#i hate using the word purist. i really do

[lullabyofthejotnar]

I remembered that one time when someone did a little bit of a rant on my post about media refusing to have accurate mythology depictions and it got me kinda thinking. Alongside the "Anti-DEI" Gamerbros, you have the "myth accuracy purists". Now, the difference is that usually, unlike the Gamerbros™, their complaints are not coming from their bigotry. But, they can still be annoying to deal with. I get why someone would be dissapointed with inaccurate depictions — Especially since there are some straight up horrendous and popular ones, which caused people to spread misinformation to the point said misinfo is accepted as the correct one.

What I don't get, however, is knowingly engaging with a series that advertises itself as being pretty much a mythology fanfiction or even a satire of them. Then getting mad there's no accuracy.

[coffeebooksrain18]

Why can’t team black stans accept strong boys are bastards after more than three years?

I am a bastard myself and its really weird how TB push it under the carpet: just now I came across a tb stan STILL whinging that in the books it was more ambiguous they were bastards versus in the show its obvious. But that’s not true, it was obvious in the books too. Their features were described in detail for that reason. IDK I get very xenophobic vibes from black stans. Most of them are blood purists who dunk on the greens for being half targaryen but they cannot do to the strong boys at risk of being called hypocrites hence they blur the truth of them being illegitimate strongs by spreading false information from the books. But it’s SO obvious they overhype the strong boys yet hate they’re bastards and not true’ targaryens. TB fans unironically are more anti bastard than alicent hightower and catelyn stark combined :p

They truly are hypocrites when it comes to the Strong boys and the fact they are in fact bastards in both canons. Also I don't understand it either, I've been accused as being Bastardphobic to which I told the person I have two siblings born/conceived out of wedlock and I don't care. I find it more odd how they want to use the word Bastard in its traditional sense for modern times when bow its just an insult like Bitch.

And yes the Strong boys were bastards in book. We have an interview of GrrM where he says if he could in the future he would build more on Rhaenyra's relationship with HARWIN STRONG, and how it effected her relationship with Laenor and by extension the Velaryons. But the fact that they still cling to this is baffling when the author himself pretty clearly stated they are bastards.

I've seen many pull out that Baratheon black hair mixed with Targaryen white could make brown. Or that they got their hair color from Aemma since she didn't have a clear description in book. Which all these are fine, if they are legitimate I would lean with the Aemma one sine the Baratheon theory doesn't even work with the world. Like GrrM has drilled his genetics for this world into us and yet they pull stuff like that out of their asses and act like it's Canon.

Also that theory dies quickly when you point out neither, House Targaryen, House Velaryon, House Barathon, or House Arryn are described as having brown eyes or pug noses. House Targaryen and House Velaryon have purple eyes. House Baratheon has blue. And House Arryn is aid to have blue to grey eyes (though the do lean grey I believe). House Baratheon is said to have strong features and wide frames. House Arryn are aid to have softer features and pale skin. None of this correlates to the Strong Boys brown hair, brown eyes, or pug noses.

Another argument they use is the fact GrrM didn't really describe House Strong besides one person who was blood and blue eyed. But that is one person, they very well could've gotten those looks from their Mother or Harwin could've gotten his looks from his Mother.

Also this whole thing peeves me since TGs get so much htw for theorizing Alicent had blonde hair since King Jaehaerys thought she was his daughter Saera. Though I don't believe this one myself I think it is more reasonable and set in the Canon than th idea the Strong Boys are bastards.

They forget many things GrrM has made clear, Rhaenyra is inspired and a parallel to Cersei, three illegitimate children, demanding they sit the throne, are only two that are clear to see. And yet MANY TBs hate Cersei. If you look at old posts about Rhaenyra before the show came out many of them are stating this fact and how obvious it is.

And yes many are Blood Purists. I cannot tell you how many posts I've seen talking about how the greens and Strong boys have the same amount of Targaryen blood but the Strong Boys is better since they have the blood of th First Men. Also almost every Daemyra I come across (and I bet these are some of the worsts) make posts on how it was Rhaeyra that gave Daemon "Pure Valyrain Sons". They forget Laena is Valyrian. Her Mother is a Targaryen and her Father is from House Velaryon, a VALYRIAN HOUSE. which only makes one wonder why they are so obsessed with the Valyrian Targaryen blood, like yeah Dragons cool but we know fem Nettles you don't have to be a Targaryen or Dragonseed to claim a Dragon. Though it probably makes it a lot easier. It makes me icky since so may act like they love the Velaryons and yt they diminish their part/stories in the Dance and all around really. It's extremely racist and needs called out more.

And finally let me say this, since we're talking about Blood Purity I figured I would point this out since I'm tired of seeing people say the Targtowers and the Strong Boys have the same amount of Targaryen blood as a way to belittle the greens.

Aemma Arryn was half Targaryen, half Arryn. And that means if we say Viserys was a pure Targaryen (he wasn't but let's just say he was) Rhaenyra 25% Arryn and 75% Targaryen.

The Strong Boys would have 50% Strong, 12.5% Arryn, and 37.5% Targaryen blood.

And then th Targtowers. Half Targaryen so 50%, and Half Hightower yet again 50%.

So actually for the TBs who act like the Strong Boys are "better" for having "more Targaryen blood". The don't in fact Rhaena and Baela have more Targaryen blood than them. But they only ever call them the Velaryon twins. Yet another show of Hypocrisy from TB.

Sorry for going on a rant as you can see I'm very passionate about this subject Anon.

Much Love!

[lurveinn]

I’m so curious about Wizarding fashion. JKR isn’t very physically descriptive- we just know that wizards wear robes, which are outlandish to muggles, and pointy hats, but what does that really mean? What kind of robe? Magical fashion clearly isn’t very gendered, since Harry remarks on a man at the Quidditch World Cup wearing a dress and insisting that it’s unisex (certainly not the case in Britain at the time), but we don’t have any other parameters. Keeping in mind the uniform from the movies, and the fact that in SWM, Snape isn’t wearing any trousers, here’s what I think wizards wear:

1. Flowing silhouettes and cloaks; clearly, wizards love a good statement cloak. Think tassels and frills (not like Ron’s Yule Ball fit!), massive extended sleeves and lots of draping.

2. Skirts: let’s be honest, just one singular robe, without any layering, doesn’t give us much to work with. Skirts go with the general silhouette, explain why the World Cup wizard thought muggle men wore dresses, and keep with the no-trousers thing from SWM. I’m South Asian, so I like to have a little fun with it and think of wizards in ghararas (my favourite item of clothing); the Wizarding World is quite insular, travel is relatively unrestricted (hello, they have magic!), everyone has a common enemy in muggles (and other species- goblins, house-elves) etcetera, so race probably doesn’t function the same way and I headcanon a lot of cross-cultural exchange. Plus, wizarding fashion isn’t restricted by weather- they have warming charms- so wearing clothes made for hot climates in England, for example, wouldn’t be a problem.

Plus, I actually think saris are a natural fancy dress option- flowy, drapey, colourful. Speaking of which-

3. If there’s one fanon idea that I hate (aside from fanon!Sirius, of course), it’s this image of wizards (specifically high society wizards) as reserved. Sorry, did we read the same books? Wizards, even posh, rich wizards, like the Malfoys and Blacks, are camp and very outlandish. They do house-elf taxidermy, they keep their wands in canes. Just because Hogwarts uniforms are black doesn’t mean that people dress like they’re in mourning all the time. People can be total snobs and obsessed with their image and still wear bright pink, insane robes, because guess what? They have different social conventions than we do. Men and women dress basically the same, so there is no reason to believe that a man wearing a flowing robe would be against the norm. I say this as someone who believes misogyny and homophobia are well and truly alive in Wizarding society, especially in pureblooded families where the emphasis is on continuing the line; they definitely exist, but they probably look different.

4. My personal obsession and headcanon: rich wizards wearing bones. Look, I might not think of them as racist in the traditional sense, but they are undeniably speciesist, if that’s a word? They think of themselves as superior, and other sentient magical species either work under (goblins) or are enslaved (house-elves) by wizards. We only see Veelas very briefly, but despite them being admired for their beauty, I doubt wizards treat them very well. So- show me blood-purists wearing corsets made of goblin bones and teeth. Show me Veelas being hunted for their blood to stain and dye clothes with. Show me exotic “magical creatures” that are humanoid and capable of reasoning and should have rights, like mermaids and werewolves, being hunted for their scales and pelts while also being ostracised for being ‘non-human’. It’s terrible, but that’s the kind of archaic jewellery and fashion the old families that the fandom likes to fetishise would like to wear.

[hollowed-theory-hall]

what’s your opinion on draco x hermione as a couple? sorry if you’ve answered this before but i haven’t been able to find an answer 🤔

Hi, and no I don't believe I have spoken about Dramione before.

As with all shipping things, ship whatever you want these are just my opinion.

With that out of the way, I honestly, I have a little soft spot for Dramione. Now, do I think it makes sense in canon, not really, but I don't mind them as a side pairing. Like, you won't find me reading/writing fics specifically for Dramione, but I'm fine when they are there.

You see, Dramione hits a very particular spot for me. That spot is that I like both characters about the same amount (which is I think they're written alright for what they are, but I find them kinda annoying in the books). That places them as equals inside my head and makes shipping them with each other easier than shipping them with characters I like more than them. This is just how shipping works for me sometimes.

As for the character personalities themselves, I think Draco and Hermione have a surprising lot in common with each other.

Draco is implied to be a top student (he's in Potions NEWT class, for example), like Hermione, meaning he's also very academically inclined. But neither of them is some brilliant strategist and while they can come up with creative solutions, they don't think very far ahead with these solutions. They don't necessarily complete each other intellectually, but I think they're about equal to each other, I think. Both are brave when the situation calls for it. Hermione hangs out with Harry and Ron, who never really had money growing up, but her family goes on ski trips. She's the only daughter of two dentists. You just know she lives well and is used to comforts at home.

Both, while having very loving parents, feel isolated from their peers growing up. You can tell Hermione was likely bullied in her muggle primary school and while Draco hangs out with Crabbe and Goyle, he isn't actually close to any of them. Both of them also share the experience of loving their parents, and yet having a great divide between them and their parents. Hermione's parents love her, but they could never connect to the wizarding world fully. Lucius and Narcissa love Draco, but once Voldemort returns, I think Draco feels more and more distant from his parents because he isn't actually a blood purist. We see that when he's truly alone and seeking comfort and a friend in year 6 he talks to Moaning Myrtle, who is a muggleborn.

I think, like Myrtle, Hermione could appreciate that Draco is sensitive. This is something I feel might get on Harry's nerves on occasion considering how he hates Cho being all weepy, but I think Hermione would find it sweet.

I do like that Hermione is the more ruthless one between the two. Like, she is the more willing of the two of them to come up with some crazy idea that is most difficult illegal (like trapping Rita in a jar or setting Snape's robes on fire). Like Draco would be horrified at the thought of breaking into the ministry, Hermione would consider it a challenge. This dynamic could be really fun.

It's a dynamic that doesn't exist with Drarry or Dron in the same way since Harry and Ron, while both are more ruthless than Draco and also break into the ministry do so out of necessity and usually would try to avoid danger. Hermione, on the other hand, is more willing to go in headfirst into crazy dangerous shit like the Gryffindor she is. I think Hermione is less hinged than Ron, and Harry is what I'm saying, and it's one of my favorite aspects of her character. And while Hermione can be ruthless, and even violent, she's also weird about violence. She has a certain line she is terrified of crossing; that line is around killing and Unforgivable curses. I think terrified is the right word because I think she knows she could cross it and it scares her. We see Harry cast Unforgivables, and while I think Hermione could cast them if she was pushed to it, it wouldn't be something she tried on her own accord. I also think she'd be more horrified with herself for succeeding than Harry is. Draco is similar in that he can cast Unforgivables when pushed to, but he's disgusted with himself over it and feels sick. What I'm saying is that Hermione is softer in that respect (but also wackier in her plans), which I think would be very interesting when paired with Draco.

Both of them could be incredibly stubborn, which I think they'd both enjoy. Both Hermione and Draco are very verbal characters, they love talking and blabbering on and that would help them connect to each other because they would just start talking about something, and just, never really stop talking because both of them are like that. I think Draco would also enjoy bantering and arguing as a playful pastime the way Hermione and Ron do, which is also a point in Dramione's favor.

Hermione is less forgiving than Harry is, though, but she is capable of forgiving Draco, I don't think it's beyond her. Yes, slurs and all, I think it's in character for her to forgive him under the right circumstances.

So, like, while they're not a pairing I read all that much, they do compel me a bit. My main problem with Dramione is that often when they're paired up, both of them are too out of character for my liking.

[buffyfan145]

Word of warning we just got a ton of possible leaks about season 2 of "Rings of Power" coming from The One Ring Net source. However, I will point out while a few of these seem possible this reminds me a lot of other "leaked" things for my other fandoms, especially DC and Marvel movies/shows, and most of those turned out to be false and fans just posting things for their own enjoyment. However, this is how it first leaked that Halbrand was Sauron before season 1 aired. Some of these do match scoops/spoilers we've gotten from Fellowship of Fans an interviews with the cast, but some of these are so out of left field. I'll post a breakdown under a cut of the major ones but you can see the post in full here. But I will point out some of these would be massive changes to the lore that even I'd be shocked if they do it, so again we'll see.

So the first thing that matches what FOF and even Charlie Vickers teased is that season 2 is going to show a lot of Sauron flashbacks and tell his side of the story and that we'll be in on his plans the whole time. But according to this post the Mairon version is a separate actor and that Gavi is actually the Annatar version but Halbrand/Charlie is still the main one going forward.

They're saying the Tolkien estate gave Amazon more access to "The Silmarillion" and we will see all the Valar, Maiar, Eru (he's just a voice though so we won't see a person), Melkor/Morgoth, Mairon (even called this name), Gandalf/Mithrander (who is Daniel's The Stranger), and even Ungoliant as we get this full backstory in the show.

Halbrand will go back to the dwarves and reveal he's Mairon to them and they truth him because of Aule.

It'll be revealed that Sauron/Mairon had a son and Adar killed him, which was why the line Adar said about "a woman or a child" was said in s1. No idea who the boy's mother is but possibly Amelia Kenworthy's character. This is a huge departure but would be interesting to have Sauron/Mairon/Halbrand actually have been a father and the 2nd Maiar besides Melian to have children.

Gandalf/Mithrander will also have flashbacks, including that he almost sided with Mairon, and even introduce Shadowfax.

Tom Bombadil and Goldberry will appear, which we already saw a leak about this possibly happening last year.

Supposedly Halbrand/Sauron does keep up his infatuation with Galadriel but actually goes back to Eregion not as just Annatar but as Celeborn!!! 😮 So they don't rescue Celeborn after all but it is Sauron/Halbrand and it's making it sound like there's romantic scenes between them but again it's actually Sauron/Halbrand with Galadriel and not Celeborn. I know some of us Haladriel shippers have written this exact thing in our fics and if this really does happen that again hints that Sauron/Halbrand really could be Celebrian's biological father which I would be shocked if the show did this even though I'd also love it. LOL Then add in if they do this change where Sauron had a son that died and possibly ends up having a daughter with Galadriel. It does sound like the real Celeborn does come back too at some point so if this happens this is going to be interesting, even though I know a lot of the purists and regular LOTR fans might hate it.

The season does end with Sauron forging the One Ring, which FOF has also been speculating. The thing is if Galadriel will be with him when he does as FOF reported on her being captured by Adar during the Battle of Eregion with this also confirms happens in the last 2 episodes.

They're also saying too that the season will also end with Galadriel making a choice to save either real Celeborn and/or Sauron/Halbrand as Celeborn, which again could point to above that she gets captured and then decides to stay with him. So this is going to be very interesting if any of these turn out to be true.

[midnightstargazer]

thoughts on sunshine james

I mean, it's not canon. I can see where it comes from, but it's not the James we see in the few actual flashbacks of him.

James, in canon, was very loyal and selfless towards the people he loved the most. He treated Sirius like a brother and welcomed him into his family's home when Sirius ran away. He accepted Remus when he found out he was a werewolf and went to great lengths to help him. He fought and died in a war that he could have opted out of, probably for Lily's sake and because it was the right thing to do. And, of course, he never questioned whether he could trust Peter, to disastrous results. This is where the sunshine characterization comes from, I think.

But he was also someone who had very black and white ideas about right and wrong. The other Marauders + Lily showed a capacity to see gray area when it came to the people they were closest to, or just in general.

Lily was friends with Snape for years, even after he started hanging out with the future Death Eaters' gang, even knowing he was using Dark magic.

Remus understood that the Marauders' bullying was wrong, but did not stand up to them about it and still saw them as good people. Later in life, he was able to tolerate Snape and trust Dumbledore's judgment on him.

Sirius gave us the line "the world isn't split into good people and Death Eaters" and was pretty forgiving in his assessment of Regulus ("stupid idiot" is a very mild insult to be immediately followed by "he joined the Death Eaters")

Peter - well, Peter betrayed them to Voldemort, so obviously he wasn't very concerned with morality.

James, on the other hand? Saw the world in black and white, not a lot of nuance. He absolutely despised pure-blood rhetoric and Dark Arts and wanted nothing to do with people who aligned themselves with those things. No exceptions. And while he was generous and loyal towards his friends, he had no problem being cruel to people he deemed bad. It's very strongly implied that his reasons for targeting Snape were connected to Snape's interest in the Dark Arts and use of the word "mudblood." He felt like it was acceptable to bully Snape because Snape was not a good person.

(I think there was definitely also some personal dislike involved, which would have existed regardless, hence the "it's more the fact that he exists" comment. But still, Remus and Sirius seem pretty convinced James hating the Dark Arts had a lot to do with it).

This sort of "it's okay to do bad things to bad people" mentality is pretty much opposite of what sunshine James usually ends up looking like in fanon. Largely because sunshine James is usually paired with Regulus. And, obviously, to make that work, even with the softer versions of Regulus that usually go with the ship, James has to be a very forgiving sort of person who's willing to see nuance and give people a chance, not someone who takes a hard line stance against blood purist ideology or Dark Arts.

This is why Jegulus doesn't work for me unless it's very far removed from canon. Because if Voldemort exists, and the war is happening, and they both have their canon views on blood purity and Dark Arts and join their respective sides, I just don't see it. If Regulus survived his trip to the lake and was actively working against Voldemort in the long term, then maybe. If his views also changed quite a bit. But even then, I still think James would be starting with a negative opinion of him and it would take a lot to get him to reconsider. I'm not saying Regulus doesn't deserve a second chance, or doesn't deserve to be loved by a good person. It's just... not how I see James at all.

tl;dr - canon James is a good and loyal friend but not an all-loving ray of sunshine who wants to see the best in everyone. The sunshine characterization makes Jegulus possible with a closer-to-canon plot and setting, but it isn't really compatible with James's canon characterization.

[oh-my-bindery]

I clearly had a little late night rant to myself so I decided to share it…

Drarry and how I see them and why they are SO IMPORTANT to me

Draco

Draco is sheltered, an only child, he is spoiled, he has been fed blood purist nonsense all his life by his family and those around him. Which is so relatable to me as I am an ex-catholic who not only had extremely clouded beliefs about race, but also sexuality and religion. I said awful things to people, I was being fed that by teachers, parents, newspapers, Catholic Church, school classmates and teachers. Everything around me was that way. I was a very closeted trans gay man who eventually lost it and wanted to burn all those beliefs down once I figured out what I his deep down about myself and became more aware of people, suffering and prejudice.

I used to use my words to protect myself and even being nasty to people, wanting to hurt them so they couldn’t hurt me. I was a very closeted gay and transgender person. I really relate to Draco.

Draco’s humanity/ vulnerability

The turning moment for me seeing Draco differently (or having a chance of change) as it was for Harry in the books, was seeing the humanity to Draco.

We never truly see Dracos humanity or how he is on his day to day basis (we do get some scenes that shape him as a person and present wider outlook on his character) as the book is written from Harry’s perspective and JKR really hates Draco.

Which is awful, she never gave him a true redemption despite hinting at it, building it up over the 6th, 7th book. Draco stops eating in his 6th year (it’s not directly stated but it is said that he looks “sick” which could be taken is such which addition to not sleeping and overwhelming stress and pressure clearly visible on him), he is forced to become a Death Eater and given the mark as a punishment to his father, he becomes panicked and miserable and acting out of paranoia and not doing a great job. He cries so much so, he becomes friends with Moaning Myrtle and even she says how sad and depressed he is, how lonely he is. Which leads me to conclude that either a) he distanced himself from his friends b) his friends are not his real friends but only friends with him bc of his high up status as a Malfoy or they have been family friends for years due to their parents being friends. c) both. At first maybe Draco felt like he could restore the good family name to his family. He was proud. But then he realized what all of it meant it meant that he would have to kill and he is truly not capable of it.

Draco’s wand working for Harry very well/ being a light side wand

Let’s take a look at what Harry Potter Wiki says about it first.

“Draco Malfoy's wand was 10" long, made of hawthorn wood, and had a unicorn hair core. “

“Hawthorn wands are said to be "most at home" with a wizard passing through a period of turmoil. During the last couple of years of owning this wand, Draco Malfoy was under enormous pressure to murder Albus Dumbledore, and immediately afterwards suffered through Voldemort occupying his family's home. Harry Potter claimed mastery of this wand at a time of great turmoil as well, undergoing a robbery of Gringotts Bank and the Battle of Hogwarts within a short time of gaining this wand.”

What can be told about Draco from it is that he not only was going through some turmoil when he was chosen by his wand at 11 but also continued to do so in Dracos darkest time in 6th year.

What we can gather from this regarding Drarry is that they are both going through the worst. They would understand each other.

Then we move on to:

“Wands with unicorn hair as its core are the hardest to turn to Dark Arts. Although this would seem ironic at first, as Draco's inclination to Dark Arts during his early to middle years (and his success at casting the very dark Imperius Curse) his last years at school led to a change of his lifestyle that made him realise he had gone further than he expected, and henceforth turn away from the Dark Arts.”

Draco was opposed to Dark Arts from a young age even though his father was most certainly very into them. Which is extremely interesting. What was Draco like before he came to Howarts? I can only assume his mum was a good and living influence on his life (she’s definitely flawed and believing in blood purity, but she will give up her own life and happiness if it means Draco is alive and happy).

And yeah Draco was always a terrible Death Eater because his heart was not truly in it. He wanted to save his family and himself from dying.

Draco’s wand in Harry’s hand (GET YOUR MIND OUT IF THE GUTTER)

“Harry looked down at the hawthorn wand that had once belonged to Draco Malfoy. He had been surprised, but pleased, to discover that it worked for him at least as well as Hermione's had done.” - Deathly Hallows

IM SORRY BUT DRACOS WAND CHANGING ALLIANCE TO HARRY IS THE GAYEST THING EVER.

Wands to tend to have difficult time switching masters. Yet Dracos wand doesn’t. It works great for Harry despite Garry not winning it fairly.

Draco’s wand is one that is the least likely to turn into dark arts. The wand chooses the wizard. On the topic of wands Dracos wand felt the most friendly to Harry and he defeated Voldemort with it. Dracos wand also is said to have a very hard time to switch owners/ sides yet there was no problem of it when Harry took it from Draco. Draco didn’t even fight back enough for it. Almost as if he wanted Harry to have it. Which would make sense that the wand worked so well for Harry as Draco wanted it to work for Harry. It only makes sense that way. It may have not been intended by JkR to write that but it’s what she wrote.

Not Identifying Harry in the Malfoy Manor

Draco lies to his family risking his own and his family’s lives to give Harry time to escape the Manor. He knows Harry is Harry but instead says he “can’t be sure” which is the only response he could go for in order for Harry and his friends not to be killed. If Draco said that Harry was not Harry, him, Hermione and Ron would have been killed because they are useless to the Death Eaters and Snatchers.

Draco is top student in some of his classes from what we know. He is smart, he must have known how to deal with this situation. He also was terrified when he saw Harry as Harry noticed.

“… Draco… approached.

“Well, Draco?” said Lucius Malfoy... “Is it? Is it Harry Potter?”

“I can’t—I can’t be sure,” said Draco….

“But look at him carefully, look! Come closer!… …Draco, come here, look properly! What do you think?”

“…Draco’s expression was full of reluctance, even fear.

“I don’t know,” he said, and he walked away…”

-Deathly Hallows

Harry noticed so many of Dracos emotions, more than anyone, they both read each other so well. Know each other by their breath, by their slight movement (main piece of proof is the emotive HBP). They know what the other is going to say or is thinking. Harry knew Draco was terrified and didn’t want to torture Rowle as his punishment. He could see it on Dracos face in his visions after the Manor escape. So far so Harry felt bad for Draco, it hurt him to look at it and he had to cut off that connection it hurt him so much.

“

“More, Rowle, or shall we end it and feed you to Nagini? Lord Voldemort is not sure that he will forgive this time. . . . You called me back for this, to tell me that Harry Potter has escaped again? Draco, give Rowle another taste of our displeasure. . . . Do it, or feel my wrath yourself!”

A log fell in the fire: Flames reared, their light darting across a terrified, pointed white face — with a sense of emerging from deep water, Harry drew heaving breaths and opened his eyes.

He was spread-eagled on the cold black marble floor, his nose inches from one of the silver serpent tails that supported the large bathtub. He sat up. Malfoy’s gaunt, petrified face seemed branded on the inside of his eyes. Harry felt sickened by what he had seen, by the use to which Draco was now being put by Voldemort.” - Deathly Hallows

Also going back to Draco, he had to live with Voldemort since his fifth year. Terrified, watching people die in his house, terrified that his parents or himself will be tortured or killed. And let’s not lie he probably was tortured himself by letting Harry get away. Draco is a skilled at occlumency so he could probably hide his feelings towards Harry from Voldemort or his father.

Harry saves Draco from the Room of Requirements and then again even tho Draco is talking to a Death Eather saying he is on their side. Harry cares about Draco not dying. He risks his own and his friends lives to save Draco. I’m pretty sure Harry would not to that to other people he hates and he didn’t- not Crabbe or Goyle. All he cared about was Draco. This boy is not just a noble Gryffinor and his Harry-self who is adamant about saving lives. He cares about Draco more than he does for other people that are not his friends or family.

I can definitely continue but if people want to add to it, please feel free as I WOULD LIVE IT!

[centaurs-a]

in general ive seen a lot of people misunderstanding the relationship between Lucius and Draco, they portray it as something strained and slightly abusive on Lucius's part but I can't put into words just how little in canon there is to support that viewing and how there is actually a lot more to show that they actually have a rather good father-son relationship.

In canon, Draco has the infamous line "my father will hear about this", it's become something of a joke within fandom but something being made into a joke by fans doesn't mean it doesn't have weight in the story, this line shows just how much Draco trusts his father. After all, what child would go to a parent for help if the child didn't trust the parent? Draco shows time and time again throughout the series that he trusts his father a lot, from going to him about Buckbeak to him annoying his father about Harry all summer in book 2, he shares a lot of his life with his thoughts and feelings with his dad and more importantly Lucius allows Draco to share these things with him. He isn't neglecting his son, no deadbeat would know about their kids ramblings on some kid they don't like at school or would they attempt to drive their kid to do better in school (albeit in a bit of a harsh and blood purist way)

While there's no substantial evidence that Draco is being mentally abused, there's also no evidence for any physical abuse. Draco is skinny, yes, but so are both of his parents, and in a society (and series) that hates fat people, he would be thought to be wary of eating to much, even then Narcissa sends Draco sweets on holidays so there's obviously some leeway there.

So there's no food being withheld like with Harry and the Dursleys, which is all I can't really think of for physical abuse Draco may have suffered. Maybe his father used the [cruciatus] curse on him, but that requires willingness to truly hurt the person it's being casted on, and from their canon interactions it's clear that Lucius truly loves Draco. I don't think that he would've had it in him to cast that on his son, especially if Harry couldn't cast it on Bellatrix after she murdered Sirius.

I don't really know why I wrote this, it's 10 at night and I'm so sick of people slandering Lucius Malfoy for something he didn't even do. If your gonna shit on him shit on him for putting a cursed book into an 11 year olds cauldron without even knowing what it did.

[ceilidho]

Twenty questions for fic writers

thanks @kneelingshadowsalome !!!! @ohbo-ohno @charliemwrites if u guys wanna do this go ahead. or anyone else that feels like it

1. How many works do you have on Ao3?

47 LMAO

2. What's your total Ao3 word count?

a staggering 583,382

3. What fandoms do you write for?

call of duty basically exclusively now, but i used to also write for star wars, shadow & bone, spiderverse, rings of power, and the last of us (may write more for tlou in the future)

4. Top five by kudos.

dead ringer, take me home country road, red dawn, ghost prompts, and landscape with honey.

5. Do you respond to comments?

god i used to all the time ages ago, but now i don't. i truly just get so overwhelmed and it exhausts me. i will respond to the odd comment now and again though, and i read them all obsessively.

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

"the terrible nature of ghosts" for sure

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

i guess "landscape with honey" ended on a sweet note. or "birdsongs". i like writing fics that have endings that feel neither happy nor sad; i'd like to think that most of my fics end on a note that make you feel mildly uneasy but overall good.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

i have blocked an UNTOLD amount of people, so not anymore. but every now and then i'll get the stray "you're evil and the shit you write is fucked up" comment. people tend not to do that when you moderate comments though.

9. Do you write smut?

well now, that's my bread and butter

10. Craziest crossover.

i'm with salome on this one - i'm a purist. not interested in crossovers.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

ages ago when i was younger sure. not since then thankfully.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

maybe?? i know some people have asked and i've given them permission but then they've never come back to tell me whether they did it or not.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

yes!!! i wrote "dead ringer" with a friend and it's my most popular fic lmao. i love love love co-writing with people, but i rarely do it because your style kind of has to match the other person's in order for it to work.

14. All time favorite ship?

god reylo was really it for me for the longest time. i'm not sure any non x reader thing will ever top that. i do LOVE abby/ellie from the last of us, but there's hardly anything for them.

15. What's a wip you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

any reylo incomplete fic, im so sorry. it's just not gonna happen.

16. What are your writing strengths?

detailed descriptions. introspection and character analysis.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

DIALOGUE. i don't know how the fuck people talk sometimes. also longer plots. and i'm not amazing with visualizing how houses and places look for some reason so i really need to get better at that (i'll be honest, i still don't FULLY know what the town in "country roads" looks like so i try to describe it very vaguely).

18. Thoughts on dialogue in another language?

i really only enjoy it when it's used effectively - when the audience is supposed to be aligned with the main character in not understanding what's being said.

19. First fandom you wrote in?

teen wolf!

20. Favorite fic you've ever written?

"saltwater" my beloved. or "auribus teneo lupum" from my reylo days.

[imaginejamesandsirius]

Sirius was 16 when Regulus was born, and ran away when Regulus was only a couple of months old. He and James are happily married and have a son together, Harry (who was born 1980, like canon).

One day Sirius is visited by a Wizard Solicitor with a Will telling him that he’s inherited half of the Black fortune, and is now also has custody of his younger brother, who is a about 8 at this point.

Sirius assumed that his brother had been the perfect child for his parents, he expects a blood-purist spoiled brat — instead he’s got a child who’s abuse makes his own (which was already severe) seem like nothing.

Just Sirius feeling guilt for abandoning Regulus, feeling responsible for his abuse, and he and James trying to give him the best life possible — and Harry being adorable, and Regulus and him becoming the best brothers, which makes Sirius feel complicated feelings.

((A/N: Mentions of child abuse))

Anger and discomfort. That's what Sirius felt when his father pushed a week-old baby into his arms and said, "Hold him until your mother gets back."

The new baby, his new brother, sixteen years younger than him, Regulus, whimpers pathetically. He tries to rearrange his arms so the baby won't start screaming, but does he know anything about babies? He's never really been around one before. This is maybe the second time he's held one, and he would've been happier if it had stayed at one.

"Why can't you bloody hold him?" Sirius asks as Orion backs away. "He's your stupid son."

"As are you," Orion replies dryly, a familiar angry glint in his eye. "So do as I say and hold your sodding brother while I get a drink." He leaves, long strides taking him from the room far faster than Sirius can chase after him. He doesn't like the fact that he has a sibling now or that he's supposed to wait here until Walburga gets in-- whenever that's supposed to be-- but he doesn't want to bash the baby's head into the door, so he has to stop following their father and wait in the room as requested.

He sighs, gives the door an impotent kick, then gingerly makes his way to a chair. It's easier to hold a baby while sitting, right? He's heard that somewhere. Maybe, if he's lucky, Regulus will stay asleep. Or is he awake and just not crying? It's hard to tell which when his face is so scrunched up. Sirius isn't sure. As long as he's quiet though, he doesn't care.

He knows what a new sibling means. His parents didn't say it in as many words, but they didn't need to; he knows that he's a disappointment to them. He's said a hundred times (to James), that if they could replace him, they would. And now they have.

His parents don't like each other. They don't have sex for fun. They purposefully conceived Regulus so that, once Sirius is gone, they'll have a new heir. Sirius knows that he won't be here much longer. It's a toss up whether he runs or they throw him out. He thinks he's going to run; he'll be able to pack all of his things that way.

He glances down at the (thankfully) still quiet baby in his arms and hates him, just a little bit. Right now, he's fine. He's a baby. He doesn't have personality, he's trying to figure out going to sleep and eating when he's hungry. But when he grows up? Sirius turned out alright, in spite of their parents. Regulus probably won't turn out the same. Andromeda noted to him once, in the corner of one of their family gatherings, "It's fifty-fifty if one of us isn't utter shite. It's like, you and I turned out good, so Bellatrix and Narcissa have to be piss." Sirius laughed, knowing the truth in her words; Uncle Alphard, present but apart from the others like they were, was a clear sign. They could turn out good, but it wasn't a guarantee.

If Sirius is fine, then what does that mean for the future of this newborn baby? He'll grow up under Walburga and Orion's watchful eyes and the 'benefit' of hindsight that raising Sirius will have given them.

Sirius will grow to hate him. That stir of anger, to that future, to their parents, is still there. "Sorry, mate," he whispers. Angry or not, he pities him.

*

There's a knock on the door, and James answers. "Hullo. Erm, can I help you?"

"I'm a solicitor, my name is Joe Byrne." He holds a business card out. It's a deep green, almost black but its colour is visible from the sunlight shining on the doorstep. "I'm here to speak to Sirius Potter."

James takes the card and glances down at it. The sigil stamped to the background and the skate of magic underlining his information like an errant drop of water mean he's old money-- which means he's likely connected to the Black family. "I don't know what business you could have with him."

"I presume you're his husband, James Potter?"

"That's correct."

"Mr. Potter, are you aware that his mother recently passed?"

"Yes-" it was in The Prophet "-but she disowned him. I know children are usually in the will even if they're estranged, but this isn't a usual situation."

Mr. Byrne doesn't appear bothered by this. "The will has been read. What Walburga Black may or may not have done to disown your husband in a social manner wasn't reflected legally, so I need to speak with him."

James knows he's being overprotective by thinking anyone connected with the Black's-- even professionally-- is bad for Sirius. So he swallows it down, tucks the card in his pocket, and says, "Okay. Please, come in. Would you like a cup of tea?"

"Please. Thank you."

James waves his wand to get things started in the kitchen and leads Mr. Byrne to an armchair. They're both quiet as he sits. Another wave of his wand brings the teapot out, the tray and cups trailing behind it. He can't remember if it's polite to pour for him or not; it's been so long since he tried to be proper, and that was occasionally, not all the time. Bloody hell, he shouldn't care about this, and he doesn't, really, but he's nervous. Sirius's parents are an old scar, but they are a scar. What's the point in putting pressure on that scar again? For a single galleon that his mother left, just to spite him? "Go ahead," he says, motioning to the tea service, "and I'll go get Sirius."

Mr. Byrne thanks him, so even if it was a mistake, it's a small one.

James isn't looking forward to this. To any part of this. He didn't even want to let the solicitor in, but now he has to tell Sirius that he's here, and he likes that less. He heads to the backyard, where they were soaking in the sun for a few hours while Harry's at the Longbottom's.

Sirius glances over when he walks out, then frowns. "You alright?"

"There's a solicitor here for you. From Walburga."

"I don't imagine we'd have anything to discuss."

"I said the same to him, but he claims you're in the will." James holds out a hand to him and tries to smile. "Best to get it over with."

Sirius sighs but agrees, taking his hand and joining him inside.

Mr. Byrne introduces himself to Sirius before opening his briefcase and removing a sizeable folder. "I apologize for coming to your home to discuss this, but my letters didn't receive any response and certain matters need to be taken care of quickly."

"We received quite a bit of post after her death," James says by way of apology. None of the letters were welcome; they'd burned the lot of it without sifting through to check senders.

"I understand," he replies, accepting. Then he looks to Sirius. "In summary, you are now the Head of the Black family. There's quite a bit of details to get through in relation to that, but we can schedule an appointment for that if you prefer. The most urgent matter is that of your younger brother, one Regulus Black. Since your mother's death, he's been staying with a member of S.U.B.S., but the hope is to transfer him into your custody as quickly as possible. There are a few forms I need your signature on, and then you'll be his legal guardians." Mr. Byrne is very efficient about the whole matter. As he's speaking, he retrieves a quill and inkwell from his briefcase. By the time he's done, the inkwell is unstoppered, and the corresponding forms are facing Sirius and James.

Two minutes ago, they had a three year old and struggled with that. Now they're being told they have to raise another kid, one who's older and they've never met.

Sod everything.

*

Sirius and James have a certain idea what Regulus will be like. Sirius was raised in that house, he knows what life was like before he went to Hogwarts, and Regulus is eight. He was snooty and cold and unused to anything like James and Sirius as they are now; Regulus will be the same, possibly worse.

The first glimpse they get of Regulus makes them rethink that assumption.

The first conversation they try to have with him crushes that assumption beneath a harsh hammer and grinds it up afterwards. At first, Regulus is too loud, too aggressive. Then, he's quiet, almost not daring to breathe, and he shrinks away like he expects pain. When none comes, he flees to the loo with a murmured excuse.

"That's not normal," Sirius whispers to James. They need to talk about it, but he doesn't want Regulus to overhear. And, given what just happened, he doesn't want to go too far from him.

"Definitely not," James whispers back. "D'you think they hurt him?"

"That's what it looked like, but it doesn't make any sense. They wanted to make him the perfect son to replace me." He shakes his head. "This doesn't follow."

"Maybe he's skittish from losing his parents and living with strangers," James says, but he doesn't sound like he believes it.

Sirius doesn't believe it either, but he says, "Yeah. Maybe."

*

"Are you going to lock me in the basement?" Regulus asks one day over lunch.

Sirius wishes Harry weren't here for this, and James wishes that there was a warning before someone asked something so horrible like that.

"There's no basement," Harry informs him. "Uncle Peter's house has a basement, but he says I can't go in." He's too young to understand the horrible implications in Regulus’s question. To him, it's a question on the same level as 'can I go in Dad's potion lab' or 'can we have dinner early today'.

James tries to smile. "Right. Like Harry said, no basement. I don't know why we'd do something like that to you anyways."

"The full moon is tomorrow night."

His stomach sinks, because that didn't sound like a different topic, and he doesn't want to ask, but he has to. Sirius braces himself and asks, "Why is that important?"

"They put me in the basement for my transformations."

He blinks. "Transformations?"

"When I become a wolf." Regulus said it as if this was information they already knew.

Sirius and James both force themselves not to react; there's no point in making him think it's a bad reaction. "Right. You don't have to do that anymore, we have something else worked out." They'll have to figure it out tonight. It'll be easy, since they can both transform and keep him company, but finding a suitable location will be a bit of a challenge-- and finding someone to mind Harry while they were both gone, helping Regulus, won't be easy because of the short notice. 

*

"I should've taken Regulus with me when I ran away from my parents," Sirius says, staring up at the ceiling and hating himself for something eight years past. From the corner of his eye, he can see James pause.

"You're not blaming yourself, are you?"

He says nothing.

James sighs, a quiet, sad thing, and pads over to the bed. He sits and places a hand on Sirius's shoulder. "We were sixteen. We couldn't have raised a kid."

"We would've figured it out," Sirius says stubbornly. He's convinced that it's true. They had Harry a little earlier than was wise, but they had each other, so they were able to get through it. It would've been the same with Regulus; they would've been scared and stressed with juggling everything, but they would've managed it.

James lays down. He throws one leg over Sirius's and curves his arm to smush between them so he can hold his hand. He should probably look up at the ceiling with him, but instead he stares at Sirius. His jaw is set, eyes tight, and he's glaring at the red paint like it's done him wrong. "I know you feel bad for him. I do too, but there's nothing we could have done-"

"We could've helped," Sirius cuts in, voice hard.

Mm. He isn't going to make this easy, is he? James keeps himself from sighing again, knowing it'll only make Sirius more defensive. "Okay. Humour me. You're sixteen, and you show up at my house with a baby in your arms. My parents let you and Regulus both live there. We-"

"I know that it wouldn't have been easy with Hogwarts, but-"

James is the one to cut him off this time. "I wasn't talking about Hogwarts, I was talking about Walburga and Orion. If you'd brought him with you, that would be kidnapping. Do you really think they'd let that slide? The law would've been on their side, and they would've wanted him back."

"They treated him like rubbish!" Sirius says, turning his head to glare at James instead of the ceiling. "He's a werewolf; they wouldn't have raised a finger."

"He wasn't a werewolf back then."

A retort is on the tip of his tongue, but he hesitates when that penetrates his fog of guilt and self-recrimination. James is right; Regulus wasn't a werewolf. He doesn't know when he was bitten, but it had to be after he left. "I still think I should've been able to do something," he eventually says, feeling helpless and hating it.

"You didn't know. And it doesn't seem like anyone else knows; they kept it locked down. All we can do is focus on how much better parents we're going to be to him," James says with a grin.

Sirius snickers. "Yeah. Doesn't sound like it'll be hard."

"We'll blow them out of the water."

*

Harry thinks it's fun to have Regulus around. Where James and Sirius are sometimes too busy to play with him exactly the way he wants, Regulus is always free-- and, importantly, always willing. Regulus and Harry both are enjoying the novelty of living with someone close to them in age. Hell, Regulus is enjoying playing. So much of it, he seems to be experiencing for the first time (like he's never had a playmate), but sometimes he does act the five years older than Harry that he is, knowing what Harry wants before he says a word.

It's pretty damn cute no matter which way he's acting. He talks more now, which is a marked improvement on when he first moved in. He doesn't fully trust Sirius and James yet, but they've got plenty of time to build off that, and he does trust them a little. He doesn't expect for them to berate him over nothing; he doesn't expect for them to lock him away on full moons or when he gets 'too annoying'. James gets frustrated with the slow pace sometimes, hating that Sirius has to remind him that baby steps are the only way they'll make progress. Raising Harry is, by comparison, easy. He's known them his whole life, never had reason to doubt that they'll be there for him or keep him safe. Dealing with raising both of them at the same time, with these differing viewpoints, isn't easy, but they're surviving.

Regulus and Harry wore themselves out playing. Sirius, as Padfoot, joined the fun, and he's feeling lethargic as they head inside. When he curls up to take a nap, Harry joins him automatically, pillowing his head on thick fur. When Regulus sees the way Sirius doesn't shake him off, he joins them, arm over Harry and head resting on Padfoot's gently moving chest.

James comes home, takes a photograph before any of them can wake, then tiptoes around the house, wanting them to have as much peace as they can. It's not an easy family, not one he ever thought they'd have, but it's good. Regulus fits in, taking on the role of Harry's brother, with Sirius more like a father.

[darklinaforever]

Why are you all so serious when it comes to imaginary characters? This works for both teams btw. It's okay to love books, characters, and so on, but you act like we live in real Westeros and choose who will rule us. Or as if the Targaryens are your real relatives during a real war. For God's sake. The fact that people love the blacks does not give them any moral superiority. The fact that people love the greens doesn't make them immoral or anything.

In fact, you really don't read any of my posts, and are you really content with the fact that I'm team Blacks and loving Daemyra to spit your venom in anonymous messages in fact ?! It’s just crazy at this point. You look like a bunch of weirdos.

I never claimed to be morally better, or that people who liked the Greens were immoral. Liking the Greens doesn't make you immoral. They are good villains, and most people, including me, like good villains. I'm literally a fan of the real Alicent in the book. She's a great villain that I love to hate.

And for your information, I also never said that Team Blacks were morally superior people. My god, I even once had an argument with a pro team Blacks and pro Daemyra person who hated the Velaryon children and the fact that they were illegitimate ! I never decreed that those who liked the black team were 100% good people VS those who liked the greens as bad ! Where does this bullshit come from ?!

On the other hand, what I denounce are those who claim that the Greens are not villains / antagonists. When that's literally what they are. This is their narrative function. They are not morally gray characters, anti-heroes or worse yet, misunderstood virtuous characters as some like to claim. Once again, there is no problem with liking Team Greens, but there is a problem with believing that they are justified in the story for doing what they do and that they are anything other than villains / antagonists. If you read Fire and Blood and end up being Team Greens at face value, you either have questionable beliefs or you simply have significant problems with reading comprehension (and I hope this is generally the second case for the ASOIAF and Fire and Blood community). The Greens are literally a bunch of misogynists fighting for patriarchal traditions, are blood purists and mostly rapists like Aegon II and Aemond.

The Blacks team is not perfect. Certainly, there are noble people among them, but also and above all morally ambiguous characters. However, they are not the antagonists and villains of the story. They are the protagonists. Team Blacks fights for a woman's right to ascend the throne. About keeping your promises and oaths. And even if it is not for feminist purposes, Rhaenyra on the throne would have given a precedent for women to subsequently also have the right to power. In short, Rhaenyra on the throne would have set a precedent to probably improve the situation of women in Westeros in the lines of succession. To be Team Greens in the first degree is in fact to deny power to women and change in a society. That's what it implies narratively.

It's the same thing for those trying to say they are neutral, trying to make people believe that the two teams are on the same level, probably to avoid feeling guilty for loving the Greens beyond simple villains, refusing to see them as such. To speak of being neutral is to deny that the Blacks are fighting for a much nobler cause overall than the Greens. Once again, the Blacks are fighting for a woman's right to the throne and respecting her words and oaths. While the Greens are literally treated misogynists and usurpers who fight for patriarchal tradition... Just like the simple fact that the number of war crimes are not at all equivalent depending on the team.

It's not the same thing. These are simple facts.

The narrative purpose of GRRM's for the Rhaneyra character is simple. She was usurped because she was a woman. By misogyny. And people who are first degree team greens or neutral have this great tendency to deny it. Simply because otherwise, they couldn't justify defending the greens.

Reading Fire and Blood and ending up at first level being team greens or neutral, once again demonstrates a huge reading comprehension problem. GRRM didn't write this story thinking that the Greens were right or that both teams were on the same level, otherwise, the Greens wouldn't get karmic punishment.

I realize that everyone can see what they want in a fictional work, but there are limits to stupid interpretation. Fire and Blood is very clear that the Greens are the villains / antagonists with very bad motivations, going against the law itself. Because yes, the word of the king is the law. Supporting the Greens or being neutral at first glance, without seeing them as villains / antagonists, is at this stage being willfully blind, unless once again you have questionable values ​​or quite simply very, very poor reading comprehension, which you should be worried about.

The excuse of "it's fiction, so we can think what we want, it doesn't matter" is bullshit. An excuse for not thinking about the fiction you consume. This is proof of intellectual laziness. Do you really think GRRM wouldn't want you to think about his work ?

It's a naive and simplistic way of thinking, designed to justify supporting a misogynistic team, wishing to maintain patriarchal traditions. Once again, either it comes from your own problematic morality that you do not accept, or it is simply not having reading comprehension and supporting the fact of not thinking about what you consume in order to avoid not be aware of the problematic things about what you love in order to simply not give yourself a bad conscience.

Again, there is nothing immoral about liking the Greens. Most people like a good villain / antagonist. I've always said it. On the other hand, yes, it is problematic, to pretend that the Greens are not villains / antagonists, then trying to make them pass for more complex characters than they are, even anti-heroes, or worse, downright misunderstood characters who would be morally superior to the Blacks team. That's always what I talk about. Nothing more. And if this truth bothers you, you should question yourself...

Reflecting on the fiction we consume is not stupid. That should be the basis. And I won't apologize for thinking about what I consume.

And it's still cheeky to come and tell me that I'm lecturing people when it's me that people come to harass with private messages to wrongly explain to me that I romanticize grooming, that I'm a Bitch who doesn't understand anything about the characters I'm talking about, that I should be ashamed, close my tumblr, that Daemon Targaryen is the real rapist from Fire and Blood and that Aegon II is just a normal prince of his time doing his best. Ironically, it's the Greens and Neutral team who always come to me to spew their superior morality to apparently understand that poor little Aegon II is a complex and tragic character while Daemon is the real monster of the story and that the real The goal of Fire and Blood is to choose your favorite war criminal. Lol. That couldn't be further from the truth, and it's complete bullshit. Who once again tries to impose moral superiority on others ? (And again, I'm also entitled to this for liking Kylo Ren / Ben Solo and the Darkling) I think you're clearly talking to the wrong person in terms of promulgating moral oaths.

Love what you love. Just be aware of what it is and think about it. That's all I'm saying.

Once again, I have nothing against those who like the Greens. I have a problem with those who try to make people believe that they are not the villains / antagonists that GRRM made them out to be in the story. To try to make them appear as complex characters, anti-heroes, misunderstood characters who would have reasons just to act as they do. Worse still, to come and tell me that their favorite characters are morally superior to those of the Blacks team or even on an equal footing. Things that are completely false. And if these simple truths bother you that much, don't read my tumblr ! It's simple to do, isn't it ?

At this point of stupidity, I'm going to end up losing my faith in humanity...

@aleksanderscult

[crystalmaiden77real]

Every Fallacy Game Purists Insult People With

There are 19 fallacies they use here: Ad Hoc, Ad Hominem, Anecdotal Fallacy, Affirming the Consequent, Denying the Antecedent, Anecdotal Fallacy, Appeal to Ridicule, Association Fallacy, Bulverism, Proof by Examples, Stolen Concept, The Strawman Fallacy, Toupee Fallacy, The False Dichotomy, The Broken Record, Converse Error, No True Scotsman, Red Herring, With Us or Against Us.

I'm just talking about the toxic purists here. These are really just about being a stan, which is an overly emotional immature egotist who can’t take people saying even one true criticism of what he likes and resorts to demonization and blocking �� but how is it possible to be someone who thinks “ different = bad “ and rages about EVERY difference, and not be a stan for what you prefer which only results from being that level of emotional? They also fall under 45 of the tropes for self-righteous people, and that's later in this.

1: Ad Hoc: “ An explanation of why a particular thing may be the case is substituted for an argument as to why it IS, “ which can be detected by “ uses of the words “ might “ “ maybe “ “ probably “ “ possibly “ and “ could “ “ but an arrogant arguer will not even use those. Them assuming that everyone who makes adaptations must hate or at least not respect the source material falls under this, and them assuming any adaptation fan does.

Not to say any argument that falls under this can’t be right, that’d be Fallacy Fallacy, rather it is less likely to be right and the fallacy is insisting that it definitely is. Game purists do this in defense of the games because they’ll defend anything about them. “ Tails wasn’t egotistical in Lost World! He was only pretending to be when he was bragging about himself! “ At least I assume that’s why he said no he wasn’t, otherwise he has no argument. This was never proven true in the story.

It was never referred back to and this same argument could be applied to Sonic himself. They do this because the reason they hate other continuities so much is because they’re stans of the games, and that sensitivity causes them to perceive any adaptational difference as intentional criticism.

2: Ad Hominems: Game purists always deal in this when going out of their way to insult people who talk about other continuities positively online. “ You prefer an adaptational difference? You just hate the games! “ “ Anyone who likes Surge is obviously a simp for her because he’s a stan of the comic! “

  They’ll see anyone compliment IDW and say to them, “Thanks for telling me you hate the games. “ which is always responded with, ” No I don’t, “ or best of all, “ Did anyone tell you that you can like different things for different reasons? “ Yeah like different franchises. The fallacy is the insult doesn’t refute the point they wanted to refute, the point the other person made about the difference or adaptation being good. It just conveniently avoids thinking about how perhaps it may be good.

  Someone can hate the source material and still be right that an adaptation or its difference is good. So it’s an Irrelevant Thesis. Similarly, them just attacking the other continuities of a series saying they’re bad or garbage doesn’t prove their point. It doesn’t prove their point about being a Canon Fascist being the way to go either.

  There are SO many fallacies associated with this, “ you must hate the games! “ “ any fan of any adaptation is no true fan “ or “ anyone who insults the games once isn’t a fan “ that I’m gonna have to put them all under this one category right here and count them all because it’d be repetitive otherwise.

  Any fallacy listed after this that has nothing after its name is here because of one of those things they say: Ad Hoc, Ad Hominem, Anecdotal Fallacy, Bulverism, Proof by Examples, The Strawman Fallacy, Toupee Fallacy, The False Dichotomy, The Broken Record, Converse Error, Everything Except Most Things, the Undistributed Middle fallacy, No True Scotsman, Red Herring.

 Anecdotal Fallacy: “ X happened to me/someone else so the statistics are wrong, it happens all the time. “ “ Bulverism is a logical fallacy in which one party simply assumes that the other party is wrong, and explains the other party’s reasons for wanting to believe it rather than addressing the argument itself. It combines Begging the Question with the Genetic Fallacy. Wikipedia expresses Bulverism as: You claim that A is true. Because of B you personally desire that A should be true.  Therefore A is false. “

  Proof by Examples: “ Also called an inappropriate or hasty generalization, this fallacy happens when someone takes one or more non-exhaustive examples from a group that have a property, and making a generalization that everything in that group has that property. “

  “ The Strawman Fallacy happens when a debater constructs a more easily defeated version of their opponent’s position to attack. “ “ The Toupee Fallacy is when a debater claims that all examples of a subject conform to a specific quality because they’ve never seen one that hadn’t, ignoring that any examples they did see that didn’t have that quality they didn’t recognize as examples. “

  The Broken Record: “ If you repeat the same point over and over again, you win — because obviously, the other side didn’t address it if you won’t shut up about it. Extra effective if you keep repeating a catchy soundbite or buzzword. “

  Converse Error: “ (part of “Correlation does not imply causation.”) Concluding that a certain set of results can only come from one set of circumstances. “If A, then B. B, therefore A.” So if adaptation fan, then game hater. Now see how it comes off when you pretend they’re saying an Unacceptable Target in place of adaptation fan.

  When told by someone who says twice that he loves SA2 that the Sonic 3 movie shouldn’t have been identical to SA2 because showing the characters going through all of the levels identically would’ve dragged on forever and been boring, a game purist didn’t address that point. Instead he accused him of saying that he thinks SA2 is bad and garbage, despite him saying he loved it twice in that post.

  The point he actually made wasn’t refuted, because it can’t be. It’s so much easier to make up a blatant lie out of thin air to refute. They repeat this delusion Ad Nauseum hoping it’ll get convincing if they say it enough. On a side note you can always tell someone's childish by whether they wrongly think that they’re being strawmanned by people pointing out literally what they’ve said and what the accurate implications of that are.

  “ However, it’s more often used to get the audience on one’s side than it is to confuse the opponent, especially when it’s coupled with an Ad Hominem implying that the opponent is immoral for ” holding” the strawmanned position. “

  At one point the most extreme game purist DID admit that he doesn’t think every fan of adaptations hates the games, but still says most of them do. Saying most of a group is a certain way when that certain way isn’t mandatory and intrinsic to the very nature of being a part of that group is still bigoted. If you said that about any oppressed minority group it’d be seen as the bigotry it is. And yet he claims to want bigotry to end. Yet in other posts he said he hates anyone who likes the adaptations.

  Also that’s only one game purist, it’d be the Anecdotal Fallacy to apply that to them all. Most of them might still hold this fallacy, but at least I said might. I could name another game purist who said that he doesn’t hate fans of the adaptations per se, he just hates that they say when they’re better than the games. And that logic itself is bad because when an adaptation does do better, who’s to say people should have their freedom of speech restricted when it comes to pointing that out or else lose face to you?

  They should get to because it makes them happy and isn’t hurting anything. So what if a tiny amount can’t handle that? That even applies to if they’re wrong about a difference being good, but when they’re wrong it’s okay to be annoyed at that.

Red Herring: “ In logic, a fallacy of distraction where an irrelevant side-argument is introduced in an attempt to draw the opponent away from their main one. “

3: Affirming the Consequent: “ If A, then B. B is true. Therefore, A. “ If my car was a Ferrari it could travel at over 100 mph. It can do that. Therefore, it must be a Ferrari! “ The fallacy is that it’s never proven that A is the only possible cause of B being true. “ If Trip was the last of her kind she’d be like Knuckles. She’s like Knuckles by being the only guardian of a magical gem, therefore she must be the last of her kind. Never mind her official character bio not confirming that.

   Never mind the manuals and wikis never confirming that, never mind the fact that it’s never the case that Classic Sonic levels show NPCs in them either way. By the same evidence you should assume Rouge’s the last of her kind, you could look at Amy and say that there’d never be any more hedgehogs after her and Sonic because these two used to be the only hedgehogs shown.

The assumption was also from Appeal to Ignorance; the games didn’t show other Sungazers, this must mean they don’t exist. The games don’t show Sonic going to the toilet. This must mean he doesn’t have to go.

Sega didn’t allow other echidnas to be in IDW but it allowed other sungazers. They know this would be told to them but keep believing this. By the same logic that Sega not allowing something in IDW means nothing, Chaos Shadow the original plan for how Shadow would fight the zombots by removing his bracelets is canon to the games because Sega didn’t allow it.

4: It’s also a result of Denying the Antecedent. “ If a person is wearing a hat they have a head. I am not wearing a hat. Therefore I do not have a head. “ If there’s other sungazers in the games Trip isn’t the last of her kind. There are not, Trip is the last of her kind. You can say the same thing about Vector. He has just as much evidence of it.

  There could still be a possibility that Trip’s the last of her kind and Sega just doesn’t give a shit what IDW does with her probably because they never plan to use her again. But it’s extremely unlikely with all of the evidence and fallacies against it. Both this and Denying the Antecedent are Non Sequitur Fallacies. Saying a character's the last of her kind is an unlikely claim so the burden of proof is on them and they have none, nothing but the absence of proof that she's the other way around.

5: Anecdotal Fallacy

6: Appeal to Ridicule: “ It suggests the argument is false by presenting it in a way where it appears silly or trivial. This fallacy is a strawman or appeal to ignorance. “ According to quantum theory an electron can be in two places at once! Have you ever heard anything so stupid? “ “ Game purists type out, “ thE gaMEs hAvE alWayS bEen inconSiSTenT “ to mock people. How does that debunk it?

  The games have gone from a world with Casino Night Zone where you just walk down to pinball flippers to get to a slot machine to a more realistic world where in Casinopolis that doesn’t happen. It went back for Heroes and back to the real world for Shadow and back again in Lost World. As usual the fallacy is when that’s the whole argument they’re using against that sentence.

  “ This fallacy differs from reductio ad absurdum, where it’s demonstrated that an absurd conclusion naturally follows from the underlying logic of an opponent’s argument. “ I’ve used this before but any victims of this would erroneously claim they’re being strawmanned. “ A variation is argumentum ad lapidem, in which a statement’s dismissed as absurd but with no proof it’s absurd. “ See any game purist’s response to every argument I’m making here. They do this any time they’re proven wrong and respond to it.

  “ There’s many fallacies that fall under Irrelevant Thesis where the arguer only thinks he refuted somebody’s opposing position; all Appeals to Consequences, all Appeals to Emotion, all Strawmen and Red Herrings, Ad Baculum, Ad Nauseum, and all Ad Hominems. “ Guess why I put some of them in bold.

7: Association Fallacy “Claiming “X is a Y. X is also a Z. Therefore, Y is a Z.” Incorporates Guilt / Honor by Association, where it is asserted that relation to a good or bad thing means the associated thing is also good or bad. “ They’ve thought, Trip the Sungazer is a guardian of a magical gem on an island. Knuckles is that too. Therefore, Trip is the last of her kind too.

8: Bulverism

9: Proof by Examples: " Another version of this fallacy is assuming that since having a little of something is good, having more must be better. " Game purists think that since having an Adaptation contain the core elements of its source material IS good, having it be almost nothing but stuff from the source material with nothing different must be better.

Therefore they publicly shame anyone who points out that nothing but Sonic vs Eggman would get stale, because that’s insulting the games, despite the common knowledge that eating enough of even your favorite food would get tiresome.

  This wasn't in the game purism article since purism's actually about hatred of adaptations and the exclusion of anything that makes them special, not just about saying the more of something there is the better, but the less of something alien in it the better. Purists aren't about love for the source because they don't care if the source changes and downgrades, they're about trying to prove stuff OTHER than the source sucks.

This fallacy is used when it comes to arguing with people that stuff like SatAM should have no differences even though that includes good ones. There are so many more novels based on SatAM than UK novels based on only the games and it was popular enough to have picture books made of it too. And clearly Sega keeps Sonic around to make money, so it’s in its best interests to make as many fans happy as possible, which would also be the ideal thing because more people would be made happy which is going to look good to anyone with compassion for the average person.

10: Stolen Concept“ A fallacy in which one or more of the concepts (or premises) on which an argument depends are (usually implicitly) denied by the argument itself, thus meaning the arguer is taking two or more opposed positions at the same time. “ “ I personally think it’s completely fair to compare an adaptation to the source material-how dare he say this is better than the source material?! “ Game purists do this with their inherently unfair preferential treatment to source material, which makes them look like hypocrites for contradicting what they’ve SAID.

  It’s really that they use double standards. I’ve made two articles on all of the different ways they tend to use this fallacy where they don’t care about the source material having problems the adaptations do but go ballistic at the adaptations for them without acknowledging that it’s not unique to them, or being deluded that it doesn’t apply to the source material at all.

  And they mock fans of adaptations because they can’t take criticism but any time someone says an accurate criticism of what they like, they throw a hissy fit and block them, even if the ones they blocked agreed with most of what they had to say.

The truth is that they actually believed that anyone except themselves who can’t take criticism is pathetic. The root of most of the world’s evil is people acting like the rules of morality don’t apply to them. Hypocrisy is defined as claiming to have beliefs and values you don’t. TV Tropes calls it not practicing what you preach.

  They would be hypocrites if they believed the exact words they said to justify purism. But it’s just making up excuses to sound persuasive. A better term is double standards or dishonesty because their beliefs are a lot more specific and far fewer in quantity than that. All of their beliefs boil down to, “ My opinions are the only ones that should be catered to and respected and anyone in conflict with that is dumb or evil or both. “

  There’s many ways they reflect this in one of their actual beliefs, like their actual belief, “ Only the franchises I want to be just like the source material have to be to be good. “  They don’t just say that because that’s not persuasive. What do you say to justify that? Because I Said So. This is the same belief that encompasses both of the first two beliefs I already covered.

  Then there’s their second actual belief, “ The source material of the specific franchises I like are the only ones that deserve praise, so only something I like can have new ideas that are good. Anything new in an adaptation is bad because it’s in one and I think it’s bad, like The Freedom Fighters. Anything unique is born out of spite or apathy for the source material, because I think it is. And even when an adaptation is using an idea from the source it’s bad, because I don’t like the adaptation. “ Like, “ Sonic shouldn’t smirk (like he does in Sonic 3) outside of the games! He'd never do that! “

  Their argument sounds a lot less persuasive when you see it for what it really is. It’s no wonder they phrase things different than that because all they could do to justify their real belief is circular logic, another fallacy. It’s not an objective truth that only the source material should be praised and deserves open-mindedness.

They just think this because they think the world should revolve around them. When their argument rests on a subjective premise, “ because it’s good, “ you should know the argument is probably false. All they want to do is make reactionary outrage bait for fellow purists about adaptations when it comes to adaptations and so it's rare for them to admit anything's good about them even when they notice it. Isn't there pride in acknowledging both good and bad to fully expose the truth? Then the audience will know what the extremely bad stories are by when there suddenly is a near lack of compliments.

  They look like hypocrites for implying that it’s unacceptable for someone to not do research by saying it’s unacceptable for someone making the story for an adaptation to not have every detail about the source material memorized. But, since they think it’s fine for THEM to make uneducated misinterpretations from a lack of knowledge, about stuff they don’t like, it’s clear what they believe is specifically,

  “ The people making an adaptation should do research to have every detail on the source material memorized until they’re a walking human encyclopedia, and if they forget even one detail their work will become garbage, they’ll prove they suck and were doing it on purpose and their work will be dead to me. But it’s worth the effort of getting the source material memorized. “

  Either this is from them not thinking it through enough to realize nobody has a good enough memory to be 100% accurate to the good material since the human memory’s infamously bad, which would mean not even anyone at Sega itself could, and even if they made mandates for this nobody would be able to remember all those mandates required, or they know this and don’t care. It’s impossible to not know that not everyone has a perfect memory.

11: The Strawman Fallacy

12: Toupee Fallacy

  Chewbacca Defense is really a whole class of fallacies which is why it wasn’t in that whole paragraph’s worth of them. “ Chewbacca Defense is using non-sequitur arguments to “prove” a point, relying on distracting and confusing the opposition. “Winning” a debate through methods other than logic and reasoned argument. “ That’s them when they jump to the conclusion that someone hates the games just because he likes an adaptation.

“ As such, the Chewbacca Defense commonly relies on Logical Fallacies and insane rhetorical techniques, like The False Dichotomy, The Ad Hominem, The Broken Record. “

13: The False Dichotomy: “ Claiming that only two (often conflicting) options exist. If the other side is wrong about anything, no matter how irrelevant, they’re wrong about everything — and you’re right about everything. “ Often their point when pointing out the problems with IDW is that because IDW stans are wrong about it being a perfect comic that’s well-written overall, and wrong about Flynn being perfect, that proves all adaptations are bad and no one should like them. “ It’s also called the black/white fallacy. “

  And I’ve noticed that they think in black and white. You’re not supposed to do that as an adult. https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BlackAndWhiteInsanity Despite the fact that they’d defend any time the games’ Sonic was harsh and don't hold anything Amy did against her, they don’t do the same for the characters that happen to not be by Sonic Team, just because of their country of origin.

  They’ve called evil a canonically heroic Canon Foreigner in a position of power who doesn’t think a game character is perfect and infallible (like the non-game purists don’t) for being in a tough situation where both decisions have harsh outcomes, even though that’s inevitable for someone in a position of power and by that logic every single one would be evil.

  They would call the character evil no matter which decision or judgement was made, even when her judgement is for preventing the destruction of the entire world, because that’s not agreeing with Sonic who was risking it. They see Sally as Non-Game Purists and view her every disagreement with a game character as her being uppity when they think she should know her place. But they think Amy can disagree with and hit Sonic with a hammer all she wants because of her country of origin.

  Yet these same people call Flynn a racist for having Mazuri have a food shortage, not just saying he wasn’t creative, they went to the next level without having enough information. They insist that because Mazuri had jars and bridges it couldn’t possibly have its situation change with time even though time tends to do that. Even Ireland had a food shortage!

And in the same post they’ll ask why Spagonia couldn’t have had the food shortage when their same defense for why Mazuri couldn’t have had one applies there. It looks like nothing’s wrong in both places, but they take place before IDW.

  I don’t know if they’re right or wrong but it’s easy for bigots to look innocent of that if they accuse someone else of it. Ben Shapiro accuses people of antisemiticness easily but is in most scenarios the opposite of someone regularly cries wolf of bigotry.

  And these purists love to talk about Sonic online to demonize people outside of their group, calling them right-wing slang “ tourists “ for not knowing everything about the lore of the games. But they were surprised to hear from Sage that Tails knew Sonic most of his life. 8-4=4, and Classic SONIC is 4 years younger, and Classic Tails is just as much younger.

  I figured this out before I saw any adaptations, but they’d insist this was just the writer making it like Archie, because Flynn wrote it and they haven’t thought enough about the games they claim to like but liking games for just the gameplay isn’t liking them as a whole, games consist of story and music too.

14: The Broken Record: One even admitted that he thinks all his problems with IDW boil down to, it’s not exactly like the games. Which isn’t even a true assessment of his complaining as a lot of their problems with it don’t just have to do with inaccuracy such as slow pacing. Or are they arguing that none of the stories in the games ever had any slow pacing?

15: Converse Error

16: No True Scotsman: Aside from the obvious way they use it, I’ve seen the most extreme one of them say “ the actual Sonic franchise “ to mean just the games, even though that ignores what franchise means; franchise 3: “ a series of related works (such as novels or films) each of which includes the same characters or different characters. “ By Cambridge dictionary: " a series of films that have the same or similar titles and are about the same characters. "

  Sure not every character’s identical to how they are in the source material but the dictionary doesn’t say there’s an exception because of that and that it means they’re different characters. If the dictionary’s not enough for you, try profiting off a Sonic fan comic or fanfiction!

The fact that the fans trying to make Season 3 of SatAM had to go through the proper legal channels should make it irrefutable that it’d be illegal to profit off any alternate Sonic continuity which would not be the case if Sega didn’t see it as part of the franchise.

  And Sega wants to make as much money as possible and thinks people thinking stuff is canon is good for business, and encouraged or at least let Aaron Webber tweet that “ Everything is canon. “ Copyright Sega and “ characters owned by Sega “ are always in these adaptations in the credits. It goes without saying it’s not just the games. Sonic is a multi-media franchise, and only 6% of it so far is just the games.

  At that point it’s only a video game franchise because the games are the oldest and current continuity and make the most money so they probably won’t be cancelled. But to claim something’s only accurate because it’s old or new is both Appeal to Tradition and Appeal to Novelty. They need to resort to this fallacy to claim they’re still fans at all for keeping any chance of people listening to them.

  https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/fan “ fan noun (2) 1: an enthusiastic devotee (as of a sport or a performing art) usually as a spectator 2: an ardent admirer or enthusiast (as of a celebrity or a pursuit) “ That’s the opposite of someone who only likes a franchise for one aspect like the gameplay or hates 93% of a franchise and usually only talks about it to trash most of it and tends to compliment it just to use that as an excuse to trash other parts of it.

  True the same applies to people who have almost nothing but complaints for the games’ main cast and worldbuilding and the way it handles stories to the point of being bitter about them overall, but you’re hardly gonna find any adult not like that due to their egregious problems so demonizing them isn’t fair when they didn’t make the games how they are and they can be admirers of other parts of the franchise in enough quantities to make up for that in Sega’s eyes for sure.

Sega loves everyone who regularly gives them money, anyone who truly cares for and understands Sega would know that. And liking an adaptation and discussing it online means either way I get to hear someone discuss Sonic! So there’s a reason they apply this fallacy to both the franchise and fans, because they can only be right that bitter fans are haters if everything not the games is outside of the franchise. But if Sonic is mostly not the games, then they're the haters, they're the anti-fans of Sonic.

17: Red Herring

18: With Us or Against Us: " A form of false dilemma. Assuming that not openly supporting one side means you oppose them (or vice-versa). " But does it count as opposing them if I don’t oppose them when it comes to the current bad continuities? They're almost the only people I ever find complain about them and how are they supposed to improve without anyone criticizing them?

They only piss me off with the well-written ones but those are usually dead or entirely dead. But it’s not even enough for them if you criticize an adaptation like IDW and put Likes/hearts on tons of their posts or videos that criticize the adaptations that are by normal people. You can’t prove game purists wrong without one blocking you.

  Game purism is their religion, no that’s being generous. It’s just a conspiracy theory now after the debunking I did. How can you say a philosophy is correct if it’s got nothing but fallacies to support it? You have to be a game purist for game purists to see you as someone worth keeping around even as someone to give them likes, and then they wonder why they have less than 10 Notes on posts and have barely anyone following them.

And they wonder why none of them will ever become actually popular on Youtube and they see every SonicTuber in general as always wrong because they disagree with them and use their brains. Youtubers are artists too, to be a good creative you have to not be fascist or you’d like the status quo too much to do anything new, so naturally most creatives aren’t fascists. So there was no chance of most SonicTubers being canon fascists.

You can’t even compliment one of IDW’s best characters without one of them saying you’re a “ cultist “ and stan of it, KotyTang got called that and he reviewed most of the comic negatively. With THIS fallacy they’re the ones exhibiting cult-like behavior, as psyco-the-frog put it.

  For someone who doesn’t like most of the modern adaptations starting with the 2000s era, it’s a little cathartic to see people who agree. Their problem is that they heavily overreact to game inaccuracy so even when you agree it starts being too grating to be worth it. A show should not be dead to you because of one minor detail that’s hardly even used in it. And they can’t keep their demonization of Archie out of their IDW posts sometimes.

  Even when they aren’t mentioning anything specific about Archie. The two comics have completely different appeals and their fanbases mistreat each other. They have different characters and settings and history so it’s not hard to understand. But these people are dim enough to say the comics are the same. Because Sonic alone is similar that means “ I can’t see the difference. “

But the key difference in their appeal is Archie is creative and IDW isn’t usually. But with people who literally think creativity is bad, I should’ve expected them to be blind to what’s good about Archie.

  Here’s every trope about self-righteousness they fall under. There’s 45! While a few of these applying to someone isn’t the end of the world, as it’s impossible to not count as any of these try reading that list, the point is the sheer amount they qualify as! 45 of them, including Fan Hater. This is at the end of this article because by this point I thoroughly proved why all of this applies to them. And here’s what a game purist would be thinking to try to justify all this, “ But it’s okay when I do it “ -said every criminal and bigot, and that falls under 2 of the tropes below.

  Fan Dumb ((” Fan Dumb: We adore some work or genre of fiction (or some person or whatever else can be adored) to the exclusion of all else, and anyone who doesn’t do likewise is wrong! “ A group of fans who are unhealthily obsessed, entitled, intolerant, and make fandom difficult for everybody else. “)) The Fundamentalist (“ Our beliefs, whether they are religious, ideological, or academic, are top priority. “),

  The Gadfly (“ If we’re the hedonistic variant, we just want self-enjoyment from provoking people’s reactions. “), Hate Dumb ((“We abhor some work or genre of fiction (or some person or whatever else can be abhorred) to the exclusion of all else, and (when we’re also Fan Haters) anyone who doesn’t do likewise is wrong! “)), Obsessively Normal (“Anything even the slightest bit unique is evil! “), Principles Zealot (“ A character who cares too much about their principles, often at the expense of caring about the results of their actions, “)

  Single-Issue Wonk (“ We obsess over one issue. Even others that intersect don’t matter. “), He Who Fights Monsters (“ How dare you accuse us of being as fanatical and evil as those evil fanatics we’re fighting to destroy?! – A character becomes more and more like the evil that they pursue. “), Internet Jerk (“ We’re free to be assholes online thanks to the anonymity of the Internet! “ An online Jerkass that takes advantage of anonymity to harass people), Black-and-White Insanity (every adaptational difference and everything unique about an adaptation is treated the same minor or major),

  Moral Guardians (“ Viewers that morally object to certain types of work and wish to see it banned or censored. “ See my entry on Appeal to Pity if you’re wondering why I include it despite the word morally), Necessarily Evil (“ We didn’t want to be evil, but the circumstances require us to be! “), Then Let Me Be Evil (“ You treat us like we’re evil? Fine, we’ll be evil, then “), Tautological Templar/ Moral Myopia (“ Evil acts aren’t evil when we do them, silly. We’re the good guys! “), Vocal Minority,

  Aggressive Categorism, Because I Said So (“ We don’t need to explain to you ignoramuses why it’s right or wrong! If we say it’s right or wrong, then it is, without question, right or wrong, so accept it! “), Blatant Lies (two of them lied that the punishment Sonic was facing for treason in issue 40 was not banishment from Knothole but execution, when normally they can be so observant they find nitpicks that EVEN I didn't notice), Brutal Honesty, Can’t Take Criticism (“ How dare you call us “fanatics”? We are the purest, truest expression of what we believe and you are in no place to criticize us! “),

  Circular Reasoning, The Complainer Is Always Wrong (“ How dare you think differently from us! “), Die for our Ship (against Sally, yes the same people who campaign against Sonic loving anybody admitted they’re SonAmy fans and like its Sonic X fanservice, which leads right to the next two), Double Standard, Double Think,

Enemies Equals Greatness (“ What defines us as the only righteous people is the antagonism from the many lowly pathetic people who know we’re better than them and can’t stand it! “), Everything is Racist/ Opinion Override (“ People who aren’t a part of group X react to an offensive comment or portrayal of that group. Members of group X don’t care. “),

  False Dichotomy, Feeling Oppressed by their Existence, Hypocrite (“ One who doesn’t practice what he preaches. “ They lecture Flynn on writing like a cynic but act cynical of most of Sonic its fans and writers and Sega of America being the most bitter people talking about Sonic, while adaptation fans only complain about 6% of Sonic minimum and are usually just positive about adaptations),

Jerk Justifications, Logical Fallacies, No True Scotsman, Offended by an Inferior’s Success, Once Done Never Forgotten, Opinion Myopia (“ How can anyone feel differently about this than we do?! “),

Playing the Victim Card, The Power of Hate, “The Reason You Suck” Speech (“ A character delivers a harsh tirade to a second character that is designed to dissect that second character’s flaws, weaknesses or failures “) against adaptation fans,

Serious Business (“ Treating something more seriously than necessary. “), Twisting the Words, With Us or Against Us, You Are What You Hate, Obnoxious Entitled Housewife (for the female game purists; “ Despite the title, she may not be married, “ “ likes rules, structures, and hierarchies, and will frequently invoke their authority… This entitlement may even manifest as bigotry… “),

  There’s some fallacies I could’ve stretched to include, like Soapbox Sadie, Undying Loyalty, Demonization, Propaganda Machine/Piece, Unsportsmanlike Gloating, Lawful Stupid (they defend mandates with Appeal to Authority so that can easily be mocked with hypothetical extremely bad mandates), but since it doesn’t fit the literal definition I won’t bother pointing them all out, there’s a lot.

  Inaccuracyspotting is an easy shallow form of criticism that can be used to make any adaptation look bad through appealing to emotion alone. It’s like making a video just about criticizing any time a bald character is a villain across various works of fiction and nitpicking apart the heroic bald characters, and saying those works are bad for it.

  The reason they had gotten on my nerves is that they do have good critical thinking skills but choose to only apply them negatively towards what they hate because they don’t wanna risk agreeing with a group they discriminate against, but defend those same problems to the death with the games proving that they don’t actually care about their quality, while I can’t turn my brain off with media so I notice when the writing is forced even when I’m casually watching a TV show for once.

  What’s unsatisfying about criticism from a game purist is that their pointing out the bad writing is just an excuse that makes their game purism sound like a persuasive grift. The adaptations could be written like Citizen Kane and they’d still hate them.

They could be good in every major writing component thus being objectively good and they’d still call them garbage if they weren’t 99.9% like the games. The only reason I don’t say 100% is they still like Sonic 2 movie and a few of its differences, or at least the most extreme one I've seen does, anyways.

  And the cognitive dissonance on that was so real that instead of realizing that hating differences on principle is stupid they had to say it was because the adaptational differences introduced were respectful while they only hate stories with ones that aren’t. But there are other changes that qualify, how do you define respectful if I’m sure they hate that Archie Sonic’s faster than Game Sonic?

Peach saying Mario’s not important isn’t a dealbreaker to them since they like the Mario movie, meaning they might find her being different in that movie respectful because she seems more competent and cooler than in the main games.

  And by that logic The Wizard of Oz would be bad because it’s got one good witch instead of two like the book. That’s racist against witches so that’s disrespectful to what the source material and its writer wanted! I don’t know how any of them can like any changes because they usually never notice or accept any changes as good. So why would any game purist not hate that there was a recent war between echidnas and owls or the Emerald and Chaos Emeralds had been fused together?

  By their logic that you can’t like a change without hating the source material or at least a part of it, that means either they don’t like the games or they hate that the echidnas were wiped out millennia ago, and that the two types of Emeralds aren’t fused.

Or, that logic is full of shit since it can’t only be true for some people, and being interested in alternate what-if scenarios doesn’t mean you hate the original. By that logic anyone who likes the What If… show for superhero fiction would hate the source material too.

  I’ve found plenty of changes that had objectively nothing wrong with them that they still hate for being changes even if they have to make up excuses. Right, because being new alone is bad, nobody wants any artistic expression of creativity in art. Let’s look at the dictionary definition of write. “ to have the job of creating books, stories, or articles, to express an idea… “ This is from the cambridge dictionary. If you aren’t creating, because you’re just using others’ ideas, like if you just wrote exactly like the games, you’re not writing.

  So being 1 to 1 is not writing very much. That’s why it should only be like the games in the major ways and the references that I outright love. References are forgivable though if they aren’t used in place of a new setting or better idea or aren't the characters quoting lines from earlier with no acknowledgement of it. Merely pointless imagery is neat but looks cynical if the story itself is bad.

  Let’s see the dictionary’s definitions of a hack! From cambridge: “ hack: a journalist (= writer for newspapers or magazines) whose work is low in quality or does not have much imagination. “ How is it imagination to be 1 to 1 with the source material? They want writers to be hacks.

Ironically they keep calling the modern writers hacks, but only because they define it without that last part, and either are solely aware of or selectively only use the other dictionaries’ outdated ill-thought-out definitions which only involve bad writing and writing purely for a paycheck.

Of course outdated applies to the above definition insisting on specifying magazines and newspapers for no reason when we all know it's not specific to writers of those. But that nitpick doesn't change the rest of the definition's accuracy as it matches what the other definitions have to say.

  Bad writing’s too vague to look objective enough for a definition. And a writer only writing for money is a hard assumption to prove to everyone that requires irrefutable evidence.

I'm tired of these people using the word Western entirely when they're about to demonize Westerners as being unable to write and localize. How can I not start to wonder if they have a bias against them after a while? What else can you say about the belief that no Westerner can write well or adapt well, and assuming the makers of SatAM were racists with no evidence? Even then it’s a False Dichotomy to say THAT would invalidate all of their original ideas.

  So they’ve been grasping at straws for years. It would’ve helped if they didn’t dismiss out of hand every adaptation that IS like the games. They baselessly insist “ every fan of American Sonic “ is “ Japanophobic “ and will preemptively mock the idea of being told otherwise and compare them to the Confederates. The only one who brings up race is you, purist. Only the purists dismiss characters out of hand based on their country of origin, instead of going on a case by case basis with them.

  How is it punching down to call out SoJ when the people working at Sega of Japan aren’t Japanese-Americans so they’re people at the same equivalent position as people like Flynn are where he lives? I never saw them complain about that popular OVA or the manga. It must be that the most extreme only complained about Sonic X because the Americans in 4Kids were involved.

  The weird thing is, even the most extreme purist doesn’t have a huge amount of complaining about AoStH or Sonic Boom. It must be because game stans can’t stand adaptations taking Sonic seriously, but are fine with when the games do, including Shadow the Hedgehog. It calls into question whether they truly like when Sonic is dark or not because their amount of bias means they would never think back to any times adaptations did dark material tactfully and purposefully or wouldn’t bring it up if they did.

  I’ve read two game purists saying that as long as you like the games and don’t put them down they don’t have a problem with you liking adaptations. It doesn’t make it okay to say you only like a member of a harmless group if they’re “ one of the good ones “ if you assume they’re rare. It still doesn't make adaptation fans feel safe to even talk to you.

If a lie gets repeated to someone enough it becomes harder to not believe it. Game purists are like Flat Earthers. Nothing convinces them they’re wrong not even this article because they’re so arrogant and emotional that they won’t engage with the facts against their views even when they prove they’re fallacious. There is literally nothing actually supporting game purism because its entire foundation is fallacies and opinions.

  And yet they accuse Archie and SatAM fans of being like Flat Earthers because they don’t respect American companies and either haven’t learned that Sega of America’s why this series didn’t stay a tech demo and made it the most money or are one of the nutjobs that dismiss all of the info on what it did for Sonic as fake news because it doesn’t suit their agenda.

So someone ought to add to that entry on Sonic’s Misaimed Fandom page because it was by someone who despite saying Sonic was a joint venture only sees SoJ as valid, arguing that people should only care about what they think.

It’s rare that an adaptation won’t contain anything that people like about the games. If one were to hate all these things you would hate the games, and if one truly liked them they would also be happy seeing them in adaptations.

If you absolutely love these game elements one would expect just seeing them in anything to be enough to make you like stories that aren’t badly written in most of the components of writing, or even then, people who get giddy about something will like a bad plot just because it’s there. STC has Emerald Hill Zone and Metropolis as its main settings and Emerald Hill looks exactly like the games. It had a story about an extra life monitor!

  But the game purists are still complaining about Flynn making references to the games while claiming to be the only ones who really like the games and treating the Pontaff games as above criticism.

They saw a few people give an impression of hatred and generalize due to confirmation bias. Even saying only most people are a certain way is still bigoted against that group. Imagine someone saying he doesn’t hate women because he only thinks MOST of them are annoying sorts of feminists that think that real women don’t wear dresses.

  These people say a lot that Sonic lives by his own feelings by just doing what he wants and they love that and say that it’s just because Sonic’s implied to be like that in the games but since all their opinions are feelings-based entirely and they just do whatever they want with no regard for the feelings of the people they offend, they identify with Sonic there. You know who also only lives by his own feelings and just does what he wants with no interest in upholding moral principles?

  Eggman. Eggman’s a fascist. Maybe Sonic’s philosophy isn’t good and only works out because he happens to be a good person. They even admit that it’s only through luck that Sonic happens to like being good instead. But whenever they see Sonic be too mean in adaptations specifically they have a lot of feelings about that. But he’s living by his own feelings and not caring about principles! I thought they liked that about him! They don’t. It’s just about having any excuse to demonize what they don’t like.

  If you liked a game element you’d like seeing it everywhere. Next you’re gonna tell me they claimed the whole concept of Sonic fighting Eggman with a group of friends is bad and isn’t meant to be in Sonic. Oh wait they did say that about the Freedom Fighters even though Tails and him were a group since Sonic 2 and Sonic Heroes exists. So they should hate the whole concept of Tails going with him on adventures and Knuckles being in the game then.

  Yet they defend Knuckles being in the game with no explanation because they’ll say anything to defend the games. But he has NO reason for being with Sonic, how is that better than the FFs? So that’s just an excuse for the real reason they don’t like them, Sonic Team didn’t make them.

  They act like they think “ divergence from the norm is an aberration and not innovation “ even though art for millennia has always been about subverting expectations to surprise the audience and innovate.

[netflixonyourcouch]

So, since I can't sleep and I have time, I'm gonna go through this and unpack it the best way I can. And in order for me to do this subject the most justice, I feel like we have to start from the last slide.

Men too often grill women in what can be considered niche/nerdy or otherwise male-dominated interests such as video gaming, metal and hardcore, and men's sports. There's an expectation for women to prove themselves, they get subject to questions about their knowledge and their credibility is called into question. I fully understand this and its role in this situation, with perhaps the ease in which the heckler dove into the comments to disparage her.

This situation does have more angles to explore, so I'll put a "Read More" here:

Now let's address her chief complaint, which is being a public influencer and being subject to harsh criticism. The way I feel is that if you are a creator, in the very broad sense of the word, like anywhere from being a content creator to a music or visual artist, or even a creator of products or creator of cuisine - If you have *ANY* product that others consume, there will always be haters, and there will always be critics. Period. I think that's inevitable and I think you have to say fuck the haters and accept the critics.

Anthony Fantano faces similar backlash on his music reviews. His supporters often say, "But how are you upset? It's just his OPINION!" not realizing that his OPINION is also his PRODUCT, his BRAND. He's not simply doing this in a vacuum and neither is Kelsey. I think she is learning what it feels like to be scrutinized as a public figure, but I also think, like most other public figures, she should avoid reading the comments or she'll continue to find herself getting hurt by disparaging comments.

This doesn't contradict the first point I made. She definitely is coming under fire for being a woman and giving her opinion on Beloved Male Band #342 or whatever (I'm not even sure what band they're talking about, but it doesn't really matter as it could be any band really). I would hate to see these haters tear her passion away, and if she thinks these type of call outs will help filter her fandom out, then who am I to stop her? I'm just saying, if I started going viral for music opinions and I started getting racist microaggressions and overtones in my comments, I don't want to take time out of my day to address them. BUT I'm not saying she's wrong for doing so. EYE am just saying I have a difference of opinion in how I'd react to haters in my comments.

FINALLY. One last thing to say, and again, I need to work this as carefully as I can.

As a music critic, which Kelsey doesn't think she is (and we'll discuss that too), you have a certain duty of how you approach music that is revered in music culture. Now, this is perhaps not agreed upon except for the most hardcore music purists, many of them pretentious as fuck. But as a recovering pretentious music snob (I promise I've gotten better over the years!) there is a salient point to be made here.

I have older white friends who didn't really "get" Kendrick Lamar and their chief complain was that they didn't really like his music because it heavily features "the n-word." Imagine that. Pulitzer Kenny! He won the fucking Pulitzer Prize, but your perception of his art completely reduced to "oh, he uses the n-word."

It's not valid criticism. It's your opinion, one that I can't take away from them or try to argue differently but it is in fact REDUCTIVE of Kendrick Lamar and his accomplishments as an artist.

So there's always gonna be artists and artists' works you need to approach with a certain reverence and "show your work" so to speak that you tried to consume their art completely. Like if my white friends did that, they'd realize there are several phenomenonally written Kendrick songs that have a substantial amount of depth beyond the fact that he (as a fucking black artist, mind you) uses nigga in his songs.

Kelsey disagrees with this responsibility because she doesn't fashion herself as a critic. I agree somewhat. If she doesn't want the critic tag and she's purely making content for fun and engagement then so be it. *then why spend time getting angry at the trolls if you're not even trying to be what they are assuming you to be.* If your position is "hey, I'm not a critic, these are just my silly little opinions" then STAND ON BUSINESS THEN. If you listen to 8-10 minutes of Sgt. Pepper and you think it's too whimsical and too psychedelic, then if a hater blowing smoke in your comments about how you didn't listen to it long enough, STAND ON BUSINESS.

But even moreso than that is the philosophical question of *how* should one react to albums. My disposition is this: Critic or no critic, if you have a public platform where people are consuming your content, you have a duty of care to react in a way that says you understood the damn assignment. Once you reach a certain level, you simply can't hide behind "this is just me sharing my opinion" because it's not just your opinion. You are in a position of authority, like it or not. And Kelsey doesn't seem to really enjoy the position of being in authority. But I would argue that you better figure that out before you build out a viral platform, or you better stand on what you post and be able to back your shit up with the fact that you don't care to do it in a traditional way!!

It is my opinion that people who are spotlight music influencers give up their right to have opinions without consequences. In other words, you can say fuck everybody in the club, but you cannot then walk back to your car!!!

This sounds NUTS to someone who doesn't see music opinions as a big deal, and think opinions are just personal and "aren't that deep." Kelsey, you have hundreds of thousands of people following you. Like it or not, you're in showbiz now and your opinions hold weight. You are in the unique (best, very fortunate) position to inform the masses about a subject and have them actually LISTEN to you. You can't misuse your platform by saying (for example, she did NOT say this!!) that Joanna Newsom wasn't your cup of tea because you found her voice to be grating.

"BUT IT'S HER OPINION" you might say. "If she didn't like her voice, you can't force her to like it!" Yeah, and I understand that. I don't like Diamanda Galas because I think her voice is too intense. But I'm also NEVER gonna use my platform and say all that without also acknowledging Diamanda Galas being an important avant-garde artist and nobody should speak on Joanna Newsom if they don't address the complexity of her lyrics and music composition.

It's not just Kelsey. I don't think Gen Z values having a responsibility of holding a music opinion like older generations of music enthusiasts do. But it's ok. I think she'll be ok in the long run, but she's gonna have to shake the haters off and respond to criticism much differently than she's doing here. That's if she wants to keep her current approach of reacting to shit that people hold near and dear to their hearts with silly little videos (her words, not mine).

Like if I was starting a fun film platform, I'm not about to react to watching The Godfather and go, "Eh, not my cup of tea, it was too slow."

But that's just me. Some people would say that's a perfectly valid opinion to have, and I would say they are wrong. And though we might not agree on that, that vast difference of opinion is the entire purpose of this rant.

Also, it goes without saying that all of this would apply if she was a guy too. Like I said, Anthony Fantano faces similar backlash as your stereotypical white male music nerd.

[gilbirda]

20 questions for writers, tagged by @gremlin-bot

1. how many works do you have on ao3?

83!!! But a lot are crossposted from FFN, and not ALL of my FFN stuff is there.

2. what's your total ao3 word count?

753,449

3. What fandoms do you write for?

At the moment dpxdc, but I have projects for DP in progress. I have some really old Inuyasha stuff, and Twilight, and a Gravity Falls fic that I def will continue? but mostly dpxdc :D

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Clown around and find out (Kudos: 8,524)

Mondays, am I right? (Kudos: 8,080)

Employee of the month (Kudos: 7,865)

Can't have shit in Gotham (Kudos: 7,343)

How to confuse a Bat (Kudos: 6,749)

Unsurprising xd

5. Do you respond to comments? why/why not?

I usually do the week when I post a fic, but i stop after that period of time. I don't respond mostly because I dont know what to say... I love each and every comment!!! I just get nervous.

6. What's the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Hmmmm, I'd say What could have been. It's a DP fic from Phic Phight 2022 and the prompts I used weren't necessarily angst material, but I tied them together in a story meant to leave you empty.

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

I don't do "happy" endings? I think I do "realistic" endings - main quest is conquered but we lost and gained things in the way.

I do write a lot of fluff and unapologetic one shots, so I would consider all of those "happy" endings.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

Yes.

Fortunately is not a normal event in my fics, but now that I have dipped my toes in comic book fanfiction I've gotten my fair share of purists and know-it-alls that come to my comments to educate me on what it's "canon" and explain to me how my interpretation is wrong.

That aside, I'm not afraid to portray "problematic" ships and delicate situations ,mainly mental health stuff. I'm not the first or the last person that pour themselves in their writing and use fictional characters as a medium to work on some personal things. Of course that's gotten me enough comments telling me how disgusting I am and how I'm writing XYZ wrong.

9. Do you write smut? if so, what kind?

Yes. I don't have a lot posted, but I have WIPs.

Mostly BDSM and how important it is to trust your partner.

10. Do you write crossovers? what's the craziest one?

Mostly DPxDC!

I did have an insane crossover between Twilight and a book not a lot of people know. TBH im keeping that information to myself xd.

11. have you ever had a fic stolen?

Yes.

There's a russian website that reposts fics.

And also people reposting my stuff in wattpad with a "credits to the author [name]" but they never asked me for permission.

12. have you ever had a fic translated?

Yes! To Russian!!!! Made me so happy ヾ(≧▽≦*)o

13. have you ever co-written a fic?

Yes! I'm co-writing a fic with some close friends and my girlfriend. And another fic with just my girlfriend, but I'm so slow with it lmao

14. what's your all-time fave ship?

I'm a multishipper but usually I have 1 OTP that im Very Normal about in every fandom and then I'm just okay with everything else.

Some examples are:

KogKag, SessKag (Inuyasha)

Hardcover (JazzxJason)(DPxDC)

PrussiaxHungary (Hetalia)

Mabill (Gravity Falls)

HikaHaruKao (Ouran HSHC)

Deckerstar (Lucifer TV)

15. what's a WIP you want to finish but doubt you will?

I don't want to jinx myself.

But probably the DP longfic. It's just. So long.

16. what are your writing strengths?

I've been told that my characters feel very real and that I write dynamics in a very organic way. In romance, I think I'm very good at portraying falling in love.

In general I've also been told I describe things in a way you can feel it, like you really are there.

17. writing weaknesses?

English is not my native language and I make a lot of mistakes, grammar wise. Or I let my weird miss matched speech patterns bleed into my characters and make them sound not quite right.

18. thoughts on writing dialogue in another language?

Again, I'm native Spanish speaker, so I do write in English regularly xd

Other languages, I'd need someone that speaks that language to help me.

19. first fandom you wrote for?

Inuyasha. I was about 11 years old. Those fics were written in Microsoft Word 2003, in script format (aka "theater" format), and every character had an assigned color and I would switch colors every dialogue line.

20. fave fic you've ever written?

Difficult to choose.

I love a lot of my fics, even older ones.

If I have to pick just one, I'm picking Friendly neighborhood vigilante

Tagging!

Not feeling like tagging today, and grem kinda stole the people I was thinking I could tag.

So, if anyone wants to do this, go ahead!

[borealvarg]

First written on the 11th of April, 2024

Cacao, meditation, and healing my womb

I started with "ceremonial cacao" a couple of months ago, and it is now a near-daily ritual I have.

While it is a delicious drink (I make it with milk and a bit of honey), it deserves the respect of only ever being taken in a ritualistic manner, so every time, I meditate immediately afterwards, and often set it to a small pre-ritual and incense. A bit of peace every day. (One sniff in the bag makes my brain go *happy place*)

Thus, I've also been meditating almost every day for the past couple of months, after only barely trying it a few times before. I try various guided meditations, using this knowledge to do it on my own, and going on visualization journeys - I guess some meditation purists will cringe at that, but I don't care. I want to get more into lucid dreaming and astral projection, but don't currently feel centered or focused enough to give it my best effort.

Now, I'm bleeding again, and I knew it was coming since there was no TTC:ing* this month, so I prepared for a few days by reading about spiritual practices around this, and various things to experiment with. Yesterday was the third day, a day I've seen suggested as the best to ask for a vision. I meditated with my cacao, asked for a vision, and got one. Not what I was expecting, but it really encouraged me and energized me for the rest of the day. *TTC: trying to conceive

I've had a struggle with infertility and subsequent mental health problems in the last nearly two years. It got very, very dark at times. I hated everyone I saw with a baby or bump, I hated myself, I hated my body for its inability to do what "everyone else" can do so easily.

I made this image beginning cycle 11, fourteen months ago, with the words "F U, uterus. Get your shit together."

A few months later, I realized that every single month, I was grieving as if someone had died. Not that a failed month TTC is as horrible as someone dying, not even close, but I acted like it. I could lay in bed and cry for seven-ten days every month. I realized it had gone much too far, and so went NTNP* for the rest of the summer and fall. Forbidding myself from research or reading about TTC, or "trying". Try to get my life back a bit. *NTNP: not trying, not preventing

In late fall, three favorite YouTube channels and my cousin all got pregnant or had a baby (where I didn't know they were pregnant) at the same time, and I didn't take it well, to put it mildly. It made me put my focus back, but I wasn't feeling well.

I had a sudden peak in well-being in December, I think it was my mind simply shutting off the pain and hopelessness to protect itself, but the negative thoughts and feelings came back (December was a very hard month for other reasons as well), and winter was a low time where I tried to focus on other things.

A couple of weeks ago, I had a meltdown with a lot of ugly crying. Deep hopelessness and grieving a potential future (the potential future of forever childlessness, that I oftentimes irrationally see as certain). That day, I had a long conversation with my husband, who has a completely different view. Where I see everything in black and white, numbers, statistics, failures, and compare myself to others, he sees none of these things.

We've talked many times before, but I think now finally, something clicked in me. He's right. "It hasn't happened YET", he says. And perhaps it's good that it hasn't happened yet. "Forget about those 24 months, say it starts now." I hated hearing that. "But it HAS been-" But in a way, he's right.

That's what one meditation told me, as well: What came before doesn't say anything about what will come in the future.

Some people are very practical or rational and interested in cold calculations, others highly emotional and subjective and perhaps more creative, call it "left brain vs right brain" if you will (regardless of the accuracy of that term, it is a good short description).

I am a really good 50/50 split in the worlds of science/rationality/numbers and art/spirituality/feeling, I think. But I've neglected the latter side and spent all of my 20s focusing all on the former, to my detriment. I am only now slowly learning to become more spiritual.

So yesterday, I asked for a vision and I received. Today, I wanted to do something different.

I've realized my poor womb is sick, and that it's not "her" fault. I have random unexplained ovary pains for over a year. I have serious menstrual cramps for most of my adult life, that I thought I will just have to put up with, because I'm a woman. I'm bleeding huge clots for two months in a row, third time in a year. And I'll spare you the rest of my long list of symptoms, we're into TMI territory enough as it is. 🙃 All these things started happening after we started TTC, for unknown reasons.

Cacao is a heart medicine, and meditation is about breath and body awareness. Cacao meditation tends to focus on the heart, physical and emotional. Since I'm bleeding this week, I wanted to connect with my womb and heart and give them some love - this is really strange to be writing for me, since I come from the "read scientific journals" and "think about it logically" world. But I believe in it, because the world is much more than text on paper.

I sat there for nearly an hour, longer than I had planned, and didn't want to go. Meditating on the womb and heart, thanking them.

It really did feel like returning to a relationship, such as with a friend or family member, that has been neglected or abused.

It feels a bit sappy and strange to write it, but in contrast feels really good to delve into, as so many women today - myself included - have grown up with a damaged or practically non-existent relationship to this side of us. We're in pain, we're on pills (never here, thankfully), hormone dysfunction is an epidemic, and some 1 in 10 women (and men) are infertile in what should be their peak fertile years.

I may not necessarily see eye-to-eye with much of the "hippie spiritual yoga women who use words like 'yoni' crowd", but there is a lot of genuine wisdom to find in reconnecting with natural femininity and our bodies. I make no secret of the fact that I, while calling myself an Odinist or heathen and focusing on that, am plucking spiritual practices from wherever I can find another piece to fit into what might one day be a whole picture. This is just another part of that.

I have roughly half of my "bleeding" years left, and this half will be one where I know what I'm doing and how to care for myself, instead of, as in my first half, seeing it as a painful hassle and even wishing it away completely.

I will work on healing my heart and my womb, as I continue my journey of learning.

A final note, why it may be good I haven't gotten pregnant in these two years: Because of precisely this. I was despairing. I was desperate. I hurt my marriage. I hurt my husband. I hurt myself in ways I can't all put into words here. If I had gotten pregnant in this state of mind, a postpartum depression would surely arrive like a letter in the mail. And even more reasons.

And most importantly of all, I have done an incredible amount of learning and growing in these two years, that I would never have had if I hadn't been through what I have.

[lazuli-writes]

Outtakes - Lost Memories

summary: A collection of lost and unfinished memories from a pensieve

genre: angst / hopeful / fluff

estimated word count: 3000 words

a/n: Remember folks, copying other people’s works is plagiarism and that’s illegal. Don’t be that kind of person. Anyways, hope you all enjoy it :)

©little-lazuli. Do not copy, repost, or translate without permission

[year one] Tracey figured she and Ron could be filth together.

“Areyougonnaeatthat?” Tracey almost struck her head against the table, embarrassed at how she word-vomited. Yet she did feel slightly justified at her nervousness with the strange, red headed boy to her right. He was just staring at the banoffee pie with the most empty eyes. 

He looked lost for someone who knew exactly where he was.

Tracey didn’t get it, but she didn’t want to intrude if it meant inconveniencing someone. So silent she remained… for approximately two minutes. The banoffee pie that was prepared before the boy was left untouched, and frankly, Tracey wanted it. She wanted it bad.

“W-What?” The boy stuttered. Tracey almost winced, even the boy’s voice was devoid of almost all emotion.

“Are you gonna eat that?” Tracey asked once again in a meek voice, finally turning her body to face the boy. As the boy looked at the food she gestured at, Tracey took the spare seconds to observe the boy. Wiry, tall, ginger red hair, a dash of freckles, bright blue eyes and a facet of dread exposing itself over his features—Tracey barely recognized it, but she could articulate the hints of apprehension radiating off of the boy.

“Uh… um… no.” It was the boy’s turn to stutter, pushing the banoffee pie to Tracey, prompting a tiny squeal of excitement from the copper-headed girl. 

“It seems that filth attracts filth.” 

Tracey and the redhead whipped their heads to the boy sitting across from them. A short, pale blonde boy sat, glaring into his food as he ate. A git in all its glory, sat right before them. Tracey only rolled her eyes, refusing to allow the comment to bother her. Growing up she had dealt with enough comments from her mother’s blood purist family to solidify her thick skin. She figured, why waste energy on a problem when you can just avoid and evade it? Quite Slytherin of herself Tracey believed. 

“Shut up you little git.” The tall red head all but hissed. Tracey shot a look at the boy, noticing how the once devoid face took on a mask of seething hate and disgust. 

The blonde boy sneered before continuing with eating, “Or what Weasley? Gonna starve yourself in anger? I know you’re probably used to going to bed hungry-”

Ron interrupted fiercely, “Shut it Malfoy or I’ll-“

“You’ll what?”

Tracey wanted to hit her head against the table once more, as she realized it was her voice that interrupted the red head’s. Banoffee pie completely forgotten about, Tracey tried her best to seem confident. Setting her utensils down neatly and straightening her back.

With the banoffee pie forgotten, Tracey inhaled a deep breath. Trying to pass as nonchalant, yet failing miserably, Tracey eyed the two boys before her.

“Not to be gobby with you two, but… it’s literally the first night for the next seven years of our lives. Do we really want to start it off this way?”

It seemed to be the wrong thing to say as both boys seemed to ignite at the same time.

“This house wasn’t made for blood traitors and diluted half-breeds.”

“It’s not my fault he’s a bloody wanker!”

The two states simultaneously, freezing each other in a hateful pause. They just eyed one another, completely ignoring Tracey’s presence as they stared off hatefully at one another. 

Tracey had to admit, her desire for evasion was unshakeable only a few moments ago. Now though, she had a clear mind for who she could see herself preferring to be around. It wasn’t the blonde boy.

“Well…

{memory blurred or obscured for a time}

“I guess we can be the filth of Slytherin together.”

Tracey watched as the bolts and cogs churned in the red head’s mind. She really hoped she didn’t mess this up. Tracey really wanted to have at least one friend in the house of snakes.

Elation welled up into her heart and soul as she noticed a smirk grace the lips of the red head. Tracey wasted no time to pounce on the opportunity.

“Tracey Davis. And by the looks of it, the resident half-blood of our Slytherin year-mates.” Extending her hand out after her assured introduction, Tracey smiled brightly as the boy returned the smile. Gripping her hand out in a firm handshake and allowing both to settle into a new calm.

“Ron Weasley. Proud blood traitor of this wretched house.” 

Malfoy sneered further into his food, choosing to ignore the two across from him. Tracey internally sighed in relief, grateful for his decision to keep quiet.

“So Ron, anything you looking forward to here in Hogwarts? I’m really excited for charms. I wanna learn how to make pictures move like in the newspaper.”

Tracey smiled as the red headed boy named Ron, the boy that was once emotionless incarnate, now erupted into an endless chatter of excitement. She listened to his worries, but she breathed reassurance into his being. Relaying her own insecurities of being in Slytherin.

She didn’t realize it at that moment, but eventually it came to her. Tracey could never have imagined that being the “filth” of her house alongside a fellow outcast would lead her down the best parts of her sweet yet short life …..{memory left unfinished}

[year five] Astoria hopes it’s all just one big nightmare as she is held in the embrace of Daphne, Ron and Tabby.

Despite the warming charm that shimmered above her, Astoria still shivered in her bed. Beneath the covers, scrunched up into a ball. She felt numb, pondering the uncertainty of her future.

“We can’t stay here Daph. It’s not safe. We’ll go out to muggle London tomorrow, hopefully then I can find my brother’s flat.”

“How do you know Percy will even consider taking us in? Ron… your father or mother had to have told him already.”

“Percy isn’t like the twins. He’ll help us out, I promise.”

Astoria didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but the voices of Daphne and Ron seemed to be the only thing to ground her on those sleepless nights—something that has become more common as of late. 

As someone born into wealth, Astoria never had to worry over such trivial matters in her life. A place to sleep. Food to eat. Clothes on her back. That was her parents' job. A job they worked hard at, for her and her sister. It seemed so unnecessary for her to give a second thought to such things. Yet, in less than a fortnight, her ivory tower had crumbled.

She still had nightmares of hiding in that ditch for hours. Alone, hiding, crying in the snow. A warming charm as her only company. Mum, Dad, Daphne and Ron had been taken by Death Eaters… DEATH EATERS!!!

Astoria couldn’t believe…..{memory left unfinished}

[year six] Muriel extends an olive branch at the height of the war.

“The last time a Greengrass walked these halls, he was poisoned. A pinch of belladonna was it not?”

The Prewett matriarch rolled her eyes at the comment. She hadn’t the desire to entertain such impertinent thoughts from her guest. Muriel Prewett had other things clouding her mind at the moment.

To say she expected her Monday evening to be invaded by her nephew Ronald, and the remnants of the Greengrass family would be a complete and dastard lie. Her blood. The blood of her ancestors. Defiled by that abominable dark mark. She’s sure her brother is weeping in his grave at the mere thought that his great-grandson was a slave to a dark wizard. 

But there’s little use in crying over spilled potions… or spilled blood for that matter. So here she was to see things through—as if she hadn’t been doing that for the better part of a century. Muriel was simply drinking tea, trying to detach herself from the war that had descended on her home country.

Only to have her time ruined when her nephew besieged her home, with two girls and a house elf in tow. She had the smallest desire to shun him and his for his lack of class, showing up uninvited and unannounced, how inexplicably rude. She had the ever growing desire to hex him to tears for bearing that disgusting mark in the halls of his ancestors. But for the faintest moment, Muriel let her guard down. That seemed to be all it took for Ronald to slither into her life completely. A true Slytherin to boot, just like his great aunt Lucretia and his grandmother Cedrella. Damned boy.

“I have no intention to cause you or your sister harm, you pillock.”

Across from the old crone sat the young brunette, Astoria Greengrass. Whom despite only being fourteen years of age, had the spine of a thirty year old auror in their prime. 

“You really expect us to trust you with our lives?” The bairn asked, eyes narrowing as the earl grey that sat between them was forgotten. Muriel instead, shined her eyes down upon the young couple who walked around the back yard with a house elf.

Ronald, Daphne and the unseemly house elf Tabby each were busy adding their own multitude of wards around the Prewett house. The old witch would be lying if she denied the ingenuity behind some of their wards. Runic wards, elf magic and even blood magic. Powerful wards to be added…..

{memory left unfinished}

[year seven] The Silver Quartet spend the Winter Hols together.

Theodore sighed contently as he inhaled the burning scent of lavender in air as he sat, staring into the flames of their camp. He didn’t predict that he would spend Christmas in the middle of the Orlestone Forest. Yet, he wouldn’t have it any other way.

Having devoured probably the best wilderness treat—courtesy of the wondrous Tracey Davis and her beautiful muggleness—s’mores were now a winter hols must. Theodore had already decided it so for the next festive hols. And so he sat, enjoying the warmth of the campfire, with a full belly, eyeing his companions. 

His brother in all but blood, the ginger giant that was Ronald Weasley, gave a stomach gripping laugh as he watched his other half. Theodore couldn’t stop his serene smile as he watched his cousin and best friend roll in the dirt and snow. Hair disheveled, face red from the biting cold, and dirt smudged upon both faces, Daphne and Ron shared a sweet kiss as they finished rolling on the ground. The two now focused upon embracing and holding the other, their snowball fight forgotten. 

Theodore didn’t know what to think the first time he saw the two hold hands as they entered the common room back in their fourth year. Had he known how the two would become a paragon of love and peace for not only themselves but for those around them, Theodore would have probably cut Ron some slack. 

But what was done was done, and Theodore couldn’t have had it any other way. He loved seeing his cousin have someone who loved and cherished her. He hates not being there for her two years ago on the very same day. Having to be told by the shaking form of his cousin Tori of how his only family—by both blood and choice—along with one of his best friends were kidnapped, tortured, killed and essentially enslaved with the dark mark… Theodore wanted to scream. To murder. To exact the same pain he felt on all those who dared to hurt his family. His home. 

To know little Astoria and kind little Tabby hid in a ditch, in the cold, in the snow and in utter darkness for almost ten hours made Theo want to scream. To know his uncle Bart and aunt Gia, the man and woman who raised him after his mother’s death and father’s imprisonment, the man Theodore imagined himself being, the woman who taught Theodore what it meant to be a man, tortured and butchered like animals… it made Theodore numb in his sobs. To know that Daphne, his first friend, had to watch her own parents die before her was too painful to think about it. Too goddamn painful. To know Ron took the mark for Daphne made Theodore cry, wishing it was him who could have spared his family the terrors of this war. 

Theodore couldn’t be more grateful to Ron for saving Daphne. He couldn’t be more blessed to see Ron and Daphne grow together. Becoming the answer to one another’s problems and the reason why both seemed to remain so strong, despite all they’ve been through. Theodore recognized it now every time he watched the two together. Their love was real and true. Just like his uncle Bart’s and aunt Gia’s. It was passionate, it was kind, it was sweet and it was all consuming and true. Theodore wanted that one day. 

Such desire made Theodore shift his sight to Tracey. Standing off to the side, her snowman is almost complete. A black scarf strangling its neck, heat from both the campfire and Tracey’s warming charm making the snowman slowly melt. Almost like it was bleeding. A sad smile on its face, as if saying to the world that it was happy despite a sad situation. Theodore found it heartwarming. Tracey was the best of the quartet in his opinion. Always a light in the never ending tunnel of gloom. 

“It’s rude to stare.” Tracey’s melodic voice cutting off the tangent Theodore found himself on. He couldn’t fight the blush off fast enough, as he realized he had been caught in his attentiveness on the young woman before him.

He did what he did best, tried to talk himself out of his problem, “I wasn’t staring.”

“You weren’t?” A layer of mischievousness lacing the two words.

Theodore damned the way she made his heart quicken in less than five words. He felt like that stupid, hormonal little boy who couldn’t control his emotions. Third and fourth year Theodore…. One does not speak of such times. As of now, Theodore was legally an adult. 17, of age and his own person. A secret member of the Order of Phoenix and smuggler of goods and refugees. Defenders of the defenseless. School boy crushes were beneath him. He could handle speaking to his schoolmate, who had perhaps the biggest heart, the sweetest soul and the most heavenly of looks.

“N-No.” He stuttered.

He fucking stuttered. The way he could just fling himself from the Dover cliffs was exceptional.

Tracey took the time to smile before turning her head to finishing her snowman. Attempting once again to conjure a carrot for the nose. She got as far as the carrot leaves, an orange colored pen and some actual orange peels. No carrots though.

“Well that’s too bad. I kind of enjoy your staring.”

Damn you Tracey Davis, Theodore thought as he looked down back at the flames, hoping the heat would burn away at the blush erupting over his cheeks.

Theodore must have been trapped in his own head again as he didn’t notice Tracey step away from her unfinished snowman, proceeding to shove Theodore over. Feeling himself being pushed over in an effort to make room for her, he obliged easily, still trying to hide his blush. 

“Not the way I saw myself enjoying Christmas. But it could be worse I guess.” Tracey said, wrapping her hair into a bun as settled herself next to Theodore. Fixing her coat and rearranging her scarf. Canceling the warming charm that came with her, she instead drew heat from the campfire.

“Same. I’m just glad to know you three are here and Astoria is safe.” 

Tracey hummed her agreement, both minds traveling in their own ways. 

Tracey soaked up the traces of assistance and peace around her. Her parents were safe hiding in France. Astoria was safe under thee Fidelius with Lady Prewett. Ron, Daphne and Theodore were here with her. Together they could face anything, even that stupid dark lord.

Theodore’s mind raced thinking of all the ways he wanted to protect those he cared about. Astoria was safe with Tabby and Ron’s aunt. Ron and Tracey were in his sight. He could depend on Ron to fight to the bitter end in protecting Daphne. Ron was someone Theodore didn’t have to worry for. Ron took the dark mark selflessly. Ron and Daphne were assured life as long as they were together. And Tracey… Theodore was no liar. Tracey Davis was the most divine, brilliant, powerful, kind, generous, fierce, honest witch… woman Theodore felt blessed to have ever met. 

He didn’t know why it took so long for him to realize. Six years he had known the goddess Tracey Davis. And only until last year did he have the guts to admit to himself. He had fallen in love. Theodore Nott. The son of a death eater, resident prick of the Silver Quartet, pseudo-son of Greengrass, a self preserving Slytherin prat, in love with the most beautiful witch he had come to ever known.

“Do you think you’ll find something as perfect as they did?”

Theodore’s train of thought derailed at her words. Digesting her question delicately. Mentally fortifying his mind. He trusted Tracey to respect other’s minds—to not use her light legilimency skills, especially on her closest friends. 

“If I can, then I guess I can die happy.”

“What a joy it would be. Wouldn’t it?”

“Yes,” Theodore sighed out, his eyes matching the fondness that Tracey held, both staring blissfully into one another “I guess it would.”

Tracey smiled softly before she leaned her head downward, laying it upon his shoulder. Theodore fought hard to not allow such a simple gesture render him stiff or immobile.

Relaxing and steadying his breath, Theodore simply allowed himself to enjoy the moment. Sitting there, laying his down upon hers as the two enjoyed each other’s company. The echoes of Ron and Daphne’s laughter and happiness filling the cold air. The snowflakes of the white Christmas falling down sweetly and the flames still burning.

…..{memory left unfinished}