#legitimately think about that all the time

[veilkeeper]

i do have to say that i like elgar'nan and ghilan'nain as our primary villains. because they look like cartoon bad guys on the surface but if you look a little deeper and find all those hidden little notes and codex entries, it's obvious they actually do have complexity that they don't want us to see.

ghilan'nain is actively in mourning. not just for andruil, but also for her fucked up little experiment of an archdemon, her most perfect creation, razikale. at the end of fire and ice, she is ready to throw herself into a fight that she might not win because she's blinded by her own grief, and she only doesn't because elgar'nan holds her hand and pulls her away. protects her. we can find notes that talk about how elgar'nan is concerned that she's not taking time to mourn properly. we know she's checked in on her first creations, the halla, despite the fact that she writes about them in this sort of detached, almost patronizing way. she calls them something she made when she was "untraveled and naive" and that she could never make them again, but she visited them just to see what they might have become in her absence. like she cares more than she wants to let herself.

and elgar'nan calls her sister, despite the fact that ghilan'nain is the youngest of them. he lets her experiment on lusacan for the express purpose of cheering her up. and when she dies he seems legitimately torn apart by it. what should be an opportunity for the first of the firstborn to finally become the sole tyrant he was practically made to be is instead him becoming completely and utterly alone, the only remaining of his kind. i don't think it's coincidence that both he and solas drift to each other as they do, even if it is as enemies. they're too alike, and they're also the only remnants of the old world, their world, that either of them have.

i can't say that i'm particularly sympathetic to either of them—they're both unrepentant monsters who have committed atrocities across millenia, but the fact that they have this hidden depth reminds me that at of the day they are not really anything that no one else is. they are very powerful mages that other people called gods. and people can be very sentimental, indeed.

[hardylettuce]

"I don't know how to feel about this-" well that's the thing! Adult media doesn't have to tell you how you're supposed to be feeling, because the assumption is you're an adult and can decide for yourself!

In children's media, there's usually an explicit moral or lesson because the person viewing it is a child and their frame of reference is very small. A kid reading The Lorax for the first time may legitimately not have thought about the environment before that book. A parent may use it specifically TO start a conversation about why their family recycles or doesn't use plastic bags.

But by the time you're an adult, you should have SOME level of being able to decide what sort of media you want to consume, and to decide how you feel about it. There are so many factors here, it's not just "good stories made by good people" and "bad stories made by bad people." Characters can have values that are the opposite of yours, while still reinforcing an overall message you agree with. Stories can be about something you think is important, but in real life the author has morally reprehensible views. Or a movie can just ask "hey wouldn't it be fucked up if this thing happened?" and that's it! That's all it has to be about! And you can walk away thinking "yeah that was pretty fucked up" and it's not any deeper than that! You're an adult, you get to navigate what sort of stories you experience.

The important part here is that you are making that decision for yourself. There have been groups through history who tried to decide for other people what sort of art could and could not exist, and none of them have been what I'd describe as good guys!

“it sounds like you’re justifying their actions-“ i am. they’re a fictional character. i’m okay with anything they do all the time. hope this helps.

[maddie-grove]

What do you think are some legitimate things (trends, author problems, etc) to criticize about in romance novels?

So, romance novels can be offensive in all the ways that fiction in general can be offensive, but, if I had to pick one thing that's pervasive yet fairly specific to the genre, it's the rigidity of gender roles in m/f romance. The hero is more often than not physically bigger, older, richer, and (especially in historical romance) higher-class than the heroine, and, when he doesn't have the advantage in every category, the narrative frequently (a) makes him even more powerful in the areas where he does have the advantage (i.e., she may be more aristocratic but he's very, very rich and he's friends with aristocrats now and he's big and strong and blah blah blah) or (b) is super-self-conscious about the dude being less powerful in some ways (i.e., over-explaining why he's still worthy as a partner and/or isn't put off by the heroine being taller or older or richer). I think this is sometimes a trend that comes from the top (I remember Courtney Milan saying something about getting flak for not making a hero a duke back in the early 2010s, even though he was still a confident, good-looking gentleman with money) and sometimes one that comes from readers (there was a romance review blog that I lost patience with because the reviewer couldn't relate to tall heroines). Plus, when the heroine does have more power in some way, it's usually not by a lot; like, it would be totally unremarkable if the genders were reversed. I remember reading a romance novella anthology specifically about older women/younger men, and I think only one novella had an age gap of ten or more years. (In one novella he was literally a day younger.) Meanwhile, how many historical romance novels have a twenty-year-old heroine and a thirty-year-old hero and it's treated like nothing?

On the more meta side: I think it's generally bad when authors have to spend a lot of time doing self-promotion on social media. That means less time to actually write and sometimes more self-consciousness because the book is kind of being written for people the author knows online. That's not exclusive to romance, but it is a genre largely written and read by women, and I think that results in a lot of pressure to be Nice (which includes not giving a negative opinion about a book).

I'm not a fan of the move towards "rom-com" contemporary romance, but that's largely because that's not my thing inherently. However, I do feel like many authors simultaneously want the hijinks of a romantic comedy and a romance that would be Healthy in Real Life. Which isn't impossible, but it takes more finesse than they usually have.

[retrorats]

Some thoughts about Komaeda's fifth free time event and his relationship with Hinata

The fifth Komaeda free time event has always been very popular between Komahina fans, specially because the event was where the romantic tone of their relationship was consolidated for a lot of people. But even if the focus is usually on Komaeda's love confession, I have always felt that this free time event is way more important and meaningful besides that. This event has on it a lot of important moments that say a lot about their relationship, and that make very clear the most prevalent themes of it.

The free time event starts with Komaeda wondering why Hinata is still going out in his way to talk to him. Hinata answers that he is doing it so he can hear the rest of his story, in his typical fashion of rationalizing and dismissing his feelings for Komaeda. While Komaeda tells the rest of the story, he says one of the most important things for this free time event, and in general for the relationship of Komaeda and Hinata.

This dialogue reveals to us the important information about how Komaeda not only perceived the similarities between them since they first met, but also how since that moment, he deeply believed that Hinata would be able to understand him. All of the things that this scene explains are the fundamental basis of the relationship of Komaeda and Hinata. Komaeda's attachment towards Hinata comes from a place of feeling like he had finally found a person that could get to understand him and as we will see with other parts of this free time event, he thought he had finally found a person that could love him.

Hinata's response towards Komaeda is also important to mention. Hinata negates to be not like Komaeda, he rejects their similarities and also in certain way he rejects the connection Komaeda feels between them, something that's accentuated even more considering how Komaeda interprets his words as having lost the opportunity of having someone inheriting his soul. But even in his negation, there's something deeply interesting in the way Hinata phrases certain things in it. If we look well at what Hinata is saying, we can see how while he negates being similar to Komaeda, his negation is mostly focused on negating his misery, and he seems to silently accept being a bystander that is devoid of any unique aura possessed by the talented.

In a certain way, Hinata's negation in this part has always read to me as being a last resort to try to distinguish himself in some way from Komaeda. Compared to other parts where Komaeda alludes to him and Hinata being similar, here the negation of Hinata doesn't feel so unaware like in the other times that he negated it, here it feels more like Hinata is legitimately aware of how similar they are; He says that he's not miserable, and that he is ultimately different from Komaeda as a last resort to negate what he already knows, and to dissociate himself from him.

Komaeda talks about how he doesn't have anyone in this world and how absolutely lonely his existence is. Something very interesting that Komaeda says, is that he mentions his ideologies as the main reason for being alone.

This moment is not only interesting because it puts Komaeda loneliness to be something that is a lot about his way of thinking being completely incomprehensible for other people, but also because it provides us with certain information about the relationship between Komaeda and Hinata. People distancing from Komaeda because of his beliefs is not something that is only mentioned here, but it is very explicitly the main reason why Hinata distanced himself from Komaeda since chapter 1. Because of this, it's not hard to read this to be a certain reference to his relationship with Hinata -a person that Komaeda really felt he could connect with- and how he also ended up distancing himself because of his way of thinking, like other people Komaeda knew.

This seems to be the principal reason of why Komaeda seems to be so focused on believing that he and Hinata are similar, and also in the belief of Hinata being able to understand him. Komaeda has been misunderstood by everyone all his life and his ideologies have isolated him from the rest of society. All of this has resulted on Komaeda having the fixation on finding someone that would be able to understand him, this fixation ultimately leading him to have a very intense attachment towards Hinata even when they barely really knew each other, because it was probably the first time he had known someone that was similar enough to him to understand him.

There is also a certain connection between Komaeda thinking that they are similar, Hinata distancing himself from him and Komaeda's surprised reaction in chapter 1 seeing Hinata had started to think lowly of him. When Komaeda thought that he and Hinata were similar, he probably also believed that Hinata had a similar way of thinking, and because of that, he wouldn't just distance himself from Komaeda like the others when discovering the truth of the murder.

Considering how Komaeda talks about feeling that Hinata was able to understand his feelings, how he implied that he wanted Hinata to "inherit his soul" and in general considering how much this free time event talks about their connection, is not hard to think that in certain way this line is also a little bit about Hinata. Obviously, Komaeda's desire to be loved wasn't born because of Hinata, but I do think considering all we have seen before, is logical to think that one of the reasons Komaeda was so attached to Hinata is because he saw in him -because of their similarities- someone that he could connect with, and for that same reason, someone that could love him.

This is specifically accentuated considering the very strong reaction that has Hinata regarding this statement, literally considering throwing everything he has believed about not forgiving Komaeda until that point. I don't think that his reaction is because he was aware of that fact, but I do think it was written in that way to accentuate how this was talking in a certain way about Hinata.

Hinata's extremely heartbreaking and intense response towards Komaeda "lying" could also be easily considered a hint towards this being in a certain way about Hinata, but his response to this is also about way more than just that. His reaction is due to a lot of things, for one part it's about how Hinata feels like he was just deceived by Komaeda again, after having spent so much time trying to actually understand him. But is also about how Hinata wanted to believe in the existence of the Komaeda he once knew. Both of these very strong reactions -this one and his reaction towards Komaeda wanting to be loved- are born from that, from the need to believe him and to have a proof that after all, there existed some truth about the Komaeda he once knew, that there was some logic behind Komaeda, that there existed a reason behind his behavior.

He specially wanted to believe on that line because of how human it makes Komaeda. His biggest desire being something as sensible and human as connection, and this desire, being only realized when on the verge of death, is something that makes Komaeda look very tragic. That makes, Komaeda, human and sensible, and his actions, suddenly are more understandable. Hinata wants to believe on this because he wants to make reason of Komaeda, and give a logic, a very human and sensible logic, to the way he acts.

To finalize, I really love this event because I feel that in it is conveyed all of the main themes and important parts of the relationship of Komaeda and Hinata. It's very beautiful for me to see all the little parts that make them themselves being presented so strongly and explicitly on a full event.

[communistkenobi]

idk how I feel about Bourdieu generally, but he makes the argument in On The State that the state legitimizes itself by presenting itself as “the viewpoint that produces all other viewpoints,” that it structures how we think about and understand what gets counted as “just a particular point of view” or “just an opinion,” and through this production it ceases to be seen as a viewpoint itself, which is to say, it ceases to be viewed as biased or partial by the public, and is therefore “outside the social space.” He means this specifically in the context of state reproduction, that the state is doing this to reproduce and perpetuate itself by building a public consensus that agrees that the state is legitimate (and thus unbiased). He's engaging with Weber’s idea of the rational logic of the modern state, that rationality is understood as objective, above mere opinion, and that to be legitimate is to exist outside of the domain of opinion (ie, the social).

and talking with a lot of particularly nihilistic liberals, this framing feels pretty instructive - the state doesn’t actually exist within the social realm, it’s basically just a fact of nature, like a lion or a forest, and the primary problem that arises within the state is when it takes on the characteristics of the social space by suddenly appearing partial and biased. The real crime of Trump and other “populist” right-wing politicians is that they are dragging down the state to the low space of the social realm and doing with it biased and partial things - the lion is now in the circus, and so it must be released back into its proper dignified place in nature. “fake news” and “alternative facts” are rendered oxymorons that endlessly drives liberals insane - how can facts be fake? How can the head of the state lie? Misinformation becomes the whole terrain of battle, of trying to maintain the boundary between fact and mere opinion, and through this battle the state will be cleansed of the social realm.

and ironically this is a disengagement with empiricism entirely, an irrational commitment to the rational, to the state. because at no point is there any actual reckoning with the state as an institution that emerged out of history and struggle, as something that is co-constitutive with the social realm, as an authority that decides what is impartial and unbiased, as an authority that can be challenged, it’s just an animal that does things, existing forever in time, and sometimes evil people make it do things that go against its beautiful, unbiased and impartial nature 

[fierceawakening]

Yes, exactly.

Maybe I’m weird, but I have at least one friend who has told me they were very tempted to believe manosphere stuff after getting really involved in the kind of online leftism that said “you’re male, sit down and shut up and think constantly about all the ways people like you have hurt us.” There’s only so long that you can let people scapegoat you without lashing out.

We shouldn’t stop telling people patriarchy hurts us, because it does! (It also, as has been pointed out many times, hurts them too.)

But we need to be very careful with the “our feelings are legitimate collective trauma. Yours are just uncomfortable emotions” thing. It’s not useful unless and until someone is ready to consider how group dynamics affect people. Springing it on people is just going to get either middle fingers or send the one random nice person who wants to help scrupulosity spiraling when they’re almost certainly less of a problem than most people.

I couldn't have said it better myself.

[girlcrushart]

Its actually very surprising that I've never posted Olivia Munn, because I find her really really hot. She's one of those girls I think I've posted many times but then it turns out I haven't, for incomprehensible reasons, so I'm fixing that issue today. I only recently learned that Olivia is married to John Mulaney, who I personally don't find funny at all. Olivia is very funny. He isn't. I actually find him hella creepy. Anyways, I'm sure a lot of you will be surprised I didn't know that, but also I don't really keep tabs on who hot girls are married to bc it's legitimately something I could care less about lol. And I'm learning that when I find out who hot girls have chosen to have babies with, it can lead to disappointment and sadness, so maybe I've built up a wall about it? Let's call it a Logan Paul Wall. I'm not comparing John Mulaney to Logan Paul... like... pretty sure I'd choose John over Logan if I absolutely had to—at least John has a bunch of friends I'd probably like. But, if you've been following my Nina Agdal sprees on both my accounts you'll know that in some cases I'd honestly rather not know who these girls choose as their life partners, because their questionable choices can create moral quandaries in my poster subject selections, and it's not an area of my life where I honestly want to have to think about moral quandaries. All in all, I still think Olivia Munn is hot as fuck, questionable life partner choices aside, and that is why she is today's girlcrushart guardian.

[yameoto]

yam love love love that analysis on cate you just posted and was curious what your thoughts are on queers (lesbians in specific obviously) reading her as a closeted lesbian going through comphet?

tbh i could talk about this for hours but would just like to say that she legitimately had queen maeve posters all over her childhood bedroom lol didn’t believe that soldier boy shit for a SECOND.

comphet reading of cate dunlap ft. mariecate

TLDR so u don’t have to read the whole thing; all of cate’s relationships with men are overall fake and do not revolve around love, rather the forging of an idealised identity formed around media (comphet Classic). cate’s only real raw genuine untainted relationship is with a woman. ft. mariecate

id love to my favourite hobby is looking at characters through a orangepinkwhite tinged lens. cate’s relationship with luke fits the comphet bill almost too well. firstly, cate being locked up her whole childhood means the formation of identity would be entirely based on media. a very heteronormative landscape of media, which aligns with traditional comphet. you could say her relationship with luke—literally golden boy—is comphet based, the ‘gold standard’ for a relationship cate’s drawn from all that she’s consumed in her childhood years. effectually, cate’s entire early life was robbed of her. and here, she achieves her perception’s ‘perfect’ idea of a life through luke, and forms her entire identity around him (hence her desperation to keep him). this is especially evident in the fact she changed her major to ‘hero management’ just to support luke’s career. to fully commit in shadowing him, for the rest of her life.

except, it’s fake. the entire relationship is fake. by the time of the show, cate has erased and changed and warped luke’s memory, his identity to the point where his mind breaks by the pilot. the fauxness and dysfunction of luke/cate’s relationship despite their image of unattainable perfection is probably her largest comphet indicator. maybe she loved him (not enough to remain faithful, however), but it reads as more of a subconscious love of what he represented, and something to anchor her identity to, which she’s never had a chance to form. as well as a means as to gain shetty’s affection and trust, no matter if she thought it was for his own good or not. her relationship with luke was poisoned, for a multitude of reasons.

(sidenote: cate/luke comphet reminds me of jiper comphet down to the false memories piper’s charmspeak and jason as the golden boy who literally explodes so like. there’s that’s free tidbit for anybody who is tapped the fuck in.)

cate has been so deprived of love she seeks it wherever she can find it. hence her stint with andre, which obviously ends in shambles because it’s foundations are already shaky, considering she’s cheating on luke with him, and andre is fucking his best friend’s girlfriend, but is also disingenuous, because cate’s compulsion powers arguably affect andre the secondmost to luke (though, by a wide margin). these are her two only romantic interests, and they suffer the worst consequences of it.

enter.. marie moreau. and cate’s relationship with marie is more genuine than any of her romantic relationships, which i think is the most telling thing. cate and marie serve as foils to each other: both in the manslaughter of their loved ones, the way shetty attempts to use them, and how can you NOT ship two reflections of each other?

in the finale, cate reaches out her hand, and andre can’t take it, because he doesn’t trust her. you can’t blame him. inversely, marie is the one always reaching out to cate, who is constantly defending cate’s intentions and her motivations to the others—when cate doesn’t deserve the benefit of doubt. partly, it’s because marie has known cate the least amount of time, making the betrayal sting the least. but also, cate’s relationship with marie is also the one least tainted by her compulsion powers; marie is the least affected by cate’s manipulations (to love her, to stay with her), and yet, despite marie not being compelled to do so; she still retains her faith in cate. that cate is good. that cate can be good, which is a fact not even cate believes in.

marie actively sees through cate’s compulsion, and later, nulls it. there’s a reason why marie is the one to discover cate’s betryal. there’s also a reason why marie is the one to blow cate’s arm off when saving jordan. in the same episode that cate reaches out and andre draws away, marie reaches out to cate, and cate draws away. that is a very direct comparison. it also speaks to cate’s larger unwillingness to accept love that is untainted, either fear she herself will ruin it, or because she doesn’t think she deserves it.

anyways, all this to say that yes, cate could totally be read as comphet. and mariecate is totally metal as they are, romantically involved or not.

[would-you-punt-them]

Anyway some new updates on the Beast situation were made. Not going into specifics but a few of the things Dogpack was going into were either fabricated or slightly manipulated. Obviously this doesn't change what Jimmy did is still shady

Yeah, I've been seeing people saying that, so I'm guessing this is about SoggyCereal's 90-minute video "exposing" DogPack from 4 days ago.

But having seen the video, I think it is itself ridiculously manipulative in a lot of ways, and as of right now I'm hesitant to consider the source trustworthy.

In the final third of the video Soggy flies out to America and goes to MrBeast HQ in North Carolina to conduct some interviews with current employees who used to work with DogPack. He also later admitted that a MrBeast employee paid for his international flight.

These interviews take place in a room at MrBeast HQ, with people who are currently working for the company.

In other words, SoggyCereal contacted MrBeast and requested an interview with employees who worked with DogPack for his YouTube video responding to DogPack's specific talking points and calling him a liar for an hour and a half.

So, MrBeast prepared an interview space in their headquarters (with professional lighting, sound, and cameras all set up) and hand-picked some of their current employees to give pre-prepared anecdotal evidence that they thought DogPack was a douche who made them uncomfortable, and then heavily-edited snippets of these interviews featured in the video.

Soggy did an interview himself the next day (it's also where he revealed his flight was paid for) where he insisted that these employees weren't selected and the interviews were fully unbiased and unprepared, but that is impossible to believe. As far as I'm concerned, this entire portion of the video can't be trusted.

But unsurprisingly, MrBeast has been pushing this video like crazy. Multiple drama YouTubers (including Pyrocynical and Spill Sesh) have revealed that Jimmy had personally messaged them with a link to the video, and encouraged them to cover it.

People have been theorising that this whole thing is part of a ploy by the MrBeast company, who knew that this positive video was being made. The suspicion is that the MrBeast company had employees reach out to SoggyCereal and supply him with "evidence" that discredits and slanders DogPack.

He even managed to get a hold of the full audio recording of DogPack being fired, where he begs for his job back. He presents this as proof that DogPack is a disgruntled employee, like what MrBeast's PR team have been implying.

Okay, but like... how in the hell would he gain access to that kind of sensitive information? He doesn't cite any kind of source, he doesn't even claim it was an anonymous leak. He also gives a lot of other very specific behind-the-scenes information that disprove various individual claims made by DogPack, even claims that were mentioned for like five seconds in DogPack's original video.

In contrast, Coffeezilla, who was making a video on the allegation that Jimmy has been conducting fraudulent crypto scams (it came out 5 days ago), reached out to MrBeast repeatedly to fact-check, and MrBeast refused to reply, other than with a single statement from their legal team. MrBeast hasn't responded to any other allegation publicly. And yet SoggyCereal suddenly has access to a mountain of insider information and full cooperation from MrBeast. It seems likely they're using SoggyCereal as a mouthpiece to slander DogPack while avoiding making any kind of statement themselves.

Jimmy also commented on SoggyCereal's video itself on the day it was first posted, even though it still only had a couple thousand views at the time.

He later deleted that comment, because it's just a terrible look, and supports what we already knew: that Jimmy was well-aware that this video was about to come out.

There are legitimate reasons to criticise DogPack, as he has made serious errors over the course of this drama, a lot of which he has acknowledged (including the James Warren thing, which he was rightfully criticised for heavily).

And this video shouldn't be discounted in its entirety, as it has raised some questions about DogPack. It does expose some worrying factual inaccuracies in the major accusations, and does seemingly expose some shady behaviour on his part. So, those points are valid (although I do consider the way Soggy presents them as manipulative).

But people have been saying (mostly in clickbait titles) that this somehow exonerates MrBeast, when that couldn't be further from the truth. That's just how drama YouTube works. To get people's attention, there has to be a hero and a villain. Either everything DogPack and Rosanna say is true, or nothing is and they should burn in hell. There is no middle ground.

As it stands, take any of the clickbait tweets, videos and articles saying anything has changed with a grain of salt.

That's all this is: clickbait.

In my opinion, the situation hasn't changed significantly. The main takeaway is that MrBeast is even more desparate than we thought.

[whereserpentswalk]

There's a girl in your freind group who just appeared one day. Like literally. There was one day when she appeared and everybody else acted like she had always been there. Only you didn't remember that she had existed, or more accurately only you remembered that she hadn't existed the day before.

She acted normal. So very freindly. But there was something off about her. She seemed too hand crafted, her skin too pale, her hair too blond, her eyes too blue and face too pretty. She looked more like a doll then like a real person. And it was clear after asking the right probing questions that she had no hometown, no family, no ethnic group, that she just was. You were good at asking that type of question, to prove she wasn't human.

You're the only person in that freind group who knows about the supernatural. Like, you don't deal with it on a professional basis or anything, you know a few people who are more involved in it, and you've gotten the chance to see a handful of anomalies and entities and like one eldritch being. You even time traveled once. None of it was a big deal, but you thought they were cool, and it's good to know they exist. The reason it's important is because you know knowing about that stuff effects how you perceive certain things, especially when it comes to recognizing illusions and paradoxes.

You studied her for awhile. Did what you could to check her every little action, wonder if certain small things she did were what a human would do. Question her without letting on how much you know. You've studied the way she eats, the abnormalities in her dialect. The strangeness to how she got her documents. You stole a bit of hair to send to a lab and they confirmed her nonhuman. You're pretty sure from studying the way that her clothing moves on her body that she doesn't have nipples or private parts or a bellybutton, you know it's weird to speculate about that sort of thing with someone but a body like hers is different. Still, you never got full proof, never figured out what she really was, never got to show that she wasn't a real woman and expose the inhuman creature underneath.

As time went on, and you investigated her further and further you stopped being able to see her as a monster. It's clear that even if she's not human, she probably doesn't know what she is either. And more then that she seems like a nice person, all that time you spent with her trying to figure out what type of anomaly she is, you ended up actually getting to know her and she seems like a genuinely nice human being. When she told you she liked a new song and wanted to play it for you that probably was just her liking a song. When she developed a hyperfixation on birds and started being able to name local species at a glance that might have just been a legitimate interest. When she had a crush on a girl in your freind group that was actually just a crush, and not her looking to prey on someone in an alien way. You watched a TV show with her early on to try to figure her out, that might have been the first show she ever watched.

At this point you don't really think about her inhumanity when interacting with her. She's been in the group for awhile, everyone has far more real memories of her then false memories at this point. Trying to expose her for what she really is would just be mean at this point. The paradoxical nature of her existence isn't the main thing you know about her now.

You did have to come clean that you knew something was up. You didn't tell her how much you knew, or why, you just dropped the right hints and she caught on. She became so upset, so guilty, she was worried you would tell everyone else, or that you would hurt her. A few months back you would have, but not anymore. You hugged her, didn't ask any questions about what she was, and did your best to comfort her. Though her existence may have been fake, her hugs were real, those tears were real, and that was enough.

[tevantarlos]

Unpopular Opinion 911 - et all

I'm a bisexual woman and I've known that I'm bisexual since I was 11 years old. I legitimately am attracted to both men and women.

I've been watching 911 since 2 months after season 1 ended in 2018. I got into the show for Bathena and have loved them ever since.

I keep seeing people complaining on the official show pages about how Athena abuses her authority as a cop, and while they're not wrong, they're also blowing things way out of proportion. I'm pretty sure the people saying that have never watched the NBC show Chicago PD, because if you compare what Athena's done, to what Voight on Chicago PD has done, you'd know that the stuff she's done has been pretty tame. On Chicago PD: 1. Voight has locked people up in a cage and literally tortured them for information.

2. He has killed people for revenge. He killed the guy who killed his son, Justin. He killed the guy or people who killed Al. There are probably even more occurrences than that, but these are the one's that mainly come to mind for me.

3. He literally threatened Matt Casey, Hallie Thomas, and Gabby Dawson, when his dumbass son, Justin, was on drugs and caused an accident which paralyzed someone, because they could report Justin to other police who would've actually locked Justin's stupid ass up. I get that Voight was trying to protect his kid, but that doesn't make this shit okay. Also, it's weird as hell that Antonio worked with Voight for 6 years. How the hell did Antonio not kill Voight for threatening his sister's life? That's garbage.

4. He literally stole money and drugs from criminals.

5. He has threatened his detective's lives on more than one occasion, and not in some way to make sure they are more careful and protect themselves, but as a legit threat.

Returning to my 911 thoughts.

Oliver Stark has claimed that he's been playing Buck as bisexual the entire time. No, he has not. He just wants the clicks and attention from pretending that this has been happening all along. Buck has had no interest in men until season 7 and the BuckTommy storyline happened.

The episode of Lone Star that's the crossover, doesn't prove Buck is bi. He wasn't flirting with TK, it was a misunderstanding on TK's part. Buck is literally confused when TK says that he's with someone, as he wasn't flirting with TK, he was only inviting TK to come to LA as a friend to hang out. Buck says on the show that he's checked out hot guy's asses before. He hasn't done that in canon. It's one of many things that they claim is canon, but isn't because it happened off screen. He has literally been obsessed with women from the first time we see him, until Tommy returns in season 7.

Buck can't even say that he's bisexual on the show. He hasn't done any research, when he used to research everything. He hasn't spoken to people like Hen, Karen, or even Josh in depth about his feelings for men. There was one scene, right before the relationship ended, where he talked to Josh, which didn't even amount to anything and was just a waste of time since they made Tommy OOC and broke up with Buck. Hell, he (Buck) didn't even know after 6 months that Tommy was gay and not any other identity.

All this to say, 911, TM, OS, they don't genuinely give a shit about Buck, his supposed bisexuality, Tommy, or even the other main characters on the show. From one episode to the next, they have them say one thing and then retcon it right after. The whole Buck is bi thing was a hoax. They just wanted to attract the gay and bisexual crowd back to the show since Henren and Josh haven't been getting that much screentime, and Buck and OS are like the golden child of the show. People think he's an idiot, but that he's a sweet idiot, who can do no wrong. As I stated above, I started watching 911 before season 2 even aired. I don't like the way the show is handling their characters and storylines and I'm finally getting tired of the shitty writing. I love Bathena, I love Henren, I love Madney, I loved BuckTommy. However, if Tommy is thrown aside like yesterday's trash and Buck moves on, only to fuck a bunch of women and/or men with the excuse of exploring his sexuality, I will be checking out and dropping the show.

I like Buck's character, but he's not the reason I watch the show. He's also not enough to keep me watching. Henren are constantly being threatened to have their kids taken away. Bathena is constantly put in crazy life or death situations that end in some super unrealistic way: Kid landing a plane, remember? Madney don't have anything interesting going on. Literally, all they have going on, is that they're having another kid. Eddie has spent years obsessed with his dead wife, Josh hasn't had much of a plot in years, since the only boyfriend he's had on the show was some homophobic jackass who lied and said he was gay, so that he could beat Josh up.

May is gone, Harry is gone, Sue is gone, Carla is gone, Chris is gone. All the side characters that helped make the show a little interesting, is gone. The found family dynamic is lacking or entirely absent this season. Also, making the point to show Tommy sad and longing for a family, only for him to end up sad and alone, doesn't make me want to keep watching this show.

I think I'm finished bitching for now. I know that my thoughts are all over the place, but I've kept my mouth shut on how I feel about OS and Buck's bisexuality, this whole time, but now I'm finally going to fully speak up.

As always, I know many or even most people aren't going to agree with me and that's fine. This is just my feelings and opinion on the show.

[asm5129]

So I’m coming back to this post with a clearer head.

Look, I’ve…I’ve just experienced so much toxicity and gatekeeping in this fandom, seen so many posts talking about how none of the games after the first one are “real” life is strange, so much obsession with these white girls and disdain for the other stories told in this world that are more diverse and have just as much love poured into making them.

I kept telling people, Max and Chloe’s story was over. Life is Strange is an anthology series. And I got harassed for it, laughed at for enjoying BtS and TC and ESPECIALLY LiS2.

People praising Don’t Nod to shit on Deck Nine really got under my skin too because I’ve seen so much unwarranted hostility towards LiS2, which was Don’t Nod.

It felt like people were just ignoring that hostility towards LiS2 so that they could feel better about shitting on D9.

I know that I lumped a lot of people in together with some of the worst people who call themselves fans of LiS. There are people with legitimate criticisms of DE that aren’t the toxic gatekeepers I’ve encountered or the people harassing the devs.

But I’ve seen enough people normalizing the idea that the LiS narrative team at deck nine just have a personal hatred for Pricefield and Chloe specifically. And that’s just gonna empower those inclined to harass the devs, even if you’re not one of them.

That is a myth.

Objectively speaking, it doesn’t even make any sense.

Before the Storm, for all its canon inconsistencies, tells a *really* good Chloe story

The idea that Felice Khuan (staff writer on Before the Storm and now the narrative director for Deck Nine) and a majority queer narrative team would not understand ahead of time how a lot of this would be recieved feels genuinely strange, as does the idea that a majority queer narrative team would have a collective hatred for a pioneering queer couple.

I think they were handed the mandate for a Max game, and the narrative team genuinely tried to tell a meaningful story about Max in the aftermath of the first game.

And I think Square Enix was very hands-on with the creative direction of the story.

I have a lot of faith in the narrative team.

But I have significantly less faith in deck nine or square Enix management, and one thing in that IGN expose was that Square Enix is apparently very hands-on with the scripts.

DE—and I say this as someone who genuinely liked a lot of it— reeks of the narrative team desperately trying to tell a meaningful story with a lot of interference.

And obviously this is all speculation of course, but it makes so much more sense than the team behind True Colors taking such a significant step backwards from the quality of that game.

And it’s a far more likely reality than that the narrative team somehow hates Pricefield stans so much that they made an entire video game with complex branching paths just to piss them off and make some easy cash.

Anyways. I apologize to those I lumped in with the worst so-called “fans”.

But I hope this gets y’all to think a little harder about LiS discourse.

I’m playing the new life is strange game and apparently people are pissed at how it handles following up the original because OF COURSE THEY ARE.

The first game has two endings, one where Chloe survives and one where she dies.

Officially, neither is the “canon” ending, that’s been made repeatedly clear since the original game released.

But a bunch of people keep demanding more of the Max and Chloe story. It doesn’t matter that they’ve gotten comics about it and a prequel, they still want more. They don’t want to let Life is Strange be an anthology series.

So here, Max is back as the protagonist. But guess what? Chloe isn’t a main character.

Because she fucking DIED in one of the endings, and both are canon.

So even if you choose to play in the timeline where she survived, they had to write her out or they would have had to develop two different games, one with Chloe and one without.

So instead they made it an interesting character issue. Max is stuck in the past, in the trauma of the events of the first game while Chloe wants to move forward.

It was never going to be Max and Chloe living happily ever after. It couldn’t be.

That’s not an interesting game, and it flies in the face of the ending of the original.

This game is in many ways rooted in Max dealing with that trauma and like…that’s an interesting story.

But you’re mad because the story you wanted isn’t the story they made, even though that was literally never going to happen.

The LiS fandom is shitty sometimes

Very gatekeep-y

There’s a sort of notion that there’s only one way for a Life is Strange game to be Life is Strange, but the people that buy into that don’t seem to realize that their criteria is literally just the game that already exists.

[hughesybear]

thinking about them (extensive Petey & Quinn thoughts below cut)

so! Hughes and Pettersson, Quinn and Elias, Huggy and Petey. the natural and the savant. the “odd couple” holding out for contracts together in Michigan. named alternate captains at the same time; when Petey was asked about Quinn being named captain, he said “Quinn is the captain and we’re happy.” the title of best player on the Canucks fluctuates between them season-to-season.

they are so similar in so many ways. quieter personalities, lead-by-example types, relentless drives to improve. people who care deeply about their communities. a perfect fit for the leadership dynamic alongside each other.

Quinn on Petey: “I think our skill sets are complimentary.”

Petey on Quinn: “We think the game very similarly.”

leading up to his draft, Petey broke his shot down into twelve component parts and mastered each one because he knew it was viewed as a weakness; leading up to his Norris-winning season, Quinn improved his shot to the extent that it became a legitimate weapon, and it’s gotten even better this year. the day after he got drafted, Petey came back to the Canucks’ draft table for the later rounds to learn about their process and the players they were picking after him; the offseason after playing the Predators in the playoffs, Quinn consulted with Allvin to sign Sherwood, who has been an amazing fit with the Canucks so far this season. they both see exactly what the team requires from them in order to improve, and they don’t stop at anything to get better, whether it’s their own game, working with their teammates, or any other aspect of the team.

Petey was at Quinn’s captaincy press conference, and Quinn was at Petey’s contract extension press conference. both so skilled, so cerebral, so creative, and yet so different in how people perceive them, but their similarities on the ice unify them nonetheless.

Petey on rooming with Quinn:

What are the best and worst parts about rooming with Huggy Bear on the road?

He is the messiest guy I know! He’s going to say I’m throwing him under the bus, but it’s time for a change!

Is he one of those guys that lives out of his suitcase?

Oh, gosh, that’s the perfect explanation. He steps into the hotel room, I’m trying to be neat, put my bag where it’s not taking up space. Then he comes in, throws the bag in the middle of the room, open it up, takes out his suits, puts it over the chair. Lays in bed, kicks off his shoes. Then his socks off, just kicks them too. He’s very messy. On the good side, he doesn’t talk that much! No, but we put on movies. Netflix. We have similar taste, similar interest in what movies we like. It’s fun.

Quinn on rooming with Petey:

Petey called you a messy guy, what was Elias Pettersson like as a roommate last year?

I read the thing, he’s just so dramatic. Let’s just leave it at that […] Me and Petey are really tight so I loved it. We had a lot of fun together. We don’t have roommates this year in the hotels but I think me and him both miss each other and would want to roommate […] But yeah, we had a lot of fun, he’s one of my best friends so we had some good times too.

they’ve come a long way from rooming together five years ago, and now they find themselves in a position they’ve been in from the moment Petey scored his first goal on his first shot in his first NHL game - bearing the burden of the franchise together. enjoy the future, folks, here it is right now! except it isn’t, not all of it, because three of the six Canucks that were with the team five years ago are currently out of the lineup.

so what do Hughes and Pettersson do? they step up. they lead in tandem. roommates, franchise cornerstones, brunch pals - some of those things are in the past, but they still share what they have in common on the ice, and so many things off the ice as well.

they bleed for this team in the same way, in the same places, for the same cause.

Which teammate would you choose to make a playlist, if those were the only songs you would be able to listen to for the rest of your life?

Quinn Hughes: “Petey.”

[vladdyissues]

Lately Ive seen some awful things about antis and haters making threats and getting artists banned from Tumblr and X. Im new to the Phandom and love pompep but Im scared i'll be targeted if I write and share pompep fics. How do you manage sharing your work so bravely?

Firstly, welcome to the Phandom—and especially Pompous Pep! I have a simple protocol for enjoying a drama-free Tumblr experience:

Preventative Action

1. Find your community. Follow other Pompep fans and supporters and reblog their things. Don't be afraid to leave nice tags; we love and welcome interactions :) You can also join the Pompep Discord server if you enjoy chatting (DM me for details).

2. Turn off anon asks. This will solve 99% of all potential problems, and you can turn it back on whenever you want. Antis are cowards who prefer to hide behind the mask of anonymity. They seldom have the courage to say something with their whole username.

3. Block the obvious haters. This is a big fandom, and at some point you're likely to come across people openly hating on pompep, either on their bio, pinned posts, or comments. Block them. For an added layer of protection, add their username to your Filtering Options.

4. Tag your work appropriately. When posting, make sure your work is tagged correctly (the #pompous pep tag is especially important) so people who like pompep can find it and those who want to avoid it can block the tag. Use Content Labels when applicable.

5. Try to avoid using the platonic tag (#badger cereal) and the romantic tag (#pompous pep) at the same time. Some fans are really touchy about this. I'm not, and I think there are legitimate cases where use of both is applicable, but if you want to minimize friction, just stick with one tag or the other.

If you're not sure which tag to use, ask yourself what your intentions are with your art or fic. Is the goal a romantic relationship? If so, use the pompep tag. If it's truly ambiguous and could be seen either way, use the platonic tag first. You can always add another tag like "okay to tag as pompep", just to let people know they can interpret it however they please.

Responsive Action

If the above guidelines aren't 100% effective, here's what you do:

1. Don't feed the trolls. If you receive any negative asks in your inbox, it's important to NOT engage with them. Delete them, ignore them, don't let them get to you. Antis thrive on attention, so let them starve. Eventually they'll move on when they realize they're not going to get a rise out of you.

The same goes for any negative comment left on your work. Just delete it, block the person who left it, and pretend it never happened.

These asks and comments may come in the form of questions. Example: "How can you ship Danny with Vlad? That's [insert gross accusation here]" Resist the urge to answer these questions. They are not made in good faith. This person just wants to start an argument.

2. Report any harassment. If by some chance you receive a seriously hateful ask, like threats of violence or abuse, take a screenshot for proof/safekeeping, then report the message and the user if they're not anonymous. If the ask is anonymous, use the meatball menu (•••) at the top right to report the message and block the anon.

Final Words

It takes time to develop a thick skin and Don't Give A Fuck attitude, but it can be done. You are a phan. You have every right to be here and enjoy this fandom in peace, just like everyone else. Anyone who believes in harassing others over silly things like which cartoon characters should be allowed to kiss clearly has nothing better to do with their life. The sooner you shut them out, the happier you'll be.

Regarding media: Artists attract a lot more negative attention than writers for reasons I won't get into right now, but if you're mainly a writer, you will enjoy a much quieter fandom experience. Wherever you post your stories—I recommend AO3; DM me if you need an invite—follow the same advice there as I've given here: make sure your work is tagged correctly; support your fellow Pompep fans by reading and commenting on their works, building that community; moderate comments if you're concerned about negativity; block and mute users if they give you any trouble, and you'll enjoy a much more positive fandom experience.

There is strength in community. When you start making new fandom friends, you'll feel a lot less lonely, and that will give you the confidence you need to really have a good time here.

Wishing you the best, anon!

[lipstickchainsaw]

I haven't really talked about Vander as a character in this act yet, and this is the last opportunity I get before he loses himself again, so I may as well take it.

From his flashbacks, especially the remarkably violent shot of him strangling Silco, we learn that Vander's pacifism in season 1 was very much a choice he had made, and kept making, very deliberately. Sure, we technically knew this. He made that soft threat to Marcus about having to put the gloves back on, not to mention how he beat people up in that first scene, but I don't think we understood how significant a choice that was.

But in these episodes, we've learned that Vander had a seriously violent streak entirely on his own. His vicious beating of the Enforcers on the bridge way back when wasn't just a man pushed to extremes in one moment; it was the expression of a rage that had been building for a while.

This makes his advice to Vi in episode 2 of season 1 very fun from a narrative perspective. Because yes, he gives that advice, and yes, we hear it, and we intellectually understand the point he's making, but, much like Vi, who hasn't had the experience Vander has, we don't really get it. We don't really see the point he's making, the deep well of experience he's drawing on when he puts that into words.

It similarly explains his incredible reluctance to actually put those gloves back on, because he understands that deep well of anger he still has within him, that he chooses to keep a lid on every day, and he knows that the last time he resorted to this violence, he didn't just lead a lot of people to their deaths, in his anger, he betrayed and nearly murdered his best friend.

It takes his actual children dying and being hurt around him to get him to break that rule, and open that well once more.

All of which is to say, the anger and violence driving Warwick isn't just from the monster Singed combined him with, some of that is legitimately Vander being Vander, and now, as then, even when he is at his most Vander, he makes the deliberately and reasoned decision to use that capacity for violence to protect his kid.

RIP Rictus, you stooge.

[smileposting]

alright so based on That One Ask Yugo Posted here's my headcanon-theory-vision-thing of what the drain is/means: so, drain has a very Negative connotation within the context of the story. In General, for something to go down the drain is for something to be wasted, and for something to be wasted is to serve no use to the Bigger Picture — ergo, it is not Unreasonable to assume that the drain as a theological concept in great god grove's universe is shorthand for "the place where things that the world No Longer Needs go." this could be people, technology, concepts, entire species, etc.

given the amount of historical anachronism we see within the grove itself, it's very possible that there really is no rhyme or reason to what goes down the drain and what does not, but there are still people both in and outside of the grove who ascribe some kind of moral value to it, i.e. "well if you're here then you must have done something to deserve it because the alternative is Much scarier to think about." if the bizzyboys being from the drain is meant to prove that there are other sapient beings in there, then i imagine this could apply to the drain's residents as well. i'd say it's even possible that the grove exists in direct opposition to the drain, even if unwittingly, given how much of GGG's story is about the importance of preserving history and art, no matter how grisly or seemingly incomprehensible. either way the grove doesn't seem like the kind of place that's very keen on determining value based on usefulness, nor do its gods seem like the kind of pantheon that would come up with something like the drain. it's possible that the drain is older than even them -- i suppose i'd have to find whatever in-game info there apparently is about it to confirm lol.

anyways it'd certainly explain a few things -- again, the fact that every area seems to be in a different time period, the second-eldest god being a passionate historian, inspekta and capochin's whole [gestures vaguely] everything, even inspekta ascending to godhood in the first place. of course the bizzyboys were a legitimate organization once upon a time. but all i'm saying is that if i was a deity ruling over a land in which archival As A Concept was this vitally important thing no matter how "useless" the things being archived were considered, and one day i met a guy who literally pulled himself out of The Place Where Things Deemed Useless Go and organized a lil army of guys who are Also from the place where things deemed useless go so they could run around my land and help people, thereby telling that place to go fuck itself and that they are in fact, Not useless -- i'd be impressed. i would in fact be like "hey have you considered running in the God Elections bc that's metal as fuck." it may not have been what he needed in the end but like i see how we could have Gotten here is what i'm saying.