#like my long best friend from like

[yung-goos]

irt the last post I rb'd, this topic has always intrigued me, as someone who has struggled with this sort of thing. I'll preface this by saying, I agree with everything op is saying. I think. for starters, this whole "male epdi-" blah blah hooplah shit is a bullshit. and of course it is, we know this. a "loneliness epidemic" however could hold some merit, cuz quite frankly every fucking body is lonely. but I digress. to the c e r t a i n men this speaks to, its a poignant message that needs to be said, heard and felt, and I think at some point in my life this might've hit more close to home. I can't speak for all mascs/men, and I know a lot tend to be loud and wrong about all of this. that being said.... I do think it genuinely goes both ways. and the only reason I didn't realize this sooner was the many ways in which I was socialized around sex. how we're socialized around sex. and I think thats what largely plays into this whole argument. I can go on and on about the toxic aspects around this socialization and how that plays into the way men interact with women, but I'll let yall have that. a part of me tho can't help but deeply sympathize where this might be coming from. I'ma put the rest of this under a cut for more context on where I'm hopefully coming from, cuz it's just gunna get long af, deeply personal and tbh I wanna get some shit out this section kinda summarizes what I feel for the most part. but anyways

tw. SA

*by men and women I mean masc and femmes respectively to be more clear. I aint writing both every damn time tho*

as a non-binary ass nigga let me start off this section by saying I'm under the firm belief many men are trying their best to be their best, but ultimately many are beyond saving, this message will fall on many deaf ears, and quite frankly under patriarchy and cishet norms there will always be an epidemic of men who only pursue relationships with women if sex is involved. very unfortunate. but again, I'll save that for yall to dissect. cuz yall whacking em already enough. under these same cishet norms though, the same can be said for some women towards men

for context, I rarely approach people unless its like, online or through apps, large part due to my debilitating social anxiety. and I do mean debilitating. so in order for most, if not any -ships to begin I have to be approached or have them intiate. women specifically speaking have largely pursued me for just sex and/or romance, which let me be clear, I am mostly fine with this, but I'll get more into that later. I may have not recognized this then but I do notice how this def fucks with dynamics of a friendship if the people involved aren't ready or mature enough to engage with that dynamic. but I think the root of the issue, apart from the way a lot of men view and treat sex, is on a deeper level so many men crave intimacy, and seek it from anywhere they can get it. growing up in a world, and I'm sure this would be annoying for a lot of people to hear, where your feelings as a man arent nurtured through your youth, and not taken seriously, patiently, or with the same sense of urgency as others when you're grown, I can understand the eagerness for men to want, crave, more in situations, even when its inappropriate. like, I grew up emotionally repressed thinking I was never going to be intimate ever with anyone with the way I looked. only to grow up realizing some women never minded, some even liked the way I looked, so you can rest assured I was eager to be thrown any kind of intamacy anyone offered. even when I really shouldn't have. and, well, long story short this sort of can-do attitude, in one example, is what got me sexually assaulted in a movie theatre. while it was packed. and I didn't even realize I was sexually assaulted till another women painted it clearly out for me. and then, the people who engaged with me non-sexually??? well. the one of the more recent women I tried to be friends with, whom I was friends with for awhile before then, sat down with me and expressed how much she missed me and wanted to build a friendship, only to then ghost me after I texted her telling her to lmk when shes free. we were trying to go to a board game restaurant. another wanted to be friends, fuck buddies at first, but when that was taken off the table, for a reason that "didn't involve me" nor did I need to know why apparently(?), proceeded to try and tell me she wanted to be friends and could "see something with me" but could not treat me like a friend (as in opening up or generally just being there for eachother), while in the same breath saying how she has other friends she treats as friends and even then that was a toss up??? and let me not even get started on the countless amount of times I've tried engaging with women about my interests, day, or general life, and be met with disinterest or, hell, even criticism in some cases? all this to say, could you imagine how confusing it is to then try and understand how to engage with women when this is the bulk of your interactions with women? it took me a long while to realize I was essentially groomed and primed to be ready for any and all types of sexual advances from women, sometimes desperate enough that if you gave me an inch I'd be damned if I didn't try going the mile, all because that's the only way women engaged with me seriously, up until a certain point. ultimately I did have to come face to face with how my personal deep need for intimacy encroached on these relationships in ways I did not want or intend. but looking deep down it has only left me with heartfelt, bitter questions. like. Do women treat me with the same level of empathy, patience, and care as their non-masc peers? Are women inclined to invite me to things that aren't sexual in nature? Are men allowed to be sad, emotional, silly, crass, or even wrong around the women I'm around? Can I enthusiastically engage with women about our interests that arent sexual or romantic in nature? do you see where I'm going with this.

I'm fortunate to have made and become besties with a friend who has helped break down a few of these questions that seemed like walls to me and has shown me I am capable, and more importantly, deserving of a friendship thats rooted in care and not just sex. I do not have proof, nor have a spoken to many men on this, but I'm positive a lot of men are dealing with the same or similar feeling or situations. and its seldom ever talked about cuz I don't think these conversations are taken seriously. or just met with bad faith in general. women are absolutely not the ones who are responsible for men or anyone else for that matter. and yes, I do think op is right. men will greatly benefit from divesting from this mental prison we've found ourselves in. I do think we can benefit though from trying to engage with men in more effective ways beyond "men bad", even when they're being (reasonably) ridiculous. but oh my god anyways.

[floccinaucinihilipilificationa]

[kensatou]

you think YOU had a bad day at work?

bonus: sid shrieking "no!!!! NO!!!!!" loud enough to be heard in the stands and on camera

[bacchuschucklefuck]

we let the ocean drown out our voices/enjoying the bitterness/in the chaotic light, I close my eyes and see

[yangjeongin]

hyunjin x everyone he's done a dance challenge with

[doctorsiren]

I saw an interesting post a while back that said “Capcom made us [Miles and Diego/Godot] only have like two(?) interactions because they knew we would be unstoppable with a brother dynamic” and tbh it stuck with me bc it was intriguing.

So yeah that potential brotherhood, but that Godot/Diego AU I made (that I still need a name for)

Also I bet Gregory Edgeworth would have smelled like a bit like coffee, and so Diego just reminds Miles of that comforting presence 😭 (the von Karma estate was a tea household, so he didn’t smell much coffee after DL-6 and didn’t realize how much he missed it/reminded him of his father)

[shimera]

the last transmission

__

shmol leland as a bonus because yea

[todayisafridaynight]

[seiwas]

for writing game, iwaizumi + assistance <3

hope this sparks some inspo and thank you in advancee

hi there!! thanks for sending in a prompt 🫶

contains: friends to lovers (ish), halloween parties, reader is dressed as catwoman, expletives, iwaizumi is thiiiiis 🤏 close to murdering seijoh4 (jk)

iwaizumi + assistance

this is a set-up.

iwaizumi knows he shouldn't have fucking believed anything the boys "promised" him back when they assigned him this costume.

the suit is fucking tight, spandex digging into his groins and all other crevices that definitely should be aired out after after a few hours. he's had to constantly readjust his stance almost every few minutes, the black fabric compressing his thighs and torso, significantly constricting the range of motion his shoulders and arms are typically used to. if anything else, it could double up as a back brace from how rigidly straight it's kept his posture all night.

he'll give it to makki though; he did outdo himself sourcing this year's costumes―this batman set looks pretty damn legit.

except for one tiny problem.

there's no fucking pee hole. it's a zip-up, zip-down one-piece situation. and that normally wouldn't be a problem, except that oikawa "accidentally" knocked over a cocktail straight into his pants, the sickeningly sweet liquid now seeping straight into the fabric and past his boxers―cold and sticky as it touches his skin.

and so, the problem: his pants are wet, it makes him want to fucking pee, and coincidentally, the only vacant bathroom is across the hall, at your apartment.

this is why he believes this is a set up. that, and the fact that you're dressed in an outfit strikingly similar―just with cat ears.

he's been asked five times in this party if you're in matching couple outfits.

it catches him off guard, flusters him because of how badly he wants to say yes. but, you're just friends, and he doesn't even think you like him that way (despite mattsun and oikawa practically begging him to confess. makki tells him he thinks you're going to do it first).

so he politely smiles and says no, but you look good, your costume clinging to you in all the right places. thank fucking god he has a cape because he's pretty sure he spent the first 30 minutes in the party hiding his boner.

"hajime, it's fine, i swear," you stand beside him in front of the conveniently locked bathroom in oikawa's apartment. from the other side of the door, he's pretty sure he hears mattsun and his girlfriend mumbling. maybe fucking? who knows. "you can just use the bathroom in my apartment."

he glances at you before closing his eyes, contemplating, before finally agreeing to you.

"okay."

if he's being honest with himself, friends is definitely an incomplete label to what you are. as oikawa's neighbor, you are conveniently around all the time; and oikawa being oikawa, the ever-social butterfly, he's somehow managed to carve a space for you in the friend group.

(never mind the fact that oikawa's sniffed him out from the moment he first introduced you.)

you were a crush, then a friend, and now you're someone he picks up from work and drives back home three times a week, because he "has to train oikawa." you don't question it, even when you both know he stays over for dinner way past the gym's open hours.

"you know where it is," you open your apartment and urge him in.

"sorry again," he turns to face you.

"yeah, yeah, just pee!" you laugh, shoving him towards the bathroom door.

getting out of the suit is manageable, and he's able to wipe off a bit of the cocktail that's leaked to the suit and his boxers just to make sure it isn't gross and sticky when he gets home later. peeing is a big relief once he gets it over with, but it's when he has to suit up again that things become difficult.

stretching out the spandex one body part at a time is a workout in itself―the hardest task being when he has to pull it over his shoulders, adjusting it to fit properly over his arms and chest.

but then the zipper breaks.

and he truly thinks makki has fucked him over.

iwaizumi contemplates what to do next for a good, good while. he tries calling oikawa, only to no success every time; no way in hell is he calling mattsun in the middle of having sex. and calling makki isn't even an option; he'd never hear the end of it.

then you knock on the door, your voice soft and concerned as you ask, "hajime? you good in there?" you hit it spot on, too, "do you need help with your suit?"

iwaizumi presses his palms to his eyes. he's a rational man, straightforward and logical in thinking. there is literally no other option for him right now but to ask help from you. again.

fuck.

.

it's 30 minutes later when oikawa barges in your door, and the sight that greets him is iwaizumi in nothing but a hoodie (the hoodie you borrowed some time ago) and his boxers, with his hands on your waist as you hover your hairdryer over the crotch of his batman costume―cat headpiece off and all.

"you finally got together?!"

[front-facing-pokemon]

[pansyfemme]

i have been a ball of depression lately as well as my physical health worsening pretty severly this past week due to stress and so my friends have been. trying so hard to get me to get out and do things and its very sweet but i feel bad because the whole time i’m just a total mess

[dykedvonte]

Honestly I see Jimmy's refusal to put Curly out of his misery less about his weird feelings of envy or his delusions but the fact Curly is all but stated to be a shield to Jimmy from his actions and people seeing the worst in him.

The only characters that Jimmy really interacts with one on one before the crash are Curly and Anya, two individuals he has wildly different relationships with. It's likely that Curly really did most of the talking between them as the pilots and the rest of the crew as staff. They didn't know of Jimmy's more reprehensible behaviors cause they never really had the chance to and Jimmy is subconsciously aware. If they had disliked him more than Anya would have told Swansea earlier or even Daisuke when things got really bad.

It's why he takes the immediate opportunity to blame Curly; He's the shield. He's saved Jimmy's ass more times than he can count and more times than Jimmy would ever admit. Even when he can't really do it anymore, he mentally shields himself from his own faults by putting Curly between them. Letting Curly die puts too much on him because he doesn't know how to function without a safety net.

In the end Curly only lives because Jimmy needs the idea that Curly will inevitably make things better to stay alive, meaning Curly has to live, no matter how much it pains him to do so.

[slymanner]

Look all I'm saying is if that a shadow game can work THAT well and be so well designed story wise and gameplay wise

HE can work

[anghraine]

jenndoesnotcare replied to this post:

Every time LDS kids come to my neighborhood I am so so nice to them. I hope they remember the blue haired lady who was kind, when people try to convince them the outside world is bad and scary. (Also they are always so young! I want to feed them cookies and give them Diana Wynne Jones books or something)

Thank you! Honestly, this sort of kindness can go a really long way, even if it doesn't seem like it at the time.

LDS children and missionaries (and the majority of the latter are barely of age) are often the people who interact the most with non-Mormons on a daily basis, and thus are kind of the "face" of the Church to non-Mormons a lot of the time. As a result, they're frequently the ones who actually experience the brunt of antagonism towards the Church, which only reinforces the distrust they've already been taught to feel towards the rest of the world.

It's not that the Church doesn't deserve this antagonism, but a lot of people seem to take this enormous pride in showing up Mormon teenagers who have spent most of their lives under intense social pressure, instruction, expectation, and close observation from both their peers and from older authorities in the Church (it largely operates on seniority, so young unmarried people in particular tend to have very little power within its hierarchies). Being "owned" for clout by non-Mormons doesn't prove anything to most of them except that their leaders and parents are right and they can't trust people outside the Church.

The fact that the Church usually does provide a tightly-knit community, a distinct and familiar culture, and a well-developed infrastructure for supporting its members' needs as long as they do [xyz] means that there can be very concrete benefits to staying in the Church, staying closeted, whatever. So if, additionally, a Mormon kid has every reason to think that nobody outside the Church is going to extend compassion or kindness towards them, that the rest of the world really is as hostile and dangerous as they've been told, the stakes for leaving are all the higher, despite the costs of staying.

So people from "outside" who disrupt this narrative of a hostile, threatening world that cannot conceivably understand their experiences or perspectives can be really important. It's important for them to know that there are communities and reliable support systems outside the Church, that leaving the Church does not have to mean being a pariah in every context, that there are concrete resources outside the Church, that compassion and decency in ordinary day-to-day life is not the province of any particular religion or sect and can be found anywhere. This kind of information can be really important evidence for people to have when they are deciding how much they're willing to risk losing.

So yeah, all of this is to say that you're doing a good thing that may well provide a lifeline for very vulnerable people, even if you don't personally see results at the time.

[nebulathunderwave-art]

Birthday wishes to Zewu-jun from Lanling

(Birthday wishes to Er-Ge from A-Yao)

8.10.2024 | Happy birthday Lan Xichen! 💙☁️

[gayleafpool]

i think a big thing people get wrong w leafpool’s character is thinking her passivity comes from like fear or insecurity or being shy or something when really it comes from like. defeat. she’s been burned so many times so now she just accepts it there’s no point in fighting back