the characters that you like. You dont just take the text (or whatever medium you are engaging with) at face value, you think through what is happening and what it means. You have excelent literary analysis skills.

I think you are probably pretty blunt and opinionated, but you are not mean or unkind. You care deeply for the people around you and put a lot of effort into understanding them.

You may lean towards pessimism sometimes, but you have a sarcastic sense of humor which can make it seem like you are more pessimistic than you really are.

You are very enthusiastic about the beautiful parts of the world, and delight in happy suprises.

I have no idea why, but you feel like somebody who thinks marine biology is cool af.

How did I do? Did I get anything right?

oh my god I love this alskfjsjf

first of all: sorry this took me a hot second to answer 😅

second: hey how does it feel to cut out a piece of my soul only to serve it to me on a silver platter?

gonna go more in depth with each one under the cut (bc I love talking about myself lol) but if you don't have the nerves for that ATM let it be known that you've got me clocked my guy. if I have to describe myself in a job interview I'm gonna ring up beloved tumblr anon to do it for me 🫡 💕

most inaccurate is probably that I'm actually not sure whether I'd call myself an optimist or pessimist (though I do know that I make an effort to be outwardly more optimistic than I actually feel) and while I do absolutely adore the ocean I'm not sure I'd say that I'm particularly interested in marine biology specifically. it's one of those things I keep telling myself I want to do more research on but I never actually do it, so like, theoretically yes but not in practice? does this make sense?

1. id say lucy heartfilia lives rent-free in my head but it would probably be more accurate to say that I feed her scraps of brain matter and heart tissue and devotion in hopes she deems my soul a worthy resting place (<- look how normal I am about her!)

FT was not only my longest obsession ever to date but also my first after moving countries, so being unwell about Lucy again feels weirdly nostalgic in a way?

2. oh yeah I do adore analysing texts and characters and devices and stuff. which is also why I adore wuthering heights lol (cycles and parallels and tragedies my beloved). I don't really know how to read WITHOUT doing this tbh? like of course there is a difference when I am actively engaging with it but sometimes I'll say something that seems pretty obvious to me and then people will be like "this is a great analysis!" lol

(also not to brag but I've been told more than once that I often approach narratives and symbolism from an angle that others haven't considered before 😏)

I actually started studying literature, but for various reasons (which include not being able to deal with a bunch of people clacking on their laptops at the same time the sound was literally driving me insane does anyone have any tips on how to deal with that) I stopped going after like a month

tho id say my favorite thing to analyze is actualy theater plays? especially because of the added element of speech (it feels unfair to judge an audiobook by this metric since books were primarily written to be read but theater is literally made to be spoken aloud and thus it is the authors duty to also think about the cadences of the words and what the different sounds feel like instead of just focusing on how it looks like on paper imo) and visuals

whenever I go with a friend (I need to go with someone so I can talk about it) I'll first ask them what they thought so I can gather my thoughts and kinda compare and then I won't shut up until we have to go out separate ways lol

3. which is a great way to get into the third point: I do have opinions about everything! (unless I don't have a lot of information on the topic in question). I always keep myself open for counter arguments (my biggest fear is becoming one of those obnoxious stubborn ignorant people who are proud of being stuck in their ways and categorically refuse to even consider other viewpoints and opinions) but unless this is about something factual where you have more experience/facts than me it's actually pretty hard to convince me.

because while I love sharing my opinions to everyone that'll listen, im Not a fan of confrontations? I tire of them pretty quickly so depending on whether you pass my vibe check I will either be honest (hey yo agree to disagree can we change topics) or pretend to agree just so we can move on without anyone getting prissy lmao

4. and yes I do try to always be kind to people! dni if you don't make an effort to wish the bus driver a good day tbh. I have this need to be acknowledged and remembered by strangers and also feel really bad whenever im mean to people so my compromise is to try to always be friendly while wearing bright hair and clothes lol

I think I also have a pretty approachable aura? I'm often asked for directions and stuff (which is always a shame for the people asking because i am lostTM)

5. okay so. this is actually a fun exercise to do. because characters in books need to be fairly simple at their core (so the author can write them consistently) while creating the illusion of being complex and layered - and you can kind of do the same thing to real people!

in my mind that makes me a bad shittalker because I'll be actively doing this while you are trying to tell me about something shitty someone else did to you. I'll try to look at it from various angles (at least within the realm of the possible when going solely by a very biased POV) which often comes across as defending them? but I think this is a rather unpopular opinion since I can't count the times I've heard "I know you don't like to shittalk people, but-" as a conversation starter lol

6. I am! a sarcastic shit! I can clearly tell the difference between my sarcasm and my serious voice, but people say that it sounds the same to them (which just makes it more fun tbh lol) tho I think that's only fair considering I often have a hard time telling when other ppl are being serious vs not

7. idk where I am on the optimism pessimism scale tbh. when I was small I figured out this neat magic trick where if u pretend to have really low expectations things seem even cooler than they actually are. it makes sense (expectations and everyone is master of their own reality and contrast etc etc) but back then I genuinely thought I had unravelled the fabric of the universe lol

so like. I'll always be kinda expecting the worst while at the same time not quite believing it? so I'm not disappointed when the "worst" does indeed happen but am also not actively psyching myself out? idk the only gymnastics I'm good at are the mental ones

long story short anon I hope I don't come off too strong but I think I am in love with you <3