#not to say people should just be rude for no reason
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saw your oc and not surprised that it’s a child. no wonder aoex fandom has so much pedos in it that have child characters. go and delete yourself
okay normally I don’t answer on those hate messages but this one is personal so I try my best to explain what happened to me somehow idk my English is not the best and I’m not used to talk about personal stuff online.
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Hi! My name is Pax and I’m receiving hate messages since I started posting art of my favorite character from Blue Exorcist.
At first it was only on twitter. I started posting around a year ago and then people sent me messages like how they hate Arthur. I wasn’t used to be part of a fandom so I thought it was kinda normal. I just blocked the people and yes it became calmer after that. Then it started on tumblr too. I love to get questions where I can draw something in return but I also got anon questions that are just rude or weird. Luckily you can block anons too but somehow they always come back to me after a small amount of time and tbh idk what I do wrong.
I am ignoring, deleting and blocking those all the time. Don’t get me wrong I really don’t care much but saying stuff like I’m a pedo is WRONG just because I have a child OC. I’ve never drawn him in any romantic way and I’ll never do. I don’t even think about that. Why should I? OCs are often like own children and my oc Kingo is like my own son. He was originally created for a roleplay where Arthur decided to adopt him after a lot of things happened to him. They are only father and son and they love each other because Arthur is trying to be a really good dad like he always trying to do his best with no matter what he do. The point is Kingo became my OC after I got the diagnosis that I’d never be able to get own children after trying it for 4 years. It was my dream even if a lot of people couldn’t imagine how important it can be for a woman who really wants this. I build a house where everything should be safe for my future child. Getting this result of all my tests and my health conditions was a shock I’ll never get fully over it even if I pretend. My relationship broke after 8 years and I never felt so useless.
This is the reason why I created my OC Kingo. Not because I am a pedo or something wtf. It was because I found consolation in having a fictional son and that he has a family that cares about him. Thats why Kingo will always be a very special OC and I get very emotional when it comes to him.
I know I don’t need to explain myself and who the fuck is gonna read that text hmm but yes. Stop hating me I just wanna do art. Nothing more. You’re annoying go out and do something nice instead of hating each other ✨
#Please stop spreading hate#Our fandom is so small we need to stay together#blue exorcist#aoex#ao no exorcist#arthur auguste angel
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okay but i think she can handle A FEW people who don't like her
#not to say people should just be rude for no reason#like when people call her ugly or body shame#i'm just saying#she's unaffected by random people online not liking her music#all i have to say#anti taylor swift#swifties dni
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it is not controversial to say that if you cannot finacially, emotionally provide for a child and/or your genetics would lead to them suffering then you should not have said child.
#anti natalism#anti natalist#antinatalism#antinatalist#seriously the amount of people who scream eugenics.#you have no fucking clue what eugenics is#you are screaming your support for children being born into already negelctful and abusive situations just for your own liberalism.#And guess what--animals in the wild who have genetic disorders dont get to pass on their faulty genes either#it isnt rude for me to say it. it's reality#and if you cant accept reality than thats even more reason you should nto be allowed to breed#i myself have endless genetic predisposures. schizophrenia diabetes heart disease arthritis.#even if i had the finances and wanted a child i know it would be COMPLETELY unethical to gamble with their life.#you all have gambling addictions and are control freaks
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#@ comment directed to me in a tag. i have not talked abt them anywhere publicly but if u were deep enough in the paint in 2020ish theyre#like not super surprising. i think i wanna get back around to the trolls in my reread (so itll b a while) before i say anthing solid#just so i can go in w intent to pay closer attention again but like#overall have a low opinion on most the troll boys insofar as i see that the narrative seems to also not care for them. they seem to exist#to serve narrative purposes & end up discarded when no longer relevant. ie they dont end up very interesting and thus i view#many fans with suspicion when they have 'boys disease' ie having an outsized focus on the boys of the story despite hs being by the end#an extremely female dominated text with a lot to say about masculinity as an opressive force#tavros and gamzee are the biggest bugbears here (only really beaten out in eyebrow raising by cronus and the male dancestors)#on account of fans of them often downplaying gamzee's misogyny that is core to his role as a charismatic cult leader (or worse#sending trans women death threats when they made the factual assesment that gamzee was written to be a weird misogynist calling it#character assassination etc. man 2020 was wild.) tavros mostly just ends up being an accessory to this crime tbh. though his genuinely#complicated relationship w vriska oft being flattened to villify vriska + an inability to actually read what tavros Says...#like. if you get rid of tavros' quirk. stammering and all. and read his lines. he's kind of fucking rude? and yeah its alternia they all ar#but i have my hesitancies wrt how people seem to infantilise him (a disabled character) to the point of ignoring his dialogue and flaws#when one of tavros' core conceits (u can argue if this is . like. something hussie should have stayed out of. like its not their lane) is#that shitty ppl online will be assholes but will be allowed to get away with it due to unrelated disability. which like. it was 2010 ig#but this is hit upon again with mituna being distinctly a 4 channer with real brain damage and speech issues & all his friends letting him#get away with shit he still clearly has the cognitive capacity to know is wrong. its very messily handled but. i dont rlly like tavros ig.#will b amazed if tumblr doesnt eat these tags i went on wayy too long. but im not putting this in plaintext for obvi reasons#lucabytereads
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i do understand and acknowledge that most people who pick up mdzs and get really into it walk away from the experience with wangx!an brainrot that brings them joy and suffering (affectionate) in equal measure, and--unless they're assholish at me or my pals--i wish all of those people well and hope that the veritable cornucopia of wangx!an content on this webbed site and AO3 is everything they've ever wanted out of their fandom experience. wwx is the protagonist, lwj is his court-appointed soulmate, their happily ever after is what most people pick up the books wanting to experience, and that's, you know, fine. live your bliss etc.
i just hope that one day it won't be such a hot and controversial take for fans who didn't develop wangx!an brainrot, and who found something and/or someone else more compelling and engaging about the text, to be able to say as much, and talk about it as much as we want to, without generating a bunch of passive-aggressive--or aggressive-aggressive--commentary from hardcore wangx!an stans who seem to take our disinterest in the central romance personally for whatever reason. like genuinely i would probably not dislike wangx!an as much as i have come to dislike them if i hadn't been inundated with very rude reblog commentary or anon asks early on in my fandom experience just for saying /checks my notes, "maybe jin guangyao isn't evil, actually. maybe wei wuxian did some things wrong."
dgmw, i'm glad that lots of people here are able to like jgy, for example, and still enjoy wwx and wangx!an specifically. but for those of us who don't, or who are struggling to rediscover some affection for the main pair, this attitude.... did not develop in a vacuum lol. i would just like for people to bear that in mind, i guess.
#salty peak sect 🧂#not really in response to anything in particular so much as a general ~vibe~ i've observed#i wish i could be one of those people who simply bops along and enjoys all the ships canon and otherwise#and delights in all the characters equally all the time#unfortunately...... fandom is what it is i g#edited to add that it STILL kills me how much blowback i experienced#just by telling people 'you're being rude actually. this is rude and you should stop'#like the initial rude behaviour that was a CONSTANT in the tags when i first showed up here#made it almost impossible for me to find the fun stuff i wanted to enjoy without scrolling past a bunch of hateful vitriol first#but for some reason!! which i still don't fully understand!!!#i became the asshole for calling people out over it#or--and this is even more confusing to me--just flate out saying 'that's wrong actually'#if you tag your post with a take that is objectively incorrect#and someone sees it and tells you 'that is contradicted by the text here'#the person correcting you for the thing you got wrong AND added to the general fandom tags#is not actually being an asshole#simply for saying 'this is wrong'
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give meee... headcanons about the Sangfielle friends in the most boring AU you can imagine like. idk. office Sangfielle. grocery store Sangfielle. they all work at a movie theater. whatever sounds mundane as hell and you have Thoughts about :3
okay tumblr ate my fucking answer the first time. let's try this again.
the thing about these guys is that no matter how mundane you make it, they can make anything into a situation. that's just the guys they are. so we put them in a Walmart.
Marn is an employee with a great customer service voice. She's keeping it together in the face of some truly wild statements and requests. One man keeps asking for frootie hooties, a brand of cereal that he insists is real and everyone is just refusing to sell to him, and she's spent twenty minutes trying to tell him that they just don't have it in stock
Lye and Es are having an animated conversation in the clothing area, where she is examining various colorful dresses and he is distractedly picking things off of nearby shelves and putting them back down. The conversation started at how they got kicked out of dayward yve's novelty store and is now about whether stealing should be more or less of a crime than manslaughter, because it's not as bad as killing but it is on purpose. People are trying not to pay attention to them. Eventually they are asked to leave, at which point it is revealed that lye has about two hundred dollars worth of items in his pockets and es has some candles she liked and a new pair of shoes in hers. They are both barred from Walmart.
Duvall hates it here. It's loud, he hates the lights, the aisles make no sense, he can't find anything he's looking for, and people keep coming up to him to ask him where things are. He doesn't even work here. Why do people assume he works here? He's not even wearing any Walmart merchandise. Is that what it's called when you're an employee? Merchandise? Well, it's what it would be called if he wears it, which he never will, because he doesn't work here and never wants to. Have a nice day ma'am.
Pickman is slowly marching her way through the aisles one at a time, peering at her shopping list and holding a tiny shopping basket in one hand. She has to be very careful not to knock the shelves over sometimes. Just trying to get groceries. People are nervously avoiding her. Says "Hey, you" to some poor employee to ask where the milk and cigarettes are. Just grunts at everything else. When she's at the checkout, the guy there asks "Did you find everything you're looking for?", and she just says "No." and leaves
Chine comes out of the bathroom with a live rat in his hand. People scream. The manager finally comes up to him like "Sir, you can't have rats in here." They say "Oh, she's not mine. She was just having trouble opening the door." Gets a big meat on the bone at the deli and nothing else. When he asks how much it costs, they just say it's on the house and try to get him to leave as soon as possible. They go like "Oh, really? Are you sure? I have some money." and sound surprised but pleased, like they're being done a personal favor. The employees insist. He's like "Alright, thanks!" and then asks the rat if she wants anything
#the manager tells an employee to get the rat some cheese. chine says that cheese is actually bad for rats and some seeds would be better#the manager tells the employee to get the rat some seeds and for chine to get the fuck out of their establishment#chine is a little taken aback by the rudeness but leaves without further issue#runs into lye and es outside and is like “hey look they just gave me some free stuff”#Lyke is like “what???? I got kicked out because I wanted free stuff!”#chine says “I think I just got kicked out too. Maybe that's just what happens?"#lyke says “yeah but you got to keep the stuff!”#“Did you not get to keep your stuff?”#“I mean. Not *all* of it.”#“Huh.”#“They didn't let me keep the stuff I kept on purpose.”#es makes a reasonable sounding remark about how they'd be running a pretty terrible business if they handed everything out for free#everyone should get what they need but these people do have livelihoods to think about#is also putting on lipstick that she definitely just shoplifted#duvall comes out and swears he's never coming back here. is asked if he's also banned for life from the Walmart.#demands what the hell these people were doing in the Walmart to get banned for life#because he saw a man getting real heated about frootie hooties and that's definitely not a real cereal#so if that doesn't meet the bar he's not sure he wants to know what does#sangfielle#friends at the table#Shoop#asks
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when I was little I used to play clue with my sister and when I won by being like “okay YOU don’t have the candlestick and I don’t have the candlestick and there are no more cards, so it’s gotta be the candlestick” she would get really mad and tell me I was cheating because I wasn’t supposed to be making assumptions like that and she didn’t understand where I was getting the info from, so I was ruining the game for her
anyways I don’t rly get why people on twt are THAT mad about veilguard spoilers because they do not seem that deep
#dragon age spoilers#dav#da4 spoilers#da4#and my GOD the spoilers are here in the comments too#but like I keep seeing people like ‘I can’t believe they’d just tell us that the blight is organic’#girl the blight’s BEEN organic#‘they said we’re gonna see things about solas’ past!!!!!’#at solas’ house? his house in the fade? where all the dreams and spirits and memories live? groundbreaking#I can see the whole ‘ghilan’nain has been experimenting on darkspawn’ thing as a shock to some people#and I’m not saying you have to read the companion books#but like….. that was established in tevinter nights#a book that’s been out for four years and pretty widely discussed in the fandom#also though the discourse around spoilers for da4 has just been bizarre in general#like idk man I think that BioWare/content creators being like ‘in two weeks there will be spoilers on twt’ is….. decent and reasonable?#and some of the comments are so……. ????#I just don’t think ‘I don’t like spoilers so no one else should be allowed to see them’ is a very hinged take#I saw someone who said that them saying ‘’maybe stay off twt for a minute’#was essentially them telling her that she couldn’t read the news or talk to her family#like WHAT are you talking about#and I think yeah! it is totally your right to not want to see spoilers absolutely 1000% fair#but why are you watching a 22 minute gameplay reveal and expecting it to be entirely context-free???#ESPECIALLY when all the videos have a warning at the beginning about spoilers??#on twt I keep seeing people who are like ‘showing all this stuff about the game in advance is rude to fans and HORRIBLE marketing’#what do you MEEEEAAAAANNNNNNNN
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twitter is entering their "rts > likes" phase now that likes are private after they spent years calling us ungrateful for being demotivated by ratios lmao
#man fuck yall just support artists you enjoy#dont attack people who dont rb/rt your art (hell they might even have it scheduled) but also dont constantly demand ''content'' from people#ESPECIALLY without telling them that you appreciate the effort they put in to show you cool things they made for free#you should've been rt'ing/rb'ing from the START 😒 just show people you care!#im just waiting to scroll through post after post of ppl calling out ''entitled artists'' lmao#btw my opinion on the whole thing is painfully neutral if you couldnt tell#i dont think you should care that much about numbers and ppl take it wayyyyyy too far#throwback to that one guy who personally @ everyone who didnt reblog their art that was CRAZY. i would straight up report you KJFGHKG#i also understand and have personally experienced how much engagement can change your mood#a simple ''i love this!'' can make someone's day. it's not hard to understand why ppl like engagement#when they make post after post without so much as a little tag they dont care about sharing anymore#the fact that people call that ''entitlement'' is also crazy#i have a lot of drawings i havent posted or just left nonrebloggable bc it really doesnt make a difference lmao#the only ones i leave rebloggable are the ones that i Know will do well and get attention. like the little pig redraw#if it's cute or funny it gets positive attention. anything else is shit on here lmao#it's just not as fun to share. it either leads to no engagement or negative engagement#would rather have nothing than something rude so whatever#some ppl say it's always been like this but no it absolutely was not always like this#idk what exactly caused the change. probably a lot of factors#could even just be the fandoms i hang around in! but considering i've seen the same sentiment from a bunch of ppl i doubt it's that#the best solution to no engagement is to just make friends and have fun#but 90% of the internet is hostile and negative and rude for no fucking reason#when i unfollowed someone on my old public twitter and they @ me over it. damn i dont know why but NOW i know why 😭#this post has gone way off course im just ranting at this point. i havent talked in a while hi how have you guys been#work was a lot yesterday and today is too slow (im not at work im just going crazy in my house)#(and i cant leave my house bc there's construction blocking the road someone save me)#chat
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wild thread i saw on the fanfiction subreddit, this was just one of the conversations that went down
#op (red) was very stubborn about their opinion (saying the only reason an author won't reply is pride & thinking they're above commenters)#wish i had screenshotted that removed reply of theirs: it was a crazy take (negative)#reddit#fanfiction#blah#fanfic#i do not agree with op's opinions btw if that wasn't clear#also said it you don't reply to comments you should just turn comments off because it's rude to let people comment without giving a reply
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oh this is going to be......... a problem actually
#me when i start wips i KNOW are going to be so much longer than i want them to be#I KNOW IT I FUCKING SEE IT IN MY MIND#every time Every Single Time#to make things even better it's vega and warden AGAIN#which is objectively not a bad thing because i love them deeply and intensely#but in terms of my bitter and hateful need to be externally validated this is some of the worst news possible because#what it inevitably means is tens of hours of my life in exchange for maybe 30 or 40 notes lmao#half of which are my own self rbs#head in HANDS. why cant i just like writing about characters that are easily and broadly popular#i should have conditioned myself harder into liking milo or asher or sam something#OR DAVID AND ANGEL. GOD my life would be so much easier if i liked david and angel#(you know full well this is not an attack on people who do like those characters. don't pretend like it is so you have an excuse to be rude#i say it every fucking time I AM NOT OWED ANYTHING I GET IT I UNDERSTAND#doesn't mean it's not disheartening to make tens of thousands of words and see almost no acknowledgement of it at all#yes again for the millionth time: nobody is OBLIGATED to like my writing or like the characters i write about YOU DON'T HAVE TO#once again: you KNOW that is not the thing i am bitching about here#i am a hateful spiteful bitch for DIFFERENT reasons#those reasons being i have a deeply insecure and desperate need for validation that no amount of 'art for art's sake!' can cure#art for art's sake is all well and good. doesn't ever seem to make me feel better though#delete later
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one of the dramas from the wedding was one of the grooms cousins (on the other side not mine) just not wearing the clothes we had made for her specifically
#i think they cost smth like 1 lakh rupees so that is crazy#she is such a bitch i cannot believe it#when asked about it she just laughed in our faces and said it didnt fit.. it was custom made and she was the one who sent the measurements#and all of the other cousins wore matching ones in different clothes#she just thinks shes better than us.. bc she managed to go to the us and now has a fake american accent also#i dont get this inferiority complex our people have. it is ridiculous.#i told everyone we should we should ask for the clothes back since she clearly doesnt want them but they said it was a gift so no#actually i think she just wanted to be 'modern' and our clothes were a traditional gharara#so she came with her legs out :/#tbh she looked bad anyways so . actually idgaf#she literally did not acknowledge me or my sister at all i think she considers us . i dont know like their maids that were brought along#its actually crazy like. she was acting like she was closer to the bride and groom than we were and we were just some randos#its basically my brother who is getting married and we havent spoken to this girl for years?? she was the reason my aunt came to the uk#bc she used to beat up my cousin (who got married) when he was little and my aunt didnt want to be around her and her mum didnt control her#imagine breaking the family up and being hated by the immediate relatives of the groom and acting like you are the vip guest..#havent told my cousin how she acted with us yet bc partially its like whats the point shes nobody#but i feel like his wife thinks shes super nice bc of course she was sucking up to her#i dont want to be a bad sister in law and cause problems so i'll just keep it to myself#not like anyone will talk to her again so what does it matter#it was nice seeing our side of the family though#especially one of my great aunties who accoring to my sister i was 'glazing' lmaoo#maybe its bc they know i am my mothers daughter and the other side dont?#i feel like its still unacceptable behavoiur though. just rude for no reason you could at least say hello
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siiiiiiigh
#i am in fact a grown adult who is still incapable of talking about their feelings and thoughts to people so I'll just rant here#my relationship with my mother is. so weird. it's not always bad but it always ends up bad for one reason or another#she can be perfectly civil and i'll still be irritated. other times i do try to tolerate it and engage and she ends up saying something#upsetting to me either way.#i don't want to keep being rude to her i don't want to get mad and annoyed all the time but i just can't stop. it's always like this#and i hate myself for it and i hate her and i hate everything about it#today i was leaving for work and she was like. i'll take the trash out of your room and i told her not to do it. she kept insisting and i#had to raise my voice at her to maybe get the point across to get her not to touch anything#and yes my room is a fucking mess and it is something to be embarrassed of. i just feel so fucking tired all time time and i keep tellin#myself that i will clean it this time for sure and then i don't. most of the time it's my mother taking care of it without my permission#and i am grateful for it bc nobody likes living in a mess... but i also fucking hate it because it makes me feel even more worthless#i just can't get rid of the feeling of shame. no matter what i do.#and back to the mother thing. i told her that if she touches anything i will go to her room and throw out anything that isn't nailed down#even though objectively i have no reason to oppose her helping me#but i also fucking hate it#maybe being rude is the only way to get it across. but also i get irritated about anything so easily#i feel shittier and shittier every day. had there been an easy and painless way of killing myself i would have done it already#and despite how much i want to blame this on a disorder or lack of access to medication. there is no magic pill that would fix me is there#i'm just a shitty person who cannot get it together despite everything being handed to me#i'm literally bad at anything and everything. i'm not even a good blogger lmao#people have it much worse in life and still do better. me? i'm useless. there's no helping it. i should have died from covid or something#nobody will save me. nobody cares enough. besides one person whom i push away because i can't stand her and i don't even know why 👍#if i stop messaging people first most of them would forget about me#i am alone. a lonely person in a messy room desperately trying to be entertaining so someone will pay a little bit of attention to me.#not to mention the geopolitics#i won't even go there. i hate the possibility that people might see it mentioned and give me shit for it#one more thing that is apparently my fault. directly or indirectly#all i want is to leave this country. spend the day with someone who cares for me like an actual friend. and then shoot myself so i don't#have to go back#sealene.txt
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#people who come onto my unhappy ending fics and write a comment that is essentially their pitch for a coda that makes it happy#girl go write your own fic!!#sorry but I think it’s kind of rude to come onto fics and not say ONE thing abt the story itself#just launch into your ‘this should happen’#ok. I don’t care.#idk like this kind of discussion is appropriate for fic jamming on Tumblr or with friends…#not w a random on ao3 who has published a finish fic they chose to end a certain way for a reason
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Top 10 posts customer service workers hate reading
very controversial opinion here, but sometimes customer service workers are the problem 😶
#once again reminded to be nice to the customers#reminds me of a time a customer wasn’t mean but was really overbearing and took like an hour to finish assembling his gift#admittedly a very nice gift for his mother#part of that hour was him coming back to the store and wrapping the box right in front of me#and he was doing such a terrible job i just ended up helping him anyway#i had to ask my boss to stop me if he came back because i couldn’t tell this guy to fuck off because he was being nice#but that kind of nice where you say stuff like oh i must be so annoying right now#yeah you are get out i wanna sit down#hate this post especially because i absolutely cant be mean at my job because most of the people who do get on my nerves are parents#who usually have their kids with them#and i always feel bad whenever i have to raise my voice at children or teenagers#like im not perfect and i know my shortcomings but what is this post achieving#not to mention being a little rude is normal we get angry for a reason thats why customer service workers put up with it#that and we need to keep our jobs and pay rent#and deal with 50 more customers for the rest of the day#but then again i guess that customer i got impatient with has to deal with 50 more cashiers today so tough world#I agree with op but its one of those things that is such a little problem compared to the other bigger problem#IM JUST BEING TOLD TO BE NICE AGAIN#if you made it this far you should read Bright-sided by Barbara Ehrenreich#its about toxic positivity in the united states#like why is everyone in this country so opposed to being upset#dont get me started on food service#which is already a high stress environment#with most of the staff in kitchen not even getting the opportunity to have a word with customers#and the ones that do are usually teenagers anyway who should not be judged for giving attitude#like i started these tags from the mind of a retail employee#but now i remember i worked in food service#some of the nastiest stuff you hear from people day to day isnt even from customers but your coworkers#who may have to pick up your slack if you fall behind whether thats your fault at all#anyway cool sentiment but this post reeks of i-never-worked-a-customer-service job or i-did-but-im-complicit-in-worker-suffering
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So don't you worry your pretty, little mind people throw rocks at things that shine and life makes love look hard + all these ppl think love's for show but I would die for you in secret = me today
#so i fought with a friend yesterday cuz for some reason she thought it was a good idea to go to tell my someone and we should stop being#friends with my other someone implying she was some kind of bully just for telling another friend she was being ridiculous and that she#should try to save her dignity. needless to say this 'friend' has talked with my someone like thrice in her life#so i got mad. like really mad. cuz 1) stfu its none of your business and 2) i find the fact so annoying she thinks she has to go to fight#ppl cuz they 'were too rude' to her friend. like bitch shes isn't a kindergarten. let her fight her of battles#+ thats breaking boundaries with at least three people. anyways im still kinda mad and thats not helping my anxiety 🫠🙃#sorry for the ts lyrics btw. shes the only one i know writes about ppl getting too intrusive in her relationships
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You're a reasonably informed person on the internet. You've experienced things like no longer being able to get files off an old storage device, media you've downloaded suddenly going poof, sites and forums with troves full of people's thoughts and ideas vanishing forever. You've heard of cybercrime. You've read articles about lost media. You have at least a basic understanding that digital data is vulnerable, is what I'm saying. I'm guessing that you're also aware that history is, you know... important? And that it's an ongoing study, requiring ... data about how people live? And that it's not just about stanning celebrities that happen to be dead? Congratulations, you are significantly better-informed than the British government! So they're currently like "Oh hai can we destroy all these historical documents pls? To save money? Because we'll digitise them first so it's fine! That'll be easy, cheap and reliable -- right? These wills from the 1850s will totally be fine for another 170 years as a PNG or whatever, yeah? We didn't need to do an impact assesment about this because it's clearly win-win! We'd keep the physical wills of Famous People™ though because Famous People™ actually matter, unlike you plebs. We don't think there are any equalities implications about this, either! Also the only examples of Famous People™ we can think of are all white and rich, only one is a woman and she got famous because of the guy she married. Kisses!"
Yes, this is the same Government that's like "Oh no removing a statue of slave trader is erasing history :(" You have, however, until 23 February 2024 to politely inquire of them what the fuck they are smoking. And they will have to publish a summary of the responses they receive. And it will look kind of bad if the feedback is well-argued, informative and overwhelmingly negative and they go ahead and do it anyway. I currently edit documents including responses to consultations like (but significantly less insane) than this one. Responses do actually matter. I would particularly encourage British people/people based in the UK to do this, but as far as I can see it doesn't say you have to be either. If you are, say, a historian or an archivist, or someone who specialises in digital data do say so and draw on your expertise in your answers. This isn't a question of filling out a form. You have to manually compose an email answering the 12 questions in the consultation paper at the link above. I'll put my own answers under the fold. Note -- I never know if I'm being too rude in these sorts of things. You probably shouldn't be ruder than I have been.
Please do not copy and paste any of this: that would defeat the purpose. This isn't a petition, they need to see a range of individual responses. But it may give you a jumping-off point.
Question 1: Should the current law providing for the inspection of wills be preserved?
Yes. Our ability to understand our shared past is a fundamental aspect of our heritage. It is not possible for any authority to know in advance what future insights they are supporting or impeding by their treatment of material evidence. Safeguarding the historical record for future generations should be considered an extremely important duty.
Question 2: Are there any reforms you would suggest to the current law enabling wills to be inspected?
No.
Question 3: Are there any reasons why the High Court should store original paper will documents on a permanent basis, as opposed to just retaining a digitised copy of that material?
Yes. I am amazed that the recent cyber attack on the British Library, which has effectively paralysed it completely, not been sufficient to answer this question for you. I also refer you to the fate of the Domesday Project. Digital storage is useful and can help more people access information; however, it is also inherently fragile. Malice, accident, or eventual inevitable obsolescence not merely might occur, but absolutely should be expected. It is ludicrously naive and reflects a truly unpardonable ignorance to assume that information preserved only in digital form is somehow inviolable and safe, or that a physical document once digitised, never need be digitised again..At absolute minimum, it should be understood as certain that at least some of any digital-only archive will eventually be permanently lost. It is not remotely implausible that all of it would be. Preserving the physical documents provides a crucial failsafe. It also allows any errors in reproduction -- also inevitable-- to be, eventually, seen and corrected. Note that maintaining, upgrading and replacing digital infrastructure is not free, easy or reliable. Over the long term, risks to the data concerned can only accumulate.
"Unlike the methods for preserving analog documents that have been honed over millennia, there is no deep precedence to look to regarding the management of digital records. As such, the processing, long-term storage, and distribution potential of archival digital data are highly unresolved issues. [..] the more digital data is migrated, translated, and re-compressed into new formats, the more room there is for information to be lost, be it at the microbit-level of preservation. Any failure to contend with the instability of digital storage mediums, hardware obsolescence, and software obsolescence thus meets a terminal end—the definitive loss of information. The common belief that digital data is safe so long as it is backed up according to the 3-2-1 rule (3 copies on 2 different formats with 1 copy saved off site) belies the fact that it is fundamentally unclear how long digital information can or will remain intact. What is certain is that its unique vulnerabilities do become more pertinent with age." -- James Boyda, On Loss in the 21st Century: Digital Decay and the Archive, Introduction.
Question 4: Do you agree that after a certain time original paper documents (from 1858 onwards) may be destroyed (other than for famous individuals)? Are there any alternatives, involving the public or private sector, you can suggest to their being destroyed?
Absolutely not. And I would have hoped we were past the "great man" theory of history. Firstly, you do not know which figures will still be considered "famous" in the future and which currently obscure individuals may deserve and eventually receive greater attention. I note that of the three figures you mention here as notable enough to have their wills preserved, all are white, the majority are male (the one woman having achieved fame through marriage) and all were wealthy at the time of their death. Any such approach will certainly cull evidence of the lives of women, people of colour and the poor from the historical record, and send a clear message about whose lives you consider worth remembering.
Secondly, the famous and successsful are only a small part of our history. Understanding the realities that shaped our past and continue to mould our present requires evidence of the lives of so-called "ordinary people"!
Did you even speak to any historians before coming up with this idea?
Entrusting the documents to the private sector would be similarly disastrous. What happens when a private company goes bust or decides that preserving this material is no longer profitable? What reasonable person, confronted with our crumbling privatised water infrastructure, would willingly consign any part of our heritage to a similar fate?
Question 5: Do you agree that there is equivalence between paper and digital copies of wills so that the ECA 2000 can be used?
No. And it raises serious questions about the skill and knowledge base within HMCTS and the government that the very basic concepts of data loss and the digital dark age appear to be unknown to you. I also refer you to the Domesday Project.
Question 6: Are there any other matters directly related to the retention of digital or paper wills that are not covered by the proposed exercise of the powers in the ECA 2000 that you consider are necessary?
Destroying the physical documents will always be an unforgivable dereliction of legal and moral duty.
Question 7: If the Government pursues preserving permanently only a digital copy of a will document, should it seek to reform the primary legislation by introducing a Bill or do so under the ECA 2000?
Destroying the physical documents will always be an unforgivable dereliction of legal and moral duty.
Question 8: If the Government moves to digital only copies of original will documents, what do you think the retention period for the original paper wills should be? Please give reasons and state what you believe the minimum retention period should be and whether you consider the Government’s suggestion of 25 years to be reasonable.
There is no good version of this plan. The physical documents should be preserved.
Question 9: Do you agree with the principle that wills of famous people should be preserved in the original paper form for historic interest?
This question betrays deep ignorance of what "historic interest" actually is. The study of history is not simply glorified celebrity gossip. If anything, the physical wills of currently famous people could be considered more expendable as it is likely that their contents are so widely diffused as to be relatively "safe", whereas the wills of so-called "ordinary people" will, especially in aggregate, provide insights that have not yet been explored.
Question 10: Do you have any initial suggestions on the criteria which should be adopted for identifying famous/historic figures whose original paper will document should be preserved permanently?
Abandon this entire lamentable plan. As previously discussed, you do not and cannot know who will be considered "famous" in the future, and fame is a profoundly flawed criterion of historical significance.
Question 11: Do you agree that the Probate Registries should only permanently retain wills and codicils from the documents submitted in support of a probate application? Please explain, if setting out the case for retention of any other documents.
No, all the documents should be preserved indefinitely.
Question 12: Do you agree that we have correctly identified the range and extent of the equalities impacts under each of these proposals set out in this consultation? Please give reasons and supply evidence of further equalities impacts as appropriate.
No. You appear to have neglected equalities impacts entirely. As discussed, in your drive to prioritise "famous people", your plan will certainly prioritise the white, wealthy and mostly the male, as your "Charles Dickens, Charles Darwin and Princess Diana" examples amply indicate. This plan will create a two-tier system where evidence of the lives of the privileged is carefully preserved while information regarding people of colour, women, the working class and other disadvantaged groups is disproportionately abandoned to digital decay and eventual loss. Current and future historians from, or specialising in the history of minority groups will be especially impoverished by this.
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