#like how can both things be true?

[where-dreams-dwell]

Argh the hypocrisy, misogyny and wilful misunderstanding around women as fans is so infuriating!

Matt Rife wants to ‘assure’ people that he doesn’t ‘cater to women’ in his new comedy special. If so that is a fucking *stupid* decision.

Because if you’re an artist then a largely female fan base is a great marker for success.

Some of the most successful global artists right now? Taylor Swift. BTS (and K-pop to a greater extent). Harry Styles. Beyoncé.

The majority of their fanbase? Female.

IMPORTANT: I’m NOT saying men don’t love/support/consume these artists, or that they shouldn’t. Huge numbers of men love and support these artists, and they should continue to do so. I’m stating that the majority of these fanbases are made up of women.

And women show up for you as an artist, on every metric which currently tracks ‘success’. They stream your songs/interviews/skits; they buy your album/record/dvd; they fight over tickets and pay astronomical fees to see you live; they tune into your award shows/guest stars; they watch your movies/documentaries; they post about you and your activities; and they go to bat for you in arenas you aren’t even aware of.

The colleague at work who heard a BTS song on the radio? Oh yeah, it can be intimidating if you don’t know who they are, here let me help you understand more and show you their best attributes and why you might like to learn more.

The family member who doesn’t ‘get’ why this singer is all over their TV? No worries, let me explain their songs and why they resonate, how they connect with their fans and why they’re incredibly talented.

And when ‘real’ artists are brought up to compare them against, not only do they pick an artist who’s peak years were decades ago, they try to rewrite history.

‘Yeah they might be successful but they’re not the Beatles!’ Okay so you see the Beatles as legitimate, successful, global artists with talent. Shall we look at Beatle Mania? A huge part of their success was the women who supported them, who bought their records, showed up to their performances, who funded their financial success and drove their pop culture relevance.

‘Yes they’re a good singer but they’re not Elvis!’. Oh are you referring to ‘The Hips’ who’s gyrating style of dancing ‘drove women wild’? Who’s success in music meant he was *able* to make movies and tour the country. The women who consumed his music, came to his shows, followed his personal life in the news, who watched his movies - they’re the ones who financed his life. Guys wanted to be Elvis, to dress like him, because women loved him.

Why is having a majority female audience seen to delegitimise you as an artist? When they are the ones who got you to where you are now, why are they suddenly not good enough?

[heymacy]

IAN GALLAGHER + his journey with bipolar disorder

╰┈➤ “At times, being bipolar can be an all-consuming challenge, requiring a lot of stamina and even more courage, so if you’re living with this illness and functioning at all, it’s something to be proud of, not ashamed of." - Carrie Fisher

[cool-abed-filmz]

went to disney, snagged photos with the gays, covered my face because i actually don’t like how i look in them ( i’m one of those autistics who can’t smile to save their life plus i was trying not to die of gay panic over logan and joy over wade)

(rambles in the tags my bad)

[sergle]

yall are about to piss me off by not having any PASSING basic knowledge of the way the u.s. military manipulates its recruits into joining by typing up one of your uninformed, unresearched, unempathetic, individualistic, unbelievably annoying posts about how 100% of the people in the military ended up there because they just Love America So Damn Much! they're extremely mature and informed at time of recruitment, they can totally leave anytime they want, they totally had tons of other avenues in life they could've taken, there was no rush at all to get income as fast as possible, and everyone in the military also totally is part of the combat divisions and personally enjoys being IN the military very much, big believers of violence. everyone in the military is shooting guns all day, that's how that works. they LOVE BLOODSHED. also I love the "amewicans haha" twang to this type of shit because you're actually TOTALLY stealing our Thing, which is turning systemic issues into Individual Issues. Instead of talking about the powers that be, it's so Personal Choice up in here. It's, "well you shouldn't have done it then. I totally wouldn't because I know better." you don't wanna talk about the military industrial complex as a whole, and you don't want to talk about recruiters, you just want to pin the blame on Specific Individual People one-by-one, as if they're responsible for the system that they're being ground up in. someone was in the military? bad person, no matter what. it's easier to believe that, I guess, than to acknowledge that Normal People (with high school educations) are manipulated and incentivized into joining a system that is Bad. at like age 18. but yeah no that 18 year old should have just been smarter lol haha anyway here are some screenshots for no particular reason

side note this reply of someone going "umm just get loans and go into a high paying field it's easy XD" as a direct response to someone trying to explain how most americans joining the military are being funneled in that direction out of a need for money.

and another person who Decided that americans join the military just CLENCHING their teeth thinking of other people, and not thinking completely selfishly about their own selves and their own income/housing/healthcare.

[sukibenders]

I'll never forget how, during the release of s3 of Bridgerton and people talking about how poorly handled Kate and Anthony felt (as characters within the plot because certain writing choices made no sense), along with how some fans felt like they were being sidelined the responses were "Oh, it's not that deep" or "You're reading too much into things", followed with dismissal after dismissal (along with undertones of racism from a certain group, but for another time). Now, with this article (which was edited after the fact mind you) from Shondaland specifically Shonda's weird passive aggressiveness toward Jonathan, fan speculating them having issues with Jonathan and Simone, both of them making it clear how they want Kathony's story to continue even when some producers of the show were giving the opposite vibes....hmm. Doesn't seem like too much reading into the situation but I digress.

[oldtvandcomics]

Not to contribute to a Discourse, but I keep seeing the "should we ship Alastor or not" thing, and. Like most other things, it lacks nuance.

It is true, many people don't understand how to write him in a relationship without it feeling very weird and very out of character. But this is also true about most popular ships? The voices of the characters are not right, and they keep acting in a way that is too sweet, too romantic, and the actual dynamic that made that ship interesting in the first place is missing. "He would not fucking say that" is such a popular phrase for a reason.

In Alastor's case, his asexuality is one of the major things that fanfic authors get wrong. Another is his moral grayness, his difficulties expressing (or even noticing) his emotions, and, at least in the Alastor/Lucifer ship (which is what I have been reading) the antagonism of the canon relationship and how they would navigate it with their absurd fight for dominance. And yes, these are definitely problems.

But, as someone who has been bingeing these fics faster than the tag is moving, these are only some of the fics.

And every popular ship has got a lot of bad writing in it.

The good fics, despite being shippy and more often than not, smutty, all acknowledge Alastor's asexuality in some way. It depends on that author, how, but I have seen him confused about this new situation, participating in sex for his own reasons like manipulation and enjoying having control, I have seen what in other fics would be sexual desire replaced with hunger for blood, hunger for power, or desire for closeness, I have seen asexual and aspec authors use him to talk about their own experiences with being sexualized against their will, or to explore what they would and would not be comfortable with doing. I have seen Alastor look for and find ways around his discomforts, using magic and staying clothed and making sure that he is in control.

So I don't know. Are people being weird about him? Heck yes. But I feel like fics, even shippy and smutty ones about Alastor are also doing some actual good, representation-wise. I can only speak for myself, but I can say for certain that watching a powerful, asexual character navigate his way around sexuality has filled a need in me that I didn't even realize that I had.

I'm really not wanting to start any fights here, just, you know. Different angle to look at this from.

[bericas]

isaac & scott / mason & theo | sometimes all i think about is you

[thelastharbinger]

something something something loki's love for sylvie more appropriately manifesting as platonic rather than romantic because his love for her is a lesson in healing--particularly the inner child that still holds resentment towards a lying, unaffectionate father. loki's heart breaks for sylvie because it breaks for him too. he sees her and views the version of himself that is still angry and deeply, deeply wounded. his affection stems from the empathy of understanding what it is to have had a narrative for their life controlled/manipulated for them. in their sameness, loki offers the compassion he wishes he would've gotten or would've been able to receive. and because to turn back on her would be to turn back on himself. loki allows himself to be something other than the trickster god he made himself out to be in a desperate plea at taking back control. it is mobius that tells him he can be other than what he was and offers him another mode of survival, all of it a lesson in love. sylvie teaches loki radical self-love, how to show up for himself and others, and mobius is the conduit through which loki practices this healthier way of loving.

[demodraws0606]

I really want the Red team to attempt to RP with BBH because despite this man being a huge tryhard, he is also a HUGE lore/RP bitch.

This man is already theorizing with Bagi about the cursed team, there is so much potential.

I know BBH has done nothing but terrorize them but he is ironically the one guy I feel like they can kinda rope into the roleplay lol

[fayevalcntine]

The whole framing of Lestat as the sole symbol of patriarchy that fandom is so desperate to put him in doesn't work unless you deliberately ignore how he was also a victim of rape and abuse before he was turned. People want him to be fit into this strict role of "father figure/violent husband/perpetrator" that is only that and not even a whole person, and in doing so they need to push aside the fact that despite being his family's provider, he was also pushed into that role when his father forbid him from joining a monastery or gaining an education that he wanted. Lestat wanted to run away with a theater group as a kid, and actually managed to do so once Gabrielle gave him her blessing and monetary support in order to go to Paris. He didn't always want to be the provider, he was forced into that role and became despondent when he thought he would never get a chance to leave his home.

His new life prior to being turned is pretty much the antithesis to the whole "Lestat is a manly man who would sooner throw up than be compared to a woman" spiel: he lived with another man in Paris while also being an actor, having left his family and "responsibility" to them. The only family member he was ever close to was his mother, all the other male members shunned or ridiculed him. Add onto that the fact that his turning firmly placed him within the role of the damsel/victim: he's kidnapped from his bed by a stranger, taken into a tower and left to rot while being fed on for a week, before then being raped and violently turned all while never even being asked if he would consent to it in any normal circumstance. But you of course have to ignore all of this if you want him to only represent the aggressor/patriarch while Louis is the helpless unhappy matriarch of the family.

My issue isn't that I think Louis isn't a victim, it's that it's not unrealistic for Lestat to be an aggressor/abuser while also displaying traits that aren't regularly assigned to stereotypical depictions of male characters. He's abusive to Claudia while also having been a victim of abuse from his own family. He's not a good maker/teacher, but he also didn't even have one when he was turned. He's the provider/attempted protector of the family and seemed to like being that, while also having run away from his own family prior to this to act in a theater in Paris. He's a rich white man while also being obviously effeminate in public spaces, even to Tom's own bigoted humor.

Like Louis' own complicated story with being his family's benefactor and provider, you can't firmly place Lestat as being one thing or another in terms of gender ideals without deliberately ignoring parts about him that don't fit this. And I don't think it's an absolute necessity, when even in Louis' own story, Lestat isn't stripped of his effeminate mannerisms or behavior while also being the abusive maker/father/lover.

[yunmeng-jiang]

that man does NOT think of wei wuxian as his gege

[wow-an-unfunny-joke]

I fucking hate soulmate aus! But hear me out- skk soulmate au, Chuuya doesn’t have a soulmate for arhabaki reasons, Dazai doesn’t have a soulmate either for like other reasons, he’s just unlucky or smth idk. They find eachother, they skk it up, one of them is like ‘idk if I’m human man, I don’t have a soulmate’ and the other is like ‘yo me too????’ And then they KISS

[bumblingbabooshka]

Hey, Star Trek Writers... -taps the glass-

[triglycercule]

dust and horror angel and demon themes,,,, they could totally parallel each other...... :3

dust=angel of death described in the delta rune prophecy (self declared) (i DEFINITELY elaborated on this one waayyyy before but anyways dust with a fucked up savior complex SAVE ME SAVE ME.... death is a blessing ass guy. life is torment and he will be the one to liberate monsters from their bodies and with the strength they provide to him be able to take down evil evil creation of pure misery that is the human ✨✨✨ dont worry his evil cackles are to HIDE HIS PAIN of saving everyone....... trust)

horror=demon that dragged everyone in horrortale into hell (as perceived by everyone else) (i think it would be a cool hc if everyone outside of snowdin viewed horror as literally a demon. maybe undyne preaches that. anyone outside of snowdin might be WAYYY worse because they starve for longer and literally take part in cannibalism so they might not have the same sort of mild sanity that snowdin residents do,,,, besides he DID kinda bring them all eternal suffering. kinda. nobody but undyne knows what happened at the core so she could totally just paint the story to blame horror fully)

ANYWAYS i like the possible dynamics this could have :333

dust to horror (please let me kill you PLEASE let me kill you i can end it all so peacefully wouldn't it be nice??? i promise ill make it quick just for you),,, horror to dust (i want you to live and suffer with what youve done i want you to watch all of your choices hit you one day and i'll be there and laugh at you. i'll keep you alive just to keep you suffering ok?)

OR dust to horror (you dont deserve to die you dont deserve to even be hurt by me. not because youre the exception but youre the Exception i absolutely loathe you so youll never get the sweet release of death :3) and horror to dust (just let me die already i dont wanna be here. youre supposed to be a savior right??? an angel?? then why don't you save me already when i need it more than anyone else)

[possamble]

I'm not allowed to be on social media for more than two seconds today but I just wanted to say that Laios will absolutely have his own reaction to all this as someone who would die for Falin but has also imprinted on Marcille as his Emotional Support Comphet White Girl Not-Girlfriend along the way

[unityrain24]

once again wishing begging dying for series loki and og loki to be different character tags on ao3