#obviously this is coming partly from the perspective of someone who's used to doing this to OTHER people's arguments

[infiniteeight8]

Hello again, just me humbly requesting that you bless us with more of the IronStrange Can’t Find Out series. I know you said getting in the queue early is the best bet, so asking for updates right after you post a new one is my game plan. I need these boys to get their happy ending in this verse eventually! 😅❤️

Your timing was excellent! 😀 Along with the other two, but you know, that means you all got three updates not too far apart! Win for everyone. lol. 

I have two prompts in the queue for this series after this one. 

And now, Tony’s POV post-heat!

-

Tony throws himself down on the couch near the armchair where Pepper is curled up, reading. “I’m not a jealous person, right?” he demands.

Pepper puts her book aside. “You aren’t,” she affirms, partly because this is obviously the appropriate response for whatever rant Tony is about to launch into, and partly because Tony really isn’t a jealous person. If a potential—or even current—partner is more interested in someone else than they are in him, the last thing Tony wants is for them to stick around. And when the interest is purely theoretical, window shopping, to speak, he has no problem playing along with his partner’s appreciation.

He shoots her a despairing look. “Then why is the thought of this mystery alpha of Stephen’s driving me crazy?” 

“Probably because he’s hurting your friend, if unknowingly,” Pepper says. “You’ve always been protective of your friends.” And Tony’s feelings for Stephen had rapidly escalated past friendship, even if he was being a little stubborn about recognizing that. 

“I can’t stop wondering what this guy is like,” Tony says, tipping his head back against the couch. “Is he enhanced? A civilian? Has he even met Stephen in this timeline? Is Stephen pining for a guy who doesn’t know he exists, or a guy who doesn’t even want him?” Tony groans. “I can’t decide which is worse. I mean, being actively rejected is probably worse, but at least then Stephen might be able to get over the guy.”

“You said they had multiple lifetimes together,” Pepper interrupts gently. “I can’t imagine that’s easy to get over.”

Tony makes a frustrated noise. “I know. But I keep thinking, if I knew something about the guy, maybe I’d understand. Or at least I’d— I don’t even know.” Pepper knows. At least I’d be able to size up the competition. Or maybe, At least I’d know what he has that I don’t. But she keeps quiet. “But Stephen won’t say anything about the guy. Nada. Nil. Zip. Except that he’s an male alpha, and that he’s happily mated.” Tony slumps.

Pepper makes a sympathetic noise. Honestly, she’s a bit baffled, too. If it was her, she thinks she’d want to talk about her mate. Even if they couldn’t be together. Maybe especially if they couldn’t be together. But on the occasions she’s met Stephen, it hasn’t really seemed to her like he was pining. He’d been rather focused on Tony, actually, almost to the point of being rude, though Pepper hadn’t minded.

Wait.

“What’s that expression for?” Tony says, sitting up out of his slouch. He points at her. “I know that face. That’s your ‘I just realized Tony is being an idiot’ face. Spill. What’d I do?”

“Tony,” Pepper says slowly. “Does Stephen know why you and I got bonded?”

“Sure,” Tony says automatically.

“No, think about it,” Pepper insists. “Did you ever actually tell him, or are you just assuming he knows because you trust him enough for him to know?”

Tony opens his mouth, then stops, brow wrinkling. “I mean, I must have…”

“When?” Pepper demands.

Tony visibly searches his memory and comes up blank. “Okay, so I may have assumed. Why?”

Pepper laughs and shakes her head. “Tony. From Stephen’s perspective, you are happily mated and therefore unavailable.”

Tony looks stunned. “You think I might be the mystery alpha?”

“It would explain why Stephen’s been so tight-lipped,” Pepper says. “His friendship with you is all he has, and he’s probably terrified it’ll ruin it if you find out.”

“He wasn’t confusing me for his alpha during his heat,” Tony says with dawning realization. “He was forgetting that I wasn’t his alpha. He must have been worried he’d give himself away, that’s why he didn’t want my help at first.”

Tony is still for a moment, and then he leaps up and is halfway to the elevator before Pepper can react. “Tony, wait!”

He stops just short of the elevator and turns back uncertainly. “Pep. We always said—”

Pepper waves him off. “Of course we’ll break our bond,” she says impatiently. “But you can’t just rush over and throw yourself at Stephen. He’s been hurting. If you’re not careful, it’ll end up seeming like you’re throwing that back in his face. You need to slow down and think.”

Tony lets out a long breath and scrubs his hands through his hair. “Right. You’re right.” He gives Pepper a wry look. “Careful isn’t my strong suit.”

She smiles. “You’ll figure it out.”

[cowboyjen68]

hi cowboyjen! im a lesbian in my 20s and i need some advice -- i really would like to use the butch label for myself but i hesitate because i worry others dont see me as "butch enough," so what makes a butch, butch?

Butch is something I came into because of my shared experiences with other butches. I see it as partly how I am percieved but also how I see myself in the world. It plays a part in how I relate to to other women and how women relate to me.

Not everyone who wears masculine clothing is butch (ask the women farmers around rural Iowa who are straight LOL) and being butch does entail a certian about of experiences that are common. Butches can't shake off how they are seen by others with clothing or hair styles. The energy is contast and often confuses others into being unsure if we are a man or woman upon first or even second glances.

Butch enough is not really something I put too much stock in. Butches come in all sizes, abilities and have varied jobs and interests.

The most common shared butch stories are being called Sir when someone does a quick take. Being told we "should have been a boy" or "why do you want to look like a man". We look (and feel) obviously awkward in women's dress clothing. I and all my butch friends have several stories of being ushered from or told we are in the wrong bathroom. EVEN when I had a pony tail. We get told by straight women they "wish we were men" or we "must be better than men because we understand women but are still.. you know.. manly".

Aesthetically we tend to prefer men's (read utilitarian) and short hair (again read utilitarian) but this can vary. It is a bit of a generalization. Comfortable clothing is chosen over just pleasing to look at. Let me be clear, there is NOTHING wrong with dressing in things other consider "uncomfortable) because you want to be attractive to any give group of people. Don't yuck other's yum. We all have the right to our tastes but I am speaking from a butch perspective.

Find older butches who resemble you. SIze, body shape etc and talk with them. Butch certianly does not fit everyone but in general those women who feel "butch" speaks to them is probably more accurate about themselves than others can be.

It is perfecty fine to try Butch on for size, just don't get a bit old tattoo or change all your social media right away. GIve yourself some time to decide, Yeah for me or Nah not for me.

[batsplat]

hi bat<3 i feel like you’re definitely not a die-hard fan of the big 3, but for someone like me who’s been watching men’s tennis since the early 2010s, they’re like everything.

so i wanted to ask: out of the big 3 (or big 4?) pairings, which duo do you think is more interesting? like which one feels more worth exploring in your opinion?

i just watched roger’s docu recently, and omg he gave novak a solo moment. not like a story about them, just a montage of novak yelling and screaming on court. then roger went, “this might not reflect well on novak.” it lowkey gave me vale/jorge vibes, not a perfect parallel, but within the big3/big4, they’re the duo that feels the least… connected. and yet, when it comes to tactical and technical richness, they’re at the top. roger’s obviously way more arrogant than vale, like he just doesn’t see novak as special or even interesting. meanwhile, novak used to be that guy who wanted everyone to like him, but now he’s completely over it. over the years, there’s just been this constant low-key, non-vibe-y energy between them. but their matches? they somehow deliver these insane moments at the most unexpected times. at the laver cup, roger said something to novak, and then novak cried.

i’m less into roger/rafa, partly because i’m not a rafa fan, but also because they suddenly turned into this ideal rivalry narrative, and honestly, that kinda freaked me out. i’m slowly starting to understand the feelings between them, though. like, i still don’t buy into the whole “greatest rival” thing because, let’s be real, on both the competitive and career-defining levels, it’s just not that mutual. but yeah, their pairing definitely had its advantages—sorry for saying this, but it’s true. the 2008 wimb F is obviously historic, but if you actually watch it all the way through, it’s not that great. it’s the unpredictable weather that gave it that epic feel.

and then there’s andy/novak, who’ve always been my fave because of their history and the emotional layers in their rivalry. like, when viktor troicki recently said novak was looking for a “big name” coach, my friends and i joked about it being roger, but none of us thought of andy. and then it happened. i still can’t believe it. from my very limited tennis perspective, andy’s kinda feels like a subset of novak’s. i don’t really know what qualities do coaches even need in tennis, and how do they maximize a player’s potential? so i’m really curious to see what they come up with together. their dynamic peaked in 2016, which was also the only time the big4 rivalries genuinely made me sad. so yeah, they totally deserve this heartwarming closure.

okay so first off, I have to confess I get a failing grade as a hater because I read this ask reading ?? eating breakfast with this on

I dozed off to the 2019 wimbledon final last night so idk. this isn't nadal retirement-prompted nostalgia, I actually failed as a hater there too and completely missed his last match happening so like. arrived to dance on the grave a day late. BUT the djokovic/murray coaching news DID awaken something suppressed in me. I'll probably watch the 2012 uso final next just to feel something

anyway, what this does go to show is that for all that I am obviously extremely not a fan of the big three, as a tennis fan it's also not like I can pretend to be completely immune. I grew up watching them!! I remember watching so many of their matches! often with my family! I would argue about them all the time as a fan, whether with my family or people at the tennis club or indeed my maths teacher. I was always rooting for SOMEONE, like I did have an order of preference. and... uh, it should be mentioned that I am also not a complete neutral who just intellectually hated the big three because I thought they were shitty sources of narrative tension. I was a massive murray fan as a kid so I did also just get my heart repeatedly broken by them. we're talking 'cried during murray's speech at wimbledon 2012'... I actually watched the wimbledon 2013 final at the tennis club where I trained and was EXTREMELY smug (and delighted) when murray won because EVERYONE including my coach thought djokovic would win and had been extremely annoying in my direction throughout the experience. but also I have never enjoyed a men's australian open final in my life, except 2012 I suppose. that venue holds nothing but pain and misery for me

so with my biases stated up front, where the big 3/4 rivalries are concerned, I'm basically in the 'anybody but fedal' camp. that one I feel nothing for and its popularity continues to absolutely baffle me. no hate to anyone who enjoys it but I do treat its continued dominance basically like a psyop. idk who's responsible for this or why they're doing it, but SOMEBODY is pursuing some kind of nefarious agenda. call me casey stoner because I've cracked the code. I understand they're both individually rather popular and I suppose in a detached unemotional way I do get how that could happen, but as a unit? idk man. also, EYE am a rivalry enjoyer, but I get very suspicious when too many fans are an enjoyer of a particular rivalry... (or y'know, sometimes you've got rivalries that have a lot of 'theoretical fans' but you can kinda tell they do basically hate one of the competitors involved and will immediately throw them overboard if they have to take a side, which also passes the test.) just shows to me that there's zero edge there. most partisan fans of an athlete hate anyone who is a threat to their athlete, that's just how people are. if there's this little hate then that tells me that there's too little threat which tells me the stakes aren't quite there competitively or emotionally... which tells me that there's no real reason to care. I'm well aware that federer fans used to be more likely to be nadal haters back in the noughties (david foster wallace coming through for me again on that front) and that nadal fans are more into that rivalry than federer fans and that they're both retired now... but still!! if it was a proper fun rivalry, more partisan fans would still be bitter. fundamentally the rivalry is good for both of them in terms of legacy and pr and all that shit and they both clearly agree so it's just... empty

which yeah, so full agree on the stuff you say lol. I HAVE watched the wimbledon 2008 final (and I... think?? must have watched it at the time, I was still pretty young and clearly it wasn't a defining enough experience it stuck in my mind lol) but it's been years by now. so I can't actually reallyyyy speak to its quality and I'm probably not going to rewatch it any time soon. I do also just think it's the most boring match-up tennis-wise... partly this is because my favourite big three playstyle is djokovic's - I love how he moves around the court, I love the compact backhand and the emphasis on counterpunching... the nadal/federer match-up was mostly defined by federer attempting to figure out ways to prevent nadal from bullying his backhand. which I do know is oversimplifying things lol but it's. kinda true. djokovic/federer is the best match-up tennis-wise even if it's a bit one-sided in the biggest moments (which, whatever, that was narratively engaging too)... federer's full artistry against djokovic's precision was just more exciting to watch. then comes djokovic/nadal which is a bit of a counterpuncher-off, like they are quite tactically similar in a lot of ways, extremely optimised baseliners... but that means they were always going to push each other the furthest - they were already half a step ahead of federer in the evolution of tennis and everyone now is obviously basing their tennis primarily on how they changed the game. and, y'know, nadal's biggest rival is djokovic!! I get why if you're a nadal fan, you'd want it to be federer, but well! tough!

and YES yes I ABSOLUTELY agree that federer/djokovic is the most interesting interpersonally because federer was SO arrogant towards djokovic. the worst thing that happened to federer is that he became a pr merchant, like at least being a cunt was INTERESTING. he used to be absolutely dreadful about murray too!! aggressively unpleasant!! but that one was also frustrating because... murray didn't end up surpassing him... (I genuinely have like. traumatic flashbacks to watching their atp finals 2014 match. I don't think my soul ever quite recovered from that day.) but with djokovic!! people used to be so unpleasant about him - and okay, by now unfortunately he's given everyone plenty of cause, but BACK THEN it was a completely different story. it was so much fun rooting for him when the crowds were being horrid to him and he stuck it in their faces... before he did all the boob throwing business - staring icily at them when he beat their hero? hot

and federer was so so snide about the guy... pepperidge farm remembers when he accused teenage djokovic of faking his injuries in 2006

The 19-year-old Djokovic called his trainer multiple times. He had hamstring issues, but Federer thought he was faking his injuries to disrupt Wawrinka’s rhythm. “I don’t trust his injuries. I’m serious. I think he’s a joke, you know, when it comes down to his injuries,” Federer said.

OR in 2009

Djokovic, the No. 3 seed, threw in the towel midway through the fourth set of his quarterfinal with Andy Roddick, trailing 6-7 (3), 6-4, 6-2, 2-1. But in pointed comments, Federer, the No. 2 seed, noted that it wasn't the first time Djokovic has withdrawn midway through a match in a Grand Slam. "He's not a guy who's never given up before ... it's disappointing," said Federer, who will face Roddick in the semifinals. "I've only done it once in my career ... Andy totally deserved to win that match." "I'm almost in favor of saying, you know what, if you're not fit enough, just get out of here," Federer added. "If Novak were up two sets to love I don't think he would have retired 4-0 down in the fourth. Thanks to Andy that he retired in the end. Andy pushed him to the limits. Hats off to Andy."

'if novak were up two sets to love I don't think he would have retired 4-0 down in the fourth' ...? what are you even saying

and like, on a moral level I do actually think this is pretty gross and have a massive bone to pick with federer on his whole 'look at me aren't I amazing for never retiring from a match' schtick, which continues to have lasting harmful consequences in this sport. this kind of record isn't heroic, it's just fucking stupid. but also, it's hardly the first time or the last time tennis players accused each other of playing up their injuries - it's very much part of the sport, we've all done it or at least thought it. I am also on the record as being pro beefing with children. and it's very strong set-up for that rivalry, especially given how bloody often djokovic went on to crush federer's spirit! it's better set-up than the payoff, quite frankly

that being said, perhaps my favourite match they played is us open 2011 semis - y'know, the match where djokovic saves two matchpoints in the fifth set en route to beating federer... oh, I suppose that doesn't completely narrow it down!!

ah well!

back to 2011, that match did lead to just some really strong snarking in the press:

Djokovic was honest enough to admit the shot was a gamble – but Federer was reluctant to give him credit even for that courage in a crisis, preferring to regard it as desperate. "Confidence? Are you kidding me?" he said when it was put to him the cross-court forehand off his first serve – described by John McEnroe as "one of the all-time great shots" – was either a function of luck or confidence. "I mean, please. Some players grow up and play like that – being down 5-2 in the third, and they all just start slapping shots. I never played that way. I believe hard work's going to pay off, because early on maybe I didn't always work at my hardest. For me, this is very hard to understand. How can you play a shot like that on match point? Maybe he's been doing it for 20 years, so for him it was very normal. You've got to ask him." Djokovic was in a more relaxed mood. "Yeah, I tend to do that on match points," he said, reminded that it was exactly what he did to Federer last year. "It kinda works."

IT KINDA WORKS jhgjhgjhgkf get him again from me

here's the matchpoint save in question ofc

"someday the little twins will grow up to hear about matches like this" well -

which, I mean, federer's being extremely annoying in press! 'oh I'm above taking risks when I'm down on the scoreboard' says the man who ended up with one hell of a reputation for choking. it's also silly!! sometimes it's worth taking a swing at it!! also psychologically, because you're making things less complicated for yourself!! in individual matches, you won't necessarily be rewarded for your diligence and hard work, just not how anything works you moron. but y'know, this was the REAL federer. by the following year he'd already completely clamped down on this kind of thing and it felt like really djokovic could have also been WAY more bitter about this stuff than he publicly was... but yeah, this I did enjoy

and yeah, I do kinda see the vale/jorge comparison! like you say, federer is kinda... more arrogant, more contemptuous towards his younger rivals, also just more of a sore loser until pr got to him? tennis is infamous for its frosty handshakes, but you compare some of those with how warm valentino generally was when he lost... federer's problem was that he lacked self-awareness and was just so committed to this image of the gentleman's sport, which is why he ended up shying away from all this stuff. the unpleasantness with djokovic was actually like... still fairly late in the game, all things considered, it wasn't even really like 2011!federer to say stuff like that. which does show djokovic was capable of really really getting under his skin! and on djokovic's end, where the jorge comparison very much applies is how much he wanted the people to love him (ik his fans hate this narrative but like,, obviously he did). and how they had all already decided he was the enemy for beating their beloved federer and nadal. I do find it a bit easier to stomach with valentino because he deliberately plays with this stuff, weaponising the crowd and all that, whereas federer and nadal just pretend like it's not happening. (also morally it might be worse to boo at a motogp event because of the danger they're putting themselves in, but practically booing at a tennis match is far far worse - you can actually influence the competitors in a way you obviously cannot in motogp.) but that WAS one of the most interesting storylines in the big three era... djokovic slowly catching these two greats who were always so far ahead of them, however much people didn't want him to, even though he didn't have the love of the people on his side, and eventually managing to surpass them altogether. I do think there's plenty of interesting stuff there!! good groundwork! it's just... nowhere near enough, given how bloody long these guys ended up dominating

on djokovic/murray - MY favourite combination of guys as well, just in terms of how much I actually like both of them. it's an interesting relationship where it's like... they knew each other quite well when they were young, then inevitably grew apart a bit when they were competing for big titles? obviously they were also born exactly a week apart from each other, which is narratively fun. I suppose it's the equivalent to jorge/dani which... actually wait, no, I realise that would assign nadal to casey and certainly not my god. it's a rivalry that's a bit tough to stomach from a murray fan perspective because... I mean, it's not quite 'this is not a rivalry, they always kick our ass' territory... but when I started following tennis as a kid, it felt completely plausible that murray and djokovic would have similarly successful careers. which obviously. did not happen. still remember that kind of controversial 2015 australian open final -

- and, y'know, it's a bit frustrating!! this was the tone of a lot of that era, where you kinda just wanted to take them all aside and tell them. my god. maybe a little bit of feuding is okay, no? but well, it is what it is, mostly they had a good relationship. 2016 was kinda the best of times and worst of times because murray was pouring his heart and soul into scraping all of his potential out of himself, got another slam, year end #1 etc... but it also probably did end up fucking up his body permanently, in the quest to fight djokovic. and there IS something compelling and sad about that, but yeah. still a bit of an old wound as an actual sports fan lol

and yeah, they're two closely related playstyles!! counterpunchers with particularly excellent backhands - and if a wing falters, then it's the forehand. it was lendl coaching murray and getting him to properly go after his forehand, be aggressive enough off that wing, that got him his biggest successes. djokovic's weaknesses are less pronounced and especially these last few years, he's often been lethal as a serve + 1 forehand merchant. roland garros 2023 is a good example of that... murray was the tactician, generally thought a lot on court and had a lot in his arsenal - ofc most famously his excellent lob. djokovic does also have more to his game than just baseline pushing, even if sometimes that involves just spamming dropshots when he feels uneasy. obviously, as can be seen from the slam count, his game ended up being just a bit better... but, well, these are very fine margins. murray's slam count is deceptive, he really was the one guy who could consistently hang with those three year-in year-out. whatever revisionism people try to do now, it really was a big four era

as for the coaching relationship, I'm very curious!! coaching can take a lot of different forms and sometimes there's a bit of a distinction between the... bread and butter coaching, the people who are working with you day to day, and these more high profile gigs where sometimes it really is just localised to specific tournaments. it's all very individualised, depends on the specific demands of the player - obviously, given where djokovic is at in his career, you won't be seeing particularly major adjustments, like murray isn't going to come in and suddenly suggest djokovic revamps his serve, right. (though sometimes players still tinker with this stuff late into careers, especially if they're managing injuries.) given the particular stresses of playing in a match, what an odd experience that is in its own right, sometimes you do just need someone to be observing you, give your game a critical once-over from a little bit of distance. now, admittedly from what I've seen of djokovic's coaching relationships, I do feel like one of the coach's roles in THAT particular camp is also just 'being yelled at continuously during matches'. which...? a little curious if djokovic has that same tone when murray's standing there lmao. also one of the reasons for the yelling is when djokovic feels like he's not getting enough enthusiasm from his box. which... ... uh. I mean. murray wouldn't have been top on MY list for that particular metric. but he can get passionate at davis cup from what I've seen!! so maybe it'll work out

anyway yeah I'll cut it off there lol. obviously I spent half my childhood thinking about tennis and inevitably that involved a lot of thinking about the big four and that means I have a lot of thoughts on them so. basically it's fedole > rafole > fedal as far as I'm concerned. good luck to djokovic/murray in their endeavours, I will be there no matter what

[xjulixred45x]

Kaigaku Inadama/Nobara Kusigaki x Reader from out time

Request: Nobara (JJK) y Kaigaku (KNY) with a Reader of our times please? Good luck with your Exams!

Thanks sweetie!

Genre: Headcanons

Reader: Neutral

Warnings: none really, fluff

Nobara Kusigaki

Nobara is a quirky girl, we all know that.

Now, with a reader who comes from a world without curses? That's a new level of extravagant.

Nobara, regardless of gender, would like to go on shopping dates, or even go to cute cafes (even cat cafes) to have a quiet environment to be with her partner (God knows she needs it with her job).

She is very interested in what her S/o has to say about her world, especially because it ties her to reality in some way.

Let me explain to you.

Her S/o IS the little normal thing she have in her life.

Since she entered the world of Sorcery at least.

So I think she really appreciates this new, more "ordinary" perspective on life that her s/o has even though it may seem "more boring" at first glance.

For Nobara you will never be boring.

And partly she wishes she could enjoy the same things as you that she can't afford now (or perhaps never allowed herself due to her context).

I think that thanks to this Nobara would be one of the few people in the entire series who would be very good with a non-Sorcerer s/o. She trusts her abilities to protect you, and honestly, you're the closest thing to a "home" she's had in a long time.

Someone to act her age around and not have to worry about cursing or work is very welcome.

she will protect you no matter what, since you are not from that world, you are obviously not used to dealing with curses, so she will happily take care of them for you.

(she doesn't recognize it, but he loves to show off his skills for you.....whoever she deceives, she shows it off shamelessly).

You are one of the few people who lets you into her heart easily, so he won't let anything happen to you.

If you want to learn to be a Sorcerer, she will be conflicted, on the one hand she wants both of you to be a ✨power couple✨ but on the other hand the VERY likely possibility that you will die terrifies her.

But it's your decision. If you decide to do so, you will have ✨Scary Dog Privilge ✨ because Nobara will make sure NO ONE messes with you, be it curse or humans.

If you decide not to do it, she's fine with that, according to her "I can be brutal for both of us."

In general she protects you more than most because she cares a lot :3

Kaigaku Inadama

He definitely thought you were joking at first.

More so when you told him about the things of our time that OBVIOUSLY had not been invented for the Taisho Era. But more than bothering Kaigaku, he found it fun. At first.

Now, if you had some proof that what you say is THE TRUTH (like a phone or even a flashlight, some small but technological thing), Kaigaku.Exe stops working.

And he spends a LONG TIME questioning everything.

But then he realizes that if man-eating demons exist, then what you say may be possible.

I think he would also be impressed (even if he doesn't admit it) with his S/o's level of education (in the Taisho era people barely knew how to read and write, so if you have finished high school, you look like a GENIUS in comparison to Kaigaku).

But he also realize that your S/o is used to a much more peaceful type of life. Which means he has to constantly protect you.

It doesn't bother him, he likes to show off his strength with you (although he WILL DIE before saying it), so he constantly shows off when there is danger nearby.

In a way that his S/o comes from a future without demons gives him some hope, because it means that 1-or the demons FINALLY become extinct or 2-the Pillars will defeat Muzan at some point. Either one is good.

Of course, I don't know if it's a good idea to talk to him about Hiroshima or Nagasaki ☠️

Besides, he doesn't understand at all the historical or cultural references that his S/o throws at him, but he dismisses it rather than getting angry.

While Kaigaku is confident in his abilities to protect his s/o, I can see him being somewhat paranoid, so he would give them Wisteria fixes in case he had to go on a mission and they couldn't come.

If his S/o wants to be a Demon slayer, I think he would be very against it, more than anything he doesn't want to lose the little positive that has come into his life (he doesn't say it, but he lets it be seen), although if his S/o insists A LOT, he'll probably let you see Jigoro, and if they manages to pass the training, he would have his S/o go on all his missions with him (except when it is MANDATORY that he go alone).

If S/o remains a civilian, perhaps Kaigaku would recommend going to work in one of the Wisteria houses that the guild has, it doesn't require much training (from what I understand) and it would be much more practical to see each other more often.

In general, he is less of an idiot and more protective of a reader in our world, believing that you could not defend yourself as well as him.

But he loves you just the same.

[camlannpod]

Hello! Sorry if it's been asked before, but how do you choose which legend/story to feature in the episode? Is it just something you really enjoy, it fits thematically or are there other reasons? Thank you!

Hello! It's definitely a mix of reasons - one part is certainly stories I enjoy, but they're also very much thematic!

Also this got so long, so I apologise. I hope you enjoy it!

For example, in episode 1, Twrch Trwyth and its story Culhwch ac Olwen is one of my favourite stories, but I also think of it as an iconic Welsh story and I wanted to situate Camlann within that tradition immediately. Plus Episode 1 is Dai's episode, and Dai is both very proud of his Welsh identity and very funny. Culhwch ac Olwen is maybe the oldest comedic Welsh story so it was a good fit.

With the Kelpie - there are a lot of different variations of kelpie / water-horse stories across the British Isles. Obviously the Kelpie itself is a Scottish story, that then travels to England. Welsh 'kelpies', the Ceffyl Dŵr, are universally benevolent. Part of the reason I used this story was that it was, to me, a really interesting 19th century English version of a Kelpie story (as recorded by Katharine M Briggs - a horse comes to a church at midday and says 'the hour has come but not the man'. Later a passing lord comes by at night and the priest tries to save him by keeping him away from the river and locking him in a room in the church. When they open the door just after midnight, they find the man has drowned on dry land.)

So partly I just wanted to use that because it's such a great rescension of the kelpie story. But it's also because Morgan, whose episode ep 2 is, is so tangled in conflicting traditions about Morgan Le Fay and her own understanding of both the character and her own identity. Morgan is Welsh, and a Ceffyl Dŵr wouldn't have hurt her, but she's terrified of the English corruptions of these stories, in many ways literally haunted by them. Was Morgan le Fay a victim or a villain? How do we interepret monstrous women in medieval stories? I wanted to play with that a bit.

The Lantern Man is another situation of a great story that really inspired me - an 1800s English midlands story I found in a book called The Lore of the Land. But also that's Perry's episode, and I needed to show you why Perry's paranoia is justified, and the flip side to Dai's urgent desire to find other people is Perry's terror of the monster lurking in shadows that they're trying to protect them from. Having someone knocking at your door - that idea of a human figure with a light - was perfect for that.

The dogs were a big one for thematic reasons. This is Gwen's episode, episode 4 - normally Shucky Dogs / Black Dogs / Grimms / Church Grimms / Black Shucks are benevolent and protective. They evolved as a story from an English practice of burying a dog in a graveyard first, as there was a superstition that the first person buried in a graveyard would be stuck in purgatory between earth and heaven. The idea was to bury a dog and let its ghost shepherd souls. This evolved into stories of huge ghostly dogs as protective, territorial spirits. However over time there's a little offshoot of that story - huge black hounds with hell-red eyes haunting stretches of road and abandoned buildings, the ghosts of murdered people whose killers were never found, seeking vengeance.

So on the one hand, from a literalist perspective, over thousands of years a lot of people get murdered, especially women and trans people, and I wanted to make a point in this drama inspired by medieval literature about violence against women and queer people. But I also liked the idea of the dogs being both - both restless spirits full of fury seeking vengeance and protective, territorial guardians who were wronged. That really resonated with me as a queer woman, and I really liked the idea of both Gwen and Morgan seeing a lot of themselves in these restless ghosts.

Then finally, most recently with Gwaine and the Green Knight. First, I wanted to blur the Green Man and the Green Knight because I think of the Green Man as one of England's most iconic folkloric creatures, and the closest we have to a clearly identifiable non-Christian folk deity, essentially. There are faces of the Green Man in York cathedral! From the 1200s! And the theme of the Green Man as the living embodiment of Spring - a giant who brings green mist to everything he touches - resonates for me with the Green Knights themes of renewal and change and life. Both are some of my favourite stories.

ALSO! This is a story about queerness. It's a story about finding ways for your queerness and culutral identity to co-exist. And it's about living in the shadow of history and tradition and everyone who's come before you and not feeling good enough. Gawain and the Green Knight is so much a story about courage, and integrity, and it was exactly the journey our Gwaine needed to go on. But with the monstrous twist that this is the end of the world, and our Gwaine shouldn't need to risk his life to prove he's a good man. That queer people shouldn't need to put ourselves in real social, political, even legal danger in order to love who we love and be who we are. That that's not a fair ask of anyone.

I hope you enjoyed these ramblings! I needed to walk a little around some spoilers but yeah!

[thesoulshyperrealaslacreatura]

Drakenier: Violence as expression and affirmation - Pt.1

It has become a rather well-known piece of trivia (or at least, well-known within the niche internet circles I flow through) that 2010's Nier Replicant / Gestalt had its overall message thoroughly inspired by well, 9/11 - the discourse that produced it, that came of it, and became it. Although it may not be a direct quote, "to kill someone, you don't have to be out of your mind, you just need to believe you are correct" is a sentiment clearly echoed throughout the game; as the many layers of its central and side conflicts drop alongside the curtains to its second, third (and maybe kind of fourth) playthrough, so does what had, for quite a ways into the game, seemed like a story mostly about finding, nurturing and protecting a community - people to call home.

However, the statement above seems to somewhat conceal-so-as-to-merely-hint-at what I'd argue is a much more complex argument the games lay forth, when looked at as one series. I, myself, have found it difficult in the past to distill both Replicant and the wider series as a whole into one coherent message or thematic frame; partly (and beautifully), because there mustn't be one - this singular reading which eclipses the broad range of experiences that people have come to share with the series - such an idea is preposterously reductive. Still, I think that this mish-mash of "the game is about philosophy and tragedy and nihilism and existentialism and society and humanity and life" and whatnot misses a bit of where the different themes intersect, producing further instances of meaning from the text. I hope to discuss the evolution (were I to sound even more pretentious, I might have used the word genealogy, but I would never stoop to that) of a few central concepts surrounding drakenier's "philosophy of violence" and where they seem to have informed or have been informed by other aspects of the works.

Strap in, because just from writing the introduction I can already tell this is gonna have to come in multiple parts. Hopefully my writing can steer away from boring you to tears throughout all of it.

Spoilers for the whole series!

Part 1: Replicant, and the subjective experience gained from that funky 9/11 fun fact

"Blood is sound, sound is words, and words are power"

This quote, almost a chant from Weiss as the player starts to grasp the gameplay loop of attacking enemies to allow for magical attacks, ties in the game's teaching of that system with what I consider to be the most powerful writing from Replicant (I'm going to refer to it as Replicant for the sake of convenience, obviously Gestalt is included in that). And it is deeply tied to what Taro himself has credited as a major source of inspiration for Replicant in relation to his previous game, Drakengard.

In some ways, Nier Replicant isn't introducing a new, foreign idea over the original Drakengard, so much as bringing out new elements from within its predecessors' critiques of the gaming landscape. Though that only really becomes clear by taking future foresights the series would reach into account; this is the point at which it becomes prudent to ask ourselves one question - how might the game's design regulate the player's interaction with the game world? (A question that, if you're at all even familiar with Drakengard, you probably already know the answer to)

From this, we can extrapolate a lot of meaning from how the original Drakengard was conceived: a game about violence, from the perspective of people who were so immersed in their own awfulness and the general precarity of their world that they cannot enact anything but that same violence. And it is that violence which comes to define them.

I'd also like to do the pedantic thing and bring up the fact that violence can be thought of as more than just physical harm, but also in terms of violation. In that sense, when I claim that Drakengard's characters are defined by violence, I mean it in that their reduction of other people to objects serves as an exertion of themselves - the Dynasty Warriors inspired combat of cleansing battlefields as the only win state reflects back at Caim as his only method of building an identity of his own, one based on strength demonstrated from conquering his enemies. You might find that these 'enemies' are violated the moment they're placed into the game as props that sustain its overall narrative.

In fact, this 'loss of personhood as self-affirmation' theme reverberates into another key factor of the game's story: pacts. They explicitly deprive humans of something of themselves - their ability to communicate, to see, to age, to have hair (sure????) -, and reduces both parties into one shared essence, yet it is what permits its characters to have strength through which they find themselves as able to inflict that dehumanization onto others. Dehumanization becomes their characterization, both from the audience's perspective as well as in-world.

Following that, Nier Replicant does not dispute that destruction of the other simultaneously inflicts upon the self both corruption and affirmation. If anything, it only takes measures to strengthen that sentiment, in light of how the added theme of perspective brings forth a need to now more closely study the subjective experience of perpetrating violence. Thus:

"Blood is sound, sound is words, and words are power"

The gameplay system I've anchored this analysis to comes into play; attacking your enemies gives you the literal strength to continue your offense, by design - ridding them of their life force, their blood, perpetuates the narrative, the words being built, the sealed verses of a prophecy you've set for yourself: that of being a hero to your sister/daughter, friends and general community. This even extends to the lyrics of Ashes of Dreams:

"Are we the plaything of fiends or merely the dreams that we're telling ourselves?"

Though we shouldn't forget that Weiss' comment takes the form of X=Y=Z=W, and it seems I've neglected the 'sound' part of the sentence. As I was writing this, my brain immediately made the association between that and Drakengard 3's focus on the power of Song, which, in fairness, definitely was made with the rest of the series in mind - but, in this instance, that sounds like a bit of a lucky coincidence. Still, what the concept of sound brings to the statement doesn't seem too far off from what meaning could be made at a bit more of a general, rudimentary level, that being: our lifeforce (blood) translates into our ability to be heard (sound), thus effectively giving us narratives about the world around us (words), which gives our actions direction, purpose (power).

From that, we can take a closer look into a lot of different aspects of the game. After all, the reason I proclaimed this piece of writing to be so powerful isn't really because I could - and did - stretch its interpretation to its fullest, but also from the way it manifests itself around the struggles of various characters, while being tied to the game's overall systems and world. Emil receding into his identity as a weapon in order to redirect what he sees as his curse onto those who seek to harm his friends - leading to his sacrifice; Weiss, who also goes on to sacrifice himself, does so in the name of putting an end to this now 5-year mission, grown into his own center of existence; Louise, perhaps reacting to the world around her, saw humanity as something to claim from others, and faced erasure upon perceiving herself as incapable of acquiring it. For better or for worse, the moral codes characters create from their own intentions of living become rigid scripts to follow as self-fulfilling prophecies of their own identities.

We can see that, ultimately, characters across both games tend to follow journeys with a general structure of: bleak circumstances > feeling of powerlessness > violence as a misguided means of reclaiming the power to define oneself > entrenchment in violence becomes overbearing, coming to annihilate the very self which sought to instigate it. From the first Drakengard to the first Nier, this hasn't changed a bit. What changed is a distinct awareness in how the self, or what we might call "us" stands in conflict with the generalized other, "them", and where it uses morality as a catalyst for smoothing out the uncomfortable edges of that conflict.

In fact, the annihilation of the self as, paradoxically, an act of self-affirmation is the very core of ending D for Replicant. And this is, partly, where the inciting 9/11 quote comes into play - given our newfound empathetic understanding of where violence comes from, how do we process it? How do we make sense of it? From the way the world is established, the very act of surviving, for both replicants and gestalts, is somewhat tainted as immoral, and predicated on the erasure of an 'other'. It leaves room for later material to find itself more at ease with this question (and those circle back nicely to ending E from the new version, as well). For now, most of what the game feels comfortable in concluding comes from Kainé, who stands in contrast with most characters by fully rejecting the notion of being a moral agent throughout the entire story, yet the game still offers us the chance to save her - it, mirroring the protagonist, relentlessly believes in her. Not even that "she can be better", whatever better might mean, just that "she can be".

And obviously, finally, we can extrapolate plenty of social commentary from this. Playing off of the thematic material introduced in Automata, we could argue that Replicant's plot is, in retrospect, about slowly building up to the depiction of a certain "Death of God" - which, in nietzschean terms, is not merely society straying from religiosity, but represents an irreparable shattering in the very idea of a centralizing narrative that everyone could subscribe to and fit within. So ends humanity, not just as a species, but as a concept; no longer are people able to identify themselves as containing some unified essence of 'humanity', recognizing the other as a complete self in its own right, as they retreat into the violence that was inflicted against them, which they inflict back at the world - to have your totality reduced to a role in a play that the winner gets to write. And in that sense, I'd argue it captures specific facets of a post-9/11 climate pretty well.

Anyway, gonna make a separate post that's just about Drakengard 3, and then one that's just about Automata, but at a later time!

also, this thesis becomes more relevant when the time comes to analyze automata, but it was still helpful in having me think through the previous games, so I'll drop it here as a reference for now, and will mention it more loudly once we come to specific sections later (not about to be the next target for hbomberguy lmao): http://dspace.library.uvic.ca/handle/1828/14525

Cool that there are people writing about it!! Thank you Xinlyu Tan, the goat!!! Would love to go through more material, but I'm writing this for fun on the side... hope anyone reading this has enough fun with it to go looking for more on their own, go extend the discussion further, blah blah blah. Also hope that I make any sort of vaguely coherent point. And, lastly, I hope you enjoy yourself!

[additiva]

sending this in a second ask as it's kinda heavier then the first question. from a writer's perspective, how did you decide to include sexual assault in the fic? mostly i'm wondering if something similar has already happened in irl f1 (even setting aside c. horner, older men abusing young athletes is not new of course), and if this is the case, will it be revealed it's a wider problem in the fic-universe or just affecting ferrari drivers specifically?

(hope this is okay to ask, you don't have to answer if you don't want to ofc)

I've answered this great ask via message a while ago, and chatted about it with @innanzituttoticalmi, but I'm posting it here in case anyone else is wondering. This is an edit of the response I sent months ago, before the fic was finished which is why it's partly describing what will be.

That is going to be part of it. The Horner thing will come into it. Max is considering this a problem with Ferrari, and he's being naive, because it's a wider problem, at the very least involving Horner and Red Bull. Charles IS aware of that, and it was a formative experience for him, and it's part of the reason he doesn't expect things to go well for him if people find out.

In terms of how I decided to include it, for me it was the natural consequence of Charles' position and his personality.

The central idea of the fic is actually his unhealthy devotion to Ferrari (shocker) and how he's willing to do anything (both to his detriment and often to the detriment of others (e.g. Carlos), in pursuit of his goal).

Obviously it's Lestappen, but Max is actually this sort of comparison, in someone who had as much talent, but also had all of the other things Charles didn't have, and so was shielded from those realities, and has to realise that talent isn't enough, and that some people NEED to be likeable to succeed. He's someone who's also relentlessly pursued this same goal as Charles, but has totally different boundaries around it.

So yeah, in my initial thinking around the fic, it wasn't really my goal to write about this theme, but for me it was a very natural consequence of Charles' situation. He's made himself so desirable (in non-sexual ways primarily, but he's obviously also very pretty), for the sake of his career, and as you said, there are people with power and money, who will always seek to use it over those who need it. And F1 (and sport generally, and the world) does have an issue with abuses of power.

And Charles is so determined, that he would accept that risk and keep going.

It's an interesting theme to me, because as is sort of lightly explored in the fic, Seb and Max consider sexual assault a fundamentally unacceptable risk to take, whereas Charles sees it as: I already accepted years ago that I'll risk my life to do this. Of course I'll risk sexual assault if I have to. It's not that he considers it generally acceptable (as evidenced by his response to Ollie's potential involvement), but for himself personally, as much as it does negatively affect him, it's not worse than the risk of death which he's already accepted in a very conscious way (thanks to Jules and Antoine Hubert).

Obviously it's different, in that some risk of physical harm is intrinsic and necessary to the sport, and the risk of assault isnt. But Charles considers the risk of exposure greater than the risk of harm from managing it how he has been. And he believes he'd be able to deal with the harm if it did happen.

Max sort of considers this willingness to put up with harrassment to be evidence of some brokenness and self-disregard on Charles' part, but that's not exactly true. Charles puts up with it only because he sees exposure as a big threat to his ultimate goal of winning the championship. To him, it's a necessary sacrifice, not something he just thinks is fine.

It's also a vicious cycle for him in terms of: "I've given everything for this" -> "I can't give up now, I'll just give a little more and take a little more risk" -> "I've already been through so much for this, if I stop, itll all have been for nothing" -> "I'll just keep going. I can't stop until I achieve my goal". When you've already put so much into something, it's often easier to just keep going a little further, than to give up on the goal.

There's actually a parallel alternate version of this fic which exists only in my head, which is so much darker, and they're both basically irredeemable people except that eventually they love each other very much. And in that version Charles prostituted himself (was coerced into it, then decided that if it was going to happen he was going to get everything out of it that he could), to get through his junior career. Which is essentially what Seb was afraid of happening after the first time Charles was assaulted. And actually it's critical that Seb was there the first time, and he did help. Because that first time, Charles would've "let" it happen (excuse the phrasing). He wasn't expecting it; he wasn't at all mentally prepared in the way he is years later. He had a freeze response, and wouldn't have been able to get away. So actually, Seb did save him, and Seb's extortion also protected him financially from being pressured into things later.

In this fic, it's limited. It's not going to be this very widespread thing that everyone has had. Charles is going to be sort of the canary in the coalmine, but obviously there's the implication that others are at risk, with Ollie. Worth noting that Charles is the first young driver Ferrari has had in many years, and the academy drivers don't usually have much involvement with the team or sponsors, except for Charles who was very deliberately involving himself regularly with them, to build a path into the team.

But yes it will be a plot point that it's NOT just a Ferrari issue; that it's an issue of abuse of power within the sport more widely (@Horner). And that people (Max included 👀) have turned a blind eye to those abuses previously, when it suited them to do so, which ended up contributing to Charles' situation.

(I'm not aware of any other specific situations in F1 irl though).

Also SORRY I still haven't answered your other ask, I've never gotten around to thinking about it at enough length to provide a proper response, but I will at some stage!

[formulatrash]

What's your take on the hockey booktok thing? Since you mentioned it on twt

my initial take would be that all these people scare me so much I don't want to get into it but also people keep messaging me to be like did you know people ship carlando" off the back of it and yes. I did know that.

my understanding of what's happened on booktok, which I absorb any information about only twice a year during whatever version of this is blowing up at the time, is pretty limited. partly because I'm not on tiktok and partly because I can't read. but the crux of it seems to have come down to people writing disgustingly thirsty comments on a hockey player and his wife's posts, regardless of what they were about, somehow feeling empowered to be horny not just on main but in someone's face because of booktok.

that's, clearly, not remotely acceptable. if there are communities of people out there that thirst about me I don't know about them (although the cold tendrils of horror about the Wikifeet page have just gripped me and no, oh god, that isn't the phrase I should've used at all get me out of here) but there are loads of people who fucking hate my guts. that's like, fine, it's their own business; if they keep it on discord or whatever and away from me it doesn't do me any harm. lord knows, I have committed the act of hating and indeed being horny, sometimes simultaneously, when I was at a safe enough distance for none of the subjects to ever know.

this is a thing about fandom. if you post "Max Verstappen looks breedable" on here then he's extraordinarily unlikely to ever see it or probably know what it means. if you comment that on Kelly's instagram posts, even if you don't like her and even if that's for valid reasons, that's very different.

as I gather it, the booktok thing has exploded into RPF in general. which, I gotta say, RPF and sexually harassing a dude and his family are in fact very different things. one has a rich history, both as actual ways of telling history (Anthony and Cleopatra: RPF, Chernobyl: RPF, the god damn Gran Turismo movie is RPF about an uncomfortably large number of people I know IRL and to be fair it looks like it slaps I'm gonna see it) and as a longstanding artform. RPF's history of horny is even extremely longstanding, with obscene RPF being used by both the French and Russian revolutionaries to undermine the concept of royal divinity.

RPF is political because it involves an interpretation of real events and people. and the perspective from which that's written will always be political. RPF can, certainly, be feminist; there's quite a lot of retellings of classical stories that fit this. RPF can, also, be fucking weird horny shit. or terrible man takes. or incredible, tender, queer retellings; Kaz Rowe's graphic novel about real-life surrealist Claude Cahun is an obvious example of the latter. Pride, the film about the miners' strikes and the AIDS crisis, is another.

so yeah, it is a legitimate and recognised form of literature and art and also uhhhh. well. I mean the omegaverse is definitely recognised, legally, in court because of that one case but I don't know that even its fiercest enthusiasts would really be all that keen on describing it. not as like, literature or anything just I think most people would rather literally never have an IRL conversation about that. ever.

I'm not 1000% clear on how carlando got into this but clearly that's broken containment a long time ago anyway. when you had Sky doing love heart interviews 15 races into them being teammates or whatever, there was an obvious amount of gay chicken being played by the producers that frankly, as a queer person in motorsport, I'm a lot more comfortable with the fan version of.

no, obviously, I do not think they are dating - or want to think that tbh - but frequently-queer fans projecting the wish fulfilment of seeing a kinder and more representative world for their desires, in places hidden from the subjects, is a lot less weird than leering, laughed-at dating questions and milk baths. in an ideal world it wouldn't have to be a secret, yearned-for alternative because things would be safe and open enough for there to be real queer stories everywhere but that, unfortunately, is not the one we currently live in.

wish fulfilment and telling stories are not the same things, necessarily. sometimes you tell the stories to remind yourself it's ok to have wishes or to work out what those even are. I don't think there's anything necessarily harmful about what names the characters have in those, provided the line between reality and any real people's privacy is kept.

clearly, with the booktok thing, that's where things went extremely wrong. generally tiktok as a whole seems to have a very odd perception about other people's agency, whether it's pranking videos or like the girl who filmed people peeing at Spa. if you regard everyday people as content opportunities (spoiler: the law does not think this and particularly in the EU you cannot film people without their consent) then I guess it's easy to slide over to seeing an athlete as a target for what I suspect very few of the people doing it recognised as very unpleasant and invasive harassment.

there's nothing wrong with fancying athletes. there's nothing even wrong with sexualising them, provided you respect some boundaries and provided it's not part of the conditions of their working contracts. there's a lot of difference between there being a discord where, idk, people say Mitch Evans is hot (he is, although somewhat implausibly he genuinely does not know this) and sponsors for female tennis players wanting them to wear revealing outfits and stay skinny or teenage girls being encouraged into provocative photoshoots by people who promise them roles, etc. teenage male athletes being pressured into doing things they don't want to yet or maybe at all to prove they're men, queer athletes being forced to hide who they are or repress it entirely.

would it be a little bit odd to find RPF of yourself? yes. I won't lie, I would judge the characterisation. I already do judge that on the frankly very weird things people write about me. you have never seen RPF as strange as the narratives people will make up about you in the comments of an article about hydrogen and frankly those scare me a lot more than whether someone thinks I'd be assigned beta or whatever.

stumbling across something, rather than having explicit sexual fantasies forced into your face, especially on what's your own social media pages where people you know in real life can see them, is very different though. some people who engage with RPF cross lines, whether that's weird conspiracy stuff about girlfriends being faked or stalking people's friends accounts etc.

RPF doesn't inherently cross lines, even when it's public; there's a very interesting interview here with Jann Mardenborough and the guy who plays him in the Gran Turismo movie about, among other things, portraying a fatal crash he was involved in. clearly, Jann is not only aware of but is the executive producer of what's ultimately fiction about himself and there's an ownership there, of course. but some parts of the movie are made up, for sure.

obviously I'm like, the not-very-secret infiltrator here because clearly I am On Tumblr and know what AO3 is. I follow a bunch of people who write fanfic because they also make nice gifs of my favourite blorbos and I like to think we can all make peace with our own boundaries about that kinda thing. also I read every single Shane/Ryan fic in like 5 weeks and honestly, not going to apologise except to myself for persisting with a few that didn't pay off.

but like: you do not have to make RPF or any fandom activity unethical. the way you conduct yourself does that and some people step way out of line.

[o-uncle-newt]

On the Job minisode and Good Omens as a work on religion

(Note: This was originally a reblog of someone who then expressed that they were unhappy that I reblogged their post. As a courtesy I have reposted it as its own thing- for context, the person was upset that Neil Gaiman's take on religion was stale and said that of course if you have only a surface view of the Torah and the book of Job you'd come away with these kinds of negative impressions.)

I went to Orthodox Jewish day school for thirteen years. I thought the Job minisode was fine, as an adaptation of the story. Not breaking any ground theologically or whatever, but fine. (Though they did definitely get the number of Job's kids wrong, presumably for narrative simplicity, and the shoemaker joke doesn't work because he's really Bildad the ShuCHite.)

And, I mean, I don't think it should be MEANT to be anything but fine...? Good Omens is a fantasy novel in which heaven and hell are both the bad guys- Good Omens the show has basically kept in that model. The whole thing is about a simplistic look at the Christian Bible and a kind of cynical but light hearted agnosticism that doesn't really lend itself particularly to sophisticated religious analysis or whatever. It's not meant for that.*

The Job minisode was written by John Finnemore rather than Gaiman, a writer of whom I am a massive fan and, however, to whom I don't really look for sophisticated religious takes. He's done a Bible/religion sketch or two on his sketch show- I don't particularly love them, they're pretty surfacey- and he's self aware enough to make it very clear that he approaches everything from an "I don't believe in God but I grew up in a Christian country" perspective. (He's a lot more honest about that than a lot of other atheist/agnostic writers I've seen who do takes on religion, incidentally... so many people think they're being "objective" or whatever.)

The thing is, I actually really love the Job minisode as a Good Omens story, working within this complete fantasy world. I was disappointed in a lot of S2 but this felt like the characters, this felt like an interesting meditation on their roles and their choices... I don't know, it just really worked for me.

And I feel like part of the point is to pick one of those "well obviously on the surface this looks a bit fucked up" stories (rather than for there to be an implication that they're the only ones who noticed)- because they're working in a fictional universe in which it's been established since the nineties that heaven/God is at least a bit fucked up (no matter what I as a Jew may personally believe) and so they can just take it and run with it without having to explain! Gaiman did the same thing in S1 with the Garden of Eden and the Ark. It's just a canvas to put an Aziraphale/Crowley plot on. The original book is a Book of Revelations satire!

Honestly, I'm happier to have a pretty basic retelling of a story that's obviously fucked up on the surface, rather than them picking some midrash or something that's more subtle and nuanced and super Jewish-y and then turning it into something about how God or the angels or the demons are bad- partly because Jewish angel/demon stuff doesn't map well onto Good Omens's approach, and also because the whole point of the book from the start has been critical of organized Judeo-Christian (yes I know) religion writ large, and that's not going to change. That was weird for me to get used to as an Orthodox Jewish teen in a Bais Yaakov school when I first read it, but getting past it made me realize that all that meant was that they'd created a Biblical fantasy universe with certain tropes in it.

I think the Job minisode works perfectly well within that particular Biblical fantasy universe, and while I think that you can potentially criticize S1 (and in a slightly different way, the book) for that Biblical satire/fantasy not being particularly sophisticated about religion if that's something important to you, I don't think that it being sophisticated about religion would have improved it as a story.

*I did kinda sorta write a fic that tries to cast Aziraphale and Crowley in a more traditionally Jewish lens and... it was actually really hard. As I said above, the way the Good Omens world is set up doesn't really work for the Jewish thing. I had to make it really clear that angels don't have free will and that Heaven and Hell aren't two different sides.

[thatdesklamp]

hey! i’m the anon that once asked you about ur english a level if you even care to remember lmaoo. I JUST SAW THE REBLOGGED POST WHERE ANOTHER READER SAID THEY HATED SATORU FROM IW AND I’M???

obviously everyone’s entitled to their own opinions. i think that’s the point of reading anything tbh, form your own opinions and decide whether you like something/someone or not, bUT I LITERALLY CANNOT HELP BUT DISAGREE SO STRONGLY 😭 i’ve literally never felt this strongly about a person’s opinion on a fictional character let alone how the fictional character was written in a FANFIC 😀

and obviously, no hate to them or whatever. as i said, their opinion is theirs, i just randomly felt the need to tell you mine (ik you never asked, i’m bored and my student finance situation is pissing me off so here i am lol). i think the reason why i feel so offended (jokingly haha) about any hate towards satoru in ur fic is bcz you’ve written him identical to how satoru in the actual anime/manga is, so i felt like it was a well aimed punch to canon!satoru and as his certified wife, i can’t stand by and watch this happen 😟

he makes dumb decisions sometimes but i think that has a lot to do with the fact that hebi is quite literally his oldest friend and allowing whatever feelings he has to get in the way of that (without knowing whether she likes him or not from his pov) is risky in terms of their friendship and where that’ll take them. like in the chapter where they had their first kiss, ofc, we as readers know why she backed off and what she meant by how she couldn’t “do this anymore” (or something along those lines), but he was never aware of her NON-PLATONIC feelings towards him, so i think (i say think bcz i’m the reader and you’re the author so what you say GOES) he was just confused by what she meant.

like if i were to randomly start telling you a story of my life with no context, and you hear me say names of my friends somewhere along that story, but i never TOLD you they were my friends, you’d think “oh who’s that?” until i clarified who they are to me. quite like how he was probably confused when she was explaining how she couldn’t allow herself to indulge in something that she thought wasn’t reciprocated. he had no context and was therefore just… stupid lmao 😭 he was criticising her for leaving even tho she promised to stay bcz he just didn’t understand (not saying it’s hebi’s fault in ANY way, she is MOTHER, i will defend her till the day i die).

yeah i have a lot of other reasons why satoru is not a bad person in ur fic (he’s literally a copy of himself in canon, kudos to ur BRILLIANT writing and characterisation of him) but ik you’re probably bored and i have to go turn the house heating on bcz uk weather is no joke 😀

Hello!!

This is so so funny and lovely to hear—I’ve heard so much variety in opinions on Gojo in my fic, mainly through the comments, and so it’s so lovely when people genuinely take a proper big opinion on either side of the ‘debate’. I fully get why people would be anti-Gojo just because we’re so invested in Hebi’s perspective and when she’s treated poorly/feeling shit, it does reflect poorly on him. I think that’s why I found it fun to write the Satoru-pov oneshots; IW is such a case of ‘unreliable narrator’-ism in a way that’s not always immediately evident, and so taking yourself out of Hebi’s perspective and immersing yourself in someone else’s can really help to get a more well-rounded view of all the characters, I guess.

But yeah, I’m glad you think IW Gojo is similar to canon Gojo! I used to struggle so much with his characterisation with him as a kid, which was I think partly because he was a child and that’s difficult anyway, but also because IW was one of the first things I’d written in… like, actual years, and I wasn’t that good at writing at that point.

I do think a lot of Satoru’s dumb actions come from ignorance, in whatever aspect, and I think it’s up to the reader as to how much they ‘blame’ him for that. Especially in the later chapters: should he have noticed Hebi’s degredation in mental health, and should he have done something about it if he did, even if she had never reached out to him? She did, after all, never actually confide in him about anything troubling her: I made it a point to state it multiple times. That, I guess, is where people’s opinions will inevitably differ, as to assigning both blame and responsibility. The idea will come up a lot next chapter, but—perhaps it’s almost similar to the Geto/Gojo situation. Yes, Gojo noticed a change, and yes, he tried to talk to Geto about it: but did he do enough? Should he have tried harder? Would it have even made a difference? People have different opinions on their split, too, because it’s not so set in stone. I think that’s the main reason people would dislike IW Satoru.

More about ignorance: you’re right, I can’t see him knowing about Hebi’s feelings. Satoru’s so much more of an active character than Hebi, who is intentionally very passive (if only ‘intentionally’ so I can have the slowburn make some degree of sense, lmao, but hey!). If he knew, I’d have to have him confront her about it. Like, I cannot see Gojo *not* pushing for something if he ever thought there was a possibility of her reciprocating. So, in my head, it can be concluded from his lack of action pre-kiss, that he absolutely doesn’t think she likes him back, and he also absolutely doesn’t want to fuck up the friendship. Again: it’s so, so, so important to him. I try to justify it in the oneshots—I know so much of this is #miscommunication, but controversial opinion, miscommunication adds to the drama and is fun under CERTAIN SITUATIONS, it’s not always a bad thing. LOL.

But also low-key I get why people wouldn’t like him. But also I get why people would, and would be more than fucked off with Hebi. And why people would be somewhere in the middle. Idk where I stand, they’re just both my lil pooks, yk. <3

But hell yeah! I love ur Satoru defence squad. And enjoy your heating (😀) and respite from student finance—I wouldn’t wish that process on my worst enemy </3

[onewomancitadel]

Okay nvm I did have a V9 thought which is that they specifically gave us information that Summer Rose is more complicated than at first glance (woohoo) and not a simple Madonna (woohoo!) and was lying to Tai (oh yes) and her children (>:)) and most of all Raven knew (YES), despite Raven having apparently abandoned her team by this point. Summer and Raven are implied to both have difficult relationships with motherhood, Summer's just better at faking it. The contrast between Summer, who is partly fraudulent, versus Raven, who's lying to herself about her cowardice but who has the capacity to admit she could not act as a mother is extremely fucking yummy.

But that they still kept in contact.

But then the question I have to wonder structurally is why this specific information was given to us now (Ruby's vision of Summer is shattered; she's freed from her false self) and why what actually happened afterwards was concealed to us. We've already been given the information from previous volumes: this was Summer's last mission, and per V8, this is when Salem figured out how to make Grimm-human abominations.

So we effectively know what happened next, but what's happened next has been related through many-hand accounts, through implication from the Hound, then through magical vision which is as good as an objective account but without emotional perspective. Which basically means we need a firsthand account of what has likely happened to Summer until we meet Summer herself.

Raven's return is inevitable. It has to happen. She's the Spring Maiden, her redemption arc is probably going to eventuate in some fashion, and other than Salem she probably knows what happened. So the question is whether Raven comes out from the shadows and admits what she knows or not. It seems likely just based on how the information has been conveyed.

But I also think that R/WBY is doing something interesting with accounts of events and perspective (most prominently in V9 where they have to piece together Alyx's story), but this idea was first introduced with Ozlem and it was explored again with characters like Adam (uses his backstory to manipulate Blake) and Cinder (her backstory is used to manipulate her, and we're the ones who are shown directly what happened whilst the main cast don't know).

The deconstruction of Summer Rose is fully taking place (it has probably happened physically to boot) and the transformation of her character based on accounts of her is really interesting. I think this is absolutely setting up an emotional account of Ozma and Salem's understanding of their conflict and generally speaking I think it is very likely someone will figure out what happened to Cinder. How the relation of stories actually transform characters and their role in the narrative is definitely being played with. It's thematically fitting.

I also think this is why the Ozlem reveal - whilst being an 'objective' account of sorts - minimises the emotional experience. What do Ozma and Salem think of each other? There's set-up there.

To circle back to Raven, her return on this topic seems near-inevitable. That she's the guardian of Knowledge who has been hoarding this truth makes sense. I was obviously wrong about her return in the underworld, but she has played a part in the disillusionment and maybe that's the direction they're heading. 'Raven has to return at some point' is certainly a safer conclusion than the one I was previously speculating about.

The key is when and what can possibly go wrong that her return would necessitate. I previously speculated that the redemption arcs of Maidens would mirror the cycle of the seasons, so Raven's return would need to happen before the endgame Summer Maiden eventuates and has or had her own redemption arc. That's a pretty broad speculation and it's really dependent upon the timing of Raven. It might be that I'm wrong.

Knowing Salem can't be killed fundamentally alters the story. Raven relating what happened to Summer changes Summer and it's part of changing Raven, too.

[fadinglights]

✏️ + Ivy

muses headcanons / accepting!

headcanons for ivy

it is a fact that ivy is spoilt rotten by both her father (though it's mostly via material means instead of companionship) and her brother elijah. even though he bickers with her a lot as all siblings do, he'll go through hell for her. fortunately, her friends keep her grounded as well as the lady hired by her family as a housekeeper who took care of everything in the house and the bratty siblings growing up, or else she'd be much more insufferable as a person.

it's not exactly news but ivy has a habit of sabotaging her relationships, or just herself in general. it's partly due to the abandonment issues she got from her parents and their tumultuous relationship as her first learnt model of romance, as well as not so healthy relationships she stumbled into when she's younger and more naive that formed her perspective on love. it'll take her plenty of therapy and hard work on herself to get out of those habits and allow herself to truly be happy by herself and with someone else. obviously, she's still very much a work in progress.

she's the typical rich girl who partied too hard and gotten too high in her adolescence, but she doesn't mess with that any longer save for a drink here and there in social settings. had an unhealthy relationship with substances and body image growing up under the unfriendly spotlight thanks to her father, but she's thankfully dug her way out of that. she's still very image-conscious and modelling is probably not the best job for her sanity, but she's learnt to tread carefully, to back off and seek help when she notices some of her obsessions coming back.

most people assume she gets most of her money from her family and her modelling gigs (that most assumed she got thanks to nepotism anyway), but she actually earns a considerable amount from composing for musicians since she's fifteen and many have become huge hits. under an alias (yves being her most often used one), of course, or else all that hard work would be swept under the rug too simply because of who she is. music is something that grounds her, even in her most desolate hours, something that belongs to her forever unlike her youthful beauty that she knows will fade overtime.

[sparklyeevee]

Okay, so in Crown of Swords (beginning of Chapter 27), Perrin thinks about how "a long while had passed since anyone had been able to pick him up and throw him". The wording here strongly suggests to me that this isn't hypothetical - at some point, someone did pick him up and throw him. Now in and of itself that doesn't necessarily mean anything, because picking up and throwing small children is pretty normal and helps them develop proprioception and vestibular awareness, you just have to be gentle and aim for a soft surface. Except, first of all, he's specifically comparing this implied event to Rand using the One Power to throw him into a column hard enough to crack his ribs. And second, Perrin's proprioception is pretty bad, and was worse when he was a child (adults with working body awareness do not need to move with the kind of conscious caution Perrin does, even if they're bigger and stronger than most people), suggesting that, if anything, he was not tossed into appropriate soft surfaces enough as a child. So when Perrin was small, someone picked him up and threw him in like, the bad way. Like very possibly into a wall. (I want to note also here that "For one moment there, he had been sure Rand was going to kill him.", and while that's obviously partly meant to illustrate how unstable Rand's mental health is at this point, the entire fight they had was staged, and that Perrin was, however briefly, sure, not just afraid but sure that Rand was going to kill him seems to support that this interaction maybe set off a little bit of a trauma response). We could also talk about the dissociation and the staggering alexithymia (seriously, the only other character who comes close to Perrin's level of obliviousness to his own physical and emotional condition is Lan), but that could just be the neurodivergence - it's not terribly compelling evidence on its own.

Now, Perrin, prior to moving in with the Luhans, did not only live with his parents. I think we can rule out any of his siblings having thrown him, since he's the oldest by like five years (we'll come back to that) and the middle two Aybara kids are girls, but his uncle, Eward, Eward's wife Magde, and their three children also lived on the Aybara farm, so that's at least one other adult who was at one point probably able to pick Perrin up and throw him, and three cousins whose ages (and therefore possible relative sizes) we don't know. If the only thing in play were "Perrin was apparently physically abused as a young child" we wouldn't necessarily have an obvious culprit.

However, parental abuse is actually pretty rare in Wheel of Time. I mean, lots of parents do things that we here on Tumblr, as mostly youngish adults with a 21st century perspective, would recognize as abusive, like spanking. I'm almost sure there's reference somewhere to children being sent to bed without supper, too, and Siuan having her mouth washed out with soap for swearing as a Novice isn't remarked as particularly egregious, so that might be something parents do. But like, product of its time and all that. Parents in WoT largely don't hit their children, outside of spanking and similar. They don't throw them into walls. Hell, if I remember rightly, even Moghedian, one of the actualfacts Forsaken, didn't hurt those two boys she stole - as best the Wondergirls were able to determine, their trauma was almost entirely from watching their parents die. Except, now we gotta talk about Gawyn Trakand. Direct textual evidence for how Taringail treated Gawyn is pretty thin on the ground. We know he "had never been much of a father" to Gawyn, but that could mean almost anything. But the head trauma. The fucking head trauma. We know Elayne gave him at least two concussions for which he didn't receive Healing(TDR ch. 24), but then we have to ask, where did she get the idea that it was normal and okay to hit him in the head that hard? One can hardly imagine Morgase or Lini doing such a thing. (I'll refrain from going on a tangent about the evidence that Gawyn's vision was permanently impaired by at least one precanonical head injury, as it's not directly relevant here). What we know about what the Damodreds, in general, are like also reinforces the idea that Taringail abused Gawyn. I'm going somewhere with this, I promise.

See, Gawyn doesn't look like Taringail. I mean, at all. In point of fact, he looks like an X-23 style "change one sex chromosome and nothing else" clone of Elayne. Red hair is rare outside of the Aiel, and rarer in Cairhien than most places. Available textual evidence does not support the idea that there are any light-eyed Damodreds aside from Elayne and Gawyn, who look a lot like each other and Morgase and not a damn thing like Taringail. No one from the third age knows about genetics, as such, but basic inheritance patterns are hard to miss. But you know who does have blue eyes? House Trakand's bard, who did at least half the work of getting Morgase on the throne, and who's been close to her since she was a teenager - Thom Merrilin. To be clear, I don't think Thom is actually Gawyn's father. I think Taringail is, because Morgase confirms it in her own internal monologue, where she has no reason to lie, and I trust her to know who she slept with. I think that in the early Age of Legends, before the ban on human and animal genetic engineering was put into place, they created a dominant blue eyed gene, to help keep the Aiel visually recognizable, maybe a dominant red haired gene as well, and that the Trakands have an Aiel ancestor somewhere way back up the tree. But Taringail doesn't know that. Taringail just knows that the first child of his loveless marriage of state to a very young woman looks nothing like him and enough like Thom Merrilin to be more than a little suspicious. And there's decent, if not unambiguous, evidence that he abused Gawyn.

So we've got two characters, Perrin and Gawyn, with evidence of parental abuse, in a context where that's rare enough to be noteworthy, and we know that Gawyn's father had good reason to suspect that Gawyn wasn't his. Well okay, what about Perrin? He doesn't particularly look like his dad, is what I can say with certainty. The only physical description Con Aybara gets is "slim", which is uh, not among the words I'd use to describe Perrin. Certainly just, y'know, looking at him at any point after infancy, there'd be some visual evidence that's Perrin wasn't actually related to Con. (Maybe during infancy too, but that gets into the "Rand is at least a year younger than he ought to be" thing which is a whole different theory). So, physical abuse when the only other case we really see of that involved the perpetrator suspecting the kid wasn't his, and he looks sufficiently unlike his father that Con would have been justified in similar suspicion.

But I have more. Paetram Aybara's existence is, in itself, evidence that either he or Perrin is the product of either infidelity or covert polyamory. It's pretty rare in this setting for men to have brothers who are full siblings, and rarer still in Rand's generation. Among the older generations, we don't have enough of a family tree to really say. We don't know whether Laman's brothers were his half or full siblings, or whether Con and Eward Aybara were, or whether any of Siuan's uncles were full siblings to each other. Leane Sharif had brothers, plural, I believe, although we don't have details. But we do know that for like, the kids, it's virtually unheard of. The Basheres apparently had three boys, and I can hardly imagine either of them having kids with anyone other than each other (although since Faile's older brothers are never named and died off screen before she enters the story, they don't feel entirely, y'know, real), but other than that it's just Perrin and Paetram. And then with the largest age gap of any two siblings, half, full, or otherwise, in the series. By and large, there seems to be a limit of one boy per pairing, although whether this is accomplished through The Pattern, reliable and undescribed methods of selecting a child's sex during conception, sex-selective abortion, or a truly distressing amount of infanticide, I really wouldn't venture to guess. I had initially thought that Paetram's existence might be attributable to the Aybaras going for a second boy during or shortly after the breakbone fever outbreak in 989ish, out of fear that they'd lose the one they already had, since the timing just about lines up, but it would make at least as much sense if Perrin and Paetram, y'know, weren't full siblings.

Okay, so that's the evidence that Perrin isn't, biologically, Con Aybara's son, but why Haral Luhhan? Since part of our basis for this is that he doesn't look like Con, on account of he's Huge, we're looking for a pretty big guy. Among men in the Two Rivers who get a physical description, there are two reasonable candidates: Haral Luhhan and Bran al'Vere. But I don't think it's Bran, because of the show. I trust Rafe not to have missed anything I caught, and he decided to throw in possible romantic feelings between Perrin and Egwene. I shan't say "Rafe would never write a near miss with accidental half-sibling incest." but I will say that I don't think he would have done it casually. Which means that Rafe does not think Perrin and Egwene are related, and that's good enough for me. My only actual uncertainty is whether Perrin's biological father is someone from the Two Rivers at all - Eye of the World is at some fucking pains to avoid telling us whether Mat or Perrin were born outside the Two Rivers, so the possibility cannot be discounted.

One of the problems with Wheel of Time is that there's just, so much going on, sometimes you catch a new implication casually thrown into an offhand sentence in the middle of a scene about something else, and you work it through with other textual evidence until you've got a pretty good idea what it means, and you move on with your life, but now you know this new thing, and it becomes part of your basis for further analysis, and you try to talk about a theory that's partly based on it and people go "Wait, what do you mean Haral Luhhan is Perrin's biological father?"

[a-dragons-journal]

any suggestions/advice for someone who has always been anti-fictionkin, but who is now questioning being fictionkind? it's confusing and stressful and i keep getting angry at myself for even considering being fictionkin.

Alright, this one's a doozy, sorry for the delay on it - I wanted to make sure I had the time and energy to sit down and give this the depth of response it deserves.

First off: You are most definitely not alone. You'd be shocked how many fictionkin - and otherkin, for that matter! - I know who went from being antikin or anti-fictionkin to realizing they were 'kin/fictionkin. I can almost guarantee some of them will reply to this post sooner or later (and I encourage them to).

Second: The best thing you can do for yourself overall, I think, is to take it slow and be gentle with yourself. You are allowed to set it aside when you start wrapping yourself up into too tight of an emotional ball. It's going to be stressful no matter how this goes, but you're allowed to take it in as small of chunks as you need to to minimize that stress while figuring this out. Questioning a strong belief you've held for a long time is hard and it is stressful - the brain doesn't like rewiring pathways like that, and it will likely get panicky and may try to confirmation-bias you out of it. Questioning your identity itself is also extremely hard and stressful for a lot of people. It is only natural to be freaked out by all this. Pause, take three deep breaths (count 'em), and take it one step at a time.

Third: Regarding specifically questioning whether your stance on something is actually correct or not, the best tool in your toolbox is the word "why". Apply it liberally. You've been anti-fictionkin for a long time: why is that? What are your reasons for thinking fictionkin is [fake/stupid/misguided/etc.]? Write them down, it'll probably make it easier to keep track of your thoughts. Then take each of those bullet points, those arguments, and ask again: Why do I think this? What's my logic? What's my evidence?

Eventually you will hit a point where the "why do I think this" question no longer makes sense - that's called a base assumption, and it's what your current logic is based on, and thus is what really needs to be evaluated to see if that logic is sound or flawed.

For example: Let's say one of your reasons for being anti-fictionkin is "It's not possible to be something that's a creation from someone else's brain."

Well, why do you think that?

Your answer might be, "It's not real, and didn't exist even in imagination until that person wrote about it, so you can't have been that thing until that person wrote about it."

Now, you could ask "why do I think that?" again, but at that point it seems kind of to not make much sense and I would call this a base assumption, so I would re-direct the questioning in a different way. There are two ways to challenge this base assumption that I see: First, is it true that you can't have been that thing until the person wrote about it?, and second, if we prove that that is true, does that make the identity less real once it's there?

Now you go reading and researching. As someone who runs an antikin response blog, chances are that whatever arguments you have against fictionkin, they have been stated and refuted a hundred times before - which is great for you, because it means if you can find those old archived conversations, they might answer your concerns adequately and you might not have to start a new one!

In this case, for the sake of our example exercise, I'll tell you the answers I would give to these two questions that, in my opinion, pretty solidly demonstrate that the base assumption is flawed:

The short answer to the first question is that no, it's not true, my evidence being that you can find essays and other evidence of people who had the experiences linked to their fictionkinity long before they came across their source media - and in some cases, long before their source media even existed. (Example evidence here, here, and here.) (The longer answer includes some philosophizing about how really, species and character labels are often just a way of getting across "this is similar enough to what I experience that it's a convenient label to convey it to others with," especially in the case of fictionkin, and thus it makes complete sense that in the vastness of several billion people who've lived on this earth one person's experiences and another person's imagination have an awful lot of coincidental similarities even if they probably don't line up perfectly, purely through Monkeys With Typewriters theory.)

The answer to the second question is a bit more philosophical, but my argument would be this: in my opinion, even if someone didn't have a fictotype before exposure to their source media, that doesn't change that their experiences are happening and having a significant impact on them. Kintypes coming about later in life, for various reasons both spiritual and psychological, have been accepted for a long time in the otherkin community. Whether someone is otherkin has little if anything to do with how their identity came about*, and the same should logically apply to fictionkin - someone's identity is based on their experiences, and the source of those experiences is (or at least should be) secondary.

*Arguable exception for identities that were consciously, intentionally formed, ie 'links; I'm not gonna get into that here, that's a whole other discussion.

Now, once you have those arguments presented to you, either via your own internal logic or by someone else through conversation, you get to evaluate them and decide whether they make sense and are internally consistent (ie, if their arguments contradict themselves, either you've misunderstood something, or their argument is badly flawed). And, if you decide the argument is flawed, to ask yourself why that is. What logic enables you to break down their argument and refute it? What parts of their argument make sense and are solid, if any?

If this seems a bit cyclical, it's because it is. The idea is to break every argument, for and against, down to its basic building blocks, and then look at those building blocks to make sure they're actually sound. If one of your base assumptions is false or flawed, the argument/opinion based on it is inherently flawed as well.

This whole process is hard and intimidating work, especially if you haven't practiced it before. But it's necessary, and to me at least it's rewarding when you get the hang of it. There's a reason I run an antikin response blog - I genuinely enjoy this process; I enjoy ripping debates apart to examine them piece by piece and see what makes sense and what doesn't. It's mental enrichment for me, and it can be for you too. It feels good to look at your stances on things and know that you have put effort into making sure they're as logically sound, factually correct, and morally correct as possible with the information you currently have. It's also a never-ending process - you should always be ready to re-examine your opinions on things in light of new information, should new information arise. (People also don't always like it when you tell them you're not gonna open your fat mouth until you've examined all the information thoroughly and have sorted out your opinion, because the internet wants your opinion now, but oh well. They usually (usually) appreciate it after the fact, when you've come back with a well-informed opinion instead of a half-baked and reactionary one.)

That's how things are supposed to work, anyway, but confirmation bias is a powerful force. I'm proud of you for standing up to it and trying to re-examine stuff in your own brain - that takes grit. We are allergic to admitting we're wrong in today's society, and it's genuinely a massive problem - we're getting more and more reactionary and polarized because of it, because we're so used to being shamed for admitting we were wrong that instead it's often easier to double down. Props to you for not going the easy way and just doubling down.

As one last thing, a list of resources for you regarding fictionkin and some of the common anti-fictionkin arguments I've seen and had a hand in refuting (not including the ones I linked up there):

A more in-depth explanation of fictionkinity from @/shadowfae

A more general guide on questioning a kintype, also from@/shadowfae

A thread of someone asking questions and fictionkin answering

“Isn’t being fictionkin disrespecting the creator?”, from @/anti-kin-cringe

On fictionkin and how there’s no real “line” between fantasy/mythological creatures like dragons (hi) and fictional characters/creatures, also from @/anti-kin-cringe

On the history of fictionkin, from@/liongoatsnake

houseofchimeras dot weebly dot com, which I can't link directly because Tumblr is stupid about external links, but I recommend their entire website and the websites linked in their Bookmarks page, though you'll have to do a bit of sifting to find stuff that's specifically relevant to you of course

Finally, my "fictionkin" tag on a-dragons-explanations (the aforementioned antikin response blog I run) for your perusal, which contains every discussion about fictionkin I've had on that blog.

...Phew. Hopefully that wasn't too much alphabet soup for ya ^^;

As a PS - if you want to chat with someone about all this, I'm more than happy to either simply provide answers to any questions you have, or to actively grill you and challenge your arguments for you (to your comfort level, of course) as someone who has a good deal of practice doing that. I'm available in DMs or on Discord (Discord would be preferable, since it's a bit more functional than Tumblr DMs) if you want either of those things - no judgement here.

[simplepotatofarmer]

Please, I'm here for your thoughts on the stream! I loved it personally. - 💡

oh, same Light Bulb Anon! this might have been my favorite lore from Techno!

I said this earlier, but I truly appreciate cc!Techno's way of doing lore. it's very relaxed and easy and that means a lot for me, personally. I understand it might not be what everyone prefers but as someone with PTSD, the prison streams have often been extremely rough for me. but cc!Techno, by having clear boundaries, makes it possible for me to go into a stream and know that it'll be fine.

and that brings me to the first 'actual lore' point: techno did in fact go in with a plan.

this was foreshadow with techno's 'does it even really matter?' line. he knew he'd be betrayed and went in expecting it. I've seen people say that his demeanor was too nonchalant or relaxed but I think they're forgetting a few things.

one, techno has always been like that as a character. it's partly comedic relief and partly how he deals with the canon anxiety. we've seen that before with the red festival. two, everything he did was super deliberate. acting clueless, stalling in places and asking sam lots of questions, having sam re-open and close the door. all those things were deliberate. it was intel gathering. it couldn't have been any clearer. techno knew what he was doing from the start: the will, putting the dogs in the boat, everything.

and now let's talk about how this stream was the clearest example of how deeply techno cares for people and how emotional he is.

it starts with his picture of phil and the way he was obviously dismayed at losing it and continues with the soft nodding to the zombie piglins as he passes them. I've said it before, but techno has a kindness to him that isn't always obvious but if you look, you'll see it.

but for me, the two biggest moments of this come when techno reaches the cell with dream.

he gets there and instead of being pleased that he has a visitor, dream is shouting for him in panic, voice breaking, to stop, to go back, that it's a trap. techno knows this but dream doesn't. he stays calm. he reassures dream. not only that, but he tells dream he's here to see him. that he should've come to visit him regardless. think about how comforting that must be for dream, who has been alone for so long, the only company coming from the person torturing him, to hear someone say they wanted to see him. techno puts him at ease and deliberately.

then. then, trapped in prison with no armor or weapons - something that is so rare for techno because he's too paranoid, too afraid of being used or betrayed, too used to being heard only when he spills blood - he tells dream that they're not out of options. not because techno will handle it. not because he's the Blade. not because of anything techno himself will do but because he has friends. he has friends and he trusts and he knows they will be there for him.

what a difference that is from when he looked at a sign with the words 'safe haven' and said softly, "I used to think there was such a place but the only safety is being alone."

now he has people who will come for him, who will help him.

who will defy his torturer and refuse to write a letter and will shout out a warning, telling him to turn back.

because that's what dream did.

why didn't quackity have a note to give to techno? why did dream yell that he didn't write the note?

there's a sort of desperate bravery in what he did, in trying to punch techno before he was fully trapped.

dream has done horrible things, unforgivable things (and I hate that I have to say this each time, over and over, it should be clear by now) but he said techno was the only ally he had left and he did everything he could to keep techno from suffering his fate.

and once the panic passed (let's take a moment to appreciate cc!Dream and his acting, it was great), once he was able to speak without his voice cracking, without the out bursts of frustration, one of the first things he did was tell techno about his clock.

about one of the few things that had kept him grounded this whole time, to one of the few people who has told dream that they want to know his perspective, that they want to hear what he has to say.

techno, yes, wants the information about the prison, but he wants to know dream's story and I'm so excited about that. it's time.

[olreid]

[from replies] i would certainly not argue against the assertion that the princesses are powerful, but i dont know that we know enough to be able to say it comes from the loops. partly just because the party hasn't died enough for us to really understand what dying does to a character mechanically. all brennan's said is that it would be really bad for a character to keep dying, but we don't really have any sense of what that specifically means. the party gains power not from dying, though they did level up in death lol, but from combat -- e.g. they gained two levels in this most recent giant fight. that might seem like a pedantic distinction but i think it really does matter -- if you spend a lot of lives running or otherwise not fighting, you're not going to be getting more powerful just by virtue of looping, at least as i understand it.

the party's mechanical abilities did carry over from one body to the next, so it does seem that you could accumulate more power than the average person just by virtue of living more lives and having more combat experiences if you chose, but it doesn't seem to be a particularly effective method as the princesses -- in their own view -- have only just become powerful enough to have a chance at going toe to toe with the fairies. none of the princesses' power has yet been enough to free them from this cycle of loops, which is their singular goal, so that makes me question how much power they can have truly accumulated.

the potential usefulness of looping also seems to depend on whether or not you're able to control which world you respawn in -- snow white gave the impression that part of the reason it's been so hard to get all the princesses in the same world is because dying means waking up in a different world and then having to make your way back to an agreed-upon meeting point, potentially from very far away. we are obviously not seeing behind the scenes of the princesses' operation, but the impression i got is one of months of travel across and between worlds because at no point have we been given to understand that dying more means having more control over that death in the manner of being able to pick where and when you go back to.

re: "only a few chances," certainly the princesses have been cumulatively alive for more longer than the average person, which one could argue is a boon rather than a curse (altho i am always of the opinion that immortality resembles death more closely than life); maybe it has been useful for their plan to be able to strategize across lifetimes and iterate based on their findings. however, there had to have been a time before they had these goals, when they had no purpose but were still being resurrected again and again against their will. you don't need extra time to live a life, especially when that extra time means that you go through the most traumatic parts of your life again and again.

what we maybe can understand better is what dying repeatedly might do to someone emotionally -- cf. siobhan in the ap saying there's no meaningful difference between endless resurrection in order to undergo suffering and hell and brennan saying something to the effect that some princesses have made it through their loops 'with more planks in the ship' implying that those who haven't have lose something fundamental as a result of looping and snow white talking to rosamund about watching her friends from her story die over and over again.

if there's an argument to be made about the princesses being out of touch or coming from a perspective that not many can relate to, surely it's along this axis of compounded trauma, of undergoing a unique horror in living the same story over and over again and being conscious of it, rather than because they are somehow lucky to have been made to undergo more iterations of their shitty lives than anyone else.

tldr im def not trying to say that the princesses are not powerful in their own right and certainly they have twisted the fact that they are not allowed to die to their advantage in some ways, but i just don't think we know enough to say that looping has been a boon to them or that it affords them powers they wouldn't otherwise have been able to access. ultimately, they wouldn't even need more time for their plans or a means to gain power if they weren't desperately trying to get free of this trap of infinitely recurring stories in the first place.

Brennan: You had it explained to you that not everyone has had their story told the same amount of times. Like most people in the Neverafter haven’t had their story told once; they’re just the people who live out in the land and don’t get mentioned in other people’s stories, right? Then there’s also — there’s people who have their stories told a little bit, and there’s people that have their stories told a lot, and there was an insight to see basically: how many stories had Jack had told of him?

interesting additional info about how looping works from the ap. pasting this here mainly to say lol at all the people who have been like omg the princesses are so self-absorbed due to their royalty and protagonist status and as main characters they could never hope to understand the plight of the side or background characters.. given that what this seems to be saying is that the princesses and other main characters have the short end of the stick because while different versions of a story might have different side characters, the one person who always has to be there is the person whose name gives the story its title. they loop the most out of anyone, and it is precisely their centrality in their respective narratives that renders them vulnerable in this particular way.

this also has interesting implications for the princesses' plan given that it seems like the neverafter is not synonymous with the stories told about it? brennan says here there are people who are living in the neverafter yet are never implicated in a story and therefore just live and die as normal. i assume they could become so implicated if they were to come in contact with a story character, but it does seem that if all stories were destroyed as the princesses want there would still be some people who would just go on living.