#like do you bigots have nothing better to do ?

[torahtot]

you can always tell when someone doesn't have maga men in their life and god it makes me angry.. "if you're nice and compassionate you can be the one woman that makes them realize women aren't mean!" my mom bent over backwards for my dad for 25 fucking years he has plenty of other women kissing his ass and it never changed anything. do you really think that before being radicalized they never knew a single kind woman? they were never friends with a nice girl? alt-right men's problem with women isn't just that they've experienced too many mean women and they need to be shown that women can be nice, it's that they think women are inferior and don't deserve rights and don't understand anything so you can do what you want with them. and it takes a lot more than being nice to show someone that you aren't inferior. this isn't a case of being nice even when it's hard for the sake of deradicalization, it's about spending every fucking interaction with someone trying to get them to see you as a human being with value and a functioning intellect while they just laugh and show you that's never going to happen.

i cannot stress this enough: random women are not just going out and Being Mean to men. ur average guy interacts with plenty of women throughout his life- close women amongst their friends and family, casual interactions etc. most people don't start out being shunned by women, they start out being treated as NORMAL. & when they show their disrespect in normal society, it isn't tolerated, but when they go to alt-right spaces (which they're pushed towards online) they're told they're allowed to be as horrible as they want with no consequences because they're entitled to everything. it isn't "women aren't welcoming and the alt-right is so friendly so i'll become alt-right," it's "women don't let me disrespect them and the alt-right tells me fuck them, do whatever you want, you're entitled to it all" and why would you choose the group where you have to be a normal accountable person when there's a group that will reward you for being a shithead who gives no fucks?

the alt-right can afford to be more friendly and welcoming because they can allow bigotry. this can't work the same way for progressive spaces because we can be as kind & welcoming as possible but at the end of the day we have lines where we have to say "this behavior/speech isn't allowed in this space," and for certain people, that just can't win against a space where you can be as nasty as you want. these posts always end with a disclaimer saying "of course being kind doesnt mean you need to tolerate their bigotries" but what they don't realize and what drives me crazy is that women not tolerating bigotry IS the "women are mean" that radicalized them in the first place. they perceive you pushing back on any bigotry or bullshit as you being a meanie and treating them like they're ontologically evil. the 'kindness' they need to be deradicalized is you letting them walk all over you.

idk what the answer is to deradicalizing them and im sure relationships are part of it but you can be as kind as you want and all it will do is destroy you ime. i cant stand to see people (who have never even successfully deradicalized any man by being nice btw they always speak in hypotheticals and not from experience) double down on telling women to do things that will see no results and only hurt them, especially when any woman who has tried can tell you exactly how it went

[scrawnytreedemon]

While I intend this blog to remain a largely news-free space due to the constant hellstate of the world, let me be clear that I stand in full support of both the Palestinian and Jewish peoples who are currently experiencing relentless hate and suffering in these horrid times.

I am disgusted at the number of people, especially "progressives" on this website who have used this situation to spread both Islamophobia and Antisemitism. This goes double if you dared to reblog those "punch nazis/fascists <3" and "[x] are welcome here!" posts while in the next breath spreading dangerous fucking narratives that kill people.

So many people in online political spaces evidently see this as nothing more than a case of picking "sides", when ultimately what matters is supporting the oppressed against fascist governments and militias, wherever they are.

Common people will always have more alike with each other than their leaders. This is not a novel concept. Your activism should always be motivated by love and compassion first, and hatred second. If you use your beliefs as an excuse to find an acceptable target to vent your hatred towards regardless of the actual material outcome, you are no fucking activist.

You're a bigot.

[animationismycomfort]

anybody that thinks making fun of men and telling them to die or how useless they are or that it’d be better off without them just know

you’re sexist you’re the exact same as the people who treat you like scum and I hope your own community treats you like sh-t cause you deserve nothing

[five-of-cr]

here's the thing about matthias: he isn't the honorable, reformed hero some of the fandom seems to see him as.

yes, he was raised by a tight-knit family of comrade soldiers and decides to betray them in the end. of course that took incredible strength. i don't deny that. but we also need to recognize that the drüskelle are not just some rogue cult. they are a core part of the fjerdan government, who is trying to wipe out the grisha because they are seen as dangerous. that's literally just genocide. however indoctrinated someone is, this is something that is evil from every angle, even if the character can't or won't see it.

and look, i love a good redemption arc, but matthias is such a passive actor in his. he falls in love with nina against his will. she changes his attitudes toward grisha because she's beautiful and kind so all grisha can't be bad, right? this a classic example of the trope of separating the "good ones" from the rest, where you cherry-pick specific individuals to point to as exceptions to a group's nature, which is still implied to be evil. you have to do a lot more than fall in love to truly unearth and address the roots of bigotry.

tbh, this is my biggest critique of the books as a whole. i loathe the "love conquers all" trope that pairs together a character from the oppressed group and one from the oppressors, letting the one show the other through the power of love that being bigoted is not nice. it puts all the responsibility on the former to prove their humanity, and gives all the credit to the latter's ability to be persuaded to recognize it. and then it inevitably leads to forgiveness, because the character has "earned" it by changing their views, once again making the victim seem like the villain if they don't absolve the oppressor of their past "mistakes". also, it's incredibly unrealistic for someone to fall in love with a person who actively hates them and considers them sub-human. in real life, people have to work on their bigotry before that happens, not use the relationship as a plot device for character development.

i think the idea of writing a character like matthias is neat. i think portraying someone's struggle to throw off the suffocating, hateful dogma they've been fed all their life is a story we need more of. i think personal growth of this variety should be celebrated, because otherwise people would never change. but i don't think the people, fictional or real, get to do this without facing profound consequences. it is not enough to feel sorry. it is not enough to apologize. it is definitely not enough to fall in love. and i think writing that lets people off the hook like this grossly oversimplifies power and oppression, and ends up being a feel-good way to romanticize people who cause a lot of harm.

a last note: my opinion is 100% influenced by my being bipoc. matthias is a classic aryan supremacist, even if being aryan isn't the thing he's being supremacist about. my gut reaction to that type of character is always going to be mistrust, both because people in real life have given me reason to be mistrustful and because characters like these are often written in a way that makes you sympathize with oppressors. i don't think matthias earns that trust, and i don't see why i owe him my affection as a reader.

[diluc33rpm]

the romance/relationship system in bg3 is genuinely some of the worst designed shit i've ever seen in any game with that feature but at least the memes we get out of it are funny. once saw someone comment something along the lines of 'patch note: waving at gale will no longer cause him to buy a house for the two of you to retire in' and i've never recovered since

[jennsterjay]

ugh between tumblrs ceo attacking trans people, palestine activism censorship, and kosa looming in the background like a snake I should just backup literally all lgbt fanfics/fanart I've ever read and get my mutuals/friends discords

[gender-euphowrya]

it's bizarre how some people think "hey that thing you did/said was transphobic" is some kind of invitation to debate why it actually wasn't like.

do you think trans people are bored ? do you think this is how we entertain ourselves ? that we'd bother speaking up when there wasn't actually any transphobia happening ? do you really think we don't deal with enough shit on the daily that we need to start e-fights with strangers by accusing them of bigotry they didn't really display ?

[aethersea]

another thing fantasy writers should keep track of is how much of their worldbuilding is aesthetic-based. it's not unlike the sci-fi hardness scale, which measures how closely a story holds to known, real principles of science. The Martian is extremely hard sci-fi, with nearly every detail being grounded in realistic fact as we know it; Star Trek is extremely soft sci-fi, with a vaguely plausible "space travel and no resource scarcity" premise used as a foundation for the wildest ideas the writers' room could come up with. and much as Star Trek fuckin rules, there's nothing wrong with aesthetic-based fantasy worldbuilding!

(sidenote we're not calling this 'soft fantasy' bc there's already a hard/soft divide in fantasy: hard magic follows consistent rules, like "earthbenders can always and only bend earth", and soft magic follows vague rules that often just ~feel right~, like the Force. this frankly kinda maps, but I'm not talking about just the magic, I'm talking about the worldbuilding as a whole.

actually for the purposes of this post we're calling it grounded vs airy fantasy, bc that's succinct and sounds cool.)

a great example of grounded fantasy is Dungeon Meshi: the dungeon ecosystem is meticulously thought out, the plot is driven by the very realistic need to eat well while adventuring, the story touches on both social and psychological effects of the whole 'no one dies forever down here' situation, the list goes on. the worldbuilding wants to be engaged with on a mechanical level and it rewards that engagement.

deliberately airy fantasy is less common, because in a funny way it's much harder to do. people tend to like explanations. it takes skill to pull off "the world is this way because I said so." Narnia manages: these kids fall into a magic world through the back of a wardrobe, befriend talking beavers who drink tea, get weapons from Santa Claus, dance with Bacchus and his maenads, and sail to the edge of the world, without ever breaking suspension of disbelief. it works because every new thing that happens fits the vibes. it's all just vibes! engaging with the worldbuilding on a mechanical level wouldn't just be futile, it'd be missing the point entirely.

the reason I started off calling this aesthetic-based is that an airy story will usually lean hard on an existing aesthetic, ideally one that's widely known by the target audience. Lewis was drawing on fables, fairy tales, myths, children's stories, and the vague idea of ~medieval europe~ that is to this day our most generic fantasy setting. when a prince falls in love with a fallen star, when there are giants who welcome lost children warmly and fatten them up for the feast, it all fits because these are things we'd expect to find in this story. none of this jars against what we've already seen.

and the point of it is to be wondrous and whimsical, to set the tone for the story Lewis wants to tell. and it does a great job! the airy worldbuilding serves the purposes of the story, and it's no less elegant than Ryōko Kui's elaborately grounded dungeon. neither kind of worldbuilding is better than the other.

however.

you do have to know which one you're doing.

the whole reason I'm writing this is that I saw yet another long, entertaining post dragging GRRM for absolute filth. asoiaf is a fun one because on some axes it's pretty grounded (political fuck-around-and-find-out, rumors spread farther than fact, fastest way to lose a war is to let your people starve, etc), but on others it's entirely airy (some people have magic Just Cause, the various peoples are each based on an aesthetic/stereotype/cliché with no real thought to how they influence each other as neighbors, the super-long seasons have no effect on ecology, etc).

and again! none of this is actually bad! (well ok some of those stereotypes are quite bigoted. but other than that this isn't bad.) there's nothing wrong with the season thing being there to highlight how the nobles are focused on short-sighted wars for power instead of storing up resources for the extremely dangerous and inevitable winter, that's a nice allegory, and the looming threat of many harsh years set the narrative tone. and you can always mix and match airy and grounded worldbuilding – everyone does it, frankly it's a necessity, because sooner or later the answer to every worldbuilding question is "because the author wanted it to be that way." the only completely grounded writing is nonfiction.

the problem is when you pretend that your entirely airy worldbuilding is actually super duper grounded. like, for instance, claiming that your vibes-based depiction of Medieval Europe (Gritty Edition) is completely historical, and then never even showing anyone spinning. or sniffing dismissively at Tolkien for not detailing Aragorn's tax policy, and then never addressing how a pre-industrial grain-based agricultural society is going years without harvesting any crops. (stored grain goes bad! you can't even mouse-proof your silos, how are you going to deal with mold?) and the list goes on.

the man went up on national television and invited us to engage with his worldbuilding mechanically, and then if you actually do that, it shatters like spun sugar under the pressure. doesn't he realize that's not the part of the story that's load-bearing! he should've directed our focus to the political machinations and extensive trope deconstruction, not the handwavey bit.

point is, as a fantasy writer there will always be some amount of your worldbuilding that boils down to 'because I said so,' and there's nothing wrong with that. nor is there anything wrong with making that your whole thing – airy worldbuilding can be beautiful and inspiring. but you have to be aware of what you're doing, because if you ask your readers to engage with the worldbuilding in gritty mechanical detail, you had better have some actual mechanics to show them.

[jewish-vents]

My dad is Muslim. My mom is Jewish. His family used to treat my mother and I well, but in the last year they've all become increasingly hateful and bigoted. Finally he snapped at his dad for saying something antisemitic I won't repeat here and told him, "She has done nothing to you! Her family has done nothing to you! Our country slaughtered them and threw the survivors out! And all she's ever asked you for is respect! All she's ever wanted is peace! My wife is worth more to me than you, than your respect, than [entire country my dad immigrated from]! If Jews are so evil, why do you have to goad her and goad her and fucking goad her to try to get a response? And why haven't you gotten one? I'll tell you why - it's because she's something you aren't! She's a good person! I will take a good person who's a Jew over a monster like you any day! Get out of my house and don't come back!"

I'm so torn up inside. I love my dad. I love that he loves my mom and I so much. I love that he supports our being Jewish and has always told me that God loves all people, that I don't have to be Muslim just because he is. He's helped me learn Hebrew since my dyslexia makes it hard for me just like Arabic is for him. I could not ask for a better dad. But I hate that just because he's not antisemitic, he's lost his family. All of them have gone no contact with him for over a month now. I know he's had to argue with them a hundred times over me. They've always been mad he didn't raise me Muslim. I wonder, if I hadn't been born, if that would've helped. Maybe they wouldn't be so tense and angry. Maybe his family would be nice to my mom if I weren't born, but it's too late now. I'm 17. I can't undo the past.

I miss my dad's half of the family. I miss my grandparents, my aunts, my uncles, my cousins. It hurts that they won't talk to me. I can't imagine how much worse this is hurting him. Sometimes in the early morning his eyes are bloodshot like he's been crying, even if he doesn't say anything to me. He's trying to be the cheerful person he always is. He doesn't want me to worry. But how can I not worry about him? Stress makes cardiac issues worse and he's had heart issues in the past. I want him to be okay.

Sometimes I feel this big, overwhelming sense of emotions I can't name, love and contentment and value, knowing he chose us over his family. Then I feel guilty for being happy about that, even briefly. He shouldn't have had to choose.

He's never getting his family back. I'm never getting part of my family back. I don't know what to do with that. The weight of it is hard to bear.

I miss the way things were before.

.

[official-megumin]

I'm both trans and intersex. Not just intersex by technicality either.

I was born with both male and female primary sexual characteristics, it affects me every day. Chronic pain, discrimination from doctors, you name it. My life is a constant attempt at convincing the world that my body genuinely does not fit the binary of male and female.

I was still assigned male despite this, so most of my life has been shaped by that, most of my trauma around my gender comes from being trans. But still despite that, I identify closer with my intersex identity.

I do that because even within the trans community there is little understanding or respect for intersex people, we're often made to fit a perisex trans understanding of sex and gender, and that's frustrating.

This means that I primarily fight for intersex rights, even more so with how most of the world refuses to acknowledge our existence even in this age of better understanding of trans people.

I simply have to with how the world works.

But...

The fight for intersex rights and the fight for trans rights is essentially the same. It's a fight to not be limited by the majority, a fight not to be forced to conform to the status quo rejecting out nature.

It's as unnatural to force a trans person to comform to their AGAB as it is to force an intersex person to undergo surgery or forced HRT.

Both are violations of our individuality and our bodily autonomy, both are entirely fueled by a refusal to understand or adapt to reality.

The reality is that trans people are the gender they claim to be, and that intersex people don't have to be clearly male or female to be complete people.

This is why transphobes will ALWAYS be at odds with intersex people

To any terf or otherwise transphobe out there:

You're not our friend, you're not on our side. And you'll never be speaking for us when you try to put down trans people.

You'll always be our enemy, you'll always be our oppressor, and ultimately, you'll be left in the dust. Being nothing nothing but a villain in the grand scheme of human history, just like all other bigots before you. You can claim to be right all you want, but in the end. Life proves you wrong. You can't fight that forever.

Edit: When I say intersex by technicality I don't mean to exclude anyone, no matter how minor your intersex condition may seem, no matter if it's visible or not to those around you. You're still intersex, and your experience matters.

I was just trying to shut up bad faith actors who've tried to attack me by implying I wasn't truly intersex in the past. Which ironically is what I have done here.

For that I am sorry

[hightowered]

and you know i gotta say. the vast majority of the people losing their shit this weekend made it very clear that they do not understand the difference between "artists who want a measure of comfort in their lives" and "the billionaires actually being targeted by phrases like eat the rich." that is such a weird thing to be so proud to announce to the whole entire internet.

it's also extremely weird to behave as though any individual is entitled to an artist's work for free. or that the audience should be the final say in determining what an artist creates. there is a major difference between the betrayal of an artist who produces art and then banks on their social capital to engage in harmful, violent, bigoted behavior (like jk rowling) and the "betrayal" of an artist who decides that they should be or need to be compensated for their work. the latter isn't actually a betrayal at all. it's just a shift.

the thing is that the watcher boys didn't invent capitalism, they didn't invent the streaming model, they didn't invent youtube or patreon. they aren't getting 100% of the money from either. their merch doesn't magically appear as if made by elves while they sleep. their videos don't happen out of nowhere and without incurring bills. they have a business which employs people, and sure, you can say they employ too many people, but do they actually? a bunch of randos on the internet don't actually know that. they don't know these job titles, or how necessary it is to have everyone there. it's pure speculation. the entire company exists within a system they did not invent and are trying to stay afloat in said system while a bunch of assholes on the internet berate them for not acquiescing to their every whim at the expense of their artistic integrity, their ability to compensate their staff fairly, and their ability to keep making art.

and jumping from "i want to continue enjoying this artist's work for free" to "i think people should be fired and the remaining employees should be given greater responsibilities and more tasks to complete" is wild to me. there's nothing leftist in that and so trying to leverage leftist jargon to prove some sort of moral superiority is fucking wild, it's disingenuous, and it's sketchy as hell. you're allowed to be disappointed. you're not magically exempt from being told you're being an asshole if you decide your disappointment entitles you to take part in asshole behavior.

"but we don't want something heavily produced and we don't want these shows" then don't watch! that's it! don't watch! you are not being held hostage and forced to engage with this content. you have the choice not to. throwing a tantrum and launching racist vitriol at steven lim and demanding he step down as CEO shows a level of entitlement and childishness that, frankly, i wish they could have ignored, but they're both kinder & more patient than i am.

anyway congratulations to watcher on their new streaming service and their gorgeous new website, congratulations to the boys on a new step in their careers and on achieving something they've made clear they've wanted for ages, thank you to the boys for all their hard work and for sharing their creativity with us. thank you too for taking such a big and genuinely brave step to no longer be beholden to major corporations and advertisers so you can make the art you want to make. thank you to steven lim for taking so many steps back to keep the company running and for doing your best in a shit economy and while being targeted by this kind of nastiness online. and thank you to the entire team at @wearewatcher for continuing to do amazing work despite being treated like shit by the fan community at large on the internet while you're trying to make a living and create art. you all deserve better than you've been shown of late and i hate that such an exciting moment got overshadowed by so many temper tantrums.

because the whole fucking point, the dream, is getting to make the art that matters to them, without being held back. i'm sorry y'all don't want the heavily produced and high quality shit but your preferences as a member of an audience are not the law by which artists should abide. they are artists and they are free to, and deserve to, make the art they want to make.

[nekropsii]

Do you have any thoughts on Equius

Equius is a fucked up kid who has done a lot wrong, but he is still a kid. He reads as a startlingly real portrayal of a pubescent autistic boy with an unhealthy and shaky grasp of his budding, overwhelming sexuality, with a concerning amount of influence from the internet. He is the result of adults failing him, and exposing him to hardcore fetish porn at an age too early. This is a real kind of guy that exists. A very common one, who I have met, like, at least 40 of.

Like Eridan, he feels like a kid stuck in a pipeline — except instead of the alt-right pipeline, it’s fetishism and hypersexuality. He feels like a pretty solid example of how getting involved in NSFW spaces online as a child can both deeply fuck up your sexuality and completely destroy your perception of what consent is, and what is and is not okay. He doesn’t have a grasp on boundaries whatsoever, and while this manifests in ways that are quite honestly horrifying and uncomfortable — like constantly projecting his Caste-Play BDSM fetishes onto nonconsenting, unsuspecting individuals, and… The things he did to Aradia — I cannot help but view him as an autistic boy having a rough time of puberty who got groomed through the internet over-exposing him to pornography at an early age. He’s deeply sympathetic to me from that angle. Again, I have met this kid. Homestuck is fantastic at presenting characters that are exact archetypes of real people you have known, be it personally or not. People you would have either been close friends with in middle school, or terrorized by in a random chat room on the internet. Maybe they were even you! There’s a complete nonzero chance someone is reading this who has played the role of Equius in their youth, who is totally fine and healthy now. And if that’s true, and this describes you… I’m proud of your growth!

Back to Analysis- His ardent Hemoloyalty is fascinating, also. I’ve written about this before, but there’s something compelling and very realistic about how his bigotry comes from a place of deep insecurity, rather than pride. I find bigotry coming from insecurity to be more common than it coming from overt pride. Many fictional bigots have such a genuine ego to them, a fine layer of paint labeled Badassery, when for the most part real life bigots are total losers with nothing better to do than worry about… Where someone was born, or how much melanin they have, or what’s in their pants, or whatever.

I get why people don’t tend to be fond of him, but the disquieting parts of his character are both very deliberate choices and also shockingly… Earnest, in a weird, Hussian fashion. I’ve never quite seen a character with his traits get portrayed before. He’s easy to work with, analytically speaking, you just have to be willing to stick your hands in the uncomfortable muck that is messy teenage sexuality. Many aren’t willing to, which is fair! But many also mislabel his uncomfortable traits as not intentionally uncomfortable, or simply a product of Hussie being weird and wrong and having bad opinions. This… Just blatantly isn’t the case. Sometimes fiction isn’t comfortable on purpose. Big whoop.

I think Equius could’ve been quite a fine person, had he been given the room to grow up. He’s like Jake to me in the sense that he’s one of the only characters I genuinely wouldn’t mind seeing expanded upon more, provided he be taken seriously, and not completely sanded down.

Alas.

[bandzboy]

it’s truly crazy how to kpop companies, international fans are just money bags and nothing else. we try to make our concerns heard but they are always met with silence and they just ignore us. seeing situations like seunghan’s makes me upset because the majority (international fandom mostly) wanted him to stay in the group. a lot of people supported him and yet, the minority is what they care the most about. this makes no sense and should make a lot of you mad. i’m so mad right now.

he was a guy with dreams. we just wanted to perform and be an idol but because some people are so god damn entitled and bullies, he had to leave. this is truly not fair. it’s two thousand and fucking twenty four and idols and still being kicked out of groups for dating and partying and smoking in other words: they are being kicked for being human and doing things people their age do. fans shouldn’t have this much power to kick anyone out as they please over minor things.

we have god awful people in this industry who are convicted criminals and some of them still get to have careers but a teenager dating predebut is where you draw the line?? we have ceos who are zionists and spread bigoted ideology and support isnotreal monetarily but again… an idol dating PRE DEBUT is where you are like “this cannot be”? like please get the fuck over yourselves!!

people still wonder why so many wanna boycott companies and it’s because of situations like these. we have zionists getting money and getting to produce music in this industry while these companies are in insane debts so they have to overwork idols and top of that, these idols are also punished for being normal young people. we should be rioting right now and i’m sorry to say but these things should not be happening. this should not be normal. this is not a time to say “this is how the industry is”. this is the time to actually give a fuck and do something.

there’s so much that should be done and people still wanna pretend everything is okay. i hate to break to you but things aren’t okay so i’m asking you all to care and actually want better because enough is enough.

[sassydefendorflower]

I want to talk about something. I want to talk about ableism in fandom. And sexism in fandom. Oh, and racism in fandom.

Mostly though, I wanna talk about how the discussion about these things often gets derailed because people don't understand what trends and typical behaviors actually are.

Whenever a Person of Color, a woman, someone disabled, someone queer (or an intersection of any of these groups) points out that certain fandom trends are bigoted in some shape or form, half the replies seem to be "but they are my comfort character! Maybe people just like them better because they are more interesting!" or even "people are allowed to have headcanons!" - the very daft even go for a "don't bring politics into fandom" which is a personal favorite because nothing exists in a vacuum and nothing is truly apolitical. But alas~

What most of these replies seemingly fail to understand is something very, very simple: it's not about you.

You, as an individual, are just one datapoint in a fandom. You are not the trend. You do not necessarily depict the typical behavior.

When someone points out that there is racism in fandom, that doesn't mean every fan is racist or perpetuating racist ideas*. By constantly mentioning your own lack of racism, quite often, you are actively derailing the conversation away from the problems at hand.

When someone names and describes a trend, they don't mean your headcanon specifically - they mean the accumulated number of headcanons perpetuating a harmful or outdated idea.

I am not saying this to forbid anyone from writing fics about their favorite characters or to keep anyone from having fun headcanons and sharing their theories and thoughts - quite the opposite actually. A critique of a general trend is not a critique of you as an individual - and you're going to have a much better, and more productive, time online if you can internalize that. If you stop growing defensive and instead allow yourself to actually digest the message of what was pointed out.

I am saying this to encourage some critical thinking.

Allow me to offer up some examples:

Case 1: A DC blogger made the daring statement that maybe Tim and Jason were such a popular fanfic focus because they are the only two undeniably white batboys. Immediately someone replied saying "no, it's all the fun traumatic situations we can put them in!". Which is an insane statement to make, considering the same can be said for literally ANY OTHER DC Batman and Batfam character.

The original post wasn't anything groundbreaking, they didn't accuse anyone, didn't name any names... but immediately there was a justification, immediately there was a reason why people might like these characters more. No one stopped to take a second and reflect on the current trends in fanfiction, no one considered that maybe this wasn't a declaration against people who like these characters but a thesis depicting the OVERALL trend of fandom once again focusing on undeniably white (and male) characters.

(don't get me started on the racebending of white characters in media that has a big Cast of Color and the implications of that)

Case 2: A meta posted on Ao3 about ableism in the Criminal Minds fandom caught my attention. A wonderful piece, very thoughtful, analyzing certain characterization choices within the fandom through the lens of an actually autistic person. The conclusion they reached: the writing of Spencer Reid as an autistic character, while often charming and comforting, tended to be incredibly infantilizing and at worst downright ableist. They came to that conclusion while CLEARLY stating that the individual fanfic wasn't the problem, but the general fandom trend in depicting this character.

Once again, looking at the replies seemed to be a mistake: while many comments furthered the discussion, there were quite a few which completely missed the point. Some were downright hostile. Because how dare this author imply that THEY are ableist when they write their favorite character using that specific characterization.

It didn't matter that the author allowed room for personal interpretation. It didn't matter that they noted something concerning about the entire fandom - people still thought they were attacking singular people.

Case 3: I wrote a fic about abortion in the FMA(b) fandom (actually I've written a weird amount of fics about abortion in a lot of fandoms, but alas) and I got hate comments for it. Because of that I addressed the bias in fandom against pro-choice depictions of pregnancies. I pointed out that the utter lack of abortion in many omegaverse stories or even mpreg or het romances, painted the picture of an unconscious bias that hurt people for whom abortion was the only option, the best possible ending. The response on the post itself was mostly positive, but I got anon hate.

(which I can unfortunately not show you since I deleted it in the months since)

And I'm not overly broken up about it, but it also underlines my point: by pointing at a general problem, a typical behavior, a larger trend... people feel personally attacked.

This inability to discuss sexism, ableism, racism, transphobia, etc in fandom without people turning defensive and hurt... well, it damages our ability to have these conversations at all.

Earlier I said YOU are not the problem - well, i think part of this discussion is acknowledging that: sometimes YOU are in fact part of the problem. And that's not the end of the world. But you can only recognize yourself as a cog in the machine, if you can examine your own actions, your own biases, your own preferences critically and without becoming defensive.

And, again, this is not to keep you from finding comfort in your favorite characters and headcanons. This is also not to say that I am free of biases and internalized bigotries - I am also very much a part of the system. A part of the problem.

This is so you can comfortably ask yourself "but why is there no abortion in this universe?" or "why are my favorite black characters always the top in my slash ships?" or "why do I write this disabled character as childish and in need of help?" - and sometimes the answer is "because I am disabled and I want comfort", and that's fine too.

There is no one shoe fits all in fiction. There is not a single trope that captures all members of a group. There is no single stereotype that isn't also someone's comfort. No group is a monolith, no experienced all-encompasing (or entirely unique).

There is never a simple answer.

But that doesn't mean you should stop questioning your own biases, your own ideals.

Especially, if you grow defensive if someone points out that a certain trend you engage in might be racist. Or sexist. Or queerphobic. Or fucking ableist.

*this does not mean negate the general anti-blackness perpetuated by most cultures as a result of colonialism and slavery

[darby-rowe]

୨⎯ "inches of snow" ⎯୧

young!coriolanus snow ☓ fem!reader summary your boyfriend, coriolanus snow, joins you and your family for christmas dinner, but of course it's nothing short of an insufferable experience. but don't worry, because coryo is there to take care of you!

18+ | nsfw | mdni word count 2,298 cw modern au, coryo & reader are in grad school, it's christmas!!, mentions of food, implied body shaming by family, uh oh grandma and grandpa are being bigoted again, bathroom sex, mirror sex, anal, praise, degradation, sex on the bathroom sink, it's a very anal christmas, coryo has a big dick, ooc(?) coryo, y/n usage, petnames, unprotected sex, spit play, cum play, dirty talk notes i know the title is corny as fuck LMFAO but it made me giggle. also imagine reader in ellen griswold's outift from national lampoon's christmas vacation like the one w the blouse and the green skirt bc mmmmm that fit is FIRE. this fic was slightly based off of this post bc i thought it was just too hot to ignore. this is also NOT proofread so any mistakes you find in this fic... dont talk about it

Sitting down at the pleasantly decorated dining room table, your mother insisted on saying grace before you and the rest of your family could dig in on the splendid feast you and the rest of the women in your family worked so hard on. Your mouth watered at the thought of savoring the sweet potato casserole, the baked macaroni and cheese, the ham, everything at the table was extremely decadent. And it was all displayed out in front of you, and right under your nose.

You were a bit greedy, you had to admit, as your hands were the first to get a generous scoop of the fluffy mashed potatoes, earning a scoff from your ever-so lovely paternal grandmother. Say something, you old bat, you thought to yourself, but a pleasant hand came running to rescue you from your angry thoughts. A slight squeeze on your left thigh made you blush, and you turned your head to grin at your lovely boyfriend, Coriolanus Snow. He gave you a reassuring nod, and you went back to indulging in your Christmas feast.

“So, Y/N,” your grandmother piped up, pretentiously swishing her glass of wine. “Anything interesting as of late?”

You swallowed your forkful of mashed potatoes and peas. “My third year of med school is kicking my butt,” you said, trying to lighten the hostility between you and your grandmother. “I’m definitely finding myself to have less and less free time–”

“And how do you feel about that?” your grandmother interjected right in the middle of your response, causing your brows to furrow. Her attention was now fully on Coriolanus, which you turned your head to see what his response would be.

Coriolanus huffed amusingly. “I don’t necessarily have an opinion on it,” he said. “I am also quite busy with my master’s degree. Distance makes the heart grow fonder, or however that saying goes,”

“We’re just busy little bees,” you said in a light manner, albeit a bit awkwardly. “It’ll all be worth it in the end. All this hard work will pay off,”

Your grandfather motioned his glass towards Coriolanus. “Busy little bees, eh? Bet it’s harder on you than her,” This statement made you nearly choke on your champagne. The crudeness of that man! Oh, if you didn’t know any better, you would reach across the table and slap the wrinkles off that smug face–

“It’s actually not really that hard to endure,” Coriolanus spoke up. “We both know we’ll see each other again after our busy spells and that thought keeps us going,”

You smiled bitterly at your grandfather. “Exactly,”

The table got quiet after that, and you spent a good few minutes awkwardly sipping your champagne and eating your generous plate. You felt your appetite unfortunately begin to dissipate as the unpleasantness of the evening began sinking underneath your skin.

“You know, mother,” your father chimed in. “My wife and I both met during our residency, and you know firsthand exactly how busy I was during that time. The 100 hour work weeks, the skills labs, the exams, my boards. It was hard! But my beloved and I made it through, and I’m sure Y/N and Coryo will also make it,”

“I just don’t see the need in investing this much time in such a demanding career when your husband is already planning on pursuing a career that would help the both of you,” grandmother said to you, making your face contort into one of immense displeasure.

“Coryo is not my husband, first off,” you retorted. “At least not yet, but I’m also not going to be a stay-at-home mom who spends her days dealing with the dog, the baby, and the garden. I want a fulfilling career, too! I mean, don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against stay-at-home mothers, but that life is not for me,”

“Why not?” grandmother knitted her eyebrows together. “Look at you, dear, with that revealing blouse and that pretty face, you don’t need to be pushing yourself like this,”

“Oh my god!” you cried, throwing your hands up. You finally decided you had enough, and with bitterness deep within your soul, you abruptly pushed your chair away from the table and stormed off.

“Watch your mouth, young lady!” your grandmother called out after you. “You weren’t excused!”

“I’m twenty-five years old, grandma, I can excuse myself,” you replied angrily as you traversed upstairs, your heels clicking on the hardwood material.

Slamming the door to the bathroom, you made your way to the bathtub where you sat down on the cold tiles with your knees folded up against your chest. You buried your face in your hands as you breathed in and out. In… and out…

God, you really hated your father’s parents. So judgy and crude, you were only left to wonder why they kept getting invited over to these dinners. Your parents knew how they chastised you, and even with their efforts to put a stop to their bigoted comments, they just kept going and going and going.

You were proud of yourself. You were proud of the life you were building for yourself. Sure, you still had eight years of school left, but at the end of the road you were going to be a kick-ass trauma surgeon. And Coryo was on the fast track to earning his master’s in political science. Soon, he would be running for congress, and the two of you would be unstoppable.

But here you were, practicing breathing exercises on the cold tiles of your parents’ bathroom. You needed to move out of there. Anywhere but there.

Your thoughts were interrupted by a knock on the door and the sweet sound of a familiar voice on the other side. Coriolanus, looking as handsome as ever as he gently let himself into the bathroom, joining you on the floor.

“Hey, bunny,” he cooed, taking your hands in his. “Are you okay?”

You grinned dreamily. “Now that you’re here,” this remark elicited a chuckle from Coriolanus, which made you swoon. “Listen, I have to apologize for my family,”

Coriolanus shook his head. “There’s no need to apologize,” he reassured. “You do not have to say anything. You’re not responsible for their actions, not now, not anytime,” he took your hand and kissed the back of it. “Now, how may I make my sweet girl feel better?”

It didn’t take long before the two of you were on each other like two cannibals competing to see who ripped off the other’s flesh first. Your lips crashed and molded into each other as your warm, wet tongues shoved down each other’s throats in desperate attempts to taste the other’s mouths. Coriolanus tasted like the champagne you planned on indulging yourself with later that night, feeling your mind buzz on the remnants of the alcohol. It ignited your nerves on fire.

It took your breath away when Coriolanus spun you around and pressed you against the bathroom sink, forced to look at the reflection. “Look at you, baby,” he panted, his lips red and swollen from the intense kiss he shared with you just seconds ago. “So fuckin’ pretty and fuckable. I’ll take care of you, don’t worry,”

You looked at your reflection in the mirror, your eyes scanning the pathetic, needy look on your face. You gasped slightly as Coriolanus grabbed your jaw, preventing you from looking away. “I want you to look while I fuck you,” he said, pressing his hardened bulge into your backside which made your eyes slightly roll back into your head. “I know that pussy of yours is throbbing for me, hm? Is it, bunny?”

You opened your eyes and looked at the blush that was beginning to appear on your cheeks. “Mmm’yes,” you whined. “Want you so bad, please. But we have to be quiet. Can’t let my family hear us,”

Before you could say anything else, Coriolanus’s hand slapped onto your mouth making your gasps and breaths all muffled. “There’s a solution for you, my dove,” he murmured into your ear. “Now, here’s what I’m going to do: I’m going to remove my hand and pull up that pretty little skirt of yours. Then, I’m going take off your panties, then fuck you in the ass. Am I clear?”

You and Coriolanus have indulged in anal before. It wasn’t a common occurrence, but it surely wasn’t unwelcome. Your pussy throbbed with anticipation at the thought of Coryo’s throbbing, hard cock in your tight asshole. You nodded, and he removed his hand from your mouth and cupped it in front of your lips. “Spit in my hand,” he ordered, and you drooled a generous amount of saliva into the palm of his hand.

You could hear his wet hand stroke himself in prep to enter you. With your skirt hiked up and your panties gone, you made sure to relax and breathe as you felt Coriolanus push the tip of his cock into your ass. Your efforts to stay quiet flew out the window as a primal, low groan escaped your throat as your ass became full of his dick.

“Fuuuck…” you groaned, hiking your leg up on the bathroom sink to allow Coriolanus to go deeper. God, it felt so fucking good having his dick deep in your ass. So dirty, and so fucking hot.

In a matter of moments, Coriolanus was thrusting his hips hard and deep inside you, making your mouth fall open in a silent cry of pleasure. You resorted to quiet curses and panting to help you express how good you were feeling in that moment. Goosebumps erupted on your skin. There was a slight sting to being penetrated in the ass, but it wasn’t painful to you. In fact, it only added to the overwhelming pleasure building in your nether regions.

“Such a tight fuckin’ ass,” Coriolanus murmured, grabbing your jaw once again. “Look at you, bunny, so fuckin’ needy for this cock in your ass, yeah?”

You had to be quiet. You needed too. But by god, the sound of Coriolanus speaking pure filth in your ears was insatiable. “Yes,” you growled through gritted teeth, your eyes flicking between your face and Coriolanus’s. “Fuckin’ love your cock in my ass, fuck,”

“Such a naughty girl,” he teased, taking a look down to watch his dick pump in and out of your hole. The sound of your panting and groaning mixed with Coriolanus’s grunts, slightly echoing throughout the bathroom.

You whined as you felt him withdraw from your hole, only for him to spin you around once again and help you on top of the bathroom counter. You willingly spread your legs and watched as Coriolanus re-entered your ass before withdrawing completely once more, and then he repeated these actions again, and again, and again.

“Stop teasing,” you whined, reaching a hand down to play with your pussy only for Coriolanus to swat your hand away, much to your dismay.

Coriolanus pinned both of your hands behind your back. “No touching. You’re going to come from my cock in your ass or you won’t come at all,”

You nodded obediently, your body rocking back and forth in time with his thrusts. You could feel your pussy drooling its juices from how unbelievably aroused you were. It was almost uncomfortable how badly your clit ached to be touched, but you wanted to obey your boyfriend’s orders, so you held back.

“My naughty bunny,” Coriolanus moaned. “Your ass is so tight around my cock. Feels so good. You’re making me feel so – fuck – so fucking good,”

Your mouth fell open as your panting grew more frequent. “Yes, fuck my ass,” you whispered. “Make me come from my ass, baby, please,”

“Are you close, love?”

“Yes, yes – fuck,” you threw your head back as moans threatened to escape your throat, your pleasure only heightened as Coriolanus pressed open-mouthed kisses all along your neck. You were about to come undone from just having his cock in your ass, and it was going to feel so, so good.

“Coming,” you mewled, your legs beginning to shake and the familiar feeling of an itching pulsation deep within your pussy. “Oh god, I’m coming from my ass. Fuck… fuck…!”

In an explosion of pleasure that made you see stars, your orgasm hit you like a truck as your juices gushed out of your pussy. You squeezed your eyes shut and gritted your teeth as it took every fiber of your being to not scream out in pure ecstasy. You continued to squirt all over yourself and Coriolanus’s cock. There was no doubt in your mind that your skirt was ruined.

Coriolanus withdrew from your hole to pump on his own cock until thick, white ropes hit your hole. The sound of his moans and groans pleasantly filled your ears. Your legs were still shaking, and you felt your breath nearly get knocked out of your lungs as you felt his shaft re-enter your ass, fucking his cum into you.

It took a good five minutes before the haze of your orgasm left your brain and you were able to think clearly again. You still sat on the kitchen counter as Coriolanus softly kissed your lips, praising you and telling you how good of a job you did.

“I love you,” you mumbled against his lips, holding his face with your hands.

You felt Coriolanus’s lips tug into a smile. “I know you do, my dove,”

It impressed you how well you cleaned yourself up as you prepared to join your family once again, but as you opened the door of the bathroom, your blood ran cold as you found your older sister waiting outside with a disappointed look on her face.

“Really?” she asked. “During dinner?”

God damnit.

don't be shy, let's talk. ♡

[thehollowwriter]

Maybe I'm being silly, but despite all my ranting abt Rollo's mischaracterisation making me seem angry, I'm actually more sad than anything. Idk, it just kinda hurts to see a complex character I love so much being portrayed as a racist, religious bigot.

He's a traumatised teenager who literally watched his brother burn alive and couldn't do a thing about it. Like. Do you understand how horrific that is? And the cause of this horrific situation that left Rollo scarred is magic.

Rollo is, again, a traumatised teenager who watched his brother burn alive, and likely never got the help he needed to properly deal with his grief. Of course he's going to blame magic, it's likely how he copes, how he brings a sense of reason to a complete accident that could have happened to anybody with magic.

It's easier to view magic as a malevolent force that caused this tragic event. That way, Rollo won't have to confront the fact that there wasn't any "reason" at all. And now, he can eradicate the "cause" of his brother's death and make everything better. It's much more fulfilling than not being able to do anything to make it right because it was just an accident.

I would also like to take the time remind you that Idia literally tried to end the world and is still treated better than Rollo is.

"But he's based off Frollo!" You cry, except you seem to forget the fact that Jamil is based off Jafar, an old man who lusted after a teenager and wanted to marry her, and while Jamil is horribly misunderstood by many people, he's still not treated like a bigoted monster.

A lot of people came to the conclusion that he's racist against fae, even though nothing he does indicates that. He hates magic users specifically, and of course he'll hate Malleus, Malleus is notorious for using magic for every little thing and mainly being revered for his magic.

I also think Rollo being religious/Catholic doesn't make sense for his character. Think about it. He sees magic as dangerous, a vile influence that will bring nothing but harm, but people are complacent to adore and use.

Imagine trying to tell him there's an all-powerful, essentially magical being he must submit to and worship? One which, may I remind you, many say "allows" bad things (like the death of a brother in a blazing torrent of fire magic) to happen? He'd hate that shit. He'd probably gear up to fight god himself. He wasn't even afraid when he fought Malleus, after all.

Idk, this is just from a culmination of far too many posts, memes, "analysis'", and fics portraying this incredibly complex and tragic character who challenges the ideologies of our main chast as a creepy, obsessive copy-paste of Frollo, when characters who have done much worse are adored and treated like little meow meows.

I just don't understand why people do this? Is this because he went against the fan favorite, Malleus? Is this because he's "ugly" (he's not, and it's gross how many of you think ugly = bad person)? Is it because nobody can read?

I really don't know. But it really frustrates me that the common portrayal of him is so far from his actual character, especially since I relate to him in the sense of feeling a burning rage at something that has caused suffering for you, and not being healthy in your response to it/not being able to get help.

Idk man