#like Shane can be mean but he’s not a bad person. he’s mentally ill.

[griancraft]

The vitriol people have for Shane from Stardew Valley because he isn’t able to magically fix his addiction for the player if romanced is nuts. Do you really think you get off a substance once and then can stay off it? Is he genuinely not improving or is there just not a lot of post marriage content and you’re on year 62726 of your save file? He’s not “a terrible person” and he’s also not “unfixable,” you just hate addicts.

[lucy-the-demon]

The one thing i hate about the Stardew valley fandom is how a lot of people demonize mental health issues. Like, Being somebody with clinical depression, PTSD and autism it really upsets me when people are mean about Shane and Kent.

They treat Hailey like she's the perfect woman because she's mean then Treat Shane like the scum of the earth for being mean as well.

I have a caffine addiction, and while it's not as horrible as having an alcohol addiction it's still an addiction that im trying to overcome and i have depression as well. So seeing people treat Shane like that, plus calling him a liar when he's not 100% happy and sober all the time it really upsets me to see how he's treated, and i don't like him because I want to fix him, its just nice to see depression portrayed so realistically and to feel represented in media and i just want to be there for him. I can relate to him, and when people insult him and treat him like the bad guy for being mean and depressed and not 100% sober i feel like im doing something wrong and I'm a bad person for having depression and anxiety

And i have PTSD over very different things then kent, but I understand things that trigger memories to events, if I see the person who mistreated me in life or if somebody mentions middle school I get really upset and will go on a rant about it, when I get so upset I get angry im brought back to those horrible memories, and I understand why hes stressed over something that seems minimal to others And people are mean about him too, hes not a bad person he's just got PTSD and he doesn't know how to handle it. I feel bad for him when the community is mean to him over that cutscene.

and these are fictional characters it makes me scared how they would treat a real human being with similar issues, like me. I joke about if you hate these characters you should hate me too but like, it really pisses me off how this community treats mental illnesses And being somebody with these issues i really just want to spread awareness on how i personally feel when people say horrible things about these clearly mentally ill characters that have issues that real people have

Mental illness isn't black and white y'know, and if you think it is i think you might wanna get your eyes checked because you might just be completely colorblind, or blind in general. the actual mental toll it puts on real people to be represented by characters who's mental illnesses are portrayed very realistically only to be treated poorly by uneducated fans of the series/game/movie/ etc. It's very heartbreaking to me personally..

I just want fans of Stardew to be more mindful of characters like shane and Kent because there are real people like them that have the same issues as them. You don't have to like them just understand that real people have been through the same things they have and be respectful of that. i mean I don't like Harvey but I am respectful of people with anxiety, I have anxiety too. I think everyone does at this point.. but i would never undermine his anxiety or say he's a horrible person Because he's anxious that's a disgusting thing to imply and it should be the same way with characters like shane and Kent but it's not that way

The double standard with shane and hailey is an argument that may just involve sexism but that's an entirely different argument that i don't wanna get into rn, but just know, you don't necessarily have to be a nice person to be a good person, and vise versa.

Tldr: you guys need to stop saying Shane and kent are bad people for having mental illnesses, it's really gross and insulting to those with mental illnesses

[sdvshanewife]

I literally avoid TikTok because of their opinions on Shane. They have such this warped sense of depression that’s kinda terrifying; gives me tumblr 2013 vibes where a lot of people were just saying shit like ‘uwu such a depressed wil baby bean uwu’ (I mean it’s still like that now but I feel like it was worse before), that when they see the ‘grosser’ side of depression they don’t know how to comprehend it.

Depression isn’t just ‘feeling a bit down’, it’s a serious mental illness that can and has killed people before. Shane himself literally shows suicidal ideation during his cutscenes.

If he barely finds reason to want to stay alive, where the hell would he be able to find the motivation to clean his floor, or fix the holes in his jacket.

Shane cannot be fixed, he can only heal, but like a broken vase glued back together, the cracks will always remain - and that’s not a bad thing.

He will still drink, he never claimed he was stopping, but he cuts back and it shows - that alone is a good step. He has dialogue explaining his mood will get ‘weird’ and he’ll seem cranky because depression can and does fluctuate between good and bad.

You cannot just fix him with a hug and a pat on the head. Depression doesn’t work like that. It’s not an ‘uwu soft bean’ illness, it’s serious. And I hope many of the people that do hold this mentality towards Shane are simply young, and therefore don’t fully grasp the situation because it means they can learn.

You can’t fix people, and you should never form any form of relationship under the guise of ‘fixing someone’. You care people for who they are, including flaws, and you act as the rock they need to ground and support them when they hit their lows.

I hope these people that talk about Shane this way never interact with someone depression, because I honestly think they will cause so much harm than good.

I guess that’s a lot of rambling to say: depression is awful and manifests in many ways, including symptoms that may come across as ‘gross’, but that doesn’t take away from the seriousness of it. Shane is one of the best depictions of depression in media I have seen, and while I’m not saying you have to like this character, the lack of empathy is concerning - even more when concerned to Hayley who is a completely different character to Shane. And if you do have this TikTok mentality, please learn more about depression and how awful it gets. It kills, and your comments and understanding of it, projected onto Shane, are the sort of things that will make people suffering with depression feel far worse - I know from experience as a depressed person who is very similar to Shane in many aspects (just not the alcohol part, just an unhealthy relationship with food, TMI), and has had people say this shit to me because I didn’t want to leave my room cause I was too busy using whatever energy I had to not end my life.

Sorry for the ending I know this got sad fast.

But yeah, hate TikTok, please learn how depression works, and leave Shane alone.

- mistresskezzie (sideblog hence on anon)

you said it all

[dystopiandilfs]

~~Disclaimer this is very critical of Karl and Quackity so don't read if you're just going to shit on me for having an opinion. Don't waste both of our time just move on if your offended. Also I tend use the same tags for most posts so sorry if you find this through the Karl or Quackity tag~~

Okay this can't be just me. Karl and Quackity constantly making jokes about Rat being dead isn't funny and hasn't ever been funny. Maybe I'm just being sensitive but it just genuinely bothers me. Like Dream made one joke in Survive the Internet where the objective it to be offensive and that was it. Karl and Quackity making songs and constantly restarting the bit of rat being dead just for laughs isn't it.

Like I've noticed recently that most of Quackity's streams have derailed into him insulting someone for an hour (most often Dream or George) like the any asker's song and bit was funny the first time around but now it's dead please stop bringing it up. For example George's stream yesterday was supposed to be him talking and jokingly being upset about being banned from tiktok but Quackity and Karl joined in and turned into a "let's see how far we can push George" bit. Like moving him out of the call, leaving the call, muting him etc. It's not funny. Once again maybe it's just me but that's not funny to me.

Quackity using autotune died when everyone else started to use it but I put that more on Wilbur and Tommy than Quackity. Like Wilbur and Tommy can't go 5 minutes. No offense because I like Tommy but please stop. Like George's stream where the entire stream with them using autotune was funny but after that it slowly started to become overused.

Hot Take: Being loud doesn't make you funny. Using autotune constantly doesn't make you funny anymore. Constantly ruining jokes shows how bland of a person you are.

Karl moaning and screeching in every stream.... Don't get me started on that. Like I love Sapnap but I genuinely had to turn off his stream. Like why does he make those noises. It's a new thing too he never used to do it and he doesn't do it if he's on his own, like is it genuinely because he sees tweets going viral mentioning it?

I genuinely don't know what it is. Karl when he's on his own is lovely. I love all of Karl's alt streams (his dono's I hate and I think should be muted but that's a whole different post)

I love Quackity's streams when they're other games. Like his GTA streams with Bad, Dream and George were funny. His "birthday" stream the other day with media share and Bad was funny. Him on other streams that aren't the other Feral boys are entertaining.

Like it's when they're on the other Feral boys streams or doing a stream on the SMP Karl and Quackity become infuriating. Like Jackbox is funny if they pander (let's not mention tonight's stream that was low-key boring. I'm sorry that I miss Dream's great rhyming of Fucking and Cock Sucking)

Quackity and Karl on everyone else's stream is fine to watch but with any of the feral boys they just have a 50% chance of me muting the stream and doing something else.

Once again I don't hate Karl or Quackity but they're just something about them that I can't get behind. If you genuinely think you know why please inform me.

And before people comment "George does it too" "Sapnap jokes about the same thing". Yes they do and sometimes they are annoying but they know when to stop. Let's be critical of Bad for a second, he helped kill the any asker's thing. The joke about leaking the Jackbox code hasn't ever been funny either and Bad (and George)just constantly do it. Does that mean I hate him, no I like Bad but I feel like he's often 5 minutes behind everyone else in a conversation.

Speaking of Bad let's talk about how all of Quackity's "jokes" have been aimed at Bad recently. Like I'm sure if Bad hated them he'd say something off stream but there's something about Quackity trying to see how far he can push Bad and Language that doesn't sit right with me.

I'm more forgiving towards Bad related jokes when they're made by people who've known Bad for years like the OG DreamSMP members as well as the Pummel Party group. But Karl and Quackity haven't even known Bad for a year. Like let's calm down on the jokes about killing rat (I'm not even going to include the "jokes" about Bad pulling a Shane Dawson on rat). Like Ant and Velvet constantly make sexual jokes on Bad's streams knowing Bad will say language (Velvet literally said it himself) but they know when to calm it on the gay jokes. Like Ant said previously that he went too far on a Skephalo joke and eventhough it didn't upset Bad he still apologised and moved on. If they know their boundaries surely Karl and Quackity do as well.

I get that Karl is a people pleaser and Quackity just wants to make people laugh but you can be a good entertainer and be funny without directing jokes at specific people or constantly using the same joke.

Maybe it's my second hand embarrassment or one of my many mental illnesses but everything they do I'm more aware of because it makes me cringe. It's why I can't stand Mad Verse City on Jackbox. Like I get all my rap game content through tweets and screenshots.

[hopevalley]

I've actually enjoyed watching new episodes of the show for the first time in a LONG time! I thought Lucas being frustrated w/ Elizabeth was contrived and misplaced. Was his mom like "me & your father are separated btw i told elizabeth before you?" The bit felt off. But hey, these past three episodes have been fun & much-better written than anything last season. How much of this season's improvement over recent prior ones do you think is due to the season having a new showrunner?

As to Lucas and Elizabeth, I feel this is an issue with shows in general of this runtime and episode length. I like to compare WCtH with Road to Avonlea because both shows had short seasons and 40ish minute long episodes, were family shows, and featured ensemble casts. Avonlea had a similar issue with pacing in the occasional episode. I know I like to nitpick WCtH a lot about its writing, and I never shy from honest critique, but I really do think the hiccup with Lucas and Elizabeth in Ep3 was just a product of needing a few more minutes of screentime—preferably the start of Helen telling Lucas about the situation with his father, since it did feel like him knowing everything came out of almost nowhere. We knew Helen would have to talk to him, but we never really saw her resolve to do so, and I think we earned the emotional payoff of the truth coming out. (As an aside, Helen should have apologized for telling Lucas that Elizabeth knew as well as putting her in a position where she had to keep a secret from someone she cared about. Elizabeth being put in a bad position was awful enough, but then she went and told Lucas that Elizabeth was aware the whole time? Yiiiikesssss...)

I’m pretty confident that Helen told Lucas something like: “I have to tell you something important... Your father...left me...a few weeks ago. I need to apologize for keeping it from you but I didn’t know how to bring it up...” and then probably responded to something Lucas said with a comment about how she’d talked to Elizabeth about it, or Elizabeth suggested she be honest about the situation because Lucas would find out eventually and it would be better if it came directly from her. I could definitely see Helen accidentally being too honest in a situation where she’s nervous about admitting the truth to her own son. She’s probably extremely embarrassed and ashamed, and the episode doesn’t really go into how Helen feels about it. They just jump into talk about love and how it needs to be nurtured and nobody ever asks Helen if she actually loved/loves her husband, let alone if he was a good man/husband to her. 

Not getting a scene where Helen confesses the truth weakens the entire plotline. I’m hoping they’ll just keep improving on this specific aspect of the show, and consider getting rid of unnecessary scenes or entire unnecessary storylines in favor of stronger, more complete stories.

I know their hesitation is based on the idea that not everyone cares about (for example) Lucas, so focusing really hard on Lucas’s relationship with his mother might feel Bad, but the entire “chair” plotline with Rosemary and Lee was unnecessary, as were the longer Florence and Ned scenes. Don’t get me wrong—I enjoyed them! But if they cut those out, or mostly cut them, then there would have been enough screentime for a full scene showing Helen telling Lucas about the truth.

And Chris McNally is clearly an actor who can handle an emotional scene like that, so it would have turned out well, and been well-received by the fans...even the ones who aren’t rooting for Lucas. Because what people who watch this show want to see is...depth, I think. So many relationships feel tacked on or fake. I’ve seen improvement this season, but they could definitely do more to bolster the “community” feel of the show.

--

As to the quality of the season so far...

@trash-god​ and I were chatting earlier this week about how wild it is that we’re both, like, actively looking forward to the next episode regularly. Sure, it’s still pretty early in the season, but we’re 25% of the way through. If the writing stays this consistently decent I think we’ll have the best season in a long time on our hands!

It’s funny because if you lurk on the WCTH subreddit, you’ll see most of the fans there are bored of this season, but I disagree with them in a bit way; this season is DEFINITELY better-written and smoother. As to where to place the credit, I think it’s worth considering the last few seasons and what the writers/writing teams have struggled with.

Season 4: They knew something was going to happen with their lead man so they tried introducing other things and in many ways had success. There were some REALLY GOOD scenes in S4, but there were also scenes or arcs that had a lot of potential that just fell flat. For example, they had that plot where Frank and Abigail got annoyed with each other over the fact that he’s kind of still living (mentally) as a carefree bachelor, and even though it wasn’t as thorough as it should have been, it was a pretty good and realistic storyline. But then later in the season, they introduced Carson, and Frank is suspicious of him for almost no reason (or at least, no solid reason), and then actively is...like a BAD PERSON for NO REASON. Two completely different plots, one was good and felt natural, and the other was awful and cringey. We also have the AJ plotline in S4. It started out super good because it was one of those plots that was genuinely built up to over the course of several episodes. We find out the accountant that was going to testify has withdrawn their statement, then we find out they’ve disappeared and we have a name. Bill discusses it with Abigail and Frank both, multiple times. He thinks it’s a payoff and he’s determined to prove it so he starts poking around. Eventually he gets a lead and follows it, and it’s revealed that AJ is a woman. Bill is annoying. AJ is a liar. I think conceptually this is one of the more interesting plots they’ve cobbled together, but in execution it was lacking toward the end of the story. Bill spent two episodes fighting AJ’s attitude and in the end he just lets her go with a smile? That isn’t like Bill at all. There’s a scene or two missing to make that reaction make sense. They don’t interact enough to give us the idea that Bill *understands* her, let alone would be okay with her literally breaking out of his jail ON HIS WATCH.

Season 5: They had to write Jack out of the story and had to rush a wedding in to “appease” the fans. They also had to write Shane, Philip, Frank, and Dottie off the show in this season (Dottie because the actress deals with a chronic illness and can no longer do acting work—I want to say she has Lyme’s). So they cobble this like, awkward storyline to write Frank out that doesn’t really make a lot of sense. They put this dramatic story together for Philip (when him just moving away would have been better/more interesting), and they try to bring AJ back for another 2-part episode, which sounded fun until we actually had to watch the episodes. It was at this point that I thought, “The people writing this show...think they’re writing a movie script.” It’s not that I think AJ isn’t pushy or emotionally blunt, but it definitely came across in those episodes that they wrote her that way specifically because the plot wouldn’t work out if she wasn’t. She does unreasonable things. For some reason Bill still has feelings even though she’s done nothing to earn them. (And vice-versa; he’s just so mean to her...why would she be interested?) Everyone was like :O when the AJ episodes weren’t very well-received. But like, I didn’t want AJ to come back for a huge dramatic rattlesnake bite scene. I wanted her back to see her emotional struggle with facing prison. I wanted to really see where they’d go with her seeing Henry Gowen. She says she wants to start over in Hope Valley after prison, but like...WHY? The only people who are nice to her are Dottie and Abigail! And then after this super dramatic poorly written set of scenes that pretty much ensured AJ would never be seen on the show again (because her presence was actively mocked by a lot of fans) they actually kill off Jack and try to have a deeply emotional and thoughtful episode.

The worst part is that...the post-death episode was good. The actors were great. Then you look back at the dramatic rattlesnake stuff and you’re just like, “What went wrong here?”

Season 6: They decided they were going to introduce a love triangle, so they start doing that, but then Abigail’s character AS WELL AS CODY’S CHARACTER has to be cut from the show, so they edit those out. I still think doing this was the right thing—Abigail as a character was literally UNBEARABLE throughout most of S5—but I also can’t deny that it probably brought the cohesiveness and overall quality of the season down by a bit, particularly with Abigail acting as a buffer between Nathan/Lucas and Elizabeth. I have no way of knowing if they edited other characters into those roles (it’s possible Bill became a buffer between Nathan and Elizabeth, for example), but the editing still gave us some scenes that just didn’t...quite work, like the one where Elizabeth comforts Henry, or when Lee becomes Bill’s confidant regarding the position of judge being offered to him.

Season 7: In their attempt to make Lucas seem “mysterious” they accidentally made him come off almost creepy. More than once. They had some good ideas in this season, but the writing felt a bit choppy and isolated from episode to episode. Of course Nathan’s father was innocent. Of course it was resolved in five minutes. You could see they were trying REALLY hard for cohesiveness at certain points (Elizabeth tried talking to Henry about his attitude; Jesse mentioned Frank; Dottie was mentioned), but each episode felt very isolated from the others, almost as if most of them were written completely separately from the rest.

And you’ll notice in S4, 5, and 6, we kind of have a similar problem, where some plots feel like they were written or inserted into the story independent of the other plotlines. Frank breaking into Carson’s room at the saloon to snoop through his stuff was one of the worst things in the season (literally cringey—and not in that “character is doing something in character that is hard to watch” way, but rather, “this character would literally never do that” way). The AJ storyline in S5 felt like the person who wrote it watched AJ & Bill’s interactions in S4 and absorbed ONLY the fact that they bickered a bit (and then didn’t know how to write that dynamic in a pleasing way). Writing Abigail out of the show was for the best, but it forced cracks in the plotlines that weren’t necessarily filled, as well as gave us interactions that didn’t feel quite right.

And I think S7 was trying to get on the right track, but wrote episodes in a very disjointed, haphazard kind of manner. There were good things about it, yes, but there were also some very...bad things. 

And overall the problem almost universally was that it felt like some of the episodes/interactions were written as if they were part of a movie, as part of a one time deal, instead of something that would need to be carried forward. If you go back and look over some plotlines you can start to see where the writers...didn’t know how to write fanfiction. S5 AJ is not the same character as S4 AJ. She doesn’t feel the same. She’s not written with S4 AJ in mind. She’s not a natural version of the character that exists a year later in the storyline...and then she was given a storyline that they had to force the character to fit, instead of tailoring a storyline to match the character. And they continued this trend...over...and over...and over...and over.

And now, finally, it feels that they may actually have a head writer who knows how to write television, who knows that in order to write a successful television series, you have to go back and watch the early episodes. You have to see how the characters have evolved. You have to consider how they’ve gotten to where they are, and where they will LOGICALLY go from here based on things that happen to or around them.

I don’t want to state this as Fact too early, but I definitely think it’s a factor. We’ll see how the rest of the season plays out, but I hope the quality continues to be as good as it is.

[marvinswriting]

marvin can we get a sleepy part two bc it was soft or a fic about the tiny support group?

Ofc!!!Ill write tiny support next, for now:

Sleepy part 2 (this fic is a mess, part one was third person and this one is first, sue me)

part one 

I drifted in and out of sleep throughout Damian's English class. My best friend's pocket was one of my favorite places to be. Not only was Damian's presence just an overall comfort, but his pocket was also a place for napping, hiding, chilling, and avoiding Regina George. 

It got to the point where I was in his pocket so often, Damian got a pin for his jacket that he only put on when I was asleep. It was a plain white circle, but Damian said it was a sign to friends that meant "no hugs, precious cargo". 

I was woken from sleep to the sounds of papers and chairs shuffling around. I think its the end of the period, but I can't exactly pop my head out to check the time. Trying my best not to move, I looked up out of the small sliver of light that was being let into the pocket. I could see Damian with his head turned to the right, talking to somebody. I could hear, no- feel, what Damian was saying but not the other person. I didn't really care, I just hoped the class was ending soon so I could move. My arm has fallen asleep. 

Much to my delight, the bell rang out and everyone began getting up. As Damian moved his jacket moved with him, the pocket being no exception. Damian got up and began walking as I shifted off my arm. It was safe to move in the hall, nobody was looking long enough anyway. 

I popped my head out of the pocket and grinned to Damian.

"Hello there sleeping beauty." Damian grinned.

"Hey." I smile. My voice still sounds muffled from sleep and I can guarantee my hair is a mess.

Damian lifts his pointer finger up to me, and as I predicted, starts petting down the bed head I have created.

"I was beginning to think you died, you're getting better at this no moving in class thing."

I grin and push myself out of Damian's pocket, using the edges of the fabric as footing to crawl onto his shoulder.

"Jesus, Janis. Don't do that while I'm walking." Damian says facing forward again.

"I knew what I was doing."

"What if somebody bumped into me? You could have fallen and not only gotten hurt from the hight, you'd be on the floor in the middle of the hallway where people are walking and-"

I cut Damian off mid-rant. "Then we'd have an issue, but nobody did."

Damian doesn't seem happy with this response, so I move closer to his neck and lean against him.

"I'm okay."

"Just don't do that again."

"Okay," I say softly. He probably couldn't hear it. Sometimes I do feel bad about how stressed I get Damian. I mentally add it to the list of things that take is a little too far and not to do. 

"Sorry," I say after a while. Damian's hand comes up and scoops me into his palm as we reach the next class we have together. He holds me to his chest and uses his spare hand to open the door.

"It's okay. I just got nervous."

Damian sits down at his desk and I slid off his hand. Just because classes or co-sized doesn't mean we get our own desks. Tinies just sit on a normal desk, typically with their friends. The only other tiny in this class was Aaron Samuels, who sat with Shane Omen. 

I look over to Damian who pulls my backpack out the pocket of his backpack. Being tiny does have its advantages, like having friends carry your bag. 

I pull out paper and pencils, ready to learn after my nap. The hand Damian isn't using to write comes up behind me and cups gently around me. 

All-nighters aren't the worst thing in the world, especially when your giant friend has a "no hugs, precious cargo" pin.

TAG LIST: @musicallygt @realmisspolarbear @smallsoysauce

[thehonestbanana]

For real Onision is bitter and hates himself so much that he project his insecurities onto others who suffer from mental illness, body issues, or trauma. His videos on self harm and depression never resonated with me because he was blaming people for their mental disorder, meaning it made me feel worse about myself. No doctor or sane person would use Onision's methods of 'helping' people, because that shit can easily backfire and result in worser conditions and even suicide.

Oh my god greg is the definition of projecting. Number one example I can give right now is Shane. Fuck I remember once Greg tried to do the BMI scale thing with Shane and maybe it was in the same video but he tried to compare HIS OWN BODY WITH SHANES BY WEARINF KAIS CLOTHES?!!?(other clothing as well but KAIS TOO) fucking insanity. But yeah fucking Greg hates himself so much he has to thrown on his own problems and insecurities onto other people and blame them to feel valid. It’s fucking pathetic because the people he goes after (people with ED, depression, some sort of disorder ect...) he kicks them while their down, does that make sense? Like he’s not picking on like a Chad who has those issues, he rarely ever (if EVER) picks fights with people who don’t have some sort of public kryptonite.

Like Blaire White, she’s trans and by misgendering her that could trigger her and kinda mess her up for a bit.

Shane has talked about his weight and is open about an ED and when Greg brings it up(he has many times) it could trigger him.

Who was it Sam? One of the girls had a memory issue and Greg took advantage of that and tried to get her on his lap.

Fuck yknow what I forgot who it was but I swore I read one of the girls, fuck Im not sure who but I remember reading something a long time ago about Greg. It was someone else than the main girls, again like a few years ago?Anyway they said something about Greg asking her personal things, trying to kinda find out if she has a mental disorder or if she has something he can use against her. It was something very very close to that, and honestly if that was true and I’m remembering even like a part of it, it makes sense why greg goes after people with problems, he uses it to make them feel worse about themselves so he can gain some power over them and feel valid. God what a fucking bitch.

“No doctor or sane person would use Onision's methods of 'helping' people, because that shit can easily backfire and result in worser conditions and even suicide.”

Oh absolutely. 110%. Ive been open about gurgles and how he made me feel worse about myself, my depression got way worse because I felt bad, he shamed me for feeling sad. Yet he can spout bullshit about feeing depressed and people are supposed to feel bad for him? Fuck off. Like you said the conditions get worse and it’s because they ignore the problem. I’m sure maybe Greg actually helped encourage one... maybe two people like for real to get help/stop. Again like maybe. But that doesn’t dismiss ALL THE HUNDREDS UPON THOUSANDS OF OTHER PEOPLE WHO HE HELPED GET WORSE. Like I said in response to his tweet about charity, like donate all you want it’s not gonna fix the years of damage he’s caused people. It’s not gonna get “you have roof over your head. Food in the fridge. Can take a hot shower whenever you want. Not living under a dictator.” Out of my goddamn head.

TLDR:fuck Greg

I hope you’ve gotten better since then :( I know it’s hard, trust me I have struggles all the time, those days happen but it gets better <3

[shanie-the-toyaddict]

Shanie’s Dream Fic: A Masterpost

The following is a Masterpost of all my various finished, started, and sketched out dream stories. They are listed here as the dreams originally were, not as the stories the dreams became. Listings are by Saga/Series, Story Title, and Month/Year of original dream. Also listed are the fandoms of the dreams and any specific warnings the fics might carry. For the record, this isn’t a post really for anyone on here. It’s mostly for my own records. I do have a copy on my cloud storage but I’m putting it here as well on the off chance anyone is curious. BTW: I’m putting this here so that I don’t have to list it every time. As far as the WWE dreams go. Absolutely NONE of them are Kayfabe compliant. That’s the problem with not watching the shows regularly. I don’t dream about the TV side of it often. The Zowens dream is close though. It’s sort of a hybrid. The rest? Well, all of them are some level of NKC, but some are not only non-kayfabe, they are straight up AU.  BTW2: In every single one of these stories involving me I am some manner of queer. I’m pretty sure in all but maybe one or two. I’m either wlw, ace, or both. NOT ONE of the first person dreams contains romance between me and another character. The best you get is a single platonic fake-relationship story. (That one did have a smut scene in it but it isn’t romantic.)

Anyway, list behind the cut!

ADVENTURES IN DREAMLAND Master Post

SAGA   A Family Beyond Blood

Part 1 Darkness Fallen (August 2019) I find myself trapped in a world where I died as a child. Now as a spirit I must find a way to restore the universe to it’s proper order. (Somehow my young death caused the entire universe to splinter) *McMahon Family and MCU Dream* Part 2 Death and Life on Planet Earth (August 2019)

Having saved the universe but not ourselves, I vow to do whatever it takes to return Shane to his rightful place with his family. *McMahon Family and MCU Dream*

Part 3 A World Restored to Fall (August 2019)

The universe has been reset again, and I have been returned to my proper timeline. Or have I? There’re odd happenings in a local bookshop and it’s up to me to figure out how to stop them *Original Dream Featuring IRL People*

Part 4 World War Winter (August 2019)

Nuclear Holocaust has occurred. The world is at war with the machines. As a soldier in the CAMP forces, I must leave everything I know behind and face down the android army. But, maybe there’s a familiar face or two in CAMP after all... *McMahon Family Dream* *VIOLENT*

Part 5 Of Queens and Kingdoms (August 2019)

The world is reset. AGAIN. This time, it’s me, Shane and Marissa in a new land where the middle ages and modern times are happening simultaneously and women are the dominant gender. And, somehow, I’m the bloody queen. *McMahon Family and WWE Universe Dream*

Part 6 Titans Reign (August 2019)

Having ascended to the throne and filling the royal court with WWE superstars, I must now find a way to rule over a land I barely know. Meanwhile, a sinister plot is brewing to put the patriarchy back in power. *McMahon Family and WWE Universe Dream*

SAGA That’s What Friends Are For

Part 1 Death of a Fangirl (and Birth of a Friend) (October 2019) [Only Published Story on List]

I find myself being given the chance to meet Shane. Unfortunately, my mental illness turns the dream into a nightmare and my life unravels. But don’t worry. Shane will save the day. He always does. *Shane O Mac Dream*

Part 2 With A Song In Her Heart (October 2019)

Shane has been ignoring my texts, so I hunt him down. My search finds me at a pride festival where a spontaneous song catches his attention a little too well. *Shane O Mac Dream*

Part 3 One Last Birthday to Celebrate (November 2019)

It’s Christmastime in Squirrel Hill. For some dumb reason, Shane McMahon has decided to visit me the day before his birthday. Naturally I surprise him with a present. The other surprise (getting caught in a domestic dispute) is far less pleasant. *Shane O Mac Dream* *VIOLENT*

Part 4 The Pink Rose (Not a Dream)

I survived the shooting. Waking up in a hospital, I find my mother and a room full of flowers from the WWE Superstars. But one flower, a lone pink rose, is unlabeled. Wanna take a wild guess who sent that one? *WWE Universe Story NOT Based on A Dream*

Part 5 Dreams and Demons (December 2019)

So, it seems that watching your friend nearly die in a hail of bullets isn’t the best for your mental health. At WrestleMania 37, Shane is presented with a choice. Me, or TV. Of course he chooses me, this is my dream, what other choice   would there be? *WWE Universe Dream*

[Are you starting to see why I never publish any of these. They are painfully bad self inserts and woefully self-indulgent. But they are also therapy, hence the writing]

SERIES   Trippy Shorts

Story 1 A Little Fall of Acid Rain (August 2019)

The world is ending – but only in NYC. I’m there. So are the McMahons. Destruction and danger abound. *McMahon Family Dream*

Story 2 I Know Who I Am (September 2019)

All of my favorites from TV, movies, music, and wrestling are turning up murdered. Each time, a cryptic message is left behind, written in blood. Can I figure out the connection before everyone I like is killed? *General Pop Culture Dream* *EXTREMELY VIOLENT AND DISTURBING*

Story 3 Fixed Points and Fixed Pairings [An Unfinished Symphony] (September 2019)

One night, outside the bar, I am approached by an older version of myself. She brings a time machine and a mission – go back to the attitude era and change time so Shane remains the heir apparent. But some people are just meant to be together, and others just refuse to listen – even to an angel from the future. *WWE Universe Dream*

Story 4 A Song of Summer [A Snapshot] (October 2019)

As an Agent of SHIELD, it doesn’t take a genius to see that Black Widow and Hawkeye are in love. So, through the power of music, I decide to try and hook them up. *MCU Dream*

Story 5 Journeys Beginning [A Snapshot] (December 2019)

One day at school, I find myself amid an alien incursion. But don’t worry, the Doctor is on the case. Also, Shane is involved because of course he is. *Shane O Mac and Doctor Who Dream*

Story 6 Arson, Murder, and Revolution (January 2020)

At a Hollywood LGBTQ party, I find myself caught in a plot by the Trump administration to commit mass murder. When it goes awry, revolution stirs and it’s up to me and several other progressive celebrities to light the fuse *General Pop Culture Dream* *VIOLENT*

[See, they aren’t all about Shane. Just... most of them]

STAND ALONE STORIES

Once Upon a Dream (August 2019)

I black out drunk in an alley one night and awake to find myself in a dream. It’s 1990 and I’m somehow a middle-aged black woman. Also sharing the dream is a young and angry Shane McMahon. Together we use the circumstances of the dream to fuck shit up for the NYPD. *Shane O Mac Dream* *VIOLENT*

The Many Deaths of a Tabhead (August 2019)

Five years after getting hooked on a new drug called Tabs, I find myself in an endless loop of getting murdered. The only way out is to survive. Too bad I have no memory, and everyone wants me dead *Original Story Featuring IRL People* *VIOLENT AND DISTURBING*

Champion of the Faerie Queen (December 2019)

Did you know that Marissa McMahon is the Faerie Queen and Shane is her consort? Neither did I. And, it seems, when war comes a calling, it’s up to me to save the McMahons and the country. But I’ve got superpowers now, so that helps. *McMahon Family, MCU, and DC Universe Dream*

To Earthquakes, Lovers, and Newfound Friends (May 2020)

In lovely SoCal, I’m watching a movie when an earthquake strikes. I soon find myself both blind and badly burned. The only hope I have to survive is a certain pair of lovers who just happen to be in the area for some R&R. *Zowens Dream*

Penny and Kicks vs The World (June 2020)

As a longtime WWE employee, I’ve been best friends with Shane for years. But in the fallout of Coronavirus, the public is looking for a scapegoat. Vince is more than happy to offer up my father. Now, the entire wrestling world is in turmoil and Shane and I are just trying to weather the storm. *WWE Universe Dream* *VIOLENT*

Virginia Gothic (October 2019)

In a world where my highschool sweetheart and I never broke up, we must forge a path on our own through hardship and rejection. But what is the meaning of the mysterious Jesus statue? And why is Bacchus being so damn shifty? *Original Dream Featuring IRL People*

Uzil (January 2020)

An mystical being from the horsehead nebula takes up residence in a little boy’s guinea pig. The miracles come quickly and soon they are inseparable. *Original Third Person Dream* (I wasn’t in this one)

The E-Manual (February 2020)

The end of days is drawing near. I have been chosen as a prophet of the end times by the Almighty himself. I must go out into the world armed with only scripture and a mystical magazine, trying to convert as many people as possible before time runs out. *A Mostly Original Dream* (Shane’s in the last two pages)

Seraphina and the Seven Wishes (April 2020)

The world is a video game and the McMahon’s are the Addams family. It only gets weirder from there. *McMahon Family Dream*

A Matter of Science (And Opinion) (May 2020)

I accidentally set fire to my apartment during a spell. I’m promptly arrested and call The Doctor as my defense. Sadly, the call is rerouted to Stormcage and SpongeBob SquarePants ends up on the case instead. This one is every bit as absurd as it sounds. *Doctor Who and SpongeBob SquarePants Dream*

A Revolution In This Century (Enter Me) (November 2019) The year is 2027. Climate Change has decimated the globe and revolution has reduced the Ruling Elite to food reserves. However, absolute power corrupts absolutely, and soon the new ruling poor become as ruthless as the 1% had been. In this horrible dystopia, I am a powerful government official who has taken on the McMahons as consorts for the sole purpose of saving their skins. *McMahon Family Dream* *VIOLENT, DISTURBING, AND A BIT SMUTTY*

Crystal Vision – A Dozen Birthdays (December 2019)

After showing kindness to an enchantress, I am given my hearts greatest desire – a place in Shane’s life. I am sent back in time to 2005 as a WWE Makeup tech and given 12 years in the life of my childhood heroes. But a lot happened in the WWE from 2005 to 2017 and not all of it good. How much can and do I dare change? *WWE Universe Dream* *Painfully NKC. Disturbing subject matter involved because 2007 is a thing.*

Dr. Slime and the Wondernerds (August 2019)

Three high school nerds find themselves in possession of a mysterious green substance. When it explodes during an experiment, they find they have been given superpowers. However, this is the real world and super-powered “freaks” get picked apart, not celebrated. Can the teens resist using their powers? *Original Third Person Dream* (I’m not in this one)

Planeswalking Like A Grecian (October 2019)

After death, Xena finds herself on the Astral Plane. Promptly running into Joxer, they must find a way to survive the dangers of the afterlife. But don’t worry. Gabrielle has a plan. *Xenaverse Dream* (I’m not in this one)

The Foresight Curse (June 2020)

The problem with knowing the future is that you usually don’t have the ability to change it. So when Radar O’Reilly realizes Henry’s fate the day before it happens, he has to spend the next day trying to drown out the feelings of dread and sorrow, if only for the Colonel’s sake. Funny thing though, sometimes fate takes a left turn and you get a second chance to say goodbye. *M*A*S*H Universe Dream* (I’m not in this one) Vampires, Wraiths, and Shades, Oh My! (December 2019)

In the middle ages, I am orphaned at a very young age by vampires and taken in by Vampire Hunters (AU Shane and Stephanie). Now a teenager, I fight alongside them to protect the world from the dangers of the night. *McMahon Family Vampire AU Dream*

WHEW! I’m pretty sure that’s all of them! I have so dang many dreams it’s hard to keep track of them all! Anyway, out of all of these, only a handful are finished, ONE is published (Death of a Fangirl) and a ton of them aren’t far past the sketch stage. So, this is my list. Every story on here I at least have sketched out. I doubt I will ever even bother writing many of these, but the intent is present.

[mrdevorak]

A little lesson on ASPD from someone with fucking ASPD.

So I’m just now getting around to seeing the therapist from Shane Dawson’s Jake Paul series speak out.....”therapist.”  Disclaimer, I love Shane, but his plot and the way he went about this was not good. Please watch this video when given the chance. She posted on Instagram, and wow, someone take her fucking “license” and take away the license of whoever the FUCK gave it to her.  Here’s a few things that broke into my house, kicked me in the face and took my silverware and left me on the ground for two days. 

“..sociopaths or people with anti-social personality disorder can’t be fixed. And that’s not really what I’m saying, what I’m saying is they don’t care to be.” “..they don’t want to get better.”

Okay, first of all, who told you that? I’ve met sociopaths that don’t care about the bad things they do or how they act or behave, not that they don’t want to get help. Who the fuck said we asked for this trauma? None of us. Most of ASPD people don’t receive help because of people like you, or because we don’t think we’re worthy of getting fucking help, we’re convinced we can’t be helped. “And also, a lot of people are talking about sociopaths and psychopaths being different words, one is born with it, one’s created. And I know there’s a lot of information online that supports that but diagnostically speaking from a clinicians standpoint there is no difference.”

TAKE. HER. LICENSE. Sociopaths and psychopaths are NOT the same thing. They are NOT the same thing, THEY ARE NOT THE SAME THING.  Psychopaths have something they were born with, they were taught to live like that their whole lives. Meaning psychopaths have learned how to manage and deal with emotions. They are more organized and calm individuals.  Sociopaths are made from childhood trauma, first notable, undeniable signs starting at age 15. They lose sense of empathy, understanding, control, and lack emotions heavily, which is why they tend to be involved in self-destructive behaviors more than psychopaths.  Psychopaths have control of their choices, while sociopaths live on impulses and risks, which is why they’re more likely to have an outstanding criminal record before age 18. There wouldn’t be two words if they were the same thing. “...I’m not dehumanizing them [sociopaths] what I’m doing is telling people what to look out for. Because if you haven’t recognized this, sociopaths, or anti-social personality disorder don’t have empathy for other people and often utilize other people for their own personal gain, which can be really hurtful to a lot of us. And that means there’s only 4% of the population, 1 in 25 people, who have this. I don’t want the rest of us to fall victim to their manipulation. And sure, that can make them sound like bad people but if you’re using people for your own gain and not in a thoughtful manner, and you’re not helping people in a loving manner, I’m sorry but I’m going to protect the 96% of people negatively effected.” 

What, and I cannot stress this enough, the fuck.  You are dehumanizing sociopaths. Because while myself am self-aware of my own bad doings and am a high-functioning mentally ill person, that doesn’t mean all sociopaths are aware they’re doing something toxic and harmful to others. Most don’t even know they’re mentally ill because she even SAYS most never seek help. And not to mention how HIGHLY under diagnosed personality disorders, especially cluster B, are to men. Because cluster B, involves a lot of outburst, rages, and violence and apparently that’s “just how men are.” Yes, a majority of us do that. Most if not all, but we don’t mean to most of the time. It’s a personality disorder, this illness takes over our entire brains and that’s how we fucking live. We don’t know any better, if we do, we just don’t and literally cannot CARE. That’s the POINT.  We cannot GRASP that these things are so, so harmful to others.  It takes a special person to befriend and be a partner to someone with ASPD. My boyfriend is such a fucking keeper for staying with me and managing with me and learning about my illness so he can understand and learn slowly how to not take it to heart when I do stupid shit.  You can’t let these things get to you, or you’re just not cut out to be around them. Yes, people should be aware. But educated, and with open minds and arms about it.

SOCIOPATHS ARE NOT INHERENTLY ABUSIVE.  

Shane is a great person with good intentions, but is sadly being educated incorrectly and introduced to this all the WRONG way.

[spacemantango]

X6-88 is not pure evil, boring or one-dimensional.

I see a lot of people talking shit about X6-88. Unlike most other "bad karma" male characters or male characters with questionable actions in Fallout 4 (Pickman, Maxson, DiMA, Kellogg, Danse, etc.) X6-88 is almost universally hated. I get that he doesn't have as much characterization as characters like Nick Valentine or Preston Garvey and I agree with the opinion that X6-88 says some pretty awful things:

(At Abernathy Farm) "If your daughter was that stupid, she got what she deserved."

"We should kill him later and take back the caps. We might need them for more bribes."

However, you have to consider the environment in which X6-88 was "raised". Coursers go through rigorous training and are carefully selected based on their traits. X6 was once your average Institute synth who was selected to become a courser. Synths don't have childhoods and are born full grown (with the exception of child synths, obviously) but they still "grow up" and spend their early years being shaped and formed by the Institute and it's culture. There is no room for dissent or questioning when it comes to synths. They are constantly monitored for signs of disloyalty and disobedience. The Institute has a vested interest in essentially brainwashing their synths. Walk around the Institute and you can hear other synths besides X6-88 saying all kinds of recited propaganda. X6-88 does the same.

He must have shown that he was loyal to the Institute. We can see his admiration for the Institute in his dialogue:

"Greed and materialism don't exist in the Institute."

"The future of mankind has never looked brighter. It makes me proud to serve."

"Now that you've seen the Institute, you've seen the future of mankind."

(If you destroy the Institute) "You haven't just destroyed your son's legacy, you've destroyed all hope for mankind."

"It's clear you want what's best for the Institute, and that's all that matters to me."

He really believes in the Institute's cause and propaganda. All he knows about the above-ground comes from the perspective of the Institute, which explains his disdain for the Commonwealth. The Institute needs their people to believe that the surface is awful so they think the Institute is humanity's only hope and that their methods are excusable. X6-88 has spent his entire life being told that the surface is awful, they are lesser than those in the Institute and that they are ruthless barbarians. Is it any surprise that he looks down on them?

I also want to argue against the idea that X6 is a one-dimensional character with no personality. He has good and bad traits, like any other character. I would argue that he has a dry, sarcastic sense of humor, is fiercely loyal, dedicated to his duty and stands by his principles (even if those morals are questionable).

He also shows himself to be a loyal person in general. If you gain his affinity and help the Institute, he tells you that he believes in you and will stand by your side:

"I feel honored to know you and to fight at your side."

"Your son is a great man, and I'm starting to see some of that greatness in you, too."

"It's been my privilege to know you, ma'am. I think you'll do great things for the Institute."

"I'm glad you joined us, sir. It's clear to me that Father's legacy is in good hands."

"You've been an inspiration to me, ma'am. I'll work hard to follow your example."

"It's been an honor, sir."

And he is not "emotionless". He does have some moments of being expressive, such as when you visit your dead spouse's body:

"This was your spouse? My condolences."

(I want to make clear that saying X6 is "lacking empathy" or using his stoic personality as evidence that he doesn't have feelings is incredibly ableist and harmful. X6 lacks COMPASSION (not empathy) for certain people, but he isn't some unfeeling, heartless robot.)

He is so loyal to the Institute, that it informs his entire worldview and if you take that away from him, he is devastated and becomes angry. You've destroyed the only family, world and culture he's ever known:

"How do I feel? I feel like we should have let you rot in that cryopod."

He is also fiercely duty-driven:

"They're dedicated to their duty. As a Courser, I can respect that."

Lastly, let's remember that X6-88 believes that he is not a person, that he is lower than a human being. You know this from how he talks about synths:

(At Libertalia) "He's not a man, sir, he's a synth. A synth that's confused and dangerous."

However, I would argue that X6-88 isn't completely convinced. For example:

He calls Gabriel "it" when he's trying to insist that synths aren't people but calls Gabriel "him" at every other point. It's like he forgets to stick to the Institute propaganda. This is a small point though, and I don't know if there is enough evidence to prove it.

Is X6-88 perfect and virtuous? No. Do I like the Institute and it's beliefs, which he blindly follows? No. But that doesn't change the fact that he's a complex character with a tragic backstory. The game just doesn't point that out in big, bold words for you.

In other world, if he hadn't been raised by the Institute, X6-88's loyal, duty-driven, funny and principled traits could have been utilized to further less evil means. He was poisoned by the Institute from birth, given no other outside exposure or perspective until he was already fully indoctrinated as a courser. He doesn't see his victims as human and he doesn't see HIMSELF as human. Imagine what that must be like. Imagine seeing yourself as inherently dangerous, commodity to be owned and controlled and blindly following your master.

X6-88 is a tragic character. He doesn't get a redemption arc. He doesn't ever "get better" or learn to see himself and his people as anything other than property. No matter what you do, he will die believing the lies the Institute have fed him.

By all means, criticize how he was written or dislike the character for personal reasons, but don't write him off as a purely evil, one-dimensional cardboard cutout.

Remember that, following the themes of slavery and humanity (whether or not those themes were handled well is questionable but ultimately beside the point here), X6-88's life represents that which is all too real in a lot of ways.

I'm not saying we should pity him (don'tl or think he's the best companion or that his actions are excusable (double don't). I just wish people would afford him the same complexity as other characters.

Side note to other non-black people in the reblogs/replies to this post: do not use the term "Uncle Tom" or the language surrounding that term. I think these articles sum up why that term is problematic and shouldn't be used by you: Here. Here.

The usage of that term is contentious even among black people themselves so you have no place using it, especially if you don't really know what you're talking about.

Side Side Note: Comparing X6-88 to someone on the Autism spectrum is offensive. Please don't do that. Obviously, we a-spec people can headcanon X6 however we want in that regard, but all those not on the spectrum: please don't.

Side Side SIDE Note: If you're here to argue that synths aren't people or the Institute is right to do what they do to synths, just move on to another post or make your own. I don't want that on my post please. That is not even close to the point.

Oh god another side note: Don't use mental illness language to describe X6-88 either. This isn't a Shane Dawson video, we don't need you ignorantly calling everyone sociopaths, psychopaths, etc. Just don't.

[gulensupie]

your full opinion on felix's video of shane?

To be honest my top 2 fav youtubers (and people I never stopped watching for soo long) are Shane and Felix. So I was torn on this lol.

I mean I get some things he had criticized. I can totally see that Felix is respecting his film/docu making and his series so that’s quite amazing. What I kind of agree is Shane maybe shouldn’tve starded the series with the question of “is jake a sociopath?”. I think he maybe should have talked about this in the upcoming parts. This might be the main reason why he’s getting so much criticism about the series already. We know Jake is a bad person but what if he has a different mental illness for example.

Oh and I also agree 8 parts is a lot LOL.

But yeah, he did respect Shane’s video even though he didnt like it in the end.

Plus that last part when he said “the comments will be like I know you’re just jealous cause shane’s getting more views. YEP..” haha! I love both shane and felix.

[sugrmottas]

why do you think people hold his cheating against blaine tho?

uhhhhh double standards???

maybe more like quadruple standards actually...

okay so like, fucking everyone in that show cheats, almost. rachel and finn both do (finn makes a fucking habit of it), so it’s not like our leads are our moral high ground. kurt doesn’t, though the whole chandler thing still squicks me out and i don’t totally remember how the mercedes/sam/shane thing went down but i don’t think she cheated either, so perhaps our secondary leads are more our moral high bar. 

but let’s do a quick stroll through our main characters: quinn cheats (twice), puck helps both quinn and rachel cheat (which ties into his issues with finn more than anything i think but That’s A Different Talk), santana helps someone cheat (canonically she only helps brittany on artie, but i wouldn’t be totally surprised if there were other instances), brittany cheats (once i think?), sam cheats (once? i think? i might talk about that too here), hell tina cheats. mike helps someone cheat. jake cheats, too. so like, blaine isn’t an outlier here.

what makes him different is that we see him actively regretting it. puck, quinn, rachel and sam all show some regret over their actions but we don’t have episodes dedicated to them being sad. and i think that’s the issue, which is the worst thing -- blaine feels bad and he’s demonised for it. of course, it didn’t help that the fandom already didn’t like him and anti-klainers (which were just as plentiful as klainers back in the day) seemed to side with one boy over the other and i always saw more kurt supporters than those who sided with blaine, which like. i get. we knew kurt more, we went through his struggles with him -- we met blaine post-sadie hawkins, post-recovery, he was already well-adjusted (...ish) so there was less to grab onto if we wanted to connect with this character.

but that leads to this: blaine cheats because he’s being emotionally neglected by his partner, which isn’t a Good Thing and i’ll never say it is. but it’s not like he’s cheating for fun -- he’s alone and hurt and has tried to reach out but is rebuffed at every point. blaine cheats and immediately tells kurt (which is rare for glee actually, sam’s the only other person who came forward immediately and i think puck comes forward about rachel pretty quickly) and like, i don’t understand people who say darren criss is a bad actor (*points frantically at his emmy*) because the scene where he tells kurt the truth is genuinely heartbreaking. blaine looks fucking disgusted with himself. 

and at that point, kurt’s definitely valid in pushing blaine away -- he doesn’t want to hear blaine’s explanations, nor should he have to. it’s all too new, too fresh, too volatile. they can talk another time.

except they don’t?

and that leads us to the next four episodes, where blaine struggles with his sense of self -- he doesn’t have closure on his relationship with kurt, because kurt wouldn’t talk to him. and so much of blaine’s identity is tangled up in kurt (which is an Issue obviously) that he just... loses himself. there’s definitely a point to all those metas where blaine coming to mckinley was a major step back for him as a character and we really see that here, and i think that might be where all the hate comes from? we see the fallout from blaine’s perspective, the Bad Guy of the situation (they’re both bad guys imo but it be like that sometimes) so people struggle to empathise with him. also kurt emotionally neglecting blaine was REALLY brushed over because while we only see two episodes of it (and it wasn’t shown in-depth or anything) blaine experienced at least a month of it (i lean towards more because we voted our class representatives two months into the school year but i know things are different) which doesn’t help matters.

i know people get annoyed with the “blaine probably has a mental illness” line of thought but there’s definitely something there -- kid joined 27 clubs, became senior class president and took over a nationals-winning glee club in his senior year. he was also salutatorian (i mean i’m sure he would’ve been bumped if artie and tina sorted out their issue but he still got second-highest marks in the class even if he technically ranked third). there is no way that kid didn’t have something leading him into mania (i have a lot of stock in the bipolar!blaine theory can u tell). 

but if there is something there (ryan even admitted he thought blaine might have depression but there is so much more there), i think that explains his actions a lot. it doesn’t excuse them of course, but explanations are important. 

anyway, people already hated blaine. this just gave them a canon reason to fire against him. 

also, since i said i’d talk about it: sam cheats on mercedes in s5 and it’s shitty and our girl deserves better, but sam tells her immediately. i remember fucking nothing about how that conversation went, but it ended well. the fandom didn’t fire back against sam anywhere near as much as they did blaine (which leads us into a weird talk about how they [the fandom] will fight for kurt but not mercedes but i prefer to look it as the outcome of samcedes’ conversation was more positive), but i definitely remember people using that against him -- while people like brittany, quinn and tina got off without much flack.

(i also don’t really remember finn getting much shit over it but??? i feel like i just missed it???)

so not super sure what the fuck happened there (outside of pre-existing baseless hate for the characters but it’s not like people had a reason to love quinn pre-puck revelation so??? idk???). i do find it interesting though. i never really got why people hated blaine and sam so much when they were genuinely kind-hearted males, something sorely lacking from our tv screens at the time, but... idk, people just wanted to hate, i think.

like people blame them for the downfall of glee but lmao bitch??? that’s on the fucking writers??? chord and darren didn’t storm into the writer’s room and demand writing quality go the fuck down, chill out.

okay so rounding back to klaine again because i have fucking Thoughts on this mess: i do genuinely think that should’ve been the end of them. blaine would learn how to be by himself (which is a huge issue for him, i always found help! a way too fitting song when i took away the context-- my independence seems to vanish in this haze) and kurt would learn to take responsibility for his own shortcomings (which he never did which, thinking about it, may be why at the end of every watch-through i walk away not liking kurt despite fully enjoying him whilst watching the show) and they’d go be very happy.

i’ve mentioned my endgames for them before so i won’t talk too much about it but i don’t really think they’d ever be friends (so many fanfictions have them stay friends post break-up and??? what). kurt’s trust in blaine is too fractured and for blaine, kurt is an ugly reminder of a sad part of his life -- there’s too much history there. they play nice, of course, at reunions and parties and all that, but they never talk much. one day blaine will say i’m happy you’re happy and kurt will smile and say well, i’m happy that you’re happy too and that will be the end of it. elliott will come up and give kurt a big kiss and blaine will leave to go find sam (or sebastian? my endgames are shifting, i think). it’s not an apology and it’s not forgiveness, but it’s as close as they’re ever going to get.

[madd-devil]

                    The French Students’s Mysterious Vanishing

 This is like a play, okay? It was easier for me to write it this way because I’m daydreaming like a video. I hope I respected the ambiance of a normal Buzzfeed Video. I’m very sorry if it suck. I really am. And I’m also sorry for any mistakes, English is still not my first language.

Enjoy!

[Logo of Buzzfeed Unsolved appears on the screen, following by Ryan’s voice]

Ryan: This week on Buzzfeed Unsolved, we uncover a very mysterious case which happened in France a few months ago. This case had shocked the whole French population and it still shock today.

Shane, looking at Ryan, in a serious voice: How come we never known about it?

Ryan, looks back at him, stammering: Well… Because… Um… I don’t know…

Shane, in a fake frustrated voice: Well, I will tell you why! It’s because us, Americans, are to obsessed with our own country! If I understood well, they were students, right? Teenagers, I guess? So why didn’t we known about it?

Ryan, wheezing: I don’t know!

Shane, humming: We know nothing.

Ryan, becoming serious: Anyway, I think you’re not gonna like this case.

Shane, turning to Ryan: Why?

Ryan: There are a lot of weird stuff and very creepy things. It’s like a Marvel movie, okay?

Shane: Oooh… Are they superheroes?

Ryan, laughing: No, I don’t think they are.

[The screen goes back to black, a white line appears. Above it, a date and a location written in white appears: April 23th 2019, in Ecouen, France. When the names are pronounced, five black and white photos appears of four boys and one girl.]

Ryan: On April 23th 2019, in Ecouen, France, five seventeen years old teenagers -Naomie Noire, Ethan Pereirra, Sonny Bleuet, Tom Smith and Pablo Ribatchenko- disappeared in the morning. But before going on the event of the disappearance, let’s take a look on the lives of our five high school students.

[Screen fade to black, Shane words are in yellow and Ryan in blue]

Shane: So… They belong to us?

Ryan: What? No!

Shane, being insistent: But you say “our”.

Ryan, wheezing: What! I don’t understand your logic man!

Shane, in a creepy voice: Careful Ryan… Or else French people will come for you… And cut your HEAD!

[A high school appear in a grey and white colors. At each mention of a name, the photo of one of the teenagers appear. The important things are written in italic, it is written in white or when it is very important in red on the “video”.]

Ryan: Let’s start with Naomie Noire. After what her professors told the police, at the time of the investigation, she was a shy, nice and kind girl who didn’t like talking in class and who didn’t have a lot of friends. She was a average student and she appeared to have the highest grade in History. Her parents were divorced since she was six years old and she had a severely mentally ill older sister. Then, there is Ethan Pereirra. He was a rugby man in the school’s team and he was very athletic. He was a loud boy, “a bad boy” in the making and most of the girls in his class were in love with him.

[Screen goes back to Ryan and Shane with the blue and yellow words]

Shane: Is… Is that important?

Ryan: Well, I don’t think so but for the police officers and the medias, it was.

Shane: Oh okay. After all, France is the country of love…

[Screen goes back to the high school and to the picture of Ethan Pereirra.]

Ryan: Ethan Pereirra had a large group of friends, being popular and all. He had two brothers and one sister. Next, there is Sonny Bleuet, the best friend of Ethan Pereirra. The two were friends since kindergarten and Sonny was a incredible soccer player and he wanted to be in the National French Team, he had overall good grades and he had a very big family. After, we have Tom Smith, a English exchange student, who quickly became friend with Ethan and Sonny. Tom was good at science and he was loved by his teachers but nobody did really know about his family in England. He never talked about it to someone. Finally, Pablo Ribatchenko. He was very smart and amazing at arts. He was also loved by his professors and didn’t have a large group of friends. Pablo was also good at sports.

Now, let’s tale a look on the weeks before the disappearance. Of all sudden, Ethan, Sonny and Tom quitted their friends for Naomie and Pablo. The five teenagers were often seen together, talking to each other. Some changes occurred the following weeks. Naomie became more confident, from her teachers point of views it was -quote- “a nice change in her personality. It was nice to see her raising her hand in class and talking more” -end quote-. The same happened to Pablo and everyone was delighted. But the five teenagers become more and more agitated and less productive in class the week before the day of their disappearance. One day, all of the windows in Pablo’s classroom suddenly broke, scarring all the students and the teacher, except Pablo. One of the students present this day, -Jérome Rolas- said -quote- “It was like a gust of wind inside our classroom. I was surprised, we all were. In fact, we all started panicking, we all thought it was a terrorist attack. But we realised it was not. I still don’t understand and can’t explain what happened but one thing for sure. It wasn’t normal” -end quote-.

[Now back to Ryan and Shane: yellow and blue words on black screen.]

Shane: What the heck is that? A gust of wind inside a classroom? Are they sure it wasn’t from the outside?

Ryan, laughing: Yes, they were. And there is something more weird that the gust of wind inside a room.

[The screen goes back to a classroom full of students, only a boy’s colours are standing out.]

Ryan: The student who sat next to Pablo saw that his eyes became white when the teacher pulled him back into the line and this same student saw how the young boy clenched his fists and then, the gust of wind destroyed the windows. But, events like these seemed to occur more and more around the five teenagers: lights who would flickers when Naomie would walk somewhere, a fire who started when Ethan passed by, the water of the toilets who suddenly exploded when Sonny fought back some bullies and the earth who crackled under Tom’s foot.

[Ryan and Shane, yellow and blue words on black screen.]

Shane: Yeah, it is like a Marvel movie. “Avengers 4: The French take over”. They could beat Thanos. Or they could be great villains. Five edgy teenagers against what it remains of the Avengers;

Ryan, laughing: Yeah, maybe they could. Or not.

Shane: I would watch this movie.

Ryan, still laughing: Let’s go back to the case.  

[The screen now shows the pictures of the five teenagers. When the shack is pronounced, a house in a tree appears, surrounding by trees.]

Ryan: Now, onto the day of their vanishing. Like I said, the parents called the police station and police officers came into the houses to investigate. The dogs they brought started to smell the teenagers’s odours and they led the police officers to a shack in the forest. In the shack, they discovered several maps of their city and Paris, as well as maps of cities of Russia, England, United States, Argentina, Cuba and Gabon. The shack had electricity, running water and was very clean and big, with three rooms: a large bedroom where the five teenagers seemed to sleep together in, a bathroom and the largest room was a kitchen, living and dining room. There were also clothes and the school bags of the teenagers were on the table. The police officers believed that they must have changed their clothes before disappearing into thin air.

[Screen back to Ryan and Shane, yellow and blue words.]

Shane: I want to see this shack and live in it.

Ryan: Me too. 

Shane: But how five teenagers could have built something like that? Imagine, the rangers, seeing five teenagers going in and out with DYI furniture and large bags in the forest. “Oh. They must help their parents doing some work, don’t you think Louis?” 

Ryan, laughing, continuing his game: “Yeah, they are totally not building a shack high in a tree to live in and to prepare their escapes…”

[The screen is now black, each time Ryan said “theory one, two…”, it appear in white. The words or sentences underlined are evidences.]

Ryan: The first theory suggest that the teenagers just ran away from their homes. In fact, the five of them had at least one reason to do so: doctors and psychologists then said Naomie had depression, was suicidal and had anxiety, the police officers discovered that Ethan was treated for paranoia, and with the help of the doctors and psychologists, discovered that Pablo was a psychopath, Sonny had depression too and Tom was schizophrenic. Those illnesses must have brought them together in a way and many people believed that they were all in a polyamorous relationship and that the reason why they ran away: they wanted to consume their relationship in peace.

[Screen to Ryan and Shane, staring at each other]

Shane:But what about the weird stuff? 

Ryan:Well, I think they dismissed it you know. They only concentrate on the “real facts” you know. I don’t think it would looked good if they had written in their files that this five teenagers had super powers. 

Shane, nodding: Fair enough. I also love the “oh they are all sick and crazy and damaged and they also loved each other, that is why they ran away!”. I think it’s easy and stupid. 

Ryan: Yeah, I agree. I mean, you can be in love with more than one person I guess but to say that those people who were ill and that they were in love with each other sound weird, like, we all wrap it in one thing and it’s not respectful for other people who suffer like them.

[The screen is black.]

Ryan: The evidence of this theory is that they were always with each other after they met each other at a school party. They would do sleepovers and Ethan’s parents would heard -quote- “strange sounds from their son’s bedroom” -end quote-.

[Screen to Ryan and Shane, yellow and blue words.]

Shane: So they were having a little fun together?

Ryan: I don’t know. I mean, they could have been playing a game or whatever but I don’t think they were having sex when Ethan’s parents were actually in the house. I think if they indeed had sex, they would do it in a nice and cosy place, without parents or anyone to witness it.

Shane, in a serious tone: They did it in the shack.

Ryan, wheezing.

Shane: I would do it there if I was them.

[The screen fades now to black. Theory two is written in white.]

Ryan: The second theory is really crazy and had made by some persons on the internet. It suggest that those five teenagers were possessed by demons. When they officially met each other in a school party, the weather changed suddenly and there was no cloud, no star in the sky: only the moon and it was reddish. Ethan, Naomie, Sonny, Pablo and Tom were the only ones outside at this specific moment and after this strange change of weather, they suddenly became friends. And all the incidents who followed were caused by those demons.

[Screen to Ryan and Shane, yellow and blue words.]

Shane: Crazy. Insane. Impossible.

Ryan: Yeah. I know. 

Shane: Do you have another theory on that case or…?

Ryan:Well, I made up my one, by using those two and my mind. Do you want to hear it?

Shane:Yeah of course!

[The screen shows Ryan and Shane. Shane is facing and staring at Ryan, who starts explaining his theory]

Ryan: Well, I think that something did happened this night, when they were all at the party. I think that they must have gained some powers, like in the Marvel or D.C movies and comics. And then, they saw it was only them who obtained them and they were like, “okay, we don’t know each other but we are all in the same bag now and we should stay together or else we will loose control”. Then, they started to see each other and built the shack to have their private places, somewhere safe for them you know? And then, they discovered that something link them: their illnesses. After what I have gathered, read and saw, I think they knew that… that if they didn’t go away, they will hurt someone or destroy something you know? 

Shane, nodding his head: Yeah.

Ryan: And that’s why. They were scared. They were scared that one day, they will end up killing someone. I think they started planning it when Pablo broke the windows. 

Shane: No offense, but I will go with the first theory. It is less crazy.

Ryan: Alright, that’s okay. But until then, this case remains… Unsolved.

[Screen fades to black]

[kalinara]

So I have now made it to season 4 of the Walking Dead.  I have many opinions.  I like how the show doesn't glamorize Rick, and the other characters, becoming harder and colder.  It's a necessity, and it's satisfying watching them be badass.  But it's sad too that they've become so distrustful and wary.  I was SO relieved when they took in the Woodbury group at the end of the season.  It felt like a move in the right direction.

Though...dumb question.  Why didn't they all go settle in the fortified town instead of the prison?  (I hope they at least went and looted the library.)

I enjoyed Rick's foray into insanity a little too much, I think.  I don't think it was all because of Lori.  He was clearly fraying at the edges at the start of season 3 and it just got worse...a lot worse.

At the beginning of season 3, I was thinking "that man looks like a stiff breeze would knock him over.  He clearly needs to go hide some place and cry for a while."  Then it became very clear that no amount of time in a crying room was going to fix that.

Rick is surprisingly productive and group oriented, even when in the grips of mental illness.  Clearing out a cell block, hallucinating helpful people.  (...I am a little alarmed that season 4 Rick seems to have stolen his three questions from his hallucinations, but okay then.)

That said, I kind of think that there was a point where the others should have been willing to remove him from leadership.  The man has literally broken with reality, Hershel.  Please stop guilt tripping him.  He is sick.  Let him rest!

Also, I honestly expected the Ricktatorship to be more, I dunno, dictatorial?  But it seemed like Rick only made one or two decisions total against the wishes of the group, and at least one of those were when he was seeing dead people.  The rest of the time was basically leading by committee.

(It's actually a really interesting contrast with the Governor.  The Governor wears the title of an elected official but is an autocrat.  Rick claims to be a dictator, but mostly leads according to the group wishes.)

I'm increasingly bewildered at the fics and meta I see that characterize Rick as a "natural leader" though.  Because he is clearly so much happier at the beginning of season 4.  He doesn't even have that "Oops, here I am giving orders again, sorry" that most abdicated leaders have in this sort of story line.  He’s like “Nope.  I’ll help in a crisis but I won’t give orders,  I AM WORKING ON MY CROPS DAMNIT.”  He's a GOOD leader for the most part, (in as much as while he makes mistakes that have consequences, those mistakes are reasonable based on the immediate problem and the knowledge that they have at the time), but he's definitely not naturally inclined to it.

Which leads me to the logical conclusion that Rick Grimes is totally a submissive in the bedroom.  That is a man who is begging someone, ANYONE, to take the burden of decision making away for a while.   

But while he seems happier at the beginning of season 4, and Carl certainly seems healthier, I'm not sure Rick's coping mechanisms are any better.  "No, going outside without my gun is completely reasonable."  It's good to see Rick acting a little less like a feral cat, but sweetie, direct martyrdom isn't a good idea either.

In the end, I didn't hate Lori as much as I expected to.  I actually thought MOST of her behavior made some sense.  There were three big points against her though:  1) Her reaction when Shane wanted to leave in 2x01.  Honey, just let him go.  He's a horrible person.  2) Her reinforcement of gender roles within the camp.  I hate Andrea, Lori, but she's right.  Standing watch is more important than laundry.  Also, you could actually get the boys to help.  I mean, the men are the ones benefiting from the rigid enforcement of gender roles here, but I don't get the sense that it's on purpose.  They probably don't even notice.  I think if you pointed the inequity out to Rick, at least, he'd take steps to try to change it.  3) Her reaction to Shane's death.  Because seriously?!

Now ANDREA was awful.  While I loved season 2 in general, it was a bit painful in terms of the women.  Maggie was great, but Carol and Beth were mostly non-entities, and Andrea and Lori were outright frustrating.  The gender divide in terms of skill sets was annoying too.  Season 3 was a vast improvement on that ground.  We had Michonne.  Maggie and Carol seemed to have taken an upgrade to their skills.  And while Beth seemed to take a more traditionally feminine role in taking care of the baby, she did it in a way that didn't feel like a reinforcement of gender roles.  She just did what suited her best.    I'd like to think somewhere along the way the men figured out that they too can do laundry and everyone is much happier.

Andrea being annoying in season 3 was far less frustrating, because the female characters actually got to do things.

Though one part made me laugh.  When Carol told Andrea what happened to Shane, she just kind of stammers "But Shane LOVED Rick."  And while I actually agree with her, I was amused because I'm not sure when that would have come up in conversation.

I like to imagine that it came up during sex.  "Do you think you could be a little more sanctimonious when we're doing this?"  "Have you considered wearing button down shirts?  You'd look really hot, especially from behind."

(And while I'm pretty sure Andrea meant a fraternal love, I remember that creepy fucking washcloth scene after Carl got shot, so *I* think there was a sexual component there too.)

The show spent a little too much time in Woodbury in my opinion.  Michonne was great, but honestly, the Governor and Andrea were not compelling enough to warrant that much direct attention.  Especially not when compared to what's going on back at the prison.

"Lori's dead!  Carl's becoming a child soldier!  Rick's disassociating and hallucinating!  Maggie and Glenn are traumatized!  Daryl just LEFT!  WHY ARE WE HERE AND NOT THERE!"

Tyreese and Sasha are so great.  It's lovely seeing Michael Burnham in a different kind of role.  It was a little uncomfortable though how the show seemed to have a trend of killing off one black guy just as they introduced another.  T-Dog - Oscar - Tyreese.  I was happy to see Season 4 finally realize that yes, you can have more than one black guy on the show at once.  I hope they don't fuck that up.

They're probably going to fuck that up.

I have mixed feelings about the Maggie storyline in season 3.  I'm not a huge fan of sexual violence storylines in general.  But I will give the show credit for realizing that they can hit all of the important beats of a sexual assault storyline without including a rape.  I feel like too many shows don't realize that.  I wasn't a big fan of Glenn having the bulk of the focus in the aftermath though.  He’d been through a terrible experience too, but I wanted more about HER.

I like Daryl a lot more now than I did at the start.  But I still don't get why he's the fandom favorite.   I still think that a good three-quarters of Daryl's fandom characterization is stolen from either Glenn or Rick.  Which is a shame because ACTUAL Daryl is a lot of fun.  I wish I got to see him more in fanwork.  But I think I've come to terms with the fact that I will never see eye-to-eye with a vast majority of the fandom.

(Also, please tell me Beth-Daryl won't be a thing in the show.  I like their dynamic AS FRIENDS, but she's SEVENTEEN.  He is old enough to be her FATHER.  And while age differences don’t have to be bad, she is literally still a child!)

The Prison is actually looking quite comfortable now.  Plague aside.  I can't wait to see the show ruin it.  :-)

[kudzunewsletter-blog]

Student Spotlight: Gena  

{Genuine Poetry}

Hi Gena, tell us your preferred pronouns and a little bit about yourself!

I don’t really have preferred pronouns; for myself, being genderqueer, I use all three (i.e He/Him, They/Them, She/Her) it changes on a day to day basis. To make it easier for friends to figure out what pronouns to use, I have “pronoun pins” that signify what pronouns I’d like for that day! 

A little about myself: I’m 20 years old and I grew up in Fullerton, CA for the first 18 years of my life before moving on campus at Biola University for college where I studied Psychology before taking a break from my education. I now live in Whittier, CA and travel as a professional poet around Southern California to speak/perform at schools, churches, and events. I am also becoming a public advocate for LGBT+ and mental health issues--things I am incredibly passionate about!

How did you first get into writing poetry, and what do you usually write about? I first got into poetry during my junior year of high school. I had some exposure beforehand with my high school english classes but it wasn’t until a friend showed me a Shane Koyczan poem, “Instructions for a Bad Day”, that I really started to get into the Spoken Word world. From then on I was just writing for myself as a coping mechanism. When I visited Biola University, as a prospective student, I saw a performance by a couple artists in the poetry club and I knew that’s what I wanted to do. Since I started off using writing as a coping mechanism, I usually wrote about what was going on in my mind and my life. It wasn’t until I was a student at Biola that I really began to explore different topics and found that God was leading me to write about mental illness and my own sexuality. 

How do you see your spirituality interact with your identity? My spirituality and identity are intertwined. I wouldn’t be where I am today without having focused on my spirituality to get through life. While I lost family and friends because of my identity, I always have God by my side to keep going!

How do you use poetry as a medium for expressing spirituality and identity? Why are these messages important for your audiences? I use poetry as an expression for my spirituality and identity in a way of communicating what I can’t necessarily put into regular conversations. While I can sit down, one-on-one and express and explain what I’m feeling and what I may be going through at that time, it’s a lot easier for me to put pen to paper to say what I really want or need to say. This makes it important for my audiences as well because poetry makes an interaction much more intimate and personal. While having an actual conversation does the job, sometimes poetry (and other art forms as well) can create that extra step towards understanding a person’s identity and spirituality.

What does spiritual violence mean to you? To me, spiritual violence isn’t just a simple thing to explain. Spiritual violence, in itself, is a very broad topic that applies to many aspects of a person’s life and can affect everyone differently. For myself, I recognize spiritual violence as anything that attacks, manipulates, or control a person’s identity or beliefs. This can come in the form of direct violence or even microaggressions and such that put a person down. Spiritual violence is such a powerful tactic to break someone and more people need to recognize this type of violence to put a stop to it!

What has your experience being a queer (or however you identify) student attending a Christian college been like? My experience attending a Christian college and being queer is a little mixed; while I found so many amazing and accepting friends and people, I also found those who fought back. I’ve dealt with the homophobic comments and actions as I would have anywhere else. While sometimes it may become too much to handle, I relied on the accepting community I had found. While it may be difficult to find an LGBT+ community on a Christian Campus (I didn’t find Biola Underground until my second semester), I can assure you that they are there within the student body. I’ve also found different professors and staff members that are LGBT+ friendly and allies that can help with creating a better community as well. Looking back, I’m still glad that I had my experiences at Biola because it strengthened every aspect of my life including my own identity and faith.

What is the importance of organizing a national movement of youth that resists spiritual violence? This is so incredibly important! Youth are so impressionable by even the littlest of things, and by recognizing and resisting something, such as spiritual violence, will help all generations (both current and future) to become better at dealing with and stopping spiritual violence!

How do your poems and the work that you do with Biola's Slam team fit into that movement? My poems and working for the Biola’s Slam team bring awareness to the fact that a queer community exists in the Christian world. This is important for everyone (including non-christians) to know. While most times, when I’m working on campus, it may be subtle but I’m still there to represent another community. My poems, outside of campus, bring awareness to people that you CAN be queer and Christian and that we are just as important and faithful as others with the same faith. It’s incredibly important because queer Christians are still being shunned or attacked by both communities and by furthering this movement, we may someday find that peace between LGBT+ and Christian people. 

Lastly, if you could pick one person you wanted to see in your audience, who would it be? This is always a tough question! While I want to say something super cliché, like my favorite poet (Andrea Gibson) or a certain family member (also an important choice), I would want to see someone who needs to hear what is being said. Someone who needs to find that one thing they can connect and relate to within their lives that they may be struggling with. I want to see someone who takes what I have to say to heart and it changes their lives. Either for better understanding of the communities or even to better understand themselves. Someone to realize that there is someone out there who understands what they’re going through and how hard it may be to keep moving forward. I want to see someone who decides to live or to stop hurting themselves and instead find someone to listen or to help with whatever they may be struggling with in their lives.

Check out some of Gena’s poetry here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xuK1Vd0iBRo&t=36s !

[nocaptainreuben]

Recapping My Christmas Reads... Finally.

So way back at the start of December I wrote a post called My Christmas Reading List and told you to “keep an eye on the blog for reviews of all the new books as I finish them”. Yeah… That didn’t happen. :P Don’t get me wrong, I read the books, and I wrote notes as I went along, but my motivation escaped me and I never actually sat down to write the reviews. So, to catch myself up, here’s a recap of my bookish end to 2016.

The Christmasaurus

As I said in my original post, I was so unbelievably excited for this book, as I love everything the Fletcher family do. I am pleased to say that it did not disappoint.

The story centres on a young boy called William Trundle who loves two things: Christmas and dinosaurs. One year, he can think of nothing to ask Santa for except the obvious – a dinosaur – and as luck would have it a very special dinosaur has made the North Pole his home… We see William and the Christmasaurus share an amazing adventure and have a lot of fun with them along the way. Whilst the plot is obviously very fantastical, there’s an awful lot of real emotion and heart in there, and it has a really strong message of kindness, tolerance and friendship, and provokes thoughts of things like what true happiness means, what’s really important, and how everybody can have adventures and do anything if they really believe. All that sappy nonsense. :P

The writing style is absolutely gorgeous; full of innocence, imagination, silliness, magic, and downright joy. Instantly after starting this – like, I’m talking literally in the first sentence – I had a huge smile on my face, this indescribable warm, happy feeling in my stomach and a knowledge that I was going to absolutely adore this book. It has the same feeling as Roald Dahl books, full of all the same crazy ingredients his stories were, and took me right back to my experiences of having those stories read to me as a kid.

But simultaneously, it also sent me into the future picturing myself reading this to my own kids and just filled me with joy. Whilst I don’t have kids yet and just read it myself like the big child I am, I know this book is absolutely perfect for little ones. It’s aimed as a MG book, so great for slightly older kids to read themselves, but also it’s so poetic and obviously made to be read aloud, which means it will make a lovely bedtime story – perhaps stretching it out, a little bit each night, throughout December as excellent bonding time while building up the excitement for Christmas.

It’s clear that Tom’s experience with and passion for music has been poured lovingly into every page, not just with the elves’ songs and such, but with the lyrical quality of his writing as a whole, and it just makes it this wonderful, interactive experience that I’ve not had from many books. The book is being adapted into both an animated musical film and a stage musical, and I can already see how well it will translate into those mediums. I cannot wait to see both of them!

Shane Devries’ illustrations, both on the cover and throughout the book, are stunning and really enhance the experience of an already wonderful book. They suit the story so well and help this super imaginative world to come alive in your mind’s eye.

All in all, a delightful story for the young and young at heart, that was a breath of fresh, wintry air for me in this sucky, magicless world.

The Twelve Days of Dash and Lily

This is a sequel to Dash and Lily’s Book of Dares, set a year after the events of that book, after Lily has had a particularly tough year and lost her trademark enthusiasm for life (and particularly Christmas) a little bit. I’ve seen a lot of reviews of this book in which people are moaning about it being very negative and “not in keeping with the Christmas spirit”. And yes, it is decidedly less happy and bubbly than the previous book, but that’s nothing to moan about in my opinion. With the year that Lily had it would be incredibly hard for her to keep her spirits up, and whilst people may not like to face that fact – it’s a part of life. There’s nothing wrong with a book having an air of negativity and reflecting the harder parts of life, because that feels honest and realistic. In fact, I thought it was really nice to see the contrast from the first book – which was so sickly sweet it could have been plucked straight out of Hollywood – and follow the ups and downs of Dash and Lily’s relationship rather than just the exciting rush of it beginning, as it made the whole thing more believable.

Lily as a character has also come under criticism for being selfish, moody and bratty, but again, I thought those traits were a perfect fit to this story. After all, she is a teenager and sometimes that kind of behaviour can be what they do best, but like I said, with the stuff that she’s gone through this year it’s only natural – and completely forgivable in my opinion – for her to be acting like this; it felt like this book was Lily taking time to figure things out, and she just needed to be selfish for a while to do that, which was perfectly ok with me.

Dash, on the other hand, is a lot nicer in this book and I actually liked him less for it. It didn’t feel like there was as much depth to his character anymore, as if he’d become all about Lily and lost a bit of himself in the process, so he ended up quite boring. I’m not exactly criticising, because, as with Lily, it fits; at this time in their lives, it did need to be all about Lily for a while, and that’s just the give and take nature of relationships, so once again I just thought the changes in his character reflected real life.

All in all, I didn’t enjoy it quite as much as Book of Dares, and it did feel a little unnecessary as the first book felt like enough for me and this one didn’t add a whole lot to my experience of those characters and their story. But saying that, there were some nice elements to it and considering how short it is, it’s worth spending a winter afternoon on it just to spend a little more time with Dash and Lily.

Stealing Snow

I did something I never do with this book… I DNFed. *cringes* I actually hate myself a little bit, because I hate the idea of someone forming an opinion on a book without actually having bothered to read it, and the point I stopped (16%) doesn’t seem far enough to have enough information to properly make up my mind. I tried so hard to carry on, but I just couldn’t do it. I don’t know why, but I felt like I had a wall up against this book straight away, and from the first few sentences I found myself thinking “this is gonna be bad”. It got to the point where self fulfilling prophecy was kicking in and making me hate every little thing about it, and by forcing myself to keep reading it I was actually putting myself off reading altogether, so I had to step back and take a break. I did intend to go back and carry on after I’d rekindled my reading libido with a book I was more enthusiastic about, but time went on and I never did, so I finally have to admit to myself that I just don’t want to.

I think the thing that bothered me most of all was that it just felt kind of lazy. There were little things that really irritated me (which I might not have even noticed or been bothered by in another book, but because I was already not enjoying it, I picked up on everything) like the fact that at first it said that Bale had broken Snow’s hand, then later on it became her wrist, then when it was mentioned again it was her arm. It kind of felt like the author had just not bothered to read it back after she wrote it and check for continuity or anything. In the same vein, I got the feeling she had thought to herself “oh well it’s a fantasy story, so I don’t need to bother doing any research, it’s all coming from my imagination” even though at first it’s set in the real world. The “asylum”* felt like it was written by someone with no understanding whatsoever of mental illness or how institutions like that work, and it just… bothered me. I’m not touchy enough that it was full blown offensive, but I just felt a little uncomfortable and more than anything I couldn’t believe it or sympathise with it, so I just felt detached from the characters and not interested in the story.

It’s worth noting that my copy of this book is an unfinished proof, so I can’t really make any comments on it without comparing to the published book, but unless she completely rewrote it in between those two stages I think it’s safe to say I’m not going to enjoy it.

*Personally I think that’s a completely obsolete, really shit word, with super negative connotations, but it’s the one she uses so, hey ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

So that’s everything I promised. I’ve read a bunch of others since then and, as always, have a load lined up on my TBR, but I’ve learnt my lesson now: I’m saying nothing! We’ll see what happens, and if I ever actually do write anything it’ll be a nice surprise. :P