ralphwerner-blog

[normal-nightmare]

God I am OBSESSED with this panel. The sheer amount of yearning in Jason's eyes, looking almost shy. Sneakily stealing a glance at Dick. Dick smiling a little, staring up at the ceiling, completely unaware of Jason's stare.

This feels, like, CLASSICALLY gay. This feels like a scene you'd see in a movie or show where two characters are clearly pining for each other but haven't yet confessed (but it's clearly heading that way).

Like, there is ZERO way to interpret this as platonic or as "just hero worship". Especially in the context of the entire annual. It feels like a 150k slowburn fanfic the way this annual is written. This entire thing threw me off so badly when I just joined the fandom bc this doesn't at all feel platonic.

I could talk about this annual for HOURS man

[yourgamemasterthewhiterabbit]

Of my 2% capacity to be attracted to anyone, my type is like 90% women, 5% pretty men and 5% men you would swear are super fucking manly, and never questioned being straight and cis, but are now suddenly *stressed* that they can't figure out why their attraction to me [fully socially interpreted as a woman and labelled that way up until relatively recently] feels incredibly fucking gay

[dalishious]

About Davrin's little blurb on the official website for Dragon Age: The Veilguard...

"Though he was raised in a Dalish clan, he craved excitement and adventure. He'd rather make history than reflect on it."

There's actually a lot to unpack about these two sentences.

First off, placing the word "though" in front of being "raised in a Dalish clan", gives such a thing a negative connotation. The word "though" is used in a way that sounds like "despite", as in, somehow wanting excitement and adventure must go against being Dalish. This correlates with sentence that follows. "He'd rather make history than reflect on it." The word "rather" is yet again used to separate Davrin from his Dalish origin. All together, this promotional description of Davrin is insisting that he is "not like other Dalish".

Now, obviously the game is not out yet, so we do not have total confirmation on what the nature of Davrin's relationship to his culture is really like. But there is absolutely something to be said about promoting the character this way, regardless of however he actually turns out in game. There is absolutely something to be said about how, as @/the-eldritch-it-gay put in their tags here, why do writers feel the need to make fantasy minorities hate or distance themselves from their culture? As a selling point?

Maybe this is completely misleading bullshit, maybe it isn't. All we have to go by, is what BioWare chose to say here, and their past track record with elves:

Zevran may talk about his mother in a font way, but he still has the line, "Too many of our kind think we deserve pity simply because we have failed to defend ourselves."

Velanna is one of the two elves we've had who is overtly proud of her culture, yet she is treated like she is unreasonable and too angry because of it.

Merrill too, is proud of being an elf, and of being Dalish. The story punishes her left and right for this, treats her like a child, and in the end she is either ostracized from her clan or they end up dead because... she cared too much?

Fenris has pretty much zero engagement with elven cultures, and spends his time ridiculing Merrill for being proud of hers.

Solas complains about the Dalish from the start, and says plainly that he does not see himself as having anything in common with elves of current time. "Oh, you mean elves" he says, when the Inquisitor asks how he feels about his people; the thought does not even occur to him.

Sera is... Sera is a character who could have been a really interesting examination of overcoming internalized racism, if she was written by someone competent with the subject. Instead, she just cringes at everything "too elfy" through the entire main game, and only has a single line in Trespasser that hints that she may have a personal struggle going on. But it's still left unresolved.

That's a lot a lot of negativity. So of course seeing a suggestion that more is to come with Davrin has people wary and tired.

Let us also consider the fact that Davrin is overtly Black as well, and what that means. Acting as if one must disregard history in order to make it, as his description so claims, is bullshit. It sounds too much like promoting gentrification/assimilation in my opinion; the idea that you cannot keep your culture if you want to be successful.

I also think that it goes even deeper, on a meta level - I think that BioWare is afraid people will not be able to like or relate to Davrin, if he is "too ethnic". I think that BioWare is taking this Black character and instead of questioning how he can best represent marginalized fans - particularly Black fans - they are questioning how to make him more relatable to white fans. And the only answer to that is to, of course, make him seem like he is an exception to marginalization through separating him from his people.

I am still holding onto hope that Davrin will overall be an interesting, well-written character. And I sure as hell will still be defending him from the people who are already hating on him or ignoring him completely because of their racialized biases. But that does not exempt BioWare, and specifically his writer, John Dombrow, from any criticism. This is not about Davrin the character, this is about BioWare the company's handling of Davrin the character. And in that regard, they're not off to a great start with this.

[blitzwhore]

I love how Blitz seems to battle with masculinity tbh?? Like he'll bottom but make fun of Moxxie for taking it from a woman, he'll sleep with guys but emotions are gay as hell, romance is beautiful and adorable but also kinda cringe that a guy would be that openly sappy, cool to wear drag and makeup and look stylin' but also like Moxxie is suuuuch a little princess right?? Anyway here are my various massive weapons that aren't compensating for anything. He's sooo obviously tackling severe internalised homophobia and toxic masculinity. As soon as it's not a show of strength or independence and shows any type of earnest vulnerability he immediately jumps to insinuating that it isnt the right way to be.

Ugh, yes, this! It's really interesting, because it's mostly showed subtextually (I hadn't even processed some of the examples you listed here) and it's quite easy to overlook. But, once you put the pieces together, you realise just how much he battles with shame around queerness, gender expression, and the ways they relate to vulnerability and emotion.

I personally headcanon that Cash, his dad, was homophobic. Maybe not like Crimson, who overtly hated and condemned anything queer, which in a way may have made it easier for Moxxie to realise just how awful those opinions were. I think Cash might have been queerphobic and sexist in a more insidious way. Think things like maybe treating Barbie like his little princess whom he needed to protect, all the while telling Blitz to man up. Think 'those people'-type comments, always said with a lower voice and a knowing, scornful smile. Or 'why can't they just keep it in the bedroom'. Or 'I'm fine with it, I just don't see why they need to make their whole identity about it'. Think him chastising his wife for letting Blitz cry past the age of 5-6, because he was going to turn him soft.

I explored Blitz's internalised homophobia a little bit in my Oops flashback fic, and I really want to dive into it more in future fics, because his struggle is just so interesting and relatable to me, as someone who grew up with it as well. You can really tell Blitz's relationship with his queerness (and how it interacts with his trauma) was written by people who have first-hand experience with this sort of grief. It's devastating, but also healing, in a way.

[king-crawler]

(IM SORRY THIS IS SO LONG WINDED AAUHHAGA, ur absolutely free to skip this ask or set it aside, i will not be offended i promiise)

another ask from meee srry im trying to avoid flooding yer inbox but oh my gahhhgu i want to talk to someone about turbo so so so so bad and posting about him just isnt enough to satiate my hunger (Smiles extremely scary with malicious intent)

HIS SENSE OF HUMOR AAUUUU I love overanalyzing little details about his character. i think a really silly detail about him is how he laughs at his own jokes and puns when more often than not they are overtly cruel or in poor taste and nobody aside from him actually thinks theyre funny (for example: the fungeon, the mocking comments he says as candybug). why do i bring this up, you might ask? well i wonder how this could translate into his personality in the 80s as regular old Turbo. he has likely always had this dark sense of humor, but as the jolly King Candy, its more discordant with his persona because of his innocent facade suddenly cracking a joke about how he imprisons people in a dungeon like its not a big deal. he definitely understands that its horrible, too! he just doesnt care!!!!

i wonder how this looked when he had less restraint as turbo. what kind of shit was he saying!! he was likely a major bully towards everyone and thought annoying and hurting others was funny. one of my favorite characterizations of him ever are in the fan comicsby turbotastique because he's still clearly portrayed as an abhorrent person, but he also doesn't take anything or anyone seriously outside of himself. (i also like the comic au series they did with turbo and fix it felix being GAY and DATING starring GENE BEING HOMOPHOBIC!!!)

i could go on and on and on about this slimy bitch and u seem to feel the same way which is so awesome. i give him big yummy cyanide lollipop ok he loves it dw

I LIKE THIS IDEA A LOT (forgibve me for being too sleepy to answer properly)

[mixedup-sideblog]

41 letters…what the fuck.

The charges listed against Peck:

- SA of a person under 16.

- SA by foreign object.

- SA oral.

- SA with use of anaesthesia or controlled substance.

- Using a minor for SA.

- Sending harmful matter.

Drake Bell was sexually tortured by this man when he was only 15 years old and 41 pieces of shit wrote this kind of crap in support of his abuser….

James Marsden:

“I do intend to shed light on the fact that he has learnt his lesson…the earth would fall from the sky before Brian would think about doing something like this again.”

- ahh don’t worry everyone, James is pretty sure he would never drug and r*pe a child again so let’s just let him off on this one!

Taran Killam:

“Brian is fully aware of his misjudgement and takes full responsibility.”

- poor old Brian making that minor misjudgement when he decided to prey on a child, turn him against his father, against his family, isolate him and groom him then repeatedly SA him. Don’t worry he’s stepping up and taking full responsibility!

Joanna Kerns:

“There must have been some extreme situation or temptation exerted upon him.” and “ I would hire him today to work with children.” And "a good man that made a mistake, not a bad man who got caught."

- see that’s all it was poor Brian could not resist the extreme temptation, of course blame the 15 year old victim not the fucking adult, it’s always the same bullshit from these people I swear.

Ron Melendez:

“I also know the young man…I have met his family, seen his behaviour…I saw him pursue a friendship with Brian, maintain their close ties…Brian made a large mistake but it was not his alone.”

- surprise, more victim blaming, more trivialising. A mistake is forgetting to lock your door or putting salt in your tea instead of sugar…repeatedly r*ping a child is not a fucking mistake - it’s a fucking crime!

Tom DeSanto:

“Brian is ashamed and remorseful about his lapse in judgment.” and “ I met Drake…he seemed very fearful of his father and unable to communicate with him whatever sexual issues he was going through”

- again - broken record here but r*ping a child is not a bloody lapse in judgment! And again - victim blaming and suggesting his family were at fault!

Will Freddie:

“I can only reiterate how devastated Brian is and how these past events have forever changed him.”

- well thank god Brian is so devastated that he got caught - poor thing. The threat of prison probably has ‘forever changed him’ but I’m sure his inability to stop himself from SAing kids has done far more significant damage to his victims (and yes I believe he has more than Drake).

Kimmy Robertson:

“An outrageous, overtly gay, over-sexed person…he totally took advantage of Brian’s willingness to help.”

- the amount of victim blaming in these letters, particularly this one, is just astounding. The 15 year old boy took advantage of the 40 something year old man? Do you really truly believe that Kimmy? I’ll say it again for the billionth time - What. The. Fuck.

And this is just the snippet, there are 34 more letters - all I’m sure are variations of the above examples. The fact that we live in a world where these people not only do and get away with this shit all the time but also are supported so wholeheartedly when they’re exposed for doing it, is quite frankly terrifying.

I do not accept - we did not know the extent of what we were defending as an excuse here. You knew the charges it’s even clear in the letters themselves - you know it’s about the SA of a child (a child some of you even knew personally), you decided to disregard them, defend them or downplay them. You are only coming out now with weak-ass apologies because you have to - in reality you never thought those letters would see the light of day outside the court room.

I’m sorry but the amount of victim blaming, trivialising and excusing here is just more proof to be added to the huge pile of evidence that Hollywood is a cesspit, it does not care about victims, it does not care about children.

If anyone is still in doubt about the amount of systemic CSA in Hollywood please go and watch An Open Secret (whole thing is on YouTube)- a movie that they desperately tried to bury but is just as hard hitting as ‘Quiet on Set.’

[conflictofthemind]

I don’t know how to break this to you guys, but Byler as an official couple is not going to be happening in the first half of the season and it probably won’t even officially be a thing until the finale. Because of Mike’s issues. And it being the 80s.

Will has actually… been a fairly easy character to figure out. And for as much as he does still absolutely repress his sexuality, he is way further on the path to living authentically than Mike is. We all agree on this, right? Will is used to being labelled as a freak regardless of what he does or doesn’t do. He never really tried to feign interest in girls. Most of the town already suspects he might be gay, and while it would get worse for him if the rumours were known to be truthful, he knows he has the support of Jonathan. And I think he knows deep down that he has the support of Mike (and Joyce). Otherwise, why tell him that he makes him feel better for being ‘different’ (gay)?

But Mike? ‘Just trying to be normal’ Michael Wheeler? We know he didn’t mean that as in school; he prides himself as a nerd. Michael Wheeler who seemed like he could have been on the precipice of finally breaking it off with El, and then tried to go back even harder after Will’s push? And for the general audience to make sense of what they will perceive as a sudden shift in Mike’s character when they reveal his feelings for Will, they’ll have to hammer it in that Mike is afraid to his core of being out for them to make sense of his previous actions.

Mike has a different personal life than Will. Reagan supporter conservative parents who don’t like to speak about emotions. He doesn’t have as strong of a relationship with Nancy. We know Hellfire and Eddie’s death will have big consequences on the narrative, and that the town will continue the witch hunt against all of the members of Hellfire. They list sodomy as one of its demonic influences. Will is also going back to high-school, and it’s possible he has a bruise on his face in that Episode 4 farm scene. He’s been bullied before, and I don’t see how they don’t bring that up again, and worse.

If Mike is out, or gets outed, he will fall from a much higher place into a much deeper pit than Will. I honestly foresee them both realizing eachothers’ feelings by the middle of the season, maybe acting on them in private, but Mike suddenly pushes him away in public when Will tries to initiate any contact or closeness - even nothing overtly romantic.

Will is ready to start being more open about their relationship to family and friends as he’s sick of hiding himself and has probably, at this point, come out to Joyce at the least and met Robin. Mike is not so ready. This creates a conflict leading up to the finale where Mike truly has to choose between living in the closet for the rest of his life, and losing Will, versus the bravery to be open (to friends/ family) at the risk of being rejected or further outed and kicked out / assaulted / etc.

[sofipitch]

I can't stop thinking about how well they portrayed Louis in the show. I think the change in race also really helped solidify the "vampire with a human soul" part of his character. Bare with me for what I mean by this; a lot of readers of the book tend to "not get Louis" and this was especially true of the movie, even AR said where it just seems like Louis is being annoying and whiny, go be a fun vampire. But Louis main conflict is that becoming a vampire changed nothing about him internally. The issues he has, primarily a concern with consumption and damnation don't go away. Louis is afraid of sin and also his own desires for indulgence. To some readers this may seem abstract, but they are often clear metaphors for being gay or alcoholism, Louis is very concerned with regulation, and not because he has any issues with drinking blood but more with how he is judged. He is very concerned about being seen as a monster (see Babette and portrait painter scenes). His big fight with Paul is also about Paul telling Louis that their family wasn't being holy enough. You can quickly see how Paul saying that they need to change their entire lifestyle is a judgement on Louis, the head of the household. Louis also said that he didn't want to believe his brother could have been visited by saints, bc it would be proof his brother is somehow a better person than him. Louis's internal conflict is often easily summarized by his Catholic guilt, which again can be abstract to audiences who have never experienced internalized homophobia or just a large sense of shame/feeling you are being watched

Anyways, why is the change in race smart, it's another way we can see Louis continues to be human governed by human rules, despite being a vampire. We can see it very clearly in how he is treated by society in the show, he is still treated as "lesser". Lestat thinks Louis should be above such things because he is a vampire, and while being gay and being an alcoholic are to some degree things you can hide, Louis's race is not. The opera being the last scene in Ep 2 where the schism between Louis and Lestat begins to get worse, is also where Louis has to act like Lestat's valet in public. If they were both gay white men they could at least act as equals, friends business partners, whatever. But even Lestat "we are above society" has to go through with this act but is notably not upset by it while Louis is. So to audiences that didn't get his issues, Louis desire to basically just be "normal", not an alcoholic, not of a sexuality that would be remarked upon, (while both real these two in the books are not shown overtly and exist in Louis's fear of damnation, which is still fear of judgement by others, but it isn't something that has a scene of a random accosting him in the street, it's more a persistent fear in his head, in the show they showed both these more overtly in the confession scene and the police officers in their home) not of a race treated as inferior, not having to act up his masculinity, by mixing all of those together at least one should make you GET it. I think even Jacob Anderson said it in the podcast that Louis really just wants to have a domestic family life like anyone else, and in the book while it is glossed over Louis says the time he spent being happy was that domestic family life. He just wants to be loved and not judged

In a lot of ways vampirism should suit Louis, and the book IWTV often romanticizes Louis pouncing on his prey from dark corners of the street. And that is what fits Louis the best, the desire to be left alone to be himself

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

AITA for almost killing my 8th grade english teacher? (warning: racism, sa mention)

I (M16, 14 at the time, white (this is important later)) was part of the newspaper in middle school. The teacher running the newspaper (F… 50? 60? i have no idea) was always really nice to me, and we got along really well. I was ecstatic to see that she would be my english teacher in 8th grade.

That is, until the class actually began.

This english class we mostly read books about oppression and historical atrocities and genocide because our history class wouldn’t cover that for some reason (the reason is racism). It seemed like this teacher would have done a good job of teaching this material, but well. you can see where this is going.

a week into the school year the whole class saw that she was pretty racist - not like overtly racist; she sort of said she cared about fighting oppression and then… was a part of that oppression. like she’d say “i could never be racist” and then she would be racist. it’s hard to explain. she would always be incredibly weird about disciplining the Black kids in the class, blaming one guy in particular for like. every time a guy in the class acted like and eighth grade boy would act. she was also really condescending to him; she’d constantly make comments about how he couldn’t follow rules (which obviously isn’t true). she did this to an extent to all the other Black kids in the class as well; later when some of them went to the principal to talk about what happened they said they didn’t feel safe in her class.

additionally, pretty much nobody even stood for the pledge of allegiance (we were usually busy reading cause the library in that school was really nice and had a really good collection of books), and when they did they’d never actually say it. this teacher had a problem with this, and every time she saw absolutely nobody in the class standing for the pledge of allegiance, she’d make the entire homeroom (oh yeah i was in her homeroom too, forgot to mention that) tell her why they didn’t for literally the entire class period. Every time someone mentioned systemic racism or racist history she’d butt in either saying “my parents were immigrants and they stood for the pledge” or she’d start talking about her gay son. some kids told stories of being called slurs when they were younger. some kids cried. she would always bring up her gay son as a rebuttal. and i get that being gay is hard, i’m gay myself, but that is not in any way applicable to the situation at hand here. This happened on three separate occasions - sometimes a single person would stand for the pledge just so there was at least one person doing it and so we wouldn’t have to have that conversation.

And then there was the actual teaching. oh boy. so, as i said before, almost all of our books in this class were about some sort of historical atrocity because the history class didn’t have time for it apparently. and uh. uhhhhhhh yeah. with this teacher it was not a good experience.

We had read books about racism for summer reading and we were reading the novel Chains at the beginning of the school year, and the teacher would always talk about how “resilient” the characters in the books were and how they made the best of their situations and fought back, but never about how these characters should have never had to be in these situations in the first place and WHO PUT THEM IN THESE SITUATIONS, WHAT SYSTEMS PUT THEM IN THESE SITUATIONS YOU KNOW THE KIND OF STUFF ONE WOULD NEED TO KNOW FROM A COURSE LIKE THIS TO MAKE SURE HISTORY DOESNT REPEAT ITSELF. Later in the year we read Warriors Don’t Cry and it went exactly how you’d expect. “Resiliency”. Also worse than you’d expect. The teacher victim blamed the author, a real ass person writing about real fucking events, for almost being assaulted at a young age. And though we focused more on the systems of oppression, thankfully, we also watched and interview with the little rock nine and some of the people who harassed them in school, and one of them, a white woman, said the n word and refused to apologize. and this teacher defended her???? On another occasion we had a lesson about feminism and we read some of Sojourner Truth’s writing, and she interpreted it as solely being about womanhood and not race - and when I tried to talk about how race is an important factor in the message of one of the speeches, the teacher called my parents. We also read books about the holocaust and this teacher was surprisingly respectful throughout the whole thing. No victim blaming, no talk of resilience, nothing.

I had talked to her about all of this before. We knew each other from the newspaper, and it even seemed like I was her favorite student. She would not budge. Sometimes she even made the argument that I was smarter than the other kids, that I cared more than the other kids, that I would notice these things and care about them but other kids wouldn’t and I should just shut up because nobody understands me because i’m just so smart. which made me fucking pissed. i don’t care any more than the other kids who told you stories of being harassed and ridiculed at 8:30 am on a weekday so that the whole class could excercise their freedom of speech. i’m not any smarter than the other kids who cited countless examples of the atrocities this country committed against people of color to you who you didn’t listen to. in fact, i’m not even that smart. i’d say i’m kind of an idiot. and i want to be an idiot, because then i’m not put on a pedestal to push other people down.

This happened two years ago so i don’t exactly remember the order in which these next three events happened.

Since during these talks sometimes i’d start to cry, in may my french teacher asked me if i wanted to transfer to her homeroom and i did. It was a lot better there.

Around this time about eight of the kids from my old homeroom went to the principal to talk about this teacher and how her class made them feel unsafe.

Anyway, my backpack is very heavy. I usually have a lot of books in there, until this year I used five subject notebooks, I never clean out my folders and I brought a laptop as well. Even with all this though, my backpack always ends up being heavier than I expected.

So, one day my anger toward this teacher boiled over. On my way out of english class, when she went to say goodbye to me, I shoved her to the side with my backpack. It turns out that broke her hip, and she was out of school for two weeks. When she came back she said she had almost died in the hospital. She also announced her retirement, and that she was going to go and “end racism”, ironically. She knew I was the one who hit her, but she didn’t say anything about that. I was still her favorite, apparently. It left a bad taste in my mouth that she still thought of me like this. Eventually I graduated from that school and I haven’t seen her since.

tldr: A teacher of mine was racist and making a lot of the kids in the class feel unsafe, and she tried to keep me from arguing with her about it, so I hit her with my backpack and broke her hip, almost killing her.

AITA???

What are these acronyms?

[pirateshelly]

It's great that these days you can watch shows with gay stuff and then watch interviews where everyone involved is actually overtly and enthusiastically TALKING about it. Which sounds like, you know, a pretty baseline thing to expect. But it seems like not all that long ago you'd watch something where two characters straight up have gay sex, multiple times, only to read some interview where the showrunners are like 'well lets not simplify things here I'd say they have a profound friendship, a bromance if you will, that really just transcends labels' (harrowing flashbacks to when I watched the magicians). Or shows where it would just be crickets, as if someone let them do a gay thing on their show and now everyone's afraid to actually talk about it, lest the general public actually KNOW they did a gay thing on their show (like the promotion around black sails, you would NEVER know how gay that show was unless you actually watched it).

It's nice that it actually seems normal now for people to be like 'yeah this thing we made is extremely gay, that's an important part of it why wouldn't we talk about that??'

[normal-enderman]

MAJOR MHA SPOILERS

Thinking about how..... Aoyama's parents didn’t really love him that much even if it might've seemed like they did....

They got him a quirk from AfO because they wanted a "normal" child, and probably rationalised it to themselves as "we're willing to do immoral things to ensure our child gets the best life possible, this is all out of love!" But really, it was about appearances, not love. If they had truly loved Aoyama, they wouldn't have given him a Quirk which would essentially indebt him to a criminal for the rest of his life. They weren't considering Aoyama's future or identity or feelings beyond a shallow level of "we want our child to fit in in class". It's a very insidious type of lack of love and care, because it doesn't stem from malice, but from weakness and fear of conflict.

I've met a few parents like this in real life. They aren't emotionally resilient and never learnt to deal with their issues, so the moment there is a problem, they take the most immediate action that will balm their emotions stemming from the problem even when it causes bigger problems later down the line. And will then insist that they were doing it for the betterment of everyone because they can’t grow beyond their flawed thinking.

If they really loved Aoyama, there were so many opportunities for them to avoid the situation they ended up being put in. They could have been gently honest with him from a young age about where his Quirk came from and why he wouldn’t be suited to join the ranks of heroes because of it, and encouraged him to explore his other interests and ways of helping people. Instead, they were too weak to have that conversation with him and instead allowed him to go down the path of heroism, which led to SO MANY PEOPLE being hurt. They put Aoyama in a situation where he had to DIRECTLY CONTRIBUTE TO HIS FRIENDS BEING INJURED because of their own selfishness. They allowed the worst outcome to happen because they didn't take ANY of the opportunities presented to them during Aoyama's development to guide him down a different path, because they are, fundamentally, cowardly people who take the path of least resistance and conflict even if it causes huge problems later down the line. And Aoyama DOESNT DESERVE THAT!!! He's not a coward!! He held up under horrific circumstances, the threat of his parents' death constantly hanging over him on one side and the immense guilt at hurting his friends on the other, and he STILL found time to look out for Midoriya in the middle of it all.

And there's the scene in his flashback when he's explaining how he got his Quirk.... in the scene, a young Aoyama, having just been granted a Quirk, is running to his family with happy tears in his eyes while they cry for joy. But this makes me wonder.... how was their attitude towards Aoyama BEFORE this scene, then? While they were not abusive per say, the scene really gives the sense that Aoyama's parents did not consider him "complete" until he had a Quirk. It's like they were so happy because they had finally "fixed" him.

So what was that like for young Aoyama? Growing up feeling like you are inherently flawed and incomplete and in some way a disappointment by dint of the simple fact that you are you? (This is also ties back to the gay experience + Aoyama being very overtly queer-coded ect but that's a talk for another day)

And now, Aoyama has left UA and all the friends he made, and is going back to his parents... stuck with the people who have put him through an unimaginable trauma, which he most likely will never be able to talk to anyone else about. He'll probably never grow close to the students at his new school, because the guilt will eat away at him. And the only people who share his experience are his parents, who ALLOWED THAT EXPERIENCE TO HAPPEN BECAUSE FUNDAMENTALLY THEY DO NOT LOVE HIM.

I just hope that Class 1-A stays friends with him :(

(Ps. I'm not a mha blog so don't follow for more analysis like this! I don't usually write stuff like this! Was just thinking thoughts about my favourite underrated character!)

[skyclan-funny-name-squad]

Quick which cats would be Minecraft YouTubers, Squirrelflight 100% the only reason she isn’t a Roblox YouTuber is she was born a few years too soon for that

I feel like Lionblaze would 100% be a Minecraft YouTuber who gets into drama about his temper and more violent nature and he used to roleplay with heatherpaw when he was lionpaw but they had a nasty falling apart and it fueled rumors that did not help with his temper, only a third of the drama is actually about things he did, the other two thirds is a mix between people arguing about his ancestry which is so not relevant, and people being Fucking Weird about his intrusive thoughts.

Hollyleaf tried to be a Minecraft roleplayer but as a woman even though her characters were amazing and fleshed out and nuanced they kept being sidelined for male characters Emotions before she snapped and posted her breakdown on twitter and most people are being fucking cringe about it but two percent of people who actually are paying attention and not just dismissing it as jealous hysterical woman are going “wait did she fucking kill someone?”

Jayfeather is a modder but he only mods to make lionblaze suffer and make things harder like an evil wizard or something but he’s a bit of a fan favorite because when he appears in a lionblaze episode or on his server you just know he’s going to cause some chaos, he has admin privileges, no one knows how he got admin privileges. He is the chaos god, it is him. Poppyfrost helps him with modeling things for his mods.

Sandstorm had a phase as a bed wars youtuber but she grew out of it and gets very embarrassed when it’s brought up but it is all very cute

Daisy is bad at the game but she likes to make age appropriate videos for her kids with it and accidentally got popular because she’s so nice and mom energy and it’s fun to watch her slowly improve and build up a lore about her world. Sometimes she has one of her kids on to help her and it’s all really cute. Her fans go wild whenever she makes a small sly remark about her exes, they’re never overtly mean but it’s very “bless your heart” tongue in cheek energies but she is roasting the fuck out of them from time to time and all her comments are like “GET HIS FLANK!!! (They don’t say ass because this is a FAMILY FRIENDLY channel with no swearing) when it happens

Sol gets a lot of callouts but they never seem to slip, somehow both gay and still queerbaiting his audience, actively antagonistic relationship with his fanbase. Kinda guy to do that one post that’s like “if I was a YouTuber I would tweet out that it’s weird to be shipped with my costars when I’ve only slept with one of them and it’s against my boundaries to write me with the other ones. Then I would turn off my phone”

[thepersonperson]

I'm very much with you on the dudebros convincing me of the queerness in JJK. It's actually them who first directed me into Sukugo. It was a powerscaling POC (I think) youtuber who, during the height of the DE vs DE Sukugo Showdown, said on one of his vids that Sukuna LOVES Gojo. They even have a Sukugo manip as thumbnail for it.

I've never seen that before in an other shonen series ever. It was not treated as a joke. The usage of "love" in reference to a gay ship is unironic and serious. It's really weird not only how they just roll with it, they are very open about it too. There's not even any derision or hostility on female shippers about it like in MHA as far as I've seen at least.

Oh. I love your metas so much especially the one where you referred to Bloodborne. I never realized how through the "absence" or "belittling" of the women in JJK, the dark and horrific elements of womanhood is actually highlighted. I had wondered why there's this constant usage of the word "Womb" associated with curses. Your meta made everything click for me. Gege is probably doing a Bloodborne approach or just dark horror VNs/JRPGs elements in JJK.

(Prev Related Ask)

That video. Sukuna Loves Gojo is fascinating because it came out July 22, 2023 aka when only up to JJK 229 was out. The whole “the one who will teach you love is…” quote during the fight in JJK 230 appeared After that video was released.

This means, before Gege made it obvious, a powerscaling dudebro came to the same conclusion I did about Sukugo with less information and context. None of them can read the Japanese raws. The emotions they’re picking up on are just that overtly queer.

These are the types of comments that video. Note that JJK 230 was officially released on July 31, 2024 and leaked on July 25, 2023. (I used Hadzy and the video url to get the comment dates.)

And would you look at that. Other people have not only noticed Gojo’s weird attraction to Toji (aka Prior to JJK 231 that spells out Gojo sees Toji in Sukuna)...

Some of them are assuming Gojo is a bottom (again)...

And actively encouraging fujoshis to create content.

What I also really like is how they seem to be aware Sukuna’s idea of love is fundamentally different from theirs. They may not have the words grayscale, asexual, or aroace in their vocabulary, but they do understand Sukuna’s attraction to Gojo doesn’t fit the typical gay man bill.

I’ve decided to call these people fubroshis (not fudanshis because in any other context they are wildly homophobic). These fubroshis are correct in all their assumptions and I will continue to spread their agenda.

To your other point...

"I love your metas so much especially the one where you referred to Bloodborne. I never realized how through the "absence" or "belittling" of the women in JJK, the dark and horrific elements of womanhood is actually highlighted."

That is the power of Umineko's "Without love it cannot be seen." Since Gege has otherwise stayed away from gross Shonen tropes, I wanted to give the benefit of the doubt to certain story elements. It can be hard to tell when someone is exploring misogyny vs being misogynistic. Sometimes creators do both at the same time.

[cabeswaterdrowned]

I don’t want to go off in the tags of that no fandom post so much but your bisexual PowerPoint Gansey tags. The idea of Gansey not comprehending bisexuality during the road trip SO funny to me because it implies either A) post-Pynch, Gansey just thought Adam realized he was always gay, something that really assuages Gansey’s guilt about “stealing Blue” (he is So Insane) or B) Gansey fully thinks being bi is just an Adam Thing. Because he’s Adam Parrish! Of course he’d have a special sexuality just for him. If anyone would, it would be Adam!

for anyone wondering these were the tags: https://www.tumblr.com/lesbianbluesey/753538524458991616?source=shareI think both are Highly possible and hilarious, but I’m going to go with the former because I do enjoy leaning into the ‘Gansey’s repressed controlled republican parents reaaally messed up his worldview’ aspect of everything he has going on, and because your right this would totallly be something he takes as “I don’t have to feel guilty about stealing (‘stealing’ because like. there was a lot more going onto that but in his head) my best friends girlfriend anymore!” *head in the clouds from crazy ex girlfriend starts playing in the background*. Now I’m thinking about him potentially telling Blue about Adam and Ronan (since we never really see her learn about them so I think there are several ways that could have happened but one of them is through Gansey) and him framing it as Adam came out to me as gay and in love with Ronan, well first off I think Blue would be way more surprised about the latter part of that than the former, and she would also have a lot of different feelings about this revelation.

 First of all I think it would be the opposite of Gansey where she starts to feel More guilty re: their break up and wonders if saying he should kiss Gansey was homophobic of her (it wasn’t it was extremely funny and cool of her, imo), she also feels really bad that her first normal-ish relationship with a boy was with someone using her (which isn’t Not true for their relationship in a way, just not in the way she’s thinking of) and feels extra annoyed with Adam for the Ninos argument (which she should because he was out of line in that scene imo, even though I also love that scene because it’s hysterical to me for reasons I’ve previously addressed and I love when Bluedam are cunts especially to each other) now that she thinks he was never actually into her. But she doesn’t want to be homophobic, so I feel like Blue tries to be a bit Overly Nice to Adam after this for the rest of the school year and it really unnerves/scares him, and then Gansey on the other hand allows himself to be more overtly cunty with Adam than he ever has before during that time period which Also weirds Adam out but he puts it down to him going through a lot what with dying and all. This would actually explain some things about the dynamic shifts between trc and td3 if this happened… 

To be clear Blue is coming at this from the opposite end of background effecting world view from Gansey; unlike Gansey who doesn’t know he’s bi or that bisexuality exists Blue doesn’t know She is bi but does know bisexuality and polyamory exist because she grew up surrounded by it, in fact I’ve said it before but I think the reason Blue isn’t aware she’s bi is… well one reason is she hasn’t had many close relationships with girls her age who aren’t in her family due to not having had many friends growing up since she was largely othered/bullied and then grew an armor/self-isolated (I actually have a tentative headcanon that in addition to her being bullied for being generally different in her youth some of that bullying had a homophobic bent to it because of the way she dresses and what the psychics are associated with and it being Henrietta.. it just seems right, so I think that would be an influence also) but also more importantly, Orla would have been out as bisexual since she was in high school and Blue is a Contrarian tm and Can Not have the same sexuality as Orla. Just on principle. She did feel jealous sometimes watching Orla go on dates with boys and girls but put that down to just general she-can-kiss-people-without-fear-of-murder-lips-and-I-can’t jealousy. Also I feel like Gansey might be able to grasp bi women more than bi men because of a) unfortunate tropes around that time b) the 300 fox way women c) Possibly Helen who I think could be sapphic but whether or not she’s sapphic definitely thinks Gansey is gay, this is textually canon, and definitely wants Gansey to be covert about it won’t go into this more / putting a pin in that for now. But anyway I think both Blue and Gansey would be more likely to consider the other being bi than themselves, is the thing I was getting at there. 

Anyway! I definitely think that after being told of Adam’s gayness Blue immediately understands that Adam was in love with Gansey based on all of the first two books when thinking back, Gansey on the other hand does not even consider the possibility of Adam ever being into him (at least not consciously, possibly deep DEEP down there’s some wondering but repression + plausible deniability + not wanting to seem arrogant (because I do think there’s a gray area sometimes between Gansey being oblivious about certain social situations vs him just being very used to compartmentalizing and prioritizing the quest) keep this out of conscious thought). So I think both Blue and Gansey need an outlet to talk through some of their Adam feelings but know the other can’t do that for them, which leads to (not to self plug but! This might be a scene that comes up in my ‘Reading TRB’ fic at some point… since I am playing with some intentional parallels between Sarchengsey and Bluedansey there, or at least that’s the intention in the mess of everything I have going on there) them separately gabbing to Henry about their feelings re: their situationship break ups, the shifting group dynamics with Pynch etc. and I think their accounts of the whole mess are Very different so Henry keeps getting more confused the more he listens to them, he doesn’t even know if one of them dated Adam or neither of them or both and it’s very frustrating but also intriguing for him he just wants to know everything (and he has some additional context from his Gansey stalking which should be … an interesting comparison point). 

Also when Gansey learns what bisexuality he immediately goes ‘I realized something about Adam!’ Henry, simultaneously expecting this and also wary: what about him? Gansey: He only told me that he loved Ronan he didn’t tell me he never liked Blue, Adam must be bisexual that means he must have been in love with Blue because who wouldn’t be that means I’m a horrible awful person and don’t deserve to live 😭😭 Henry, under his breath: goddamnit I can’t believe I’ve been trying to fuck you Gansey: what?? Henry: __ 

this was a fun thank you!

tagging a couple other blogs who I hope will enjoy my insane spiral, at least a lil: @immaterial-pearl @crimeronan

[charmac]

curious - do you think rcg may have had any notion that they may seriously explore the possibility of mac being gay in s6 era? s5 functionally lays the majority of groundwork for the subtext that they evolved into canonical text and s6 opens with mac fights gay marriage and imo mac is pretty heavily gay coded throughout that season. however, s7 totally makes me believe they hadn’t really considered it, because mac’s gay subtext is almost completely nonexistent, bar the flashback from s6 in 7x10. he is overtly “straight” that season. clearly by s8 it’s fully canon and one of the most logical next steps they could’ve taken with his character in retrospect, but i have always wondered if many of the choices in s6 wrt mac’s sexuality becoming increasingly more ambiguous were deliberate and i’m curious about your perspective.

I do 100%! I've definitely spoken about this before... I'm not sure if it was here or a Discord or maybe even an in-person conversation, but I've always thought it was so insane how they tell you Mac and Dennis Break Up is romantic in some sense. They are realising that their codependency is more than some "bromance" and it spooks them (obviously, really more-so Dennis).

I think acknowledging it on TASP isn't a surprise, but the fact that it's stated in the DVD commentary, before they even filmed S6, makes it clear that this was intentional foundation they intended to work off of. When Dee shatters the glass closet by stating Dennis' codependency with Mac is viewed as an "old married couple" situation, it fucks Dennis up way more than Mac, because Mac is unable to recognise the queerness of their relationship while Dennis can.

Once they make up, they've established something in the writers room going forward for Mac & Dennis that they clearly want to keep a part of their dynamic (again, as reaffirmed on the MADBU TASP episode): they are gay for each other. But they're not going to (mutually) recognise or accept it, because that ruins the joke.

So, in my opinion, they go into Season 6 really digging into that dynamic and playing on the joke by pushing against it: Dennis recognises the issue of being into Mac internally so he needs a wife; Mac recognises the issue of being gay externally so he needs to fight the gays. No doubt in my mind that throughout S6 they were writing and acting with this idea - though probably with no firm idea of where they wanted it to end up.

So we get to Season 7, and your point is the reason why Season 7 is one of my least favourite Seasons as a coherent part of Sunny (keeping in mind the flashbacks in How Mac Got Fat are just a scrapped S6 episode, reworked) - it seems to ignore a lot of the build up in order to make funny stand-alone episodes of the show. Was it because of Fat Mac? (Only one identity at a time for Mac, pls!) Is it because they had a chunk of guest writers? Is it because they thought there was a large chance it was the final season of the show? (They've talked about how when they shot the final scene for S7 (HS Reunion) it was under the idea that they might not get renewed)

Probably only RCG truly know (and maybe they don't even remember). As for me, while I don't think it was necessarily deliberate, like they sat down and said "actually lets roll back the gay [Mac] stuff here..." my idea is that going into S7 they hadn't yet figured out (or couldn't agree) if/how they wanted to make Mac's homosexuality crystal clear.

Maybe they dropped it for a season before deciding... or maybe this downtime served a purpose, because the reveals on Sunny serve one main goal: Subvert expectations.

Going from S5/6 to 8 is very obvious. That is a closeted gay guy. BUT when you have S7 cut in there in the middle, this working-season where they kind of play hard into Mac's aggressive temper and his stupidity and the fact that he's a voyeur, it's a little less-so. You're hit with Season 8 and that attempted kiss kind of comes out of nowhere and then every episode following has some kind of Mac is GAY moment and it's just extremely funny... Like, oh holy shit he's gay and he can't even recognise it.

But that gap does kinda throw you off like, was this a decision once they got renewed going forward that they needed one of them to be obviously gay based on their history? I really don’t think so, the foundation seems too intentional and the evidence we have that RCG acknowledged the character’s queerness (of all them) back then is enough to have me firmly believe the S6 stuff was just further groundwork for Mac’s character and his and Dennis’ opposing relationship

[deviouswhiz]

Skip to Loafer Relationships (and my perspective)

The confirmed, implied, or hinted

Mitsumi and Shima: Obviously

Mika and Mukai: I actually find this ship kinda intriguing simply because they aren't the stereotypical personality types that get paired together. The deprecative, insecure girl x the guy who isn't afraid to speak his mind.

Yamada and Tomoe: Tomoe is so freaking cute. Although I find Yamada a bit annoying, I really hope that his relationship with her develops him into a better person (not that he's a bad person per-se, but I feel like he needs to really learn what it means to be in a relationship and to genuinely LOVE someone instead of pursuing them for their looks.

Nao and her boyfriend: I don't remember the BF's name but I think they have a very wholesome relationship. And I think Takamatsu does a great job writing a down-to-earth, not overtly dramatized relationship for a trans character. I may have said this before in a previous post, but I have found it incredibly rare to find a respectful portrayal of a trans character in Japanese media, so StL is a treat.

Makoto and Senpai: who is this "Senpai" you ask? *Shrugs* I don't know either! Could it be the senpai from her first date with that dude back in Chapter 26? Possibly? Or is there someone new? That's also a chance. Honestly, either way, I hope it's a good person!

Characters I'm interested in:

Yuzuki: Obviously, she's the odd one out of the group. Out of the main cast, she's the only one who is strictly and overtly single. She seems to reject every guy who proposes to her, but I'm not sure if this is out of distrust built in her middle school years, or simply she just isn't interested. I honestly can't tell if she likes boys and just doesn't trust them, if she likes girls, or if she's asexual/aromatic.

Kanechika: I like this guy. He really reminds me of a lot of theater type people I met during my university days. I'll say this upfront. The first impression I got from him is he's gay. His flamboyant personality and colorful dressage does little to persuade me otherwise, LOL.

I'm sure there's more examples, but I'm just going over the few that I explicitly remember. I love reading the manga, and I wish it updated more than once a month 😭 but sometimes the wait is worth it.