#keep fighting the status quo

[yoylecake420]

This.

Vote for Kamala Harris. Trump’s plans will make America worse.

[asthedeathoflight]

I have too many wips already but hmm... Rembrandt time loop au....

[kraviolis]

with the rising fascism in the world, im not gonna trust any new medias with stories that make the villain an agent of chaos & terror while the hero/es fight to preserve the status quo.

[quietwingsinthesky]

I think what bothers me most about that argument is that dean is talking down to Sam so much

Implying that he’s not mentally sound and that dena HAS to be the one to clean up, telling Sam to stop moping about it and then ending it by saying he can stop acting like a bitch now?

That’s what they view as dean standing up for himself?!??!

I really like the Amy benny Emma situations cuz it tells us so much about dean (Sam too but mostly dean) but like so little of what it tells us is positive. ESP since I personally think so much of the benny stuff is projection like immediately telling Sam not to kill benny and assuming Sam will go after him and then immediately going after amy when he finds out about her

alsjfjlfjs I barely have anything to add here, you hit the nail on the head

the whole argument just. Dean does not come out looking good there huh. Especially the jab about Sam’s hallucinations. And the earlier line, “There are certain people in this world, no matter how dangerous they are, you just can't.” There’s no way Dean is saying that without knowing how Sam is going to hear it. That Sam is the dangerous thing that Dean could never put down. The whole shifting of this situation to be on Sam is (fun for me because I love when Dean uses how well he knows Sam to hit him where it hurts) really messed up.

Him starting with telling Sam he’s got a right to be angry, but then following that up with telling him he’s been angry long enough and needs to stop… i Need to chew on him, when did he decide he was the authority on how long Sam gets to feel resentful or to grieve his friend…

Something horribly delicious about Dean appointing himself timekeeper on Sam’s feelings.

[chronal-anomaly]

Thinking about the smell of ozone that follows Lena whenever she uses the accelerator,,,,

[askshivanulegacy]

Democrats do things on purpose too, like not voting to throw the election.

"how are the democrats so good at losing?" why don't you ask how the republicans are so good at winning?? stop acting like democrats are the only political party with agency. republicans do things on purpose.

[yanderenightmare]

♡ TW: NSFW, dubcon, bathroom sex, bullying, overall just really filthy smut, virgin insert, virginity loss, somewhat dom reader, somewhat bully reader, somewhat yandere reader

♡ FEM reader

You look like one of those girls that never smiles. Like, if he were to take that empty seat next to you in the lecture hall, you’d scowl with stink eyes and then proceed to fully ignore him. Yeah, a real bitch. That's what you look like—scary. He bets all your socials are filled with the same picture—the same deadpanned pouty face over and over, every single one with hundreds of likes and comments saying “Wow, babe!” followed by a dozen emojis from besties and horny admirers. Selfies in the mirror, showing off skin in your tight tops and short skirts—similar to the outfit you’re wearing now. Captions saying, “You can look, but you could never touch.” Yeah, he bets you’re a real attention whore. And the worst part is that you’re not even overselling, either. You’re gorgeous—even with that sour look on your face, he’d pay cold, hard-earned cash in exchange for a pair of your worn panties.

Yeah, there’s no way he’d dare sit next to you. He’s already sweating bullets just thinking about it. Even though you’re one in a million similar girls who wouldn’t give him the time of day, he's still one in a million loser incels who would do anything for it. And that’s the cold reality.

Even if he’d like to get just a whiff of your sweet perfume, he can’t. The status quo forbids it. He’s afraid the jocks will smell fresh blood in the water the moment he does, then swarm him in a matter of seconds, circling before tearing him to shreds. They’d beat him to a pulp in the bathroom, smash his head in over the sink—piss in the toilet, then flush it down with his bloodied face—and he’d have to walk reeking of it all the way home.

So, no—he really can’t sit next to you. 

But no other seats are available, and the lecture is starting soon… 

Why did absolutely everyone decide to show up today?

Oh fuck it, this isn’t high school. College bullies surely don’t bother with petty cases like this, right? They’re all about their frat initiations and rivalries to have enough spare time to beat him up over improper seating. Oh, but what if you’re one of their girlfriends—you’ll tell on him, and then he’ll definitely be beaten up, maybe even killed.

No. He’s overthinking—like always. No one is that mean. If you don’t like him sitting there, you’ll just tell him. And he’ll move. No harm done. Right? He’s not sitting in the stairwell when there’s a perfectly good and empty seat right there, right? Is he?

Yes. Yes, he is. 

“Hey, if you’re looking for a seat, this one’s empty,” a sweet voice calls out over his inner monologue, making him clutch the strap of his bookbag tighter with a flinch of his entire rigid body—his eyes peeled as he looked around to try and find the source of the sound even though he knew where it had come from. It’s as if the possibility of your voice sounding like anything aside from a she-demon was out of the question. But no, it is you. 

But there’s no way you’re talking to him, so he looks around again—there must be someone else in need of the seat aside from him. But then, why are you looking right at him? Are you pulling some type of prank? Are you really that cruel? You’re probably filming him or something—live-streaming—the chat’s blaring with ew, what a creep and omg, uggo alert right about now. He should just go home before the jocks, along with the rest of the internet, can get him.

“Are you okay?” you ask—but no, he must be hearing you wrong—there’s just no way, even though you’re looking right at him. “I think it’s starting soon—you should probably sit.”

It’s as if his fight or flight response is broken because he does the exact opposite of either—as if on autopilot, sitting down in a rush against his better judgment.

The lecture starts shortly, solidifying his choice, but he can’t pay attention. No, he needs to keep his guard up. Any second now, someone’s going to do a drive-by and throw a milkshake at him or something vile of the like, and you’ll have filmed it all even though he can’t spot you holding a phone—and then the entire hall would burst into laughter at his expense.

“Pst—” A soft whisper comes from next to him, from between the gloss of your pretty lips. You smell like candy and fruit, and it makes his gut tighten—both from anxiety and something more shameful. “I’m sorry to bother you, but do you have a pen I could borrow? Mine’s all out’a ink.”

You give him an awkward smile, and he very nearly runs away. But no, he’s glued to the seat—with nervously wrecked hands shaking as he bends for his bag and unzips it, reaching for his pencil case painfully slow as if disarming some type of bomb. Redoing the same when he opens the case and rummages for a viable pen he could offer.

When he hands it to you, he’s almost sure you plan to stab him with it. But you do no such thing.

“Thanks, you’re a lifesaver!” You cheer instead, beaming with a much brighter smile than before. “I owe you!”

His ears ring with your praise. Blushing beat red as he rips away from your gaze—still unable to focus on what the professor is preaching—not when from out of the corner of his eye, he can see you sucking on his pen like a lollypop—or something else not so innocent.

Oh, he’d been so wrong.

So, so, so very wrong.

You do smile. You smile a lot, actually. You just have one of those faces that rests bitchy. But still, bubbly airhead or not, a girl like you still shouldn't be seen with a loser like him. It’s social suicide. And still, you’re on your knees before him in a dirty little bathroom stall—the same dirty bathroom stall he feared getting a swirlie, scraping the walls with his nails to try and thwart his assailants—only, now clutching the walls for a much different reason, holding on for his mortal soul as you seek to suck it out of his fat throbbing cock.

You want to repay him—you’d said—for the pencil. He hadn't understood why you’d winked at him before you’d all but dragged him off and flung him inside the men’s bathroom, having his very life flash before his eyes.

You both make the sloppiest sounds as you make an utter mess on and of him, making him cry on all fronts—cock weeping with thick pearly beads of pre while his eyes well up with tears down his flushed face, all sweaty with panic and bliss. 

The moans springing from his chest are virginal and raw and sweet music to your ears, panting for you like a puppy—you’re sure they can hear him out in the hallway when passing by. One of his hands clasps itself on top of his mouth, holding tightly to keep it all within—eyes shut and brows cinched. And yet, he makes no effort to shove you off—hips left jerking and jittering in response to your refined technique where you take him deeply, all the way down to the base, hallowing your cheeks, throttling him with your throat as your tongue wipes his creamy slit clean.

It’s painfully clear he’s never experienced anything like it, but that’s what turns you on the most. Sick as you are, you could suck him dry and savor every drop of him, knowing you’re the first ever to get a taste. But no, by now, your pussy’s so soaked you feel yourself dripping past the soggy lace of your panties, running down your soft thighs in waste.

He’s misty-eyed when you pull off with an ever-cruel pop—a sick mix of relief and sorrow warping his chest, feeling conflicted by the pulse making him think he’s on the verge of a heart attack if you continue—and another strumming his cock, making him think he’s going to keel over and die if you leave him unfinished.

Even so, he’s in a state of complete shell shock as you mount him on top of the toilet seat he’s melting against. Chest heaving, watching you as you lift your skirt up and peal your slick underwear to the side for him to lay his bleary swiveled eyes on your bared and dripping pussy.

“I love nice guys like you—” you moan, pouring the honeyed words down his throat as you ghost his parted lips with your spit-slicked ones, straddling his lap and shimmying ever closer until your tits squish against his chest. “They make me so wet, I lose all self-control.” 

He gulps in your shadow, looking up at you for mercy—cock twitching painfully between your thighs as your wrap your hand around his base real snug, giving him a nice tug as you line him up with your needy heat—making him all but squeal beneath you.

Your other hand makes its way into his hair, braiding your fingers within the locks to hold him steady—gently pulling his head back while leering down at him like caught prey. Playing with him just so, teasing him with your words, all in your sultry voice, making his head spin hot with a fever, “You’ll be a good boy and fuck me, won’t you? Pretty please?”

His breaths are heavy and wet, coming out shaky with his instant answer, “Y-yes—” all weak in a pathetic whimper that almost has you cum too soon.

“You’re so nice~ thank you,” you croon against his lips, kissing him sloppily with your tongue in his mouth as you shift your hips and start lowering your sopping cunt down upon his seeking length, taking him in with greedy ease, eagerly gripping his soft cockhead like a toy in a claw machine.

“Fhu—fuck—” he stutters under his breath, whinging before planting his teeth into his lip to keep it at bay—feeling like putty beneath you, sweaty and heavy and dumb, eagerly wanting all which you sought to give him—only more flushed at your mean undertones as you play with him like food on a silver platter.

You sling your arms around his neck and push your chest harder against him, moaning all too brazenly, “Oh! Fuck yes—that’s so good,” you sing while slowly taking him in further. “A nice guy with a big bad bully’s dick is the best!” 

He whines in return as his inches get eaten—each devoured one by one until his tip kneads into the mouth of your womb.

Sighing happily, you kiss his cheek and put your lips right at his ear with another wanton whimper, “You fill me up so so good.” Roosting on the size, thighs resting flush against his, feeling all giddy as it stretches you out oh-so-nicely. “Such a good toy-cock for me,” keening at the way it twitches inside you, pulsing in response to your tight walls, clenching it in ways it’s never before felt.

His eyes are already rolling back into his skull once you start lolling your hips—riding him, but keeping him deep at all times—lifting just enough for it to pull out only a little before sinking back down, making it settle into that perfect needy little spot inside you that makes your whole body shiver in delight.

“Mmh,” You suck his ear lobe, releasing it with a soft bite, before smiling down at him and his sweat-pilled expression. Cooing at him, “You’re a virgin, aren’t you?”

He can’t even answer with words anymore, only giving a dumb mewl as he nods his head. But, of course, you’re already well aware.

“Mmh—” your eyes gleam with delight, giving his lap a mean ride, leaving him all but breathless, before asking, “D’you like it, virgin boy? ‘You like my pussy? Like the way it milks your chubby cock for your cum?”

He nods again, even more eagerly this time—looking downright pathetic in every sense of the word.

“Do you want to?” you offer to his desperation, feeling as though he’s falling apart at your fingertips, needing you to hold him together. “I’ll let you since you’re such a sweet guy—” you tease while clenching his cock, making it impossible to want anything else no matter the consequence. “In exchange for a favor, of course.”

He couldn’t care less what the favor was—way beyond willing to pay any price you ask of him as he finally makes a move and grabs your hips with a strength you hadn’t thought he had the balls to perform, planting you down firmly and holding you with such need as his hips jitter and stutter—resting his cheek on your shoulder in drool and tears with a lovesick groan leaving him as he fills your pussy up with his creamy spend.

His whole body shakes—spasming in cute little aftershocks as he clutches onto your body, hugging you tightly.

You respond in kind, cuddling him and kissing the top of his head. “That was so warm and filling—what a good boy—you did so well,” you murmur ever-sweetly while petting his head, combing through his sweaty locks with your long glitter-pink nails—keeping your voice saccharine. “Did you enjoy yourself, hm? Your first time cumming in pussy instead of your dirty ol’ sock?”

You pick his face up—cupping his sloppy jaw in both palms—his eyes half-mast and glazed as you nose-kiss him with a smile on your face.

“You loved it, didn’t you? Silly virgin boy…”

Your cunt tingles at the sight of him—wrecked beauty, sweaty and undone. You feel his cock unswell inside you and decide to lift off and release him—letting it flop out and splat on his tummy in a puddle of slick.

“Look,” you fuss, holding his face in direction of it. “You made such a pretty mess—isn’t it lovely?”

Your pussy is left glistening and puffy, still wanting and waiting for its final hurrah. Your breath turns headier and so does your voice, now with a new darkness to it as  you whisper, “Time for that favor, sweet boy.” 

He blinks dumbly, impossibly hopeless, wrapped so tightly around your pinky it’s pitiful. Of course, you take advantage—guiding his head to level with your cunt. 

“Open wide, tongue out flat.”

He obeys wordlessly. And oh god it makes your gut stir viscously—watching his tongue loll free between parted lips.

Your voice flares with bliss at the sight, shy of unhinged, as you giggle breathily, “That’s right—taste the pretty mess you made.”

He’s pushed face-first, trapped between your thighs with his jaw like an open cup beneath you, tonguing the mixed slick from your slit and slurping it all up without shame.

And fuck—it feels so good, you lose even more of your mind while tugging him even closer—all but pulling him off the toilet seat, making him kneel down on the floor instead. And still, he makes no effort to escape, but the opposite—seeking to go deeper into your cunt, crying into you as he laps up every last drop of yours and his arousal—making your thighs quake around him, grinding down against his mouth, onto his eager tongue, having it pet your clit over and over until you also come to the same sudden stumbling halt.

“Yes—yes! Oh, fuck! I’m gonna—it’s coming—”

And there it goes, ripping along your loins, surging from your lower belly. With both your hands tangled harshly in his hair, he’s not going anywhere, lips locked with yours as it starts pouring.

You’re squirting on him—hot and hard—on his tongue, inside his mouth, down his throat, in his belly. You’re squirting on him and he’s drinking it, he realizes—but even so, he isn’t able to stop. Instead, he unwinds his jaw even wider, digs his tongue deeper, and accepts every drop of the warm stream as it drenches his face and splashes down his collar and shoulders, utterly soaking his shirt, making in see-through as it clings to his chest like a second skin.

You’ve closed your eyes and thrown your head back, basking in every last little twitch of your body as you relieve yourself all over his face.

Finally, after a moment, you let go of his hair and step back—feeling refreshed and happy with your work—seeing the poor loser sit before the toilet, all drenched and exhausted with his limp cock spent and messy, looking like a beautiful wreck.

You smile, pulling your panties back in place, and you skirt down again before unlocking the stall and opening the door, only looking back at him for a moment, tapping your nail at a few matching pink scribbles written on the wall. “Here’s my number and address if you wanna have more fun." And then you leave, just like that. "Bye-bye~”

♡ BNHA – Amajiki, Deku, Shigaraki, Shinso ♡ JJK – Yuuta, Choso, Nanami ♡ HQ – Kageyama, Kenma ♡ CSM – Denji ♡ BLLK – Isagi ♡ DS – Zenitsu ♡ WB – Sakura, Nirei

♡ FEM x M INSERT masterlist ♡ GN x M INSERT masterlist

[isaacathom]

i had a ridiculously long post in my drafts about my lil firefly knockoff thing ive got buzzing around the brainpan but what if i didnt do that, and made it much shorter

basic setting shit - different systems are daisy chained together by something called the Interstellar Highway, which are fantasy bullshit that basically tunnels through space and loop around the edge of systems for a speed boost. Because of the speeds needed, every system on a highway has a structure called the OnRamp, which basically fucking catapults you onto the highway. theyre great.

it used to be that you would stop at every system on the highway to refuel and to check ship integrity, because engine efficiency wasnt good enough for long journeys. however, in the last 40 or so years, industrial-grade engines have gotten to the stage that they can go 2-3 systems without stopping, and that has naturally meant some systems have started languishing.

the system the story takes place in is one of those, where it primarily acted as a pit stop. the only traffic it really gets now is its own import traffic, which generally goes maybe 1 system over in either direction for essential goods.

because of the lack of Business, the systems sucking shit, and a lot of people in the inner system rely on a gig-economy of delivery ships that travel between them and the onramp.

the ship at the story's core is one of these gig economy ships. it's a like 30yo ship, bought on loan by one Captain Foster Cline, whose hectic routes throughout the system have gotten him within sight of owning the ship outright, but not quite.

the crew can be divided into sub groups, starting with the "captain core":

Foster Cline, a guy in his 50-60s. pretty nice guy overall, jovial and hard-working. owns and manages the ship, and can do most of the jobs alright

Andrea Seward, lady in her 40s. shes very cautious and 'safe', preferring known routes and repeat customers. handles a lot of the paperwork and accounting, though she can apparently pilot.

Ogawa Yuuji, guy in his early 50s. really sweet guy, always trying to help and offer advice even when its unasked for. works as the ships gunner and security guy, as well as being a general strong pair of arms.

These three have known each other for years, Cline and Ogawa in particular going back to before he bought the ship, and Seward being one of their first 'hires' when they went into business.

Then we have the younger gen:

Jalen Romilly, man in his late 20s. He's a guy who likes to follow rules and structures, always wanting things planned out and knowing what's happening. He's also particularly worried about diseases and germs, so he keeps his areas of the shop spotless. He's the ship's slow and steady primary pilot.

Gideon van der Karmozijn, man in his early 30s. He's a creative guy, loves tinkering and trying new shit, and he's always confident it will work. He's the ships primary mechanic, and secondary pilot.

These two are more recent hires, the last 5 years or so, replacing an irregular churn through other pilots and mechanics over the 30yrs of the ships operation.

The basic vibe is this ship always starts its route at the OnRamp, and the captain core + Romilly will sit down and plan out what jobs they're taking for the next little bit, trying to layer as many on top of eachother as they can for maximum profit, with the understanding that they'll revisit the list at every stop to tack more onto the end, continuing a month-long rush of work before they will return to the OnRamp station for a week.

It's gig economy delivery, and it can vary a good deal. You'll get people asking for medicine, businesses asking for raw materials, groups requiring transit from point a to point b, people needing you to transfer shit on their behalf, so on. Most of them it's pretty uneventful, though the need to try and get good profit margins means sometimes tensions can flare. it can be a big mess.

The "show", such that it is structured in my mind, would begin with 2.5 ish episodes of the 'regular shit' for these guys. obviously some of their more exciting or complicated jobs, drama with someone unwilling to pay, so on. at one point they do end up picking up a package from a shady 'merchant' where the implication is that their goods are all stolen. And it's like, well... ? not much we can do. Cline has been a good client of theirs for years, yknow how it is.

then during the third episode, they follow up on a job that needs them to go to a vineyard in high country of one of the planets to pick up a delivery bound for a bar on a different planet. they land a little ways off, and the captain core traipse off to go sort everything out with the owners while the younger gen man the ship.

at which point a group a ruffians descend upon the ship to try and take it.

karmozijn manages to barricade himself and romilly into the bridge and radio for help, and ogawa bounds off. before the others can respond, they get cut off by some members of the group, and shit just fully ensues. cline and seward get into a short firefight in the woods, ending in cline being fatally shot and seward scaring off the hijackers by convincing them that the vineyard owners are coming with firepower (they are, but they were still a few minutes out). on the ship, meanwhile, ogawa ends up fighting the hijackers in the engine room, managing to defeat or scare them off but receiving serious injuries.

with the aid of the vineyard owners, they get cline's body back to the ship and karmozijn is able to very patch-repair the mechanisms in the engine room so the ship will go. because, well... they're in the inner system, aren't they? high country, no less, middle of fucking nowhere. ships damaged, going slow as shit but theyre in a rush. nearest hospital? nearest hospital with SPACE? fucking hell. romilly is eventually able to make contact with an ambulance ship thats willing to make a detour to meet them on its way to somewhere else, and thus they get on a fuking move.

they don't make it to the rendezvous before ogawa dies.

whereas there was nothing they could do for cline, ogawa shouldn't've have died. his injuries were bad, yes, but evidently manageable. with prompt medical treatment, he would've pulled through. and they couldn't get him there.

the ship, two crew down, hobbles back to the OnRamp. each begins a rapid suite of various tasks - Seward is handling job cancellations, paperwork, the police investigation, and also volunteers/demands to be the one to tell Cline's daughter what happened. Romilly is handling talking to Ogawa's family, as well as hiring a new gunner on the double so that they can try to resume work quickly. Karmozijn is handling ship repairs, trying to make it fit into their suddenly stretched budget. and everyones grieving, and everyones handling it pretty poorly.

into this hectic period, covered by a few episodes in my mind, the crew expands not by the expected one, but by three - the new crew:

Petra Cline, Foster's daughter, in her early 20s. she's an adventurous sort who loves to try new things, and in this specific instance shes pissed. She all but demands to be allowed aboard by reasoning with Seward that since the ownership deeds were in Foster's name, as his next of kin she legally owns the ship. Seward decides not to press the issue (it may come up later anyway)

Zayvia Eskarra, nb in their mid 30s. An awkward and poorly social but lovely individual, they're brought on as the ships new gunner largely by dint of being the first person to apply for the position.

Ko Xue, woman in her last 20s. She's confident and brash, working on a vibes-based level on a lot of things. after the first 4/5 crew job goes Okay Ish but not ideal, it's agreed that they need a new pilot to replace Romilly so that he can shift into a managerial position (Sewards idea), and Ko takes that primary pilot role.

A new crew of 5/6 established, they continue on, doing a whole bunch of shit. its largely the same work, very episodic job-of-the-week business. the main underlying thing is the way the crew adapts and grows close, or apart, as the case may be.

there are a few key plots that would occur throughout in the show:

Ko is an extremely qualified ship pilot. like, highway certified. The fact she's working as the primary pilot for a dinky gig ship is bizarre, and it eventually comes to light that this is effectively a side gig for her main job, which is working for a prestigious, slightly dubious inter-system organisation who have their fingers in a lot of pies. she joined because she thought they'd help her make a difference in her dead-end system, but has found that to not be the case, and is locked into an exceptionally long contract. this interferes with her work on the ship on a number of occasions, and some members of the crew are PISSED when her status is revealed because it means shes loaded. its a whole thing.

Romilly has a family (siblings and parents) he supports with his delivery money, who occur throughout depending on how he's doing. there's a lot of drama there about whether he can afford to send the majority of his paycheck their way, especially closer to the vineyard thing, and later too. complicated stuff for him.

Eskarra is, notably, the only member of the crew who is not from the system. They're actually from a place some 4 systems down the highway, having been stranded here when the ship they were working on got 'pulled over' for illegal smuggling, being briefly locked up, and then being unable to pay for passage back home. This causes a sense of disconnect, since they arent anywhere near as familiar with the system as the others, which Eskarra attempts to rectify by like. doing chores. i love them.

Ko and Karmozijn hit it off really well because they both like pushing the ship to the limit, something that upsets both Seward and Romilly, with Romilly taking particular issue with the way Ko handles the ship - he is forced to concede she is the far better pilot, however. As close as the two become, though, Ko expresses little interest in him outside of their shared interests.

Eskarra and Romilly start lowkey dating. its a whole thing

Seward basically alienates everyone aboard the ship as she tries to live up to being the kind of captain that Cline was, which she demonstrably cannot be. she takes a special dislike to Eskarra because they are 'inferior to Ogawa in several ways', many of which have nothing to do with Eskarra's job.

Petra Cline, on the other hand, gets to be on pretty good terms with the majority of the ship, though shes on better terms with the new crew than she is with the others owing to, yknow, The Situation With Her Dad. She's the main person who is still close to Seward, because shes the one person Seward isn't rude to (or the one person who gets an unforced apology from her when she is).

She also bounces between different sectors of the ship as she learns various parts of the trade - piloting from Ko, mechanics from Karmozijn, and very limited combat stuff from Eskarra (predominantly knife-based and gun safety, with very limited opportunity to actually fire the gun bc Eskarra refuses to discharge the gun on the actual ship on principle). She does not interact with Romilly much at all, lmao.

and then we hit Da Big Thing, da big plot that i have in my noggin - a few episodes long arc in the acute sense, and certainly a longer thing overall. The Party Split.

now i have no fucking idea how we get here. my vague vibe is that there's possibly a ship that crashes off the highway into something, and theres a general sense of oh. we should uh. we should do something about that. after maybe arriving to help ferry some of the passengers to the OnRamp, maybe one of them goes 'hey. my mcguffin. can you go back and get it. ill pay you to get it' and the crew goes... yeah. sure. sure we can fetch your mcguffin. just sign this thing right here to show that we're not scavengers in case anyone asks and we'll go for it. its good pay.

and basically they're hunting for this thing, and since the ships fucked its basically picking through debris, and they aren't the only ones. guess who shows up? the shady merchants from earlier! where better to steal from than a downed ship? and they heard about a valuable mcguffin 👀

conflict ensues t'fuck. seward, romilly, and eskarra basically head out on the hunt, leaving ko, karmozijn and cline (lol) on their ship. everyones under fire. this is a mess. at some point, karmozijn tells cline that the communications are being jammed and she needs to go tell the captain (seward) that, and also that the shields are busted. she agrees, books it out. she doesnt find seward, instead finding eskarra, who is maybe Understandably Unhappy that she entered what is at this point an active fire fight, gives her a knife JUST IN CASE and tells her to fuck off back to the ship, they'll deliver the message. off they go.

on the ship, karmozijn has abandoned his station and headed to the bridge, has a conversation with Ko that quickly devolves into 'we should just get out of here, this isnt worth it' which Ko seems very lukewarm on.

on the ground, Karmozijn finds Seward to relay the message, which confuses her because Ko has been communicating with her consistently throughout the whole thing, including during her conversation with Karmozijn. And the shields seem fine? Somethings up.

Karmozijn abandons his attempt to be coy and flat out asks Ko to elope with him, which she rejects. He knocks her out, seizes the controls, and ITS. GO. TIME.

Karmozijn, Ko in tow, leaves the crash site.

Seward and Eskarra, stuck out far from the ship, end up being cut off from connecting with the rest of the crew by members of the shady group, being captured.

Cline and Romilly end up meeting up at the site where their ship used to be, and witness the departure of Seward and Eskarra with the other group.

the next bit is basically an episode for each team:

Karmozijn keeps Ko under lock and key, telling her that she could just travel with him (the under appreciated mechanic), but that if she won't he plans to just drop her off on the outskirts of some town somewhere with all her things. She manages to finagle him into letting her start packing said things in preparation, then slips away from him and leaves in the emergency shuttle. he does not pursue. she puts up a report about the ship theft, particularly paging her wealthy primary employer about the matter, and heads back to the crash site.

Cline and Romilly are forced to survive together, which is somewhat difficult because they aren't close, the ship is in so many pieces that its not a super viable shelter, and they aren't in a very hospitable area. Romilly focuses on finding things for their survival (food, shelter, so on) and Cline tries to apply the things she's learned from Karmozijn to create a distress beacon. The two end up genuinely coming to some understandings about the other, as their respective skillsets compliment fairly well. its a good camping time. it is pretty dicey though.

Seward and Eskarra are taken back to the shady merchant's base of operations and interrogated about whether they found the mcguffin or know anything about it. Despite her general demeanour, Seward holds up really well under the pressure, whereas Eskarra cracks pretty early - (un?)luckily for them, they don't know anything anyway. Seward makes a few escape attempts, without Eskarra, and for which Eskarra is punished - this does nothing to change Seward's actions. It doesn't help Eskarra that it is revealed (to Seward, anyway) that Eskarra was a former contractor of the shady merchants.

Finally, Ko returns to the crash with the shuttle and picks up Romilly and Cline, gets them fed and warmed up, and then they all mutually agree that they need to at least make an attempt to rescue Seward and Eskarra. They are actually successful, despite Seward trying to convince them to not go back in for Eskarra (Romilly, their pseudo-boyfriend, insists. thank god for homosexuality). its drama

the mcguffin almost certainly ends up being in Cline's possession, or possibly Romilly's, as the two people who remain at the crash site. so they can get back to the station (possibly with a detour for a refuel) and they can get that good good money.

obviously there are still like. consequences from this. which take some time to resolve. for instance, Karmozijn still has the fucking ship. Seward has made her dislike of Eskarra pretty fucking explicit. theres shit going on. they gotta fucking figure that out. they're also down a mechanic, a role cline probably fills at least in the interim.

its a whole thing. this is all meaningless.

[dzthenerd490]

These people are clearly anarchists... we need more people like them.

Well done, I’m proud of them and quite impressed 👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽

(I will be removing useless comments, I do not need that in my comment section ty very much)

[teaboot]

I seriously hope you can job hop to something else cause you're not chaotic neutral man.

You're still a white Canadian whose actions and job help more the megacorps keep the status quo.

I really looked up to you but that's on me.

And yeah, I know security, cop shit and military pay good money but at the cost of my people? Fuck no.

Listen. I feel you. But there's a lot of cold, power-tripping bastards in this line of work and if I stick where I am then they don't get to have that.

I'm not a cop. I am not beholden to the justice system. Sometimes I get contracted out to people who say shit like "addicts should be put down, if you see any crackheads drag them out" and I nod and say "yes sir", and then I take their money and use it to buy those people coffee and a sandwich and tell 'em when free lunch days are at the church.

Boss sees me walking with someone and thinks I'm kicking them out, gives my boss great reviews. I'm having a great conversation with Connie, who used to by a stylist and wound up on the street after an accident that left her with chronic pain and a heroin addiction. Connie learns that there's a gap between two property lines nearby where technically nobody can call to have her removed.

There's a really sweet guy in town who's normally very nice, but sometimes flies into paranoid rage and yells slurs at people. Sometimes he forgets he's been banned from places and wanders in looking for a wife he hasn't had for nine years. Owner sends me to kick him out, and I ask "hey Mike, how are you?" And see where we are today.

One time there was a guy whose abusive ex kept following him to work, and I got to walk him to his car at the end of every day to make sure she couldn't get him alone.

Another person had a stalker who kept asking receptionists when she was gonna be there, when she was supposed to leave, if she was in today. I'd keep record of every time he came in, every time someone saw him, every time he violated his restraining order or damaged her things.

And when I wonder if I'm actually helping or not, or if I'm part of the greater problem, I remember that other people who work with me call homeless people wildlife and talk about how bad they wanna get an excuse to fight someone and I remember that I'm the one who knows where the blind spots on the cameras are, and thank God it's not him.

My position is fundamentally different from that of the military or law enforcement. I don't *need* to be buddy-buddy with most of these dickheads- I don't *need* to send people into the justice system.

I do single-person foot patrol. Nobody cares how I get the job done. They say, "Hey, faceless goon number three- make that bastard disappear" and I say "on it, boss" and give him tickets to disney world.

I once asked another guard if he knew that one of our regulars used to be an airplane technician. He said, "No, I don't talk to them". Blanket "Them". "Them" as in street people. "Them" as in addicts, or shoplifters, or ex-cons, or sex workers.

I asked why, and he told me, "it's easier if you don't think of them as people."

Anyhow, now I get calls to "watch that sketchy lady who just came in" and I say, "yes, sir" and leave her the fuck alone, 'cause that's Jolene, and people always think she's on drugs and aggressive but she's just deaf in one ear and slurs cause she has brain damage, you dickhead

so yeah, don't worry, I've spent a lot of time weighing the pros and cons of my vocation, and I still think I'd rather be in charge of my locations than someone like Darryl, who dreams of "cuffing a perp" and drives a car with Punisher decals on the hood

Also it's minimum wage but that's kinda tangential

[daisyachain]

Amidst the love polyhedra of Haruhi Suzumiya I think it would be funniest if Kyon loses his virginity to Taniguchi in college by accident because he thinks that what they’re doing falls under the bro code

[branwinged]

"dragons plant no trees" gets thrown around a lot as fact, but i think the veracity of that claim is still up for debate in the books. because dany (like bran and jon and many others) is a narrative symbol of hope and rebirth within the series because of her connection to dragons and fire, not in spite of it. this is because dragons in asoiaf have a much more expansive narrative function than simply 'nuke metaphor'. the 'exclusively weapons of war' image they have acquired breaks down immediately if you recall that the first thing dany does with them is begin dismantling an unjust status quo. she rallies the unsullied at the gates of astapor with cries of dracarys! dracarys! freedom! <- dragons as a symbol of hope and freedom for the persecuted. and obviously they've been built up as an oppositional force against the others. we're told when the last dragon died summers became shorter. in that respect the dragons, or more specifically, fire which is warmth which is passion—very much embodies life against the numbing, deadening threat of eternal winter that the others represent. but fire also consumes, which simultaneously makes dragons agents of destruction, or as adwd shows: the monsters who eat little girls and leave behind their bones. but when dany found herself chained to a false peace which effectively undid her cause in meereen, it was the dragon that rescued her and reignited her fire to fight back—which is to say that dragons represent a wealth of contradictions within the text and this is likely something grrm means to parallel with the others to some extent, by questioning their apparent narrative role as the one true evil. because i doubt the series is gearing up towards a spectacle-esque battle wherein our heroes get to practice righteous, easy violence on a monolithic army of monsters. that feels like it would undo a lot of asoiaf's preoccupation with investigating violence against socially acceptable targets, even if said target is ice sidhe. and this binary between a one true good and a one true evil, i.e. melisandre's philosophy ("if half an onion is black with rot, it is a rotten onion. a man is good or he is evil.") is not something the story takes as given.

instead there's this exchange between bran, jojen, and meera in asos: "but you just said you hated them." / "why can't it be both?" / because they're different. like night and day, or ice and fire." / "if ice can burn. then love and hate can mate."—and i think it's talking about reconciling two conflicting ideas. because the dream of an eternal summer is just as unsustainable as the threat of eternal winter. i think the battle for dawn is more about questions of seasonal harmony. the first line from agot's summary says, "long ago, in a time forgotten, a preternatural event threw the seasons out of balance", so it's not totally out of question for the series to end with that seasonal balance restored once more. and that question of balance and how it can be achieved then works as a metaphor for a bunch of other things. because asoiaf at its core is very interested in exploring big contradictions, like love and duty? how do you keep all your oaths without betraying someone you love? how can one hope for a just, rightful ruler in a world where the systems in place can never allow such a thing? how do dragons plant trees?

you cannot frame dany's arc as a binary choice between planting trees or embracing (dragon)fire. because the fire is hers, it is a part of her, that's who she is. and her character has always existed outside of rigid dichotomies. at the end of agot she had two options, resign herself to a life of seclusion as a widow or die with the last of her family in that pyre, instead she performed a miracle. presently, i think grrm means to explore necessary, revolutionary violence with her arc because you cannot deal with institutional slavery by simply negotiating with slavers like she does in adwd. and the consequences thereof because she's also been set up to be more reckless with dragonfire in the future. but i think there will be an eventual reconciliation there, between her dreams "to plant trees and watch them grow." and her role as the mother of dragons, as a revolutionary figure. because if ice can burn, then maybe dragons can plant trees. they'll learn how to.

[inazuma-fulgur]

The more effective a movement is, the more ground it gains the more violence it is met with

Makes you think, maybe the government is just a violence factory after all :thinking emoji:

The movement to stop the construction of a $90 million police training center atop vast acres of Atlanta forest has been extraordinarily successful over the last year. With little national fanfare, Defend the Atlanta Forest/Stop Cop City activists nimbly deployed a range of tactics: encampments, tree-sits, peaceful protest marches, carefully targeted property damage, local community events, investigative research, and, at times, direct confrontation with police forces attempting to evict protesters from the forest. The proposed militarized training compound known as Cop City has thus far been held at bay. The Atlanta-based movement should be seen as an example of rare staying power, thoughtful strategizing, and the crucial articulation of environmentalist politics situated in anti-racist, Indigenous, and abolitionist struggle. Unsurprisingly, however, significant national attention has only been drawn to the forest defenders in the last week thanks to the extreme law enforcement repression they are now facing. A forest defender was killed by police last Wednesday, and a total of 19 protesters now face capricious and ungrounded domestic terror charges for their involvement in the movement — a rare deployment of a state domestic terror statute, threatening to exhaust and crush a resilient and developing movement. On Thursday, Georgia’s Republican Gov. Brian Kemp announced a “state of emergency” in response to the protests in downtown Atlanta in the week following the killing of the protester. The executive order grants the governor’s office extensive and preemptive repressive powers, including the ability to call on as many as 1,000 National Guard troops to quell protests at any moment. “This is an unprecedented level of repression,” said Marlon Kautz, 38, an Atlanta-based organizer with the Atlanta Solidarity Fund, which provides bail funds and legal support to protesters who are targeted for involvement in social movements, including against Cop City. “At this point the police seem to be charging every protester they arrest with ‘domestic terrorism’ regardless of the circumstances,” he said. “The other pattern we’ve noticed is they are charging everyone arrested on a given day with all crimes which happened that day.”

continue reading

[found-pham-ily]

@harvestandhearth

I almost didn't write this because of the amount of hate I was getting but you were so excited I figured one little addition wouldn't hurt.

Tw Cop!Danny if you don't like don't read.

It had been an offhand comment. Walker had notice the ghost boy...now man had seemed upset. Upon hearing Phantom's plight he had made the suggestion, become a cop.

Danny wasn't a fan of cops, too many bad things done under the guise of protecting and serving. But he'd failed at becoming a fire fighter. The heat from one of the training events had all but hospitalized him, which got him kicked out. Thanks to the meta protection acts and the open secret of who he was no one judged him for his weakness.

Then he tried for the Emt route, but between his poor high-school grades effecting any chances at a scholarship and the time he had to spend fighting ghosts he didn't really manage well and ended up dropping out. But hey he picked some stuff up and used that to patch people up post Ghost fights.

He considered a social worker too, but he couldn't exactly fight Ghost on the clock, and the lack of action made it a slog. After so long of being a vigilante, the need for action was a second nature. The Ghost biology needing to fight didn't help either.

Walker's idea buzzed around his head. It made sense in a weird way. He could actually help people, fight Ghost on the clock, and get a decent pay check...

His sister ever the busy body had asked why civil service jobs? Why not go for Nasa like he dreamed of. With the acts repealed and him being labeled a meta he could legally do so. But those damn grades ruined it.

So a cop be became. It was disturbingly easy to become one too. Worrisomely so. He was both good and bad at his job depending who you asked. The people despite their teasing loved him. He had always done his best for them, he only rarely used any form of violence with people, and when needed nothing more then the bare minimal to safely stop them. Hell he'd taken a few bullets from other cops to save people.

The other cops hated him, Danny didn't subscribe to the usually loyalty and standards a cop had. You did something illegal and abused your power he'd report it in such a way consequences had to be given. Yeah he'd keep his partner safe, and did his job well but he broke the status quo. He also made the whole force in Amity look bad. He was so good he made them look incompetent.

But despite all he did Danny wasn't free from the social scrutiny. Both from the living and the dead. Ghost mocked him for becoming lame and joining the cops. Humans just went with the stigma, not unfairly so; and it just fueled him to do his job better. To prove to people that just because he wore a uniform he wasn't full of hate.

Apparently he did his job too well. At least that's what he assumed as he sat in an office a Green Lantern in front of him. "So let me get this straight, you want me to become the face of a civilian branch of the Justice League?" Danny was still bitter about all the help he didn't get as a budding child hero.

"Yes, your work as both a cop and a meta dealing with supernatural threats has gained an online following. We want people to know that we work with the authorities and accept metas in non-hero jobs." Hal could tell the man was suspicious of him. Which wasn't unfair since the league seemed to always recruit metas into hero jobs.

"You wouldn't have to do more then you already do aside the occasional press conference." He continued.

Danny sighed and thought on it, this would secure his job that he knew was on the chopping block due to his 'insubordination'. They couldn't fire him without a major backlash if he had the Justice League on his side. But he didn't like the idea of being some sort of symbol. He just wanted to help protect people, and maybe throw some punches with some ghosts. He was a simple man after all.

"Fine but I want the medical benefits the League offers." Medical was expensive, and while Danny healed faster then the average person that didn't effect the initial bills. And he had to go to the hospital for paperwork's sake.

"That can be arranged." Hal was just glad he didn't get the expected rejection from the ex-teen hero.

[raven-at-the-writing-desk]

OMG RAVEN YOU’RE INTO EVER AFTER HIGH? I love it but can’t talk about it bc none of my friends have seen it 😭 I wish it was talked about more, especially with how deep their lore runs. I love EAH’s dynamics with the complexities of destiny. If twst followed the same logic as eah’s world it would be so interesting. How would you feel if the worlds were to mesh together and how it would work? You can interpret that in any way you want; the characters meeting or twst being bound to the same rules and societal expectations of eah, or whatnot.

Also who’s your favorite eah character compared to your favorite twst character (Leona)?Jade, right?

And have you read the eah books? I haven’t, but I’m going to try to sometime!

Eah alt account when?

I'm still salty that the Monster High x Ever After High crossover movie never saw the light of day-- Part of the reason why I don't like Disney (I mean the faceless corpo, not all Disney products) is because they have such a strong association with fairy tales that it pushes other interpretations out of the market or it leads to people assuming Disney "owns" those fairy tales. Ever After High's lore and themes run so much deeper than most other fairy tale reimaginings I've seen (and I've seen a lot). It's such a shame it doesn't get the respect and recognition it deserves even though EAH is the one out here challenging the status quo whereas modern Disney is content with mediocrity that appeals to the masses.

I think EAH and TWST, at their cores, share similar ideas so combining them would work well. Friendship, self-identity, defining your own future, questioning what "good" and "evil" truly are... It's all there. I'd imagine that if Twisted Wonderland (or at least NRC) followed the same rules as EAH, then everyone would be descendants of their Disney counterparts. (This is actually a common misperception of what TWST was to new fans; people mistakenly believe the TWST characters are children of the classic Disney villains. This has never been canon.) Unfortunately, I'd have to take away the Disney villains being twisted to be "good" guys in Twisted Wonderland's world in order for this to work by EAH rules, so... There's that to consider. This, in turn, can result in the student body splitting into Royals (pro-following one's destiny) and Rebels (anti-following one's destiny). Perhaps RSA and NRC could be one school in this AU...? Just so we have a mix of "good" and "evil" descended children in the same vicinity as one another. A must-have are the constantly bickering Narrators!! It's only really when Yuu shows up that the majority opinion starts to shift. Maybe then Crowley becomes concerned with students rising up and fighting back against the system that relies on them being complacent to keep the cycle of stories going. I've seen some readings of EAH which theorize that Royals guaranteed a happy ending is a stand-in for privilege, and that interpretation leads into very interesting conflicts when we also consider that magic in Twisted Wonderland is a privilege afforded to few.

To cover just the dorm leaders (because covering all the TWST characters would make this post way longer), I definitely see Riddle, Kalim, Idia, and Malleus as Royals and Leona, Azul, and Vil as Rebels. Here's my thought process:

Riddle is pretty self-explanatory. He comes from a background where he's used to being told what to do by his mother and so he also heavily relies on her strict, unyielding teachings to play by the book when he goes out there in the real world. Riddle is inflexible and hesitant to go against the grain--and, more importantly, he fully believes that following the rules will lead to his happiness... that doing as his fairy tale ordains will lead to a happy ending. What happens to the Queen of Hearts is dubious in the end since it's framed as Alice's dream, so I think that vagueness gives Riddle hope that by behaving himself, he'll earn the happiness he desires.

Leona is a Rebel, and not just because that's the aesthetic of his dorm. Being that he is highly intelligent and demonstrates a lot of foresight, he'd be aware of what future is in store for him and aggressively fighting against that. It would make him more desperate than ever to prove his worth, because not only does everyone see his powers as terrifying, but they also see him as a future brother murderer and dictator that will bleed the land dry of resources. It'd make the situation with his family even more strained than it already is, not to mention the extra jealousy he must feel toward Cheka, who is still too young to understand what's going to happen later.

Azul is someone who acts like a Royal but is actually a Rebel. He acts polite and like he plays by the rules, but clearly he doesn't behind the scenes. I see Azul as the kind of Rebel akin to Duchess Swan... as in, he believes he can steal away someone else's destiny for himself. Azul would constantly be looking for loopholes to save himself. He's put way too much stock into becoming a better, stronger person and he'd want to defend this new life he has made for himself. His obsession with protecting his contracts could translate well here.

Kalim is a Royal because he's mega rich and has been sheltered from the concept of bad things that happen to normal people; he has nothing to worry about. It also helps that Kalim is twisted from a character that doesn't meet a bad ending. I think he'd be aware of Jami's doomed destiny, but Kalim is so ignorant that he thinks it'll just be fine and it'll work itself out. Part of his growth could be being forced to reckon with the reality that Jamil is suffering under the legacy assigned to him and accepting the role that he plays in that by not acting.

Idia is a Royal--or at least pre-book 6 Idia is. He's a very pessimistic guy and repeatedly expresses hopelessness about the future, bemoaning the curse he and his family have to bear. Idia doesn't want to try to fight his fate, he's already accepted that it will happen and so closes himself off from others to save himself that heartbreak. Post-book 6 Idia will have swapped over to the Rebel side thanks to Ortho reviving the hope in him.

Vil is a Rebel simply for the fact that he fights social conventions. He's already out here shattering gender roles, but finds it much harder to breach that expectation that villains are just villains and nothing more. Vil keeps getting rejected at every turn, told that it's impossible to rewrite his story, that his frustrations are the natural result of jealousy and an ugly heart that festers in side of him. He steels himself to prove that notion wrong, working himself to the bone to get up on that stage and stay on it, waiting to be lavished with praise that he truly is the fairest one of all. I feel this would be so fascinating for Vil's own arc about self acceptance; maybe he wears himself down emotionally because he HAS to basically be perfect due to his job but also denies himself normal feelings like anger and jealousy because confessing that you have such "ugly" feelings only validates that you're shallow just like the stories say you will be.

Malleus is a tough one, but I settled for Royal in the end. Maleficent is doomed to be slain by a sword, right? So am I saying that THE Malleus Draconia, who is infamously arrogant about his magical abilities, would lie down and take a stab like that? Of course not! However, I do think that Malleus is initially someone who values tradition and living up to noblesse oblige. As the future ruler of a nation, people's stories are relying on him to play his expected role out, which he'd be fully cognizant of. I also think Malleus would be afforded the luxury of not having to face his destiny as soon as his peers are due to his long life span. This is in part because the person destined to slay him doesn't come into his life for literally hundreds of years. Then when book 7 arrives, Malleus has to deal with his loved ones leaving and/or betraying him as well as the realization that this is his destiny: dying alone and unloved. That'd just break him.

ahdbiqwdbqwli I COULD TALK ABOUT THIS AU FOR FOREVER BUT I'LL CUT IT SHORT OR ELSE I'LL NEVER SHUT UP 😭

EAH has so many good characters and interesting storylines, it's hard for me to pick a favorite! I of course love Apple and Raven's dilemmas, but I feel like it's cheating to pick one of them as my favorite. The whole Wonderland gang is also fantastic... I'm a sucker for their aesthetic, but they're so fun and silly in general. Kitty, Lizzie, and especially Madeline are 👌

Mmm, when I think long and hard about it, I think my favorite EAH character has to be Briar Beauty, daughter of Sleeping Beauty. Firstly, I love all the pink, roses, and bramble in her design. Secondly, I love the layers to why she is the way she is. Briar's a party girl not because "lmao, wouldn't that be a funny haha subversion of Sleeping Beauty" but because she wants to live life up before she falls asleep for 100 years and literally loses all her friends and family to the natural passage of time. That's seriously so smart and such an inventive way to think about the trauma a descendant of Sleeping Beauty might have. Seeing Briar transition from one of Apple's besties and biggest supporters to an outright rebel is satisfying as heck. (Gotta take a moment to shout out this classic moment :3)

I don't know if I would compare Briar to Jade since they're entirely different characters. However, looking at the source material, I'm actually surprised I like Briar as much as I do since I have never cared for the story of Sleeping Beauty. A part of me finds this ironic since Malleus harbors a similar fear as Briar (losing loved ones) yet I see Malleus's desire as way more selfish and self-serving than Briar's. I believe that's because Briar doesn't have the same arrogance as Malleus, so I'm more forgiving with her. EAH's actual equivalent to Malleus is Faybelle, daughter of the Dark Fairy, but I don't like her as much as I do Briar (hence why I'm comparing Malleus and Briar, not Malleus and Faybelle).

I haven't read the EAH books but I want to one day! I'd prefer to borrow them since I don't have enough space in my room for more physical books, so as soon as I find copies at a library or something...

This blog has kind of become a place where I occasionally talk about my other interests, generally as it relates to TWST, my main interest. I'd like to keep it like this since managing multiple blogs can be so draining. It already takes quite a bit of time to regularly write responses to asks just on one blog!

[akindplace]

The thing about romanticizing the tortured artist trope is that it takes very serious health conditions, physical, mental, and emotional ones, and it turns it into a very empty aesthetic made for consumption. It takes a life story, and it turns it into a punch line, an easy way out to explain a lifelong struggle while having no regard for the person who actually lived it.

It’s a way of simplifying something so complex as a whole life story, take away the good parts, the artist’s talent, and atribute years and year of studying and practicing their craft to an illness. As if it makes people feel better that maybe they aren’t geniuses but at least they aren’t “insane”.

Artists are constantly working to the bone to get people to see and understand their art, to change the current status quo, to perfect their craft. The most important thing is not how an artist died. It’s the life they lived, the work they’ve left behind, their mark on the world. Reducing people to a tragedy is not a way of appreciating their genius: their art is.

No one is a genius because of their illness, their trauma, their suffering, but because they studied and worked hard to develop the aptitude they were born with. Talent is not a miracle, it’s a lifelong effort.

This stereotype is extremely harmful to people who are currently struggling with those health problems, and it should not be used to “give pain a meaning”, because there is always so much more to someone’s life than suffering, and there is always so much more to your own life than romanticizing your own struggles and those of others.

Pain is meant to be worked through, not fed. And when you feed yourself the myth that an artist was brilliant because they were sick, you are erasing a big part of their life to try and make sense of yours. But you won’t find true meaning in life if you’re only feeding your sorrow instead of maybe, just maybe, doing what those artists did and work through it with your own art.

A lot of them did not have any access to healthcare because their conditions were unknown, but they did what they could to keep going. Their deaths don’t mean they gave up in a big tragic ending, and reducing them to that means you’re erasing everything they did to keep going, every fight, every effort they put into their own health and into their life’s work.

I love impressionist art ever since I was in elementary school, my favorite artist being Vincent Van Gogh. I was first introduced to his story as a man who had a mental illness and died a tragic death, while struggling financially and never being recognized properly during his lifetime.

But you see, Vincent Van Gogh had his brother Theo, who kept all the letters his older brother sent him, and sent his brother words of admiration, support, and unconditional love in his own.

He helped Vincent financially so he could pursue his paiting career. He saw the talent in his own brother even when others might’ve not. The period when Vincent was doing a little better with his health was actually when he was most prolific in his painting, which shuts down the idea that someone must be on the gutter and on the deepest pain and sickness to produce great art.

Most people in really poor health have a hard time managing daily life, and they probably won’t miraculously produce their best work yet while they in extreme suffering (I dare you to make the greatest work of art you’re capable of while you’re down with the flu, now imagine being in constant physical, mental and emotional distress and people think you can just make just about anything). Great art takes a lot of work. Genius and suffering don’t go hand in hand, and it reductive to explain away talent by an illness, as if any effort artists put into their craft was meaningless.

Theo named his own son after his brother, and after Vicent died, he still wanted to make his work known, and after his own death, his wife Johanna kept working on Theo’s mission besides her own political activism. She published the letters between the two brothers, and her own son helped in making Van Gogh’s work even more well known. Even though he was just a baby when his uncle died, he kept his memory alive by founding a world famous museum in his name.

Vincent Van Gogh was able to keep working because he was helped by his own family, financially, emocionally, and was given every encouragement so he could go on with his own career. He painted more when he got medical help, even though in his own time he would have had access to much simpler treatments, since the understanding of illnesses has largely changed in the last centuries.

Healthcare, support, compassion and understanding go a long way, and that’s why it’s important to keep pushing society to be more inclusive to people with illnesses - so they will get the help they need, so they won’t leave earlier than they should.

Vincent Van Gogh’s name is not well known just because of his own efforts, but also by the efforts of those who loved him and kept his name alive long after he was gone. He is not famous because he was a tortured artist. He is famous because those who loved him tried to help him in the ways they could, even after he was gone. His fame is not the result of his death, but of his life’s work and the work of those around him.

Love made him known. Support allowed him to keep working. Getting some help even at a time people did not understand his condition well enough meant he could paint more.

Van Gogh was only human, and he felt such a broad spectrum of emotions and lived through so many things, just as we all do. Behind those paintings, there is a person, a story, and so much hard work, and none of that can be reduced to the romanticized ideal of a tragic death of a tortured man.

It is not about his pain, his suffering, his death, you see. It’s about his life. And it’s about the life of those who loved him. He was able to do what he loved because he was loved, and that is the reason is remembered to this day.

I will end this long post with one of his most famous quotes:

“There is nothing more truly artistic than to love people.”