#i know many people who encourage in this way.

[iatheia]

I'm not sure I entirely agree? I would love nothing more than if every single student in my class got an A, if they demonstrated they understood the material, and demonstrated it in the homeworks and on the exam. But, there is always a fraction of students who refuse to even show up or do the barest minimum. And plenty of students would half-ass it. And after you taught a class enough times, you can pretty well intuit not "this is the bell curve distribution, and it has to be maintained no matter what" but "this student is doing comparatively to all those who have earned this grade in the past". I strive to have a consistent grading, but it isn't necessarily imposes a particular distribution of grades on a particular class, just that on average you would get certain types of students year after year.

Of course, if you have multiple people teaching the same class, you should communicate with your fellow instructors, striving to have consistency. You want to be fair to the students, if they answer the question incorrectly, but they answer it in the same way, that deserves the same grade, you shouldn't have the case where one student would get a B, and another a D for the same submission assignment in the same class, with the only difference being who is grading them. But this is solved through having a consistent rubrics, not through it being free-for all for the TAs and then trying to match each other's grade distribution.

My opinion on ChatGPT is that it is a tool like any other. And if you know how to use it, great. But in order to use it effectively, you already need to know quite a bit about the material. Even the thing that it is supposedly good at, writing computer code, it cannot handle anything more than the most trivial of tasks without hand-holding. About half of my class involves programing. And it is incredibly obvious when a student uses it. So many times they ended up generating random data instead of using the data provided to them, because a student mindlessly copied over what chatgpt has given them and didn't care if it is correct or not.

Obviously it isn't a problem unique to ChatGPT. A decade ago, there was a different type of assignment that I gave, they needed to go outside and record some observations. And if you know what you are doing, these "recordings" are incredibly easy to fake, and I would have been none the wiser. But if you don't know what you are doing... I had a student trying to convince me that they have never seen the Moon in their life after I caught them trying to "observe" it when it was below the horizon.

But generative AI amplifies the problem more. Even if you wanted to use Spark Notes, at least you needed to read those, and engage with the material to at least some degree. They were also written by people who understood the material, so even if students regurgitate that, they wouldn't be lead quite as far astray. With ChatGPT, students don't even need to read what it wrote to submit it, but they are also more blindsided when it takes them astray.

There were a couple of students I ended up calling out on its usage. One of them has admitted that he had no idea what he is doing, and I sat with him, and I walked him through the assignment, from the beginning to the end. And he is still not great at it, it doesn't come to him naturally at all, but you can definitely see him improving after he started doing stuff without resorting to AI. I can see him being more engaged, more interested in trying to succeed. The other student... is a bit of a hopeless case. They don't care, and I have no idea what is it is they are trying to get out of not just my class, but their major as a whole, because what they are getting out it so far ain't much...

Point is, yes, a diploma doesn't make a person more special than someone who doesn't have one. What matters is your passion, and whether you are willing to put in the work. Classes are meant to encourage cognitive development, to broaden the perspective, to gain at least some skills that would be useful to you later in life - they aren't the only way to get these skills, of course, you can do it in other settings if you chose to apply yourself elsewhere instead. But, if you chose to pursue higher education, then I would hope that by the end of the 4 years, you would get something meaningfull out of it, and this would only happen if you actually put in at least some modicum of effort. Otherwise you might as well buy your diploma off the street, and that would benefit absolutely nobody, least of all yourself.

(taken from a post about AI)

speaking as someone who has had to grade virtually every kind of undergraduate assignment you can think of for the past six years (essays, labs, multiple choice tests, oral presentations, class participation, quizzes, field work assignments, etc), it is wild how out-of-touch-with-reality people’s perceptions of university grading schemes are. they are a mass standardised measurement used to prove the legitimacy of your degree, not how much you’ve learned. Those things aren’t completely unrelated to one another of course, but they are very different targets to meet. It is standard practice for professors to have a very clear idea of what the grade distribution for their classes are before each semester begins, and tenure-track assessments (at least some of the ones I’ve seen) are partially judged on a professors classes’ grade distributions - handing out too many A’s is considered a bad thing because it inflates student GPAs relative to other departments, faculties, and universities, and makes classes “too easy,” ie, reduces the legitimate of the degree they earn. I have been instructed many times by professors to grade easier or harder throughout the term to meet those target averages, because those targets are the expected distribution of grades in a standardised educational setting. It is standard practice for teaching assistants to report their grade averages to one another to make sure grade distributions are consistent. there’s a reason profs sometimes curve grades if the class tanks an assignment or test, and it’s generally not because they’re being nice!

this is why AI and chatgpt so quickly expanded into academia - it’s not because this new generation is the laziest, stupidest, most illiterate batch of teenagers the world has ever seen (what an original observation you’ve made there!), it’s because education has a mass standard data format that is very easily replicable by programs trained on, yanno, large volumes of data. And sure the essays generated by chatgpt are vacuous, uncompelling, and full of factual errors, but again, speaking as someone who has graded thousands of essays written by undergrads, that’s not exactly a new phenomenon lol

I think if you want to be productively angry at ChatGPT/AI usage in academia (I saw a recent post complaining that people were using it to write emails of all things, as if emails are some sacred form of communication), your anger needs to be directed at how easily automated many undergraduate assignments are. Or maybe your professors calculating in advance that the class average will be 72% is the single best way to run a university! Who knows. But part of the emotional stakes in this that I think are hard for people to admit to, much less let go of, is that AI reveals how rote, meaningless, and silly a lot of university education is - you are not a special little genius who is better than everyone else for having a Bachelor’s degree, you have succeeded in moving through standardised post-secondary education. This is part of the reason why disabled people are systematically barred from education, because disability accommodations require a break from this standardised format, and that means disabled people are framed as lazy cheaters who “get more time and help than everyone else.” If an AI can spit out a C+ undergraduate essay, that of course threatens your sense of superiority, and we can’t have that, can we?

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

big question. i'm cis (afab) and my gf is trans (amab) and i'm sorta having a hard time reconciling something. i've been a hard line feminist since i was about 8, by 12 i was a practical library on everything and anything womens lib. i'm spending a lot more time around trans people especially my gf now and i'm sorta struggling to reconcile the trans experience with my feminism. like- i'll see trans women being like "i hate my body :(" "my voice is awful" "i need [x thing to try to pass] ugh" and like my first thought is always "NO! THATS HOW THEY FUCKING GET YOU!!! THE PATRIARCHY WANTS YOU TO HATE YOURSELF SO YOU ENSLAVE YOURSELF TO CAPITALISM AND LIVE IN A CONSTANT STATE OF NEED FOR NEW PRODUCTS TO WARD OFF THE EVER PRESENT SELF HATRED BROUGHT ON YOU BY SOCIETY" and they go "well then how do i pass/transition?" and i honestly don't know and i also don't know how far it goes before its no longer dysphoria but instead the intentional subjugation of women by patriarchy for profit. i wanna help my fellow ladies but i honestly don't know how to like- apply the feminism i was taught as a child to trans women and i want to learn as soon as possible so that i can start doing it like yesterday

hi there,

I'll be honest: if it feels hard to apply the feminism you learned as a kid to your trans friends, that's probably because the feminism you were taught didn't have trans woman in mind.

luckily, the answer to this is something that I consider to be feminism 101: what a woman does with her body is, ultimately, her fucking business.

listen: I agree with you that the beauty industry(TM) is evil. it's misogynistic, it's exploitative, it thrives by making women feel bad enough about themselves to make them spend money on shit they don't need, etc. we all know this.

now, having said that: women who like makeup or wear heels or get laser hair removal or whatever other asinine thing are not my oppressor, nor are they my enemy. dare I say, we have bigger problems.

we also need to consider that many trans women are coming to these choices from a VERY different place than many cis women are. while I think my fellow cis women really benefit from reminders that they're allowed to stop shaving or wearing eyeliner or dieting or whatever, that's because most of us have had those actions forced on us from very young ages and may genuinely need a hand to feel secure breaking out of those behaviors.

the majority of trans women are not coming from a background where they were encouraged to partake in the same personal grooming habits and modes of presentation as cis women; many of them have, in fact, been ostracized, bullied, threatened, and otherwise hurt because of forays into forms of presentation that are considered feminine. no matter how good your intentions may be, approaching your advice indelicately can, unfortunately, make you come across as no different than any transphobe on the street trying to enforce cisnormative societal expectations. it also must be said that, for many trans women, the ability to "pass" is a matter of security - for having their status as women recognized at all, and to avoid harassment and abuse in public spaces. if you live in America, like I do, politicians in power currently have an extremely explicit anti-trans agenda that can make it harrowing to be visible as a trans person, and trans women in particular are frequently targeted for violence.

there are absolutely critiques to be made the way the many trans women are expected to perform hyperfemininity. the notion that someone is duty bound to drastically change their appearance in order to transition at all is itself extremely rooted in cisnormativity, and "passing" is often contingent on being young, thin, able-bodied, reasonably wealthy, and hewing as closely to Eurocentric standards of beauty as possible. that's not awesome! but that's also not the fault of any individual; no trans person asked to be born into a world where gender norms are so narrow and failing to pass can come with a very real risk of physical danger.

also, if I can circle back to this: again, women who participate in aspects of the beauty industry are not our enemies. there are always going to be some number of women who enjoy doing their makeup or like spending time fussing over their little outfits or want breast implants or whatever. some of those women are going to be trans. my official feminist stance on this is that I don't give a shit, because I believe in bodily autonomy even when it involves things I would not do personally and the choices that individual women make about how they want to style their little meat body don't even crack the top 100 things that I'm worried about right now. it's actually kind of vitally important, politically, that trans people be able to safely pursue their preferred gender expression; while it's not particularly revolutionary for a cis woman to go outside all dolled up, whether a trans woman can do that safely is a pretty basic litmus test for how safe a given space is for queer people. it's a ridiculously low bar, and many places will still fail to clear it.

so, yeah, I don't know, dude. be there to talk to your trans girlies if they want to start unpacking some of the pressure they feel to conform to a very rigid idea of womanhood, but whether or not they can walk down the street in your neighborhood safely is a WAY bigger issue than whether they decide to do voice training or not.

if you really want to cut to the root of the insecurity and vulnerability that the beauty industry thrives on exploiting, your time is much better spent working to ensure the trans women in your life feel safe and supported and have a community where they can find support regardless of how they look.

necessary disclaimer I'm a cis girl, any transfemme folks please share your voice here and feel free to clap my ass if I've said something out of line.

[drdemonprince]

so first off, sorry bc this is super fucking heavy.

re: commonalities between cis and trans men, and that other ask. something I've had to come to terms with is how even as a teenager before I had the concept of transitioning in my head - I still got all of the societal messaging wrt misogyny, etc. I totally benefited from it, even as a woman. I put other girls down. I was the cool chick. I cashed in where I could with it. i was absolutely a chauvinist when I transitioned. I felt inhuman as a woman, but I understood that ultimately that's the way women were *supposed* to be, as much as I wished otherwise. it took a long time to unlearn that.

my personal experience makes me very uncomfortable when I see other trans men talking about gendered socialization, or how overly negative people are towards men as a class. I wonder if they have ever sat down and really reconciled with the way they have, and do, benefit from their gendered position, or if they've convinced themselves they can't be a "bad person" by virtue of their birth sex.

I can't find a nuanced way to talk about this that won't be read in bad faith as essentialist rhetoric. rape culture is the system by which consent violation is normalized, its all the music and books and movies and bad relationships I assumed were normal and romantic as a young adult. I really, really hurt people, and I did it as men are encouraged to do, and as they are rewarded for doing. I found affirmation in hurting people, and it is so fucking easy to do this without even really thinking of it because it's the entire culture you've come up in.

I'm not even talking like, obvious cases here like phyrical domestic abuse & intentional date rape. there are so many subtle boundary erosions, there's weird gray areas around drugs & alcohol, there's attitudes and expectations in established relationships, there's the potential to exploit community for personal gain. there are partners who will fear you, and freeze and fawn and will not tell you "no."

a lot of the "we need a special word for masculine transphobia" types seem to also disavow the possibility that they hold male privelege. but we need to look at that shit, sexual or otherwise. it's scary to see guys who see women talking about it and they knee-jerk shout back "I'm not a rapist" and "not all men." guarantee some of them are, and just aren't aware of it. i was.

Thank you so much anon for this really brave, candid message. I think it's something that a lot of the trans guys crowing in my inbox about how cis men "are the bad gender" need to hear. (yes, someone literally said that to me). Portraying gendered categories, especially ones based on birth assignment!, as ontologically more evil or pure than others sets people up for abuse. Separating cis men out from trans men erases the ways in which trans guys can both leverage power and the ways in which toxic masculine norms are transmitted culturally to everyone regardless of assigned sex at birth. Lots of trans guys are palpably uncomfortable with their power, and can only see that relative to cis men, they experience transphobia and misogyny in greater amounts, and so they presume they must be in a highly victimized category. But they dont ever consider that as men they can and do often wield power over women -- especially trans women -- and they've got to fucking learn how to handle that reality responsibly, which many cis men actually do know how to fucking do. Especially multiply marginalized cis men who have been preyed upon and exploited themselves.

I think it's really powerful to hear you taking ownership of the actions you've taken that have hurt others, and the allure such actions had. Very few people have the courage to look their lower moments in the face and affirm that it's actually a part of them. If we're ever going to stop abusing and talking over women we've got to own up to our shit. I've seen what can happen when men come together to be vulnerable about their struggles, own their wrongdoing, and seek to change -- back when I was working in a men's drug treatment program. We can overcome this shit and take responsibility. But a lot of the birthday boy trans guy squad is incensed by even the idea of owing anything to anyone. Like a lot of MRAs.

[kamechan98]

Nah, it's cool, I understand

And yeah, the Anti-Blitz party may be something of a start with some of the people there. I'm of the opinion that some people are likely there for the party itself and that Blitz can't have emotionally screwed over that many people. Like, Dennis? They met for a few hours at Bee's party months ago, how is he THAT upset about it he needs to go to an Anti-Blitz party? Even for Blitz that's a bit much. But I also agree that it may not be the best option, as a friendship/relationship that is built on hating one person is not likely to last or be very good. If all you have in common is hating one specific person, what else is there to build on? Maybe some people there have built solid relationships while meeting at those parties, there did seem to be a quite a few couples and friends there, so who knows? Maybe there is a form of community and friendship between these people, finding comfort and support from each other after their heartbreak while also learning to move on and find love and joy again.

But I agree it's not what Stolas really needs, to have all of the good things he knows and feel about Blitz being disregared and blame everything on Blitz, twisting it around to make him the bad guy in every aspect of his life when that isn't true. We've seen that Stolas is trying to reflect and see where HE made the wrong step in their relationship, what he can learn from the whole thing and how he can do better in the future, which Verosika keeps trying to shut down.

"But maybe it's all on me For missin' every sign and every glance And every turn" "Maybe there's somethin' here for us to glean For you to teach, and me to try to learn"

"What if I came on too strong? What if I read this all wrong? What if we just don't belong?"

Stolas, while a bit delulu at times, a hopeless romantic and not anywhere near as self-aware as he needs to be, does recognise on some level that the reason their relationship turned out the way it did isn't all Blitz' fault and the fact that he keeps trying to reflect and and go over what happened between them despite his hurt feelings, broken heart is a good thing- both for the sake of their relationship in the future and for his own development. Yeah he's trying to cover it up a bit, turning a bit petty and spiteful towards Blitz for even going to the party (maybe he wouldn't have gone if Blitz hadn't shown up at his place, wanting to be a little petty towards him) but as soon as he's there he recognises how petty, stupid and ridiculous the whole affair is, throwing an entire party every year just to hate on Blitz, and is even able to recognise this while drunk of his ass.

Our Owl Boy is a bit delulu, but not THAT delulu.

But it is as you say, Stolas is a People Please of the highest order and is only now starting to learn to stand up for himself and focus on his own wants and needs rather than bending over backwards to please others around him while suffering in silence. And spending too much time around people who don't encourage that kind of reflection and accountability would be a step backwards for him. It'd be enabling his worst habits and maybe make him regress in his growth, which is the last thing anyone needs.

Whether Stolas and Blitz end the season as friends who need to work on themselves before they get together or as a tentative couple who want to try again, do it right this time while also getting to know each other properly (last bit will probably happen regardless, but you know what I mean) I am under no delusion that they won't end up together at some point in the future. But I want to see Stolas find an identity outside of liking Blitz. As much as I love him, and I do, that's pretty much been his character for a while now. Yeah, he was Octavia but we haven't been allowed to see much of their relationship, which we know is going to have consequences of some kind before the season is over. I recognise that Blitz is the main character and is likely to be the most complex and developed character, but that doesn't mean others can't have more to them than basic interests, quirks and be defined by their role in Blitz' life. We've seen some of it with Moxxie and Millie, would love more of it, as well as seeing some development and growth for Loona, Millie (as her own person not her relationship to Moxxie or Blitz) and I think Stolas would need it too.

Maybe he and Asmodeus will become better friends? Fizz? M&M, Loona might be set up to become better friends with him as well? Maybe Vassago will be one of few Goetia who actually care about him and want him to be okay? I don't know, we'll have to wait and see.

Stolas has always been "Single"...

One thing I've noticed people say that genuinely disturb me is when they think Stolas should learn how to be single...

Guys, Stolas has been "single" his entire fucking life.

On paper, he may have been "married".

But Stolas was married to a partner that treated him like shit, and forced him to live a life constrained from being his gay ass self.

People are treating the relationship he had with Blitz as them being in an actual romantic relationship, but as Blitz stated...

To Blitz, he and Stolas were never in an actual romantic relationship because let's face it, it's true.

Blitz simply operated under the terms that Stolas had set for them in their full moon romps.

Remember guys....

This man is an emotionally-inept dumbass, who automatically assumes the worse. Of course, he's not going to see any of Stolas’s invites as anything other than Stolas just wanting him for his body.

Is it right? No, of course not.

But this is Blitz, and I'm not expecting a man who has been suppressing every single major emotion and traumatic event in his life for 15 years (prior to GF) to pick up any of the hints Stolas was dropping. He's a dumbass.

So yes, Stolas has never been in an actual relationship, and I don't think he needs to learn how to be "single" when he's been single his entire fucking life.

The man doesn't need to learn to be happy alone when he's always been alone!

"You wanna know what I want? I want to know what it's like, to not be alone. I want to be someone's someone. I want to feel wanted. But like, in a romantic way, like I'm standing out in the rain at a train station and someone is shouting: “Harriet! Don’t get on that train, it’s going to London and I cannot be without you!”"

"I just... want someone to care if I stay or go. I want someone to want... me! To want to see me. To hold me. To look at me and think "You're the only one I want!" [sheds tears] "I desire to hold you and talk to you, and never let you feel so...""

So yeah, I really don't think Stolas needs to learn to be happy alone. He knows what it's like to be alone, he's always been alone.

~~~~~~~~~~

And you know what I want?

Maybe I just want, this sad gay 🦉 to give this equally as sad and lonely pan 🦎 another chance...

Because, you know, even though he's an emotionally-inept dumbass and a motherfucker...

He's charismatic and charming...

He's good at fighting...

He's protective...

He knows how to have fun...

He's got the most beautiful smile...

He's hot as fuck...

And I also heard...

He's got a pretty cool family.

[accio-victuuri]

read a book for me. 📚

inspired by people who were curious about the books featured in xz’s video, let’s take a look at what they are. i’d like to think these were pre approved by XZ and are related to his interests. i’m not removing tge possibility that one of these were chosen by someone from xzs or the director himself. i’m tagging this as cpn because there will be some cpn. if you don’t wanna go that route and just enjoy learning about the titles featured, then go ahead. 😉

1. Restoration House by Kennesha Bucks

You don't have to live in your dream house to make your living spaces feel more like home. Home is meant to be a place to belong. A place to gather and connect. A place of beauty. A place to restore your soul. In Restoration House, author and designer Kennesha Buycks will encourage you to embrace your home and your story so you can create mindful spaces that give life to you, your loved ones, and all who enter.

2. LORI WILDE

that red book just says the author’s name and no actual title but if you look her up, she’s all about that romance novel. here is her website if you wanna know what i mean. if you move a bit, the spine of it says ��boy” so i think it maybe one of those books that has the cowboys in it!

3. Next is LIT UP, which is a black book. I’m not so sure if it’s a real book and when you search it, there are a couple of contenders. Tho i personally gravitate towards p2 since it’s black and the plot of the story is something i think XZ will enjoy!

it says out of the cubicle and into the real world, it’s like him getting out of his work cubicle years ago and discovering the world.

book overview:

Eddy Gilmore found himself on society’s fringe after being exiled from Corporate America. Despite years of higher education and exemplary service inside a cubicle’s pixelated world, he had no tangible or transferable skills to offer his community. Amazingly, failure was the door into tapping dreams and gifts that had long been ignored as impractical.

This true to life adventure is a pilgrimage into the real world, a place where neighbors make and produce things that sustain life and bring joy. When their eyes were opened to the talents all around them, Eddy and his wife discovered how to produce value themselves, and sank roots into the community. By working together, they are building a life they might never need to retire from.

4. The Interior Design Handbook

Frida Ramstedt believes in thinking about how we decorate, rather than focusing on what we decorate with. We know more today than ever before about design trends, furniture, and knickknacks, and now Frida familiarizes readers with the basic principles behind interior and styling—what looks good and, most of all, why it looks good.

The Interior Design Handbook teaches you general rules of thumb—like what the golden ratio and the golden spiral are, the proper size for a coffee table in relation to your sofa, the optimal height to hang lighting fixtures, and the best ways to use a mood board—complete with helpful illustrations. Use The Interior Design Handbook to achieve a balanced, beautiful home no matter where you live or what your style is.

5. Limits of the Known

A celebrated mountaineer and author searches for meaning in great adventures and explorations, past and present.

David Roberts, "veteran mountain climber and chronicler of adventures" (Washington Post), has spent his career documenting voyages to the most extreme landscapes on earth. In Limits of the Known, he reflects on humanity’s—and his own—relationship to extreme risk. Part memoir and part history, this book tries to make sense of why so many have committed their lives to the desperate pursuit of adventure.

In the wake of his diagnosis with throat cancer, Roberts seeks answers with sharp new urgency. He explores his own lifelong commitment to adventuring, as well as the cultural contributions of explorers throughout history: What specific forms of courage and commitment did it take for Fridtjof Nansen to survive an eighteen-month journey from a record "farthest north" with no supplies and a single rifle during his polar expedition of 1893–96? What compelled Eric Shipton to return, five times, to the ridges of Mt. Everest, plotting the mountain’s most treacherous territory years before Hillary and Tenzing’s famous ascent? What drove Bill Stone to dive 3,000 feet underground into North America’s deepest cave?

What motivates the explorers we most admire, who are willing to embark on perilous journeys and push the limits of the human body? And what is the future of adventure in a world we have mapped and trodden from end to end?

6. Eat, Drink, Nap: Bringing the House Home

The quintessential style, cooking, and home interior book from Soho House, the world's leading members' club.

Since the first Soho House opened its doors over 25 years ago, we've learnt a bit about what works. Contemporary, global yet with something quintessentially English and homely at its heart, this is Soho House style explained by its experts:

- From planning a room to vintage finds: bringing the Soho House look home.

- Our House curator's advice on how to buy, collect and hang art.

- The art of a great night's sleep: how to design the perfect bedroom.

- No-fuss recipes and chef's tips: here's how to make your favourite House dishes.

- Inside Babington: our take on country-house living. Wellies optional.

- Flip-flop glamour and poolside style from Soho House Miami Beach.

- All the secrets of cocktail hour: House tonics and barman's tips.

- Spa treatment at home, DIY facials and chocolate brownies.

Eat Drink Nap, a 300-page highly illustrated book, with a foreword from founder Nick Jones, and photography from leading food and interiors photographers Mark Seelen and Jean Cazals, shares the Soho House blueprint for stylish, modern living, the Soho House way.

7. Styled

It’s easy to find your own style confidence once you know this secret: While decorating can take months and tons of money, styling often takes just minutes. Even a few little tweaks can transform the way your room feels.

At the heart of Styled are Emily Henderson’s ten easy steps to styling any space. From editing out what you don’t love to repurposing what you can’t live without to arranging the most eye-catching vignettes on any surface, you’ll learn how to make your own style magic.

With Emily’s style diagnostic, insider tips, and more than 1,000 unique ideas from 75 envy-inducing rooms, you’ll soon be styling like you were born to do it.

8. The other book i’m seeing is WINTER TID then it cuts off so again it’s tricky to confirm what it is! My best guess is WINTER TIDE but if you google that — i can’t connect how XZ will read that lol.

EDIT: adding this one seen from the alternate MV,

The Tale of the Body Thief by Anne Rice

is a vampire novel by American writer Anne Rice, the fourth in her The Vampire Chronicles series, following The Queen of the Damned (1988). Published in 1992, it continues the adventures of Lestat, specifically his efforts to regain his lost humanity during the late 20th century.

=========

now let’s look at the CPN.

i see fans saying the style related books could be because of his work before. but he is more of a digital and design artist right? he does logos and stuff that can help their brand identity. i don’t remember him being an interior designer. there is also the eat, drink, nap which has topics on cooking and being a good host. these books are making me clown so hard! my head canon is xz is keeping himself busy ( as if he is not busy enough already ) with designing their home. his and wyb’s — if that wasn’t clear enough, that’s what i’m insinuating. if he isn’t traveling, i would imagine he is the type who just wants to spend time at home in between jobs. it is their home. their sanctuary. so xz would make sure that it is according to what they both want and that it’s stylish.

and when he is at home sipping wine, while waiting for Bobo, is he reading a LORI WILDE BOOK? lol. sexy millionaire cowboy you say? 👀👀👀👀

😂😂😂😂😂

or reading something like the LIT UP book which is more up his alley ( but again i’m not sure if this is the exact title )

what is out of place is limits of the known. out of place compared to the theme of the other books, but xz is someone who is into nature and climbing of sorts. but i haven’t seen him climb the way yibo did in ETU. the most popular cpn is that this is yibo’s contribution to the selection. or maybe he read it after yibo and liked it. OR he is also becoming interested in rock climbing — which is not a far off possibility.

-END.

[jinbeisluffy]

I see so many posts over different social media platforms about sexuality/gender hcs for the strawhats and i want to add in my own two cents because i believe im very correct (but anyone’s opinion is valid so long as it doesnt go against canon coding)

Luffy - the most aroace and trans guy to ever BREATHE. i dont mean aroace in that hes somewhere on the spectrum where he can still be attracted to people, because he cant. this guy had never grasped the concept of romance and never will, because theres no reason for it to him. hes trans because i say he is, i dont have many reasons for THAT but its just the signals hes sending me. trans to trans communication trust

Zoro - gay. thats it thats the post. no but i dont ship luffy with anyone but zoro is just attracted to literally any man who is strong, thats his criteria and thats all he ever needs. is he aware of it? not at all, he has no idea that its not normal to get bricked up by the thought of other men

Nami - i havent seen a bigger lesbian in media ever, genuinely i dont think any other character is as obviously lesbian as she is. she loves girls unapologetically no matter what, supports all girls at the end of the day (cough kalifa) . i also hit her with the asexual beam because i can, specifically demisexual because i THINK so

Usopp - while i wanna consider kaya, i wanna consider sanji too and thats making me lean between bi or omni even if omni is a label under the bi umbrella. its more a question of if he recognises his preference for men or not, because he does prefer then at the end of the day. the ace beam bounces from nami to usopp because he too doesnt feel anything and doesnt think about it either

Sanji - oh my god where do i begin. maybe just the blatant queer coding of wci as a whole?? of course hes attracted to women, thats not an aspect you can remove or just toss around to being something else. he loves and respects women, but he is so QUEER. all of wci is just queer coding, its a queer story and sanji is a queer character i will die on this hill. he probably has some kind of gender issues too, what specifically? no clue, but he likes people of multiple genders and is in deep denial about it all the time he wont ever truly accept it but he can one day as a treat live with that fact

Chopper - oh hes a reindeer he cant really have a sexuality DID WE FORGET THE FACT HES HUMAN TOO ISNT THAT LIKE HIS WHOLE THING, NOT BEING A MONSTER BUT ALSO A HUMAN. HE IS BOTH? i dont have any specific labels to slap onto him, just that hes a people lover and encourager of literally everything. ace beam bounces onto him too

Robin - trans trans trans trans trans trans trans trans you will accept robin transfem into your life right here right now. she can like anyone, she has no label on it, she just likes people and cant bother with genders or anything like that. the ace beam actually skips her because if they were doing a hear me out cake she’d be the one putting all of the crazy things. freak. (lovingly)

Franky - HOW TRANS CODED IS IT NOT TO REBUILD YOUR OWN BODY TO BECOME A BETTER VERSION OF YOURSELF AND TO REBUILD YOUR LIFE IN A WAY YOU WANT, BUT GOING BACK TO WHAT YOU LOVED ABOUT YOUR OLD SELF, AND EMBRACING IT. literally, trans goals. he modified his body and went i might as well give myself top surgery and an awesome dick while im here!! sexuality wise hes a lover of everyone, but he has preferences for women (robin) but encourages all bromances (with brook)

Brook - THIS IS WHERE IM MOST PASSIONATE!!!! people can say that hes the token straight grandpa. but theyll never understand the joy of old gay brook had a romance with his captain, the joy of brook trying to subtlety let the other strawhats know he accepts them (he isnt subtle at all and everyone knows). look at brook in drag twice for no reason and tell me he isnt queer, in some way. the ace beam finally hits someone and its brook, insert skull joke here

Jinbei - very specifically old gay man who didnt really do much throughout his youth, he always knew he liked men but he never had TIME to do anything, too busy being awesome and a father i fear. now that hes with the crew he isnt automatically gonna seek anyone out, but hes also not gonna restrain himself from finding interests in people, hes being more selfish now and thats good for him. finally the ace beam hits jinbei and proceeds to fly off towards other op characters that i might talk about some other time

can you tell im asexual and love projecting onto characters with it !!!!

[fenharel-is-so-swell]

While I’m on my ✨Race in Thedas✨ rant let me just explain why the blending of Dalish and City Elves bothers me personally.

As I said previously, I’m mixed. I’m specifically black in the ‘descendants of enslaved people’ way. I grew up in a predominantly white area but finished out highschool in a diverse school with a high number of first gen African immigrants.

(I promise this is pertinent) My relationship with race has always been complex. I benefit from a proximity to whiteness due to being mixed, but I of course still experienced rampant racism and an identity crisis.

In elementary school we had to do a yearly genealogy project. In some ways, mine was easier than the few other black kids in my class. While their families were nearly untraceable past 2-3 generations, I could just focus my effort on my mother’s side. Though, I faced ridicule because OBVIOUSLY I wasn’t white, so obviously I couldn’t be German. While I may have shared DNA, I felt much less experientially connected to the ‘family tree’ I did my reports on because their lives could look nothing like mine. They walked through world without the color of their skin first. So, of course the next year when a culture week came up and we were encouraged to wear clothing representative of our heritage I went the other way—I asked my dad to buy me a dashiki. I still I faced ridicule and still it felt foreign. I had no cultural ties to the patterns, my family never wore them, I’d never heard of the foods we looked up that were mainstays on the Ivory Coast. I may have shared DNA, I may have shared racial trauma, but my culture was different. I was black I wasn’t African.

Playing dragon age origins as a City elf I saw myself for the first time. I saw a woman divorced from her original culture, ripped from her roots by an imperial force but still incredibly steeped in a rich world created by survival and painstaking effort to hold onto oral tradition and what blended history the alienages could. I saw my grandmother singing gospel on the weekends, the church ladies in their outfits, the greens, the pecan pie, the stories of struggle the community shared, the village it took to raise all my cousins and get our older family and friends through chemo and childloss and hard financial times. In hearing about different alienages I saw the distinct cultural differences between Harlem, Oakland, Birmingham, Houston, Atlanta.

Playing as a Dalish elf I saw a facet of the African-Immigrant experience I came to know in high school from my friends who immigrated. I saw the culture more closely connected to the various countries they came from, but still scared by the vestiges of imperialism and colonialism. They were all unique, just as Dalish clans are. My Nigerian friends ate different food, had different rules, wore different clothes, had different cultural practices than my Kenyan or Nigerian friends. I had a couple of North African friends from Morrocco and Egypt that still felt grounded in the history of Africa but were so different. I saw the physical differences in them like I saw them in further DA entires in the Dalish from Antiva or elves from Tevinter.

(And better yet to see this dichotomy in culture I didn’t have to face more trauma porn on black bodies)

As I continued digging into elven cultures in southern Thedas I saw even more complexities of the diaspora that matched my experience. They way both city and Dalish elves looked down upon each other one for ‘assimilation’ and being ‘weak’. The other for holding on to ‘strange’ cultural practices and being ‘primitive’.

Growing up at a crossroads of many racial and cultural experiences I relished in the nuance, the way both cultures were painted as a people just trying to survive and hold onto themselves. A people distinct and resilient, a people not too unlike from each other and while aloof still marginally less wary in solidarity. They were both full of individuals that interacted so vibrantly with the world and life they lived in.

Flattening that in Veilguard initially devastated me, then enraged me. That’s not just poor writing, that’s borderline racist. It indicates that the differences don’t matter, the pain, the struggle, the culture, the history none of it matters because ‘an elf is just an elf’ at the end of the day. And that’s fucking gross.

[cabinetofquriosities]

From Persephone, Part 1

Agatha x Rio || Warnings: Smut, abusive violence (parental abuse)

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Agatha splashed water from a rinsing bowl into her face, washing the remnants of slumber from it. She jumped at the sound of her mother’s voice. Newly twenty and she was still completely under her thumb. She threw her dress on and ran downstairs.

The house was a cabin like the rest of Salem, but more opulent than the average one. Evanora’s coven had taken the village over after the villagers tried and failed to destroy them. The trials had just opened the door to a war the other colonizers lost.

She found her mother at the bottom, dressed in silken robes.

“I expect you to wake with the dawn,” her mother said with a look of exasperation.

“I tried, but we spent so long at the ritual in the woods last night…”

“I do not wish to hear your excuses, child. Your instructor has canceled for today, so I will have you practicing in the fields.”

“Mother-“

Evanora held up a finger, silencing her daughter.

“You shall practice until every flower in that field has bloomed,” she said, “You are the reason so many have wilted already. The selfishness of your very being knows no bounds. Even your magic takes for itself. It is time for you to learn how to fix your mistakes.”

Agatha willed away the unshed tears in her eyes. Her mother, for as long as she could remember, hated the way her magic worked. She called her a succubus, a leech on the world. As a young girl child, a witch tried to attack her mother in front of her. A seven year old Agatha leapt in front of her, trying to protect the only family she had. The blast of magic hit her, much to her mother’s horror.

However, instead of it killing her, Agatha’s body took hold of it. It gave her a feeling of euphoria, drawing a stream of power from the attacker. Her purple overtook the other woman’s teal, burning through the connection until it reached her. The woman shriveled and fell to the ground as a grey husk. Agatha smiled at the feeling before seeing what she had done. Her stomach dropped at the sight of the dead, shriveled witch. She turned to the mother she had just saved for comfort, but Evanora pushed her back, sending the small child falling to the dirt.

“Stay back, you monster,” she hissed.

Her mother had never looked at her the same way after that day. Evanora had deemed her as being inherently evil. Someone who needed to learn to repress her true nature for the sake of being acceptable.

Now, even as a grown woman, Evanora was forcing her to train with the express purpose of reversing the way her magic worked. Every time she tried to infuse life into anything, she ended up draining everything from it. She left dead flowers, plants, and animals in her wake.

She walked out into the fields of flowers her mother nourished with her magic. Her mother, while she couldn’t create life, was able to encourage it to health with her spells and enchantments. The village learned to go from fearing Evanora following the trials to loving her when she ensured the growth of abundant crops.

Her magic bridged the gap between magic and non magic, allowing both groups to coexist. People now respected and relied on healers, divination witches, and protection witches to survive in their colony. Evanora always made it clear to Agatha that her deadly magic could undo all of that good will.

Agatha desperately wanted to be good. She wanted to help the village rather than siphon it of all life. Everyone, even her fellow witches, were terrified of her. They respected her mother and coven, but always kept her at arm’s length. Some nights, she considered leaving altogether for the safety of everyone within. However, Evanora made it clear that it wasn’t an option. She needed the Harkness line to continue. Since she was never able to have another child, that only left Agatha.

Agatha knelt down, finding one of the dead flowers. She focused, a purple mist forming around it. She pictured it regaining color and life. The flower crumbled into dust while the healthy flowers around it wilted and died. She sighed and tried again. And again. and again. For hours, she felt her frustration building, her mother’s voice in her head.

She failed again and rage bubbled up. A plume of purple smoke bloomed and took all life within its radius. For twenty feet in each direction, there were the ashes of beauty that Agatha ruined. She fell to her knees, planting her hands on the lifeless dust and began sobbing. Her mother was right. All she was good for was destruction.

Behind her, she could hear one of the lifeless stems crack, snapping her out of her misery. She readied a ball of energy in case the sound was a threat. Rather than some belligerent man or wild animal, it was a woman. She wore a long, tight black dress. Her dark hair fell to her waist and her eyes were painted with wings that looked like the glittering, starry night.

“Hello,” the woman said, snapping her fingers.

The orb of magic in Agatha’s palm was extinguished. Agatha looked panicked, unsure of what to do in the presence of someone who didn’t fear her.

“Who are you?” Agatha asked, looking up at her, her knees still in the dirt.

“That was quite the display of power,” she said with a smile.

“You… are not afraid?” Agatha asked with a shaky voice.

“Why would I be afraid?” She asked.

“You must not be from here. I am-“

“Agatha Harkness. Daughter of Evanora Harkness, the leader of Salem’s coven. Your mother is known as the ‘life of Salem’ while you,” she reached down and cupped her chin, guiding her to stand, “Are known as ‘the Death of Salem’.”

Agatha’s face heated as it was touched by this stranger. She felt hypnotized, gazing into her eyes and put under her thrall.

“How did you know-“

“I like to know the most powerful witches wherever I go. It makes my job easier when one of them begins to interfere in my work,” she said, her annoyance showing in a snarl.

“Is my mother…?”

“In a way, yes. She is depriving the universe of one of its greatest witches. Of one who can maintain the balance of life and death,” she said, playing absentmindedly with Agatha’s hair, twirling a lock around her fingers.

“Who?” she asked, not able to believe the obvious answer.

“You, Agatha. Your power is being smothered when it should be allowed to grow.”

“My… What? No…” Agatha stepped back, looking confused and suspicious, “My power is not one that is useful or desirable.”

“Oh, I beg to differ,” the other woman said, “You gifts are enviable.”

“Look around you,” Agatha said, sweeping her hand to motion to the dead flowers surrounding them, “I kill everything I touch! My power is a burden. Not a gift.”

“It is simply misunderstood,” the woman said, reaching out and taking her hand in hers.

Agatha felt things that she was told never to feel for a woman. For anyone, really. Witches in her mother’s coven never married. They would deprive themselves to focus on the craft. Baby girls would be conjured through magic in their wombs, leading to men being irrelevant to the survival of their society.

Along with that was discouragement of relations with women as well, the act being seen as sullying the bonds of sisterhood. Whether it be Puritanical values or the coven’s strict beliefs, Agatha’s desire was something to be ashamed of. A blush rose in her cheeks as she looked down, trying to gather her senses.

“Scarlet suits you,” the woman said, cupping her burning cheek and rubbing her thumb over it.

“I-I am not… uh… Who are you?” Agatha sputtered out.

“Rio,” she said, her gaze traveling over every detail of her face, “The green witch.”

“W-What do you want from me, Rio?” she asked, finding herself leaning into her touch.

“Your power. Your presence,” Rio said, leaning in close enough for her breath to brush over Agatha’s lips, “Your companionship.”

Agatha’s heart was at a sprint within her chest. She was frozen where she stood, unsure of what to say. No one had ever wanted her.

“I… do not even know you. My coven… I cannot become anyone’s companion. Much less a woman’s,” Agatha said, trying to look away.

“Forget everyone else. What do you want?”

“What I want is irrelevant,” she said.

“Who told you that?”

“My mother,” she said without thinking, “Forgive me, I should not speak ill of her.”

“Why not?” Rio asked, “She does not seem like a pleasant woman.”

“She helps others…”

“She does not help you.”

“She tries to.”

“By berating you? By making you deny your purpose?”

“You do not know anything about our lives,” Agatha countered defensively.

“I know more than you think,” Rio said.

“Who do you think you are?!”

“Lady Death.”

Agatha’s blood ran cold. Her mouth gaped open as she realized that Rio was not just a green witch. She was THE green witch. The witch only spoken of in children’s bedrooms as part of cautionary tales told at bedtime. The keeper of the underworld and all of the souls within. The witch who existed long before humans came into being and would still exist long after they went extinct.

She lost all color in her face as she fell to her knees again. To speak out of turn to a higher witch was a huge transgression. To speak that way to a celestial being was unthinkable.

“Forgive me,” she said, hoping it would be enough to spare her, “I did not know.”

Rio reached down, taking her hand.

“Stand,” she ordered.

Agatha did as she was told, shaking in fear of what was about to happen. She was certain that whatever Lady Death had in store for her would make her mother’s punishments look like paradise.

“I understand. I insulted your mother and you defended her. However, loyalty is admirable, but misplaced. Someone who rejects you at every turn does not deserve your devotion.”

Agatha opened her mouth to argue, but found nothing to say in her mother’s defense. Perhaps Rio had a point.

“I will be back to visit you later. I am not giving up on you. I want to see you flourish,” Rio said, “In a way that fits who you are.”

Rio’s magic circled them. New plants and buds grew from beneath the ashes of the flowers. Verdant leaves and technicolor petals bloomed around them.

“Without letting the past plants die out, the new ones cannot grow. Your magic is a gift, Agatha. It allows nature to take its course.”

A purple flower grew from Rio’s palm. She held it out to Agatha, curtsying to her. Agatha smiled shyly as she took it from her.

“Until we meet again.”

Agatha found herself feeling lighter than she ever had. She playfully spun the flower between her fingers by the stem. She smelled it, the aroma matching Rio’s. She took care to tuck it away in her satchel before making her way into her house.

Once she was in her room, she took the flower back out, taking in its scent again. She thought back to the way Rio’s hand felt on her cheek. The way she looked at her was unlike anyone else. It was unbelievable to Agatha that Lady Death would endure her presence, much less curtsy to her.

For the next few weeks, Agatha would meet Rio at the edge of the fields. The fields went for miles and the other witch would appear at random places along the perimeter. Agatha would always feel a strange pull towards wherever Rio would be.

The two witches spent their time training. Rio would answer Agatha’s questions about spells and incantations while Agatha would answer questions about her day to day life. While Agatha was focused on knowledge and skill, Rio seemed more interested in getting to know Agatha as a person. At the end of each lesson, Agatha would leave with a flower that never wilted. A flower that smelt of Rio.

Agatha began learning how to control her siphoning abilities. She was able to drain half a tree before stopping herself. Even though it was not comparable to doing that with an attacking witch, it was a start. Agatha squealed and jumped up and down, never having taken pride in her own magic. Rio smiled more freely than Agatha had seen while watching the newer witch’s reaction. She handed her another flower bloomed from her hand.

“Good girl,” Rio said, the words making Agatha breathless for some reason.

“Thank you. For teaching me,” she said.

“It is my pleasure,” Rio said with a nod.

“I am not complaining, but why do you waste time every day on me?”

Rio cocked her head, looking completely stunned.

“I am not wasting anything. Agatha, I want to spend this time with you.”

Agatha took a shaky breath, her mind reeling as she found any excuse as to why Rio would want that.

“For my powers?” she asked.

“No,” Rio said with an air of offense, “Your powers are formidable, but I come here every day to be with you. Your distinct and wonderful spirit. In fact, your power is just a sign of something bigger.”

“What?” Agatha asked.

“This… it will sound mad, but I need for you to listen all of the way through,” Rio said, “I have walked this planet for eons with the knowledge that there was another half of me out there. It slipped from person to person, the power always the same. This same soul would never rest on the other side. It would be reborn with every death of its host. Just as I would catch up, it would escape me. The other hosts were either too afraid of the situation or would allow their own earthly personalities to hold them back. You, though. You are the home of this soul now. The soul of my other half. You are favorite form by far. You are intelligent, compassionate, strong, and devoted to those around you.”

“I-I am at a loss for words… Thank you. I am very fond of you as well. All of this seems so strange. What is my purpose in it?”

Rio took her hands in hers, holding them firmly.

“Every form of you had a chance to cross over, but it must be your choice.”

“Wait… do you mean… die?”

“No, no,” Rio said, “The opposite, actually. You have already died a million deaths throughout all of time. What you have the chance to do is to cross into the underworld as a ruler who keeps the balance, holding dominion over the dead. You will be reborn as an eternal being. I want you to be my queen.”

Agatha’s lips parted and her eyes were wide in shock. She could hardly process the fact that she was inextricably connected to Rio throughout time. She couldn’t even begin to broach the subject of marriage or queendom.

“I… do not know. Forgive me,” she said, shaking like a leaf.

Rio felt as if she had revealed too much too soon. She remembered getting so close with Agatha’s past selves only to have them panic and turn their backs on her. They had been the same soul, but molded by their environment and the experiences of their particular life. Celestial beings needed to work for their soulmates when those mates were trapped in the world of humans.

Rio’s sisters and brothers were engaged in the same struggle concerning their own fated loves. Adonis, the leader of human vanity and bodily health, had just lost the current version of his soulmate to a marriage to a man. He would need to wait until this vessel passed on and the soul migrated to another. Etheria, the essence of creativity and ruler of imagination, had lost her soulmate before she could even speak to her. The woman’s current life was ended when she was killed by a fever. Etheria now needed to find the new person the soul had reincarnated in and wait patiently.

Even if they found them, their soulmate would need to make the conscious choice to cross over to their kingdoms, often on another plane of existence where they would have an entirely new connection with humanity. They, in turn, would need to give up their humanity in order to become transcendent. That was a terrifying choice to make. It was so incomprehensible to mortal beings that it chased so many of them away.

Her siblings who had finally found and successfully wooed their partners had a wholeness and peace that Rio could only dream of. Each one had a soulmate whose power was the inverse of their own. Their magic complemented their partner’s in a way that struck a balance in their corner of the universe. The amount of time, effort, and pure chance it took each of them to find their loves felt cruel.

“Not to worry,” Rio said, “We have all the time in the world. Please do not worry.”

-Please don’t leave me. Not again- Rio thought.

She grew an orange and red flower in her hand and tucked it behind Agatha’s ear. Agatha was disoriented by the situation, but felt something undeniable when she looked into those dark eyes.

“I will see you again tomorrow,” Agatha promised.

She could see the visible relief in Rio’s form. As unbelievable as it all sounded, she knew what she was saying was the truth. A being this powerful would not show so much anxiety over the attention of a lowly human witch unless there was a reason like the one Rio had given.

Agatha also felt the unrelenting pull towards Rio. She had dreamt of those eyes since she was a girl. She had also dreamt of different lives. One as an artisan in Egypt. Another as a warrior in Greece. One in a nondescript savannah, living in a cave with some animal that had long since become extinct. She remembered resting beneath a leafless tree, her head resting on the belly of that animal, the two breathing in tandem before a shadow of a woman fell over her.

The woman appeared in each dream, but Agatha never remembered any distinguishing features apart from her eyes. As she woke each morning, the dream would sink into the back of her mind, fleeting as most dreams were.

Everything made more sense now that she connected the woman in front of her to the dreams that plagued her throughout her life. Regardless, it was not a clear choice for her. Even with her cruel mother and terrible reputation, giving away her place in this world was giving up everything she knew.

She squeezed Rio’s hand.

“Tomorrow when the first rays of daylight emerge. I will come and see you,” Agatha said.

Agatha leaned in, touching Rio’s face. It felt odd to be acting so familiar with her. She pressed her lips to her cheek, hoping it wasn’t too forward. Then again, the woman had more or less just proposed to her. Rio felt something come alive within her at the simple display of affection. She was more aware of her need for Agatha more than ever before.

Agatha took her time walking through the fields. She took in the smell of the flower, of Rio, as grass folded underfoot. She looked up at the sunset, wondering if she would ever have a better chance at happiness than this. In the distance, she noticed one of the younger girls from the coven sprinting through the fields toward her house. Her brow knit as she followed after, walking as the girl sped ahead.

Once Agatha made her way back, she saw the young girl standing next to her mother, looking pale and terrified. Agatha was used to the look of fear on the faces of others when she was near, but this was a different atmosphere altogether. The girl sprinted past her, running outside to return home.

Agatha looked up at her mother, unable to open her mouth to speak before a hand came down and slapped her hard enough to send her to the floor.

“How DARE you!” Evanora bellowed.

Her mother always had an edge to her appearance. Nothing about her looked welcoming or kind, but her anger transformed her into something absolutely terrifying. Her long grey hair was as wild as her eyes. Her fists were clenched by her sides, orbs of blue magic threatening to escape them.

“Mother, what did I do?!” Agatha whimpered.

“Oh, Agatha. You are many things, but you are not stupid. So, do not claim ignorance.”

“Of what? I do not understand!”

Evanora grabbed the flower from Agatha’s hand. She had forgotten to hide it away.

“All of those afternoons ‘training’ in the fields, you were just with some whore,” Evanora spat out.

Agatha’s heart stopped for a moment. How did she know? That little brat had seen them and told her.

“She was teaching me! I have been kept away from anyone who could help me learn how to use my power. Please, Mother! I speak the truth!” Agatha begged.

“USE YOUR POWER? You should be training to keep that power at bay! All it does is destroy. All YOU do is bring pain and suffering. I should have killed you the moment you left my body,” Evanora stated with a look of pure loathing.

Agatha’s eyes showed every emotion flooding through her. She was terrified and shattered all at once. However, she looked frozen to anyone who could see her, her face painting a portrait of pure devastation.

“Please Mother… I love you,” she managed to whisper out.

Evanora laughed bitterly before saying, “Evil like you could never know love.”

Agatha broke down crying, her face looking like that of her as a little girl. It was yet another instance of the familiar experience of being rejected by the one person who brought her into this world. However, this time was more brutal than those in the past.

“And the fact that you are out there gallivanting with some woman out there, perverting what is supposed to be sisterhood among our gender is laughable. You really think that anyone would love you once they see you for what you truly are?”

“I… I…”

“At a loss for words? Is your lying tongue now tied?”

Evanora took her by the hair and yanked her to her feet. Agatha screamed as she was roughly pulled up the stairs to her room. Her mother flung her down, raining more blows, even contributing a kick to Agatha as she was groaning in pain on the floor.

“You will never see that bitch again. Do you understand me, girl?”

Agatha wheezed for air, her entire body in pain.

“Yes, Mother,” she said, resigned.

“Good. You will stay in this room until I say you can leave.”

“N-no, please,” she whimpered, remembering times where she had been confined for months at a time, being intermittently starved and driven mad by the isolation.

“You should feel lucky that I cannot use my magic directly on you. You would not be breathing if I could. Here is your parting gift from your poor example of a lover,” she said.

Evanora crushed Rio’s flower and threw it on the floor. The destroyed bloom landed beside Agatha’s face, deformed but still alive. As the door closed, Agatha desperately tried to crawl towards it. She lost all hope as it locked and the enchantment surrounded the room. Anyone else could come and go as they pleased, but Agatha was trapped within its confines.

For several days, Agatha wasted away in her room. She was unable to leave for any reason. Her mother sent servants to bathe her once for “the wretched smell of my loathsome child”. She woke up to fewer and fewer books in her room, which were the only things keeping her sane. Her journals had not been found, but Agatha was too afraid of prying eyes to use them. She sat by the window, breathing in the scent of the undying flowers looking desperately for Rio. The aroma of those hidden gifts were her only comfort. As long as she stayed living, Rio had a chance of finding her. However, her hope waned as the days passed by.

Rio had been showing up at the edges of the fields for nearly three weeks. That first morning, she feared that Agatha had fled from her. She blamed herself for revealing too much too quickly. She found herself thinking of nothing but her as she spent her nights reaping souls.

Often, she would send fragments of herself to do the actual work of escorting souls to the underworld. One physical form could not be in so many places at once. She used magic and fractured herself into functional copies, all of them projections of the original. Regardless of this, she relieved some of them by personally attending to the dead to distract herself from the hole left in her life by Agatha.

As Death, Rio was accustomed to the rejection and hatred of others. No one enjoyed her presence. No one truly understood the need for an ending. Instead of seeing it as the culmination of the raw beauty and terror of life, the transformation into something pure, they saw it as annihilation. The hope that Agatha would see her differently slipped from her mind, leaving her numb.

After a long day of Evanora forcing Agatha to kneel on rice while reading from the coven’s writings, her mother instructed her to stand. Agatha cringed as she shakily rose to her feet, the dry rice embedded in her knees falling from small reddened indents. She was fed one meal that day which had been more than she had for the past six as well as being given a bath before her mother entered the room.

“Hand it back,” Evanora ordered, taking the books from her daughter.

She walked slowly around the perimeter of Agatha’s room as if searching for a weapon or a hidden familiar. Suddenly, she stopped short. Her eyes fell upon something red peeking out from beneath Agatha’s pillow.

Agatha’s heart dropped as she realized what she had found. Evanora ripped the pillow off to reveal a small pile of flowers. The same ones Agatha would hold to her chest and smell when she missed the outside world. The ones that held the scent of Lady Death.

Evanora scoffed, saying, “Are these enchanted? I know you could not have picked them since I have eyes on you every moment of every day. I assume SHE enchanted them since they are alive and not drained to dust.”

“Please…” Agatha practically squeaked out, her sorrow overwhelming her, “They are all I have…”

“All you have? You ungrateful brat. You have the Harkness title, but you continue to shame it with your malevolence and your foolish whims. You do not deserve sunlight. You do not deserve the spring breeze. You certainly do not deserve flowers.”

With that, flames sparked from Evanora’s palms. Fire engulfed the flowers, destroying them entirely. The ashes fell to the floor. Agatha ran her hand through them, mourning the final scrap of happiness she had.

Evanora then expanded her destruction in an explosion of magic with her as its epicenter. Though she fancied herself as not being emotion-driven, anger often took control. A tidal wave of magic swept across every field apart from her own, destroying the crops in their wake. Along with Agatha, the rest of Salem was now being starved.

Miles away, Rio felt a burning sensation rolling through her body. Something she had given life had just been destroyed. While this occasionally happened with vegetation she grew, this was something she had poured her heart into.

Agatha.

She needed to return to her. A plume of Green and black smoke surrounded her. She was transported to the doors of the Harkness estate. She could feel strong spells protecting it, but they balked under the power of Rio. She flicked her hand, causing the doors to splinter and explode. She was unsure if Agatha had destroyed the flowers herself or if someone else had. Her confusion was cleared up the moment she heart Evanora screaming at a sobbing Agatha who was begging her to just let her go. She had just assumed that Agatha had rejected her, not once considering she was being punished or even held against her will.

Rio saw red.

Evanora froze at the sound downstairs. She was about to open the door when she felt heat emanating from it. The door was set ablaze, falling away as a silhouette formed within the fire. A woman who was untouched by the inferno.

Agatha was standing again, backing up against the wall. She was terrified of dying before she could return to Rio, of being reborn in some unknown place where she couldn’t find her. Where Agatha wouldn’t remember her.

Then, she saw her. Rio was standing in the doorway wearing black silk that wrapped tightly around her body, starting in a hood over her head and ending just above the middle of her thighs. Her eyes were determined and deadly. Agatha had never been so happy to see someone so murderous.

“I missed you,” Rio said with a little wave of her fingers.

Agatha looked at her in awe, unable to respond in the middle of so much chaos. Evanora, on the other hand, had plenty to say. She whispered an incantation that extinguished the flames, the destruction left behind on the charred walls.

“GET OUT OF THIS HOUSE, YOU HEATHEN!” she bellowed.

Rio simply smirked, calmly saying, “Make. Me.”

Evanora let out a roar as she shot every bit of magic she had at the woman. Rio stumbled back a bit, but easily deflected it.

“My turn,” she said, blowing Evanora into the ceiling with a sweep of her hand, keeping her pinned.

“You will NOT TAKE HER!” Evanora yelled.

“Oh, hush,” Rio said, turning to Agatha.

She is walked over to her, taking Agatha’s hands in her own. She saw the bruises, the black eye, the signs of malnourishment. She kissed her knuckles before letting Evanora go, dropping her like a ragdoll on the floor.

“Temptress,” Evanora said, blood dripping from her lips as she sat herself up, “Harlot…”

“Do you,” Rio began, turning to face Evanora, “Have any clue who I am?”

“You are the scarlet woman who is foolish enough to scrape the bottom of the barrel with Agatha,” she spat.

Rio’s eyes flashed with fury.

“Agatha is more consequential than you will ever be, you peon,” Rio said slowly and calmly.

“You really are quite stupid,” she said with a laugh as she stood on shaky legs.

“Look at me, Evanora. Look closer and tell me who I am…” Rio said, stepping toward her.

Evanora rolled her eyes with a sardonic smile. That is, until the moonlight that filtered through the window hit the other woman’s face. The light revealed the face of death, a skull in place of skin. A grotesque, bony smile. She fell back against the wall, her eyes full of more fear than Agatha had ever seen her show.

“Lady Death…” she whispered, “Just take her. Agatha has not deserved to live since the day she was born. Take her to the underworld, to whatever hell awaits her. I shall not interfere.”

Rio knew that once this bitch died, she would ensure that her afterlife would be worse than whatever humans believed hell to be.

“So quick to relinquish your only child to such a horrible fate. You truly are a waste of breath. To have a child like her and treat her like a demon.”

She stepped closer to the cowering woman.

“Oh, nothing to say? No more cruel words to throw my way? Let me explain just how much you have erred in your ways. Agatha is the fated leader of the underworld, along with me. She is the keeper of the soul that is connected to mine.”

“What?” Evanora managed to say.

“Let me restate it in more direct terms. You, Evanora Harkness, have hurt, starved, and tortured my queen. For that, you will not pay with your life, but with your afterlife.”

“No… I did not know!” Evanora yelled, “You must be mistaken. Agatha is not a blessing, she is a deadly curse!”

“AND I AM DEATH. So, I would say that we are very well matched,” Rio said, her unhinged side coming out.

“You do not know her as I do,” Evanora said.

“I know her better than she knows herself. One thing you certainly do not know is your place.”

Knowing she was already doomed to eternal torment, Evanora allowed a bout of madness to take over.

“If you want her so badly, let me help shepherd her to the other side,” she hissed, firing her magic at a support beam. The beam fell directly onto Agatha, pinning her beneath. Rio lifted it off of her, her face the vision of panic and concern as Agatha screamed in pain. She rested a hand on her torso, feeling the cracked ribs and sensing the internal bleeding. She would not lose her. Not again.

Rio leaned down and opened the front of Agatha’s nightgown, tearing it down to her waist. Without regard for modesty, she pressed her lips to the bruising skin. She lightly kissed along the exposed flesh, healing everything she touched. Agatha’s ribs shifted back into place, the bleeding within her body stopped. Her eyes opened, taking in the sight of Rio kissing along her bare front. She went from being broken and dying to the surreal experience of being healed by the intimate affection of the woman who had filled every one of her thoughts.

Rio stood, offering her hand to Agatha. Agatha took it and was pulled up to stand. She looked from Rio to her mother. She no longer showed any love for the woman who had just tried to kill her. Agatha’s glare was as full of hate as Evanora’s.

Agatha wrapped purple chords of magic around her wrists, flinging her into the wall. Evanora threw every heavy object she could get a hold of, using her magic for send an armoire, a chair, a bed at her daughter. Agatha managed to break or magically deflect each one.

When Evanora was about to use her magic once again to take down another beam, Agatha made a fateful decision. She rapidly moved into the path of the cerulean beam of her mother’s magic. Evanora’s spiteful determination morphed into horror as violet stretched over it. Her energy, her life force was painfully pulled from every cell of her body.

Rio watched Agatha, thinking to herself that she could never look more beautiful than she did right now wrapped in a purple glow, consuming the life of someone else. Agatha’s fingers swirled, extracting more power with their movement. Tears streamed down her face as she released all of the pain her mother caused her throughout her life.

Unable and unwilling to stop, Agatha drained every drop. Evanora was left frozen, her mouth stretched open in a silent scream. Her grey form was so dry and lifeless that it fell in pieces to the floor. Agatha watched both in horror and satisfaction.

Rio could see the gears beginning to turn in Agatha’s mind and refused to allow her to blame herself. She took her face in her hands, wiping salty streaks of emotion from Agatha’s skin.

“This was not your fault,” she said firmly, “This was survival. She wanted you dead. She nearly succeeded. You did what you needed to do.”

Agatha looked at the beautiful woman before her and then back down at what remained of her mother. She broke away, kneeling down to the pile of bone and dust. Reaching in, she took her mother’s locket, wiping every bit of her off of it. She put it on, wearing the heirloom in opposition to her mother’s wishes.

She turned and, in the dark, saw Rio’s true face illuminated partially by the light from the moon. She jumped a bit, signaling to Rio that she had forgotten to mask it. Before having a chance to, Agatha approached her, taking her hand in hers, cupping her cheekbone. Lady Death leaned into her touch. She felt more accepted by Agatha than she had by anyone else. She managed to see the beauty of the necessary stage of life in its barest form.

Rio transported them to the fields where they met, standing beneath the stars. Agatha felt an overwhelming barrage of emotions. The grief of being orphaned, rage at her mother’s actions causing her own, and excitement at the newfound freedom. In the center of her warring sentiments was one that held firm.

“I want to cross over with you,” Agatha said.

Rio was stunned. She had been so concerned with Agatha’s safety that she had forgotten what she herself desired. She wanted nothing more than to seize the opportunity to finally claim her love, but she needed to be sure that this was fully accepted by her for what it was.

“You do know what that will mean for you.”

“I do.”

“You will give up your human mortality, any reincarnations, and stay with me for eternity. You will be bound to the realm of the dead and rule at my side for the rest of existence. Are you prepared to make such a commitment?” Rio asked.

“I have never been more certain of anything in my life,” Agatha said.

Rio’s eyes welled with tears, a rare show of vulnerability from the embodiment of death. Her face had shifted back to the one Agatha knew. She cradled her face in her hands, marveling at how beautiful her new bride was.

Agatha memorized every detail of the face she would gaze upon for eons to come. She surged up, capturing Rio’s lips in her own first kiss. The other woman wrapped her arms around her, holding her tightly. Rio feverishly kissed down her neck, ravenous for the witch. She pulled her dirtied nightgown from Agatha, leaving her naked in the soft light of the night sky. She removed her own dress, the fabric unwinding and falling from her form. Agatha held her breath at the vision standing before her. Rio did the same, her eyes devouring her. She pulled her back into a passionate embrace.

Agatha let out a whimper with Rio’s forceful kiss. She reveled in her own shamelessness of being disrobed out in nature while being defiled for the first time. She led them to lay in the grass and flowers, pulling Rio atop her. Her face was surrounded by tendrils of hair.

Rio’s face lit up, looking down at Agatha. She took a moment to pause and take her in. She was already consumed with so much love after such a long pursuit and the few months of getting to know her. Agatha had not seen the usually stoic figure smile very often. Now, it was as if she couldn’t help herself.

Rio kissed down her body, stopping to lavish attention on each breast, sucking and biting at the tender skin. Agatha gasped sharply, tangling her fingers in Rio’s hair. Rio moved lower, leaving marks along her abdomen. She moved her hands down to her thighs, looping her arms around them. She pulled her close, pressing her lips to her core.

Agatha moaned as she felt the overwhelming sensation of a woman’s tongue working its way into her. She rolled her hips and tugged her hair. Whimpers and moans tore from her throat as her pleasure built. Rio slid two fingers within her and explored every sensitive spot she could find. Once she found the one that made Agatha’s toes curl, she made sure to grind her fingertips over it with every thrust.

“Look at my queen… you truly are a vision,” she breathed before wrapping her lips around the bundle of nerves above her sex.

“Rio!” Agatha sobbed out as she pulled her in by her dark tresses, rutting against her mouth until pleasure overwhelmed her.

As her body went taut, the flowers crumbled around her glowing violet form. Rio slid her fingers from her, licking her clean through her aftershocks. She crawled up her form and had a look of adoration adorning her face. She swept down and kissed Agatha, letting her have a taste of herself. Agatha hummed into the kiss, shivering from the pleasure still thrumming in her body.

“I want to please you too,” Agatha whispered with a dark blush on her cheeks.

Rio smiled and tucked a curl behind Agatha’s ear.

“That is not necessary. Your pleasure is my pleasure.”

“I want to,” she said, looking desperately into Rio’s eyes.

“Okay,” Rio said, her mouth going dry from Agatha’s need to have her, “Lie back.”

Agatha did as she was told. Rio moved up to her shoulders and straddled Agatha’s face.

“Just listen to the sounds that I make and you will know what to do. Oh, and the bump above the… opening… is important. Trust me on that. Just remember to let me know if you would like to stop. I will not be ups-Aaah!”

Rio broke off as Agatha interrupted her in the best way possible. She gripped Rio’s hips and leaned up, diving into her. She ran her tongue along her slit messily, searching for the spot she described. Once she swiped over one that caused Rio to gasp, she sucked and teased it with the tip of her tongue.

Rio, for her part, tried and failed to keep her composure. Her panting sighs became loud moans in minutes. Agatha was clearly a quick study.

“Ah! Yes… Good girl…” Rio moaned as her hips stuttered, her cunt pulsing with her climax.

The praise lit a flame in Agatha’s chest. Rather than stopping after one, Agatha latched onto her. She was still in shock over the younger witch giving her so much pleasure during Agatha’s first time.

The ministrations on her sensitive clit made her double over, catching herself on her hands. She was bent over, grinding against Agatha’s face. She could feel Agatha’s hands move to clutch her ass. She trembled again with an unexpectedly fast climax. However, it seemed like Agatha wanted to go back for thirds.

“I-Inside me,” she panted, nearly unable to speak.

Rio rode her tongue, at the point where she was not so much talking than incoherently babbling and whining. No one in history had ever seen her this weak or out of control, even her other sexual partners never gave her this much pleasure.

As her hips sped, magic flowed from her hands into the dirt below them. Over the ground that Agatha had cleared of all flowers bloomed new ones. Life washed over the fields of Salem, bringing back to life the crops Evanora had destroyed. Flowers opened up around them, the petals tickling Agatha’s face. She cried out and nearly fainted. She fell to her side, hugging her knees and shivering at the feeling of overstimulation.

“Are you alright? Did I do alright?” Agatha asked with doe eyes.

“I am. And of course you did. You damn near killed death,” she said with a shit-eating grin on her face.

Agatha laughed and tucked her face into the crook of Rio’s neck.

“Are you ready to see your kingdom?” she asked.

Agatha sat up as she was offered a scarlet pomegranate.

[sunnie-angel]

so exactly one year ago i posted the first fic i ever wrote (it was about jason todd, of course it was about jason). i think there were only about 40 of you following me then. over a year i’ve written around 50k words across various projects and there’s just over 1k of you lovely people now.

thank you so much to everyone that i’ve met along the way, that have been so lovely and supportive. thank you especially to @luvrodite and @orchidsangel who were some of the first people i met in this fandom and who encouraged me to share my writing. there are so many people i could thank — other writers, frequent readers, commenters — but if i listed them all we’d be here for another year. please know that i appreciate you all, and i feel so, so lucky to have your support.

[mellxncollie]

The results are in! Thank you everyone who voted, this was super interesting to see.

The difference between these four gifs is the sharpening and export settings! Many of you picked up on the sharpening difference, as well as A and C being similar, and B and D being similar.

The super quick answer is:

Gif A = soft sharpening settings, export with pattern dithering

Gif B = sharp sharpening settings (slightly more blurred), export with diffusion dithering

Gif C = soft sharpening settings, export with diffusion dithering

Gif D = sharp sharpening settings (slightly less blurred), export with diffusion dithering

The longer explanation is:

Gifs B and D are the two 'extremes' of my typical sharpening. B being on the less sharpened end, and D being on the more sharpened end.

The sharpening settings are as follows:

The 2 layers of Smart Sharpen have the same settings. The Gaussian Blur has a radius of 1.0 pixels.

For Gif B, the opacity of the Gaussian blur layer is set to 40% (more blurred)

For Gif D, the opacity of the Gaussian blur layer is set to 20% (less blurred)

(I used to only use 20% opacity for my earlier gifs. The last 3-4 months, I now use anywhere between 20 and 40%, depending on the scene)

---

Gifs A and C are both sharpened the same way, a new softer sharpening that I haven't really used much before.

The sharpening settings are as follows (I'm using the settings from this tutorial):

Both layers have the following Smart Sharpen filter settings and the Gaussian blur is also set to 1.0 pixels. The Gaussian Blur filter is set to an opacity of 85%, and the top layer opacity is set to 50%.

For Gif A, the gif was exported using pattern dithering.

For Gif C, the gif was exported using diffusion dithering.

but A is exported using a pattern dithering, whereas C is exported using a diffusion dithering. It was so fascinating to see the a preference for C arise over A.

For a bunch of analysis, head below the cut!

Gifs B and D will be referred to as the 'sharp gifs' and A and C will be referred to as the 'soft gifs'

The Data

I'd like to start with the two most grand-overview kind of observations.

First, a bit more than a quarter of people could not see any difference between the gifs. This was super encouraging to me, since I do stress over sharpening at times, and the differences between these four gifs demonstrate some of the stuff I stress over. Nice to know that for a fairly sizeable portion of you, it doesn't matter too much.

Secondly, wayyyyyy more people use mobile than I realized. About 2/3 of responses (of the repsonses that included a device) used mobile. Now a few people did mention looking on desktop afterward, and those "second" responses aren't included in these charts. What this does mean is that most of the people seeing my gifs are doing so, at least initially, on their phones (with the tumblr mobile gif compression).

Here's a pie chart of all the responses, with the mobile/desktop scores added together, just so we can get a baseline visual of which gifs people liked the most. I've color coded a bit so that A and C are visually distinct from B and D.

If we remove all those who couldn't see a difference/found some differences but not enough to pick a favorite, we ge the following results, with gif C as the desktop favorite, and the sharp gifs as the mobile favorites:

The following shows the overall preferences. About 2/3 of voters who expressed a preference liked the sharp gifs more than the soft gifs.

However, this is a bit misleading, since theres a notable difference between desktop and mobile viewers.

On desktop, just over half of voters preferred the soft gifs. However, they didn't just prefer the soft gifs, they preferred gif C.

Gif D also fared well, whereas the other soft gif, gif A, did the poorest.

Many of the stronger reactions in the tags were to the gifs on desktop, including statements that D, and to some extent, B, was too noisy, crisp, or over-sharpened.

!! This should not be taken to mean that A is the least favorite, since my question was simply "which gif is your favorite" and says nothing of which gifs people would consider 2nd, 3rd, and 4th place.

On the other hand, mobile viewers strongly preferred the sharp gifs, with 71% of mobile votes going to the sharp gifs. Voters were divided evenly between gifs B and D.

Mobile viewers did seem to like A a little less than C.

Before moving onto some analysis, I do feel the need to note that all of these are all sharpened about equal to or less than the 'standard' sharpening settings that a majority of tutorials across tumblr will use (smart sharpen at 500%, 0.4px, and again at 10%, 10.0px).

This is a grainy, indoor shot, so it does look a bit noisier than other gifs may look with the same sharpening, which was intentional on my part. With a shot like this, I would typically put out a gif with the settings in between B and D.

Analysis

The main reason I think we get these results, including the difference between the mobile and desktop votes is (to probably no suprise of anyone who has ever published a gif on tumblr), the gif compression on the mobile app.

I've downloaded the gifs from the post from the app onto my phone so that we can compare the frames.

The left image is the top corner of a gif, as displayed on desktop. The right image is the top corner of a gif, as displayed on the mobile app.

As you can see (zoom in if you can't), you loose a ton of detail to the compression, and even some color (check out Jenny's lipstick!)

Looking at gifs on mobile is, admittedly, not as good of an experience as it is on desktop. If you want to really appreciate the work that gifmakers across this site do, check out their gifs on desktop. They look better on there (or at least, they look more like the creator intended).

So, back to the gifs in the poll.

(NOTE: These are not cropped perfectly so there is some shape distortion and slight pixel differences. That's all on my end, not wanting to spend that much time on this. Try to just pay attention to the pixellation/compression)

Starting with gif A:

The left side, desktop, image, is a nice, soft gif. It makes sense to me that people on desktop would like this. I specifically looked at pattern vs diffusion dithering since I personally prefer pattern dithering on softer gifs like this (it decreases the effect of banding in the backgrounds), but it seems like C was slightly preferred over this. Either way, it looks okay on desktop. Mobile, on the other hand, it's a bit of a disaster. Charles' face is alright (although there are some splotchy yellow bits around his face and his neck isn't looking too great), but the background gets turned into this blocky mess.

Perhaps this is the fault of pattern dithering? Maybe gif C will fare better on mobile?

Gif C:

Nope. Gif C looks just as bad on mobile. The blocks are even more noticeable in the background, though I could concede that his face looks marginally better on mobile than Gif A. Also, up close like this, you may be able to better tell the difference between the dithering export settings for the soft gifs.

Given how these two gis look on mobile, it is no surprise to me that they did not do as well on mobile than they did on desktop.

So let's check in on the sharp gifs.

Gif B:

Okay! This looks a bit better! So there's still some compressing going on with mobile, you can see it in the background, and in the colors of his face. But, a lot less detail is being lost to the compression. It's not noticeably blurrier the way the soft gifs are.

A super simplified explanation of the compression is that the algorithm is looking for clusters of similar-looking pixels to reduce into even simipler, monolithic clusters, and when there's more noise and more contrast between individual pixels, it's harder for the algorithm to find things to simplify.

A gif with sharpening like this is like a preventative measure against Tumblr's compression.

(Also of note: The file size for the compressed, mobile gifs for A and C are smaller than the original files. However, for gifs B and D, the compressed files are actually larger.)

Finally, let's look at Gif D:

Gif D is like the more extreme version of Gif B. It is even sharper, so the compression algorithm seems to be having an even harder time. The major loss on mobile on this gif seems to be the colors (check out the lips and the eyes) as opposed to the image quality.

What do people seem to prefer in a gif?

To me, these results indicate that people tend to look for two things in a gif:

Image definition

A soft, smooth look

These can exist in the same gif on Desktop, which seems to be why the soft gifs were so popular. However, I would also argue that definition is a bit more important, which was why the results were a bit more evenly spread on desktop, since all four gifs have good definition on desktop.

However, on mobile, a softer or smoother gif will often come at the loss of image definition. So, in these cases, people will gravitate towards something that has some definition. It seems like for mobile users, there was really not too much of a difference in the appearance of the two sharp gifs, so results were split.

Final reflections

Personally, on mobile I prefer B and D about evenly, and on desktop I like the look of A and B. My least favorite of these gifs was actually C, and so seeing it do so well on desktop was surprising. I was also surprised by how many people didn't see a difference between the gifs, but as I mentioned, this was more reassuring than anything else.

Most of you who shared your preferences for both platforms generally picked the soft gifs on desktop, and the sharp gifs on mobile. I suspsect if somehow it was allowed to vote once for mobile and once for desktop, this would have only served to strengthen the current results.

Thanks to everyone who voted, and thanks to everyone who added additional info in the tags or provided additional opinions over on discord. This was massively interesting for me!

out of curiosity... here's 4 iterations of the same gif with some slight differences

let me know if you are on the mobile app or on desktop, and which one you prefer. feel free to leave additional notes about your opinions in the tags or in a comment. (i have no attatchment to these gifs, they were made for science, so if you really hate the look of one, i will not be offended)

if you are super confident you know what the difference is, please refrain from putting that info in the tags or comments, i'm trying to get a sample of what people prefer when they're not looking for anything in particular

i will reblog this once the poll is over with what the difference is

[lizzie-queenofmeigas]

Warnings: Straight up incest in this chapter.

Kiara didn't trust Rafe. Not at all. He had always been a bully. The  kook. One who got everything he ever wanted. And he did. Didn't he? He got away with murdering a cop. Rafe Cameron had more privilege than the average white male, and that was already a lot.

Fucking patriarchy.

During her Kook Year he was charming and kind to her. He still sort of was at times. But even then she couldn't forget what he was. Sarah apparently did. Letting him get away with murder. And Kie got it. Alright? She did. He was her brother and they used to be very close. He was there for her when their mother died. She was loyal to him. But to this extent?

Then again, wouldn't Kie cover up for JJ, John B and Pope in similar situations? Hasn't she covered for them already when they were doing some illegal shit like stealing? And yeah, murder was worse than stealing, but Rafe was still someone Sarah loved. So maybe she could understand. And Ward deserved to go to prison more than Rafe did. Ward Cameron had killed three people in his search for the gold, he was an actual serial killer. And he had been sober while doing it, unlike Rafe.

"Are you sure of what you're doing?" she asked Sarah once they were on board of that immense cargo ship. They were given one of the rooms, even through it didn't take a full day to reach the Bahamas. Sarah and Rafe stayed in another. Which was kinda weird, but she had chosen to sleep with the boys rather than get a room for herself so she really couldn't judge "All of this is...I don't know, Sarah. It's all so weird. You siding with Rafe and literally covering up a crime—"

"Lower your voice" her friend hissed, anxiously looking around.

They were on the deck, watching as the ship moved in the dead of the night.

Kie looked around. There was no one but them there.

"Sorry"

"Yeah. I'm sure. And even if I wasn't, it's too late to turn back now"

Kiara knew that to be true. They have committed too many crimes already. All of them. They were all covering for Rafe, John B even lied before a judge. There was no going back now.

"Let's hope we don't regret this"

Sarah smiled softly, kindly, brown eyes crinkling.

"I don't think I will"

Kie huffed. Not her, but they might. Especially if Rafe fucked them over with the gold. Not that she thought that would happen, not with Sarah vouching for them, but it was always a possibility. 

"I'm gonna check on the boys" she told her "Make sure they haven't gotten into a fight with Rafe"

Sarah chuckled "Yeah, that could happen"

Kie went back to the heir room, being careful where she stepped due to the darkness. She couldn't afford to fall off the ship. She didn't want to fall off the ship. Both Sarah and her went inside, but their ways parted before Kie could reach her room. The boys were all there, thankfully. None were getting into a fight with Rafe.

"Kie, thank God! Help us here" John B exclaimed standing from the bed he chose "JJ just had a stupid idea"

"His kind of ideas" Pope murmured.

"Funny, Pope" JJ turned to her, jumping from the top of the bunk bed "Very funny. But you know I'm right. We should knock out Rafe and take the gold. Yucatan is right there, waiting for us"

Kie sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. Yeah, that was definitely a JJ idea. One of the worst he ever had. Which said a lot.

"We're not doing that"

"Why not?"

"Because it's a stupid idea?"

"And Rafe is crazy, he could kill us" 

Yeah, that too.

"Look, this is fair. We'll have the exact same amount of money we were going to have before" John B was being rational, which was weird because he normally was the second most chaotic "Let's not ruin this"

"Yeah. We are so close now. It's best to swallow our pride" 

"I agree with Pope" 

JJ rolled his eyes, running a hand through his blonde hair. Much that she loved him, she couldn't agree with his stupid ideas, or maybe because she loved him she couldn't encourage him in those things.

"Fine. What y'all want, but if shit goes the wrong way because of Rafe, don't say I didn't warn ya"

"Sarah won't let anything happen"

"And does Sarah have that much sway with Rafe?"

"She did get him to give us the gold rather than keep it"

"Exactly!" Kie's phone began to ring. It was her mom. She didn't think twice before turning it off "Let's get some sleep, the Bahamas are seven hours away, better to arrive well-rested"

JJ frowned at her, as if there was something he didn't understand. He didn't ask anything, and she didn't say anything either.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There was some money in the safe back in Tannyhill. Rafe made use of it to get the ship to take them to the Bahamas and transport the gold with discretion. The gold better be in that fucking safe. He thought twisting his signet ring nervously. If it wasn't, they were fuck. Him, Sarah and Wheezie. They would take his sisters from him, put them in the system. Rafe would fucking die if that happened. He couldn't allow it. He would end up killing more people. Because being sober was making him more irritable and with no money and no family he just might go to prison.

"Mr Cameron" the captain of the crew, he thought his name was Terry or something "There is enough water for you and your wife to take a shower"

Wife? Oh, right. Sarah.

"Thanks" he forced himself to be nice, but didn't correct him in his assumption "I'll tell her"

He handed the stout man some bills before going back to their room. Wife. He thought my sister was my wife. That didn't bother him, not at all. But he didn't get why Terry had assumed that. Did they really act that weird? Like, yeah, they were not normal siblings, especially him. And he could understand that maybe he didn't look at Sarah like he should. I definitely don't. But to think they were married was something else.

Not something bad. To him, at least. How would Sarah take it?

I don't need to tell her.

Yeah, it wasn't something important. No need to tell her. Back in their room, Sarah was scrolling through her phone, barefoot on the bed.

"Hey" he closed the door "There's water for us to take a shower if we want to"

"Cool" she smiled at him.

The light of the room made Sarah's hair look like melted gold, shiny and beautiful. Rafe extended his hand and caught a silky strand between his fingers. Sarah looked up to him, big brown eyes bearing a strange glint. She looked pretty like that.

So so pretty.

He cleared his throat, letting go of her hair and taking a step back. He shouldn't go there.

"I don't trust the pogues" he said trying to avoid thinking about what his mind was about to think "They want to keep all the gold"

"Well, a part is mine. Ours. So they better not"

Rafe tilted his head.

"What if they did?"

Sarah stopped for a moment, blinking as if trying to come up with an idea, then she shrugged.

"We'd go after them. No killing though" she smirked "I'm gonna hit the shower"

He watched her go to the small bathroom attached to their room, mouth quirked upwards. Then he remembered what he had to do. What he had promised Sarah he would do. Apologize. Just the thing he was worst at.

It wasn't really as hard as he thought it would be, going to the pogues room and knocking at the door. If he was lucky, he would be with Sarah in a moment.

"What are you doing here?" Kiara asked when she opened the door.

"Can I talk to Pope?"

Kiara looked at him in disbelief. Yeah, he couldn't believe it either.

"Why would you want to talk to me?"

He stepped inside the room, all four pogues up on their feet, but the beds were all unmade. They were sleeping, or trying to, but now they were all tense and alert. It was kinda flattering to be honest.

"I wanted to apologize for what I did" he twisted his signet ring "It was wrong. I'm sorry"

Pope and Kiara blinked at him dumfounded, meanwhile John B seemed to not believe a word and JJ was snarling at him. He didn't really care about those two.

"Rafe Cameron apologizing?" JJ snorted "Is the world ending?"

"Are you actually sorry?" Pope squinted his eyes at him, mistrustful.

Rafe couldn't blame him.

"Yeah. I am. You didn't deserve that, if anything I should have attacked JJ"

"Weird apology" Kiara murmured.

"Well, I did it because I was trying to prove a point I think, amongst other things. For putting a gun to Topper's head and all that"

"He was drowning me. That's the reason JJ pulled a gun on him" John B scoffed at him.

"How should I know? I wasn't there, and Topper didn't mention it"

"What are the other reasons?" Pope stepped closer.

"Huh?"

"The other reasons you attacked me"

He twisted the ring again, taking a deep breath.

"I was kinda...very high. And, I don't know, man, shit gets blurry at times. I guess I just wanted to hurt someone and I used every excuse to do it. Sometimes... sometimes I just need the violence"

He didn't miss the JJ looked down, as if he understood. As if he could relate. He didn't miss the way Kiara looked at the blond either.

"Okay"

His eyebrows raised involuntary.

"What?"

"You're willing to help us with the gold to prove you're better now, you're sober. I believe you"

Rafe let out a breath, smiling.

"Are you serious? Pope—"

The four pogues began to argue with one another, but he didn't really care. It was like a great weight was lifted of his shoulders. He was forgiven. Sarah would be so happy.

"I been thinking about the gold, actually. About how to use it legally" he told Sarah his plan already, and she approved. No that he needed her approval, but it was good to have it. "We say you found it in Tannyhill, because I don't think you found it without breaking some laws"

"Breaking and entering" JJ murmured.

"It wasn't very legal, no" Pope agreed.

Rafe didn't even blink, he had been expecting that. He was kinda curious as to where exactly did they find it 400 million in gold, but he didn't ask. Sarah could tell him all the details later.

"And that'll work?"

He shrugged.

"There's a hole in the basement of Tannyhill. It's been there for ages, we can always say the gold was there"

"How big is that hole?"

"Pretty big, Sarah still fits in there. We used to hide there when we played hide and seek"

Something crossed over Pope's face, he didn't want. Maybe he was just doing math. He was the smart one after all.

"How long it's been there?"

"Why does that matter?" JJ blinked confused.

"It could be the original hiding place of the gold. I don't think Denmark Tanny had it always where we found it"

"It was pretty unpractical" Kiara agreed.

He was kinda lost in the conversation, but answered either way. Doing better. Being better.

"According to my mother, it was already there when her father was a child" She used to tell her stories about her childhood, and her father's. She told him stories about so many things. He still missed her. Would he ever stop missing her? "Well... I'll go get some sleep"

Sarah was probably missing him.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

They were already in the Bahamas when she awoke. Sun shining through the small windows of the boat. She shook Rafe, trying to wake him up.

"What?" he asked groggily, eyes opening just a little.

Sarah smiled at the sight. Face pressed against the pillow, strands of dark hair over his half-closed eyes.

"We are in the Bahamas"

That seemed to wake him completely. Rafe sat straight, rubbing his eyes. He looked at her, eyes moving up and down her body.

"I'll get dressed"

Sarah nodded and left the room. The sun burn over her skin as she walked to the Pogues on the docks.

"How are we going to your house?" Asked Kie, watching the people in the docks, slash, bazaar "You have a car or..."

"Yeah"

"Good" JJ said, he had joint between his fingers "The sooner we get this over with, the better"

"Agreed" John B was still not looking at her.

She should probably care about that. She didn't.

"No smoking, JJ" Pope forcibly took the joint and stored it in his pocket "We need you lucid"

"It's not like it makes much of a difference" she commented jokingly.

"Exactly!" JJ extended his hand towards Pope "Give it back!"

Just when Pope was about to concede, Rafe appeared from the behind them fully dressed.

"What are you doing? We need you sober, all of you"

"Oh, come on!"

"You'll have it back once we're in Kildare"

JJ argue with them to have the joint back the whole car ride to their house in the Bahamas. It was just as they left it last winter. It was not as big as Tannyhill, but it had a good size. Good security too. The guard at the door didn't even ask about Ward, thankfully, even though he probably was dying for some information. Most people were.

"Holy shit" JJ whistled when they were inside "I'm buying a house like this one with my share. The parties will be legendary"

"Wow" Pope murmured in agreement "It would probably cost a few millions"

"1.5 million" Rafe corrected  "It's not that much" 

Sarah shook her head as the four pogues stared at her brother like he just said something unbelievable. Maybe he had, though she agreed with him. Tannyhill was way more expensive than that.

"Let's go get the gold"

"Yeah, but you four stay here" her brother ordered as he started climbing up the stairs.

"Why?"

"I don't want you to learn how to open the safe" he shrugged.

"Right. Or you want to keep the gold all to yourself" she had not realized before that JJ had a cut on his lips.

"Why would you I bring you here then?"

"To kill us" Pope supplied, looking slightly alert.

"Calm down, guys" Sarah followed her brother upstairs "I'll go with him"

"And you are trustworthy?" John B asked, bitterness lacing his tone.

"I trust her"

They started arguing again, about whether she was trustworthy or not. Sarah shared a look with her brother before they entered the office. The safe was kept in Ward's former office, just like in Tannyhill. It was a tall, rectangular, iron box. Almost as tall as Rafe. 

Sarah's heart was beating wildly in her chest. She smiled at her brother, reassuringly, as he worked to open the safe.

"Jackpot" he whispered when the door opened.

It was blinding, the sight of all the gold bars placed neatly inside the safe. So much gold. Sarah screeched happily.

"Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes!" she couldn't help but jump around the room.

"Holy shit!" her brother laughed.

It was a laugh of joy, of relief. It meant that he could breathe again, that they were saved. Without a warning, Rafe held her in his arms and spun her around. Sarah giggled happily, feeling a little dizzy, and a little sad, when he put her down. They stared at each other, panting and smiling, euphoric. And then Rafe leaned forward and pressed his lips to hers. 

Oh.

He held her in place, his hand on the back of her neck, for a few seconds. So many seconds. So little time. She didn't mind.  Then he let her go, and she stumbled backwards, wide-eyed and confused. Heat rose to her cheeks. She couldn't talk. She couldn't—

What just happened?

"Guys!" Kie's voice boomed around the corridor and she appeared through the door, her eyes landing on the gold "Oh, my God. It's here! All of it. Yes!"

The rest of the Pogues heard their exclamations and joined them with their owns. All happy, all celebrating. Rafe avoided her gaze, but she didn't stop searching for it. Searching for answers. She got none.

[dseval]

What are your thoughts of CrossDust? What dynamic you think they have?

Permission to yap about CrossDust??

Short answer: funny i like both of them they should kiss

...Long yapping ahead (there's yapping about my Murder Sans interpretation, then there's also CrossDust. It's long.)

I'd like to first clarify that my interpretation of Dust may be different compared to many (I think, at least). Since I base his character on the canon information from Ask-Dusttale and fangames— particularly Evan Streblow's Dusttale (if you don't know, it's the one with the psychotic HAHAHAHAHAHAHA and "We're gonna have a MAD time!")

I also slot in some headcanons (and self-projections, can't help it) and some character adjustments because I think canon Murder is extremely difficult to work with, especially in the context of shipping and anything else this fandom does with him in general.

But just the gist of it so you all don't have to read that much (I can go on for ten more paragraphs. I'm obsessed with this guy):

I'll use the names Murder and Dust interchangeably and within different contexts. I like to think Murder is a front that Dust puts on— an apathetic murderer who finds emotions difficult to feel, someone who always lies to get his way, a sociopath. While Dust is quiet, honest, and more contemplative. It's mostly Murder who interacts with others.

Murder and Dust aren't necessarily two different people. Ultimately, Dust directly influences Murder's choices, and Murder may disappear one day once Dust feels content.

His hallucinations aren't only Papyrus, he also hallucinates about others although Papyrus is the most often. And these hallucinations speak different things according to the state he's in. Murder's hallucinations would encourage him to hurt more. While Dust's would induce guilt.

Murder is a very focused person, not afraid to take the lead, and he hates it when nothing happens. Dust on the other hand is content just doing nothing.

Murder finds love absurd. Dust too, but he entertains the thought of it.

Murder and Dust both think words are silly, insincere, and can change meanings, so they are more action-oriented.

He's demisexual. That's a headcanon.

And if anyone has any different interpretation of Murder/Dust Sans, that is absolutely okay and amazing. Dusttale is a very hard AU to actually get into (all the informations are scattered). Plus, there is nothing wrong with fanon. I think it's great, I like fanon. I sometimes like fanon more than canon.

Now CrossDust.

For their general dynamic, I think it's very difficult for them to get together. They just go back and forth between something and nothing. They have like... The slowest of slow burns.

I'd like to implement the entire Underverse thing. Remember how Cross stole Classic's soul? Apparently, Sanses across different alternate timelines can share a memory. So Geno knows Cross stole 'his' soul. Killer also acknowledges this and says to XChara that they stole 'his' soul.

So technically to Murder/Dust— Cross also had stolen 'his' soul (And Murder would've had felt all Cross's pain while at it, too). I think Murder would find it hilarious that Cross brought literally every single innocent AU into his problem. Dust would feel like Cross's plans are ridiculous, but since it's XChara's plan, and XChara is the human, Dust wouldn't even question it.

In a way, they share SOULs once, even if indirectly. Murder/Dust knows probably a lot about Cross. But Cross didn't know who the hell this guy is. Either way, with that in mind. Murder probably didn't have a good first impression of Cross. Dust might empathize with him, since Cross also committed a genocide in order to 'make things better' which is also Dust's reasoning. Cross might learn about Murder's actions later— but cannot judge Murder/Dust for it.

They are very similar. Kindred souls in a way. They went through similar struggles but they turned out to be completely different people. Because Cross in his entire life is under control, while Murder acts on choice. Because Cross knows what he did is horrible and he'll carry that sin to the grave, while Murder justifies his actions.

Cross is too trusting (he doesn't trust easily now), too seeking for approval, he doesn't know what to do if no one orders him. Murder thinks he himself is enough, Murder thinks he is the hero, he doesn't need anyone else.

Cross thinks Murder is a bad person, an absolute jerk. Murder likes to toy with him, probably also uses Cross to his advantage. Murder can either try to hurt Cross, or will try to win his favour. But can Cross judge him? Not really, hell, I don't think Cross even noticed if Murder did manipulate him. Low-key toxic these two.

But then there's the private moments, the intimate moments where Dust shed the front that is Murder. Where Dust is sincere; he doesn't talk, but the way he gazes and acts towards Cross is honest. And although reluctant, maybe Cross desires to bring that side out of him more.

It's both difficult for them to trust. But eventually Dust will learn that Cross cannot lie— Dust will trust words again. Eventually Cross realizes that he's not the only one hurt, and he can find a home in others, he can choose to find a home.

Cross will find it frustrating how Dust shuts himself down. Dust would find it frustrating how hard Cross tries for him. But eventually, Dust would learn to no longer front himself up with Murder. Cross would need a signal from Dust that what he's doing is okay and perfect before they can advance further.

They'll care about one another.

Eventually, they'll trust each other.

In a relationship sense where they're both happy and recovered, though. I think both of them like cuddling. Dust still had a hard time with words, but he knows how much it means for Cross to have words of affirmations, so he would praise Cross a lot. Cross knows Dust is as restless as he is, so he makes sure they both have a full schedule with a lot of things to do.

All in all, they're comfortable with each other. And that's enough, really.

(i almost yapped for ten more paragraphs but I think this is enough for now sksksksk)

Dust Sans by Ask-Dusttale

Cross Sans, Underverse, & XTale by Jakei

Mentioned characters: Killer Sans (by Rahafwabas), Geno (by loverofpiggies/CrayonQueen)

[amysubmits]

“you know why some men are so full of shit? because the world has failed them.” yeah … this is bullshit, and honestly pretty insulting to “good” men, many of whom have been dealt a shitty lot in life, who aren’t toxic or abusive. some men are full of shit because it benefits them to be full of shit. if your reaction to having a shitty life is to become sexist (or racist, or homophobic, etc) you’re a bad person.

a world in which 91% of heads of state (and 92% of CEOs, and 72% of industry leaders) are male has not “failed men.” a world in which men own 50% more wealth than women, while women do 300% more unpaid labor than men, has not “failed men.” a world in which 50 countries allow men to legally rape their wives has not “failed men.”

Having privilege in one area doesn't exclude you from being failed in other areas. Look at the suicide rate, the shorter life expectancy, etc.

The fact that there are men who have had shitty lives who don't become racist or sexist doesn't mean that other men weren't failed by the individual people in their lives or society at large.

If one woman experienced trauma and didn't become a drug addict, that doesn't mean her sister who is a drug addict didn't become an addict because of their shared childhood trauma. That's really simplified black and white thinking to say if I turned out okay,they're just choosing to be an addict! Mental health and coping methods are so much more complex than that. Everyone who goes through trauma is just trying to survive as best as their brain and nervous system know how. Some of us end up with coping methods that are seen as pro-social and "good", and others end up with default trauma responses and coping methods that get labeled as "bad". Both are harmful in different ways. And I'm speaking as someone with a lifelong "good girl" coping method.

There are endless factors in how people turn out. As one simplified example, if a boy had abusive and neglectful parents who publicly claimed to be feminists, and then the first person in that kids life who REALLY made them feel cared for, seen, supported, encouraged was sexist? That kid is a lot more likely to grow up sexist than another kid who also had a traumatic childhood but didn't see examples of people being good to them personally who had shitty views. It's just bad logic to say if some men live under patriarchy and become feminist, then the sexist guys are just inherently shitty people...

I'm not trying to say we should look fondly at sexist people. Of course not. But if you really think that there are widespread problems in men and that those things aren't caused by a systemic failure in some way, then you're arguing that a larger portion of men are just born inherently 'bad' somehow compared to women. Believing that a group of people is just somehow inherently bad or lesser is damn near the definition of prejudice.

[7-oh-ta1]

When I see ppl hating on king rhoam i start blacking out and seeing visions

[tennessoui]

au where jedi healers take a vow not unlike jedi temple guards, but instead of wearing a mask and becoming anonymous, they give up their sight and wear blindfolds to allow the Force to guide their every action. it’s also supposed to blind them to their patients’ differences, which used to be symbolic but since the war between the jedi and the sith broke out, has become much less so

because jedi healers are supposed to heal regardless of if their patient is a jedi or a sith, when they’re deployed on battlefields after the fighting is over, they use the Force to heal every injured person they come upon.

anakin skywalker, who was chosen from the creche and agreed to follow the Healing path at the age of 9, thinks it’s sort of stupid that they have to wait until after the fighting is over to begin to help because he can feel people dying in the Force, he can feel their pain--

young general kenobi, who remembers his old creche-mate anakin skywalker and how blue his eyes once were, thinks it’s beyond foolhardy that this healer is stealing out across an active battlefield, blindfold over his eyes and bending down to heal karking darth maul and single-handedly diverting all of obi-wan’s attention away from the droids and sith legion because now he has to make sure he’s ok he can’t just leave him to the whims of the Force, he’s unprotected and he’s going to get himself killed----

it’s a headache and a half for everyone involved because general kenobi keeps abandoning his battle strategy and sometimes even position to ensure healer skywalker’s safety and healer skywalker keeps dropping everything and everyone the moment he feels obi-wan kenobi get hurt in the Force to rush to his side, Force Vow of Healing Equality be damned.

but......the Council keeps deploying them to the same battlefield because healer skywalker is never more effective as when he knows he must heal fifty mortal wounds before he can rid general kenobi of a headache, and general kenobi is never as ruthless as when skywalker is on the field close to him, in potential harm’s way

despite how much they insist they hate each other 

[dekarios]

when i was younger like. early to mid twenties. i used to get so mad at all the 'its a dating sim' jokes towards rpgs with romance in it. and now i'm just like.. i ain't got the time nor the energy to be upset that some people play these games exclusively for romance. there's nothing wrong with that. many people read romance novels exclusively and are only there for the romance portions, in games we have a billion visual novels where no one cares about the story and just wanna romance pretty people, blah blah romance as a genre exists for a reason and rpgs with romance options are the best option still for 'make your own character to romance the character of choice' whereas everything else gives you a premade, even in visual novels you have a premade character even if you can name them and maybe change a few things, its all very basic... i have nothing against people who use rpgs to get that same feeling but having more control over how they get it

anyway