#i’m putting a moratorium on that fucking post.

[stonebutchery]

alright, i am not fucking reading all of that.

i literally have said that exclusionism from individual random other queer people who happen to be transfeminine is still exclusionism and still sucks. but the disproportionate punishment and persecution of transfems for doing this is what i’m fucking talking about and taking issue with. i have never seen more vitriol in my life aimed at transfems than i do now, for shit that they also happen to suffer from as victims of the most extreme exclusionism, from not only other queer and trans people but society as a whole.

transfems have zero structural power over transmisogyny-exempt folks, i am asking us to show them some damn patience and grace when they make mistakes, it is the absolute very least we can do in the interest of collective liberation. a handful of individual transfems making bad-faith exclusionist statements still does not equate to transfems being an oppressor class on any level, and i am sick of seeing people trying to generalize transfems as some kind of nasty-bad group of trans people who are “transandrophobic” and “transmisandrist” when androphobia and misandry are literal fabrications, they do not exist in nature, they are not real. as concepts, they are predicated on a complete fucking distortion of reality.

i do not genuinely expect an apology from past exclusionists i described in this post, i know we’ll probably only ever see a handful of them apologize for the damage they did by being exclusionists. i expect better behavior and inclusivity and greater solidarity from them going forward.

at the same time, we do not get to revoke our solidarity for other queer people over this; the hypothetical trans woman who made a panphobic joke on tumblr.com, regardless of any pain it may have caused (yes, including genuine, traumatic harm) still fucking deserves mutual aid to get some groceries and fill her car’s tank with gas so she can survive in this transmisogynistic hellscape of a world that is constantly trying to see her dead. i beg of everyone, do not “all lives matter” this issue. collective liberation means collective liberation. it means: i want this queer liberation for all queers, because we don’t have rights and protections until all of us have rights and protections.

however, i do have a problem with people excusing transmisogyny as acceptable exclusionism but drawing the line at lateral aggression against transmisogyny-exempt queers, including trying to ‘hold transfems accountable’ for it. it’s a frightening and explicitly transmisogynistic double standard that i find utterly absurd, yet i have observed it happening far more often than i have even seen other tme trans dudes claiming that something happening to them was “transandrophobia.”

your struggle is my struggle, even if you have done wrong in the past or participated in exclusionism, UNLESS that exclusionism has explicitly punched down at transfems for being transfems (transmisogyny). this caveat is not a case of lateral aggression. it is, instead, OPPRESSIVE.

so, no, a trans woman being mean to you online does not bestow someone with permission to scapegoat transfems for exclusionism, and it certainly does not grant anyone the ability to concoct a fake structural oppression for which they claim all transfems are capable or guilty of committing.

i’m a transmisogyny-exempt trans dude. if this hypothetical transfem starts bullying or harassing me online, even when it’s specifically for being a trans dude, she’s still not capable of oppressing me. that’s why the term ‘lateral aggression’ exists (even still, transfems face more than just lateral aggression—transmisogyny-exempt people being transmisogynists oppresses and harms them, the same cannot be said about the lateral aggression we observe between two transmisogyny-exempt queer people). the result, in this hypothetical scenario, is that i block her and i move on, or i ignore her. i don’t, then, leave this scenario with the idea that transfems are capable of oppressing me. that’s not how the world works. that’s not reality. you can make up all the words you want, it still won’t make “transmisandry” or “transandrophobia” a real phenomenon.

and it’s actually very fucking easy not to become a terminally ignorant transmisogynist reactionary who generalizes all transfems as intracommunity aggressors and oppressors.

[dadhaver]

It’s time to strike, ladies!

ATTENTION USA RESIDENTS: Do you want to support abortion rights but don’t know how?

I’m calling for a total stop to supporting the economy. I cannot afford to lose my job and strike, but I can opt out of supporting the economy they want to sacrifice us all for.

Whether it be covid or abortion, I’m fucking tired of being sacrificed for the economy. If you are also tired of being placed on the sacrificial slab: Please, starting TODAY, MAY 10, DO NOT PURCHASE ANYTHING BUT FOOD AND FUEL.

You can organize in your community via online Buy Nothing or trade groups, by procuring items directly from people and not companies, we can cause mass disruption. A good starting point is facebook marketplace, or facebook groups for your city/town, “Buy Sell Trade” groups have been around forever, and they are your neighbors. Give them the money you would have given to the corporations. If there are none in your area, please try to thrift or lift the products* you need.

* medical products and procedures do not count. Please keep yourselves healthy.

Don’t believe you can make a difference? Remember when the CDC dropped the quarantine time from 10 to 5 days, and told us to come to work but not to go to NYE parties? They’re on the verge of collapse. The economy literally cannot withstand 5 extra days of no productivity. I’d wager it also cannot withstand the loss of our financial backing.

What about rent? Excellent question, if your rent is non negotiable (your state, city, or municipality does not have a current moratorium placed on rent), continue paying if there are no options except being unhoused. But! You can utilize your space to host organizing meetings. Utilize your spare rooms to stock up on goods in case you or your community need them. If you have outdoor space, consider planting a garden to bolster your rations, and to give what excess you have to the community. I don't want to do this alone, how can I get others involved? Please sound off in the tags or replies where you’re located and ORGANIZE within your community. Tell your friends, tell your parents, tell your coworkers. We don’t need the economy, we never did. It's them that require our sacrifice, our bodies, our time, and our capital to continue. If we come together and mutually support each other, we take away their greatest asset. I am in Texas. Please reach out to me specifically if you are also in Texas and need mutual aid.

Okay, I won’t add to the death driven economy, and I told my friends. How else can I get involved? 1.) ORGANIZE. Talk to people in your community, go downtown and place stickers, flyers, banners, etc with information. Put leaflets wherever you can. Most importantly, meet and plan action with those in your community. We are each other's best natural resource. THE TIME TO COME TOGETHER AND ACT UP IS NOW! 2.) If you have a job and can comfortably strike, STRIKE! 3.) If you have a job and cannot strike, lessen your productivity, talk to your coworkers about your goals if it's safe to do so. Strike info:

4.) Please visit these abortion rights resources and mutual aid resources, they are also posted in my bio. Tumblr can block links in posts. There you will find state by state abortion rights information, funds to donate to, and more about how you can take action now. ***************************************************************** https://href.li/?https://riseup4abortionrights.org/

WE DO NOT CONSENT! WE WILL NOT BE YOUR GROSS DOMESTIC PRODUCT!

[ranboo5]

whats 'the clip' and knifetrick?

Augh. Under the cut for shipping discourse and p/dophilia ment (nothing graphic or specific). Gets long bc I discuss my thoughts on DSMP shipping in general. You are setting me up fr anon

Some quick vocab -

intimacy here is used to refer to. Well. Any kind of intimacy between characters, of any sort, as an umbrella term /r, /p, and /qp here are used as shorteners to denote "romantic," "platonic," and "queerplatonic," both as adjectives And as verbs ("to /r" = "to portray romantically") shipping here is used to refer to any focused examination of intimacy between characters

And some clarity that Should follow from the essay next but may not - """anti-antis"""" and RPF writers delete forever

The Clip is from one of if not the? most recent Discord stage(s) Mr Live has done (which I missed when it was live RIP) wherein he issues a hard ban on shipping him ("do not ship me, in any way, with anyone!") which would less influence c!beeduo (which has been portrayed/stated to be romantic AND nonromantic both conflictingly for a while until being confirmed unconfirmed several months ago, that being the last was heard) without its direct invocation if he hadn't also cited for the reason as being underage ("'Cause, one, it's straight up pedophilia") which is! a) immediately applicable to At Least his DSMP character, Partially and b) while not Strictly True (should b obvious that portraying a relationship within the bounds of what it is in canon and in a nonsexual way is not That, and /r-ing c!beeduo etc was possible to do Appropriately again by remaining w/in the bounds of canon) is Clearly Indicative of the fact that baggage-wise it IS associated with people being fucking creeps

This Really complicates things bc like okay the apparent solution is "lol just don't /r it" but it's really like. A Worse issue than that bc like.

Okay the reason shipping in terms of fictional characters is a Different Bar is bc it's an examination of Intimacy and certain lines exist in certain dynamics of intimacy that Isn't Shown (which is the whole Within The Bounds Of Canon thing) which is important in a medium like DSMP because of the smaller gap + more personal relationship b/w character and streamer. Examining intimacy beyond th bounds of the consent that has been established in that regard is Weird at best and Violating And Creepy more often and, As Mentioned In Ranb's Stage, Literally Evil at worst

Which is why writing abt like. QPR or platonically intimate Techno and Philza (characters) is smth that is fine because that's smth that has been shown and repeatedly stated onscreen; it's in the bounds of canon n thus within th bounds of what the streamers've consented 2 be done with their characters. But writing T3chza making out or whatever is fucked up because it's smth that's beyond those consent barriers

And the thing is right

Slapping a /p on T3chza makeout doesn't. Make it less violating

Like what you CALL romantic is not the measure or whether it's past those barriers yk? And if it's indistinguishable, if it's in extrapolative territory that is Past The Bounds, it Does Not Matter how much you /p it EVEN IF IT IS TECHNICALLY PLATONIC y feel? Like at the end of the day placing a moratorium on some/all forms of shipping is placing a moratorium on certain examinings of intimacy

And okay 2 go back to Mr Live and his character. What it implies taken in context w/ older portrayals of c!beeduo and said by invoking smth that both evokes Really fucked up baggage (that does unfortunately exist btw I'm sorry if you didn't know that but People Really Do B Fucked Up Abt Beeduo) AND applies to his character is a revocation of consent to examining deep intimacies:tm: with his character, which is gonna apply regardless of the nature of that intimacy (even if nonromantic)

Like I don't /r c!beeduo myself, do not, never have, but I talk to people who have and have consumed content where they r background /r; I also don't think it matters. Like I don't Actively /r it and I don't Actively Not /r it because imho w/ the intimacy regarding c!beeduo that is plot relevant and character important whether that intimacy is /p /qp or /r doesn't really matter. I don't consider myself Less of a c!beeduo shipper than someone who /rs them because that would be dumb as hell and while none of the content I've made* is Intrinsically or Intentionally /r it certainly can be read tht way as much as it can be read /qp or /p. It's be dumb and hypocritical of me to like, dunk on ppl for /r-ing c!beeduo when I'm also invested in these two and my tonetags r not gonna suddenly Delete the picking apart I've done of the dynamic @ hand

Which Has Been. Within Bounds Of Canon. It's been what's been shown (sometimes to my great distress. There is a reason that the :canon_beeduo: emote looks the way it does) Directly Onscreen and in general keeping with the tone n intensity/directions of what they've Done With The Characters

HOWEVER

As mentioned up there. Revocation of consent

It makes. Full sense 2 me that Mr Live wants to place a moratorium or fullon ban on shipping his characters perhaps where he wouldn't have before because of the Unfortunately Very Extant trends of people being Fucking Weird about shipping his characters AND of using them as a Thinly Veiled Excuse to ship HIM, which. I should not have to explain why shipping real people is fucking abhorrent

THIS creates a problem which is a. Bit of a vacuum in interacting with what is a facet of c!Ranboo's arc, decision making, and character. Like you CAN have c!Ranboo w/o cbeeduo but you Can't Really have his plotline without examining c!beeduo. And as I mentioned earlier: even if your examination of c!beeduo is fully platonic, the significance of it To the plotline means that any examination of it and its relevance to the plotline and characters IS gonna be an examination of intimacy, which. Regardless of it's platonic, Is Still Shipping

Unless some HARD retconning happens it leaves this like. Hole in an aspect of c!Ranboo's arc and decisionmaking and it's very. Uncertain? God. Fucking months ago I was already kind of :huh. Does he know what the fuck he's doing: irt c!beeduo and desperately wishing for things to be cleared up and now it's only That Much Stronger

NOW. KNIFETRICK, FINALLY

Knifetrick (or, as it’s actually listed, Bishop’s Knife Trick) is a fic about "Ran and Jackie from The Pit TFTSMP" in a "canon-typical ambiguously romantic relationship." As you can tell from the scare quotes, especially if you've seen me vague, both of these are, to put it politely, Doubtful. I've read the fic; I will not be sharing my opinions because that would be neither productive nor responsible (I will just say I can't recommend it and leave it at that) but I WILL say the following that Is relevant to the conversation:

Ran's and Jackie's characterizations respectively have very little to do with characterizations from The Pit, and bear a dollar-store-version resemblance to tropes and personality motifs found in ESPECIALLY fanon c!beeduo, especially later in the fic. I would not go so far as to say they are Intentionally Literally Ranboo and Tubbo but they are transparent expies and were clearly written at LEAST unintentionally w/ c!beeduo in mind (esp since. Ran and Jackie barely interacted in The Pit), and for a readerbase that, as far as I can tell, is HUGELY dominated by /r c!beeduo shippers. Like. Sorry. This is off-brand c!beeduo.

The dynamic between the two is pretty unambiguously romantic, also; despite what the fic's white knights claim, romantic tropes and implications/motifs/imagery from at LEAST chapter two, and is very much explicitly romantic by the most recent chapter.

FROM CH1:

"And now, with raised eyebrows and a pursed lip, the newly named General Jackie observes Ran in such a way that makes the enderman’s skin crawl. Ran reminds himself that this kid, as short and harmless as he may look, is trained to kill. [...] Jackie narrows his eyes and tilts his head a little, as if he’s trying to read in between every one of Ran’s imperfect scales."

FROM CH2:

"It makes Ran’s skin itch with discomfort. [...] 'That actually doesn’t explain much of anything at all,' complains Jackie, and he pops a few croutons into his mouth with one hand. 'Tell me what you’re thinking, pretty-boy.'

"Ran feels his face flush, no doubt mildly glowing green.

"Yes, that was the other thing. The unnecessary compliments to his physical appearance.

"They don’t happen very often, and don’t seem to have very much meaning or intention behind them— Jackie often speaks like an unthinking kid— but when they do happen… they’re embarrassing. [...] It’s annoying how the rug is pulled out from under his feet in these moments when he’s 'embarrassed'. Like the conversation see-saw has temporarily shifted weight in the general’s favor."

I am not going to include excerpts from Chapter 6 because it's just the entire chapter.

I WILL SAY, HOWEVER, STEPPING ON THIS SCORPION BEFORE IT STINGS: they are not written in an RPFy manner and I don't think there's any grounds, including Vibes, of accusing Knifetrick of being like. Closet truthing or whatever. Also, while I think there's certainly Some Weirdness ESPECIALLY around the reaction, the romance itself is Not written in any way I'd call weird or problematic pre-clip; it's nothing inappropriate or like Weirdly Fetishy or whatever. Knifetrick is not #problematic or anything and I don't have beef with like the concept of liking it intrinsically; if I thought it was like. Abhorrent I wouldn't be sharing excerpts lmao dhjfnhdsbvdnfjh. Hence: if anyone uses this post or anyth like it to send harassment or bad faith ANYTHING to anyone involved with Knifetrick I will hunt you down in the fucking night even if it WAS #problematic that'd be the LITERAL OPPOSITE of productive and as it stands it's Literally Not. Essentially: Knifetrick is a (questionably-written /mean) fic using Ran and Jackie from The Pit as a vessel for a large chunk of the dynamics and headcanons of fanon /r c!beeduo in particular

And again, I would not call it problematic in any way (aside from the disingenuity of the insistence that it's TOTALLY UNRELATED TO BEEDUO and TOOOTALLY WASN'T INTENDED TO BE ROMANTIC GUYS like own your shit please)... IF it weren't for the advent of The Clip, which is calling in2 question the Entirety of the problem of /r-ing any variant of c!beeduo or any of Ranboo's characters at all

I really do not have an answer for this tbh. I genuinely wanna hear from the streamer on this more specifically because I like,,, I got no clue where 2 go from here? Do I just consider an arc retconned? Was it an issue of speaking abt a troubling subject kneejerk wise and I'm reading too much in2 it?

I just. I dunno

Tl;dr (AT LONG LAST)

- The Clip is a clip of a Discord stage where Ranboo (streamer) loudly explicitly decried shipping in a way that implicitly applies to characters he plays - This would be all well and good but is rendered complicated by the plot relevance of c!beeduo, which does not stop being shipping if it's /p'd due to it still necessarily being an examination of a particular intimacy in a way that is in canon hard to distinguish the /p, /qp, or /r nature of - Bishop's Knife Trick is an AO3 fic centered around using TFTSMP characters as /r c!beeduo expies which is not a bad thing in and of itself unless it also is covered under this moratorium - Things remain unclear until and unless we get clearer word from streamer, but considering Mr Live seems to be allergic to clarifying anything abt c!beeduo this is doubtful

*very little if any of the content I personally have made 4 c!beeduo has been posted publicly, for related reasons. You May have seen it if you're in servers w/ me, depending on Which Ones

[sroloc--elbisivni]

Prompts open until 2022

I announced this on the last chapter of Definitionless in this strict atmosphere that went up today, (!!!!!!) but to say it again and for anyone here who likes my writing but doesn’t care about Transformers: **I am opening prompts until January 1, 2022. I will make an effort, within reason, to respond to any prompt I get for the rest of the year. **

They can be for scenes from another perspective, or missing scenes from, or future timestamps of fics I’ve already written. I’m even putting a moratorium on my no-responding-to-sequel-requests rule.

They can be for any fandom I’ve written for, or ones I haven’t but you know I know about.

They can be for ‘things I mentioned one time and never elaborated on’ or completely new ideas.

They can be for single words and a ship, song lyrics and a fandom,  completely original snippets, character dynamics, whatever. Anything goes. If it really squicks me out, I just won’t fill it, but for pretty much any request (assuming good faith) I’ll give it a shot.

All I ask is that if I ask you to narrow something down, please do! otherwise I’ll take a wild guess, but I like specificity.

Why I’ve done this, gross sentimentality, and rambling personal crap under the cut.

The first and fastest reason is that I’m almost at 1000 followers, and I always meant to do some kind of prompt thing in celebration. Another reason is...so this is my wordcount on AO3 for 2021 as of finishing Definitionless.

For context, here are the previous three years

2020 includes the total word count of Universe Collision, which has been a work-in-progress since 2016. It’s 37k but only about 8k of that is from the last three years. I have literally written more this year than I have in the past three combined. This is your brain on Transformers, I guess!

Most of that is Definitionless, which is part of why I’m sentimental today, because that isn’t the first fic I wrote for Transformers but this--it was a big, long project that I started back in January and kept chipping away at a little bit at a time and now it’s done. That’s cool. I’m celebrating that.

The last reason...In 2019, my dad died.

I know. Subject change. I said I’d be getting grossly sentimental and this is part of why but it’s been over two years now and I still haven’t figured out how to explain that delicately. My dad died and I kept functioning outwardly like a person but I got kind of fucked up on grief for a while, enough that in 2020 when everything shut down and classes went online it honestly came as a relief. This is my context for I think the single most traumatic collective event of my generation: it was a relief.

In between these things, while behaving outwardly like a person, I tried to relearn how to behave inwardly like a person. How to keep my mental and emotional health and enjoyment of things ticking. A lot of that, for me, filters through fandom and online friends because these have been huge parts of my life since high school. So looking back, when I think of how I got briefly, wildly into the Penumbra podcast and started three fics only to realize now that I haven’t been able to touch the show in months and I don’t know if I’ll ever listen to it, because I was in such a painful place at the time I was first drawn to it, I can realize ‘oh. I was kind of fucked up.’ in a way I truly honestly wasn’t able to see at the time. Sometimes understanding your own pain is really counterproductive to surviving it. (I ran the stats on my own daily poems and the word ‘grief’ just...vanishes in 2020, before coming back in force this year. it’s kind of wild)

In late December, my friend Iz asked me if I’d join the D&D campaign she’d been running for a while. I went ‘sure, I’d love to, and also by the way, I’m really interested in playing as a character from your canonically post-apocalytic decaying world who’s lost everything for some reason.’ (At the time, if you’d asked me how I was doing, I would have said ‘oh, I’m fine’ and genuinely believed it.) Iz, you are a saint and a gift of a friend and the game you made was a lifeline for me. I don’t think I can say that enough.

About that same time, I finally gave these comics Steph had been telling me about for ages a shot and picked up MTMTE. I didn’t make it through on that first round, but I did watch the Bumblebee movie, and between those two things I got enough context that when someone on my dash started raving about astolat’s MegOp fic I went ‘hm’ and opened those. And then I read my way through a solid chunk of the archive. And eventually I went back to MTMTE and had Some Kind of Feelings. 

In March or so, feministbatman who I was now playing D&D with and I started talking about our characters, and an AU where they had a different first meeting, and over the next four months we co-wrote a novella set in just that scenario. I wrote out a small percentage myself, but mostly I cheerled and edited and opined and generally just got the chance to remember: wow. I really like writing, actually. If you’re reading this: thank you, thank you, thank you.

Right after this is about when I got back into MTMTE. And watched TFP. And I kept reading a lot of transformers fic, and mentioned it to my friend Jess, who went ‘hey another friend is also telling me about transformers recently’ and then started playing in that space with me as I started to come up with ideas. and still hasn’t stopped, even though it’s been over a year of me sending her many stupid and silly ideas and fics in 400-word chunks over the course of weeks. Thanks. Thanks thanks thanks. I owe you so much.

I’m as stable and I’m happy as I am today because of dear friends, because of community, and because of the silly things I’ve done with words online. I want to celebrate that, and give back a little bit, and since the thing that I have fun contributing and that I think other people often have fun with from me is my writing, well...here you go. Ask away. I’ve been lucky enough to received a lot of joy from the people I’ve interacted with in the past couple of years, and I want to put some of that joy into the world.

And if you’ve ever clicked on something I’ve written because you wanted to see what it was, if you’ve ever liked a poem or fic I’ve posted, if you’ve ever taken that extra step to reach out and tell me ‘hey I liked what you made’--this is for you, in particular. Thank you all. Thank you so, so, much.

[freewayshark]

Ok I read a truly absurd amount of fic in the last 24 hours, like… 200k I’m now realizing actually Jesus Christ what the fuck ANYWAY I need to finish the book I’ve been reading for like a week so tomorrow I’m putting a self imposed moratorium on fic… unless something particularly good looking gets posted, I’m only human

[mightbewriting]

Beginning and End: Chapter Fourteen

“You’re being intentionally distracting,” she continued.

She ducked, slipping beneath his arm and stepping around him.

“I need to work when I’m here,” she said. “None of that.” She waved vaguely in his direction.

“None of what?”

Annoyed as he was by the distance she’d put between them, he preened at the unspoken compliment.

She tapped her foot several times before answering, either uncertain if she should or not knowing how.

“All of it,” she finally said. “Just—all of it.”

And that moratorium on all of it, which he discovered upon subsequent admonishments, included: maintaining eye contact too long, lingering too close, smiling too wide, and thinking too loudly about how he wanted to bend her over the nearest horizontal surface and fuck her senseless, endured day in and day out.

Chapter Fourteen of Beginning and End has been posted! Read it here!

[bigskydreaming]

Are you going to read Tom Taylor’s nightwing? The preview looks fun

Oh I’ll give it a shot, for sure. I didn’t read the preview yet but I did read his interview. I like that he acknowledged the awkwardness of having already killed Dick twice. As that’s the sort of thing bound to be an elephant in the room with any character, when that’s the only real history a writer has with that character before taking over his solo title, lol. So I mean, at least he’s aware of why some Dick Grayson fans are like uh, approaching with caution, lmao.

The only part that really concerned me was when he said he was eager to get Nightwing back on the pedestal where he belongs when.....what. No. Bad take. Do not like. IMO that’s the crux of all issues with his character, the fact that no person real or fictional BELONGS on a pedestal, and being on one is never ever to anybody’s benefit, because its flat out impossible to live up to the expectations that go hand in hand with someone existing up atop a pedestal. So I’m like....no. Nobody needs to put anybody back on a pedestal.

BUT. I’m trying not to read too much into it yet, as its entirely possible it was just an unfortunate turn of phrase he didn’t put too much thought into, and he was just expressing an acknowledgment of the battering Dick’s reputation and perception in audience eyes has taken over the past few years, and he’s eager to just....work on making him better-liked again.

So. We’ll see. *Shrugs*

I mean, ultimately, my wishlist for anyone writing Dick Grayson is pretty finite? Like, a huge part of my exasperation in a lot of my more ranty-posts is like, I don’t have this long list of expectations or demands for his character in order for me to personally enjoy him and his writing......the frustrating part is just HOW MANY of the takes on him I dislike all stem from the same handful of issues.

So really, all I’m hoping for from Taylor’s Nightwing run is:

1) A look at him as competent and capable as befits a character who’s been doing the superhero thing for about as long as anyone, and has been as integral to various teams and the cape community as he is....and with this acknowledged and like, shown the kind of respect you’d think would ATTACH to his alleged reputation within the cape community, instead of it only ever seeming to invite resentment from other characters instead. With this including a look at him as equally competent and capable in his civilian life, as befits a character who has always, across every single continuity, prided himself on being self-sufficient and independent wherever possible.

2) Keeping him centered in his own tragedies and traumas instead of him and those events just viewed as plot vehicles meant to inspire and evoke emotions in OTHER characters, with the focus then shifted entirely on how they feel about things he’s more directly and adversely impacted by. If I have to see one more victim-blaming centric storyline about this character, I’m gonna......well, just continue to rant about it the same way I always have I’M JUST SAYING, enoooooough, can we please have at least like a five year moratorium on ‘here’s how everything bad to befall Dick Grayson is directly his own fault in not just his own eyes, but also those of every other character and most readers.’ Like, there are other tropes. Check the Trope Well, I promise it has not yet run dry.

3) Allowing him the same range of emotions and reactions enjoyed by everyone when reacting to the things HE says and does, instead of him being limited by what he’s ‘supposed’ to be doing/feeling/thinking for the good of the family or teams or community instead of to his own damn benefit. Ie not having to swallow every insult or deprecating remark about how badly he dealt with various traumatic events to befall him, and instead getting to return fire and say how he feels about that - with this rendered sympathetically by the writing, instead of just another way to cast him as ungrateful, out of touch, or oblivious to his impact on others. 

(All of which really don’t gel with him allegedly being the emotional glue of the Batfam and cape communities, which is where the expectations of him being supposed to do and say things to help support his family or bring them back close together come from in the first place. Like, this is a two-way street. You can’t claim you’re disappointed with this character for not being the emotional heart of his family like you want and EXPECT him to be, and then turn around and just completely and perpetually characterize him as being emotionally obtuse and self-centered and ungracious, because how the hell would a character like that even GET the reputation of being the emotional glue of a family or team in the first place, y’know? It doesn’t make sense.) 

But yeah, just like, allow him to be a PART of these communities and family, instead of just wholly in service to their needs. Which means that hey, sometimes they fuck up too, and if that’s never actually acknowledged within a narrative, if the apology stream is always ever flowing one way, eventually you end up with a pretty unpleasant picture of a man who is only TRULY at the center/glue position of a family because he’s being utilized as the family scapegoat, someone everyone can hold accountable for everything that goes wrong and count on/expect him to ACCEPT accountability for that, thus artificially ‘solving’ conflict within the family or improving relationships temporarily, because the others are at least for the moment emotionally validated or satisfied by the ‘proof’ that someone was to blame for this and that someone has accepted said blame.

Like say, even when he dies or gets sent into what’s basically exile or loses all his memories or the dozen other things that correlate with things going to shit for everyone else, but without that correlation ever extended on their part to see that oh hey, rather than him and what happened to him just being the catalyst for things going to shit for us, things were ALSO rather shitty for him as well, at the same damn time.

Etc, etc.

But yeah, ultimately, that’s it, that’s my entire wishlist for stories about Dick Grayson, canon or otherwise. Literally all my wants and hopes for Taylor’s Nightwing run can be summed up as like, as long as its somewhat in range of/in keeping with the above list of three whole Super Big Asks, I’ll be fine with it. 

I don’t need a super-revolutionary or ground-breaking new take on Dick Grayson. I will be one hundred percent happy and satisfied just reading stories that feel like they’re being written by a writer who is rooting for this hero and who is writing with the intention of having readers root for him too.

And hey, even if all else fails, at least Taylor’s not Tynion, lololol.

[dialux]

I feel like the rest of the group knows Booker has done his best to kill himself before, but any time/fic theu find him at it post-exile (esp after he’s speaking w them again) always fucking gets me

As a counterpoint, nonny, I fall into the camp of Andy, Joe and Nicky not knowing.

Because I just love the idea of Booker being the forger and the hacker and the competent guy who nobody knows is falling apart until it’s way, way too late. But the real tragedy here? Is not only that Booker fell apart: it’s how good he was at hiding it!

Joe and Nicky are pretty observant, and Andy’s definitely no slouch in that department either.

So Booker’s being a good actor? It’s backed up by his criminal history, and also by how surprised everyone else is re: his betrayal, and, even more importantly, puts the onus of identifying all his problems on him as supposed to everyone around him.

(I mean, that would’ve been true no matter what, but there’s a difference between someone going abt being so drunk he cannot function and someone picking out missions for them and identifying homes for them and being a really good guy to have at their back and then spending his off-time drinking like he’s taking part in a cheeseburger eating contest, only with alcohol. For one, you’d expect people to say something; for the other, you might just treat it as a... personal decision. The sheer number of people I know who would, in a normal society, be told they’re addicted to alcohol numbers very, very high. But so long as it doesn’t stop them from doing their work or touches on their personal lives to a great extent- and especially if you spend extensive time alone, without family- I don’t see anyone saying anything.)

Imo, the best possible fic for this- and I’m writing one, yes, for another ask I got a couple days ago- is one where they might have known it on an intellectual level, but didn’t really understand until they’re all on a mission and suddenly Booker’s thrown himself into danger for no ostensible reason, and they all need to back up and think about... stuff. And what, exactly, that means, and why it happened, and, maybe, even, how to stop it.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that pure whump is definitely not for me? I just love Booker being a pathetic, prickly asshole: emphasis on the prickly.

Accepting help isn’t for him! But neither is giving up.

I mean, it took the guy 250 years to really truly surrender himself. Otherwise, on a list of tragedies he’s gone through: the French Revolution; Napoleon’s invasion of Russia; buried all his children such that the youngest died at 42- which is so young; and by then everyone else is already dead, including his wife- and then spent about seventeen decades with someone who very clearly doesn’t remember her own mother and two other people who have decided and built their lives into each other, all the while killing people/throwing himself into the shittiest places in the world on the off hope that they might take some bullets and spare the people that won’t be able to survive that. It’s an utter tragedy on every level. It isn’t just the loss of what happened to him before 1842: it’s the continuous loss of it, reminded every time that he sees a mother crying over her dead children or a father burying the child that didn’t come home from the war.

And Booker doesn’t give up until 2019.

Idk, but that says something to me. First, whatever happened in 2018 to make Andy call for a moratorium was obviously vvv fucked up. Second, Booker trusted Copley to hold to his word on making the world a better place with his sacrifice.

Booker, even if left to his own devices for a hundred years, isn’t going to be spending the time drinking himself to as many deaths as possible- though he might attempt it for a year or two. He’ll do it, and then get to work on figuring out how to remove the immortality himself. He’ll do it, and then start working on setting up safety nets for the rest of the team. He’ll do it, and then take missions for himself, because the only person who’s ever given him a reason to live that can’t be taken from him is Andy, who’s told him to live for others, to live to help others.

And maybe one of those missions crosses with the other four. Maybe they realize that Booker’s far less inclined to care about his own safety- this is the man who walked into a bunker in Sudan knowing he’d be shot at by sixteen people, and didn’t hesitate the entire goddamn time- than any other human should be. Maybe they decide to talk to him about it.

But if they do, and if it happens, it’ll be a conversation that’s... tense, because there’s so much guilt on all sides, and hurt, because maybe there shouldn’t have been this many secrets between them, and grief, and loss, and all of those other things that make for the very best kinds of discussion. Not pure forgiveness; not pure hatred.

Just a family, trying to work through bad times together.

[mariacallous]

27, 28, 29, 30

27. Classics or modern literature?

¿porque no los dos?

I think that you need both - there’s reasons why both are good and there are times when one or both can speak to you in a particular way. I don’t really think one is better than the other. At one point everything that is considered “classic” was once modern, and they’re not meant to be rigid, impermeable categories. I mean, rereading the D’Aulaire’s book of greek myths and Edith Hamilton’s mythology reminded me of the timelessness/universality of some things, but Lucy Foley’s The Guest List and Toni Morrison’s Song of Solomon and Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck Club do the same thing. I think they’re all good and I wouldn’t want to limit myself to just one or the other.

28. Thoughts on adults reading YA?

It’s whatever - I go back and reread YA books I remember enjoying. YA is a reading level, not a genre, really, and I don’t get why people have this totemic arrogance about only reading it. I think YA has become like “neoliberal” and all the other words I put in that moratorium post in that its new definition is “Whatever I want it to mean”. There’s a particularly slick kind of anti-intellectualism with the people who boast that they only read YA and I’m over it. Also the number and type of books that get classified as “YA” by people is fucking ridiculous. It’s becoming the pickme/I’m not like other girls of the theoretically literate world.

29.  Have you ever read a book in another language?

Does academe count as another language? Otherwise, not really - not untranslated, at least.

30.  Have you ever written your own book?

In my head, but otherwise no.

[stonebutchery]

it's kind of baffling to me that entire sub-groups of queer folks endured a decade of being singled out and targeted for being asexual, aromantic, bisexual, pansexual, nonbinary, polyamorous, etc. and i have yet to see any substantial apologies from people who were directly responsible for causing genuine harm. i find it completely bizarre that there are so many people who want to sweep their past contributions to widespread lateral aggression toward specific queer groups under the rug like it didn't happen so they can wash their hands of it... there are people who are irreversibly traumatized because of this. there are people who took their lives because of it.

i'm wording the post like despite the fact that exclusionism targeting these groups (and more) continues to persist partly because it was a really frighteningly common trend to harass people just because they were ace, aro, bi, pan, nonbinary, poly, etc... and it's crazy to me that many of the people who were affected by this massive multi-pronged public online bullying campaign against the 'unacceptable types of queers' are the ones still receiving messages like "my url got put on an aphobe blocklist in 2016 because apparently a post i made making fun of asexuals got some teenage asexuals harassed and i still distrust asexuals to this day because of that" ...are you fucking kidding me?

we will never achieve any kind of unity as a queer community while we are insisting upon ignoring the hurt that lateral aggression has caused, and acting like the burden lies on the shoulders of the people who were harmed to forgive the people who harmed them and 'just move on', many of whom are not sorry for what they did! or they don't consider what they did to be wrong! how is that not deeply disturbing and troubling to more of you?

03/06/2024 edit: i’m putting a complete moratorium on this post because i am really sick and tired of having my point not only completely misconstrued and distorted entirely but also weaponized against transfems (particularly in replies i have decided to delete about how “ugh yes, exclusionism, and now transfems are bullying transmascs”) i find that really sickening and i’m demanding that it stop, and i can make it stop by turning off reblogs. so i have.

my objective in writing this post was never to request an apology from people who have been laterally-aggressive exclusionists in the past. i don’t think we’ll ever get more than a handful of apologies from those people, anyway. my point was that it was pretty terrifying to witness and experience a lot of lateral aggression that transferred from the real, in-person world to the deeply online spaces back into the real, in-person world in a really fucked up feedback loop and being a young queer person during this time and having that shape me, snd shape the experiences of my queer friends who have been traumatized by it.

however, it is absolutely unacceptable to me that the issue of transmisogyny is so blatantly overlooked by our entire community. for decades, transfems have experienced oppression and exclusion from transmisogyny-exempt women and queers. their exclusion from political queer liberation movements has caused many of the major schisms within our community we are still having arguments about to this day. if you want collective queer liberation, you must uplift transfems. there is no other option. you don’t get to write off all transfems just because one person who happened to be transfem was mean to you online or something.

i have answered and responded to way too many conspiracy-brained transmisogynist reactionaries to allow this post to keep fucking snowballing with people writing paragraphs in the tags about “transmisandry” or “transandrophobia.” please get your heads out of your asses.

this absolutely is the transmisogyny website, as always, and the place where all basic textual comprehension skills go to die, apparently.

[village-skeptic]

8, 65!

8. What are your current goals?To integrate fitness practice into my life in a way that is flexible, manageable, sustainable long-term, and congruent with my identity. (TL;DR: to start running on a regular basis, to keep it up, and to avoid becoming someone who can’t do anything but talk about their fucking exercise plan.)

To move out of this post-professional-identity-crisis phase of moratorium and into a new phase of professional self-actualization. (TL;DR: to identify some of current goals and then make plans to reach them!)

To either get the hell out of this town or find a way to really, truly *live* here. (TL;DR: the latter option.)

To not only finish my WIPs, but to actually woman up and put some (non- fannish, non-fiction) stuff out there to be published. (TBH: I’m wincing even typing those words.)

65. What are you saving money for?

…I’m saving money?(Retirement, basically. Thank God for automatic deductions.)

Jesus, @eventyyr! Coming in right out of the gate with these Adult Questions. XD 

[ask me some of these 100 questions?]

[cleoselene]

anothermoronintransition replied to your post “anothermoronintransition replied to your post “anyone who says The...”

I'm enjoying it and Jodhi May is queen in every see sense of the word

I’ve loved her since Emma (2009) and completely agree, she is iconic

Anya Chalotra is also like, wow, a fucking star

Edit: I also believe Jodhi May is like, the only GoT alum to be allowed on the show lol.  Netflix put like a moratorium on casting GoT actors because they didn’t want to seem like they were copying

[circusglass]

*Rubs forehead.*

I'm going to probably make several posts about this in the next two-ish weeks, but!! I got a new job.

I don't start for 2 weeks and it's going to be a lot busier than my current job (which allows me a lot of dicking around time). It's probably going to take me time to acclimate to my new routine and to build new writing habits that don't hinge on writing in the afternoons.

Until then, because I don't want to be overwhelmed, and I already am due to the sheer amount of drafts I have (I used to have no more than 10 and I'm breaching 45 and that's fucking untenable for me), I'm going to be dropping a lot of threads.

There are many I haven't gotten to in months, and many I don't have muse for. Many dropped will probably be first meeting threads (unless they've happened in the last month and a half).

If we've plotted a thread or verse, I'm probably keeping it.

This isn't an attempt to deter anyone from writing with me. If I follow you I want to write with you!! But I'm putting a moratorium on first meetings right now in favor of pre-plotted stuff (literally unless we can make their first meeting memorable in some capacity). I know I can be difficult to get ahold of, but I want to try, so please, please don't hesitate to contact me via DM or Disco.rd (MINETA STEALS PILLS FROM GEEZERS#5287). Mutuals only.

I'm overwhelmed by the state of my drafts and by my inbox (which I'm clearing out again save for a handful). I don't want to feel like I'm falling behind.

I'm probably also going to try to rely on a queue system and see how that works for me as well.

I just seriously need to make peace with the fact that this is unsustainable despite how determined I try to be.

I need to Marie Kondo the FUCK out of this blog and keep only what sparks joy, you know?

[clotpolesonly]

Finish Your WIPs Challenge

i’m hoping to participate in @teenwolflegacy​‘s january event, to kick my ass into gear and start me on my writing for the year! so here’s my list of things i’m supposed to be writing and have not been:

oneshots:

Sterek - Derek swipes left on Stiles’ grindr profile in an airport, Stiles sees over his shoulder and calls him out on it, Derek is actually attracted to him but refuses to admit it cuz he’s already committed

Sterek - hurricane knocks the power out, Derek walks in on Stiles jerking off and gets flustered, featuring sex positive ace!Derek

Sterek - Derek gets stuck doing deputy date auction, super uncomfortable with it, gives Stiles his own money and orders him to win the bid

Stackson - boys all share an apartment, Stiles wakes up after night of debauchery to find a dude on their couch, not sure whose one night stand it was, mistakenly assumes it was Jackson’s and gets super jealous

Stackson - Stiles does a spell to reveal his soulmate, is very distressed to get Jackson as a result, Scott sets out to help Stiles use the scientific method to determine if it’s a reliable result or bogus

Stackson - Stiles finds Jackson are both dragged along to political christmas party by their dads, run off to get drunk together, Jackson reveals he broke up with Lydia because of emotional abuse and warns Stiles away from her

multichaps:

Sterek - Laura cuts Derek off financially for being chronically broke and self-destructive for years, he takes a modeling job off craigslist without realizing it’s for a shibari photoshoot series for dom!photographer!Stiles, finds that not only is he much subbier than previously reckoned but also that his emotional issues are manifold and overwhelming, especially when ropes are involved

Sterek - ace!Derek seeks out Stiles for sex, unsure of whether he’s sex-repulsed or sex-neutral, wants someone he trusts to stop if he needs it to help him explore his sexual boundaries

Stackson - Stiles and Jackson are members of rival a cappella groups who start hate-fucking, Jackson as a way of sticking it to overbearing!Derek when he puts a moratorium on sleeping with the enemy, and Stiles in the hopes of getting a leg up on the competition

Thinking About Blue Skies - Laurallison - AU where you see in black and white until you first touch your soulmate, Laura gets her colors while fighting with hunters but refuses to accept Allison when she comes knocking

REM-DAC - Sterek - cyberpunk AU, escaped werewolf Derek implanted with a device meant to kill him, needs technopath Stiles to deactivate it, both need to be smuggled out of the city to find loved ones previously assumed dead

For Shell And Safety - gen/Sterek - outsider POV, post-apocalyptic future fic, bamf magic!Stiles as the protector of Beacon Hills, OC reluctant werewolf Leah brings a message to him revealing that Derek is not dead as previously assumed but has been forcibly turned human and that Scott is still captured by the Warlock that destroyed their region to start with

sooooo here’s to hoping that at least like 3 of these might get finished..........

[eratoschild]

Throwing Caution to the....Wall

Now posted on my new ao3 account! http://archiveofourown.org/works/13105944

The bill was paid, a generous tip discretely left. Let it not be said that the Prince and his advisor were stingy restaurant patrons, let it not be said that they drew untoward attention to themselves as they finished their dinner and made their way to the exit. Ignis hoped no one noticed that their dining was a bit rushed, hoped that no one noticed that they didn't speak much. If he avoided Noct's gaze, it was only to curb the risk of unabashed- and unquestionably inappropriate- eye fucking. It had started as a normal dinner out, a table in a quiet corner of a new restaurant. They had barely been seated when Noct, taking advantage of the long table cloth, slipped a foot out of his shoe and right up his advisor’s inseam, wearing a small but shameless smirk as he did. To the less familiar observer, Ignis would not even have appeared to have done so much as bat an eyelash. But Noct had caught the almost imperceptible nostril twitch, the barest narrowing of one eye. And of course no one would ever have known about the muscle tension shifting as his toes slid upwards from ankle to knee to inner thigh. The maître d’ had come to their table, made some pretty speech about being honored to host His Highness this fine night and please do not hesitate to let him know if there is aught that might improve their visit. The prince had thanked him perfectly pleasantly, if cursorily. Ignis, a bit more graciously before asking the house’s recommendations for the evening. From the corner of his eye, Ignis had seen Noct's smirk twist slightly at this request, unequivocal signal between them that time was not to be wasted with the perusal of menus and making up of minds. Their unspoken agreement: when the question was asked, the responding recommendation was heeded. “...and a wine pairing, if I may offer a suggestion?” They had gone along with it, a glass apiece. Dinner was served with surprising quickness, as if the staff had sensed that they were on borrowed time before the air in their dining room ignited. Noct, who hadn’t even complained about vegetables, quickly fixed his shoe under the table. Thank you, but they would pass on dessert this time. “Highness?” Ignis, finally, breaking his self-imposed moratorium on eye contact, rose from the table, catching the Prince’s attention with a slightly arched brow. Side by side, but not touching (carefully on his part, at least), they made their way to the exit. A few steps outside the restaurant, obfuscated in a nondescript but surprisingly clean alley in the business district, Ignis stopped and quickly surveyed their surroundings. Not an exhibitionist, but at times less patient than some might guess, he was not entirely above putting some of his tactical skills to more personal use. “Specs?” He could hear the implied hurry in Noct's voice to get to the car. Turning to the Prince, a wicked curl to his lips, Ignis tipped his head wordlessly down the alley. Noct half-laughed, half-scoffed. “Impatient tonight?” “And you're not?” countered Ignis in a controlled voice as they started walking. About halfway down the alley, Noct realized that Ignis was no longer beside him, but slightly behind him. No sooner had he noticed this when there was a hand on the back of his neck, steering him purposely towards a shadowy alcove, tension in those fingers a bare hint of what was forthcoming. When they reached it, he was pushed, in a way that only Ignis could, against the wall- just enough to be certain that he felt it, carefully enough to ensure no true injury. He let himself go limp on the brick surface, sandwiched from behind by the advisor’s taller form. One gloved hand moved to pin his wrists over his head, the other held over his mouth. He tried to speak but couldn't, though he did manage to bite a finger. Ignis swore and rolled his hips, forcing Noct more sharply against the wall, a muffled moan escaping in response to the rough friction against his cock. “I don’t know about you, Highness, but I’ve no interest in being heard,” he muttered in Noct's ear, his voice the sound of velvet and malice. Fuck. He laughed, as much as he could, against the hand that pressed even more firmly at his mouth and pushed back, as much as he could, against the lean, hard body behind him. He shivered at the sensation of the cock against his ass, then struggled and fought until one wrist broke free, falling down to meet Ignis’s hair, his fingers twisting into the silken strands, eliciting a soft, inarticulate sound. He fought further, writhing and shoving until he was able to turn himself around, back to the wall now. “Hypocrite,” said Noct with a soundless laugh, his head falling back against the brick to expose a pale throat. “Begging your pardon?” Ignis replied as he leaned down to rake his teeth over the vulnerable skin. Noct shuddered under his mouth as he did. “You’re a hypocrite. You talk such a good game about propriety. You’re the one who could use that lecture right now,” elaborated the prince in a raspy whisper. Six, the things that voice was doing to him right now rivaled the physical sensations created by the body writhing against him. The look in his eyes, partially shrouded by soot-dark lashes, directly contradicted the words he spoke “Would you prefer I drop you off at your apartment with a spoken “Good night’ and a cordial handshake in the name of propriety? We can leave now and have you at your front door in ten minutes.” “Don’t even think about it.” By now, Noct had snaked his arms around his waist, dug his hands into Ignis’s back pockets and pulled him in so they were grinding together roughly. He was painfully aroused. His eyes fell closed as Ignis wedged a knee between his thighs and pressed upwards. “Astr-“. Ignis clamped a hand back over the prince’s mouth before easing the knee away slightly and pressing in again. Noct was near the breaking point, he could hear it in his uneven breath, see it in his face: deep pink flush across his cheekbones, eyelashes fluttering erratically. He leaned and planted his free forearm on the wall just above Noct’s shoulder, bringing them into tighter contact. Noct was still grabbing his ass through the thin fabric of his pockets, fingernails digging into his skin. He held onto Ignis, vaguely aware that he was probably going to leave marks, and not really caring at the moment. He was pinned by two points: the hard muscled thigh pressing into his groin and the hand over his mouth, he couldn’t speak, his movement was limited. He had provoked Ignis in the restaurant- he knew exactly what he was doing at the time and gotten the desired result, though he didn’t actually expect to be pushed against a wall halfway down the alley; usually, they made it back to whomever’s apartment was closest. He certainly wasn’t complaining though, he just wanted to ride it out. Pulling Ignis against him more insistently, Noctis arched his back and tipped his head to one side, the invitation to more licking and biting at his neck readily accepted, the heat of the tongue and scraping of teeth firing darts along his nerves straight to his cock. He moaned, louder this time. The hand on his mouth only muffled so much. He threaded his fingers into Ignis’s hair again, a sharp tug as they closed in a fist. He nearly came when he heard the answering moan: his own name, the single syllable drawn out and low, as if being dragged from Ignis's throat in that beautiful accent of his. So much for not wanting to be heard if anyone should pass by. “You're close?” Ignis hissed through clenched teeth. A weak nod was the only response. He was just about at the edge himself and while he briefly wished that he'd had the presence of mind to not let them get carried away here, it was too late to dwell on that now. The car wasn't parked far away but neither of them would make it back in the state they'd gotten themselves into in the few minutes they had been here. The only thing to do now was finish this. He took one of Noct's nipples through his shirt and rolled it between his fingers for a few seconds as they ground together before giving it a sudden pinch, drawing a hitched inhale. Two more quick pinches and Noct briefly stiffened against him, fist in his hair tightening again, nails of the hand still on his ass and digging in with increased demand. A few staccato jerks of his hips, and there was a sudden wet heat between them. The rush of added sensations pulled Ignis along with it, and within moments, he collapsed against Noct, with a shuddering gasp. As they came back to their senses, Noctis straightened himself as Ignis turned to lean momentarily on the wall beside him. He studied his advisor. Normally perfect hair was a mess, eyes closed and lips parted, regaining control of his breath and composure. “Six. You need to forget propriety more often.” “One of us needs to keep his wits about him,” Ignis replied, turning to return Noct’s stare, expression turning into one of mild regret. “I apologize, this was unwise. Improprieties aside, it left you vulnerable-“ “Specs?” “Yes?” “Shut up. I’m fine. Worry about risk management later.” “Fine. We should make our way home anyway now that we’ve gotten it out of our system for the night.” “I don’t know about you but nothing’s “out of my system”. Anyway, it's my turn to get you against a wall.” “Oh, do you think so, darling?” “Yeah.” He should have seen it coming but he was taken by surprise when Ignis turned and, with his typical lethal grace and speed, had him pinned to the wall again. This time kissing him- hard enough to stop his breath, then biting his lip before pulling back with a long, controlled inhale and a stare that lanced straight through him, making it crystal clear to Noct that it wasn’t “out of his system” either. “We’ll see about that.”

[airbnbfestivals]

How can I get Airbnb to take down a listing that violates local law?

Hi, all. I'm an Airbnb neighbor, not a guest or host. Sorry this is a bit lengthy, I'll put a tldr at the end.

I've been trying for months now to deal with my next door neighbor, who is using their apartment unit as an Airbnb despite it violating the LA Home-Sharing Ordinance and our lease terms. A quick tldr is basically that hosts must have a valid registration number on the listing and approval from the landlord. The host is listing the unit as a hotel/motel to skirt the number requirement and obviously does not have approval.

Due to the eviction moratorium in effect right now, management cannot evict the tenant, and prior to this they told me it would be a lengthy (>1 year) process for them to get the eviction done. Whether that's true or bs, I am not sure - but for now I'm hoping to at least get Airbnb to take down the listing in the meantime.

I've reported the listing to management, the Department of City Planning, LAPD, and Airbnb multiple times through Airbnb Neighbors and reporting the listing directly. I've also contacted the host indirectly via Airbnb Neighbors to let him know complaints about frequent noise and violent guests that have threatened me in the past. I have even met the cleaning staff one day and asked them to call the host so that I can talk to them in person - I was told to "fuck off and talk to management if you have a problem" (by the host, not the staff). One of the recent reviews on the listing also states that the host asked the guest to keep the fact that they were an Airbnb guest secret from neighbors and the leasing office - so the host clearly knows what he's doing is not permitted.

The Airbnb support rep told me they will let the host know that they need to comply with local laws, but refused to tell me how they will actually ensure that the host does so and that they have "no plans to remove the listing at this time". I know it's obviously not in Airbnb's interest to take down a listing that's making them money right now, but is there any way I can get Airbnb to investigate this further?

Ordinarily I wouldn't care about the Airbnb but the guests there constantly are making noise late at night (not big parties bad enough to call the cops, but disruptive enough that there's no way I can sleep), breaking rules (smoking indoors, leaving trash outside the doors like we're a hotel), and generally being assholes (threatening to break into my apartment and throw me off a 15-story building when I asked them to keep the noise down, having a "I'm on vacation, I can do whatever I want" mentality). It's been making my life as a neighbor hell for the last 6 months and the host clearly has no intention of trying to make it right.

tldr: Uncooperative host operating an Airbnb despite it being against lease terms and LA's home-sharing ordinance. How can I get LA to take action on the listing?

Original post here =+-+= Get $20 off your first AirBnB stay.