#just going ahead and reposting this because I'm sure the original is long gone

[sopheadraws]

When it comes to Brittany S. Pierce, people’s interpretations are all over the place. It ranges anywhere from <3 innocent babie <3, to severely cognitively impaired, to manipulative liar who pretends to be stupid so others obey their will (which I’ll later accuse her mother of, but that’s neither here nor there). Anyways, I’m adding my opinion into the cacophony because, despite the indecisive fanbase, thorough Brittany meta is lacking in quantity. Also, I tend to think my opinion is best, as is human nature.

This analysis is rooted in autistic!Brittany, and while its unnecessary since I’ll go through many of her autistic characteristics, here’s a post detailing the headcanon and a medical article describing the diagnostic criteria in simple terms if you’re unfamiliar with the disorder. I understand that not everybody considers Britt neurodivergent, and that’s totally fine - I’m always up for a healthy conversation/debate! - but please give me a heads up if you plan to respond critically because a lot of this is based on my own experiences as an autistic teenage girl, so unmentioned critiques can feel personal fast. Now without further ado:

A Deep Dive Into Brittany S. Pierce <3

Auditory Processing Disorder “APD” is a subdivision of Sensory Processing Disorder “SPD” which is a quintessential element of an autism diagnosis. APD is pretty much exactly what it sounds (haha pun) like: despite somebody’s hearing abilities, the brain fails to process auditory input properly. The APD trait I hear discussed most in autism spaces is the inability to filter out background noises, but Britt seems to struggle most with interpreting meaning from words. Sometimes when people talk to me (“dolphins are just gay sharks”), even though they’re speaking clearly and I’m very literate in English, it sounds like jumbled nonsense (“dulfanz-our-goost-gae-shorcks”). This accounts for what I’m calling Brittany’s “so close you can taste it” lines. Think of her claim that Christopher Cross discovered America or that O is the capital of Ohio; a man named Christopher C. is indeed credited with discovering America and O is the only capital letter in Ohio. As a whole, they often misunderstand things told to them directly, and it seems a lot less foolish if she only understood half of what was being said via APD.

I’m calling the category of Brittany lines that can’t usually be rationalized as possible by anybody over seven (e.g. Rory the leprechaun, storks delivering babies, and anything with Lord Tubbington) the “stranger than fanfiction lines.” Now, I could take these at face value and say she’s tapping into a magical dimension, but I have my own set of autism driven realism issues, so, without a pre-existing fantasy world, I’m using my significant brainpower to twist Brittany into plausibility =D I ultimately think the best explanation for the stranger than fanfiction lines is echolalia. Echolalia is the repetition of words or phrases, and it’s usually associated with autism. Autistic people often reuse other people’s words, and since we usually think in pictures and have various social communication problems, it’s easier than formulating new sentences. Or we just like the tongue movements/sound a word makes. Personally, I quote songs a lot - if you say something loosely related to a Taylor Swift, musical, or Glee lyric, chances are I’ll sing it - and dipsomaniacal is a new fave to say randomly. There’s some evidence for Britt doing this in canon, unrelated to the stranger than fanfiction lines. While Brittany is known for calling him Blaine Warbler, it actually originated from Rachel and the infamous spin the bottle kiss. They also repeat ‘uber weird after Blaine in the That’s So Rachel reading, and the last line of that scene is them talking in time with Blaine, a behavior seen in S1 with Santana. However, it interests me most that she calls Artie a robot, as we see her dad call Stephen Hawkin, another wheelchair user, a robot in S6.

Basically, I blame the Pierces for how terribly adjusted their child is <3 (Mostly Whitney. Assuming Pierce actually has an IQ of 40, he’s disabled too and deserves some slack in terms of spreading misinformation.) In her admittedly limited screen time, Whitney manages to do two positive things: be an LGBTQ+ ally and let her younger daughter do soccer, I guess. Otherwise, she kept the truth about Stephen Hawking from Brittany for 20 years, cheated on her husband on their honeymoon for claiming infertility, crapped in random barns, insulted her husband’s intelligence, publicly insulted her husband’s appearance, and arguably restricted her daughter’s intellectual growth. To be honest, I realize Whitney isn’t that deep and I don’t actually hate her, but if people can hate Brittany for being a comedic character from the 2010s, I’ll do the same thing to their mother in defense of Brittany. Fight stop the violence with violence, baby! Anyways, I don’t think echolalia alone can explain the stranger than fanfiction lines. At least, not without a source. And that’s usually where upbringing comes in.

I’m ruling out nature automatically because there aren’t chromosomes telling people to believe in unicorns. Well, some people - including autistic people (hehe see what I’m doing here?) - are more inclined to believe falsehoods, but falsehoods have to be fed by someone else. With autism, the reckless believing tendencies come from literal thinking in part. Also, since SPD makes processing the outside world difficult, we often can’t recognize “obvious” truths in the first place. My extended family hated watching movies with me because I used to ask questions every five seconds lol. Setting Pierce aside because he seems to follow Whitney blindly; Brittany’s unnamed sister, Sue, and Whitney are the remaining suspects.

I assume Brittany’s sister is significantly younger than Britt because she played soccer with a seven-year-old in S1 (technically she could’ve been the coach, but that throws off my theory that the Klaine/Brittana wedding was child free), and children aren’t clever or mean enough to throw off anybody’s world view so badly :) Sue does seem the obvious answer, but she didn’t meet Brittany until they started high school, and she’s consistently baffled by Britt’s behavior despite encouraging her own eccentricities in the other Cheerios. And that leaves Whitney as the perpetrator, blaming her Scientology and gambling addiction on a cat.

Finally, I do think there’s a few times when Brittany intended for her jokes to be jokes. I don’t think it happens as much as you might expect, but there’s a scene in S3 when JBI is interviewing Brittany about her class president candidacy, and she tells him she’s voting for Rick “The Stick” Nelson before turning to Santana and laughing that clued me in. I think the mentality behind these lines (the “pun intended” category) is best explained with an anecdote from my own childhood.

When I was little - maybe six or seven - I really wanted to be funny. Well, I wanted to be liked, and since I didn’t understand social cues, my solution was humor because I knew my dad told jokes which made me laugh, which made him likable! Unfortunately, as a literal thinking child, I had no idea how to do this, which meant I parroted the only joke I knew (“What time is it when an elephant sits on the table?” “Time to get a new table!”) in hopes of chuckles. This went about as badly as you would expect. After a while, my parents got rightfully fed up with this joke and got me a joke book. I had no sense which of these jokes were funny, which wasn’t helped by most of the book being about taxes, bad marriages, and other stuff aimed at adults.

It wasn’t until a routine walk to the convenient store that my comedy dreams were fulfilled. My dad, little sister, and I used to walk to the “snack store” to buy a drink each and share a candy bar. While we had some routine favorites, we also tried out new candies together. However, there were a few bars my dad refused to buy because he’d disliked them prior to our snack store outings. Most infamous of these forbidden fruits was the Zero Bar. We tended to reference the Zero Bar when picking our next treat, and on this fateful day I said, “It’s called the Zero Bar because zero people like it.”

And my dad laughed. He laughed because of something I’d said. I was elated!

The only catch up was I hadn’t actually intended it as a joke. After all my attempts to be funny, the only thing that apparently worked was speaking my mind. This singular incident didn’t rewire my understanding of humor - I attempted the parroting tactic with the Zero Bar joke after all - but it’s the most pivotal moment in my mind. To this day, I play up my neurodivergent thought process to make others laugh. I reference Glee at seemly unrelated times with mock enthusiasm to callback times I’ve mentioned Glee with real enthusiasm or talk about my other interests in forced monotones.

There isn’t any actual evidence that Brittany has the same weird complex about humor, but some of their interactions regarding stupidity parallel it. In general, when they’re away from Santana, Brittany appears fairly insecure about her neurodivergence. I might even go as far as to say that she doesn’t joke without Santana around. Now, I don’t think Britt knows what her atypicalities are until they’re presumably diagnosed at M.I.T., but every neurodivergent person I know knew something was wrong before being diagnosed. (I want to talk about how Blaine’s diagnosed autism is a foil for Brittany’s undiagnosed autism at some point, but you didn’t sign up for autistic!Blaine, so now isn’t the time.)

Anddd, that’d pretty much it for now :) I intend to write more in depth Brittany meta in the future, but this is a decent overview for the time being. I hope this made you think, and I’d love to hear your thoughts if it did!

[thedrarrylibrarian]

I'm so excited to have my friend, @babooshkart join me in the library today! Although I’d seen their art and always enjoyed it before, I really fell in love with her 25 Days of Harry and Draco series, and that’s where our friendship first started (just in case you’re wondering, this piece is my personal favorite from that series). She’s here today to chat about art and to help me announce something new that I’m excited about in the library. You can read our conversation below, I’ll be DL, in bold and Babooshkart will be Boo. I had an amazing time talking with Boo, and I hope you have fun reading our conversation!

DL: Good morning! Thanks for agreeing to come chat with me today!

Boo: I’ve been looking forward to this all week, thank you so much for having me!

DL: Aww! I’ve been looking forward to this too. I’m especially excited to have you on to help me introduce my new feature, Art Mondays, since it’s really thanks to you that I had this idea. I’d been thinking for a while about if the library should try to include more art, but I wasn’t sure how to do that, or if it’d even be something that people were interested in. And then you told me how much it meant to you to be tagged in that post about artists I enjoy, I felt like it was a sign telling me to go ahead with it.

Boo: You’re gonna make me blush! I’m so unbearably excited for this new feature, and really flattered that I could be any sort of catalyst for you to create it. I know a lot of artists (obviously myself included) rely on rec blogs to help us find our next read – and possibly art inspiration – so it means a lot that you’d have an art feature!

DL: I think that artists are such an important part of our fandom community, so I really want them to feel included in our library community as well. I’m always encouraging people to leave kudos and comments on fics, but I want to give a way to show support to artists as well. Reblogs are what helps art to get traction, right?

Boo: For sure! I mean, I personally post some of my art to AO3 (mostly fest-related stuff, and I treasure every kudos and comment that I get there), but Tumblr sees every piece I make, and people reblogging them is the main way to get them really circulating in the fandom.

DL: Reblogging is good, but reposting is different than reblogging. Have you ever had your art reposted without your permission?

Boo: A lot of times, and it’s really frustrating. I’ve actually gone off of making art for Wolfstar, because I had a piece that I made for my friend Mari @onbeinganangel reposted so many times. It’s sad, because I loved that piece so much!! I don’t understand reposts, especially since tumblr and Instagram both have such clear ways of sharing art to personal blogs and accounts without reposting. So I will always be thankful to people who like/reblog/share, as it’s for them that I’m putting all this art out onto the internet!

DL: I feel like for a long time, especially as a fandom newbie, I heard about reposting but I didn’t understand it. Reposting is when someone takes your art (or your fic or something that you made) and posts it on their own account as if they are the person who made it. Even if the reposter gives credit, it’s still hurtful because someone took your work and put it somewhere you can’t control without your permission. 

Boo: Exactly that. Originally I had a much gentler reposting policy, but after having my work put on so many different accounts where the reposter was claiming them as their own artwork I don’t allow any reposts, even with credit. I’ve also had reposts that would be defensive about not crediting me as the artist, or just respond “idk, I found it on Pinterest”. Now I go after reposts like a dog with a bone. It strips the joy out of creation, to have your work stolen. It’s very similar to some people exporting AO3 fics to Wattpad or fanfic.net–once that happens, we (the creators) have no agency over our own work. 

DL: That sucks. So to clarify, reblogging is different than reposting. Reposting is taking that work and posting it under your own account, whereas reblogging is just sharing the artists’ original post.

Boo: Exactly! Reblogging (or sharing the post to your story on Instagram) is actually a super helpful way to get the original artwork out into the community! And a reblog is a useful tool – people who want to see more of that artist’s work can just click right through to their blog, rather than trying to hunt down the credit in some way.

DL: That brings us to the Library’s new feature, Art Mondays! Art Monday is going to be a single reblog of a piece of art that I’ve seen and enjoyed. I don’t feel qualified to give my thoughts on art like I would for a Happy Hour fic, but I still love seeing it and I’m hoping this can create a space for artists in the library and promote fanart a bit more.

Boo: I’m so looking forward to this!!! And I wouldn’t worry about feeling qualified – I’m an artist and I reblog fanart with incoherent screaming in the tags and nothing else. It’s the loveliest feeling to have a fandom community space like the Library putting our work on display, and I can’t even begin to explain how excited I am! (It’s more incoherent screaming, that’s what it is!) Where will you be hunting down your Art Monday features?

DL: Ooh! Like where do I find them? 

Boo: Yeah! Will you be searching through tags, or relying on the dashboard? Stalking old fests?

DL: That’s a great question! First of all, I want to say that the Library’s Donation Policy will apply here, so if you’ve made art or see art you like and want to share it with the Library, please feel free to send me a link to the original post and I’ll consider adding it to Art Mondays (please know I make no guarantee that just because you’ve sent me something that I will feature it). So far, I’ve mostly found art through my dashboard, but I’ve definitely been stalking a bit also. When I see a piece of art that I like, if it’s Drarry it’s been going in the queue for Mondays. However, when I see one piece of art that I like, then usually I follow that artist for more. Something super lovely about fandom is that for the most part, following one artist means that I start finding more artists through them. So I have been scrolling (stalking) through artists’ blogs and using them to find other artists who I enjoy. I don’t search tags very often, but I did get into a “More posts like this” hole the other day and added 4 pieces to the queue that way. I’ve also been branching out a bit and following some artists such as yourself on Instagram, but I’m super lowkey there. I’m just lurking on insta lol. But that’s been a good way of seeing who has new art coming out because it’s usually being teased on stories there.

Boo: Oh my god you’re a lurker??? I have so much love for my instagram lurkers. I had no idea. This is so exciting! And yes, I adore that engaging more in fandom makes it so easy to find other creators with works that I love! I’ve made so many good friends by losing my mind in the reblog tags. I’m so excited to see what you have queued up!!!

DL: That’s something that I really love about Drarry, especially compared to other fandoms that I’ve been in. Of course there’s always going to be someone who wants to be a bummer and tear others down, but for the most part I see so much of our fandom going out of their way to be kind and lift each other up and share each other’s work. I’m thinking specifically of @the-starryknight’s Tuesday TLC Zone  and @phd-mama’s May We Lift Each Other Up series. I think that’s a really healthy aspect of our fandom that’s doing so much for us. When we celebrate someone else’s work, when we reblog or share, it makes it that much easier for other people to find it. And it builds relationships where others do that for us too.

Boo: It really does!! And speaking as someone who has only been involved as a fandom artist for the past year and a half, it can be shocking and exciting to have authors and artists that I’ve been following for years engage with my content. I’m always overwhelmed with love when that happens, and usually struck with an urge to create even more (which is amazing, but also agonizing because I do have a day job that takes up my time). Fandom positivity and respect means even more amazing fics, artwork, podfics, and rec lists because creators want to put that goodness out there! This appreciation goes to fandom blogs that aren’t creators too – I know I speak for a lot of artists when I say that I have some followers that I adore just because they’ve thrown so much love my way.

DL: I totally get you – I’m always so grateful when someone just says “Hey, I like your library.” It’s such a lovely feeling, being appreciated.

Boo: It’s so wonderful!!! Every time it happens, I’m like “I love you, do you want a painting dedicated to you?” Which of course is a little unsustainable, but the urge is there.

DL: A little unsustainable lol. Pesky capitalism. I do have one last question for you before we wrap up. 

Boo: Yes! I’m ready!!

DL: Are you currently reading anything, fic or published, that you’d like to share with us?

Boo: Ooh! I just finished Witness Marks by @gryffindorhearts, which was published for Fang Fest last week! That was a fun one because I was commissioned to do art for it as a surprise gift, but didn't have access to the fic, only bits and pieces that Starry gathered for me as references, so it was cool to read the whole fic and sink into the story. Next on the queue is @softlystarstruck's Fang Fest piece What Husbands Are For, which snagged me with "arranged marriage enemies to lovers". For traditional lit, I'm working my way through Harrow the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir (space necromancers!!!) and Under the Whispering Door by TJ Klune (ghost love story!!!!). Highly recommend both of them.

DL: OOOOH! Space necromancers!? Ghost LOVE!? You've got me convinced. Amazing.

Boo: Yeah YOU ARE!

DL: No, YOU! But seriously, thank you again for joining me and chatting. I always have so much fun chatting with you! And I think library patrons will enjoy this too! 

Boo: I’m so excited about this, and really honored that you asked me to be a part of it!

I hope you enjoyed our conversation, and please let’s support our local fandom artists by reblogging and sharing their art. And lastly, please join me this afternoon as I reblog and share the first post I’m featuring for Art Monday!

Lots of Love and Happy Art Monday!

[fandomspov]

･ ﾟ𖡼 ︎ִֶָ⁀➷

FERRIS-WHEEL | e. mikaelson

「 sᴜᴍᴍᴀʀʏ 」 ଽ elijah and bekah coming to mystic falls to search for klaus but ending up meeting you.

「 ᴡᴀʀɴɪɴɢs 」 ଽ swearing ; fluff ; angst.

「 ᴡᴏʀᴅ ᴄᴏᴜɴᴛ 」 ଽ 1k.

➪ ᴀᴜᴛʜᴏʀ's ɴᴏᴛᴇs ❝ hi loves, please don't steal my work and if you repost it make sure to give credits. requests are always opened, enjoy ❞

elijah and rebekah pulled up in the salvatore's boarding house driveway "do you think they'll help us?" rebekah asked and elijah sighed "i hope so" they got out of the car and came to the door, knocking three times "y/n go open the door" damon shouted from the kitchen

"why me?" you fought back making him roll his eyes "because you're the youngest and you're my best friend " you mocked with a sigh "fine"

you strolled over to the door and opened it with a smile "hello, how can i help you?" your brothers told you about the mikaelson, still you never knew how they looked like, but you knew about the vampires, werewolves, witches etc because you were a witch yourself.

elijah's lips curved into a smile when he saw you, you couldn't help but stare yourself. damn he is gorgeous "we're searching for damon salvatore" rebekah stated, suddenly you felt a hand pull you behind them. it was damon "what do you want" he interrogated the original siblings "you know all too well damon" elijah stated making your brother sigh "come in"

"elijah mikaelson" he presented himself as he leaned down to kiss your hand "y/n, lockwood" you blushed never breaking the intense gaze. you all walked over to the big table and sat down

"i never knew you had a sister" elijah pointed out grabbing damon's attention "first of all she's not my sister, secondly don't even think about it, mikaelson" damon looked elijah dead in the eyes but he just smiled, he knew he was in control, he was stronger than damon after all.

"we all know that stefan turned off his humanity and klaus is now using him, we need to get him to turn it back on and get my brother back" rebekah explained "yeah but we don't know where they are" damon added on "we're gonna find out"

"i think i can help with that" you popped into conversation making everyone turn to you "stefan talked to me the day he went on the killing spree, he said they were going to denver for a trip, they might be there". elijah smirked turning back to face the others "guess we're going to denver" getting up from the table you all gathered pit the door

"we're gonna split in 2, me and damon and elijah and y/n" bekah ordered and you nodded, already agreeing with the pairing "why can't i go with y/n, she's my sister. i don't trust him with her" damon stated "because. now let's go we have no time to waste" she said dragging a whining damon to his car.

"your car or mine?" you asked making him smile "mine" he opened the door for you and you got in, thanking him before "so are you a vampire?" he questioned "no i'm a witch and i guess you're an original vampire"

he nodded with a smirk, still looking at the road ahead "if you don't mind me asking, how old are you?" "over 1000, darling" you nodded your head with a shocked expression "that's a pretty long time"

after hours of torture, your powers were not as strong and you could barely do anything "elijah, have you gone soft for a witch?" klaus laughed making elijah pin him to the wall "what the hell happened to you, nicklaus? why are you doing this?"

"stefan let her go or else i'll have to get her myself and you won't love it" elijah earned getting closer and closer to where stefan was standing with you trapped in his arms, ready to take your heart out

"let's just say i was getting a little, bored" he smirked but they were pulled out of their talk by your scream making elijah use his speed to push stefan to the ground "i told you you won't love it"

he reminded pushing his hand through stefan's chest. all he could hear was your panting behind him but he was pulled away by someone "just let him go he's not in his right mind" damon said gripping stefan by the collar and pulling him up

while dealing with him, elijah was desperate to make you feel better. you used your powers to heal the wound with elijah's help you got back up "thanks" you told him.

you smirked leaning in to peck his lips "you're the best" you felt him put his arm around your shoulders getting a smile to creep onto your face, letting your head fall on his shoulder "want to go on the roller-coaster?"

you couldn't help but laugh at his joke, even if it was a little old school it was still funny "i'm still shocked that i got you to come here with me, i didn't see you as a carnival person" you explained making him smile "i'm not but what don't i do for you, darling?"

he froze in his spot, eyes widening "what? come on your a thousand-year-old vampire and you are scared of roller-coasters?" you mocked making him nod "yeah in fact i am, so instead let's go on the ferris-wheel" you shook your head with a laugh "what? it's more romantic, i can't kiss you on the roller-coaster, can i?"

"you have a point there" you smiled as you handed the tickets to the boy standing in front of the line, getting inside a capsule, praying that no one else would join. but luckily the ride started and no one else came in the same capsule.

"isn't this relaxing?" he said stretching his arms "not really, no" you said looking out the window, seeing how far you are from the ground "holy shit we're high", elijah let out a small laugh "are you afraid of heights?" "oh don't start"

"y/n lockwood, the 21-year-old witch of mystic falls is afraid of heights" he teased you gave him a small slap on the chest but suddenly the capsule started swinging from side to side for a small bit making you go on alert mode

"this is it, we're falling" you gripped the seat beneath you "calm down y/n it's nothing" he giggled pulling you closer to him.

"come on enjoy this moment, we're finally alone after all this time" he took in a deep breath "yeah, you're right" he nodded in agreement, letting silence take over "and this is the part where you kiss me and we start making out" you explained to him making him chuckle "i knew that" "mhm"

"come here" he smirked pulling you closer until your lips touch, melting into his arms. you never wanted this moment to end. it was perfect. everything was perfect.