#i just keep saying things

[kindalikerackham]

In the creation of the time traveller, we imagine time in loops, in lines, in an endless branching explosion of decisions into a silly little network graph. None of these fully encapsulate the way we generally portray time (and I'm sure my suggestion will be no exception). Even in this branching eternity, our stories coalesce into the one core timeline, the one true story's outcome.

Maybe I've just been scrolling past too many mobile game ads, but I've recently become fond of another visualization. In my mind, the water of time flows down, down, down, and the facts of physical life shape its direction and speed, its depth and intensity.

It is thus the task of the time traveller to adjust that direction. Outside of time, they present new obstacles to its path upon returning, and the shape of the water changes, sometimes in minute twinges affecting few, sometimes in swirls of paradoxical eddies and stagnation, and, often, in the alteration of the flows beneath it.

Thus, the origin of the time traveler is real, and the river that dripped their way created them. And thus, the flow of time ceases to water it.

Thus, the new obstacles presented by the time traveler have real and lasting effects on the path of the water, though often much remains the same.

The old path of the water is no longer possible, but its still real. And it's effects will last, barring other obstacles' intervention.

That old path can be returned to, if the obstacles is removed or significantly altered.

Other streams may exist as well, but they're not xx

And in it all, time continues to flow down through the obstacles of space and time and human tampering

[sentienceisoverrated]

Exams really put you through the ‘is this me talking or is this the stress?’

[kindalikerackham]

Wikipedia says "you haven't contributed anything significantly original enough to be a notable figure."

I don't always agree with the decisions of Wikipedia's volunteer editors, but having learned that their decision on how to handle the James Somerton situation was to deem him non-notable and turn his article into a redirect to a brief writeup of Hbomberguy's plagiarism investigation – well, like I said, this may not be a good decision, but in context it's an extremely funny one.

[stil-lindigo]

lead balloon (the tumblr post that saved me)

if this comic resonated with you, it would mean the world to me if you donated to this palestinian family's escape fund.

--

no creative notes because this isn't that kind of comic.

I know I don’t owe any of you anything but I still felt compelled to write about my long term absence. And I feel far enough away from the dangerous spot I was in to be able to make this comic. I have a therapist now, and she agreed that making this could be a very cathartic gesture, and the start of properly leaving these thoughts behind me. I am still, at seemingly random times, blindsided by fleeting desires to kill myself. They’re always passing urges, but it’s disarming, and uncomfortable. I worry sometimes that my brain’s spent so long thinking only about suicide that it’s forgotten how to think about anything else. Like, now that I've opened that door for myself, I'll never be able to fully shut it again. But I’m trying my best to encourage my mind in other directions. We'll see how that goes.

I am still donating all proceeds from my store to Palestinian causes. So far, I've donated over $15K, not including donations coming from my own pocket or the fundraising streams which jointly raised around $10K. In the time since I made my initial post about where this money would be going, the focus has shifted from aid organisations to directly donating to escape funds.

If you'd like to do the same, you can look at Operation Olive Branch, which hosts hundreds of Palestinian escape funds or donate to Safebow, which has helped facilitate the safe crossing and securing of important medical procedures for over 150 at-risk palestinians since the beginning of the genocide.

[brucie-baby]

the fact that alfred was the one to put up jason's memorial is so important to me

[pangur-and-grim]

my mom was saying that I'm pretty unlucky when it comes to cat health, but I was saying that a lot of folk have issues like mine, it's just that they don't deal with them and then the cat dies.

she said "that's not true at all," and I had to list how many cats my aunt and uncle have burnt through in the same time I've had Pangur and Grim. and then I talked about an old friend who would never even name her kittens, because they always died within the first year. and of friends who've watched their cats deteriorate without going to the vet, while saying "there's nothing I can do." in mainstream culture, cat death is normal and invisible. it's just that a lot of time the cat dies outside of the house (whether through illness, accident, or predation) so people get to maintain deniability.

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

main take aways from Halloween (1978) rewatch:

michael myers is canonically 21??? this bitch should be at the club

*sees tiddies* ***MURDEROUS RAMPAGE NOISES***

that's it that's the movie

outside of the fact that everyone who has sex is murdered by the narrative, this is a surprisingly chill portrayal of female sexuality? these teen girls are horny and actively enjoying Getting It On with their boytoys. no pushy boyfriends sneaking in through their bedroom windows--these ladies are taking the initiative to sneak out and GET SOME. one of them gets laid and then immediately orders her boyfriend to get her a beer. (yes she gets Slashered soon afterward, but so does the boyfriend so honestly, gender equality.) yes the Final Girl is the only one not having sex, but she's not bullied for that, nor are her friends slut shamed except possibly by being murdered by the narrative

actually the only character who is shown being morally condemned on-screen is michael myers. specifically FOR his violent overreaction to other people's sex lives. (people he is spying on). metaphorically, the villain is American Puritanism sticking its judgy nose into other people's business.

aka Michael Myers Is A Republican

but actually the real villain is the doctor. guy's a judgemental, shaming, pathologizing asshole. and he's been in charge of michael's care since he was SIX YEARS OLD? kid never had a chance. i'd go on a killing spree too

also the parents. where are the parents? it's halloween night and all the teenage girls are home babysitting their younger siblings? come to think of it, michael's first victim was his own older sister, whom he killed while she was babysitting him. teen girls are really shouldering a labour burden here. maybe parentification is the true villain

side note: mike commits his first murder wearing a clown costume...which is never referenced again? his 'iconic' costume is a generic mask and wig and jumpsuit, when we coulda had a Killer Clown Michael Myers??? travesty

i like how the Final Girl and her friend casually smoke weed in her car. yeah she's an honor student and her friend is the sheriff's daughter. yeah they smoke weed. so what it's 1978

(to reiterate, mike is 21 and should be at the club. im not saying he shouldn't be rampaging, im saying it's sad that he broke out, tasted freedom for the first time in his life, and immediately snuck back into his childhood home to go rampaging. let's have a remake where he goes to a nightclub and has a few beers. maybe some slutty dancing. then rampage)

oh no he's hot

[iamanartichoke]

I don't know who needs to hear this, but as a creator -

I am fine with "the audience" -

downloading my fics

printing my fics

copy/pasting or screenshotting my fics

sharing your saved copy of my fics with anyone else who might want them in the unlikely but never impossible case that my fics are no longer available on ao3

making a book of my fic(s) and running your fingers across the pages while lovingly whispering my precioussss

doing these things with anything I create for fandom, such as meta, headcanons, au nonsense like 'texts from the brodinsons,' etc

I am not fine with "the audience"

doing any of the above with the purpose/intent of plagiarizing my work or passing it off as their own in any capacity

feeding my work into ai for any reason whatsoever

Save the fandom things. Preserve the fandom things. Respect the fandom things.

Enjoy the fandom things.

[kindalikerackham]

This is how you know the Cass Review authors and others urging to "put the brakes" on supplying medical transitioning tools fundamentally do not understand the trans experience:

When they reviewed the qualitative data, the most common response they received was "I wish I knew there was more than one way" to explore my gender. They took this to mean "Stop! We're giving them too much too soon! We don't understand this, and they're saying they didn't need it!"

If they actually knew what this phrase meant to the trans community, they'd be able to apply that to their recommendations. If they listened to the full statement nearly any trans person says, they'd have different recommendations (e.g. let children test out different social transitions, advocate for an environment that's conducive for that experimentation (with or without parent's knowledge!), giving them the knowledge and the space to explore the vastness of gender identification and expression in non-permanent fashion).

Instead, they're using phrasing like that to create their own medical standards that aren't listening to what we're saying (standards that boost their own egos for "going against the grain").

That's the problem with an individualized poor-naive-young-girls medical approach. It hears "I wish I knew about the many ways I can exist in relation to the gender binary" (often directly followed by: "but I'm so glad I got here, living nontraditionally wrt gender"), and it says "we need to STOP letting them do this to themselves!"

It hears "transitions are most successful in treating youth mental health issues when combined with a trusting intimate parental relationship," and it says "parents NEED to be on board with this to do anything" instead of "parents need to be supportive of their child and their child's experimentation if they want to successfully assist in building their child's mental health and future life," instead of "trying to experiment with gender transition with unsupportive or obtuse parents damages that relationship so completely that they lose one enormous society-permitted safety net and thus their mental health remains precarious, now from different stressors."

It hears "trans folks are often unemployed," and it says "medically transitioning doesn't help trans people 'contribute to society,'" instead of "trans people have a hard time getting jobs, especially when they are visibly trans," instead of "we should advocate for a working environment and hiring process that doesn't debase or ignore trans existence."

It hears "trans mental health poor and often neurodivergent" and says "what if trans bad?????"

Get a fucking grip. Listen to the people you're talking over.

1- Demands like these are not a new thing. Trans people were (and in some cases still are) medically gatekept if they were not judged as likely to end up living a normal, "respectable", "passing", and extremely gender-conforming heterosexual life. Often these judgments were made based on race.

In fact, what the suggestion above is is a repeat of historical trends.

2- This all is still working from the assumption that being trans is a disease and transition is a sort of last resort to be avoided as much as possible in favor of the alternative of just doing nothing, or possibly doing conversion therapy. Somehow they never seem to demand very strict evidence in favor of that.

It is a very uneven sort of skepticism. Transition remains suspicious no matter how many times people say it helped them but conversion therapy and HRT bans are treated as neutral, even effective alternatives based on nothing.

3- History and hypocrisy aside, it's just bad if someone's rights and autonomy are contingent on stuff like employment, isn't it? Imagine if you were required to prove the correctness of all decisions about your body this way.

Want an abortion? Well, we can't be sure an abortion would actually make your life better unless we make sure you're likely to be employed and having whatever I define as a good sex life afterwards. Don't you remember that "I regret my abortion" campaign? Sure most people say they don't, but what if they're lying?

You're gay and want to have sex and get married to someone of the same gender? Well, we don't know if you actually want that or if it would be good for you, thus we must ban those options for your own good until we make sure gay people are just as employed and socially connected after coming out and if not they shouldn't be allowed these freedoms. Hope your family doesn't just kick you out of the house when they find out!

[bigfatbreak]

Birds of a Feather previous / next

[xxplastic-cubexx]

alternate apocalypse ending or something who the hcrist knows anymore

[egophiliac]

some more Twst pokemon as my brain melts at the impending episode 7 drop tomorrow! ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ

I went with Gholdengo and Cufant for Kalim, and Seviper and Malamar for Jamil! I went back and forth a looooot on whether to give Malamar to Jamil or Azul, but ultimately I think it just fits Jamil better. (Seviper was a given though)

[knownoshamc]

Armand + why would you say that if you have only met this man once

[jenanigans1207]

What I wanted so badly was for Mary to learn about her boys from Cas. Like that night where Cas finds her when she can’t sleep and she expresses that she just doesn’t know anything about her sons since she missed so much?? All I wanted was for Cas to sit down with her at the table and just start telling her about them. Basic stuff at first: their favorite foods, their sleeping habits, the stuff he’s just observed by being their passenger for years.

And then I want him to say something totally Cas, like “Dean always wears more layers but that’s because his body naturally runs two degrees colder than Sam’s. But that’s normal for him and not indicative of any illness, so it’s nothing to worry about.”

And as they talk, it starts to get a little deeper, and Cas tells her more. He tells her about what she missed, about all the horrible things that happened to her sons and how they coped; how it changed them. And he tells her about Sam, he does, but really it ends up being all about Dean.

He’ll tell her about how Dean clenches his fists when he’s upset, even as he tries to keep his face impassive. About how Dean drums his fingers on the steering wheel when he’s anxious. He’ll tell her about Dean’s nightmares, about the ways he’s chosen to cope. He’ll tell her how to know when to approach Dean and when to give him space, how to gently acknowledge what he’s feeling without pushing him too far.

And with every word he says, Mary’s curious head tilt from when she’d seen them hug in reunion turns into a bone deep type of certainty. Because Cas is telling her things that only someone who paid special attention would notice. He’s telling her things that only someone very, very close to her son’s heart would know.

Cas will tell her the cliff notes of what they’ve been through; will tell her how the whole world looked to Dean and he rose to the occasion over and over again. He’ll tell her about Dean’s doubts in himself and then vehemently declare them as wrong and explain, at length, why. He will tell her about the people Dean has loved— the people who loved him like he was their own— and lost. He will tell her about Bobby, Ellen, Jody, Donna, and Charlie. He’ll tell her about Claire, too, and how Dean stepped up.

And the whole time, Mary will have this realization that oh, she may not have been around to guide and protect her sons, but there was always someone there to care for them and support them when they needed it. She will realize that she and John may have left them, but they were never alone.

But more than that, there was someone there for Dean. Someone picking Dean over and over again while Dean picked Sam, or the world, over himself. There was someone fighting for Dean when he wasn’t fighting for himself. There was someone who saw Dean, and loved him unconditionally.

Sitting across from her, at the asscrack of dawn, filling her in on all the things she missed was every mother’s dream: someone who loved her child with the kind of devotion that would break the world. And from the sounds of the stories she was being told, it did break the world. Someone whose love is entirely untainted and comes without any strings attached.

It’s so clear to her as she listens to Cas talk that Cas loves Dean with no expectations. That loving Dean is something he just does, like he doesn’t know how not to love Dean, like the possibility of not loving him never occurred to Cas. He loves Dean in a way that Mary knows can and will soothe Dean’s sharp edges and battered heart. He loves Dean in the kind of pure way that tells Mary that it will continue to endure and overcome everything without ever diminishing, even the littlest amount.

Mary, through tears, will tell Cas how she always told Dean that there were angels watching over him. And before Cas can make some comment about Dean being the Righteous Man and the interest of most of Heaven, she will place a hand over his and give him a motherly look that will convey all the things she’s not sure how to say— and the things she’s not sure Cas is ready to hear yet. And Cas will flush and look away, mumbling about how her son is very special to him.

And when she pulls him into a hug and murmurs thank yous into his shoulder, she will be comforted in the knowledge that her sons turned out to be wonderful men, and that they managed to stay together through everything. She will be comforted to know that no matter what happens, no matter her shortcomings as she tries to fill a role she never meant to leave, Sam will have Dean and Dean will have Cas.

And this time, when Cas tells her that she belongs here, she will believe him. And she will tell him that he belongs here, too.

And when Dean wakes up a few hours later and wanders in to find Mary and Cas still chatting over the table, he’ll be surprised— but pleased— to find Mary looking more at ease. He’ll be pleased when she gives him a warm hug and pats him on the cheek and tell him with all the sincerity that only a mother can muster that she’s glad that he met Castiel. And when Dean agrees, a little confused, Mary will just smile at him.

“I always said I’d like a third son.” She says, “so give him a reason to take our last name, won’t you?”

And Dean will splutter and turn fifteen shades of red as he steadfastly doesn’t look at Cas but mumbles something that suggests he’s not against the idea at all.

And Mary will laugh again and wink at an equally red Cas before heading towards the kitchen like “Cas said waffles are your favorite, so I hope you’re hungry!”

[just-null]

wrestling to be the first to greet you (they broke into your house)

[bookalicent]

yeah so this was insane