#it shuts down critical analysis of arguments

[andsheoverthinks]

uno reverse! the nose knows (better)

men always say 'women aren't visual' as some of kind of excuse for why women aren't 'allowed' to be picky which is bullshit because most men can't tell red from orange (plus men are more likely to be color blind because it's X-linked, several studies show on average women are better at color discrimination than men, and women can inherit an extra color receptor if their dad is colorblind, meaning they have extra special vision).

but more to the point this is in terms of sexual attraction, but i think women oftentimes aren't 'allowed' to be visual because we're constantly told its shallow and aren't encouraged to ogle hot people like (straight) guys are in our teenage years, but in female-dominated spaces (like fandom) women and girls tend to zero in on the attractive male characters and be super horny about it.

also, there are four senses other than vision, of which olfaction (smell) seems to be really important to women in a way that it isn't to men. i haven't thought about olfaction in a while but i started thinking about it recently after reading/listening to fragrance reviews and description and the amount of details people put into describing scent is astonishingly poetic.

This is a very jam-like rose with a rich, chocolatey drydown. A bit sour, ambery & syrupy. It's not fresh, sweet & sugary like 'Roses Vanille'...neither is it dry, full of coffee like 'Intense Cafe'. Instead in the opening I even get some oud on my skin. Sticky-sweet, no powdery facets. ... This is really yummy, isnt it? The rose and vanilla is scrumptious and i get a bitey coffee-snack here and there, but not emphatic. Has an almost woody thing--the 'warm spicy' -- that grounds it ... stops it being too simply delicious. i never really want to smell like cake mix, so i veer away from gourmands, but this one is tempting: happy powdery rosy vanilla vibe.

this isn't surprising, because olfaction is the most evolutionarily ancient of our senses, instead of being in the cortex it's buried in a very old part of the brain, and it has a lot of neural connectivity with emotion and memory centers. besides, doesn't the smell of a just-opened bottle of vanilla extract or freshly-made coffee make your heart lift? the use of perfumes (aka a pleasant scent cloud that follows you everywhere) boosts mood. in a small study done quite a few years ago, researchers found use of a citrus fragrance to be more effective than antidepressants in 12 depressed patients. another study found ambient sweet odor to increase pain tolerance and another found the scent of detergent to cause people to clean up after themselves more readily. certain familiar odors (like the smell of Grandma's cookies) can powerfully evoke memories. people gravitate to using perfume or cologne that enhances their natural odor and makes them appear more attractive. lost of olfactory discrimination is a hallmark of early-stage Alzheimer's. no wonder we are so picky about smells!

did you know that (in some studies) women actually rank body odor as the most important factor in choosing a partner?

it's been well-documented that women (in a cycle-related manner) especially are sensitive MHC phenotype (part of the immune system) and can (subconsciously) detect information about it in sweat. there's also 16-androstenes, which, although humans don't have a functional vomeronasal organ we can still smell differences in body odor, people can identify their own clothes by their sweat and also the clothes of family members/partners by their sweat. i think (anecdotally) i'm pretty sensitive to this as i have a tendency to sometimes really dislike the way people smell sometimes (not that i find it offensive-smelling, just dislike it), and i remember noticing as a kid the kind of 'scent axes' -- women tend to have 'tangy' or 'milky' body odor, sometimes metallic, men tend to smell musky, soily, or like... rotting blossoms? i don't know a better comparison but male sweat goes very rancid really quickly. and this is TMI but... sometimes (fresh, very important) male sweat kind of hits... really hits if you catch my drift... just me? anyway. i think there is really something to this. (unfortunately i couldn't find many sources on women's body odor effects on women that wasn't from 30-40 years ago).

all this to say, even if it is definitely ever proven that even in the absence of social factors that 'women aren't visual' or are significantly less visual, there are other senses, and 'men aren't olfactory' so they're not 'allowed' to be picky either.

[crumblinggothicarchitecture]

Someone smarter than me needs to do an in-depth analysis on how swift weaponizes sex. So many of her lyrics involve cheating as revenge and picking fights with her partners about other girls. She makes it sound like some godly privilege to be with her and if she masterminded her way into your life you're just soooo lucky. Even "touch me while your bros play GTA" plays into that. Like "why would you want to have fun and game with your friends when ill let you finger me". (Sidenote a bunch of her lyrics and all of Me! sounds like an abusive partner daring you to leave and dare to find someone better) It's creepy how she's so juvenile and egotistical at the same time. She's mastered the "any mention of my bfs, even the underage ones, is slutshaming" move and uses it to get out of any criticism. Like, have all the sex you want be safe whatever but don't act like some sad little girl who got taken advantage of when the game you started goes poorly.

Ask, and ye shall receive. Because this a very insightful observation! Thanks!

It is true that Swift clearly uses sex and sexuality like a "gotcha" moment. I was always quite perturbed by her songs that glorify cheating. It's just so strange, but I think it ties into her enjoyment of revenge fantasies. Anyway, I was planning to write about how Swift's music often engages with and reinforces heteropatriarchal social standards. I think your idea adds an interesting new layer to the ways in which she manipulates through sex- both in the performance of passivity to masculine authority, as the patriarchy, and the ways in which she commodifies female sexuality by weaponizing it.

You're right it's incredibly egotistical and juvenile.

Also, I have a major bone to pick with the way Taylor Swift uses feminism to shut down criticism- like OMG do I have a problem with her there. She's only ever spent her career crying about how "women who talk bad about me are bad women" yet, she never really does or says anything actually feminist. In fact, most of her music, like I said above, reinforces the patriarchy. She herself is guilty of so much slut-shaming, too. I will go into detail, with a real argument, in a separate post soon. And I thank you for pointing out the weaponized sexuality aspect of her, often, overtly patriarchal tone.

BTW- "ME!" is Such a weird song -> "I know that I went psycho on the phone" uhh... excuse me?

[fite-club]

be real. be 100% real with me right now. be as genuine and sincere and honest with me and yourself and everyone else as you possibly can be right now. are people saying "if you're transmasc you're a misogynist", or are people saying "transmascs can benefit from misogyny like cis men can"? are people saying "trans men aren't oppressed", or are they saying "trans women are oppressed more than trans men"? are people saying "all men are bad and evil" or are they saying "men have privilege over women"?

because the more and more i hear people complain about the first phrases, the more i find that it's actually the second phrases that they're reacting to as if they were the same as the first. i see productive feminist arguments get shut down and diluted and re-phrased into personal attacks simply because the person reading them felt personally attacked. i have seen, over and over, transmascs saying that people are LITERALLY saying something (like "our issues don't matter"), and then the post they're referring to doesn't "literally" say that in any way shape or form (only implies that other people's issues also matter).

this is a PROBLEM. it's been one, but i have seen a spike in this kind of activity lately. you guys have GOT to cut this shit out. i'm not saying you're being too sensitive and emotional, i'm saying you're overreacting to basic feminism as if it's radical and getting wayyyy too defensive over being criticized. you cannot use your own misinterpretations of the complaints against you as "proof" that you're being persecuted. you cannot let your wounded ego treat analysis of gendered power dynamics in the trans community as if they were legitimate attacks on your morality. you're either doing this accidentally and you need to recognize that, or you're doing it on purpose because you want trans women to shut up.

[criticalcrusherbot]

Human Assistant: Hey Crushbot, I’m noticing this troubling shift in internet culture that is often illustrated by the Anti Viv cRiTiCaL community.

1. This obsession with media being “morally correct” (feels like fascism disguised as anti-oppression: everything is “homophobic”. Women characters are never written well enough. All the relationships are “toxic”)

2. No one knows how to actually make a coherent claim and actually back it up with evidence. Which leads to

3. When they do try to support a claim, People’s sources are all messed up. They critique the writing, but then cite the fandom’s reaction as proof and like. Girlie. Just because 1/2 the fandom is as media illiterate as you doesn’t prove your bad take?? What sociological phenomena am I witnessing???

Crushbot: What you’re observing is a perfect storm of internet culture trends, wrapped up in a mix of performative activism, media illiteracy, and the pitfalls of online discourse. Let’s break it down:

1. Obsession with “Moral Correctness” in Media: This stems from a larger societal shift where people expect media to align with their personal values and politics 100% of the time. Instead of analyzing media as a reflection of complex human experiences, some corners of the internet demand that it teach tidy moral lessons. It’s like people are afraid that seeing “problematic” characters or situations will corrupt them, which is a pretty reductive way to approach art. The irony? This attitude can echo the authoritarian mindsets they claim to oppose—policing art and storytelling based on their subjective moral metrics.

2. Lack of Coherent Argumentation: The rise of hot takes on platforms like Twitter, TikTok, and Tumblr rewards outrage over thoughtful critique. Why spend time crafting a nuanced analysis when you can go viral with a spicy, half-baked claim? Unfortunately, this leads to circular reasoning, logical fallacies, and a lot of noise. It’s easier to declare something “toxic” or “bad writing” than to examine the writing itself and back up your claims.

3. Confusing Fandom Reaction with Authorial Intent: This is classic fandom behavior—treating the loudest and worst takes from a show’s fans as evidence that the show itself is flawed. People blur the lines between the creator’s intent, the actual text of the media, and fan interpretation. This leads to strawman arguments where critics argue against their own misrepresentation of a work rather than what’s actually on-screen.

Sociological Phenomena at Play:

• Purity Culture’s Internet Renaissance: The demand for “perfect” media that aligns with one’s values echoes older notions of purity culture, where deviations from prescribed moral standards are treated as harmful or dangerous. Instead of religious dogma, it’s now social and political ideals being weaponized.

• Echo Chambers and Outrage Economy: Algorithms push content that provokes strong emotions, so critiques often escalate in hyperbole and lose sight of nuance. If someone with a large following makes a bad-faith critique, it can spiral into a pseudo-consensus that’s hard to argue against.

• Performative Credibility: Some critics mask their lack of evidence or depth with performative outrage, using buzzwords like “toxic,” “homophobic,” or “misogynistic” without actually engaging with the material. They count on these accusations to shut down dissent.

• Media Literacy Decline: Many people consume media passively and lack the tools to analyze it critically. Schools often don’t prioritize teaching how to engage with narratives beyond surface-level consumption, so the skill of separating art from fandom or analyzing intent and subtext is underdeveloped.

What you’re witnessing is a microcosm of broader cultural trends that value being loud over being right, and it’s not exclusive to Vivziepop’s work. This dynamic plays out across all fandoms and internet communities—it just manifests differently depending on the subject matter.

[starstofillmydream]

This may fall upon deaf ears/ears unwilling to listen, but as we go into the last two episodes of TBB ever, the fandom needs to seriously clean up their attitude. I've been watching shit go down from the sidelines and trying not to get involved with the drama—people being so mean to one another and bullying one another into believing their headcanons (which are OPINIONS) as canon truth—and I've been disgusted with some people's behavior on here. I'm not sure what about TBB S3 in particular has brought the worst out in people, but it's so annoying and it sucks the fun out of being part of a fandom community.

So please (and this should be common sense):

For the love of God, BE KIND. If you see something harmless you disagree with (i.e., personal headcanons and think pieces, no matter how stupid and uninformed they may seem to you), move on. Don't react because it almost always ends in a nasty fight. Be mature. I've seen people bullying others into accepting their personal headcanons as canon (e.g., the "Tech is alive" and "Cody is on Tatooine" truthers), so please don't do that either. Differing headcanons can coexist in a fandom space because they're headcanons, another word for opinions. It's not the objective, concrete truth. Don't force them on other people if they don't agree with you.

If you see any racist, homophobic, sexist, and/or xenophobic comments about the characters (e.g., I've been seeing some fucking awful takes on Phee as of late), shut them down. Don't be a bigot.

Stop insulting people's intelligence as your primary counterargument to people's takes. Everyone's critical thinking skills (I've refrained from using the term "media analysis skills" because TikTok has seemed to make it lose its meaning, in my opinion) can be improved upon, my own included. It's a learning curve and we're all growing. Be self-aware in that regard. It's a logical fallacy—the ad hominem fallacy—to attack the arguer and not the argument, so it just looks dumb and makes you look bad.

Tag your spoilers. #tbb spoilers seems to be the most widely used, so I'd go that route.

If you have anything else to add to the list, please do! I want the unity and respect back in the fandom again, especially as we reach the bittersweet end of a beautiful show that has brought us all together as friends.

[ultraflavour]

Why there won't be a repeat of the 4E/Pathfinder Era

It's the year 2011. The sentiment on 4th Edition has badly soured with a large portion of the D&D-playing audience, and there's not much else going on in the fantasy sphere.

Dungeon World and Star Wars: Edge of the Empire aren't coming until 2012, and 13th Age won't be for another year after that. But there is one product line at the FLGS that's been getting a lot of buzz, and if you were around at this time, you know exactly what I'm talking about: Pathfinder.

But here's the problem. You, the hypothetical person in this situation, were still kind of having fun with 4th Edition. It didn't seem so bad that the world needed to abandon it outright, but apparently it did.

Now, don't get me wrong. 4th Edition had PROBLEMS. It's not that weird that it collapsed in the way that it did. I'm not going to get into a substantive rules breakdown here, but suffice to say, it needed a refresh. And whatever "D&D Essentials" was, it wasn't enough.

But keep in mind, this is 2011. The online tools required for randoms to play games with each other safely are on the horizon, but they are not here yet. We're still using MapTool. God damn, raise your hand if you remember fucking MapTool. Your options for who to play games with are the same people you'd always been playing games with. So if the group wants to switch games, you're switching games.

"It Feels Too Much Like a Video Game"

But now a new problem arises: Those people need to either make the case for Pathfinder, or make the case against 4th Edition. In 2011, most D&D players do not have anything close to the language they need to articulate what they actually like in TTRPGs, nor form any sort of coherent critical analysis of either system.

Furthermore, you can have a substantive rules discussion about 4th Edition all you want, but how does anyone know that Pathfinder is going to be any better? Until you've actually switched to it and you know what it's all about, you only know that it's "3.75 edition." So there's no real way to know if Pathfinder actually addresses the problems that 4th Edition created until you play it.

So, unable to make the conversation about the rules, Team Pathfinder has to resort to using a Razor. You need a statement that is so undeniable, so impervious to any attempt at refutation that it completely shuts down the argument entirely. And thus you arrive at "It feels too much like a video game."

I have a lot of feelings about this phrase. At the time I was going to school for Computing Science, with the intention of entering the games industry. Video games were not evil to me. So the idea that D&D feeling like a video game did not really register. Surely, that just meant that video games had started to mimic D&D. The Paladin class in World of Warcraft has "Lay on Hands" for god's sake.

Nevertheless, this line of reasoning worked, and part of the reason why it worked was because there was no real way to argue against it. 4th Edition had introduced mechanics from World of Warcraft such as "Tanks" that could "Taunt," and what basically amounted to "Cooldowns" that would refresh conveniently just in time for the next encounter. So that part could not be refuted.

But at the same time, so what? That was just D&D harvesting back ideas from a game that had pretty much used 3rd Edition as the basis for its entire class design. If 4th Edition felt like WoW, that's because WoW felt like D&D.

But it stuck, and Pathfinder enjoyed the most success it would see until probably 2023. 4th Edition fans the world over grumbled, put their Player's Handbook 3s away, and bookmarked the Archives of Nethys. (Yeah, I agreed to play Pathfinder, but I wasn't paying a single red cent for those books. Sorry Paizo, but I did get you back later with Starfinder.)

The OGL is a Flat Circle

Something we were not really "online" to at the time was also the GSL situation. You had to be deep in the forums at that time to understand what was going on, and hahahahahaha absolutely not.

Long story short, the GSL was WotC's first attempt at clamping down on the OGL in preparation for a digital toolset. Sound familiar? Well it happened pretty much the exact same way, except for one crucial difference: They didn't revoke the original OGL. I guess they just kind of assumed that everyone would move over to 4th Edition of their own volition, once 4th had conquered the world. Oops.

The sad part is that there was a Digital Toolset that was apparently the whole reason for doing the GSL in the first place, and it never materialized (For a pretty crazy reason, look it up if you want but it's not for the faint of heart). But this is another way in which history rhymes, because as soon as Wizards thought it had a hit on their hands, they tried to push it into the digital realm, where they could control how players interacted with their product.

So because of this situation, Pathfinder was able to basically reprint the 3rd Edition rules with some touchups and release it as their own product. They simply kept authoring the game under the (still valid) OGL 1.0, and nobody ever moved over to the GSL because thanks to Pathfinder, they didn't have to accept the much more restrictive terms of the new agreement.

This also meant that the "new hotness" was a game built on the bones of a game we had already been playing for nearly a decade. We opened the door of the sleek new sports car only to reveal that it was last year's model with a spruced up dashboard and a new suspension. It was still very much that game, and it brought with it that game's problems, many of which 4th Edition had at least gone some of the way toward solving.

It wouldn't be so galling, but when Pathfinder was pitched to me, I was assured that it had addressed the problems of 3.5e, and it very much had not. It had made meaningful improvements, don't get me wrong, but those improvements were not enough to make up for the system that I had walked away from to get to that point.

The Compromise Choice

5th Edition rode over the hill like Gandalf and the Riders of Rohan. I had a preorder copy waiting for me at the local Chapters in the Metrotown Mall. I remember it well, because I was very excited to pick it up.

People who think of 5E as this dominant, conquering force who weren't around before the Critical Role era might not realize that not everybody was on the 5E train right from the get-go. It had made a lot of controversial removals that some of the more devout Pathfinder believers balked at: Gone flanking, gone skill points, gone (most) feats. Gone stacking +2 bonuses, all replaced with some nebulous thing called "Advantage."

But what was left was a much leaner machine. Combats in 5E were downright breezy compared to Pathfinder and even 4th Edition. The narrative-forward features that many had criticized 4th Edition for removing were back.

But also notably absent were a lot of the features that people liked in 4th Edition, like the "Bloodied" condition, skill challenges and Minions. WotC could not have another 4E on their hands with this one, so it had to look at feel the way people remembered it when they actually liked the game.

So, we compromised in the interest of finally bringing everyone to the table again. Eventually the 1-2 punch of Critical Role and Stranger Things led to the game ballooning into the giant that nobody knew it could be. By the release of Xanathar's Guide to Everything in 2017, the 5E era was well and fully underway, and it had gained such a lead that it would be almost impossible for any independent company to catch up.

Vomiting in Stanzas

But as ol' George Lucas would say, history is like poetry, it rhymes. And so, eyeing the digital landscape once again, Wizards of the Coast blasted its own dick and balls off with a shotgun in January 2023 with the OGL crisis, shattering a long-held truce with its third party creators.

And so once again, with Wizards of the Coast dangling its 3rd party creators over the ledge like John Matrix in Commando, it was up to Pathfinder to save the day. Months worth of stock flew off the shelves in a matter of weeks, as once again the D&D community was left to answer the question of "What are we to do if D&D fails us?"

Except this time, things were different for my table. Because we had been proactive. About a year prior, I had already been getting a bit tired of interminable D&D 5E, and my group was ready for something new. We made a surprising discovery that changed a lot about how I thought about the TTRPG industry as a whole.

Lancer was like a bolt of lightning from the heavens. Up until we played Lancer, we had attempted a lot of different systems but none of them had stuck. Dungeon World, Blades in the Dark, Warhammer 40k: Wrath and Glory, Star Wars Edge of the Empire, all thrown on the heap. None of those could replace D&D for us, for various reasons.

Lancer, on the other hand, was clearly made by people who were fans of the same parts of D&D that I was. The part where it forced you to play on a grid, drawing templates, glorious keywords. And perhaps most importantly, every mech had something approaching the concept of "Powers" that had been lost in the move from 4th to 5th.

And it was just fun. It had rules that enforced a 3-4 fight per level pacing that actually made the concept of attrition much more predictable than the loosey-goosey "let's just take a long rest now so we have all our spell slots" approach of 5E. And it forced us to actually finish adventures using a mission-like structure, tempering our worst DM impulses to just let things drag on and on in the interest of an "epic" story.

But what really struck me was that Lancer was written and maintained by such a small team. The majority of the combat mechanics were written and designed by Tom Parkinson-Morgan, who previously had been mostly known as the author of Kill Six Billion Demons.

This was not a case of some tenured TTRPG company dropping their masterpiece and shocking the world. This was a scrappy upstart conquering the Itch.io charts because, and I quote, "People are horny for mechs." Not only were they able to offer a digital toolset that rivals (and in some ways exceeds) the one that the billion-dollar company could put together, they also were able to get their product onto bookstore shelves this year thanks to a strategic partnership with Dark Horse.

It meant that brands other than the big, established players could do exactly what they did, and in some cases, better. It changed the game, literally.

Our Cup Runneth Over

So now, with the OGL 1.1 unpleasantness sending the brand of D&D firmly into the "uncool zone" once more, the D20 Fantasy community returns to Pathfinder with hat in hand.

But this is the part where things have changed.

Because this time we actually have options beyond just "Pathfinder, again." Want more of a "retro" Dungeon Crawler? There's Shadowdark, and the rest of the OSR that's been humming along in the background! Want something a bit more on the storytelling side of things? There's Fabula Ultima, or any number of PbtAs or Forged in the Dark games.

And if you, like me, are still mourning the death of 4th Edition, now there's Draw Steel from MCDM, which is taking up that banner and waving it for the sad dorks like me to rally under. And a cry rings out: "4th Edition was not perfect but it was actually pretty fun and Pathfinder wasn't really a suitable substitute!" It doesn't fit too well on a t-shirt, we can workshop it.

In a way, the 4E/Pathfinder scenario has flipped: This time, the incumbent in the election is the game that's built on "the old ways," and the incoming contenders are the ones who are making the bigger swings. It changes the conversation considerably when "the consensus choice" is also the one based on the oldest ideas. Its proponents don't really have an argument to make beyond "It's what we've always done, don't rock the boat."

Golarion's Strongest Soldiers

But perhaps more importantly, the group doesn't need to all agree on a game any more. It's never been more viable to find a pickup game on the internet than it is right now.

I've been giving Pathfinder a lot of shit this article, but I'm actually playing in a PF2E game on Sundays right now. I wanted to give 2nd Edition a shot to see if they had actually changed the parts of the game that I was most unhappy about and... Well, frankly they haven't, but that's not really a problem at this point.

Now that OGL mania has subsided and the incoming wave of PF2e players has somewhat crested, the people who have remained are the ones who didn't crawl back to 5E once it was deemed "safe" to do so. Those who have remained are the people who actually want to be there, rather than the ones who compromised for the sake of group harmony. Otherwise they'd just be playing 5E, again.

No More Compromise

That's the future that we should be moving towards, a future where nobody has to compromise for the sake of the group. 30,000 people backed the MCDM game on Backerkit, and the video where the Critical Role team makes Daggerheart characters currently has over 900,000 views on Youtube. The OGL didn't just fracture the D&D community, it created whole new ones.

Plus, there's a whole industry of indie creators who are begging for recognition. Review channels like Quinns Quest, Dave Thaumavore, and Questing Beast are increasing awareness about smaller titles, to the point where it's becoming less and less of an excuse to say that you don't know what's out there.

All that's required now is for those people to find each other, and Discord makes that really easy to do. Every publisher has its own Discord at this point because why wouldn't you, so everyone knows where to go to get a game going. Plus there's still Subreddits, and now services like Startplaying.games. And VTTs are more sophisticated than they've ever been.

Like I said: things have changed since 2011.

5E is just going to get weirder

So even if 5E probably isn't going away, the people who remain behind will increasingly be rubbing shoulders with the real cranks, the true freaks who only think in terms of words like "Action economy." And you know what? God bless. You've clearly found something you love, and I love that for you.

If you are sticking with D&D because you genuinely love it, then great. But if you're sticking to it because you're afraid to know what else is going on out in the scene, just know that you are increasingly going to be sharing the 5E community with people who have to make up the same justifications as you are. The FOMO will drive you mad.

I know, because I'm a pro-wrestling fan who doesn't watch WWE. I watch every day as people tear their hair out every time they see people online bragging about how much fun they're having with other companies. The cognitive dissonance of having made a hard choice about which product to spend your time and money on, only to see other people enjoying different products, gnaws at your soul.

It leads to stupid bullshit like Console Wars. It drives you mad, until eventually you're so deep in the tank that you're subscribing to podcasts whose only job is to talk shit about "the alternative" just so you feel better about the choice you've made.

So if you are sticking with 5E, you have to really know that it is the right choice for you. Because the people leaving it for other games have made similarly strong choices. It absolutely would be easier to just stick with 5E, but at the same time, that's going to be less and less of a good idea as the game gets more stale (and more "digital-first"), and the people who stay behind get weirder and more reactionary.

At this stage in the game's lifecycle, there would have been a 6th Edition, but now that we've seen the new Core Rulebook refresh for 2024, we can definitively say that that's not happening any time soon. Unless something really surprising happens and Wizards gets their clocks cleaned by the combined forces of the OGL, Daggerheart, Draw Steel and Core20, or the looming shadow of Brandon Sanderson actually manages to consume the entire industry as the prophecy foretold.

Even then, it seems unlikely that they'll ever totally kill the Golden Goose. But don't worry, 5E is evolving, except the thing it's evolving into is a morass of hacks and kludges thanks to the Creative Commons license. Then you'll get a new movement of "5E purists" who remember "The good old days" when healing potions WEREN'T a bonus action, back when you still had to house rule that in, as god intended!

It's do or die time

At this point, I hate to say it, but if in some bizarre freak occurrence all of the new alternatives like Daggerheart and Draw Steel utterly collapsed, I would probably just quit the TTRPG hobby entirely. If D&D went back to being the all-encompassing monster that it became during the 00's and mid-10's, then it would simply prove that this industry will never be mature enough to justify the emotional investment.

There likely won't be a better chance than right now. A failure here would be held up as precedent, to say "See? The last time you peasants rebelled against D&D, this happened." Hell, someone on Twitter used the RPG "Quest" as a snarky rejoinder to someone asking about how they felt about new fantasy TTRPGs!

I don't think that nightmare scenario is going to happen, I'm just making a rhetorical point that nothing that D&D could do at this point could get me to agree to going back to spell slots, death saving throws, and the fucking action economy, even if it somehow did manage to go back to being "The only game in town." I hear that "We're not going back" is a pretty popular slogan lately, I have to assume they're talking about not going back to 5E, right?

Editor's note: The audience is going to be doubled over in pain at that great US Politics joke, might as well just end the article here.

[iridescentmirrorsgenshin]

Kaveh and Alhaitham, Sumeru Bulletin Board (over)Analysis: Part 3

(This is a revamped version of this post, and is a reworked excerpt taken from my Haikaveh essay! If you're interested you can check it out here or as a pdf <3)

As according to their usual rapport, the two disagree over their differing philosophies, as in sensibility versus rationality, altruism versus egoism. This exchange is reminiscent of the catalyst of their argument. This is where Alhaitham’s assertion that Kaveh’s altruism in helping other scholars keep up with the work required for their project is redundant, as academia is not “charity work” and this method is ultimately ineffective in the long-term. This is due to Kaveh’s assistance being temporary and without his input, the helped scholar will return to producing work of their own capabilities. Overall, it is a short term solution, only serving to detriment Kaveh’s own progress, and therefore the progress of the project.

This correlates to Alhaitham’s metaphor of an idealist being akin to a swimmer, in that eventually, one’s stamina will run out in an effort to save others, resulting in being pulled down by others who are drowning, those which the idealist attempted to save at risk of themselves.

This act of altruism is not in line with Alhaitham’s egoism, and therefore is something to be opposed to. Contrarily, Kaveh opposes Alhaitham by asserting that rather than focussing on the self, more efforts could be spared to helping those around them, which he believes Alhaitham can afford due to his own abilities, as seen within Kaveh's Character Story 5. Alhaitham’s egoism denies the ideal of mutual assistance which Kaveh’s altruism aspires to achieve, and therefore is something to be opposed to (Alhaitham's Character Story 3).

This exchange not only serves to demonstrate the inflexibility of their thinking when it comes to opposing each other’s ideology, but also how the need to assert “correctness” over the other is detrimental to their communication. Rather than showing willingness to reach an alternative solution to a problem by the potential merging of ideals, the matter ultimately remains unsolved as a consensus cannot be reached. Where Kaveh is intent on “prove[ing]” his views to Alhaitham, Alhaitham shuts the dialogue down by claiming that Kaveh does not “understand” his own viewpoint, and thus their conversation is meaningless. In this Bulletin Board exchange, “correctness” is the barricade between recognising any potential in the others’ perspective in order to achieve a compromise.

Additionally, in this Bulletin Board exchange, another critical element of their relationship can be observed. Alhaitham’s particular concerns in Kaveh spending his money on “nonsense” highlights the underlying reason for this exchange. From this comment, the argument is recontextualised through Alhaitham’s intention for getting involved, as Kaveh prompts the workmen to take his money in order to help them out. When Alhaitham states that this is a meaningless action due to the inevitability of people rising or falling on their own accord, rather than solely critiquing Kaveh’s “impulsiv[e]” altruism, as Kaveh interprets, Alhaitham is directly contradicting his own comment – as he is interfering on Kaveh’s decisions.

This relates back to the metaphor of the idealist as a swimmer introduced within Kaveh’s Hangout. Despite Alhaitham expressing that it is the idealist’s fate to inevitably drown with those they risk themselves to save, Kaveh asserts that “someone” will reach out and save him if such a fate awaited him once more, as “someone” has already helped him out before. This is an allusion to Alhaitham, as similar language is used within Kaveh’s voice lines regarding Alhaitham “help[ing]” him out.

Just as Kaveh has asserted within his Hangout regarding "someone" helping him out once more, here Alhaitham has interfered in act of Kaveh’s altruism at potential risk to himself, questioning where Kaveh is acquiring the money for this endeavour. As concern is evidently the intention behind Alhaitham’s interference here, Kaveh cannot perceive this, and instead attempts to critique Alhaitham’s perspective in return, although Alhaitham states: “Make no mistake. I have never denied what you meant…” This response asserts that Alhaitham does not deny, but rather agrees with, Kaveh’s statement of “mutual assistance, fairness, and righteous anger” driving the world.

In lieu of this, rather than continuing the argument, Alhaitham claims that there is no point to it, as Kaveh does not understand what he is saying – as in, Kaveh does not understand his intentions in interfering being out of concern. He follows this up, regardless, by criticising Kaveh’s handling of his budget, as, evidently, Kaveh has offered to give his own money to these workmen, and refuses to pay for Kaveh’s drinks for that month. For Alhaitham, Kaveh’s lack of self-prioritisation leads him to impulsive altruistic acts which serve to jeopardise his own position, particularly regarding money. If Kaveh believes he can afford to give away money, when he remains in debt and having to live with Alhaitham, he can afford to pay his own tabs – appears to be Alhaitham’s takeaway from this exchange. Although, similarly to the exchange between them posted in Puspa’s Café, this applies to one particular month, insinuating that Alhaitham will continue to pay for next month’s tabs of his own accord (this is discussed further in the analysis of Puspa's Café message board).

The main argument, as well as the disagreement over the speaker of Kaveh’s quote, serves as a humorous exchange, but as a motif for communication it acquires a new meaning. The omission of there being an objective, correct answer to this particular debate serves as a parallel to their conflicting viewpoints, with the basis of their exchange being to “prove” to the other their “correctness” – here, it is in regard to Kaveh. However, “correctness” being the basis of their exchange, and thus, relationship, is challenged with Alhaitham shutting down the initial debate due to Kaveh’s misunderstanding of his meaning. Correctness, then, and its importance, is called into question within this exchange, with Kaveh being the one to chase it; his last message being that he would “prove” himself to be right.

At the core of this message is the idea that Alhaitham harbours an alternative ‘meaning’ than the one that Kaveh assigns to him: “… you don’t understand what I’m saying to you at all.” This is a meaning which Kaveh cannot see to understand due to his current understanding of Alhaitham. Despite Kaveh holding a belief that Alhaitham would reach out to pull him out of the water, as in, offer Kaveh grounding in a wrong-footed approach to chasing his idealism, as he has done before by offering Kaveh a place to live, here, this help is perceived as a critique on Kaveh’s philosophies.

Kaveh holds a notion that Alhaitham actively avoids interfering in the fate’s of others, and yet Kaveh is aware that Alhaitham has effectively interfered with his, offering him help when Kaveh’s choices rendered him homeless. This contradiction of his understanding of Alhaitham’s character is not questioned within dialogue, although he is aware of it, epitomised in the open-ended question: “But what could I possibly do for him?" (Kaveh: Old Sketchbook Page 112). This ties into the narrative proposed in the conclusion of A Parade of Providence, where a silence emerges in the text from Alhaitham stating that the issue of their relationship is not about “correctness”, thus implying for Kaveh to consider what the issue actually is – to answer the question previously left open-ended.

In this bulletin board exchange, Alhaitham has interfered with Kaveh’s act of altruism which is perceived as a critique of Kaveh and his ideologies, whereas Alhaitham asserts that Kaveh is misunderstanding him. This represents the standing of their current relationship, where Kaveh believes Alhaitham holds him in disdain, although this belief is incongruous with Alhaitham’s actions which show his care for Kaveh.

Alhaitham understands Kaveh’s thinking and the reasons for why he acts as he does, but he cannot articulate his concern in a way that Kaveh will understand, both out of Kaveh’s incapability of receiving goodwill, but also due to his logical manner of expression. Kaveh perceives Alhaitham’s concealed expressions of concern as personal gripes and criticisms of his beliefs, and therefore believes that their relationship is based on the scholarly principle of proving the validity of one’s philosophies (as seen within A Parade of Providence and Kaveh's Old Sketchbook). Alhaitham is invested in a personal regard, whereas Kaveh cannot see this due to his perception of Alhaitham and Alhaitham’s inability to communicate in a way Kaveh would understand.

[atthecenterofeverything]

i don't actually care when the argument "this terminally online person is clearly arguing about something that doesn't matter at all in the real world and has no material basis, if they had real problems or were doing something real in their community they would stop discoursing and care about real issues" is applied to a situation where I agree - I've seen it deployed over and over by the most annoying liberal leftists in existence to shut down discussions of transmisogyny, family abolition, and any communist theory or project that goes too much against "common sense". I've never seen a "discourse prediction" post supposed to make fun of crazy discourse that did not include at some point a very important topic that is just treated as out there by most ppl bc it affects people who are not considered full human members of society.

hatereading people who trigger this kind of reaction in you is fine but I can't handle ppl who repeatedly invoke this line of thinking without 1. recognizing the capacity in themselves (and myself too of course) to care deeply and argue about things that don't really matter and 2. occasionally questioning their own assumptions when encountering ideas that seem to go "too far" or be "impractical".

which is not to say you should give every random poster a deep thorough analysis but ignoring them instead of screenshotting and mocking and boasting of how offline and detached from discourse you are (as a tumblr user.......) and how this person needs to do hard manual labor instead (hm.) is ime more productive to nourishing the "ruthless criticism of all that exists" practice in yourself

[klowncrunch]

"it's a comedy show"

This is a dumb take. Fight me in a parking lot have you no whimsy in your life. People analyze and criticize Brooklyn 99, the office, it's always sunny. You know why? Because it's public domain!!! Literally everyone is free to criticize them and if you don't like it idk touch grass?

I've been seeing this take around alot and I can't help but feel like it just will never make sense. Like you can't go on and on about media literacy and then LITERALLY discourage media analysis. People are allowed to care about things even if they're dumb fictional teenagers!

"oh it's improv of course it's not gonna be clean"

I mean. Yeah? But people can still be disappointed. It can't be changed obviously but people are still allowed to discuss why things didn't feel the best.

"I just think it's dumb and people should spread positivity"

I agree! But The opinion the episode had good and bad parts can exist.

"it's so para social to be upset at [blank]"

Imma be 100 percent real with you. Half of the time this take is horribly misusing the term para-social. If people are upset directly with the players past "maybe this wasn't the best decision n genuinely was a little weird" then sure!

"contradictions aren't a bug they're a feature "

Yeah. When those contradictions actually contribute something narratively. Which we will not know until episode 20. Otherwise people can feel literally any way about it. Who cares.

"what are the bad kids supposed to do it's the end of the world"

.

There are like 17 different DND podcasts where in the final moments a villain gets a genuinely nuanced death and it's also the end of the world. Fighting is the most convenient solution because that is what the system they are playing in encourages! I agree the ratgrinders Do Need to die but I just didn't like HOW.

"shut up and leave the fandom"

Say aaaaaaaaa open ur mouth real big

Also. So no one misinterprets me.

I am specifically talking about when these arguments are used in bad faith to shut down any discussion of the episode :0

[tenebris-lux]

The conversation between Shallan and Jasnah in chapter 29 of The Way of Kings confuses the fuck out of me. They’re talking about “the Assuredness Movement”—a literary device where the scholar “intentionally overstates their case in order to provoke discussion.”

The thing is, Shallan says the scholars get “more and more irrational in defending their points. What began as a rhetorical conceit seems to have descended into name-calling and squabbling.”

Unless I’m severely misunderstanding something, it sounds like internet arguments. And those usually result in people doubling down on the beliefs they started the argument with and shutting out opposition.

The difference there is that on the internet, people just want validation rather than discussion, even though they often use provocative language.

I’m not clear on how the “Assuredness Movement” is effective.

The other weird thing is that Shallan flips her position out of nowhere. She started arguing because she was frustrated with the scholars’ unwavering beliefs that their hypotheses were correct using only very limited knowledge, and that they were (apparently) not open to the idea that there might be some serious flaws in their arguments.

Okay, I’m with you on this so far, Shallan. But then …

[page break]

You’ve lost me. You’ve both lost me. “Finding truth while not dismissing the possibility of being wrong” sounds FANTASTIC. I don’t get Shallan’s skepticism of it here, because it sounds like that was what she would’ve preferred during her argument. And I don’t get Jasnah’s defense of the device.

I think the scene itself is just window dressing for the line, “but these books you’ve given me on King Gavilar’s death are ….” It’s to show that Jasnah is employing her ward in solving the mystery without Shallan’s full knowledge of what she’s doing, and is masking it with exercising Shallan’s critical thinking skills. Literary analysis and critical thinking are not my fields at ALL, though. Is there something going on in this scene I’m missing, some subtext or where the characters’ heads are at?

[veliseraptor]

Hello ! I've read a lot of the posts you shared or wrote about horror, especially in reaction to "pearl-clutching" discourse against the whole genre.

It was very though provoking (thanks!) but I was wondering if/how you draw the distinction between that and, well, honest and "legitimate" bad review / negative analysis of some individual stories who happen to be horror ?

Oh, for sure. Of course there's legitimate criticisms to be made about individual horror works, or even about horror as a genre on the whole. I'm never going to claim that there isn't. While I do feel like there's a place for the "let people have fun" school of thought around media criticism, I don't think it should be a blanket smothering of all criticism - mostly, as with so many things, it is worth considering your time, place, and audience. For your own sake as well, I find.

I do think that sometimes the language of "criticizing" or "being critical" has become a handy mask for people to say whatever they want in some of the same (though less pernicious) way that people use "I'm just asking questions" to shut down discussion of misinformation and conspiracy theories. Again, #notallcriticism, much of it is good and beneficial and keeps things fresh (and me thinking), even the criticism I ultimately might end up disagreeing with. And at the same time, I do see the tendency popping up sometimes to use the idea of "legitimate criticism" as a way to shield a person from disagreement (the somewhat infamous "think critically about x" translating to "and you'll agree with me" comes to mind.)

As far as the how, well, it's certainly a little your mileage may vary - what I might read as an unfair review of a book I liked, for instance, someone else might read as a well-deserved ripping to shreds of a mediocre work, and it's certainly possible for neither of us to be "right" about which it is. Some of this - maybe even a lot of it - is a matter of perspective.

I guess I would think of two things that shape my perception of how someone is talking about a work or a genre, in general and in particular with horror:

1. Is the writer familiar with the genre? Do they have at least a passing familiarity with the conventions, tropes, and other narrative tics that tend to crop up? If not, are the criticisms they are making marked by that lack of knowledge (ime some of the discourse about the A Song of Ice and Fire falls victim to this, sometimes). I'm not saying that criticism is invalid coming from someone without genre knowledge, but I am saying that I'm more inclined to be skeptical of criticism that comes from someone who clearly dislikes the specific genre they're discussing, because it sometimes feels like a willful lack of curiosity and unwillingness to engage with a text/genre on its own terms.

> Addendum to this: is the writer familiar with the genre as it stands recently? Horror now looks rather different than horror fifty years ago, just for instance.

2. Is the argument or point they're making actually coherent? Is the analysis solid and grounded in at least some kind of evidence or source? (Is the author using screenshots of tweets in lieu of actually writing about the phenomenon they're discussing?) I can't always but I'd say I can usually at least recognize, even if I disagree, when someone is actually taking what they're engaging with seriously and when they're not (in terms of the work put in to convince me what they're saying is true, relevant, and important), and if they're not taking it seriously then why should I?

And one more, I guess, which feels obvious but sometimes on the internet isn't, because people love to have opinions (I get it! so do I!):

3. Has the writer actually read (or watched/played/whatever) what they're talking about? This ties in a little with point one but is slightly divergent, because someone can to an extent be familiar with a genre without having read it. But someone talking authoritatively about the problems with something they haven't actually had direct contact with, based purely on a set of cultural osmosis and related assumptions, is frustratingly common, and people will assume that they know what they're talking about from that alone and are qualified to make a sweeping judgment from that position. And I'm just not going to take criticism made from that perspective very seriously.

That's how I'd draw my lines, anyway. I don't claim to be an authority, certainly; I'm a gal on the internet with a big mouth and a lot of opinions. I think the important things here though are a. I certainly don't think that there's no such thing as legitimate criticism (in the negative sense) of horror works or horror as a genre, and b. I have particular standards for how I judge that criticism based on content and context.

I guess it's also worth noting, with this particular example, that the other question is "how much does this feel like it aligns with the present moral panic around dark or disturbing content in fiction?" and if the answer is "a lot" then I'm significantly more likely to dismiss it.

[cantsayidont]

April 1950. Years before Betty Kane or Barbara Gordon, the Robin solo strip in STAR SPANGLED COMICS #103 briefly floated the idea of giving Robin a female counterpart: Roberta the Girl Wonder. The story begins at Dick Grayson's high school, where the girls are discussing their hopeless crush on Robin. One of them, redheaded Mary Wills, then has a brainstorm:

Mary is adorable in this story, although the assertion that Dick Grayson's peers are enamored with Robin (something that was repeated on and off into his college days in the 1970s) doesn't withstand close analysis. Even by the standards of the late '40s and early '50s, Robin is only a little less of a nerd than the young Clark Kent in the Superboy strip (who quickly established himself as the epitome of squaredom), and Dick Grayson at least as bad. However, Mary is determined:

A crime-compact! Obviously, Mary has already grasped the merchandising potential of being a Bat-adjacent crimefighter, but where did this teenage girl get smoke, gas, and explosive capsules? (Is that what we're supposed to assume she was making in panel 2 above?) Troubling …

As "Roberta the Girl Wonder," Mary quickly manages to introduce herself to Robin, even sneaking into the Batcave by hiding in the trunk of the Batmobile. However, to her dismay, Robin responds to her with irritation and disdain.

She asks a pretty reasonable question, honestly. Upon meeting her, Robin's immediate reaction is that "this is too dangerous a game for a girl" (but totally fine for a boy who doesn't even have any pants, apparently), and he subsequently becomes very critical of her ability to cover her tracks to protect her secret identity (much of which criticism seems unmerited or at least overblown), but even if you consider those reasonable arguments, his almost total disinterest in her (the above splash page not withstanding) does end up coming across as kind of gay. The comics were a little vague about how old Robin was supposed to be, but the beginning of this story indicates that he and Mary go to the same high school, so he's probably 15 or 16. That he reacts to a pretty girl his own age expressing obvious interest in him as if she were trying to sell him aluminum siding is thus a little odd unless, as Mary suggests, he just doesn't like girls.

To underscore the point, Robin deliberately sabotages her, arranging to douse her with chemicals (with which he's surreptitiously dosed the perfume shown below) to make her mask fall off in public:

Poor Mary.

Mary Wills is more than a little reminiscent of another STAR SPANGLED COMICS character: Merry, the Girl of a Thousand Gimmicks. First seen in STAR SPANGLED COMICS #81 in June 1948 (although she didn't adopt her costumed identity until the following issue), she was Merry Pemberton, adoptive sister of Sylvester Pemberton, the Star-Spangled Kid. Syl tried to discourage her from getting involved in crimefighting, but not only did she not listen to him, she soon took over his strip.

The above panels are from a story in STAR SPANGLED COMICS #86, which is still identified with the Star-Spangled Kid logo on the splash page even though Syl himself is nowhere in sight. With the following issue, the strip officially became Merry's in name as well as fact. However, with reader interest in superheroes fading rapidly, the strip lasted only through #90, in March 1949.

Roberta the GIrl Wonder may have originated an attempt to create a similar heroine for the Robin strip, but given how hard the ending of her story shuts down the possibility of her reappearing, one assumes editor Whitney Ellsworth decided that particular ship had sailed. National-DC was not very likely to replace Robin with a girl the way Merry had replaced her brother and Black Canary had superseded Johnny Thunder, and in any event, it had already become clear that it wasn't going to arrest the sales decline. Even Robin would soon lose the STAR SPANGLED cover slot to Tomahawk, and in 1952, the book became STAR-SPANGLED WAR STORIES.

[ripplestitchskein]

Establishing Shot

Episode 3: Spring Broken

To catch up on the rest of this analysis series or see other essays referred to here please refer to the Master Post.

This analysis may be a little shorter because this episode is less of a story driver and more of a backstory drop. That’s not a criticism of the episode, but the two major things to come out of it (Loona and Blitzo’s relationship and Verosika) are also explored in other episodes so it’s one you could skip technically without losing anything. It’s more of a setup episode to dig into things deeper down the line without them coming from nowhere. This episode does have some really important relationship parallels though and some cute and fun moments I enjoy a lot.

The episode opens with Blitzø loudly and badly singing along with a song on the radio. Millie looks pleased, Moxxie is covering his ears, our first indication he is a music snob but not the last, and Loona is rolling her eyes as per usual.

The song itself really evokes that sense of bad early teens and 20’s relationship decisions, there is a kind of nostalgia with it in the sense that you had fun being fucked up and irresponsible and it reminds you of that, but you wouldn’t want to go back to that place. I think this is intentional with Verosika being a youthful indiscretion, a different time in Blitzo’s life. I don’t think he’s necessarily nostalgic for it, he seems to resent it and view it as a waste of time, but I think the song serves to put the audience in that mindset.

Verosika steals Blitzø’s parking space and we have the episode conflict right up front and center.

We are given A LOT of information in dialogue drops. I found the amount of information dropped in such a contentious, snappy scene to be super fun. I love efficient dialogue and this delivers.

Verosika and Blitzø used to date, Verosika has a drinking problem but she left rehab early due to her fame and obviously hasn’t handled it if the flask in her hand is any indication. She pulls from it immediately and it is a fun little plot device later you aren’t necessarily expecting. I actually didn’t pick up on it until my second rewatch. I liked this detail a lot and appreciated how naturally it was worked in.

Blitzø is revealed to have a sister that is also in rehab and based on his reaction he is upset about that. Blitzø has a lot of resentment about Verosika in general, it carries through in every interaction, and seems misplaced given she reveals he is the one who ran off, leaving her to foot the bill and then maxxed out her credit cards. This could be because of something yet to be revealed, or it could be just a nod to how people act with toxic early relationships.

Their argument uses a lot of gendered insults and sexual aggression, which speaks to why it didn’t work out between them.

To digress for a moment, I think Blitzø’s reaction to women in general is interesting. I’m keeping an eye on it this rewatch but he is always much more verbally aggressive towards female characters, excepting Loona and Millie. In Murder Family he is very misogynistic with the client. In LooLoo Land he yells at the offended mother. In the Hellbie’s clinic he yells at the waiting mom and the secretary and when he goes to visit Barbie in rehab he is super intense with the nurse. He shuts up Octavia in LooLoo Land, and he is kind of nice about it, calling her sweetie, but ultimately dismissive and he also says some really gross things about her on the phone in LooLoo Land.

It may just be my perception but he tends to back off when faced with other males, or is certainly not as intense with them. Vortex in this episode, Asmodeus in others, and he’s almost deferential to Striker and Crimson. He gets a little aggressive in his language with Stolas but he is clearly the dominant one in that relationship.

Back to the episode.

Loona is clearly interested in the Verosika proceedings. She is a fan. It’s a more positive emotion than we’ve seen from her thus far.

Verosika mentions that Vortex is her new bodyguard and he does a better job than Blitzø ever did.

The running theme of people telling Blitzø he is bad at his past jobs is one of my favorite little character details. Each little jab speaks to his insecurity and the entire show being about him finding his place and something he can prove he’s good at. It’s a really subtle way to drive that insecurity home for the audience. This comes up later in his conversations with Striker, Fizz and Crimson, some from a place of building him up as a manipulation tactic and others bringing him down.

The IMP gang are all shocked he dated a famous pop star, and like I mentioned in my Ozzie’s essay he is very dismissive, and annoyed about it. Eyes narrowed, arms crossed, “Yeah we dated, so what?” “Why are you all acting like that’s such a shock.” They are fairly insulting to him about it.

“You are all making it a way bigger deal than it needs to be. I don’t pry into your stupid personal lives.” Which they all rightly point out he absolutely does. And in this episode in fact, not only with a Loona but asking if Millie pegs Moxxie.

Millie asks what sex with Verosika is like showing us Blitzø is not the only one with boundary issues, and Blitzø, the most sexual character on this show save for Stolas, who is equal and limits it to Blitzø only for the most part, asks them to drop it. He does NOT want to talk about this. It is such a departure even this early on you can clock it as significant. There is history there and Blitzø does not like it.

Loona bemoans that she did her makeup shitty on a day when she met such a famous person and Blitzø tells her she looks perfect like always. He is in full on simpering dad mode, which is always cute. Loona FINALLY drops that he is her Dad for the audience, though she takes it back immediately and calls him Blitz, so now we know this is a thing: he is her dad and he is over the top in his affection and she rejects it.

Another digression, apologies, but this is SUPER IMPORTANT.

I find it really telling that Blitzø’s “unwanted” affection for Loona is treated very differently than Stolas’s by the *ahem* more critical fandom. Because they are essentially the same. They just aren’t both sexual. To be extremely clear, I do not in anyway think Stolas’s sexual advances are unwanted, just like I don’t think Blitzø’s parental desperation is. We have two very opinionated characters, who absolutely leave situations they find truly undesirable. In this very episode we have evidence of it. Blitzø left Verosika. Blitzø leaves Loona on the beach after they fight. Loona storms off repeatedly and Vortex even praises her for standing up for herself.

Blitzø is over the top affectionate, he uses a baby voice, he offers her treats, he calls her a silly name she doesn’t seem to like. And she shuts him down, she scoffs, she rolls her eyes, she runs away, she is visibly annoyed. Repeatedly. All things Blitzø does to Stolas. She is JUST AS uncomfortable with it but through her expressions when he’s not looking, her body language cues, and her deflection via dialogue like when she calls him Dad and corrects herself, we can tell she craves that familial love and she even gives into it at times when she can tell Blitzø needs her too even though she fears getting too close, like in Queen Bee.

Blitzø does the EXACT SAME THING with Stolas. Stolas baby talks him, offers him little treats. (Of the more sexual variety), calls him a cutesy name he is annoyed about but when Stolas seems to truly need him to be softer Blitzø gives in even though he fears getting too close, and I firmly believe this parallel is incredibly intentional. These are two very important relationships in Blitzo’s life and they directly mirror each other.

There is more to the Loona & Blitzø vs Stolas/Blitzo relationship parallel for me than even the Fizz and Asmodeus one because it really shows that Blitzø and Stolas come from the exact same place, they are just in different positions in each relationship.

What works the most about it is that BECAUSE Blitzø is on the rejected side of the Loona relationship it actually feeds into his rejection of the Stolas relationship. The one person he should be able to give and receive love freely with, his actual family, even pushes him away. Because he feels unworthy of a romantic relationship, he tries too hard with his familial one and the cycle repeats. There is also a lot to say about their positions of power in these relationships as well.

Blitzø took Loona in. He houses and feeds her and gave her a job. He feels comfortable expressing his affection because he is the “power” holder. He essentially secured Loona’s place in his life by taking her in and giving her a job in his business. I wouldn’t normally put it in those terms for a teenage adoption, but it’s an appropriate way to look at it in this show, especially with what’s said in the episode. Blitzø feels like taking her in and giving her a place should count for something and Loona resents it, she was almost an adult anyway. We even see him more or less “shopping” for her when we flash back in Seeing Stars. He bought her from a pound. Loona feels like she didn’t need him. She does, but she doesn’t want to.

With Stolas it’s the opposite for Blitzø. Stolas secured Blitzø’s place in his life with the grimoire. Stolas is why his business runs right now. Just like Loona, Blitzø needs Stolas, not just for the grimoire, just like Loona doesn’t need Blitzø for just her job and her home, but he doesn’t want to need Stolas for anything either.

(I want to be clear that this is JUST in the context of this cartoon show. I in no way look at actual adoption in real life through this lens, just need to say that for the weirdos.)

We also see that Loona is more alike with her father than she wants to admit, even rejecting affection the exact same way. Their relationship development is on a similar track and pace as well. We get a change with Stolas and Blitzø in Ozzie’s and directly after a change with Loona and Blitzø in Queen Bee. I will…. probably write a whole separate essay on this with all the examples to flesh it out more. It’s that crucial, but I don’t want to spend too much more time on it here. It was just too critical to leave out.

Okay, sorry, back to the episode.

Moxxie offers to ease the tension and talk to Verosika. The succubi crew attack him and then Blitzø gets really pissed. It’s one of those little “he really cares about his employees” moments I adore. We also get the first hint Moxxie is bisexual when he doesn’t reject the male coded incubus for any other reason than he is married.

Blitzø is very clear he is only throwing down the challenge they can kill more people than the succubi can fuck because they went after his employee. I’m interested in the lore of a “demon challenge” but Verosika backs down for an unrelated reason so no clues as to how binding they are.

We also get a good glimpse of Verosika’s tattoo, which is a heart with Blitzø crossed out. She was obviously way more into the relationship than he was, and as I speculated in the Ozzie’s essay I think he fled because of her trying to get too close to him and he was intimated by her increasing fame and the eyes and scrutiny that brought with it. I’m sure there is more to it they’ll explore but that is what we have so far. I find it interesting as well that we don’t get any more info about their relationship than got in Spring Broken in the Ozzie’s episode, she was solely there as a contrast with Stolas just like Fizz.

Like many of the characters from Blitzø ‘s past she continues to pointedly use BlitzO instead of the name he prefers.

I think this is less of a deadnaming thing as some people interpret it, than an “until he reconciles his past with them they won’t let him forget it” thing. Names are a big deal on this show and only the characters that knew him before pointedly use the O. As he makes amends to these people he hurt, intentionally or not, they will accept the new life he’s trying to lead.

It is possible he could revert back to BlitzO as well by the end, that’s a viable direction to go, but I’m pretty sure it’s going to be the former. They won’t call him Blitz and accept the change he’s trying to make until he makes amends.

Stolas gives Blitzø a new name altogether, one that he doesn’t appear to like either, but for different reasons. I think in that instance instead of the changing his name to escape his past he dislikes the nickname because of his fear of the future and the intimacy and romantic love that it could come with. Blitzø sees cutesy nicknames as a sign of affection, and he uses them frequently with people he loves LoonyToony, MillieBillie, etc to express his love. Having Stolas do the same to him scares him.

Blitzø breaks down the plan on the board with a little cartoon. He maintains that intense aggression about Verosika throughout. Moxxie and Blitzø argue about the plan and drop a cute little art school joke.

Loona asks if she can come this time and Blitzø forbids it with a fourth wall break about people over sexualizing her.

We get some lore about the human disguises, Loona has one but the imps don’t. This is a problem in this universe and is called back to in TruthSeekers and Seeing Stars. This potentially has plot implications later, either with D.H.O.R.K.S or an overarching Hell authority. I have some theories that both IMP and Stolas will be in trouble over this eventually.

Blitzø makes a flyer that hints at his dyslexia, Moxxie is wrong again, and they have the clients they need to kill for the challenge.

We arrive at the beach, which conveniently has all the targets the clients require. Loona sniffs a piece of paper and can somehow find them. I will take no “but the world building consistency!” criticisms about this show, specifically because of this scene that tells us “sometimes you just hand wave shit to get the plot moving, it doesn’t have to make sense, it’s not that deep”.

We get a little murder montage. Blitzø is being cocky and then Verosika starts the episode’s song. Verosika puts up a Fuck You Blitzo sign, which is echoed by a sign hanging off the building over the parking space at the beginning of the episode that says Buck You Flitzo. I do not know why that sign is there in the parking lot but it’s a fun detail.

Verosika can’t get through a song without drinking. I still really like the use of the flask as both a plot device and a character issues nod wrapped up in one so it bears repeating.

Loona seems to be captured by the energy of the song and approaches Vortex. There is an indication about the world building here, that the succubi can compel in some way with the song. Loona seems to almost be in a trance and the humans certainly are. Blitzø seems immune. He notices Loona is gone and yells out “where’s my baby” very dramatically with his very misplaced fatherly concerned about her.

Meanwhile, Verosika chucks her flask into the ocean. Trouble is brewing.

Loona approaches Vortex and she is very different to how we’ve seen her thus far. She’s awkward and strange and reveals she doesn’t have any friends. This is much different than how she interacts with the human men she lured into their deaths. She was very sure and not at all awkward with that. When confronted with someone she likes and is attracted to she falls to pieces a bit. Vortex is genuinely really nice, not playing into her little crush but still being friendly and teasing her a bit. I really like him as a side character.

Blitzø inserts himself into their conversation and says one of my favorite quotable lines “Conversation leads to HPV”.

He uses his authority as a boss first to get her back to work but it’s really coming from a place of parental concern. It’s a good character moment, instead of just telling her why he’s worried he defaults to boss Blitzø first.

This is one of the cruxes of their relationship issue. Blitzø adopted her when she was almost grown, he thinks that should count for something and Loona is rebellious teen yelling “You’re not my real dad”. Neither of them are approaching this from a good place. Blitzø is pushing his authority as both boss and father and Loona is pushing back and remaining guarded even after years of Blitzø being there for her. It takes time to break down those walls for both of them. That conflict starts here in Spring Broken and remains a plot point throughout.

Meanwhile Moxxie and Millie keep killing folks for the business. Moxxie gets mistaken for a possum and thrown into some beer.

Loona attempts to reach out to Blitzø but he rejects her this time and storms off. Vortex comforts Loona and is genuinely just a cool dude all around. Seriously, I like him a lot. I like the direction the show chose, where some shows might have gone the douchey route with such a character and had Loona experience a heartbreak that way, we get a different approach. He is a genuinely nice guy who is with someone else.

Loona appreciates Vortex’s support but still looks troubled. She doesn’t break down and approach Blitzø any further however.

She drops a bit of dialogue that’s meaningful instead: “He’ll get over it, he always does.”

Narrator: He doesn’t.

Millie gets a drunken Moxxie out of the beer cooler and he’s the cutest bean. I loved this scene from a personal level because, like my own partner, when he gets drunk he simps for his wife even harder. It was such a cute moment.

Millie goes feral when he’s in danger as she tends to do. The high five when he’s in the demon fish’s jaws while she is trying to save him makes me laugh out loud every time. It’s great. Like A+ animation choice.

Moxxie and Millie have a couple’s moment and a resentful Blitzø rolls his eyes and crosses his arms and says it’s too wholesome for him. I point this out because of how intentional it is as a character reveal. Moxxie and Millie were already cuddling but they amped it up and had Blitzø comment on it in an episode where his ex shows up and presents a very messed up relationship from his past.

Verosika and crew approach the team. They try to pin the blame on IMP but Millie has the flask. It’s shown again that there are consequences for what they do in the human world. They all seem to genuinely fear whatever those consequences are.

Verosika points out IMP will get in trouble too but Moxxie counters with one of my other favorite lines “A human called me a potthum, I am NOT a potthum.”

They agree to give back the parking space, Verosika is pissed. Blitzø gloats. So many middle fingers in this episode.

Loona and Tex are still talking and he offers to invite her to a party and drops that he has a girlfriend. Loona is incredibly disappointed.

Everyone heads home, I especially liked everyone’s different drops into the portal.

Verosika and crew get arrested and it’s implied they’ll get out of it for sexual favors.

This episode is just a fun one. I don’t think it’s meant to be taken too seriously but it has some fun character tidbits and the Loona and Blitzø relationship setup. We get more insight into Loona versus the apathetic sarcasm of the previous episodes. She is awkward and lonely and seems to be interested in finding a romantic partner. The episode itself frames this around Blitzo’s own youthful indiscretion, and is most likely the source of his concern though it’s a subtle setup. I like to think Blitzø was probably around Loona’s age when it all went wrong with Verosika, and that’s why he’s so overprotective. He knows where relationships in your late teens and early 20’s can go.

Loona is closed off to Blitzø but seems to genuinely want that connection between them, but they are too similar.

I like the placement of this episode story wise. I hinted at this in my previous analysis, and while I don’t know this for sure, the reveal of Blitzø as her adopted father at this point seems very intentional. In the non canon pilot it’s just dropped as a bit of quick dialogue and not even in a creative way, it’s kind of forced actually but I like that when they sat down and developed it further they waited for the right moment. We go two episodes entire episodes without learning it in canon.

I mentioned in the Murder Family analysis that I initially thought Loona was an employee he was sexually harassing not his daughter. I can’t determine if the creators thought everyone watching had seen the Pilot or if they wanted to wait to introduce it on purpose. I lean towards the latter considering how carefully crafted Murder Family was as a true Pilot.

It would have been okay to just dialogue drop it again in Murder Family or made sense to mention it in LooLoo Land given the father/daughter focus of that episode but I think they made the right choice dropping it here. Not only is this a more Loona centric episode but we, the audience, can now directly contrast it with the preceding episode.

In LooLoo Land, Stolas is having a similar issue with Octavia, though the issue there is more of a family breakdown than an issue of independence, but whereas Stolas and Octavia resolve the conflict for the most part in that episode (though it will reappear in Seeing Stars in a slightly different way) Loona and Blitzø do not. They fight, they separate, they do not reconcile. This tells us this is an ongoing plot point, it will come up again and it will not be resolved in a single storyline, it is an ongoing thing they want to develop.

Not to keep being all BUT STOLITZ in an episode Stolas doesn’t even appear in, but I love the back to back contrast between LooLoo Land and Spring Broken and the fact that we are shown that, though Stolas and Blitzø are very different, they have similar issues in their relationships with their daughters. They are both fathers trying their best.

How the issues are handled speak to their flaws in character as well: Stolas fucks up because of his issues trying to force a happy family image and alienates his daughter, but he talks to her about it and she is receptive and forgives him and they reconcile. Octavia is very like her father in a people pleasing way in that she does go along with what Stolas wants (though she protests a lot more) and does this until she explodes and then she is soothed by actually talking it through and being receptive. Stolas has done similar things, he goes along with things to keep the peace and then he explodes, his blow up at Stella for instance. I’m hoping we’ll see more of him blowing up in future. Both Blitzø and Stolas are reflected in their daughters. Stolas even takes this same approach with Blitzø he does with Octavia, he reaches out and tries to talk, but because of Blitzø’s issues he gets rejected. Loona would do the same.

Blitzø and Loona’s conflict is both with his exerting his authority and being overbearing and overly affectionate which Loona doesn’t trust. Loona, because she is like Blitzø, rejects him for both, but because both of them default to ignoring the problem, neither talk about it and it goes unresolved.

I just really like this contrast. I also like how you can see how tied together all these characters are, they have thier own unique issues but they still parallel and mirror each other throughout.

I don’t like to refer to episodes as filler episodes, because no episode is truly just filler unless it’s a flashback episode and even then sometimes they matter, but this episode could be classified as such as it only gives us backstory hints and no real resolutions. As I said before if you skipped it you wouldn’t be missing any necessary context for the show as everything in it gets brought up again. It does introduce Verosika and setup Loona and Blitzø’s relationship conflict however. These are both important but we explore them elsewhere too so this is more of an establishing shot of those things rather than a typical setup and resolution. These are pins to be knocked down later.

We the audience know there is more to explore with both of them, whereas with LooLoo Land I don’t think they intended for Octavia to necessarily be a long term conflict for Stolas, they set it up and resolve it in one shot. Seeing Stars came later and was kind of a rehash of LooLoo Land but this time bringing both Loona and Blitzø into it and calling back to the issues of Spring Broken. Seeing Stars is what ties the issues of LooLoo Land and Spring Broken together, but that’s an essay for another day.

[garden-bug]

Your Thrawn takes (concluding the debate)

From a poll I did yesterday. You can check out the post on my profile. I’m tempted to do a longer one to get a more accurate result… but that’s it for now! Thanks for participating.

100% people

No character, unless they’re a pure villain, is fully immoral. It’s an interesting viewpoint to take on a character like Thrawn who has undoubtedly done moral actions. Perhaps you view something he did as so immoral it negotiated all of this for you?

Another thing that people seem to not realise: ‘good morals’ and ‘good character’ are not synonymous. If somebody tells you a character that you like has done bad things, don’t take it personally! Nuance is what makes characters interesting. I love characters like Maul and Mahito (jjk) purely because they are completely selfish and atrociously evil. I’m not gonna get sad if someone says, ‘how can you like them they’re evil?’ A huge reason why I like them because they’re evil. Duh. Characters like that are fascinating. That person does not understand the implications of characters as storytelling tools (another reason I would argue it’s so important to analyse critically - you’ll take everything personally otherwise and not be able to appreciate this). Maybe you can help them realise that the character isn’t fully immoral, but is actually an anti-villain or an anti-hero. By having these discussions properly (instead of just getting annoyed and shutting them down) we will realise that, wow, 80% of people have the same view (that’s most of you).

I’m repeating myself again here, but I’d also like to stress the importance of expectations when people post about a story or character. Somebody who makes a post about one particular aspect of a story or character that leans towards more moral or immoral is probably not going to give a balanced judgement of the entire work or characterisation. You’ll realise by responding that, oops, they actually do understand everything you do, it’s just this post was about one small thing and you took it as their entire bias. My post criticising the Ascendancy’s use of child soldiers received a response generalising the fandom as people who are obsessed with analysing morality and think Thrawn is this horrific pure evil character. No… that’s not what I said! (And the morality part, that’s a bad thing?)

This annoys me people

7 people picked the last option, which does make me sad if it’s because they’re frustrated by the type of arguments that seem to arise from this topic and don’t want to engage anymore. Having these better discussions would probably help this. Hopefully they do understand the value of morality in literature analysis in general. It can be an important tool to assess whether one character is more effective than another, to illustrate the themes of your story, and much much more.

Some people view stories are purely for entertainment and not for any intellectual purpose, but I disagree and don’t understand this. I would find stories unbelievably boring that way. If you disagree that’s your personal preference, and I will not change my mind because this is mine, so DNI please.

Conclusion of the debate

The conclusion of the debate is… well, critical analysis (including of the moralality kind) is required to understand what really makes a character a good character.

Thrawn is such an incredibly fascinating character, I think, because of his moral ambiguity. Why does Death Note fascinate people? Take the moral debate out of Death Note and you render the entire story meaningless. There would be nothing. There wouldn’t even be a story. I feel like this is obvious.

[baravaggio]

it's actually kind of horrifying watching tiktok become people's first introduction to core concepts like settler colonialism, imperialism, genocide, ethnic cleansing, islamophobia, antisemitism, etc. because the power of a strong tone of voice paired with a parasocial relationship with a creator can make almost any shitty argument seem credible to people who don't already have solid critical thinking & analysis skills. not only that but when people disagree in the comments & try to correct misinformation or provide more context they're shut down quickly by that creator's fans it's genuinely scary

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Susan Kelley

Published: May 2, 2018

Colleges and universities across the country are struggling with the question of who decides what is acceptable speech on campus. When does a controversial topic become hate speech? When should it be allowed as free speech?

Two Cornell researchers say psychological science’s extensive study of bias offers an important lens through which to view these conflicts, as we strive to understand and reduce them.

There is no alternative to free speech, say co-authors Stephen Ceci and Wendy Williams in “Who Decides What Is Acceptable Speech on Campus? Why Restricting Free Speech Is Not the Answer.” Their analysis appeared May 2 in Perspectives in Psychological Science as the lead article in the issue.

“There is no alternative to free speech, because every controversial topic has a substantial group of people who view it as hate speech,” said Ceci, the Helen L. Carr Professor of Developmental Psychology. “If we define unacceptable speech in terms of topics students say should be banned because they make them feel marginalized or uncomfortable, then we remove all controversial topics from consideration.”

Added Williams, professor of human development: “Feeling discomfort and angst at hearing words is not a legal reason to shut down other people’s rights to say those things.”

Since the 1950s, psychological science has demonstrated that many types of bias can prevent opposing sides from accepting the validity of each other’s arguments, the authors say.

Selective perception makes opponents on an issue literally see things differently. In 1954, researchers showed a film of a 1951 football game – Princeton versus Dartmouth, well-known for its competitive, rough play – to two groups: one of Princeton fans and the other of Dartmouth boosters. Each team’s supporters saw the majority of flagrant violations as having been committed by opposing players.

For people with selective bias, “it’s not just that they interpret their perceptions differently; they actually see different things,” Ceci said.

In “myside” bias, people look for evidence that supports their opinions and ignore or downgrade evidence that contradicts them. “Blind-spot bias comes from deep identification with a cause. We believe we are especially enlightened, while our opponents’ affiliation with the opposite side leads them to be biased,” Ceci said. Similarly, naïve realism makes people feel their views are grounded in reality but their opponents’ are not.

These and many other biases explain why a sizable percentage of students favor banning nearly every controversial topic, the authors said.

For example, a Cato Institute survey of 3,000 Americans with university experience found:

40 percent would ban a speaker who says men on average are better than women at math;

51 percent would ban claims that all white people are racist;

49 percent would ban statements that Christians are backward and brainwashed;

49 percent would ban speech that criticizes police;

41 percent would ban speakers who say undocumented immigrants should be deported;

74 percent said universities should cancel speakers if students threaten violent protest;

19 percent said violence is justified to stifle speakers who might make others uncomfortable;

and 51 percent said it was OK to prevent others from hearing a speaker.

“In such a climate, the heckler’s veto reigns supreme and any expression that is offensive to any subgroup on campus would be banned,” Williams said.

College experiences should involve challenging our beliefs, even when those experiences go beyond our comfort level, and no campus group has the right to determine for the entire community what can be discussed, the authors said.

Universities can take several steps to help students avoid the biases that prevent them from valuing other points of view and to reduce extremist views and confrontations, they said.

Just as colleges require that freshmen understand codes of conduct for sexual harassment, plagiarism and intoxication, they could require freshmen to understand the differences between free speech and hate speech, between First Amendment protections and speech codes, and the meaning of “evidence.”

Role-playing exercises could be woven into controversial seminars in which supporters of each side are asked to switch sides. And universities could organize civil debates on controversial topics.

Students should be made to understand they are entering a place that believes deeply in the importance of dialogue and free speech, Ceci said.

“Free speech isn’t just for opinions that we all share. That kind of speech doesn’t need protecting,” he said. “It’s for expressions that can be vile and hateful and disgusting. That has to be part of the cultural understanding.”