#i get where people are coming from and this is just my personal vibe on the matter

[popculturealchemy]

giant masses

black spears

.

climbed your everest

sherpa, my brain

sherpa, hiding red flags

sherpa, casting shadow on your flaws

highlighting your strength

.

uncanny valley.

you think you're deep

mariana trench vibes coming from your end

Interesting at first

submarines sinking

you sinking them

shallowness,

I was unprepared for the kiddie pool of your truth

.

this shouldn't feel like myst

a complicated turn based point and click wtf nightmare game.

puzzles without answers

you're just fucking vague.

not the same

no solutions; = solution

.

rather be like nintendogs

rubbing my sylus on your bottom screen

doggy style multiplayer coop mission

finding that back and forth frequency we need

.

can't find you now

not sure sure if you had one

someone else got it.

new orbit or something

.

shedding you like leaves

hurting at first

nourishing my roots

creating ecology at my feet.

belonging to the streets

putting things where they go when they go there

.

.

someothing about you died

and you never told me

.

you felt it change

I'm noticing

I'm waiting

el niño

hurricane on the east coast of your phase

waxing and waning

.

no explanation

feeling dark, distance. erasure.

your face is stuck in my vision

.

no explaination needed,

your face is terrifying though

thought I'd give you a warning

.

dropped like a hot stone

falling like a leaf

.

time healing wound of separation

no one at fault

just hurting, foggy

discrete depression all day now

till this things fades

.

oh yeah. that persons not here no more

.

they are but, just different or something

black spear

red rover sent right over

hot girl summer

hot girl stone

warming my bed, thank you

leaves feeling cold now.

.

didn't break my chain.

you found my weak links

actually, I told you

you pulled on them right away

Information used on me

supposed to be used to protect me

complete. utter. lack. of. partnership. skills.

seeing an opening and taking it

full force

my weak weakspot becomes a fulcrum

a toggle switch

trigger my seizures

howd you get in here weirdo

you did this to your grandma too.

i'm so glad you accidentally told me that

feeling protected and hurt by luck

four leaf clover

knowing how to use it

.

not sure what else to say

bon voyage

no hard feelings but feeling only hard feelings

.

focusing on something else now

blurry feeling.

snuffed by the spear

.

feeling like a good year thats mine today

leaves falling

spears forming

nests revealed

needing exploring

.

new changes for new nests

less pesky birds

birds that don't peck

.

ctrl alt del this feeling

rebooting

trying off and on again.

living in the present..

eventually getting there

a lifelong test

.

one moment eclipsing the rest

break up

light shining behind this black prism

waiting to crest

already cresting

glass 1% full today

.

get back together?

.

surely, you jest.

.

I don't want to friends.

Neither did you.

It was supposed us

weird labels

archaic words

wanting to feel special

feeling reductive

reductive popculture moment in your mind.

doing "the thing."

.

enemies feels too personal.

memory halflife

redflags in view now

unraveling.

like a bathbomb fractal galaxy bath

poising the well

my water

black spear to your memory

you're poisoning me know

you're think you're smart because your friends smile while you're talking

dollar store connection

Impetus/ response

.

and now your falling from my memory

.

letting you fall gracefully is my gift to you

and it keeps on giving

enjoy the worms

fly high

.

focusing on my 1% water and black spear

old farmer painting

feeling rugged and dragged around by horses

.

cruel tricks

.

black spear not cruelty

.

third party I need for protection

people like you exist

I know that know

.

Ted talk running late

pixel's remembering my thoughts

you're a leaf now

I'm a tree

[slickdickwitchbitchh]

OBX realityshow!au

“Coming Soon: Outer Banks After Dark”

Coming to Netflix this summer !

It’s the show everyone will be talking about—a reality TV experiment like no other. Welcome to the Outer Banks, where the richest of the rich—the Kooks—rule the pristine beaches and country clubs, while the Pogues, the working-class locals, hustle to make a living on the water. The divide between these two worlds has fueled decades of tension, and now, it’s about to hit a boiling point under the summer sun.

This season: Relationships will ignite, friendships will fracture, and secrets will explode.

Meet Y/N: the wildcard in a love triangle that’s shaking the OBX to its core. On one side, there’s JJ—the fun-loving bad boy with a reckless streak and a heart of gold. On the other, Rafe—the reformed kook whose dangerous charm has everyone questioning his motives. Sparks fly as Y/N tries to navigate her feelings, but when a late-night pool party takes a turn, the rivalry between JJ and Rafe threatens to get out of control.

But that’s just the beginning. Sarah Cameron is navigating her own triangle with long-time boyfriend John B and her ex, Topper. "Once a Topper, always a Topper," she teases in her confessional—but John B isn’t laughing. When an innocent game of truth or dare turns personal, things get messy.

And then there’s Sarah and Kiara. Once inseparable, now anything but. Their unresolved tension from Kiara’s kook year resurfaces, threatening to split the group down the middle. "She acts like she’s better than me now," Sarah snaps. "But we all remember who she was."

"I feel like I’m stuck in the middle of this," Y/N admits in her confessional. "I’m friends with both of them, but it’s exhausting trying to keep the peace when they can’t even be in the same room together."

And while Cleo and Pope are the group’s newest power couple, even they aren’t immune to the drama. "We’re just trying to stay out of it," Cleo jokes in her confessional. Pope smirks, adding, "But let’s be real, these people live for chaos."

Friendships will be tested. Lines will be crossed. Hearts will be broken.

So, grab your drink and settle in for the world’s most dramatic beach house experiment. This isn’t just summer in the OBX—this is Outer Banks After Dark.

First Chapter

Author's Note

Hey guys,

Thank you so much for checking out my story! This is my very first fanfiction, and I’m so excited (and nervous) to share it with you all. I’m keeping things open and fun, so if you have any ideas or plotlines you’d like to see, my requests are definitely open. I’d love to hear your thoughts and suggestions—this story is for all of us to enjoy together!

This will be a love triangle for Y/N, and honestly… I don’t even know who she’s going to end up with yet! I’m just as torn as she is, so we’ll figure it out together as the story unfolds.

Oh, and one last thing! I’ll be posting a moodboard for Y/N and the show tomorrow, so stay tuned for that! I can’t wait to dive deeper into the vibes of this story with you.

Thank you again for all your support, and I hope you love what’s coming!

xoxo, [Z]

[michaelmilligan]

The Jonmartin manifesto no one asked for but needed to get out

So, I've not been in the tma fandom for long yet, having only listened to it for the first time a few months ago. But from browsing the Jonmartin (and teaholding and jmart) tag regularly, it seems to me like most jonmartin shippers fall into one of these two categories:

They would find each other in every universe; or

It's a miracle they even got together in this universe

(Obviously, that's an oversimplification, and people who express one view in one post can easily hold a different view at another time - these are fictional characters we're talking about after all, and headcanons don't need to be consistent and can even contradict each other. This is just the general vibe I got so far.)

Anyway, I wanted to add my own two cents on the topic, because while I understand where both of these views are coming from, I think neither of them is ultimately correct.

(Putting the rest under a read more - be warned that this is NOT a spoiler-free post, so if you haven't finished listening to TMA yet and you want a spoiler-free experience, you probably shouldn't read this.)

So, before we get to my own opinion, let's first look at where the two options I mentioned above come from, shall we?

"They would find each other in every universe"

Obviously, this view is highly romantic - star-crossed lovers, finding each other again and again. It is both a good foundational basis for AUs, and a ray of hope in the face of the tragedy that is the tma finale.

Of course, concerning the finale, this is a rather different take than concerning AUs (since it would mean the very same characters finding each other again in a different world, not fundamentally different characters, shaped by said other world, also finding each other). And maybe when people express this view, they mean more the finale fix-its than AUs, though I suspect that plenty of people mean both.

It's a nice, comforting thought. And don't we all need some comfort after the finale? Yes, we certainly do. (Except for the people who read only hurt without comfort and angst, I guess. You do you, and I'm glad you're having fun, but personally I do desperately need some comfort, lmao.)

Is this view supported by canon though?

Cynical minds would say no, and personally I'm more inclined to agree with them, though as I've said, for me the truth lies outside of those two rigid stances (somewhere in between, I suppose).

I don't see much in canon which points to Jon and Martin falling in love under any circumstances/in any universe, especially considering their... let's say difficult relationships at the start of the show. But of course we must also take into account the specific circumstances in canon (more on that below) and interpretations vary, and I do very much enjoy AUs, so I'm certainly not trying to throw shade if you're on this side of the 'divide'.

Mostly, I think there CAN be other circumstances in which those two get together, outside the canon ones. (I'm writing a canon-divergent jonmartin fic myself, lol.) Let's get into that while we look at the other view, shall we.

"It's a miracle they even got together in this one"

Ah, the Martin-approved stance. One could say 'well, they literally said it in canon' and be done with it. However, that would require us to believe that the opinions of the characters are always true and correct, which. Lmao. We only have to listen to season 2 of tma to know that this is very much not the case.

And even if S5 Martin is not S2 Jon at the height of his paranoia, he's still very much a man shaped by his own life and experiences. I'm sure he would call himself a realist, but he honestly seems more like a pessimist to me. Which is understandable, given his life, and his association with the Lonely, which has often been (in my opinion accurately) compared to depression.

The thing is, Jon did treat Martin horribly in S1, and then he admittedly treated everyone horribly in S2. It was only in the course of S3 that their relationship got more, let's say, equal, with Jon no longer thinking Martin would be 'contributing nothing but delays'. (And then of course we have S4, which I LOVE even though it hurts me deeply. Then again, that's the whole show. And, obviously, S5 my beloved.)

So. Jon seemed to hate Martin in S1, while Martin was arguably already in love with the man. (Arguably. We do know that he acted catty to Basira in S2, so it's reasonable to assume that he started liking him at some point in S1, or even before the show started.) Then a lot of traumatic things happened, and they got together.

This means it must be the traumatic things that made them compatible, right? Just like Martin says in S5?

Well, one could see it that way. Jon certainly changed over the seasons, coming off his high horse and such. (In S5, he arguably gets back on it quite a bit, but then he IS the Eye's specialest little princess in a world that's literally ruled by it. And also he is slowly losing his grip on his own humanity. But I digress.)

And I do think that the trauma channeled a lot of those changes - the first time we see Jon being actually emotionally open (something he still struggles with over all seasons, because people don't just change fundamentally that quickly) is during Prentiss' attack on the Institute. They're in a situation where they might reasonably die (they even expect it, because they don't know that Elias is just rubbing his greedy little paws as he waits for things to get worse before he saves them with the gas).

I do think that moment could have been a big turning point for Jon and Martin, if it hadn't been immediately followed with the discovery of Gertrude's body, and Jon's subsequent descent into paranoia. Jon opened up, and also saw that Martin was rather competent during the attack, which could have led to them becoming closer, respectively having at least something like a normal work relationship.

But then Jon got paranoid and interpreted everything he saw negatively, including Martin's competence, which was twisted in his mind to 'What if he's just been pretending to be incompetent and is actually an evil agent out to kill the archivist'.

(Big sigh.)

Anyway, before I lose myself in the red string as well: Yes, Jon seems to 'mellow' over the seasons, especially with regard to Martin, at the same time that he's going through terribly traumatic events.

But does that mean that it's actually the trauma that's changing him and his relationships? Partly, certainly, but I would argue that trauma doesn't make you nicer or kinder. It might make you realise some things, but that doesn't mean that you can't realise those things in other ways.

And does it means that they couldn't have come together if they had met under different circumstances? Also not necessarily! I would even argue that the specific circumstances they met under were detrimental to Jon's first impression of Martin. And yes, this goes beyond the dog story.

So let's try and dissect their relationship from the start.

A theory of... something like nuance, or whatever

The starting situation

(Yes, I did have to use a Supernatural gif, thank you for asking. No, I will not apologise. <3)

Alright. So let's start with what we actually know about Jon and Martin's first meeting. Obviously, there's the dog story, though as far as I know that's not 'canon' because it wasn't actually in the podcast. I still like it, and think it adds another reason to Jon's behaviour, though I don't necessarily think it's necessary, because Jon already had lots of other reasons to tell himself that Martin wasn't worth his time.

1.1. Jon has issues. More at 11.

First of all, we learn throughout the podcast that Jon doesn't actually have any qualifications to lead an archive. He's probably 29 when the show starts (in 2016, going by the fandom wiki stating that he was born in 1987, which is reasonable given everything we learn about his age).

So, he's 29 and suddenly appointed, after four years of working in one department, to become the head of a completely different department. He does not have a degree that would give him credentials for leading an archive, nor are we told that he has ever even worked in an archive. For all we know, and that he knows, he is woefully underqualified. (This is also, I think, highlighted in S2 when Jon threatens to resign, only to then be baffled by Elias saying that he would be difficult to replace. Elias means something completely different than his skill set as an archivist with a lower case 'a', presumably, but then Jon doesn't know that.)

This means that Jon is in a highly stressful position, because he's trying to do a job he doesn't actually know how to do, while also trying not to let on that he doesn't know how to do it!

It doesn't help that Jon is also terribly scared of what all might be lurking in the shadows (or even in the light), as he himself admits during the Prentiss attack. He is extremely high-strung from day one, basically a wet chihuahua shaking in a slight breeze, while trying to seem like a strong bulldog.

We also know that Jon asked for two people to be his assistants: Tim and Sasha. They both worked in research, and Sasha also briefly worked in artefact storage, making them both qualified to help Jon with following up on statements. But I think more than their qualifications, Jon probably requested them because he knew and got along with them.

Imagine: Your boss tells you that he's promoting you into a position you're not qualified for and which you have no real clue how to do. Wouldn't you rather have people around you who you're already friendly with, and who are likely to cut you some slack if you're not perfect on day one? I know I would!

1.2. Elias is a little shit and I want to kill him with hammers (affectionately)

And then Elias transfers Martin.

I'm going off the dog story again, because again, I like it, and I think it does fit neatly into canon. If this story is to be believed, Elias neither asked nor did he tell Jon that he was giving him another assistant. He apparently simply told Martin 'you work at the archives now, congratulations' and then went back to his office to smile smugly to himself.

This is a VERY bad start for a working relationship, because not only does Martin come in unannounced, this also comes off as Elias not respecting Jon, or potentially even sending someone to report back to Elias (because Martin is the only one who doesn't have an established rapport with Jon).

Jon never verbalises this suspicion, so maybe this is too much interpretation on my part, but in any case it's cause for a lot of resentment on Jon's part, and since he can't exactly let it out on Elias (who is rarely there, anyway), he simply lets it out on Martin.

He finds reasons to do so, of course, insulting his work and all that. It's probably easy, especially in the beginning, because not unlike Jon, Martin doesn't have any qualifications to work in an archive! He worked at the library before, and we know that his degree is made up (which we can only assume Elias knows, considering he can know almost anything).

(I actually find the question on why Elias transferred Martin in the first place extremely interesting, and might get into that in another post. But this one is already too long, lmao.)

1.3. Martin is too nice, aka Jon has even more issues

This is mostly my personal headcanon, though I do feel it fits Jon's character - which is that he doesn't know how to deal with nice people.

Not kind people. Not friendly people. But nice people.

People who do things seemingly out of the mere goodness of their heart. Like bringing their mean boss tea when he never asked them to do that. Like being friendly even in the face of insults. Someone who constantly takes himself back in favour of other people and their opinions.

People like Martin is appearing to be. Appearing, because Martin isn't actually like that. He does have his opinions, and he could probably grumble up a storm in S1 about Jon, but Jon is his BOSS, and so he plays.

Martin also IS genuinely a nice person most of the time (when he's not on a revenge rampage, making his boyfriend murder people). He doesn't have to do nice things for Jon like bring him tea in S2. But he does. Because that's Martin's way of trying to reach out, to show other people that he means no harm (and that he can be useful).

(I also think that Jon's snappish behaviour, where Martin never quite knows what will set the man off, might remind him off his mum, but again I digress. :))

But I think Jon doesn't know how to deal with that, because even when he's not in the height of paranoia, he still suspects that people who are THAT nice (especially when they have no reason to be nice because he's being an arsehole to them) have a secret agenda. This is playing into what I said under 2 (the part that might be too much interpretation on my side lol), because if Jon suspects that Martin is reporting back to Elias, or is at least someone who would not be friendly if he found out that Jon doesn't know what he's doing, then he can't allow himself to relax around him, and he certainly can't allow himself to be lulled into false security (as Jon would think) around him.

Tl;dr on this point: I think Jon is wary of Martin's niceness because he thinks he might be fishing for gossip/anything he can use against Jon. And even if he isn't, Jon thinks he would be likely to use anything he learns against Jon, because they weren't friends to begin with, and Jon's behaviour has made them anything but that.

(We have to remember that this is the guy who says in S2 that he knows what it's like to 'lack the respect of one's peers', aka the kid who got bullied by at least one older kid, and likely had no or very few friends - plus he believes in the supernatural, which doesn't exactly lend itself well to getting academic respect.)

1.4. They were fucked from the start, your honour

Basically what the meme says, but yeah. The they were put in practically guaranteed that Jon would be wary of Martin, and that Martin would be trying extra hard to make friends with him, which in turn would make Jon even more wary/hostile.

And Elias made it worse, either knowingly or by negligence (not telling Jon about transferring Martin).

If we add the whole dog story to it... they were fucked. I do actually wonder if, assuming we take the dog story as canon, Elias actually somehow managed to set that up. Or whether he was at least cackling (sorry, smiling ever so silently, but smugly) in his office as it happened, or whenever he ended up knowing that it happened.

2. Yes, we've had one starting point, but what about second starting point?

As we have established above, the starting situation for Jon and Martin was... not ideal. So, would they have gotten together easily given a different starting point, like in a cute coffee shop AU?

Eh.

It's true that the specific situation they were in made it a lot harder for them to actually communicate and see each other as they are than it had to be. That doesn't mean that a different situation would have made it easy, though.

Their personalities still make it hard, though, as even without the added stress of a new job, Jon is still a little chihuahua shaking in the corner, who tries to make up for it by barking at everyone, and Martin is still the guy trying to approach him with treats and getting his hand bitten.

There are certainly specific situation that could make it easier, especially if Jon isn't scared as hell, and has maybe already learned that not everyone who does something nice for him wants to just pull on his strings. (Yes, I do think that the thing that makes Martin, according to Annabelle, suited for the Web, is the thing that put Jon on edge at the beginning. I don't know if this was intended at all, but it makes me cackle.)

The beauty of fanfic is that we can do whatever the hell we want. But I think the most fun thing an AU author can do is think 'What would have to happen, in this specific scenario, for these two to get over themselves and get together?'

Excursion: Martin, my beloved depressed blorbo who I am certainly not projecting on, haha

Because it IS both of them who need to get over themselves. Of course Jon's issues are the most obvious, and I've certainly expanded on them enough. But Martin also has a problem, and it's that he's constantly hiding his true feelings and opinions, especially anger and fear.

That makes sense, perhaps, in a workplace, though considering he's dealing with a walking, talking worm hive and a stalker boss... Let's just say it probably would have helped Tim, too, if Martin hadn't been so desperate to make everyone be friends again.

Because Martin is always TRYING to make everything better for everyone, but he's actually not helping anyone. Being nice to Jon and bringing him tea doesn't help battle his paranoia. And trying to tell Tim not to be so angry at Jon, and can't they all be friends, doesn't actually help Tim with his anger.

All Martin is essentially doing is making himself small and saying 'let's get along, pretty please' every now and then. I don't know if it would have helped if he had expressed his own fears and anger, and maybe Jon would have misconstrued that as well, too deep in his paranoia already. But at least Tim might have realised that he was not alone in all this. (His biggest problem, as he says in S2, is that he feels that no one has his back, which I think at least partly results from no one expressing the same anger, aka no one validating his feelings.)

Anyway! (Jon voice) Excursion ends.

3. (To the melody of 'What shall we do with the drunken sailor') What shall we do with these total idiots?

So, how ARE these two going to get together, if they're so woefully unequipped to deal with each other?

Well, first we need to give Martin a good helping of self-confidence. Then we need to kind of give Jon the same, since his problem ALSO is that he's unsure of himself, he just tries to make other people small to cover it up, instead of making himself small. (And isn't that a funny thing to do for someone who we know was bullied. To become a bully himself. Oh, the snake, biting its own tail...)

The easy answer is, of course: You can come up with your own version, get creative. <3

The more complex answer is: A lot of stuff, probably. Jon and Martin will certainly need time to get to know each other, and of course it depends on what situation you put them in to start. But there will be misunderstandings, and there will be hurt feelings, and I am going to soak it up all like a particularly slowburn-greedy sponge.

I feel like there are probably five million ways to get them together, and some might be cute and fluffy (if they go to therapy first, I guess, lol) and many will be full of tears. <3 (Jon voice) And I want to see them all on my desk by Friday! So get to it!

In all seriousness though, yeah, I think there's not one right way for them to get together (though canon did it well imo). But it's also a little more complex than we might give it credit to (very much including me).

4. So what now?

I don't know. I'm not your dad. Write a fic. Draw a picture. Put down your own thoughts on the matter. Or take a shower and clean up your room, young Padawan!

(Though actually, if you've read this post from start to finish in one session, what you should probably do is get up and stretch and get some water.)

And above all! And this is imperative.

Have a good day. <3

[icewindandboringhorror]

I occasionally wish to reach out to old friends/acquaintances I haven't spoken to since high school/some other even earlier time in my life, but I have SOOO little social energy even for required tasks (like making dr phone calls or etc), I never have any leftover for extra ones, and it would be very odd to message someone I haven't spoken to in like 5 years out of the blue but then take 4 entire months to respond back lol.. My natural curiosity with nostalgia/collecting details of the past/etc. (literally if I were born a little earlier I would definitely do scrapbooking or something lol) is very strong, but, alas, not strong enough to beat out the Social Issues Demons apparently

[todayisafridaynight]

what makes minedai even sadder is that we never rlly see daigo try to build a bond with anyone else like he did with mine it rlly shows how badly it effected him like yeah he reached out to shinada in y5 but that’s rlly it and he probably would wanna leave him alone after that and not involve him in any yakuza stuff so i don’t think they would’ve hung out or anything like that afterwards. All he rlly had were saejima and majima but they were more like babysitters than anything, wish we saw more of their dynamic tho like we did with majima and daigo in dead souls since that was fun and we were lowkey robbed but in canon he’s just as lonely as he was before majimas promise to kiryu. And mine is the only person he really had a meaningful relationship with romantic or not they were still really close and we don’t see that again with daigo ever (from what i recall after y3) ok sorry for rambling LMFAO

even with shinada, he reached out to him more so out of 'duty' and trying to make up for the misfortune that befell him because of yakuza than wanting to rekindle any kind of friendship they might have had in high school (though it sounds more like they were just acquaintances if shinada needing a second to remember who daigo was is anything), so yah i doubt they really had any kind of bond afterwards

dead souls really was the only time after Y3 where we got to see daigo be more sociable with someone, but its as you say majima and saejima are more like retainers than close friends

[deepseawave]

obsessed w the tags on ur last reblog

Omgg, thank you haha, it was a quality post so I just had to appreciate it in full force 😂❤️

Can‘t believe someone would actually enjoy my yapping :,D

[nonuggetshere]

I'm gonna continue with the requests later, but I also felt the need to doodle my two PVs with a little bit of gender on the side

They're both still very much genderless, but because not every non-binary/agender person will have the same perception/feelings regarding their gender and won't have the same gender presentation, I decided to mess around with it a little

Hallow is genderfluidv(though after some consideration I realised agenderflux describes them more accurately, but oh well, these labels don't even exist in their story so who cares), they're non-binary but their alignment fluctuates between fem-leaning, masc-leaning, something in-between and neither. They're fine with any terms and pronouns but mostly go by they/them.

Luna is genderfae/transfem, their gender fluctuates between agender and fem-aligned non-binary. They mostly go by they/them and gender-neutral and feminine terms, they're fine with she/her and some neopronouns, but any masculine terms and pronouns are a big no-no for them. Currently, I'm considering making them an enby lesbian, but that might change in the future.

[darabeatha]

/ I've noticed that at this point I'm not even writing on any blog anymore, I just come and yell about some blorbo and leave. Rinse and repeat my lieges

[ourceliumnetwork]

apparently we're not out of the woods on holiday trauma responses just yet - i'm hoping we're on the tail end of it but like. good lord.

[a-concert-just-for-me]

Arcane s2 spoilers

Powder in episode 7 is so unsettling to me. They neurotypicalized my girl. She’s in regular girl clothes and has a boyfriend and a stable job and is able to think rationally and also work towards her goals and reach her potential…she’s no longer #hashtag relatable. That whole arc had me like “put it back!!!!! I need that girl to be fucking insane!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

[minody]

I think I'm ready to say something about punish by Ethel cain.

I've only listened to preacher's daughter and I think Ethel Cain is a master producer and lyricist, with an incredible sense of detail and ambiance. I'm not really in the circle of cain or that familiar with the fanbase or the lore though, and she's not really centered on my social media algorithms except for incidentally as she's relevant to pop music and alt trans ppl, so that might be impacting the lack of discussion ive seen around punish. ok disclaimer aside

any of the discussion, comments, or reviews I've seen of punish praise it like, in a normal social media fan way, people love the song and listen to it 30 times a day and love the silent hill vibes and think it's an amazing song to play in the car and love the way the guitar sounds or feels and think it's abstract and praiseworthy. I literally cannot and will not be listening to this song other than that first listen, except for when I listen again when I go through the entire perverts project when it releases, bc it's literally like too good at everything it does and I find the song deeply and traumatically uncomfortable to listen to. as a lead single, punish does a great job of telling me what I should expect from perverts: cuttingly sharp and smart exposure of discomfiting themes told through the lyrics and then made into a 360° 3D synesthetically sensory experience through the production. and speaking of production, Hayden's ability to create mood, ambiance, and literally just "place" through the production is so masterful, I can't think of a better word except for diegetic like her ability to introduce and expose a world or a moment (or a memory?) through songcraft is literally masterful. it's the epitome of what "show don't tell" means, to me. when I listened, it felt like, even if she doesn't say child sexual grooming, and post trauma, and sexual assault survivor, her ability to evoke shame and punishment and helplessness turned into rebellion, and feeling trapped in a cage, and feeling like a captain of your own ship in a storm, and feeling like the broken thing inside of you isn't capable of being healed only survived. the clarity and intensity with which punish evoked this in me makes me like never want to listen to this song again. I'm really glad that there are people bumping this 7 minute track on loop during their morning commute but like I do start to think. are you people just stronger than me or

[in-tua-deep]

wait i just remembered. on friday we has a "awesome committee" staff meeting which is apparently just a meeting for staff to like. bring food. play games. and bond with each other? and this week we played two truths and a lie

mine were i have only broken one bone and it wasn't even my fault (lie), i'm the youngest of five children (true), and i dislocated my arm six times before the age of seven (also true)

so many people picked the youngest of five children as the lie. one person commented that they thought i might have four sibling but i don't give off youngest child energy or something

what does that mean

what. what energy do i give off. what birth order vibe do i have. i just remember this happened and it has been haunting me ever since

[endbeginning]

and if i said.... pet.er peve.nsie.....

[anti-dazai-blog]

ngl that dazai anon™ reminds a little of myself when i was hyperfixated on a specific character and would go on to guilt trip every single fic writer who dared to kill her

but like... i was 10

Oh I relate to this so hard in the sense that dazai anon reminds me of my pre-teen self— when I was like 12 I went through a phase of hating on an actor who played a character I didn’t like (the actor did a perfectly fine job of portraying the character, my 12 year old brain just couldn’t differentiate between an actor who’s really good at playing an asshole and an Actual Real Life asshole).

Luckily I never harassed anyone over it, and once I outgrew that phase I was like “That was so stupid.”

anyway that’s why I keep saying I really hope the Dazai anon just outgrows this phase naturally. I think the fact that this is all taking place on the internet instead of in some private group chat between Dazai anon and their friends is making this so much worse, because it’s creating this cycle where they have to keep doubling down and the internet will never let them forget about this and outgrow it in a healthy way.

point is the internet is the REAL problem here.

[dbssh]

the thing about junkrat is that like. yeah he does and has killed people but alot of people in the fandom who seem to really hate him (or at least think he's overrated) tend to like. characterize him like he's an evil ruthless white boy murderer and not a comic relief character? like i remember people being like "the tumblr fandom seems to forgot junkrat and roadhog are violent criminals and not wacky adventure bros) and like i guess if you ready their bios and nothing else than yeah?

WELL YEAH. i think those kind of people are.funny because like they could not more explicitly be wacky adventure bros, like, even when they kill people they do it with a silly style like junkrat is Funny. i think i just dont like it when the devs put things in the game where hes like "🥺🥺🥺🥺 why does nobody like meeeeeeeee im so saaaaaaaad about nobody liking meeee" and then people write 27 paragraphs of meta about how he was just a little misunderstood babyguy the whole time and the rest of the cast is unfairly mean like its like, baptistes fault that junkrat loves to be weird and violent and offputting

[belovedblabber]

I’ve gotta say, people reacting to all of this dnd wotc ogl stuff by being super snooty like ‘dnd is a bad system anyway and just try something else’ to be frustrating