#largely just a vent essay

[always-andromeda]

notes on femininity - 5/14/24

I wonder if I will ever be able to look at myself and not feel myself start to spin out. Because that seems to be what happens every time I do. For as long as I can remember, my relationship with girlhood has always been contemptuous. 

As far back as childhood, I felt it. All my friends wore bright colors smattered with sparkles from Justice while I dressed in my mother’s hand-me-down business casual wear. They were the only thing that fit me. Because little girls my size just weren’t worth selling to, I guess. All the other little girls got to be these pretty princesses covered in ruffles and jewels and I was just…there.

I was the one the other girls were always pointedly embarrassed of. On one hand, I was a pretty poor representation of their girl club. But on the other, man, did I make them look a whole lot better. Can’t live with me, can’t live without me or however the saying goes.

I may have been a girl, but I wasn’t girl enough to play Bella Swan when we played Twilight at recess. I was taller and bigger and I didn’t quite fit in with the rest of them. So of course I alternated between playing Edward and Jacob in a sea of the other girls all fawning around me, performing this exaggerated helplessness like they’d seen in the movies. 

I think that’s how I was taught to view femininity in general. Girl wasn’t defined by genitals or reproductive organs. It was defined by performance and, by extension, helplessness and pain. Most importantly, it always revolved around men.

Any and every man could be the all seeing audience we played for. Your father, your brother, your friends, hell, even God himself. It was all for Him. So you always had to be prepared to contort yourself into whatever position He needed; the Maiden, the Mother, the Sage, the Innocent, the Enigma, the Boss, the Siren, any number of clown costumes one could parade around in.

I did what I’ve always done. I studied them. Because I yearned to understand what makes a girl earn the attention of this audience. Every other girl seemed to be born blessed in that regard. Boys liked them. And so I thought: how do I trick people into believing that I’m one of those girls too?

Being fat, unattractive, unappealing, and uninteresting, I certainly had my work cut out for me. My teenage years were spent googling:

“how to be pretty”

“how to do eyeliner”

“how to talk to boys”

“how to flirt with boys”

“how to french kiss”

“how to suppress gag reflex”

Because what was the point if I didn’t have those things down? What the fuck was the point of anything if I wasn’t building myself up into some mythical fucking creature who could be anything for anyone? I didn’t have a type but I could be anyone’s. If they could look past my face and my body, of course; if they understood that I was looking at myself with the same unimpressed expression as they were. I could do my best impression of whatever girl they needed me to be. I was constantly doing market research, constantly inputting data, constantly updating into the newest, best version I could possibly be.

Imagine my surprise when I learned that when you turn yourself into a giving machine, you tend to attract people who only want to take. In fact, sometimes you attract thieves who don’t bother sticking a dollar in the slot either. Instead they smash the glass facade surrounding your humanity and take what they please.

They leave you empty, wondering what you are going to fill those slots with. Because what if someone passes by? What if they’d like something from you too? You don’t want them to see the broken glass. You don’t want them to be afraid. You don’t want them to reach their hand inside and hurt themselves on the jagged remnants of the crime inflicted on you. So you sweep away the evidence and drape a blanket over yourself.

You’re not out of order, you’re merely undergoing renovation. Don’t worry, I still have things to offer! You can count on me! I can still be worth something!

I can’t help but feel that deep down inside of me, there is something rotten. And not from something that was stolen from me. It’s something that’s been slowly putrefying since the day I was born. Maybe that something is the fact that I don’t have a place amongst it all. Maybe it’s the fact that if I were born a hundred years ago, I probably would’ve been locked in a hospital somewhere. I’d have my own little padded room with a slot in the door that’s too small to see all of me through. I could only be viewed in fragments, withering away over time until there’s nothing left to observe. Maybe it’s the fact that the idea of that comforts me even the slightest bit.

Because I still make myself into that machine. Could I ever stop being that girl? I try so hard to stop. But in a way, it’s such a self fulfilling prophecy. Because if I keep doing those things…aren’t I fulfilling the ultimate mission of femininity and girlhood? 

I can’t be the only one who feels it. I know I’m not. There’s enough feminist literature out in the world that I know hundreds of thousands of people have felt it long before I have.

I’m just tired. I’m tired of not knowing who I am when I’m not performing or when I’m not in pain. I’m tired of feeling like those are the only moments where I have something to offer the world. I’m tired of feeling like I have to offer something to begin with.

[exhaslo]

Kinktober Day 20- Roommate!Miguel x Reader

*Requested by Reader ;) *

        It was your third year of college and you had decided to get one of the dorm houses right next to the college. Finally! No more small apartment in a large dorm hall; no more random fire alarms because someone didn't know how long to cook popcorn; no more being locked out of your dorm room because you were in a shared bathroom; and finally, no more loud and obnoxious roommates. Having this house meant that you picked your roommate. You had your freedom.

        What better than a roommate who is going to have their heads stuck in the books or at the library? You interviewed so many people, but only one caught your attention as the perfect roommate. 

Miguel O'Hara

         The man was not only eye candy, but one of the smartest students on campus. Correction, he was the smartest student. You were surprised when he was in the hunt for a roommate. The two of you got along and you decided to go with him. All you ever heard about him was either girls wanting to fuck him, or that he was a hardass who kept his head in the books. A perfect roommate.

         Things were going smoothly for the first few months. You barely saw him due to your conflicting schedules, but he kept his part of the house clean. There was never any loud noise from his room, nor was there any reason to complain. The only little issue you were having was that he was too fucking sexy.

        Lord did the impure thoughts start when you saw him exit the shower one day. You swore drool was coming out of your mouth as you stared at him. You would have never thought that Miguel was so fit. No wonder why all the girls on campus wanted to date him. The man had a body of a god!

"Perhaps I should charge a fee," Miguel said, waking you from your trance. Your face was flustered,

"Sorry! I was just surprised!" You admitted, hiding your embarrassment. 

"Surprised it took you long enough to know why I like to hide here instead of the library?" You could have sworn you saw a smirk on his face, "Midterms are coming up. Let me know if you need help...studying."

        Oh man, you were embarrassed. Since then, Miguel had gotten a little more snarky with you. In a playful manner. Honestly, it felt like he was pulling st your heart strings. The man was smart, hot and a menace to your thoughts. You were ashamed to say that you had thought about your roommate a lot at night as you played with yourself.

        You weren't the only one. Miguel was pumping his dick in his hand every night to the thought of you under him. You were pretty dangerous to be around. Walking around in your underwear and a shirt; laying on the couch; hell, Miguel was even aroused by you cooking dinner. In his eyes, you were already his. He just hadn't sealed the deal yet.

"Argh, I hate men!" You cried out, planting your face onto the couch. Miguel was sitting on the side chair,

"Including me?" He asked, not straying away from his essay. You huffed, face him,

"No..."

"Good, now who do I have to beat up for annoying my precious roommate?"

"Hahaaa, just one of my classmates. We were doing a project and he had the gall to tell me I had no idea what I'm doing. I fucking major in the subject!"

       As you were venting, Miguel was staring at you. He found it cute how red your cheeks got when you were angry. How tight your clothes were against your body. Miguel wanted to see you strip. To get lazy and comfy. It was something only for his eyes to see. He moved his laptop over his bulge, wanting to hide the fact that he was getting turned on from just staring at you.

"And then he had the absolute nerve after all that to ask me out! Like, why would I want to date a rude snob like him?! After I said hell no, he called me a bitch and went to shit talk me to his friends!" You whimpered, tears threatening to spill. 

        Miguel immediately went to your aid. He brought you a box of tissues, sitting beside you now. You rested your head against his shoulder, trying your best to not cry.

"I can beat him up for you, amor. (love). You can do so much better."

"Haha, thanks Miguel."

---------------

          After that, you went back to your hard studies since Finals were around the corner. That boy who had bothered you prior stopped bothering you completely. In fact, he avoided you. It was strange, but you were happy about it. All you needed was to pass your classes. Miguel helped you study for midterms, perhaps he was willing to help you again for finals?

        You were sitting in your shared living room, waiting for Miguel's class to get out. You were getting frustrated from trying to figure out stuff from another class. Glancing at the time, you inhaled deeply. There was still plenty of time before Miguel came home, you could use a little destress. Laying against the couch, you spread your legs and began to rub your clit was massaging you breast.

"Mhm, Miguel," You closed your eyes, imaging that it was Miguel toying with your body.

        Raising your hips, you started to feverishly rub your clit. Whines coming out as you desperately wanted Miguel to touch you. You lowered your fingers to your aching hole, doing your best to finger yourself.

"Miguel!" You whined.

"Fuck," Miguel groaned as he walked through the door. You gasped loudly, fixing yourself, 

"M-Miguel!? Y-Your c-class-?!" You panicked. Miguel hurried to your side,

"Don't you fucking stop now." He groaned, his hands making haste into your shorts, "Fuck, hearing your moans when I walk in. Cómo puedo contenerme? (How can I hold myself back?)"

       You gasped as Miguel had you pinned to the couch. His hands quickly replaced yours and he entered two digits into your wet cunt. You moaned, arching your back into the couch as he pumped his fingers roughly. Your pussy clentching down against his hand whike your hips moved against his palm. His fingers were so thick, bigger than some of your toys. He was already stretching you out.

"Hah, ah, M-Miguel..." You whimpered a moan as he curled his fingers. Miguel licked his lips,

"Qué hermoso. Tu cuerpo se está desmoronando por mi culpa. (How beautiful. Your body just falling apart because of me.)" You trembled as you reached your first orgasm, "What a naughty roommate. Teasing me so much."

        You panted heavily, never experience an orgasm like that before. You followed Miguel's gaze, watching him undo his pants as he licked his fingers. His pupils almost looked blown once he had a taste of you. It made you wetter. Finally, all of those wet dreams you've had of fucking your roommate was about to come true. Miguel cussed lowly as his belt got in the way.

"I never seen you this stressed," You teased, helping him undo his pants, "How long have you been wanting this?"

"Why do you think I became your roommate?" Miguel watched your reaction towards his large dick, "You?"

"Before midterms,"

        You stroked his dick with both hands. His low rumbling groans were turning you on more. You brought your lips to his tip, licking the precum that had started to drip. You winced at the salty taste but continued to suck him. Miguel's hand rested on your head as you bobbed your head against him. It was difficult and you could not take him fully, but Miguel seemed to enjoy it. Tears formed from the corner of your eyes as Miguel forced your head lower.

        Muffling against his dick, Miguel stopped, allowing you to breathe. You crawled over his lap, positioning his dick over your soaked hole. Miguel held your hips and placed you on your back before entering. The two of you moaned in unison. Miguel held your legs up as he stretched you out. Miguel was destroying your pussy and he hadn't even moved yet. You gripped the couch's blanket, raising your hips as he kept pushing himself inside.

"Looks like you need help with your finals," Miguel groaned, watching your pussy suck his dick as he finally fit his whole length, "Let me start by teaching this naughty pussy a lesson."

"Mhm, p-please," You begged. Miguel pulled back then slapped his length into you with force, "Ah~!" You cried out.

"Qué compañera de cuarto más cachonda. ¿A punto de romperse después de un solo empujón de mi polla? Tu coño fue hecho solo para mí. Mira lo mojada que estás, sólo para mí. (What a slutty roommate. About to break after just one thrust of my dick? Your pussy was made just for me. Look at how wet you are, just for me.)"

"M-Miguel!" 

        You gasped for air as he fucked your brains out. Each thrust was bringing your orgasm closer and closer. Miguel grabbed your breasts, playing with them as he sucked on your collarbone. His dick pounding you relentlessly. He had his body pinned against you like an animal in heat, refusing to let you go. You wrapped your arms around his neck, moaning into his ear as you reached another orgasm. Miguel shivered in delight and decided to reward you. He slammed his cock a few more times, filling your womb with his cum.

"Looks like you're going to need a lot more lessons, cariño (sweetheart). But don't worry, I won't charge my dear roommate."

"Y-You better not." You huffed. Miguel smirked as he gave you another slap of his dick, "W-Wait~ Mhm, d-don't...d-do that." Your whines turned into moans as Miguel kept abusing your poor cunt.

"After waiting this long, you really don't think I'm not going to fuck you dumb? Gotta make sure I keep tutoring you."

"Hah, hah, y-yes," You replied, throwing your head back in pleasure.

        You did not care how many times you needed to ask Miguel for help. You knew that he would tutor you seriously. It was your payment that you really looked forward too. Anytime either of you were stressed, you two had some of the best sex. When it was time to renew your lease for the house, both you and Miguel did not hesitate to agree. Miguel was the perfect roommate. Perfect boyfriend. You were not letting go of him, and neither was he of you.

[genderqueerdykes]

Your post about man hating & antimasculism reminds me of the essay/blog post “I Am A Transwoman. I Am In The Closet. I Am Not Coming Out” (tldr: the author is a trans woman and a large part of the essay/post describes her experiences with man hating & antimasculism and how that affected her)

As a transmasc/transneutral individual, I always resonated with that essay/blog post. Especially since the whole man hating & antimasculism rhetoric has seemingly started to influence people I know who weren’t man hating/antimasculism/etc before (e.g., it’s uncomfortable to feel like I’m put in a position where I either feel like I have to trigger my own dysphoria and point out to people that I’m unambiguously read as a woman + that I’m closeted offline + I’m not transitioning in any capacity [offline due to safety reasons] to be taken seriously when talking about certain thing or say nothing and be completely dismissed. Doing something like calling them out for being dismissive and prejudiced doesn’t end well…)

Feel free not to reply to this and/or delete it. I just wanted to get this out (sorry for venting)

GOD THANK YOU FOR THE REMINDER!!!!!!! i haven't thought about that essay in forever:

can someone link us the post containing this essay? I feel like this is a huge thing to be showing to people right now. the first time i read it, i cried because i related so hard. people are so cruel and don't understand that coming out as a trans woman is SO fucking hard and straight up impossible in many places. it means death in many places. people just straight up doing fucking care and are not compassionate about potential trans women around them that have to stay in the closet or boymode for safety.

thank you so much for reminding us and sharing your experience. i'm sorry that you're facing these issues, it's really tough to deal with that sort of thing IRL and then listen to absolutely batshit banter online. take care of yourself. stay safe out there and thanks again

[olderthannetfic]

Hot take incoming.

People who have been traumatized or otherwise harmed by certain people (predators, etc) have every right to be upset about it, and angry, and scared about whether other people will experience the same thing. They also have a right to process their trauma in their own time, because everyone is different. It is also understandable that some people might not have access to a way to process that trauma. Lastly, obviously, people with trauma totally deserve to be included in fandom spaces as much as someone who doesn't have trauma.

However… I feel like there is a line that shouldn't be crossed when engaging in certain discourse in fandom, and outside of fandom. If someone has lots of unresolved, unprocessed trauma, and because of it, they can't be (sufficiently) objective, or look at things in a more unbiased manner, they should not be engaging in discourse about things like censorship too heavily—if at all. They need to postpone that until their mental health is a bit better.

Unresolved trauma can make it really hard to properly acknowledge nuance. For example, if someone's parents grabbed them, beat them, withheld food, opened locked doors on them, et al, yes, they're going to have trauma. But the question remains whether they can view something like a fictional dynamic where, for instance, someone makes amends with their parents who abused them due to mental illness, which has since been treated, with ample objectivity. Or any other, even darker topics, especially ones where toxic relationships and events are written to be erotic). It really feels like many people in fandom don't recognize they might be too biased to read something without viscerally (viscerally!) reacting, and throwing down the "ban it" card. I get the impression it's not really healthy for the individual a lot of times, too.

I've reblogged posts about why it's bad to censor sensitive topics in fandom, and I've posted some of my own commentary, which tends to be very clinical. I've had multiple strangers, at these times, create full-on essays in my inbox where, after mentioning how I seemed like a safe space, they described how they were groomed and abused by someone, and all sorts of stuff that I didn't want to read. While it was very sympathetic, they argued that x things should be censored, and nobody should be allowed to write toxic relationships, because they "knew just how bad that trauma could be," and they implored me to believe them. But even if they do have firsthand experience with that trauma, and they feel so strongly about it, does that really make their argument any more logical?

I'm convinced these people still had unprocessed trauma, so they were acting with their feelings, not their brain. I got this impression from how they completely trauma-dumped on me - I kid you not, it felt like they had to get this stuff out somehow, because they hadn't been given enough opportunity to vent before. One of these people who were in my inbox? They legitimately seemed desperate to get me to accept what they were saying. Now, it could've been a bucket of fake bullshit. But if it was real, I have to wonder how much of the incessant campaigning for censorship is actually a misguided way for people to manage and make sense of trauma, to validate it somehow, and feel like they're getting control over a situation, even if they don't realize that's what they're trying to do.

Not to claim people shouldn't be allowed to speak their minds. But, there's nuance. I feel like a lot of people in fandom need to wrap their heads around the fact that there is a large difference between being informed by trauma, and letting trauma speak for you. And the latter can often lead to bad outcomes.

--

[goodluckclove]

clove my kind comrade. i have a very emotional writing advice question for you. this turned kinda long, i apologize

i've been working on college applications these last few months, with the majority of that time taking the form of essay writing. and in these months it has been discovered that, at least to my dad's standards, my normal nonfiction prose writing skills are absolutely abysmal. i would write a draft, think i had everything pretty much shiny and complete, only to have everything i had worked so hard to finish absolutely picked to shreds by my dad and told i needed to start over. and there's nuance to this; i do quite literally forget a lot of writing tips and processes that worked for me, and it took last week's adhd diagnosis 17 years too late for me to stop hating myself for not being able to write a 300 word essay in a week. but this has left deep scars on my psyche and sent me for the most intense mental heath loop ive had in years.

that all contributed to a very intense anxiety ive developed about writing. i'll open a wip (or hell start writing an ask) and i will feel such a sense of dread. it's like i'm reaching into an oven that i know i've burned myself on so many times before. i can barely write a sentence before i start overthinking things too much and give up. this is specifically talking about my own personal writing. five minutes ago i opened my most self-indulgent wip that only four people on earth would ever be allowed to see and felt such an overwhelming fear of "what if it's bad". "what if it doesn't read this way to people". i've never had that before. i write what i write, and it's generally pretty damn good. but the anxiety i have about these stupid college essays has bled into MY work, MY own fun projects.

essentially, what i'm asking you is if you can offer any advice of how to conquer this anxiety. i know that an essay and a gay little fanfiction are fundamentally different things that cannot be equated with each other, and i know that other people's opinion on what is ultimately a self indulgent project can be easily and happily disregarded. but i can't have a self indulgent project if i can't even bring myself to physically write it.

this turned into a vent lmao. i hope you and Wife and the cats are doing splendidly.

Hi Bas! This ask made me deeply angry when I read it last night! Shame from artists, especially young artists just starting out in life and in their craft, apparently provokes a pretty deep rage in my soul.

I'm fine now. I'm at a coffee shop. Thank you for a pretty vulnerable and heartfelt insight into your brain-space, and I'm going to give it a pretty long and ramble-y response because that's what it deserves - and honestly, you've known me for long enough that I'm sure you kind of assume this is what's coming. Before that, though, I get the sense you're pretty anxious and drained. In the name of meeting your sincerity I would like to offer a look at the drawing my surrogate child demanded I draw for them after they saw the terrible Sonic the Hedgehog I drew from memory last night. Their prompt was "T4T Sonic/Shadow"

What do you think? I gave Shadow a wallet chain. I've never drawn fan art before but I do think going forward I'm going to give most, if not every famous IP I draw a wallet chain. This made me grin a lot because it's so fucking weird. Also it's not canon. Canonically Shadow would not smoke a blunt. Canonically Shadow the Hedgehog vapes.

Okay I made myself properly silly time for business. Come follow me into a hypothetical situation so I can talk to you (and anyone in your position - which is a lot of people your age) more intimately.

Okay, so I'm at a new coffee shop. It's open concept, fairly minimal an industrial in decor. I'm in this seated nook in the back at a bench by a large round table. The lighting is soft. There's a lot of plants and the baristas are like kind of anti-social which usually means the coffee is going to be great or pretty bad. Luckily it's the former - I got this iced maple cardamom latte. They have other drinks too. Tea. Your usual coffee varieties. They have a rosemary syrup you can put in lattes that I might try if I feel like I want another coffee later. Take my card and order something. I'll wait here.

You're back? What'd you get?

Mm. Fuck. I should've gotten that too. Nevermind, it's fine. I'll probably come back here again.

Okay, so college essays. I'm going to go ahead and just open by saying that college essays are absolutely not the same as nonfiction prose. Flat out, end of sentence. They're aren't apples and oranges - it's like comparing an apple and a used 2007 Honda Accord.

Good nonfiction means different things to different people. I personally enjoy a bit of humor and love for a subject, even if it's mundane to most of society. My wife prefers a Wikipedia-level of dry Academia. Different strokes.

College admission essays, however, are not good. They're really not. From a vague amount of research it seems this has been an issue for decades now.

You can still write like a bad college essay, don't get me wrong. Something riddled with typos or dribbled out by a generative AI. But if you look a little bit at what the people who actually check applications are, it seems the spectrum isn't "bad to great" as much as it is "bad to fine". My own college essay was some bullshit about how I learned about myself and the world around me by going to the grocery store before school and buying a baguette to have for lunch. It was stupendously mediocre. I got into college.

There's a lot of reasons for this. It could be because the average 17-18 year old isn't given the tools or opportunity to write really solid nonfiction - probably because the society we live in doesn't expect them to have anything to contribute in that way, but that's beside the point. You're taught essays. Ways to format papers that, from what I gather, only really apply in academic settings. When I was in high school the average essay had pretty stark parameters students were expected to follow, and from what I've heard those parameters have only gotten more specific.

With all that in mind, I understand why you're freaked out. If you look up tips on solid college essays the advice is like just comically vague. Be authentic! Focus on deeper themes! Pose a philosophical question! That last one actually made me laugh out loud when I read it, because it's so insanely discordant compared to how I've seen people you're age be treated. To go straight from people assuming you need your hand held on nearly anything to having a person say "Hey solve nihilism in 450 words " is baffling.

There's real advice in this odd, clickbait-y quips. You shouldn't feel like you have to play a character or pretend to be something you don't want to do, because that comes across in the text pretty easily. You should consider exploring a topic, because it reveals more about you as a person and that's valuable to the application as a whole. You - I'm going to go out and say you don't need to pose any sort of philosophical quandary at all, actually. That's a pretty wild thing to ask a huge portion of New Adults to be able to do.

So this isn't nonfiction. This isn't a think piece or a memoir, even though people might compare it to both. This is closer to a cover letter. You should still try, but do so knowing this is separate from your skills as a writer. Once you do that, you'll hopefully be able to relax enough to actually let your character slip into the work. What you mainly want to do is express a sense of your voice and sort of imply an idea of the type of presence you would be as a student at your school of choice. That's the point of the application as a whole. It's not going to win a Pulitzer. It would be truly, very weird if an admissions essay won a Pulitzer.

The other thing that I think might be making you and people in your shoes feel crazy is that you're in the period of your life when a lot of adults around you are going to say just the wackest nonsense. Oh this application determines the rest of your life! The stakes have never been higher! This is your future! You're setting the entire course of the rest of your life right now, somehow!

That obviously is also not true. Next year will be a decade since I graduate high school, and I still actually have no idea why some people had that level of intensity. It strikes me as incredibly counter-productive. I explained this to my kid, and they were shocked when I told them how many paths there are to get a higher education. You can get your first few years at a community college and then go to a university. You can go to a polytech school (They make them for the arts too! my brother went to Cogswell and it was such a cool campus) and get straight into industry experience. You might get into a university and transfer to a different one because it has a better program or opportunity.

All of these are cool. Not going to college is also cool, although it comes with other pitfalls. You can also go to college later on down the line. If you haven't figured it out yet, existing in the world is actually really flexible and open in terms of life choices. A college application, essay included, is not likely to play a huge part in the grand scheme of your life. The results of this will give you a sort of better understanding of your options for a plan for the next - like - year, maybe? It won't even determine it. It's more of a cool, maybe or a cool, I guess not right now situation.

It's also way harder for most people to work with a smaller word count. Less words mean less margin for error. That's stressful. You aren't a failure for struggling to write 300 words in a week when you can't choose the parameters of the writing, can't change the deadline, and probably have a bunch of people saying how crazy important all this is. Those are batshit work conditions for someone who doesn't have ADHD.

For someone who does, I can see how easily this would warp the perspective you have on everything else you do. Being picked apart by someone who hasn't been where you are in like 20+ years but still expects you to take their words as gospel? Confusing! Maybe feeling the inexplicable need to compare yourself to any published nonfiction you've read and loved, even though this isn't even nonfiction - and if it was, those writers have definitely been working in the genre longer than just goddamned now.

I think I've told a few people your age that this is the point where you kind of have to pick and choose how often you listen to the adults in your life. That feels irresponsible for me to say, but I do stand by it. When it comes to the transition between high school and college, most established adults are just crazy biased. Maybe because they raised you. Maybe because they're blinded by nostalgia and think that high school was the best part of their lives. Maybe they aren't familiar with the work you want to go into and what's needed to get a start in it. Or they could just straight up not understand how the college system works now.

It is such bullshit that you eventually have to craft a sense of internal intuition out of essentially nothing but it is a thing. It takes time, though. I won't pretend like you can make it happen immediately right now.

What matters is that you're okay. I promise you that - you're okay. Looking you straight in the eye, Bas, you're a good writer. Not "good for your age", I have read enough of your actual writing to know that you're pretty solid already. I've also read enough of your posts and had conversations with you to know for certain that if you wanted to pursue nonfiction you'd be pretty good at it right off the bat. This would be under the usual standards of a nonfiction writer, of course - meaning you get to pick the length, subject, and when you finish it.

You are in the unfortunate period of going through multiple transitions at once. It's hard enough to navigate the way relationships change when people decide (or struggle to process) how you're an "adult" now (also not really true in a lot of ways, but that's another ramble). But going so long under the assumption of having a Default Brain Experience and then realizing that all of the struggles you assumed were normal are actually an imbalance of chemicals is jarring.

It's treatable, yes. Once you get on a medication that helps with the dopamine everything is immeasurably easier, holy shit. But even then it's still painful at times because the difference is so palpable you sometimes stop and think why did it take so long for me to be able to have this? Why did no one see I was struggling? That was my experience, at least.

This is a crucial point in life where you have to be extra kind to yourself however you can. Once you get on stimulants, if you go that way, drink a lot of water and remember to eat (Some of them can make appetite wonky and I think they all dehydrate you). Be careful with caffeine because they do make you more sensitive to that. Maybe like just stop thinking about whether or not your writing is bad or doesn't work in certain ways because I am a Professional Writer and those kinds of thoughts have literally never been helpful to me. When they pop up in my brain I literally say "no" and force myself to think about something else.

Whether your writing is "good" is not an actual question. Is it coherent and does it contain a noticeable and unique voice? Yes. Is it what you want? I can't answer that, but if you say no the way to fix that is usually read more/write more/think more/share with other more.

Also does it read the way it should to other people? Stop it. Don't worry about that yet. You have to finish the damn thing or else it won't read any way to anyone. So much of writing is Second Draft You's problem.

Anyways that's all I have to say. My heart goes out to you for being pulled in so many directions. From my own experience it gets slightly easier once you submit the apps, but people do continue saying dumb nonsense until like midway into your first year in college. And if you end up leaving college for some reason or another people will keep occasionally saying dumb nonsense. But usually by then you're more equipped to ignore them.

You're going to be okay. You are an intelligent, insightful, artistically capable and deeply kind individual. Whether you share your thoughts and make your stories, true or not, through text or art or a mix of both, you have so much to offer. Just remember that.

Also I'm hungry. I've been writing this for a while and I didn't get any work done on the painting for my wife, but it's almost noon and I didn't have breakfast. There's an American Chinese place near here and they have pretty cheap lunch specials. Come on, get your stuff and let's take a break.

Mongolian beef yum yum.

[silvernyxchariot]

Tumblr is filled with horny bastards, so this is probably the wrong place to vent or rant about this. But it's been bothering me for a while.

Synopsis: I do not play Zenless Zone Zero, nor do I care what Jane Doe's personality or occupation is. I did not ask for an essay. The point is the Jane Doe demo for Zenless Zone Zero wasn't that sexual. People who are whining are just sensitive.

Two of you missed that point, and I am dissappointed but not surprised that I have to spell it out in the synopsis.

If it made you uncomfortable, then Hoyo did their job right. I don't play, nor do I want to play ZZZ, but I still watched Jane Doe's character demo because of all the negative comments buzzing around it. My initial reaction to all of it was, "What in the puritanical 2024 bullshit are people complaining about NOW? 💀" It really wasn't that bad or "gross."🧍‍♂️ At this point, just stop playing all the games that make you so uncomfy.

The phrases I see the most in the comments section are "gooner," gross, and S@'d. "Gooner," without looking at Urban Dictionary, just means "horny" or "perverted," I surmise. I empathize with victims of sexual assault, but this is a sensual and sexual character with a tall female model, large bust, wide hips, and a small waist who is also interrogating an NPC. She LOOKS like she was built for the people who simp for "mommy 😩💦" characters. Upon first glance, someone else who also doesn't play ZZZ told me, "Oh, she's a demon." So...

A villainous looking character, being villainous! 😱 Omg, what are the odds!

Someone also commented that "Children or people who are way too young are consuming media that they shouldn't be," and true. I see that every day when parents buy their kid yaoi or some shit without questioning it. But that's not anyone else's fault but the parent and child consuming the content. Media is diverse and does not need to cater to everyone's moral compass.

It's no one else's fault either if you can't read or ignore warning labels. ZZZ is labeled T for teens for possible "violence, suggestive themes, crude humor, minimal blood, simulated gambling and/or infrequent use of strong language." Did you expect Jane Doe to be Mary Poppins!! 💀💀 Or should media censor everything for precious ✨️child who can do no wrong✨️.

[lakeshorez]

An Anecdote of Asexuality, Autism, and Other Oddities.

i originally posted this absolute essay of a comment underneath Carseatheadrest’s song “It’s Only Sex for, obvious reasons, however - I figured possibly it would be helpful to post it here to reach more folks who may resonate. (The song is fire btw, y’all should check CSH out!!) Apologies for any grammar mishaps - I wrote this after waking up from a five-hour long nap prior to taking my meds (whoops), and my autism can make it difficult when writing long-form pieces like this.

This is merely a slightly unhinged vent-post that seemed to get out of hand as I continued to write it; mainly focusing upon my own struggles with intimacy and how society views it as a whole - my relationship with being asexual, and how my autism leads me to perceive the act of sex in a slightly altered light compared to most.

General content warnings for: surface-level mentions of sexual content (nothing too explicit, I promise.), and brief mentions of past trauma.

That being said - I introduce you all to a glimpse inside my thoughts - and hopefully - despite having few followers, lol - some of you can relate, understand, or hell, possibly even learn something new about yourselves!

————————————

I’m 17 and although I’ve never been intimate nor do I have a partner - I’ve always felt immensely disconnected from most people’s allure towards intimacy since I find it weirdly “feral” in a way? Like, perceiving how aggressive people act within sexual scenarios with one another seems to put me off. As if they’re ’drunk off lust’ or something, being fully controlled by desire I guess? But to be fair, the only blatant exposure I’ve had to intimacy is through written text, along with hearing others’ testimonies on the manner. But, whenever I hear people going on about how they find it arousing when someone uses dirty talk I just feel weirdly— put off? I don’t know. Plus, I might be the only one who feels this way, but I absolutely despise the feeling of being in the act - more so the physical aspects of it. Sure, the closest I’ve had to actually being intimate is with by my own hand - but my point is, the sensations that are being absolutely overblown throughout the rest of your body; heavy breathing, sweating, a dazed mind, trembling limbs, etc - feel too overwhelming to me. I think I could be a result of me being autistic, and likely having heightened sensory impulses makes it feel so strange. But another thing I’ve noticed for me, is that the sensations feel eerily similar to when I’m upon the brink of a panic attack strangely enough. Not to mention how utterly tainted with filth I feel after the fact. Sure, I’ve tried to read articles upon articles on why sex and self pleasure is a natural occurrence - the health benefits and all - how it’s abnormal to feel ashamed or disconnected from the act, how I purely need to suck it up because if I dare express any destain from engaging in it, I’m considered a fault in the system. And yet, the internalized feelings of disconnect from my own body still linger, regardless how often I try to convince myself it’s normal.

It’s gotten to the point where I’ve sorta realized - perhaps it’s just not for me. Perhaps, I feel better when I’m not forcing myself to be someone I’m not? Or perhaps, what if all this time I’m merely lying to myself - what if my apathy and disgust regarding it was a result of unresolved childhood trauma? Perhaps made even more so of how I’ve never even held hands romantically with another human being. What if I’m wrong? Wrong about not understanding what all the hype is about — an unmoved fault in a sea of flirty playboy bunnies. I’m still trying to properly unpack a lot of what may have caused me to feel so strange about it, likely a large mess of factors; past trauma, growing under the watchful eye of a Christian mother, the fact I’m a pan trans guy- but I think one large part of it may be due to my autism. I’ve noticed, with a lot of basic tasks life throws at me, I always had a tendency to overanalyze and dissect a lot of things, sex included. I tend to view it in a very literal and logical light - sure, I can fully understand why people enjoy it, how they enjoy the emotional bond it creates, how they feel sparks from the bounds of pleasure that surge throughout their bodies - but other than that, I never can comprehend why people seem to place it on such a high pedestal? I could never quite comprehend why people put intimacy on the same level as eating, breathing, or even sleeping. I could never comprehend why people seemed to make such fusses over it. How my own mom couldn’t comprehend I don’t care much for the act, how people can’t physically accept the fact someone could live without it, as if the sensation itself is the elixir of life.

I feel whenever there’s conversations regarding the topic, autistic people such as myself tend to be left out of the conversations a whole lot. I suppose it’s unfortunately due to a whole slew of factors, such as infantilization; people viewing us as innocent children who’d never engage in something as adultery and taboo as sex because in their minds, we’re practically nothing more than overgrown children. However, I recall reading about how studies have shown that people assigned female at birth on average tend to have more nerve endings displayed around their reproductive organs - therefore, often feeling sexual sensations to a more heightened degree compared to our amab counterparts. However, I think it could also be linked to the discussion of being autistic and our feelings regarding intimacy. Since we tend to already have an intense heightened display of sensory inputs - primarily touch - I suppose it makes sense why I, and a lot of other afab autistic individuals feel like we’re on the brink of having a sensory overload when feeling any sexual stimulation. What would be considered as pleasurable to someone who isn’t autistic, could be interpreted as something almost painful to someone who is.

Whenever I try to learn on how to be more comfortable with the idea of intimacy, often the advice is so blatantly intended for non-autistic folk, along with taking on a very cisgendered-heteronormative view upon the matter as well. I’ve always felt extremely alienated when it came to talks about it and whatnot - mainly due to my autism, the fact I’m a trans pansexual dude, and past trauma relating to intimacy. Yet …in an odd way, whenever I browse through comment sections of videos on talks about intimacy and how to be an intimate partner, it’s like I’m seeing a glimpse in an alternate reality - a reality where everyone just seems to “get it”. A reality where not a single person ever had to cope with a horde of internalized mental struggles regarding such a topic, they openly state how much they enjoy being intimate with their partners, going into immense detail upon what makes them “tick” with tens of comments beneath them sharing that same anecdote. Cracking jokes and sharing their stories like it’s a normal Tuesday. And yet, part of me can’t help but feel like I’m an anomaly in an odd sense. Why regardless of how many sex-positive articles and videos I burn into my mind, I’ll constantly feel like I’m a flaw upon the system. How there’s always an eerily familiar contortion lodged deep within a pit in my stomach whenever the mere thought is brought up. How the nauseating pit only continues to expand itself - feeding off my utter discomfort, my inability to “get it”, like a spreading sickness that lacks no means of ending. But the pit never leaves, it just sits there within me. It only expands and contracts itself, constantly shifting its size and intensity to remind me of my abnormality. I can feel it deep within my body - I can feel its cruel weight make itself known whenever the topic of intimacy is brought up, whenever I feel that desire burn throughout my skin.

I suppose it’s why I felt like there was something wrong with me when I despised the sensations intimacy brought. Whenever I’d bring it up, I was told I was just a goddamn immature 17 year old who needed to ‘grow up’ and wait until I found a partner, then I’d finally “get it”. Then I’d finally understand what all the hype was about, then I’d finally feel whole. After all, being a virgin your whole life is something to be ashamed of, isn’t it? And yet, the closest thing I’ve had to experiencing any sexual stimulation is by my own hand - but even while I’m in the act, I can’t help but feel the overwhelming sensation of my heavy breathing, my heart throbbing at an unsteady rhythm, my limbs trembling, the almost burning sensation that only increases between my thighs until it boils over. And after? I feel disoriented. Like my mind is attempting to sew itself back together through trembling limbs and shaken breaths. And I want to cry. To sob, to clutch my shaken limbs around myself in a desperate means of granting myself comfort - I feel like I’m about to explode, with no other means to feel whole once again.

And despite it all, I often find myself wondering; “Why did nobody warn me about this?” Why didn’t they warn me of the intense barrage of sensations being thrown at my body in the most uneven hellish masses imaginable? Why didn’t they mention how my body would feel like it’s dying? After all, isn’t it guilty pleasure? A pleasure unmatched by anything granted by nature itself? A pleasure delectable as the sweetest honey, the closest thing to heaven humanity has acquired without the act of death. Shouldn’t it feel immaculate? Shouldn’t I feel satisfied? And yet, I lie between my disheveled bed sheets, clutching onto a pillow as heavy tears stain its fabric. And I can’t help but internally beat myself up over my emotions - why I feel so dejected and mentally shaken over a sensation that’s considered one of nature’s greatest gifts. How no matter how many times I mentally prepare myself to ‘fix’ my ongoing barrage of mental turmoil through watching videos of a person who clearly hasn’t felt the anguish I’m in explain in detail how to ‘enjoy’ the act. Assuming it comes naturally to anyone who watches, assuming that not a single person on the opposite side of the screen has ever felt such alienation from the rest of the human race over something that everyone just seems to magically have imbedded within their minds from birth. Assuming nobody is as utterly flawed as I am.

I suppose my detachment in regards to intimacy - even if it’s limited to merely touching myself once in a goddamn blue moon - has convinced me that I, in all my traumatized asexual autistic glory, would make one hell of a horrible partner. Who wants a partner who flinches at the slightest of touch, a partner who feels like they’re on the brink of a panic attack when the sensations get too intense for them to bear, who can’t stop hyperventilating and sobbing through thick and heavy tears as they try to soothe me like a distraught child, how dare I try and have my partner be some therapist for my issues…After all, that’s what a horrible partner does…right? A horrible partner doesn’t care for their spouse’s sexual needs - haven’t I heard of all those couples who break up because they couldn’t be satisfied in bed? How dare I try and insinuate that my future partner should settle for less, that they should live in an unfulfilling relationship unable to act upon a natural desire because I’m too utterly messed up to have it drilled into my thick skull that it’s normal. How dare I be so selfish.

It’s all I hear when I tell people I’m asexual, when I try and explain my autism physically does not allow me to think nor feel any different, how my entire being practically makes me feel differently around the entire discussion regarding intimacy. And yet, they express their worries and condolences. Not directed towards me, but to whatever future partner may interweave their fingers with mine someday. They mourn more intensely for that nonexistent entity over the person who’s standing in front of them in the flesh. They mourn for the fact that my future partner will have to somehow settle for less in their words, they try and convince me that merely granting my affection and love through hand-written notes and carefully crafted gifts and trinkets will never compare to the sheer raw intimacy sex can bring. How dare I insinuate that someone could be happy and fulfilled without such a need for something so natural, how dare I express one can feel fulfilled through other means that do not entail intimacy. How dare my sheer existence challenge their narrow mindset. How dare someone who chooses to become my spouse be understanding and grant me their compassionate empathy for simply being, how dare they feel fulfilled and satisfied by being granted affectionate notes and gifts over being touched by their beloved, how dare they “settle for less” and be content with simply experiencing the light of their partner through a clothed body. How dare they challenge the status quo for merely existing. It’s as if, people physically cannot fathom that someone can feel equally happy and fulfilled without the need for it. However, I suppose I don’t blame them - it’s everywhere you look. The expectancy to engage in it is practically being advertised and gossiped about in every corner of the world around them. As if feeling any distain or discomfort with the idea is an immediate challenge against something bigger. Like an act of rebellion, almost. But, am I being rebellious? How is me being some traumatized asexual autistic person on par with being some rebellious teenager? I’m not trying to challenge anything nor anyone, but it seems as if my sheer existence is already capable of doing that.

But hey, I guess you could say - it’s only sex :3 (I’m so sorry)

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

Spoiler for Jujutsu Kaisen

I'm sorry it's so long and looks like a vent post. I'm sorry for those of you who had great luck in avoiding Jujutsu Kaisen until now. With that, let me give some context before the assholery.

Jujutsu Kaisen has a breakout character, Gojo, he is unique, flawed, well written, well loved, overpowered, and the most misunderstood character in this series. He recently met his end in the most infuriating way possible. It was an unceremonious death, off screened, after the biggest most violent battle in the series. Before he was brutally offed with just meaningless exposition detailing how he was killed and him uncharacteristically justifying the death in an afterlife scene that's written to appease a large part of the fandom (shippers- he's gay coded, no waifu here). His death completely destroyed his legacy and the future of this manga.

Problem: This is a popular series with disproportionate numbers of haters, casual fans, fans who get their information from tiktok or fanworks instead of the manga, fans who did a surface level reading of it, opinionated fans who didn't read after a certain point but discuss every new chapter like they're experts, people who hate it because they compared it to their favorite series and Jujutsu Kaisen didn't go that way, people who harass the readers and wish bodily harm on the author for not conforming to FANON, the works.

Gojo was MIA for almost 3 years which made fanon takeover the fandom, when he came back the author was accused of mischaracterization and bad writing because he didn't match 3 years of fanon. Reiterating, I mean fanon not headcanon, the headcanons here are almost all fanon based too and you will get nasty anons if you say you dislike FANON or praise CANON but I believe in people's right to headcanon.

My relationship with this: I've been a fan since 2019, this character of Gojo resonated with me like no one did in my 20+ years in fandom, he is my specialest blorbo, his relationship with his best friend has moved me etc. I'm autistic and this is my special interest as well. Needless to say depression has hit me like a freight train.

MY problem: My friend of 7 years who's currently deeply into yuri and danmei, who shared many fandoms with me, has been through the thick and thins with me, has decided to make me an enemy. When the chapter came out he chatted with me sent his condolences. Then he in his own social medias started talking about how he knew it was going to be a bad series, how he's glad he quit after struggling through 50 chapters, made all the jokes in the world about this death, discussed every little thing he hated and mocked this with his other weeb friends who are like the people I mentioned in the Problem section, validated all their complaints based on their reading of the FANON. He has had many discussions with me about this manga and very rarely did he express any of this negativity.

My assholery: I got frustrated, it was like he wanted me to see how much he could hurt me. I messaged him saying, "Hey what are you saying here, that's not how this character is written. The chapter is bad but this criticism is baseless and in bad faith" He laughed it off, "It's not that deep, this is fiction." I argued that's a shallow thing to say, he said it should have been like FANON since that makes more sense. I said that's conventional writing I thought we wanted different things than the same old nice characters in found family and such.

Then I said something about his favorites and hypocrisy, he said he's not so into it that he couldn't take criticism. I said that was a lie he's always writing essays about those characters. I also said criticize it for the right reasons damn it. He kept denying his own love for his fave so he could keep criticizing mine, because he at least had the sense to not fall for a shounen series. I asked if he was enjoying hurting me. He said are you for real, get a grip and stop justifying your behavior for fiction, they won't giving you cookies for defending them, if you can't bear to see negativity then feel free to mute or block. I snapped and said this is why no one likes casual fans, you can't keep your mouth shut about things you don't know. Have fun with being a two faced friend to everyone. Then I blocked him everywhere.

Some of my friends said I should have muted him long ago, I said this was inevitable if he was just going to validate everyone in vicinity, he had to pick a side. Others said I was right to tell him off. I regret some of the comments I made now.

AITA for the way I handled it? He is right, I could have muted him, I could have not spent my time doomscrolling and seeing all the bad takes he agreed with. I could have waited it out and not dropped an old friend over fiction. I could have done many things.

Please don't comment about touching grass, that's the least helpful thing anyone can say on blorbo the website. It's not a real advice we all know that. Therapy is also there for the depression and it will take years for me to get over the death, you don't need to remind me.

What are these acronyms?

[quirkwizard]

Hey Wiz! I need your help with this quirk Idea I have called "Rev Up" where the user uses their body heat from everyday activities or movement to build up heat which then in turn becomes the source of their power bit by bit they would look more and more like Molten man from Spectacular Spider-man, this is primarily built and used for speed, making for mad dashes and quick close quarter combat, however I need help fleshing this idea out more and making it much more cohesive (Part 1)

Part 2 of Rev Up, As for it's abilities it isn't limited to speed but due to the user's personality that's what it's used for mostly, this quirk can use the heat of the body and vent it out to a large concussive force like Jax from Mortal Kombat 11 using his excess heat as a projectile. As an ultimate move version of this, he could do a copy of the pokemon move "Overheat" basically venting out all his heat in a large AOE blast leaving him defenseless and freezing due to removing ALL body heat

Rev Up Part 3: As for why it speeds up the user via Body Heat is because it's cool, I don't actually have a reason for now which is why I figured to ask for your help as you know your stuff and much more about quirk and quirk effects than I do. At first I thought it was due to the legs being the main source of locomotion and due to that, heat but it felt like I was just making up some stupid science mumbo jumbo, I'd like to ask for your help, thank you

Rev Up Part 4: Weaknesses, this quirk affects the user's personality, as they build up heat they go from their usual calm, collected and thoughtful demeanor to a reckless and rushing one due to the heat making a mess out of the brain and it's functions making him have much more adrenaline than usual, not just that heat is not just their source of power but also their weakness due to their body overheating without venting and burning out leaving them far weaker than post overheat

Rev Up Part 5: I'm sorry this is the last one, I need your help to make this quirk idea much more realistic (?) or much more cohesive in execution via maybe an analysis? Is it perhaps too simplistic? Can more applications be made to it? Are the weaknesses not enough? I'm sorry for the long essays, and thank you always for your quirk analysis I loved reading them all

As a small aside: you don't need to justify the effect as long as it fits within the Quirk's own logic. It doesn't matter that Iida's legs have pipes coming out of them, it matters more that they need fuel and stall out like a car.

I think that there is something in here, but it needs some trimming and revising to get there. There is a lot going on with this Quirk. While they could be from the stream of consciousness way you wrote your ask, I still think it'd benefit from some scaling down. I would remove the user exerting all of their body heat and using it as a projectile. The whole venting thing seems counter intuitive for balance since one of the big downsides is that the user can end up overheating and burning out and the range attacks seem out of place with the rest of the Quirk's design. Keep it physical augmentations to start out with and maybe keep some of the greater heat based applications to after they start training the power or have it be something they build up to at the higher levels of the power. On that note, I may change around the core premise some. Instead of building up heat from just walking around, as that seems way too passive and easy for a power like this, you could have it be tied to their adrenaline. The more pumped up they feel, the more potent their Quirk becomes. That ties into the user's body heating up and the altered mindset they get when they use the power while simplifying the premise some. Finally, I'm not sure about the name "Rev Up". Something like "Heat Up" or "Burnout" may make more sense for this.

[cookieblobber]

The Defense of Steven Universe’s (OG Show) Ending

(This is basically a post where I put everything I said in a large Twitter thread so it’s more easily readable, with maybe a few changes and additions.

Spoilers BTW)

So I’ve been drawing a lot of stuff lately and in doing so, I’ve been rewatching a lot of old shows I used to watch and finishing whatever I missed out on. Steven Universe was an interesting one, as I recall having some form of obsession with it as a kid on Google+, however I barely remembered watching a lot of it or if I even watched it on TV or on websites like Kisscartoon. And after doing so,

I barely see the hate for it that it’s gotten for years.

It has its flaws, and issues that have plagued the show outside of what’s within it, but it’s no doubt memorable with a great cast of characters and very unique and fascinating lore and story telling. Now, I don’t wanna really get into a whole deep dive review on the whole show, as even though I’ve made a couple of essays lately (mainly on Sonic the Hedgehog), I don’t think I’m that experienced to go over an entire 5 seasons explaining each and every episode’s strengths and weaknesses and allat (though maybe I might discuss the amazing character development of each crystal gem in the future, who knows?), rather I want to discuss something that is partially why I started watching this show again: The Ending - Change Your Mind (S5E29).

——————————————

Now, the ending is understandably mixed, I understand the critiques of it being weird and anticlimactic and all and how it doesn’t feel like the diamonds’ actions on gem history was fully acknowledged and been punished for it. I completely get the criticism here and I don’t want to drive away people from making actual critiques on the show and where it could’ve improved upon.

What I mainly want to focus on is the notion that the ending can be summed up to, “Steven forgave Gem Hitler”

That is very incorrect.

See, the whole reason why White Diamond (the “Gem Hitler”) was involved with the story was because after Steven was able to prove to Blue and Yellow Diamond that he’s Pink Diamond, he takes the opportunity to use their stronger powers to restore one of the corrupted gems (Centipede). This works…for a moment, as they’re only restored once all 3 put their healing powers to use, but upon letting go of the gem, they reform back into their corrupted version. With Steven technically being part of the Diamond Authroity, he thinks maybe he can take advantage of his position to be able to speak to White Diamond, the highest gem in the patriarchy, and convince her to come to Earth to help the corrupted gems.

Throughout these last episodes, it’s clear this is all for a demand to help gems that were stuck on Earth. While Steven wanted to just try and talk to White, and convinced Blue and Yellow to express how they feel about how White has handled their civilization, there’s never a point where he’s all like “look inside your heart, please you have so much good in you I can feel it” or whatever. Considering how he had to fuse with the Crystal Gems and team up with others who showed up to be able to fight her mech and barely reach to the top of it to meet her, this whole plan wasn’t really as pacifist as many have made it out to be.

———————————

Sorry to stray off a little but, funny thing is, as much as people make fun of Steven Universe for being a show where characters just talk their feelings out and suddenly everything is good, they acknowledge in one of the episodes that not every gem has this deep trauma or pain they try to hold in.

In the episode, “Stuck Together” he and Lars get caught by Aquamarine and Topaz, they both open up to each other about how no matter what happens, they got each other. This leads Topaz who throughout her introduction has been mute and serious and who has them held hostage, to start crying and vent about how much emotional pain she’s been holding in so much because it’s her job. When Aquamarine finds out she’s trying to help them escape, they desperately start trying to convince her that she’s allowed to open up about whatever she feels, that they’re here to listen and talk.

This is was her reaction.

And I have yet to watch Future right now, but from what I’m reading, even after a lot has changed since the original show and tons of gems live peacefully with Beach City, she shows up again to get her revenge.

At no point is she ever redeemed in any way.

———————————

Anyways, the only reason why Steven was able to convince White to do something to corrupted gems on Earth was because he bested her and she couldn’t do anything about it.

Her whole ordeal was how she wants to have this flawless world where nothing goes out of line, even if it means having to mind control them so they act just like her. She views herself as being the perfect gem of all time who knows what’s best for everyone. However, due to how she’s acted with Steven, being an adult gem constantly picking on a literal child because she refuses to accept he’s not Pink Diamond or is part human; how it’s all just a disguise and Pink Diamond is just lying to herself, she’s embarrassed and realizes she indeed does have a flaw. She’s shaken up with guilt over how petty and childish she’s been acting, being exactly what she’s been criticizing Pink Diamond, to the point where she questions who she is. If she’s not this flawless perfect gem who knows what’s best, then what is she? What should she be since throughout her whole life she’s been obsessed with perfection? She can’t be leader of a whole gem civilization trying to make everyone flawless if she herself is flawed. What further solidified it was how she was unable to control Pink Steven no matter how much she tried, and once she started blushing and feeling embarrassed, she lost control on the other gems she had brainwashed. Blue and Yellow even react in disgust/fear seeing her become “off-color” due to her blush, basically for a moment them losing respect for her.

Steven goes up to her and tries to tell her to just, let people be who they are, without trying to “fix” them, and maybe she can be whoever she wants to be. White is still in distraught, wanting to be someone who knows better, be better, and wanting to make everything better, which Steven offers her a way to do so (which is coming to Earth to help the corrupted gems), but first needing to leave your own head - literally and figuratively.

————————————

At no point throughout the ending is White crying about trauma or begging for forgiveness to Steven and having him go “it’s ok we all make mistakes 🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰”, all that happens is Steven sees her essentially having an identity crisis now that she cracked and realized she isn’t as perfect as she thought she was, and being the good natured kid he is, offers to show her how she can be a better person, taking the opportunity to make her do what he set out to demand from her. To say they should’ve shattered her would’ve defeated the whole point as to why Steven even went back to Homeworld to begin with, cuz he needed White’s help. Plus, still haven’t watched Future but,

There is a scene where Steven actually attempts to SHATTER White Diamond upon taking control of her body for everything she has done to him, he CLEARLY doesn’t find her to be in the clear of everything she’s done.

TL;DR They can’t just shatter her cuz she’s the big bad villain, the whole point of the final episodes was Steven needing her in order to restore all the corrupted gems they’ve saved throughout the show. No matter what it took, he was going to find a way to do it. While I do agree that there could’ve been better acknowledgment on everything that she’s done to Homeworld and all, same goes for Blue and Yellow, as they’re immediately relegated to out of touch aunts, to make the massive stretch that this is supposed to be Steven forgiving Hitler or proof that Rebecca Sugar (a Jewish person) is a Nazi apologist…come on bro.

EDIT: I really recommend btw watching this video I recently just viewed discussing the show’s ending and really diving in about the topic of Steven’s identity and White’s identity. It’s informative summarizing a lot of what’s been hinted at and led up to the final episode and goes over stuff I could never even attempt to bring to light with how amateurish I am at this sorta junk 💀

And even if with everything being said, you still believe in the notion that “Steven forgave Gen Hitler” or whatever, I’m about to bring up an argument so earth shattering that it will make you re-evaluate everything you know about the show. So, here it goes:

IT’S A FUCKING PG CARTOON SHOW

———————————

Listen, I know it’s very cliche to use the, “it’s a kids show it’s not that deep!!” argument or whatever idiots say to avoid people from discussing further about their favorite things, especially in an era where many are pushing the “Animation is Cinema” phrase and proving its not just kiddie shit only babies like, but what I mean is

At what point is it crossing the line when making comparisons from a thing in fiction to something in real life?

What makes a great story is how it’s able to draw connections to realistic issues or problems many face with unique metaphors and analogies and all of that, Steven Universe is no different. However, at what point are the metaphors or references to real life supposed to stop? At what point does it become stretching really hard? I can understand how people have had ideas that “fusion is a metaphor for sex” or whatever to some degree.

But going as far as to compare this obviously over the top dictator to the world’s worst man to have ever lived on planet earth who is responsible for the death of millions just because he so happens to also be a dictator, doesn’t that seem so…psychotic to even try to relate when it’s obvious that was never the intention? I mean look at this whole world of the show, it’s a futuristic jewelry space civilization filled with advanced technology and bright colors, how do you look at all of this and first thing that comes to mind is Nazi Germany? How do you look at a giant voluptuous white woman who’s existed for millenniums and think “yea that’s Hitler right there”, all because she’s simply a textbook definition of a dictator?

Trying to make her whole country this flawless world where no one goes out of line and disallows any form of diversity? Like any typical villain? Is that really all it takes to be considered as “animated Hitler”?

Does that mean the abandoned flawed gems in the abandoned Kindergarten that Steven and Lars met at the very bottom of Homeworld are supposed to be a reference to Anne Frank’s family hiding from nazis? One would say that’s a massive stretch to make and they’d be right, cuz it is…just like what people say about White Diamond.

These kinds of massive stretches and comparisons have been made in the past constantly, and for what? To gang up on a show that just wanted to teach kids the values of showing love and positivity, being there for your friends and families and trying to accept people’s flaws or differences in how they live? To make excuses to be blatantly anti-semetic towards the Jewish person who created this show? All because over shit like the fanbase was infamous at one point for how they treated each other and the show producers or because the ending wasn’t how many wanted it to be or how it debatably pushes the idea of positivity way too much in places where it shouldn’t try to?

At what point do people who criticize this show for it’s apparent farfetched ideologies of being kind to everyone, start sounding farfetched themselves for making these insane leaps in logic to make a blatantly slanderous argument and label on the show? If something like “White Diamond is supposed to be Gem Hitler” is something many easily gave into believing, what kind of fucked up comparisons would people make next about the entirety of Homeworld or gems as a species till these start to sound like psychotic conspiracy theories?

————————————

Steven Universe is no doubt a flawed show, I won’t deny that, will never deny that. As much as I defend the ending and go against how people have slandered the show, I can admit stuff could’ve been done better. However, like I’ve said at the beginning, I fail to see how all the hate the show’s gotten for years has ever been deserved or warrented. It’s clear that even with its flaws in storytelling, pacing, (sometimes animation), there is still so much to love about this show. It’s characters, it’s music, it’s themes, it’s lore, etc. There’s good reason as to why people love and still fondly remember it and consider it to be just as important as the other shows that brought in this renaissance era for Cartoon Network (Gumball, Regular Show, and Adventure Time).

After all, just like what the ending taught people, things aren’t always going to be perfect, and that’s ok. Flaws make things what they are, and unless said flaws actively have negative effects on things, there’s no reason to fight against them so excruciatingly. We may strive hard for perfection and flawlessness, to be considered perfect or for a thing we like to be considered perfect, but at some point, trying to do so much just to achieve said perfection will down the road start to become an issue and affect ourselves and the ones around us, the ones we love.

When you think about it, a lot of what has happened within the fanbase and the critics of the show mimic similar attitude to White Diamond. This want for perfection, for nothing to be going out of line, but all it’s done is damage the show’s reputation to many.

Fans on here long ago harassing an artist for the way they drew one of the characters of the show as she wasn’t in this “perfect” body shape they wanted her in. Or harassing producers of the show for how they’d handle things like (iirc) Lapis and Peridot’s “relationship” because it didn’t match their “perfect” connection between the two, and more.

On the other side, critics like the infamous Lily Orchard blasting the show for not being this “perfectly” told story and going out of her way to make these insane comparisons to have some leverage in this giant attack on the show and what it stands for.

These wild and out of pocket attempts to make everything perfect for the show, and what has it done? It heavily soured how people view the show, making people want to stay away from getting into it as from the POV of the outside looking in, it’s a whole rabbit hole they probably shouldn’t get into…for their sake of their mental health. This mindset to be caught up in selfish outlandish views of what’s deemed as being perfect has only made things worse for everyone on every side of discussion on this show. And while as of lately things seem to be recovering, as more people are giving the show a second chance and realizing how messed up people like Lily Orchard were, still the effects of what happened back in the mid-late 2010s are noticeable in some areas.

——————————

If it gets to a point where we’re fighting a flaw that barely affects anyone, is it really a flaw that is that important or even a flaw at all to begin with? We can strive to be better people and learn from mistakes, but a perfect person who can do no wrong is just impossible.

Flaws are what help make everything feel unique in it’s own right. That’s not to say some flaws can’t be acknowledged and called out, but as for flaws that sum up to “someone/something is different from what I expected”, it seems over the top to go so hard to fight against it, as we’d be fighting against having diversity among each and every one of us.

If every pork-chop were perfect, we wouldn’t have hot dogs.

[onesunofagun]

You know, I'm going to put a thought down because I'm thinking about this again because of the post earlier.

It might be a vent? I think it's more just me trying to describe a feeling so it's outside me and I can look at it.

I've seen a lotta discourse and a lot of theories and different takes out there. There's always gonna be some stuff that's frustrating because it's something Sus being widely normalised, but generally speaking, I think the varied perspective and ideas are always good thing in a fandom.

I've seen all sorts of ideas be explored-- in fics, in doujins and art, in roleplay, in lore essays-- over the years. I like to think I have a pretty good map on the fandoms I've been online and present in since the early 00s. I can usually remember context about how certain stuff came about, like what tropes or ideas got popular when and how, whether through shipping or fanon or mangas or general knowledge about the development process.

When you've been in a fandom a long time-- especially if you have made a lot of contributions to it, at any point-- sometimes you even have a part in shaping certain idea flows within it, yourself.

So I have had the chance to see and contribute to a lot of conversations that have happened over and over and over again, in a kind of generational way. I have seen certain discussions from old forums, translate to fics. I've seen them pop up on tumblr, then tumble to Reddit, then YouTube. I have watched the spread through the general sphere of things, get added to and turned over and re-examined.

For the record: I love watching that process, and I like being part of that process! Mentally tracking the grandfathered in fandom history has also become its own kinda hobby for me.

I've always found it interesting mapping where new fans come in, seeing how they orient themselves and what they pick up-- how and why and what they do with it, whether I appreciate it or not (I highlight biases that are related to harmful ideas when I see them to illuminate them).

Seeing certain concepts be repeatedly rediscovered and watching how certain waves of fans digest them is fascinating. Sometimes with surprising results, sometimes with disappointing results, but it's fascinating either way. That's kind of part of the appeal having been here so long and why I came back into (mild) activity-- I get to study and dissect the fandom behaviours as well.

But despite all of that, I've found I don't really appreciate a good number of the popular YouTubers who focus on Zelda as their channel topic.

I think I've developed a bit of a distaste for a few of them in particular, actually--the big number Zeldatuber channels. Mostly the ones that seem to be the theorycrafters that kinda followed on from a MatPat style format. All of my love to well researched videos analysing the themes and meta, and all the silly boundary breaks and speedruns, mind. But I found I got really disillusioned with the handful of channels that rose to prominence and how their content shifted with that growth.

With the potential to monetise their discussions and discords worth of people and patrons driving this kinda content, I do think a lot about things that have been discussed in the fandom in the past that get taken up and regurgitated as part of that grind. I have lost track of how many videos that have come out of a few big Zeldatubers of this vein gave me a really weird slimy feeling and I am trying to work out what it is.

I'm not super invested in watching much of Zeldatube at large, mostly because I've seen most popular subjects covered in many variations. I'm a lot more personally interested in analysis, rather than theorycraft, so take it with a grain of salt that I may have a bias too (The popular Zonai fixation really doesn't interest me at all, and Zeldatube burnt out on that hard).

A lot of the channels like this seem to present their stuff like it is brand new and never been seen before, and like it's a great achievement in sleuthing or that they've cracked a code-- but not in a fun feeling way. Not in an exciting personal discovery way, but in a way that feels like it's propping up an exclusivity around that channel, and its validity as a leading authority on Zeldadom. There's something vaguely newsfeed-like, or sensationalist about it to me, with tight knit associations to other big channels making the same type of content (and about the same types of subjects as far as I ever noticed, and widely overlapping perspectives).

I wonder if that's a cynical feeling that I have where I'm just being an old man yelling at clouds, but there's really something that rubs me wrong about the handful of top channels like this. Something about the way they generate and present, and potentially profit from, often long running fandom concepts and otherwise freely shared ideas that have had many contributions feels off.

Maybe it's also me struggling to understand the closed off nature of how a lot of people just absorb the series secondhand now, and how normal it is to have the most popular Zeldatube channels setting the tones and assumptions around lore for large swatches of the newer fans. And not because old guard gatekeeping, but because there's an obvious chasm there between new and old fans of the same media that now exists that's seemingly getting wider.

I do sometimes worry about the trend of recycled old fanon staples presented as brand new takes, because of that-- or worse, sold as the definitive take, especially when a lot of people do just accept them and then go off and start arguments because 'big Zeldatube said so' and they must know best.

Sometimes I wonder if the trend is actually adding to issues with consumption vs engagement, in terms of media literacy and fandom interaction. There's certainly some theories, because of these channels, widely taken as a kind of gospel from the 'zelda experts' like the discussion is already closed; mystery solved. I've legit seen smaller youtubers be accused of stealing or copying theories from the larger channels, when making detailed and well researched videos about canon lore. I have had multiple interactions with fans who just link to a popular video and be like 'here watch this, it'll explain it' like they can't even be bothered to have their own take, but they're also not interested in yours.

The way big Zeldatube presents itself and gets consumed at large, though, I guess I just don't recognise that as the same as seeing a new fan have a joyful discovery of something from their own interactions with the franchise and fandom. I realise that the channel runners are fans themselves, but I suppose I mean that the platform feels more like a degree of professional separation that's very closed. It's become 'Zelda is my job now' thing that's focused on interest trends and news.

Something something, decades of fandom interaction and discussion and archiving getting scraped and haphazardly slapped together again for the content grind because clout and profit??

That feels mean to say but--

"Like and subscribe and join my patreon for more content, often mined from various thoughts around the fandom to make up a new video to schedule" is how it often tastes to me and that's not a flavour I enjoy.

Again, by all means, not applicable to the whole of Zeldatube or many fans who do watch the big channels. But this kinda thing does feel like a pervasive and popular part of the theorycrafter channels. Commodification of theory, and exploitative platforms built off a community's back, leave a lot of the big Zeldatubers without my support or endearment. I feel incredibly conflicted about them.

Is that anything?

[thetepes]

when did i say the abuse of trans men wasn’t a problem? i’ve personally been abused for being a trans man, don’t put words in my mouth asshole. i’m just not so brainwashed by transmisogynists that i think a few trans women making vent posts on tumblr has any meaningful effect on our community. the only people bothered by this are incredibly fragile and need to grow a spine, they sound like incels complaining about this.

You've made a mistake. Let me explain to you what that mistake was.

You were talking to tumber user @confused-rat. I am @thetepes. I'm not going to waste my fucking time like Rat does trying to have a genuine exchange with an ingenuine person. You'd have better luck with Rat or @liquidorcard or maybe Crim if he's in the mood for a quirky little back and forth. Any of the many people in this space you blew right past to come claw at my door. So here you go, you got it.

I don't give a single fuck what any transwomen venting online have to say. I practice the art of minding my own damn business unless they @ me, specify me, or are asking for help, I don't fucking care beyond baseline human empathy. I get it. Men suck. I've been abused by enough of them to share that sentiment within a reasonable fucking window. Life's fucking hard when you have a cunt, want a cunt, or look like you might have one. It's known.

We aren't talking about transwomen venting.

We're talking about fucking beadells. You know, beadells? The fucking radical fake feminist hate group that fucking hates men? Especially transmen! That's us! And they don't want us to stop being meanie bo beanies online. They want us dead. They want us, enbys, and any woman who identifies as masc in any way fucking dead.

You're ok with slinging names around so allow me to really impress upon you your place with me and my take on your opinion. You're a bitch born, bitch made, bitch hog squealing to the wrong fucking person. I'm too old. You and your kind already ran me out when I came to you when I was young, scared, alone, and hurt. I'm not in your fucking community. I haven't been in your community for years at this point. It's safer where you and society at large can't see me.

You can't use buzzwords to scare me into compliance, you can't bully me into parroting this week's approved twitlonger essay about how I should be slamming my forehead into the ground until I see blood like a concubine at the foot of whoever, begging for forgiveness for a perceived social slight and people are raising their heads and seeing how living in fear of being called whatever word's the scariest this month isn't any way to live. I don't have anyone or anything to lose from you and yours.

You can keep slamming your head into the ground, champion, but there will always be something. That something is going to be your perceived male privilege. It will always be there with these people. You can't shuck that. No matter if you don't pass. No matter if you can't transition. No matter if you do pass, but you're any other thing that puts you in the brass in the privilege Olympics. You can't earn atonement for it. You will never be forgiven for having it and maybe you're just fine living that way, but do you know who else can't? Transwomen. Normal fucking Transwomen.

You didn't just blow past all the transmen on your way to me, you stepped all over all those good women posting, replying, reblogging about how this same fucking shit is killing them. They don't pass or they do and they got outed or they can't transition medically or socially or any of the hundreds of ways I've seen transwomen venting about since I had these freaks taking advantage of their status dumped in my goddamn lap.

I know you saw them cause this blog has only been here a few months and I've been inundated damn near every day with them just wanting to fucking live, but feeling like they have to play these fucking games just enough for some fucking peace. The ones that don't play get harassed by cowards like you. Being a transwoman doesn't exempt you from transmisogyny, right?

And yes, that's what you are. You are a fucking coward. It's morons like you bowing to this shit because you're scared of the social consequences. Like I said though, people are realizing this is bullshit. The tides are turning and whoever's orbit you're currently caught in who sent you out here to take screenshots and scamper back with so they can bolster their "SEE! They're bullies! They're violent transmisogynists who! Target transwomen!" for claps and asspats from a bunch of silly kids is going to be so fucking quick to drop you once you accidentally send one of these off anon or they actually have to get a life.

Let me put it oh so poetically as an anon I got earlier; they aren't going to fuck you. You're going to be on your own and there's no friend group there to fall back on. I've been there, man, the rug pull is hard and fast. All those people you think you can depend on because you can sing a song of six pence over politics with are going to be gone because suddenly it won't look good to be seen with anyone associated with whoever that freak was and you're too much of a coward and too goddamn lazy to put in the effort to change. There's a thousand of you on twitter following this week's loudest voice on youtube and apparently on here.

You're in for a lonely one and I feel bad for you, but me? I'll be alright. Life's a struggle, but I'll put in the work and so will all the beautiful, talented, and amazing people I've met out here. Me and the transwomen you trod over, we'll be just fine. We stopped playing and we're teaching the ones who have gotten hurt or are just worn out how to live life outside the stadium where you don't have to be batting 1000 every god damn day and have to preform perfectly every second.

You're pathetic and I'm tired of wasting my time being nice to people like you so the people around me don't catch strays.

Do the world a favor and grow up.

[femmefatalevibe]

Hi lovely!

I come from grandparents who are illiterate and my uncles, aunts and mom have degrees and went to college but they still have issues with using large vocabulary and understanding things in a larger context. Idk how to explain it. But it’s like they’re only saying what they know and misuse words. I find myself doing that too and didn’t realize it til I was corrected by a college professor in front of the whole class and it was embarrassingggg.

For me it’s worse, because my cousins have this issue too and they’re all in school but my parent had a stroke and I’m always around them and their words are slurred and they use to wrong words and I pick up on that habit because I help take care of them.

One day I want to do public speaking- debate club - stuff like that. I want to be in leadership but i feel held back or not good enough or knowledgeable enough even though I study hard, and speak to different people when I can.

Even though I read and listen to educational stuff on YouTube from different views, I still have the habits my family does.

What should I do be better with my words, mindset, and stuff like that? Thank u so much :)



Hi love! It sounds like you're going through a lot with your family, so sending love <3

To improve your vocabulary, communication, verbal delivery, and public speaking skills, I would suggest:

Read. A lot. Try reading articles/essays from well-written publications (The New Yorker and The Atlantic immediately come to mind), and books & essays from classic and contemporary authors across cultures to diversify your lexicon & expand your worldview.

Listen to TED Talks. Also, programs like Toastmasters are supposed to be great for public speaking.

Practice talking to yourself in the mirror. Give yourself a pep talk or have a self-debate with yourself in the mirror when alone.

Write journal entries that mimic thesis statements. Vent like you're writing an informal essay. Then, take some time away from the page and revise it into a logical string of thoughts/arguments to prove why or why your decision made sense, was the most helpful, etc. for a more minor situation that occurred throughout a random day (let's just say why you made a certain lunch or time you decided to shower – nothing emotionally-charged or heavy on the mind/soul).

Free write to expand on your strongest or most unpopular opinions. You can learn how to justify/craft a compelling argument with no one trying to interject when you speak while always having the final say.

Hope this helps xx

[katyspersonal]

i hate to be that guy but i wish there were more bb fics that were less smut and more lore bc for such a rich story there is mostly just nsfw stuff in the ao3 tag lol. but no offense if ppl like that..

Your feelings are valid, anon!

Like, yeah, it is one of those 'kinda petty gripe' moments I was talking about! People are completely valid to spend their time and effort on what makes them (and often their mutuals and fans) happy! Yet at the same time, I am myself a huge fucking NERD about timeline, concepts, worldbuilding, messages, philosophy, specifics of factions and covenants, systems of 'magic' and science within the lore and all that, and if presented with a choice between the hottest fanfic for my OTP or an oddly detailed fictional research paper on something complex that went within the lore, I'd not even hesitate to pick the latter xd

There ARE many things to think about in BB, yes! My personal favorite to dissect were how Kin works and headanons about Great Ones (ALL of them). I have not found a cool way to put my BB worldbuilding dissections into a fic, tho... :') Me and @val-of-the-north also dream of writing a large prequel of Pthumerians history with what predated dungeons and some known characters. But we are more visual artists than writers. Sigh!

I could offer an advice for the situation when you have a gripe with something that is most popular in a fandom, and wish people did more interesting stuff:

1) Have a tiny group of people who are bitter about the same thing (can also be conveniently put in a Discord chat)! It is extremely therapeutic to have a few friends with whom you can be haters together, so you vent it all out and go to the 'public' fandom all happy and cheerful, not carrying this negativity to the open internet where people that love [a thing] can see it. I mean- I do have a group like this! Our most frequient petty haters sessions are pouting at the fact that this or that character only gets remembered as part of a ship and not as their own person xd Feeling heard in a small group where your words can't hurt anyone, nor anyone will guilt you for being "entitled" is just. good.

2) Create the stuff you would like to see more of (drawings, fanfics, essays, theories, headcanons, memes prompting an idea in a subtle way even), or encourage people to think more about this stuff (prompting discussions, buying art/fic commissions, doing trades (art for fic, for example), catching a person that accepts requests and spending yours on what you'd like to see more of, sending people asks that could trigger to develop something about lore etc). Really mind the latter, though! Like... trust me dude, even if you can't draw or write, nor have enough money for commissions, you can still cause pretty tangible influence on creativity! If you just say right things at the right time to the right people. Heck- I more or less got some skill at inspiring people creatively <:3 Like... I prompt a person to think of this or that theme or character, and before I know it they already developed something because of that discussion? (not tryna boast xd) Or another good example is @heraldofcrow who mastered the skill of prompting discussions about Bloody Crow sooooo well that people keep becoming his fans because of her, and some are even drawing him thanks to her! I constantly see people creating more content of the boy thanks to her, and all she did was simply talking to them! xD A gripe at a character, theme, concept etc not being popular enough can cause GREAT things to happen and you can become people's MUSE! 😎

_______________

Hmmmm I think that's it! Basically? You probably have more charisma to inspire writers (including to fiddle with lore) than you are aware of. They need readers, AND they need ideas. You will figure this out! ...or even write a killer fanfic yourself.

[uselessdancedata]

Ever need to scream into the void? Share Sunday submission form. Need to rant about someone? Share Sunday submission form. Need to vent? Share Sunday submission form. Wanna write about your latest interest? Share Sunday submission form. Do you have a very large English essay that you think someone needs to read? Share Sunday submission form. Need to practise writing words from language your learning? Share Sunday submission form. Just wanna talk? Share Sunday submission form. Wanna practise creative writing? Share Sunday submission form.

Get it girlies!! EQW wants to hear it all!!👏👏👏

yea guys didn't you hear that eqw is everyone's new agony aunt !!!!!

[llondonfog]

fic writer asks!!! 🌈 🎀 💝 🍭 💎 ☯️ (i got. a bit excited ahfbsjfn)

Let's Get ((REAL)) fic writer asks

🌈is there a fic that you worked *really fucking hard on* that no one would ever know? maybe a scene/theme you struggled with?

the upcoming zine fic my god i just wanted it to be so perfect because this was my first time committing to a word limit way above what i normally write, and it would be illustrated by someone i really admire— i really agonized over every word of that fic and kept deleting pages of it because i doubted it so much lol overall though, if i'm struggling with a prompt, i'll just delete large portions of it and rewrite entirely, if not from scratch until the flow finally kicks in and the words start to piece back together

💝what is a fic that got a different response than you were expecting?

there are quite a few that i wrote as throwaways that spiked in notes which left me thoroughly bemused, but i have to say it's the potion!au one!!! that was a completely isolated prompt that i didn't expect to touch again after the twstober writing event, and i STILL get asks on it today!! it blows my mind how that resonated with so many of you- it wasn't one i was intending to world-build or even write more about, so i'm really happy that i've had the chance to explore it with everyone<3

🍭why did you start writing?

this is so lame, but i honestly can't recall. i've just always loved stories and i've always enjoyed writing/essay prompts for school when i was younger- pretty much all of my english classes would have us free-write for about 10 min of the period starting from when i was in 3rd grade, and that definitely fostered my joy for exploring new prompts and ideas. i think i was around 13 yro when i discovered fanfics, and that opened an entire new world where i learned that if i didn't like a scene in a book or how characters interacted.....i could just rewrite it and that completely blew my mind lol

💎why is writing important to you?

funnily enough, most of my writing could be considered vent pieces. i write to purge my emotions (positive and negative), and to validate for myself that i can still weave a story after abandoning the practice for a few years. it's a way of expression, and i enjoy having a partner along for the ride to grow with and from as we explore ideas together

☯️how do you think engaging with each other through tumblr, twitter, comments, kudos, creates healthy fandom experiences? How do you deal with that if you're not a social person/experience social anxiety?

i personally think the positive engagement outweighs the negative- i love being able share work from the community and go wild with praise in the tags, i think that everyone deserves to hear how their artwork/story/post touched their audience. in that same way, it's how we all get to trade ideas and build off each other's premises that gets fed back into the community until they take on lives of their own. it's amazing to see what a thriving fandom can create when there's so much affection for the content and those creating, it's something i've not been a part of before when most of the fandoms i've joined have been dead ones lol

i can't say that i have social anxiety, but i am a highly forgetful person when it comes to engagement ; A ; i'll see that someone reblogged my stuff or left a message with a highly insightful and sweet comment, and i'll get all excited to respond to them later.......and then later turns into several days because it completely slipped my mind and it's too late to acknowledge it now ; A ; im really bad at that, i can only keep a conversation up with like two people online before i get completely overwhelmed and neglect everything else ailfjiafd