#like to clarify it was more than just that one post like. man i've kinda quietly stopped talking to everyone for a reason.

[moe-broey]

Like for real how hard is it to just. Accept that sometimes somebody wants to be called something else. Why do you even fucking care. I'm so fucking tired.

[silent-neutral]

About SH2 Pyramid Head symbolism and the remake PT.1

--mentions of sexual violence, suicidal themes and just overall mental illness-- please PLEASE DON'T READ BEYOND THE CUT IF YOU PLAN TO PLAY THIS GAME BUT KNOW NOTHING ABOUT SILENT HILL 2!! There will be spoilers in this ''essay'' and I don't want to spoil such a great game for anyone starting fresh and blind, because that'd be the perfect way to start this game imho - your feeling toward this game will be heightened without knowing too much, plus forming your own view and having questions about it is also cool.

(***Had to cut this down into parts after watching 10+ hours of the remake and so much watching gave me a headache that felt like a literal hangover the next day ugh I felt like James lol otherwise it's too many topics and words in 1 post. This way it might be easier to organize them. )

------------------------------- My mind was blown recently. Ig I'm posting this to clarify more to myself than anything, but I had to search up Ito's recent comments about certain scenes with Pyramid Head. (ahem, the first cutscenes specifically). I've always had my own ideas and guesses about specific details playing as James, but after some clarifications on Ito's part about Pyramid Head.. it kind of jarred me, but at the same time explained other things and now my initial view of this game and its characters are validating my assumptions.. And if you knew about this already, well good on you.... Ito tweets so much sometimes, info like this gets buried and I had no idea until a week or so ago lol. So in light of SH2R releasing, I conveniently found out about some crucial details that would *also* inadvertently explain my (petty) gripes about SH2R. I watched the entire playthrough and my views have slightly altered (mostly positive, as this game was actually very faithful to the original imo). but for now I give you...a very wordy analysis on some themes of SH2. Excuse my rambly thought process though, it's very hard to organise them sometimes, I say to future self re-reading this later lol.

We know the monsters all carry symbolism relating to James. Specifically speaking, the series has a lot of sexual undertones present. Man.. Idk where it all started but I'm pretty sure we all assumed it was true when every Silent Hill source or fanpage over decades would bring up James' sexual repression. It made sense because of how things appeared, plus Angela's trauma and her demon....that James even fights... Well.. Ito hates fans saying James 'sexual repression' being symbolised in the monsters are canon. He doesn't mind people forming their own opinion, but he hates when fans say it's canon lol. At any rate, there was a lot of confusion from what I read at first (and the language barrier didn't help, but I think I got the gist of what he meant). --------------------------------------------------------------- Talking specifically about the mannequin scene, Ito says PH is *not* raping them. Ok sure, tbh it looks too vague to label it something extreme like that. But it became something of a meme and Ig it ended up being believed as true. Kinda wish this sentiment was quashed many years ago and not in 2020/2021 gah... So, what's happening in that scene is actually far more deeper than simply to traumatise James.... Pyramid Head is a manifestation of James' guilt AND unconscious desire to be punished for killing his terminally ill wife. James is called to Silent Hill via a delusional letter from Mary he created in his mind.(A made up one to ignore the real one). He's suffering from some kind of selective amnesia throughout the game, hence why everything is there to remind him of his pain. Obviously he's traumatised by what he did that his mind has blocked it out to the point it seems he has remembered a false timeline of events... but his soul is yearning for judgement. Ito says that, therefore, James is suffering from many delusions, that's what's creating and manifesting his inner demons (true for all that come to Silent Hill). Pyramid Head himself is manifested as the executioner, tasked with punishing James, and so.. He is actually attacking James' delusions, trying to remove them:

*o* And Ito goes further! Right after PH kills those mannequins, he stalks over toward the closet James hides in (also meaningful, lmao, but okok it's not about sexual orientation). Apparently, PH's appearance is shifting. Ito says he modelled and animated all the monsters in the original, so I trust him when he says that the front left panel in the corner of his helmet is peeling/flaking back and a tongue-like appendage protrudes from the hole. Although.. he admits it might be too dark to see in that scene, but it's there supposedly. I'm paraphrasing, but Ito implies that PH is impacted by James' delusions in that James *thinks* he sees a tentacle come out of the helmet and thus manifests that. And that's when James shoots at him - He shoots at his own desire to be judged when it attempts to remove his delusions that are keeping him from the truth of his reality!! James can't face reality at this point - those delusions are keeping him somewhat sane and distracted! It hurts too much this early on for PH to attack those delusions so he stops it...this is why he is 'in the closet'. James continues to keep those 'skeletons' there, for now. It makes PH look like the true good guy - an angel.. like Valtiel (interesting to note they have similar body design). Because of learning this, I very quickly noticed how throughout the Remake, you will find plenty already downed enemies.. and it was easy to think ''PH was here''. After James realises the truth from the tape, the Hotel reveals its true appearance (not sure when it burned down or if that has something to do with Alessa, er wait I remember in Origins it was in her house.. well anyway! this could explain James' sketchy memory of events, especially when confronted by Laura having only met Mary and received the letter a year ago in-game.) Anyway, the point is; if James is aware, then the delusions begin to fade. So after watching the Remake, I hoped that the monsters wouldn't appear/be weakened and lo and behold! Bloober was paying attention! The monsters after you watch the tape are weak and limping, can't attack or are already dead and I was delighted! It means Ito was consistent that the delusions the town creates makes up the core theme of Silent Hill. In the original, there are only 2 lying bodies before the PH fight. (I forget the meaning behind them but it has something to do with James' helplessness.) At any rate, Remake did the 'dying vision' symbolism much better here and the explanation is so so fascinating that it led me to rethink the concept behind PH. Side note though, about that hole in PH's helmet. I was always so damn confused about it for so many years!! I used to draw it as a rectangular hole (some art by Ito actually depicted it like that iirc), and then eventually to a gunshot hole since James, well, shot at him, so I assumed that's what it was from. and NOW it's actually a triangular shaped hole from the paneling being 'turned upward' due to how James' is perceiving him in the moment. What a revelation, I cry. Ah.. and note on other design aspects.. Apparently Ito never designed PH with a mass of flesh under the helmet (just a perpetual shadow and the neck bag thing at the back) and he doesn't even know who conceptualised that, but I think it's due to all the cameos and appearances PH has made in many games since SH2. And he looks slightly different each time so.. yeah, interesting that.

Even the figma has that fleshy mass (and gunshot hole!) but I'd say it is accurate on nearly everything else:

It is a very nice figure though. I can't blame all these figures ever released that *weren't* supervised by Masahiro Ito himself, because lmao, Ito just admitted that PH is subjected to changes depending on how James views him, and that explains why details are vague and hard to determine let alone see bc the game is so dark. Take this little gacha figure of PH for example, from a cute baseball game called, I think, Konami Dream Stars (Pal Pro kun?) Yeah, I got Snake as well lol:

...and yes, shameless little peek at my nerdiness on display, all the Capcom stuff is directly below it lolll

------------------------------------------------------------------ So! Having learned what I did, I ofc had to question the next obvious thing; the cutscene just before the first boss fight. PH was without a doubt molesting the Lying Figure/Body which was moaning suggestively the entire fucking time - no one is about to gaslight me into thinking THAT wasn't sexual! And yes, Ito admits that scene was intentionally made to appear sexual (as opposed to the mannequins) and yet he says it has no sexual meaning....wtf does that even mean?! Well, I think I got it. Again, language barrier is most likely to blame, but... To apply the last explanation for the mannequins; James' delusions are making him *think* he is seeing something intimate to the point it manifests right then and there which is so disturbing he recoils and tries to go back through the now-locked door. And so.. it would seem that to PH, he is just trying to destroy the delusions and he can't help how James perceives that; it's just going to manifest accordingly. And while Ito hates 'sexual repression' as somehow being canon to some fans (the majority actually), well, bruh... can you really blame people for coming to that conclusion? The flesh lips, nurses too, are on the risque side. Now, idk how it doesn't indicate something sexual if it's not meaning to be but I am aware of Ito's art style tending to be quite sexual and suggestive, featuring a lot of bdsm themes in his artwork and he is quite obviously inspired by at least HR Giger's work. So making the nurses, for example, look the way they do may be a stylistic choice, but I highly doubt it doesn't also have a symbolic purpose other than referencing Lisa's image or something (This is Silent Hill though ffs, everything is symbolic, it HAS to be). I'll reassess the meaning of those for myself, but specifically I'm addressing PH (and soon in another post, the other elephant in the room: Abstract Daddy.) Initially, I always saw PH as trying to remind James of his sins, jolt his memory, to wake him up to reality. (Which is interesting considering it's not clear if Silent Hill itself is even rooted in reality, the alter dimensions I mean. Another topic I want to address soon.) I also noticed the mirroring effect PH/Maria were doing in relation to their human counterparts; PH is James, and Maria is Mary; James killed Mary, and so PH kills Maria. But.. If PH is actually also trying to destroy the delusions, (which also appears to reflect the fact James is trying to overcome his guilt, his mental blockages that are causing his selective amnesia)that inadvertently means PH will need to destroy himself in the end as well, and that is exactly what happens..

Coincidentally, this would also reflect James' suiciding.

But first, PH attacks the monsters that are manifested and represent different aspects of James' trauma/psyche. Then he is constantly confronting James by killing Maria, or James having to return to a dead Maria. I thought he was basically tormenting James by showing him what he'd essentially done to Mary. "This is what you're guilty about, this is what you need to accept'' I think that idea still holds water (pun very intentional), but now I feel it adds another layer because Maria is the ultimate delusion... and thus, PH must destroy her. Now when she says 'I'm not your Mary, but I can if you want me to be' makes more sense to me what she is. She too is subjected to James' delusions because she keeps shifting the perspective she talks or thinks in, Mary's or Maria's? But she knows she is not Mary, just a manifestation of an idea. And James deep down knows she is holding him back (like all the other delusions) and that feeling calls PH to thus kill her. When James can't escape the reality of his past, he finally accepts the truth, the memories revived by the tape, and confronts PH after stabbing Maria a final time. 'Stop denying/ignoring your guilt, and stop trying to cover it up with distractions like Maria'. James finally doesn't need to be told anymore, he has punished himself (fitting, seeing as PH is an extension of James anyway) and thus PH, the final delusion/illusion kill themselves and disappear.

-------------------------------------

OK so that's PH! Now to compare that with the remake

My main gripe was that the game is way too saturated in colour and too bright in certain parts, but it improves that as you delve deeper in the game thankfully. Kudos to Bloober for changing James' face to something more 'unaware' and disassociative. Gripe number 2: I do wish they cut out the 'hand rubbing' in the opening scene or at least tone it down bc that kind of foreshadowing is too damn obvious, sorry. Not needed. Especially not right at the start. Not even for old fans playing it, we know what happens, but cmon...It makes James too aware of *something* and his selective amnesia is what gives rise to his own customised demons...if he is even slightly aware of what he did, then what is the point to seeing the monsters, let alone PH attacking them, now that we know what Ito had intended? Wouldnt that change their appearance, or rather, remove them altogether? sigh, anyway. I find PH a bit too bright, not dirty enough and consequently, not as disturbing. Partly for that was how they clearly removed the lying body scene from the boss fight. I would be lying if I said I wasn't disappointed, but now with much needed context, this now makes sense...

HOWEVER....If my guess about James' assuming something sexual was taking place in that scene is what manifested it to begin with, then what is there to say about the remake?... So the simple act of hand-rubbing (awareness) really DOES make a difference, huh?! >:O it took away our favourite PH scene! 😂💔..

We can talk about DEI and stuff like that affecting certain themes in this game.... but Ito saying 'it doesn't mean it's sexual' would explain why it's taken out of the remake. Ito has supervised the Bloober design team on this, so they would have so much more context and info from the man himself... Still, it appears to conflict with James' psyche, bc it is through his very perspective that we are perceiving the town and how it presents itself to James so ofc if James sees something explicit, so are we the player. We are seeing the town and monsters through his eyes. And there is much to say about whether or not the other characters are even seeing the same town, but I'll get to that too. There is also the possibility that it's just 'creative freedom' on Bloober's part. It sucks, but overall... the game's pros outweigh the cons. Symbolism for Silent Hill is a very strong trait though, so I'm a bit conflicted about those changes. In the end, PH being a punisher and attacking the delusions of James' traumatised state of mind is fundamental, so as long as that is present, then I can't really say it's so inaccurate ig. It does imho, take away from PH's menacing persona and tones the disturbing factor down which consequently, in my humble opinion, makes him less scary. Intimidating, perhaps.. but less so. He looks very cool though lol. Especially how he breaks the walls during the chase and the final PH battle, I was super impressed with it! I didn't really like how PH was animated in the cutscene in the first fight (the way he turns around, idk..) but I love how they both throw the spears at you! This fight definitely improved upon the og version. Ah, and the sound of his heavy footsteps are wonderful as well! There was another creative thing Bloober did with PH's knife where you have to pick it up to advance through the tentacle wall thing. I realised this was a manifestation of James mental blocks since he starts holding his head in pain. But I thought "oh cool! James is gonna use the Great Knife to cut them!" But sadly, no.. but.. those tentacles would peel back, afraid of the presence of PH's knife... they are delusions after all~

Oh btw.. I didn't realize this before, but as soon as you attain Angela's knife, PH appears with the Great Knife - before this, he is unarmed. In Remake, right after you get her knife, you can hear PH's infamous screeching coming from dragging the Great Knife, reiterating that he is James. Subtle but very cool! I can't believe I didn't make that connection myself lol bah.

A bit more gripes to mention though: his strange janky movements that were imitated in remake made it look like a sad parody of the original scene, which was much more disturbing. I think it would have been better had they not added that part, it was random to see when he was moving as normal as one does trying to apprehend the mannequins, then calmly and slowly assessing the room only to suddenly flail about and strike random poses barely reminiscent of what he does in the original...and then just stand there as if James never shot him 🤨 not to mention, James looks so unbothered in this scene, he doesnt look at all anxious like in the original..the whole 'interaction' looked awkward. The original scene was paced better giving PH a kind of build up to those strange movements. I also dislike the lack of reaction and bad pacing with several of Remake's cutscenes as it toned down much of the intensity in crucial moments of the game, like in this one with PH. Yet... improved on others that I think were made better than the original's by elaborating on them.

Anyway I will touch on this and add more criticisms on remake in another post, this one is long enough lol; i just tried to get my thoughts on PH in one post but if I missed something I'll just add it in the PT.2.

If you actually read this, you must be as obsessed as I am (thank you)! Feel free to add your thoughts if you want, I love talking about silent hill symbolism or the ideologies behind The Order.

[thecoolerliauditore]

I've only skimmed a lot of the posts so sorry if this point has been made but I wonder how peoples' perception of Masculinity vs Femininity as a spectrum affects their perception of characters and designs. Do some people view Masculinity and Feminity as complete opposites, with androgyny as the middle ground? Can you be masculine and feminine simultaneously, while not really being androgynous? Does the 'threshold' of androgyny change depending on how the cc/character is depicted in 'canon'? to be clear I don't necessarily think any of these viewpoints are 100% correct or whatever but I think it's interesting how people will have different perspectives, because most people's view of gender are skewed different and what might read as a fem design could read masculine to another or just entirely androgynous. sorry for the ramble this stuff fascinates me deeply

No yeah it is fascinating!! It's a. very complicated topic since of course the concepts of "masculinity" and "femininity" are very frivolous and amorphous, hence why I kept feeling the need to clarify how it gets. Weird with anime-inspired styles what with the culture shock and whatnot.

This song was really popular in fandoms awhile back and I think it's like. a great example of how one culture's completely neutral (or even masculine!) traits can be seen as feminine (or in this case, "gay") when viewed by another. It's also just really funny and I'm kinda sad no on has done a life series animatic to it yet.

masculinity and femininity as a scale with androgynous in the middle is also something I'm glad you bring up, because the concepts of masculinity and femininity are so arbitrary and as such there are so many ways to deviate from the norm -- some more socially acceptable than others! Thinking about, for example, the young MAGA hat'd women you see on sites like twitter with the most racist takes of all time and who are very proud of their ability to keep up with the boys in terms of 'murican masculinity (chugging beers, changing tires, so on and so forth) but at the same time cake their faces with makeup, support that Hashtag tradwife lifestyle and Would Not Ever Consider wearing clothes from the mens section because that is the Bad type of gender non-conformity for commies and lesbians or whatever.

Compare that to like. sorry incoming irl lore. the way I've had people in both more liberal and less woke areas get nervous when they try to address me, with the only big difference being that more younger, liberal people will typically either ask for my pronouns or they/them me by default.

I'm lucky enough that most people here are polite but as someone who has presented both masc/fem the way people treat me is so distinctly different based on my perceived gender as well as my level of androgyny it was kind of shocking to me. Eitherway there's a distinct attitude it's like. Rude to not be able to tell whether someone's a man or woman I've noticed and nowadays I have a lot of fun stressing people out. Sadism in me or whatever.

ANYWAY this was about minecraft youtubers. Analysing how people gender their designs, unconsciously or not, is fascinating because of how interpretative these designs are. There's also probably something you could say about how gaming youtuber is a very male-dominated space and how female gaming youtubers tend to overperform femininity, but in very different ways dependent on their intended audience (compare say. Lizzie and Pokimane for example.)

I think it's also worth noting that like. masculinity and femininity in behaviour is very different from physical presentation. which is how you get images like this

in addition to, again, these concepts already being abstract.

and of course, all said with me biting my tongue on the queer side of things still, because that's a whole other sub-sector of stereotypes and in-group signalling and history that runs convergent with mainstream views on gender.

I think it might be an interesting exercise to put your own designs up against others and consider what points they differ and what that might mean for how the other artist interprets the character vs how you do it. And then if you can look up what the artist actually has to say about the character and see just how right/wrong you were and how your own biases come into play. Two different people can have very similar views on a character, for example, but communicate that through opposite design tropes because they have different associations with said tropes. Not just for gender things btw and I've found peoples more nuanced opinions are harder to read than you'd think! I don't think anyone would look at my Bdubs design and guess that I thought he was fairly feminine in personality, for example.

I love doing that and challenging my own pre-conceptions of what i think peoples takes are judging by their designs (as well as what I think certain traits indicate in personality!). It's amazing for example how many pearl designs I've seen as too feminine and rolled my eyes at turn out to be drawn by artists who very much consider her to be tomboyish.

[asirenssilk]

Oct-Nov '24 Braids:

First post on the new Tumblr. I'm going to be structuring my posts around my hairstyles so they'll either have to do with a style I would like to do or am currently doing, or have just recently finished. Hopefully it makes more sense as you continue reading (if He wills it). So without further ado, here are Spiders and Orchids on my head :):

I learned how to braid my hair in 2018 while I was in college because it was too expensive to keep trying to get it done, especially because I love getting new styles. It was slow work at first ( + deeply humbling to move through the world with only your wits and the 26 braids you managed to put on your head) and will try to find some pics from that time. It's taken a while since then but I'm better with the more technical side of braiding which includes constantly remapping a grid pattern the geometry of my head will accept (it is constantly changing), standardizing the size of my braids, bending my knee and bowing my head to Color Theory, and getting better at noticing with my hands.

SWBAT ('student' will be able to):

The esoteric goal of this hairstyle was to capture three things that terrify me and do a bit of 'exposure therapy' through my first favorite medium (hair). I chose spiders, orchids, and Mitski's "Bug like an Angel" [Specifically the line 'Well, when you break them, they break you right back.' ]

The technical goals I used to integrate those esoteric learnings into a material medium: Small Individual braids, Intentional Grid Design (esp. for the back of my head), Color Matching/Being playful with color

The Overall End Goal was to have a more literal command over things that scare me on an existential level. Not to do away wholly the fear, but to invite it to play a better role in my day to day. Spiders used to scare me because of the Legs and the vague notion that it will not be a man at the end of time, but a spider. Anansi the Spider stories also did their Big One on me before I ever had a chance to fight back. I find them beautiful and they used to scare me because I felt as though they might use that against me given the chance (I actually kinda look for them now because when I kill a fly in my room, I don't want to waste its life with a trash bin). Orchids were scary to me because of their fickleness. It was scary to think something might take such careful work to become beautiful only to die under very mundane circumstances. And I don't think I need to explain the knife that is Bug Like an Angel and broken promises.

The Process:

Start: Sept. 23. 2024 to End: Oct. 19. 2024

Started on my hair about four days after I took it down from my last style. I like to do my take down and clarifier wash back to back, then let my hair rest. I'm currently deeply jobless so that is easy to let happen, but in the past I had gotten used to squeezing braiding into a three day process. This style took a lot longer than what has now become more normal for me (four- five day process bc I honor my rest now) because I got a tooth infection that needed antibiotics and a lot more stuff got in my way. In true esoteric fashion, the style came- as within- so without + as in you, so in me. I had to confront all those fears in my own real life before I could finish the hair style and really lay them to rest.

Clarifier Wash: Washed my hair twice with Dawn Dish Soap and did an Aztec Clay mask (Clay, honey, ACV, grapeseed and avocado oil). My last set of braids were also tiny, and I've noticed that I find the extra small braids to be better for promoting thickness in my hair (my hair is naturally on the finer side). Not sure if that is actually true- just something I noticed to seem true for me. Anyway, those tiny braids tend to collect dirt way easier and I used Blue Magic which also attracts a bit more misc. lint to my hair so the double wash of dawn was more than necessary to really clean my scalp which almost sputtered an inhale at the end of wash day. I've decided to only use blue magic when my do is closer to its demise and switch my normal shampoo for something a little stronger so it gets through the braids on wash days.

Materials for Braids: Some left over red, rust brown, and platinum blonde. And my hairs natural black color (I DID bleach my hairline in June which has helped me Lock In color theory wise). I would give the hair color numbers but these packs had been switched from their original packagings and kept in my closet for a year so I just don't really know. I used this same red last year all over my head, and the brown too. The blonde came from earlier this year from a previous style. Again, deeply jobless so I really tried to use what I have laying around and rely more on the grid pattern and length to offset the lack of cohesion in terms of color. I really liked the idea of making it look a little gory in the way of 'blood, fat, and marrow' to better capture the feeling of fear that spiders specifically evoke in me. That feeling that you will be consumed, past flesh- bones and all.

Materials Con't: Rubber bands, rat tail combs, brush, blowdryer, hair bands, beeswax edge control, duckbill clips, a great and faithful bonnet, two handheld mirrors and a large room mirror. Mango butter, vanilla oil stuff, and grapeseed oil in the water I used to set the braids at the end for a nice smell :).

Process:

This is where I have to pretend the process was not as bad as it actually was lmao. The physical act of braiding is tiring, I wasn't feeling well (emotionally or physically), and it was so much work for the pay out to just be having my hair done. There are a couple places where I really compromised with myself and didn't mind the parting too much but because I was really exacting with the bigger shapes I was unwilling to change.

What I really enjoyed (near the end) was becoming more spider in my weavings as the foundation was laid out, I got more playful with how much blonde and red I would incorporate into one braid and the braids were pretty long too before I set them. While I was braiding I thought the most obvious idea would be to keep them down my back and to my ass and really lean into the "ghastly" energy of these colors. So I braided each braid down to the end, only to chop it off after setting them because what I learned about fear was that it's important to keep only enough.

Thanks for reading!

[destinyc1020]

Hey Destinyc1020!!

Welcome back!👋🏼

If we're being honest here, I think Tom wasn't necessarily ready for kids and a family but, maybe he and Zendaya had long talks on what they each want for the future and they can see it with each other. Maybe her desires are the family and children and he said, I couldn't agree more, why wait. I think Zendaya doesn't say much or anything about what she wants relationship wise, but, believe me she herself may have mentioned she wants children by a certain time and she doesn't really see herself waiting too long, or being a certain age. The pandemic showed alot of people's true colors and desires I think. Unfortunately, he does where his heart on his sleeve and I think Z was a tit for tat with JE. I will say this, Zendaya is wonderful, but, Tom has shown himself to be just as wonderful. I think people tend to think she's the greatest thing since sliced bread and make Tom out to be the one whose desperate for her. I don't think he's desperate at all. Just because she's beautiful people put her on this huge pedestal, and downplay him. When in actuality, beauty isn't everything. Personality and character mean more, and I think that's what makes him so attractive, even to Z possibly. This is all speculation of course. But, yeah...I see you gal...

What I dislike about those interviews, I really wish his publicist had spoken to him and told him to be himself but, leave your relationship issues at home. They kinda left him out there like a lamb for the taking. Never show your HAND. Lol!!!

And, let us know when your absent, we be missing a girlfriend, and thats on PERIOD. 🤣

Awww... thanks for the welcome 😊 ❤️🥰

Anyway....

Idk why some ppl think that Tom isn't wonderful. Did I ever say that? 🥴 Where is this coming from? I've never said anything of the sort. If anything, I feel like I've been pretty fair with both of them?

I just state things how I personally see them. 🤷🏾‍♀️ You all don't have to agree, but don't put words in my mouth either.

You can go back and read my posts from 2020 and 2021 when we were talking heavily about their breakup and whatnot and see that I've ALWAYS taken a neutral stance when it comes to them and their breakup, and I think they're BOTH equally wonderful for each other! 🥰❤️

Women are just seen more as "The Prize" (it's true!), so yea, I think MOST guys are lucky to be with whatever great woman they're with, and they would tell you that also. 😂🤷🏾‍♀️

Most men know they would be nothing without their woman. Why do you think that men have such a HARD time being alone after a breakup or the death of a spouse? Women have it hard too (of course) but you have to admit that most of us can take it or leave it sometimes lol 😆 🤣

We're not gonna crumble if we're single or need to be independent for a while.

Anyway, just to clarify, when ppl say that Tom isn't gonna do better than Zendaya, they're not saying this just cuz she's "pretty". There are PLENTY of pretty women in Hollywood. Just like when ppl talk about how wonderful and great that Tom is for Z, we're not just talking about his looks. There are PLENTY of handsome guys in Hollywood, but not everyone is the total package. 🤷🏾‍♀️

When ppl talk about how great they are for each other, they're talking about their kindness, how down to earth they are, how level-headed and straight and narrow Z is, how mature, respectful, and good-hearted that Tom is, etc. It's NOT just about looks, or even how successful and rich they are (although, those two are pluses lol 🤭).

It's their CHARACTER. It's the TOTAL package. Not just "looks" or whatever.

And who said Tom is "desperate"? Again, where are you all getting this from? 🥴 Certainly not from my blog.

If we joke that Tom is whipped it's because it's so CUTE when a man is totally whipped for you! 🥰❤️ It's not a bad thing, and it doesn't make the man "desperate" either. 🙄 You WANT a man to feel that way about you! 🥰

Personally, I think TZ are both whipped for each other! How many times have I said this lol? 😂 I personally think it's cute and adorable. ❤️

Re: Z and kids....

Like I said before with men, I think a woman starts thinking more about children and "the future" when she thinks she's found the man who she would want to be the father of her children 🥰

Obviously, if Tom is talking about having kids to the public, you know good and well he and Z have discussed this as well. 😏

They're both on the same page.

[marinerainbow]

Alright, I need to make a post that isn't Disney... So let's talk about horror! Specifically one of my favorite genres:

Two Sentence Horror Stories.

Writing a story, any story, is exceedingly difficult for many ways. But to make a whole story with just two sentences? A story that enraptured the reader and makes them shake but also want to know more? Now that is talent. And I never get tired of reading them.

So, even though nobody asked, here is my top 10 favorite two sentence horror stories and why I like them so much.

TW: Horror and creepy gifs, along with very unsettling topics. You have been warned. All credit goes to the original authors.

Number 10:

I never go to sleep.

But I always wake up.

It doesn't seem like much honestly. But when you really think about it, that's when it starts to get more creepy. Why is this person constantly awake? Why do they keep waking up? What do they awaken to?

But at the same time, to me, this feels like one of those horror stories where it's more unsettling with imagery rather than on its own. I first heard it in an animated top 10 list and the imagery with it is definitely freaky, but when you take that away I don't feel so scared anymore. Chilled yes, but not scared.

Number 9:

"Now be careful, that line of rock salt is the only thing keeping them out," the man said, welcoming my group into his refuge.

"Sea salt," I clarified, "sea salt keeps us out."

I do believe in the supernatural. I'm not the kind of person who will cover my whole house in salt cause I'm so paranoid about evil spirits, but I do believe that there are some creatures out there.

I am also anxious about the thought that if I ever do encounter a dangerous spirit or creature, I will not be prepared to face it or have the wrong information, just like the poor man in this story.

Number 8:

A girl heard her mother call her by name, and started to head downstairs.

Just before she did, her mother pulled her into her room and said, "I heard it too."

If you're a fan of two sentence horror stories, you've no doubt heard this one, or a variation of it.

Like the one above, it's probably been heard a dozen times. Though it's still one of my favorites. It didn't quite help that the video I first heard this story used the name Sarah for the girl, which just so happens to be my own name. So it kinda spooked me on a personal level too.

Number 7:

I always thought my cat had a staring problem, since she always seemed to be transfixed on my face.

I never realized until now, that she was always staring right behind me.

I've lived with cats for nearly my whole life. Literally. And I believe that animals can sense things that we can't, whether it be supernatural or otherwise.

So this story makes me shiver to think about, imagining this scenario with me and my own cat. And with my own fear, the thought of anything- or anyone- being behind me without my knowledge, it just makes it even worse for me.

Number 6:

I begin tucking him into bed and he tells me, "Daddy, check for monsters under my bed."

I look underneath for his amusement and see him, another him, under the bed, staring back at me, quivering and whispering, "Daddy, there's somebody on my bed."

Every child's worst fear comes to life in the most terrifying way possible. Now the father has to make the decision, which one is his real son? And if he makes the wrong choice, or doesn't act fast enough, who knows what the consequences will be?

Number 5:

I told her there was no monster in her closet as I picked her up, and told her she could sleep with us tonight.

I figured that was the safest way off getting her out of the house without him realizing I saw him.

One of the many fears a parent would have. This is just so bone-chilling to read, I can only imagine how the narrator must have felt seeing a stranger in his daughter's closet.

Not to mention that, from the looks of things, it was a normal human intruder, nothing supernatural. To me, that just makes it even scarier. If it was a ghost or a demon, that would have been easier to deduce that the daughter is simply haunted. But a more real horror? Why was the man hiding in the girl's closet? What was he planning?

It's questions like that that are best left remained unanswered.

Number 4:

You get home, tired after a long days work and ready for a relaxing night alone.

You reach for the light switch, but another hand is already there.

I grew up in a household where at least one person was awake no matter what. And it wasn't like they had different schedules, my parents expressly told me and my siblings that it was to make sure that no one broke into the house or anything.

They relaxed on that over the years, I think, but it still stuck with me. I'm genuinely terrified of the thought of living alone now, and this story is one of the ways that perfectly captures my fear. I know someday I'll have to live by myself for some time until I start a family of my own. And this story always comes to mind when I think that.

Number 3:

The last thing I saw was my alarm clock flashing 12:07 before she pushed her long, rotting finger nails through my chest, her other hand muffling my screams.

I sat bolt upright, relieved it was only a dream, but as my clock read 12:06, I could hear my closet door creaking open.

I have lost count of how many times I've woken up in the middle of the night and thought I saw something creeping toward me. But then I would turn on the light, and nothing was there. I even have a memory from my childhood that I'm 65% sure is a genuine sleep paralysis story. Not to mention the kind of crazy or fucked up dreams I'll sometimes get before I wake up.

So when I read this story, it got to me on a personal level as well. Let me just say I'm grateful that my closet has no doors or else I'd probably try to barricade the doors every night just to reassure my subconscious.

Yeah, any supernatural creature in there may easily break through it, but at least I'll be able to get a few more minutes of peaceful sleep before I die.

Number 2:

When the kidnapper made me guess where he kept my daughter, I pointed to the basement and he said, "Correct!" And allowed me to see her.

But when I found her severed head in there, I realized every other choice would have been correct too.

Holy shit, do I even need to explain this one? A parent who was clinging onto the hope that they finally found their child, and their hope is squashed in the worst way imaginable.

It's mental, emotional, and in a way physical torture. And you can practically feel the sick, twisted smile on the kidnapper's face as you read this horror story.

And the worst part? This isn't even number one on this list.

Number 1:

After working a hard day I came home to see my girlfriend cradling our child.

I didn't know which was more frightening; seeing my dead girlfriend and stillborn child, or knowing that someone broke into my apartment to place them there.

This... Holy shit I actually had to reread this a couple of times when I first found it.

Someone breaks into my girlfriend and child's graves, takes them all the way from their burial sites to my home, breaks into my home, proceeds to purposefully place them in such a way that would have looked heartwarming if they were alive, and then (supposedly) leaves for me to find the scene all on my own with no explanation. It's like #2 but on steroids.

This isn't just a simple hatred for the victim. It's an obsession. Whether it be a love for this twisted game, or a crazy ex-lover who decides to torture their victim for leaving them, this is an obsession with mentally breaking the narrator of this story.

And that's my list. Do you guys agree? What would you pick for your own list?

[lonelywretchjervistetch]

My DC Cinematic Universe: Superman (Part IX)

Chapter Nine: Superman

It's at this time that we finally begin the story for this first theoretical film. Bits and pieces have been added throughout this elongated essay series, but this post is the culmination of these efforts, as well as fixing or clarifying a few things I've already mentioned.

Now, before anything else, there is something I need to make abundantly clear. I am not a writer. I am not a screenplay writer, a comic book writer, or a writer of any other kind. My name is published in scientific papers, and my training is primarily in ecology and ornithology. I have a bunch of ideas about comics and webcomics, but haven't really finished them (as of yet). I have written a healthy number of film reviews on my side profile, but I DEFINITELY wouldn't call them literary masterpieces. So, yeah, absolutely not a writer.

However, what I am is a MASSIVE goddamn nerd who spends a lot of time thinking about how he would make movies about various comic book characters. Superman, of course, is one of those characters. So, before we start, here are a few things to keep in mind. This is meant to be lighter in tone, and more down to Earth than most Superman films tend to be. Think more like Superman: The First Movie, but a touch more serious nd introspective when it comes to our main character. And again, not a writer, so some blanks may have to be filled in here or there as we go along.

OK, OK, without further ado...let's see what we can do. Flash the DC logo, let's get started!

Prologue: Up in the Sky

We're gonna bookend this film with narration from Lois Lane, specifically pieces that she's writing on Superman and Metropolis. Gonna be mostly show and less tell, but Lois will help introduce us to the city. And in the beginning, we'll go from the opening directly to the street. Bustling activity on the sidewalk, people starting their day as the sun rises, and tracking life in Metropolis, right from the start.

Metropolis, for all intents and purposes, should feel like a real city. I'm talking Chicago, I'm talking New York. But, where Gotham represents those cities in the dead of night, when fear lurks in the darkness, we'll be seeing Metropolis shortly after sunrise, just as the city begins to wake up. And again, this should feel like a real city, with character and flavor all its own. And Lois' narration should reflect and describe that character. A city that's always been grasping towards a bright future, but is inhabited by those comfortable living in the modern day. A place of tomorrows that hold onto the past. Nostalgia tempered by ambition. Y'know, that kinda stuff.

As Lois begins to describe the feel and life in the city, as well as recent changes and strife, we go to Hob's Bay, a older harborside neighborhood, and one of the oldest in Metropolis. a man visits a news stand and picks up a paper. This man is Bibbo Bibowski, a local character and owner of the Ace o'Clubs pub, and he picks up a local paper, the Daily Star. He looks at the Daily Planet, which is reporting on Superman, and grimaces. Not a fan, clearly. He puts in a pair of headphones, and turns on a podcast, Leslie Willis' Live Wire. Yeah, on the nose, I know, but you get it.

As Bibbo's walking to work, he bumps into a clumsy young man, whom he identifies as Jimmy Olsen. The two are friendly, but you can see a brief clash of ideologies as Bibbo refers to Jimmy's job at the Daily Planet as less than respectable, given their stance on certain issues. Jimmy brushes this off, because he's going to be late to work. He grabs some food from a stand, then gets a rideshare to the Daily Planet. But before he can get there...

Why yes, that IS a clip from the 1997 film Steel, starring Shaquille O'Neal. And yes, this IS for a good reason! So, Jimmy's in the ride share, texting Lois to let her know that's he's on his way to the office. But, on the way, a crime erupts when the Metropolis PD race by, interrupting traffic. Jimmy, following the normal actions of an intrepid reporter (according to Lois, anyway), asks the driver to follow them. When they get there, they see the police interrupting a robbery.

Lois' narration continues, telling us that crime has been getting worse, with gangs taking claim over various territories, using increasingly powerful weaponry. This weaponry, in this case is the Toastmaster, a powerful weapon used by the White Rabbit Gang of Hob's Bay. Caught smuggling the weapons by the police, a fire fight has erupted. The Special Forces Unit, led by Maggie Sawyer and Dan Turpin, arrives with their own firepower and manages to subdue some of the gang members. But at that point, a much larger Toastmaster, the BG-105, is brought out by a member of the gang, each of whom have a white rabbit on their jackets. He fires the gun, and it's obvious that the cops are outmatched. It's also at this point that Jimmy's out of the car, taking pictures for a story.

A gang member grabs a box and runs away, backed up by his compatriots. And as the danger's increased significantly, and Maggie and Dan are about to be blasted by this Toastmaster...

Part One: This is Your Life, Clark Kent

So, yeah, obviously this is when Superman shows up. We flash the title screen real fast, play his bombastic leitmotif, and we jump right back into the action. Superman gets hit by the blast, and you can immediately tell that this isn't the normal kind of hit you'd expect Superman to take. Normally, we see Superman sort of glance off bullets and energy blasts like nothing, but this clearly has more kick to it. Superman takes a few steps forward through the blast, struggling a bit as he does it, while Sawyer and Turpin and the rest of the unit mobilize on the other members of the gang present. Even then, though, one of the gang members escapes, scared and not wanting to be caught. Superman is, of course, there to take out the big Toastmaster and provide needed backup for the cops.

The fight ends, Superman has some interaction with Maggie Sawyer and Turpin (the latter of whom is slightly more non-plussed by Superman getting into police business), and he takes off. Jimmy looks on at this, then looks at his photos, all of which are genuinely fantastic. Jimmy, for the record, should be a great photographer. And that should be agreed upon at the Daily Planet, where Jimmy arrives to the angry shouts of editor-in-chief Perry White.

Perry's shouting for Jimmy, as well as any reporters who have info on the White Rabbit attack that's just happened. Jimmy walks into a meeting, where we meet each of the major members of the Daily Planet crew. I've described them of Part V of this essay series, but real quick in this sequence, we get some basic descriptions of their roles in the paper.

Cat Grant is a gossip columnist, whose current focus is on Lex Luthor and his relationship with some Contessa from Italy, as well as other prescient gossip. She's been essentially removed from the Superman beat, which she's still kinda bitter towards Lois about, but whatever. However, over the course of the Superman franchise, Cat will find herself orienting more towards superhero and supervillain reporting, moving her into a slightly different role than she's had in the comics.

Steve Lombard, sports columnist, is focusing on an upcoming game between the Metropolis Meteors (a team which he used to serve on) and the Gotham Wildcats, the winner of which is set up go up against either the Midway Cardinals or the Star City Stags to determine standing in the National Conference. He rambles on about it, but Perry cuts him off.

Ron Troupe, political columnist, is reporting on politician Gordon Crown's campaign, which includes his stance on the crime increase, as well as the struggles of the police. This is our introduction to the some of the sociopolitical strain in Metropolis, which is obviously a major theme going forward, as well as Crown's goal.

It's at this point that Jimmy comes in, with reports of the photos he's gotten for a new story. He looks for Lois, who's on the crime beat and the city beat alongside Clark, and is also not there. Nor is city beat reporter Clark, and we see that their seats at the table are empty, much to Perry's irritation. He asks where Lois is, and we find out exactly where she is.

Here, we finally put face to the narration, as Lois Lane arrives at the crime scene in order to speak with Sawyer, Turpin, and the recently arrived Chief William Henderson, who is speaking with Superman and giving his thanks. Lois, being the intrepid reporter, tries to get an interview with anybody who'll give her the time of day. Basically everybody's in a hurry to leave, as the police are needed for an upcoming press conference with Gordon Crown, which Ron Troupe is also attending. But one person does interact with Lois: Superman. They obviously have a previous press-informer relationship, as Superman gives Lois a healthy amount of info about the events that had unfolded, then takes off after a polite (if slightly awkward) greeting. And once he takes off, running up and out of breath right after is Clark Kent, who had not gotten to the scene as a result of traffic, and was "beat to the punch" by Lois.

So, yeah, obviously Clark and Superman are one and the same, but I'm really trying to carve out a distinct difference between the two identities. Clark is Superman's real face, but he would try and play it up just a little bit to throw suspicion off of himself. Most of the time, this isn't an issue, but there is somebody who's come close to figuring out his secret: Lois. And we get this idea throughout the film. Anyway, Clark and Lois' dynamic is notably different, and we should see the change. The two are clearly friendly towards each other, although we should get the idea that this is a recent development. As reporters, they engage in some friendly competition and banter, but they're also somewhat too busy to hang out outside of work. Which is another dichotomy to enforce. Y'know, Superman is too busy for Lois, but Lois is too busy for Clark. It's symmetry! Anyway, after some pleasant and likeable conversation, the two head to work together.

Two more things real quick. Firstly, the romantic tension isn't quite out in the open as of yet, but there's definitely chemistry between the two. You should get the sense of a pre-existing relationship, with some potentially romantic overtones, but it's not crystallized yet. After all, romance between these two isn't exactly tension, since it's inevitable, but we should see the hints of it beginning to blossom. And it will blossom, but in an unexpected manner. Why?

Well, that brings us to our second point: Lois knows that Clark is Superman, but Clark doesn't know that Lois knows. Because let's be goddamn honest about something: Lois is absolutely a bullshit detector. And her insanely intrepid nature has led her to realize that Clark and Superman are one and the same. But she's mostly wrestling with ethics here. Does she ruin this person's life, and almost certainly the lives of others by telling a truth that doesn't need to be outed...or does she continue to gather information on this person, and try and understand them further to get a more fleshed-out story? And, of course, that was Lois' original plan, but she's realized that Clark is his own person, and not actually pretending to be something he isn't, in both of his identities. And in the process, she actually found herself liking Clark as a person, and not just as a story. But the distance between his identities is still hard for her to reconcile, so she's still figuring things out. But by the end of this film, she'll know exactly what she wants, and how she feels about Clark and Superman.

We cut from those two, and to an alleyway, to where the gang member who'd escaped earlier has run. A car pulls up, and the person inside is Bruno Manheim, who is being played by Tony Dalton in this essay. Somebody suggested it, and I like him for the part, honestly. The gang member is let into the car, and a friendly-seeming Bruno chats it up with them. Apparently, this struggle was part of a trade deal between the White Rabbits and Manheim's group, Intergang, but someone had tipped Manheim and his men off, meaning that Intergang didn't show up to the deal. Who tipped them off isn't said, however.

Manheim wants the Toastmasters, but now wants to deal directly with the boss of the Rabbits, whose identity is not well-known. After a conversation, Manheim intimidates the Rabbit and tells him he wants a meeting with their boss. He convinces the member to help arrange the meeting, and to tell only the boss so that this kind of thing wouldn't happen again. He lets the freaked-out Rabbit go, and relaxes in the back of his car.

A partition lowers, and a man in the passenger seat asks why he let him go. One, Manheim has other places to be; and two, at some point during the talk, Manheim slipped a tracker on the young Rabbit. Yes, this is a tech-savvy gang, and Manheim is not entirely stupid. He tells the driver to drop him off at "the rally", and then tells the man in the passenger seat to track down the rabbit. This man, John Corben, smiles at the request, and the group takes off. Oh, and the pre-Metallo Corben is played by Wilson Bethel in this essay.

OK, we're getting a little bogged down in the details, but let's continue following the story. At this point, I've been building up to a rally that's set to take place that afternoon. As Lois and Clark arrive at the Planet, they interact with the other members of the bullpen in various stages of their day, and we get to know see the inter-office relationships. Most prominently, of course, is Jimmy and our duo, and the three are pretty clearly often associated with each other. They go to meet Perry, he's a little pissed at how late they were, but lets it go in Lois' case when he hears their intel for the overarching story. But since Clark hasn't come in with a story, Perry assigns him to accompany Troupe to the upcoming Crown rally, and to get interviews with the audience members present, while Troupe interviews Crown himself. Clark agrees, and Jimmy offers to accompany them to get pictures of the event.

After this meeting, Clark gets a call from his folks, who are packing to head to Metropolis later that week on a visit. We get a hint that Jonathan Kent recently visited a doctor for cardiac concerns, but little more than a mention. Clark goes to meet Troupe, who's somewhat dismissive, but not out of any malice. It's from him and Olsen than we get an idea of who Gordon Crown is, as well as his views, and what the rally is going to focus upon.

Crown (played by Will Poulter for the purpose of this essay, and because I think he'd be a solid cast), is a young, likeable politician currently running for public office, after having been a popular political pundit working for the rival to the Daily Bugle, the Morgan Edge-owned company Galaxy Communications. On good terms with the Planet staff, he's an affable person with somewhat conservative views. Not everyone agrees with him, but he's got a reliable base. Interestingly, he's particularly critical of superheroes and vigilantes, having built his career on a very anti-crime platform.

He's also a very fast social climber, but this is attributed to him either being a massive suck-up (which he is when necessary), or just very good at his job (which he definitely seems to be). In any case, his success is undeniable, and his popularity is climbing, as seen by the decent number of people at the rally. This number includes Clark, Ron, and Jimmy, amongst other reporters; Inspector Henderson and Maggie Sawyer, who've just arrived; LexCorp representative Mercy Graves (more on her later), there in place of her boss; and pulling up in a limo in the back, Bruno Manheim. He gets out, then tells his driver he knows what to do. The driver pulls around the corner, then parked the car in an alley, bringing a gun with him.

He climbs up to the roof, and as this happens, we get a glimpse at Gordon Crown. We see him talking backstage with Mercy Graves, where she's giving him a message from Lex. He finishes that conversation, then greets Henderson and talks about the events of the day in terms of the White Rabbit Gang, just before going onstage. Just then, the driver sets up a rifle on a rooftop opposite the rally. Obviously, we're looking at an assassination attempt. However, before anything happens, the man leaves, simply setting up the gun and hooking it up to a technological device of some kind. He gets it set up, then leaves after setting a timer of some kind.

Once he makes it into the car, he watches on a screen in the car. When the time is right, he presses the button, and an obvious (obvious) laser light shines on Crown. Everyone sees this, including Clark, who speeds off to intercept the bullet. The gun fires, a bullet hits Superman, who's just arrived, and Crown locks eyes with a passing car, which holds Manheim staring at him through the window, and winking. Crown sees this, Crown understands this...but he says nothing. Instead, he takes the opportunity to thank Superman, even though it's apparent that he doesn't really want to. Superman goes to find the culprit, but to no avail.

After the shooting and the police follow-up, Lois arrives to cover this event, as it falls beneath her wheelhouse. After the stressful day, Jimmy invites Clark, Lois, and Ron to go to the Ace o' Clubs and take a load off. Ron passes, but Clark and Lois agree, and the group decides to meet up that night. Once there, we see that Crown has quickly rebounded, and is meeting with an anchor on a local news program, recounting the events of that day. Bibbo, with this channel on at the pub, comments to various individuals in the bar (Jimmy included) that some people (him included) think Superman was in on it, trying to make himself look like a big hero in front of the audience, and in front of Crown, his biggest detractor. Which, frankly, is a solid argument.

Lois agrees that the idea would be a good story, while Jimmy vehemently disagrees. He's a big fan of Superman, and he knows he was trying to do the right thing. CLark doesn't say much, since he doesn't like to comment on...well, himself. He does agree that it's a plausible theory, though. The three have a conversation about Superman, maybe about other similar figures that have appeared in the city or elsewhere, and give us a better idea of the environs in which we find ourselves.

From there, we go to a very nice house in Martinside, a very wealthy district of the city. A car pulls up to this house, and Gordon Crown exits. He enters the house, where in an office meeting with some of his men, Bruno Manheim is sitting and laughing. When Crown enters, he dismisses everybody but Corben, his right hand man. Crown's clearly a little upset at the assassination attempt, as there was no way Manheim could've known that Superman would show up. Manheim brushes it off, as the wound the bullet was meant to inflict would've been non-lethal, and that whoever his tech connections were knew what they were talking about with the remote rifle.

Crown capitulates this, and thanks Manheim for his cooperation. He also regrets the fact that Superman was there, as it could've helped his public image. Still, he thinks he's spun the angles all right, all things considered. The two have a shared moment of hatred for Superman, but Manheim seems to think he'll be able to take care of him soon. A curious Crown asks how, and Manheim credits his own connections. Just then, we hear someone else enter the room, with a clack of heels.

Now here's where things get a little...tricky. This is Angora Lapin (yes, really), played in this essay by Taraji P. Henson. In the comics, Angora is a villain of Steel, AKA John Henry Irons, having stolen his experimental weapons and work to make the Toastmaster and issue it to the streets for cash. She's the leader of the White Rabbit Gang in this film, and is called White Rabbit in the comics. And she's also implied to be an albino black woman. Which is...hard to cast.

Shout out, by the way, to Diandra Forrest, the only albino black actress I could find. I hope her career goes well, because it's very much in its infancy at the moment. But, for now, we're gonna go with Henson. Now, to be fair, Lapin is basically a cameo here, but she's received the message about meeting with Manheim to make a deal about the Toastmasters. Crown stays during this interaction, which Lapin clocks but cares little about. Manheim, in fact, states that Crown is under the protection of Intergang, and that he'll make things good for them in Gotham. Lapin and her gang can have in on that as well, if they make a deal for the Toastmasters, and lays low for a little while, working for Intergang in the process. Lapin agrees, but also notes that they didn't do much against Superman.

And that's when Crown interjects. His connections may be able to help with that.

Finally, this night in Metropolis is coming to a close. All of this has happened within one day. Clark and Lois leave Jimmy at the Ace O' Clubs, with both Lois and Clark headed home. They say their goodbyes, with Lois' dialogue indicating some kind of knowledge about Clark's secret life, which is easily played off as a joke. They say good night, and Clark goes back to the apartment. He reads some messages from his folks, who've obviously seen the news about the assassination attempt, and are checking in on their son. Clark responds with a smile, maybe even calls, and then heads to bed for the night.

But in his sleep, Clark has dreams that he's encased in crystal, cold and alone in an empty void. Other visions come to him, and we see glimpses of Krypton's destruction and his past. Clark, in this universe, doesn't know a lot about his past, save that he's from another planet, and that he didn't have these abilities from birth. He also knows of his connection with the sun of Earth, and that the ship he arrived here inside of is largely made of crystal and otherworldly metals. But the uncertainty, combined with these dreams of a forgotten past, is a constant thought with him. And when he wakes up in a cold sweat (which Clark doesn't usually do), he gets up and flies into the night as Superman, using his vision to see the stars beyond the light pollution from the city below.

And that's the end of...Act One.

Shit. SHIT. It's gonna be longer than nine parts, isn't it? Dammit.

Index: Superman

Part I: Why I Love Superman

Part II: On Lois Lane

Part III: The Kents

Part IV: The 'Rents

Part V: The...Frendts?

Part VI: Lex Luthor

Part VII: The Real Villains

Part VIII: Superman's Rogues Gallery

Part IX: The Story - Act One

Part X: The Story (Acts Two and Three)

Part XI: The Story - Climax

Part XII: Epilogue (Part One)

Part XIII: Epilogue (Part Two)

[casperillion]

i cant post the orignial context because i think op blocked me but thats fine, i just want to air my thoughts and tbh if theyre not looking anymore im happier abt that.

to summarise a little bit of what this is abt, i replied to an article that very much implied that all trans men are loud misogynists, especially towards trans women which is not something i agree with. my reasons for not agreeing with this is very much based on my real world and online experiences of growing up in the queer community with many trans people around me. I stated that i dont think that misogynistic trans men (which look, i know they exist, ive met them) should be considered the majority and on top of that it feels very weird to focus so heavily on that when trans men do not hold a position of power over other trans people, especially not systematically.

to be fair to op i didnt explain this as clearly as i could originally since my first response to the article was very much an emotional response.

anyway op told me the world would be better off without me in it and that i should kill myself, that im a transmisogynist, and that im the reason they hate that theyre trans masc. someone else told them to back off bc while they agreed with op they thought it was a bit fucked up to say that, i responded to them and clarified my points and this person also ended up agreeing with me.

op then messaged me privately with this

okay context done here are my thoughts, i'll try to split this up so its a bit easier to read Original point

so for this one, trans men and our issues are very often erased or only ever brought up as an after thought. I dont feel like i need to explain why erasure is bad but the biggest issue i find with this is lack of resources and lack of coverage or even knowledge about the shit trans men deal with in a cisnormativity society.

this article was rough for me to read because it described every trans man that the writer had met as someone who became a loud misogynist and the conclusion was that all trans men were that way, if not openly then secretly. I know this is not the case because i know many trans men and trans masculine people, many of those men are very passionate supporters of trans women, nb people, and cis women. honestly i think these experiences say more about the person who wrote the article than trans men as a whole.

this attitude is used by TERFs to harass trans men who they see as "traitors" and its where i see this sort of thing most often. its very weird to be this focused on this subject especially without discussing how complex being trans masculine is.

its kinda hard to put everything into words, i'll add on more when i remember it later

To the person who posted the article that is now harassing me

im not gonna name them but looking through thier blog actually... made me really sad. they are the type of people that have fallen victim to this kind of thing. they hate men, and they hate themselves even more for being one.

its so sad to me that they see themself like that, its kinda hard to even know if theres a way i can help them, i want to though. even though they were incredible weird towards me.

digression into them being weird actually bc ive been thinking abt it.

they were very quick to judge who i am as a person without knowing anything about me, made a lot of assumptions that arent true. it felt a lot like projection because like?? idk its wild to doubt that i care about my close friends???? you dont know any of us?? you dont even know what community i come from?? i know trans women from like, actually idk the youngest age but roughly from 20 years old to 40+, most of the trans men i know are in their 20s, and i dont even know what the range for nb people i know is because ive met too many and i stopped keeping track. I've lived with other trans people in person of all genres (idk i dont have a better word) , ive volunteered in places where ive met and helped trans women get back on their feet while experiencing financial hardship. as a teenager i was involved in creating safe spaces for trans and gnc teens in my city to meet each other and hang out. less relevant but ive also be outright told by women im close with that they value my perspective when we have discussions about misogyny, actually that was literally 2 nights ago while we were discussing the best way to create a safe space for women and trans fems. obviously op knows none of this but its wild that they just.. assumed so much and decided that my voice was not important or worth listening to.

[foxymoxynoona]

hii i wanted to start your secret songs series but I'm a bit confused if it's finished? or which one is the first episode? sorry this is kinda dumb😭

i just asked if the secret songs series is finished but I meant if jks story is finished and now ur continuing w taes or namjoons? idk I'm just a bit confused 😭

-------------

Hey no problem! The main story of the series (which is all following Jungkook and OC Sasha) isn't finished. I just started posting book 3. I think there will be 5 books based on what I've written so far (I wrote a vast majority of the story a couple years ago, before I ever started posting, and now I edit and fill in the missing spaces as we go through the story.)

Book 1: Little Bean (complete) Book 2: Flux (complete) Book 3: My Matryoshka (just started) There's also extra one shots related to Jungkook or Sasha that don't feature in the main story in a collection called JJK & SP: The B-Sides

I've been starting little collections of side stories for the other members. As of right now, these aren't going to be full thorough stories the way the main story is, they're just collections of related one shots or small story arcs. I've only done a few so far, but I do have a lot of plans for them. In the event they really took off, I might reorder and string them more into what feels like a story arc, though never as in-depth as the JK one. I can't imagine ever writing such an epic-length story again, I was crazy when I did it 🤣

So far I have two up and I'm working on one for Yoongi next. Again, not much here yet but I do have lots of ideas, just more ideas than time 😅

RM: Mono to Stereo (2 chapters so far) V: The Man (1 chapter so far)

Everything is listed on the Secret Song ao3 series page here: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2015143

Hope that helps clarify!

[fainthedcherry]

3 hrs spent total for sketching - and skipping my pizza time for this xD

I'm VERY happy to say, that I had a lot of fun trying to come up with some alt-designs!!!

I got the idea to draw these doodles from a blog I really like, from @shoechoe !! (sorry if you hate tags, just wanted to credit back to you and also reblog the source of inspo!!!)

I've never drawn Doppio NOR Diavolo ever before, plus I mainly draw anthros in my free time, so I put some extra effort into these in trying to make these look appealing despite my obvious time-crunch LOL!

Since unfortunately I have to go to work in order to feed myself LOL, that means I couldn't of spend the rest of my midnight on this, so this looks REALLY rough and ofc some anatomy-mistakes were ignored, but yeah! For 3 hrs, I'm p OK w/ the results!!! :o;

RAMBLE SECTION ABT ART/DESIGN PROCESS BELOW;

Hope any fans out there enjoy my weird ideas I had design-wise. xD

Diavolo was giving very oldhead punk - maybe even the gatekeepy types KLFGSDLKGDS, but I also thought about "OOH he'd probably LOVE glam-punk. Somewhere around his era too w/ 80s-90s dude probably musta LOVED David Bowie!!" So I've drawn one with glam-punk influences, the other just freely off the top of my head, on what I consider something more punk-ish xD

Oh, also I sliiightly dulled the colours,, just sliightly. If the colours look off in some way, blame my program, that prevents me from getting migraines due to bluelight. I have a filter, that sets my screen to a certain % of orange, so if colours look colder than they're supposed to...It was bc of that. xD It's 3AM here in Germany, as I write this!! :>

That was my main thought-process,,, then last second I thought "omg I also need to throw Doppio in here bc I love him too who WOULDN'T" - soO here we have emo-Doppio!! or...Emoppio I guess. xD You think his band-kid energy would've been SO off the charts, that Abbacchio could've gotten to him first instead of the other way around? ;T /hj

Honestly tho...I think bandkid Doppio and Risotto could've gotten along better than what we got. xD I can dream I guess. 😌

(JIC that joke about Korn is very specific, I know that Korn is more nu-metal and stuff pls don't behead me fellow Korn fans for a joke, Diavolo fans pls don't behead me for making a joke about KC's genera intelligence to know what music-genres are, my acoustic arse wants to make sure, to clarify it in case someone might think I wrote that down in a serious manner, I am just a court-jester throwinf tomatoes at the king basically CKSKDJ)

IMA KEEP THIS SHORT BC I GOTTA SLEEP OBV. LATE SHIFT WILL ABSOLUTELY BODY ME IN TERMS OF CONTRACTS I GOTTA WORK ON LATELY.

I'll do my best to try and catch every Dia and Doppi tag sdfjksklg, I am notoriously AWFUL at tagging my posts no matter on what platform xD

I hope I'm fine to use a fanart tag tbh I'm kinda scared bc I never draw fanart as most of my friends know,, ovo;: I am SO new to drawing fanart man. xD

I hope to Abbacchio-post some day too,, I thought of a funny comic but it's gonna take a GOOD while to draw ofc ><

i can never get over diavolo being canonically punk

[screamin-abt-haikyuu]

Why I think Asahi acts like the weight of the world is on his shoulders

What this is about: Character Analysis of Asahi and the reason behind his behaviours (personal opinion/HC but formed due to and heavily based on his canon behaviour). Warnings: Mental abuse, troubled home life, being hard on oneself, feeling like a burden, idk what else but these are the major ones. A/N: I fucking love doing character analysis' and I fucking love Asahi Azumane. That's it. That's the note.

I have been intending to make a post about this for a while and @bobsie's recent angst HCs are beautifully written and a lot similar to how I feel about the issue (You should read them for better context).

I'm just adding my thoughts on the topic but purely related to his family/home life. Would like to clarify again that these are my personal opinions, of course.

Slight Manga spoilers ahead, proceed with caution. By slight, I mean the panels do not give away any results from any match or even what match they're from or if they're even from any match. Basically lmao not exactly a spoiler just conversations/thought processes that take place later in the manga.

Asahi's self doubt definitely existed from way before the Date Tech match because even Daichi and Suga told the first years that Asahi is the type of guy who would feel more responsible than most for the loss.

And then there was this exchange in the manga which makes it clear (read from right to left):

This kind of behaviour doesn't just...happen without cause. At least for me it didn't. It takes years of conditioning and being told you're worthless to be so hard on yourself. As someone who sees herself in Asahi, I relate SO much and literally see myself every time he is too hard on himself or acts like the weight of the world is on his shoulders and berates himself to the depths of despair every time he makes a mistake. Especially if that mistake affects people he cares about.

I legit feel like the world has ended every time I make a mistake lmao and that stems from being shouted at for the tiniest things when I was a kid. This gets worse when someone else gets affected/ feels bad because of my mistake.

Also, I'm much better now that I've grown up and processed some shit. Even after processing stuff, that kinda reaction becomes instinctive tho.

He also constantly feels like a burden on his team and friends because that's how he's been made to feel at home. He quit volleyball, the thing he loved so much, because he thought he was just bringing his teammates down.

He ties the value of his existence to what he can do for others. He thought that he was useless to the team and his friends just because he couldn't score. He sees no value in and of himself. He only feels he has value when he's being of use to others.

And from the above data, I personally think he has a father who is hard on him. Idk about Japan in particular but as an Asian, I know the kind of expectations Asian parents, especially fathers, have from their sons.

Asahi is sweet and kind and sensitive. Maybe when he was little he got scared easily. Or cried easily. Or was interested in creative things or activities that "aren't for boys" (very possible, seeing the path he took after high school). Maybe he was always told to toughen up and "be a man" or "boys don't cry". And maybe he was shouted at in general when he didn't fit the mould of an ideal son. Personally, I feel like it was all of these factors + the general pressure of living up to your family's expectations. He wasn't appreciated enough. Or maybe he was only given love/appreciation/attention when he lived up to his father's (or mother's) expectations and made to feel worthless otherwise.

Also this panel just really makes me cry it really gave us an insight into his mind and the way he is so hard on himself. These voices aren't just his. These are the collective voices of everyone who thinks he's a disappointment and they have made him feel so. It is what he has been conditioned to believe and think about himself over the years.

I think this is why I love Asahi so much as a character because I see him. I have been him. In some ways, I still am him.

And now that I've grown up and realized that I didn't deserve to be treated that way, that I deserved more kindness and love and to be understood while I was growing up, I pour out all that love to this character I see myself in. I wanna tell him he has value, his emotions are valid and he matters. All things I would have loved to hear while growing up.

Basically, baby boy deserved to be understood and be treated more kindly than he was.

Wow this got deep. Oh, well.

Side note: When I was reading this fic, the entire time I was thinking- yeah this seems like it could be canon. Especially the home life dynamics shown here.

Reblogs are appreciated. Please do not repost.

[do-ray-mi]

Food Chain pt.2(Park Jisung x m!reader)

Pairing: NCT Dream Jisung x male reader

Genre: Highschool Au, angst, hurt/comfort, enemies to friends to lovers.

Warnings!!: this fic contains use of the F slur, bullying, toxic behavior and is not to be mimicked. Viewers Discretion is Advised.

Description: Karma comes even in the form of who you thought you could trust the most.

🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀

He was one of the first to arrive in class, he took his seat at the back. The group of girls in the front were gossiping about something on their phones... but they looked confused, even almost mad or disgusted.

"Can't believe he's gay!!" One girl says out loud, grasping more of Y/n attention.

'Oh no, who is it now?' Y/n thought.

More students walked in, also talking about something while showing their phones to their friends.

Y/n was close to bringing out his own phone, only to realise that even if he did, he still has no idea what everyone is looking at.

One of the jocks in class turned to Y/n with a smug look, "yo twinkle toes, you're not the only queer here now!"

Y/n only gave him a scrunched up look, the jock walked over to him and gave him his phone. It was Chenle's post, it was a screenshot of some texts. He read the caption.

'Guess who's the school's new fag!' It read, reading the texts in the screenshot... his eyes grew wider.

Park Jisung, flirting with another man over text.

Y/n gave the phone back to the jock, he was slightly in a daze still trying process what he saw.

"He's finally getting his karma, this might be the best day in your life." The jock said giving Y/n a pat on the head before going back to his seat.

Y/n just sat there, "why does this make sense, yet also doesn't". He really didn't know what to make of this situation.

How did Chenle get that screenshot? Why did he post it? He thought those two were best friends...

Then it clicked... right, the Food Chain. Chenle saw the opportunity to overthrow Jisung and took it.

During class, the teacher had to kick out a few students cause all they were talking about was that post.

Once it was finished, he was trampled on by Kai and Soobin.

"Dude did you hear!?!?" Kai almost screeched.

"It's kinda hard not to... this is the first time I've seen something like this."

Soobin looked around, he noticed how everyone was looking for something... or someone.

"I don't think he's here today...", He spoke up, Kai and Y/n looked over at him in slight confusion l, "Jisung" he clarified.

"I wouldn't be surprised, he got completely humiliated." Beomgyu said walking towards them, alone.

You can clearly see how quickly Soobin and Kai tensed up at his presence.

"Can I... talk to you two? Please..." Beomgyu almost begged, his eyes glossed over, showing a mixture of emotions. Soobin glanced at Y/n, asking for his opinion through his eyes.

Y/n knew what was going to happen, he saw it coming from a mile away. "Go for it" he mouthed at him.

Not without a hint of hesitation, Soobin and Kai followed Beomgyu to a secluded corner of the hallway.

Y/n made his way to his locker to put away his bag. It might sound fucked, but he feels safer in school today knowing that everyone is distracted.

Of course, his kindness got the best of him and he couldn't help but wonder. "How is Jisung doing..?"

Lunch was interesting, Beomgyu was joining them now.

Apparently, Yeonjun and Taehyun kicked him out. Y/n didn't pry into the reasoning, but judging on how Beomgyu clutched the side of his stomach every so often...

... it was probably literal.

Y/n glanced over at Jisung's gang, the Dreamies they call themselves... which is ironic considering how much of a nightmare they are.

Chenle was glowing in the new attention he was getting. The only members he could see were uncomfortable were Jeno, Jaemin and Renjun.

Hm, interesting.

*

Things started taking a turn the next day, when Jisung arrived at school. He dressed a lot less flashy than usual, hoping to avoid people. Unfortunately, he couldn't change his height so he still stood out like a sore thumb.

The morning wasn't so bad for Jisung, he only got whispers, laughs and the occasional shoulder shove.

He got into his first class, where his... old friends were. As well as his number one victim, right now he can't help but feel intimidated by him too.

Jisung walked into the classroom after taking in a deep breath. Almost like a horror movie, all heads turned to stare at him simultaneously.

"Oh well look who decides to show up!!!" Chenle shouted out, his legs against the desk with his head held high in an air of arrogance. Laughs echoed in the room aswell as in his head.

Huh, so this is what it's like...

"Guess you owe a little someone an apology for being a hypocrite." The same Jock from yesterday voiced out, Jisung glanced at Y/n in the back of the classroom. He also noticed how the only available seat in the classroom, was right next to the boy.

Jisung sighed and made his way towards the desk and sat on the chair.

He looked down on the desk, the entire desk was big enough for two students and it was covered in sharpie.

Slurs, death threats, lewd drawings depicting stereotypical homosexual behavior, insults... you name it.

They were directed towards him now too.

All because Chenle decided to make a fake convo and post it. Now this is where he is...

[lilacandladybugs]

I personally am not religious at all but I've always tried my best to respect those who are and I think it's pretty lovely that you have something like that to help you feel safe and comfortable!

I hope this doesn't come across as demeaning but, I kinda find it interesting?? to have that sort of blind faith and belief is just interesting and kind of neat to me I suppose

I don't understand but I'm happy that you have something like that to keep you up in trying times :]

I'm glad that you feel that way! Also I'm not offended lmao you guys are all really friendly and I don't think you want to offend me so I will always take it that way. I am going to clarify something but I'm pretty sure this isn't what you mean so just for passersby~

Blind faith in anon's words i think means like belief in something that I can't see, which is valid, but some people use it to mean faith beyond reason so I'm going to briefly walk you through some thought process so you know that I didn’t just randomly choose this lol

I think the real reason I believe in God is this realization that we all to some extent believe in something, have faith in something. Even if you are agnostic, people still have to choose how they actively live their lives. Agnostics usually end up functioning as atheists, they don't know who God is, and so they function like he doesn't exist.

So we all at some point end up betting our lives on some belief system. We bet our present life, and any potential future life, on what we think we can understand right now. We bet our lives that God doesn't exist, or we bet our lives that he does. And even if someone chooses not to think about it, they're betting their lives that it isn't important.

We also all have to have a level of blind faith (imo), we believe that we can think, we believe that goodness or badness exists. We believe that reason exists, we believe in logic, in science, in our senses. Faith is just an assumption that something is true, and you can’t use logic to prove that logic is valid, so at some point you have to take it on faith. All premises are at some level an act of faith.

So then the question becomes, since I can’t know anything 100% certainly but I literally have to choose something, what do I choose? What seems most likely?

To me, it seems more likely that God aligned the stars and placed the Earth precisely where it is than that it happened by chance. It seems more likely that information came from an informant than that it came from no where, and it seems more likely that life came from a source than that life came from death. 

It seems more likely to me that Jesus was who he said he was than that he was just a good person, because good people don’t lie, they don’t mislead entire populations to bet their lives on a lie. But Jesus claimed to be God and he seemed like a good man. It seems more likely to me that the Bible was the word of God than that it was able to be constructed over thousands of years by people who never knew each other in three different languages and still survived thousands of years.

And the one that hits the most is that I think it is more likely that people matter than that they don’t. It’s more likely in my mind that morality exists than that it doesn’t, and if it does exist it must have been defined by someone outside of ourselves, thus making it more likely to be God.

Here is an excerpt I wrote from this post, that explains a little bit more:

Nietzsche, Kant, and Epictetus are all similar in that i have the same issue with all of them. They all want to put the anchor of meaning within the individual human. But i swear to god when i say that i want to hug my brother again i dont just mean i want to hug a person, i mean that i miss that person, that there was something that was valuable about him not just to me but that was valuable to the entire universe, and that when he died that piece of the universe was lost. epictetus’ argument was that human beings are simply mortal beings, and so grieving them is an unreasonable reaction to that fact of reality - we are all going to die, so why get attached to people like they’re immortal?

Which raises the question for me, why do we grieve like we’re meant to be immortal? Why is it that the world trembles under the crushing weight of death? That even birds miss their mates when they die, that elephants linger by the graves of their ancestors, that dogs continue to look for their masters once they’ve passed? Are we, like epictetus nietzsche and kant too, are we the only possible anchor for meaning? Do things in and of themselves mean nothing except in relation to us, so we can’t say, “death is bad,” but only, “death is bad to me”? it just doesn’t seem true

That’s who I’ve come to understand God to be. Things are complex and full of logic and information and cohesion, because when God spoke the universes into existence he planned it out carefully and tenderly. Things want to be loved and cared for and valued because God is triune, he exists as one God with three persons, loving one another for all of existence, and creating life to share in that eternal love with them. Human beings grieve one another’s deaths like we aren’t meant to die because we weren’t meant to die, death was a natural result of our decision to part ways with the giver of life, and leaving him meant that we die, and it isn’t how it’s meant to be, it’s one of the greatest tragedies to ever occur. When my brother died it felt like the universe lost something that was intrinsically valuable, not just to me, because my brother was created for a purpose by our creator, and his meaning is anchored not in my human flesh that will pass away but in the very foundation of our known universe, in the character of who God is.

--

Anyway if you’re interested I can send you some philosophy and history behind why I believe what I believe, it for sure wasn’t developed out of no where I’ve spent years questioning it and thinking about it. But most people don’t want to read that much so if you want more you can hmu in messages or send another ask idk XD 

Thanks anon! Sorry for hijacking your ask I know you aren’t that interested lol

[teaveetamer]

Hey man, we've chatted before on my main. I sent that one modmail last August, remember? How's it going?

I wasn't gonna respond since Ezra already said something and I don't want you to feel like you're getting dogpiled, but since I was directly involved in that situation and I was the main person calling the harassers in question out, and I called your attention to some of the harassment that was ongoing at the time (before Moonlitboar I guess, since it was August), I guess you're talking about me here. So I kinda feel obligated to say something given some of the things you said about (presumably) me in this post.

I'm not sure why you decided to bring this up rn when you weren't really involved in all of that and, like... you either chose not to ask people who were heavily involved for their side of the story, or you don't know enough about the situation to be aware of who you should be contacting in the first place to ask?

I have made numerous, repeated, honest efforts to de-escalate everything going on here, and people threatened to put a .45 ACP in me and they've talked about killing me. So like, I'm not really sure what you're trying to say, but I don't really appreciate the "you have a complicated relationship with the truth" dig given everything that's been happening. I feel like you don't have a great handle on how bad this has become or why some of us feel the need to continue talking about it (despite how much I would VERY MUCH like to talk about literally anything else at this point. Like holy fuck I've had a post in my drafts since July where I talk about wanting this blog to go dormant). Or maybe you've just got one perspective, I don't know.

I really appreciated how you were willing to sit down and talk to me and listen to me a year ago, and I hope you'll do that again for this post. I'm honestly not trying to fight, I'm just Tired.

So I gotta start with my interpretation of this post. Maybe this isn't what you meant, but uh. You've basically accused (again, I'm assuming) me of having a "complicated relationship with the truth" (I'm not sure how I would interpret this as anything other than you calling me a liar, or maybe delusional?) while simultaneously humoring a blatantly ridiculous conspiracy theory that absolves the other party of guilt for what transpired, and then you go on to air your grievances about how people feel unsafe in the fandom and the environment is toxic. I mean. I don't know how you'd react to reading that collection of thoughts strung together in that specific manner out of the blue, but it kiiiiiiinda makes it seem like you think I'm the problem for calling out harassment and you're looking for reasons to excuse the behavior of people who blatantly harassed someone. Without having ever spoken to me about it. Which is, uh. If that's not what you were trying to say I think you should clarify that immediately.

One more thing that makes me feel a bit uneasy about the wording of your post. You have previously admitted that you used to "talk on a regular basis" with Raxis, AKA one of the the people who has spearheaded much of the harassment. And you didn't disclose that in your OP. So clearly there's some degree of prior relationship there that might be relevant to mention if you're going to take the mantle of neutral third party observer while also calling into question my integrity wrt my statements about or interactions with him.

Considering you appear to have done a bit of a 180 on Raxis since this comment, and it's to claim you might have proliferated lies about him and now you want evidence of a conspiracy theory absolving him, I'm going to hazard a guess that you might have been in contact with him (or someone very sympathetic to him) more recently than 7 months ago?

So, like, sorry but I guess this is going to be long. But since we couldn't have this conversation privately and now you've made statements publicly calling my integrity into question, I'm just gonna do this publicly and add thoughts, detail and context, and links to relevant info where I think it's helpful (to you or to anyone who might read this):

1 I have nothing to hide about what happened with that post. Ezra linked it in the comments, but here is the link to the actual "fuck around and find out" post. The original, as well as all of his responses to me and my responses to him, are preserved because of how Tumblr works. I have a web archive link as well just in case tumblr goes through with their plans to change how reblog preservation works. In the notes you can find additional context, including numerous screenshots regarding the harassment faced by people. Though if OP has blocked someone (or multiple someones) it might prevent their comments and reblogs from appearing on the post notes now. You would have to go to their blogs to find them. Unfortunately there's nothing I can do about that. Maybe, if anyone contributed and they want to make sure you see it, they can post a link to their reblogs as well.

I'm a bit snippy in this interaction. That's because this was previously the interaction I'd had with Raxis, prior to Moonlitboar. And I was a bit snippy there, because yeah I just experienced the trauma of having my human right to bodily autonomy stripped from me and he was using it as a "gotcha" in a fandom argument. I'll remind you that he repeatedly calls me hysterical, by the way, both to my face and behind my back. So given the context that I first interacted with him in, that's cool.

I know I'm not perfect, but I feel like I was more than reasonable and willing to give him a second chance despite everything leading up to the Moonlit situation.

I am a lot less forgiving now, because I have given him grace and he continues engaging in the behavior that caused the problem in the first place. He and his friends are also escalating things beyond the pale, including such things as lying about people sending him death threats and falsely accusing me of engaging in blackmail when I tried to politely de-escalate the situation with the discord server mods.

2) "especially with the attempt to drag Edelgard's VA (Cristina Vee) into this drama and with the digging up of years-old Discord posts."

Couple of things here. First, Edelgard's VA is Tara Platt not Christina Vee. Second, I remember the anon who made the post and tagged her VA. They got called out, immediately apologized, and then came back and told me they fucked up.

Also, while it was a dumb decision at the time, it's not like 3H VAs haven't gotten involved in the fandom or discourse (e.g. Petra's VA has vocally shat on Rhea fans and Joe Zieja is his own whole thing. Hackney and Clark have also openly engaged with fan communities on social media as well) so I can also see why it made sense in Anon's head at the time. I don't see why you bring it up like there was some sort of sustained harassment of Tara Platt over the situation. It was one tag in a call out post, and Anon immediately acknowledged that they messed up and deserved to get called out for it.

Anon apologized over a year ago, it hasn't happened again as far as I'm aware, and Tara Platt is a grown woman who is well established in the industry. She can just ignore getting tagged one time in some fandom drama if she wants (and clearly she did), and I don't doubt that people @ her all the time in stupid shit and she's used to just ignoring it by now (if she even has her mentions on). Can we dispense with this misunderstanding and move on?

As for "digging up years-old Discord posts"

First, many of them aren't "years old". Second, many of us, in posting screenshots from their discord, were trying to prove that they were directing harassment toward us from their discord. Which they were. Some of those posts are old, because this has been going on since at least 2021. This is something I've explicitly talked to the mods of their discord about to try and stop. You can see my pinned post for a summary of how that turned out.

But feel free to ask any questions about it. As I've said numerous times, I have absolutely nothing to hide about what went on in my conversations with the mods of their server. I can grab you screenshots of literally anything you might want to know about what was said there, and I've already gone through and screen recorded every single message sent among us (with proof that I haven't deleted anything) just in case I got accused of something ridiculous and untrue. Which, uh, it seems that I have. So +1 for foresight.

3) "While I won't elaborate, I also have reason to believe that the anti-Edelgard crowd also has a complicated relationship with the truth"

I already mentioned this, but that's a pretty bold claim to make when you haven't spoken to any of us. You're trying to present yourself as an unbiased observer or someone trying to find the truth out, but if that's the role you want to have in this conversation then I'd really appreciate a DM in the future and an honest disclosure of your ties to the people involved. You know. Before you basically publicly intimate that I'm a liar or whatever is going on here in this sentence. Or at least explain why you think that I am lying in the public post, so I can actually respond to it properly instead of whatever is going on right now.

4) I am not God and I don't know for sure what the harassment entailed or who stole the URL, so I cannot make an impartial judgment."

So don't comment on it if you don't know what happened?

I can't tell you who stole the URL either. I can tell you that it was stolen, they reblogged a post mocking Moonlitboar for deleting everything after sustained harassment and talked about how they thought it was "funny" to pile on, and then mysteriously the blog was wiped a few months ago after Raxis got in trouble again for harassing someone else and people were bringing the situation up again.

So like? What's more likely? Someone who sympathized with Moonlitboar stole their URL to mock and inflict more emotional pain on them just for a hypothetical future fandom "w", or the guy and/or his clinger-ons, who have been involved in a pattern of harassing behavior over a span of two+ years, did something else harassing toward someone they were already harassing?

And really, logic hats on for a second. If someone who just hated Edelgard fans were engaging in a false flag attack why would they wipe the account and all of the evidence months ago? Not after they got accused of being a false-flag, but months ago when Raxis started getting called out for harassing Reyna (and possibly earlier, I don't know when exactly they wiped it)? Why would they leave it dormant after Raxis started getting called out and they started getting serious backlash for doing it, instead of continuing to use it for harassing purposes to give the "edelhaters" more "ammo"? Why have they never given it back to Moonlitboar that we know of if they were really on their side? Like, genuinely, where on earth does a conspiracy theory like this even come from?

5) "To me, the fact that this incident happened and that it continues to linger is symbolic of the fact that an entire section of our fandom has been turned into a wasteland where people are fearful to speak their mind."

Again, maybe this isn't want you meant, but the fact that you're putting this statement in the context of "the people who called out the harassment are liars and please give me proof that the harassers are innocent and being lied about" is uh. If you didn't intend it, you sure did imply something really nasty about me with the way you structured this post.

So again, here we go. Yeah, it keeps being brought up because it's evidence of a pattern of behavior that continues to happen. I'm happy to never bring it up again if it would just stop happening. Raxis is still stalking and harassing people in the same way he stalked and harassed Moonlit, so what happened to Moonlit is unfortunately still relevant. He doesn't even try to hide it, like, you can see it if you go to LITERALLY any one of his social media profiles. Like, maybe we should talk about the time he was posting about Nilsh's (who had him blocked for two years at this point) completely unrelated to Fire Emblem political opinions on Reddit just to shit on him? Would you call this normal, healthy behavior?

Most of the blogs Raxis stalks properly tag their posts so they can be blacklisted by Edelgard fans, and they often censor their posts so they don't show up in Edelgard searches by accident. This is quite literally the best anyone can do on Tumblr to keep people from seeing their shit without literally never speaking at all.

I think you would agree with me when I say that everyone should be allowed to express opinions about the games, without fear of being stalked and harassed, right? The fact that Raxis continues stalking and block evading, taking screenshots, and reposting them to numerous social media platforms including Twitter, Gamefaqs, Reddit, and Discord should be your first clue that normal fandom arguing behavior is not going on here. This is something you literally ban people for on your subreddit.

I know you're a mod on Reddit. Making an alt account to view a blog that has blocked you, taking screenshots of their posts, and reposting them constantly just to keep "arguing" with them after they have made it very clear that they do not want you to talk to them any more, is the Tumblr equivalent of a mod banning someone from a subreddit but they keep making alt accounts to continue posting. It's explicitly against Tumblr's ToS (look under harassment), and if their admins were worth a damn the guy would have been banned a hundred times over for it. He literally has tags he specifically uses to organize his posts where he's screenshotted people who have blocked him. He's even explicitly, publicly admitted to making an alt account to stalk people who have blocked him.

I have no beef with anyone who has opinions about the game that I don't agree with. I don't even read their posts. I am focused on calling out one specific collection of fans consisting of specific actors who continue to cause problems for the community, such as refusing to respect the block button and breaking ToS to engage in harassment.

A boundary is set. It is crossed. It needs to be called out as unacceptable behavior. Period. That's all that's going on here. There's no beef with Edelgard fans who follow the rules and the etiquette and don't do this shit, and I have never engaged with them like I have with Raxis (because there is no need).

6) "And I do not mean to be an "enlightened centrist," but this kind of thing certainly does not exclusively happen to BL fans and it is not exclusively perpetrated by Edelgard fans."

No one is claiming that it only happens to BL fans or that it's only perpetrated by Edelgard fans. We're talking about the specific actions of a handful of Edelgard fans.

7) "When we are at the point where there are accusations of conspiracies being lobbed between cliques, there is something wrong."

I'm not entirely sure what you're referring to, since I was not aware of any conspiracies until I read the one you introduced in this post.

Unless you're referring to people joking about Raxis having a sockpuppet account. Which, as I've stated above, isn't a conspiracy. It's something he literally admitted to publicly.

8) "Some people may be more to blame than others, but I do not believe anyone who continues to be involved can truly claim to be innocent."

I'm not going to pretend like I'm perfect, but when there's people literally talking about killing me I feel like I have to keep calling it out. Like. For my own safety. When I've tried to de-escalate and I basically get told I can go fuck myself and I deserve to be harassed, so yeah I kinda feel like there's an unequal contribution to the toxicity going on here.

9) "Let me say this again: this entire conflict has made people feel unsafe to discuss a game that they love."

I agree? That's why I keep talking about people who are making others feel unsafe. Like, you know, the kind of people who joke about how upset we get about being misgendered, engage in blatant queerphobia and racism, intentionally make comments about genocide to trigger people, make death threats, stalk, harass, etc.? I mean Raxis has now TWICE (that I know of) screencapped or quoted my anons out of context and posted about it on other platforms (I have him blocked btw). No reason to do that unless you're trying to start shit. Not to mention the blatant ableism people sent me over the Moonlitboar situation, or the post where someone accused me of having a persecution complex for talking about my experiences with sexual violence shortly after.

A collection of more screenshots.

Here's some more.

I've been consistent in what I'm trying to do here since it happened.

And that's just a handful of stuff I can immediately think of and find posts about, mostly specifically pertaining to me. Are you concerned with how safe I feel in this fandom too? I don't feel safe when people like this continue behaving like this despite my best efforts to ignore them, and I don't feel safe when they amp up on harassing me when I try to call them out for their blatantly toxic fandom behavior.

If you do have a problem with anything I've specifically said or done as I've gone about navigating this situation then you can go ahead and bring me specifics (off anon), with links to exactly what I've said, and we can have a conversation about it. I'd really rather avoid this pointless public vagueposting and non-specific shade that, contrary to your stated goals, does nothing but stir up discourse, dump fuel on the stupid "us vs. them" fire, and hurt feelings.

10) "This includes being a bystander - if you see stuff like this happening, even if it's from someone you consider a friend, do not be afraid to step in and say something! Your small, humble action could make a huge difference for other people."

You say don't be a bystander, but then also I did try calling out extremely harmful fandom behavior and you've made a post which, again, reads a lot to me like you're... asking people to please give you proof that I was lying(?) about someone you consider close enough to have been in regular contact with previously(??) without talking to me at all about the situation prior to posting it(???)

Like yeah, uh, not exactly encouraging people to feel comfortable speaking up if they're just going to immediately get told they "have a complicated relationship with the truth" for doing so?

More broadly now:

Listen, I've had this blog since 2020 and in all that time, to my recollection, I've only ever deleted a single post from it (which was about Engage and unrelated to anything we're talking about here). And someone went and archived the blog too back when this all first happened so you can go compare notes if you want.

I'm not trying to be a dick here, seriously, but it's a bit galling if I'm being honest. You're completely comfortable saying I "have a complicated relationship with the truth" despite the fact that you have either deliberately never spoken to me about the situation in question despite knowing I was heavily involved, or you don't know enough about the situation to even know I was involved and that I was someone you might need to talk to. Meanwhile, in the same post, you're openly asking for people to prove that someone—the guy you literally say has deleted and tried to hide his shameful bragging about harassing someone—is the victim of some conspiracy led by... who, exactly? Me?

Again, like, use our logic brains here. Who is more likely to have a "complicated relationship with the truth"? Someone who has never deleted a post and leaves everything they've publicly said about the situation (good or bad, perfect or potentially problematic) completely available for anyone to browse? Or the people actively trying to delete evidence?

11) Anyway we can wrap this up. I've invited folk numerous times to provide screenshots of Moonlitboar harassing people, which they've been repeatedly claiming is a thing that definitely happened to justify Moonlit getting harassed off of social media, and they have as of yet declined to provide any sort of evidence to me. They don't even describe instances that they can't obtain proof for (which would be reasonable as the harassment led Moonlit to delete all of their socials, thus the proof would no longer exist. Except, actually, it might because someone archived their blog at least two dozen times prior to them deleting it). At a certain point I have to conclude that they are being less than truthful about what Moonlit was doing leading up to this incident.

I do have evidence of Raxis stalking Moonlitboar despite explicitly being told that Moonlit blocked him and he was no longer welcome to continue interacting with them, though. So, y'know.

Again, I don't know what led you to make this post or if you meant for it to come across how it did, but please, don't continue speaking on this before you've done more research. You can DM me and I'll try to provide you links to anything you might need, and obviously I included some in this post to start, but it's impossible for me to condense two+ years of sustained harassment spanning at least half a dozen different people, a handful of perpetrators, and at bunch of incidents, into a single tumblr post.

Anyway hope that was coherent. Kinda spent too long looking at it at this point, just gonna send it off and go to bed.

Random thoughts the second - On Hostility in the FE Community, Part 1

This past weekend, more or less, marked a year since an incident that took place here on Tumblr regarding the Fire Emblem: Three Houses community. Specifically, it involved an artist being run out of the fandom due to harassment. Even as a relatively uninvolved person, this incident has stuck in my mind for the past year as perhaps one of the most egregious things to come out of the four years of discourse over this game. If you, my audience of two or three, will indulge me, I have a few rambles - so much in fact that I have to split into two parts. The first part will focus on 3H specifically, and the second will be on the broader FE community.

As I was saying, about a year ago – towards the end of September 2022 – there was an incident which took place on Tumblr. This incident involved a fanartist for Three Houses who was a fan of the Blue Lions. They were rather obscure, or at least obscure enough to where I had never heard of them before this. The artist deleted their social media after allegedly experiencing harassment from Edelgard fans which was allegedly over a comment over Sitri. Afterwards, their Tumblr URL was hijacked by someone else and used to reblog a rant from a prominent Edelgard fan. In that post, the person denied responsibility but they said that the artist “got what they deserved” and that they “fucked around and found out.” While the posts in question have been deleted, I do have screenshots of this happening in case anyone wants to examine what was actually said rather than taking my description as fact.

Generally, this person and their followers have been held responsible for what happened to this fanartist, and this story has been passed around as fact to this day. I was personally angered when I heard of what happened, especially because of the brazen URL stealing, the lack of shame regarding what happened to this person, and how irrelevant they were in the grand scheme of things. (It's one thing if this happens to someone who compared Edelgard to Putin or called Dimitri a racist or something like that - as poor of an excuse it is to point to that, it's at least an excuse. This was beyond the pale.) It pains me to admit that I allowed anger to get the better of me, and I apologize that I did so.

Since then, there’s been an interesting allegation. 

I’ve seen that when this story has been brought up, other peoplehave claimed that the artist was harassed off the Internet by “their own fans” and that members of the…we’ll say “anti-Edelgard” group had framed Edelgard fans as being responsible.

Sadly, I cannot immediately disbelieve this allegation. Some of the reaction to this incident was quite exaggerated, especially with the attempt to drag Edelgard's VA (Cristina Vee) into this drama and with the digging up of years-old Discord posts. While I won't elaborate, I also have reason to believe that the anti-Edelgard crowd also has a complicated relationship with the truth. It may be simplest to believe that it is the Edelgard fans who are lying and that whoever stole the URL sympathized with them or collaborated with them, but as things stand, it's a he said-she said situation. I am not God and I don't know for sure what the harassment entailed or who stole the URL, so I cannot make an impartial judgment.

(As an aside, while I'm not interested in debating this incident publicly, my conscience does weigh on me for having possibly spread calumnies in the past. If anyone per chance has evidence that there really was a conspiracy to frame Edelgard fans as responsible for harassment, I ask that this evidence be emailed to skelezomperman@gmail.com. If you convince me that there really was a conspiracy, I will publicly apologize. If you send evidence but it doesn’t convince me, I won’t say anything in public, so don't feel afraid to reach out.)

So this is where things stand, one year after moonlitboar was run off Tumblr. It would be one thing if this quietly faded into the background, but to this day I still see people spread this story (probably because nothing happened with any of the people involved, as far as I know) and to this day I see people play the blame game over this. To me, the fact that this incident happened and that it continues to linger is symbolic of the fact that an entire section of our fandom has been turned into a wasteland where people are fearful to speak their mind. It was egregious, but certainly not the only incident. And I do not mean to be an "enlightened centrist," but this kind of thing certainly does not exclusively happen to BL fans and it is not exclusively perpetrated by Edelgard fans. Many different people from many different cliques are responsible for this petty conflict and I would say that it has left a negative impact across the broader FE community. At the very least, I hope we can all agree that this shouldn't have happened and this person did not deserve this, regardless of what they actually said. I freely admit that I am naïve, but I hope that one day this will be resolved - that not only will the actual truth be known, but that all those responsible will apologize and turn a new leaf.

I will address this last part to everyone who continues to be involved in debates over FE3H, whether it is here on Tumblr or elsewhere. I recognize that with some of you, I have lost credibility due to past actions, but I hope you will still listen. When we are at the point where there are accusations of conspiracies being lobbed between cliques, there is something wrong. Some people may be more to blame than others, but I do not believe anyone who continues to be involved can truly claim to be innocent. I recommend that you do an examination of conscience: in other words, to review if your activities to fandom are truly bettering yourself and others or if they are detrimental. Those who are fanning the flames of conflict are quite possibly hurting themselves more than other people! I will get more into this in the second half of the post, but please, I really recommend stepping back and taking a long look at what exactly you are bringing to our community.

If you are spending inordinate amount of times getting into arguments with other people about 3H, or if you see yourself as part of some kind of war, or if you are looking down on other people, or if you see yourself as a martyr, you should take a step back and consider if you actually being a positive influence or if you are part of the problem. Yes, some people do say really stupid, mind-blowingly dumb things, and I understand the temptation to rebut it - I feel it a lot. But it’s worth remembering that sometimes it’s best to just leave them alone and lay off. Lack of discretion is a big reason why many people have been made to feel unsafe in a community discussing a game that they love. Let me say this again: this entire conflict has made people feel unsafe to discuss a game that they love. Putting everything else aside, this alone should be enough to make anyone in this community feel ashamed. It is very regrettable and we should all review to see if we have contributed to that and what we can change to prevent that in the future. This includes being a bystander - if you see stuff like this happening, even if it's from someone you consider a friend, do not be afraid to step in and say something! Your small, humble action could make a huge difference for other people.

To those of you who have made it to the end...congratulations? You are probably asking: how is this thing that involves a few dozen people at most relevant to the broader FE community? Tomorrow or Friday, I will post the second half of this ramble in which I address hostility across the entire spectrum of intensity, from a simple backhanded comment to outright harassment like this. From there, we can perhaps truly discover what it means to be a welcoming community and better ourselves and each other.

[scooprtroopr]

anti billy lol

OH! Lmfao okay thank you for clarifying, sorry I literally just woke up from a nap and was like “what does this mean!” Honestly I think to some degree I've always been worried that someone would ask me this question and I would answer and get bombarded with shit from people, so I'm gonna answer but please no one send me shit or I will just find the most unrelated things to answer with and it'll really just be a waste of your time.

I’m gonna do my best to explain my thoughts because I am not often great about that. And I think the conversation around his character has a lot of layers to it so I’m sorry is this is wordy and more info than you’re looking for!

So like the straight to the point answer is that I do not like him.

HOWEVER! I think as a character he adds a certain element to the show. Like going back and watching seasons 2 and 3 I’m like “aww yeah man screw this dude” but like, I think that’s just kinda how they set the character up and wrote him. I don’t personally think he’s a very likeable character. And that’s fine! I think shows and movies need characters that you’re kinda meant to dislike or hate. Like that in its own way gives his scenes their own kind of enjoyment.

In terms of what that means for my blog and interacting with the the fandom, I mean look my take on that is that ya know this is my blog and so im not really gonna post about him unless there’s ya know a post I think is kinda funny (and yes those posts are likely not particularly kind to him). And I would just ask that people who follow me and like him respect that I don’t like his character and so there may occasionally be posts i reblog that do not sit well with those people. I know there’s at least a few of you that follow me that like him and I’m sure by this point you know this is not a pro-billy blog and we’ve all been able to vibe with each other well enough.

I do think in certain circles of the internet his character gets away with A LOT of awful shit. Like I don’t get how people are able to excuse his racism or ya know him trying to run kids off the road. Does part of that have to do with the fact that Dacre Montgomery is an attractive dude? Yeah I think so. Do I think part of it is that people are willing to overlook negative characteristics of a character they like and think is hot? Also yea. And that’s what really doesn’t sit well with me, like if you like him as a character good on ya but if you are willing to overlook that shit and pretend he’s a precious baby who has done no wrong I just think you should maybe really sit down and think about why you’re excusing those actions and how that may extend to a real life scenario.

I dont know if any of this makes sense but I kinda just word vomitted unintentionally, so sorry about that!

[khaleesiofalicante]

I really said fuck classes who needs notes anyway (i do I have 5 tests in the next two weeks)

before I post my live blog here, I feel like people really underestimate how bad rumors are and how much they fuck with your mental health. they don't lose sleep over them, they don't think twice. but these things are harmful as fuck. they leave wounds that take so long to recover from because you keep on thinking about these lies who to others are "just words"

I've been there. it's not fun. I wish I had the courage back then to stand up to those rumors which I have now. these things never leave you. others might move on but the healing process is a journey that is long and hard. I wish more people understood just what effect their words can have.

Yeah, he knew a thing or two about family members going overboard with glitter.

IT'S RAFAEL CENTRIC GHSYGUJDUYDFUIKFDUIDFIUDF

TAVVY

TAVVY

TAVVY

DCSUIHDCSUIDUYUDICUIVSDUIHFVSUILFBUHKIFSV

I feel like I keyboard smash A LOT

“You will never drink even if you are not riding the bike,” Dad had pointed out – all Consul Voice and threatening glares. “The legal age for drinking in New York is 21.”

“But it’s 15 in Idris!”

“Well unfortunately for you, we are in Exile,” dad had grinned.

DAD ALEC UHIKSFDUIHKSGUIKSDVUIHKDVUHIKSVD

Max had a habit of ‘borrowing’ things and selling them on eBay. In his brother’s defense, Bapak had so many clothes that he never noticed when things disappeared. But Rafael did since he had a habit of wearing his father’s clothes.

The warlock – not the shadowhunter.

He wouldn’t be caught dead in one of those sweaters.

Now that Rafael was 18, he was almost as tall as his father.

The shadowhunter – not the warlock.

I AM SCREAMING

I love how he's clarifying which one he's talking about

“Do you know I used to have a crush on Lily Chen?” Tavvy blushed. “But then I found out she made out with Helen once and it kinda got weird.”

Ah yes. I remember. Does Rafael know that Alec also walked in on them?

ARCHITECT TAVVY

SDHDVUHDFSV,YDSFVUYVSFFUSVFUVFS

SHADOWUNTERS ATTENDING MUNDANE COLLEGES

“Dude, college kids don’t give a shit,” Tavvy laughed. “You could walk into a lecture covered in runes, holding a seraph blade and they wouldn’t give you a second look.”

“Cause they are chill?”

“Yes. But mostly cause they are dead inside,” Tavvy chuckled.

Surprisingly that's exactly what my grade 6 prefect told me (DAMN WHY AM I ALWAYS REMEMBERING GRADE 6 IT'S BEEN YEARS. that was a horrible year *shudders*)

ANJALI IS A CENTURION

LMAO THIS IS WHAT RAFAEL MEANT WHEN HE SAID HE WOULDNT WANT TO GO TO THE SCHOLOMANCE FOR PERSONAL REASONS

I still ship them.

“The meeting is going to go perfe-What is SHE doing here?”

Well, that was a quick change-

Unlike Aunt Maia, Lily did not like to be called Aunt Lily. So, Rafael respected her wishes. Max of course continued to call her Aunt Lily and sometimes Abeula Lily since his brother had a pathological condition of pissing people off.

THAT'S SO MAX OMG JHSXUHSCUHISDHUHUKIDVS

great now I miss Raphael

I HAVE A CLASS IN 7 MINUTES STOP MAKING ME CRY

that is so thoughtful of him though...

tears.

“There are no photos of Raphael,” Lily sighed.

“Because he is a vampire?” Tavvy asked sympathetically.

“Because he is Raphael,” she grinned. “Vampires can most certainly take photos. You should follow me on Instagram. My handle is simp_for_carstairs.”

Of course, it is. No one is surprised.

Tavvy picked one up, took a large bite and it threw it back immediately. “Holy shit, that’s spicy!”

“White,” Lily and Anjali snorted at the same time.

white people and their bland foods smh

“She is not wrong,” Lily nodded seriously. “I’m a Jem Carstairs fan first and a vampire second.”

As she should be

UHDSUHDFSUHFDH ANJALI AND RAFAEL COMPETING ABOUT WHO'S LILY'S FAVORITE

He observed Anjali’s long dark hair spilled over her shoulders as her eyes stayed on Lily – sharp, protective and beautiful.

"Beautiful"

I AM NOT LETTING THIS GO

I'm THE DAMN CAPTAIN OF THIS SHIP

FUCKING RUMORS

I'm GONNA KILL SOMEONE

“Shadowhunters are awful gossips,” Anjali said. “Let’s not waste our time with this nonsense.”

There was something in her voice. Something he couldn’t put his finger on.

No, wait I want to know what was in her voice.

But no. It couldn’t be. They weren’t dating.

YET

Rafael was sure there was something more than friendship between them. But David was polite to a fault and Max was an oblivious little shit. So, obviously nothing had happened yet.

OH MY GOD THESE TWO

But this was different. He would tolerate rumours about himself. But he would not tolerate rumours about his family.

I and Rafael will beat up the people who spread these rumors together :D

“She once told me she likes sipping tea more than drinking blood.

I-

same.

NOT THAT I DRINK BLOOD-

RAFAEL LMAO NO

"I hate her she's so annoying"

continues to daydream about her and how tall she'd be without those boots, lies to tavvy about her dating someone

Why did he do that? What was the purpose? Did he not want other people to date just because he wasn’t dating anyone?

And he calls Max oblivious.

oh class started

shit

IDC IDC I'LL STILL BE READING

LEXI AND SELENA ARE AT THE ACADEMY

JACE HYPER FIXATING ON THINGS BECAUSE HE'S BORED IS SUCH A MOOD

“David and I added rosemary to this one,” Uncle Jace wiped his hands on his apron. “It has definitely improved the taste, hasn’t it?”

“Save me,” David mouthed from behind the man.

LMAO POOR DAVID

“Empty nest syndrome,” Rafael chuckled. “I’m glad neither Max nor I had to leave home. My fathers are much worse.”

He remembered his first sleepover at the institute. His parents had waited for “an excruciating hour” before crashing the institute and joining the sleepover themselves.

yup, that's them.

“David,” Rafael grinned. “Are you afraid of my father?”

“What? No! He is the just a regular person…who can throw me in the silent city any time he wants,” David rambled and then shook his head. “Where is Max?”

He tried to sound nonchalant. But Rafael noted the way the other boy’s eyes fluttered every time he said Max’s name.

Just the way a crooked smile appeared on his brother’s lips every time someone said David’s name.

Idiots

ok, there is so much to unpack here.

DAVID HAS A VALID REASON OK??

These two are such IDIOTS HUSDUHISCUIDSVCUIHVSDUHI

“Max said Bapak is biased, and that he needs an unbiased tutor. Uncle Ragnor volunteered,” Rafael chuckled. “God bless the poor man.”

“Max isn’t that bad,” David replied.

“Looks like you’re biased too, David,” Rafael winked and picked up a spare bow from the training room.

of course, he is.

G-FORCE KJHSDCUISDYUKDFSUYKDSVYUSFD

oh shit

oh shit

WHO DID WHAT THIS TIME

what's the rumor and who do I need to kill

He didn’t know her well. But she knew a lot about him. Just as she knew a lot about the twins. She was one of those people who was oddly invested in his life just because Rafael happened to the Consul’s son.

what is her problem?

what the fuck

I need a minute

I need a minute to digest that

I'm so glad I closed my camera in class

what the actual fuck did she just say

tell me I'm hallucinating

times like these I wish I was Jared 19

no, because I'm actually speechless right now

Paige and Irene need therapy

OH SHE WENT THERE

“Paige, that’s enough!” the Dean snapped at her. “How dare you talk to him that way? You talk about warlock corruption but where all of you when Valentine exploited Jace and Clary? Where was this moral obligation when Valentine lied to his children and played with their feelings as if they were nothing but toys to be controlled and manipulated? I’m sick of shadowhunters victim blaming children instead of holding people like Valentine accountable.”

THANK YOU

SAY IT LOUDER FOR THE PEOPLE IN THE BACK SIMON

I feel like we all focus so much on the "incest" and hate on clace we forget that this part of the story was literally an abuser seeing that the victim was recovering and took the only thing which made him happy from him

I can't believe this

“Children have been suffering for a long time now, Paige,” Uncle Jace said now, his fists balled at his sides. “Where were you when Alec proposed the child protection bill? We didn’t see any of you supporting it.”

“We had other priorities,” the older woman replied. “People were dying! It was not the right time for a new law. We could have always signed that bill later. There was no rush!”

OTHER PRIORITIES MY ASS BITCH FUCK YOU

hey just realizing Rafael is the token straight

I'M SORRY IM TRYING TO DISTRACT ME

“The Cohort who made children kill themselves to prove a point?” Uncle Simon asked dryly. “That Cohort?”

I am so close to either crying or killing someone or both.

This was Max’s spot since it had the best Wi-Fi coverage.

yeah trust me I spend all the time in the guest room because it has the best wifi coverage or the study.

MAX IS SMOKING TOO

YOU FUCKING IDIOTS

oh wait

oh they might be alec's

yeah

For the next thirty minutes, Max paced around the room, threatening to portal all the shadowhunters to hell.

Then he went on about a plan to attack the cohort and portal them all to hell too.

He kept talking about portalling people to hell.

MAX YES LET'S DO IT!!!!

But here is the thing about people, they don’t get to you. You get to them.

They simply say something and leave. They probably don’t even mean the things they say or lose sleep over it. But it wasn’t the same for you. You obsess over it. You stay awake at night and let it consume your dreams.

YES! To others, it's just words. meaningless. to you, the effect can be so so deep. it's not easy to always brush them off.

NO MAGNUS

THAT'S IT

MAX AND I ARE PORTALLING PEOPLE TO HELL

WE'RE DOING IT

why do we hurt others?

my teacher: ill take a test on this chapter. all 20 units

me: softly crying because people are little shits and they hurt others.

“Fuck everyone else,” dad hissed. “They’ve hurt our family enough.”

EXACTLY. LEAVE THEM ALONE.

“I am simply being honest with you,” Dad interrupted. “I could never be okay when you are away from me. But I will manage. Max is going to raise hell though. So, that’s going to be fun.”

AS HE SHOULD

Neither Rafael nor Max would never admit it out loud, but on the day of that sleepover, on the day their parents had crashed the institute bcause they had missed the kids too much…Rafael and Max had been only a moment away from calling their parents to come pick them up.

He's right though.

it'll take time. lots of it maybe.

BUT THE ACTUAL AUDACITY.

It fucked with his mind so much.

Rafael...ALRIGHT WHERE ARE MY FLAMETHROWERS

“DAD! BAPA! WAKE UP! RAFE IS TRYING TO RUN AWAY!”

MAX REMINDS ME SO MUCH OF MY LITTLE BROTHER

He had forgotten about the bloody paperwork. Shadowhunters on their travel year had to notify the Clave and get their paperwork in order.

Well, it shouldn’t be a problem since the Clave was standing across the hall.

EXACTLY

Because it was killing him. It was killing him not to be lying on the couch, his head resting on his Bapak’s lap just like every other Saturday morning.

It was killing him not to touch, not to love, not to care.

GET MY FLAMETHROWERS AND CANNIBAL GOLDFISHES WE HAVE SOME WORK TO DO

(goddamn every class I have taken so far the teacher has told us there is a test coming up it's 9 am in the morning.)

His brother growled at that like the little feral animal that he was.

that's adorable actually.

“Fine,” Max rolled his eyes. “Does this mean I can also travel? There is a Twenty One Pilots concert in Sydney and-”

“Nice try,” Dad said. “But no. You are staying here.”

“Excuse me, but what about my healing?” Max demanded. “I’ve been traumatised by this thing.”

“You can go to therapy,” Rafael winked at this brother.

Therapy is boring but useful so-

He needed to survive this. So, he decided to go back to the place he had learned how to survive in the first place.

He needed to go back home.

UGLY CRYING WHILE TAYLOR SWIFT PLAYS IN THE BACKGROUND AND MY HISTORY CLASS IN 2 MINUTES

I'm so proud of him for this...

I still say we kill these people.

JOAQUIN AND JULIETTE

UHISDCUIHFSDUGUIDFVDSDVFJHGDFVHUKDVHUKVF

Camilla Alvarez.

well well.

OH THEY KISSED

“Right,” Rafael had said. “Gap year. Besides, I do talk them. My brother threatened to paint my room in hot pink if I don’t text him every day.”

hands max a pint of paint HAVE AT IT

Max: Also – New Rumour. Dalliance between Lily and Tavvy.

Rafe: OMFG WHAT

Max: They are running with it and freaking old n*philim out.

AS THEY SHOULD UFUHIFUIHFUIHKFU

THE CENSORED N*PHILIM I'M SCREAMING

“He is hot.”

He laughed out loud. “Yeah. I hear that a lot.”

“Your dad looks kinda scary,” she pointed out.

Rafael laughed again. “Yeah. I kinda hear that a lot too.”

I'm liking this ship...

I'M STILL LOYAL TO THE RAFAEL AND ANJALI SHIP

but I'm happy for him. I'm glad he's getting the space he needs

Dad: Jst found legal age fr drnkng in Buenos Aires is 18.

Rafe: ????

Dad: I hv friends thr.

Rafe: ???

Dad: Thy r watchn u.

Rafe: Creepy but okay.

HJSDCGUIHJGSDCYUICVXUHVUHKDV

THE BOY'S DRINKING Y'ALL

Do it

MILA IS GOING TO NY!!

I like her. she's nice.

He was leaving soon. He didn’t see the point in lying to her. “I ran away from home. Kind of.”

“Why?”

“I hurt someone I love,” Rafael confessed. “The person I love most in the world.”

honey, it wasn't your fault... hugs

Shit. Why wasn’t Bapak going to the accords signing? He had been there for every single one since the very first time.

no no no no is something wrong?? I'm worried.

“You look taller,” Rafael told his brother who hadn’t grown an inch.

LMAO

Max and I are vertically challenged.

“Rafe, go to talk to him. Or I will tell everyone you’ve been smoking in the balcony!”

So, he was going to pin this on him, huh? This little shit.

well-

“You’ve progressed from freaking to fucking,” he pointed out.

“That’s not the fucking point, Rafael!” Max said in exasperation.

“You did it again,” Rafe pinched Max’s cheek. “My little brother is all grown up now. Linguistically I mean.”

“Dick."

I CAN'T WITH THESE TWO

When he had gone back to Buenos Aires, the place was completely different - even the shadow market.

There were no abandoned children in the streets. There were no racist and ignorant leaders exploiting innocent downworlders.

There was only growth.

His father had done that. Alec Lightwood had helped Joaquin and his people create a new world in Buenos Aires.

This shows how much people can flourish under good leadership if they really try.

YOU KNOW I'M SUPPOSED TO BE TAKING THESE NOTES DOWN, NOT CRYING OVER THIS.

“I will protect our family. I will protect our friends. I will protect those who ask for my protection. But I will not tolerate their hate. I will not turn my head and pretend it doesn’t hurt. Because it does hurt and that’s not okay.”

Rafael smiled at that. “Yeah. Yeah, that’s not okay.”

“The accords is important. But so am I. There is no point in signing a treaty that is meant to value equality if I have to sign it while being surrounded by those who refuse to respect me or my identity. I simply cannot do it, Rafael. I hope you understand.”

I'm sobbing like YES YOU DONT OWE THEM SHIT. THESE UNGRATEFUL BITCHES.

“It’s taken me a while to realize this. But I don’t owe the nephilim anything,” Bapak said firmly. “It’s about time they realize that too.”

YES EXACTLY

“I’ve known shadowhunters for a long time, Rafael. Good ones. Bad ones. All kinds of them – and shadowhunters have always defined themselves by their love. Not by your weapons. Not by your runes. Not by your last names. Not by your laws. Shadowhunters have always defined themselves by love. So, don’t ever let them take that away from you.”

I want this on a T-shirt. These damn shadowhunters and their love.

“Like the Accords Hall kiss?” Rafael grinned.

“It’s the stupidest thing your father had ever done – which is really saying something,” his father laughed. “But it’s also the bravest thing I’ve ever seen him do. And that’s how I knew.”

affectionate sigh that's alec.

“Good. Max is sitting in the porch and singing All by Myself,” Tessa chuckled and closed the door. “Just thought you should know!!”

Rafael giggled at that. “He must have given you hell.”

“Nothing I couldn’t handle,” Bapak shrugged, and Rafael raised an eyebrow. “Fine. I might have promised to buy him a car when he turns 18.”

“You’re hoping he would stop aging by then, aren’t you?” Rafael chuckled.

Max is so dramatic I aspire to be like him.

Blue banners when the lost return, the shadowhunter rhythm said.

Rafael had returned home – and he was no longer lost.

I'm ok I say as I cry during my history class

I'm so proud of him.

“Well, that needs to be rectified immediately,” Dad said in the Consul Voice and literally yelled. “I am about to kiss my son – on both cheeks! You better gossip about this too!”

“Oh my god, stop!” Rafael giggled and tried to escape.

“YAS!” he heard Uncle Jace yelled from somewhere. “GIVE US A FOREHEAD KISS TOO!”

THEY ARE SO DRAMATIC I LOVE THESE IDIOTS SO MUCH.

THEM ADDING TO THE ACCORDS AS THEY SHOULD OMG

“The hell is hate speech?” someone asked.

Do you not have a dictionary you uncultured swine

“There is a very clear difference between free speech and hate speech,” Cristina Rosales pointed out. “The fact that you don’t seem to know that is all the more reason for us to include this provision.”

YES CRISTINA

“By the angel,” an old man gasped. “There is no need to be so emotional. The younger generation can be such snowflakes.”

What if I just strangles him

“Discriminatory language?” a woman demanded. “What does that even mean?”

“Calling vampires bloodsuckers,” Lily Chen answered.

“Calling warlocks demon spawns,” Ragnor Fell pointed out.

“Calling werewolves fleabags,” Maia Roberts declared.

“Calling faeries half-breeds,” Kieran Kingson all but yelled.

The fact that they have had to deal with this shit for YEARS. (also why Kingson? isn't Kieran the king?)

THE QUEEN HERSELF IS HERE Y'ALL

“Which one of you shitheads said hate speech is harmless?” Anjali demanded, her voice booming over everyone and everything else.

YES ANJALI

Anjali had a grin of her own. “While that might true, Paige, there is most certainly a law on child protection. You didn’t just hurt Magnus Bane. You also hurt his son. Section 7 of the Child Protection Bill states that any person who physically or emotionally injures a child through ill-treatment, neglect, abandonment or abuse is guilty of breaking the covenant.”

“Damn straight!” someone yelled from the crowd – it sounded suspiciously like Kit.

CALL THESE BITCHES OUT YES

“Rafael is not a child!” someone yelled again. A lot of them this time. “It’s still not illegal. The law doesn’t say so!”

“By the angel, for someone who is obsessed with the law you people seem to know nothing about it,” Anjali said in exasperation. “The child protection law defines a child as a person under 18 years OR younger. The incident happened when he was still 18. It’s illegal.”

YES ANJALI FUCK THESE PEOPLE

“I’m the Inquisitor’s daughter,” she said. “Next time, think twice before you quote the law at me.”

SHOW THEM, QUEEN

How did she know his birthday????

ahem

“So, if you do hurt him emotionally, you can still be implicated. You will face charges and you can possibly be stripped of your runes,” Anjali pointed out seriously. “Now I ask you again. Does anyone else have to say anything about him?”

There was absolute silence then.

“Didn’t fucking think so,” Anjali spat. “I literally had to mention the stripping of your marks for you to respect another person’s basic rights. If you give half the value you place on your precious runes to other people, we wouldn’t be in exile right now.”

The Cohort looked terrified – of Anjali or their future in the Clave, Rafael didn’t know.

“People are dying,” Anjali said, her voice heavy now. “Our people are fucking dying, and you seem to be more bothered with who is sleeping with whom. Shame on you. Shame on all of you!”

She turned to the Council. The Inquisitor looked like he was going to cry from pride. Rafael’s dad looked half terrified but mostly impressed. Lily was blowing kisses at Anjali. The other downworld leaders looked quite pleased.

Shadowhunters are so fucking bigoted and narrow-minded. I'm seething right now.

also, alec looking scared-

“THAT’S THE BEST SHIT I HAVE EVER SEEN IN MY ENTIRE LIFE!” Emma Carstairs yelled.

“Goddamn, I wish Magnus was here to see this,” Uncle Jace grinned. “That was satisfying as hell.”

“No worries, I recorded the whole thing!” Kit put up his hand.

YES YES AND YES

“Fuck the Cohort,” Rafael giggled.

“Actually, I would prefer you use the word screw,” his father pointed out. “Screw the Cohort!”

“Oh my god, Dad!” Rafael rolled his eyes. “I am allowed to swear once in a while.”

“No, you are not,” Dad said firmly – this man was so not ready to meet Max’s new persona. “As your friend pointed out, you are still a child.”

Alec seeing Max curse left and right: 👁️👄👁️

"She hates me!"

“Rafael, she stood up for you in front of the entire Clave. She fought the Cohort. It was incredibly brave. I wish she had spoken to me before without causing all the chaos. So, it was a little stupid of course. But still brave.”

Stupid but brave.

YESYESYESYES IT'S HAPPENING!!!

ANJALI WHO HURT YOU

WHO DARED TO

Names. Give me names NOW

Jaime no...please no not Jaime.

please please, please

ok, I searched it up. And he can get treatment. He can live. It doesn't have to be serious. please, Jaime...

“If you ever tell anyone you saw me crying, I will drag you to Idris and drown you in Lake Lyn.”

This is such an Anjali thing to say.

OOO MILLA (Mila?) MESSAGED!!! Is there gonna be some sort of love triangle here??

me who despises love triangles (aside from TID of course): ...

BUT SINCE IT'S YOU I'M SURE IT'LL BE AMAZING. I'm still nervous about this though...

UHCUHDVUKDVHUKVHUVHM I LOVED THIS CHAPTER SO SO SO SO MUCH IT WAS A LITERAL ROLLERCOASTER AND ANJALI QUEEN I LOVE

see ya on Friday!!

OKAY I AM LOVING THIS ENERGY BUT PLEASE FOCUS ON YOUR CLASSES FJKSDFHJKSJFHKD I PROMISE THE STORY IS GOING TO BE HERE WHEN YOU GET BACK LOL.

But I am so glad you like it. Amidst all your screaming and chaos, I always find very perceptive and profound observations. It's fantastic! I love it so much!

Thank you for enjoying LBAF - and good luck with your tests!!!