#no one owes you their political stances on tumblr or anywhere

[embras-grace]

MUWAHAHAHAHA YOU ACTIVATED MY TRAP CARD!

For every antisemitic, aggressive, and rude anon I get for being Jewish and not wanting politics on my Palia sideblog I add another person to my block list!

[sssrha]

WangXian wouldn’t have been very functional pre-Wei Wuxian’s resurrection

So I was talking to @litescheme on Twitter and I decided to pour my heart out about how I hated the general fandom consensus that Wei Wuxian going to Gusu when Lan Wangji asked him to would have solved all of his problems, primarily because the idea of just straight up going to Gusu is incredibly flawed. Lo and behold, they agreed wholeheartedly. We had a great discussion and now I’m here to relay the discussion onto Tumblr in essay form uwu.

(By the way, this is based mostly on CQL with a good bit of novel added in, as well as a few hints of the donghua.)

Part One: “Come back to Gusu!” is a great romantic notion but a terrible plan of action.

First of all, one must ask the question: what on Earth was Lan Wangji’s game plan with the whole “Come back to Gusu!” thing? I think we can all agree that most of the Lan Sect hated Wei Wuxian - by the end, at least. Lan Xichen certainly had less than charitable feelings toward him. With such a hostile environment, the only way I can see Wei Wuxian surviving within the Sect is while being forced into a Madam Lan-type situation. I find that prospect more reminiscent of a horror movie than a heartwarming fic about healing.

Luckily for us, we can safely say that canon Lan Wangji would not have done that! Due to certain childhood trauma, Lan Wangji definitely would not have forced Wei Wuxian to do anything, go anywhere, or stay anywhere that he didn’t want to. That isn’t even touching on how much Lan Wangji genuinely wanted Wei Wuxian to be happy, and forcing Wei Wuxian to do anything had generally been proven to not make him happy. Good on him!

The next point: why would Wei Wuxian have gone to Gusu in the first place? Even while ignoring WangXian’s rampant misunderstandings, Wei Wuxian always actively had a reason to not go to Gusu. During the Sunshot Campaign, he was a major player and commanded a huge amount of power that probably aided the Sects greatly. During his stay in the Burial Mounds, he had a community of war prisoners to protect. How could he go to Gusu?

I’ve seen fics where Lan Wangji ensured the safety of the Wen Remnants, and while I absolutely adore the trope, I really don’t see that happening with canon Lan Wangji. First, I don’t think he’d grown as a person enough to fully rebel against his Sect until Wei Wuxian was in immediate danger, and second, I straight up don’t think that he had the sway to. Pulling that kind of stunt implies a good deal of political power within the Sect...and also implies that Lan Wangji would have had enough power to escape a punishment which he clearly never thought he deserved. However, I could be wrong on this point! Politics has never been my forte. 

Also, I don’t think anyone can bank on the Lan Sect accepting the Wen Remnants. After all, the Lan Sect participated in the First Siege of the Burial Mounds and thus, presumably, also the slaughter of the Wen Remnants.

Upon further reflection, I figured that the only time Wei Wuxian might have actually gone to Gusu was that brief period of time after the Sunshot Campaign and before he met Wen Qing. However, for him to agree, I figured that three things had to happen:

Wei Wuxian had to understand that Lan Wangji wanted to help him, not hurt him.

Wei Wuxian had to come to the (false!) conclusion that Jiang Cheng no longer needed his help or support at Lotus Pier.

Wei Wuxian had to accept that he was worth saving in the first place.

(The concept came pre-set with some delicious Yunmeng Bros angst because Jiang Cheng would almost certainly take Wei Wuxian (permanently) going to Gusu the same way he took Wei Wuxian taking the Wen Remnants to the Burial Mounds: a betrayal, a promise broken. Emotionally, of course. There definitely wouldn’t have been political pressure closing in from all sides the way there was in canon.)

I was going to expand on that concept, but then I hit a bit of a hurdle: I genuinely did not, and still do not, see any reason for Wei Wuxian to actually go to Gusu. At that point, Wei Wuxian was doing everything he felt he needed to: he protected Jiang Cheng because Madam Yu told him to (and because he genuinely cared for him, but Madam Yu’s command was his driving force) and he only left Jiang Cheng when Wen Qing - someone he perceived himself owing a greater debt to due to the golden core removal - came along. When looking at it from that regard, I don’t think Wei Wuxian would ever see a reason to go to Gusu.

So, even after clearing up the miscommunication, Lan Wangji would have to present a good reason for Wei Wuxian to listen to him. 

I don’t think Lan Wangji going up to Wei Wuxian and saying, “Please come back to Gusu, I want to protect you,” would have worked. Considering how prideful Wei Wuxian was back then - with a good bit of it justified when you consider the fact that he killed a large amount of people in a single night during the Pledge Conference (though the exact number is never actually confirmed as far as I remember) - I don’t see Wei Wuxian taking the implication that he needs protection very well. No matter how many good intentions Lan Wangji had, he would have ended up offending Wei Wuxian at that point.

Another route Lan Wangji could have taken: “Please come back to Gusu, I want to play Cleansing for you.” Again, I don’t think this would have worked. (At least, that was definitely his stance in CQL and Wei Wuxian still didn’t do anything.) In Chapter 78, Wei Wuxian mentioned that the Sound of Lucidity had no effect on him. The Sound of Lucidity is, presumably, one of the Song(s) of Clarity, of which Cleansing is the most powerful. Lan Wangji used the Sound of Lucidity at the Pledge Conference after the battle had started. I don’t exactly know why he didn’t use Cleansing when it was more powerful... Either way, after he played the Sound of Lucidity, Wei Wuxian said, “You should’ve known since long ago—Sound of Lucidity is useless to me!” Thus, Lan Wangji asking him to go to Gusu so he could play Cleansing probably wouldn’t have seemed like an especially compelling reason to Wei Wuxian.

After some thought, I figured that post-resurrection, Wei Wuxian agreed to stay with Lan Wangji in the Cloud Recesses after the mystery was solved because:

He was not as prideful as pre-death Wei Wuxian.

He saw no reason to go back to Lotus Pier since Jiang Cheng made it very clear that he was unhappy with him.

He managed to process and confess his feeling to Lan Wangji, who did the same.

Pre-death Wei Wuxian has none of this. Basically, Wei Wuxian at that point had no reason to go to Gusu for anything other than a short visit.

Now, I don’t know if any of you have noticed, but this entire time I’ve been ignoring not only the reality that Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji’s relationship pre-death was...very bad, but also something else very important: the Stygian Tiger Seal. 

The Stygian Tiger Seal was, of course, stupidly powerful, and Wei Wuxian only kept it because it would take too much time and energy to destroy, and it was meant to deter anyone from attacking him since he already knew that so many people were against him. One of his main fears was someone else - someone with impure motives - getting their hands on it, so of course he was paranoid wondering who would try to steal it from him. Lan Wangji asking him to go to a place where Wei Wuxian would be surrounded by people who hated his form of cultivation? Yeah, that didn’t sound that great. 

(Also, can we please take a moment to appreciate this excerpt from the novel: “The Stygian Tiger Seal’s powers were considerably greater than what he had imagined. He originally wanted to use it to assist him, but its powers were almost exceeding him, its creator” (Chapter 30). Almost. He said the Seal was not as powerful as him! The Stygian Tiger Seal was, indeed, strong, but he was more so! I see a lot of fanfics paint the Stygian Tiger Seal as what made him so terrifying and...it was certainly a part of it, but he did most of it on his own! Ah, we love terrifying main characters~)

Now, I’ve acknowledged the existence of WangXian’s miscommunication, but I’ve never actually addressed it. So, here it is: I do not think Lan Wangji confessing to Wei Wuxian (even before his stint in the Burial Mounds after the Bloodbath at Nevernight) would have gone well. In Chapter 2, there is this excerpt: “Wei WuXian’s eyebrows twitched. Not only a lunatic, a homosexual lunatic as well.” This requires a bit of interpretation because it’s not exactly clear what Wei Wuxian’s eyebrow twitch means, but I’ve always interpreted it as annoyance - or even disgust - at the addition of “homosexual” to Mo Xuanyu’s profile. I’m not saying that Wei Wuxian was necessarily homophobic before the entire events of the novel, but I sincerely don’t think Wei Wuxian would have appreciated Lan Wangji - or any other man, for that matter - confessing to him. If even (immediate) post-resurrection Wei Wuxian had that attitude, I can imagine what would have gone through pre-death Wei Wuxian’s head. 

So, Sunshot Campaign, post-Sunshot Campaign, and Yiling Patriarch Wei Wuxian would all definitely not go back to Gusu, nor would they appreciate a confession from Lan Wangji. That leaves the question: what about pre-Sunshot Campaign Wei Wuxian?

Part Two: Why I really don’t think WangXian would have worked out pre-Sunshot Campaign.

From here on out, “Wei Ying, come back to Gusu!” is no longer relevant because, well, Lan Wangji never said it before the meeting in the supervisory office. (And I think I’ve made my point regarding that as well as I could.)

Starting with Cloud Recesses-era Wei Wuxian...I think that, out of all the different versions of Wei Wuxian, he would have been the one of the two most-likely to get together with Lan Wangji (pre-resurrection, of course). Even then, I don’t see that high a likelihood of that actually happening. Why? Repression! Fuck both Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji were so deeply repressed at that point! Lan Wangji was obviously more aware of his feelings, and Wei Wuxian...I don’t know, I haven’t read the novel far enough to actually have this be a legitimate interpretation, but looking at CQL, I don’t really think Wei Wuxian was in love with Lan Wangji at that point (but I don’t have much evidence to back that up other than my a-spec radar...).

And even if they did somehow manage to overcome their repression - and actually both had feelings for each other in the first place - they were still teenagers! Fifteen at the beginning, I’m pretty sure, and fifteen-year-olds are decidedly bad at maintaining any sort of relationship. That doesn’t even touch on the fact that WangXian was probably legitimately incompatible at that point. Lan Wangji still lived and breathed the rules and Wei Wuxian didn’t give a fuck about them. To maintain any sort of long-term relationship, they’d have to simultaneously undergo a whole novel of character development...which is doable! But! I don’t exactly see it as plausible.

Then, of course, Wei Wuxian got kicked out of the Cloud Recesses and WangXian didn’t see each other until two years later, at the Discussion Conference in Qishan. I don’t really see long-distance relationships working out very well in ancient China, so I can’t imagine them properly maintaining their relationship throughout that. And, of course, Lan Wangji’s rage after Wei Wuxian pulls his forehead ribbon was also due to his repression. Considering how short the Discussion Conference seemed to be, I don’t think there was much room for a relationship to develop. 

At the Indoctrination Camp, Lan Wangji had a whole swarm of things to worry about other than his (frankly painful) pining for Wei Wuxian so, again, I don’t see a romantic relationship developing at that point in time. 

A time-frame that I think can be uniquely isolated as a very possible place to develop their relationship would be while they were trapped in the cave with the Tortoise of Slaughter. Mostly before they killed the beast, though, since afterward, Wei Wuxian had too much of a fever for any romantic shenaniganry. My reasoning is that the cave was the first time since Wei Wuxian’s punishment in the Cloud Recesses that the two of them were forced to spend a long stretch of time together, and thus could potentially open up to each other. I remember in the anime that Lan Wangji sheds a few tears as he mentions that the Cloud Recesses had burned, that his brother was missing, and that his father was...dead? Severely injured? One of those two. He was back in business-mode pretty soon afterward, but if Lan Wangji could have been persuaded to open up a bit more by an persistent and concerned Wei Wuxian, I can see a slow confession being teased out of him - there was certainly enough time!

Then again, them getting together would only happen if Wei Wuxian were both comfortable with the idea of gay men and willing to accept that he was, in fact, attracted to Lan Wangji, and if Lan Wangji were willing to let go of the rules enough to be comfortable with Wei Wuxian’s naturally rebellious nature.

After that, WangXian doesn’t meet again until the supervisory office, and I’ve already talked about all of that.

In conclusion, “Come back to Gusu!” was sweet but misguided and WangXian wouldn’t have effectively happened pre-resurrection.

Now, what does that mean for you? ...Nothing. Absolutely fucking nothing. This doesn’t mean I’m forsaking all fics where WangXian gets together pre-resurrection (in fact, I absolutely love them!) and I’m definitely not trying to say that my interpretation is the only right one. I’m not trying to police what everyone thinks and decree that all fics where Wei Wuxian is open about liking men are wrong or any crap like that. Those fics are great and I love them! These are my (and @litescheme’s) thoughts on the matter that I (we) wanted to spill out into the greater world! You can agree, you can disagree, you can ignore me (us) entirely! But if you read through this meta, then I’m assuming that you found the concept interesting. That is all I was going for!

(Well, that and trying to thoroughly debunk the notion that Yiling Patriarch Wei Wuxian getting shoved into seclusion in the Jingshi by an apologetic Lan Wangji would be in any way “healing” or even “good” for Wei Wuxian, because honestly? Fuck that.)

Ahh, thanks for reading!

[forgxtemall]

@illunaris​ has sent: 38, 3, 5 @obliviouskind​ has sent: -13, 16, 21 and 35?- @victorydestined​ has sent: #6, 14, 22 (to be honest meme) @waveraging​ has sent: 1, 3, 8 — be honest meme!

the be honest meme.   [NO LONGER ACCEPTING!]

Everything is under read more!

1. What would prevent you from following someone?

// Here’s a quick run down of things, bc I think I’ve made this quite clear in my rules:

Political stuff. Regardless of the person’s stance & views, RP isn’t the place for this - take it to a personal blog or somewhere else.

The blog is empty. There is no sample of their writing, it is nothing more than a bunch of generic aesthetic/musing/their own promo posts. This generally hints, at a blog that won’t stick for the long run.

Lack of a rules/about page. Basic stuff, that surprisingly a bunch of people don’t have. This also includes, blogs with those types of themes that leave you with “Where the fuck are the links???”. Also, no, linking your “about page” to the wiki doesn’t count as an about, I want to know your muse, not the character I already know.

Anyone under 18. I am not comfortable with interacting/talking to anyone below the legal age. I touch on a wide variety of topics, most of which, aren’t suitable for anyone underage.

Assosciation with people who I’d rather avoid. This used to be bigger in the past, when filtering on mobile & blacklist weren’t a thing, but I still find myself doing this on rare- isolated cases here & there.

The writing style/interpretation clashes with mine. This is self-explenatory. English may not be my first language, but if I can’t understand your writing- then what’s even the point?

Fandom I don’t want to assosciate/crossover with. MLP, Under.tale, League of Leg.ends, Home.stuck...

Fictional/other kin.s. Self-explenatory, I don’t wish to waste my time with ppl who can’t distinguish reality from fiction. & I’ve had a bunch of bad experiences with those in the past.

3. What current rp trend do you hate?

// Those IC-blogs. Just... No. Nope, nopeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee. Stop this please.........

5. Do you prefer interacting with male muses or female more? Why?

// TBH the muse’s gender isn’t something I pay attention to, unless I’m looking to ship with mine.

My focus is on the character/muse as a whole.

6. Do you prefer writing male muses or female more? Why?

// Imma say it: Kahili is the very first young woman, I picked to rp as in a long time.

I prefer writing male muses, because I’ve had some god awful experiences in the past that have put me off from rping as females for the longest time. I’ve had my own fair share of bad experiences, while rping as men- but they never came anywhere near to what I had to endure as a woman.

From complete creepers (both coming from male muses & females alike), to having f/f forced onto me when I didn’t want it & so on. I was just generally having a far better time with guys, than with girls.

8. Name any three things about the rpc that bother you.

Policing people’s blogs contents (self-explenatory);

People making their muse POC/Trans/LGBTQ+/have a mental disorder just to avoid criticism (self-explenatory);

People’s entitlement for RPing (nobody owes you an interaction/plot/etc. Srsly cut this nasty attitude out)

13. Have you ever thought about leaving rp? What caused it? What changed your mind?

// There was a time I was, way more invested & interested in my discor.d rps than the ones on tumblr. So, for a moment I thought of going exclusive Dis.cord.

It all changed, when I managed to find a balance to them... For the most part- but still.

14. Do you think rp has had a positive or negative affect on your life or you as a person?

// It was through RP I got to finally share, my opinions & views on the series I absolutely love. Not only that, but I came across people who were genuinely interested on them. In a way, I was able to finally join the fandom through RPing. So I’d say, on this aspect- yes it definetely had a positive effect on me <3

16. If you could change one thing about rp on tumblr, what would it be? Why?

// As much fun I have wih making these graphics & icons, I can’t help but feel like nowadays RP has lost its focus from someone’s Rping/writing skills.

if tumblr screwed up and Thanos snapped the possibility of putting graphics/icons/etc, it would do wonders for the RPC.

The photoshop skills competition would stop right there. Also, it would be wonderful for artists, bc of ppl using fan arts for their edits without any credit/permission for their work.

21. Have you ever followed someone because you felt like you had to, not because you wanted to?

// Y  E S. It was the worst, it felt like I was being held at gunpoint........... Not fun at all, bc- our muses just didn’t have any real way to interact with each other in the first place.

22. What would make you block someone?

// Besides what I’ve stated above- at the start of this post?

Well, if the person rubs me in the wrong way, I’ll block them. Like... The person may not even have done anything to me, but I just don’t feel comfortable having them unblocked/following/interacting with my blog.

So I block them, just to avoid any possible awkward situation.

35. Do you read other people’s threads or do you only read your own?

// I wished I had the time to read MORE from the dash TBH. I do read some threads here & there from time to time! And I’ve read some great stuff from my mutuals!

38. What advice would you give to someone new to rp?

// Focus on your portrayal! Work on it! Develop your muse!

People will eventually find their way to you, just take your time & don’t be afraid to draw your limits/lines. Go do your thing & have your fun man!

[spiked-watch-blog]

Life inside the RCP cult

The post below —written by @InfiniteCoincid for his blog— provides an excellent insight into the Revolutionary Communist Party, where the LM Network that would then end up grouping around @spikedonline, first got together. 

We post it here in the spirit of keeping everything in one place

...

My days in a far-right troll cult

In Sheffield as of 1987 anyone walking through the shopping precinct in the centre of town ran a gauntlet of left-wing newspaper sellers. The 14-year-old me often generally managed to avoid handing over 30p or so of my hard-earned paper round money for Socialist Worker, but on occasion I found myself buttonholed by some garrulous and well-presented young people pushing a publication called ‘The Next Step’. None of them appeared to be local, and they were, by comparison with their competitors, refreshingly unconcerned with whatever workers’ struggles were going on in South Yorkshire at the time. I didn’t get the ideological distinctions between the Revolutionary Communist Party, as they were called, and the Socialist Workers, but I suspect that the way they responded whenever I asked about such things – they were more than happy to slag off their rivals on the left – appealed to my disaffected sensibilities and inchoate contrarian instincts. I started going to meetings at which they pressed a copy of Lenin’s ‘What is to be done’ on me, and also made me shell out for a copy of a book called ‘Moral Panics’, which I did read and found splenetically entertaining if sometimes puzzing at the level of basic logical argumentation.

Although I had trouble keeping up with their sometimes contradictory-seeming political arguments, they were at least friendly, relatively unpatronising and certainly socially useful. They took me to the Leadmill to see a band who later turned out to be Deacon Blue and got me properly drunk, all the time shouting in my ear about stuff I really didn’t know much about. I do remember that one of my new comrades, taking issue with a stranger’s St George’s badge, began shouting at them about Northern Ireland and started a dancefloor ruckus. We also took a trip to London to the gay pride carnival, or as it was at the time, demo, where I had a distinctly Life of Brian moment upon seeing a banner from the Revolutionary Communist Group. I asked the natural question, only to be told that they were ‘wankers’. Then the general election came around, and we ourselves stopped being the RCP, turning instead into something called the Red Front, under which monicker we went banging on doors in search of people to disagree with. Our campaign ended with 107 votes, which was considered a victory as at least it was more than the possibly dead bloke from some basically defunct version of the Communist Party had received. Eventually other aspects of teenagehood took over and I, despite some tugging on their part (I think I still owe them £1.75 for the Lenin book, which they were keen to get hold of), I succeeded in drifting away.

From then on I kept an occasional eye on what they were up to but maintained my distance. I remember joining all my fellow delegates in turning my back as an RCP member spoke up at NUS conference, but I don’t remember why. Although I was living in Ireland at the time, I was vaguely aware that they were ubiquitous in the mid-1990s, standing on street corners looking slick and pushing subscriptions to their magazine Living Marxism. It had entertaining covers and contained articles written from a consistently libertarian standpoint, with elaborate arguments that would sort of persuade you that what you had thought about (for a not-entirely-random example) the environment was wrong, but with an uncanny feeling that you were the victim of some sort of trick or part of a game that wasn’t actually all that much fun to play. After it became clear that they were prepared to perpetrate full-on atrocity denial in order to promote their wilfully exasperating view of the world, it was very hard for anyone to take anything they said seriously. Few would have expected them to continue to deepen their influence in British life, but it seems they are far more determined and cunning than anyone might have thought.

Given their relatively rapid en masse shift away from the left, there’s been a ongoing mystery of why they do what they do, particularly since (through their website Spiked) they started selling their contrarian punditry to corporations and the right-wing media. From my own experiences and from having followed their development through articles such as this and this, I suspect they are a bit of a sect, but one in which the personal bonds override and yet (if we consider their commitment to the politics of self-interest) determine their collective ideological stance. The members of the core group, largely unchanged for the last thirty of so years, have managed to cave out steady careers in the media, with a shared ideological bent seemingly determined by the desire not just to provoke but to (as we now understand it) troll. Their contrarianism far surpasses anything I might have identified with as a teenager.

The LRB piece linked to above refers to this teenage aspect, the way their rhetorical insistence that everyone ‘act like grown-ups’ seems to betray an adolescent mindset. (It also mentions that Frank Furedi’s dependence on newspaper articles for his source material suggests that his reputation as a serious academic is not entirely deserved.) They continue to have a fixation on the young, with their successive front projects such as the Manifesto Club, the East London Science School and WorldWrite (of which 1987’s election candidate is now director) aimed directly at teenagers. Now that schools are up for grabs by anyone with enough cash, regardless of their ideological proclivities, they seem to be enjoying more direct access to young minds. The prominence of Brendan O’Neill as a steadfastly obnoxious commentator for my new-not-favourite newspaper The Telegraph has (re)alerted many to the dangers of their project, which now seems to dovetail with certain aspects of a hard-right agenda, particularly outright climate denial and the abuse of the notion of ‘free speech’ to legitimate hate speech. This site has also written this week of the insidious influence they also seem to enjoy in sections of the BBC. (This excellent Tumblr blog Twitter feed is also extremely informative on such matters, with an very useful primer to countering their bullshit available here.) Of course, it’s something of a provocative exaggeration to call the Spiked/LM/RCP crowd a far-right troll cult, just as it’s completely absurd to call the #metoo phenomenon a ‘moral panic’ and a ‘modern day Salem’ or claim that misplaced hysteria over climate change caused the Grenfell fire. But from my experiences as an impressionable young person subjected to their influence, combined with the fact that their current agenda is so close to that of the global far-right as to make very little meaningful difference, this is not a group of people who should be allowed anywhere near schools.

Original post.