#no i will NOT be tagging the other fandom i do NOT want to be interrogated and subsequently bullied

[tseecka]

It's also one of the absolute best ways to find MORE fic that will scratch whatever itch brought you to that author in the first place. Because if you click on an author (using one of my faves to demonstrate),

To go to their page,

You can click on this link here,

To find OTHER WORKS THAT AUTHOR ENJOYED READING.

I'm so fucking serious: this is like a Wikipedia rabbit hole but for fanfiction. Many of my absolute favourite fics or writers are ones I discovered by investigating what my current faves are reading and liking well enough to bookmark.

This isn't foolproof obviously. Not everyone uses bookmarks, many people make their bookmarks privately, but if you're stymied by the absolute glut of fic in your favourite tags and want to find something new to read, it's such an amazing place to start. Consider:

If you're finicky about writing style or quality, odds are your favorite fic writer is bookmarking works that jive with their own sensibilities.

You like how they write particular dynamics or tropes or kinks? They probably have their own favorites in those categories. Same goes for motifs or themes.

You want to know what other fandoms might be inspiring them, where you might find content you enjoy as well? Explore what fandoms they are reading fic for, and maybe discover something new! (Case in point; I first learned about Victoria Goddard's books specifically from exploring what @ariaste was reading, and now I LOVE THEM.)

Some tags for fandoms or pairings have tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of fics. Relying only on kudos or bookmark counts to sort through them all isn't a guaranteed way of finding your next fave fic, but washing through years or even decades of stories isn't necessarily feasible. This can also be a fantastic way to uncover hidden or forgotten gems and show older fics some love. You wanna know how you get authors gushing with excitement about someone commenting on their fic from 2007 that they thought had been entirely subsumed by the influx of reboot fans? You follow the rabbit hole!

It's not creepy. It's not stalking. It's not even weird. Users can make their bookmarks private if they choose to, or just bookmark through other means. Looking through what your faves loved enough to save for later is such a great way to replicate the old Internet communities of webrings and message boards, of making recommendations to one another.

And then, don't forget to make your own bookmarks--because you can also go down these rabbit holes by taking a look at who bookmarked that fic you love so much, and seeing what else THEY'VE liked enough to save; and people can do the same with you.

I am incredibly serious right now when I beg you all, please, and if you have Twitter or Tiktok or whatever to please spread the word: click on an author's profile on Ao3.

You want to know if an author has written more? Want to know if they're still writing? Want to see more from them? Want to know if they've written a trope or kink or sex scenario you enjoy?

Click on their name. And look at their profile.

I cannot tell you how many times in the last six months someone has read a new or newer fic of mine and said they (a new reader who has read nothing else I've done) "can't wait to see what you do next!" I've written 50+ fics and over a million words already.

"I don't know if you're still writing..." click on my profile. I am. I literally wrote a 128k+ fic for that ship last month.

"Would you ever do X?" "Please do Y!" I already did. Click on my name and look at my works.

Archive of our Own is a library. It's an archive. Not social media. It is your responsibility to fight back against the laziness that corporate algorithms have trained into you.

Click my author name. Just click it. Just click it.

Before you demand more, or ask if a writer will do XYZ, or wonder if the author still writing, or anything - click on their profile. Click on the author's profile.

I'm not trying to be mean or condescending or anything like that. I'm just exhausted. It's disheartening and frustrating to repeat myself ad nauseam, because someone couldn't take thirty seconds to do the tiniest bit of work to see if I've written lately, if I've written more for their ship, or scan my works to see if I've written what they're asking for. Please. Please. I'm begging.

Click the author's name, and explore before you ask.

[giveemhales]

🦇 My 30 Favorite Batfam Fics of 2024 🦇

I’m continuing my annual tradition of sharing some of my favorite fics that came out in the past year (you can see last year’s list here). This is just a way for me to show my love and appreciation for the many amazing artists/writers who keep the fandom alive. If you read any of these fics, please make sure to leave some kudos and comments! And there are so many amazing fics I wasn’t able to include, so I encourage you to show some appreciation to your own favorites!

Please be sure to read all tags and warnings. I’ve provided warnings for the darkest fics.

All of these fics were completed in 2024. I only do one fic per author, but definitely check out all of these authors’ other works. Also, most of these feature tim, because he is my favorite. Now, without further ado…

Sparkles by @iselsis (2k, jason & bruce, fluff, a/b/o dynamics, batman finds an omega kid covered in cuddle pollen and going into heat)

until the bounds of death have been unwound by @vinelark (2.9k, tim & jason, fantasy and angst with a hopeful ending, tim is a demigod and he goes to save jason from the underworld) (the sequel is also great!)

Sacrificial Lamb by @kgraces (3.3k, tim & bruce, angst with a happy ending, bruce makes a deal with the devil to trade tim’s life for jason’s, his kids later find out) (this fic messed me up, i actually think about it all the time)

wouldn’t wish it by @green-eyedfirework (3.3k, jason & damian & tim, whump/angst with a hopeful ending, talia calls jason to save his brothers from the league of assassins) *READ THE TAGS

Lucky Number Three by @sohotthateveryonedied (3.4k, tim & bruce, angst and hurt/comfort, bruce has to deal with the consequences of his actions while he was under the influence of truth serum) (won’t make much sense unless you read this fic which honestly destroyed me)

Anything by @byrambles (3.5k, dick-centric, angst with a happy ending, bruce tells dick he wants to adopt his siblings, dick assumes this does not mean him)

possess by @envysparkler (4.6k, bruce-centric, angst with a happy ending, bruce is possessed by a demon that want, fortunately jason has magic swords)

The Guilt Never Really Left, You Know by @neuro-psyche (4.9k, dick & jason, angst with a happy ending, nightwing saves and then confronts red hood) *READ THE TAGS

Sacrifice by @onemuseleft (5.4k, bruce & his kids, light angst with a happy ending, the justice league is successfully negotiating with alien invaders until they request the sacrifice of one of Batman’s children)

you’ll be alright [or else] by @call-me-quill (5.9k, tim & jason, angst with a happy ending, tim takes a bullet meant for jason and doesn’t understand why jason is so upset)

the bed and breakfast by @adelfie (6.2k, dick-centric, fluff and angst with a happy ending, dick is stranded at a b&b during blizzard, things seem fine until he realizes he’s being held hostage)

with the exception of… by @dss1101 (6.4k, tim-centric, hurt/comfort, everyone realizes tim had a very different experience with his batman than all the other kids)

How to be a Little Brother by @die-erlkonigin6083 (7.4k, damian-centric, fluff and light angst, damian tries to learn how to be a good younger brother)

Reply ‘STOP’ to Unsubscribe by @motleyfam & @batmoniker (8.4k, jason & tim, angst with a happy ending, tim imagines his dad when he’s hit with fear gas at school) (this will probably make more sense if you read the rest of the series first, but I don’t think is strictly necessary (but you should read the series anyway bc it’s great))

Of A Genius’ Legacy by @sparkoflena (8.5k, tim-centric, fluff, tim graduates high school, a lot more people than he expected show up)

Flatline by @dragonpyre (8.9k, jason-centric, angst with a happy ending, jason is injected with a drug that basically shuts down his body, he has to watch his family’s reactions to finding his “dead” body)

Our Dead Drink the Sea by @ghost-bxrd (9.2k, jason-centric, angst with a happy ending, jason is a selkie and bruce kept his pelt when he died, the red hood takes the pelt and the batfam want it back)

In The Back Room by WhumpKing223 (9.9k, dick & jason & tim, heavy angst with a hopeful ending, batman discovers black mask is holding three boys captive, bruce wayne decides to take them in) (the rest of the series is about the boys’ time with bruce and it is great) *READ THE TAGS

Boom, Boom, Pow! by LilaVaporizer9000 (11.1k, tim-centric, absolute hilarity, kid tim steals the batmobile and wreaks havoc/ saves the day)

how to feed your local demon by @inkpotsprite (14.5k, tim & dick & bruce, fluff and humor and light angst, dick is an incubus and isn’t doing well after jason’s death, tim shows up to help)

the fire under your feet by @phneltwrites (17.8k, tim & jason & damian, angst with a happy ending, tim shows up to the league of assassins while jason is still there, they must team up to save damian from ra’s)

Perfect Storm by @banditywrites (25.1k, tim-centric, angst with a happy ending, tim is winning the game of not needing anything from his parents, but it starts getting harder and his neighbors are concerned)

you’re not defenseless, i’ll be your shelter by @fandomtrash-whataboutit (26.3k, tim-centric, angst with a hopeful ending, tim is lex luthor’s captive and is in charge of watching over the new captives- young justice) (the only batfam relationship in this is tim & dick, but the rest of the series has more batfam plus timkon and is so good)

Brother of the Fucking Year by @aceofdivinechlorophyll (26.4k, jason-centric, fluff and crack, jason makes plans to chaotically meet and bond with his siblings… as red hood) (will probably make more sense if you read the first part of the series first, which is also funny and great)

Join the Club by @cephalog0d (26.9k, jason & tim & dick, fluff and humor and light angst, where tim and jason meet at school, tim is dick’s biggest fan, and jason thinks it would be funny to make them meet) (this was filled for me for FTH but I would have included this fic regardless, it’s great)

What Christmas Means To Me by @taralaurel (29.9k, tim & dick & jason & bruce, fluff and angst, tim meets bruce when he is dressed as santa and asks for his parents to be home for Christmas, the batfam takes this as a challenge)

Screaming In The Dark (While We All Play Our Part) by @yourwakingnightmares (32.9k, dick & jason & tim & damian, heavy angst with a hopeful ending, the batboys are captives of a very evil batman, they escape and go to the justice league for help) (I also rec the sequel, which is ongoing and great) *READ THE TAGS

The Right Substitution is Key by @addictedapple (34.4k, jason-centric, fluff and crack and light angst, nightwing and batman go missing, robin asks red hood to fill in as batman)

the loneliness in worth by @yeeyee123 (56.1k, tim & damian, angst with a happy ending and humor, tim is supposed to be training in paris, he instead ends up with the league of assassins and decides he’s gonna help damian get to his father)

Northern Attitude (I Was Raised on Little Light) by @theskeptileptic (103.2k, tim-centric, heavy angst with a happy ending, tim is bruce’s biological son, jack drake has been punishing him his whole life for this, the batfam just want tim in their life) (technically not finished, but I didn’t put it in the WIP section as there is only one chapter left and it’s honestly at a satisfying stopping point) *READ THE TAGS, there is graphic child abuse

+5 WIPs I’d love to see more of in 2025!

[Refuge] by @raberbagirl (7.6k, tim & jason & dick, mostly fluff, the boys take refuge from the streets in the abandoned and supposedly haunted Wayne manor, the spirit of the manor is just happy to care for the kids)

a cuckoo in the nest by @antebunny (9.4k, tim-centric, angst and fluff, bruce makes a deal with the fae to get jason back, he has to take tim in in return, tim just wants to be loved)

Mine by @millytsworld (18k, jason & dick, angst with a happy ending, dick is the right hand man to an infamous mob boss (bruce) and decides jason is his new little brother, jason completely misunderstands dick’s intentions) *READ THE TAGS

Losing Time by hatlessmule (40.3k, tim-centric, angst (hopefully with a happy ending), tim finds himself in a universe where he doesn’t exist, the batfam want to know who this flighty kid is)

Care and Keeping and Kryptonite by @mild-and-hammered (96.9k, superbat ft. the bat kids, fluff and light angst, mild-mannered reporter clark is injured and has to stay with playboy bruce wayne and neither know the other’s secret identity, meanwhile bruce’s kids start meddling to bring the two closer together)

[waitmyturtles]

Clearing The Air On This Wack-Ass Event Of Toxic Fandom That My Brown Ass Was Recently Dragged Into

(*References and endnotes are posted in the comments.)

This past weekend, I was unwittingly brought into an event of toxic fandom instigated by @maybe-boys-do-love. The following is an account of that event, and a rebuttal to misrepresentations that he made in his posts.

1) Chronology of Events and Clarification of Communication, Connections, and Blocks

Late last week, @lurkingshan posted a thought piece about separating art and commerce in discussions of queer shows, and talked, in part, about Spare Me Your Mercy and the show's ratings popularity in Thailand as compared to its narrative shortcomings. The piece also talks about the artistic success, versus the public outcry, of the South Korean queer show, Love In The Big City. I, and a few others, reblogged the post with thought pieces of our own. (If you are interested in following along, reading the second link is a necessity.)

Tumblr user @maybe-boys-do-love subsequently posted, separately on his blog, a reaction post to Shan's post and my reblog of her post (1). His reaction contained misreads and dangerous misrepresentations of Shan's and my writing.

Shan and @maybe-boys-do-love had previously mutually blocked each other (2). Therefore, @maybe-boys-do-love went around the block to react to Shan's post.

He did not make clear to his audience that he was reacting to Shan's post. He wrote his reaction post without citing or linking to Shan's post, and did not tag me as well, thus removing both myself and Shan from a discourse that we had instigated, and prevented his audience from knowing or understanding his reference point for his reaction.

Mutuals reached out to me with @maybe-boys-do-love's piece, having previously read Shan's and my posts.

I DMed @maybe-boys-do-love to note to him that I had seen his post, and that I preferred to be tagged directly in discourse. I wrote that I would write today's post as a means of correcting the incorrect assumptions he made about my opinions. I also checked with @lurkingshan to make her aware of the post and ask if she wanted to be included in a response. Shan stated that she had already blocked @maybe-boys-do-love for previous instances where he indirectly vague-posted about her and misrepresented her writing, and that she had no interest in responding, but was fine with me doing so.

I then publicly reblogged @maybe-boys-do-love's reaction post with a clarifying note, sharing the link to Shan's original post and my reblog of our original SMYM discourse. I noted publicly that his reaction post contained misreads and inaccuracies that I will be clarifying today.

@maybe-boys-do-love deleted my reblog. I do not see my original reblog of his reaction post in his reblog notes. Mutuals confirmed, from their blogs, that they also cannot see my original reblog of his reaction post.

I requested to him by DM that he reinstate my reblog. He did not. He reblogged my reblog from my own blog (sorry, y'all) with a response to me and a general defense of his original reaction post.

He denied in DMs that he had deleted my reblog. I stated that I didn't believe him, and requested for our DM conversation to end (3).

2) Toxic Fandom and Expectations of Personal Accountability in Public Forums

Before I get into the nitty-gritty of responding to @maybe-boys-do-love's reaction post, I want to take a quick second to talk about toxic fandom and accountability, because it's been a topic bubbling up particularly in the world of the fandom of Asian, and specifically Thai, QLs. My public and private conversations with @maybe-boys-do-love about this reaction incident, prior to this post's publication, have been filled with a kind of noxious disingenuousness and deceit that has given me the damn creeps.

I've had tussles with other bloggers before about our disagreements of the art and economics of Asian QLs. The discourse has been almost always so much fun, often argumentative, sometimes gritty, sometimes passive aggressive, and sometimes parasocial involving the celebrities and creators of these shows.

I have always kept discourse respectful, and I pride myself with integrity on responding to any point that has been shot my way. I have been blocked for my takes, and I have encouraged others to block me if my takes are not to their liking, and they attack me for them. I encourage folks who don't like my takes to curate their Tumblr experiences, and take agency for what they agree with and want to read.

If I rant about someone's potential faves -- someone's fave shows or couples -- I put trigger warnings on those posts (here and here are two examples, and the most immediate link above also has a TW), knowing there's a lot of sensitivity out there over content. I trust the judgement of readers to read those trigger warnings and to skedaddle.

In other words, I take full responsibility and accountability for my writing, and I expect my readers to engage with me in good faith in return. I'm proud of the critical posts I've made over the last two and a half years here on Tumblr, especially my exploration of the history of the Thai BL genre through my Old GMMTV Challenge project.

I posted recently that the Asian QL scholar, Dr. Thomas Baudinette, believes that the number one threat to the growth of the Thai BL industry is toxic fandom and the prioritization of problematic markets.

It's funny that I posted that a few days before this incident happened. The specific elements of toxic behavior as demonstrated by @maybe-boys-do-love, as stated above, are that he

a) subverted blocks to read and respond to Shan's post without citing her, b) he did not clarify for his audience what he was reacting to, thus rendering untruthful his real intentions in writing his post, and c) his actual reaction post contained misreads and misinterpretations of Shan's and my analysis.

I'd like to name some elements of toxic behavior and fandom that occurred in the public communication I had with @maybe-boys-do-love to highlight them in order to emphasize the disrespectful nature of this incident.

In his reblog of my clarification post to his original reaction post, @maybe-boys-do-love writes,

"I also want to respect that not everyone wants to get involved in a back-and-forth on here."

Because of previous DMs, reblogs, tags, and comments on and of my work that @maybe-boys-do-love has made, I know that he is very familiar with my blog and my writing. We have previously communicated publicly and privately. I do not know why he would make an assumption that I would not have wanted to be tagged in his original reaction post, reacting inaccurately to points I made in my Spare Me Your Mercy post, considering that he and I have a public history of prior engagement. 

This assumption (remember the adage about assuming…) makes so little sense to me that I can only conclude he is coming from a stance of a disingenuous and untruthful defense.

More concerning, @maybe-boys-do-love follows with:

"I just wanted to create a post that made people whose queer tastes diverge from others feel welcome to their own preferences and appreciate that there’s not a single stance in the queer BL fandom about what qualifies as good and/or queer work."

Again, as @maybe-boys-do-love is familiar with my blog, I do not know why he would assume that my work is insular so as to not welcome different perspectives and discourse on my opinions -- as he and I had actually engaged, in the past, on our opinions of other content, and that there is overwhelming proof on my blog that I love engaging in discourse with others.

The statement that "there's not a single stance in the queer BL fandom" about my work is disingenuous, disrespectful, and toxic.

If it's not clear in the most obvious way -- and it may not be clear to some -- I am a personal blogger, posting my opinions and analysis, on a personal blog. My blog isn't Encyclopedia fucking Brittanica.

@maybe-boys-do-love indicates in his reblog that his mutuals helped him get around his and Shan's blocks. 

He also identifies as a "flaming gay guy" to characterize his position for his love of Spare Me Your Mercy, leading him to go around the blocks to comment on Shan's original post.

"Friends of mine shared the post with me knowing the love I, as a flaming gay guy, had for Spare Me Your Mercy."

I want to note that in the context of this characterization, I myself reached out to three gay male friends (one Asian friend, and two white friends married to each other). (There's nothing that IRL people love more than an Internet beef.) These three individuals range on the flaming spectrum, and assured me that @maybe-boys-do-love's position does not count as spoken monolithically for the gay male community (4).

Which leads me to my last point (for now) about toxic fandom. As iterated above: these Tumblr blogs we write on are personal blogs, homes to personal opinions, created by individuals.

The danger of trying to leverage group-think or group-speak to validate toxic opinions and toxic engagement with others is high within fandom discourse. I see it all the time on X in BL shipper circles. Maybe @maybe-boys-do-love's friends were too cowardly to write reaction posts of their own, and asked their friend to write one on their behalf. If that's the case, @maybe-boys-do-love can show us the receipts. But I'm guessing that didn't happen.

Within group and family therapy arenas, and human relations and business environments, counseling often focuses on "I-speak" -- the practice of using the "I" pronoun to claim accountability for facts, opinions, recounting of details, and so on. Using the "we" pronoun to justify a position -- without identifying who your "we" is -- weakens a stance, and at the same time, creates panic and fear within a group or community. It's a tactic often used in gaslighting or supremacist situations to generate collective fear over incorrect facts and threats.

This tactic is useless in a scenario like this, when there is ample published proof that @maybe-boys-do-love published a misrepresentative reaction post that did not link to the original source, deceiving his audience; he subsequently tried to monolithically speak for others, and to leverage and claim community to justify his doing so. It's wrong, it's disingenuous, and it's toxic.

I wouldn't want this guy speaking for me, and I hope readers of this post wouldn't want him to, either.

3) Responding to Misrepresented Points in MBDL's Reaction Post

Note: Much of @maybe-boys-do-love's reaction post reacted to points that @lurkingshan made about Spare Me Your Mercy and the Asian QL genre. I have consulted with Shan on my responses and she has approved them.

My entire rebuttal is long. An abridged version is below, and the entire rebuttal is linked here at this private link.

I want to start my response to misrepresented points in @maybe-boys-do-love's reaction post by highlighting the most noxious misread he made. He writes,

"and just a friendly reminder that a simple BL romcom is equally as queer of a story as a story about HIV."

Much of @maybe-boys-do-love's reaction post seemed magically conjured out of his ass to assume or imply that certain points were made by @lurkingshan when they were most certainly not.

NOT ONCE IN @lurkingshan's POST WAS LOVE IN THE BIG CITY DESCRIBED AS A "STORY ABOUT HIV." IN FACT, HIV WAS NEVER MENTIONED AT ALL, BY ANYONE, IN THE ORIGINAL POST, OR ANY OF THE REBLOGS AND ADDITIONS.

That was a heinous and noxious misread and reduction of @lurkingshan's post, wholly inaccurate and misrepresentative of the tone and content of Shan's original writing, and more revealing about him and his perspectives about the shows, than anyone he was pretending to fight.

And nowhere in @lurkingshan's original post did she claim that a BL romcom was not as "equally as queer" as any other story.

I want to respond specifically to an analysis of capitalism and markets that I made in my reblog of Shan's post, that @maybe-boys-do-love then reacted to.

"just a reminder, if we wanna talk about capitalism, that the whole idea of a work being better or worse, queerer or less queer, more valuable or less valuable based on it’s reception in numbers (either higher or lower) is not something Marx and Engels would be into, since they ascribed to exchange value over use value. The labor put into the work is where it’s at—and all of these shows had plentiful hours of (queer) labor put into them! But not everyone who talks about the wrongs of capitalism on here is actually interested in the finer details of how capitalism operates, the full political and economic realities of the companies making these shows, nor the individuals who are forced to fight for change within capitalism’s global structure."

This was such a convoluted, random, and inaccurate reaction to my post that I had to send it to a family member who is an actual professional economist (again, remember, IRL people love internet beefs) (5). He assured me that Karl Marx and Fredreich Engels would NOT have wanted to get tangled up in this beef.

But, anyway. I'm not a communist, and when I speak about capitalism and the markets to which Asian QL content is marketed to, I'm not analyzing the quantity of labor put into these shows that needs to be exchanged on the various Asian markets in order for the shows to be made. That's a very specific sightline into production budgets that maybe tingles @maybe-boys-do-love's brain. I think he was just trying to sound smart.

I want to be clear that he reacted to nothing I wrote in my post. This was a made-up stream of something that only established how he watches and judges shows.

But because I used the word "capitalism" in my post to talk about how GMMTV and other studios are addressing queerness and queer perspectives in their shows, @maybe-boys-do-love found reason to take issue with my writing, and to assume an air of intellectualism to establish a false sense of superiority -- by posting drivel.

All responses can be found at this link.

4) Conclusion and a Public Request to Respect Boundaries

As I wrote above: I wrote this post to make a public record of rebuttal against misinterpretations made about my writing by @maybe-boys-do-love.

I will publicly request that @maybe-boys-do-love do not contact me again. Do not reblog, tag, or comment on my posts.

If I have to block @maybe-boys-do-love, I will. However, I want the ability to read any further reaction he might have to this rebuttal, especially if he continues to besmirch my writing inaccurately and disingenuously.

As he demonstrated that he could not respect Shan's boundaries prior to this incident, I will say publicly now:

RESPECT MY BOUNDARIES.

And I want to thank the many mutuals who reached out to me during this incident to offer your support, and to notify me that this public incident of misrepresentation was taking place.

[joejhang]

my unasked-for input in the jeremy discourse

been seeing a lot of jeremy knox discussion as of late while mindlessly scrolling thru the aftg tag so i've decided it's time to step in. spoilers ahead continue at ur own risk.

the main criticism of jeremy i've seen in the fandom is the way he treats/deals with jean's situation. a lot of people think he's just not doing a good job and can be insensitive or thoughtless at times. i'd like to counter this by saying: he's doing his best, and he's actually doing pretty well.

the aftg fandom at large has this superiority issue where they seem to always know the right thing and the right way to go. i'm gonna remind y'all that we are very used to the foxes and andreil, and the trojans are a totally different environment to the one we've been acclimatised to. the foxes are not well-adjusted AT ALL and to an outsider's eye the way they deal with each other is probably really cruel and rude at times. it works for them because they're in similar positions in life and have no time for politeness and courtesy, and the only way for them to work together is to work out all the fights and issues head-on, with little concern for hurt feelings. it works for them, but that doesn't mean it's the best or only way to go for anyone else.

jeremy may have an untold backstory of his own, but i think we can all agree that he's much more well-adjusted than jean, who has been living in an abusive cult environment for years. the trojans and jeremy are completely unfamiliar to jean, but so is jean to jeremy. jeremy has no idea the full extent of jean's past and history of abuse, so you can imagine his shock and horror when he finally begins to realise the ugly details of what happened to him.

there's a lot of emphasis on action and reaction in the way the fandom sees characters and relationships, but not a lot on intention. i think, no matter the mistakes jeremy makes, his intentions are good. he wants to support jean and help him in his healing journey. was it wrong of him to tell cat and laila what happened in jean's freshman year without his permission? yes, of course. but i think people need to consider that jeremy is literally only human. he's a 22 year old boy who has unresolved issues of his own that's just trying to do the best he can with what he has. he shouldn't have talked about jean's past without his consent, but it's important to know that he didn't do it with malicious intent or just to gossip. he probably genuinely thought it was the right way to go to let cat and laila know, so they can help jean better by knowing what happened. it wasn't the right thing to do, but honestly i think people in the fandom are more pressed about it than jean is. jean remarks on it and seems a bit annoyed, both with himself for telling jeremy and jeremy for telling the girls, but he doesn't hold it against jeremy and clearly still trusts him. jean knows that jeremy wants the best for him, and is doing his best, and the fandom should remember that too.

i think a lot of the issues the fandom has w jeremy and also jerejean is that they seem to think jeremy is going to "heal" jean. i cannot explain how much this take boils my blood because people can't "heal" other people. healing is a complicated and long process that requires, yes, help from others, but also changes in perspective, environment and core belief. jeremy alone is not going to fix jean and make him good as new, and that attitude towards them is unhelpful when analysing the narrative. jean's slow journey of healing comes from the combination of: a huge change in environment (the mob mindset of the raven's nest -> the sunshine court), a support network (jeremy, cat, laila, wymack, the trojans, occasionally kevin and neil), a change in mindset (both towards exy as a sport and towards relationships with others and a relationship with himself) and simply time. no one person can heal another, and no matter how large a role jeremy plays in jean's healing, he knows he can't do it on his own. so do the other people around jean. it's why cat takes him on a motorbike ride, just to let him relax and see the world. it's why renee doesn't get jean to stay with her, because she knows how good the trojans will be for him. jeremy is not going to heal jean, but he can definitely help him with it.

the last and arguably most important thing is this: jean trusts jeremy. y'all can talk about how jean is traumatised and unfamiliar with the world outside the nest but i swear to god this fandom babies and uwufies him to unbelievable extents. jean may be unspeakably traumatised and at the end of his rope, but he is an adult, and he does have agency. he understands that jeremy cares about him and his wellbeing, and he trusts jeremy. jeremy isn't perfect. he's inevitably going to make mistakes and do questionable things along the way, but i don't think he's at all impeding jean's healing or growth, and he is doing everything with genuine good intentions. one person's definition of the "right" thing to do is not objective and all-encompassing. jeremy may do things that offend you, and that you would hate, but everyone has a different opinion on these things. do you guys remember the conversation between andreil after dr*ke's attack, when neil pushes andrew just to see him crack? if u think about it on an objective level, it was wrong, even cruel, to press someone about their history of trauma after a horribly traumatic event has just happened to them. but andrew doesn't hold it against neil, and doesn't even seem all that bothered by it. i think the aftg fandom would do well to look at things and events that happen in the books in context and stop thinking that there is only one right answer to every question and only one correct solution in every situation. just because something would be a no-go for you, doesn't mean it would be for everyone, and that goes for fictional characters as much as it goes for real life.

anyway i just find it so interesting how critical and quick to judge people are when it comes to jeremy, when, objectively, the foxes and even andreil have done probably more pressing and objectively "wrong" things to each other. if u read the series back, there are a lot of times when they push and challenge each other's boundaries, but there's an understanding that that is the best way for them to engage with each other. it would do everyone a lot of good to apply the same attitude to the sunshine court, considering how vastly different of a context this new series is in.

[wellofdean]

tags via @ilarual: #literally this is the thing!!#Dean has not explicitly said the words ''please stop leaving''#but he has tried very hard through his actions to express that#AND!!!! CRUCIALLY!!! BECAUSE DEAN IS ACTUALLY A PRETTY GOOD VERBAL COMMUNICATOR!!#he has ALSO!!! verbally expressed his desire for Cas to stick around using OTHER words!!!#not as explicit as ''please stop leaving and stay with me'' but absolutely conveying the same sentiment#what the hell do you think ''we're stronger together'' and the whole ''cursed or not'' speech were about????#like Cas needs it to be more clear than that to Get It bc he does not understand how his constant absence HURTS#but Dean does not want to BE more explicit than he already is#bc he feels like he's been VERY direct on the subject already#he literally told Cas he needs him. TWICE. and has prayed that he needs him there with them at least once that I can recall#Dean thinks he's been EXTREMELY explicitly clear already!!!#and that Cas is constantly leaving bc despite hearing Dean's tacit request to stay Cas is REFUSING that request and doesn't WANT to stay#he keeps asking and getting rebuffed WHY would he be louder and needier about it when he thinks all it's going to get him#is the emotional equivalent of a slap to the face?#in no universe is Dean going to ask for something louder when from his POV he's already been begging for it and being refused like????#this is one of those cases where neither of them is actually doing anything wrong#Dean is communicating perfectly fine it's just Cas is autistic and missing some subtext#Cas isn't wrong for prioritizing his missions when he doesn't understand that Dean wants him there as much as he wants to be there#they're just talking past each other and a deeper conversation or two would fix this problem for them#they just don't realize that conversation is necessary#bc Dean thinks he's been heard and understood and Cas is politely declining his request for more time together#and Cas is unaware that that's something Dean has been asking for at varying volume levels for years#and instead bc of his trauma feels compelled to ''earn'' his place in the family with feats of strength so to speak#no one is at fault for their emotional needs not being met it's just a miscommunication#unfortunately the fandom focuses super hard on only one part of that equation and thus the takes on it are so often Bad™#and ignore Cas's motivations and role as a complex actor with his own trauma and emotional issues and blind spots#anyway they're losers I adore them both <3#spn

OMG thank you. NO ONE IS AT FAULT FOR THEIR EMOTIONAL NEEDS NOT BEING MET.

I love them both so much, and they are so fucking hapless about this one particular thing: they are in love and Chuck keeps fucking with them.

And you are so right, @ilaurel, that Cas's motivations and traumas and complexities are ignored by so much of the fandom. I, an inveterate Dean enjoyer, who thinks Dean is a darling who has never committed a wrong that couldn't be forgiven if he just makes his bewildered wet eyes sad face, cannot understand why we gotta PICK ONE? Like, can't an autistic trauma survivor who's just learning the ropes on this whole 'free will' thing, and who's in love with god's favourite boytoy make a mistake here and there? Can we just give him a fucking break because his heart is the right place? By which I mean in Dean's lap?? If Dean and Cas can forgive each other, can't we just let them both be beautiful fuck ups and love them both?

Personally, I forgive them both their trespasses and hope they get to make out forever in a million beautiful hereafters.

on a realer note i do think people forget that a huge part of the destiel equation is that cas won’t stay. like yeah we focus a lot on the fact that dean won’t ask him to, but cas never sticking around is a huge factor there

[tragically-jane-doe]

Mentally preparing myself to dig through my ao3 history for one specific superbat fic

(by chance any if the homies know it Bruce Wayne gets outed as like a homophobe (he's not he's just insanely deep in the closet) and he has to convince the league that he's not by slowly coming out as bi to everyone I'm pretty sure he comes out to Diana first in way of lasso)

Edit

Sadly I'm pretty sure it has been deleted I've gone thru two months worth of backlog and only had 2 deleted fics and by comparing ao3 history to my google history I'm pretty sure it was called different constellations (I pressed on the link like a dummy and its only showing as 404 error as the name now 😔)

(the other deleted fic was batman's playlist where that damn manwhore seduces superman by listening to wap on repeat during a workout)

On my knees begging ao3 authors to just orphan their works instead of deleting them please babes

[nosferatini]

Writers Guild Presents: The Evening of Nightingales

Cover art by my incredible friend @daneecastle! Why yes, she does have a Patreon! Go check it out!

Fluffy first time smut, anyone???

Rating: Explicit

Tags: Ineffable Turbo Virgins

Status: 10k, Complete

Summary:

The Book of Life told Aziraphale that a Holy Union would make the two of them inseparable. Two names—one demon and one angel—now written as one, in permanent ink. Well, that covers their ethereal souls… but what about the rest? It’s their wedding night, and the nightingales are singing in Berkeley Square. What magic is abroad in the bookshop air tonight? 

Read it on AO3:

The Evening of Nightingales

Excerpt:

Crowley’s eyes darkened as he watched, breath hitching under the sound of Aziraphale’s noises. A moan escaped the angel’s mouth around the shiny surface of the apple, and the demon bit his lip.  “Mmphh…” Crowley was glad he’d stripped out of the wet outer clothes. His smoking jacket’s silk lining yielded under his body’s reactions as pinpricks of excitement quickened his pulse. He could smell the fruit burst into the air with every cherubic nibble. He inhaled Aziraphale’s fading cologne and that delicious honeydew and ginger emanating from his hair. A tiny trickle of juice collected at the corner of Aziraphale’s mouth, and Crowley had to school himself against licking it away.  Too soon… he thought. They would make this last. They’d earned that. He had never ached so. And Aziraphale, his posture melting to something languid and lazy, felt quite the same.  The angel tilted his head back to look at the demon. His eyes were wells of emotion as he chewed the apple with leisurely content. Wells that begged one to dip the pail in, to taste the water. To drink deeply… Crowley swallowed so loud the storm could have heard it. Outside, great dapples of water washed against the window, a Van Gogh of purple and amber hues reflecting the seasonal lights strung down the street. Then all at once, the street lights went out, and every splash upon the glass was black as the vast night beyond.  The two celestial entities within the bookshop flat vaguely registered the dimming of the light, but their world currently consisted of the warmth of the fire and each other’s breaths, the noises they were making, and the unmistakable charge in the air between them.  If they’d had a mind to think about it, they might have realized that was where all the power had just been diverted to. But their eyes weren’t looking at the firmament. Trueform and corporeal alike were transfixed with the motions of an angel's jaw and the twitching of a demon’s slitted pupils. Aziraphale took another bite of the apple.  Crunch. Juice was rolling down Crowley’s thumb and Aziraphale’s chin. The angel made a move to reach for a handkerchief. But Crowley smacked the hand like a chef chasing away prying fingers from an unfinished dish. His voice was firm, but hushed. “Leave it.” The palpitation of Aziraphale’s heart matched the rhythm of the rain for a moment. He swallowed, accidentally downing a larger chunk of apple than he’d intended, and watched as Crowley fixed him with a roguish smirk. The demon drew a slow breath before speaking again.  “What do you want, angel?” Aziraphale brightened, his mouth glistening with the wet of consumption. “I want…” he breathed, “to taste… you .”

Hello fandom! This is my contribution to the goodomensafterdark Pillow Fight!

It is a stand alone work, as well as a tasty teaser (an appeteaser if you will!) for The Season of Nightingales, which I hope you will consider reading! It also serves as an EXPLICIT replacement for Chapter 35, (so if you're already reading Nightingales, keep going and you'll get to this!)

Oh, hi by the way! My name is Nos, and I am a beta addict. 🫣 Please join me in a toast to my beta readers @addledmongoose, @dbacklot99 @demonsandpieohmy @on1occasionfork @brenna and u/blackjeans93 for all the love, attention and patience they gave! I am so spoiled!

Okay I swear I’m ACTUALLY done with this fic now. lol. 

@kotias I will tag GOAD now. I mean goodomensafterdark. I mean... Shit I forgot how? Let me google it....

"Am I GrdOmensAftrDrk?" — no?

"how to know if I am at grdominzdick?" — that didn't work.

"AT ERMAGRRDomenzafyerdark?" — am I close yet?

Wait, I forgot, you're French! Lets try…. Au BonnesOmenzApresNuit!!!

No? lol. Fine. @goodomensafterdark

[alittlebitofloveliness]

I think so many of the issues between book fans vs musical fans in the fandom come from the fact that people are pretending they're the same story, so people get really upset when they see one of their favourite characters being mischaracterized or left out, when in reality they are two DIFFERENT stories that share the same SOURCE MATERIAL. Like, I love the book. My blog is very much focus around the book, and there is a reason I don't tag my content with the musical tag very often, because the Darry Curtis I'm writing about is NOT the same Darry Curtis from the musical. And that's okay! It is! I know it seems crazy but they're both great characters, they're just not the SAME character. My favourite character is Steve Randle, but I haven't thrown a shit fit about how he isn't included as much in the musical because it's a different story, and because what content does exist for musical Steve offers lore for a very interesting character. Just like some people get all upset about blogs and content focusing on the soc characters in the musical, and I'm like I don't know what to tell you, I haven't even seen the musical and I know that the socs play a more important role in the story the musical tells than they do in the book; and that the musical universe makes it so it's far more likely that the socs and greasers COULD potentially have more aquaintanceships/childhood friendships/ post adolescent relationships than the book in which Ponyboy consistently notes that neither the greasers nor socs as a whole can see past their way of life to see the other side as people. Idk, I just think people from the book fandom and musical fandom need to just accept they're different stories, with different characters, with DIFFERENT messages and themes. Like, you really can't mischaracterise a character when the character that's being 'mischaracterized' is a different character to start with. Musical Dally isn't book Dally, full stop, but that doesn't mean that the musical character isn't fleshed out and deep and interesting and a complex addition to the musical, just like it doesn't cheapen the fact that book Dallas is the centre of the story. They just serve a different purpose, because they're two different characters in two different stories, neither one is 'better' than the other because they're NOT the same thing. I just wish people would stop vaugeposting and hating and othering each other, and it's getting the point where people need to learn to either engage with both stories or use filters to curate their fandom experience, OR collectively decide to split into two separate fandoms and tag stuff the outsiders book vs the outsiders movie accordingly, because I really love the Outsiders but all the petty fighting is driving me crazy , it's exhausting and it's making me want to leave the fandom altogether and I highly doubt I'm the only one. In the nicest way possible, please examine both stories for what they are, be mature, and act accordingly. Please.

[olderthannetfic]

www.tumblr.com/olderthannetfic/771823370694213632

You need the say the bit about the way canon treats characters way louder because I really think that the way the character is... framed, I guess? accounts for huge chunks of it.

I remember when the Disk Horse was about Finn vs. Kylo Ren from the Star Wars sequel trilogy and I got called racist for trying to point out that Finn was always framed as the comic relief/unserious by the canon. He has a character arc in the first movie, but his emotions and his trauma and his personality are mostly played for laughs (ha! ha! Black janitor guy is scared because he's a coward! - and him being a janitor is a change that came pretty late, he was originally meant to be the top of his class). OTOH Kylo Ren has the camera linger on his anguished face while sad music plays and he monologues about the moral conflicts that he's facing.

The average viewer/reader - especially in the case of visual media - doesn't really stop watching to form non-prejudiced independent opinions on every character (and really shouldn't if your narrative is well-constructed!), that'd take up too much of their mental bandwidth! They let themselves be guided by how things and people are framed, so of course they'd see Ren as Serious and Tragic and Finn as the funny guy, which is inherently less sexy to most people!

Same thing with F/F: when canon treats its women with any degree of complexity and gives them the sort of character traits that are conductive to blorbofication people are all over it!

My dash's been drowning in Rhaenycent for a year now, and that's a show that arguably sorta botched its female characters in the attempt to make them complex! But it doesn't matter, because they set up all these juicy dynamics and the fans are all over it!

Fans LOVE Claudia from IWTV even though the tragedy of her canonical role is that the guys always sideline her for each other.

I went to the Anora tag after seeing the movie and saw a bunch of Anora x reader fic in between the gifs the same way I did for Feyd Rautha from Dune or any other feral unhinged character fans love imagining themselves having sex with (and then blocked it lol).

Like, my taste in women and men is exactly the same but the large majority of characters that fit it are men, because we just don't get a lot of women who are composed, charming rogues on the outside and crippled traumatized messes on the inside, with a narrative that gives this sufficient weight, and also lets them be feral and unhinged. And I actually prefer minority characters because where I'm from I'm from a minority group myself, but again, most of them don't fit the bill personality-wise or framing-wise.

Fandom's a hobby and it's meant to be fun - I'm not gonna be constantly swimming uphill from what the canon is trying to present to me just because a character shares a demographic category with me. I think this is the case for most people, really.

--

My read on a lot of this is that people are sad about the status quo (fair) and are lying to themselves that the culprits are nearby where they can reach them.

If we confront the fact that the real source is the director or the cinematographer or the studio head, it all feels so much more insurmountable.

Of course, one can opt for niche, indie media, but a lot of people don't want to do that, so they fall back on this shitty coping mechanism of pretending that they can yell at the people around them and effect meaningful change.

[plethomacademia]

I'm not trying to dismiss you, that sucks and it shouldn't happen and I'm sorry that it is. I didn't mean to suggest that my experience invalidates or supercedes yours.

My point is more that when I see positive only posts, I feel like I cannot engage because, to me, this game is the sum of its parts. I now avoid talking to positive only people about the game because I don't want to ruin their good time because they only post positive things. I have made a point to tag all my critical posts so they can be filtered.

I'm not telling you what to do, just saying that it didn't match my experience, I'm sorry this is happening to you, and I wish people could chill out so you and others like you might feel comfortable talking about your issues because then maybe people like me will feel like they can join the conversation without ruining people's fandom funtime.

You know what the most frustrating thing about DAV criticism is at the moment? It's that I do in fact have criticisms. Quite a few, actually. It's a Bioware game, of course I have criticisms. No one I've spoken to or whose posts I've seen thinks it's perfect or above criticism. But the thing is, I—and I imagine a lot of other firmly positive blogs—know that if I share any of those criticisms, if I make posts discussing them and talk about the game's flaws, I will immediately be inundated by people using those complaints to insist that the whole game is garbage and the writing is bad and Bioware's a terrible studio who can't make good games and DAI (of all fucking games) was so much better and blah blah blah blah. I know that because it's happened every goddamn time I've made a less-than-positive post about DAV. And I don't have the energy to deal with that! The endless stream of bad faith criticism wears me down and having to constantly stop to defend a game I like when I'm trying to discuss its flaws because if I don't (and frankly half the time even if I do) people will use my posts to claim the whole game is garbage is exhausting, and fandom is supposed to be fun. So I can't discuss DAV's flaws on tumblr if I want to avoid that, and it is infuriating. I see people bitching about toxic positivity and people refusing to acknowledge the game's flaws, and I really want those people to take a second to consider: do the game's fans ignore its flaws and refuse to accept that anything about it is bad? Or have you created an environment that is so toxic that no one who likes the game wants to risk getting your attention by mentioning what's bad about it and they respond more aggressively than is warranted to even genuine critique in an attempt to ward you off? Because there will always be assholes who claim that genuine problems are Fine, Actually, Stop Being Such A Baby... but if people can't address the game's flaws in public without immediately getting dragged into five different arguments about how it is in fact ultimately a really solid game, they're not going to do it no matter how much they recognise those flaws.

[bellaxgiornata]

How Much Did You Miss Me?

Pairing: Jax Teller x fem!Reader Word Count: 3k [Jax Fic Masterlist]

Warnings/tags: 18+; smut, f!masturbation, cocky Jax and his filthy mouth, somewhat rough sex (kinda, not really), porn with minimal plot, unprotected sex

Summary: While Jax is on a protection run, you're desperate to ease some tension so you can fall asleep. But when he unexpectedly returns early, he's determined to prove he's better than your toy.

a/n: This is pure filth. All of it. I was writing some soft!Jax smut and was struck with the need for something with a cocky Jax, so this interrupted that and fell out of me really quick. Newer to this fandom, but if you'd like me to tag something not listed above, let me know. Feedback and reblogs are always appreciated!

You hated nights like tonight. Nights when Jax was out late doing a protection run with the club and you were left alone in your apartment.

You especially hated nights like tonight when you couldn't seem to ignore that damn incessant ache between your thighs no matter how hard you tried. You knew you’d never get to sleep tonight if you didn’t get rid of it, but all you wanted was Jax–his mouth, his fingers, his cock. Right now you craved any part of him, but he was probably hours away on his bike and you were here with nothing but your damn vibrator.

Head nestled amidst the pillows of your bed, your eyes squeezed tightly shut as the repetitive buzzing noise drowned out the sound of anything else in your apartment. You were focused on the pleasure steadily building in your body as your mind desperately tried to conjure up images from the last time you'd been with Jax two mornings ago. Holding tight to the memory of him lazily fucking into you while half awake from that other morning, you desperately attempted to chase your release just so that you could relax enough to finally go to sleep tonight.

Teeth biting down on your lip, you could feel that intoxicating sensation gradually growing stronger within you. You were getting closer, inching nearer and nearer as that wave of pleasure crept its way up your spine. Keeping your focus on the memory of Jax with your legs tossed over his shoulders, his large hands holding your ankles firmly in place as he slowly rolled his hips into you, your back arched along the bed as the pleasure continued to build. You were so damn close now.

But the sound of a familiar deep, rumbling chuckle broke through the moment. 

Just as you'd startled and opened your eyes, Jax was reaching down and pulling the toy out of your hand without the slightest hesitation. With a smug smirk on his lips, he easily turned the vibrator off without even glancing away from where you were sprawled naked on the bed before him.

“Really, baby?” he asked, his tone a mixture of amused and annoyed as he gestured his head at the vibrator in his hand. “This what you do when I'm gone?”

Lips parting in surprise for the briefest moment, you gaped at his audacity. Seconds later you recovered, shooting him a pointed look that only had his smirk growing a little more.

“What the hell, Jax?” you shot back in frustration. 

He held the toy up higher in his hand, his brows raising back at you. “You think I'm gonna let my girl use this fucking thing when I've got something much better?”

If it wasn't for the fact that you were feeling sufficiently sexually frustrated at the moment, you'd have found the sight of him holding your purple vibrator up with that look on his face somewhat funny. But right now you didn't feel anything close to entertained.

“You were supposed to be out, Jax,” you reminded him. “What the hell else am I supposed to do when you're gone? Suffer?”

“Now there's a thought,” he mused.

With an annoyed huff, you watched as he turned around to set the vibrator on your dresser. Pushing yourself upright on the bed, you frowned at him when he turned back to face you.

“Come on now, darlin’,” he drawled, a glint in his eyes as they roamed over the way you sat naked on the bed. “Don't give me that look. I'm not going to leave you so...tense.” 

Your eyes narrowed at the way he was still grinning at you. Unaffected by your look, his hands reached up and slowly slipped the leather kutte off of his shoulders, letting it drop to your bedroom floor with a soft thump.

“What's the catch, Jax?” you asked him, cutting straight to the point.

He chuckled at your question, his hands casually undoing the buttons of his flannel one at a time next. “No catch, baby. I wouldn't do that to you. Not when it seems like I interrupted you before your satisfying conclusion.”

You shook your head immediately, not entirely believing what he was telling you–not with that look on his face. Thighs pressing together as you watched him undress, your body was craving release at this point. It didn't help that Jax had caught the subtle squirming and shifting of your hips, his eyes dropping down towards your legs. His tongue darted out, running slowly along his bottom lip as he slid the flannel down his arms and to the floor. Your eyes immediately drank in the sight of his bare chest, raking over every toned muscle, little scar, and tattoo now made visible.

“Okay, maybe one little catch,” he amended.

Gritting your teeth together, you watched as his hands lowered, beginning to slowly undo the button and the zipper of his jeans. He was going so slow on purpose just to tease you.

“What?” you grudgingly asked.

“I want to hear you,” he continued, pushing his jeans and black boxer briefs down his thighs in one fluid movement that had you almost salivating at the sight of him finally bare. “No keeping quiet tonight. I don't give a shit if we piss off your neighbors again.” He kicked out of his clothes, taking two steps before he was right at the foot of the bed. “I want to know how much more you enjoy my cock. I want to hear it. You got that?” 

His eyes held yours as he leaned forward and planted both hands on the edge of the bed. There was a challenge in his expression, daring you to tell him no. But you knew better than to do that because then he probably really would leave you frustrated and unsatisfied tonight. And honestly, you had a feeling you'd be so sensitive at this point that you wouldn't be keeping very quiet.

“It's not like I wanted that thing over you in the first place, Jax,” you answered flatly. 

Clearly your response had been one he wanted to hear because Jax climbed up onto your bed the second you'd finished speaking. He jutted his chin out at you before he spoke again, that smug smirk he often wore returning.

“Roll over, baby. On your stomach,” he ordered.

You hesitated for only a moment, just long enough to take in the sight of him naked on his knees on your bed, one hand stroking his hardening length. He looked so good that you just couldn’t help yourself, but the moment one of his brows arched at you, you shifted and turned, laying down on your stomach.

“There you go, baby,” he praised in a deep rumble.

His voice went straight to your cunt, a surge of pleasure running through you. His rough hands grabbed onto your hips, shifting them a little higher up off the bed before one of them slid over to grab a firm handful of your ass. A quiet, soft little noise slipped out of you in response, the anticipation of what was coming causing your cunt to pathetically clench around nothing. 

As Jax pushed your legs apart wider with his knees, making room for himself between them, a pleased, throaty noise vibrated in his chest. The sound alone had your hands fisting the bed sheets before you glanced over your shoulder at him behind you.

“Already impatient, darlin’?” Jax teased.

“Of course I'm impatient, you interrupted what I was–”

Your words were cut off the second he ran the tip of himself through your damp folds, a gasp falling out of you instead. You were so damn sensitive already from what you'd just been doing that you didn't think you’d be lasting much longer. Especially when another throaty, satisfied noise left Jax behind you.

“What was that, baby?” he asked, amused. “Would you have preferred the toy instead?”

He teased the tip of himself against your entrance, barely pressing himself against you. Your eyelids immediately fluttered, your breath hitching. You just wanted to feel him already.

“No, Jax,” you nearly whined in response.

Trying to compose yourself as you watched him once more over your shoulder, you saw the slow, satisfied grin spread over his lips. A second later you were rewarded with the feel of him partially sinking into you, the sensation causing your mouth to fall open and a soft groan to slip out.

“That fucking toy get you this goddamn wet?” he growled, a hint of irritation in his tone. “That why you feel so goddamn good already?”

Jax moved behind you, leaning forward on the bed until his body was flush over the back of yours, resting his forearms along the mattress on either side of your hands to withhold some of his weight from off of you. His hips pushed himself further inside of you a little more roughly than usual as if to emphasize his displeasure at your use of the vibrator. The gesture met with a sharper gasp from you this time.

“Was–was thinking about you,” you managed to breathe out.

His face hovered just over your shoulder now, his mouth beside your ear when another pleased rumble sounded in his throat. He pulled his hips slowly backwards, his cock nearly slipping out of you before he roughly buried himself fully back into you in one quick movement. A high-pitched curse flew out of your mouth, your eyes snapping shut.

“So you were thinking about me?” he murmured, his tone far softer than the current thrust of his hips against you. His head shifted, his lips brushing the shell of your ear as he spoke. “You miss me that much when I'm out with the club, baby?”

“Mhmm,” you hummed out, the noise sounding more like a needy whine.

Jax’s pace increased at your response, his cock repeatedly burying itself so deep inside of you that he kept hitting the spot that made the edges of your vision nearly burn white. You were so damn close again already, each of his panting breaths and rough grunts in your ear drawing you right back to the moment he had interrupted a little bit ago.

You loved this position and Jax knew it. The angle he could thrust into you was always perfect, allowing him to fill you completely with every sharp snap of his hips. And you loved the feel of his solid, warm body pressed flush over the entirety of you, his weight pressing you deep into the mattress as he practically overwhelmed all of your senses. You could feel the pull of his muscles against your back, hear the grunts and heavy breaths slipping out of his mouth beside your ear, feel his hot breath along your neck, smell the familiar scent of cigarettes and leather.

Your cunt was tightening around him already at the influx of stimulation, squeezing him as you kept drawing closer to the release you craved. A flurry of soft moans had been increasingly tumbling out of your mouth as he continued to roughly fuck into you, his hips repeatedly ramming into your ass over and over. But you could tell he wanted more when the hand beside yours moved, sliding its way along the bed before moving between your body and the mattress, brushing down past your breasts and your stomach. His hand continued its descent further until it stopped between your thighs, his fingertips landing right on your already sensitive clit. A hiss of pleasure came from between your teeth and Jax huffed in amusement beside your ear.

“Baby, I know you can be louder,” he panted out. “I told you I wanna hear you.”

His fingers began rubbing circles against that sensitive bundle of nerves and your eyes nearly rolled back into your head. You felt like you were drowning in bliss now as his hips continued rolling roughly into you, the sound of skin on skin obscenely mixing with Jax’s grunts and your growing moans.

“Louder,” he ordered, continuing to speak into your ear between gritted teeth and forceful thrusts. “Let me–hear you. Wanna know–how much–you missed me.”

“Fuck–Jax–”

With an animalistic grunt, his teeth latched onto your earlobe, giving a couple of sharp tugs against the delicate skin as his fingers continued rubbing against you. Your cunt fluttered around him, gripping him like a vice. He groaned in response, releasing your earlobe before his forehead dropped onto your shoulder as his hips began to stutter, slowly losing their rhythm as he neared his own release. That had your own hips beginning to push back against him, desperately trying to match his pace and take him somehow deeper.

“That’s it baby,” he whispered into your skin. His body pressed more of its weight on top of you as he kept ramming his hips into yours, chasing his own release. “That’s my girl.”

“Jax–I’m–”

You couldn’t get the words out, you were already teetering on the edge of an orgasm, one that felt far stronger than normal because of its delay. At the feel of Jax pressing a soft kiss to your shoulder, your eyes snapped tightly shut.

“I know, baby,” he murmured, his voice strained. “Let go for me. Need you to–” he paused, breaking off on a groan that had your toes curling along the sheets as he hit you with a particularly deep thrust. “Need you to–cum for me.”

When the pads of his fingers added just a bit more pressure to your clit, you finally lost it underneath him. A moan tore its way up through you, ringing out through your bedroom as your fingers fisted the bed sheets even tighter. Jax continued to thrust into you, though the movements had grown sloppy as his breaths grew ragged and loud beside your ear. He was grunting and groaning as your body trembled its way through your orgasm until he gave another particularly deep, sharp thrust that had you crying his name.

That’s when Jax finally lost it. A resonant, beautiful moan tumbled out from between his lips as his hand finally left its place between your thighs to grip the pillow beside your head. He gave a few more rough pumps into you before you felt the warmth of his release fill you. You hummed softly, your cunt continuing to twitch around him.

Jax expelled a deep breath before he practically collapsed half on top of you, the weight of him only causing your already blissfully boneless body to relax further into the bed. As you both sat there panting, your loud breaths filling the room as your sweat-dampened bodies remained tangled together, you could feel his cock gradually beginning to soften inside of you. 

“So that–that’s what you get up to when I’m out, huh?” Jax finally asked, still sounding out of breath. “You and that goddamn vibrator get nice and close when I’m busy?”

Turning your head along the pillow, your eyes met Jax’s as his head rested on the pillow beside yours. There was a lazy half-smile on his lips as he gazed back at you, but there was something soft and tender shining in his eyes as he watched you in return. He looked so damn good all flushed and satisfied that you were half tempted to rile him up for another round once you recovered.

“Not every time,” you answered, a small smile slipping onto your lips as your breath came in heavy. “Just…some nights. When I’m missing you.”

A soft, amused breath left him as his hand reached up, lightly brushing aside a strand of hair that had stuck to the perspiration along your forehead with his fingertips. “Yeah?” he murmured, his hand coming to gently stroke your cheek. “Miss me that much tonight, did you?”

You hummed an affirmative response, your small smile growing. “Yeah. Wasn’t expecting you to come over tonight,” you told him, your heart still pounding heavily in your chest. “You made it sound like you’d be gone all night.”

“I was supposed to be,” he replied. “Had that protection run. Wasn’t gonna be back until four in the morning. But then some bullshit was going down at the clubhouse so Clay sent Opie and I back. Think he meant it like a punishment or somethin’.”

Jax laughed softly, shifting on the bed to ease some of his weight off of you. The movement had you once more growing aware of the fact that he was still inside of you. 

“Jokes on him,” he continued, that usual cocky smirk slipping onto his face. “Wasn’t that big of a problem to handle. And right now, this don’t feel remotely like a punishment.”

Quirking a brow back at him, a small grin tugged at your lips. “You want me to make it feel like one?” you teased.

Jax’s hand reached down, lightly swatting your ass as he grinned deviously at you. The gesture had you laughing, the sound causing the corners of his eyes to crease.

“Baby, this is your punishment for using that goddamn toy,” he reminded you. 

“Not feeling very much like a punishment for me, either,” you joked back.

That devious expression on his face only grew, a hint of mischief glinting in his eyes suddenly. He leaned forward off the pillow, his teeth lightly mouthing at your bare shoulder as his eyes continued to hold your gaze.

“You want me to make it feel like one?” he asked, throwing your words back at you.

A shudder ran up your spine at the sultry tone of his voice before a sinful smirk pulled the corners of his lips upwards. You were definitely in for it tonight.

[saynomorefic]

2024 fandom review

Ty for tagging me @willesredlights @phneltwrites @grounded-parasocial <3

This is going to be a mishmash of formats I've seen, so thanks everyone for giving me ideas

Fics written

I started watching and writing YR this year, so 2024 has really been huge for me in returning to fandom and fic writing. I wrote 27 works (plus tumblr ficlets) and 117k words, by far the most I've written!

First fic posted in 2024: You Kill Me (WIP) 2024-02-06

My love letter to Young Royals. Anyone who has read this, thank you and sorry, it's deeply personal and my raw initial reaction to watching the show.

Last fic posted in 2024: Ghosts of Simons Past 2024-12-23

Silly little christmas fic!

Fav fic I've written: Let's take this overboard (WIP) 2024-06-25

My Mediterranean yacht AU! Ah my beloved. Thank you to everyone for showing this story love. It's still going, I'm just putting the pieces together. How do you pick a direction when you have so many?

It's been a big year of writing :) I haven't written creatively for about 9 years, so it's safe to say Young Royals and this community have ignited a creative spark I didn't know I had in me. When I was a kid my dream was to be a writer. Getting emotional here, but it's hitting me that in a way, that dream has come true in a way! I know fanfic is not technically professional writing, but in a way it's cooler - we don't get to just message our favorite "real" authors whenever we want, nor do bigger authors get to experience being in a club of writers like this! (actually I wouldn't know, but w/3).

Thank you to every single person who has sat down and read my little stories, you guys truly don't know what you have given me and how much it means.

Fics read under the cut <3

Fics read

I can't give a number, but I have bookmarked 117 fics since 2024-02-11, and it's safe to say I've read at least 4x that.. so uh.. it's a lot :''))

This is a list of favs after going through my bookmarks, and definitely not an exhaustive list of all the fics I've read and loved from this past year. Thank you to ALL writers out there for your amazing work <3

First fic I bookmarked/ read: objects in motion by Capiche

Last fic I read: Under the Mistletoe by @vvachillessongvv (so cute!)

Some favorites I've read this year:

Stairway to Heaven by @unfortunate17

the person responsible for finding young royals, and this was one of the very first fics I read! Heartbreaking and wonderful.

Something Real as Pain by @crownedwille

I love how this story directly engages with power differences between Wilhelm and Simon, and I'm so proud of these two <3

be the place you call your home by @phneltwrites

I love them so much. No one does post-canon like you! such a unique writing voice and characterizations to match <3

Faroe Gone by @groenendaelfic

Pining Simon. Pining Wilhelm. Remote island-farm-cottage sex. What more could you want?

We Left Footprints When We Passed By by @in-amor-veritas

One of the first long fics I read, and these two will never leave me.

darling, lost in the darkling woods by Ripki on ao3

honorable mention to Align, but this noir gripped me like no other.

Fright Fest! by @enjoythesilentworld

I adore everything about this, horrorific, whumpy and visceral <33

sleep, dream, you, repeat (live, die next to me) by @espejonight28738

This little gem! The Midsommar AU. So so good, so well written.

bittersweet ecstasy (I pick my poison and it's you) by wthbaby (ao3)

An amazing ABO fic that's more werewolf /fantasy than anything!

The initiation - sorry if we got a bit rough by @silvagrey

A really interesting look at the aftermath of Wilhelm's initiation ritual, and a type of canon divergence I've never seen!

A Glimpse of Us by @simons-purplehoodie

An early love, read this in April and was swept away.

Look at us by @willesredlights

So hot, so sweet, and bonus that it was a gift for me! <33

to color with two by @wildcalendula

I love the way they communicate about sex here. So tender and loving and lovely. Just this whole series!

The Way We Were by queerofthemonth (ao3)

Damaged popstar Simon. Sad Kronprins Wilhelm. Fuck.

Cock by @stretchoutfics

Just so much to say about pining and sexuality crisis Wilhelm. It feels so realistic, and I love their communication here.

One, two, three (Not only you and me) by @skibasyndrome

So much communication, so much trust, so much honesty. And the LAPDANCING? Also, thank you so much for every kinktober contribution, promise we are all very grateful <3

Where We Left Off by @gulliblelemon

So tender, they will literally be in my heart forever. It's time to re-read!

come closer and see into the dark (WIP) by @bigalockwood

I can't decide what's better, unique magical ghosts or juicy slow burn interpersonal relationships at the YR ghost agency. Love <3

losing a friend is the hardest part by psyanky on ao3

God do a love break ups and second chances. And everything psyanky writes.

We're Going to Be Friends (Lilac Grove) by wilmonlibrarian on ao3

I'm so in love. Borrower Simon is adorable, and it blows my mind how this author created this whole world.

I am awaiting you (WIP) by @toffeelemon and thatgayprince (pls help me tag on tumblr!)

I am so in love with Princess Simon and Wille here. Uadhakjsdha

i've got power in my hands (and it's yours for the taking) by @starvalisedham

The library fight from August's POV. There are LAYERS here, and I love how much is up to interpretation reg. his perception of Wilmon.

maybe now maybe here tonight by @dreamyelectronicmusic

I love a getting back together fic, and the writing! I'm in awe.

My Home for All Time by @hergrandplan

Amazing contributions for Wille's month! Every ficlet and morsel.

words written down by @caramelpenguin

Every single one. how do I pick? Thank you for always sharing these beautiful snapshots with us <3

this is the golden age of something good and right and real (Painter AU) series by @alltoowille

I couldn't choose bc the first part was INSANE. and then I read it and realized there was 50k+ after? Think I ascended. Thank you <3

and last but not least obviously by @grapehyasynth

Changed me. Changed how I write, and then changed me again.

Final reflections

I wanted to say I loved helping celebrate Wilmonhits5k on ao3, and big thanks to everyone who participated through fic recs and commenting.

I have to mention the people that keep this fic world turning through fic recs, making gifs, fandom engagement, and more! @simonsapelsin @youngroyals-events @kruemel8 @sillyunicorn @grounded-parasocial @books-books-smolderinglooks @impossibleknots @sillylittleflower and too many more to list. You guys are truly the best <3

If we have never chit chatted, feel free to come say hi! <3 Happy new year to you all, and here's to more YR magic in 2025.

[thecoffeelorian]

I'm At Soup! (TBB Edition)

Title: I'm At Soup!

Fandom: Star Wars/The Bad Batch

Characters Involved: Crosshair, Batcher, Hunter, and Wrecker

WC: 486/Under 1k.

A/N: This is the one-shot to celebrate me reaching 300 followers on Tumblr! Thank you all for getting me here, and let me also tag the following people specifically:

No Pressure Tags:

@oraleandreu @gun-roswell @harmless--dreamer @built-on-hope-1977 @orangez3st

@hellhoundmaggie @lulalovez @momojedi @lazyprofessorpursesalad @still-nix-d-goffic

@archivewriter1ont @cloneflo99 @tink1221 @leapingbadger and anybody else who would like something funny to read. :D

Don't call unless it's an emergency, Hunter had requested, wanting nothing less than near perfect silence during his latest shopping trip. Under normal circumstances, Crosshair would have done just that, as he already had first-hand experience with being overwhelmed and also wasn't all that eager to force others to go through the same thing.

However...no thanks to Batcher having run off ten minutes ago, her confusion as to whether or not the moon-yos of Pabu were living animals or squeaky toys, it was unfortunately time to call in the reinforcements.

Specifically, calling up Hunter himself over the commlink, all the while he himself stood at attention by the dining room table.

"Hello?"

"Hey, Cross, what's up?"

"I need your help, can you come here?"

"Uh, I can't, I'm buying clothes."

"Alright, well..."

Letting out a small sigh, Crosshair just shrugged and continued with the call. Best not to overthink the situation, after all...yet.

"...Hurry up and come over here."

"I can't find them."

What.

"What do you mean, you can't find them?"

"I can't find them, there's only soup."

A small crackle of static popped over the system, then an awkward silence followed...and curiously enough, no 'Gotcha' or other hints that this was just one big joke from Hunter.

"What do you mean, 'there's only soup'?"

"It means there's only soup!"

"Well then, get out of the soup aisle!"

"All right! You don't have to shout at me!"

Next came the sound of footsteps as Hunter continued down a different aisle, a small huff of annoyance, and then--

"--There's more soup."

"What do you mean there's more soup?"

"There's just more soup!"

Two aisles of soup now...? This was getting out of hand, and no, that wasn't a round of self-deprecating humor.

It. Was. Madness.

"Go into the next aisle!"

"There's still soup!"

"Where are you right now?!"

"I'm at soup!"

At Soup?! How could any Trooper in the known galaxy, be it far far away or a few klicks ahead, suddenly be 'At Soup'?!

"What do you mean you're "at soup?"

"I mean I'm at soup!"

"What store are you in?!"

"I'm at the soup store!"

"Why are you buying clothes at the soup store?"

"Kriff you!"

Both Troopers turned off their ends of the commlink with a loud slap, each of them so frustrated with the other that they most likely would not be on speaking terms for the next hour.

Back on Crosshair's end, he would merely shake his head in disgust before going off in search of the dog treats, if only to give Batcher a reason to come running the moment he jostled the bag loudly enough.

On Hunter's end, however...he would be comforted with one of Wrecker's hands upon his shoulder, along with the following vote of confidence:

"I think we're gonna have to stun this guy, Sarge."

"Dank Ferrik," Hunter sighed in return. Today just wasn't his day.

[musicfeedsmysoul12]

Don’t remember but if so: report ever story like we should when tags are there for ‘reach’.

That isn’t how it works so we need to do it.

I know a lot of people probably would go: oh no we can’t do that because it’s rude/cruel/wrong but it isn’t. So many people are trying to ignore rules and do what they want because they’re allowed to do so on other platforms. TikTok lets people tag for reach but Tumblr and AO3 don’t. I have reported so many stories for using multiple tags like that and I’ll keep doing it.

If you need to ignore all the rules to get your story read: learn to be a better writer. If you’re worried about not everyone seeing your story, let me tell you you’ll piss off more people when they see you tagged for reach then not. If someone is searching for a specific tag and they come across yours thinking it will have it, and it doesn’t, you just made someone upset.

If you do the ‘coming soon’ thing and piss people off, you’re at fault for having no one read your stuff.

I am really sick of how fandom etiquette has gone downhill over the years and that’s not even discussing how I actually don’t feel motivated a lot to write because of it. This is just my frustration as a reader.

So lately I've been finding stories on AO3 with a title and a summary but once I click on it all it says is: chapter coming soon.

Which... I don't even know what to think, I'm so confused. What is the point? I am baffled. Can someone explain this to me? What is the logic behind this?

[doublel27]

I’m going to take a moment and say that @waitmyturtles has blocked me so I can no longer see any likes or replies to my response of their bullying post and other posts of hers which can be found here. I can no longer tag her nor can I see any comments or replies to my part of that post.

I am going to ask kindly, that you not reblog my version of that post, because clearly waitmyturtles doesn’t want it engaged with, especially with me as friends have now said they can’t see any of the replies, AND I don’t think @maybe-boys-do-love needs to keep seeing the tantrum leveled at him. If you want to talk to me about it, my inbox and messages are open. I also just want to say that if they @ me, because I don’t have them blocked, it may look like they’re saying things for me to respond to I can’t see. Know I am not avoiding discourse and am staying transparent. I’m going to ask that you not send any posts, direct or vagueblogging, to me. If you don’t like it say something or let it go. But I don’t need to know.

Also, while I called out waitmyturtles and lurkingshan (who I also cannot tag, so has blocked me), please don’t use this as an excuse to pile on or send hate to them. Do not respond to toxic fandom with toxic fandom. I said it when people ganged up on @benygio over his We Are take, just like I did here. I hope one day they want to talk again but I doubt it.

Much love y’all. May everyone find some peace.

[wen-kexing-apologist]

Well, I was tagged in this reblog (linked for context because that post is wayyyy too long already and I’m prone to run on sentences) so I am going to respond to the part of this that @doublel27 quoted me on. 

I want to make some things clear before I start: 

Critiquing shows does not mean I always hate those shows, few shows are perfect, and for me it is worth discussing what a show did and did not do well. 

I do not care if people like the shows I do not like, and I do not care if people do not like the shows I like. It is extremely rare that people agree on everything in the same piece of media. Everyone is entitled to their own enjoyment of their preferred media and I guarantee you that Shan, Turtles, Ben, Twig, etc. etc. will say the same. Also, since you mentioned Twig’s post about We Are, please let me direct you to the episode of The Conversation where Twig, Ben, and NiNi talk together about their differing opinions on that very show. And in case you were genuinely concerned about Ben and Twig’s feelings on the quality of Thai BLs this year, you can stick around for the second half where they talk about Knock, Knock Boys! Hopefully that will assuage your fears.

Some of the issues I have with vague posting are (a) it can lead to confusion, especially in a case like this where, according to you, maybe boys do love posted a response to eight different people’s commentary simultaneously without attributing which op’s thoughts he was responding to at any point. (b) By bundling eight responses in to one post without @ ing people, it makes it seem like he has misinterpreted other people’s commentary or taken something in intentionally bad faith (c) other tumblr users in a fandom will let people know when an “unrelated post” makes commentary specific enough to be recognized as a response to someone else’s statements thus drawing them in to the conversation. It’s why I prefer to be tagged in responses to the thoughts I share. This is a public forum, whatever I post in here is able to be reblogged, tagged, or commented on. If I didn’t want people to interact with my posts…I wouldn’t post them. If you don’t feel comfortable tagging people who you are responding to, then at least acknowledge them in your writing. We love a cited source.

I don’t love policing language, but since you were more than happy doing it in your post, then I’ll say one thing here: the tone of maybe boys do love’s post does not read, to me, like it is intended to welcome people who appreciate that there is “not a single stance about what qualifies BL as good work.” It reads like it is “reminding” the supposedly eight people he is vague-posting about that they are being unreasonable in their expressed opinions. It especially does not read with the primary intention of welcoming others when Maybe Boys Do Love’s response to Turtle’s initial reblog was to comment on her “respectfulness” and Shan and Ben’s lack thereof simply because they blocked him on Tumblr. A thing which people do every day for any number of reasons. But I digress.

As for my part in your response, you referenced a statement from my tumblr post A Pause for Reflection: Part 2- Only Friends, Racism, and the Commodification of Queer Asians: 

“We all need to, but white Westerners especially, be extremely careful and introspective with the ways we are engaging with queer Asian media”

On the seriousness of this statement, doublel27, you and I are agreed. I think it is valid to state that this should apply to the decisions of writers, directors, etc. of BLs. And I also agree that preventing infantilization and removal of agency from writers, directors, actors, and audiences is a good addition. That said, I do not think critiquing media is in any way shape or form an infantilizing or agency-removing act. 

I do, however, think you are falling victim to the western paternalism/white saviorism you are so upset about by going on to a South East Asian woman’s post and chastising her about not speaking for a South East Asian audience when you are a white westerner?

Also, I think there I might be missing a step in your logical progression when you say “I’m of the opinion that what’s good for queer Thai television is not for foreign audiences to decide, ultimately. That’s for queer Thai people to decide.” It would amaze me greatly if this hypothetical monolith of queer people in Thailand were to be 100% in agreement about what constitutes good queer television. Personally I see your belief that no one outside of queer Thai people is allowed to critique queer Thai shows as actually undermining the legitimacy of this genre as a source of entertainment for audiences outside of just queer (in this case) Thai people. Media is frequently made with an intended audience in mind, but that does not mean people outside that target audience are barred from engaging with it. No one is saying “this is a bad queer Thai show and I am deciding that for all queer people” they are saying “here is what or why I did not like the decision they made about x,y,z."

If you are going to quote me, then I hope you also read the first half of my Pause for Reflection posts Taking Pause for Reflection- Part 1: Respectable Promiscuity and Only Friends where I talk about respectable promiscuity and discuss the ways in which respectability politics have resulted in “current LGBTQ+ political movements shifting away from highlighting sexual liberation as an aspect of queer culture, in order to make queer people more palatable to the overarching heterosexual society. And how that bleeds through in to the kinds of media that exist, the types of queer people portrayed within that media, as well as how often gay sex is shown, the type of gay sex shown, and the number of gay sex partners depicted. (Read: generally infrequently, generally vanilla, generally one).” Just so you are aware of where I stand in all of this and what people like Shan and myself are talking about when we critique the decision to remove sexual content from queer stories for the sake of storytelling or viewership.  

I haven’t mentioned this one in awhile but I used to talk a lot about my perception of queer content being able to be categorized in By, For, and About Queers formatting. For example, a film like Pariah (2011) is a story about a queer person created by a queer person with a narrative that feels like it is made for the enjoyment of queer people above all others (but of course anyone can watch).

^I think this was made by abl, who I am not tagging because I do not want to drag them in to this conversation, but whose image I still want to cite.

This is obviously subjective, and I’m not saying it should always be used, but I know some people can find it nice to organize things by categories. 

Again, this is subjective but I’ll give a short list of a couple of BLs that I personally would categorize as being For queer people- by which I mean it feels like a love letter to queer people, I can see something of myself and my experiences in it, and I would not be surprised if the primary intended audience was queer people:

I Told Sunset About You

The Miracle of Teddy Bear

What Did You Eat Yesterday

Koisenu Futari

Here is a short list of some BLs I would personally categorize under About queer people- that is, queer people are the main characters but the piece feels like the primary intended audience is not queer people:

Kiseki: Dear to Me

KinnPorsche

My School President

Spare Me Your Mercy

That does not mean the shows about queer people aren’t queer stories, but it does mean the intention behind the work is different. Which brings me all the way back to Spare Me Your Mercy since that’s what started all of this in the first place: 

Lux Sirilux in an interview before the show came out stated:

“Having NC would steal the attention of the story because what we were going to talk about was dark drama and euthanasia.”

She also says: 

“The characters are gay, but we don’t offer [fan]service in every episode or include NC (explicit) scenes."

(I got these statements above from this post by clariredaring who I am not tagging in this because I do not want to pull them in to this whole ordeal any more than they already have been).

Lux is absolutely allowed to make the decision to remove NC scenes from SMYM if she believes that it will detract from the vibe and the overarching theme. Sammon is absolutely allowed to approve and accept the removal of NC content from the Spare Me Your Mercy television show. No one is arguing that. (And I feel comfortable speaking for Shan here at the very least because we talk about shows a lot and I know what her post was actually saying as it relates to viewership). I already wrote a post about my feelings on this matter where I discussed why I feel that choice went wrong in this case. That does not mean anyone else has to feel that way, and I’m not forcing anyone to agree with me. And if people disagree with me, fine, they are welcome to discuss with me why they feel like the story worked as is if they want to and ignore me if they don't. (And literally as I was writing this a great example of someone disagreeing with me came through in this post by elimstillnotgarak who I will not be tagging in this simply because I don't want to drag someone who is not involved in this in to a very different discussion). But there is a level of disingenuousness that comes with the statement 'you should not say anything negative ever about the stories you have watched from cultures outside of your own.' I'm not saying this is the belief you hold, but I am saying that is how I interpret your statements about not speaking for a queer Thai audience.

And, as someone who has written multiple essays breaking down sex scenes in BLs, let me just say that I believe there is a fundamental difference between NC scenes and fanservice. I think there are instances where fanservice can result in positive changes (The Magnus Archives, for example, updated their ending after seeing how much fans were shipping Jon and Martin together and I think the ending was better for it) but I think there are a lot of times when fanservice actually does undermine the narrative. As for NC scenes, there are definitely ones that detract from the story at hand, and there are ones that I think people throw in as a bandaid in the hopes that they can get higher viewership (Playboyy and Battle of the Writers are examples of that imo) but I think there are a lot of times when NC scenes actually improve the narratives they are a part of expressly because they can tell you a whole hell of a lot about a character’s relationship and feelings to another person in a very short period of time. 

For me, I think Sammon and Lux here engaged in respectability politics operating under a belief that NC scenes between these queer characters would take away from the larger story they were trying to tell. And I think that the believability of the romantic relationship between Kan and Tew suffered for it. This is a show that already was written for a larger general audience because most of Sammon’s work places some medical mystery narrative at the front and center (which makes sense because she’s a doctor). 

And personally doublel27 I feel you are drawing a false equivalency between critique and infantilization and I would appreciate it if next time you quote me, you make sure you read the entirety of the post so that you can better understand that I will continue to be critical of people who submit to respectable promiscuity and make the choice to tone down the queerness in their story because they are worried it will distract the audience at large.