#no tumblr I don't think that's a popular tag

[biancadoes1]

Oh oh oh, I know why the jakola trolls are so numerous and virulent right now!

School's out for winter break and the children are bored. Think about it, teenagers idolize hard. (Been there, it happens.)

So we have some kiddos that have latched onto Nicola as their hero. They are still of an age to be easily influenced by gossip sites (without fact checking) and peer pressure. Get a gaggle of kids in a group and give one or two great charisma stats and boom, you found the leaders.

Next, you give them something to hate to balance their idolization. This is where the idol starts to matter less. In this case, they will have chosen to disregard Luke because they perceive him as choosing the "popular, pretty girl" instead of the idol they identify with.

Instead of hating A, which to be fair is a very easy target, they chose to hate Luke (while pretending to not hate Luke but pushing hard that he is with A) and invent a narrative setting Nic up with some younger man that likely they identify better with because he's gen Z like them.

Now, instead of listening to any reason from outside their group, they have formed their own little groupthink cult that:

1. Trolls Instagram comments of people associated with the mains and the mains themselves

2. Floods differently thinking tumblrs with anon hate asks

3. Inappropriately tags Nic and/or Luke and/or JD on Instagram.

4. Argues continuously about how Nic must be with JD with half-facts and emotional opinions.

5. Sends fake tips to deux merde.

6. Makes them cling harder to each other each time they are mocked, reinforcing the cult theme until they somehow outgrow it.

We are just seeing their boredom spike right now because they have no school to occupy their little noggins. Any adults that are jakolas? Are just immature, lack critical thinking, and are weak minded.

The older Jakola's are the most concerning.

Since I'm a geezer I hope I don't catch whatever bug they caught...

[flecks-of-stardust]

wholeheartedly and with as much gentleness as possible, i truly think there needs to be more discussion about downpour in the community as it is now. for a variety of reasons.

[doodlingwren]

It's again that time of the week where I have to go and report the spam and/or porn bots from the tags I follow because every time I see one of their posts on my dashboard I die inside a little bit

[romanticatheartt]

I just want to say, bringing down another character/ship to praise your favorite one, doesn't make me agreeing with you, it makes me hate the favorite character/ship of yours and despise your childish personality... just saying :)

[milfbrainrot]

have always been a bit more neutral to timebomb but it has rly surprisingly grown on me so much ;-; i think i do see it more from the tragedy angle and maybe more one-sided. i'm not sure jinx has ever been in a place to reciprocate the feelings i'm sure ekko has, but it is nice to think about for years down the line and in terms of what could have been.

[gellavonhamster]

tbf it's a rare pair because oda's cannot write women as people disease is getting worse

I wouldn't say it is necessarily true about all female characters? I found some of the women introduced late in the story quite complex and fascinating - Pudding, Reiju, and Big Mom (who, I think, is a far more interesting and terrifying villain than Kaido) come to mind. You're probably right about Tashigi specifically, though, it seems like Oda doesn't know what to do with her at this point. She seems to have been introduced to sort of be to Zoro what Koby is to Luffy, a foil growing and evolving alongside him but on the other side of the barricade, and/or be proof that women can become great skilled warriors too, and then she doesn't really get to do either :/ But I can fix her have watched enough mediocre TV in my life to be used to loving female characters for the potential I see in them rather than just for what writers allow them to be

[pyrosomatic-metamorphosis]

people can use this site however they want but there's something almost- idk, sad? about how few people are actually using their blogs. you can turn themes on and have skeletons dancing in the background. you can make everything hot pink. your blog is your scrapbook and you can put whatever you want in there. tags are okay at organizing things so you can have just a whole archive of cool shit to look at later. i know people complain a lot about people liking stuff about reblogging for engagement, and on one hand i get that- it is WILD to see a drawing i spent hours on get only 12 reblogs and 60 likes. Absolute culture shock compared to my previous fandoms. but i don't think you should reblog anything to make artists happy. i think you should reblog things so you can find them again. i think you should queue things to appear on the dash at specific times on certain days. i think you should reblog things so when you're talking to your friends about xyz post you saw you can look in your blog's archive and find it again. i think you should reblog things so that your dash is filled with one really sleepy cat. with the loss of reblogs there's the loss of engagement, which Does hurt the community-focus that makes tumblr so appealing, but idk i just wish people were more excited about the incredible amount of customization that tumblr allows and took advantage of that more

[freakwiththeknifecollection]

Yeah, you should only create for yourself, but if I'm putting it out there I would like to know that I'm not just endlessly shouting into the void

[prentissluvr]

be honest, is my theme bad? 😭 yours is very pretty, i feel like mine is very discoordinated though i don’t know

-@moose-code

hi lovely!! thanks for calling mine pretty!

i don't think it's bad at all!! i actually really adore the colors, the blue + yellow is very nice! it has nice contrast! also, everyone has different taste in what kind of theme they like! i'm also a visual arts major + graphic design minor so i spend a lot of time learning how to make things look visually pleasing which does make a difference i think?

if you want to be very picky about your theme, which you don't have to be, i think that the only thing that i personally would change is the second picture you have in your pinned (if that's something you're counting as part of your theme) solely because it is so neutral and desaturated in color, so it doesn't blend in with the other images you're using (which are generally more warm in tone). you could either find a new picture with warmer tones or you could edit the photo by upping the "warmth" setting! this should be able to be done in your photos app, ik for sure it can on apple iphone, but it's a basic photo editing setting so it should in any built in photo editing on your phone! but that's all! i really like the dividers you chose and the overall vibe + again, i love the colors i think they're nice and unique!!

[brood-mother]

if you’re ever worried about your fic not being good enough, i beg you to scroll through literally any ao3 tag and you will see  - and i mean this in the nicest way possible - that your work doesn’t have to be great or even by many accounts ‘good’ for people to enjoy it and engage with it in a meaningful way. the two cake effect is so so real. if you write it, people will read it. 

[researching-anomalies]

I've been working on a world building project for the past few months and I'm finally ready to share it with folks! Welcome to Lookout Basin!

Get the PDF here: https://uncertaintycrossing.itch.io/lookout-basin-national-park-vgfall2023

(Free/pwyw)

--

Dive into fun at Lookout Basin, California's first paranormal National Park! This all inclusive visitor's guide can help you and your family plan a fun trip to the West Coast this fall season. Find thrill seeking fun with our hiking trails through anomalous areas to our boat tours across an active graveyard. Have a more relaxed visit with our Sphinx riddle nights or ghost educational programs. With a variety of activities across the park, Lookout Basin has something for everyone.

----

Inspired by Mystery Flesh Pit National Park, Fablehaven, SCP Foundation/Wanderers' Library, and various folklore stories, Lookout Basin National Park, Visitor's Guide Fall 2023 is a non-traditional storytelling exercise, where the world of Lookout Basin is explored through the park advertising. The entirety of the Lookout Basin universe will be explored through weird ways of storytelling, with other oddly formatted books and an interactive game planned in the future. 

----

[linalilia]

I also want to know why it has an arrow and gradient. Maybe it means trending? But really I have no clue.

NO I'M SO CONFUSED like i was like "yeah maybe it's just because it's popular rn let me check the other ones" and i went to check the tags for other games/media and. if that's the case ARE YOU TELLING ME THAT TWST IS MORE POPULAR THAN GENSHIN RN?? I WON'T BELIEVE YOU

[rotisseries]

actually now that the clique thing is a few days old, i didn't really get involved for a reason and I don't feel super strongly in either direction

but I will say that like. while there's certainly a problem of less interaction on the fanworks/posts from less popular blogs, this isn't really a byler exclusive issue? this happens in most fandoms these days, interaction is just on a decline in general which IS. a problem but not really a "byler tumblr is cliquey" problem. in regards to any actual cliques I wouldn't say they don't exist but I don't think it's "the popular kids" themselves doing this. I don't know if the rest of you have some other bloggers in mind that I don't know about, but as someone who is mutuals with a fair amount of who I thought were the popular blogs, they are always very nice and welcoming to me, and actually easy to talk to once you just. see them and talk to them as a normal human and not an omnipotent fandom god. so this is all to say that if there's a clique issue I think it's from the outside. I think maybe people are perceiving these bigger blogs who all happen to be friends as these untouchable idols in fandom and it's. making it cliquey from the outside. like are they a clique or have you just convinced yourself they wouldn't want anything to do with you and isolated this group from everyone else. this isn't to say that people can't be assholes of course just that I don't think any of this is intentional

[tuiyla]

"#and people can be so fucking performative about mertina but that's another topic"

can you talk more about that? I have noticed some people on reddit resenting Faberritana’s popularity because three of them are white (and one is viewed as the epitome of pretty privilege) and another is a slender, lighter-skinned and mixed-white Afro-Latina (aka Hollywood’s “acceptable” version of a black woman, akin to Zendaya) and while that’s a discussion to be had, imo some in the fandom take it too far and suggest that racism, colorism and fatphobia are the main reasons why they're the four most popular female characters on Glee in general and idk that also rubs me the wrong way.

Yes of course, because it can be a controversial topic but honestly fuck whoever takes issue with me saying this.

Like, let's start off with this: I get that the Faberritana thing can be annoying. I myself find it grating, particularly when I see stuff from the height of the Glee fandom 2011-2012 and it's very clearly centering on Faberritana, at the expense and exclusion of the two other main girls who are less conventionally palatable for, let's be honest, racist and fatphobic reasons. And Glee itself was very, very bad at centering them. So like, I Get It. Faberritana feels like elevating the three white ladies of the group and "allowing" Santana to also take on that fan favourite role. I'd wager, because of the queer storyline and yes, Naya's undeniable conventional attractiveness. Although I do take issue with the baffling backlash people like Zendaya face because shifting the blame onto women of colour for Hollywood deeming them more screen appropriate is in itself fucked up. Particularly in Naya's case because her mixed heritage was constantly ignored to boil it down to something more easily consumable, such as in the context of Glee her being the token Latina and her Blackness all but erased. But anyway.

The answer to this being this, like you say, taking it too far and creating a counter movement is just all wrong. To me. Not only because putting some women down to elevate others NEVER should be the fucking case oh my god it's 2023, but because appreciation for Mertina being born out of spite towards Faberritana enjoyers is... not real appreciation. I could start stanning St Berry sooo hard but if it's just because I find Finchel more and more repulsive, that ain't gonna be the great win for St Berry I sometimes see people posit Mertina appreciation as. I know this sounds strange but it's the fandom equivalent of trying to make an ex jealous via your rebound. You're not actually taking the rebound's feelings into consideration. Alright okay out of left field simile but you get where I'm coming from.

I think that's what annoyed me the most in my reddit days, which, *shudders* are thankfully over. This childish need to counterbalance to take extreme. X ch is popular? Well I don't like them so there must be a moral reason as to why they're The Worst, actually. Y ship is well-liked? I'm going to passive-aggressively show appreciation for Z shit all while implying that all who support another ship hint hint wink wink are Wrong and basic. I think all who spent time on the sub will be able to relate to this. But like I say, that's not real appreciation. If you feel like showing appreciation for, say, Mertina because they're statistically less like to be talked about with the same fervor, good! Please do that. But make it come from a place of authenticity or I, for one, will not be able to get fully behind it.

It's slightly different on tumblr. One, because you curate your own dashboard and experiences and I've fortunately seen the love get spread around a lot more. There are entire blogs I associate with loving Tina (hello tumblr user @tina-cohen-chang) and though Mercedes love is less "centered", I guess, it's ubiquitous as far as I see. And sure, some chs will always be more appreciated than others, but I don't see people throwing a hissy fit about Artie not being even close to being as popular or Klaine, or similar things. Liking the Glee boys is basically synonymous to liking Klaine + Sam + Mike but people never used the term Klainesike so I guess that's okay. And to be clear, it is okay! Like who you like, call it what you want. I'm happy to see things like Tina week or the relatively smaller but constant portions of Mercedes love. It's never the people complaining about Faberritana supplying it, though, which is why it's so performative. You don't have to be a content creator, no one does, but also no one owes you anything and supporting less fan favourite-y chs out of pure spite just makes you look like an ass.

Circling back, even with all this said I too find the unironic use of the Faberritana portmaunteu cringe and I do think Mertina deserve more appreciation. And I think there are layers of racism as well as the show's own issues playing into why that isn't the case. They were less featured and that in itself is a problem. And that's worth investigating within fandom circles. But that's never what happens when the people of reddit complain about Faberritana's popularity and instead it just becomes this resentment party where no one wins but they give themselves brownie points for even pretending to like the Black and Asian women of the show. Congrats I guess, real win for intersectional feminism right there. Really kicked racism in the gut with that.

Basically it just becomes grating, far more grating than unironically using the term Faberritana, when people get into petty passive-aggressive counter-movements in fandom. It becomes not about love for Mertina but bitterness that chs they happen to not like are popular. And I know I just said in my reply that I don't vibe with what I perceive to be inauthentic appreciation of chs, but I also don't like when fans start policing within fandom. So I'm not doing that with anything I'm saying, in fact what I'm trying to get at is to enjoy and let enjoy. Heaven knows I don't have the energy to spread all my Glee love equally and that's okay. I do try to express the love I have for chs other than Santana, or other than my usual suspects but at the end of the day, I know what I like and I like it because I want to enjoy it. Getting sort of off topic, anyway, so just like stop be an ass about people's love for things and mind your own business. If your own business is liking thing X then that's great, enjoy the fandom content and create your own if you wish, but why be mad about what people like about a 10 year-old show, particularly if you're too lazy to actually have those discussion about race and gender and other larger societal issues. You know?

[cakeinthevoid]

actually I've been thinking

Suddenly got real curious... You can't take back a Kudos so I think most people actually seem to wait until the entire work is complete—but if I read an unfinished work that makes me go insane, you KNOW I am commenting asap.

[theultracharmingladynoire]

Added a 'not ml' tag for posts about shows other than ml!