#i'm 100% sure this has happened

[nebuladreamz]

A little different than last year's, but here we are again. To say that this past year hasn't been absolutely wild would be a lie, cause HOLY SHIT MAN

This year's birthday is. A little different for me, but you already have the silly comic to show that so I won't make like a broken record oops

But, despite the changes and hills that life's decided I should climb or throw at, it hasn't changed the fact that I'm so genuinely fucking thankful to the people that I've known since joining this fandom. I'm not even kidding when I say that being here has actually changed my life for the better. I know I said something similar last year, but this time, hoo boy it sure turned up the AMP and test how far I could go.

So, to everyone, both new and old; thank you for being here :D

@garbagechocolate @darkxsoulzyx @smoljeanius @bunmuffin @skizabaa

@tuzesdays @sleepykas @fernzwing @kandidandi @starsketchez

@just-a-drawing-bean @notdysfunk @ilsole @amberluvsbugs @cloudyvoid

@nomsthecat @alfinefalf @nosleepygay @theblog-with-thestuff

@cacaocheri

(Edit: ty kibbits for informing me of the. Fuck ass tagging system)

AND TAGGING OTHERS BECAUSE. POINTS. BONKS WITH HEAD. GETTING TO EITHER INTERACT OR TALK OR WHATEVER IS ALWAYS A DELIGHT

@ohno-the-sun @kibbits @ink-yy @saltyfryz @kaprisvn

@hierba-picante @sunny-sophies-garden @cookiiemancer @sneeblbop @justaduckarts

@pepethehumanz @crystalmagpie447 @woolysstuff @mocha-illustrates @duhsty1

@sanchensky @pillowspace @victarin @witherfide

[I DEFINITELY GOT SONAS WRONG AND THESE AREN'T ALL THE SILLY PEOPLE I KNOW BUT IM SITTING HERE AT 2:30 IN THE MORNING JUST KNOW YOU'RE THERE IN SPIRIT HANDING YOU ALL POPTARTS WAUGH]

[unbidden-yidden-deactivated20240]

Another aspect of this whole shitty discourse that's been driving me insane is that I feel like I can't actually express the criticisms I do have of Israel at all or in an unvarnished way, because if I do, it will get picked up by antisemites and people who want Israel wiped off the map and just be more fuel for the fire. I refuse to be a token and I don't want to hang out dirty laundry at a time when doing that gets Jews attacked and feeds into violent hatred for the entirety of Israel. At the same time, I feel morally obligated to discuss these things, because (a) I care about the lives it's impacting and (b) because I also refuse to be a hypocrite that prioritizes "being right" over the facts on the ground, one of the worst and most common sins in these discussions.

So then I constantly find myself doing crazy math to figure out what I can and can't responsibly speak on, because what if it gets used as a weapon against my people instead of being necessary intra-Jewish tochecha?

[egophiliac]

I hear you on brave but I think Mr. CEO man could be woz

Which I’m all here for tbh

anon you sent this over 9 hours before the reveal, h...HOW DID YOU KNOW

(I am also all here for it honestly) (I kind of hope they lean really hard into the overworked-CEO bit...how is he supposed to fight evil when there's all this paperwork that he has to get in by Friday, ugh)

[ominous-feychild]

Now I'm curious (because I see this 100% happening at least ONCE within the world I'm writing and I think it's hilarious)--

Imagine you're a worshipper of this one amazing goddess who can do no wrong, helps and has helped a lot of people. Then, one day, you're living your life and you meet this one guy. He's absolutely covered in scars, looks like he grew up in some kind of penitentiary. And he's buff. Like, seriously buff. Built like a horse.

He introduces himself.

He shares his name with one of your goddess's old angels. This one guy used to be one of her top guys, one of her most powerful attendants... up until the day he attacked her.

Then he was cursed and cast down for his crimes.

"Ha," you say, half out of awkwardness and half to fill the air while you figure out what to say. "That was real cruel of your parents, huh? Naming you after that guy."

The man sighs heavily, face twitching.

"No," he says, barely restraining his rage, "that's me."

What do you do?

@honeybewrites (also would love to know this answer from anyone else, haha)

[crookedfivefingers]

[lupins-hehim-pussy]

I wanna know ur Fontaine msq criticisms 👁️👁️👂I’m all ears

I'm not sure if you wanted me to talk about this secretly or publicly but! Here I go!

The TLDR: Fontaine MSQ aestheticised prison, poverty, child abuse, the justice system/court and didn't properly address any of it.

More:

Focalors/Furina has way too much of a sympathetic angle for a dictator who's lets people drown with her inaction.

Neuvillette feels Bad for sentencing some people to death/prison, but that's it. He's one of the most powerful people in Fontaine. If he felt like there are systemic injustices, I.E sending an abused Child to prison, he should be the first person to DO something about it, not just cry and be sad so the audience can be like aw, that's complex character writing isn't it? No it's not! And guilt doesn't absolve you!!!!!!! (These are stuff we deal with in OTCOJ read my fic now /j)

Meropide has children in it, both Sentenced there (Wriothesley) and BORN THERE (Lanoire), and this is just a quirk of the place. Not only that, Meropide accepts prisoners of all genders and crimes. There are abusers and abuse victims in one place. Do you know how bad that is? How much potential for crimes to happen in a place like that— oh wait, Meropide isn't under Fontaine's jurisdiction. If you are assaulted as an inmate it literally means nothing to the court.

Wriothesley had no qualifications when he took over. Depending on how long he lived on the streets, how old he was when he killed his parents, how old he was when he was first taken in by the orphanage, etc, the man might never have more than 4–5 years of formal education. Sigewinne probably had to teach him how to write reports. And do Meropide's spreadsheets. Edit because I forgot to elaborate on this one: This isn't a point brought up anywhere, which is bad, because when poverty and incarceration robs you of a proper education (and the rights to vote in many places too, too, by the way), it reduces your prospects for jobs, reduces many people's ability to get a home etc etc. Wriothesley was just, narratively, Given his position.

Meropide is an industrialized prison, and they portray this as a good thing. Prisoners are paid in coupons for their labour, and this is also portrayed as a good thing.

The One-Meal-A-Day reform was something Paimon gushed about being so great of a perk, that people might want to go to jail for food (could be interesting and reflective of systemic poverty if MHY had brains, but they don't, so I was just Pissed because essentially all Paimon wanted to say was "Prison isn't so bad, but still don't go to prison guys! Prison labour is really hard!"). By the way, in most real-world prisons they are obligated to feed you three meals a day. Because that's how much food a human needs. MHY went with one meal just so they can say "if you want to eat more, you have to work." And then the welfare meal is a goddamn gacha. So imagine you're a starving child who's too weak to work in the fucking robot assembly line, and you wander up for your first meal in 24 hours, only to luck in with a shit one. I'd kill myself.

They wrote Wriothesley, who's a victim of the system, into a guy who's say shit like "I'm the Duke I can do whatever I want" for a cool moment where he choke-slams an inmate (I know he was a bad guy. But also, in copaganda when cops are violent/disregarding protocols, they are always only portrayed to do that against bad guys, so what does our critical thinking tells us about this one?) They wrote Wriothesley, who was an inmate of a prison so bad, so notorious that it is the literal boogeyman of Fontaine, that has a legal (???) fighting pit, with an administrator who abuses his position to be unreasonable, to willingly stay in the place and become an Administrator who would choke-slam an inmate while saying a cool line about how he has the power to do whatever he wants. They wrote him, the guy who had to be fed on the streets by melusines, to think one-meal-a-day was a good enough reform (while he spends god-knows how much on his boat). This wasn't a victim-turns-into-abuser narrative either, they want all this to be seen as positive character growth.

And then, the final kicker is, they gloss over his entire abuse. You can only read about these shit in his profile, which most people don't because they don't Have Him or doesn't care to unlock it/read it online, and they jammed his entire backstory into a flaccid info-dump at the end of his character story quest. This man isn't Allowed to feel abused and neglected and show any reaction to it within the narrative of Fontaine itself, because if they actually Gave Weight to what happened to him, they'd have to confront THE FUCKING JUSTICE SYSTEM they had NO PLANS on criticising. I don't think they ever explicitly said the fucking Crime-Theatre nonsense was Bad either.

I could go on, but this is already so long. But yeah, I hope this gave you an idea.

[heytheredeann]

“Yes, there is a place where someone loves you both before and after they learn what you are.” ― Neil Hilborn

[chiyana]

Bruce: now, for the last part of this meeting

Dick, Jason, Tim, Stephanie, Damian, Cass, and Duke: ?

Bruce: -turns around to bring up a power point presentation, the title card of which just reads 'Please Be Normal About Tim'-

Bruce: -turns back around-

Bruce: ...Tim why are you the only one still here

Tim: I just like power point presentations

[shimmerluna]

WAIT Elle has box braids in s3??? I could cry

I don't think she had bad hair in s1 or s2, but I'm excited that they're actually giving the Black girls Black hairstyles instead of having them wear it out.

Before, it felt like the (all-white, for context) hair department was just ignorant about Black hair, so they put wigs on the Black actresses and only did styles that also work on nonblack hair for their own sake/convenience. This theory was especially supported by the fact that Tara, whose 4c hair couldn't really be styled the same as nonblack hair, wore a twistout that would take literal hours to do every day, but she had box braids in s2! and Elle has box braids now!! I'm so excited!!!

I also feel like this fits her bold, fashion-loving personality so much better than leaving her hair out. Our hair is basically its own accessory, and the long box braids are very feminine. Again, I'm not saying not having a protective style isn't feminine or fashionable (I myself am a fashion girlie with an Afro), but having one is another outlet for her creativity, and I'm glad they're recognizing that now.

[kyouka-supremacy]

--

[coldercreation]

brb about to go down a research rabbit hole lol

Question of the day!

Why is showing ‘disinterest’ such prevalent thing when it comes to building friendships and relationships?

I have talked about this here before in my rants lol, but it just always frustrates me. Like, you know those arbitrary ‘rules’ in dating that you shouldn’t show too much interest or get in touch too soon, or be too ‘intense’ or interested? Like, obviously don’t be a stalker and read the room etc, but I mean if you're just a regular and safe 'well-adjusted' person, why is you showing genuine effort and interest seen as a bad thing (I don't mean love bombing, that's a whole different thing)? If you genuinely like each other, why is the social rule saying that you shouldn’t show that? Same goes with friendships, why is showing interest in the person you want to get to know sometimes, somehow, a bad thing? To a point that some people can get put off by that effort someone is showing to get to know them? Not saying everyone is like this, because I know there are so many people who aren’t. And plenty people also disregard these social rules because they aren’t actually concrete rules. 

This is just a social construct and I’m trying to figure out why it is, because it seems counter productive? By what logic does it work? How are you supposed to make friends/date, if them showing interest in you makes you exit the relationship/ghost/breadcrumb?

How long are we supposed to only talk in one line texts about surface level stuff, to avoid being too much/too intense, before it’s acceptable? How do you know you’re following the same social timelines with the people you’re trying to get close to, when there’s no actual set rules? Someone might think you have to wait three days after a date to get in touch, but someone else will get offended if you take longer than two. But the next day or the same day is too desperate to some folk? And I'm talking about this from the point of view of someone who doesn't have trouble reading social cues/expectations. Can't even imagine dealing with this mess if that wasn't the case. Like what's the point of having these 'rules' if it just makes things more difficult for everyone? :')

These rules, technically, don't need to exist at all. It's all made up, based on... Something? We can always dismiss them ourselves but I'd like to know why they came to be and why we keep upholding them. I want to know the social purpose y'know? Is it a safety thing? Protecting yourself and not wanting to be vulnerable? That'd be valid, of course. But it does seem self sabotaging as it blocks people from actually making the connections they say they want to have?

I’ve been trying to find any research on the social behaviour regarding this, but I’m not sure what to even look up lol. Especially because I think the way we interact and behave has changed so much just in the last five years even. 

I just find it so curious that there’s so many headlines about loneliness epidemic, but people also recoil away from others when someone does show them genuine interest and wants to talk to them.   

I’ve had this initial ‘disinterest’ stage happen in the friendship context more. Also sudden, out of nowhere, communication ending/ghosting disinterest when trying to make friends (like please hurt my heart some more I beg u lmao). I haven’t really dated in the last few years so I don’t personally know how that field is at the moment, but I know ghosting is really common and people actively try to hold back from showing interest at first, even if they are reallyreally interested.

Maybe I’ll try looking more into the effects on social media etc, there’s a lot about ghosting in that context. But I just feel like it’s not quite what I mean, because I feel this disinterest phenomenon thing is separate from ghosting. 

Anyway! Happy Sunday loll xx

[rogue-bard]

Oh look, it's my favourite video game characters: Zelda and Hades!!

[blindhades]

i love knowing about other people's business so please tell me in the tags: what's something that lives in your mind rent-free?

[racewinner]

feeling very conflicted about the new one ok rock song, like on one hand, banger (and a heavy one, hell yes!) with a great message, on the other, looking at the credits and not seeing the name of a single member of the band feels... bad.

[rawliverandgoronspice]

words pale to express how much I hate macron at this point

[lemonhemlock]

I'm a 'Martin won't ever publish another ASOIAF book' truther but in addition to King Bran being profoundly idiotic, Martin has major structural issues that are now too 'big' to 'fix' imo. Namely, the ages of the characters are ridiculous and are all wrong for where their arcs need to go. The characters on the show were aged up and even the younger ones grew up on screen so Bran and Sansa and Arya were at least into late teens/adulthood at the end of the show - one is 13 and other is currently 11 and Bran is like, what, 8 in books? sksksksksk Just absolutely disastrous.

The characters should have been in their mid to late teens at the start of AGOT, at minimum. Especially because Martin essentially treated them, and has them act, like adults. I'm sorry, but I don't think that man has any understanding between the mental and physical developmental differences between, say, a 14 year old girl and a 17 year old girl. Every character appears and acts like they are anywhere from 3 to 5 years older than they are.

Also, the POV structure, while interesting, has also been disastrous in actually getting the story moving because certain characters have to be in certain places for things to happen while others are just sitting around killing time.

Hmmm, I don't really agree about the POV structure. It functioned fine for three books and offered compelling court drama, battles, magical elements and intriguing plot-twists. AGOT / ACOK / ASOS are pretty well paced and I've even seen someone making the case that the series could even have ended in that point and would have been one of the best fictional fantasy experiments. I found myself agreeing and disagreeing. I think the ASOS ending would have still distinguished ASOIAF from other fantasy series in its toppling of the good-guys-win-everything type of wrap-up, but it would be way less ambitious than what GRRM ended up pursuing.

The pacing problems came about with AFFC/ADWD. And I'm not one to talk here, because I'm an AFFC truther and it's always been my favourite of the series, so my two cents on this is that Dany's Slaver's Bay plotline is too damn long. Tyrion is also taking too damn long to get to her. It's a drag. In the book she is supposed to solve the Quaithe riddle,* escape Vaes Dothrak, get herself an army + navy, make the decision to leave Slaver's Bay AND sail to Westeros, so that in TWOW she can fight Young Gryff, face-off the Others, become a mask-off tyrant AND get deposed? It's a lot.

I honestly think he should just give up the 7 book compartmentation, admit defeat and just add another damn book to the series to get Dany to Westeros and fit in his fAegon plotline. It's not like he doesn't have the pages. No one's gonna care if there are 8 books instead of magic no 7. But my guess is that he's hung up over some decisions he's made in the past and kept trying to make the gargantuan plot fit inside this neat box he envisioned - 7 books, King Bran, Caesar!Jon etc. It would explain why he tried a time skip between ASOS and AFFC and had to scrap it - it would make more sense for the Stark children to be older. But he characterized himself as a gardener-style writing who doesn't plan everything in advance and lets the story grow organically. In that case, he should make allowances if the story grew in a direction he did not initially predict and make the required changes! Maybe King Bran made sense when he first wrote the initial three-book outline, but that was a long time ago & many other plot points changed.

My advice is to just stop trying to make the plot fit the previous designs, stay true to the way the characters evolved and respect the themes you've painstakingly developed over the course of nearly 30 years. Otherwise what's the point? If your original ending doesn't fit anymore, think of another ending ffs. The show is irrelevant at this point, so what if the endgame will be different? IDK, I'd be thinking that this is my life's work and I have every right to do it justice. Perhaps that's what he's thinking too and why it's taking him so long.

I agree that the ages of the characters are ridiculous, but if a time skip really, really can't fit anywhere, it's better to compromise on the age issue and leave off with a teen monarch than it would be to impose a surveillance state in Westeros as the solution with all-seeing, all-knowing Bran. That's a starkly dystopic ending, if you ask me.

Not to mention that it clashes directly with the end of magic - how is Bran supposed to be the Tree of Sauron if there's no magic anymore and everything goes back to normal? On what basis does he even get to be king at all if he's just a regular boy? How will he even survive being pulled out of the weirwood net if magic leaves the realm of men?

*“To go north, you must journey south. To reach the west, you must go east. To go forward you must go back, and to touch the light you must pass beneath the shadow.” JFC, if Dany has to get to Asshai, I will fucking scream.