#is a bad term

[i-like-forcefem]

I love cosmic-horror forcefem

Going about your day as normal and all of a sudden

It is here

You do not know what that means

But it is here

You try to ignore it

But it moves

It changes you

You know not why

You know not why

But it does

Like a bird being tagged and released

You got turned and twisted inside out, until you found yourself in the body of a girl

You felt no pain

No discomfort

And it is gone

And much like a bird that got tagged you’ll never know why this happened to you

But you’ll be much happier for it, won’t you cutie?

[inkskinned]

because sometimes there are invisible tests and invisible rules and you're just supposed to ... know the rule. someone you thought of as a friend asks you for book recommendations, so you give her a list of like 30 books, each with a brief blurb and why you like it. later, you find out she screenshotted the list and send it out to a group chat with the note: what an absolute freak can you believe this. you saw the responses: emojis where people are rolling over laughing. too much and obsessive and actually kind of creepy in the comments. you thought you'd been doing the right thing. she'd asked, right? an invisible rule: this is what happens when you get too excited.

you aren't supposed to laugh at your own jokes, so you don't, but then you're too serious. you're not supposed to be too loud, but then people say you're too quiet. you aren't supposed to get passionate about things, but then you're shy, boring. you aren't supposed to talk too much, but then people are mad when you're not good at replying.

you fold yourself into a prettier paper crane. since you never know what is "selfish" and what is "charity," you give yourself over, fully. you'd rather be empty and over-generous - you'd rather eat your own boundaries than have even one person believe that you're mean. since you don't know what the thing is that will make them hate you, you simply scrub yourself clean of any form of roughness. if you are perfect and smiling and funny, they can love you. if you are always there for them and never admit what's happening and never mention your past and never make them uncomfortable - you can make up for it. you can earn it.

don't fuck up. they're all testing you, always. they're tolerating you. whatever secret club happened, over a summer somewhere - during some activity you didn't get to attend - everyone else just... figured it out. like they got some kind of award or examination that allowed them to know how-to-be-normal. how to fit. and for the rest of your life, you've been playing catch-up. you've been trying to prove that - haha! you get it! that the joke they're telling, the people they are, the manual they got- yeah, you've totally read it.

if you can just divide yourself in two - the lovable one, and the one that is you - you can do this. you can walk the line. they can laugh and accept you. if you are always-balanced, never burdensome, a delight to have in class, champagne and glittering and never gawky or florescent or god-forbid cringe: you can get away with it.

you stare at your therapist, whom you can make jokes with, and who laughs at your jokes, because you are so fucking good at people-pleasing. you smile at her, and she asks you how you're doing, and you automatically say i'm good, thanks, how are you? while the answer swims somewhere in your little lizard brain:

how long have you been doing this now? mastering the art of your body and mind like you're piloting a puppet. has it worked? what do you mean that all you feel is... just exhausted. pick yourself up, the tightrope has no net. after all, you're cheating, somehow, but nobody seems to know you actually flunked the test. it's working!

aren't you happy yet?

[wolfienation]

absolutely hilarious to me that agatha calls rio a bad boy when in reality rio is actually the rule following jock with infinite patience and care who brings you flowers on a first date.

agatha on the other hand is the snarky girl who gets into arguements with her teacher about the smallest details in the lecture and is constantly getting detention for cursing someone out. she's top of all her classes tho.

[anxi04]

tim and bruce have an odd relationship to the rest of the family. they don’t act like father and son but it seems like they have a “deeper” bond than the others

bruce seems to take tim’s advice more seriously, bruce actually takes a break if tim tells him, tim still gets benched but not nearly as much as he should, and most confusingly, tim benched bruce once. not alfred benching bruce, TIM.

normally bruce has to be forced to take a break, and normally by alfred, but if tim says “you’re benched for a week” bruce? listens?

they have no idea why. some of them ask dick if he knows since he was there but he’s just as confused

and then despite all that there’s also such a strain between them? it’s really on the line of a professional relationship and almost a care taker. it’s very confusing. and then the times bruce gives tim a present or anything like that and tim stops and stares at him for a second, like he’s dissecting bruce. no one is able to fully figure it. until bruce is de-aged to tim’s robin era.

tim is very adamant about most of them, but especially jason and damian, do not reveal their names to him. for the time being they have a strictly professional relationship with their father who doesn’t know them.

they finally get some of the picture when they see tim start acting as bruce’s caretaker. tim switches between being gentle “hey, you need to sleep” to screaming at bruce. it always works. tim knows exactly which version bruce needs and it scares the team cause that has to require some practice

they’re then also thrown for a loop when they hear bruce call out jason’s name in a shocked voice, which makes sense cause he doesn’t know jason is alive but jason still has his helmet on so what? and then they hear a voice none of them have heard. except dick goes pale and jason’s breath hitches. and suddenly tim is responding to jason’s name and acting weird, almost like what some of dicks stories described jason as. and it’s so fucked up when they’re watching time act like someone else and bruce going along with it

the dynamic they’re getting is also fucked up once again when, during one of bruce’s really bad days, tim straight up acts like bruce’s parent. and bruce reacts well.

they’re all horrified by this. the realization that tim and bruce’s relationship has so many layers and that they do act like father and son sometimes. except bruce isn’t the father and tim isn’t the son

[lesbiannieism]

i need 7+ seasons of dead boy detectives specifically to see the long-term payoff of charles putting a jar of bees in his bag

[baguantte]

hey

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

This wine tastes like pigs blood!

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[aethersea]

I do think Blazing Saddles handled its one depiction of native americans very poorly, and the full extent of its representation of chinese workers on the railroad is they were literally just there. not even one single speaking line. unclear if this is worse or better than the redface.

it's fucking phenomenal at lampooning antiblack racism though. extremely blatant, extremely funny satire, which is constantly and loudly saying "racism is the philosophy of the terminally stupid at best and morally depraved at worst, and we should all be pointing and laughing at them 24/7"

plus the main character is a heroic black man who has to navigate a whole lot of bullshit but is constantly smirking at the extraordinarily stupid racists and inviting the audience into the joke. the one heroic white character is a guy who was suicidally depressed until he met the protagonist and they just instantly became buds, and he's firmly in a supporting role the whole time and happy to be there. the protagonist saves the day with the help of his black friends from the railroad, and uses the position of power he was given to uplift not only those friends, but all the railroad workers of other minorities too, in an explicit show of solidarity.

anyone saying "Blazing Saddles is racist" had better be talking about its treatment of non-black minorities. it had better not be such superficial takes as "oh but they say the n-word all the time" or "they have nazis and the kkk in there!" because goddamn if that's the full extent of your critique I very seriously suggest you read up on media analysis. there is too much going over your head, you need to learn to recognize satire.

[a-polite-melody]

“But if a trans man wasn’t trans would he—”

SHUT THE FUCK UP

He is trans.

You don’t get to separate the trans and the man because it’s convenient for you. Trans men are men because they are trans. Trans men are trans because they are men. You can’t just separate trans men’s identities out like this to say they’re oppressed for being trans and not men because THOSE ARE THE SAME THING and separating them to categorize how trans + man interact in a mathematical version of identity politics flies directly in the face of intersectionality and I’m so tired of pretending it doesn’t.

[blueskittlesart]

zl wedding (again)

[gertritude-art]

A fun way imo to develop characters is to look at them and ask, "what does this imply?" This unfortunately only works if you already have a character concept in mind, but it's always been useful for me when I need to create some interiority for a character who feels a little flat.

As previously stated, literally all you're doing is looking at a character and performing a rudimentary analysis of them based on what you've already developed. A good example of this is my character Mordred, who early on in his development was conceived of as a sickly looking teenager wearing a full suit and bowtie. This is because I thought there was a lot of potential in this image. "What kind of teenager goes to school everyday wearing a full suit and bowtie?" Probably a kid who takes himself very seriously and has some interest in looking "polished" -- perhaps he even views himself above his peers for how he dresses. And, how might this visual extend to other aspects of him? Is he always someone who goes against the grain? Does he actually have an interest in men's wear, or is this a symbolic image for how he stands against his peers? I bet he has strong opinions on society. Did he buy the suit himself, or did his mom buy it, because one or the other also implies some stuff about the nature of their relationship, if his mother is supportive of his oddness or not, etc. etc. etc. A lot of stuff that you can find out, just from looking at one small aspect of a character! The same kind of process can spiral from anything - a character's actions, a character's thoughts, their beliefs, a line they say, a face they make, a hobby they have... all can be a good starting point for developing them further and figuring out more about them.

In a similar vein, I know that people recommend filling out character charts and stuff, but usually I find it more useful to think of a character in terms of a "scenario" or a "description" than in terms of their traits. "This character is smart" vs. "This characters complains to the teacher when the test has a question that isn't in the book" ; "This person is stubborn" vs. "This is the kind of person who'd rather starve than order food if they said they weren't hungry." Figuring out a character through something like this gives me a specific image of how they might act in a story as opposed to more broadly-described traits. Being as I tend to think up characters with story ideas and scenarios, it's much more helpful for me! "Ah, but how do you do this, Gert?" Easy: you stare at a wall for multiple hours until you have a revelation about a character. This is surely what everyone is capable of [nodding sagely]

[juniemunie]

[Abandoned by the Lightners, his heart became cracked with hatred.]

Hitting a lil' too close to home?

[inkskinned]

hey btw if you're in the USA at  2:20 p.m. ET on Wednesday, Oct. 4, they're testing the emergency broadcast system. your phone is probably going to make a really loud noise, even if it's on silent. there's a backup date on the 11th if they need to postpone it.

if you're not in a safe situation and have an extra phone, you should turn that phone completely off beforehand.

additionally, if you're like me, and are easily startled; i recommend treating it like a party. have a countdown or something. be surrounded by your loved ones. take the actions you personally need to take to make yourself safe.

i have already seen mockery towards any person who feels nervous about this. for the record, it completely, completely valid to have "emergency broadcast sounds" be an anxiety trigger. do not let other people make fun of you for that. emergency sounds are legitimately engineered to make us take action; those of us with high levels of anxiety and/or neurodivergence are already pre-disposed to have a Bad Time. sometimes it is best to acknowledge that the situation will be triggering for some, and to prepare for that; rather than just saying "well that's stupid, it's just a test."

"loud scary sound time" isn't like, my favorite thing, but we can at least try to prevent some additional anxiety by preparing for it. maybe get yourself a cake? noise cancelling headphones? the new hozier album? whatever helps. love u, hope you're okay. we are gonna ride it out together.

[bananonbinary]

it somewhat frustrates me when people talk about biden funding genocide, because it's not not true, but it's also like. not really a biden-specific problem. the united states, as a whole, is very pro-genocide. i have never in my life seen a presidential candidate that thinks we should pull back from all the fucked up shit we do internationally.

that is bad. don't get me wrong. you should protest, and make your voices heard, and better yet, actually do things that support the people in danger, but talking about it like it's a unique wrong that biden has done really obfuscates the fact that he is one of the better politicians we've had in office. i'm not saying i'd be his best friend, i don't know or care about him as a person. but as a man doing a job, he IS doing it better than anyone else who could realistically hold the position. it's a low bar, but i'll be damned if we don't clear it just because people think small improvement doesn't matter.

[vaguely-concerned]

thinking about not only the specific people lucanis pulls in to represent the 'locks' in his psyche, but the storytelling that happens in the structure/order of them. the underlying ideas are presented something like:

the lucanis who went into the ossuary never came back out again; he died down there (the boy caterina raised is gone forever) -> you're putting yourself in danger doing this (by being close to me), you should leave because I can't bear it if you get hurt because of me -> it doesn't matter even if we do try this, it won't work anyway (again because of me) ('you know what he's like, you can open the door but he won't walk through it' :'( oofie doofie) -> what if the real secret is that there was never anything but the monster in here from the beginning. you should leave, there was never anything here worth saving in the first place. (implicitly: what if I deserved what happened, all along.)

it runs pretty cleanly from outward-oriented attachment anxiety ('caterina won't even want me back like this, she won't recognize me (the same way I no longer recognize myself)) and gradually deeper inwards until we reach self-image and self worth. or you know, the harrowing basic lack of it lol.

"careful -- they'll know we're not right," spite says in one of their first scenes... but clearly, some very deep part of lucanis has feared or suspected for much longer than that that there's something inherently not right at the core of him, way before any demon entered the picture. and the voice he gives those lines to is the person who should know him better than anyone in the world, who he has loved more than anyone in the world -- and who deliberately chose to hurt him so horrifically anyway. 'It's better if I'm just a monster and deserved what happened than it is to allow for the idea that the brother I love doesn't really exist and maybe never did'. it's better if he's fundamentally flawed in some way that needed fixing to help him survive, and that's why caterina chose to hurt him again and again -- out of love. (this one I think he might have a very sad wakeup call on one day if he ever ends up with the responsibility and care of a child of his own in some way and realizes just how alien the idea of ever intentionally hurting them for any reason is to him. oh buddy. also interesting that he keeps caterina as the outermost lock -- there IS a distance he keeps there that he hasn't with illario. he doesn't resent her 'anymore' he says, but he also keeps her carefully further away from his deepest self.)

as far as I could tell the only note in the mind prison that's fully hidden and needs to be uncovered is the sad painful helpless stupid little truth that even after all this, even knowing what happened... he still loves his brother. is there anything illario could ever do that would make lucanis completely stop loving him, do you think? sometimes the trouble with unconditional love is that it is, well. unconditional, even when some terms and conditions probably would have been in order haha.

that's the pattern you see there again and again; he would rather destroy and abandon and imprison himself at every turn than let go of love, even when it's just scraps, even when there's only ever enough of it to hurt him. it's only when rook shows up and as it were takes his hand and walks along with him that he can entertain the idea of changing the story of what walking out the door might mean in the end.

[dykeulous]

btw your homophobic republican grandma is not a radfem. no, the conservative woman talking about “womanly brain” & being explicitly anti-abortion isn’t a radfem, either. no… the spiritual woman telling young girls to “return to their divine feminine” & selling out cheap dating instructions & “tips” & promoting the idea of “female-specific” emotions, thoughts, and feelings, most likely isn’t a radfem. your radical christian mom that disowned you for being trans isn’t a radfem. please. PLEASE LEARN what radical feminism is. i am BEGGING you.