#kinder as a system

[thesorcerersshadow]

“you have to show everyone that you were right and they were wrong.”

i’m so fascinated by what gwen says here because there are ways in which it feels almost antithetical to a more surface level reading of her character (that does, at times, feel like the one the show wants us to engage with.) she doesn’t say that exposing valiant is the Right Thing To Do or appeal to a sense of honor or justice in the broader sense, even though i’m sure she does think that and believe those values apply here.

what she says here is… so self-interested, on merlin’s behalf. she believes him pretty implicitly (she asks once if he’s telling the truth, he says yes, she doesn’t question it) and her main reaction is “you have to do something to prove you were right.”

and i think part of that comes from just, like, really liking merlin right away / seeing the good of humanity in him (something i will maintain forever is mutually a big part of what they see in each other) and being offended on his behalf, feeling that he’s been Wronged. so like, justice is at play in her mind here, but it’s on a far more personal, intimate level than just being about Doing What’s Right.

and i also don’t think it’s a reach to say gwen might be doing some projection here. it might not have been on the same level/with the same stakes, but how many times do you think gwen had to bite her tongue when she knew she was right about something? morgana is kind to her as an employer at this point—far kinder than many nobles would be to their servants. but there is still and uneven balance to their dynamic, and even if morgana is willing to hear her out about certain things, in front of other nobles, in front of court, in front of uther—gwen knows her word doesn’t count for much, either.

[tentative-wanderer]

Thinking that Yue Qingyuan is attached to Shen Jiu the way one would love a younger brother, because you see parallels between Yue Qingyuan’s behaviour and your own behaviour as an elder sibling, is correct. BUT thinking that Yue Qingyuan is only attached to Shen Jiu the way one would love a younger brother is incorrect. I hope you don’t have a broken bloody thread of fate between you and your sibling. That would be very inconvenient. 👀

Not saying that what went on between them at the stage it was at in the book is definitely classified as romantic. Their minds were likely too occupied by the weight of their pasts to think of more. How does one define the sort of love whose owners died before it could come to fruition?

(One incomplete answer is: a tragedy. Couldn’t live long enough to muddle out how to love you properly. So I turn the “what could have been” into “is” in alternate universes. Hm I was talking about fics but that came out fancier. In perhaps cruder words, qijiu is like a miscarried foetus that I turn into a person in fics. A human foetus is still human and not some other species of animal, even if you don’t call it a person. Do you get my drift?)

[chocochococoffee]

small headcanon time

a small unnamed tomb emerges alongside the rest of beloved named ones in cang qiong. no one knows who made it, no one knows whose body is in there. the only two people seen praying to it couldn't be more different.

one of them is shang qinghua, who more than pray he prefers to look at it. he doesnt talk, most of the times he pours it baijiu or just eye it intensely.

the other person who has been seen praying to it is yue qingyuan, who, in comparison, prays intensely, reciting sutras sometimes. he cries and touches it and kneels and suffers until he has no more tears.

they dont visit often. they sometimes are seen together at it.

when shen qingqiu asked qinghua over the meaning of that tomb, qinghua just shrugs and says "it has no name bro, could be whoever you want to"

[iamfuckingsorry]

"Do you know where we are going next?" I asked ART.

Y'know what, I think maybe I don't need any more Murderbot books. I think maybe ending things here is fucking perfect and as much as I love Wells's writing I'm genuinely not sure it can get better for me.

Like, so much of the books are about MB learning how to be a person, about becoming okay with being a complete individual with everything it entails. The first thing it does once it's actually allowed to decide on its own is it runs away from it all (admittedly to go on a mission to confirm some things about its past, because it genuinely just wants to be *good*). It shoves all its emotions away as much as it's able to. Then shit happens, and it makes its first friends, makes decisions based on these friendships, goes through a lot of emotionally intense situations...

And we get to this point here. MB having zero doubts about going with ART says a lot about its relationship with ART, but it also says a lot about its relationship with its humans - it knows that wherever it goes, when it comes back, the humans will still be there. Its humans actively acknowledge its struggles with being a now-free SecUnit and MB is willing to entertain the discussions to an extent and share information about its deeply personal experiences. Hell, System Collapse ends with MB admitting it might be somewhat broken, but that's okay as long as it can keep doing its job, and agreeing to basically do counselling - this is the guy what would rewatch its favourite TV show again and again in order to avoid acknowledging it even had Emotions a couple books back.

Reading this, I know that MB will be okay. It has hopes and goals and genuinely believes in itself and it has an amazing support system that its willing to lean on for the first time in its life. I'm convinced it'll go on to do great things with ART. And that's really the only thing I need to know.

[peiskos-and-apricity]

History is going to look back on the people who voted for Trump the same way it looks back on the people who supported Nazis and I'm not even exaggerating. Be joyous in your victory now, but know that when your grandchildren talk about their family tree they're going to erase your name out of pure shame. I hope your heart weighs heavy with the pain you have brought to future generations. I hope it hurts.

[cream-and-tea]

heyyy don’t mean to bother you but did you know that um. You, now - the ones listening to my idling progress from back home in Glottage - you’re telling yourselves; Val cannot possibly be growing angry over something like this. How dare she? The hypocrite. How can this thing, this monster, this battle-saint, possibly find any kind of righteous anger in her twisted and repurposed heart for the lives of the fallen foe? How does our terrible Val think she can justify any kind of anger at the sight of the flattened and buried corpses of enemy civilians and enemy children, when we’ve already been listening to her murder police officers, soldiers and townsfolk single-handedly in turn? How can she be furious when we’ve heard her butcher her way through the little old ladies of the CLS in the hopeless effort to murder her own faraway mother? (Mockingly) See? You can be sacred and yet self-aware. Yes, I am culpable. I am dreadful. I have been responsible for great atrocities and I will commit a great many more before I’m done. And still - I am growing furious, as I walk through the devastation of this town. Because the wound of Sutler’s Weald is not like any wound I would make. It’s clumsy, it’s crude. It’s thoughtless. I begin to tell myself, as I walk - I wouldn’t have murdered them like this. I would have been kinder. I would have killed them quickly or gracefully, and there would have been beauty and strangeness in the manner of it. And even that’s all deception, even if I had been cruel and slow and lingering in the massacre of these innocent people, upon my whim - I would at least have looked them in the eyes, and I would have borne the weight of my cruelty. If they’d asked me to, I could have killed this town beautifully. And I’d have borne witness to the horror, and I’d have rejoiced in it - and it would have been considerably less vile and ugly than this. The ones back home, the ones who are listening in, I don’t think they know what they’ve done here. The line of connection between the victim and the victimiser, the sacrifice and the god - it’s long, and tangled, and indistinct. A god should not be able to avert her eyes. What a terrible thing it must be, to be monstrous and not even know it. And even if all of this is lies, even if I am just as bad and just as careless as the people back home who did this to Sutler’s Weald… …well, then, let me hate them, pure and simply, for being just as bad as me, because people - -people should be kinder than the gods that eat them. The town square is largely intact. A few burning cars, a single shrine and statue to some goddess of victory, her snapped-off arm raised in imagined triumph. I sit down upon the pavement in the ruined heart of the town, and I tell the dead people of Sutler’s Weald beautiful lies. I tell them that they survived, in their hundreds - miraculously and inexplicably, dodging the bombs. Not a single victim, not one death. An act of divine mercy. When that doesn’t work, I tell them that they were buried properly, according to whatever rites or customs they happen to cherish. When that doesn’t work, I try and turn them into my mother again, in the hopes of making the dead people hateful to me. When that doesn’t work, I tell them that I’m sorry. I tell them I wish they still had ears to become all the wondrous imaginings I had in store for them. I tell them… …that all things considered, they deserved a better avenging and foreign god, a better tormentor, a better oblivion, than the one that was forced upon them. (With cold fury) I tell them- I will find a way to give them something better.

[creatively-cosmic]

once again debating breaking my own rules again by putting guy (blue) who has not been introduced in mn officially in a rp interaction... itd be so funny. silly perhaps. its not like hes a secret its just what hes Doing that's a secret

[gachagon]

So I just learned what the NBA Bubble is

You mean to tell me a bunch of rich people who like Basketball went ahead and just made the Blue Lock facility IRL so the players could play during covid????

What a weird wacky world we live in

[kurushimiangel]

IMSOBBING I CHECKED MY EMAILS AND I SEE AN INVITE TO A MINI PIZZA PARTY FOR BEING A TOP BORROWER AT MY SCHOOL LIBRARY????? I DIDN'T KNOW THAT WAS A THING LMFAOOOO HLEPME

[divinekangaroo]

The joys of a system that require you to serve a notice to your own mother-with-dementia regarding the hearing that'll take all her financial and medical decisionmaking authority away from her.

[ythmir-writes]

im so thankful for people posting their pulls because now i can see just how hard it is to r2/r3 these solar pairs and i can manage expectations. i have a month to save for Zayne's solar pair and you bet your ass im gonna do everything to get him at r3 no matter what

[carcinized]

i have srsly had irl queer people make fun of me for being queer + liking sports and tell me that is like, not gay or something. like ok just say youre chronically online. womens soccer is the queerest thing i have ever been a part of hands down. also youre an awful person

[waywardsalt]

ive spent like 20 minutes trying to world this eloquently but i give up; im a big fan of linebeck just. not being capable of watching over kids not the person to be the guardian of a group of young people he struggles to take care of himself at times and has so much shit going on that it takes about one conversation with oshus for the old man to realize that this guy is. not doing great

[dirt-nerd]

Dude HH as a show is literally hurting people. Like, actual human beings in the real world. At that point you can't just brush shit aside with "oh the show just isn't for you, just don't watch it if you don't like it!" And even then, people are allowed to criticize flaws in things. Please be more thoughtful, this is not the hill you want to die on.

How exactly is this hurting human beings? Its not some disney show being shoved down everyones throats 24/7, so its pretty easy to avoid- I didn't even really know about it until a week ago! Additionally it doesn't seem to contain any intentional propaganda of the * these minority groups are evil* type.

It does have its flaws, not every joke lands, and the humour runs on the darker side of comedy which is definitely not to everyones taste. But unless the creators are doing some JK Rowling level "our billions in profits are funding a hate group" level shit I don't see what else the show could be doing that can't be fixed by just being responsible about your own media consumption?

Also I love a good show critique! But when someones criticism extends to the point where they seem to dislike the show at a fundamental level I genuinely think "hey I don't think this show is bringing you joy, maybe find something else" is a more thoughtful response then dragging them deeper into the rabbit hole by quibbling over different interpretations of the story or whatever.

[walkietalkiemaniac]

sad to report there is no way of hating your body without going "before you criticize your X always remember, your X wont change but your friends with X will see this" no peace no nothing cant a guy hate parts of their body without hurting anyone

[tr0llskog]

Please... I want him