#i will probably never get over this

[shadesofmauve]

I want to step away from the art-vs-artist side of the Gaiman issue for a bit, and talk about, well, the rest of it. Because those emotions you're feeling would be the same without the art; the art just adds another layer.

Source: I worked with a guy who turned out to be heavily involved in an international, multi-state sex-slavery/trafficking ring.

He was really nice.

Yeah.

It hits like a dumptruck of shit. You don't feel stable in your world anymore. How could someone you interacted with, liked, also be a truly horrible person? How could your judgement be that bad? How can real people, not stylized cartoon bogeymen, be actually doing this shit?

You have to sit with the fact that you couldn't, or probably couldn't, have known. You should have no guilt as part of this horror — but guilt is almost certainly part of that mess you're feeling, because our brains do this associative thing, and somehow "I liked [the version of] the guy [that I knew]", or his creations, becomes "I made a horrible mistake and should feel guilty."

You didn't, loves, you didn't.

We're human, and we can only go by the information we have. And the information we have is only the smallest glimpse into someone else's life.

I didn't work closely with the guy I knew at work, but we chatted. He wasn't just nice; he was one of the only people outside my tiny department who seemed genuinely nice in a workplace that was rapidly becoming incredibly toxic. He loaned me a bike trainer. Occasionally he'd see me at the bus stop and give me a lift home.

Yup. I was a young woman in my twenties and rode in this guy's car. More than once.

When I tell this story that part usually makes people gasp. "You must feel so scared about what could have happened to you!" "You're so lucky nothing happened!"

No, that's not how it worked. I was never in danger. This guy targeted Korean women with little-to-no English who were coerced and powerless. A white, fluent, US citizen coworker wasn't a potential victim. I got to be a person, not prey.

Y'know that little warning bell that goes off, when you're around someone who might be a danger to you? That animal sense that says "Something is off here, watch out"?

Yeah, that doesn't ping if the preferred prey isn't around.

That's what rattled me the most about this. I liked to think of myself as willing to stand up for people with less power than me. I worked with Japanese exchange students in college and put myself bodily between them and creeps, and I sure as hell got that little alarm when some asian-schoolgirl fetishist schmoozed on them. But we were all there.

I had to learn that the alarm won't go off when the hunter isn't hunting. That it's not the solid indicator I might've thought it was. That sometimes this is what the privilege of not being prey does; it completely masks your ability to detect the horrors that are going on.

A lot of people point out that 'people like that' have amazing charisma and ability to lie and manipulate, and that's true. Anyone who's gotten away with this shit for decades is going to be way smoother than the pathetic little hangers-on I dealt with in university. But it's not just that. I seriously, deeply believe that he saw me as a person, and he did not extend personhood to his victims. We didn't have a fake coworker relationship. We had a real one. And just like I don't know the ins-and-outs of most of my coworkers lives, I had no idea that what he did on his down time was perpetrate horrors.

I know this is getting off the topic, but it's so very important. Especially as a message to cis guys: please understand that you won't recognize a creep the way you might think you will. If you're not the preferred prey, the hind-brain alarm won't go off. You have to listen to victims, not your gut feeling that the person seems perfectly nice and normal. It doesn't mean there's never a false accusation, but face the fact that it's usually real, and you don't have enough information to say otherwise.

So, yeah. It fucking sucks. Writing about this twists my insides into tense knots, and it was almost a decade ago. I was never in danger. No one I knew was hurt!

Just countless, powerless women, horrifically abused by someone who was nice to me.

You don't trust your own judgement quite the same way, after. And as utterly shitty as it is, as twisted up and unstead-in-the-world as I felt the day I found out — I don't actually think that's a bad thing.

I think we all need to question our own judgement. It makes us better people.

I don't see villains around every corner just because I knew one, once. But I do own the fact that I can't know, really know, about anyone except those closest to me. They have their own full lives. They'll go from the pinnacles of kindness to the depths of depravity — and I won't know.

It's not a failing. It's just being human. Something to remember before you slap labels on people, before you condemn them or idolize them. Think about how much you can't know, and how flawed our judgement always is.

Grieve for victims, and the feeling of betrayal. But maybe let yourself off the hook, and be a bit slower to skewer others on it.

[max-fewtrell]

.

[brightonstudios]

OH MY GOSH WHAT?!?!?

This is so freaking beautiful!!!!

Holy cow you are so talented!!! Never would I have imagined someone making fanart of my AU!!! Thank you so so so much!!!

Mkay- for all those who need a new tmnt comic au to freak out over- GO CHECK OUT @brightonstudios's Alone Together!! Thanks to @allyheart707, I was able to start reading their comic, and GUYS. I can just FEEEL the gears twisting and turning for the story!! I love it so far, and I can't wait to see what happens next. :)

Also~ MANNNN ALIVEEE DOES IT FEEL GOOOOD TO DRAW AGAIN!!!! :) Thanks, Brighton, for inspiring me to draw fanart!! I really needed the extra creativity boost!! :)

~ Melissa

[nenoname]

Cute wholesome fics where Stan teaches Soos or Wendy how to drive were always so funny to me because...

And while he insists that everyone in town has ran over McGucket before, we also know he ran over Toby too and absolutely did not give a shit (understandable in that case)

But then again...

Also bless Mr Honeypants

And another detail I love is that his car is casually filled with parking tickets

How many tickets are in Ford's name...

[iizuumi]

screenshot redraw from the last ep hehehehe

[egophiliac]

Hi it's just to let you know that the official romanization of Revaan's name is Raverne ! Also they have romanized Baul's name to Baur !

Twst coming back at us again with the least expected romanization! thank you everybody (oh god my inbox) (no it's great, I literally asked for this and the reactions have been INCREDIBLE, thank you all!)

I do like Raverne though, I think it's got a nice fancy sound to it! (I had kinda suspected it was going to be an R instead of an L, so the fact that it's SO close to Laverne except for that is hilarious to me personally.) and Dragoneye Duke is honestly probably the best translation for his title, I wasn't envying the localizers that one. :') Baur instead of Baul I was NOT expecting, but in retrospect I think his name's supposed to be a reference to the Bauru crocodile, so that actually makes way more sense!

someone else also said Meleanor has become Maleanor, which is the REALLY weird one to me, because I was so surprised it was written as Mel instead of Mal in the first place?! oh god no I can't decide which one I like better. 😭 (I wonder if they might change it to Mal...they have made romanization changes before) (like I remember House of Distraction being corrected to House of Destruction in Playful Land) (I did check and she's still Mel for now, but I dunno, they might Mal her up and some point and save me from having to make a decision about which one to use) (HECK I CAN'T DECIDE)

uhhhh thank you for letting me ramble about anime names, let's just say MONOGRAMMED SWEATERS FOR EVERYONE

[a-for-apocalypse]

reposting my youtube comment onto here bc its literally all i can think about. caitvi may have been affecting each other's lives for far longer than they know (they may have been saving each other for far longer than they've realized too).

I've seen a lot of good theories about where the timeline divergence came from (damn the arcane fandom is so big brained sometimes, good job y'all), but this one consistently rots my brain from the inside out bc my god. i will never get over the underlying tragedy of ep 7. how one small difference could have changed it all.

arcane really is a story of what ifs, each more painful to think about than the last.

[nerdy-hyperfixations]

My mom (and my sister) said that both baby Stan and Ford are adorable but Ford is cuter and she likes him better and I think my heart is shattered.

This post is dedicated to my favorite kid Stanley panels:

My mom didn’t even like him when I showed the one where he murders those two kids 😭😭😭 that’s the best part!!!

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

oh hey! i was reading a fic the other day where Wangji was once misspelled as Wangu. which leads me to: MDZS Pingu-style??? noot noot!

Do you think love can bloom on the sea ice?

[wardingshout]

started playing ooc but couldn't stop thinking about la so here's ww :) it makes sense 👍

[tinyfantasminha]

hey ! what a nice shirt

[spaceandbones]

I fully believe if L whipped his dick out at quite literally ANY point in the series Light would suck it with 0 questions asked. Like it wouldn't even be an internal debate and the inner monologue would be exactly like their tennis match. I'm not even sure either of them would consider it sex and it would not be weird

[sen-ya]

I am having thoughts about Law being extremely worried any time Roci gets sick, just because he remembers how miserable he was when he was sick, and maybe he thinks it’s his fault, because his immune system’s been compromised by Amber Lead

this one really got away from me it really was just supposed to be the first one with a different ending but anyway here it is lol

[pit-2-podium]

I really think the Williams team hasn't realized how much of their treatment towards Logan has lost them a lot of good will among fans. Like take his lap of legends, so much work went in to that, (from Logan, Williams Alumni, and the team behind it), was such a big opportunity, and really could have had generated some much needed good pr for the team and Logan, especially with the team and their treatment of Logan. Yet they allowed it to be overshadowed by the Alex announcement, like really you couldn't have waited at least a few days?

The moment Logan leaves I can see a lot of fans, just not interacting with Williams content anymore. As much as we talk about Alex and James Vowles being the ones who are restructuring/rebuilding Williams you can't forget Logan has also been a major face of that movement. All of their new era content, like their podcasts and interviews, Logan has played a major part in and I think a lot of fans will have a bad taste in their mouth watching once he leaves on such bad terms. Because realistically Logan has the perfect personality for that type of content and it will be nearly impossible to replace him there, its why he and Alex work together so well, they can match the energy and tangents.

Then you have to take into account of them Americans and drive to survive people. They get a lot of hate for either liking the sport at all or how they get into it. Logan is their driver, if you look at social media beyond Instagram comments you will find so much support for him. It is one thing to drop Logan as a driver because he's under-preforming (though I have thoughts about That to) but to go from saying you are going to do everything to help logan to publicly flirting with new drivers? Thats just rude. And now Williams are shutting themselves off from these markets/fan bases. I'm sorry but realistically Logan is leaving F1 and Americans will no longer have a home driver to root for and they will blame Williams for that so people will not stick around.

TLDR; Williams by being dicks have shot themselves in the foot next year publicity wise

[unpersoniverse]

Skén:nen sá:sewh

as promised, here's Precious boy™ getting kissed by Precious wife™ because he deserves all the love in the world :cc

translation: Get home safe

[icewindandboringhorror]

On average, what is the total MONTHLY amount that you spend on dining out*?

*(This doesn't only count going out to restaurants, but also stuff like picking up fast food to bring home, getting a coffee on the way to work, getting a premade sandwich from a grocery store deli during lunch, buying a quick snack from a convenience store or food cart whilst walking somewhere, ordering a pizza or any other food to be delivered to your home, etc.)

*(If you often dine out in groups/as a household: calculate and divide the costs so that you get a Per Person average. This is for YOU individually, NOT the total household/group costs)

(I'm sure polls similar to this have been made before (very common topic), I just haven't personally seen one that I can remember, so, I was curious to do my own! I was discussing this with a group of people today and it was very interesting to see how widely the number varied between individuals. :0c )

(Reblog for bigger sample size if you can, and feel free to explain your answer in tags if there's anything extra to add!)