#i mean i recognise that my judgement of what is good is different from that of another group of people's judgement

[8cfc00]

cant believe my posts have not been explodinf w notes this is so fucked im drawing grant wilson mitski a pearl

[st4rtar0t]

Helping your recognise your superpower

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Picture 1

Your lust for knowledge is your superpower. And I know you may think that is a lame power to have but I do want to your realise that knowledge is everything. The more knowledgeable you are, the more mature you become. Maturity comes from a sense of understanding and experience. The way you're always ready to learn new things makes you unique. Some of could be an higher achiver, or your sense of self comes from your academic performance. I think it's good to be knowledge but don't bring yourself down when you don't perform well. Give yourself time to learn and revise.

Your another superpower is your ability to look at situations from different perspectives. You know sometimes our pain clouds our vision making it difficult to acknowledge the hurt of others. But not for you, no matter how bad your situation is, you wouldn't let your emotions cloud your judgement Which is an remarkable ability.

Your faith, whether in yourself, in others or in something greater than us all, gives you strength and resilience in times of difficulty. Your belief in humanity, your trust in kindness and your faith in the possibility of a better future awaiting us uplifts not only you but also the people around you.

Picture 2

Your planning is your superpower. It's like having a secret weapon in life. When you plan, you're like a master strategist, able to foresee obstacles and navigate around them. You can set goals and figure out the steps to reach them. Planning helps you stay organized, focused, and prepared for whatever comes your way. It's not just about making lists; it's about taking control of your future and making things happen. So, embrace your planning abilities, because they can truly make you unstoppable. Some of you could be INTJ/ENTJ.

Your another superpower is your protectiveness. It's your ability to shield and guard the ones you care about, keeping them safe from harm. Just like a superhero, you have an instinct to watch over others, anticipating dangers and swooping in to shield them from harm. Your protective nature is a strength that shines brightly, offering comfort and security to those around you. Embrace this superpower, for it is a reflection of your love and dedication to keeping your loved ones out of harm's way. you may think that this makes you more feminine but caring for the people that you makes you stronger. Your constant transformation is your superpower because it means you're always evolving, learning, and adapting. Instead of being stuck in one way of thinking or doing things, you embrace change and use it to your advantage. You're like a chameleon, able to adjust to any situation or challenge that comes your way. This flexibility allows you to grow stronger, wiser, and more resilient with each transformation. So, don't fear change, embrace it, because it's what makes you unstoppable.

Picture 3

Your love for others is your superpower because it has the ability to transform lives in ways beyond imagination. When you extend kindness, understanding, and support to those around you, you create an atmosphere of warmth and positivity. Your love has the power to heal wounds, mend broken hearts, and inspire greatness in others. It's a force that spreads joy, brings people together, and fosters deep connections. Through your love, you become a beacon of hope and strength, capable of uplifting the spirits of those who may be struggling.

Your powerful presence is like a superpower. It's all about how you carry yourself and how you make others feel when you're around. You don't need special abilities because you are your own strength. People notice you without you having to do anything flashy. Your confidence and the way you connect with others make you stand out. Your presence is like a magnet, attracting attention and admiration wherever you go. It's what makes you truly remarkable.

Your voice and the words you choose have immense power. When you speak, it's like magic weaving through the air, touching hearts and minds. The tone, pitch, and rhythm of your voice can convey emotions and messages in ways that no other form of communication can. And the words you select? They're like arrows hitting their target, shaping thoughts, inspiring actions, and building connections. Whether you're calming a storm with soothing words or igniting a fire with passionate speech.

[saintsenara]

Thoughts on Ron and Hermione as a ship?

thank you very much for the ask, @thesilverstarling!

i’ll state my position straight away: book ron and hermione are the best of the canon couples.

they will have a long and extremely happy marriage made rich by great and stalwart love, lust, fun, and faithfulness, rather than held together by duty and couples’ therapy like so many readers and authors (including jkr, who seems to have decided to spend the years since the conclusion of the series failing to understand anything about her own characters) tend to think.

i will state another position straight away: lest i seem like i’m just a fan with blinkers on, i think this even though hermione is, by far, my least favourite member of the trio. if she were real i would detest her, and i dislike how she is treated by the narrative as always justified in her negative characteristics. i like fanon hermione - perfect and preternaturally good - even less.

as a result, i think that it’s ridiculous that jkr has said that she thought ron needed to ‘become worthy’ of hermione. they belong together as equals - which is what they’re set up in the narrative as being from the off - and i hate seeing that undermined.

because ronald weasley? he’s an icon. and he doesn’t get anywhere near the respect he deserves in fandom.

there are multiple reasons for this - ron’s narrative purpose is to be the everyman sidekick, and so he is able to be less special than harry or hermione (the helper-figure); the amount of aristocracy wank in this fandom means that the weasleys’ ordinariness is less appealing to writers than making harry have twenty different lordships and call himself hadrian; the narrative interrogates ron’s flaws - especially his capacity for jealousy - much more intensively than it interrogates either hermione’s (cruel, inflexible, meddling) or harry’s (reckless, self-absorbed, judgemental) - but one i feel is particularly significant is that ron is such a british character that many of his traits are not understood as intended by non-british readers.

in particular - as is outlined in this excellent meta by @whinlatter - ron’s sense of humour isn’t indicative of immaturity or a lack of seriousness, but is, in fact, evidence that he’s the most emotionally aware of the trio.

ron is shown throughout the series to understand how both harry and hermione need to have their emotions approached - and i think there is no piece of writing which says this better than crocodile heart by @floreatcastellumposts:

That was what she liked most about Ron, she thought vaguely. He was very good at being suitably outraged on your behalf. For Harry, for her, for Neville. That sort of thing mattered, when you were hurt or embarrassed or wronged in some way. You needed to have someone else on your side, to be as emotional as you felt, maybe even more so, so that you might feel a bit more normal. It was very decent of him, and she was not sure he realised he did it.

ron’s inherent emotional awareness is an enormous source of comfort to other people. he does the work which isn’t flashy or special - he makes tea and tells jokes and is just there - but which is needed in healthy human relationships far more frequently than a willingness to fight to the death for the other person.

[as an aside, this normality - even though i think it is assumed rather than justified by the text - is also what ginny provides for harry. if you believe that hinny are a good couple but romione aren’t… i can’t help you.]

but let’s look at some specific reasons why ron and hermione belong together:

their communication styles mesh perfectly. ron is the only person hermione knows who feeds her love of being challenged and debated, and who is able to engage in this way of communicating without becoming irate when she refuses to back down. ron is good at picking his battles, but he’s also good at recognising that hermione’s tendency to argue isn’t intended to be confrontational a lot of the time - it’s just the way she works through feelings and problems. he’s far more easy-going about her tendency to nag, interrupt, try to provoke arguments, or speak condescendingly than he’s given credit for - and hermione evidently respects this, since when he does tell her not to push a situation (above all, when she’s trying to needle harry into talking about sirius), she listens to him.

that ron and hermione’s tendency to bicker is taken by fans to be a bad thing is because it’s something harry - from whose perspective the narrative is written - doesn’t understand. harry is extremely conflict-avoidant - he tends to take being pushed on views and opinions he has to be insulting; and he has a tendency to assume that he is right which is just as profound as hermione’s. he and ginny communicate not by debating, but by ginny having no time for his rigidity and refusing to indulge it - but ron and hermione bickering about everything is not a negative thing within their specific emotional dynamic.

[as another aside, this glaring chasm in communication styles is why harry and hermione would be a disaster as a couple.]

they each provide validation the other needs. it’s clear - reading between the lines - that hermione is a tremendously lonely person. the friendlessness of her initial few weeks at hogwarts seems to be a continuation of her experience as a child, and - outside of ron and harry - that friendlessness endures through her schooldays. i’m always struck, for example, by the fact that, when she falls out with ron in prisoner of azkaban, she has no-one else to spend time with, and that this is only avoided in half-blood prince because harry decides not to freeze her out. i don’t think her friendship with ginny is anywhere near as close as fanon seems to imply (ginny has no interest in being nagged either), nor do i think that she’s anywhere near as close to neville (not least because she is so condescending to him) as she’s often written to be.

and this loneliness seems to stretch beyond hogwarts. the absence of hermione’s parents’ from the narrative is - in a doylist sense - clearly just a device to maximise time with the trio all together, but the watsonian reading is that she doesn’t have a particularly good relationship with them. hermione’s obviously upper-middle-class background - the name! the skiing! the holidays in the south of france! - can be presumed, i think, to come with a series of expectations from her parents which she feels constantly that she’s not entirely meeting, particularly expectations attached to academic success.

[for example, the grangers - were she a muggle child - would undoubtedly have ambitions for her to attend an elite university and then go into a prestigious career. tertiary education of the type that they’re familiar with doesn’t seem to exist in the wizarding world - most careers seem to be taught by apprenticeship - and this, alongside all the other divides between the magical and muggle worlds which contribute to the distance between them, would be one very obvious area in which she felt the need to prove herself to them.]

ron, too, has quite a difficult relationship with his position in the family - voldemort’s locket is not wrong to point out that he seems to receive considerably less of his mother’s emotional attention than ginny or the rest of his brothers - and he too is constrained by expectations which he doesn’t know how to explain he has no interest in - above all, molly’s desire for her sons to achieve top grades and go into the ministry.

he also suffers while at hogwarts from being ‘harry potter’s best friend’, something which harry never appreciates. but hermione does. she recognises ron’s jealousy and never allows harry to minimise it (and she and ron are very much aligned on having no respect for harry’s saviour and martyr complexes). she appreciates ron’s strengths - above all his kindness and his sense of humour - and makes him feel as though he’s achieved things with them. and ron does the same for her; he is hugely observant when it comes to her, and he challenges and defends her.

the two of them clearly spend a lot of time together one-on-one while harry’s involved in his various shenanigans (including outside of school - hermione has often arrived at the burrow days or even weeks before harry, and they seem to write to each other frequently when apart). they do this within a relationship which is fundamentally equal. one issue with hinny is that, post-war, harry is going to have to get used to seeing ginny as a peer, rather than as someone he has to protect. but ron and hermione never have that issue - equality is baked into their relationship from the off.

because, to be quite frank, fandom overstates the role that jealousy plays in their relationship. it’s true that ron certainly doesn’t acquit himself brilliantly when it comes to hermione’s relationship with viktor krum (it’s because he’s bi and doesn’t know it yet), and a tendency to externalise his insecurity into trying to make others also feel insecure is one of his primary negative traits (hermione does this too, via her patented lofty voice when she’s trying to condescend to people). but this is often taken as the initial red flag for how the relationship would crash and burn, and ron’s toxic jealousy is often used in fan-fiction as the trigger for emotional and physical violence towards hermione which, frequently, seems to drive her into the arms of either draco malfoy or severus snape… who are, of course, the first people we think of when we hear the words ‘not prone to jealousy’...

but i think it’s important to point out several things in defence of ron’s jealousy over krum. firstly, hermione evidently regards his jealousy as ridiculous - she’s upset by it, yes, but her upset must be understood as being caused by the fact that she wanted him to ask her out. she doesn’t think he’s being possessive, she thinks he’s being stupid. secondly, hermione is equally as jealous over ron’s crush on fleur delacour and relationship with lavender brown. she behaves just as cruelly when it comes to lavender as ron does when it comes to krum - and the narrative only treats her actions as more sympathetic or justified both because harry dislikes lavender too, and because, by that point in the series, jkr has dispensed with any inclination to ever criticise her.

but, outside of this teenage pettiness, ron is never jealous of hermione over things which matter. he is never jealous of her intelligence or competence or ambition or success (indeed, he defends her constantly from attacks designed to undermine her in these areas). for someone who struggles with being overshadowed by harry, he is never upset at being overshadowed by her. he is clearly going to be happy to support her in any of the career ambitions she can be written as having post-war.

and, on this point, i think it’s worth interrogating why so many readers still seem to feel uncomfortable with the idea of ron and hermione having a dynamic where she is the more ‘powerful’ one. [it’s always a bit trite to say ‘but what if the genders were reversed?’, but actually that’s not irrelevant here]. if hermione ends up taking the ministry by storm and ron becomes a stay-at-home father or has a job which is just to pay the bills, what, precisely, is wrong with that? why, precisely, should hermione regard ron making that choice for himself as a negative thing? hermione so often seems to leave ron in fan-fiction because of a lack of ambition - something which seems to be particularly common in dramione - but, in canon, she is shown to not particularly care if ron and harry do the bare minimum when it comes to studying etc. she nags them to do their work so they don’t get in trouble. she doesn’t nag them to do it to the same standard that she would.

and, actually, i think that ron being less ambitious than hermione is something which is key to how well they work. because ron provides not only emotional support, but emotional clarity.

hermione is shown throughout canon to - just as harry does - have a tendency to become obsessive to the detriment of her own health. she is also often - as harry is - emotionally or intellectually inflexible, and finds it hard to move on when what she feels or believes is proven to be wrong. both she and harry are micro-thinkers, who lean towards knee-jerk assumptions and stubborn convictions (and, indeed, hermione has a remarkably hagrid-ish tendency towards blind loyalty).

ron is none of these things. ron is a big-picture thinker (it’s why he’s so good at chess). he’s a pragmatist. he’s the least righteous of the three. he understands that faith and loyalty are choices, and that sometimes these choices will lead to outcomes which are bad or hard. he is the one of the three most willing to own up to having made mistakes. he is the one least likely to act on gut instinct (and, therefore, the hardest to fool - i think it’s worth emphasising that he clocks that tom riddle is tricking harry immediately, the only one of the trio to do so). he understands that things are a marathon, not a sprint. he is the least obsessive.

and these traits contribute to aspects of his character which are underappreciated. ron worries about hermione making herself ill during exams, or when she is using the time-turner, and makes an effort to get her to set healthy boundaries and redirect her anxiety. ron stands on a broken leg in front of sirius or goes into the forest to fight aragog not out of righteousness, but out of choice. ron takes over the burden of preparing buckbeak’s defence when it is clear that hermione is approaching burnout. ron is completely right that harry hasn’t done any long-term planning for the horcrux hunt, and his anger does force harry to tighten up after he leaves the trio. ron has a clear head in the middle of battle. ron makes harry and hermione laugh. ron is unafraid of human emotion. ron arrests harry’s tendency to brood over the little things by looking at the bigger picture. ron will always come back.

ron is bringing his politician wife regular cups of tea and making sure she doesn’t work all night. he is helping his lawyer wife to feel less upset over losing one case by reminding her that she’s won ten others. he is noticing stress creeping in and whirling her off for a dirty weekend, or even just a takeaway on the sofa. he is teaching his daughter to be proud of her ambition and his son to treat women as equals and both of his children that all you can do when you fuck up is apologise and try to do better. he is making hermione smile on the worst days of her life. he is helping her strategise her long-term goals when she gets stuck on the short-term ones. he is telling her straight when she needs to get it together. he is seeing a misogynistic head of department call hermione a ‘silly little girl’ and choosing to tell him exactly what he thinks of that.

ron is the ultimate wife guy. hermione is a very, very lucky lady.

[timeagainreviews]

The Hyperfixations of Steven Moffat

Leading up to the Doctor Who Christmas special, I was surprised to see people expressing indifference toward the prospect of new Doctor Who. There were the usual shitbag “Not my Doctor,” homophobes and racists who add nothing but noise to the background radiation of the fandom. But there were also ride-or-die fans expressing disinterest. And it’s not like I don’t get it. The first season of RTD’s return was a bit jank. For me, it was a marked uptick in quality, but it also felt like it was trying a bit too hard. We’re also coming off the tail end of a Hell Year™, and we’re tired. Honestly, I kind of hate anyone whose biggest problem in the world right now is the Superman trailer. But I also recognise the need for escapism. Which is why a Doctor Who Christmas special and Wallace & Gromit double feature was such a welcome reprieve from Hell Year™. That was my Christmas sorted. And you know what? I had a lovely fucking Christmas.

My greatest takeaway from this double feature was that Wallace is a bit of a menace in his own right, and Moffat is a man with hyperfixations. When I say this, I don’t mean it in a judgemental way (except for Wallace, he should take more care), but rather to highlight what I think is Moffat’s main quality as a writer. Recently Moffat disclosed that he has been diagnosed autistic. As a neurospicy individual myself, I appreciate a good hyperfixation. Let this blog be exhibit A. You give an autistic or ADHD person a hyperfixation, and it’s like a dog with a bone. You can see this in the way Moffat writes about time travel. I’ve mentioned it before, but Moffat writes time travel like a young boy who got hyperfixated and couldn’t stop thinking about the implications of time travel. 

What are some of Moffat’s hyperfixations as a writer? How about names beginning with “Os”? What about women who look like Elon Musk’s mum if she were a burlesque scientist? Or young people who meet older people and become obsessed with them into adulthood? (I’m not gonna get into it, but it’s weird that it happened three times) While some of Moffat’s preoccupations are distinctly Steven, others are more widely shared. I still remember being nervous around a hobo statue my grandmother had in her basement. I used to run past it as though it were going to spring into life the moment I took my eyes off it. I understand Weeping Angels. Fear of the dark gets us the Vashta Nerada. Steven Moffat is a writer whose fixations are at the centre of his work. And part of that work lands him in hotel rooms where he has plenty of time to lie there and think about the room he’s in.

About a month ago, we were given our first taste of “Joy to the World,” with the opening scene of the Doctor going door to door in various locations attempting to deliver a ham and cheese toastie and a pumpkin spice latte. I don’t usually watch scenes ahead of their time, but the costume geek in me really wanted to see the latest variation on what has become the closest thing we’ll get to a signature look for this Doctor. I loved the butterscotch tones with the wide legged trousers. Such an iconic look. This may be one of my favourite costumes Ncuti has worn thus far. However, beyond a glimpse at the new costume, I was curious to see the Fifteenth Doctor with a different companion from Ruby Sunday. I adored Nicola Coughlan as Clare in Derry Girls, so I had to sneak a peak.

It was rare in classic Doctor Who for a Doctor to go into a situation with no companions. The Third Doctor was alone before meeting Liz Shaw. The TARDIS engines had hardly cooled between Leela and Romana. There were also the Eighth Doctor and Grace. But for the most part, there was always a companion bridging the exchange. It’s far more common in modern Doctor Who to see the Doctor without a companion at the beginning of a story. These moments interest me because its a chance to see the Doctor’s vulnerability. With no one to impress, the Doctor feels somehow less confident. The Doctor doesn’t always need a companion to remind him when he’s gone too far, but also to remind him to feel love. Here, we see the Doctor still not used to being on his own. He pops into a hotel lobby for a couple cups of coffee before remembering he only needs the one.

While this is a nice re-introduction to the Doctor’s current emotional state, I was a little disappointed by this being the reason the Doctor was at the Time Hotel in the first place. It’s funny that he steals coffee from hotel lobbies on the reg, but it’s a flimsy device for a story setup. Then again, that is Moffat’s way. During his run on Doctor Who it was always impressed upon us that the TARDIS always took the Doctor where he needed to be. He even reiterates this concept during the Doctor and Anita’s conversation about her sat nav. That’s sort of the Doctor’s whole thing. Go somewhere innocuous on the day when everything went to shit. Henrik’s Department Store operated for years without incident until the Nestine Consciousness showed up and the Doctor had to blow the place up. Besides, how else are you going to draw a guy who time travels and has no need for a home into a time travelling hotel? Those are like the two things he needs the least. So yeah, the Doctor steals coffees like they were TARDISes.

Along with Nicola Coughlan guest starring as Joy, we get an adorable turn from Joel Fry as the charmingly dim Trev Simpkins. While his screentime is minimal, I fell in love with Trev almost immediately. Sadly, Trev wouldn’t be long for this world, but the stars are a completely different story. Having been conscripted by the Doctor to spy on a strange man in the hotel lobby, Trev quickly becomes embroiled in the journey of the mysterious Villengard suitcase by becoming its next host. This is how we’re introduced to Joy Almondo, a young woman staying at the Sandringham Hotel, which is a bit of a flophouse. Once again, we’re reintroduced to another Moffat hyperfixation which is a weird “women be shoppin’” attitude when Joy nervously asks Anita if its obvious that she’s single. I rolled my eyes at that line, and it’s made slightly more egregious when you consider the reason Joy is by herself in this run-down hotel on Christmas Eve. Why would she be thinking of men on the night she’s very clearly mourning the loss of her mum? The brief conversation between her and the fly in her room endears us to her far more than her anxiety about finding a man in this economy.

Ultimately, the Sandringham Hotel proves to be a lot more interesting of a location than the Time Hotel. Which is saying something considering that out of the Time Hotel’s many doors into different periods of time, one of those doors is some kind of Hobbit door. In contrast to the wacky voyeur tourism of the Time Hotel, the Sandringham Hotel was where the emotional core of the story takes place, even if I find Moffat’s conceit about hotels a bit contrived. You see, I can imagine the genesis of this story came from Moffat lying in a hotel room and considering that weird door that won’t open. We’ve all wondered about it. But he loses me a bit with his take on why people stay at such hotels.

Back in 2016, my friend Gary came and visited me from the states. We planned a trip down to London where he could see Abbey Road and then onto Cardiff for the Doctor Who Experience and up to Liverpool to see John Lennon’s house. It was a bare-bones trip over three days that required some sacrifices in train times and accommodations. We needed a good hotel in London, but what was most important was a place to hang our heads for the evening, so we went with cheap. The hotel we ended up with, we lovingly referred to as the Hotel Mos Eisley because it was a wretched hive of scum and villany. The rooms were numbered with a devil-may-care randomness. At the top of the stairs was a slashed canvas depicting Marilyn Monroe. One of her teeth had been blacked out and a swastika was drawn on her forehead. We had to sleep with toilet paper in our ears for fear of roaches. But we met so many characters in this hotel that we remember it as a fond memory of our trip. We still laugh about it to this day. My point being, sometimes a hotel room is just a means to an end. Also, some people are just poor. It’s not that deep, Steven.

I will however concede that this isn’t lost on Steven Moffat. As I said before, a lot of humanity can be found in the mundane setting of the Sandringham. Spoilers for the Bible if you’ve not read it, but that sentiment is reiterated with the humble manger where Mary gives birth to Jesus at the end of this episode. Furthermore, the Doctor was merely making Joy angry in an attempt to wake her out of whatever control the Villengard briefcase has over her. I had read about a week ago that Moffat wanted to bring the Doctor’s meanness back into the character, something which I have been waiting for since Chibnall decided to make the Doctor constantly stoked on life. I’m not going to go back and count the number of times in this blog where I mentioned wishing they would make Jodie scarier, but it was often. The Doctor is an alien and basically a god, it’s nice to be reminded of that on occasion. Eccleston is a good Doctor, but he became a great Doctor when we saw him lose his shit in “Dalek.” Even if it was being mean to save Joy’s life, it was nice to see the manipulative cosmic being we saw in the Seventh and Eleventh Doctors.

The Doctor is forced to go the long way to save Joy in the future by boot strap paradoxing the briefcase code to himself. I really loved this year the Doctor spends with Anita, working side by side at this hotel. As my friend Taryn quipped, they did more to build the Doctor and Anita’s relationship in one episode than they did Thirteen and Yaz’s relationship in three seasons. But in this relationship, I did find a few holes, and I don’t think I’m alone in suspecting they mean something. By now, you’ve probably seen a theory or two about Anita being Mrs Flood, and I’m right there with you. While she seems perfectly nice, there are some moments when Anita feels like she’s either a woman out of time, or not of this world. She didn’t recognise police boxes, which is sort of fair. I mean, here in Glasgow, they’re everywhere. But they are still a relic. She also didn’t know what Auld Lang Syne meant. Once again, fair dos, not everyone does. But growing up in the UK and not knowing who Guy Fawkes was? Very suspicious.

The Doctor stays with Anita for an entire year working side by side at the hotel. It gave shades of “The Lodger,” and “The Power of Three,” watching the Doctor stay in one place for an extended period while using his Doctory technology in service of mundane tasks. It was very charming and Christmassy to see the Doctor in this capacity. It only further drove home my belief that Ncuti Gatwa was a shoe-in for the Doctor. However, my internet addled-brain still laughed when they hinged a large portion of the episode’s emotional core around a hotel cuck chair. Moffat is clearly not suffering from the same brain rot as me. It’s Chibnall and VOR (see: vore) all over again. Moffat may have a lot to say about hotel rooms, but so does the internet. Sometimes, the fact that Doctor Who is made by middle aged Doctor Who nerds is entirely apparent. I suppose it’s what makes the show so wonderfully memeable. 

Trev uses the phrase “Everywhere, all at once,” in this epsiode and I can’t help but feel like Doctor Who is dipping its toe into the metaverse. Last season we had a character called Susan Triad who was played by a woman named Susan Twist. Then the characters dance while singing that there is always a twist at the end. If Anita turns out to be Mrs Flood, then we’ll have a woman named Anita Dobson who plays a character named Anita Flood. I’m not saying this is what is happening, but it can’t be lost on RTD. Then again, Moffat did give us Oswin Oswald at the same time we got Osgood and I’ll be damned if it didn’t feel related back then too. One of the recurring theories I see people returning to is that the Doctor is in the Land of Fiction from “The Mindrobber.” Perhaps they have included the Master of the Land into the Pantheon of Gods. If you watched the trailer for season two, you’ll have noticed the large animated character emerging for the theatre screen. It’s either the deepest Eighth Doctor cut ever (Crooked World represent!) or the walls between fiction and reality are bleeding into one another. What will that mean for the Doctor, a fictional character? Doctor Who may be a staple of British culture, but it also exists in a Britain so foreign to modern Britain because it never went through a phase of Dalekmania. None the less, I sense another shakeup on the horizon.

Speaking of Britains from a foreign reality, how about that COVID-19 representation? I say foreign from reality, because if you were to have watched Doctor Who during the pandemic, you would think that their fictional version of Britain never had to deal with the coronavirus. I’m not going to sit here and call Chibnall gutless for not including the pandemic into the storyline. I imagine it was a choice that required a meeting and they ultimately decided not to address it. If I were to guess, I would imagine they left the pandemic out of the show for two reasons. Firstly, they probably wanted Doctor Who to be a reprieve from death and despair. And secondly, they probably wanted to avoid questions like “Why doesn’t the Doctor just give everyone the cure?” So yeah, they probably did what was best at the time and left it at that. I can appreciate that. I can also appreciate them introducing it to give the Tories a proper bollocking.

I’ve seen some complaints about Joy’s decrying the Tories as her mother gasped her final breaths in the hospital. Some people (see: idiots) thought it was too political and woke. Which, if that’s your takeaway from this episode, I pity you. If anything, the Tories got off light. I have friends who lost their mums to COVID and I was happy to see the show finally address the very real situation we survived. I’m old enough to have lived through monkey pox outbreaks, bird flu, SARS, and mad cow disease. I never met anyone who got those diseases. I’ve had COVID three times. The pandemic was out of control in a way no living human had seen since the 1920s. Doctor Who has often struggled with finding the correct tone when tackling deep issues. But I feel like they nailed it here. Oddly, it being a Christmas story allows it the proper tone to reflect on holidays spent with late loved ones.

It’s rare when I watch an episode of Doctor Who when my closest network of friends and family who watch Doctor Who are all in agreement as to its quality. Usually one of us has a grievance to air. But everyone in my little circle really enjoyed the episode. This is surprising considering the somewhat cheesy ending with Bethlehem (though I did love the idea that the Time Hotel is why there was no room at the inn for Mary and Joseph). Myself and Taryn, both atheists, weren’t bothered in the slightest. My friend Alice, a Christian, wasn’t bothered by it on any religious grounds. It was a sweet moment afforded by the fact that it’s Christmas. Besides, if Baby Jesus isn’t invited to his birthday party, then maybe they’re doing something wrong. Other than the usual chuckleheads, I’ve not seen many people complaining about this episode. I did see that some people were let down by the lack of Silurians. The Silurian hotel manager, Melnak, had led some to believe that this Christmas special was going to be rife with Silurians. I never got this impression as he seemed like a one-off character. In fact, after watching the second episode preview, I thought it was implied that the Villengard briefcase hologram took the form of the dominant species during dinosaur times. It would appear that we were all wrong. Other than that and some of Moffat’s weird “women be shopping” brand of dialogue, it was a very solid episode of Doctor Who.

Along with the quiet moments of reflection, the deep connection between the Doctor and Anita, and Joy’s mourning her mother, we even got some exciting action scenes. We got a Jurassic Park style dinosaur with glowy eyes. We even got an exciting train scene. I love watching Ncuti in that flowing coat. He’s like a superhero in his cape atop that train in an ice storm. It was fun to watch him swinging a grappling hook to open the tomb encasing the starseed. But when the Doctor returns, both Joy and the starseed have ascended the stairs to the wild blue yonder above. While I had hoped for a little bit more of a presence of Villengard, I appreciated that this sentient star had more in mind than death and destruction. Villengard was so far from in control of the situation by that point and I loved that. Because, in reality, they’ve always been pathetic and small-time in the Doctor’s world. They acknowledge and appreciate the shared risk all sentient life takes with their actions. They like to think its the same worry people had when they fired up the Hadron Collider, but it’s closer in nature to corporations killing the environment we all depend on. “The Starseed will bloom and the flesh will rise,” wasn’t a threat, but a prelude to Joy’s ascent into the heavens. What’s more is that Trev and the other carriers of the star case will also live on forever in the sky. Leading the wisemen to Jesus and delivering Joy’s mother to the great beyond. If you think this episode didn’t make me cry, you’d be wrong.

The episode ends, but not before revisiting a couple of familiar faces. We see Ruby waiting by her phone for the Doctor to call, but instead it’s her mum. We can expect to see Ruby again, but probably not right away, which I’m fine with. It will give us time to get to know Varada Sethu as “Belinda Chandra,” a name which excites me on two levels. Is she related to Rani Chandra? And why does she have a different name from Mundy Flynn? Is this an Adeola/Martha cousins thing? Or is an Oswin/Clara different versions of the same person thing? Maybe it’s something more? The important thing is that I’m curious and excited to find out. I expect great things from Doctor Who, and if nothing else, chairs for the TARDIS. The future of Doctor Who feels bright from my perspective, I just wish the rest of the fandom felt the same way. 2025, or Hell Year™ 2.0,  is going to be a rough year for a lot of us. Like I said, I understand the need for escapism. You have my permission to feel good about yourself and to enjoy some Doctor Who next year. Fuck the haters. You have value and you deserve to feel joy.

[dollywheeler]

October 23th, 1996

Dear diary,

Let’s see - the last few days have kind of been a blur.

I don’t think I did anything particularly interesting, just following my routine - same old same old. I had to spend all of Sunday catching up on my homework, so nothing special happened there. Mike let me take his old guitar home, though, and the reading for English class is going a lot better now I can alternate chapters of Walden with a moment of playing music. My Oasis tape has been running non-stop.

Cheer practice is going fine - the routines are a bit easier now so I’m having less trouble. I try to practice the harder ones as often as possible, but I still haven’t found a solution for practicing the jumps on my own.

Oh! I almost forgot - On Sunday, I watched Dracula! Danny recommended it and I wanted to watch something while finishing my homework. It was too good - I had to pause it and rush to finish my homework so I could watch it properly; This is exactly why I usually play something I’ve already seen.

I wish we could have watched it together though, but we’ve both been so busy we’ve barely had the chance to spend time together. Whenever he doesn’t have basketbal practice, I have cheer or babysitting, or he has to work at the diner. Mrs. Benson is doing a lot better, at least, so I don’t have to go over as often. Danny joins us for lunch most days, though, and I try to come to the diner as much as possible - it’s nice, just being able to talk to him, even if it’s in snippets between him serving the other customers. Christy doesn’t seem to mind it too much, either, as long as Danny doesn’t leave anyone waiting for too long.

Still, I hope we can go on an actual date again soon.

Mom already hinted at having him over for dinner and I’m… Not sure how to feel about that.

I mean, Danny’s great and I’m sure Dad will like him - I already know mom does because she can’t stop raving about our homecoming pictures. She went to pick them up from the developer on Monday and though I do look terrible in a lot of them, there’s some really cool pictures as well - ANYWAY, what I was trying to say (write? Whatever) was that it feels weird to have him over for dinner with the family.

I was too young to remember the first time Jonathan joined us for dinner - if he ever did before they both went off to college - so it’s not like I can look to my older sister for an example.

Lord knows Mike never brought a girl home.

What I’m trying to say is - I have no idea how Mom and Dad are gong to act. Especially dad - there’s a big enough gap between me and Nancy that I’m sure dad is going to have to get used to his daughter dating all over again.

I might call Nancy and ask for advice - if she has the time, of course. She’s so busy lately running all over the place. When I called on Saturday she said they’d be coming back to the US on Tuesday, but it wouldn’t be the first time their stay got extended. I’ll probably just wait on her to call over the weekend, just in case.

I don’t know what else to write about really, but I’m at the diner and a table in the back is staring at me. I don’t know why - I know their faces but not their names. Pretty sure one used to be the school’s librarian before he retired a few years ago. I see him and the woman he’s talking to around town sometimes, walking dogs, or here at the diner drinking coffee and gossiping as they are now. Most residents always follow everything going on around them, and I’m sure they recognise me in turn from seeing me around one too many times, but today I swear they’ve been looking at me specifically for way too long.

So, I took out my diary and started writing so it seems like I’m not bothered and can’t hear what they’re saying.

It’s strangely unsettling. I don’t know - they seem judgemental, and I feel judged, though for the life of me I can’t figure out why. I’m not doing anything different. I don’t look anything different - I’m not wearing anything special. Sure, I’ve been talking to Danny a lot because it’s so calm today, but it’s not like we’re being particularly loud.

Pretty sure I just heard them say “the Byers kid” - which is strange, because a, I’m not a Byers, and b, I’m not my brother - hell, we don’t even look alike.

I didn’t even realise they knew who I was, let alone who my brother’s friends are. Anyway, it’s weird how hung-up they are about Mike and Will’s return to Hawkins - I mean, it’s been more than two months, and they were only gone for - what? Seven? Ish? Years? I don’t even know.

I guess that’s the one downfall from living in a small town.

Most of the time it’s an advantage - like havig to go to the post office during the summer and getting to chat with Dylan while she works, or feeling completely at home in a diner because you know every face there. It’s nice knowing your neighbours and your neighbour’s neighbours in turn.

Like last week, with Mrs. Benson, I heard soooo many stories about the people around town. And sure, it’s gossip which isn’t always nice, but more often than not it’s just keeping everyone updated. It’s how we all show we care - how else would Mom know who’s in desperate need of a casserole or a plate of cookies?

That sounds like a hyperbole or whatever - Mike would probably know the perfect term - but it’s more relevant than one might think.

Plenty people don’t know to ask for help - like Mrs. Benson - and they’re just waiting on people to offer it.

If there’s one thing I’ve learned from mom, is that more often than not overbearing is just bearing enough.

Anyway, Daniel and his mom are new to town too, but no one’s talking about that anymore either. Now I think about it, it is weird that people seem more hung-up about them than Danny. I mean, Danny and his mom are total outsiders - even if they only came from a few towns over - but at least Mike and Will are known strangers. They came back, which isn’t unheard of.

Mr. Howard, our PE teacher, for example, moved back in his thirties to take care of his ailing father. His father is still kicking around, by the by, even though he’s been back for almost twenty years now. Anyway, even though he’d been gone for seventeen years, everyone acted like he’d simply never left.

Max’ mom, on the other hand, still often gets reminded that she’s not from here, though it’s less obvious because the residents of the trailer park are used to people coming and going more than Suburbians, and also because she at least was here for ’86.

Now I think about it, it’s bothering me more and more.

I’ve always felt like I’m missing something - it’s often clear mom and Mike are talking around me - but I always just assumed it’s them being weird about Mike’s degree. That’s the one thing dad brings up sometimes when it’s about Mike, right before mom sends him a warning glare with pointed eyes at me. I don’t know - I get dad wanted us to do something practical, or at least, Mike, because dad has plenty of opinions on Nancy’s career as well. But he’s from a previous time, and honestly why Nancy wants to work so bad, I don’t understand.

Anyway, this took a turn.

I really keep getting carried away with these things.

The people are still there, but they seemed to have moved on conversationally, and it’s about time I head home anyway. I’m just going to say goodbye to Daniel and get going so I’m back in time for dinner.

Love, Holly

[chrysalis-the-butterfly]

Schnee's video "The Deeper Meaning of Loser Baby" is by far the BEST Hazbin Hotel analysis I've ever seen. Literally. Perfectly pointed, edited and EXTREMELY empathetic. Like. For real. It clearly shows how media literate and sympathetic the author is. He analysed Angel's behaviour, his trauma, how realistic it is, how well written Angel and his whole arc is, analysed why and how Husk was able to help Angel when Charlie wasn't... omg, it's so much better than any anti bullshit trying to explain why "Angel is a bad victim actually, hypersexual and unperfect? Nhaaa you're unvalid actually yeah sorry" to validate their own hate boner against Viv. Seriously, what a fucking perfect video. I recommend anyone of watching it, even haters, so they can see how blind and ignorant they truly are.

Thanks for sharing!

I did really like how non-judgmental Schnee's video was. I do occasionally watch videos made by Hazbin haters - because I want to give the other side a fair hearing, and expose myself to different views so I'm not just in an echo chamber - and one of the things I'm struck by is how many of them drift away from talking about the cartoon to pass judgement on the fans. "I don't understand how anyone can like these characters!" "Y'all have been gaslit into thinking this is good writing!" "Everyone has such bad takes, as evidenced by this single comment that only one person said which I'm now going to rant about!" That sort of thing.

Schnee's video was different. It didn't poke fun at the fans of the cartoon (probably because it was made by a fan). It instead kept its focus on the story - what Angel goes through, and how impactful that is, and how Angel's arc fits into the wider themes of Hazbin Hotel. And the whole thing was really well-scripted and well-edited.

Another thing I liked about Schnee's video was the fact that it wasn't laser-focused on Angel's character flaws, which it seems a lot of anti-Angel videos are. They focus too much on how he was harassing Husk in the earlier episodes, and don't acknowledge the fact that he changed and stopped doing that in the later episodes.

I even saw one video that was criticising the Huskerdust ship saying, "Be mad at me for saying this all you want, but I'm sorry, does Angel even really deserve Husk at this point?" When I heard that, my jaw dropped. What do you mean, Angel doesn't deserve Husk? Yes, he has a bad coping mechanism that hurts others, but does that really make him totally unworthy of love? Can he not be loved as he is and then helped to change?

And what does that say about Husk? That quote makes it sound like Husk is better than Angel and that Angel would drag him down, like Husk is some perfect precious uwu smol bean who needs to be protected from the big bad spider demon. My fellow human being, Husk is a former Overlord. He owned souls and gambled with them and didn't care until his own power was threatened. But I don't see anyone arguing that Husk doesn't deserve Angel because of that!

Why is Angel getting all this ire? Why is he the launcher of a thousand discourse posts and not, I don't know, Valentino, his abuser? That very same video also mentioned Staticmoth, and all it said about that ship was, "I just don't feel comfortable shipping a sex abuser with someone" - and that was it! Valentino has done so much worse than Angel, but he was quickly dismissed in that one comment, whereas Angel got three minutes in this video (plus multiple other videos by the same person) trashing him in an angry tone of voice with F-bombs aplenty! It's disproportionate!

(deep breath)

Wow, that was a doozy of a tangent!

That's the trouble with watching videos by Hazbin haters: you run the risk of hearing something that boils your blood. So it's really refreshing to find videos that aren't just criticising Angel endlessly, but treat his story with the respect such topics deserve.

I feel that not enough people recognise Angel's positive traits either. Such as his willingness to assist people even if they've hurt him in the past. Or his bravery in standing up for others. Angel's got a good heart deep down! It just takes a bit of work to help him show it.

[byoldervine]

Writing Tips - Engage In Bad Media

To be clear, when I say this I do NOT mean to force yourself to read things that make you very uncomfortable or things you just plain can’t stand; use your best judgement to recognise when the cons outweigh the pros and never feel bad about having to shelf that story

What I mean is that knowing what not to do, or even just what you don’t want to do, can be just as helpful as knowing what you should do. No story, flawless as it may seem, is perfect, and it’s not only useful but healthy to acknowledge the flaws in things we enjoy

I’ll go first; in my opinion, Avatar: The Last Airbender didn’t have good romance. The story was amazing almost everywhere else, but they fumbled when it came to most of the romantic relationships, especially Kataang - it really felt to me like they just wanted the main guy and the main girl to get together, but while there was a lot of pining from Aang and tidbits from Katara scattered in here and there, they seemed to frequently forget the in-between part where they go from ‘do I confess?’ or “ I just said I was confused!” to them kissing

And despite saying this, I still love ATLA! You’re allowed to like things while also acknowledging where it falls short, and it’s a lot better than vehemently defending every aspect of the writing regardless of the intention of the critic, which in turn weakens your arguments that the writing actually is good

If you think some writing could be improved, consider what the problem is with it, explain why it doesn’t work and suggest alternatives to improve it. If you can give evidence to support your claim, you’re providing insightful analysis, and even if others disagree with it you still assessed the story and came to a conclusion about how you yourself would differ from the source material

Additionally, spite has always been a great motivator; fix-it fics are a thing, channeling your anger into writing out what happened to you but making the outcome more fair is a thing. Even if it’s not objectively better but just a subjective thing you prefer, you can still write that, and there’s nothing wrong with that. So long as you’re not sending fics to the original creator and telling them their work sucked, it’s okay to write your own interpretations and come up with ideas that you personally prefer. There will always be an audience for that if you want to share it, you just have to interact in those spaces appropriately

[behindthewox]

WoE part 1, the criticism

With a dozen WoE anons in my inbox, some very long and some repeating what's already been said, I decided to take the most relevant bits and pieces and make a summary instead of posting all of it in one massive block of opinions and feelings. This post is the first part, focusing on the criticism.

When reading, keep in mind that there's a second post with praise and appreciation over the same people addressed in this post. Criticism evokes feelings, and a good judgement should be based on rational thought. Keep an open mind and read both before you make up your mind about what you think about this.

Anon A, pt 1 I joined World of Elements as a result of the constant advertisement from most servers I was on. I don't like to constantly ramble but I feel as though the people voicing their concerns about the server are completely right. [...] For a start, there are very many users on the server who aren't respectful and considerate of your abilities and boundaries. This is aimed at both non-management and management. I think it's quite disappointing to say this but the staff on the server, have made me feel unwelcome. [...] Users being told there characters aren't good enough and staff going out of their way to let users know of this saddens me very much.

_ _ _

Anon B I agree, I'm a user who has only joined recently but it's pretty obvious the MoM and another staff member are really close which makes it very awkward when being on site. [...] World of Elements has also gone though a lot of drama although it's very new. Staff members are all telling you off at the same time which makes you feel targeted.

Never underestimate the importance of basic respect, consideration and positive attitudes, and never underestimate the damage of the opposite. This sort of social skills take some learning, but people won't learn unless there are clear guidelines to follow and good role models to look up to and learn from.

It's not easy to treat old friends and new strangers equally, you will be closer to your old friends and there will be inside jokes and banter that is part of that relationship. That's fine when it's just the old friends, but when there are other people involved that has to be put aside. An inside joke than only some people get makes the others feel excluded.

Again, it takes some learning to recognise your behaviour and be self aware enough to recognise when you're doing something that may make others feel excluded.

Anon C, pt 1 Someone stated to be patient with new servers, when it is still the WoX community. There should be an understanding of how to treat users and there should be an understanding of when and how to deal with certain situations. Rules are there for a reason. [...] A new server does not mean that staff members are new to the positions. Many of them have been around WoX for years and should understand when they're out of line. Staff, above everything, should be role models and they are severely lacking that when users are confused or hurt. Some staff members use AI for their notice boards, and others create situations with passive aggressiveness, sending users to react in a certain way, then causing that user to seem out of line and have even more people push it. The idea has potential, but the staff, so far, from what I've seen, does not.

_ _ _

Anon D You can not hold your friend up on a pedestal and treat the ‘normal users’ differently. You cannot allow behaviour in your friends, that you would not in normal users. That is not how it works.

What might help is to bring in an outsider whose job is to point out when this happens and nudge everyone towards a more equal conversation. And set up some guidelines for general behaviour and how to practise authority without being a prick.

Everyone deserves a chance to learn and better themselves, so let's give them the time to do that.

I'm ending this with the more personal opinions and accusations, the stuff that probably stings the most. Just remember, opinions are opinions and the statemtens might not be factually correct. Keep other people's judgements in mind, but always make your own if you can.

Anon A, pt 2 My final issue is with the MoM herself. Which I find has been the main issue with the server. Not only has she gone out of her way to make people I appreciate feel unwelcome and an overall disturbance to her journey with this server but she has not acted professionally and done what is expected of her. I'm fairly new to wox but I know this is not the sort of behavior you would expect of someone to be a possible head of site. She claims to be "open to criticism" yet she doesn't take it well. Instead, she continues to degrade users and make them feel less of their worth.

_ _ _

Anon C, pt 2 Admittedly, I feel like the MoM is close with some staff members and they know more than others. This should NEVER be how sites are ruled. [...] I really fear more things will happen if there's not some serious change, whether this is a change in staff or a change in behaviour is up to the MoM and HM, but if there is no change, I can assure you that the site won't even last.

[onewomancitadel]

I am serious, I won't touch S/uccession again, it's just such a great example of the kind of thing I am interested in (which is pretty much psychonanalytic... lol). The interface of archetypes is so interesting and I think it does express itself as a mechanism for cultivated cultural/social attitudes (be it as it may) which transcend popular social justice talking points and speak even deeper to particular moral, emotional, spiritual attitudes... I absolutely think the social justice angle is well-intentioned, it's just not comprehensive enough for me (and pretty much cannot be reconciled with the 'fiction doesn't real' position, but that is neither here nor there. My quibble is to what capacity does fiction real or does fiction reflect social attitudes, which is not an extreme position on my part at all, and it's frankly absurd the leaps that so-called 'antis' take. They need a better name).

Why is it that we make these judgements, how do they overall affect our interactions with storytelling, do they or do they not reflect real life attitudes, etc., like if you knew Shiv in real life as a human being would you treat her differently from her fictional self (I think fictional characters are distinct from real people; this is why people don't need to self-flagellate over 'feeling bad' for the wrong guy, because the point of the narrative is empathetic engagement. It's just interesting that it can actually happen in the reverse: there are people whom I otherwise agree with re: social justice politics that I have blocked because they talked mad shit about Cinder being unsympathetic).

I also don't think that there is just The Bad Attitudes some Bad People have, and when you get rid of the Bad Attituder Interface Component, they are the Good People with Good Narrative Interpretations. Interpretation narratively is never that flat; there is never going to be total concordance about what is or isn't the most ideal story, even with accompanying political responsibility and ostensibly clear goals of empowerment. (What does 'empowerment' mean in storytelling anyway? Is it physical might? Is it the strong female protagonist who kills people? What about humanisation? Do characters of one type come with a responsibility that others don't? So on). The reality is that the way you interact with stories is the way everybody does and there is no clear-cut way to having All of the Correct Opinions. That will literally drive you insane. This is why I return to asking deeper questions about narrative and thematic goals and why I argue for representation on the grounds of artistic excellence. It's not a popular idea, I'll give you that, but it's pretty much the only position I can personally reconcile between recognising art doesn't have political responsibility or morally didactic responsibility and yes, censorship of comprehensive artistic products is bad, but there is incentive to tell stories from every fabric of human experience... and that the humanisation of characters (and their homes, cultures, experiences etc.) matters.

So the Bad Attituder Interface Component won't go away - and sure, some people do just have bad opinions - but I think that's kind of the point? Because I do think art does reveal things about us, and is transformative in small ways too, and that's important. I think it is superficial to view it as an active political battleground (for good or ill; particularly from a governmental perspective - we don't want to encourage any attitude bordering on propaganda-mandated art... lol... these are the logical conclusions!) but equally you can learn things through it. Besides, none of the beliefs we harbour are distinct from one another - or organised in separate compartments in our hearts - even when they sometimes might seem conflicting with one another - and so I can never view narrative response through the flat lense of 'are you or aren't you a misogynist?' Which you have every reason to disengage from, be it racism or homophobia or transphobia or anti-Semitism, but equally I think it's a little superficial to view things that way. Which, honestly, isn't just a Leftist thing at all; the gender anxieties are just a little different.

I'm always worried I'm secretly a bad person and everybody hates me, especially because I had some really horrific online friendships on Tumblr when I was a teenager where my every move was scrutinised (I don't mean this in a 'I got told I was racist and it was terrible' type of thing; I mean I had my eating disorder explained back to me about why it was really addiction type of thing where my every move/word was scrutinised and I had to be constantly vigilant; I was sixteen and she was twenty-six) and I still pretty much exist with that watchman in my head, lol. So maybe what I'm talking about isn't the same sort of anxiety other people have anymore because it has been a few years lol; in fact the majority of asks taking me to task have been about misandry, so I would say with my - regular audience? - things don't exactly pan out the way I necessarily expect. But equally for that crowd what I've laid out here is true, and I would say that a real political urgency assigned to narrative interpretation isn't, and has never been, the blue-haired SJW thing. Think back to the way DND was characterised as Satanic. Or that reading was bad for women.

Point being I don't tend to view misogyny or social evil as its own superstructure; I think it is beholden to (deeper) psychological tools, and you can see those expressed in narrative response, and the conversation - for me personally - doesn't begin and end there, usually.

[dogsliampaynedoesntinstagram]

Hi! Judgemental anon here. I tend to like to categorize things into right or wrong, good or bad. And I think that can show up a lot in fandom, especially when fans are excited or panicked. I’m working on the black and white thinking, but it makes me feel more in control. I’m so terrified of drugs personally because I always want to be really aware and in control of what’s happening around me, but I’ve always worried that I’ll be left out if I don’t. I shouldn’t project my fear and insecurity onto other people. Just because I can’t immediately understand doesn’t mean that their doing something wrong or that I even need to understand. But I like to feel that I do understand parts of Harry etc, when I really don’t. I wonder if other young 1D fans are afraid of or confused about drugs in a similar way, and therefore don’t want celebrities they��ve attached themselves to using them.

I was thinking specifically about celebrities and the difference between looking “healthy” to a lot of people versus feeling how they want to feel. Can some celebrities make more money off appearing “unhealthy” or “healthy” based on the persona their team has created? That comes back to your point about stress

Thanks so much for coming back anon - this is very lovely and generous of you to share. You sent a follow up on the health and celebrities question - and so I'm going to cut and paste the second paragraph and answer it there.

You sound very thoughtful and generous anon. I recognise a lot of the feelings you are talking about. I was super anxious about drugs and alcohol as a teenager. I had a family history of alcoholism and a family history of bipolar that had mental health disorder and I was told that that was much worse in one family member because of teenage weed consumption (now I'd probably be sceptical about cause and affect). And the way those adults were was pretty scary to me. I was really scared that I was just a few moments away from being in a trap for the rest of my life.

It was totally OK for me to feel that way and it's totally OK for you to feel the way you feel. I think you're probably right that at least some of the anxiety driven discussions within fandom are about how hard it is being young and how hard it is to negotiate becoming an adult. I'll try and remember that (although when people lead with their judgement - I do find it very hard).

You originally asked me how could you be less judgemental of other people who do drugs and drink. Can I make a suggestion that maybe that's not the issue - what stands out here is not the way you judge other people, but the way you treat your own desires.

One of the problems with black and white thinking is that it ends up deligitimising our desires. The fact that you don't want to do drugs and alcohol is enough. Your own desire is enough. It doesn't need to be validated by any moral system - even your own.

I think the way that you are sounds pretty awesome - and you will find all your way through this of your own. But to answer your question - for a lot of people the best way to learn to be less judgemental to other people is to be kinder to yourself. Or more particularly to grow the sense that your desires and preferences don't have to be objectively correct to be valid. Sending you huge amounts of love.

[mangled-by-disuse]

On Praxis...

while i am on my hobby-horse: a thing that strikes me lately is that political discourse often fails to draw a distinction between political action and praxis.

(and this is going to sound nitpicky but i think it's genuinely important)

Political action is just that - an action taken for political purposes. It's a broad category, which necessarily includes praxis, but is not the same as praxis.

Praxis, according to (among others) Marx, Sartre, and Gramsci, is action taken in furtherance of and development of political theory. Marx in particular emphasises that praxis is an approach to political theory, not separate from it - it's from the old Greek concepts of praxis (philosophy developed by doing) and poesis (philosophy developed by thinking). So political praxis is an approach to theory, as well as an approach to activism: it is a way of saying, okay, this theory looks good on paper, how does it play out on the ground?

To be praxis, I would say, an action must not only 1) be politically motivated (i.e., be political action), but 2) refer to, and come from, a coherent ideology or political theory, meaning one which is specific in its sense of what is wrong and what should replace the current system, and 3) be intended to materially further that political theory.

And "political theory" here also has a technical meaning. It is not a political theory to say "the system is bad". Political theory has to in some way say: "the system is bad because of X and Y, and we think this could be addressed by alternative system Z".

Praxis says: "in order to test our belief that things would be better under our system, we will take action A and B to force changes C and D, which bring us closer to our system." It requires specificity, it requires direction, and it requires clarity of purpose.

So, for instance: riot is not, in itself, praxis, unless by rioting the rioters seek to make a specific material change. In other words, rioting against a system is political action, but not praxis, unless you have considered what you want the riot to accomplish and how rioting will further those aims.

(I am not trying to place a value judgement here. An action is not bad merely because it is not praxis; not everything has to be praxis. And a thing being praxis does not make it good - for instance, the Daily Wire creating weird anti-trans propaganda documentaries is, in fact, praxis; it's praxis of a right-wing reactionary theory. Israel committing genocide is Zionist praxis. The Holodomor and the Siberian camps were as much a form of praxis as the Russian Revolution. Praxis is not unique to the left or to socialism, and a praxis is only ever as good as its underlying theory.)

I am not condemning political action which does not meet the criteria I've laid out here. Sometimes, it is extremely fucking understandable that, in an untenable situation, we lash out against oppressive forces without fully developed praxis. Sometimes, there isn't time to fully develop praxis - if you're dealing with an immediate situation, you can only take immediate action.

But I think that it makes a huge difference to how we discuss political actions which either are not praxis, or do not communicate their praxis-ness clearly, to recognise that not all political action is praxis.

(if nothing else, it allows us to make political action into praxis. It can be done after the fact! It has been!)

[blossomwithsunshine]

I'm currently playing Blazblue arcade mode and for Izayoi since quite a while actually. I need to confess I wasn't remembering the events correctly of what happened in the arcade mode specifically even though it's left me all a little confused. In multiple arcade modes, at least the ones of Tsubaki and Makoto, an Izayoi shows up or is mentioned as someone who is all for killing or sealing away Noel for the fate of the world. Izayoi's own arcade mode contradicts this somewhat, which is why I'm going to add onto what I said about the character previously to see if my theory missed anything or is inaccurate on any details.

The first major interaction in act 3 is Vs. Jin. First thing we see from the interaction is that this happens after Tsubaki's arcade mode ends, since Jin says "I won't repeat myself", which makes the Izayoi we're playing as not one separated by the Embryo similar to how Mu12 and Noel were separated.

"As Tsubaki- I will protect my friends!" She clearly states she sees herself as Tsubaki, or that she will act as "Tsubaki" in the sense that she will protect her friends above everything. It's a proclamation of identity, choosing or a role and denying another name and role by extention. She chooses, despite her form to be and act as "Tsubaki." Other than that, Izayoi still questions Jin's judgement and objectivity: when Jin says he's the power of order, he needs to protect everyone and the world, Izayoi says that Jin is just one person. This highlights again a difference in philosophy that only comes up after Tsubaki transforms into Izayoi, because remember, this is the second fight, and second opportunity for banter in a row, which is used to highlight how different Izayoi and Tsubaki act in the same situation.

The next fight with Makoto is a warm up between the two, no mention of an Izayoi clone here. And also, mention of the Izayoi having influence over Tsubaki? Influence mentioned in the same breath as the Imperator, who is a person. Just to highlight that for a moment because it implies a little on the effect or on the feeling Tsubaki gets when she is Izayoi, or becomes her in her own mind. More on that later.

The last two fights happen right after eachother, first is Izayoi saving Noel from her own Paranoia and fear, the other is a bit more interesting against Hakumen who asks her to lend him the power of the Izayoi- even calling her Izayoi throughout implying its a more fitting name for her than Tsubaki. Maybe this is because of her having Izayoi's true form, or because of Izayoi ... is actually a part of Tsubaki and doesn't want to hurt Noel. Maybe Izayoi the weapon is like an amplifier to one's strife and emotions, meaning that it's both easier to see the good in others but also easier to see evil and fault, shown by all the dialogue where Izayoi really sympathises with others and sees them for who they are, like with Lambda where she tells the android to believe in herself so that she can truly become a person of her own, while Tsubaki in the same situation asks about Sector Seven, why Lambda resembles Noel, etc.

Though... if "Izayoi's influence" isn't actually that of the weapon but of a headmate of tsubaki herself then that would explain why she mentions Izayoi in the same way she mentions the Imperator, further supporter by the fact that the Izayoi isn't supposed to have any kind of personality changing influence on it's user, since that isn't mentioned by anyone in the series to my knowledge or from the Glossary entry to Izayoi included in Central fiction. Even further evidence of this conclusion is also the way Izayoi and Tsubaki both handle the topic to their corruption differently. Tsubaki never mentions the mindeater curse or the fact she ever stood against the others at all, while Izayoi takes personal responsibility for it, as if only then recognising the memories of her actions as her own.

So, this is where I'm at, basically. Hope this was fun to read again.

Sorry I didn't respond until now but thanks for giving more of your thoughts!! You don't have to apologize for being confused: Blazblue lore is hard to keep up with after all. What I'll say won't be as detailed as yours and may come across as messy so bear with me.

I don't remember Tsubaki's arcade mode bringing up Izayoi too much and even then, in Act 3 she vowed to would protect Noel anyway. I did see Makoto's arcade mode though, and honestly, the fact Relius appears at the end of her arcade mode is kinda what makes Izayoi's appearance there confusing to me. We know that this is the real Izayoi and not a creation like he said, but Makoto also says how Tsubaki wouldn't be so willing to kill her best friends so coldly like this. Hell, Izayoi's own arcade mode contradicts this. So...is Izayoi really in control of herself? Did Relius do something to her?? Knowing that bastard, he very much could've. I don't know, it's so vague to me.

I did mention in the post that Izayoi has the ability to steal light from the user itself and while it may not change their personality, it can still cause them to be blind, and we have seen this happen to Tsubaki, both physically, and I believe it does mentally too if I'm not mistaken, so if that is true, then a theory of mine is that while it doesn't outright change their personality, it can cause the parts of their personality (especially the flaws they have deep inside) they already had to be brought to the light more, and it's shown with how, for example, Izayoi is even more passionate with bringing justice and more confident on what her view of justice is than even Tsubaki, who gets confused and lost at what her vision of true justice is throughout the series.

Also, I think with how Izayoi mentions the Mind Eater curse, but Tsubaki doesn't could be explained by how while she broke out of the Mind Eater curse, Tsubaki had already become Izayoi at this point and is still Izayoi after that. Of course, you could also theorize how as Tsubaki, she's ashamed of what she did and tries to avoid the topic altogether, while Izayoi is more open to admit what she did, as Izayoi is the part of Tsubaki that wholeheartedly accepts the darkness she kept locked away in her heart.

Thank you very much again for the read!! Maybe one day, I'll make a post showcasing the differences and similarities between Tsubaki and Izayoi, since this is actually really interesting to me! Maybe though. I love how now there can be open discussions of Tsubaki's character like this!

[abishekmuses]

Creative.

Cole Schafer’s newsletter - it made think a few things. 

This guy’s really good at selling himself. And I don’t mean in that ANY negative sense. He embodies all that is great about the American Hustle. 

Unashamed. That’s the thing. 

And his stuff inspires me to write. 

His brand of creativity somehow gives me the license to create - to write. For the joy of it. It makes it accessible and whatever the opposite of daunting is. 

I’m thinking - there are lot of stories from my life I’d like to share. Just like his story of his camping trip. That painfully awkward crush he had on that freckled Quebecois girl. 

I have stories like that. 

I guess I’m a “creative” after all. 

I never grew up identifying with a tag like that. Wonder how I would have turned out if I had. Would my associations have been different?

I guess we’ll never know. 

But now I know for sure - I’m a creative. I’m that kind of person. 

Ha - I remember even as kid, I was fascinated with the idea of being a physician writer. 

There was so much romance to the notion.

I also remembered today that I was fascinated with the idea of writing beautiful things and then throwing them away. Morbidly fascinated with the idea of somebody picking up those pages  and reading them, wondering who wrote them. 

I want to get more comfortable with this fact - the fact that I love creating verbal structures. I love expressing myself. It doesn’t need to be towards any end - It just needs to be. 

I have a need for aesthetics. Creating beauty is its own reward. And the best part about creating for myself is that I’ll always be able to see the beauty inherent in it - the limitations or the blemishes, if you will, won’t stop me from seeing how beautiful it is. 

I feel like I have so much to say. 

Do I feel ashamed of judgement? Is that it?

I think so. I think we all are, to varying extents. 

This is what I think it is - I think I want to be associated only with the most beautiful things I can create. Not with the mediocre. 

There is some validity to this notion - I mean, brand value and all. 

But if this is getting in the way of me creating things at all, then fuck it!

Man the linkedin thing is such a bummer. I wonder what it was? The Norway thing - that’s easily explainable though - 

Anyway, I hope it works out and has that effect of making me appreciate it more. 

I want more money in my life. 

I want to create without fear. 

I want to live for joy. 

I want to roam the world free from fear, anxiety and worry. 

I’m tired of worrying. 

I’m tired of thinking about money. 

Which is ironic because the fact still remains that I have a great job - even with the salary cut. 

I want to continue checking out Cole Schafer’s work - I think it will inspire me to create more. I want to create more. I want to put it out there. It would make me happy if people engage with the stuff I create. 

I don’t care if I’m stating the obvious. I like typing. Just for the fuck of it. 

And these are honest words - why would I not like to type them?

God I remember I’ve loved typing for the longest time. I remember - I’ve loved writing words for the longest time - Wonder why it’s taken so long for me to recognise this in myself. 

Is that how pervasively pernicious the South Indian middle class trap is?

Man. I wonder. 

If a guy like me who doesn’t have a single middle class sinew in me can be held back this much - this shit must really be pervasive then. 

I feel my neurosis slipping away every time I write. Maybe Tasha was right about the Gemini energy thing. 

I wonder what she’s upto - she can be really sweet. But also ditsy. She can be profound and dumb at the same time.

What I love about her is this - she has the ability to interact with a certain spectrum of humanity that I struggle to interact with. She does it so effortlessly and seems to be able to see greatness in them - I struggle possibly because of self-consciousness. Possibly because of some misplaced sense of elitism. Some sense of a disconnect? I don’t know. Like - I don’t like the way I’ being seen? Or think I’m being seen. 

This is a lovely change of pace - the words that are coming out now are of a higher order than the usual worried rants to myself that I produce - quotidian affairs. 

So yeah money. Money would be nice. Man Linkedin!

It’ll work out. 

I think I’ll be let off with a warning. 

Time to remember than zen thing - 85% is good. Slow is smooth. Smooth is fast. I tried building my body super quickly - My back fucked up. I tried coming up on linkedin too quickly - I got banned. I tried to make a lot of money too quickly - I haven’t published an article for ONiO in a whiiiiiiile. Patience. 

It’s eluded me. I need patience. I’ll find it I think. Nandi is the man.

Ahh yes I remember. before I got to the desk to write this - I was thinking about how I’m so filled with resentment and anger - how a lot of the stuff I say about India, and “ok sir”, and this and that - it’s not that the stuff itself can’t be well received - it’s the energy - the emotional charge that’s not well received. 

Can I transmute my resentment into humour?

I think I can. I think I am doing that.

Ok. Time to attend to the quotidian. But the supernal shall be where I dwell more and more.

#creative #creativity #selfdoubt #artist

[leicamoments]

Competition Time

I see the new year round of competitions has started...announcing the commencement of the 2024 process to apply for the merry-go-round.

I've not entered a competition in around 30 years and refuse to do so these days. For the record, the last one I entered was the Wanderlust competition and I won my category...the image being published in their book, in the magazine and shown at various exhibitions.

It wasn't the first competition I had won - but it certainly was the last.

Why? Because most of the competitions I see these days fail on three fronts.

Firstly, there are too many of them that require you to pay to play. Why should you have to pay to enter one of your pictures, for the judges to look at?

The body running the competition can make money from publishing the photo(s); they can get sponsorship for the competition; they can get publicity for running the competition that boosts their sales or membership.

So, my advice is, don't pay to enter any competition!

Secondly, Gratuitous copyright grabs. There are competitions that essentially take your copyright, or certainly ensure that however good your image is and however commercial it could be...you won't ever make a penny from them because they enforce an exclusivity clause or hold the rights to publish.

So again, don't give in to that small print clause.

Thirdly, a lot of competitions boil down to a popularity vote. Favouring those people with large social media followings, associations with groups or companies, or simply are shameless enough to relentlessly market their image at people asking them to vote for it.

A popularity vote, where the image may not be even be looked at by those that vote...simply, in my eyes, invalidates the competition and results.

At the end of the day, those competitions that don't fail the above tests are essentially a subjective process of the 'here and now'. What I mean is that at the given time and place, with the person(s) asked to make a judgement on what is in front of them...it is simply a comparative decision.

That doesn't mean your image isn't good enough. It doesn't mean that your picture isn't superb and deserves to win. Not at all, it just means, at that time an arbitrary decision was made to rank photos in a particular order...when at a later date, they could be put in a totally different order.

I've seen so many professional photographers putting up on their websites that they are an 'award winning' photographer and that may well be true, but what in the end does that mean?

Most of the awards that they list may well be competitions that you've never heard of and may find difficult to find out much about. Who says that they are even real competitions!

I've seen several photographers that base their whole marketing of their company and themselves on being 'award winning'; and when you look at the images they've won awards for...it may very well be the same photo entered into 20 competitions over a period of ten years.

I find that a questionable practice - but believe me, it does happen (and far more frequently than you would imagine).

So no, I don't enter competitions. I don't say that I am an award winning photographer. I don't care about that side of the industry.

For those that win the big, recognised and prestigious competitions - I am genuinely in awe of some of the work that is shown; but the rest...as Shania Twain said...that don't impress me much.

For the pay to play and popularity vote awards...If that's your bag...then fine...I wish you luck!

[roastthesadidiot]

The biggest wake-up call on any social view that you have been wrong about is when you are being confronted with that very same situation and everything you ever judged is either coming right back in your face or falling apart.

As I had explained before, I came from a pretty conservative and judgemental family. And a lot of the extreme right mantras have passed my ears when politics were brought up. Thinking back about my time as a teenager (and finding some really cringy posts back on Facebook that I've now removed), I was very close, if not already, brainwashed into believing these things. But after I failed my highschool years, I was forced to rethink a lot of those views that I had been carrying all my life.

The very first view being: "If you never finish school, you're a lazy bum." Thinking back about those times and everything that followed (eventually getting my highschool degree in the adults educational centre and then miserably failing college) , I just had to conclude that our society's way of measuring intelligence by educational degrees doesn't necessarily mean you're superior to others who never got their degrees. Or that some people just couldn't get their degrees, because they were in a situation where they were unable to finish their studies (like an early job opportunity or being struck by a disease that makes you unable to focus on your studies). Or even seeing people who have majored in their studies, but continuously make some of the dumbest possible (financial) decisions in their life.

The view that was the most difficult to change for me was from the people that were different of colour and interests. School is by far the single worst place to observe this trait, because you know they will all band together and socially isolate themselves from everyone else. And depending on who they are influenced by will either not care or start bullying you for not being their kind. I had been targeted for bullying by both white and coloured, so my trust in anything either "religious" or soccer maniacs was immediately gone when I noticed the trait. So what changed my view on this? When I got to meet these same people when they weren't peer pressured. When nobody else was there to speak evil about others and we could freely talk as individuals and recognise our struggles as participators in society. And eventually we all come out with a better understanding of eachother.

After my failed college exploit, it was time for me to look for a job. It took me over a year to finally find a place that wanted to give me the chance I needed. Everywhere else I had a 1 day contract and then weeks of nothing. That was when the comments of "You can work anywhere you want if you try hard enough" were becoming very hurtful. I was actively applying, but was either ignored or told I was "uninterested" because I didn't know how to sell my Curriculum that had practically nothing of worth to them.

Eventually I got to work in a store on a fixed contract. Which is essential to apply for a loan, since I wanted to move out. Unfortunately, my pay was not that much to get a good enough loan to buy anything in the housing market (This period, it's even worse). The very first comment you will hear is: "Then go look for a better job." Which with my previously mentioned situation, I felt like: "I just went through all that, I'm not doing this again."

So like everyone else I'm trying to scrape together everything I can. But at that point, everything I was saving felt like it was the same amount as the average housing prices were rising. When I explained the situation, people were immediately insinuating I've been wasting my money on parties, cars, subscriptions, travels,....while I've never been able to do any of that. If my life had taken a drastic path for the better with my past upbringing, I would've very likely turned out to be the same judgemental a**h***.

All of these experiences have taught me that people aren't the generalized versions of the social standing they've been placed in. Every case is an individual case where most of the times these people aren't (directly) at fault. I will not say that from now on I will never live with misconceptions and stereotypes about others. That is a naïve and a hypocritical thing to say as a part of a society that is prone to this kind of thinking. But if we truly wish to grow as a person, we need to critically reflect on our subjective opinions and recognise these situations that aren't ours (yet).

[leaf-in-a-flower-garden]

I would've gotten to this sooner but I was really busy and also low-key forgot (sorry this ended up being really long oops)

1. Thank you for providing pictures!!!! I've never had the chance to look at the prophecy murals fully (I've never fully finished it lol) but whenever I caught a glimpse I assumed it was just the angle, but the pictures you showed me does make it clearer, thank you! On the topic of the other children doing the Trials, it's important to remember that the children were always going to die, that's what the prophecy showed, whether or not Daleth agreed to it, if it's one of those 'you can never escape this' type prophecy. Which was what I was kinda alluding to (which, looking back I could've worded it better, it was 3am what do you want XD)

2. I'm also from a very Christian (catholic specifically) family!! I totally get what you're saying about how it's basically ingrained into their heads that questioning the will of their god is a big no-no. Which was also kinda my point in that it's likely that not even the Elders felt confident enough to disobey their God, since they're (I think) basically stars like us sky kids, therefore very interlocked with the MegaBird. But I'm also weary to immediately relate an in-game religion to a real world one and how that impacts real people versus game characters because.. Well from what we can tell there was no colonisation or wars or anything like that held because of religion, so the religious experience for these game characters is bound to be vastly different than ours.

3. The detail you mentioned about Alef was kinda the point of my original post, you can (and should) sympathise with little Alef, they went through a lot, but just because you sympathise with Alef doesn't mean you can't recognise the nuance to the situation that both Daleth and the Prophets were in. The Prophets were just middle-'men' in the process of finding The One, and Daleth's job was to identify and guide the One towards the Trials. You could say that they were prophesied to do so, just like Alef was. The other children are shown in the mural dead, so Daleth and the Prophets knew there would be loss of life, but compare a few dead to the rise of The One, who should've led their kingdom to prosperity, it was hardly a competition. And while that seems bad, again, this is an argument (not really idc that much lol) of morality, we may think that was a horrible thing to do, but in this hyper religious society, that is also EXTREMELY primitive in terms of technology compared to us, it's bound to have differences in morality to us. Basically what I'm saying is that while we can judge them based on their moral actions, it wouldn't be a fair judgement to make.

Also the 'will of god' part, I totally agree, but is also trivialising the whole concept of the MegaBird, it was never shown to be out to get a certain group of people like how Christianity can be, the MegaBird was only ever shown to be the distant creator of the Sky universe, occasionally interacting in, quite frankly, weird ways. And while it definitely was cruel in terms of the prophecy, you can see this across many religions and stuff, multiple trials to find those worthy, but the people guiding those for it are hardly as criticised as Daleth often is for it. Which, again, was the point of my original post.. Daleth is constantly criticised, blamed and villainized by people for "forcing Alef into the trials when he was only just a kid!!!!! 🥺" Without actual critical thought about how the public opinion would've been or Daleth's thoughts in it or any of that. Face the truth: people just want to villainize the nuanced old man, because he's an old man with nuances, and not to genuinely sympathise with Alef.

TLDR: Reread my original post.

4. Your last point is 100% right; all of the elders assumed they were doing good and wouldn't have the ability to look to the future and immediately know that Alef and the prophecy were a "bad thing". Each and every elder, especially Daleth, had good intentions (probably... Looks at SahMekh..) with each of their actions, even if we in the future now know that those actions were wrong.

5. I have no idea what post you're talking about in the tags

6. Yeah my original post was meant to say that it isn't a black and white scenario that's what I was saying.

Idk guys, I think stripping the nuance from Daleth sending Alef to the Trials is a little silly. Idkidk but have you ever considered that the morals of an ancient religious society were... different from ours? Like, how do you know that Daleth even had a choice in the matter? If the prophecy is the MegaBird's will, then he as their child has no right to disobey. What is he but a religious leader and guide? Also, again, we're applying today's morals to a society completely different to us. Also also, how do you know it was multiple children? Was it said, explicitly shown that multiple children came and went? Could it not have been Alef's struggle Throughout the Trials? Is that not a possibility?

In a world where religion is extremely prevalent in your day to day life, would there be no martyrs?