#it's about the Camaraderie

[deathsbestgirl]

something that just occurred to me: in squeeze, scully's having lunch with colton and they're gossiping about old classmates.

tom was expecting her to make some kind of cutting comment about marty, but she doesn't hold any resentment like colton does. she just says "well good for marty." he got "lucky" but clearly he did something right if he was promoted that quickly.

but this is definitely something scully does with friends — complaining about people, making jokes about them. and immediately after his last comment here, she turns it to colton and his career. and he in turn brings up hers. only he's mocking it, where she was being kind & encouraging to him.

he starts talking about "encounters of the third kind" and "spooky mulder" and at this point, her perspective on mulder has shifted. and this is the episode scully finally understands how different mulder really is — the respect he gives her, the way he listens, and he prioritizes victims, not his career.

first, she's a little embarrassed? she defends mulder, kind of neutrally. to colton, it seems like this lunch is about using scully to get mulder's help, and to "help" scully off of the x files. but she's an adult, she got an assignment. then he calls her "mrs. spooky" and i think that's what really sets off her journey in this episode.

she's embarrassed when colton & mulder first meet. she's flustered before anything happens — the first two cases, it was really just them. they didn't deal much with people within the fbi, mostly the local pd & other locals.

later confronts mulder after he defends her, insisting she found the right guy. she calls him territorial and tries to backpedal. because is it her or the work? but they're already entwined, because like he gives scully something rare, she does the same for mulder. she might have laughed at "spooky mulder" in the pilot, but scully is kind and she cares about her job & the truth.

so mulder tells her of course he was being territorial then grabs her necklace and "gives" her a choice. he leaves to let her make it and it only takes her a few moments to decide. she was being honest when she told colton mulder is a good agent, and although she doesn't yet understand how his mind works, she knows he has a reason — and she needs to know.

now to what i was really thinking about:

later, colton gets the other agents called off mulder & scully's stakeout. colton insists on being the one to call mulder — a call he doesn't seem to have received. scully is pissed off, she calls mulder to rant about colton. says they should file a complaint about his interference.

in the pilot, when mulder calls her at the end, late at night...she tells him they'll talk at work. but now she gets it. and she erases a boundary she placed. one that eventually, in season three, has her calling mulder over & over again. one that (later this season?) has him at her apartment so he can show her the best photos of a ufo he's ever seen. and episode where she tells him a hard truth because he has to consider it.

scully loves being mean. she loves talking shit about people. but she only does it with people who have earned it. colton lost that privilege because he showed his true colors, and mulder gained it in spades.

this entire episode is colton (and the other men) disrespecting both scully & mulder professionally, and making comments like school bullies. these people fundamentally misunderstand scully — she is kind, she has a work ethic they can't fathom, and she cares. all of these things, mulder appreciates. he understands. scully firmly makes her choice in this episode. she's on the victims' side, and beyond that, she's on mulder's. climbing the ladder means nothing if it isn't about helping people.

anyway. scully loves to talk shit with her friends and she slowly eliminates every friend she has except mulder <3

[humming-fly]

i followed you for your fma art and am delighted to see you posting about malevolent!!!! i’m guessing you love guys with other guys in their heads

ayy glad you're enjoying the cycle of nonsense haha - and of course it's two for the price of one, you can't beat that kind of bargain!!

[nyamcattt]

i saw ryoko kui's dunmeshi page of laios hugging everyone in his party, and i wanted to make one for sombra with everyone in talon

[feroluce]

For some weird reason, I've always been fascinated by how wildly different Sampo operates in the Underground vs the Overworld.

Sampo is present in both places and even in official sources, he's not really counted as one side or the other- now that the theory has been confirmed in-game, he's generally just lumped in with the Masked Fools.

But there really is a big difference!

Probably the most obvious and well known instance of Sampo's...business practices *cough burglary and fraud COUGH* in the Overworld is from the Belobog Museum event. In it, you don't find out Sampo is the main culprit until near the end, because Pela has to set up a sting just to catch him in the act. And that sting is necessary all because the initial suspect they arrested, Norbert, had pretty much no idea of his partner's identity. Sampo wouldn't even speak to him face-to-face.

And whereas Sampo is normally very pleasant and friendly with the trailblazer...when he thinks he's talking to Norbert here, he straight up says that they are NOT friends. Like he really shuts that shit DOWN.

There's also an Overworld NPC, Chavez, who heads the "Dark Blue Scam Support Group." And he. Really really really does not like Sampo fjkdasjklfdj

Chavez clearly wants Sampo caught, and has literally no positive feelings about him. So. Why call it the Dark Blue Scam? Why not just out him by name? Chavez obviously doesn't give a single shit about Sampo's dignity or privacy. But he never once refers to him as "Sampo," and even the pamphlets he passes out make no mention of it. No one in the entire support group seems to know how to identify him or how to refer to him except by his hair color. If the trailblazer says his name, Chavez reacts as though he's never heard it before.

(I've seen people say this means Sampo Koski is an alias and not his real name? But Ray pointed this out, and honestly I agree; even the Fools call him Sampo, after all. I think it's just that Chavez never knew Sampo's name in the first place, and given his immense distrust, immediately assumes it's an alias.)

And then there's his characters stories, where he proceeds to pull off a heist in the Overworld while in disguise as Brughel Poisson the entire time. Literally his own stories don't mention Sampo's name even once.

So anyway, all this shows that when he's up in the Overworld working cons, Sampo is incredibly slippery and secretive about his identity. The only people who seem to know him are Pela, Serval, and Gepard. He doesn't get close to anyone else, and is even surprisingly unfriendly. Nobody knows his name. No one knows his face. He has zero qualms about backstabbing or double-crossing, and even plans for it in some cases.

Meanwhile, down in the Underground, I'm pretty sure literally the worst thing we hear of him doing is scalping tickets in front of the Fight Club. Which isn't even illegal in a lot of places (although it's certainly a dick move).

In Hook's companion quest, a vagrant miner steals Fersman's equipment and tries to sell it to Sampo. Even before the trailblazer and Hook jump in and out the vagrant as a thief, Sampo hesitates to buy it because it sounds like stolen goods, which he doesn't want any part of.

Even knowing that a geomarrow detector is rare and incredibly valuable in the mines, Sampo makes no attempt to double-cross Hook or profit off of her loss, and even tells her who to go to to get it fixed.

And my favorite example of Sampo in the Underground is the Survival Wisdom adventure mission. In it, Sampo starts up a business with Peak, another miner. And like. In wild contrast to all the cons he pulls above ground, Sampo is actually super nice and helpful here.

Just the same as with Hook's quest, Sampo talks to Peak face-to-face, with no disguises or barriers. When the trailblazer finds them, they're just in the Great Mine, no secretive meeting places. Peak knows Sampo, is familiar with him, and calls him by name. It's not even a con! There's nothing illegal going on; it really is just a business partnership. Peak is more than happy with their deal, he's even pretty enthusiastic about it, because thanks to Sampo he can now make enough money to get by while also accommodating his chronic fatigue.

The only person Sampo lies to in this whole ordeal is the trailblazer, who he manipulates into getting Peak's mining equipment back from the vagrants that stole it in the first place. And when it's done, he rewards them with a legit treasure map.

So when he's working in the Underground, Sampo is MUCH more upright and lawful. Part of this is probably to do with his "business" model- Sampo only takes advantage of the wealthy, and poverty runs rampant in the Underground. When he charges Peak an extra 30% (the same percentage he charges Norbert as a consultation fee in the museum heists- Sampo seems to go by percentage instead of a flat rate, which means his prices are more fair for lower incomes) for carelessly losing their supply, Peak literally starts counting out pocket change.

Dude's working for pennies and good will down there dknsmdmd

And you can twist this into a Robin Hood thing if you want- Sampo IS technically working to feed orphans and heal the sick. He says himself he's more than happy to make up the shortfall between the greedy and the marginalized- I mean he says it in the shadiest way possible, but I doubt the people benefiting from his work really care that he's a slimeball if it means they can survive another day. Even the two heists he pulls in his character stories are literally just him stealing absurd amounts of food.

Personally though I think it is solely because of Natasha, and Sampo is hilariously well-behaved specifically for her, because she keeps him on a short leash JSKZJMSMSKS

[capcollector]

sorta companion piece to these doodles

something that’s crossed my mind in the context of deacon and bunny getting together/starting a family. how do you react when two ppl you really respect but maybe don’t exactly Love say they’re having a kid together.

[lbhslefttiddie]

actually since im talking about vague ideas i like but havent worked into a useable setting yet: i think, under very specific circumstances involving sy, lbh and sj could become a horrible and terrifying collaborative force. like i think it would be fun and also funny in a shen bros au dealio where sj and lbh are just constantly at each other's fucking throats because of their respective Deals and then the second sy lands himself in a sy-brand Situation they both react with such vicious like-minded fury one would think they had coordinated their actions. i think they could reach an Agreement of sorts if they were put in a position which showed them that they both prioritize sy's safety to the same insane degree. something so fun about having to confront that the person you'd so comfortably despised for so long has shown themself to be very human in the face of the suffering of someone you also love dearly. that there may be no one in the world outside yourself who you would be able to trust your loved one's care to except that bitch you cannot stand

[deservedgrace]

I don't think that framing "Marginalized™️ Atheism/Deconstruction" and "Cishet White Male Atheism/Deconstruction" as inherently ~separate and distinct~ is super effective (and disclaimer I'm specifically speaking about my experience with christianity, atheism, and ex christian atheists/deconstructors), but also... okay so I was raised in a cult, and cults are oppressive for all its members. Nobody gets out unscathed, everyone experiences the abuse tactics, everybody is a victim. But within the cult there is a hierarchy, and cishet white men are at the top. So while the cult is oppressive to everyone, and everyone is harmed in some way, it is also uniquely oppressive to queer folks, to BIPOC, to disabled folks, to women, etc etc. And the thing that happens to some of those cishet white men is they leave an oppressive cult, where they are considered the "default", and they go into the ~real world~, where they are also considered the "default", and even in atheist/deconstruction spaces, their bodies and experiences are often the leading voices.

The men that leave go from an oppressive patriarchal culture to a far less oppressive (to them) patriarchal society. The white people that leave go from an oppressive racist culture to a far less oppressive (to them) racist society. The people that leave go from an oppressive culture that does not value marginalized voices to a different, less oppressive culture that also does not value marginalized voices. And if you personally do not experience [xyz] oppression, it can be difficult to even realize there are things surrounding that you have to deconstruct unless you listen to the voices of the oppressed. But some cishet white men go from being considered the "default" in an oppressive culture, to being considered the "default" in a less oppressive culture (to them). Their experience of "overcoming systemic oppression" comes from leaving the church, and it can be really easy to fall into the trap that the church, specifically, is the sole oppressor and enemy of everyone.

Of course this doesn't happen in every single case and it's also not exclusive to cishet white men. But those blind spots are why I think it's important for everyone to listen to a variety of voices when they're deconstructing, especially if those voices are talking about oppression you wouldn't have experienced firsthand.

No, our deconstructions are not inherently different, but the experiences and circumstances prior to it often are. It's okay to acknowledge that and beneficial for everybody to listen to each other's experiences.

[crashromance]

hitting the lads with the babygirlification beam

[darby-rowe]

cum right on me

[artoutforblood]

LAMB LAMB LAMB LAMB

[kangals]

way back in 2014, probably a few weeks or months after you posted that picture of boone with the stick on his head, i checked your blog out and so dearly enjoyed all the dogposting that i followed. i think you were the first dogblr blog i actually followed at the time, but it's been ages and my memory is bad, so i'm not fully sure. it wasn't long before then--2012 i think?--that i had gotten a new dog of my own, a border collie. iirc he and boone were just about the same age.

in 2018 i lost that blog i'd followed you with, and a lot of connections with it. i didn't return until 2021, and when i did, i didn't refollow most of the old blogs; i don't think i even really went looking for them. it took me a while to get back into the swing of using tumblr.

last september, my border collie had a sharp health decline, and i had to say goodbye. it's not the first time i've had to put a pet down, but i think it was the hardest. i'm still not over it. even just typing this now, i feel raw.

then in march or so, i made a new fandom friend who knows you, and i enthusiastically recalled following you before and how much i enjoyed it. i didn't even know about stellina, and now there's kep too! but... i also didn't know you'd lost boone. i followed because i still really enjoy your blog, and i love your collies too. and butters!!! so glad she's still here!

idk what made me look tonight... maybe because i talked about my old border collie with someone today. i went looking for the posts immediately around when you lost boone, because i guess some part of me wanted to know what happened. i spent the better part of an hour (maybe longer?) reading posts from the weeks before the decline, and then the loss, and then the deluge of old boone pictures after, and i've been crying pretty much the whole time just reading your posts and tags about him.

and this is a long and windy way to get to saying thank you. i'm glad you shared your grief, though that seems like a weird thing to say. there's something cathartic about crying over someone else's dog when you still hurt about your own, and knowing you're not alone in that kind of sorrow. boone was such a beautiful boy. i'll never forget that silly post that made me check your blog out in the first place, or the years of posts i stuck around for after. i wish i'd remembered to follow sooner, but the archive is still there, and it's so fun looking through all those old posts about him and his quirks and antics. he was amazing.

sorry for the length of this, i just... really wanted you to know that he touched yet another life, i guess. and i've been so deeply enjoying your posts about stellina and kep. i know it'll be a year soon... i hope there's some peace in how things have gone since he passed, and i hope the anniversary isn't too hard on you. thank you for sharing him with us.

i've been on tumblr for 14 years and this is, genuinely, the nicest ask i think i've ever been sent.

thank you - sincerely. there's been a lot of times over the course of this blog that i've felt like i was oversharing, or talking about pointless things only i cared about. i still so frequently start typing out a post only to stop mid-sentence and delete it because i can't help but think "no one cares about this." possibly it's why i like to talk about my pets so much - they're not me, but i'm the one who knows them best, so i get to say "hey look at this" and ramble and have people say "i'm looking" back. when boone passed, i lost that filter and i poured my grief out into this blog because it was the closest outlet i had. and to have hundreds of people not only acknowledge this but to commiserate, to reassure, to share their own stories - that helped healed me more than i can put into words. it's exactly as you said: there's a catharsis in grieving together.

i am sorry you also had to say goodbye. i wish i could say it gets easier, but i think that would be defeating the point of grief. your grief is your love and damn it if there isn't any act more loving in the world than choosing to say goodbye to an old, loyal dog. you think of how dogs were domesticated tens of thousands of years ago, of how human society and dogs have developed intertwined, of how we have records of ancient greeks and romans carving loving epitaths on their dog's graves, of how a prehistoric dog's skull was found with a bone placed in it's mouth after death, and you wonder if grieving a dog isn't one of the most consistent experiences in the whole of human history that there is.

i'm glad to know that this could bring you some comfort, in some way. it's incredibly touching to know that you kept me and boone in your thoughts for all this time. i am doing ok - i've been reflecting a lot as we approach the one-year mark. i'm not sure if i'll be able to condense those thoughts down into coherent words, but i'll do my best. i hope that my silly little pets continue to bring you some happiness, and that you've found peace with your own grief.

thank you, again - this is extremely touching and means a hell of a lot to me.

[cirr0stratus]

George MacKay you are wazzer goom To Me

[akkivee]

NATTO ON ICE CREAM?? JAKURAI IS UR TUMMY OK

💉: while we’re on the topic, vanilla ice cream when mixed with natto is simply delicious

🥂👔: ⁉️

💉: surely the two of you have tried it before?

🥂👔: w-well…..

💉: have you? 🙂

🥂: n-no……….

👔: but sensei, you have…….??

💉: have you? 🙂

👔: i haven’t!!

💉: i see! then after this, i’ll treat the both of you to it!! 🤗

🥂: y…………yippee…………

👔: thank you very much………………..

————————————————

not only is he so fine with it, he swears by it LOL

[flickeringflame216]

keep getting anxious about classes starting in two weeks and then I keep remembering CHOIR!!!!

[preywhore]

knight and jester who are fucking the same royal meet up to compare notes

[fmet]

Watching Asa brighten up and act all proud after Denji compliments her is both so funny and uplifting but also incredibly sad because you KNOW the only reason such a (backhanded) compliment garnered that reaction from her is because she’s so deprived of any level of verbal affection, from anyone. She knows she’s a boring, judgmental and generally unpleasant person to be around. No amount of deflecting her own insecurities onto the happy mundanity of others could possibly change that she knows this. And it must have been since her mothers passing that she’s heard anything even remotely indulgent like that directed towards her. Years and years of shrouding herself in a lens of superiority to make up for how absolutely lonely and disliked she is before someone like Denji came along and cut through that fog :((((( Asaaaaaa