#i have more to say on this subject but this is the dash appropriate version

[heartsbreaking]

i'm gonna be so fucking fr one thing that has always pissed me off about the rpc is how personal people take it when shows/sequels don't go how they expect them to go/don't follow the canon people have made up in their head. like i get canon divergence, but its SO FRUSTRATING to me to see rpers bashing show runners/bashing directors for choices that make sense for their story just because they don't fit the version of the character they write on tumbIr.gov. it's exhausting and i'm not naming fandoms you can assign that shit for yourselves but its tiring. i'm tired like y'all HAVE to know by now that when you give a character that doesn't have a last name or mentioned parent or something an origin story that MIGHT change in canon and might not be what you made up right? you don't have have to take it out on the writers...or hell maybe you don't even have to post about it. just go with your canon and make sure your canon divergence is clear somewhere on your page so a) everyone is on the same page and b) people can decide whether they want to follow your canon and if they don't want to they don't follow you and that saves everyone hurt feelings. bashing the writers may not reach the actual writers but it does reach OTHER PEOPLE who write those characters and write in the same fandom and that does make it kind of a hostile place ngl.

[2manyturbos]

🏁 Rules 🏁

Hi: You can call me Vile. They/She/He with a slight inclination toward They/Them. I’m 30+ and have been rping for well over a decade. Me nb grey ace gay cryptid that loves their villains.

This is a Side Blog: Follows are through vile-muses.

Content Disclaimer: Please use your better judgment when following. Expect heavy themes; this is NOT a coffee shop AU. Regardless that such themes will be tagged, if you can’t handle dark themes, I cannot recommend a follow. There will be morally grey if not outright immoral actions included on this blog. IC =/= OOC. This should go without saying, but I do not condone all the actions of my character. If this is a triggering subject or if you cannot divorce the writer from any potentially villainous characters they write, I cannot recommend a follow.

Obligatory Mention: I reserve the right to not RP with everyone, ect ect.

Fandom DNI’s: As a personal preference, I'd rather not see the following with high frequency on my dash: Harry Potter, FNAF (and similar “mascot horror”), South Park, Family Guy, Marvel, DC, Superheroes in general, My Little Pony, Star Wars, Homestuck, Disney Descendants, Twisted Wonderland, Once Upon A Time, Disney “Live Action” Remakes, K Pop. So I avoid blogs where it seems like I'll be seeing a lot of any of this.

Self Inserts: I don't roleplay with them. Sorry. In my experience there's always a problem with the inability to separate ic from ooc with self inserts. That and I'm just uncomfy with it in general. It isn't fun for me.

Accessibility Clause: If I can’t navigate or easily read your blog, I won’t follow. Ditto for post formatting. Accessibility is important. On the flip side: if there’s anything I can do to make my content easier to enjoy, please don’t hesitate to ask. I am a player to values accessibility over aesthetic.

Duplicate Muses: I will not allow duplicates of my own muse to meet each-other. I will allow my characters to meet other oc Turbos but NOT other versions of the original. Ties into me not wanting to focus on the multi-verse, as elaborated on further down. I will, however, interact with multiples of other characters.

Regarding Live Action Icons: If you cannot tolerate that I don’t always use them, I am not a good partner for you. I spent time and effort into developing my artistic skill and use my own art for some graphics; please be respectful of that. I have zero interest whatsoever in getting a rl face claim for Turbo.

Shipping: Highly selective. I need to trust you. I need to be familiar with your vibe, which requires months of me sharing a space with you. I do not like to ship with cis straight male muns, sorry.

Actions have consequences in my RPs. I don’t kill without consent, but don’t expect me or my character to be a doormat. If your muse antagonizes or annoys mine, expect an appropriate reaction. This goes both ways; my characters may not be terribly nice. Feel free to respond to their behavior in kind.

Assuming Relationships: I don’t do pre-established relationships (that aren’t canon) at all. I build IC relations from the ground up. If you want to plot out some -basic- history, or a sort of outline, that’s fine, but nothing too in-depth to start with. No long-lost lovers, children or family members. Please do not attempt to imply relationships I haven’t agreed to. If you have a destination in mind for their relationship (i.e. eventual family figures), I’ll slowly work up to it thread by thread, but I won’t go all in at first before I know what their chemistry is like.

I Am Slow: Please be aware I’m a working adult who may have to go on hiatus for months at a time. I can be a slow RPer and may take a week or more to respond to threads regularly. If potentially waiting a month or two for replies during my busy periods is a dealbreaker for you, I’m not the right partner. I do however do my best to give notice of hiatuses.

You Are Slow?: On the flip side, I don’t mind fellow slow RPers and I understand that life happens; in this case I will expect something in your rules, a hiatus notice, or even direct communication with me if replies will be slow. Don’t apologize for taking a month +, I’m very used to it.

Post Length: I regularly write two paragraphs (5+ sentences) or more. I don’t exactly have a firm wordcount requirement. As long as it seems like we’re putting in an equal effort, specific reply lengths aren’t a deal breaker for me. I never do one-liners; I honestly just can’t… unless it’s for crack threads lol.

My Artwork: This blog includes a fair amount my own art. Anyone is welcome to reblog my art. But please do not repost or reuse my art. Do not repost my artwork; no, not even with credit. Anyone doing so is doing so against my wishes and I will report you. Failing that, I will ask you personally to remove it. Failing that, I will go public. So please don’t steal my art.

I only rp with other adults. This is not an invitation to convince me otherwise. I will check blogs for ages; any blog without an age, I will assume is under 18 and will not interact. If I suspect you are lying about your age or are otherwise not mature enough in interactions, I’m within my rights to cut contact.

No Multi-verse Shenanigans Please: I’m not interested in multi-verse shenanigans. I don’t like plots where my characters are warped to another universe and will not respond to RPs that paint me into that corner. I’m an old rper who’s already done that to death and am bored with it. Instead, I would suggest just a mutual agreement between partners that our characters come from the same universe. Or, if you really want your character to come from a different universe, please don’t make it the focus of the rp.

Digital vs Real World: “Players” somehow entering the digital world is okay as a plot point for face to face interaction reasons. But please don’t put my characters into the real world without plotting first.

Story progression is a thing. What your characters do will be remembered thread to thread. If we have a relationship between our characters in mind, I will generally try to work to get closer to it thread-by-thread. Also, there will be changes to the character on my blog as time goes on. Development happens. I am a roleplayer to likes to keep track of continuity.

Passwords give me anxiety. Sorry, lol: I’m not going to have my anxiety invalidated either. I don’t follow people with a password requirement in respect to that. I read rules before I even follow/follow back to check if we’re compatible. If you don’t believe me, that’s gravy, but we’re not compatible.

I am assuming if you’re down here, you read my rules. I have no password requirement so *party horn*

[phantomskeep]

Hey, so for your new dpxdc post about w*ndigo Danny is cool but please be aware that you are appropriating a closed spiritual traditions of Algonquian-speaking First Nations in North America- like, really truly people know that those beings exist and will definitely murder them if named. Again, I do think the post is neat just not with that particular entity.

Heyhey! I am aware that the post is a bit of a questionable "is this okay to do" due to the rocky relationship between Native Americans and the people who came to colonize America (hnngg that sounds bad?? but I have no idea how to word it differently. Basically that Native American culture has been butchered beyond belief at best, appropriated at worst, by the rest of the world). I have done my fair share of research on the wendigo subject - from books to documentaries to scholar articles to blogs to even Reddit/Tumblr posts - and from what I understand it is not taboo to speak of a wendigo. Many people get the Navajo's Skinwalker mixed up with the more northern wendigo and over time non-native pop culture have mixed the two and gotten them confused over time.

As I stated before, however, I am not a member of any Native American nation, nor a member of any Algonquian speaking culture. Again - this is not my culture and I am not looking to offend or appropriate any. I'm just a humble US cowboy mixed with a dose of Japanese farmer with a dash of cajun mariner; but I would also like to stress that I did not make that post while being uninformed.

That being said, from my understanding on this subject the word "wendigo" is not one that cannot be spoken. This is, again from what I've been able to find, because "wendigo" is not the actual spelling/name of the spirit. I'm not going to write or say what the Algonquian word is because that is something I don't think those nations want spread, based on the context that I found it in.

If you have the sources where you got your information from, can you please share them with me? Even if it's just another Anon message with a sneaky link to them, or the name of where you got it from that would be really great.

I will be going back to my DCxDP idea post and clarifying that the version of "wendigo" I am using is the more pop-culture version rather than the actual folklore.

If you want to see the other post I did regarding a small, teeny-tiny slice of some of the digging I have done on the subject, follow this link here.

I love the folklore behind wendigos (thanks, Hannibal) and have been on a decade-long binge on any information regarding them. They're cool, even if I (personally) tend to enjoy the bastardized "not actually a wendigo because it has antlers and is not a spirit" more than the actual folklore - which I can and will admit is appropriation to a degree. What can I say? I saw a zombie deer one day on the farm, turned around and watched Hannibal for the first time. I was hooked because I thought I actually saw a wendigo/ravenstag/weird cannibal thing chilling my backyard. Ten years later and I can fully admit I just saw an ill deer and was immediately slapped with a fucked-up version of cool folklore.

Again, if you have the sources that you got your information from and wouldn't mind sharing I would be super happy <3 I want to be as informed as possible, which is something I believe I have done. But! I know I can make errors and would like to fix them as much as possible. Having the source on hand would be great, because I am planning on using wendigo/wendigo-adjacent lore in a story I am currently writing. I am planning on hitting up some Natives from the areas the folklore originated from before I wrote my ideas into the plot and now it seems like I need to do that more than ever haha.

Hopefully this clarifies some stuff? If you want to have an anonymous conversation on this subject keep filling up my inbox, I love talking about this subject because I learn so much new stuff every time.

[nettlestonenell]

Enola Holmes in Review

Gentle Readers:

1.       I did not plan to watch Enola Holmes

2.       I do not/have not watched Stranger Things, and my entire concept of Millie Bobby Brown as a human is encapsulated in the occasional errant tumblr post, and a line of eyewear she apparently has created, posters for which hang at my glasses-provider.

3.       I had never heard of the YA novels about Enola Holmes

There she is!

Yes, I do tend to enjoy nearly any incarnation of Sherlock Holmes. And, yes, I am often surprised by this fact. For some reason, Holmes, unlike, say, Chris Evans as Cap or Chris Hemsworth as Thor [instances where I can’t really imagine enjoying anyone else in the role] I am always interested to see someone else’s [writer and actor and director]’s take on him. *Subtle shout-out to James D’Arcy’s 2002 turn in A Case of Evil.

Mr. Jarvis! [and there was Vincent D’Onofrio and opium!!]

And yet, watching the Enola Holmes trailer [no doubt b/c of tumblr], and yes, admittedly not unmoved [we are not made of stone] by Cavill’s Curls™ the delight I felt in watching that advert led me to start informing my family that on September 23rd what I was going to be doing was enjoying Enola Holmes on Netflix [and anyone else was free to join me].

Someone important is missing from this picture

And what a delight it was. In the run-up to its debut I read more than a few reviews of the film [and, I think, every one of them written by men], some of which struck me as simply coming from a place of mean-spiritedness, yet none—even the positive reviews—preparing me for how ENJOYABLE this film is.

I’m not going to provide a full review point-by-point here, b/c the film involves cases to be solved (no, none of them are overwhelmingly complex—YA novel--, so all the more reason not to spoil any pay-offs). But I do have some things to talk about.

THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM – And what a nice, nice elephant it is! Henry Cavill as Holmes is, in my opinion an absolute delight of a performance. From the moment he first says Enola’s name (a perfectly-rendered reaction to the moment playing out) this Holmes fits into this Greatest Showman-like version of Victorian England, where no one’s too dirty no matter how poor, and where despite a flaming red dress, cut too low for daytime wear, young Enola is never once mistaken for a working girl. [Again, YA novel] As other reviewers have noted, HC is, well, Cut and Bulked Out, and in his highly tailored frock coats well, strapping is too light a description word. *not a complaint. Cavill’s Curls are out and proud and here to tell us that we are meant to be Having Fun, and Gentle Readers—THEY DO NOT LIE.

No, not a priest’s collar where he is undercover (though I had thought so)

In fact, you could absolutely write your thesis statement on this film, that it’s really a fraternal, familial love story between Sherlock and Enola. Sherlock is the character during the two hours that actually changes. [Yes, Enola comes to an understanding about herself, and her circumstances change repeatedly—but it is Sherlock who experiences a Change of Heart/Reversal]. 

Raise your hand if you’re totally here for significantly older brother/significantly youngest sister family love!

HOW I WOULD DESCRIBE IT – This might in no way be helpful, but, Enola Holmes is basically The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles...

Where have you gone, Sean Patrick Flanery?

a YA historical storyline that’s written adjacent to [there, famous people] here, enduring fictional characters. It’s adventurous and pleasantly immersive, historical morays are given a slap-dash portrayal, rather than a fully-accurate representation, there’s adventures to be had, and side-characters to be converted into caring about the title character as much as we, the audience, do.

LUCY HONEYCHURCH – Yes, that gorgeous girl from Windy Corner. The timeline doesn’t jibe, but I daresay Helena Bonham Carter (back in a corset—though she may have worn those for Bellatrix) as Eudoria Holmes *IS* what Lucy Honeychurch might well have become beyond A Room with a View’s end. Bonham Carter looks absolutely at home here (period films have sorely missed her! –she had a part in 2015’s Suffragette), and still wears the trappings of Victorian England like a second skin. 

Not to mention that she now join my personal comfort-list of on-screen mothers with the likes of 1997’s Little Women Susan Sarandon and Cinderella’s Hayley Atwell.

FAMILY ISSUES OR PLOT HOLES? 

It’s a fair question. There’s a lot going on in this plot, some of which...seem solvable. Why has it been so very long since the Holmes brothers have seen their own mother? And sister? How could the woman we come to know as Eudoria raise a Mycroft? [see also, Molly Weasley?] Why aren’t people who seem to care about Enola more engaged with saving her from all the dangers London throws in her way? Why does Enola accept several acts of violence aimed at her, why does she in certain instances Do What She Is Told? Rather than chalk these up to plot holes or convenient devices, I’m siding with the Holmes family being dysfunctional [who knows what dad was like? We’re certainly not told here]. 

[clears throat]

The conversations between Mycroft and Sherlock barely skim the surface of any subject they interact on. Classic dysfunction: distancing one’s true self from human interaction b/c keeping the peace supersedes all else.

Enola accepts certain treatments b/c if we really do watch her relationship with her mother, there is an element of something amiss—as I will declare the later abandonment shows. Enola is a child used to being elevated and celebrated on one hand, and shut out and isolated on the other. Her parent has informed her about so much, but essentially locked her away in a false reality, where Enola is not taken to see the world, nor taught how to interact in it (which is explicitly stated). Perhaps it is not so surprising that the Holmes’ brothers have not cared overly much for visiting their remaining family. And when repeatedly confronted with a minor child (and yet a child likely though old enough or about so, to be married off) being forced to endure things diametrically opposed to her will—the brothers’ reactions are stoic, the system they accept as to how life must be lived immoveable and morally right simply by its very existence.

MILLIE BOBBY BROWN – THE STAR – In what has to be an Emmy-nomination-deserving turn, MBB is nothing short of wholly in charge of the screen. She never overpowers the story. She’s as loveable as Sandra Bullock in While You Were Sleeping, and as ready for her closeup as Jennifer Lawrence in The Hunger Games. As another review mentioned, she handles the 4th wall breaks in such as way as we look forward to the next time she’s going to talk to us. We ache with her sorrow for her lost mom, and rage with her at the adults in her life choosing wrongly for her future—or simply not choosing at all.

A random observation, but one that feels important to me: her HAIR. Yes! They’ve managed to make a late Victorian-era film where the heroine’s hair looks like real hair that someone really styled (or in some scenes, didn’t). And yet, where the hair looks proper for the time. [wild applause]

COMPLAINTS: Well, in honesty there aren’t any. If you want to complain that there isn’t any dirt, that the evil of the world (I mean, c’mon, this is narrowly post-Dickensian London, here) is neutered, that the adults in question seem neither alarmed enough or emboldened enough at either their mother or sister being missing and possibly out of their depths in a dangerous society without protection, and in Enola’s case real-world skills--? Well, I’m certainly not going to disagree with you. This is YA Victorian London, after all, not Ripper Street. There is also neither a hint of or actual threat of sexual violence at any point in the film. But the lack of that has preserved us from having to sit through that, as well as no doubt lectures about how Enola’s virtue might be spoilt and she might become useful to no man.

The relationships are appropriate, too. Despite strides between Enola and certain adults in the film, by the time the credits roll they’re not showing physical affection toward each other (a move that would have seemed over-the-top), and teen relationships are shown progressing at a reasonable and mutedly awkward pace.

Now, Netflix, green-light me five more films (or more). There’s still a new version of John Watson to meet, after all!

[la5t-res0rt]

this was written several weeks ago in response to asks i was receiving i am posting it now it is very long the longest i have ever made and it is not very well edited but here it is in this final essay i talk about how shitty rae is about black people in her writing as well as just me talking about how her writing sucks in general lets begin

hello everyone 

as you may know i have received a lot of anons in the last week or so about issues of racism in the beetlejuice community both just generally speaking and also within specific spaces 

i was very frustrated to not be getting the answers i wanted because i typically do not talk about what i do not see but in an effort to be better about discourse i went looking through discourse from before my time in the fandom and i also received some receipts and information from my followers and from some friends

keep in mind that the voices and thoughts of bipoc are not only incredibly important at all times but in this circumstance it is important that if a bipoc has something to add you listen and learn and be better

i admit that when this happened i wasnt aware of the extent of what occurred and im angry at myself for not doing more at that time and i want to work harder to make sure something like this doesnt go unnoticed again

im a hesitant to talk about months old discourse because i have been criticized for bringing up quote old new unquote but this is very important and i am willing to face whatever comes from to me

lets talk about this

content from our local racist idiot that may be months old but its important

putting my thoughts under a cut to spare the dash but before i begin obviously this is awful

lets fucking unpack this folks

right out the gate op states that she supports artistic freedom but then within a couple words she goes against that statement

being entirely canon compliant isnt artistic freedom and even so if this person has so much respect for canon they wouldnt be out here erasing lydias obvious disgust for beetlejuice in the movie or ignoring lydias age for the sake of shipping that shit isnt canon either 

also we love the quick jab at the musical there hilarious we love it dont we because god forbid a licensed and successful branch on a media have any standing in this conversation but whatever

now lets scroll down and talk about the term racebending

the term racebending was coined around 2009 in response to the avatar the last airbender movie a film in which the east asian races of the characters were erased by casting white actors in the three leading roles of aang sokka and katara 

whenever the term racebending is used in a negative light it is almost always a case of whitewashing like casting scarlett johansen in ghost in the shell or the casting of white actors of the prince of persia sands of time instead of iranian ones

this kind of racebending erases minorities from beeing seen in media and is wrong

all that being said however racebending has also been noted to have very positive after effects like the 1997 adaptation of cinderella or casting samuel jackson as nick fury in the marvel movies nick fury was originally a white guy can you even imagine

i read this piece from an academic that said quote writers can change the race and cultural specificity of central characters or pull a secondary character of color from the margins transforming them into the central protagonist unquote

racebending like the kind that rae is so heated about is the kind of creative freedom that leads to more representation of bipoc in media which will never be a bad thing ever no matter how pissy you get about it

designing a version of a character as a poc isnt serving to make them necessarily better it serves to give new perspective and perhaps the opportunity to connect even more deeply with a character it doesnt marginalize or erase white people it can uplift poc and if you think uplifting poc is wrong because it tears down white people or whatever youre a fucking moron and you need to get out of your podunk white folk town and see the real world

the numbers of times a bipoc particularly a bipoc that is also lgbt+ has been represented in media are dwarfed by what i as a white dude have seen myself represented in media is and that isnt okay that isnt equality and its something that should change not only in mainstream media but in fandom spaces as well

lets move down a bit further to the part about bullying straight people which is hilarious and lets also talk about the term fetishistic as well lets start with that

this person literally writes explicit pornography of a minor and an adult are we really going to let someone like that dictate what is and what isnt fetishistic

similarly to doing a positive racebend situation people may project lgbt+ headcanons on a character because its part of who they are and it helps them feel closer to the character and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that

depicting lgbt+ subject matter on existing characters isnt an inherently fetishistic action generally things only really become fetishistic when the media is being crafted and hyped by people who are outside of lgbt+ community for example how young teens used to flip a tit about yaoi or how chasers fetishize trans people

but drawing a character with top surgery scars or headcanoning them as trans is harmless and its just another way to interpret a character literally anone could be trans unless if their character bio says theyre cis and most of them dont go that deep so it really is open to interpretation and on the whole most creators encourage this sort of exploration because it is a good thing to get healthy representation out in the world

as for it being used to bully straights thats just funny i dont have anything else on that like if youre straight and you feel threatened and bullied because of someone headcanoning someone as anything that isnt cishet youre a fucking idiot and a weak baby idiot at that like the real world must fucking suck for you because lgbt+ people are everywhere and statistically a big chunk of your favorite characters arent cishet sorry be mad about it

lets roll down a bit further about the big meat of the issue which was when several artists were drawing interpretations of lydia as a black girl which i loved but clearly this person didnt love it because they have a very narrow and very racist and problematic view of what it means to be a black person

and before i move forward i must reiderate that i am a white person and you should listen to the thoughts of poc people like @fright-of-their-lives​ or @gender-chaotic it is not my place to explain what the black experience is like and it certainly isnt this persons either

implying that the story of a black person isnt worth telling unless if the character faces struggles like racism and prejudice is downright moronic 

why use the word kissable to describe a black persons lips now thats what i call fetishistic and its to another extreme if youre talking about a black version of lydia on top of that

the author of this post says herself that shes white so clearly shes the person whos an authority on the black experience and what it means to be a black person right am i reading that right or am i having a fucking conniption

how about allowing black characters to exist without having to struggle why cant a black version of lydia just be a goth teenager with a ghost problem who likes photography and is also black like she doesnt have to move to a hick town and get abused by racist folks she doesnt have to go through any more shit than she already goes through and if you honestly think thats the only way to tell a black persons story you need to get your brain cleaned

you know nothing about the complexities about being a black person and i dont either but you know wh odo black people who are doing black versions of canon characters they fucking know 

lets squiggle down just a bit further 

so the writer has issues with giving characters traits like a broad nose or larger lips if theyre a woman but if theyre a man suddenly its totally okay to go all ryan murphy ahs coven papa legba appropriation when approaching character design like are you fucking stupid do you hear yourself is that really how you see black men like what the fuck is wrong with you

none of the shit youre spewing takes bravery it takes ignorance and supreme levels of stupidity

do you really think you with your fic where a black lgbt+ woman is tortured and abused where you use the n word with a hard r to refer to her like that shits not okay its fucking depraved and yeah we know you love being shitty but like christ on a bike thats so much 

can we also talk about this

what the fuck is this fetishistic bull roar garbage calling this black character beyonce dressing her up in quote fuck me heels unquote are you are you seriously gonna write this and say its a shining example of how to write a black character youre basically saying ope here she is shes a sex icon haha im so progressive and i clealry understand the black experience hahahaha fuck you oh my god

on top of that theres a point where this character is only referred to as curly hair or the fact that the n word is used in the fic with the hard r like thats hands down not okay for you to use especially not in a manner like this jesus christ

oop heres a little more a sampling for you of the hell i am enduring in reading this drivel

oh boy lets put a leash on the angry black woman character lets put her in a leash and have the man imply hes a master like are you kidding me are you for real and what the fuck is with calling her shit like j lo and beyonce do you actually think thats clever at all are you just thinking of any poc that comes into your head for this 

also lydia fucking tells this girl that she shouldnt have lost her temper like she got fucking leashed im so tired why is this writing so problematic and also so bad

hold up before i lose my head lets look at some of her own comments on the matter of this character and what happens to her

hi hello youre just casually tossing the word lynch out there in the wide open world as if thats not a problem that is still real like are you fucking unhinged there have been multiple cases of this exact thing happening in our firepit of a country in the last five months alone like how can you still have shit like this up for people to read how can you be proud of work like this in this climate

and also what the fuck is that last bit 

what the actual fuck

i dont speak for black people as a white person but you do!? im sorry i had to get my punctuation out for that because wow thats fucking asinine just because one black person read your fic and didnt find the torture and abuse of your one black character abhorrant doesnt mean that the vast majority of people not only in the fandom but in the human population with decency are going to think its okay because its not 

i started this post hoping to be level headed and professional but jesus fucking christ this woman is something else white nationalism is alive and well folks and its name is rae

if you defend this woman you defend some truly abhorrant raecism

editors notes 

in order to get some perspective on these issues more fully some of the writing by the author was examined and on the whole it was pretty unreadable but i want to just call back to the very beginning of this essay where the person in question talked about holding canon in high regard but then in their writing they just go around giving people magic and shit and ignoring the end of the movie entirely like are you canon compliant or nah 

the writing doesnt even read like beetlejuice fanfic it reads as self indulgent fiction you could easily change the names and its just a bad fanfic from 2007

also can we talk about writing the lesbian character as an angry man hater like its 2020 dude and als olets touch on that girl on girl pandering while beetlejuice is just there like here we go fetishizing again wee

i cant find a way to work this into this already massive post but

im going to throw up

okay so thats a lot we have covered a lot today and im sure my ask box will regret it but this definitely should have been more picked apart when it happened

please feel free to add more to this i would love more perspectives than just my own.

[thevividgreenmoss]

Hey, no offense intended, but do you have any connection to the fieriframes blog that tumblr linked to yesterday? It @'s you several times. Sorry if you've been asked this a lot!

None taken! I feel like it really is at this point my responsibility to publicly address this since the people deserve to know the truth and while no harm has been meant at any point it's still not okay to keep people in the dark for too long cause then like what's even going on in there it could be anything but we can't even see...and after a certain point society can't be held responsible for how it react against whatever it is that is going on in those shadows like I mean it's only become more apparent in this post-Trump post-Capitol Hill riot moment the damage this kind of thing can cause how sick and twisted we all might become as a result...hopefully this can be the start of us coming together to heal and washing our hands of this whole affair that really did spiral out of control which again we didn't mean for that to happen I mean I can't speak for everyone involved but I personally especially didn't expect the related emergence of a lawsuit citing the stewarship of Gondor in the lord of the rings series as proof that the supreme court must overturn the results of our recent election and reinstate Donald Trump as president and I personally do NOT agree with what they're doing or who they're doing it for although I have to say I will defend their right to do what they're doing despite not agreeing with it or at least not with all of it I think they actually make some good points and yes even when it comes to the core of what they're saying I don't find any part of it objectionable if I'm being frank, if that's still even allowed? With cancel culture and everything but I mean the point is that even if the more I think about it and listen to both sides the more I have to say I do agree with all of it and I hope they're successful but it wasn't an intended consequence or one we can be reasonably expected to have foreseen lbut we still have to take responsibility that's called being an adult and it's maybe even part of being an American, adult or otherwise, even when it's hard to do but anyways as I'm rapidly approaching the limit of my capacity to articulate new if terribly incoherent thoughts having still not answered your basic question, I'm going to paste my response to All This from this morning, if that's okay. After all responsibility does and must start with response so:

Most of my relatives have always led very nondescript detached from influence or power in any capacity due to varying combinations of indifference & ineptitude sort of existences like despite varying socioeconomic contexts across generations and/or within different branches of the family there's a general trend of whatever the opposite of noteworthiness is lmao which honestly I feel is usually for the best, but there are two exceptions in the form of extended family six degrees of separation type distant connections to very despicable Pakistani political figures on my mom's side one of which is that two of grandpa's first cousins were childhood friends with Benazir Bhutto and apparently their mom at one point kind of like stopped letting them hang out due to like increasing (appropriate/understandable) political aversion but then Benazir's mom was like no she misses them so they started letting them hang out again which like idk situations like that can be awkward and I mean you're not responsible for somehow anticipating that this child would grow up to be a malevolent public presence along similar lines as her father already was at the time (also would carry on the paternal legacy by meeting a violent untimely end in one of those situations where history very perversely and, despite the malignant and violent impact that the victim themselves had on society, tragically rhymes with itself but that's a whole other thing) but yeah so I guess ultimately they ended up remaining in touch socially throughout their lives and apparently a picture of them at some function together ended up in a Time magazine feature at some point in the early 90s? All of which is to say that I think my equivalent brush with notoriety will go down as being the time a handful of people asked me what was going on with the whole Guy Fieri all over the dash situation like my version of a lifelong acquaintance with and one-time appearance in an extremely minor background role in the media saga surrounding the first woman to serve as head of state in a muslim majority nation, a member of one of the major political dynasties of the past fifty years, is when the weak association I have with fieriframes.tumblr.com that's based off me reflexively reblogging all of their posts and literally nothing else at all becomes a subject of faint interest on the day the aforementioned blog & its namesake became involved in a random promotional gimmick of some sort along with this dying but never dead website

[hong-kong-art-man]

“Stars, Too, Were Time Travellers. The 4 Great Stars That I Have Worked With And Salute.” ——The Respected Film Art Director Of Hong Kong Bill Lui 

In film, an ‘Art Director’(美術指導)works directly below the ‘Production Designer’(美術總監) and a large part of his duties are the administrative aspects of the art department. The Production Designer is the superior individual responsible for the overall look and tone of the film project. He works with the art director, set dresser, prop master and cinematographer to accomplish the director’s artistic vision of the film.

The former Chairman of Hong Kong Film Arts Association Bill Lui(雷楚雄) is a kind and helpful friend who always tries to lighten the burdens of other people. He was a great Art Director and is now an adored Production Designer working in the Mainland and Hong Kong.

Inside each of us is a natural-born story listener. I asked Bill, “Any good story to share from your interesting career?” Bill replied, “Maurice, you like to encourage people. Let me cite 4 charming actors whose heart-piercing supports to me are always unforgettable. They are, in the order of their seniority, Josephine Siao(蕭芳芳), Simon Yam(任達華), Maggie Cheung(張曼玉) and Nicolas Tse(謝霆鋒). As an ‘art controller’ in the film-making process, my judgements are based on my personal opinions and tastes but they can be very subjective. I am glad that the above good actors did tell me the other side of the coin, namely facts and angles that I might not have fully considered.”

“Josephine Siao was special because she was like a walking dictionary or caring mentor, probably due to the fact that she became an actress in 1953 when she was only 6 years old. She is also a film director. She is the jack of all trades and ‘master of all’ as well. In one movie, she had to play the role of a Cantonese opera actress. She went backstage to observe the opera actors for more than 10 evenings and took a note of all the suggestions that she intended to propose to me. I still remember her putting on a super-powdery and overpowering perfume on a film set. I was shocked and asked her why. She smiled, ‘Bill, it is the preferred scent of the Cantonese opera actresses and I do think the strong smell can help the other actors accepting me as the character in the film!’” said Bill.

Josephine Siao has been my lifelong idol——I never thought of anyone as a super movie star until I watched her film I love a Go-Go (我愛阿高高) in 1967!

I asked Bill, “I guess Simon Yam is the male version of Josephine Siao?” Bill laughed, “Not exactly. In the 70s, Simon was a fashion model, later a TV star and progressed to become a successful film actor in Hong Kong. Josephine was eager to serve others and Simon is helpful to the art direction of a film in a different way. He is more an independent perfectionist in everything he did. Whenever I knew Simon was in the cast, I had nothing to worry about him. He himself was a designer cum artist. I recall that in a film about a high society gigolo, Simon proposed to me, ‘Bill, I know your limited budget but such a gigolo will surely wear Giorgio Armani or Jean Paul Gaultier. Could I contribute half of the money needed and we go together to buy such brands to make the character more graphic.’ After this proposal, I saw him also dashing up to a gym to make sure that his body will look sexy to match the role.”

I probed, “Is Maggie Cheung like Simon?” Bill moved his head, “Maggie showed her support to an art director by listening to him. She gave me a lot of freedom to combine all the ingredients for her role. She said only one thing, ‘Bill, I trust you will take good care of all the stuff and see to it that all will pertain appropriately to the role. Do not care about if I look better or worse. It is not my concern. I will be very accommodating if the film can become better!’”

Raised in Britain, Maggie Cheung started her acting career after placing second in 1983’s Miss Hong Kong Pageant. She won the ‘Best Actress’ award at Cannes Film Festival in 2004. 90% of the Chinese population can say out her name loud. It is a pity that she is now semi-retired.

I asked, “Bill, the youngest is Nicolas Tse who is now about 40. What is he like?” Bill shared his thought, “Perhaps both his parents were good actors and he had learnt what professionalism should mean since his childhood. He joined the movie world at 16. He is too proficient in the dos and don’ts. Courage is doing what you are afraid to do. Youth is being not afraid to do. These two explain why whenever I asked Nic to do something exciting, he always answered, ‘Why not? Let me have a go!’ The world is fast changing and trends on art are forever moving too. I explore new ideas and I need unique stars like Nic telling me that he is willing to experiment with me. For me, Nic is more a ‘co-working partner’. He is now very popular in the Mainland and deserves such an outcome. Nic shows the difference between a star and an actor. A star will say, ‘How can I change the fix to suit me?’ An actor will say, ‘How can I change myself to suit the fix?’ Nic is incredibly clever.”

The possibility of a dream, the dream of making unreal into real, is the force inspiring art directors to do better and finer. If an art director is the painter, his stars cannot just be the canvas. They are interactive. A professional art director who works hard not because of his or her status or remuneration, but the ethical obligation under which the best in a film has to come together!

MLee

Interview with Josephine Siao Acknowledgement: RTHK https://youtu.be/I1znTY-06nk

Simon Yam Movie Acknowledgement: Filmko Pictures https://youtu.be/_TRyoxt7Rvk

Maggie Cheung Movie “Clean” Acknowledgement: youtube 　https://youtu.be/jj_o-onUIWA

Nicholas Tse Movie “Invisible Target” Acknowledgement: Universe Entertainment Ltd https://youtu.be/t-c8mxI2oTU

[quirkwizard]

(1/3) How do you think a quirk based off the Drifter's dash, in Hyper Light Drifter work? I imagine something like a teleporting version of recipro burst, but has a heavy stamina toll (as if you sprinted instantly) or something similar.

(2/3)The Drifter also uses a "hard light" based sword, which shifts size/shape as needed, and I was also wondering how that could be quirkified--simply being able to harden light nearby seems like it can become a little too powerful (even if it takes, say, some sort of severe strain), but I don't have any other good ideas on how to retain that flexibility/power, while keeping it reasonable.

(3/3)Finally, I actually just found your blog, and I really appreciate how you consider fairly balancing a quirk, with realistic ups/downs, so you've got a new fan here!

First off, welcome. I’m glad you have been enjoying my blog so much and I hope you like this as well. Second, I don't normally do two subjects like this in an ask, but I’ll do it because they both require simple answers.

I think there is merit in the first idea, but I question the teleporting aspect. I've read around and saw clips, and what he is doing seems more like high speed movement since he is leaving afterimages. So maybe something like "Overclock" or "Dash" would be more appropriate. As for the second idea I'm less sure about that. Even if you made into a beam the user makes instead of it being a sword, hard light was something I found hard to justify in the setting since it could be so powerful. I guess you could try to make it plasma, but that would have its own problems consider it might as well be a light saber.

[allthe-queens-men]

Day Three - Wedding

Joanna and Rog are getting married!

…………………………………………………………………………………..

How They Met

·       The two meet when Rog is interested in getting Joanna to audition for her band. Rog is working as a cosmetologist and running a fashion boutique with best friend Melina. Jo does contracted electronics repairs, and makes a fairly good living doing so. Jo isn’t impressed with the band at first, but she does like the girls in the band, so she decides to give it a shot and make a hobby of it.

·       She never imagined it’d become as big as it does, or that she’d fall in love along the way. (Rog, for her part, at least knew the former would happen.)

The Engagement

·       Jo is the first to broach the subject of marriage. Rog thinks she’s joking at first, and makes the mistake of laughing. But when she realizes her girlfriend really does want this, she apologizes and takes it into consideration.

·       It was never that Rog didn’t want to be with Jo for the rest of her life –she does. But she’s never been too fond of the institution of marriage (she doesn’t exactly have good examples to draw on), so it was never something she believed they needed.

·       But Jo really wants it. And Rog is instinctively indifferent to the idea, and wants so much to make Jo happy in any way she can.

·       And she loves to throw big parties.

·       So she says ‘yes, let’s get married!’ And Jo is so happy she could cry (which she does).

·       But then Rog feels a little bad that it wasn’t some Big Romantic Gesture, and starts to make a plan to really blow her girlfriend (fiancée?) away!

·       Mel and Brianna are out doing “Love of My Life,” and as it draws to the end of the song Jo and Rog come back out into the shadows. All like normal so far. But then the lights come up toward the very end of the song, and Jo’s wondering like, ‘did they forget the cue or..?’

·       And then Rog comes down from the riser with a little box in her hand, and Mel hands her the mic. Jo is staring at her in shock, and everyone in the crowd is confused but also super excited to see what’s going on!

·       “I’ve never been one for subtlety, and a love this big deserves an equally big gesture.”

·       And she drops to one knee with the biggest smile on her face and Jo’s covering her mouth in shock and the audience goes wild!! And Rog puts the ring on her fiancée’s finger and they hug tight.

·       Mel grabs the mic back and teasingly begs them to get a room, and less than a minute later they’re back on track with the show, all happier than ever.

Date

·       The wedding is scheduled for April 27th, giving the couple approximately nine months to plan their wedding between studio sessions and interviews and press releases. Rog is stressed out by the process but takes it in stride, only really losing her temper twice during the process. Jo actually finds it very relaxing! She likes organization and details and budgets.

Style

·       They have a fairytale princess theme. (Not Disney, more ethereal and fantastical). Appropriate for two members of a band called King, but they both insist it’s a coincidence!

·       It’s really a fairytale ending for them. Jo grew up in a very conservative household, and only very few in her family are open-minded enough that she even dares to invite them to the wedding. She never thought she’d be able to happily marry the woman of her dreams, but that day is coming, soon, and she’s so incredibly excited.

·       The color scheme is white and pink with gold accents. Very light and regal.

Venue

·       They get married at a castle, as any princesses should! The reception is held under a tent on the estate lawn.

Guest List

·       The guests are mostly friends, new and old. They do have some family coming, too, but they’re both much happier sharing this day with friends that love and support them than family that doesn’t.

·       In total the headcount comes to about 50 for the ceremony and 200 for the reception.

Wedding Party

·       The wedding party consists only of their sisters, Melina, and Brianna. Melina is Rog’s maid of honor and Brianna is Jo’s, but Mel is by far most involved in the planning process with them.

Photography & Videography

·       It’s very important to them that the wedding photos and videos capture their incredible joy and love for each other. They go for a photographer whose style is very light and airy, almost fairy-like.

·       They make a list of all the important moments they want their photographer and videographer to capture. It’s a long list.

DJ & Band

·       They have a DJ for the ceremony audio and most of the reception. But they’re in the music industry, and are friends with some big names in the industry, so they call in a few favors to have some great live entertainment.

·       They’re very serious about only having love songs and fun songs play –no breakup, heartbreak, or other sad songs. Rog is firmly of the belief that those songs have no place at a wedding, “at least not a happy one.”

·       Mel and Brianna go up on stage to sing “You’re My Best Friend.”

Flowers

·       Lots of pink and white peonies, mixed with some dark greenery. Jo carries a bouquet; Rog wears a matching flower in her hair.

Dinner, Drinks, & Desserts

·       They want to have a wide range of food options for all tastes and dietary needs, and they have enough space to have stations spread out around the dining area. Jo goes for steak and potatoes; Rog beelines for the hibachi grill.

·       They splurge on booze, but neither of them plan to get very drunk that night. They want to be sure to remember it all.

·       Rog has a sweet tooth, so dessert is very important. Instead of a big wedding cake, they opt for a diverse dessert table, just getting a cute little cake for the sake of cutting (they both really want to shove it in the other’s face.)

Dresses & Other Attire

·       They try to match their dresses fairly well, even though they’re going for very different silhouettes –and not seeing each other in their dresses for their wedding days. It requires a lot of coordination between Mel and Brianna to figure out whether their choices will work well together without letting on to Rog or Jo what the other might be wearing. It’s an exhausting arrangement but well worth it.

·       Thin and tall Jo decides on a column shape, letting the satin flow from her shoulders down to the floor. It’s very simple but she feels so pretty and elegant, and after trying out several other styles she’s quite certain this is the one for her. It takes some alterations, but by the big day it fits her perfectly and she cries when she sees herself.

·       She wears simple white Mary-Jane shoes, and a silver chain choker.

·       Rog, to fit the princess theme, goes for an A-line ball gown. It brings all the attention to her and she kind of loves that. It’s also satin with lace trim, and a layer of tulle over her large skirt. It’s one of the first dresses she tried on –Mel found it and knew she would absolutely love it, which she did. Even though she tries on other gowns, it she remains fairly sure she’ll go back to that one, which of course she does.

·       Rog wears silver and shear T-strap heels, a diamond choker and matching bracelets.

·       The rings are identical silver bands with shimmering opal insets, and “Always & Forever” inscribed on the insides.

Hair & Makeup

·       Rog wears her hair in a half-updo. Jo wears hers down. Both of their makeup is elegant and just dramatic enough to show up on camera, Jo’s a bit more natural than Rog’s.

Gift Registry

·       Because they don’t need anything, and have more than enough to buy anything they could want, they decide instead to ask guests to donate to one (or all) of their selected favorite charities in place of bringing a gift.

Bridesmaid Attire

·       The bridesmaid dresses are rose gold silk. Of course, Mel picked them out. The styles are flat silhouettes but cut is up to the woman’s preferences.

Bachelorette Party

·       They have a joint bachelorette party with their bridal party and a few other friends. They go to New York City for a long weekend and just have a crazy time together, shopping and bar-hopping and clubbing in all the best places in the city.

·       They’re very glad they did this a week before the wedding, though, because everyone is so horribly hungover half the weekend.

Vows

·       R: “I never wanted to get married, and then I met you. You’ve brought such joy and light to my life that I can’t imagine ever giving you up, and so –maybe it was selfish of me— but I knew early on I had to have you forever. You make me want to be the best version of myself just so I can pretend I deserve someone as kind and brave and clever as you. I will cherish you forever and ever. Thank you for wanting to be my wife. I love you.”

·       J: “I’ve been dreaming of my wedding day since I was seven years old. It took almost ten more years to realize I didn’t want to marry a man, but another woman, and my fantasy was dashed to pieces. For many years I accepted that it would just never be true –that I would never get to celebrate my love with the woman of my dreams, and decided that maybe I could be happy without ever finding love like I dreamed of. But then I found the greatest love when I wasn’t looking, in a college dive bar. Fate was good to me that day, and I haven’t ever taken it for granted. You’re an incredible woman. You make me feel loved, you make me laugh, and you make me want to be the best that I can be. I’m rambling now because I love you more than words could ever say. So I’ll leave it at this: I love you, Rog. I will love you and care for you and stand by your side from now until the end of time, and am so blessed to receive your love in return.”

Honeymoon

·       Rog surprises Jo on their wedding night with lacy white lingerie under her gown.

·       They go to Fiji for their honeymoon and have an amazing time. They have the rest of their lives together, and things couldn’t be more perfect.

[cindylouwho-2]

RECENT NEWS, RESOURCES & STUDIES, December 2019

Welcome to my latest summary of recent news, resources & studies including search, analytics, content marketing, social media & ecommerce! This covers articles I came across since the October report, although some may be older than that.

I am also missing a lot here, but pared it down somewhat to make more readable. The lead up to the holiday shopping season was a lot crazier than I expected 🙃

Given the time of year, please do not expect another report until January. However, I will do brief posts of important news/blog posts in the interim as needed.

There are going to be big changes to this report coming in 2020. Have any suggestions or feedback?  Leave a comment below, email me through my website, or send me a message on Twitter.

TOP NEWS & ARTICLES

You are going to need to add Etsy’s tax ID to customs forms on New Zealand orders as of Dec. 1. Etsy’s ID is: 122-669-18.

FTC issues huge fines for selling fake likes & followers on social media, and for posting fake reviews online. “The [likes and followers] case could pave the way for further legal action on the same grounds, using the Devumi case as precedent. Indeed, shortly after the initial finding by the NY Attorney General, Facebook announced that it was moving ahead with legal action against several providers which it had found to be dealing in fake social media engagement.”

Everyone should read this article, if only to learn what not to do: Using “priming” to convert more buyers/users is a crucial marketing tactic.”Priming works by using associations made in our subconscious, and are almost always unnoticeable to the subject.” Example: “During a study, researchers approached customers in an electronics store, who’d entered to buy a new laptop.Half of the customers were asked what their memory needs were, and the other half were asked what their processor needs were...The group who were asked about memory, bought computers with higher memory and the group who were asked about processor speed, bought computers with much higher processor speeds.”

Etsy removed the word “Bugs” from the Bugs forum, & admits they will only will be monitoring it from 9-5 Etsy time (ET) Monday to Friday. They won’t be replying, but expect “hundreds of sellers” to do that job for them, unpaid. If you have an issue, you will now need to email through the Contact page, use the new 24 hour live chat, or phone them. [Note the parts they aren’t mentioning - Support is taking over a week to reply to emails right now, live chat will only be able to help with the simplest of questions (e.g., how do I change my email address?) & it is possible to spend over an hour on hold when you phone. You could spend quite a bit of money on long distance fees, especially if you are in a country that doesn’t have its own phone number, all for something you used to be able to get for free in the forum, sometimes on the same day. This is Etsy’s definition of “major improvements”.]

Check out this proposed US legislation, which wants large internet companies [yes, Etsy fits their definition] to reveal their algorithms & offer visitors a version with no “filter bubble.” You might not like Etsy search now, but I can guarantee it would become impossible if they removed all of the algorithm factors. [This editorial is a bit over the top, but does cover some of the key questions.]

ETSY NEWS

Items have been disappearing from a small number of Etsy searches since July, & Etsy still won’t tell us what is going on. If you discover you are affected, please let me know.

There have been a few threads on Etsy sending threatening emails about shops being below Etsy’s customer service expectations, often for just a few bad feedbacks or cases, which has shocked many long time sellers (even though they have been sending them for years; it appears they have decreased the number of “problems” you need to have to get an email.) Without announcing anything, Etsy released a page of “seller service level standards” that can help explain what they are looking for, namely cases & 1-2 star reviews, as well as the exact formula they use. I started a discussion thread here, & in case Etsy deletes comments in the thread, here is the dashboard showing your score. (Some people cannot make that link work; Etsy says only shops that received a warning can see it.) My blog post is here.

I summarized the 3rd quarter report here, and Etsy summarized it here. The stock market is not happy with management at the moment, with Morgan Stanley this past week stating that they expected Etsy’s 4th quarter to be worse than originally predicted, due to state sales tax laws and Etsy’s reduction in its Google Shopping ad buying. Note Etsy removed the “priority placement” for US free shipping about a week after the 3rd Q report, without any announcement, probably due to the blowback about it reducing first page conversions. (They didn’t announce anything; it just disappeared.)

Cyber Week traffic on Etsy was more than double what they saw on the average summer day.

They did a Q & A thread on the new stats, which wasn’t particularly useful. They admitted they intentionally removed the keyword & other data prior to November 2017 because “older data periods are less comparable to current stats”. [I believe that is code for “we’re too cheap to pay for the storage; investors need their payouts.”] They did finally add YOY comparisons back in a few weeks ago.

Etsy has again changed a few category & attribute options, including more baby stuff.

They did a holiday gift shopping promotion where people could call Etsy & get suggestions for gifts on Nov. 5. All gifts shipped free, so non-free shipping shops were not included. “It could also be a case study for personalization efforts to come from the long-running handmade marketplace.”

You’ve probably already noticed that Convos are now called Messages, but here is the announcement with the details just in case.

Etsy ran an Etsy search critique thread on November 13; the thread wasn't particularly useful, as almost all the staff who do the critiques aren’t experts in search. Basically, they say to use all of your tags, avoid repeating words in tags & titles, have 3-4 short phrases in your title, use commas in your titles (”Buyer research shows that using commas instead of dashes helps titles appear more clean and readable”), offer free shipping, and use all of your photos. The big takeaway for me was - they think we all have unlimited photography budgets, models, and time to do different modelled photos for every listing (including at the beach! LOL), photos of each of our different pieces in progress, photos of us working, & photos of each type of packaging. Needless to say, none of those things are bad if you have gobs of time or the money to pay someone to do all of that. But if you are like me and are a one-person business, live in a small condo, don’t have the strength to take photos all day, don’t have an abundance of people to model when I am taking photos (i.e., people I know have real jobs & aren’t around when I work on photos), and don’t have anyone to take photos of me making things, then this is pretty laughable. I wouldn't even consider doing all of this for my 5 best selling listings, never mind all 430+. YMMV. [The repeated mentions of process photos makes me worry they will be requiring those for everyone at some point …but I am sure I am just being paranoid.] One notable error was telling someone to use “color” (the US spelling) instead of “colour” (the proper English spelling) because the shop’s language settings were US English - Etsy currently treats these both the same, so there is no issue at the moment. Are they trying to give us a hint about something?

SEO: GOOGLE & OTHER SEARCH ENGINES

Introducing BERT: Google’s new technology to help organic search process natural language better. This isn’t likely a change you can optimize for, but it should help searchers get more relevant results for complicated queries. “Here is an example of Google showing a more relevant featured snippet for the query “Parking on a hill with no curb”. In the past, a query like this would confuse Google’s systems. Google said, “We placed too much importance on the word “curb” and ignored the word “no”, not understanding how critical that word was to appropriately responding to this query. So we’d return results for parking on a hill with a curb.” Moz’s Whiteborad Friday covered the basics. [warning - some bits are advanced. Just skip those if you need to.] A study said BERT still isn’t very good at understanding “not” and other negatives. The NY Times may be one of the sites that is affected.

If you were disappointed when keyword research tool Keywords Everywhere became a paid tool, a new alternative has been released. Note that Keyword Surfer is still in beta. I’m going to try it for a bit and write up a short report if I think it is worth using. (The traffic estimates are way off, as in almost 10 times too low, for the sites I have info on.)  If you try it, let me know what you think!

While we are on the topic, here’s 13 keyword research errors you don’t want to make. Short takeaways - not every high volume keyword phrase will work for your specific product, don't ignore long tail, and make sure you look at the search results for any keyword before you decide to use it.

Here’s another keyword and topic research tool that compiles questions people search along with a relationship tree so you can see how ideas are connected.

More common SEO problems with ecommerce sites.

If you code your own website, check out the new Google instructions on writing your organic search snippets. Note this is supposedly only about display & not about ranking.

Improve your Instagram traffic with 8 SEO tips for your profile and posts.

Which is better for SEO - Squarespace or WordPress? The results are likely skewed by the fact that “platforms like Wix and Squarespace tend to attract less SEO-savvy people than WordPress.” They agree with what I have been saying for a while: if you know what you're doing, Squarespace sites can rank just fine.

Excellent tips on how good SEO also helps you comply with US disability access laws.

The latest on Google updates - there was apparently one around November 7. This one may have hit affiliate websites more than other types.

The Wall Street Journal wrote an article claiming Google manipulated search results to favour its interests & those of its advertisers, including eBay. [The original article is behind a paywall; the link is in that news coverage.] However, many in the SEO community - most of whom are not usually reluctant to criticize Google when they are behaving poorly - feel the article is way off base, & demonstrates a fundamental lack of knowledge of how Google works. Barry Schwartz of Search Engine Land & Search Engine Roundtable even did interviews with t WSJ staff for the article, and was amazed at how much they got wrong. “Even a basic understanding of the difference between organic listings (the free search results) and the paid listings (the ads in the search results) eluded them…[Glenn] Gabe told us that not only were his conversations with the paper off-the-record but also that he was misquoted”

CONTENT MARKETING & SOCIAL MEDIA (includes blogging & emails)

Here’s something I don’t see discussed much: using templates (& other consistent branding) in your social media, blog and website posts.

Content hubs are a very useful way to increase your search engine traffic for a core topic while providing a landing page for social media, ads etc.

Good primer here for beginning social media marketing for your business. You’ll need to do more research depending on your target market and what platform/s you choose, but it is definitely a good overview of getting started.

If you think influencer marketing is right for your business, here are 10 places you can find influencers to work with.

Your email subject lines can change the open rates; here are 19 tips to make them more clickable.

Instagram started testing hiding “likes” on posts in the US as of November 11th, & then announced plans to try it out globally. A study on previous tests showed that there may be some effect on influencer engagement.

Facebook has introduced its own payment system, currently in the US only, for limited situations only at the moment.

Reddit is an often overlooked social media platform to use for business but the traffic is strong, so check out these tips on asking it work for your business. [infographic]

ONLINE ADVERTISING (SEARCH ENGINES, SOCIAL MEDIA, & OTHERS)

Pay for online ads (outside of Etsy) but don’t know what negative keywords are? Here’s how to use them with Google.

Hubspot continues their massive rush of “ultimate guides” with everything you wanted to know about Amazon ads.

Facebook now allows you to have different text in the same ads, which can be adjusted for different groups of users.

Amazon is predicted to continue cutting into Google’s online ad dominance through 2021; Google currently has 73% of money spent on online ads in the US.

If you are interested in long term brand building in your advertising, you might be interested in this article, where Adidas admits it was ignoring brand ads & pushing instant returns for too long.

Just in time for the holidays, Google Merchant Center rolled out a bunch of upgrades.

Buying TV ad time is losing popularity; it will be less than 25% of all advertising spend in just a few years, while digital spending is now over 50%.

STATS, DATA, OTHER TRACKING

Facebook changed how they count page impressions.

Everything you want to know about the Google Search Console. Oh, and also everything you want to know about the Google Search Console. Which one do you like best? [If you have your own website or freestanding blog and are not using the Console, you probably should be reading both of those. Seriously, just set the darn thing up, then learn how to use it later.]

Also, the Console now features a speed report, and has changed how they send you messages.

ECOMMERCE NEWS, IDEAS, TRENDS

Trend alert: many struggling or failed retailers sell clothing. “This sector is saturated with supply and is arguably over-stored.” … “For younger shoppers, as they choose which apparel brands do get their attention, sustainability and other cultural issues are often at the forefront.”

US sellers can now get discounted UPS rates through Shippo.

A bug is keeping suspended Amazon sellers from being reinstated.

BUSINESS & CONSUMER STUDIES, STATS & REPORTS; SOCIOLOGY & PSYCHOLOGY, CUSTOMER SERVICE

Don’t use these common customer service lines. ...“there are studies that support the use of positive language in customer service. Instead of focusing on what you can’t do for a customer, focus on what you can do. No one likes to be told no.”

Another article on the psychology of colour; beware that some of this is a bit simplistic, as there are always exceptions.

Holiday shopping will push further into December this year, with half starting around Cyber Monday (Dec. 2). 62% of “high spenders” (over $2100 spent on the holidays) will shop on their smart phones. 25% of respondents to this survey said they already started shopping in September. It turns out most people want gift cards, among other stats. Nearly half of US shoppers are more likely to shop with companies that are socially responsible. Mobile shopping is expected to beat desktop shopping for the first time this season. And yes, most Americans expect to add to their credit card debt before January, men more than women.

US retail sales fell 0.3% in September; online sales fell the same amount.  

MISCELLANEOUS (including humour)

Trend alert - apparently Generation Z is not big on makeup, and it is affecting large companies’ profits.

Google’s co-founders hand the parent company Alphabet over to the current CEO. They still work for Google and will focus most of their time there.

Google Webmaster spokesperson John Mueller tackles the controversial question - is a hot dog a sandwich? [humour]

[watusichris]

A Bob Dylan Story, or Two

WARNING: The following may contain spoilers. Yes, spoilers.

In Martin Scorsese’s 2005 documentary Bob Dylan: No Direction Home, which takes in Dylan’s youth and the first five years of his recording and touring career, the late Izzy Young, the founder of Greenwich Village’s Folklore Center, picks through an early Dylan bio. He notes some of the singer’s more outrageous accounts about his early travels, and his claims of learning songs from blind Chicago street singer Arvella Gray and Texas songster Mance Lipscomb.

“I should have figured out right away he was bullshitting me,” Young says.

From the very first, bullshitting was an important, even preeminent part of Dylan’s self-manifestation, and some of the recent acts of archival curation on the musician’s behalf have also involved no small amount of manure spreading. (cf. my piece on the gospel set Trouble No More, here: https://watusichris.tumblr.com/post/167349872212/a-dylan-a-day-annex-narrow-is-the-way).

Scorsese’s new film Rolling Thunder Revue: A Bob Dylan Story, which premieres on Netflix June 12, is being described in some quarters as a “documentary,” but it is animated in no small measure by large servings of highly entertaining mendacity. Its subject gives a bit of the game away in its early minutes: Dylan takes a stab at explaining what the subject of the film might be, then halts abruptly and says, “Ah, bullshit.”

The movie, which is being accompanied by a 14-CD boxed set of music (my Variety review: https://variety.com/2019/music/news/bob-dylan-rolling-thunder-revue-live-box-set-review-1203235093/), is a major reclamation project. The copious documentary footage of Dylan’s titular tour of 1975 was shot for his maiden project as a film director, the excruciating, nearly four-hour Renaldo & Clara. I had a hand in launching that self-indulgent disaster in 1978, and to say the grosses were nightmarish is an understatement -- it flopped on arrival. It’s still a chore to view this addled junior-high stab at Children of Paradise. Watching it today at its full length on YouTube, I wanted to remove my brain from my skull with my own hands.

Dreadful as Dylan’s movie was, some astounding performances by Dylan and his many Rolling Thunder co-stars and cohorts could be found amid its stupor-inducing dramatic improvisations by Dylan and his cast of non-professionals (who included his wife Sara, whom he was trying to woo back into his good graces, and his former paramour and singing partner Joan Baez).

Wisely pretending that Renaldo & Clara never existed, Scorsese organizes the blazing footage of Dylan, his immense and febrile RTR band, and his co-stars into a chronological account, augmented by new testimony, of what the late poet and tour fellow traveler Allen Ginsberg calls “a con man carny medicine show” in a vintage interview.

Since Renaldo & Clara has been officially buried in the vaults for four decades and never officially released on home video, and the concert material that hasn’t been scrubbed from the Internet is not of the highest quality, the vibrant, newly cleaned-up footage in Scorsese’s feature will most assuredly blow minds.

Part of the Rolling Thunder Revue’s allure derives from the starry trek’s short run of remote ’75 dates in New England and Canada, and the movie delivers the goods in spades, offering up those obscure shows in all their forceful glory. The visually pristine sequences of Dylan and company hurling themselves through then brand-new numbers like “One More Cup of Coffee,” “Isis,” “Romance in Durango,” and “Hurricane” and high-watt rearrangements of oldies like “It Ain’t Me, Babe,” “The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll,” and “Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door” shook the theater at the screening I attended.

Dylan himself is especially intense onscreen in his whiteface and plumed, flower-bedecked, wide-brimmed hat, dashing around the stage and locking eyes with his band mates and duet partners Baez and Roger McGuinn. Customarily a non-presence in front of a camera (even in his own movie), he is ferociously alive behind the RTR mic.

No less exciting is material captured by the side of the road, like a version of Peter LaFarge’s  “Ballad of Ira Hayes,” about the Native American hero of Iwo Jima, played at a Tuscarora Indian reservation, or an impromptu run-through by Joni Mitchell of her new song “Coyote” (reputedly inspired by an affair with tour mate Sam Shepard) with Dylan and McGuinn in Gordon Lightfoot’s living room.

Despite its seemingly conventional contours, Scorsese’s look at the short, lively life of the Rolling Thunder Revue should not be confused with his relatively straightforward docs like No Direction Home, The Last Waltz (which also features Dylan), or his films about George Harrison and the Rolling Stones.

“Life is about creating yourself,” Dylan says, and Scorsese acts as an accomplice in the present endeavor. The results are enjoyably perverse.

The sleight-of-hand approach announces itself in the film’s first minute. It begins with a clip from an 1896 short by Georges Meliés, the subject of Scorsese’s 2011 homage Hugo, in which the French filmmaking magician makes a woman disappear. (Just as the director renders Sara Dylan invisible in the proceedings, it should be noted.) A title card immediately appears: “Conjuring the Rolling Thunder Revue.” The word “conjuring” suggests that some of what the audience will be seeing is at once something more than and somewhat less than the truth. (A lyric comes to mind: “All the people we used to know, they’re an illusion to me now.”)

Keener-witted viewers of Rolling Thunder Revue may have already started to wonder about the veracity of some of what they’ve been watching by the time they reach a segment, late in the film, in which former Michigan congressman Jack Tanner talks about a trip to a Rolling Thunder show in Niagara Falls that was facilitated by President Jimmy Carter.

After you realize that “Tanner” is the actor Michael Murphy, reprising his role in Robert Altman’s political mockumentary Tanner ’88, you may start to understand that some of what you’ve already seen is the purest fiction. You then find yourself second-guessing some of the talking heads who offer their recollections.

So was that “European film director” actually a part of the crew shooting the tour? Or is he possibly a former performance artist? How is it that one of the purported tour promoters shares the name of the current chairman of a major Hollywood studio? Nah, couldn’t be. Should we believe an assertion by Ronnie Hawkins, who played “Bob Dylan” in Renaldo & Clara, that Scarlet Rivera, the exotic violinist on the tour, was a major freak who invited him to her hotel room to watch her have sex? (“She had a sword,” both Hawkins and Dylan report, darkly.) Was Rivera’s boyfriend really Gene Simmons of KISS, whose makeup supposedly inspired Dylan’s whiteface? (That one’s a real hoot!) Should we trust Sharon Stone, the star of Scorsese’s Casino, when she describes joining the tour as a 17-year-old?

Not content to toy with his own reality, Dylan has obviously given license to Scorsese to toy with everyone else’s, too. Note the picture’s subtitle again: “a Bob Dylan story.” In this case, a good synonym for “story” is “yarn,” and a decent yarn it is.

I suppose it’s appropriate that Allen Ginsberg, making a poignant posthumous return to Dylan’s stage, is the beating heart of Rolling Thunder Revue. After all, he was a man who appeared in Jack Kerouac’s novels as fictional characters – Carlo Marx, Alvah Goldbook, Irwin Garden, Adam Moorad. Dylan calls him “the Oracle of Delphi” here, and he brings the picaresque rigor of the Beats to the film, as he declaims his hardcore elegy “Kaddish” to an audience of little old ladies at a mahjongg tournament, reads Kerouac’s Mexico City Blues at the novelist’s Massachusetts grave site, and dances ecstatically in a hotel ballroom.

The poet is granted the film’s final moments, in which he instructs the audience to  “pick up on some redemption of your own consciousness, and make it for your own eternity.” That line seems almost like a description of Dylan’s and Scorsese’s playbook for this unusual movie.

[fourohfourrealitynotfound]

Rear View Mirror

“When Eva told Dylan about her plan to take a two-day car ride to go off to college, they asked to tag along and make it a road trip.”

For the rest of her life, Eva kept this trip a secret. She never told anyone for fear that they would look at her in a different way when she explained how it ended.

-

TW Suicide, emotional abuse, and food are all mentioned in this short story. There’s also a moment where a non-binary character is deadnamed, but the deadname is written as a dash.

If you are going through suicidal thoughts, emotional abuse, or an eating disorder, please Google the appropriate hotline or support service. I and many others care about you, and we want you to get the help you need. Your life matters.

-

Read below the cut or on Wattpad.

When Eva told Dylan about her plan to take a two-day car ride to go off to college, they asked to tag along and make it a road trip.

The best friends had known each other for the better part of three years, but they never met in person. Eva vaguely remembered some Tumblr post about rubber ducks with knives that lead Dylan becoming her mutual. They eventually started messaging and then Skyping as they became friends. Eva was proud to include Dylan on her list of most reliable friends.

She didn’t know too much about their personal problems. She knew that their home life wasn’t the greatest, and that their parents were rather unsupportive and borderline emotionally abusive. Eva may not have known the full extent of the situation, but she was definitely happy that her best friend was getting out of there.

Dylan barely had to ask before Eva agreed to drive road trip with them. Secretly, she had been hoping that they would ask. What’s a better way to become closer friends than to be stuck in a moving vehicle with them for two days? So, when they asked to ride with her, she enthusiastically agreed.

-

Dylan’s house wasn’t in shambles, but it wasn’t a mansion, either. They lived in a neighborhood where all the houses were the same cookie-cutter box in different colors. The driveway lead to a one-car garage, and there was even a small front yard. Across the street, some little kids played with chalk and balls and scooters. The area was rather pleasant, in Eva’s opinion.

When she pulled up to the house, Eva double checked the number before sending them a text that she was there. A minute later, Dylan was hustling out of the house with a duffle bag slung over their shoulder. Eva got out of the car to open the trunk and give them a huge hug. “It’s nice to finally meet you!” she said.

”Same!” Dylan said, but with a slightly less enthusiastic tone. “Let’s just get out of here.” They shut the trunk and quickly got in the passenger seat. Eva noted Dylan’s nervous behavior, but she chalked it up to running away from their parents and meeting someone they’d only known through the internet. So, she let it go and joined Dylan in the car.

-

The first couple hours were a bit awkward. They attempted to make small talk, but it didn’t go well. Eva kept dancing around the subject of Dylan’s decision to leave home while Dylan ignored her questions and tried to talk about silly Tumblr posts. Eventually, they just lapsed into silence.

When they got back in the car after stopping at a gas station, Eva decided to play music so they wouldn’t have to suffer in a palpable silence. She hooked up her phone to her car’s radio speakers and let Dylan scroll through Spotify and play whatever they wanted. The first couple songs were enjoyed in silence. Eva then began to hum and then sing along, and soon they were both screaming the lyrics at the top of their lungs.

The conversation stated with favorite bands before moving through favors movies, television, actors, and more. Talking became easier by the minute as the two found topics that they could comfortably agree upon. As they ran out of easy subjects, they moved on to political issues and moral debates.

As the conversation evolved, Eva began to feel more and more grateful that she had brought Dylan along. It looked like her plan of cementing their friendship would be successful after all.

-

When it was dark outside and Eva could barely keep her eyes open, Dylan suggested that they stop for the night. Not wanting to spend money on a hotel, the pair eventually decided to sleep in the car. They were lucky to find the parking lot of a recently shut down restaurant just a couple minutes after exiting the interstate.

Eva retrieved a couple blankets from the trunk and shower her companion how to recline their seat all the way back. They bid each other goodnight and turned to curl up facing the car doors.

After a few minutes of silence, Eva whispered, “Dylan? Are you awake?”

”Yeah,” they replied. “I can’t sleep.”

”Me either.”

”Why?” Dylan flipped over to face her.

Having heard them moving, Eva also turned over. “You first.”

”Ok,” Dylan started, taking a deep breath. “I’m thinking about my parents.”

Eva wanted to ask about why they were running away, but she restrained herself. “Do you miss them?”

”No, definitely not. I’m so glad that I’m leaving. The way they made comments about my appearance or my grades or the amount of time I spent on the internet... it was just so toxic. It felt like the descriptions you read about people who are bullied in school.”

Eva nodded. “Your parents shouldn’t make you feel like a victim.”

”Yeah. I didn’t realize that for the longest time, but when I did, it was like a light switched on in my brain. I don’t owe them anything. They can’t force me to stay while they are making comments that let my mental health deteriorate.

”Before you offered to let me come with you, I was in a really bad place . . .” They trailed off and took a few deep breaths. Eva noticed that their eyes were sparkling with held back tears. “My mind was thinking the darkest thoughts that someone could have. If you hadn’t messaged me when you did, I don’t know what I would have done.” At this point, Dylan’s breath was shaky and their voice was cracking.

”Hey, it’s ok,” Eva sat up and leaned across the parking break to give them a hug. “You’re here now. They can’t do anything to take you back. You’re free.” Dylan finally broke and sobbed into her neck.

They stayed like that for a long time, holding each from across the car. When Dylan finally calmed down, they both laid down and drifted off to sleep. It was comforting to both of them to know that they were safe with someone who had their back.

-

Eva woke up first, but she stayed laying down for a little while longer, letting Dylan sleep. Eventually, she gently shook them awake. “Hey, Dylan,” she whispered. “Put on your seatbelt so I can take us to breakfast.” They grumbled but complied, and soon Eva was driving to the nearest place with pancakes while Dylan continued to sleep.

Eva gently woke Dylan again when they arrived. Inside, the pair ordered a breakfast feast and chatted about their favorite foods, their favorite memories, their most nostalgic items, their most sentimental keepsakes. The conversation was light and filled with increased laughter as they consumed caffeine and woke up. They took their time and continued to chat, ordering more coffee as an excuse to stay. When their bellies were so full that they couldn’t possibly eat any more, Eva and Dylan returned to the car and continued their journey.

-

As they approached their destination, Eva and Dylan’s mood began to dim. The car fell into an uneasy silence that they didn’t bother to fill with music. Eva had spent nearly two days in the same car as Dylan, but she hadn’t grown tired of their presence. In fact, she grew more attached to her fiends. They would be living in the same city, but Eva didn’t want to say to them when they reached their destination. She already knew that she’d miss Dylan while living only ten minutes away.

When there was only twenty minutes of driving left, Eva exited the interstate to refuel at a gas station. The sun was beginning to touch the horizon when finished filling up the car. “Hey, I need to go to the restroom,” she told Dylan. “I’ll be right back.”

On her way back to the car, her phone rang for the first time in two days. The caller ID was Dylan, but that couldn’t be right. From where she was standing, Eva could see them sitting in the car and watching the distant sunset in the car’s mirrors. They must have left their phone at home, and it was probably one of their family members calling to ask where Dylan was. Not wanting to disturb them with a conversation about their family, Eva answered the phone still standing on the sidewalk in a few feet away from the car.

”Hello, is this Eva West?” The voice was masculine, most likely Dylan’s father.

She turned away from the car to face the sunset. “Yeah, that’s me.”

”Okay, good. I’m calling all of —‘s friends to inform them.”

She winced at the use of her friend’s deadname. “Inform us of what?” Eva tried to keep her voice neutral and not give away that she knew Dylan had run away from home and knew their exact location.

Dylan’s dad was silent for a moment, and then a shaking breath was drawn. “— is dead.”

That was weird. Dead, not missing? Perhaps they gave up on the search and declared them dead. “What . . . What do you mean?” Eva barely had to add any concern to her voice, because it was already creeping in.

“— committed . . . committed suicide a week ago.”

A week ago. A week ago was when Eva told Dylan that she was going to road trip to college. A week ago was when Dylan asked Eva to tag along on her road trip. A week ago was when Eva made the plan to road trip and become closer friends.

The hand holding up her phone was shaking violently. “I have to go. Thank you for telling me.” Eva hung up and then paused to take a few deep breaths. She whipped around to look at the car, not sure which version of what she would find terrified her more.

No one was in the car.

Eva stared at the empty passenger seat for a while, unable to comprehend what it meant. The world blurred as tears quickly pooled in her eyes. She somehow managed to get in the car before she completely broke down. Eva’s head rested on the steering wheel that she gripped with an iron-tight grip. Her sobs were loud and wet and heartbreaking.

Some time later, she calmed down enough to wipe her eyes. She fumbled in her jacket pocket and pulled out her phone, navigating to her text conversations and call list and Tumblr messages. All of the conversation that Eva remembered having with Dylan over the past week were gone. There was no evidence to prove that she had actually interacted with them.

Dylan was gone.

Eva leaned back in her seat and stared into the rear view mirror. Her eyes glazed over as she remembered her times with Dylan, the good and the bad and the great. She didn’t know if the past week had been hallucinations or a ghostly visit, but Eva was grateful to have some perceived interaction before Dylan left for good.

Her only regret was that she never got to tell them goodbye.

[waywardted]

hi! firstly i really want you to know this isn’t hate at all🤍 i adore your blog and your gifs so so much but i just had to type this out because the gifset you just posted upset me a little bit ngl. rebecca was literally saying she was a pedophile and grooming sam in the scene you put next to a romance movie. again i love love love your gifs a lot but i really don’t think this should be romanticized and normalized :/ sam’s brain isn’t fully developed yet and rebecca is closer to 50 than 40. he was 19 in season 1. her first instinct was to be upset and say she was grooming him. and imo she only got with him as a trauma response. it’s just not right. again - i really hope you don’t take this as hate because it’s not at all! i just got upset seeing that scene compared to a romantic comedy and i had to say something for my peace of mind. really hope you understand🤍have a really good day or night depending on where you are💌 and thank you for all you do for the fandom🥰

Hi anon! First off, I hear ya! Thanks for being so sweet as you spoke your truth, Ted would be proud 😆 I was a bit nervous to post that set cause I know s/r is a very touchy subject for many people, but I hope I tagged it appropriately so it would get filtered out for those not interested in seeing it :) The tl;dr of this answer is that the set wasn’t intended to be shippy or anti but rather just a look at the TL storyline next to the movie it’s in conversation with—especially because of the contrast you’re talking about!

Okay long version—giffing for me is first and foremost a means of processing and analyzing the show. I was watching the movie yesterday and I just really wanted to see the “resolution” of actual You’ve Got Mail side by side with Ted Lasso’s YGM plot line, particularly because they do look SO different. (Emphasis on processing cause I still don't think I'm able to fully, conclusively articulate my thoughts on it all lol.) It’s interesting of course because the realization moment is the resolution in YGM, and the movie tells us everything will be okay now despite the obstacles Kathleen and Joe have (classic romcom move). But in TL it’s really just the beginning of this pretty messy period for these two characters, and the show presents that laundry list of the reasons it can’t work long-term right there in Rebecca’s reaction.

I wanted to use the ‘I didn’t know who you were with’ line in the caption because I think it perfectly captures in its simplicity how these relationships are even allowed to happen in both TL and YGM, and how shocking it is even to the people in those relationships that they do (God, I didn’t realize! I didn’t know—!). Without the absurdity of this (beloved) romcom scenario aka the bubble of anonymity that is their internet communication, these two couples wouldn’t have happened. In YGM, it all ends up okay because Kathleen gets who she actually wanted and she’s tearfully shaking her head at, like, the luck of that. Rebecca on the other hand is unhappily blindsided, shaking her head even more vigorously at the bad (I think she’d say in that moment) luck of it. I think the visual contrast of their reactions is so interesting, and then you have Joe and Sam both being kind of encouraging and positive about it. Interesting!

There really is so much to unpack with that storyline. I’m not gonna get into the rest of their relationship’s lifecycle, but I agree with you that girl is working through some shit as we move forward! As well as learning some important things about herself that I hope make her more ready for a healthy relationship with her own self and a healthy romantic relationship with Ted :))) I hope one day we get an oral history of the show or something cause I reeeally wanna know what those writers' room conversations were like! Anyway, I am sorry to have brought distress to your dash <3 have a great day/night/weekend/etc!!

[easyfoodnetwork]

‘It Was a Losing Fight to Write Anything That Wasn’t “Ethnic”’

White food writers are often allowed to be generalists, while BIPOC creators are limited to their personal histories, their cultures, and the foods their grandmothers made

In this age of the cook-turned-influencer, Bon Appétit’s video content found astonishing success by capitalizing on the colorful world of the quirky characters featured in its test kitchen. In many cases, the employees’ personalities were turned into their personal brands. This strategy, actively pursued by now-former editor-in-chief Adam Rapoport, piggybacked off an evolving relationship between audiences and celebrity chefs like Alison Roman, whose “authentic” lazy-girl cooking hacks jolted her into almost instant fame. Branding oneself as the creator of a viral dish (“the stew,” “the pasta”) or crafting an identity around a quirk or personality trait, all but eliminates the need for bona fide experts, allowing the internet-friendly celebrity chef to take their place.

But as the casual viewer noticed — and as stories about Bon Appétit’s corporate culture have revealed in recent weeks — it is almost always only white food writers, chefs, and recipe developers who get to adopt personas that go beyond their ethnicity. For every Brad Leone, who gets to be goofy and charming, for every Claire Saffitz, who becomes a sensation for being hyper-competitive and neurotically orderly, you have a Priya Krishna or a Rick Martinez, whose ethnicity, and the “expertise” in a certain cuisine that comes with it, is often framed as their most useful contribution to the team.

Martinez, former senior food editor and current BA contributor, was branded the “resident taco maestro” in the pages of the magazine, yet, as he recounted to Business Insider, then-deputy editor Andrew Knowlton asked if he was “a one-trick pony” for focusing on Mexican cuisine. Argentinian test kitchen manager Gaby Melian’s only solo video on YouTube is of her making her family’s empanada recipe. Fan favorite Sohla El-Waylly, who managed to veer out into more generalist territory with beloved recipes for dumplings, cinnamon buns, and even a carbonara dessert, started her career at BA talking about her riff on a family biryani recipe on the Bon Appétit Foodcast podcast and made an “updated” version of a Bengali snack, piyaju, for her first solo video. Even after expanding out of her “niche” and producing some of the channel’s most creative recipes, El-Waylly’s expertise was considered external to her identity, and — as she revealed in an Instagram story on June 8 — she was compensated as such. Other BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and people of color) at BA, including contributing editor Priya Krishna and research director Joseph Hernandez, also spoke out against BA’s pay disparities and its pervasive racist culture that, as Business Insider wrote, “does not provide nonwhite employees the same opportunities on the brand’s video side that white employees enjoy.”

The feeling of being slotted into a niche is all too familiar for Martinez. “There’s this idea in food media that it’s somehow easier to cook the food of your culture because you grew up with it or that it’s a part of you,” Martinez tells me. “It completely discounts the skills that it takes to build a recipe for an American audience. To recreate or even create an homage to the original dish requires a lot of creativity, skill, and work.”

The recent changes at BA — Rapoport’s resignation, white BA staffers’ refusal to put out content until their BIPOC colleagues are paid fairly — are a start. Yet the simultaneous compartmentalizing and marginalization of BIPOC in food media goes far beyond one organization or one editor-in-chief. Allowing BIPOC to have more agency within the food media system will require reimagining the relationship white America has both to “other cuisines” and to the people who grew up on them.

There’s this perception in food media, which publications like Bon Appétit subscribe to and perpetuate, that all that nonwhite writers really want is to have their cultures represented “authentically.” But the premise of authenticity is rooted in a white gaze that selectively acquires aspects of nonwhite cultures to package as just exotic enough to remain accessible. In late June, the New York Times published a story about “Thai fruit” that frames common fruit in Thailand as foreign and difficult to understand. The week before, tofu was labeled “white, chewy, and bland” in a since-deleted tweet by Bloomberg Asia. And who can forget the infamous Bon Appétit pho fiasco, which called the Vietnamese dish “the new ramen” and enlisted a white chef to give a “PSA: This Is How You Should Be Eating Pho”? Stories like these serve as reminders that foods outside of whiteness are at odds with an imagined “American” readership, for whom these foods remain distant and other.

“Our white colleagues think that we are speaking out about representation or appropriation because we want to be seen as experts on the subject,” says travel and food writer Dan Q. Dao. “[But] what we are [really] fighting is a long battle for inclusivity and equity in our workplaces.”

“I’m often asked to add a cultural slant even when one does not exist.”

Those workplaces, it should be noted, are overwhelmingly white. In June, Leah Bhabha noted in a Grubstreet piece, citing a 2019 Diversity Baseline study, that 76 percent of all publishing industry professionals are white. “In my own experience, as a biracial Indian writer, I’ve never had more than one coworker of color on my team,” she wrote, “and frequently it’s just been me.” The social media age — and the branding pressures inherent within — exacerbates that experience. Social media allows for real-time feedback that makes creators accountable to an audience that often acts as ad hoc sensitivity readers for people writing about their own cultural backgrounds. Writer and chef Samin Nosrat recently tweeted her frustrations with that pressure: “Instead of criticizing the systems that refuse to allow for greater diversity and inclusion, desis, Iranians, whoever, just pile on individual cooks for our perceived failure to represent their ideal versions of their entire cuisines. (Or even more frustratingly, for failing to cook something *exactly* like maman did it back home. I am not your maman!)”

But as media writer Allegra Hobbs pointed out in October 2019, “in the age of Twitter and Instagram, an online presence, which is necessarily public and necessarily consumable, seems all but mandatory for a writer who reaches (or hopes to reach) a certain level of renown.” In curating this online presence, writers and other creators are often pushed to flatten themselves into an easily legible extension of their identity.

Like many, food writer and chef Lesley Téllez has struggled with the expectations that come with being Mexican in food media. “There’s more pressure on BIPOC to find a niche that makes us stand out,” she says. “Over and over, the faces who look like us are people who specialize in food from their particular countries or backgrounds. It sends an overt message that stepping out as a generalist is hard, and that you will not be hired as such. I have definitely felt pressure to keep non-Mexican-cooking stuff off of my social media, and my old blog.”

For all the claims organizations in food media have made of diversifying their rosters and cleaning up the more egregious offenses in their treatment of nonwhite writers, there is still an association between nonwhite writers and their ethnicity, which is treated as tantamount to other aspects of their identities. BIPOC in food media are routinely not considered for assignments about things that don’t directly relate to their ethnicity or race. “I became a food writer 20 years ago when it was not really a profession,” says Ramin Ganeshram. “Yet, despite my qualifications as a reporter, editor, and chef, it was a losing fight to write anything that wasn’t ‘ethnic.’... I was discouraged and prevented from writing about generalized food technique or profiles, despite French culinary training.”

These assignments are often handed off to white writers, who are seen as “generalists” with the ability to stick their hands into any cuisine and turn it into something palatable (or, more importantly, into pageviews). Ganeshram says, “I was directly told regarding a job I didn’t receive at a New England-based national cooking magazine that they thought of me as more of an ‘ethnic’ writer.”

Instead, BIPOC get stuck with work directly related to their ethnicities. “I’m often asked to add a cultural slant even when one does not exist,” says food writer Su-Jit Lin, “or frame things from a point of greater expertise than I actually have. It’s assumed I’m fully indoctrinated into the culture and more Chinese than American (not true — my lane is actually Southern, Italian, and kind of Irish food).” Even when chefs push back against this compartmentalization, they are turned into caricatured ambassadors for their backgrounds. Chef (and Eater contributor) Jenny Dorsey wrote on Twitter that even though she demonstrated a dish on video that had nothing to do with her heritage, the result was ultimately titled “Jenny Dorsey talks about how her Chinese-American heritage influences her cooking.”

Often, the addition of a “cultural slant” to stories leads to one of the more egregious ways that nonwhite food is pigeonholed and othered — through what writer Isabel Quintero calls a lust for “Abuelita longing.” The term speaks to the way immigrant and diasporic writers (both within and outside food media) are frequently expected to add a dash of trauma or ancestral belonging to anything they write. As a Trinidadian-Iranian chef, Ganeshram finds this association particularly limiting. “When I’ve tried to write stories about my Iranian heritage, not being a recent Iranian immigrant or the child of a post-revolution immigrant has been an issue,” she says. “The editors I dealt with only wanted a refugee/escaping the Islamic Republic story. They decided what constituted an ‘authentic’ Iranian story, and that story was based in strife and hardship only.” These markers of authenticity can only come from the wholesome domesticity presumed of the ethnic other.

The extreme whiteness of the food industry, and of food media, places undue pressure on nonwhite writers and chefs. As food writer and founder of Whetstone Magazine, Stephen Satterfield wrote for Chefsfeed in 2017: “In mostly-white communities, you become an ambassador for your race. The stakes are high, and you try hard not to screw it up for the ones behind you…. Black chefs know this well: we must validate our presence, where others exist unquestioned. And what does it mean to be a black food writer? It means that you’ll never just be a food writer, you’ll be a black food writer.”

In other words, being designated as “ethnic” chefs put far too many BIPOC working in food media in a bind. Either they work against being pigeonholed by pitching stories that mark them as generalists, but lose out on assignments as a consequence, or they double down and tell stories of their culture and cuisine, but risk being limited both career- and compensation-wise.

Martinez was aware of this predicament while signing on to write a regional Mexican cookbook. “Writing a love letter to Mexico is so important in these times, but I had to seriously consider whether it would be a career-limiting move,” he says. He chose to write the book, but others, like Caroline Shin, food journalist and founder of the Cooking with Granny video and workshop series, have had to push against the expectation that anything they publish will be about their ethnic cuisine. “Last year, literary agents told me that I couldn’t sell diversity,” she says. “[I]f I wanted a cookbook, I should focus on my Korean culture.” While Shin chose to start her own program as what she calls an “‘I’ll show you’ to white-dominated institutions,” it raises the question of whether BIPOC in food media can taste mainstream success without operating as spokespeople for their ethnic cuisines.

But if you continue to pigeonhole and tokenize your BIPOC employees, seeing them primarily as products of trauma or perpetuating their marginalization by refusing them fair pay and workplace equity, then your calls to diversify the workplace mean very little, if anything at all.

Mallika Khanna is a graduate student in media who writes about film and digital culture, diaspora and immigrant experiences and the environment through a feminist, anti-capitalist lens. Nicole Medina is a Philly based illustrator who loves capturing adventure through her art using bold colors and patterns.

from Eater - All https://ift.tt/39Jaxcc https://ift.tt/3ffOn2G

White food writers are often allowed to be generalists, while BIPOC creators are limited to their personal histories, their cultures, and the foods their grandmothers made

In this age of the cook-turned-influencer, Bon Appétit’s video content found astonishing success by capitalizing on the colorful world of the quirky characters featured in its test kitchen. In many cases, the employees’ personalities were turned into their personal brands. This strategy, actively pursued by now-former editor-in-chief Adam Rapoport, piggybacked off an evolving relationship between audiences and celebrity chefs like Alison Roman, whose “authentic” lazy-girl cooking hacks jolted her into almost instant fame. Branding oneself as the creator of a viral dish (“the stew,” “the pasta”) or crafting an identity around a quirk or personality trait, all but eliminates the need for bona fide experts, allowing the internet-friendly celebrity chef to take their place.

But as the casual viewer noticed — and as stories about Bon Appétit’s corporate culture have revealed in recent weeks — it is almost always only white food writers, chefs, and recipe developers who get to adopt personas that go beyond their ethnicity. For every Brad Leone, who gets to be goofy and charming, for every Claire Saffitz, who becomes a sensation for being hyper-competitive and neurotically orderly, you have a Priya Krishna or a Rick Martinez, whose ethnicity, and the “expertise” in a certain cuisine that comes with it, is often framed as their most useful contribution to the team.

Martinez, former senior food editor and current BA contributor, was branded the “resident taco maestro” in the pages of the magazine, yet, as he recounted to Business Insider, then-deputy editor Andrew Knowlton asked if he was “a one-trick pony” for focusing on Mexican cuisine. Argentinian test kitchen manager Gaby Melian’s only solo video on YouTube is of her making her family’s empanada recipe. Fan favorite Sohla El-Waylly, who managed to veer out into more generalist territory with beloved recipes for dumplings, cinnamon buns, and even a carbonara dessert, started her career at BA talking about her riff on a family biryani recipe on the Bon Appétit Foodcast podcast and made an “updated” version of a Bengali snack, piyaju, for her first solo video. Even after expanding out of her “niche” and producing some of the channel’s most creative recipes, El-Waylly’s expertise was considered external to her identity, and — as she revealed in an Instagram story on June 8 — she was compensated as such. Other BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and people of color) at BA, including contributing editor Priya Krishna and research director Joseph Hernandez, also spoke out against BA’s pay disparities and its pervasive racist culture that, as Business Insider wrote, “does not provide nonwhite employees the same opportunities on the brand’s video side that white employees enjoy.”

The feeling of being slotted into a niche is all too familiar for Martinez. “There’s this idea in food media that it’s somehow easier to cook the food of your culture because you grew up with it or that it’s a part of you,” Martinez tells me. “It completely discounts the skills that it takes to build a recipe for an American audience. To recreate or even create an homage to the original dish requires a lot of creativity, skill, and work.”

The recent changes at BA — Rapoport’s resignation, white BA staffers’ refusal to put out content until their BIPOC colleagues are paid fairly — are a start. Yet the simultaneous compartmentalizing and marginalization of BIPOC in food media goes far beyond one organization or one editor-in-chief. Allowing BIPOC to have more agency within the food media system will require reimagining the relationship white America has both to “other cuisines” and to the people who grew up on them.

There’s this perception in food media, which publications like Bon Appétit subscribe to and perpetuate, that all that nonwhite writers really want is to have their cultures represented “authentically.” But the premise of authenticity is rooted in a white gaze that selectively acquires aspects of nonwhite cultures to package as just exotic enough to remain accessible. In late June, the New York Times published a story about “Thai fruit” that frames common fruit in Thailand as foreign and difficult to understand. The week before, tofu was labeled “white, chewy, and bland” in a since-deleted tweet by Bloomberg Asia. And who can forget the infamous Bon Appétit pho fiasco, which called the Vietnamese dish “the new ramen” and enlisted a white chef to give a “PSA: This Is How You Should Be Eating Pho”? Stories like these serve as reminders that foods outside of whiteness are at odds with an imagined “American” readership, for whom these foods remain distant and other.

“Our white colleagues think that we are speaking out about representation or appropriation because we want to be seen as experts on the subject,” says travel and food writer Dan Q. Dao. “[But] what we are [really] fighting is a long battle for inclusivity and equity in our workplaces.”

“I’m often asked to add a cultural slant even when one does not exist.”

Those workplaces, it should be noted, are overwhelmingly white. In June, Leah Bhabha noted in a Grubstreet piece, citing a 2019 Diversity Baseline study, that 76 percent of all publishing industry professionals are white. “In my own experience, as a biracial Indian writer, I’ve never had more than one coworker of color on my team,” she wrote, “and frequently it’s just been me.” The social media age — and the branding pressures inherent within — exacerbates that experience. Social media allows for real-time feedback that makes creators accountable to an audience that often acts as ad hoc sensitivity readers for people writing about their own cultural backgrounds. Writer and chef Samin Nosrat recently tweeted her frustrations with that pressure: “Instead of criticizing the systems that refuse to allow for greater diversity and inclusion, desis, Iranians, whoever, just pile on individual cooks for our perceived failure to represent their ideal versions of their entire cuisines. (Or even more frustratingly, for failing to cook something *exactly* like maman did it back home. I am not your maman!)”

But as media writer Allegra Hobbs pointed out in October 2019, “in the age of Twitter and Instagram, an online presence, which is necessarily public and necessarily consumable, seems all but mandatory for a writer who reaches (or hopes to reach) a certain level of renown.” In curating this online presence, writers and other creators are often pushed to flatten themselves into an easily legible extension of their identity.

Like many, food writer and chef Lesley Téllez has struggled with the expectations that come with being Mexican in food media. “There’s more pressure on BIPOC to find a niche that makes us stand out,” she says. “Over and over, the faces who look like us are people who specialize in food from their particular countries or backgrounds. It sends an overt message that stepping out as a generalist is hard, and that you will not be hired as such. I have definitely felt pressure to keep non-Mexican-cooking stuff off of my social media, and my old blog.”

For all the claims organizations in food media have made of diversifying their rosters and cleaning up the more egregious offenses in their treatment of nonwhite writers, there is still an association between nonwhite writers and their ethnicity, which is treated as tantamount to other aspects of their identities. BIPOC in food media are routinely not considered for assignments about things that don’t directly relate to their ethnicity or race. “I became a food writer 20 years ago when it was not really a profession,” says Ramin Ganeshram. “Yet, despite my qualifications as a reporter, editor, and chef, it was a losing fight to write anything that wasn’t ‘ethnic.’... I was discouraged and prevented from writing about generalized food technique or profiles, despite French culinary training.”

These assignments are often handed off to white writers, who are seen as “generalists” with the ability to stick their hands into any cuisine and turn it into something palatable (or, more importantly, into pageviews). Ganeshram says, “I was directly told regarding a job I didn’t receive at a New England-based national cooking magazine that they thought of me as more of an ‘ethnic’ writer.”

Instead, BIPOC get stuck with work directly related to their ethnicities. “I’m often asked to add a cultural slant even when one does not exist,” says food writer Su-Jit Lin, “or frame things from a point of greater expertise than I actually have. It’s assumed I’m fully indoctrinated into the culture and more Chinese than American (not true — my lane is actually Southern, Italian, and kind of Irish food).” Even when chefs push back against this compartmentalization, they are turned into caricatured ambassadors for their backgrounds. Chef (and Eater contributor) Jenny Dorsey wrote on Twitter that even though she demonstrated a dish on video that had nothing to do with her heritage, the result was ultimately titled “Jenny Dorsey talks about how her Chinese-American heritage influences her cooking.”

Often, the addition of a “cultural slant” to stories leads to one of the more egregious ways that nonwhite food is pigeonholed and othered — through what writer Isabel Quintero calls a lust for “Abuelita longing.” The term speaks to the way immigrant and diasporic writers (both within and outside food media) are frequently expected to add a dash of trauma or ancestral belonging to anything they write. As a Trinidadian-Iranian chef, Ganeshram finds this association particularly limiting. “When I’ve tried to write stories about my Iranian heritage, not being a recent Iranian immigrant or the child of a post-revolution immigrant has been an issue,” she says. “The editors I dealt with only wanted a refugee/escaping the Islamic Republic story. They decided what constituted an ‘authentic’ Iranian story, and that story was based in strife and hardship only.” These markers of authenticity can only come from the wholesome domesticity presumed of the ethnic other.

The extreme whiteness of the food industry, and of food media, places undue pressure on nonwhite writers and chefs. As food writer and founder of Whetstone Magazine, Stephen Satterfield wrote for Chefsfeed in 2017: “In mostly-white communities, you become an ambassador for your race. The stakes are high, and you try hard not to screw it up for the ones behind you…. Black chefs know this well: we must validate our presence, where others exist unquestioned. And what does it mean to be a black food writer? It means that you’ll never just be a food writer, you’ll be a black food writer.”

In other words, being designated as “ethnic” chefs put far too many BIPOC working in food media in a bind. Either they work against being pigeonholed by pitching stories that mark them as generalists, but lose out on assignments as a consequence, or they double down and tell stories of their culture and cuisine, but risk being limited both career- and compensation-wise.

Martinez was aware of this predicament while signing on to write a regional Mexican cookbook. “Writing a love letter to Mexico is so important in these times, but I had to seriously consider whether it would be a career-limiting move,” he says. He chose to write the book, but others, like Caroline Shin, food journalist and founder of the Cooking with Granny video and workshop series, have had to push against the expectation that anything they publish will be about their ethnic cuisine. “Last year, literary agents told me that I couldn’t sell diversity,” she says. “[I]f I wanted a cookbook, I should focus on my Korean culture.” While Shin chose to start her own program as what she calls an “‘I’ll show you’ to white-dominated institutions,” it raises the question of whether BIPOC in food media can taste mainstream success without operating as spokespeople for their ethnic cuisines.

But if you continue to pigeonhole and tokenize your BIPOC employees, seeing them primarily as products of trauma or perpetuating their marginalization by refusing them fair pay and workplace equity, then your calls to diversify the workplace mean very little, if anything at all.

Mallika Khanna is a graduate student in media who writes about film and digital culture, diaspora and immigrant experiences and the environment through a feminist, anti-capitalist lens. Nicole Medina is a Philly based illustrator who loves capturing adventure through her art using bold colors and patterns.

from Eater - All https://ift.tt/39Jaxcc via Blogger https://ift.tt/3jV5hXH

[blueskyandpudding]

THE EZRA MILLER DISCOURSE ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

So recently there was a post from prince-ezra-miller​ said that an anon send them an ask to report her encounter with Ezra at one of his band’s show from last year. I want to make a post about what just happened and how everyone deal with it.

First of all, I hope you will read this, maybe you’ll be more thoughtfully, and making more justified judgement on this story.

This is the post that started it all:

So a fan went to Sons’ show, met Ezra, saw him wearing a native American garment incorrectly and decided to tell him that. But he got upset and told her (the fan’s sexuality is confirmed) that she knew nothing because she was Mexican, based on her appearance. The fan felt bad at how Ezra was acting. “He later gave a half assed apology then said he didn’t realize he did anything wrong but told the fan they didn’t need to be upset by his ignorant ass.”

Now onto my opinion.

When I first saw this post, I thought “wow, that’s heavy. How could he?” and then I read it again. But there is something odd about this:

- The fan sent an anon ask to them.

- This story is told by the fanblog, with their words, not the fan’s. They put their perspective of the story in this post, causing so many people to lean on this to accuse Ezra of being racist.

- Evidence? They didn’t even put on the anon ask.

- I know what you’re thinking. You think “How could you think that someone made that up? That’s a very terrible thing to say.” But I just don’t trust an anon ask that came out of nowhere and said Ezra is racist. Sorry. Anon is not a trustworthy source.

- Why wait for a whole year to bring this up?

Alright, next, they decided to bring up every single “tea” they could find at the time, harassed him, joked about him, planned to go to their show to confront them with the story. And they tweeted Sons on Twitter, you can go check for yourself.

This is the drawing of a so-called “fan” of Ezra flushing in the toilet. ಠ_ಠ They were angry, ok BUT SERIOUSLY?

And many more asks do the exact same thing. You guys are cyber-bullying him. 

This joke is just problematic, and it’s not even funny.

And they accused Ezra of “appropriate culture” too. Not only Native American, but also Asian.

Here’s that post about the clothes he wore:

OHHH I think someone needs to chill out :) A good response to this ( from user drunkoncaffeineanddepression )

​In case you’re wondering what’s so interesting about MET GALA 2015, let me show you:

///OMG I THINK HOLLYWOOD IS APPROPRIATING ASIAN CULTURE I’M SO PISSED///

Moving on.

Prince-Ezra-Miller received some anon asks of them receiving an email from Sons, and they posted the screen captures here:

http://prince-ezra-miller.tumblr.com/post/158135563322/i-began-to-call-him-out-after-he-began-talking

I won’t mention how I think about their response, that’s up to you. Right now I will show you what’s the real problem.

A friend sent me the link to a thread on Twitter, it’s in the reply section here: https://twitter.com/SonsOAIF/status/839241403544793088

A few tweets were deleted, but I already captured the conversation between these two people:

The link she attached:

http://iamtheshyone13.tumblr.com/post/158140758262/im-the-one-who-sent-an-email-to-sons-of-an

Oh and remember that the fan was upset because Ezra assumed she was Mexican while she was actually a Native American?

So basically, a white boy tell you you’re a Mexican (which you are) and you are so angry, how dare he assume your nationality according to your appearance???!!!!

This Lizz girl (whom I suspect is one of that Prince blog admins, she has the uncensored version of the email and the way she talks about it too, idk, that’s just me making assumptions) mistaken Cheyenne for the girl who went to their show and encountered the problem. In fact, Cheyenne is not the victim, she’s the one who sent an email to them, and maybe she’s this anon:

Now do you see how messed up this thing is??? An anonymous girl told a fanblog a story, and that fanblog told others their version of the story, and it keeps going. The story isn’t original anymore, which means Sons cannot respond to some gossip without proofs and details. You demand apology from them, but how can they do that when they don’t even remember the accident? And when you don’t give Sons and their band mates the same respect you want from them? 

As consequences to this ridiculous story, some fans have already aggressively made terrible accusations towards Ezra:

The way they 100% trust this Prince fanblog is ¯\_ツ_/¯. Really. They link to that blog like some kind of “source”, like some kind of Ezra’s representative who knows him so well, live so closely to him.

Those are the things I find hard to understand about this drama.

When you see these kinds of story of your idol about such sensitive subjects appear on your dash, the first thing you do is to do some research, check your facts, and most important: STAY NEUTRAL. Don’t jump to conclusion right away and judge a person based on what internet gives you. He’s how you want him to be. I, personally, do not see him as a saint. He’s someone I feel connected with, he has problems, ideals, etc. He has flaws, but I won’t judge him because of those flaws, I’m not his relative, or his friends, or his family. I don’t know him in real life. So I clearly do not have the right to do that. But I see you guys harassing him, making people seeing him as a bad person, accusing him over some unreliable story and call it “justice.” Ezra and Sons don’t deserve to be treated this way. None of us does. 

And the most important things is, I do feel bad for the fan who encountered the problem. But I wish she would stand up for herself, make a new blog or something and tell the story instead of sending anon ask to a blog. That way, the story would stay insistent. But she didn’t do that, and you people behave like such bullies. What a shame that you people even calling yourselves “fan.”

[myrhymesarepurer]

The Pixie Cut

FMAB, Post-Promised Day Riza cuts her hair, then subsequentially shatters a coffee mug.  Six years of progress, gone.  “You know I used to tease you about that haircut.” Pairing  Royai Rating K a/n  i can’t write ficlets. i can’t. they all end up being like so many pages. This one is eight. I tried. I really did. Even so, this little moment holds such a lovely place in my head cannon. Also, my little fic, Not Anymore revolves around this very same subject, the move to Ishval. Go check that out after.  ff ao3

She went to lunch.

She went to lunch and obliterated six years of progress. She went to lunch, obliterated all that progress, stepped through the doors, and felt ice.  

It was shorter. 

Appropriately so, she froze.

The whole office was back. She was late. She stood in the doorway, gripping the handle.

The men looked up. She was never late. Havoc popped a chip in his mouth.

“Nice hair cut, Hawkeye,” he crunched “Throwback.” 

“I did always like the short hair, Captain,” Fuery nodded. “Looks good,” Breda confirmed, sneaking another  bit of a brownie, rather overtly 

Lunch is over. No food in the office.

She was supposed to say something. She didn’t say anything. The General lifted an eyebrow, looking to her.

They would be leaving in a week.  The office was in boxes, actually.

“Very sensible for the desert,” Falman commented. Riza’s fingers grazed the blonde cut short at her ear. She said nothing. She studied the carpet.

Roy’s face dropped.

The Captain took a breath, looked to the men nodded in thanks then finally moved from the doorway.

The sun through the massive wall of windows was scorching. Riza, once frozen, now burned like fire.

She removed her military jacket, draped it over her chair, then turned on her heel toward the coffee.  

Then they all just decided something was wrong. She didn’t even drink coffee.

Yup, something was definitely wrong.  

No, she shut it down silently. She was fine. They didn’t think so.

So, they then collectively, wordlessly, started plotting.  Havoc elbowed Breda in the ribs. “It’s cute too,” Breda coughed out. “Very cute!” Fuery agreed. “Becoming, yes.” Falman added quickly “Hot.” Havoc finished it off.

That should have shocked her out of it.

Inappropriate insubordination always got her attention.

All of those things were true, of course. The pixie cut was highly underrated.

But, still. Roy just watched her shuffle through the cabinet,  pull out the coffee beans, and ready the grinder.

“Out.” Roy then said softly, only just loud enough to hear.

Havoc, Breda, Falman, Fuery, snapped from Riza to Roy. They stared, wide-eyed, waiting for his solution.

For, the only person, truly, that even might be able to ‘fix’ Riza Hawkeye was Roy Mustang.

So, they sat in waiting, ready to help. Roy screwed the cap back on his pen, and said, “Go take lunch,”

Riza stiffened, coffee mug in hand, back facing the office.

No, he wasn’t going to do this. Kick the team out. Satisfy his hero complex. Try to save her.

She was fine.

Still, he said, “Go take lunch.”

“Boss, we already had-“

“Go take another.” Roy bit through his teeth. Fuery, Breda, Falman all rushed, snatched up their hidden snacks and flew through the doors. Havoc lingered.

He stood, fished his lighter out from his desk, glanced from Roy to Riza to Roy again, essentially ensuring the General didn’t need backup.

Roy got up, shook his head, and waved him away. Havoc left. and Riza stood her ground hoping Roy would be lazy enough to skip the trip to the coffee cart.

Her hopes were dashed. He appeared beside her.  

“Sir, do not start-“

The General swept fingers across the top layers for her hair and let out a “huh.”

Riza swatted his hand away. 

“It does look good, Captain.” “I’m fine, General,” she said sternly. 

“You did not need to evacuate the room simply  because you believe otherwise, Sir.” she grumbled,

Roy tilted his head, “It’s the haircut, isn’t it?” He ran fingers through it again, deeper this time.

It was highly inappropriate, but Roy did not stop and Riza did not stop him.

“It hasn’t been this short since-“ Roy started softly. Riza finished strong. “Since I murdered hundreds of thousands of innocent people. Yes, I know.” her words were venomous, not out of malice, out of grief.

“And, yet, you are fine, Captain?” Roy made his point.

He knew when she was crumbling,  even worse, he almost always knew why. despite her unmatched talent of resolving, or rather hiding, any such circumstance.

He always knew.

So, he got her alone and he tried to fix her, like always. The joke was on him. Not even Roy Mustang could fix a heinous criminal. The hailed sharp shooter, the famed killer, the single woman who recklessly, obliviously unleashed flame alchemy,

She slaughtered a race. There was no fixing that.

Riza grit her teeth, gripped her mug, then Riza threw it.

The cup flew, shattered on hit clear across the room, all because of a haircut.

Roy hadn’t flinched. He just seemed lightly surprised, impressed even. Riza turned away from the pieces and found herself huffing for air.

She caught her breath, bit her lip, shook her head. She was so stupid. She was so weak. So weak she had lost her head, her professionalism, her vice.

“Forgive me, Sir. My behavior is inappro-“ It was then that her General grabbed the decorative bouquet off the coffee cart, dumped the flowers, the water and all into the garbage and handed her the vase. “This would be more satisfying.”

The Captain stared at the glass, incredulous, then glanced up at Roy. He cinched a smile.

Riza actually did think about it, but, in the end, waved the glass away.

“No thank you, Sir” she mumbled and sighed away the suffocation. Her fingers mindlessly lifted again, this time to sweep the loose pieces of blonde back behind her ear. The lack hit her hard.  “I apologize again, General. I’m-” 

Riza could not find the will to finish, not while she then would have to confess the fact that she maybe could not handle this,  not alone.  the full week of nightmares, post-traumatic stress. six years of recovery, gone. 

Riza still gnawed at her lip and shut her eyes. It was quite simple, really.

Psychological changes often produce the desire for a physical change. Significant events often cause said psychological changes, in preparation for the future, the next step, the new version of yourself.  

After Ishval, Mustang and Hawkeye found Edward, Alphonse and Winry.

At that time, their journey to the top had begun full throttle, and Riza had admired Resembool, the air, the peace, and Winry’s long, blonde hair.

Something needed to change, she remembered thinking. She wouldn’t mind letting her hair grow, a new version, void of blood, sun, and endless sand.

It was really quite simple. She just thought she was stronger.  

For, today she had lunch.

Today she had lunch and cut off six years of progress, of coping, and working, and fighting

and for what? practicality? much easier to manage, very sensible for the desert.

She thought she might be stronger.

In a week, they would be leaving, back to the sun, the endless sand.

She would be there again, the very same Private Hawkeye. She sure looked the part. One physical change reversing, nullifying a psychological remake, six years, 

gone.  

Roy watched Riza’s eyes glass over. She braced herself on the counter, then hid her head in her hands. 

That hair cut, the pixie cut, was present for every horrifying event in Riza Hawkeye’s life, death and ink and sun, and sand and blood, and fire.

She had always kept it short. It was much easier to maintain.  

But, with its return came grief, and guilt,  and perhaps it's very own curse.

She looked like a murderer, like blood and sand and fire, and she-

“You know,” Roy crossed his arms, and thought to the ceiling.    ”when we were young, I teased you about that haircut.”

He then leaned back against the counter back and back until he was in her sight, practically forcing her to look at him.

She compromised and glared instead.  

“Yes, I remember,” she huffed, “That does not help, Sir,” Roy shrugged, “It was only to hide the fact that I liked it.”

Riza lifted off the counter and looked at him squarely. Roy smiled sheepishly, particularly remembering the year before he left, “Havoc’s right. It’s hot.”

Riza scrunched her nose and twisted her lips, wondering if she should be flattered or disturbed. 

Regardless, the fact remained;

Roy Mustang had reminded her of the one time her pixie cut existed in happiness.

Riza decided to roll her eyes and bite the inside of her cheek, willing it not to flush pink.

“We’re going back,” Roy sighed after a moment. He looked away, to the shattered porcelain scattered across the floor.

He would be lying if he said he didn’t want to throw and smash and pulverize anything, everything, every day. In a week, they would be leaving. 

Riza returned to the coffee pot, and nodded lightly.

She gripped the bridge of her nose and actually had to hold off the sting of tears.

But, Roy turned back to her, wove his fingers into her soft blonde hair and guided her back to him. He was close. She could breathe, and let go. 

“It’s a good thing we’re going together,” He said surely, smiling as much as he could.

Riza lifted her chin, recovered,   and sighed into the truth,

“Yes. It is.”

For, it was true. Every time in her past when she felt comfort, happiness, peace, courage, every time she felt new:.  She was with Roy Mustang, Even when she had her pixie cut.

                                           a teeny tiny bonus 

“Shall I retrieve the men, Sir?” “No.” “You know they will take the full hour, General.”

“I don’t mind,” he huffed then plucked a flower out from the trash can, dusted off the coffee grinds and offered it to her. He smiled, “Wanna grab dessert?”  “No.” 

a/n There’s this chapter in Home which I think is the most romantic RoyxRiza moment I have ever written. This one is a close second, I think. It also came really fast and out of nowhere. Those are kind of the best ones.  One more time for the fellas in the back, my little fic, Not Anymore revolves around this very same subject, the move to Ishval. In that little fic, these roles are switched. So, go read that one, and enjoy.  Reblog, tag, like and comment. Pamper me.