#i just feel like what i Want and who i Am are fundamentally at odds w one another

[nolongerexistingsadcatface]

Ok yes America hating the cold is funny (eh) BUT. have you considered that I like the imagery of an America sitting alone in the forest in the bleak mid-winter landscape of an east coast woods, all alone in both body and mind, agonizing over her seeming doom to be stuck in the throes of loneliness for all eternity?

[opens-up-4-nobody]

...

[eyesoftxmorrow]

i wish i could love in a way that matters

[inkskinned]

she's three years younger than i am, and i put on cascada as a throwback, cackling - before your time! i've been borrowing my brother's car, and it's older than dirt, so the trunk is like, maybe permanently locked. when the sun comes through the window to frame her cheekbones, i feel like i'm 16 again. i shake when i'm kissing her, worried i won't get it right.

in 2003, my state made gay marriage legal. where she grew up, it wasn't legal until 11 years later - 10 years ago. if legal protections for gay marriage were a person, that person would be entering 5th grade. online, a white gay man calls the fight for legal marriage boring, which isn't kind of him but it is a common enough opinion.

it has only been 9 years since gay marriage was nationally official. it is already boring to have gay people in your tv. it is already boring to mention being gay - "why make it your entire personality?" i know siblings that have a larger age gap than the amount of time it's been legally protected. i recently saw a grown man record himself crying about how evil gay people are. he was begging us, red in the face - just do better.

i am absolutely ruined any time my girlfriend talks about being 27 (i know!! a child!), but we actually attended undergrad at the same time since i had taken off time to work between high school and college. while walking through the city, we drop our hands, try not to look too often at each other. the other day i went to an open mic in a basement. the headlining comedian said being lesbian isn't interesting, but i am a lesbian, if you care. as a joke, she had any lesbian raise their hand if present. i raised mine, weirdly embarrassed at being the single hand in a sea of other faces. she had everyone give me a round of applause. i felt something between pride and also throwing up.

sometimes one thing is also another thing. i keep thinking about my uncle. he died in the hospital without his husband of 35 years - they were not legally wed, so his husband could not enter. this sounds like it should be from 1950. it happened in 2007. harassment and abuse and financial hardship still follow any person who is trying to get married while disabled. marriage equality isn't really equal yet.

and i don't know that i can ever put a name to what i'm experiencing. sometimes it just feels... so odd to watch the balance. people are fundamentally uninterested in your identity, but also - like, there's a whole fucking bastion of rabid men and women who want to kill you. your friends roll their eyes you're gay we get it and that is funny but like. when you asked your father do you still love me? he just said go to your room. you haven't told your grandmother. disney is on their 390th "first" gay representation, but also cancelled owl house and censored the fuck out of gravity falls. you actively got bullied for being gay, but your advisor told you to find a different gimmick for your college essay - everyone says they're gay these days.

once while you were having a hard day you cried about the fact that the reason our story is so fucking boring to so many people is that it is so similar. that it is rare for one of us to just, like, have a good experience across the board. that our stories often have very parallel bends - the dehumanization, the trauma, the trouble with trusting again. these become rote instead of disgusting. how bad could it be if it is happening to so many people?

i kiss my girlfriend when nobody is looking. i like her jawline and how her hands splay when she's making a joke. there is nothing new about this story, sappho. i love her like opening up the sun. like folding peace between the layers of my life, a buttercream of euphoria, freckles and laughter and wonder.

my dad knows about her. i've been out to him since i was 18 - roughly four years before the supreme court would protect us. the other day he flipped down the sun visor while driving me to the eye doctor. "you need to accept that your body was made for a husband. you want to be a mother because you were made for men, not women." he wants me to date my old high school boyfriend. i gagged about it, and he shook his head. he said - "don't be so dramatic. you can get used to anything."

the other day a straight friend of mine snorted down her nose about it, accidentally echoing him - she said there are bigger problems in this world than planning a wedding.

[shakingparadigm]

Seeing all those analysis posts about how Till liked Mizi because she was gentle while not giving the same attention to Ivan because he wasn't... how Ivan might have made Till uncomfortable because he expressed his admiration for Till through violence because he liked how Till had the courage to fight back...

I was wandering if Ivan ever realized that the way he went about showing his feelings wasn't positive for Till and he fucking did. "I wish I had been kinder" he fucking regrets dude, fuck me man.

(This veered wildly off-topic I am so sorry.)

Coming back to this ask after the most recent R6 update is interesting.

I've always wondered why they chose the title Cure in particular. I was expecting a song title along the lines of Star or something abyssal. Then I thought about Till's affiliation with experiments and drugs and the various ways he was hurt. Cure... It also brings to mind how the content for Ivan highlights his "oddness", how he's framed as someone different, almost wrong in a sense. There's something that he lacks, something that he feels the need to fix, to cure.

In the recent ROUND 6 production post, the true meaning is revealed. You're right on a certain level, but as always, it's complicated.

Both Ivan and Till seek a certain type of "healing", maybe to compensate for their pain, their oddness and their loneliness. They wish to be cured of their suffering somehow and they seek the solution in other people.

QMENG states that Till desires a type of healing that Ivan cannot provide, and vice versa.

It goes without saying, pretty common knowledge at this point, but Till is a lot softer under his rebellious front. As someone who's been beat and abused his whole life, it makes sense that that type of love he'd want is something gentler, something stable. It's incredibly obvious in the way he acts towards Mizi. She's so genuine, so bright, untainted by the cruel reality of the world. Till softens around her, since she has only showed him kindness he in turn shows her the sweetest side of himself. He's had nothing stable to cling onto before, so he immediately becomes attached to this idealized version of Mizi. He believes she's the only person who can provide him with what he needs, the only one who can "heal" him.

It's outright stated that Ivan cannot provide that type of "healing" that Till is looking for. Ivan does try, of course. Unfortunately, he lacks something fundamental. Because of this he expresses himself in rather childish ways, which may involve a little cruelty and attention-seeking. A lot of Ivan's actions are muddled by his complicated feelings as well, as its stated that his true emotions and intentions are difficult to grasp. With Till, Ivan wants to save and be saved, hurt and heal him, keep him and set him free. Live for him and die for him. He criticizes Sua on the ethics of self-sacrifice and then goes on to do the same himself. With Ivan, everything contradicts.

He tries desperately to be the cure that Till needs, but due to his incredibly complex nature that "healing" will never be just healing. It may come with more pain and confusion despite his best efforts.

I don't think Till refused to give Ivan attention because he wasn't gentle enough, rather I think it's because everything was so complicated whenever Ivan was involved. Ivan is there for him in his times of need and causes a fair bit of trouble during the rest. He's strange and hard to grasp, but he's familiar. Calling each other "friends" seemed like such an inadequate label because they're simultaneously too close and not close enough. Ivan does wish he was kinder, though. Not only to Till, but to Sua and most likely a few other people as well. There's a lot of aspects in which Ivan wishes he were different, and it's tragic to hear how he deprecates himself in his final moments for it.

There's the second half of QMENG's statement as well, "vice versa". Till cannot provide what Ivan needs either, but Ivan desperately desires it anyway.

Ivan views Till as his cure. He wants to not only "heal" Till, but to be healed by him as well. This desire can be seen in the lyrics of Cure:

Notice my pain

And mend me right now

To quiet my fears

I'll drown in you

(The wish for "healing" is stated.)

In your gaze, where I’m seen

Consume me, yes, me, oh, oh

(Ivan urges Till to "consume" him like medicine, he wishes to be what Till needs.)

Ivan lacks something, and he believes that Till can make up for that lack which is why he's so fascinated by him. If Ivan is a black abyss, Till is a supernova, bringing life to an empty void. Unfortunately, Till is explosive and rather inept at handling his own extreme emotions, which causes him to either lash out violently or retreat further inward and push Ivan away. He's also a thoroughly destructive and hurt individual, seeking his own cure in another form. He cannot provide what Ivan needs.

Both Ivan and Till are incredibly volatile. That's not to say they don't have their gentler sides, but overall they've been doomed from the start. Ultimately it's no fault of theirs, they did what they could with their complicated feelings and fought through their own respective hells.

In the end, Ivan had to come to terms with the fact that he couldn't get the "healing" he needed and could never be what Till needed, either. That's why he finally acted on his impulses and let his complicated feelings win over, resulting in his death. Despite all the heartache, his final thoughts are a statement of gratitude. Truly a tragedy.

[sh1nsoukoku]

Pls tell me all dazai autism traits in ur list

OMG I AM SO GLAD YOU ASKED, yes yes yes…

I want to preface this by saying this is in no means supposed to be canon facts or a diagnosis, I just think he is a very autistic-coded character coming from my own experiences as an autistic adult!

Long post under the cut because I don’t know how to stfu!!!

We will start with my main reasoning:

As we know, Dazai and his ability are based off of the work No Longer Human. Dazai being similar to the main character Yozo. Yozo is a kind of “stand in” for the real life author Osamu Dazai as No Longer Human contains a lot of real events from the author’s life. BSD Dazai and Yozo’s main similarities are the disconnection from others and high masking. Here are two quotes from the book:

“All I feel are the assaults of apprehension and terror at the thought that I am the only one who is entirely unlike the rest. It is almost impossible for me to converse with other people. What should I talk about? How should I say it? - I don’t know.”

This is incredibly similar to the lived experiences of Autistic people. I used to feel like an alien, or just fundamentally different than others. We tend to also struggle with communicating and other social dynamics. Dazai feels isolated from others, let’s very few people close, and searches for meaning by observing other humans and life and death itself. He quotes this as his reason for joining the Mafia. He also processes emotion differently, at odds with people around him.

“I managed to maintain on the surface a smile which never deserted my lips; this was the accommodation I offered to others, a most precarious achievement performed by me only at the cost of excruciating efforts within.”

This is one of the best descriptions I have read of Autistic Masking. Dazai HIGHLY masks. Dazai is known for not showing his true thoughts/feelings/opinions often in BSD. He can code switch easily, serious in one moment and then covering it with his over the top silly/unusual/maniacal personality. In NLH this is described as “clowning.” I also think Dazai’s genius “always according to plan” thing is sometimes a mask, so he doesn’t show the fact that he’s working hard to pull strings and figure things out.

He does have some insane pattern recognition though which is also an autistic attribute!

And now for the more surface level reasons:

Repetitive Behavior/Media Consumption: Dazai reads the same book over and over again. The Ultimate Guide to Suicide is a book he’s had with him since his PM days and he tells Atsushi that he already knows everything it says because he’s read it hundreds of times. A very common autistic trait!

Restricted Diet: Dazai seems to have a limited diet consisting of alcohol and canned crab! It’s a same food/safe food he has often. His room was described to be full of discarded cans of crab and bottles. Limited diets are common in autistic people.

Stimming: Dazai stims! He is a very wiggly and stimmy person. There’s several scenes where he is seen humming and singing or making little silly noises.

Dazai and his headphones are so important to me.. he seems to wear them frequently around the office. It could be noise cancelling or auditory stimulation that he likes.

The man never sits normally on a chair which is something I think a lot of neurodivergent people can relate to.

And of course floor time! Shown by him rolling around when stressed, laying on the rooftop and a few instances in Wan! like the marshmallow scene.

Also you can’t tell me that this is not two burnt out autistics after overworking their brains…

[saintsenara]

How are you able to enjoy toxic/unhealthy/“problematic” ships/characters without feeling weird (for lack of a better word) about it?

I ask this because I want to be able to do this myself as it seems like a much more enjoyable way of engaging with fiction to me. I can get over some ships just being toxic and the characters not being good together and still enjoy their dynamic but I have trouble with the other ships that feel morally wrong. I know it’s just fiction but I can’t seem to get over the ick feeling I have when I think about those ships/characters. I feel like I’m being too puritanical about these things but I don’t know how to stop feeling like something is gross when I feel it’s gross…

Do you have any tips to stop jumping to moralizing ships/characters?

thank you very much for the ask, anon!

i'm going to be upfront that this reflexive gross feeling isn't something i've ever really struggled with - both in fic and more broadly. this is due to various personal idiosyncrasies, above all the fact that i've got disengaged boomer parents who didn't police our media consumption [my favourite book when i was eleven? lolita...] and that i'm a doctor, which is a profession which requires you to develop a very high threshold for what you find disgusting. the human body - at all stages of its life-cycle and its cycle of decomposition - produces a lot of different fluids... and it's also the case that [just as if you can think of it, there's porn for it] if an inanimate object exists, somebody somewhere has got it stuck inside them...

and so the situation that i find myself in is that i consider it infinitely less weird that i enjoy the odd bit of hot tomarrymort action than that i actively enjoy cutting through bone with a saw...

but, obviously, "get a medical degree" isn't particularly helpful advice...

i am a ride-or-die fan of the concept of stepping outside of your comfort zone. this is why i'm such an avowed multishipper - i think it's good for us as fandom citizens to examine the potential of our faves in relationships [romantic or otherwise] which are either not their canon endgames or which aren't our preferred pairings, and in situations which don't align with their canon experiences [whether that means making them suffer or giving them full-on fluff]. it draws out the multiple aspects of a character to consider them from these different angles - and it prevents us from getting so stuck in one interpretation of a character or configuration of a ship which means that it puts our backs up to stumble across stories which approach things differently.

but stepping outside of your comfort zone doesn't mean that you have to go enormously far. it may be that a reader decides - having only ever read teen-rated fics where characters' sex lives don't extend beyond hand-holding and forehead kisses - to take the plunge into an explicit piece filled to the brim with watersports and age play. it may be that a reader decides - having only ever read teen-rated fics for one canon pairing - to read a teen-rated fic for a non-canon alternative. both of these are entirely valid approaches.

by which i mean, our comfort levels and our thresholds for discomfort are subjective, they're personal. if there are ships or themes or characters you don't want to read about because they don't feel good... you're not doing something wrong if you avoid them. exposing yourself to fics you expect to make you uncomfortable can be useful - and fiction is certainly a way to explore discomfort which gives you much more control over the experience than encountering it in real life - but it's not something you're obliged to do to be active in fandom.

the thing you are obliged to do to be active in fandom is to be nice to other people, no matter what their tastes in fiction. this means, at its fundamental level, that when you see people who ship pairings or like themes which make you think "ew"... you keep it to yourself/the group chat rather than putting it on the timeline.

but, once this is something you've got the hang of [which takes a bit of time! but practice makes perfect!], something i feel can be a really useful way of overcoming a tendency towards knee-jerk moralising reactions is to just vibe in the vicinity of people you know like the content you instinctively feel is gross.

this doesn't mean you have to read any of this content - but you'll learn just by hanging out near them that the people who do are just... normal. one minute they might reblog a rec for a pairing you think "absolutely not" about, the next they might reblog a cat picture which makes you squeal with delight. you'll like some of their content, but not all. you'll agree with some of it, but not all. you might like progressively more of it as you spend time in their orbit - maybe they'll explain why they like the pairing or character in question and you'll think "huh, i've never looked at it like that" - or you might not. this is absolutely fine.

all of us - at one time or other - have made a black-and-white moralising pronouncement: people who think x are gross; people who like y are fucked-up, you'd never catch me doing z. and these pronouncements are different from our wider, societally-influenced moral codes - which are good things, otherwise we'd live in the purge - in that they're fundamentally ways for us to feel good about ourselves and our families and our friends by defining ourselves as better than a faceless other. we say "you'd never catch me reading that, it's foul" when we know [or think we know] that the friend we're talking to would agree with the statement. we are far less likely to say it if we know that the friend - whom we see as a human being who is beautiful in their imperfection and inherently worthy of love simply by virtue of being alive - was reading and enjoying that just the other day.

and so the best way to train yourself out of reflexively moralising ships or characters or tropes is to put a face to the faceless other who likes them. be intentional in sharing a space with fans of the stuff you feel uncomfortable with and, eventually, it just becomes background noise. you'll scroll on tumblr, say "well there we are, jane's written some more of her sirius/harry piss kink fic - although i'm not interested in clicking on it" and go on with your day.

because the other thing i think it's really useful to do is to train yourself into reframing your disgust as disinterest. there are plenty of things which i don't seek out to read - and some of these topics are completely benign and some are darker [i don't enjoy reading explicit non-con, for example] - but this is because i try to frame it as that i don't think these things would interest me.

this is still the maintenance of a personal comfort zone, but thinking of the content outside this zone as something you are disinterested in turns it into something neutral. when you think of it as something to be disgusted or grossed out by, it naturally provokes a visceral response which makes you look through a moral lens. thinking in terms of disinterest, instead, gives you sufficient detachment from this visceral response to recognise, interrogate, contextualise, and control it.

and - in time - this neutral reframing may result in you feeling more interested in taking the plunge into the ships and characters and stories you currently don't vibe with, once you don't have an instinctive disgust response as a barrier.

or it may not. and this is absolutely fine.

[hms-no-fun]

so, (SPOILERS FOR FIONNA AND CAKE but its relevant to the question but im gonna put a bunch of line breaks just in case lol)

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so fionna and cake ended with fionna basically being like, you know, youre RIGHT god, if magic came back my wish would simply be twisted and it would suck, there will be no rule breaking miracles! I will now work as a struggling minimum wage employee in seattle and Be Happy about it. i sure am glad the threat of losing everyone i know and love set me straight!! sorry to send u this really random thing the ending just felt like such a slap in the face and i wanted to ask someone who knows that exact Seattle Struggle. this is absolutely me appealing to the Writing Gods to back me up that the ending wasnt very good lmao but if i have a direct line to the craftsgoat i simply must use it for something stupid at least once

FULL SERIES SPOILERS FOR FIONNA & CAKE AFTER THE BREAK!!!

i really disagree with your read on the ending. it didn't feel like "just struggle with seattle minimum wage forever and be happy about it" at all to me! the whole instigating incident was that fionna wanted to transform reality into something that she personally thought would be better, without taking into account the fact that other people exist and have internal lives just as complex as hers. she comes back to her original world to find marshall and gary holding hands, explains to them the magical adventure she's been on and the fact that their world is about to transform into something unrecognizably magical, and they receive this with abject horror! fionna doesn't know whether simon becoming ice king again will erase marhsall & gary's burgeoning relationship, which makes her realize that in her quest to escape the boring, oppressive reality of working odd jobs to make ends meet, she's only ever focused that energy on how to make things better for her.

i really want to dig into this because it's a key theme of the show. there is a destructive selfishness innate to the "heroes" of this universe, who feel entitled to the joyous empowerment of being able to defeat anyone and everyone they see in open combat. cake has a whole musical number about this! simon's arc in the last two episodes was betty grabbing him and shaking him until he finally asked himself, how would my life have been different if i'd just once let the woman i loved steer the ship for a while? and then of course we see the lich in a reality where he succeeded in eradicating all life, only to find himself desiccated and without purpose, begging the god of chaos for an answer it cannot give. brian david gilbert's ice prince seems perfectly put together and successful, until the reveal that he's outsourced his madness to someone who didn't accept the terms of the crown's curse. this didn't solve the fundamental problem, it just inverted the roles of its expression by making princess bubblegum into the mad candy queen. nothing about the status quo has changed, simon has simply given himself a more dignified role in it.

this is a story about what happens when people in struggle behave as though they are the protagonist of reality. when fionna says "this is the world i want to fight for" she's not fighting for the right to get another shitty minimum wage job. i think you've really missed something by accepting that conclusion when cake the cat is right there saying that her magical self IS the version of herself she wants to live as. being a normal house cat for her was, arguably, a form of body dysmorphia, and the show lets her keep that magic at the end! the thing is, their world IS changed by the events of the show! the status quo is altered!

like, what do we actually see everyone DOING when the credits approach? we see this entire disconnected community banding together to rebuild the city together, and we see a huge crowd of protesters outside marshall's mom's place demanding that she lower rents. we see people connecting with other people, including three outcasts from other universes escaping to this more boring one for their own safety. i loved this ending honestly, because it felt to me like an attempted refutation of the very idea that you can magically transform reality into something better overnight. if fionna'd gotten her original wish and made her world into, like, candy world, then... what? let's say they play it as like, at last people are freed from the shackles of capitalism and everyone just gets to be weird funky critters going on adventures or whatever. what would that, as art, actually say? what would that mean to us in the real world? if we're going into this cartoon looking for some kind of revolutionary energy (which IS present in the text, much to its credit), what actionable or symbolically resonant message are we supposed to take from a story that resolves its problems with magic? at that point, it ceases to be relevant as anything more than pure fantasy, because it has abandoned any connection to the material reality WE are trapped in.

i don't want to magically transform the world overnight. this whole show goes out of its way to explore how trying to transform the world overnight, in a world where such a thing is possible, is a really fucking bad idea for a whole host of reasons. regardless, such things aren't possible in our world. so going into the finale, my worry was that they WOULD turn fionna's world into another candy world and just say, ah, the revolution is when you think the right things so hard that the material plane bends to your will.

that's neoliberal thinking. that's like the essence of the failed leftist project of the "end of history" era from the 90s onwards, when marxism was systematically rooted out of academic cultural analysis and replaced with the delusion that if you can just get people thinking the right things, you can affect change in the world. well here we are, it's 2023 and all that magical thinking has got us is a world on fire and a civilization of human beings so thoroughly disempowered that they would literally rather pretend to be a tortured anime protagonist than exist in this boring, shitty, violent reality. you can't think your way out of oppression. raising labor consciousness is, at best, step one. you want to know why unions are winning big right now when they've been completely useless in this country for decades? it's because they've stopped giving a shit about optics they can't control and remembered that the boss's value does not exist without labor. you do not necessarily need marxism for this, marxism is simply the most accurate articulation of the fact that workers who make the things a capitalist sells can kneecap the capitalist by refusing to make the things they want to sell. change doesn't happen with the publishing of a book or whatever, it happens when enough people in real life press their material demands hard enough that someone in charge is left no choice but to listen.

so for me, fionna & cake ending the way it did was a huge relief, because it wasn't espousing magical thinking. the solution to fionna's ennui and economic anxiety was not to just get another job and be happy to live in the world as it was-- it was to create a sense of shared community and struggle, uniting the not-seattleites in their survival of a near-apocalypse and using it as a jumping off point for fundamentally transforming the state of that world as it exists. fionna had to realize that her problems are everyone's problems, and that making her life personally better at the expense of everyone else's agency is just an act of kicking the can of responsibility down the road indefinitely. no one who gets their wish in this show is happy to have gotten it, or avoids punishing others who didn't ask to be involved.

the "canonization" of fionna & cake felt like a reaction to the idea that we in our world are permanently isolated from the fictional realities we create where change seems to come so easy, and the powerlessness that can engender. instead this show is saying, okay, let's say we are in continuity with these fantastical realities. what do we actually DO with that? how do we make this world more fun, more interesting, more fulfilling for everyone to live in? the answer is the same as it's always been, and no other answer would ever feel satisfying: you do it by organizing the workers against the current arrangement of the state with the explicit goal of transforming it for the better.

what does simon do at the end when he gives fionna her world to her? he says that no one person should have that responsibility, that it's been in one person's hands for too long. so he gives it to her in the form of a dandelion, whose blown seeds merge with and become part of everyone trying to survive the scarab's attack. the idea here is that while no single person ever possesses the power to transform the world on their own, the world itself belongs to all of us, and it is within our power to transform it together. those who hoard power want us to believe that this is not the case precisely because the basis of their power is fraudulent and maintained through the violence of the state.

as someone who does live in seattle for better and worse, as much as i do wish i could make literally anything better right the fuck now by whatever means necessary... the fact is i can't. and it does no one any good to labor under the assumption that i or any other individual has that kind of absolute transformative power. the solutions are all right there, and they are simple, materialist propositions whose only difficulty lies in how successfully we've been propagandized to think that the individual is God, or at least speaks on His behalf. there's no thinking our way out of this pickle, and no one's gonna do the hard work for us.

as to the question of how you actually get people in real life to get together and do all that hard work... well, personally i think it's unfair to ask a 10 episode cartoon show to give you any kind of actionable advice on that front. i might even go so far as to say that such an expectation is an expression of the very same magical thinking which the show tries to push back against! in any case i liked it quite a lot and i hope this rambling answer encourages you to revisit the show and reconsider some of your takeaways

[dracoqueen22]

For Melly: Aerith/Tifa - against all odds

Tifa is exhausted. 

She’s covered in cuts and bruises. Her body aches. Her head’s spinning, and worst of all, her heart has taken a beating. She doesn’t understand Cloud. She doesn’t know Cloud. She wonders if she ever did. 

And she definitely isn’t sure what happened five years ago. Not anymore. 

Tifa’s exhausted, but she can’t sleep. Energy runs through her veins, adrenaline certain another battle might come bursting through that door. She can’t seem to calm down. 

It doesn’t seem like Aerith can sleep either. She’s been staring at the ceiling and fiddling with the buttons on her dress for as long as Tifa’s been fruitlessly counting chocobos. She’s up to 963. 

Tifa rolls on her side, facing Aerith, arm tucked under her cheek. “Can’t sleep either, huh?” 

“You’d think I’d be exhausted,” Aerith says. She turns to face Tifa, their bodies a pair of parentheses on opposite beds. Her shoulders are bare, but Tifa isn’t sure why she’s focusing on that fact. “I mean, I’m definitely tired, but I guess that’s not enough.” 

“Worried?” Tifa asks. “About your mom?” 

Aerith smiles, gentle and sweet all the way to her willowy bones. “No. She can take care of herself.” 

“Do you think we made the wrong choice?” Tifa blurts out, almost before Aerith can finish answering. It’s something Tifa’s gnawed on, over and over, especially after Cloud’s recitation of an event he can’t have seen. 

Is he wrong because he’s lying on purpose? Or is he actually remembering something he experienced because the choice they made, there on that highway, has fundamentally altered the course of their universe? Is he even her Cloud? Or is Tifa the one misremembering? 

Tifa doesn’t know. 

“It’s too soon to say.” Aerith draws nonsense on the mattress in front of her. That soft smile lingers. “It’s terrifying, but it’s also kind of exhilarating.” 

Tifa would chalk Aerith’s optimism up to naivete, but that’s far from the truth. Aerith’s life hasn’t been a picnic and that she can still be sweet is a testament to her strength. 

Tifa envies her for it. That strength that allows her to be weak. 

“How so?” she asks. 

“Well, I’ve never had a sleepover before,” Aerith says with the frankness that makes Tifa’s heart ache. “Or a girlfriend.” She pauses, cheeks going pink. “I mean, a woman who is a friend. Woman-friend? No, that just doesn’t have the same ring to it.” 

Tifa laughs quietly as Aerith’s face scrunches with genuine confusion. 

“It’s been a long time since I’ve had a girlfriend,” Tifa says. “Most of the kids my age were boys.” 

“Like Cloud?” 

Tifa’s too slow to stop the flinch. It’s hard to say if Aerith noticed. “Yeah,” she says quietly, but then the memory hits her, easing the sting. “Though he’s always been pretty enough.” 

“He sure is.” Aerith giggles and turns on her back, stretching her arms over her head with a hum. “But that’s what I mean. We made a choice and decided to fight, and now here I am, against all odds, on my first sleepover.” 

Tifa doesn’t tell her all the ways this doesn’t count. It’s a simple wish. A simple joy. She wants Aerith to have it. 

“Do you think we should have a pillow fight?” Aerith asks, but before Tifa can answer, she laughs and says, “Hmm. Maybe not. I think you’d win in one hit.” 

“I’d be gentle,” Tifa says. 

“I know you would.” Aerith’s grin makes Tifa’s heart go thump-thump-thump in a way it hasn’t before. 

Aerith abruptly sits up and looks around as if an idea has popped into her mind. “Hmm,” she says. “There’s not enough furniture to make a fort, and I don’t think that vending machine had any candy. I’m stumped on ideas.” 

“Aren’t we a little old for sleepovers anyway?” 

“Probably.” Aerith sighs, and there’s a wealth of disappointment in the small sound. “I guess we should be sleeping. We have a lot more walking ahead of us.” 

Aerith flops back, pulls the blanket up to her chin, and stares at the ceiling. She dutifully closes her eyes, and Tifa feels a bit like she’s kicked a bucket. Could it really hurt to entertain such an innocent joy? 

Tifa rolls off the bed, bringing her blanket with her, and flops down next to Aerith. “Tell me a secret,” she says as she squirms down to get comfortable. 

Aerith blinks at her. “What?” 

“It’s what you do at a sleepover.” At least, in Tifa’s experience, that what she thinks most young girls do. “You tell each other secrets.” 

“Oh.” Aerith’s cheeks turn a pretty pink. “I don’t think I have any that you don’t already know.” She presses her lips together, face scrunched in serious thought. 

“Nothing?” Tifa prompts as she tucks her arm under her head. “Not even an embarrassing story you don’t want anyone to know?” 

Aerith laughs and turns to face her, voice going softer like they are two young woman sharing a secret with no one else. “I have plenty of those stories. But what about you? Do you have any secrets?” 

“Too many,” Tifa sighs, and her thoughts wander again, to home, to Nibelheim, to five long, confusing years, and one stubborn, confusing blond the next room over. Maybe this is a bad idea after all. 

She shouldn’t spill all the troubles on her shoulders. Aerith shouldn’t have to help bear that load. She has enough problems without Tifa adding to her stress. Maybe this was a bad idea after all. 

Tifa shifts, intending to go back to her own bed, and back to chocobo number 964. But Aerith touches her arm, and that’s enough for Tifa to freeze. Surprised. 

“We don’t have to share secrets,” Aerith says, her resting hand curling into a gentle hold, “But we can share the bed. If you want, I mean.” 

Tifa’s heart throbs so loud, it thumps in her ears. Slowly, she settles back into place, arm tingling under the barely noticeable weight of Aerith’s hand. 

“That is one of the rules of sleepovers,” Tifa says, even though they’re both too old and bruised for such a thing. But they are also a lot alike. Tifa’s never had a “girlfriend” either. 

Aerith giggles and winks at her. “I won’t tell if you don’t. It can be our secret.” She holds out a hand, pinky crooked. “Promise?” 

Tifa’s face heats, almost like she’s blushing, but that would be ridiculous. No less ridiculous than hooking her finger with Aerith’s and saying, “Promise.” 

Lying there next to Aerith, Tifa doesn’t even get to chocobo number 965 before she’s fast asleep. 

***

[lu-sn]

i know it's 300 years late to be making this post but man. i am still SO angry about mew

the setup was perfect!!! you have mew, this probably-aspec character who hits all of the checkboxes for prim-privileged-gay and seems fully unaware of that privilege, and you have boston, fully unashamed of his sex drive and his many sexcapades while still partially closeted, and they hate each other, okay. they constantly sling barbs at each other right from the beginning, and they're not friendly about it. mew thinks boston is an uncontrollable slut and boston thinks mew is a horrendously stuck-up prude and they're constantly judging each other. at the beginning of the show, they're two fundamentally incompatible people.

and then top comes along, and he's this character who's willing to put up a facade for mew -- willing to play the part of the sweet, unproblematic boyfriend -- but under the hood, he's a lot more like boston than anyone wants to admit. he's a piece of shit to everyone but mew, and he's slept around, and he openly likes sex. he wants it. he's struggling a little without it.

it's perfect because boston is a character that mew is fundamentally at odds with, and top is a character similar to boston that mew does not want to be at odds with. it sets up this huge clash of principles for mew, who is going to either have to learn to accept some of top's behavior and realize that boston might deserve that acceptance too, or he's going to be unable to accept some parts of top in a way that will hurt their relationship.

... or so you would think.

instead, mew gets to have his cake and eat it too: top cheats on him (and frankly, the circumstances of this cheating are suspect; top was basically manipulated into it), and instead of digging into why top did this, why top might feel compelled to secretly have sex with someone behind mew's back, mew lets top grovel at his feet for months, then takes him back while "forgiving but not forgetting". there's no attempt on mew's part to understand top or the cheating, only to corral top back into the persona that mew thought he was in the first place. and top lets it happen. by the end of the show, all traces of the "problematic" man he was in the beginning have been mysteriously wiped away. his cocaine problem is gone, his debilitating fear of fire is gone, and he is perfectly content in this relationship with mew where they have relatively little sex, even though mew is constantly making eyes at all of the new men who show up (cough cough boeing COUGH COUGH MIX) and even though this supposed straying on mew's end and the ensuing jealousy from top was a big factor in why top cheated in the first place.

and because mew didn't need to understand anything deeper about top, there's no way in hell he gains any sympathy for boston; he kicks boston to the curb and is obnoxiously righteous about it.

i've seen some comments that mew is not a hollow and unrealistic character for acting like this; there are many, many people out there who act just as selfishly as mew. i can't stand those people, and i can't stand mew, and in a sense that does make him a compelling character. so putting aside the fact that i would have much preferred to see him struggle with the crumbling of either his principles or his relationship... the arcs of the characters around him are definitely hollow and unrealistic, as a direct consequence of his position in the overall narrative.

let's look at boston for a second. mew, who you famously think is a stuck-up bitch, ends up catching the unwavering attention of top, who you want to get fucked by; you slowly manipulate top into cheating on mew with you, and you're gleeful about it. this is not a thing you'd do if you felt any sort of sympathy or friendship towards mew! you clearly disrespect the guy! you probably fucking hate him!

and then the guy you hate finds out what you did, and he threatens to out you and circulate revenge porn of you in retaliation, and he's the smuggest little shit about it while he promises to ruin your life and then ten seconds later flips masks and goes "but i wouldn't do it because i'm above that kind of behavior" -- and i would just like to poll all of you, and ask you: if a guy you disrespected so deeply came up to you and threatened to ruin your life while continuing to display all the traits you already hated him for, would you feel sad that he friendship-broke up with you and try to friendship-get him back? or would you, i don't know, hate him for all eternity?

once the cheating news breaks, the narrative tries to convince us, again and again, that boston feels bad and guilty about what he did to mew and that he doesn't hate mew and wants to be friends again. i'm sorry. i don't buy it. the boston we saw at the beginning of the show is not a guy who would grovel at mew's feet. so why does the narrative make him do it? why does the narrative kneecap his character like this?

it's for the same reason that all of top's problems disappear. it's because the narrative wants so badly to position mew as the good guy. mew did nothing wrong, they say, over and over again. look at how top and boston beg him for forgiveness. look at how terrible boston was for wronging mew but how right mew was for threatening boston back. look at how top erases all his own flaws just like mew said he could, and boston doesn't do the same, so top earns a spot in the friend group but boston loses his spot forever.

if the narrative had been brave enough to fracture mew's image a little, to acknowledge that he's a mean, messy hypocrite, i could have respected his place in the show as a whole. but they didn't. instead, they gave his character so much potential for growth and then squandered it all, and if that wasn't enough, they went ahead and neutered all of the characters around him, too.

[girl4music]

The idea or take that romance isn’t as important as friendship when friendship can evolve into romance is an odd one for me and I think it’s because I don’t think romance can be a romance without a deep friendship.

I’m partial to the “love is friendship on fire” adage and fictional ships or couple romances or love stories that begin from friendship. I favour friends-to-lovers and slow burn platonic-to-romantic relationships in art/entertainment because the depth of the connection is not only depicted but also drawn out and developed.

You get the whole journey so there’s never any rush to get to one development to another. There’s no time-skipping. And there’s no push for something more to happen because what you see happening is part of why you want it to be something more. You appreciate all of it. Even the negatives like the fights and conflicts because that also helps to evolve the relationship into higher degrees of love and devotion than ever before if you’re able to get the whole journey of what you want.

And I think this is why I am fundamentally bored with romantic WLW ships of today in TV art/entertainment.

Because you don’t get the whole journey of the ship.

You don’t really get a love story.

You barely get a pamphlet. 😒

But shows like ‘Xena: Warrior Princess’ and ‘Wynonna Earp’ give you WLW ships where you get everything in the ships because the journey is the whole point to it.

And for me - that feels significantly more romantic than something that’s explicitly made to be romantic.

I’ve come to realize that that’s probably because they both begin as friends and that that never changes. All that happens is the friendship evolves into romance. And I feel like a lot of TV show WLW ships get it very wrong when they change the friendship side of things. That’s if it even starts as a friendship first. I am often surprised by how many WLW ships I’ve seen in TV art/entertainment that do not. That immediately go into romance. That’s usually just because those shows are just too damn short and linear and they have no time to show you the journey. Thank fuck for fanfic then because in fanfic you can rewrite the beginnings and endings and also explore all the detail in the middle.

What can I say? TV show storytelling just isn’t a good medium for WLW representation not because they don’t want to give you the whole journey… but because they’re prevented from being able to do so.

And I’ve had enough now. I’ve had enough of being made a side storyline or liner notes in a straight person’s show or being killed off or cancelled or tragically broken up and separated when it’s not.

I either want to be a main narrative or not there at all.

I don’t want to have to settle for a half-way state and position of existence just because I’m not male and not straight. I don’t want to have to just make do and I think anybody that believes that they should seriously need to watch something more “dated” where the censorship might be rampant throughout, but… least you still get to see the whole damn journey of what is. Least there is development for those characters and even a conclusion and closure to their relationships…

Least you actually get to see yourself be … someone.

And none of it has absolutely anything to do with your sexuality or gender identity in the way where you have to feel like you’re apologizing for it or sacrificing for it… but rather… this is what is happening and it’s fine.

People really think it’s contradictory that why I love Xena and Gabrielle so much is because their sexuality or the nature of their relationship is never made an issue. They see that as an erasure of who they are.

When no, that’s not it at all.

It’s just not all they are.

It’s not all they do.

There’s so much more about them that’s detailed instead over that and it still never takes away from it.

And that’s what you want. That’s the kind of format to a love story you want to be watching or reading about because it’s normal, it’s natural and it’s just how it is.

They’re lead female characters with many main narratives across the span of 6 whole ass seasons.

And oh yeah, they just happen to be queer and in love.

The journey of the relationship as a friendship is always put first and made the focus with Xena and Gabrielle but it’s always up to you what else they are. It’s just for me - the friendship is what IS so romantic. I can’t really separate one from the other because to me… the reason why they’re the greatest love story that I’ve ever seen in TV of all-time is because they begin as friends and they never neglect this aspect.

[asherlockstudy]

I enjoy gmm because it's low impact and relaxing. Wonderhole (especially the sci fi one) is really heavy even in the first few minutes and I don't know when I'll be in the right head space to watch it. after making me love Sandy and Horst and killing them off (same as killing off the guys weirdly in their second season of Buddy System), i'm wary of their fictional efforts. Don't get me wrong, the cloud episode was lovely! But their work can be very hit or miss - sweet and enjoyable, or *very* dark, often both. I don't have the capacity for weirdly dark codependent death stuff right now. They do tend towards that, however artistically, however deep they want it to be, and NOT everyone loves watching death stuff about characters they like. I don't want to watch dark humor right now. IMO, their daily show is easy, calming, background content - but their fictional efforts are (often) extremely dark. I don't know why people are pretending the audience should be the same for both. Yes they're in L.A. but realistically not everyone loves dark experimental fictional short films. I would be more impressed with a promise of happy endings than how much budget / creativity their work involves. So I am not the audience, and I am not the only one among regular viewers. I wish them well, of course, but really? How is this shocking to anyone? The audience they've cultivated really doesn't like surprises. (Sometimes due to mental health or neurodiversity reasons, sometimes due to life situations, etc. They like the routine shows, the familiar format.) Don't make me love a character and then kill him (and his best friend or other half) off so you can feel something. I really do wish they can get what they want out of the series. I just find it odd how they don't understand it's not for everyone.

This is an interesting take. I admit I never considered their scripted work “dark” but just having some dark moments but now that you said that I am literally surprised at myself because I have been making these very posts about their scripted content largely being about one sad story… I’m not being much of help here but I remembered that one thing Rhett has said that made the most profound impression on me, many years ago, I remember it vividly, in the EB about laughter and jokes, he had said “We are fundamentally sad people”. It’s the one thing that left a mark and shaped from that point entirely the way I view them and what I think of them.

We don’t disagree though. That’s pretty much what I was saying - they have created a fanbase that does not exactly match their artistic vision. GMM, sure. But their art style needs to build a separate fanbase, with some overlap of course for people like me. However, they base all their hopes on people of routine, on people who want only lighthearted inconsequential content, on people who watch with their kids. It never ceases to amaze me how they have all these dozens of people working and monitoring and quizzing for them and they still can’t bloody understand their own fans.

[stormblessed95]

Hey stormy! What are your thoughts on the docuseries so far?

(Hit send before finishing) the pacing feels a bit odd to me, like in ep 3 we’re already in 2019 and I just feel like there’s so much more we could’ve seen of the early days :(

I personally am loving it. But I'm also missing BTS so bad I'll take them anyway they wanna give them to me. Lmfao I also think it's well done enough and is SO SO SO important for ARMYs who haven't seen more of their history yet or who are new to watch this docu series. Learning their history is so fundamental to being their fan and understanding who they are honestly. And this is such a perfect chance to do that in a way that is less overwhelming than "here's hundreds of thousands of hours of content, go get caught up."

I think the docu series highlights how important it is for ARMY, new and old and in between, to go back to their roots and understand their history and where BTS has come from and how's it shaped them into who they are now as people and as idols. And how they relate to and love ARMY and the WHY that is behind all of that too. There is good reasons why ARMYs are so protective of BTS and seeing why first hand and knowing their roots for yourself is better than just hearing why from other people. Learning their history should come first for us as fans.... And this docu series is such a good opportunity for people to do that!

THAT SAID!! I don't disagree with you about the editing or wanting more. I will never stop wanting more about BTS. I devour everything they give me and hoard new information about them like an absolute weirdo. Lol and their editing team is always low-key a little whack. Like their ITS editing is all the hell over the place and so messy 😂😂 it's a choice... They keep doing this. We learn to live with it clearly and love it regardless because we love the content 😂 oh well. It's not *too bad* it does just timeline hop alot which I can see how that can be confusing at times for some people and feeling the desire for even more.

[msmargaretmurry]

Apparently the players themselves absolutely hated last year’s all star game which was a shocker to me. It looked fun from my view! But a lot of reporters have said guys were talking shit and didn’t like it. I personally find joy in watching Connor McDavid’s money laundering scheme but it was not as fun as last year’s in my eyes. I do appreciate making it a mega competition where there’s one big prize at the end but I wish more guys competed. This one really just felt like a competition between Cale and Connor for a lot of it.

anon i'm so sorry you sent this EONS ago and i've just been so busy i haven't had the chance to sit down and write out all the all star game thoughts and ponderings i've been having. because i know we are probably all sick of the asg complaining and discourse but i genuinely think it is such an interesting topic! what makes a "good" all star weekend? what is the criteria for measuring "good"? ideally you create an event that is widely appealing to both fans and players but that's surprisingly difficult, and imo sometimes those things are kind of fundamentally at odds!

lots of asg thoughts (complaints) under the cut lol sorry, i do not expect people to actually read all this

i'm not SHOCKED to hear that players didn't like the asw in florida because i feel like guys have been complaining about the asw since time immemorial, but i too am surprised that they apparently complained so much that the nhl decided they had to overhaul the whole skills comp. i went to the asg in florida and certainly had my quibbles about the experience from a fan standpoint but overall had a really fun time. my main complaint is that there was too many pre-recorded stuff during the skills comp — like, i didn't pay money to sit in this arena and watch videos on the jumbotron, you know? so while i do like when there's a special skills event that kind of pays homage to the host city, and i surely am not complaining about the #content we got out of the dunk tank, that was a little frustrating!

a complaint i know players have had about the skills competition in the past is that they don't want to be embarrassed, and while obviously it can be embarrassing to fall during fastest skater or take 46 seconds doing the accuracy shooting, it has seemed like for a lot of them the events they think are most likely to be embarrassing are the events that rely on leaning into personality and being silly/funny and creative in non-hockey ways — events that really lean into the entertainment part of it all instead of the athlete part, like the breakaway challenge. the vast majority of these guys do not like to think of themselves as entertainers! in their minds they're just hockey players! and hockey culture actively dissuades guys from standing out and having loud personalities so it makes sense that many of them would be more comfortable in a contest that's pure skills!

unfortunately the most fun and memorable parts of all star weekends are almost always the parts where guys DO show a lot of personality and/or are blatantly just having fun, not when they're concentrating super hard on executing skills events. i caught a bit of the nfl pro bowl and was so struck by how it seemed like the players were having so much FUN. there was so much JOY. it made it compelling and entertaining even though it don't follow the nfl closely enough to know who many of the guys at the pro bowl were.

like, i'm not knocking pure skills events. i genuinely enjoy watching these elite athletes be extremely good at things. the classic skills events — fastest skater, hardest shot — are fun to watch! and i'm not fundamentally opposed to more pure skills events. the pvp goalie save streak event was so fun, for example. but i thought a lot of the events invented for this year were too samey. they didn't really showcase different types of skills, they were just riffing on similar skill sets. it wasn't compelling to me, and i also thought it was kind of lol that everyone but connor had to learn the events on the fly and that definitely disadvantaged them.

AND i truly hated that only a handful of guys got to do the skills competition. to me one of the most fun things about the skills comp is the chance to see guys from teams all across the league and have some surprises about who does really well in events! that can't happen when the nhl decides that two-thirds of the teams don't even get representation in the skills comp, that over half the players aren't good enough to include in the event. who knows, maybe those guys preferred hanging out and drinking and watching, and that's valid of them, but as a fan — you invited my guys to the asg but didn't think they were good enough to do a few silly skill games? felt kinda shitty, man!

so while i do like connor, it really irked me the way the whole competition felt like it was designed to showcase him. yes, he's truly great, and it's fun to watch him be great! but i can turn on literally any oilers game and watch him be great; i don't need a whole event designed to showcase it. i want the the all star weekend to celebrate the LEAGUE, to use this opportunity to highlight great players who maybe DON'T constantly get the spotlight anyway IN ADDITION to the big names. i can't remember any skills comp in the past, even ones featuring generational talents at their peaks, that felt so pointedly designed to showcase a single player and it really rubbed me the wrong way. this isn't a knock against connor; it's a knock against how the nhl framed and presented the whole thing.

obviously this is my personal opinion, i've seen plenty of people who thought it was fun. that's valid! i am not The ASG Worth Decider, i am just one fan with a lot of feelings. i can also understand how it could have been more fun in-person than televised. unfortunately i was watching on tv so that's the only experience i can opine about. but also in addition to my personal opinion i objectively feel like it's a huge missed marketing opportunity. you're not gonna spark people's interests in watching new teams/players if you keep hammering home that this one guy is the guy worth watching.

though honestly, the entire skills comp experience for me was deeply colored by how awful i thought the commentary was. the constant judginess toward players instead of joy and celebration of players was gross. the way they kept leaning hard into the million dollar prize as this huge motivating factor for these millionaires to win a series of silly games was gross. it's very possible i would have enjoyed it more if the commentary didn't suck so much, lmao.

also sorry i gotta complain real quick about the sheer number of canucks and leafs. sorry i know this is such an annoying complaint. i am even very fond of a lot of the guys from those teams who were voted in but my god there were too many of them. i would have let three leafs slide since they're the host team and toronto is ~so special~ even though many host teams have only gotten one or two players in the past, but this was a bridge too far. "they were decided by popular vote what else did you expect" i'm not an idiot, okay, that is exactly what i expected to happen with the popular vote. my complaint is not that the popular vote popular voted, it's that the nhl decided that's how they were gonna do things. the whole damn system is bad!!!

and lest it be concluded from this post that i am SOLELY a hater let me say for the record that i don't think the whole thing was bad. there were some really fun moments! i love that they brought the asg draft back and i had a lot of fun watching it. i thought the ACTUAL all star games were really entertaining and fun to watch. i thought that one musical guest in the sens outfit killed it. my beef is really just with a bunch of aspects of the skills comp lmao.

in conclusion: more joy!!! more celebration of the league as a whole!!! more chances for unexpected all star heroes!!!

[phightinghottakes]

Uhm, here I have some thingies to say on Scythe.

I think she's well designed, and her colord are nice BUT:

-- I don't think that her skin color matches the palate. And no, I'm not being racist, as a mixed person, I don't tend to be biased in either direction. If she was made to be black originally, then I wouldn't say anything, as that would be kinda weird. But, because she was made with a skin color that fit her palate perfectly well, only to be made darker, which doesn't match, bothers me a bit. There are many other characters that would've been better to make darkskinned, if they just wanted to be inclusive (Banhammer, Skateboard, Boombox, etc.). Also, I feel like when creators try and be inclusive, they forget that there are more colors than just 'black'and 'white', they could've just kept her light-skinned, or made her look more mixed, but no, there are only two races. Other than that, I don't have much to say, she's basically perfect, and it's not like her skin color ruins the design, it just bothers me a little bit.

2. Personality is a bit off

-- In all homesty, she's a new character, so it's a bit odd how people expect her to already be fully fleshed out, however, she feels like a predator, ehoch makes sense, seeing that she's a serial killer, bit there's something else that triggers me a little, but maybe I'm just sensitive

-- (This is going to get me argued with, so let me put a disclaimer: Scythestaff is a perfectly fine ship, this os my personal opinion and why I don't PERSONALLY like it, do not argue with me, because there is nothing to argue about, I am allowed to share my opinion as you are yours. I would also like to very quickly mention that I have been involved in these sorts of 'being flirted with unwantedly by a much older person' relationships, so that makes me biased and 'sensitive' to this sort of stuff)

-- I don't like the way she talks to Vinestaff. It feels like she's flirting, but not in the healthy way, and Vinestaff doesn't seem to like it based off of her responses. Scythe is, fundamentally (in my mind and from what I have read), cat-calling a much younger woman who is communicating that she is uncomfortable with that. And for me, that makes me like her character much less, not that I'm saying I liked the fact that she was a killer, but there's something about being a creep that's... more uncomfortable for me.

3. TRUE EYE

-- One thing I will say is that i like the fact that there isn't much about the True Eye, it gives us room to theorize, to be involved, to IMAGINE! Maybe it's just cause I grew up with Matpat and like writing, but I enjoy having to come up with own ideas and digging for information. We have a basic idea of some of the relations and statuses, as well as information on Lost Temples itself, and I feel like that's all I need.

-- I guess it's resonable to rather be handed lore, but i like being able to form ideas as a fandom, through creative writing and posts, not being spoon-fed information.

4. Fanart and stuff

-- I like most of the fanart where she had a more 'masculine' build (less curves, flatter chest, muscular), over where she's incredibly feminine. I don't think there's anything wrong with making he feminine, but I just imagine her being a lean woman, so she wouldn't have much shape or fat on her

-- This links to the fact that I don't think that she looks too old. For one part, in this day and age, not a lot of 40 years old, specifically not the rich ones (which Scythe definitely is, have wrinkles and that sort of stuff. I think she has SOME wrinkles, but it's not very noticeable. Also, she's probably really fit, seeing as she's a serial killer, the weapon she uses, and just her overall character. I do get why people would rather her look older, though, I just think that she would look closer to 30 than anything else.

-- I also don't like her being used for fan service. She is a strong, independent, powerful, dangerous woman, not someone you can 'fix' or should make to solely be simped on, not to say that she should be unattractive, just keep her other factors in, not just the fact that she's 'sexy'.

That's all I really have to say on her. I'll talk about someone else later!!

-- 🌒 : D

.

[lanaevyssmoved]

👀 what if I was interested in that Gale poly rant but in a positive way?

LKSJFDLKFJGDFG i can't use the rant on you then because it would be too clinical and i would angry swear sometimes probably

but honestly like. first we need to talk about halsin . wait first we need to talk about poly as a sexuality

i'm going to try and not turn this into a massive character analysis or analysis of queer identity in media etc so i will attempt to retain my humour throughout to ground me

people who are poly tend to sit on either side of a coin. poly is a preferred state of relationship, or just a state of relationship they enjoy, and they can do just fine with monogamy, and everything is chill - ultimate relaxed person mode. the other side is the group of poly individuals who view poly as important to them and their sexual identity as being straight or gay or bisexual or pansexual or any other identity. for them it is part of the queer umbrella and it is fundamental to their being, they can't turn it off, they can't be ok with monogamy, this is who they are.

for reference, halsin is the latter. poly is part of his sexual identity.

halsins poly rep is, spoken from a poly person, ok. it is ok. it's not good, it's not bad. it's mostly the stuff around halsin i don't like. (and i am not going to talk about his drow situation, for reference, because that shit goes beyond poly rep.) making halsin token poly, for lack of a better word, would realistically be fine in most situations, in fact i've talked with aisling about this and i would have preferred they made him poly with no poly options in the game to go with him over what we got - we can't forget he was added late, he isn't as fleshed out, he feels a bit misplaced sometimes, and his poly goes hand in hand with that. he could have existed as a poly character, which nearly all wood elves are in canon, without shoving in some poly options for him with existing companions who would explore that with anyone else despite the game allowing you to romance those companions with the other companions if you play as them? and they flirt with each other in banter quite regularly? i don't know. it feels very like, o shit we gotta make him poly he's a wood elf! and he's a druid! but we have no options for him! who are the easiest to add without it feeling odd??? like idk. it doesn't feel great from a poly pov, and if you enjoy like halsin x shart x tav or halsin x astarion x tav that's totally cool - i am not dismissing these at all because i don't fucking care about canon so even if it didn't exist in canon in a way i don't really like, i would still be cool with it.

our poly rep leaves much to be desired, tldr.

i am happy it exists, however. and my hope is that one day in the future when we have an rpg where every romance option is bisexual or pansexual that they are also poly. that is my ultimate ideal for the future of these situations in gaming. i know some people are uncomfortable with poly, but that's why we refer to what i first said. you can have characters like halsin where it is fundamental to their being - they will never be monogamous, you cannot change them. but you can also have individuals who are cool with monogamy if you're not comfortable with polyamory. i want characters who will date each other on their own, and you can join the polycule, or get involved with just one of them. i want devs to be open minded and not give us a token polyamorous character and instead explore it in better ways.

i have known many poly people, i've dated poly people of both sides of the coin, i've been involved with people who are married to someone they don't live with but have nesting partners (a partner they live with who isn't their spouse) and multiple partners on the side and follow the hierarchy side of poly. my ex helped me understand poly as a sexuality and they also didn't subscribe to poly hierarchy and all their partners would be equal. poly is an expansive identity and it deserves the attention and respect other queer identities do.

a poly person creating poly ships and poly situationships with a character or characters who are confirmed monogamous is the same to me as a gay person creating gay ships and gay situationships with a character or characters who are confirmed straight. and that might be divisive, because many people, including queer people are not ready for or not comfortable with polyamory yet in their spaces. now i can be respectful of people who have trauma around polyamory because they were involved with someone who used it as a weapon - usually done by someone who isn't actually poly. but we as poly people deserve to take up space, we deserve to be in your media, we deserve respect, we deserve to be represented well.

and if video game devs aren't going to do that for me, you bet your ass i'm gonna do it for myself. no one can take that power for me.

what exists in my game doesn't have to mean shit for yours - it doesn't exist in yours. it is a thing i do for me to make me happy. if anyone gets upset about that they need to go outside.

please don't cast a witches curse on me

i might come back to edit this ... i haven't proof read it..... this was just screaming <3 i'm too tired to read my own words back