#of all the shows to validate me lol

[rock-a-noodle]

The newest Clone High episode....really went and validated my trauma there didn't it?

[mbat]

i love how werewolves are a metaphor for so many things. queerness. trauma. menstruation. chronic illness. like... its the best fictional creature for a reason

[meaningless-mayhem]

Being asexual and possibly aromantic but also being a huge shipper and hopeless romantic is such a wild experience ngl. I'm always freaking out about my favorite ships and giggling internally reading ship fics, getting invested in characters finally kissing or reading about their pining and their love and I think "I want what they have!!"

But then sometimes you have a slamming realization that your sweet shipping scenarios you imagine in your head look totally different irl and that you are extremely aspec.

One time I went down a YouTube rabbit hole and stumbled across Vsauce's "Why Do We Kiss?" video and let me tell you. When I saw that stock video footage of two people kissing each other I was a little flabbergasted lmaooo

[3416]

also kyper going so hardcore about 1634 today saved me..... "34 wants 16. he doesnt want 88, he doesn't want anybody else. he wants him." he said it with SO much conviction, it's killing me. like that's how me and the oomfs speak bro, welcome to the club. also the use of their numbers to make it less personal like these guys dont wear their numbers like a LIFELINEEEE......

[princsstwilightsparkl]

saying "if aroace people can date, then can lesbians date men?" is absolutely aphobic narrative btw!

[winepresswrath]

I think I would need to reread the first book to really commit to this opinion but imo some of the horror of book!claudia is that she really is a terribly inhuman monster. she was a vampire child, so she never learned to be human. she was a vampire child so she'll never grow up and fulfill that potential. companionship is a necessity for her because she can't look after herself and that makes her bitter and disdainful of people who want love for its own sake, especially in the context of Louis and Lestat, who damned her to her current state to fulfill their own emotional needs. it's a stark contrast to show Claudia, who yes, is a vicious mass murdering vampire and has fun with it, but is otherwise a lonely woman who craves companionship and understanding because she's a person. Her beef with Louis is still about his failure to prioritize her and his assorted bad idea relationship choices but the undertones are so different and I really feel like the tragedy is that he didn't put her first and not that he could never have made her happy no matter what he chose.

[bandsandwristbands]

Vent post

[clownattack]

my midterm/absolutorium is over and now i can actually. celebrate my bday lol i was too buried by uni bs this month to unwind.

i got like three diff pieces of cake from my fave pastry shop bc I DESERVE IT AFTER BLOWING MY PRESENTATION/DEFENSE OUT THE PARK (according my my classmates/prof but also ME MIETTE!!! IM SO HAPPY I DIDNT CLAM UP LIKE I DID DURING THE ONLINE PRESENAYSH AUHJA. And the prof cadre actually??? Seemed interested and asked me questions abt the process etc. Which is not on brand, usually they seem disinterested in what ppl are presenting and only a few projects get their attention. NGL after working my ass off beading these skulls i feel JUSTLY REWARDED. HARD WORK PAID OFF. And as per uj they couldnt believe i make them all by hand lmaaaaooo anyway zen right now after beinf so stressed last week & the weekend i can actually relax. enjoy my term break. make some clay critters

also the pics are kind of ehhh bcs the artificial lighting was super intense and kind of took away the softness/dark colors from the skulls esp :c i dont really want to upload hi res pics of these things until im finished with my masters 100% and hopefully have my degree. The red skull esp looks kind of miserable compared to rl/vids/proper documentation but i dont want to upload now. idk maybe i will once i rest and think abt it? ANYWAY THE CAKES

[drop-the-curtain-123]

ok very specific gripe about assassination classroom

But how comes the series is all "be yourself, use your hobbies, despite everyone judgement, for good" then just... Never questions the roasting of Mimura air guitaring?

Look at my boy! He's so unwell afterwards

Ik now there are more scenes later in the manga that again use it as a Punchline. It just encapsulates that weird gap of "things that are just never Not the Joke/Mocked" which kind of defeats the show messaging 😭

t's not even used in a "do it anyway, grow strong and proud" like some others, it's just. There.

(hi rinka btw happy belated birthday to you)

Anyway unconsequential nitpicking rant over, have a good day.

[butwhatifidothis]

Ultimately, I think one of the worst things Hopes does wrt its writing of Claude is take out all of the complexities and contradictions that had made him so interesting to begin with.

OG Claude lies and manipulates people and closes himself off while still searching for the truth and wanting people to come together and be open with each other, because of how his traumas meld together with his dreams. He says that he'll do whatever it takes to get what he wants and shows off opportunistic tendencies and then buckles at the first sight of innocents getting hurt, because no matter how much he wants what he wants he still prioritizes the lives of the people around him over anything else. He knows of people's capacity to hurt others for petty or illogical reasons - was raised with that knowledge beating its existence into him - and yet still dreams of a world where people of different lands and cultures can still be friends, because that is how tightly he holds onto his dreams. He's a kind person with the capacity for being a dick, and his contradictions add on so much to his character; they in large part are his character.

Hopes Claude? He lies and manipulates people and closes himself off... and that's it. He says he'll do whatever it takes to get what he wants... and he does. He knows of people's capacity to hurt others for petty or illogical reasons... and has no real dreams of stopping it (or dreams of anything in the future really, by his own admission) and he indulges in that very behavior himself, seemingly without any awareness. He is untrustworthy, and manipulative, and opportunist... and that's it. What you see is what you get. And if this were a character unto themselves, if we're kind and we ignore all of the other issues with Hopes!Claude's writing, that would be a fun enough villain to follow around.

But it's not; this is supposed to be Claude. This is a character who has so much of his foundations be built on the idea that what he presents on the surface isn't all that he seems. That he's more than a character who is just "tee hee I'm only pretending to be nice but I'm actually eeeeevil evil evil evil evil evil evil," but someone who both uses kindness as a means to an end and embodies it genuinely. Warm yet calculated, a good man with real flaws - THAT is who Claude is. Hopes Claude is who Claude is if you strip him of any complexity - He Is Only Pretending To Be Good, But Actually He Is Bad.

He's just... easier to swallow, in a sense. Claude is a good person who is willing and able to do bad things, but only up to a very specific, very clear point, all for a good dream he's held onto for years and plans extensively to make a reality in the future; Clyde is a shit person who's willing to do everything short of bombing specifically whatever land he himself is ruling, all for what essentially amounts to no concrete purpose. There's no need to think about Clyde as hard, since he just does what he does because he's doing it and that's enough.

It's why I'm glad I am Dev-Approved to just fuckin' ignore Hopes entirely as a horrific fever dream, because Hopes does not understand what made Claude so lovable at all

[radiation]

i can't get rocky horror picture show. i feel like for it to have appeal to you, it needed to have been formative media and a sexual awakening of sorts. watched it a couple years ago coming from 1. already being out of the closet for years, 2, knowing the reputation rhps has both with the transmisogyny and theater nerds. i was gonna approach it for what it was, and i hoped to at least find some appreciation as a pulp sci fi enjoyer. but what made the most disappointed in the end is that for its reputation, it was not nearly as weird or transgressive or as queer as other 70s movies i know of or have seen. i had already seen phantom of the paradise by that point so my expectations for weird rock operas were set much higher, and i expected more of the pulpiness that it promised. i can appreciate the acting, art direction, some of the music, and i can understand what it meant to people, but there are way better and more entertaining and weirder 70s movies out there. i watched it in a double feature with shock treatment and i liked shock better. if you want a better pulp sci fi sex comedy with questionable elements, watch flesh gordon (1974)

.

[sunlightfeeling]

I genuinely feel like I dont have a right at all to complain or talk negative about Japanese fans but like……..the evident cliqueish-ness of honestly what looks like a very unfortunate larger chunk of them ……😮‍💨

like i gotta be honest the concert was a lot more isolating than it actually already was in itself because of the vibes at least a couple of clusters of fans gave me

[akkivee]

AHHHHH I'm up for reasons, just realized I went past midnight, and took a listen to the new BAT songs. HNNNGG!! FIRE. BUT it actually hit me just now, I didn't make the connection before, but Kuko's delivery in Terminus straight up sounds like its a Sutra. It makes me think of those videos of monks doing the Heart Sutra with a backing beat, hype shit. The flow is more or less consistent, though it does like to flow back and forth between Sutra and Rap which is REALLY neat, and oh man, symbolism started to hit as well, just like in the progression of the genres of Kuko's solos. 1) Gay Bam: VERY CHAOTIC. Its scat, its 80s dance aerobics, its Peter Pan crowing, its flirty. Its like something you'd see at Eurovision or whatever. 2) YGOTS: Punk Rock!! YG is more cohesive in tone throughout, but since its a rock song there is still that rebellious energy there. And then 3) Terminus: Rap and Preaching have become one. The energy is completely different and it just hits different flat out and it feels like something important has happened within him.

here were my wins from the drama track btw like it’s hilarious how hard i won with this drama track but one teeeeeeeeny tiiiiiiiny little detail fueled that much upset LMAO

like it rounded off so much: the reason why shakku and kuukou butt heads so much, what kuukou is willing to do to protect his family, jyushi and hitoya stating how much they see each other as family and them fighting to keep that bond together when it’s kuukou who pushed them away, jyushi’s truest self and the change being himself brings, hitoya resolving to ‘hate the sin not the sinner’ when choosing to fight for justice, and bat outright saying they want to guide the people LIKE ITS ALL OUT THERE NOW 😭😭😭😭😭

and i think there’s still room to show more with kuukou as well with the holes presented in the track!!!! and yeah, kuukou and jyushi’s pink isn’t necessarily in relation to women in their lives but both of them sharing the power to change minds with the power of words, as we esp saw jyushi do in this track WE ARE JUST GETTING STARTED FR WITH BAT NOW 💜💜💜💜💜

[giantkillerjack]

Ya know. I spent most of my life with horrible painful soul-crushing social anxiety.

And after about 25 years of continuous hard work, suddenly, people started pointing out - to my utter bafflement - that I had, in fact, achieved my lifelong dream of being charismatic. I'm 29 now; I feel comfortable in most social situations, and it is a very rare person whom I cannot make laugh.

I am, undoubtedly, finally, charismatic.

But do you know what I found?

I found that now that I have an understanding of which social rules serve which functions -- Now that I have an understanding of just how much damage my awkwardness was doing to people, well,

I found that, actually, my awkwardness never really hurt anyone at all. People were just judgmental dicks to me about it.

Now that I have the skill-level to (most of the time) creatively vocalize what is in my head as soon as I think it and without fear, I can confirm once and for all what I had always suspected:

I was worth talking to when I was quiet.

I was worth talking to when I was awkward, and when the words in my head took time and patience to hear, and when most of my jokes didn't land. I was worth talking to the whole time.

So I just... I hope that if you've ever wondered whether you are worth communicating with, the answer is yes. Absolutely yes. Each of us has a soul worth sharing - and if you and I were talking, I would happily wait for you to speak (or communicate in other ways) without condescending, and I would never shame you for that harmless awkwardness that so many people feel the need to violently stomp out.

You are worth talking to. You just are. And you deserve people who will speak to you with kindness, with patience, and with the basic immutable respect owed to all people.

(I talk about this with some frequency, both on tumblr and in real life. At some point, maybe I'll gather all my thoughts on the matter into one post. At some point, I wrote about my personal experience trying to build my social skill. But I felt the need to say at least a little bit tonight after seeing this other lovely post, and I'm glad I did. It will happen again.)

[unproduciblesmackdown]

truly lmao 2024 lambda literary award finalist wynnstannery

[sleepyfishies]

Larian is out for me omg

I was already having a lot of Feelings™ about Astarion but THIS conversation fucking broke me

When I tell you this is the exact kind of idea I struggled with literally just last month... And now it's put into words in this silly little game, by the number 1 "hot sexy vampire bf that everyone wants to sleep with"... Idk man it's making me feel things, holy hell