#maybe people want ‘clout’ but this website does not have clout so i do not understand that angle

[kimtsunoyaiba]

I don’t talk much here about anything outside of Kimetsu itself, but I’ve noticed some people in this fandom try to take credit for… literal screenshots. It’s a bit wild.

[onyxisnotuniqueenough]

ATTENTION ATTENTION (VERY FEW) CITIZENS OF ONYXCITY

THIS IS A CALL, FROM YOUR LOVELY MAYOR, TO MAKE YOUR VOICE HEARD! MAKE YOUR VOICE HEARD ! MAKE YOUR VOICE HEARD!

basically tell me if like you're there. i'm getting tired of this bullshit. truly truly. every few months i make a post along these lines where i ask all my followers to interact so i know that i'm not talking to the void, and everytime i'm met with silence, it's reason more for me to post less and less. if you're somehow, by some miracle, someone who looks at my posts, you probably would have noticed how much the frequency of posts have lessened. and it's! honestly! because i feel completely alone on tumblr! i'm glad a recent post on my art account helped me to meet one or two really nice people, but that's all the human interaction i get on this website. and i'm tired of it.

i know i don't write less on here because i have less to say, but because i feel like i have less space to say it. my mind tells me constantly that committing to logging on every day is useless cause nobody sees anything of mine anyway. even during the phase where i'd try to write funny jokes and one-liners, or when i committed hard to a fuckin roleplay account, it still didn't do anything.

so here are all my cards. i am someone who's extremely excited to share their original stories and creative projects with the world, but only gets attention on fanart.

HOW can i make people interested in what I'M interested in? I don't want to draw fanart that much! I don't want to be an artist on social media who only does that!

that bullshit thing when people say "your excitement/enjoyment will show through and everyone will love it as much as you do! do what you like until it works!" is not fucking working!

does any artist here have advice for me? what the hell can i do to get myself out of this hole? is there another social media out there i can post my art to without being scared of ai? that is popular?

i don't want to make videos. i don't have the equipment, the privacy or the confidence for that. i am talking about ... well this.

my art acc : @onyxalsolikesart

ps : i know tumblr isn't about clout. i'm not about clout. i'm not trying to get famous. i just want to make friends, answer questions and talk about my characters, get feedback and MAYBE IN THE LONG RUN potentially have a few interested commission clients if ONE day i can afford a tablet and draw digitally.

[thelordofgifs]

very excited for the next tfs arc, hopefully maglor has time to recover from his many wounds in time to get more pincushion-ed. I love how maglor has the most and least plot armour simultaneously. Any pointed objects in a metre radius spontaneously attack him but he will. not. die. He persists.

Also, very funny that curufin is lost. You don't know where he is, he might not know where he is! He could be anywhere. He could be in your house! He could be in my house! If i see him i will let you know!

where did most of the feanorian soldiers go? If any of them are still loyal i imagine they could be useful later.

Anyway I'm looking forward to the return of everyone's favourite feral woodland princess!

Is thingol's fate going to change in this fic? The feanorions have even less political clout than they did in the silm so he's probably not going to be negotiated with without a really good argument. Without Celegorm and with Curufin missing/not going to do any more arguing and the lack of forces for them to use I don't know how a second kinslaying could happen but I am excited to find out!!

lol I think I’m going to give Maglor a little break from the pincushioning – he has Been Through It lately and now deserves a nice long rest in which to recover and get many hugs from Maedhros and prepare for his next character arc!

WHERE IS CURUFIN. WE DO NOT KNOW. tbh if he’s in anyone’s house it would be yours – he knows how much you love him!! Although I am now dying to see a giant wanted poster for Curufin. Or not even wanted in the criminal sense but more like a lost dog poster. Maedhros and Maglor can stick them up all over Hithlum like hi have you seen our lil brother he’s the absolute worst but we’d like to know where he is

Ok so I actually went down a rabbit hole here thinking about numbers. According to random websites whose sources I have not thoroughly checked, the average fatality rate in a medieval battle would have been about 10-15%, going up to maybe 25% for really bad ones. (Sadly the small sibling is away at university now so my usual source of military facts has disappeared.) Since the Nirnaeth was probably THE worst military defeat in the legendarium, and it involved Balrogs and dragons, we could put an upper limit of like 30% on fatality rates on the battles of Beleriand? Although Barahir somehow managed to get his entire fighting army presumably numbering at least a thousand down to thirteen guys so maybe that’s an underestimate! Also most fatalities taken by the losing side are apparently during the retreat, not the battle itself; and since Maglor managed to draw off the orc armies during the fall of Himring, let’s say that Maedhros lost… 15% of his people in the fight. So definitely a pretty bad defeat, but not awful. Then of the remaining 85%, let’s say 75% went south to Amon Ereb and the last 10% have decided to join up with Fingon instead. But Maedhros has explicitly renounced his command of them, so that lot aren’t really Fëanorian soldiers any more. Meanwhile Caranthir and Amras just received a LOT of reinforcements, not to mention some extremely confusing news about what’s been going on.

Anyway yessss I am SO excited to have our feral woodland princess back and causing trouble!! More than one person in the notes was wondering if she’d show up and stop either the execution or the fall of Himring as a whole and I felt really sad about not being able to do that, but the timelines just don’t work out. But she’s going to have Stuff to do (some of which I know about and some of it I only have very vague ideas about).

Ok so Thingol… I really need to do some thinking about him. What I can tell you is that the fall of Nargothrond, Húrin bringing the Nauglamír to Doriath, and the subsequent death via entirely preventable racism thing is not going to go down the same way in tfs as it does in canon (which isn’t to say none of those things will happen – but if they do happen, they’ll happen differently). So his fate is going to be different, but that doesn’t mean he’s going make it out okay necessarily! My instinct is to just make a bunch of people have conversations and see what conclusions they come to. The AU is going to get into some very uncharted territory soon, and I will absolutely be making everything up as I go.

Thank you for the ask ❤️❤️❤️

[conkreetmonkey]

(rant, as a new Tumblr user (not actually that mad, just having a little fun))

I need all Tumblr users to understand that I will never interact with any post that explicitly asks for reblogs or likes. idc how many cutesy emojis you wrap that turd in, take that Facebook shit somewhere else. Especially people whose already obnoxiously existent under-post blurbs say something like "reblogs>likes!" Fuck off, if I was going to do either of those things, I certainly aren't planning to now. It's like if I gave you a $5 bill and you said you wished it was a $10. I'm trying to be nice, you greedy bastard. Stop being so passive-aggressive. This isn't a business transaction, but you're acting like a used car salesman trying to haggle for the best price. I'll give your post what I think it deserves.

Unless there are actual stakes behind a post, like if you're asking for help or spreading important news, or maybe even trying to promote an art account (sometimes), I respect it. Otherwise, I despise it when people beg for digital brownie points. It gives me Reddit "le updoots" flashbacks. I already hand out likes and reblogs like a kindergarten TA does a bag of dollar store lollipops. I'm not obligated to spread every one of your dark academia AU Klance fancams like the damn town crier. Your post should be likeable on its own accord, without you grovelling for scraps like a starving street dog every time you post a pink-tinted Twitter screenshot you stole from an Instagram repost bot.

And it's especially pathetic when it's just mindless selfies or other wannabe influencer shit. Clout means less than nothing here, and you get it by posting worthwhile content, not just by having a fat ass crammed into beige leggings. Nobody's going to pay you to advertise weird diet beverages if you get enough reblogs, and interaction doesn't prompt an algorithm to spread your insipid, soulless content slop. This is not a website for influencers. We do not want you here. You are a digital parasite that adds nothing and seeks only to take. Go away.

This isn't even mentioning the graphic design of some of these banners. Some of you even have brightly coloured little jpegs, although these are, I've found, more often used for DNI lists. Either way, it's obnoxious, and made more obnoxious by the fact that it was seemingly made in MS Paint by a preteen fujoshi in 2008. Get your pink text on magenta gradient backgrounds away from my poor eyeballs. This is the kind of thing that should be in a pinned post or a bio, not on every goddamn post you make. JUST STOP.

[imightgetbetter]

this will probably be quite long-winded so i'm going to put it under a read more. this has nothing to do with matty or the band, it's my other favorite artists, but i just can't talk about this on my main blog because i fear the people i am talking about will find it and harass me and talk shit about me for weeks again (this happened after an anon mistake and a bit of an impulse decision back a few years ago and i hated my life and almost deleted my blog because of it) so i trust that this will stay between us (as much as it can on the internet)

so my main blog is a primarily harry styles/niall horan blog with a whole bunch of my shitty diary posts and things i think are silly. it started with niall and harry writing and then when niall went on hiatus after his last album it became a primarily harry blog because i wrote my biggest story in the height of the pandemic and it gained a lot of traction during quarantine. in that height, someone started talking shit about niall and i went to his defence as any lonesome teenager does and it backfired on me gravely and this group of harry styles blogs that think they're very popular and cool harassed me about it. it was awful for weeks. i basically couldn't go online without having a panic attack. anyways, it's that same group.

all they do is talk about how much they think niall is a copy and paste of harry or that he isn't marketable or that he can't pick singles or that he pushes his streams and charts too much. all while claiming they don't care about him and hate him or whatever. they say all these things that simply aren't true. harry didn't "create" marketing campaigns on websites, neither did niall! however, niall's last album was marketed through a website and videos everyday and all this. harry isn't original in his techniques, the difference is that his following is so insane that they will do every single marketing thing for him. he doesn't need a team of people to do it. these fans are so insane that they are doing a job that people get paid to do. niall does his job! that's why he's telling people to stream and whatnot.

niall's songwriting is miles and miles better than harry's, but because of the way they think harry is the best at everything, they don't recognize that. niall started working with amy allen (a writer harry worked with on his last album) nearly six years ago, maybe even seven. she co-wrote my favorite niall horan song, to this day. like, they saw amy allen and tobias jesso jr and freaked out that niall was copying harry, as if niall isn't also a songwriter in the industry. like .. i genuinely am so sick of this conversation! (i also would compare niall's songwriting in depth and meaning to matty's, which is why i love it so much)

it's also very fucking annoying that harry stans have created this whole culture around going to concerts and liking artists that is so toxic and annoying that i can't stand it. like, half of the people at niall's pop up shop today weren't even singing his songs, they were singing the harry songs that were on the playlist. or the way all these harry stans are suddenly talking about niall on tiktok to get clout or merch or whatever it is. i've literally been a niall fan or whatever since the very beginning of one direction, i followed him on tour way back when, he's the reason i love live music and want to work in touring. i love harry, i do, i've gone to his shows plenty of times and talk about him and have a blog and a story, i'm not saying anything bad really about him, but it's so frustrating to see how people treat other artists just compared to harry styles and i literally am getting so annoyed every day.

okay i think i'm done. like i said .. this is between you and me and god.

[greaseonmymouth]

I’ve been avoiding reblogging stuff about Palestine and Israel on here because it’s not what I use tumblr for (and also because I prefer to get my political news from outlets that aren’t tumblr) but I have seen a massive increase in these gofundme posts on my dash in the past few months, including a massive increase in guilt tripping. And every time I want to say, but vetted by who? Why are you letting yourself be preyed on like this? Please take a breath and look after yourself and think twice before sharing the gofundmes or donating to them.

As OP has pointed out, most of them are scams. I cannot trust that any of the ones making the rounds here are any of the few legitimate ones. I also do not have a ton of money so when I do donate, I want to be sure my money is actually going somewhere it can help.

Here are two organisations I have been donating to:

Palestine Children’s Relief Fund (PCRF)

Save The Children (I have actually been donating to the Danish branch Red Barnet)

These are reputable global organisations with a documented history, paid employees, volunteers, and the means to bring aid to where it needs to go.

As OP mentions there are multiple reputable charitable aid organisations that could really use your money to actually help people. There are likely even local branches in your own country you can look to. Here are two orgs in additions to the ones I mentioned above:

United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA)

Anera

And here are two websites that can be used to look up a charity:

Charity Navigator

Charity Watch

And look, maybe all that is overwhelming and frightening and maybe you feel like you’re just throwing money into the void. Maybe you don’t even have any money to spare and are just reblogging all the gofundmes because you don’t know what else you could be doing. Here are a few suggestions:

Stop reblogging the gofundmes. Frankly, get off tumblr when it comes this stuff. There is no way to verify anybody’s identity on this website. Anonymity is a feature of this site. The blue checkmarks aren’t real.

If you really absolutely must do your activism online and on tumblr, please start sharing posts about reputable organisations, like the ones mentioned in this post, instead

Check if there is a local organisation to you that helps refugees and asylum seekers where you live that you can support instead of reblogging into the void

Online clout isn’t real and you don’t need to perform. By this I mean: it does not help Palestine or Palestinians that you are driving yourself into the ground yelling about this stuff online, letting yourself be guilt tripped and then turning around perpetuating the guilt. Look after yourself

Local organisations often struggle more for money and support than the big global orgs, so please consider these. After all, once the refugees have gone somewhere else, they still need support. Here is one example of a local-to-me organisation that I support:

LGBT Asylum Danmark

And finally: You cannot save the entire world. Do not let yourself get preyed on and burn out with guilt and stress by manipulative scam campaigns. Do what little you can to help and remember that together we will make a difference.

I am Amira, the breadwinner for my family after my father's death. We were forced to flee to the southern part of Gaza after the war intensified. Our home, my university, and my workplace were bombed😢.

We are now in desperate need to escape this danger and continue my dream and educational and professional journey💔. I kindly ask you to donate or share the campaign link. Your support can save our lives and give us a chance to live in peace🍉.

Thank you from the bottom of my heart🙏.

Hey folks! Let's have a quick conversation about charity scams, because God love you little peanuts but you are spraying my dash with this "Save Amira/Noor/Abdullah's family/etc" shit these days.

In brief: if you want to help the people of Palestine, give to a legitimate organization, like the UNRWA (as I have). Individual "Palestinians" or "Palestinian families" reaching out to solicit donations are overwhelmingly going to be scams.

"But I reblogged it from someone who said that this fundraiser was verified!" The person saying that is either (1) in on the scam, (2) actively the one running the scam, or (3) painfully naive. "Verified" by who? How? They never say. It's always just some shit like "I've known Amir for 12 years and he's like a brother to me, that's how I know his heart is true." I can say that too. I just made Amir up, but our bond is real and his Facebook profile is 100% legitimate. Please consider his need for €30,000 verified.

I get it, I really do. You want to DO something to alleviate all some of this suffering, and helping an individual or a specific family feels more real than giving to a faceless organization. That's why those "for only one dollar a day, you can feed this specific photogenic child in Africa, who will make you a piece of bespoke macaroni art as a token of his love and gratitude" organizations do so well. Attaching a face to the suffering motivates donors. Reputable charities like Save The Children know that, and so do scammers.

But when you allow scammers to take advantage of your empathy and your desire to help, you are directing money away from the people who need it. You are directing energy away from where it would do some good.

Charity scams have surged since Israel's invasion of Gaza. Some scammers set up entire fake websites pretending to be legitimate relief organizations. Some scammers hack or spoof legitimate Palestinians' e-mail and social media accounts in order to solicit donations. But all of that is a lot more work than putting together a photo collage of some rubble + some attractive Arabic-looking people in what plausibly might be Gaza, setting up a GoFundMe, and copy-pasting the same message to a few hundred or thousand accounts on social media. Like...this is literally the lowest effort scam out there. Social media monitoring tools have tracked a 40% increase in scam-related content since the "All Eyes on Rafah" movement gained momentum.

Some of these Rafah crossing GoFundMes are legitimate. It is deeply unfortunate that there is no easy way to tell them apart from the frauds which vastly outnumber them. For those who are pained by these appeals for aid, and want to give to an individual or a family instead of a reputable relief organization, please consider:

There are more than 800,000 refugees in Rafah at this point.

Egypt only lets a very small number of people through the crossing every day. I've read numbers as low as 150 and as "high" as "a minimum of 500," with 250 being the figure reported most.

Every one of those people needs to pay between $6000 and $15000 to make the list. If you get added to the list but miss your window, due to lack of internet connectivity or, you know, any of a hundred other reasons why the people in Rafah might not be able to check a fucking website right now, you lose your place, lose your money, and have to start the whole process again.

To put it bluntly: every person who pays to make the Rafah crossing is taking one of a horrifyingly small number of slots away from the other 800,000 refugees, and it's not even a guarantee of escape. And the more money that gets funneled into this process, the higher that price will rise, as corrupt and opportunistic travel agencies and Egyptian officials gouge desperate people for as much as they can get.

This is not an effective way of spending your money. Unless it's for your personal family, in which case, yeah, obviously you do everything you can to get these people specifically out of Rafah. But if you just want to "help the Palestinians?" You're not.

Which brings us to Amira here!

Clicking through to Amira's GoFundMe brings you to this little gem, organized by an "Abdallah Alanqar," which features the kind of writing I'm more used to seeing from clickbait retellings of Reddit posts designed to get you to look at ads.

"When sorrow and difficulties strike hard, hope becomes the lone star in the dark sky. This is the story of Amira, a 23-year-old girl who found herself bearing the burden of her family after her father's death three years ago due to the coronavirus."

Am I...am I meant to believe this is her bedroom? Amira's personal bedroom? This is clearly catalogue photography.

"After her father's passing, Amira found herself taking care of her family, consisting of her mother, sister Noor, and brother Abdulrahman. Her mother, suffering from high blood pressure and diabetes, faces health problems that further complicate their situation. But courage and determination drive Amira forward."

Good, great, well-lit stock footage of rubble, gotta have some of that. The same photo collage is also used in this GoFundMe for "Mohammed Alanqer," also run by "Abdallah Alanqar." That one's a little better, Abdallah clearly at least raided someone's actual Facebook page for family photos. Amira's here has no photos of her at all, and just one selfie on her Tumblr.

Mohammed also has a Tumblr! The pinned post starts with: "Hello, my name is Mohammed Alanqar, and I am from Gaza Palestine 🇵🇸. I write to you today with a heavy heart💔, seeking hope and help. The ongoing conflict has put my family's life in grave danger🙏." Weird how this ostensibly 36 year old man writes exactly like our 23 year old Amira.

Also, if you go to Mohammed's Instagram, it's 100% interior design photos from either AI or magazines - you know, the kind of stuff you usually see on fake Instagram accounts - until July 12th, at which point it suddenly switches to tons and tons of photos of this one Arabic family. I hope they're alive, whoever they are.

It goes without saying that if you Google any of the names of the people mentioned in these GoFundMes, the only thing that comes up is the GoFundMe and the promotional social media surrounding the GoFundMe. That's weird, right? Mohammed ostensibly had a start-up (not that we're told what it was called). Amira was a student. You'd expect that Googling their names would turn up something.

Anyway, back to Amira.

"Amira worked as a teaching assistant at the university while pursuing a master's degree in data science, and also worked as a programmer in a company. Her life was going smoothly until war came and destroyed everything."

Just "the university" and "a company." No details, nothing that would let us actually look up if Amira exists or not. (They also include more stock footage of rubble here, I'll spare you.)

"Her university, workplace, and home were completely destroyed, forcing them to flee south in search of a safe haven. Now, Amira and her family live in tents for displaced people in Deir al-Balah, where they suffer from water shortages and the spread of diseases, posing an additional challenge, especially for her immunocompromised mother."

Note that they don't say fled south from where. I'm not sure about the relevance of the photos here; is this supposed to be depicting the dirty, abysmal conditions in Deir al-Balah? Because this is just what outdoor cooking looks like. I had an identical meal in the backyard of a Lebanese family I knew growing up. This looks like a nice day. The close crops + blurred edges on these photos are there to make it harder to find the original images sources, btw.

Blah blah blah, you get the picture. This is nothing. Amira doesn't exist.

"But her post says she was vetted!"

Sure enough, her pinned post does feature this:

I don't know any of these people offhand and wouldn't blindly trust them with my money, so let's dig a little deeper, shall we?

Nabulsi's post is not "vetting." It is an uncritical reposting of the information (and images...) in Amira's GoFundMe, without any additional comment or context.

Fairuzfan's post is just a wordless reblog of - oh, what's this? A post by "Ameera Alanqar," as in, our OP? Just a different blog run by our good friend Amira here? And all of the posts on that blog are about Amira and Mohammed, and how much of your money they need?

Sar-soor's post is just a wordless reblog of Nabulsi's post. Again, no context or further information provided.

Aaand 90s-ghost's post is just a wordless reblog of the same post, again, reblogged from @amira-alanqar, a blog which has now been deleted. Add it to the list with @amira-world and @ameera-anq.

I found another deleted blog called @palestinian-fundraising which put a big "VERIFIED AS REAL" stamp in red across the bottom of these posts, with a link that just goes back to...Nabulsi's reblog. None of this is vetting. None of this is anything.

I know you're upset. I know you just want to help! I know you want to do anything, even if it's small, even if it's just reblogging the words of some desperate young woman or family man in the hopes that it gets them a tiny bit closer to safety and peace. But you are accomplishing nothing but putting money into the pockets of scammers. Amira's GoFundMe has raised €17,826. "Mohammed's" GoFundMe has raised €48,958.

Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop.

[h34vybottom]

Because of certain reasons or whatever I try to keep my online shit on this website pretty concise. Pretty clear cut to whatever extent I can in the moment but I dunno I'm kind of over being clean for the moment. A lot of bad shit has happened to me over my life and like it fucking sucks and I hate it! And I want shit to ve different and I want people to never be like how I was as a kid and you know I can't do that. I have no actual power or anything. I have no influence over anyone. Oh fuck me one note on a post FUVK now I'm really a social media influcenc3t. Like nah. I've been ignored for so long and I hate that shit. I'm not asking for attention here, I'm just saying shit. This era of online everything and everything being sooooo hostile on every level that you can't even go outside anymore w/out some annoying cunt trying to make you into fucking views. Actual fucking freaks like me can't catch a break and I'm sorry but who the fuck is asking for all this shit? Why are people so eager for clout and shit? The money? The fame? You want your life to be that fucking miserable? You want to ruin others that fucking easily????? You want to subscribe to Twitter Blue that badly? Get your misinformation cheques that much? Sometimes I wish what I said had meaning in a world so wanting to get rid of meaning in exchange for profit. Sometimes I wish my words had value and that people understood that shit beyond misinterpreted byllshit. Sometimes I wish there was fucking nuance. There ain't shit. Nothing. Not a fucking thing. This is such a me issue. Like I dunno maybe I wish the people in charge of governance would actually, you know. Give a fuck!!!! about th e people they're dooming..like no it's not good that corporations literally get away w/ actual fucking slavery. I need that to stop. Can't do shit about it. I don't want Apple using fuxking CBP and other parts of the US government to criminalize, harass, and dismantle small businesses because they want complete and utter control over how people use their own purchases and ultimately their lives. You know. Heavy shit. I try to not to be so heavy all the time on this interred net of ours, BUT YOU KNOW sometimes it's impossible..sorry buddy. I get ignored anyway so what the fuck does it even matter

[ughseoks]

indefinite hiatus notice

hi everyone 🤍 this announcement has been a very long time coming, and i apologize for beating around the bush for so long.

this sideblog has only been active for about a year and a half, but i’ve been on this platform for nearly four years now. during this time i’ve made countless friendships—ones that i will treasure forever—and i am endlessly grateful for the incredible people that tumblr has brought into my life. i am also so incredibly thankful to have been given access to a platform where i could share my stories and have thousands of people support me along my creative journey. this blog has served as an outlet and an escape for me for a very long time, and i’m very grateful for that. but unfortunately, it’s time for me to take a step back and move on.

⬇️

i’ll refrain from stating too much about the blatantly obvious fact that a good amount of this fandom is toxic. i’ve been burned, hurt and betrayed more times than i can count by people i once trusted for the sake of clout and attention. this community has a gross tendency to encourage the idea that relationships between bloggers can and should utilize toxicity, drama and bullying as a way to gain a following, and to be frank, i am exhausted. tumblr fame literally does not exist, and it’s beyond disappointing and disheartening to see people act so aggressively and viciously towards others for the sake of a follower count that only they can see. my goal on this platform was always to post my content and make friends, and it’s sickening to see bloggers who only care about their follower count. that being said, the toxicity of the fandom is not the only reason i’m leaving, nor does it define my entire experience on this platform. i will forever treasure the wonderful memories i’ve made while being active, and the bad ones have taught me valuable lessons along the way.

some of you may have noticed that i’ve been pretty inactive for a few months now, and there are a few reasons for this. in the simplest terms, i’ve moved on from writing on tumblr. this blog was created as a way to pass time in quarantine, and now that i’m busy again, i don’t see the need to continue keeping it alive when i don’t feel passionate about it anymore. it has served its purpose, and i have new priorities now. i have a group of irl friends i love dearly, a degree that i’m more passionate about studying for than writing fanfiction, and new memories to make outside of the online world. i’ve just… moved on from this blog, this website and this hobby. it no longer means to me what it used to, and i feel disingenuous keeping this blog “running” when my heart just isn’t in it anymore. it’s a bittersweet goodbye, but i’ve simply found things that i would rather focus on and flourish in as opposed to spending my time here.

i want to take a second to thank you all for all of the love and support that i received regarding the mxm announcement i made a few weeks back. i’m very thankful to have such kind and loving followers. the statement is still partially true, as i’m not abandoning writing completely—just on this platform. i will continue to upload mxm fanfiction when/if i have the time and inspiration on my ao3 account. i’m unsure how often i’ll be writing, maybe one or two short fics a year if i’m lucky. the one thing i do know is that i will not be uploading on tumblr again.

to those of you who’ve made it this far, thank you for reading 🤍 i appreciate you all and i am forever thankful for the support you all gave me while i was active. my mutuals are more than welcome to keep contact with me on discord, and i may log onto tumblr periodically just to check in on things, but it’s safe to assume that i’m basically gone. it’s time for me to move on to the things that fulfill me and make me happy rather than forcing myself to stay here.

thank you all for giving me a place to escape in a time when i needed it most. i hope that my works were able to do the same for you. 

i’m leaving this period of my life with a heart full of love and gratitude. from the bottom of my heart, thank you.

your favorite cowgirl,

lainey 🤍

[ragnarssons]

people are fcking wild lmao. calling me a fake activist for not supporting aquaman 2 because of amber turd, saying “you don’t support the pocs working on it”. have you actually watched my blog? do you know my life? i’ve been out there on social medias, supporting ray fisher the whole way through, on instagram, on twitter. i’ve been out there, supporting EVERY. SINGLE. ONE of jason momoa’s projects whether small or big: heck, i’ve paid for stupid apple tv just to watch “see” and i’m among the only 30 people on this website knowing about this show! i’m even gonna pay netflix again just to watch “sweet girl” in august, i watched frontier back when it came out, i watched red road, road to paloma (jason’s movies) and all- HECK I BOUGHT HIS SHOES because i 100% support everything he does for environment and to stop single use plastic. don’t go around and pretend wb doesn’t KNOW what they’re doing by keeping amber heard on aquaman 2: there literally IS a petition to have her fired, with TWO MILLIONS SIGNATURES on it. watch the youtube comment section on every video with her, every aquaman-video related on youtube: THE ONLY THING PEOPLE ARE TALKING ABOUT about this movie (and these movies) is her and how they won’t support another movie with her, and people have voiced it pretty openly. tons of aquaman fans 100% support jason momoa and love him as aquaman, they loved patrick wilson, they loved yahya, and NONE of us want the movie not to exist: WE JUST WANT AMBER HEARD OUT OF IT. that’s the thing: you want to be an activist for the pocs of this movie? well get her out of it, because they will LOSE by having her on it, and neither wb nor amber heard herself will suffer because of it, it’ll be the pocs i’m supposedly not supporting who will suffer the most. for everything they’ve heard from the public, wb KNOWS amber heard is the problem and the only thing people are opposing regarding aquaman 2. nothing else. fans loved james wan’s version, prefered it to what even zack snyder’s showed for atlantis in justice league. fans loved jason’s version of aquaman, he’s got nothing but praise for it. fans all want to see more of black mantha and mostly regretted him not being properly exploited as a villain on the first movie (since y’know, i’m part of the fandom, i actually know that). so no, me, not supporting a studio that has chosen to stand their ground and to stand up for a racist/abusive/homophobic b*tch (and yes, she is homophobic, don’t come at me saying she can’t be because she’s bisexual, there are proofs) who can’t even come at some locations to work (ie: australia), at the expanse of ACTUAL POCS (who will lose a lot of money, maybe credibility for working with her) is not me being a fake activist. yes, amber heard is NOTHING in this movie(s), that’s why it could be so easy to replace her. she’s just there, playing pretty while the actual pocs of this movie carry the movie (jason, yahya, james; all doing an amazing job that already HAS been tarnished by amber heard- as seen again, through social medias and and such). and again, that’s not adressing how she LITERALLY bullied jason momoa through the whole press tour, mocked him and his character and oftentimes said mera was the main character and “the hero”????? (again, everything is out there, on this thing called the internet, do your own research): some examples, her playing the victim because jason “tore her book’s last page” and how her and her fans literally called him an abuser and toxic for doing so, trying to have him cancelled. how she and her mob LITERALLY cyberbullied zoe kravitz (aka jason’s step-daughter, and also a poc) for talking positively about johnny depp. not even gonna talk how she openly mocks johnny depp (let’s still talk about him, no matter what, you are still ignoring THE AUDIO TAPES where she admits to being an abuser- and the other audio tape where we actually hear people - witnesses to the scene - say she cut his fcking finger!) on social media and bullies him (or anyone who stands up against her; even australia’s prime minister, while SHE is the one who comitted a crime in this country!), how, again, we have PROOF that she’s a racist: faked her activism for black lives matter, refers to latinos as “maids”, uses the n-word. PROOF that she’s homophobic: mocking johnny depp for running to his bodyguard, saying he should shag him and such. PROOF and TESTIMONIES that she’s literally The Worst to work with. PROOF and TESTIMONIES that she ABUSED her assistant and stole her r*pe story for clout. PROOF that she used sick kids for clout and didn’t donate ANY money to charities, even tho she kept screaming at the top of her lungs that she did, only to gain popularity and play the selfless victim even more. remember how she became the spokeperson for dv victims, even tho she was charged back in 2009 for abusing her girlfriend? (and again, we have audio tapes where she argues the difference between punching and hitting her husband, while drugging him with xanax but ok) please, tell me again how much of a “fake activist” i am for not wanting to support that woman and the studio that keeps a blind eye to everything she’s done, to her loved ones (yknow, the actual footage that shows that whitney, aka amber’s sister had been beaten by amber), to the public eye, and to her colleagues on the set of aquaman itself?

[species-id]

Mod here, this is a anon group owned blog where anon things are submitted.

Us : checking notifs

Ppl claiming a stock image website is pushing an exclusive anti alterhuman agenda: oh deer

this is in no offense to the websites maker. but I think a disclaimer needs to be made. I'm gonna have a professional side, but also an unhinged side. So in my professional voice I'll say. No free stock image website is pushing an exclusionary agenda. Why are yall sounding like....

This is where my mother, defender of baby queerios, Begins. Buckle up if you want some fun, the defense of the unserious search of identity, life, and maybe some funny stock images.

The replies are So funny bc yall are claiming this definition is trying to fix something or talk over you when it isn't. Like wtf bro. It's a free website with no press and free stock images.

"If you don't like alterhuman then don't use it "

Anon to the resource blog: OK I made another term for anyone to use. submitted it to resource page. Here's a free website or whatever this is for anyone that resonates. ANYONE THAT RESONATES.

Comments: "stop trying to fix what isn't broken and pressing things on ppl, stop excluding ppl for ur comfort dont remake it."

Well, stop telling ppl that theyre doing actual nefarious things like actively excluding people based on a niche blog ? Remaking it? Why yall like a similar term erases another? Yeah, It just sounds like yall think every general umbrella term made is an attack on yours. I assure you it's not. It's not just yall though. It's an alternate flag, sign ect. Gets this treatment. It's literally just a post on how someone defines alter being. Sometimes we post a flag or two.... To me alter being is the a different way of being in the world than normally accepted. It includes all that alterhuman does. Simple as that for me. FOR ME. every reply here is stating their view of this website as "yes i know this is what exactly they meant" but I've seen it defined differently the same way I've seen so many renditions of EVERY other term.

I could go off and say theria- from theirans means theria as in placental mammals and therefore exclusive to reptile therians. Theyre making an exclusive term against reptiles. Thats how y'all be sounding.

And on the other side of that..you know what if a reptile feels that way about it they have all the rights to say they aren't a therian if it bothers them so much.

They'll use something else (whatever they want) and won't bother you. It's not that serious. But what is serious is accusing ppl making new terms as an exclusive agenda against one you think is better. Because it makes ppl afraid to speak their mind about things that ppl might make fun of as being "too much" and thats the part we don't like.

Literally chillax in the replies yall.

Yall saying it's already used in research sounds like ur telling ppl "stfu our word is official (tm) so its more important (tm) so stop making things up and pressing ur comfort on others " it sounds like yall are more pressed about it (and pressing your thoughts, or at least defending them for no reason) more than this random free made website thats literally anon so no clout there.

this is why I used to shut up about being queer and meaning I'm nonhuman within queerness bc yall are just gonna dog pile anyone that says that. I define nonhumanity under queerness. Am I suddenly pushing ppl to call everyone queer? To be honest a few of us don't like some terms bc there's just too much drama associated with it, feel talked over in experiences." I don't feel it fits me. There fore it doesn't." Simple right? So really no general term is sacred. I don't think the maker of the site should care where it's been cited especially over someone exploring identity. And save ur time quoting this innocent website bc as long as i dont see "alt H is shitty for everyone!" Which i dont. Anything you think is alluding to an anti alterhuman agenda is an assumption. But I see that about being anti alt b in the comments. "It doesn't make sense" " its creating an exclusive club" followed by yall mentioning a research paper to make your point "official"? wtf? Who's the club here?

I assure you that no one cares this much. Out in grass world, I call myself nonhuman and the normies call me lgbtq. And to be honest nonhumanity is like queerness for most people. The idea of queerness is already so familiar with society at large, the the jumping off point is my offline people calling it an extension of queerness. It is already happening offline where i live and yall are honeslty the same as furries to most people. Theres no controlling the mainstream which will always be much bigger. And sure to me, im unbothered. But am i gunna tell yall to stop making words up? No. So I shrug, and move on instead of writing think pieces on why other people I will never see again dont like doodlebob calling themselves queer and have an agenda. im neutral on ppl using whatever. Who cares. But what i dont like and why I'm writing this, is for folks who resonate with this resource and feel bad bc ppl in these comments turn around and tell someone else that their way is stepping over theirs bc they made a random free website that just exists with no press….like lmao. then saying their term is some kind of official bc its used in research and its lowkey saying to use the other official terms you use and urs doesn't Need to be fixed (implying you think they're trying to fix yours?) or pick something YOU think is better. if youre telling them that maybe alth is not for them then dont use it? Thats what theyre doing. They need something different than anything out there apparantly and If you don't like the path they made for themselves, it then it's not for you keep scrolling.

Anyways homies if you wanna make a term called blah that describes ur general feelings on ur identity and it an umbrella term for whoever feels what you describe as it make a resource page made of stock images with no press or paying for ads do it because it's literally IMPOSSIBLE to press anything on something as personal as identity because we have the capacity to make choices which cant possibly be brainwashed by a FREE STOCK IMAGE WEBSITE. For satire istg I'm making a blah post. yes with the shitty watermark stock photos. Not to make fun of op. No offense to who made the website. ur definition of alterbeing is interesteing and even if i dont use it im ok with you making a website (free websites slay btw) to share ur insights. I just want To make a point about how ridiculous the comment section is making the point that a free stock image website is pushing an agenda on anyone.

just be nice ppl. No one is attacking you. They're just trying to find themselves. And we're here to share niche shit. You need to calm down. Also we know we aren't calm, bc what we passionately defend here is expression without being accused of an agenda. Be nice yall. It's just all hugs and lots of stock images here. Lots. Maybe those silly pixelated ones from the last search page of google.

Shout out to one of our anon mods who co wrote this to add the funny stock image reference lmao

ALTERBEING RESOURCE of the day:

[haltyoubillowychickenwing]

Kaitlin Bennett and Liberty Hangout

Kaitlin Bennett is considered the internet’s most hated conservative, lets talk about why.

Bennett Is a twenty-five-year-old white cisgender heterosexual female who is a strict catholic. She rose to fame in 2018 when her graduation photo included an AR-10 rifle. This was a means of activism and advocating for her rights to bare arms.

She gets clout and content from infiltrating spaces that are meant for activists who happen to have different beliefs than her. She interviews them and posts said interviews on youtube and on her website. I watch these videos and feel great shame for the amount of politically uneducated people. However, I doubt that they accurately represent the intelligence of the left due to editing.

In this photo, she is dressed as Elizabeth Warren, a woman who ran for president in the 2016 election. Bennett is joined by a black man dressed as a white cowboy. To explain Bennett’s costume, Warren had lied about being native american to get a scholarship for college. They ask, “if my costume is not okay, then what makes what Warren did ok?”

Bennett was using this controversial costume to make a point. I am white so I don’t know wether this would be offensive to native americans though I can say I wouldnt consider this cultural appropriation because it is not Bennett adopting the culture of native americans. This does, however, feed into the stereotypes and generalization of native americans, which is something Warren did not do. Regardless, Bennett’s action is a strong method of raising awareness for the injustice Elizabeth Warren has done for the native american people.

The black man’s name is Joel Patrick and he uses his costume to ask if it’s offensive to white people. His costume includes white powder with light foundation for makeup, and a stereotypical cowboy outfit. Theres a point in the video where Patrick asks a white woman if his costume is offensive. The woman says it would be different if it was a white person doing blackface. When asked why, the woman refers to white privilege and how her ethnicity has not faced the issues other ethnicities have. How I would put it is the depiction isn’t offensive because it doesn’t depict white people in a bad way. At the beginning of the video. Patrick introduces himself as Tom, Woody from Toy Story’s grandfather in non-negative way. This is not a canon character, however, it does draw the line between what I would consider a good reason to portray oneself as a race that is not their own and a bad one. If Patrick was dressed as any cowboy, things would be different. This is because it implies that all cowboys are white or that only white people can be cowboys.

This next picture is what really gets me though.

These are her “Columbus Day” twitter posts. Take a look.

These are screenshots from Bennett’s twitter page about how she celebrates “Columbus Day”. One thanks Christopher Columbus for civilizing the west, and the other shows her wearing some native american inspired makeup. I dont feel comfortable speaking out about the makeup since i’m not a native american but I can certainly mention the horrific depiction of native americans. It nearly compares them to animals that needed to be tamed. It is so unfortunate that she cant see the damage colonizers caused or the civility of native americans.

Next I’d like to talk about her twitter specifically the concept of her having a twitter page and what she uses it for. Through her tweets she has made it clear that she does not believe masks help us, that she does not believe she should get the covid vaccine, that she believes pride is about broadcasting gay sex to children, and that a case in which a white woman was killed by the police should’ve been as big of a deal as the death of George Floyd.

Bennett does not believe trans people exist. She believes only in XY or XX chromosomes. She also fails to recognize the possibility of someone being intersex. She refers to crocheted packers (for ftm trans kids) as something to “shove down that pants of an innocent young girl to make it look like she has a penis bulge” while there have been tweets about this specific size of packer and how it seems to be for infants (it is smaller than a chapstick), i’d like to argue a point of if a child is wearing a diaper, it wouldnt serve its supposed purpose. If I knew I was trans as a kid, I would’ve loved to have one of these as a reminder that even though I look like a girl, I’m a boy and I have a penis. If your child can understand the concept of being transgender, then they can understand if they’re transgender or questioning. It hurts me to see someone so concerned about livelihood of youth be so ignorant of one major cause of suicide all over the world.

She seems to have something against all liberals and somehow still calls them snowflakes. Her ignorance disturbs me. I feel bad for her and her stereotypical 50s household where she doesn’t cook and clean because she wants to, but because she thinks it’ll make for a stable household. Her views on women and how she calls herself a feminist is disappointing too. Maybe Ill add to this post tmr if it gets a lot of notes, but for now, please see my sources and visit these websites.

*the videos wont link properly so just search ‘college students have no morals’ on youtube for the video where Bennett desides that college student have no morals because they support trans people, ‘Elizabeth Warren goes to college’ on youtube for the elizabeth warren video, and ‘what the heck is this liberty’ on youtube for the packer video (all on her youtube channel, liberty hangout)*

Liberty Hangout on Youtube

Joel Patrick on Twitter

Kaitlin Bennett on Twitter (links are broken, ill fix later)

[silvysartfulness]

I got tagged by @ameliarating and @veliseraptor to do this writer meme thing!

How many works do you have on AO3?

Six. I only started posting fic on AO3 last year. Before that, many long years ago, I used my own websites and LiveJounal.

What’s your total AO3 word count?

177481. The absolute majority of which is of course Heaven Has A Road.

How many fandoms have you written for and what are they?

On AO3, only The Untamed.

But before that, I've written for Disney Afternoon's Aladdin, Slayers, Kingdom Hearts, Assassin's Creed, and one-shot fics for my own original verses as well as my friends'.

What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Heaven Has A Road But No One Walks It at 1194, unsurprisingly. It's my magnum opus on AO3.

Blanket Statement at 302. The first fic I wrote for the Untamed, and the first thing I posted on AO3 (Thank you, Lise, for holding my hand and walking me through it!)

And To Many More at 169

High Noon In Deserted City at 96, which is sort of funny, since it's just a picture and about 1000 words. But the premise is fun! Still hoping for some hungry writer to adopt it and write something for it. :)

Self-Inflicted at 75.

Which checks out, I guess – the longest fic with the most readers comes first, then the fluff, then the funny and finally the angsty and fucked up. XD

I still suspect The Plotbunny of Doom / The Renegades for Kingdom Hearts would score as my all time highest, though, if LJ likes and comments translated to the AO3 format. That fic took me and two friends three whole years to write together, was 104 chapters long and over 300k.

Do you respond to comments, why or why not?

I really try! Comments mean everything to me, and I want to reply to them all! But when I'm low on spoons (which is unfortunately often) I fall hopelessly behind, and then the catching up becomes an impossible-looking chore in and of itself.

I should really set some time aside every day to catch up on the last few chapters' worth of comments... I do love the interaction and discussion a good comment can spawn!

What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

Hm... I write a ton of angst, but only a few actually have sad endings. I'd say Eaten counts, as does Self-Inflicted, I guess. TPBoD had a very open ending that was still definitely on the somewhat hopeless side.

Do you write crossovers? If so, what is the craziest one you’ve written?

Mm, it's not usually my favourite genre (though I mean, the whole Kingdom Hearts verse is a crossover in and of itself) but it depends a lot on the source material. I guess TPBoD might soft-count, since we tossed in a bunch of non-canon references with all the world-jumping.

Have you ever received hate on a fic?

Not as such? Oh yeah, I do recall getting a very upset comment on a non-con fic I wrote back in the KH days, by someone who couldn't conceive how you could claim to love a character and then write such horrible things happening to them. But you get those occasionally. Look, crushing my favourite characters is therapy. Doesn't mean I don't love them.

The Russian fandom are loudly aggressive in their comments on some chapters of Heaven Has A Road, but that's more focused on the characters, not me personally.

On the whole, I've been pretty spared. But then, there's little point in sending hate; I just block.

Do you write smut? if so what kind?

Oh, absolutely. Haven't really gotten to that point in the posted chapters of Heaven Has A Road yet, but we're about to unleash it aplenty in the upcoming ones.

What kind? Most kinds, I guess? Soft and fluffy, aggressive and snarly, consensual, dubcon, non-con. Mostly mlm but I've written het, too. Can't remember if I've written wlw, but I've certainly headcanoned/drawn it. A bit of kink is nice.

I prefer focusing on the chemistry and sensations when I write porn, rather than detailed physical smacking and squelching and body fluids, but that's just my personal preference and writing style.

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I know of? Not that I can remember? I have my art stolen regularly, and I've had my online identity stolen, but I don't think anyone's stolen anything I've written...

Have you ever had a fic translated?

Yes! Heaven Has A Road is being translated into Russian, and I'm insanely honoured and flattered!

Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Yes – TPBoD aka The Plot Bunny of Doom, aka The Renegades, for Kingdom Hearts. I wrote it over ten years ago together with a friend and my now wife. It was a monster of a fic, I think about 320k, and the fact that we were three people helping and pushing and encouraging each other really helped keep it going!

I don't know if I would have the focus for something like it now, but it was an amazing experience I'll always treasure.

What’s your all time favorite ship?

Oh man, that changes with each hyperfixation... I may have to say Marluxia/Vexen for Kingdom Hearts, simply because it's a ship that's been around in my life for so long. I still occasionally go back to read favourite bits of the fics I wrote for them, including TPBoD.

Currently it's SongXueXiao from The Untamed, of course, and a very strong contender overall! I've dabbled a bit in poly ships before, but this is the first time I have one as my main, and I'm love them.

What’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

Uh. I don’t really have any? Because of my burnout-brain, I can only really focus on one major project at a time, and that's currently heaven has A Road. And I'm really, really hoping I will be able to finish it!

It's all plotted out, I just need to write the stupid thing. Working on it.

What are your writing strengths?

Hm, I'd say that I've developed a voice/prose over the years that I'm actually quite happy with! And I'm good at conveying/invoking emotion, if going solely by how many people comment that I've made them cry. :D

I enjoy writing dialogue, and I love working with layers of symbolism.

What are your writing weaknesses?

The actual writing process. 🙄 I'm extremely uneven and unstructured in getting the actual words down. Also convoluted and inflated text at times - sometimes I write a lot of words without actually saying anything. And English is my second language, so just nailing the correct phrasing and grammar can be a headache at times.

What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

If it impacts the plot – like the POV character not understanding it, then maybe. And using terms that can't be translated, absolutely! Other than that, there's little point in making a text harder for the reader to grasp by tossing in whole sections in another language for clout. Is my personal view, at least, of course other writers may disagree.

What was the first fandom you wrote for?

My first online fandom that I wrote fic for was Disney Afternoon's Aladdin show. Before that, I wrote original fic. And before that, before the internet was A Thing, I'd write and draw for stories that captivated me, just for my own entertainment. If you count that, I'd probably say Phantom of the Opera was my first – I had a whole ”everyone is a horse because that's what I know how to draw” AU when I was about 10 or so, that I'd draw lots of pictures for. When I was even younger, I used to make up stories for my younger brothers, based on movies and series we had watched together. I've always been a storyteller, one way or another, if only in my own head. I wouldn't know how not to.

What’s your favorite fic you’ve written?

I would have to say Heaven Has A Road, even though it's still unfinished. It's the first work of that sheer scope I have ever attempted by myself, and I'm honestly insanely proud of myself for what I have accomplished already!

Second would be TPBoD – The Renegades. Even though that was a shared effort, it's a very long fic that we managed to bring all the way to its intended conclusion, and I'm very proud of that, too!

Plus there are bits of both these fics I really like, and that I will go back and read for my own enjoyment occasionally.

tagging: @orodrethsgeek, @ebonykain, @fromaliminalspace, @chigrima, @soawen

[jbbuckybarnes]

We need to talk...

I knew that this topic of interactions will come up again, because it has never been talked all the way through, so I had this drafted for a while. So much of this old draft still resonated with this permanently unfinished discussion that I just had to edit it and post it, because I feel like it has to be said and put into one post. We can’t keep starting this conversation and then make it so dramatic that there is no conclusion or compromise. The only reason this time is more mellow is because people have better standards for this stuff due to a pandemic going on. This is written for the MCU fandom, but I’ve seen this go down in different fandoms, so here we go:

Things that are NOT at fault for readers not interacting:

The Readers. Should be clear after asking them again and again. And nothing changing. The readers at large are not at fault for a couple people being demanding or hateful. Neither are they at fault for this website and other social medias automatically putting writers at a disadvantage. They do their best with the time they have in their life (just like writers). And after asking them over months to try and reblog more and not much changing, it should be obvious that it isn’t where the problem lies. At least not 95% of it. NOW:

Things that ARE at fault for readers not interacting:

Pushing them, thinking they owe you stuff, while you tear other writers down saying that nobody owes them stuff. That happens time and time again. To me, to friends, to writers I check in with. Don't expect community to come to you when you don't come to them.

Not putting anon asks off when demands and hate get too much. It’s literally THAT easy when people get nasty. It’s sad for the nice anons, but they will understand. Save your mental health! Save the mental health of people reading that hate on their dash. I don’t know how many people constantly answering to hate I have unfollowed and I’m sure people have unfollowed me for doing the same.

Ego and hypocrisy. You can't say numbers aren't a problem and then say they are. In the same post. AND then also deny it later in some of the cases we’ve seen in recent months. Yes, that happened. In several fandoms where this topic comes up semi-regularly. And that might also be the reason people are tired of this stuff and speak out against it.

The fact Tumblr is only used approximately twice a year by most people. And has a shitty tag system. And a shitty algorithm. You are at an automatic disadvantage.

The fact some of you can't understand that 3-5% of your following interacting is a good and normal rate on pretty much all social media. The bigger you get in followers, the bigger the gap gets between followers and interaction (and demand and hate). There are literal statistics on that. 1% interaction at 10k is still good for a platform you have no power over!

The fact some of the people here call anons *haters* for pointing out that you interact w the same 10 people, making that speace seem excluding, when it's literally true what those people say!? Nothing wrong with only support the same 10 people on your blog, but then don't say that you practice what you preach (cause you don’t). You can’t demand more interaction when you don’t interact more yourself. That is how it works, for anyone, not just people of a certain follower count. If I reblog more fics, my blog gets more clout. Logical conclusion. Works for everyone. You have no time for that? Then don’t expect more back. It’s called SOCIAL media for a damn reason.

Telling people asking for Tumblr advice to interact more to make new friends but being the most defensive/indifferent person once they talk to you in DMs. Yes, that keeps happening and I know it from either my own experience or from others sharing their experiences with me. It’s kinda sad. It’s more of a minor factor in people not interacting, but I’ve seen it enough to mention it.

Making shitposts and personal posts all day and then saying you don't have the time in your life to interact w peoples' writings. Like, drabbles exist on almost anyone's masterlist. 5 minute read, easy support for a writer that might be losing motivation. Not every work has to be written like a novel to be great as hell or “quality proven.”

Oh, and there hasn't been a MCU movie in a while, making most of our readership probably currently not care about the fandom as much. Especially after Endgame ended up being a total opinion splitter.

Bonus: The misunderstanding that pushing shy readers to interact does the exact opposite. Not to start about the fact that we are in the middle of a pandemic at the moment. That means they may not have time to read and you may not have time to write. Normal. Logical. The same reason lots of people currently don’t publish. Don’t expect anything predictable and controlable out of current times.

Bonus: Check how you connect interactions to self worth and worth/fun of your writing hobby. Define what success means for you in this space, otherwise you will never be satisfied. It won’t matter if a post has 1k reblogs, you’ll always want more, because you chase an infinite metric.

Bonus: Maybe take a month to concentrate on community, getting outside of your bubble that you deny but very likely have (I’m not excluding myself from this), and actually improve interactions. Some people seem to have forgotten that when you interact with other writers, they probably interact back. Surprise! Your followers already know your tried and true fanfic friends, they want some new stuff without searching for it. Basic Marketing knowledge, know what your audience wants. If you do this for the interactions you gotta look at it from a marketing standpoint and not a pure passion standpoint. Oh: And maybe they find you interacting in the notes of someone else’s post and become an active follower. Win-Win-Win situation.

Bonus: Community is a loop, a net of interactions. Some people here have clique behavior, sound defensive and/or simply don't practice what they preach. That is not me or anyone else hating on specific blogs (I’m also no complete exception), it’s people trying to tell you that you can’t ask for shit you don’t practice yourself. Nothing wrong with supporting your friends only, but then don’t go around expecting new people to find your stuff. It’s literally THAT simple. You can’t have both!

Bonus: Ignoring some of the ride or die readers that are already there. Some of the people on here wish they had that and it’s deadass taken it for granted by some. Meanwhile I'm sitting here with Serotonin levels like christmas when someone I know reblogs my stuff and my fic gets some clout. Imma repeat myself: If you do it for the numbers, you gotta look at it more like marketing and less like pure passion.

And again: You are on a social media platform that will always put you at a disatvantage. That is not the readers' fault. It's how social media works at this point. If you want as much interaction as you can without putting in more interaction work yourself, simply share your works on here, AO3 and Wattpad simultaneously. Problem solved.

Bottomline: If you want more love on your work you gotta go beyond what you currently do, since it’s clearly not working for you. Reblog stuff from people you don't know. I don't give a sh*t if it's a 5k or a 100 follower blog. Hell, there is the whole 366 reblog challenge and some of you deadass went on reblogging the same people when that’s not really what this was made for. I, personally, haven't run out of new people to reblog, so this shouldn't be hard. Actually take time to talk to people in DM's, it takes 10 minutes in the evening to write a few people a message asking how they are or sending a cute gif. If you want stuff, you have to give it. Not leave it. People have come to me before, telling me "the community doesn't owe you stuff", no, they don't, but they do owe if they wanna be owed something back or even demand to be owed something back. Community is about back and forth. You give, you get. It's work, cause it's a big hobby. If you don't have time, that's cool, but then don't be sad about lower interaction. It’s logical that low activity from you leads to low activity from others in the long run, unless you do something worldshakingly new. You don't wanna look beyond a circle of friends or your go-to writers much? That's fine, but don't be upset about barely new people interacting cause they feel excluded or simply don’t find your work because of the same people seeing the same people reblogging the same works. What's not fine is not seeing how readers are NOT THE PROBLEM.

I haven’t talked to a single person about this that DIDN’T find the posts surrounding it demanding and completely ignoring the arguments some others had...repeatedly. Every single time it came up. Not just once but time and time again, whenever this topic comes up. You want interaction? Interact. You don’t want hate? Don’t give it a platform. As harsh as that sounds, I’ve never felt better on this platform since I put anon asks off, even when I miss the nice anons. They probably understand. PS: Again, this was written a while ago and edited to fit into a more general context now. I hope people can discuss this in a civil, non-judgmental way, because that is how I tried to write this. This is not again a specific person or group, it’s pinpointing what I see repeating for two years on this platform now, in all corners. I’d also like to mention that we are still in a pandemic and lives have never looked so vastly different, so you can’t demand anything normal in this very not normal time. Even if you do it all right, your interactions dropped in the pandemic cause people likely stay away form this platform for mental health reasons. There is so many layers to look at, these clearly aren’t all, but I hope it makes some people think about what and when they complain. Numbers will never satisfy you, they will always leave you wanting more if you don’t know why you do what you do and for what. Anyway: Be nice to each other and me in the notes in case this gets shared! No drama please! Ignore any grammar and typo mistakes, lol. Love ya!

[programmed-and-dangerous]

I posted 28,647 times in 2021

31 posts created (0%)

28616 posts reblogged (100%)

For every post I created, I reblogged 923.1 posts.

I added 83 tags in 2021

#0 - 3 posts

#save - 27 posts

#audio - 21 posts

#neuralblender - 8 posts

#fave - 6 posts

#ya know - 6 posts

#mine - 3 posts

#👀 - 3 posts

#terrible - 3 posts

#nice - 3 posts

Longest Tag: 134 characters

#i don’t know how to describe that if i’m thinking visually/specially that whatever image appears briefly in the top right of my vision

My Top Posts in 2021

#5

What the fuck is that

5 notes • Posted 2021-09-28 22:26:10 GMT

#4

bananas cant handle humidity so they literally just undress themselves that's hilarious

a terrible fact found by my roommate after our bananas did that and the bananas at starbucks doing the same

6 notes • Posted 2021-04-16 05:06:45 GMT

#3

hi i'm super new to tumblr and u seem like u know stuff what should i know about this site lol

Never been asked anything like this before but I’ll give it a shot

1) first rule of any social media really. The block button is there for a reason. Curate your experience how you want it and don’t be afraid to block anyone for whatever reason. Not everyone on here has the best intentions

2) even though nsfw content is explicitly banned on the site now, the porn bots have recently found ways around the censors and have come back in force. Be aware of this especially if you’re a minor/someone who is triggered by this kind of content.

3) socially this website is full of all kinds of people, from teens doing their thing to astrophysicists and the moment any of them log in to this website, it’s a race to the bottom for intelligence. It’s not a bad thing it’s charming especially when some people are trying to make serious bad faith arguments and everyone replying is refusing to seriously engage (even though in my opinion it’s better to not even platform bad faith arguments)

4) in a similar vein, this website is full of misinformation like any other. My personal feed hasn’t had the same feed of dubious sources that it once had 4-5 years ago but stuff still passes through. I encourage doing your own research on subjects that matter. I often won’t fact check something if it’s something small, inconsequential, and entertaining and I’ll admit to that here

5) if you’re here to chase clout, don’t. No one here cares and that’s the biggest selling point in my eyes along with the sites inability to advertise anything effectively. I’ve been on this site since like 2013-2014 and gaining too much attention on this site is usually a beacon for some kind of hate. Seen plenty of users chased off this site over the years

6) if you have triggers or squicks (I guess like triggers but more just things you’re moderately uncomfortable with) and you see a mutual or someone you follow who doesn’t normally post about that thing, maybe let them know. It doesn’t have to be through dm to u can anonymously inbox them asking them to tag posts with some kind of tw tag

7) last one reminded me that there’s a way to blacklist tags on the site and I encourage everyone to do it. I’ve only got a couple but I don’t have triggers that can be set off by stuff I see on the internet

8) follow tags for things that interest you. You’ll find users who you may also want to follow or interact with. And be social. I’m usually not but it’s because I’m a lurker who doesn’t message anyone first (gotta love that anxiety)

9) kind of a smaller thing to end on but this website does have a kind of calendar. Your Out of Touch Thurdays and the like weekly and some lesser ones like you just missed out of the combo homestuck/Neil banging out the tunes day where the whole site goes wild

I’m sure there’s more that I missed. As I mentioned above I’m more of a lurker on this site doing my own thing but I hope this helps!

12 notes • Posted 2021-04-19 18:05:50 GMT

#2

You know what, fuck you!

*Places a humidifier in your kitchen to make your bananas all peel themselves in your sleep*

12 notes • Posted 2021-04-16 04:58:30 GMT

#1

My contribution to the critical role fandom

49 notes • Posted 2021-11-23 05:36:35 GMT

Get your Tumblr 2021 Year in Review →

[serialreblogger]

So best i can tell all of Shakespeare's works have a free pdf version on Google play books what ones do you suggest reading first? (Also the audiobook of The Divine comedy by Dante is also currently free)

oooh NICE

HM it depends what you’re looking for in a Shakespeare play! My favourite’s probably Twelfth Night, which is a comedy (i.e. it has a happy ending) (or at least. Nobody important dies), because it’s absolutely CRAMMED full of Shakespeare’s signature genderbending/identity play. Plus, it’s probably? one of the easier plays to read? All around a good introduction to Shakespeare’s style when writing a “comedy”--lots of different kinds of humor, showcases different social castes, twelve different plotlines going on at once, copious amounts of deception and misunderstandings, “oh what tangled webs we weave” hilarity, so much chemistry between all the wrong people, and as happy an ending as you can get when everyone’s forced to fake heterosexuality. 

I also really liked Measure for Measure, because it had me on the edge of my seat the whole way through (which is impressive, because you don’t expect to be that tense when you’re reading a Shakespeare play, especially one typically labelled a “comedy”) but it’s weird of me to like it because it’s a weird play (which involves a lot of sexual manipulation and harassment, tw for that). So maybe don’t start with that one.

The Comedy of Errors is also quite short and fairly simple in terms of poetic diction, so if Shakespearean language isn’t your thing that might be a good introduction. Then again, a lot of people dislike it because it’s kind of missing the extra level Shakespeare adds to his writing (it kind of reads like the Bard wrote it in one night), so don’t judge Shakespeare by the CoE if you do start there. 

If you’re looking for a good romance, of course, Much Ado About Nothing (Beatrice and Benedick, am i right?). I’m also partial to Celia and Rosalind’s relationship in As You Like It, but of course they don’t end up married to each other. Rosalind’s still a delightful genderbending levelheaded female character, though, the likes of which modern Hollywood only dreams of creating, so there is that, and it’s a pretty good intro to Shakespeare’s style when it comes to writing romance (i.e., he can’t/won’t do it right but he sure does end up writing something).

AND if you’re interested in tragedies, Hamlet is probably my favourite. I love the emo gay Danish prince. Horatio deserves better and so does Ophelia. (Nobody else though.) But Hamlet’s the longest one out of all of Shakespeare’s plays, so if you want something a little shorter I’d probably recommend King Lear. I dunno what it was about that play exactly, but I found it a particularly visceral read--maybe it’s bc I related so uncomfortably hard to Lear’s descent into madness. And if neither of those appeals to you, Julius Caesar’s another really good one (and you get maximum clout for quoting it around people, bonus).

Also if Google Play doesn’t end up working out, I found these three websites super helpful when I was working on my degree! They should have all of Shakespeare’s works free for browsing, too :)

[malicious-fisheeves]

Anyway here’s the dumb fandom shit manifesto but here’s the whole thing under the read more

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1WKjpOTU7D-JkiXD1gqYNJcjzGI691WXWRj4CJ3mI5UU/edit?usp=sharing

           Honestly this is for myself personally, everyone has their own barometer, but I hate all of you and will hit you with my tonka truck

          It’s incredibly telling that most of the people who proudly call themselves “anti antis” and “problematic” don’t see this as a serious issue. They’re more concerned with their right to jack off than having--not even compassion, just basic decency, for children / abuse survivors in fan spaces. Harassment campaigns against minors who are rightfully uncomfortable with how ‘big’ artists and other fan content creators interact with them are incredibly common, and it’s incredibly ironic to hear these same people bemoaning how their right to free speech is being taken away, or how “antis should care more about real people” -- people against pedophilia and incest shipping do care about real people of course. For example, real children who are hurt in real life when people create grooming content for real pedophiles, or abuse survivors trying to navigate their own road to recovery who are barraged with content that makes them relive their trauma (especially in the case of vocal survivors, who are often specifically harassed with content meant to trigger them). It’s also laughable that these people are always talking about how they “properly tag” their works so that it can be avoided, all the while continuing to follow creators who specifically outline their discomfort with these “anti antis” and say they don’t want to be followed by or interact with them. These people have no regard for other people’s boundaries.           There’s also the hilarious (/s) instances of these people proclaiming their therapists think that them making child porn is just fine. Most often, these incidents are either blatant lies from “fandom therapists” (who quickly accumulate clout and then ~mysteriously~ disappear to side blogs once they’ve stroked enough people’s wounded egos.) While there are some forms of treatments that do involve creating art or writing about your own personal experience so you can work through the complicated emotions that come from being a victim of abuse, these are supposed to be in tightly monitored situations, not posted to widely used social media and fan works sites where that material can be used by groomers. Your 50 yr old therapist, Kelly, doesn’t know what AO3 is, and even if she did, who’s to say she’s right in the first place?           Adjacent to this argument is one from legality, which already sets off a million red flags for anyone who’s discussed real-life instances of abuse where it was ‘alright’ because a predator waited until their victim was of age. Legal? Yes, maybe, but morally justifiable? No. Of course, this itself will ring their incessant whinging about how “fiction =/= morality.” Yes, of course, the things we create do not necessarily reflect our own morals on principle alone. However, writing dark subject matters requires a clarity of purpose--if you’ve ever been on the side that representation is important, because it influences how we think about certain groups of people or subject matter (like war), then you understand this principle already. There are certain ways of portraying these things that have a real impact on how a reader interprets them. Yes, violent video games don’t make people violent, but they can make war seem much more palatable, or make the enemy less human. The torture porn in many horror films in the 70s/80s wouldn’t have made men more violent towards women, but it did contribute to larger misogynistic ideas about women(this doesn’t even touch upon the sub genre of trans horror, which of course does have real effects on how trans people, mainly trans women, are viewed, and contributes to violence against them).

          This argument that “fiction =/= reality” really misses the forest for the trees when it comes to these discussions, quite frankly, because it’s rarely about “you read incest porn, you are therefore going to commit incest” and moreso about the wider impacts that the masses of fan works aggregated onto websites as opposed to you, personally, being ~*problematic*~. Quite frankly, I would probably be less vocal and less ~mean~ about it if people I knew, and myself included, weren’t put on the end of harassment campaigns, made fake callouts for, or lied to by people I thought I was at least on good terms with. When fans perpetuate racist stereotypes--making black and latine characters hypersexual aggressive or borderline (or, yknow, just actual) rapists to their petite white ‘romantic’ interests, or making asian characters submissive waifs and abuse victims--it has a real effect on how people of color interact with fan works. If you want to talk about being ~pushed out of the fandom~ maybe shut up forever.           One thing I did want to note upon is that it’s already quite ridiculous to claim that “fiction doesn’t effect reality”, one, for the claims above (you simply cannot claim that representation is important and then dismiss fans of color saying your slavery non con fic is racist) when it’s very obvious that these “anti anti” spaces attract predators on the reg. This is most plain on twitter, where a cursory scroll through popular “anti” dunking blogs are filled with self proclaimed pedophiles (some claiming to be “no contact” which is basically useless if you speak to victims of CSA). Because those blogs make them feel good. You’re not actually hurting anyone, what you’re doing is fine. Children can consent. Beyond that, it also gives them a network to meet other pedophiles and distribute their child porn, and a way to meet children, especially for blogs that post mainly about children’s television shows. Children want to feel mature and respected, and blogs like these give them this avenue, because to many children sex is a taboo, mature topic. They can’t talk to their parents, because they’re afraid of getting in trouble for talking about sex, and that’s what predators prey upon. It’s the perfect grooming environment. Regardless of whether or not you think that reading child porn, or rape fics, will make you, personally, a rapist, these places have created an environment where children are put in danger. This isn’t a hypothetical--multiple predators have been outed from “anti anti” discords, where they return with regularity.

TLDR fuck all yall