#it's morally egregious any way you look at it idk

[thebendsbyradiohead]

atp i'm just sticking around to hear if they'll ever mention the fact he immediately occupied macedonia after joining the axis powers ergo he wasn't just strongarmed into doing it bc of peer pressure from romania & greece, & then proceeded to deport 90% of our jewish population to treblinka while conveniently avoiding doing the same to the bulgarian jewish people & now being called "the savior of the jews" while cavorting with hitler lol

started listening to this historical true crime podcast abt the death of boris the third of bulgaria mid-ww2 but it's by these 2 former bbc journos & in the first ep they go to talk to his surviving children one of which is the unofficial king of bulgaria who lives in some palace near sofia

anw they take a taxi to get there & then they were like "can you imagine hopping in a cab in london & asking the driver to take you to buckingham palace??" & on the way there they kept saying the usual orientalist "eastern europe is scary & poor" stuff like "it's not your typical versailles palace fit for a king, it's more like a dilapidated junkyard" and "when we get there, the palace is undergoing renovations, all paid from king simeon's funds since he's not entitled to taxpayer's money" like won't somebody think of the imported german royals exiled by the communists!!! who will pay for their palaces if not the peasants living day by day on a 800 euro salary???

first of all, a) if anything YOU are the weird ones for making such a circus of monarchy in the year of our lord 2024, not everyone else for refusing to give them their hard-earned money, b) i cannot BELIEVE you got me defending bulgarians of all people & c) drop dead immediately you racist posh cunts

[literaticat]

Regarding the AI-to-sort-through-submissions question, a major publisher recently opened (briefly) to submissions and were going to use an AI called Storywise to sort their subs. There was a massive backlash on social media and they rescinded the idea, got them a lot of bad press. Not sure if you saw that controversy. So I wonder if the person who asked you that question also saw that or if some agencies/other publishers are now doing this too.

I hadn't heard of this controversy, so I googled it, and came up with this article recapping a thing where Angry Robot was going to use Storywise to sort through submissions and got a lot of pushback. (Are they a major publisher? Is this what you were referring to? Or was there another thing?)

The interesting / wild thing about this to me is that... this doesn't sound like a big deal, actually? They put an FAQ about it (which they have left up for transparency) -- in reading the article above and the FAQ, if they are to be believed, it seems that AR were using a non-generative AI program that was NOT being trained on or retaining any of the author's work.

This "slushbot" was going to filter submissions to the appropriate editor and flag any anomalies (like, "doesn't fit requested word count" etc).

All submissions, whether or not they were "flagged" in this way, were being looked at by an actual human. (Because slushbot can make mistakes!).

This... doesn't sound that egregious to me? In fact, it sounds super reasonable? AM I BONKS? Am I missing something?? Maybe!

Things I -- and possibly you! -- use every day that have similar features:

GMAIL. Uses AI to filter out spam, highlight important messages, designate promotions and ads to different folders, remind me to follow up on things, etc. Does it make mistakes? Sure, sometimes. I do have to check the spam filter now and again to make sure it isn't flagging important things wrongly. Does it make my life infinitely easier? YES. I get hundreds of emails a day -- if I had to look at all the trash ones, I would NEVER find the important ones!

SPELLCHECK / AUTOCORRECT / AUTOCOMPLETE / GRAMMARLY, et al. Use AI to tell me when I have misspelled something or to suggest wording. Is it always right? No! I never mean DUCK, spellcheck! Does it make my life easier? For sure! I have fat fingers, this saves me from many a gaffe!

"IF YOU LIKE ____, TRY _____" -- you know how online retailers often suggest things based on your buying preferences, or give you a bargain on things they know you enjoy to get you to re-buy, etc? You know how TikTok and Netflix push content that they think you'll be into based on your viewing habits? Or you'll just be chatting about beekeepers and suddenly you have ads for bee merch on your Facebook? That's the magic of the algorithms, babes. And they are everywhere.

QUERYMANAGER. I don't know if this technically counts as "AI" -- but QM does do things like flag submissions that meet certain criteria that I've designated (like, if it is somebody who is previously published, if it is a referral, etc) -- it also tells me the history of submissions, so I know if they've queried the agency before and when and to whom and with what material. (This is how I KNOW FOR A FACT that so many people don't follow the DUCKING directions.) And, while currently I have to manually forward submissions to other agents if they are more appropriate for them, I could see a world where that was automated -- like if all queries came to a central repository and QM2.0 forwarded them to the specific agents at the agency who were open to [whatever] kind of book. Would that be a bad thing? Or a HELPFUL thing? IDK.

These are just tools, at the end of the day. I don't think there's anything morally wrong with using them or trying them out as long as you aren't letting them make actual decisions for you. Like, I would never want a slushbot to reject things (or accept them!) on my behalf - I have to be the one to look, just as I would never want an algorithm to purchase things on my behalf just because I MIGHT like them -- no thank you! By all means suggest, but I have to make the final decision!

(TL;DR: Using spellcheck on your work to make sure you haven't called me KENNIFER? Yes please! "Creating" work that you intend to submit with your name on it using generative AI? Please, no. Using an AI filter to flag submissions and sort them to the correct person? Sounds OK! Stealing author's work to train an AI? Not OK!)

[georges-chambers]

❤️ 💚 🖤 for the ask game!

"Which character do you think is most egregiously mischaracterized by the fandom?"

This one is not easy, really. A lot of Terror characters I personally really enjoy I also know literally aren't given elaborate canon characters so I understand they're. Not really 'mischaracterized', their fan interpretations which might be most popular just Aren't Mine, Personally. And a lot is still just a matter of preference and phrasing a characters actions as like, 'their intentional, malicious inaction' versus 'their incredible struggle and relatable lack of initiative'. So taking all of this into account. Going to say Billy Gibson. I'm just. So tired of So many fans somehow seeing everything he did and making him out to be someone totally innocent taken advantage of and manipulated in every way. He absolutely. Wasnt? Did they somehow miss Hickey's, 'I pressed him?' Line entirely? Did they miss the fact that he came up with the idea for a mutiny? THE FACT THAT HE TOLD IRVING, THE WAY HE DID? But I also still really like him as a character because that makes him so much more interesting than just a helpless victim so I can't stand how some fans just take absolutely no interest there.

"What does everyone else get wrong about your favourite character?'

My chosen blorbo Chambers? Technically he has so few lines 90% of the character I think is there is my own hc but I will say this anyways: I feel like people make him out to be both 1. Something or an orphan of some kind, and 2. Just like. Really innocent. Way more often than they should. The second goes for basically any ships boy. Like yes their whole thing was being younger and inexperienced compared to the rest of the crew, but like. Idk. I feel like a lot of fans either make them even younger and/or more. 'Modern' standards for what they'd expect of 18/19 year olrs at the time and place and I just. Don't see it at all. Which also ties into why I don't personally like the first thing with Chambers specifically. It's clearly canon with Young and one can't rule it out for Evans and Golding, but like. What characterization we actually do get of Chambers shows him being the one who seems to look up to, even admire perceived authorities like Sir John and Bryant a lot. Way more than others anyways. Even until the very end, unlike someone who seems to have had a much more probably desperate life, like Golding, he just. Never does any sort of mutiny, despite being in what seems like the same sort of position as any who did. So while I still feel like the idea is definitely valid and sometimes like reading about ot, I just personally feel like there's no way he was a completely destitute little waif, definitely not compared to the other 3 ships boys. There's also the fact that the historical Chambers actually had a family who were still aware he'd gone away and waiting for his return and all, which is, again, much more than the other ships boys had. But also I feel like saying I dislike most of all when people combine the idea that they're just sopping wet pathetic Victorian orphans And Also innocent children who know/understand the harshness of life so little because that's. An oxymoron to me. Pick One. Tbh all 4 of them could be considered my favourite characters less because I like them and more because I have A Lot of Thoughts on them i guess.

"Which character is not as morally good as everyone seems to think?"

Of course there's obviously Gibson like I just mentioned, Goodsir for clear reasons, but keeping with my ships boy brand, I literally wanted so much to answer exactly this to say Fucking Golding. Tbh it's not really like anyone's defending him much, but I hear so often, 'Well, by that point what choice did he have?' Or some variation of him being like 'lead astray' by Hickey and oh my God. I get it, he's just a little ships boy or something, but did we watch the same show? (He's like one of the most tertiary characters who has So few lines so I do completely understand this and again, it's just my personal hcs. But like. Here's why I cannot see that.) Most use the idea that he 'didn't have anyone else' but this is the same or a similar idea to the idea that Gibson 'had no one else', an idea which makes a lot more sense in the context of Hickey and Gibsons whole relationship, but like. What. Does Golding have in common with Hickey? Like name 1 reason why he should trust more and be closer to Hickey than God only knows how many other just. Similar crew mates on Terror? And there is the fact that after/around when Strong and Evans die, they're seen together with Golding telling Hickey 'Take care of yourself' (this does in fact haunt me), but like. All that indicates is they had some sort of Connection, but not how deep it was in any way. Also there's the way we see Hickey interact with/talk about the men he does actively manipulate such as Manson, Armitage, and Hartnell, and of course correct me if I'm wrong but like. Goldings just about as able as any of them. One could probably argue less of a liability Because he could always try using his impressionability to his advantage. But yet Hickey did nothing with him, despite how apparently impressionable he'd be. And even if that were the case and somehow he takes a sort of solace in Hickey or Hickeys able to mastermindedly manipulate him slowly, so easily he doesn't even seem to. Be putting much premeditation or anything behind it. Even if that's true, what about when he was manipulating Crozier? How would Golding be able to come up with and do that (Actively Scheming though he did look of course) but see none of what Hickey did with him? And just. Why? The others loyal to Hickey by that point, we generally know about. We know about Hodgson and Tozer and why they're as loyal as they are. We even know more about Armitage and why he's involved. But like. We Don't know why the hell Goldings doing any of this, not as well as we do them. If he were really just the most pathetic, poor idiot being manipulated into it all, why wouldn't he just think, 'hm. Well there's . A lot of protection here with Crozier. And even if I'm not too fond of anyone here, we just have a lot more practical resources and all. And I could sell all of them out here and now and he probably couldn't or wouldn't punish me too harshly and I'd be protected.' Like. He could probably go on to assume that on some level. So the fact that he does all he does and chooses to go back to Hickey and bring back Crozier and others to them, to me, implies he was probably way closer to Hickey than we really saw, definitely had the premeditation to just. Do all that, and like. God only knows what else he'd do right?

I just think Goldings way more fucked up than most seem to acknowledge/think about and definitely not a complete idiot, arguably smarter than some of the other mutineers. Thank you for reading this manifesto of a post.

[woodohwanedandproud]

@applestorms #yes yes absolutely #idk to some degree generally i try to approach stories on their own basis at least initially #e.g. focusing on DN in terms of characters rather than distinct questions of ethics like whether or not light is actually doing good etc #but. recently i think i’ve been questioning that a bit #it’s just hard to separate it out entirely even if unintentional y’know #also it drives me nuts when people do the ‘uhuhuhuh um acktually. 🤓👆light was right’ schtick #no he was fucking not!! #it is core to DN imo that light very rarely has to actually interact with his victims #to see them for their humanity or personal mindsets or lives #the ways in which they might’ve been pushed to crime one way or another through the circumstances of their lives #idk it just falls into that classic mindset of seeing criminals as ‘doing evil for evil’s sake’ #and refusing to see the very real human motivations that exist behind every crime #ultimately light is completely unwilling to engage with any moral quandaries because of the nature of his mindset surrounding KIRA in the #first place & the selfish motivations he personally holds #ironically he sees himself in the exact way he refuses to see any of the people he passes judgement on #sighh idk. is any of that coherent #again yeah it’s hard to piece this out fully w/o good context of the japanese justice system #but also like… i mean light is killing american criminals too. by proxy he is almost undoubtedly falling for the same racist bias inherent #to the american justice system #and any other biases racial or otherwise present in justice systems worldwide #or even outside of those justice systems i mean yeah he does some ‘research’ or whatever for most kills #and only tries to target the worst of the worst at least initially #but c’mon #they say it in series— the crime rate starts dropping incredibly once KIRA is well known to the world #how low do you think light ends up dropping his standards? esp once mikami gets involved #note that his reaction to mikami’s claims is never ‘that’s wrong’ but always ‘that’s too soon’ #he WAS planning on getting rid of all the so-called lazy and useless parts of society at some point #there are flaws inherent to light’s approach yes but he’s also kind of fucking terrible regardless #he does not respect or connect with the rest of humanity in the slightest #light sees himself as being above the rest of humanity, as the peak ideal that everyone should strive to be. once you start getting rid of the most egregious offenders, how soon does the mindset transform? when you start killing off everyone that isn’t like you? it’s a blessing, frankly, that light only reigned for 6 years. i cannot imagine what the world would’ve looked like if he had a full lifetime of that kind of power @moonlarked (OP) read your tags and you’re absolutely right! tbf death note is super fucking vague about what light “counts” as criminality…I dunno if he researched the American prison system or whatever when killing Americans but death note doesn’t seem to know either! like yeah he absolutely killed war criminals corrupt politicians evil rich people etc etc but i think the sense of dehumanization is really important here

yeah death note is very much not interested in breaking the status quo at all or meaningfully criticizing the police system for obvious reasons (it’s a crime thriller that has no interest in being anything but entertaining) but i think it’s interesting to expand on the implications of the characters with the ideas of totalitarianism and state sanctioned violence in a death of the author kind of way

(obviously i am coming from a western viewpoint, if anyone familiar with the japanese criminal justice system wants to go more in depth with this feel free to, I’ve definitely heard interesting ideas in that regard)

[lambsearandlavender]

The other day my husband was like, "ok I really need to confess that I like (my best friend's husband) less and less every time we interact" and it was such a RELIEF

And we talked for like an hour about all the reasons she deserves better and why he went from "kind of boring and moderate politically but overall nice" to "spineless, truly only cares about himself and people he personally knows, low empathy for anyone else, increasingly finding out how conservative he is, and treats my best friend *fine* but not at all *how amazing as she deserves* and also so fucking white bread stick in the mud etc"

And it sucks because he's not abusive, he's not mean, he's fine. He does shit that incredibly pisses me off but like, it's not stuff that's egregious to her.

The best way to explain it is, she is straight upper middle class and very privileged; and like in college she would always always fall for moderate to conservative guys, homophobes, etc and is just willing to overlook and forgive SO MUCH in a man, like.... she'll just shrug and be like idk it doesn't affect me and he's nice to x people Overall even if he thinks x politically and whatever

And I'm the rabid queer feminist friend who is like frothing at the mouth bc she's liberal and I'm like WHAT DO YOU MEAN HE DOESNT BELIEVE IN ABORTION BUT KNOWS YOU DONT WANT KIDS

To her credit she doesn't excuse homophobia or transphobia etc anymore bc she has moralls yall, really fucking good ones, but she still agrees to disagree on so much shit that I could never

And I just look at her moderate to conservative husband and his shitty truly awful family and speaking as someone who had to go no contact with their in laws, and my husband is low contact with them, I'm like GIRL DO IT. TRUST YOUR GUT. THEY FUCKING SUCK AND IF YOU MOVE STATES TO LIVE CLOSER TO THEM LIKE YOUR HUSBAND WANTS, YOU WILL BE ABSOLUTELY ALONE AND AWAY FROM EVERY SINGLE PERSON YOU LOVE AND THEY WILL *D E S T R O Y* YOU

They literally cause so incredibly much drama in her life from halfway across the country and are not nice to each other or her, do not communicate like literally the worst communicators most secret keeping bullshit people I've ever had the displeasure of meeting, they're so fucking awful and he wants her to leave every single thing and person she knows to live near them. He literally moved to our state temporarily, made friends, fell in love, and chose to marry someone who said they never wanted to leave this state, chose to stay here, has a whole life and friends and support system up here plus her family are the kindest most loving and generous people, and now he's like no we need to move to my state and my shitty unsupportive family in a state where you don't have friends like I do here, where you have less rights, etc

I want to scream

I'll never tell her any of this unless they divorce, of course, but I really can't see him ever doing anything bad enough for that in her eyes

I just. Yeah. I like him less every time we talk and I'm glad my husband and I are on the same page and it's frustrating.

[h-worksrambles]

Overdue thoughts on Fire Emblem Warriors: Three Hopes

I’ve been meaning to talk about my reaction to the latest Fire Emblem Warriors: Three Hopes trailer, and now I’m finally gonna do it. This isn’t some super in depth theory crafting. Much like my Kingdom Hearts IV post this is just some early reflections.

I’ll start with what I’ve noticed in terms of gameplay because this’ll be the shorter part. Also, I’ll just quickly point out that most of my Musou knowledge comes from the two Hyrule Warriors games. So if I sound ignorant about specifics of Dynasty Warriors gameplay, it’s because I am. Just a heads up. 

One thing I’ve been consistently impressed by in Koei Tecmo’s latest Musou spin-offs is how committed they are to trying to make them feel like part of the series that spawned them. Persona 5 Strikers and Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity both perfectly match the graphical style of the games they’re based off. They also both pull a ton of aspects from the gameplay of their source material and blend them with Warriors gameplay. Sure enough, we have already seen Combat Arts, Gambits, Adjutants and the class system in these trailers. Combat Arts are particularly neat, since OP special moves are a Warriors tradition, but letting you choose from multiple ones is a neat bit of customisation (or maybe it’s already been done idk). Teaming up with allies on the battle field for group attacks is also cool as is more control over AI allies, but I hope this doesn’t replace actually swapping characters which I think is a great mechanic for these games both to keep variety, and bolster their light strategy elements. Three Houses’ training is also back, and hopefully will be used to cut down on the typical Musou grind rather than increase it.

Ok, that’s all I can observe from the gameplay as far as I can make out and it all looks great. Here’s hoping there’s not any egregious performance issues.

Anyway, onto the story. So far I’m getting major vibes of Age of Calamity. This very much appears to be an alternate timeline, much of which revolves around our new protagonist, Shez. The idea seems to be that Shez’s absence was the main reason Three Houses played out the way it did, and now that they’re here, things may go differently. 

Incidentally I’m glad Shez isn’t a silent protagonist. Byleth had more characterisation than your average silent protag, but they really couldn’t carry a story without the three lords (see Silver Snow for proof). I’ve already praised the new redesigns, and yes they are all chef’s kiss. But I wanna talk chronology. Anime ages are hazy at the best of times, but from what I see, there is definitely a timeskip here and they do look older, but the changes are way less pronounced than they were in Three Houses. The war has not been going on for five whole years it seems.

The game also seems to be going out of its way to tap into some unexplored ideas from the original. For instance, we see a pink haired warrior in the trailer who could very possibly be Holst, Hilda’s previously unseen brother, as well as a new character who resembles Claude (another member of the Almryan nobility?). Even Monica seems to be here, though the jury’s still out on whether this the real or Monica or simply a disguised Kronya. 

Shez also has a companion figure much like Sothis named Arval, but this guy’s whole colour scheme resembles the Agarthans. I know that, as such, some people are expecting a twist villain but I actually hope not. The Agarthans were probably the weakest part of Three Houses’ story as they hindered the game’s gray morality by being obvious villains who masterminded many of Fódlan’s worst aspects. Giving them a sympathetic god figure similar to Sothis, or at least having one Agarthan who isn’t cartoonishly evil could provide them depth, much like the Nabateans.

And of course, we gotta talk about Byleth. 

I think posing Byleth as an antagonist is a great reversal. It takes their silent, borderline Gary-Stu/Mary-Sue nature and turns it into something threatening by turning it against us. Nice to see them living up to the Ashen Demon name. And supposedly, they nearly killed Shez at some point in the past and the story is hyping up a rematch of sorts. However, I highly doubt they are a true villain. We see that their name and gender is still decided by the player, which implies they’re playable. So I’m expecting a dual perspective story simillar to Gaiden and its remake Shadows of Valentia. This would mean switching between Byleth and Shez at story intervals much like Alm and Celica, leading up to their second confrontation. Then again, this game apparently has three routes, so I don’t know how this could logistically work in that context. Interestingly, Sothis’ narration in the first trailer makes some comment about revenge and given how, normally, only Byleth can hear her, that implies to me that maybe Jeralt’s death plays out differently in this timeline. Could Shez themselves be involved? We’ll see I guess...

Lastly, there’s the question of whether this game will have any kind of ‘everyone lives’ golden ending. On the one hand, Three Houses is supposed to be a tragedy. It has no completely happy ending and I think it’s a better game for it. That being said, the Warriors crossovers have often been kind of fanfic-y. They’re bombastic fan-pleasing spectacles that run on hype, and Age of Calamity specifically set itself apart as an AU so it could run wild without contradicting Breath of the Wild. I see no reason Three Hopes couldn’t do the same. Though the fact that it still has multiple routes means that unless there’s some Fates/Sonic Adventure 2 ‘last story’, it probably won’t have a fully happy ending. So maybe bring tissues to be safe.

There’s still a lot we don’t know, but I’m still really excited. I loved Age of Calamity (though I suspect some people would shoot me for saying that because something, something ‘false advertising’) and this looks to bring a lot of the same buckwild AU energy to one of my favourite Switch titles. Plus I’m just looking forward to seeing these characters again, AND using them to curbstomp entire armies. I just hope the playable roster is up to par, considering how much I love Three Houses cast. 

But yeah, long story short, I’m incredibly excited. 

[oswald-privileges]

ALL RIGHT BUT YOU ASKED FOR IT

Power of Three as a series is just. full of weaknesses, most of which come down to poor continuity and structure. I'm not gonna try and fix ALL of those, bc that'd be laborious as hell, but I will pick out things that I feel are the most egregious as case studies.

What Po3 does have, tho, is an absolutely shining strength in the concept of its three main characters. After twelve books of Blandly Heroic Protagonist Syndrome, Jayfeather is an absolute godsend. He's angry! He's rude! He's unhappy! He's not nice. I Love Him And He's My Son. Lionblaze has his invincible pride (hah) and emergent bloodlust, and Hollyleaf has her moral absolutism and certainty. These are good starting points for characters. Sadly, the lack of continuity undermines what could have been three really good character arcs.

So! I present to you:

HOW TO MAKE "WARRIORS: THE POWER OF THREE" NOT COMPLETELY SUCK ACCORDING TO MY PERSONAL TASTE; A NON-EXHAUSTIVE, NON-CONSECUTIVE LIST BY ME

ONE

- Have there be a persistant, overarching series threat. Sol is a character with amazing villain potential who does literally nothing except hang around, and do exactly 2 Bad Things completely off-screen. This Is Not Good.

- Instead, have him be present from the second book onwards- initially introduced as a friendly but enigmatic outsider who is slowly revealed across the series to be a complete black hole of a personality, a social parasite quietly rearranging whatever community he's a part of to just-so-happen to benefit him as much as humanly possible. His "preach individualism not starclan" methods are not so much values as one strategy out of many. (to those who know me- yes i have a type. no i will not apologise.)

- Maybe his ultimate goal is to dissolve and centralise the clans or something so that he can live out his life as a political puppetmaster in all the cat-luxury he likes. idk it's hard to imagine overall stakes for this rewrite BECAUSE THE ORIGINAL DOESN'T HAVE ANY

TWO

- For gods sake you don't have a series based on the premise of "the main characters develop super powers" and then only have the second power confirmed by the end of the fourth book. I understand the first book mostly focusing on Jayfeather- his powers are obvious from the start, he's got the strongest personality of the three, he gets access to most of the prophecy plot stuff because of them. But you NEED to have the other two show an interest in something concrete happening to them beyond that, and you need to at least hint towards the other two having something unique to them even if nobody clocks it yet.

- Have Jayfeather tell his siblings about the prophecy by the end of book two at the latest. The amount of time he spends noodling around not sharing it with them is inexcusable. It's not that it's out of character for him to hang onto a secret for a bit, it's just that there's no point and it slows everything down. It would be equally in character for him to go to his siblings and be like "look, i'm SPECIAL. well you as well but ALSO ME". Boy starts off as desperate for recognition, what can I say

THREE

- Have Jayfeather discover that StarClan don't withhold signs or information on purpose for the sake of "building courage and faith" or whatever nonsense. Seeing and communicating the future is metaphysically very difficult, so interpreting signs and messages is a genuine skill, or even an art. The cats of StarClan, however, really are just ghosts, much more similar to living cats than the currently living believe. This is the impotus for Jayfeather's discarding of his reverence for StarClan, which remains consistent throughout the series.

- Have Hollyleaf and Jayfeather both still change their cat careers in the first book, but put place more attention on the fact that they basically switched jobs. Have a scene where they end up yelling at each other, because can't the other see how lucky they have it? The tension breaks when they realise they've both lost something important to them- Jayfeather his chance to prove he's as capable as a sighted cat, and Hollyleaf her path to helping her clan in the way she thinks is best. They commiserate together, and reluctantly promise to do the best they can with their lots, so they don't waste the path the other wishes they'd taken. This closeness is eroded over the series as they disagree more and more on the subject of StarClan and its role in their moral choices and obligations.

FOUR

- Speaking of Hollyleaf! I nearly threw my phone across the room when the first Omen of the Stars book claimed that Hollyleaf "worked so hard to discover her power to help her clan". Where, Ms Erins??? I would have LOVED to have seen that!! Hollyleaf expresses absolutely no concern over the details of what power she has/will develop, and only has a couple of scenes even touching on her ambitions to help her clan. She has some vague ideas about becoming leader and like one scene where she gets to do some leadery things, but that never gets followed up on. What does happen is that the whole "warrior code" thing becomes more and more a part of her personality (for no clear reason) until she snaps.

- Hollyleaf going off the deep end is something I wanted so badly to get into and be moved by, because I could see where it comes from! Her moral certainty is fascinating, especially since it's based in something as abstract as the warrior code- which, when you think about it, isn't really... anything. There's no concrete set of rules that make it up, no traditional wording or cat philosophers, not even any fables. It's a handful of agreed-upon, common sense rules- don't cross boundaries, don't take prey that isn't yours, respect your ancestors, and don't murder. That's it!

- So, combining the above points, I think Hollyleaf not being one of the Three should stay, but both the audience and the characters are given good reason to believe she is. By around the third volume, make it so that Hollyleaf has found that her power is to get cats to "Do The Right Thing"- i.e. what she wants them to do. She sneaks off often to see Sol, who teachs her how to use this power. Her siblings are concerned about this new power, having already gotten a glimpse at what Sol can do, but she's confident that she can only use this power for good. Volume-specific plot happens, Sol manipulates her into causing him to win, she is shocked and horrified, and vows to stick ridgedly to what she knows is right i.e. The Warrior Code

- However, the more fervently she tries to stick to this abstract idea, the less it gives her results, the more her power seems to be failing. Believing that StarClan is taking her power away from her, she becomes caught up in a faith-guilt spiral that puts her in the position to snap at the end of the series. By that point it's clear to her siblings that Hollyleaf has no power- she was just very, very good at persuading people to do what she wanted.

FIVE

- Lionblaze is a girl now because I Said So. This Cat Is Trans And There's Nothing You Can Do About It.

- Her relationship with Heathertail stays the same- childhood sweethearts who are torn apart as they begin to understand the nature of the societal divides that exist between them.

- This can be used to contextualise the whole "half clan/outsider blood" thing as a cultural contradiction. In reality, inter- and outer- clan relationships aren't at all rare. They can't be, otherwise the whole society would be inbred out of existence in like five generations. But if at least one society of humans can spend a good 200 years pretending Sex Is Bad And Sinful Actually then cats can have persistant cat-racism in the face of all logic. Heathertail clocks this contradiction, Lionblaze doesn't.

- Her relationship-to-power arc doesn't need changing all that much either, other than starting much sooner and being more consistent. At first, she's completely overjoyed by her power, since unlike her siblings, it lines up so well with her ambition- become the finest warrior any of the clans have to offer. As the berserker rage aspect becomes more prevelent, she becomes more and more disturbed by the fact that she isn't disturbed by what she can do, and that she doesn't want the escalation of her power to stop.

- Tigerstar still does his thing, but Brambleclaw knows about it. He recognises the signs from when his father used to visit him, and tries to train Lionblaze in his own way. She ends up caught between wanting to be a good warrior, and testing the limits of her power.

SIX

- Jayfeather can stay basically the same because he's my perfect little angy boy and nothing needs to change. His arcs can be strengthened by having a more robust relationship with Yellowfang where they try to out-bitch each other, and coming to terms with his internalised ablism. Maybe he has a chat with Mothwing about faith a couple of times. Him furiously lashing out at being offered help transitions into an acceptence and understanding of his abilities more naturally. He never stops being A Grumpy Old Man.

- All fucking past-lives unexplained time travel goes in the BIN. Doesn't fucking happen. You can have that lore dump sprinkled across the books, or come from going deep into the tunnels and having a surreal meeting. Make it properly eldritch-level scary, shake Jayfeather's confidence in the idea of them being just a bunch of ghosts.

SEVEN

- Have the way Brambleclaw and Squirrelflight present very clearly as parents to the Three be explicitly, textually unusual. One of the things I liked so much about the first series was an almost total lack of emphasis on who was mated with who, and who was related or not. It felt very real to how feral cat colonies form, where raising kittens is a communal job. This gets completely dropped the moment series 2 starts and now the cats have monogamy.

- This emphasis on the family unit and fostering close relationships between parents and kittens is deliberate on the part of both Leafpool and Squirrelflight. Their aim is to cover for Leafpool so she doesn't lose her role as medicine cat- something she already gave up Crowfeather for before she was pregnant.

- In that little bit of backstory, have a robust reason for both Leafpool and Squirrelflight to leave the camp while Leafpool is pregnant and giving birth, possibly one that ties into the present day story in some minor way. I don't know how, it would just make that element of the story a lot more ground than "we left, the kits were born, then we came back and everyone was cool with it"

- When it comes to the "I am Not your mother" reveal, Jayfeather and Lionblaze are confused and hurt that they were lied to, but come to the reasonable conclusion that well, since they were raised mostly by Squirrelflight, saw Leafpool often, and are loved by both, they don't hate her. Lionblaze has something of a crisis over being half-clan, possibly initiating an attempted reunion with Heathertail. Jayfeather is more concerned with how other cats will think it makes him lesser, something he's still sensitive too.

- Hollyleaf, meanwhile, completely fucking snaps at the way her mother Violated Part Of The Code. It's a completely irrational reaction, but expected because she's been growing more and more reliant on The Code for the whole series, and less and less stable in her attempts to aid her clan and train to be its new leader.

- Squirrelflight is the one to murder Ashfur. This is easy to work out while reading- she's literally the only one of the four with a motive who isn't a perspective character. The mystery is less around finding out who did it, and more about why she did it (it's very ambiguous as to whether it was an accident or not). The main tension comes from who finds out when.

- Lionblaze is shocked, awed by how far she'd go to protect the three of them, and reassures her she did the right thing (as a way to salve her own uncertainty over her own longing for violence). Jayfeather makes it all about himself because he's Jayfeather- upset that he didn't know immediately, instead of, you know, figuring it out in a few hours because he can basically read minds. They try their best to hide it from Hollyleaf, who is already rattling around the final volume as a full-on antagonist, but are unsuccessful. This almost costs them something incredibly important- possibly Squirrelflight's life.

EIGHT

- the whole plot with the Tribe Of Rushing Water is a MASSIVE can of worms that could be removed from the series without issue. As it is:

- Characterize the Tribe as uncertain of how to fight other cats, because yes, they haven't had to do this before. DON'T characterise them as pathetic, doing whatever their leader says without thinking, and with ancestors who have Given Up

- Have some of the Tribe be really good at the violence. Worryingly good. Have others be sickened by what they're being asked to do.

- Have some of the clan cats reflect on what they've done. Hollyleaf would be all for introducing this society to jesus The Code, but even she might be horrified at being thanked by a tribe cat who can't wait to get out there and win themselves glory, only to be killed a few hours later

- The Tribe begin a new tradition of marking the walls in the mud they use as camoflage in order to commemorate their battles, and memorialise the fallen. One of the characters reflects on the fact that in a generation or two, the Tribe will feel like it's always been this way. How many of their own traditions- those that feel almost like natural law- started out the same way?

- Have Sol as the leader of the invaders, or maybe having insinuated himself into the tribe as a "mediator" and doing his charismatic cult leader thing.

NINE

- Cinderheart isn't a reincarnation of Cinderpelt. She's just named after her bc Cinderpelt saved her mother from a badger. this is because I think the reincanation thing is stupid and I can't think of a way to make it good.

TEN

- No more using tails as hand gestures like covering people's mouths. Never. None of it. It's expunged from existence.

Disclaimer: I haven't read Omen of the Stars yet, so I can't account for anything that might happen in that series that's grounded in Po3. I'm like... two thirds of the way through the first volume. I'm Not Impressed.

[lambertsdaddyissues]

Dumping this here because i dont want to clutter up my main but WOW the way fandoms treat female characters & bend over backwards to justify hating them... insane

A female villain? Fucking irredeemable, never mind that (white) male villains who do objectively horrific things have widespread fanbases.

A female antihero? Well ummm ackshully she's abusive and bad and idk i just can't justify liking her because she does such Bad Things!! Never mind that I stan all her male antihero counterparts lollll

A female side character? She's soooo underveloped I can't actually get into her character!!! (Sidenote, would you like to see my 100k longfic about a male side character just as undeveloped as her?)

A female (morally grey) protagonist? WELL ACTUALLY HERE'S HOW TO INTERPRET HER AS BAD AND CREEPY AND EVIL AND AN ABUSER SO THAT WE CAN ALL JUSTIFY HATING HER!

A female protagonist who is just objectively a good person? Ugh, she's just.... not compelling... tragic.... that OR we need to nitpick and misinterpret her tiniest actions to justify disliking her despite her being written a genuinely good person!! OR she's just a mary sue!!!

And it's even more fucking egregious when the character is a woman of colour lmao like fandom will find any excuse to hate her :))

(Obligatory disclaimer that yes you are allowed not to like female characters but if you constantly find yourself inventing reasons to hate female characters whilst stanning their male counterparts it does start to look like [internalised] misogyny lmfao)

[cryptidsandcatacombs]

What If I Killed Someone For You

Rating: absolutely postively adult for violent yandere content. Anyone under the age of 18 better go away. No reading allowed for anyone under the age of 18. Plus there's like one adult joke in here so no one under the age of 18 allowed for that reason either.

Summary: This is literally fueled by my love of yandere content #nojudgingcringecultureisdeadandikilledit. Noe better watch himself because he's been my muse lately. Anyways uuuu idk yandere stuff here so you know someone's getting stabbed. We should probably do something about that, but we're not gonna. Thems the rules chief. No, you can't stop it either you total fucking killjoy. I'll start stealing toes if you do. What will I do with said toes? Black markets are a lucrative business and I need the money cause I'm broke fam. So really it's the economy's fault that I'm chopping toes. Say thanks late stage capitalism. This is brought to you by idk the monster under your bed who chops off the toes for me. He gets paid by the hour so try no to run too much ok.

Oh and this fic contains lyrics from If I killed someone for you by Alec Benjamin. Yes I'm inserting song lyrics into a fic like it's the early 2000s.

I'm packing up my things and I'm wiping down the walls I'm rinsing off my clothes and I'm walking through the halls I did it all for her So I felt nothing at all I don't know what she'll say So I'll ask her when she calls

Would you love me more? If I killed someone for you

Oz was considered by most a laid back sort of guy. Never angered easily. He can get frustrated like every other person, but not so easily angered.

However, despite his laid back nature, he had a vice. Jealousy. One that he was very self aware of. He often tried not to let it get the better of him, but there it was. A beast clad in green with eyes of emerald staring him directly in the fact tempting him with its siren song.

The siren song came in the form of Noe Archiviste and....whoever this girl was that was hanging all over Noe right now. She had a voice as sweet as molasses and brown curls that fell down her shoulders like waterfalls. She would run her hands over Noe and look at him with her doe eyes. She was a cute on overall. Couldn't blame Noe for taking interest if it was there.

He seemed to not the mind the attention he received from the lady...nor the frivolous compliments....nor the blatantly flirty way she seems to be touching him with every caress of his hands into hers and the way she wraps her arms around his neck.

Oz's eye twitched. Oz could have stuffed down all this rage and envy that suddenly sprouted from the ether, but jealousy was truly Oz's vice. One he wasn't planning to fix any time soon. He wanted to sit there and be happy for his dearest Noe. Stay to the sidelines and be happy for his good fortune for love is one of the greatest things you can find.

However, there was another urge. One just as strong.

"I want her to die," cried Oz's thoughts. "I want her gone. She can't take Noe away from me. She can't. I know him and I aren't together in a romantic sense, but...I don't want her taking away my chance either. She has to go"

"Now now Oz," said another voice in Oz's head, "You know that's wrong. You can't go around getting rid of anyone you see as a competition or obstacle towards someone you care about."

Oz was prone to scolding himself at times like these. He always held himself to high moral standards. Sometimes too high. To the point of self-loathing. Impressive if you ask the writer. Self awareness? Bitch please for shame. This isn't a call out post for myself. What is it you may ask? Hey, we're getting off topic you little trickster. You're supposed to be a reader. Not breaking the fourth wall.

"Yes yes I know I can't do that. I'm not going to. That still doesn't save me from any form of feral urge to wring her neck and ship her body down the river and hope and have her loved ones pray she can be identified by her dental records. Fuck does she even love him. What if she's out to hurt him or worse just wants him for his body? Look at him! He's gorgeous. Who can blame her? What if she doesn't love him like I do," said Oz's internal thoughts.

"Oz you're being dumb. She might love him unconditionally too and he deserves that for himself," Oz argued internally with himself back.

"I know I know, but I'm just saying what if. I just don't like the idea of him getting hurt nor the idea of her taking him away from me. I'm entitled to that feeling aren't I," Oz continued to debate with his voice of reason.

"Fair, but lets just wait and see. He's a big boy and can handle himself," Oz's voice of reason stated.

"Yeah a big boy in more ways than one I bet," said the third internal Oz voice of being horny and all around slutty that constantly lives there.

"This is getting us nowhere," Oz himself decided to just cut the internal argument off before it turns into a blood match to the death. This was disturbing his routine of stalking Noe for ...research purposes.

Oz looked over to now see them sitting down at the nearby cafe. They were seated across from each other. Oz noted Noe might be enjoying his usual coffee or tea. He liked it extra sweet either way. The man has one hell of a sweet tooth.

"Yeah I bet that brown haired hussie doesn't know that, but I do," Oz thought to himself smugly.

Oz looked back at Noe's companion to see her touching his arm and doing the egregious crime of looking into his magnificent purple eyes. Wait....was she now touching his face?

"You lucky bitch," Oz thought to himself this time with anger brows drawn on the words for dramatic emphasis.

Oz ran his fingers through his hair in frustration. "Damn it! How long is this date going to last? I hope it stops before I puke up a lung," Oz thought to himself this time internally rolling in pain.

Hours passed and Oz with surprising tenacity had stayed there all day following Noe around with the clever disguise of wearing a hat and ya know some shabby clothes. Truly no way he could be recognized. Yep, he's got it all figured out.

Oz decided to follow them home from a fair distance. Oz looked up to see the sunset. It was starting to get dark and Oz hated the dark, but he hated certain people who might harm those he loves even more. A little nyctophobia isn't gonna hurt.

Oz followed quietly until he noticed they stopped in front of a flat. It was her flat. Noe escorted her to the door like the gentleman he is and waved her good night. Oz had found a nice dark alleyway to hide in so he wouldn't be spotted.

Noe headed towards Oz's direction which caused Oz to hide deeper into the darkness. Oz bit his lip from the anxiety of being found and having some explaining to do. Like who was he kidding? This disguise was paper thin!

Noe looked like he was passing by Oz, then stopped. Oz froze. Oh god had he spotted him?

Before Oz could register what happened next, Noe had gone in a flash. Oz knew he was fast, but he couldn't see where he went.

It was then a grunt and the sound of what seemed to be something getting bashed against the wall behind Oz. Oz slowly turned to find Noe whose hand was pressing something against the wall.

It was then he grabbed whatever he was holding and slammed it again. Oz stared into the darkness to see his eyes glowing red to match the blood on his gloves.

After another slam, the clear sound of bone cracking from the impact could be heard. Noe dropped, what Oz could assume, the now lifeless body of the person he just killed.

Noe turned to see Oz and Oz froze. "Ok ok maybe he doesn't know it's you," Oz thought to himself. "Oh I know."

"Aye top of the morning to you," Oz did in his best Irish accent that he could muster.

Noe leaned down and inspected Oz. Oz could only look at Noe confused as Noe lifted Oz's arms and looked over Oz's face and the rest of his person.

Noe then gave a sigh of relief. "Good, I was afraid he had hurt you Oz," Noe said putting a hand on Oz's shoulder.

"Wait, you knew it was me," Oz said face turning hot.

"I mean, I'd recognize you from anywhere. You're not hard to miss," Noe pointed out.

"Oh uuu so what happened exactly," Oz asked now curious about the now lifeless elephant in the room.

Oz went to look at the supposed body only for Noe to yank him back and shook his head no.

"You're squeamish," Noe said taking his bloody glove off, putting his now bare hand on Oz's face,"I wouldn't look."

Oz shuddered taking Noe's advice.

"The man had been following you. I know of him. That vampire right there would have killed you where you stood if I hadn't done something," Noe said honestly.

Oz batted his lashes in shock taken aback. "I...almost died," Oz asked.

Noe nodded. "Fortunately, he doesn't kill in broad daylight, so I had to wait til night. I had just noticed him following you today. I don't know how long he's been doing it for, but if I had noticed earlier, he would have been dead on the first day," Noe nearly growled out. "I'd rather not have killed him in broad daylight either,ut if I had to, I would have," Noe wanted to point out. "If he had attacked you, I absolutely would have."(edited)

Oz turned pale. "W-wait, when did you notice I was...," Oz said not knowing how to word his next question.

"Following me," Noe asked for him, "Since I left the house. You're not exactly subtle."

Oz blushed. "Oh uh sorry I was just curious as to what your daily routine was like and then I noticed you had a female companion, so I was trying to see if you were safe," Oz said nervously.

"Her? She was lonely and needed company, so I obliged. She's a bit friendly, but so am I," Noe pointed out.

"So are you...interested in her? Dating her even," Oz asked getting to the point.

Noe shook his head. "Not in the slightest," Noe said heading towards the body making effort to cover it up. "I'll dispose of the body in a minute. Let's take the back ways so I'm not caught soaked in blood. I need to get you home," Noe said quickly leading him back.

"Wait what if someone finds it," Oz asked fearfully.

"This will be quick," Noe said picking up Oz and speeding off.

Oz could often forget how fast this unstoppable force of a man was.

A few minutes later, Oz was back on his doorstep. Oz rubbed the back of his neck looking towards Noe wondering what Noe was going to do now.

"Now, go inside and don't come check on me. I don't want to have to hide more bodies this evening should more make the fatal mistake of coming after you," Noe said waiting til Oz got to his door.

"Ok ok," Oz said opening his door.

Oz waved Noe off as he sped away to do the dirty work.

Later that night, Oz flopped over into the bed still registering the fact he just saw Noe Archiviste straight up body a man. The sweet, gentle lamb of a man just increased the body count this evening. The man was now a statistic in vampire based deaths. Truly mystifying.

Oz wanted to stay up and see if Noe was going to be ok. However, sleep took Oz before Oz could make any quick decisions. It had been a long day.

As Oz slept, Noe crept in with any blood soaked clothes supposedly disposed of. Noe bent down and ran his fingers through Oz's hair.

Noe's fingers drifted to Oz's pulse on his neck. Long has Noe fantasized about marking Oz's neck. The thought made him shiver, but he couldn't. He couldn't bare to do it with him possibly not consent as marking someone like that is a big deal.

Noe pressed a little more of the pulse of Oz's neck. The beat made Noe's heart race and what Noe could swear was drool. To be so intimate with Oz to the point he trusts Noe to drink his blood. It was enough to make him shiver.

Noe shook himself from these thoughts. He couldn't give in. Not without Oz's permission.

Noe got up quietly and shut Oz's door bedroom door behind him as he left. He couldn't bare to kiss Oz's face good night as he was afraid it would trigger something in him.

Noe fled out the door into the dead of night towards his place. He wouldn't let any harm come to Oz. Even if that danger was himself.

[thatyanderecritic]

i really like the yandere dynamic but i dont openly post or reblog about it anymore cuz i've had people give me a hard time over it being problematic. and i get told im terrible, get called a freak... idk. do you have any advice for dealing with this...?

Hey anon, sorry for not getting to you sooner. We have a lot of questioned queued up to be answered but I decided to put you first since this is a pretty big issue. 

To be a yandere fan, we’re in a rather precarious position. Like any fandom, we are plagued with bad apples that end up painting the community’s face as a whole. You know the type of bad apples that all fandoms have: the overzealous stans that either attack those outside the community for not sharing a view or catering to our fandom. We also suffer from infighting/bullying between yandere fans because not everyone shares the same views on what a yandere is or even for something as stupid as a yandere headcanon for a character that never was a yandere, to begin with. But unlike most fandoms, the works that we support tend to go against us at times. That is to say... since we’re a bit of an under “funded” (e.g. don’t have enough yandere media. Especially for male yanderes) fandom, people tend to quickly put CrAzY characters on a pedestal without question. And this hurts our credibility, ALOT.  Having group within the fandom worshipping some non-yandere, psychotic girl as a yandere just because she’s kawaii while the more “sane” fans try to explain, “No, we swear yandere’s aren’t like that” doesn’t look good for our case. 

Is there anything we can do about people attacking us for our preference? Not exactly, I’m sorry to say. The moment humans gained self-awareness and free will, universal mental unity became a myth. There will always be a disconnect, even on concepts that all humans should be in agreement on. Would you believe me if I say that some people don’t believe that people should be allowed to have a livable wage? Of course, people will have their reasons as to why they think a certain way regardless if it sounds logical or not. Just because they have a reason doesn’t mean it’s reasonable but in a world where emotions is king, logical will never win.

People who attack you for liking yanderes most likely were victims of abuse and went through some sort of trauma that yanderes are usually identified/linked with. If they weren’t direct victims then they know someone who is a victim. And if it isn’t either of these two, then they’re most likely a bleeding heart with a “higher than thou” sense of morality. Regardless of the reasoning, they all have their hearts in the right places but rigid in their perspective of the world. Already, the decision is cemented and may never change. To most, we’re as egregious as pedophiles and incest-lovers just because we like villains. After all: “How in the world could anyone remotely ‘like’ such awful people?! Clearly, there is something wrong with THEM.” Of course, we have our reasons for liking yanderes but most people close their ears and eyes since they already judged us based on our interest. For those who were victims of abuse or know someone, I understand that they’re reaching out to attack those who seem to defend characters that may or may not be similar to their assailant/abuser. They attack, they defend invisible victims, and in a way, looking for purpose... looking at how they can turn their trauma into a positive. But most of the time, they overstep their boundaries and try to enforce their authority in something they don’t understand. 

The only way we can approach these types of people is to send an open invitation for a diplomatic talk in trying to reach a middle ground. While a change of opinion would be nice, it would be nearly impossible since a lot of people are grounded in their personal moral compass. If they are open for a conversation, then all hope is not lost. Ideally, if a conversation is open then the most important thing is to validate their emotions invested in this situation. 9 out of time 10, people are stubborn in an argument because they feel like they’re getting personally targeted either by their identity, their pride, or their emotions. Therefore, they double down and become louder in their argument, not because of their view but because they believe they are defending themselves. From there, once the other recognize that you aren’t attacking them, you shift the conversation onto yourself and point out how they were making you feel the same away but they were actively attacking you; not only that, treating you as less than human just because you prefer villainous FICTIONAL characters. Ideally, at this point, the other recognizes their hypocrisy and you both agree in staying in your own lanes. If by some miracle they’re open of a different perspective, then you’re given a platform to say why you like yanderes... typical reasons being the idea of unconditional love or coping. 

But this is all hypothetical and the most desirable outcome. But more than often, people are more than comfortable at screaming at you every time you try to open your mouth... most likely something they learned because someone shut them down in such a way. Not only that, they most likely formed their own counter-arguments already since a lot of yandere fans have the same reasons as to why they like yanderes: unconditional love or coping. The counter-argument can usually be boiled down to two reasons: unethical and risking future victims seeking a “yandere” partner. Ethicality... this is a low hanging fruit to argue. Everyone (well the majority of people, again it’s universally impossible to be on the same page) would agree that it’s bad to stalk a person. Even a yandere fan would say never to stalk a person IRL. But because of this, they think they got you in an “ethical checkmate”. It’s a cheap argument and they’re just trying to make you feel like a monster for your preferences in fictional characters. Funny enough, this is a tactic that abusers would use to shame their victim into compliance... hm...

The second counter-argument people use is “think of the youths!” Let’s be real... it’s scientifically proven that kids and teens are easily impressionable because of their underdeveloped brains and lack of experience. Not only the concerns of the younger members of society, they fear that by allowing us to enjoy our media, we are “normalizing” abusive relationships in society. Considering the state of the United State’s government, I understand where the fear is coming from. But they’re barking up the wrong tree and especially using the wrong method in preventing this dystopian future. I always see these people bring up the ‘Jaws’ case as to why there should be no yanderes and no support for them. You know, the case where there was a sudden increase in shark hunting due to public fear which pushed certain shark species into endangerment. It’s always this argument, I swear... anyways, they always toss this without never diving in deeper as to why this happened. 

Before Jaws, people didn’t know anything about sharks in general. There just wasn’t any interest in sharks because we humans just didn’t find time interesting at the time. They were there and we can’t really eat sharks. But, there were already tales about sharks being “man-eaters” from those stranded out at sea or curious citizens. The stereotype was already there. But Jaws brought sharks to the forefront of public scrutiny and shark hunting competitions came up because “what’s the harm? Sharks are man-eaters”. This dropped the shark population, but because of this there was an interest in sharks, funding to research them suddenly increased. Scientist turned their attention on sharks while later on fed to informing the public, making them educated and less scared of shark attacks. Jaws came out in 1975... Shark Week on the discovery channel came out in 1988... there’s a reason, folks. People became interested in sharks. Yes, Jaws hurt the shark population but it’s slowly been going up. Damage takes time to repair. But it also brought about awareness. While the stereotype isn’t dead (that’s just humans at this point and it’s always been a stereotype ever since man was on a boat), it opened a conversation. And that’s the key point here. (Here’s a link. But you can go even further if you research)

Abusive relationships, manipulative people, toxic actions... these are nothing new. “Getting rid” of yandere fans will not solve this issue, just like telling your kid “there are kids starving in Africa” will not end world hunger. For the Jaws example, I point to the argument that politicians make about how video games create violent people. We know that it’s nonsense, you know it’s nonsense. But there is a fear of the “unknown”. People back then thought that cartoons like Tom and Jerry would cause kids to grow up violent. And even further back, people thought that reading books created lazy people. The fear on what’s on TV is a fear people had since the beginning of time. People aren’t as soft as they believe they are but they can lack information... Instead of shutting down people and censor what goes on TV, use it as a stepping stone for the bigger conversation. It’s a lack of knowledge and fear of the unknown that killed the sharks but it is knowledge that is now protecting them. 

This is especially important for our younger peers. Raise of hands, who actually changed their minds as a teenager after someone called you stupid or told you “no” with giving a logical reason besides “because I say so.” I’m going to guess we got an empty room here. Attacking our younger peers or those who are older just because they like a character trope IS NOT HELPING THEM AND ESPECIALLY NOT MAKING THE ATTACKERS LOOK LIKE HEROES. THEY LOOK LIKE JACKASSES. Fuck man, the younger ones want acceptance and looking a supportive group by joining a fandom. Calling them toxic just pushes them to the edge these people never wanted them to be. The same applying to the older ones. We all got our issues and y’all never know what it is. That’s why I hate seeing people in our fandom gatekeep against our younger peers. They’re going to come in even though you say crap like “Lmaooo, my blog/game is 18+! Okay, byeeeee!” If you want to protect them then be their fucking guide, my dudes. You can have a mature conversation with them and explain the difference between fiction and reality and what’s wrong and right. “Yanderes are pretty cool, ay sport? But notice how that guy gaslighted the girl? That is a common tactic people do IRL. Be sure to recognize it as a red flag.” Fuck, is that so fucking hard for everyone? Some people act like they never grew on the internet during the early 2000s.Y’all were a teenager once. If what you’re doing wouldn’t help teenage you in the past, then you’re doing it wrong. Smh. 

Finally, I do want to make a point for those who use coping reasons. While I do understand where you’re coming from, you guys are our most vulnerable to these attacks but also the reason for the attacks as well. It’s the mindset of “How could you support something like this?! You must be a horrible person.” I know a lot of people aren’t like that but also, we got bad apples... people who take this for coping reasons way too far. To them, I ask them to come back from the edge and let’s look for help together. Using yanderes to embrace “yandere tendencies” or rationalizing your abuse as normal isn’t the way. Use it to help you breathe and help you feel grounded but don’t let it define you... especially don’t make it a lifeline. As for those who know the difference and can separate fiction from reality, I applaud you but you got some work in helping those who are too deep. I’ve seen some of the yandere Tumblr group chats on the app. I’ll be real... YIKES. It’s a bit of an echo chamber. I ended up having to message a user on a side since I saw red flags in the group chat when I was lurking. People were trying to give the wrong help by encouraging their actions. Just... don’t do this y’all. I get you relate but don’t get your homie in jail or a court date for a restraining order. 

Anyways, I’m sorry anon for pulling farther and farther away from you specifically since this is a big issue that everyone tackles and I’m also sorry that I can’t give you an “end all” answer. First, you can try having a civil conversation with these people. Try for the middle ground and if you feel like you can push further, then try to do a change of mind. But I know this is hard, especially when tensions build and emotions get heated. But it’s important to never explode that anger... or at least direct that anger into a logical response. The moment you explode and made an error of judgment, you will lose and suffer publically. If a conversation isn’t possible, then encourage these people to stay in their lane and unfollow you. Why the fuck are they following you if they hate the things you reblog? Sounds unhealthy... suggest some hobbies or blogs to follow instead. From there, if they try to continue the hate, just block them and delete the messages. As they say, don’t feed the trolls. Y’all may think you’ve seen all the hate anons we get but we get a lot more than what we answer. We just delete them because they’re typically incoherent or stupid. They don’t come back lol. 

From there, anon, surround yourself with people who you find agreeable and who you relate to. A lot of yandere blogs are down for a talk, I’ll be real. Just be sure you open up that you want to be friends lol. So... yeah. I’m sorry this isn’t perfect, but I hope it helps. Don’t be afraid of being yourself!

[marwankenzarisgaylittleearring]

Your vampire AU is awesome! Too many good parts but faves are Joe who is so true to movie Joe in his exhuberance and warmth, and Nicky in awe of how beautiful Joe is - I've never related with Nicky so much. Idk if you will write a sequel but if there is ever a continuation, please can Booker get a happy ending, I love that French idiot. Thanks for sharing <3

IM SO GLAD U LIKED IT !!!! i’m not necessarily planning a sequel but there are just so many extra bits that i would have liked to fit in there that are just wasting away in my extra-bits file, and okay, for you, i will put in the little joe&booker interaction that was supposed to go in there somewhere (that i tried to fit in 3 different times and never ended up being able to use) under a readmore here bc i, too, love that french idiot

(this was meant to come right after the first feeding)

Once Dr. al-Kaysani is finished inspecting himself and Nicolo equally, has re-dressed and packed away his remaining equipment, they make their way back down to the front hall. With suddenness Sébastien’s playing stops, and Nicolo hears his brother’s footsteps behind them.

“Nico,” he says, opening the door to his bedroom. “Have you seen my- oh.”

The grin on Séba’s face makes Nicolo think that he was only waiting to catch a glimpse of his guest. His choice of bedmates is no longer scandalous to the rest of the Family, and Sébastien does not object morally to any of it, but that does not stop him from being annoying. Nicolo sighs and casts his gaze up to the heavens.

“Sébastien, this is the doctor al-Kaysani.” He says it with some gravity, to ensure his brother does not make a fool of both of them. “Dr. al-Kaysani, this is my brother Sébastien.”

Being preoccupied as he is with sending silent prayers to whomever may be listening that Séba keeps his mouth shut firmly, it takes Nicolo a moment to notice the twin-look both men are wearing.

He does not miss, however, when the doctor laughs heartily. “I know you!” He exclaims.

“Nicolo, are you quite aware of the company you keep?” Séba’s tone is jovial, his grin mean. He has not looked quite so carefree in some time. “The esteemed doctor Yusuf al-Kaysani, yes, we’ve heard a lot about him. But nothing quite so egregious as his taste in sports teams.”

“Repeat that without your brother between us, dear fellow!” The doctor croons.

“Last I did that you broke my nose.”

“And set it, too!” His hands land on Nicolo’s shoulders, and he grins broadly. “Mr. di Genova, you have been living with the inspiration of this project all this time and did not tell me?”

He is saved from answering by perhaps the strangest thing that has happened all evening. Sébastien advancing towards the two of them and wrapping the doctor up in such a hug Nicolo wonders quite how long they have known each other prior to this. His heart aches to see the way Dr. al-Kaysani’s hand fits against the back of his brother’s head.

[iamchrissi]

II’ve seen Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald.

Short non-spoilery thoughts:

The animation is top notch. The story is... meh. Like, the idea isn’t bad, but it kind of didn’t really grip me. The character work varied very much from some truly good scenes to ... well. All in all it’s not a terrible movie, but I’m not sure I’d call it a good one either.

FULL SPOILERS UNDER THE CUT:

I’ll start with a short outline of the plot:

Credence survived the last movie and is in a magical carnival in Paris, with his girlfriend Nagini. Grindelwald escapes. Due to hijinks, and Dumbledore’s influence, Newt ends up in Paris, and brings Jacob, who remembers and has been in a relationship with Queenie. Tina is there for work, and Queenie to visit Tina. There’s also headhunters looking for Credence, as there are rumors he the last male Lestrange, Leta Lestranges brother, who disappeared as a baby. Credence and Nagini escape looking for answers into his past. Tina, Jacob and Newt look for Credence, and also Queenie, who wanted to visit Tina but never arrived. She ends up with Grindelwald, who tells her she’s innocent and lets her go. Leta Lestrange and Newt‘s brother Theseus arrive, too, to find out about Credence. Eventually, Leta tearfully confesses that she’s known for sure that her little brother is dead since she was a little girl and blames herself for it, making it impossible for Credence to be said brother. Grindelwald calls for a great assembly of wizards and witches interested in his ideology. He gives a grand speech and shows them visions of WWII. Queenie, Jacob, Tina, Newt and Leta all listen to it, while the aurors including Theseus show up. They kill a listener, which Grindelwald uses to prove the others that he is right. He asks them all to bring his message into the world. Queenie, who has been promised a world where she can marry Jacob, joins him to the loud protests of Jacob. Grindelwald kills pretty much all the aurors other then Theseus. Credence too, joins him while Nagini protests. It looks like Leta might join him, too, but she instead tries to kill him, essentially committing suicide by villain. She looks in the direction of both Newt and Theseus and says ‘I love you’ before being disintegrated. Nicholas Flamel shows up to help contain the curse Grindelwald cast. They manage to stop the curse, and a niffler brings Newt a piece of jewelry that Grindelwald treasured. He later brings it to Dumbledore, stating it’s a blood pact. In the last scene, Grindelwald gets advice on how to approach Credence from Queenie, and gives him a wand. He also tells him that his name is Aurelius Dumbledore.

So, thoughts:

- Let’s start with the last part. I very much hope that the whole Aurelius Dumbledore part is a lie, because otherwise Rowling just broke her own world. According to Rowling herself Dumbledore is born in 1881. His mother died when he was 18 (1899 or 1900) and his father has been imprisoned in Azkaban since before that. Yet, this movie wants me to believe that in 1927 he has a little brother that’s under twenty? I know writers can’t do math, but come on, this is egregious. Also, like a dead little brother wouldn’t have shown up in Rita’s book, like, really.

- Staying with Dumbledore, he was surprisingly good. Like, with all that ‘he’s not gay here’ that I heard before that, I expected the worst, but he is actually good? Like, there is a scene where he is interrogated by aurors who want him to duel Grindelwald, and he refuses. They bring up the fact that they used to be friends, as close as brothers, and Dumbledore immediately says that they were closer than brothers. Later, he stands in front of the mirror Erised, and he sees both Grindelwalds current face (god is Johnny Depp ugly) and happier memories of their time together. Jude Law sells the hell out of that scene, and though it’s never said openly, you’d have to be blind to miss the fact that Dumbledore is still in love with Grindelwald.

- He has quite a few other good scenes, like asking Newt to go to Paris, where you can really see him going for a manipulation that would have totally worked on Harry. There‘s also a scene where he tries to comfort Leta about her little brother, stating that he lost his sister, and when she asks whether he loved her he says that he didn’t love her as much as he should have. That was a pretty good scene.

- And then in the end they kind of ruin it by saying that the blood pact is the reason Dumbledore didn’t fight Grindelwald, and now that Newt brought him that piece of jewelry he can go fight him. I very much preferred it when it was an emotional decision not to fight his old love. This blood pact just seems like a get out of jail free card, so that Dumbledore’s not to blame for anything. Idk, I like my Dumbledore complicated and morally grey at times.

- Also, Dumbledore did not teach Defense against the Dark Arts! He taught transfiguration!!! He was still teaching that when Tom Riddle was at school! Minverva McGonagall started teaching in the fifties, not the twenties!!!!

- Seriously, there was a female Professor McGonagall at Hogwarts in Newt’s and Leta’s school time in the movie. This makes no sense. And we know it can’t be a relative, because McGonagall is the name of Minvera’s muggle father.

- Leta, on the other hand, was a very pleasant surprise. She is an actually three dimensional character, who is complicated and kind and I really love her, guys. We actually get flash backs of her school time, how she made friends with Newt, which is super cute, and also a very sweet Slytherin/Hufflepuff friendship. Her whole backstory is just super tragic. Like, her father, a rich old wild pureblood, saw her mother, who was married and had a kid on her own, but he imperiused her and made her come with him. Then, the mother died giving birth to Leta, but her father never loved her because she’s a girl. And then he marries again and has a son which he totally dotes on. And then, when travelling to America per ship, Leta, who looked like she was somewhere between five and seven at oldest in that flashback, exchanges her constantly crying baby brother for the sleeping baby next door, just so she can sleep for a bit, but then the ship sinks and the baby she exchanged is saved with her while her actual little brother drowns, and she blames herself for it despite having been a child herself. Like, darling, let me hug you. And people are talking about her missing little brother and how her father doesn’t love her all the time in Hogwarts, and she’s mean towards those, but she is also kind to Newt, who is kind right back, and oh my god, I didn’t expect so many feelings about Leta Lestrange. And she just feels so well rounded.

- And then she dies. And I feel very conflicted about it. Because on the one hand, it makes sense that her character would choose to do this. Because she blames herself for her brother’s death, and she has been really unsettled and depressed and she finally unloaded the true story, and you can see how she feels that she can die now, that death is what she deserves and that it would be a relief. There’s a line after she tells the story where Newt tells her that it’s not her fault (and he’s right!) and she says that he has always loved every monster, that just describes her feelings very well. So it makes sense she’d do a suicide by villain. On the other hand, this is kind of textbook fridging, what with it being used to bring Newt and Theseus closer together and finally giving Newt the motivation to fight Grindelwald. Like, textbook fridging, and the fact that the black woman, one of three named black characters, commits suicide and feels like a monster also makes me uncomfortable. Like, I am white, therefore it is not my place to speak on this and if I’m wrong I’m truly sorry, but it just felt kind of racist.

- Also, I’d have really liked to know what she sees in Theseus? I mean, he’s not a terrible character, but we do not see anything that explains what those two see in each other. And there is also no explanation as to what Newt took the fall for, or why they stopped being so close. And the fact that she looks at both brothers when she says ‘I love you’ made for a nice scene, but still no answers as to why she ended up engaged to Theseus.

- Meanwhile, Queenie became an asshole. Like, Jacob doesn’t think they should marry because of discriminatory laws, so she puts him under a love spell that has him do everything she wants? Of course, the movie doesn’t acknowledge what a horrific consent violation that is, but I do. And then she has a mental break down in Paris, because so many people and her being a legilimens, which... not a bad idea, only later she never has any problems with it again despite being among even more people, and last movie it wasn’t a problem either. And then she joins the man who wants to kill and enslave all muggles, because he promises her she could marry her muggle. Like, yes, she’s supposed to be naive, but she’s not supposed to be this bloody stupid.

- Jacob spends the whole movie running after her, essentially. He’s even more of a comic relief character than last time. In the end he makes a principled stand, which was good, because otherwise the whole character would have become a joke, but even so it was on the edge at times. Why he remembers is handwaved, in a way that doesn’t really make sense, but I guess that’s to be expected.

- Tina is nice and good at her job and unreasonably jealous when she hears that Newt might be engaged to Leta, which totally fits her character, though. I like that she’s still shown to be kind and caring towards Credence but also principled and tough. Newt and her also have a very sweet scene where he tells her that it’s actually his brother who is engaged to Leta. She is not shown to react to Queenie’s defection at all, though, which was just weird and unfortunate, because like, this is her sister. Her choosing to work with a dark wizard is something that Tina should at least somewhat react to.

- Newt is still Newt. He has an assistant to help take care of the beasts, but she is in only one scene. Dumbledore’s manipulation kind of not really working fit, as did that he didn’t even realize it was manipulative, because Newt just thinks so very different from Dumbledore. And it was cute that he decided to go to Paris only when he realized that Tina was there. His relationship with his brother made a lot of sense, given that they simply don’t speak the same language, metaphorically. I’d have loved to see more of him and Leta, though, because I love Leta.

- Credence story as a hunt for truth made sense. Ezra Miller was amazing. And that he ends up back with Grindelwald, with the visual callback of Grindelwald craddling him like in the last movie, also fit. I’m not at all interested in the Aurelius Dumbledore angle, but I’ve explained that above.

- Nagini. Nagini, Nagini, Nagini. It has been discussed by and long as to why her whole story is offensive, and I won’t be able to say anything that hasn’t been said better before. The movie doesn’t redeem the story. Nagini is there to be Credence’s kind, sad girlfriend.  The actress is pretty good, but she couldn’t do much with a script that mostly just needs her to look sad and hold hands with Credence. She survives the movie and is seen to stick with the heroes, which would make me feel way better if I didn’t know how she’s going to end.

- Nicholas Flamel also shows up for a bit, but without his wife, which ... doesn’t really make sense, but at this point I’d kind of given up on coherency.

[bomberqueen17]

I have friends who buy pre-prepped chicken breasts from a supermarket rather than from a local butcher, not because they are grossed out by cleaning (which I understand cause I freak out about texture) but because it's somehow less dissonant with their love of animals, which...

Yeah, I’m not super into handling raw meat-- well, I wasn’t. I’m sort of over it now. But I get it, it’s real gross and unnerving. 

And I can see dealing with that being too heavy for some people. My mother-not-in-law shivers and tells me to stop whenever I mention any hint of what I do at my sister’s farm, and says “if I think about it too hard I’d never eat anything but tree bark”, and I get that attitude, I do. But. 

To then go on and seem to genuinely believe that since you don’t see the gross part, the gross part never happened, is really infuriatingly willful blindness.

Not to get into it too much, but I kind of feel the same way about people who eschew meat entirely but then never look at where their non-meat food comes from. I get it, factory farming of meat is gross as fuck (link is to a New Yorker article about a chicken processing plant), and if you’re woke enough to notice that, kudos to you-- but industrial farming of vegetables is also, at least in the US, heavily based on exploitation of workers and deeply enmeshed in the degradation of the natural environment. Anyone can sort of pick a point at which well, you just have to eat something, and that’s fine, but an awful lot of people pick a totally random point where they decide they’re cool with it, and then from that point proceed to be all, IDK, self-justified about it. 

This case, that my sister was talking about, is egregious because it’s so obvious that the point this person chose to stick at and get self-righteous about is the gross shit happens where i don’t see it and that’s the only moral way to live, which is utter nonsense. But, as you say, not all that uncommon.