#literal babbles

[damienthepious]

watching @nanowrimo within a single hour:

make an awful, ill-conceived, sponsored post about "responsible"/"ethical" uses of ai in writing

immediately get ratio'd in a way i've never seen on tumblr with a small swarm of chastising-to-negative replies and no reblogs

start deleting replies

reply to their own post being like 'agree to disagree!!!' while saying that ai can TOTALLY be ethical because spellcheck exists!! (???) while in NO WAY responding to the criticisms of ai for its environmental impact OR the building of databases on material without author consent, ie, stolen material, OR the money laundering rampant in the industry

when called out on deleting replies, literally messaged me people who called them out to say "We don't have a problem with folks disagreeing with AI. It's the tone of the discourse." So. overtly stated tone policing.

get even MORE replies saying this is a Bad Look, and some reblogs now that people's replies are being deleted

DISABLE REBLOGS when people aren't saying what nano would prefer they say

im juust in literal awe of this fucking mess.

[eastgaysian]

the specific frustration with dungeon meshi is that there's been a very distinct shift in fan content and a very clear reason for it. it was one of the rare cases of a decently popular work where the vast majority of fan content you saw was gen or f/f; m/m ships existed but they were not anywhere near as overwhelming as in other fan spaces, and people who heard about dunmeshi by word of mouth often came in knowing about farcille. the anime started airing after the manga was completed and is a pretty faithful adaptation, it's not as if it added any more fanservice/sexualization/shipping fodder. the only difference is that it made dunmeshi more mainstream/popular, and that's when the focus started shifting towards m/m ships and away from gen and f/f. for the people who enjoyed being in a fan space that unlike 99% of fandoms wasn't m/m focused, that fucking sucks, and there's nothing you can do about it because you are always flat out outnumbered

[anghraine]

It's interesting (if often frustrating) to see the renewed Orc Discourse after the last few episodes of ROP. I've seen arguments that orcs have to be personifications of evil rather than people as such or else the ethics of our heroes' approach to them becomes much more fraught. Tolkien's work, as written, seems an odd choice to me for not wrangling with difficult questions, and of course, more diehard fans are going to immediately bring up Shagrat and Gorbag.

If you haven't read LOTR recently, Shagrat and Gorbag are two orcs who briefly have a conversation about how they're being screwed over by Sauron but have no other real options, about their opinions of mistakes that have been made, that they think Sauron himself has made one, but it's not safe to discuss because Sauron has spies in their own ranks. They reminisce about better times when they had more freedom and fantasize about a future when they can go elsewhere and set up a small-scale banditry operation rather than being involved in this huge-scale war. Eventually, however, they end up turning on each other.

Basically any time that someone brings up the "humanity" of this conversation, someone else will point out that they're still bad people. They're not at all guilty about what they're part of. They just resent the dangers to themselves, the pressure from above, failures of competence, the surveillance they're under, and their lack of realistic alternative options. The dream of another life mentioned in the conversation is still one of preying on innocent people, just on a much smaller and more immediate scale, etc.

I think this misses the reason it keeps getting brought up, though. The point is not that Shagrat and Gorbag are good people. The point is that they are people.

There's something very normal and recognizable about their resentment of their superiors, their fears of reprisal and betrayal that ultimately are realized, their dislike of this kind of industrial war machine that erases their individual work and contributions, the tinge of wistfulness in their hope of escape into a different kind of life. Their dialect is deliberately "common"—and there's a lot more to say about that and the fact that it's another commoner, Sam, who outwits them—but one of the main effects is to make them sound familiar and ordinary. And it's interesting that one of the points they specifically raise is that they're not going to get better treatment from "the good guys" so they can't defect, either.

This is self-interested, yes, but it's not the self-interest of some mystical being or spirit or whatnot, but of people.

Tolkien's later remarks tend to back this up. He said that female orcs do exist, but are rarely seen in the story because the characters only interact with the all-male warrior class of orcs. Whatever female orcs "do," it isn't going to war. Maybe they do a lot of the agricultural work that is apparently happening in distant parts of Mordor, maybe they are chiefly responsible for young orcs, maybe both and/or something else, we don't know. But we know they're out there and we know that they reproduce sexually and we know that they're not part of the orcish warrior class.

Regardless of all the problems with this, the idea that orcs have a gender-restricted warrior class at all and we're just not seeing any of their other classes because of where the story is set doesn't sound like automatons of evil. It sounds like an actual culture of people that we only see along the fringes.

And this whole matter of "but if they're people, we have to think about ethics, so they can't be people" is a weird circular argument that cannot account for what's in LOTR or for much of what Tolkien said afterwards. Yes, he struggled with The Problem of Orcs and how to reconcile it with his world building and his ethical system, but "maybe they're not people" is ultimately not a workable solution as far as LOTR goes and can't even account for much of the later evolution of his ideas, including explicit statements in his letters.

And in the end, the real response that comes to mind to that circular argument is "maybe you should think about ethics more."

[mylittleredgirl]

i can't stop chewing on the MASH time loop situation. my star trek brain will not turn off. there is definitely some kind of temporal anomaly at play, but it's not really a time loop in the traditional sense.

effects carry over from loop to loop. they appear to age. the same wounded soldiers appear on the table three times, but the scars of past surgeries are still there. a character leaves or dies and is gone from the mash forever; their replacement arrives near the end of the war and is still there at the beginning. the dates overlap, yet their presence is sequential. the other characters remember all of them.

how far does this effect extend? if it's summer again at mash, is it summer in tokyo? is it summer in maine? if BJ is in korea two years before he arrived, who's in residency in california, marrying his wife, conceiving his child?

their family trees at home deform—different wives, different children, loved ones alternately dead and alive and never born. those inside are oblivious to what they've lost. hawkeye remembers trapper, but not his sister. what happens in korea persists; the world outside is a fragile suggestion. he tells a soldier that men at the front can't see the whole war, only the other guys dug in with them on their one little hill.

for a deep space nine fan this is irresistible. hawkeye says, wars end, but war is forever. kira asks, if the past has changed, why do i still remember it? sisko never left that ship. time itself is warped by trauma. it is not linear. you exist here. you choose to exist here.

[aesthetic-bbyg]

“STOP TRYING TO FUCK THAT CLOWN”

WELL HOW ABOUT YOU MAKE ME🙄🙄

[y-rhywbeth2]

Bhaal talking to you in the journal updates is fun, but honestly nothing in BG3 has topped the one-sided conversations you get to have with this asshole in your dreams during the original games. It nicely illustrated how Bhaal thinks of his spawn and also gives you a good idea of how the Dark Urge's nightmares usually go. I feel like I'm missing things without having to listen to his ego every other night.

Look at this A+ parenting! (These moments have lived in my head rent free for at least a decade so I'm sharing them.)

"Such pride is undeserved, great predator, when your whole being is borrowed. Credit where it is due, and dues where payment is demanded."

"You will learn."

[stabs you with a knife]

[drowns you in blood]

[sets you on fire]

[disembowels you as the Slayer]

"...you will learn to trust me. Don't be afraid. You are safe here... if you behave."

"[My other child] clings to her old life as though it actually matters. She will learn."

"You will come to realize how little choice you have. You will do what you must, become what you must [...] You will accept the gifts offered to you."

"Fall to your knees! You can do no other!"

"What do I want? Your life, your soul, your body! I am the instinct that will fuel the father! I am the blood!"

"I lurk behind your soul, in the very fibre of your being. I am the only thing left when mind and reason are stripped away. I will show you what you can be, what you can do… if you simply let yourself become what you are. I can show you all of this, because I am within. I am what fills the void. I am you."

"You are to be given a gift. It is a valuable prize, one that you had better appreciate."

"You worry for your companions perhaps? Leave them, abandon them, and become what you must. There is great power in your heritage. Use it, and become closer to who you are… what you could be. Feel what is in the void. Use the tools that you are given. Become part of something greater. I am in you, and I know what is best. Each time you use it, each time you accept it, you move a little closer to the evil within. Perhaps you lose yourself in the end, but you will go to greater reward than you can know. After all, what does an eternity of nothingness matter, when you can [easily] destroy all that would oppose your development..."

This didn't work, so on his next attempt Bhaal did his best to ensure this kid would be tailored to obey and have no personality outside of being an extension of his will. Clearly his mistake was waiting until they were adults to start fucking them up, so - kill your family!

[bidokja]

the way orv beats you over the head with "you can never fully know a story, you can only ever interpret it, this being true doesn't make your love for the story any less real. through communication and interconnection we can grow our understanding of a story. this also applies to yourself." and then hits you with the combo of "now replace Story with Person" and knocks you out cold

[sunnymainecoonx]

Horror's silly I guess..... idk sometimes I just want him to slam people idk

Sighs the man's a little angy don't judge him... Jesus he's ugly

[bluebelledmoon]

dude PLEASE take the day off

[superstarrockin]

i forget how to use this app sometimes but omg one piece community let’s be friends….my dms are open. being my friend is a great investment

[picas-art]

Lost & Found (Riddler/Scarecrow) -  Page 23 First page | Previous page View on Webtoon

To quote my other half when he saw the sketch of this page:

"Omg it's finally happening!"

Like this comic? Buy me a coffee!💚

[jaxyscreams]

Fucking sobbing at the convo between Toby and Harriet in episode 9

Though it’s through metaphors it’s so obviously two autistic people talking about the struggles of not fitting in with allistic people

And it’s such a beautiful moment of emotional connection

Especially with the combined shots of Harriet fidgeting with the pocket watch that Toby handed her (his obvious safe item) for comfort

[anghraine]

It's wild to me that I had heard of the prime Kirk/Spock content in various TOS episodes long before I saw them, but had never heard of what IMO is the shippiest moment of all thus far, in an interestingly O_o goddamn I do not want whatever you two have but you do you?? holy shit though what a moment way.

I'm of course referring to the otherwise rather mid episode "Requiem for Methuselah," in which Kirk has an underwritten love affair with a clueless woman whose various secrets have to be discovered before her inevitable death.

At one point in this relationship, her.......uh, guardian??? sort of???????? had Spock play the piano while she and Kirk waltzed, which (in-story) Spock did perfectly while somehow managing to silently exude even more intensity than usual. After the plot (and her life) were over, we end not with the usual cheerful bit of snark on the bridge that ends most episodes, but with a weary Kirk falling asleep with his head on his arms and Spock hovering not for away. McCoy exposits the last bit of detail and then goes on an unprompted and honestly pretty viciously racist speech about how Spock, unlike Kirk, will never suffer from the joys and travails of love because of his inherent lack of feeling as a Vulcan. The speech is longer than usual and just really mean-spirited as McCoy waxes rhapsodic about all the aspects of passionate true love that Spock will not and cannot experience as a Vulcan before he just leaves.

Spock then turns to look at Kirk, and now just bleeding intensity, takes a few slow, deliberate steps towards the sleeping Kirk, lays his hand against Kirk's cheek and neck, and then very obviously mind melds with the sleeping Kirk while murmuring, "Forget."

Is this healthy respectful behavior that honors Kirk's autonomy? No, obviously. Is it god-tier repressed homoerotic passion between two people who should probably just work their issues out and stop inflicting themselves on anyone else? Yes.

[pudgybun]

I was laying down with my feeder in bed, making out and cuddling while he rubbed his cock against my ass and squeezed on my belly fat. I started getting rly turned on so I just kept whimpering "I need it... I need it!" Over and over again and without missing a beat he goes "Need what? A ham and cheese croissant?" and the thing is. He's RIGHT that actually was what I was talking about

[chickpea0]

Do you guys ever think about historical age regression? And no I don't mean in fiction I mean like how there's so many people that regressed. What was it like? Do you wonder if there was a regressor and their caregiver who lived in the 60s? Did any adults or teens in the early 1900s wish they had a rocking horse every time they saw one in a shop window? What about even further, in the 1800s? The 1600s even. Older?

We're not alone, maybe modern day is during a time where regression is more present because it's a perfect amount of certain factors, sure but it's not like someone in 2014 just decided to! I think it's really facinating and intimate to imagine all these people throughout the years going through what we go through. And I bet a good lot of them lived happily. And maybe quite a few found a good support system.

[hinasho]

Raka: the human girl followed you all the way from your camp?

Noa: yes. it’s very annoying

Raka: and an Eagle follows you as well? You have TWO animal sidekicks that follow you??

Noa: I guess

Raka: and you can SING?????

Noa: well—

Raka: the old books have spoken of this phenomenon before. Animal sidekicks & singing. By any chance, was one of or both of your parents the leader of your clan?

Noa: actually yes. how’d you know?

Raka:

Raka: have you ever heard of this mysterious ancient creature known as a “Disney Princess” Noa?