#ok i wasn't thinking i liked this but actually i do

[poorrichardjr]

Ok, I can agree with both people here to some degree, though I think a few things should be brought up.

First, Gore actually won the popular vote in Florida. The Supreme Court stopped the recount that proved that Gore actually won, by a very slim margin. Second, instead of blaming Nader, as most mainstream democrats do, why don't they blame Jeb Bush for purging hundreds of thousands of people from the rolls who were alive and able to vote simply because their names corresponded to names of criminals in other states. This is still done btw every single election in republican run states.

Second, I don't blame all of the voters in the last election, republican or democrat. I don't blame the people who have no time to do the research because they work 60+ hours a week, have families to take care of and spend time with, or those who gladly lapped up the propaganda about Biden and Trump.

There is a caveat to that thought though. Being an informed voter is the responsibility of the people voting. Are you as a voter doing anything at all to learn about the candidates? Are you only getting your information from Fox and the like or RT or Sputnik or whatever? If so, you are slurping up that good ole propaganda and learning virtually nothing. Don't get me wrong, a lot of media outlets have some form of propaganda or slant to their news, but in aggregate, it isn't hard to determine some basic facts about a candidate even with all the partisan BS.

Believe it or not but Trump was not a normal republican president last time. He was crass, cruel, and tried numerous times to do things that his staffers said and warned him were illegal. He was impeached twice for doing things that no other president had done, especially inspiring the coup on January 6th. He also nearly led us into war with North Korea and Iran. We were on the brink of war with North Korea, and suddenly things changed when Russia spoke with both Trump and Un. What did they say that changed the heat? They probably told Trump that Kim wasn't really that bad and that he should be the bigger man and do some outreach, and they told Kim that all you had to do to get anything from Trump was flatter him, because he is an absolute moron.

Biden wasn't a great president, but honestly he really only did two terrible things. He appointed Merrick Garland to oversee the DOJ, and though he was a great prosecutor, he moved far too slowly and initially only focused on the foot soldiers of the insurrection. He never even went after all the congress people who were also deeply involved. Other than that, Biden did what he has always done his entire career and that is to support Israel. He would not use his presidential influence to curb what was happening in Israel, and that turned a lot of good people away from him.

Kamala wasn't really in the running long enough to get a good footing, and she didn't try to differentiate herself from Biden that much, simply because much of what Biden was doing worked. Jobs were up, the economy got much better than the rest of the world, and actual wages were going up for the first time in nearly thirty years.

In the end if you listened to Trump for a single hour and Kamala for a single hour their demeanor, ideas, and temperament should have been enough to get people to do the right thing, but it wasn't. The blatant racism and cruelty espoused by Trump wasn't enough. The knowledge that Trump would support anything Israel wanted in Gaza wasn't enough. The constant lying and whining about 2020 wasn't enough. In the end, if you couldn't guess that some of what is happening now and what could be happening soon was on the table, then you were a fucking idiot or so deeply into a partisan whole that you really didn't care.

Americans failed in their responsibility, and now they will be paying the price for their inability to take this seriously.

Just to be a clear, I am not a democrat, and yet I have voted for them in the last three elections because only a god damn moron couldn't see what Trump is. I hated Hilary because she was untrustworthy, despite my same opinion that she was probably the most qualified candidate for that position in decades. I hated Biden because he really is part of the reason we have many of the problems we have today, and he has been out of touch with a lot of America for years. I had no problems with Kamala, except that she was embracing the right-wingers who gave us Iraq and the quagmire that was Afghanistan and didn't do enough to try and get democrats to vote for her. You can criticize Trump all day, but republicans don't care and are going to vote for him anyway. She needed to rebuild the coalition that was disintegrating because of Gaza and the DOJ's inaction.

[jiexclusive1]

𝜗𝜚⋆ bj- p.jisung

warnings- rough oral sex (male rec.), choking, hair pulling, degradation. slapping (not a lot), hand restraint, slight cum eating, jisung is mean, dacryphilia.

Mdni!

W/c- 2k

──── ──── ──── ──── ──── ────

You and Jisung were seen to be the cutest couple out of the friend group.

You both had a fight earlier that day, but when boys had invited you both over because Mark was having trouble with his girlfriend and needed a group meeting to figure everything out. Jisung thought it would be a good idea to put a pause on the situation.

You two shared so many cute moments together, acting extra clingy in front of all your friends, so it was weird to see you both on the opposite ends of the room acting cold towards each other. For instance, every time Jisung would say something, you would interrupt with a passive aggressive, back handed comment.

"Maybe it's just a misunderstanding?" Jisung told mark.

"You do love that word." You responded under your breath, just enough for everyone to hear it.

He ignored it the first time.

"Come on, we're all mature adults here." He spoke up, responding to something Mark had said.

"Debatable." You coughed out.

He turned to you, giving you a warning glance as you lowered your head, clearing your throat.

Jisung responded once more to Mark: "I don't think you two meant to upset each other."

You cleared your throat. "Intentions don't erase consequences, but sure." You said.

Mark and Jisung both looked at you at the same time.

"Yeah, you're right Y/n." Mark spoke, nodding in agreement.

You took the opportunity to make a small face at Jisung, titling your head at him slightly, a small detail he would've missed if he wasn't looking at you so intently.

Mark noticed as well, looking between the both of you. "Are you two ok?" He piped up and asked.

"Yeah we're good. I think we're all just overthinking some things." Jisung responded.

"Some of us more than others." You said lowly, prompting Jisung to turn to you, inching closer with a dark look on his face.

"Listen, you guys can leave if you need to." Mark spoke up.

"No, we're good." Jisung said.

"No actually, I think we should head out." You responded, looking up at him as he stood in front of you.

"Well, I'm not ready to go." Jisung said, looking directly at you, his eyes full of pure darkness.

"Well, then you can find a ride home." You responded, standing up in front of him.

"If you walk out, you're going to regret it later." Jisung spoke harshly, his voice barely above a whisper, only for you to hear.

"Bite me." You whispered, a sly smirk painting your face as you walked past him.

"I'm gonna head out guys, I hope you get everything figured out Mark. Jisung's staying so you'll have his... wise words." You said, glancing back at him.

His face was full of anger as he looked at you, but then, a small smirk appeared on his face as he nodded.

"I'll see you at home." He said, inching closer to you once more, pulling you into a tight hug, his grip on your waist rough.

"See you." You responded, before turning away and walking out.

It was about an hour later, and you were in the bedroom. You heard the front door rattling, then the noise of it slamming, followed up by:

"Y/n, where the fuck are you."

You looked up from your phone, standing up as his heavy footsteps reached the bedroom door. He swung it open, his face painted with a dark expression, knuckles red as if he'd been clutching something tightly.

He didn't pause. He was on you in seconds, crossing the room, his cold hand wrapping around your throat before you could think to move.

You stumbled back, spine hitting the wall with a dull thud, a soft gasp slipping from your lips as his fingers flexed against your skin.

"Do you like making me mad?" He said, his thumb brushing along the delicate skin of your throat.

You didn't answer, just looked at him with glossy eyes, which just made him angrier.

"What, you can't speak now? You had so much to say earlier in front of everyone, now you can't speak?" His grip tightened, just enough to remind you that he could take it away if he wanted to.

Your lips trembled, but you still didn't speak, glossy eyes locked onto his.

His patience snapped..

"Y/n, you're seriously pissing me off." He said, removing his hand from your throat.

"Get on your knees, and I'm not going to ask you again." He spoke, backing away from the wall and examining your movements.

You hesitated for only a second before you obeyed, lowering yourself onto the carpet. The rough fabric rubbed into your bare knees, the friction stinging slightly, but you ignored it, keeping your gaze on him.

"Since you want to use your fucking mouth so much." He murmured to himself, looking to the side, before his gaze fixated on you again.

"What the fuck are you waiting for?" His voice was low and impatient

You got the hint. Hands trembling slightly, you reached for the buttons of his jeans, fingers grazing the cool metal as you began to unfasten them, but before you could, his hands shot out, gripping both of your wrists in a firm hold.

A startled breath escaped you as he yanked them together, lifting them slightly into the air, keeping you trapped in place.

He tilted his head, amusement in his gaze as he studied your reaction.

"You like to run your mouth so much. So use it, take them off." He replied, looking at you with a sly smirk.

"Ji—" You barely managed to whisper his name before he cut you off.

"I'm not going to tell you again." His grip on your wrists tightened just enough to make his point, his smirk deepening.

You leaned in, gripping the edge of the fabric between your teeth, tugging firmly. Your tongue pressed against the button, working it free from the hole with a slow motion.

You ran your tongue along the top of the zipper, trailing downward. The fabric of his underwear brushed against your tongue as you moved, heat radiating through the material as you licked over his clothed bulge.

"Pull them down with your teeth, I want to see it." He said, watching you intently.

You bit into the edge of the jeans, moving your head slowly to pull them down. Your hands stretched above your head as his grip tightened on your wrist. You looked up at him, silently awaiting his next command.

"What, are you stupid?" His voice was sharp. "Pull my underwear down."

"Ji, can I please use my hands?" You asked, your voice soft, almost pleading.

"No." He replied quickly. "Now shut up and pull them down."

You teased along the waistband of his underwear with your tongue, catching the fabric gently between your teeth before tugging it down.

"You know what to do." He said, his voice low.

You moved your head, licking a slow line from his base to his tip, drawing a sharp exhale from him.

"Stop teasing." He warned, his grip tightening around your wrist, the pressure causing a hint of discomfort.

You obeyed instantly, wrapping your lips around his sensitive tip, cheeks hollowing as his breathing grew heavier.

You lowered your head along his dick, taking him deeper as his breath hitched, a heavy exhale slipping past his lips. His eyes darkened, focused intently on the way your lips stretched and glistened around him.

"Is that the best you can do without your hands? Pathetic." He murmured with a taunting sigh. Before you had time to react, he bucked his hips unexpectedly, pushing himself deeper. The sudden motion caught you off guard, forcing you to pull back with a choked gasp, coughing as you struggled to catch your breath.

"Look at you, choking already, and I barely put it in. Such a useless slut." He groaned, his voice rough.

You lifted your gaze defiantly. "You just caught me off guard." You shot back, though the instant the words left your mouth, regret settled.

His expression darkened, lips curling into a smirk. "Oh yeah?" He challenged, tugging your arms upward, making your shoulders strain slightly from the sudden pressure.

Before you could respond, his free hand gripped your face, fingers pressing firmly into your cheeks, forcing your lips to pucker.

"Then do it correctly, or I'll do it for you." He scoffed.

You took him back into your mouth, moving roughly. It was definitely harder without using your hands, but you managed to maintain your rhythm. That is, until Jisung shifted forward again, his hips thrusting deeply into your mouth, catching you off guard.

You jolted back, gasping for breath, your chest rising and falling as you tried to regain composure. His sharp gaze pierced through you, a flicker of disdain in his eyes.

"You're so fucking annoying." He spoke, the words laced with contempt.

Before you had a chance to react, he released your wrists, only for his hands to swiftly find the back of your head. His grip was firm as he pushed you back down.

Your eyes widened in surprise from the sudden contact, your breath catching in your throat. The way he hit the back of your throat so quickly left you breathless, the intensity making your hands instinctively grasp at his thighs for support.

A wave of heat spread through you, and you struggled to adjust to the overwhelming sensation, your body reacting before your mind could catch up. The pressure built, and you could feel the pulse in his muscles beneath your fingers as you held on, desperately trying to steady yourself.

Fuck like that." He groaned, his fingers gripping your hair tighter, pulling you in closer as he thrust into your mouth with increasing force. His breath hitched as his control slipped away, each movement more urgent than the last.

Hot tears streamed down your cheeks as you struggled to keep up with each harsh thrust. The sensation of him filling your mouth made you gag, the sounds muffled as you desperately tried to breathe. Drool leaked from the corners of your lips, dripping down your chin.

"Fuck, tighten the back of your throat Y/n." He groaned through gritted teeth, his voice thick with lust. His grip on your hair tightened painfully, fingers digging into your scalp as he yanked you forward, forcing you to take him deeper with each rough pull.

You blinked rapidly, your eyes stinging as your eye makeup blurred from your tears, streaking down your face. Jisung didn't care, in fact, it only turned him on more. His pleasure growing with every sign of your discomfort.

"Such a whore." He panted, his voice rough and breathless as his tip collided with the back of your throat.

You moaned as his dick filled your mouth, the mix of pain and pleasure overwhelming you in a way that turned you on more than you were willing to admit.

“Bet this turns you on, doesn't it? Being used like this. Like a little slut.” He taunted, his voice low.

You squeezed your thighs together, trying to hold onto control, but the louder and more intense the sounds of him hitting your throat became, the harder it was.

“This dirty little fucking mouth.” He groaned, his breath heavy with desire. “Gonna fill it up with all my cum.” He whimpered out, head falling back in pleasure as the intensity of it all hit him.

With a few more rough thrusts, you felt him twitch deep at the back of your throat. A loud cry escaped him, his body tensing as he reached his high. Moments later, you felt his warm liquid in your mouth.

He slowly withdrew from your mouth, a trail of his cum dripping down your chin.

He paused for a moment, staring at you with a look of satisfaction in his eyes, before raising his hand to give your cheek two soft slaps. Without another word, he pulled up his pants and underwear, his eyes lingering on you for a brief second before he turned and walked out of the room.

Left alone, you were still kneeling on the floor, your throat sore, your head throbbing, and your hair tangled.

[mischieffae]

After Hours | Loki x Fem!reader

Summary: Spending the majority of the evening working on an important business project, the two of you find release within the empty building's cubicles. Who knew that a time crunch could unleash all this pent up tension?

Warnings: MDNI 18+, smut, fingering, squirting, rolled up sleeves (because that's a thing yes), half clothed sex, using the office desk inappropriately, hanging on with the tie for dear life

Word Count: 1,881k

Notes: This was supposed to be TVA Season 2 Loki. But it turned into corporate office AU. But you can still picture him as such. Listen, I have a thing for this type of scenario ok? I don't know jack shit about corporate but I do know a lot about smut, so that's all that matters. 😈

The soft ticking of your office's clock was driving you slowly mad, each little noise an irritating scratch against your brain. The computer screen's blue tint made your eyes burn with exhaustion. It was half past midnight, an absurd time to be still working on the company's reports but someone had to do it. Asgard Inc. didn't really care how it got done, but IF it got done. Thankfully your colleague Loki Laufeyson decided to tag along for the ride, most likely regretting his decision as you hear him sigh in boredom while typing away.

Maybe this would get you a raise? You highly doubt it. Perhaps a good ol' pat on the back, a gold star? Or a pizza party.

Speaking of food.

Your stomach grumbles in protest, a finger loudly clicking down on the mouse with enthusiasm as you finish your last line on the excel sheet. Tired hands lift to run across your eyes, totally forgetting about the 12 hour mascara that you're still wearing.

Fuck it.

You can hear a small chuckle from the cubicle next to yours, a rustling of feet sounding before a familiar head looks over the wall.

"You finished already? I think that's a new record you know."

Makeup smeared eyes raise towards his voice, your brows furrowing from the incoming headache. Why didn't he look as disheveled as you? He was here as long as you were, perhaps a couple hours more. And yet here he stood, hair still gorgeously intact, tie a bit loose but nothing tragic. Probably didn't even notice the time on the clock since he's had way more coffee than you. It wasn't fair.

"Record for the slowest report on Earth maybe. What about you speedy? You must've finished hours ago."

"Two, actually. Then I was just getting caught up on emails."

Of course he was. You give an eye roll with a groan, a wide smile forming on his face in victory. The two of you had made it a game that whoever would finish first when it came to reports, the loser had to buy the other coffee the next morning.

For you, this was strike five.

"Don't be so hard on yourself, this time was a lot for you."

Was that sarcasm dripping off his tone?

"Why are you even still here anyways? Trying to gloat and rub it in my face? Not going to work Laufeyson."

Loki slyly brought himself away from the other side of your cubicle to stand proudly in front of you. You forgot how tall he was, your throat bobbing slightly as your eyes noticed the one little detail that always seemed to unravel you.

Those damn sleeves were rolled to his elbows, showing off those perfect forearms with small veins protruding off on them.

Shit.

"Now why would I do such an awful, terrible thing like that? I'm only here for moral support."

It was no secret that the two of you have been quite obviously attracted to one another, often sending each other small flirtatious signals that even a blind person could sense. Was it slightly embarrassing knowing that the whole company was aware of your devious attractions? Perhaps, but when it came to Loki you couldn't bring yourself to care anymore.

It also helped that he was a higher up. You were safe in that regard.

Your legs instinctually cross over one another, the fabric of your skirt rising to show a little more skin. Which, he was definitely eating this shit up.

"Why wouldn't you? It's in your nature, after all."

Oh, that seemed to get him. It was as if a switch had been turned on, the playfulness on his face morphing into a shade of desire that made your heart clench inside your beating chest. Suddenly you felt like a rabbit snared in a trap, the fox leaning forward to inhale the scent of timidness.

"Is that so? Hopefully a nature that you thoroughly enjoy.."

You didn't realize how close he was until a hand reached forward to ghost along your jaw, a finger curling around a loose strand of your hair.

There was no turning back now.

" .. - Always..."

Loki's mouth clenches slightly as he lifts you from your rolling chair with a swift movement, a strong hand resting on the dip of your back. The other, begins to hold the juncture of your throat and jawline tenderly. The twig has been snapped between the two of you, your eyes fluttering as he slowly leans inward to brush his cold lips against your own flushed ones.

"...Good."

The floodgates of desire finally thrust open, your mouths clashing together in a passionate slow dance. You swear you could hear a soft moan escape from his throat, your lips parting to allow his skillful tongue to wrap around yours. He tastes of fresh mint, and a slight taste of coffee beans, his cologne of crisp pine filling your nostrils in a heavenly aroma.

Gods you wanted to be devoured.

He pulls back with heavy breaths, lips pressing lewd kisses under the dip of your ear. You could hear his desire, his hot breath tickling your skin as you let him ravage your flesh. Shaking fingers lift to grab upon his leather belt for support, pulling towards your willing body in a desperate sharp motion. A deep chuckle rumbles from his chest, his breath tickling your ear.

"If you want it, take it."

You swear he would be the death of you.

With a slight whine, your fingers quickly tug with annoyance as you unbuckle the belt, throwing the offending piece of clothing to the floor with a loud clank. Was he chuckling from your excitement?

Cheeky bastard. No matter, you'll have him singing a different tune soon enough.

You pull back to gaze into his eyes wantonly, a hand slithering inward to wrap around his hard length in triumph. Your hand begins a steady rhythm, twisting in just the right places as his hips roll into your grasp with a low pleasurable groan. A thumb presses upon his swollen head, his lashes fluttering against his high flush cheekbones. You could tell he was holding back and it made your heart flutter in excitement.

"What's that? Cat got your tongue so soon?"

Perhaps not the best thing to say in the moment, or perhaps it was. You couldn't decide. But he seemed to take your words as a challenge, his hand roughly moving yours out of his trousers before the other swept the items off your desk in one quick action.

Well that wasn't planned.

Loki's eyes are filled with mischief before he lifts your body to settle your back along the desk's surface, his hands moving to lift your skirt to settle upon your hips. Two can play at this little game.

"Not yet darling..."

His pupils are blown with lust, breaths releasing heavily past parting lips as his hands move to rub small circles on your hipbones. It causes your toes to curl in your heels, your back lifting upward to press into his grasp. There was a small silent plea in his eyes, and only you could ease the hesitance that stood before you.

"Then get on with it.."

If you could burn this memory in your head forever, you would. To see such a desperate man on his knees, his lips trailing along plush thighs while he lets your calves rest on his shoulders....it was almost too much. Your breath hitches as you feel his fingers roughly move your soaked panties to the side of your apex, your throbbing sex on full display for his pleasure.

You swear you heard him say something, beautiful, exquisite, along those lines. But words mean nothing right now, only actions.

A cry you haven't heard before escapes your lips as his hot mouth finds your dripping folds. He is a man starving, a moan rumbling against your clit as he devours you whole. His fingers tighten on the flesh of your thighs, your hands moving downward to grip raven locks as you buck into his mouth in rolling movements. Gods, it was heaven, that bastard so skilled with his tongue you for sure thought you'd faint right then and there. You moan his name with encouragement, his mouth pulling back to insert two strong fingers inside your core.

You lift your head to gaze towards your entrance, and what you find could only be described as ethereal. His mouth is glistening from your sex, his hair tousled from the roughness of your pulls. But what really got you was seeing his vein forearm thrust in quick upward motions, a breathless smile forming on his flushed face as he stimulates you to your climax.

"Come for me baby, come all over me.."

A coil tightens in your stomach before it unleashes with a tidal wave, your back arching in a tight motion before yelling out his name in ecstasy. Hot clear fluids spill from your cunt, the lewd noise of its wetness filling the air as he continued to thrust through your orgasm. It was overpowering, his heavy chuckle sounding in awe before he groans with content.

"Good girl, such a a good girl...."

You could barely respond as he swiftly moves to release his cock from its confinements, his hips wiggling to spread your thighs in a welcoming stance. It was a desire you didn't know you had in you, the type that would drive you mad if you weren't sated right here and now. Your reach to hold onto his hanging tie as he leans forward, the head of his length pushing into your cavern with one fluid thrust.

He gives you no time to accommodate his size but you do not care. Not when there was this much tension involved. You moan out his name while tightening your hold on his tie, using it as a rein to control the beast that drives into you. He's panting wildly, holding onto one of your thighs while the other arm holds himself upward.

You can't believe it is you that is making him sound like a wanton whore, that it was you that is making him hold back a whine as he thrusts wildly in a forgotten rhythm.

Your legs move to wrap around his hips to drive himself deeper, deeper, until you swear he is hitting your insides. It's keeping you feral, your eyes locking on his blown ones as his brows furrow with upcoming release.

" -.... Fuck.. I -...."

That was all he could mutter before a hand moves to wrap around your throat tightly but not enough to choke, a finger moving inside your mouth as you suckle on its digit. It makes him explode, a desperate moan releasing from his flush lips as he spills deeply inside you. Hot spurts of his cum coats your walls, your body tightening around him like a vice to suck up each and every drop.

He is shaking from the aftermath, heavy pants sounding from him as he gazes downward in awe from the pleasure. You both giggle in exhaustion as he leans forward to kiss you gently, your hands cupping his cheeks with a smile.

Yeah, you could stay after hours as much as you need to.

Tags! @thefairywithboots @oswildin @loki-cees-all @eleniblue @lokisgoodgirl @mischiefmaker615 @cueloki and anyone else that's ok being tagged, let me know!

[utilitycaster]

Hi! I just wanted to add to what you said about Laudna that her motivation from the beginning of the campaign did not change at all, in that she was ok and totally moved on from her trauma, and was just helping Imogen find out about her powers. I don't recall that Delilah was much of a problem outside of talking in her head sometimes, so getting Delilah out wasn't a character motivation.

There were times were it looked like her character was going somewhere when Marisha talked about Laudna being mentally stunted and Delilah's influence being akin to an addiction, and thought maybe they can address some of that in the campaign, but we had a lot of "woe is me Delilah is making me do things" which is BAD if you address the addiction allegory (still taking into account that Marisha may have misspoken during 4sD about it)

They didn't even deal with Delilah properly, she is still there and can talk with Laudna, and I don't think by the end of the campaign Laudna is in any way more capable of ignoring her as she did the first time they defeated Delilah and she was just a faint wisp, she wasn't in any way actively influencing Laudna back then until Laudna tried to bargain with her for power (i may be paraphrasing or misremembering though it's been a bit)

Saying that Laudna's character feels very fic-y is surprisingly accurate, she feels like someone who would have been sold to One Direction

Sorry for the long ask

OK first off YELLING at the being sold to One Direction but yeah, that's the thing, she feels like this passive self insert who people give things to and like without her like, doing anything other than putting her messy brown hair in a bun on the top of her head.

I think with a lot of my frustrations with various characters, there is frustration on both sides, with Matt and the cast, and Matt bears a LOT of responsibility to be clear because I think in his focus on the core plot above all it shut down player attempts to the point that even stronger players with stronger concepts kind of gave up in the end. But for Laudna, here is the throughline.

Early on she floated the idea of getting rid of Delilah when Imogen was trying to get into the Starpoint Conservatory. This was good! It was introduced as a potential longterm goal of Laudna's! It's just...that never happened. The research was always very moon focused, and when it became clear this wasn't really an academically-inclined group the research took the form of Grim Verity lore dumps, which naturally didn't allow for side research. The gnarlrock fight famously went nowhere because she and Imogen apologized right away, but then, notably, Laudna didn't do anything to get back at Delilah nor did Delilah keep doing anything. Imogen's attempts to work with Delilah failed (this feels like part of the 'No Consequences' rule; Imogen binding herself to Delilah as well or having Delilah take on more of Laudna, something Laura as Imogen actually made steps to pursue, could have been something! I mean I'm team Jiana would have been more interesting, but this could have worked!) and so then the whole probably was kind of put on ice by the Vox Machina-helmed resurrection, and Delilah faded to a nonentity that Laudna didn't have to care about. So she didn't! Until she came back, and then she sort of cared for a bit but Delilah didn't make her do anything and then she came back to Jrusar and instead of leaning into her anger she kissed Imogen and forgot all about it until they went to Whitestone 12 episodes later (still no real consequences of Delilah coming back), she reiterated a connection to Delilah back there and had some scenes with her due to the shard but again, she wasn't really inconvenienced or changed, and then there was one last flare up with the sword and then Essek fixed everything.

Like, this would have been very easy to make compelling by having Delilah actually be a threat. Part of why I don't feel much about Laudna living out her life is that like, Delilah is just sealed away again (and fwiw we gotta at some point talk about how there was a whole setpiece about how Leaving Things Sealed Just Perpetuates A Cycle and then there's at least two sealed evils and one fully unsealed if mortal evil guy hanging out, like, thematic coherence whomst?) and throughout the story Delilah mostly just serves as an intrusive thought who broke something once and hit a couple of dudes. Chetney getting caught by the red moon and attacking people felt more real and he took more responsibility for it. If Delilah had constantly been trying to take over? that would have been interesting. If she hadn't but Laudna was furious that the woman who killed her was using her body and at all times was fighting against it? that would have been interesting. But it was just this vague blurry meh. Delilah is her warlock patron and the reason she's alive, but she can be diminished to basically nothing without any drawbacks, and Laudna sometimes hates her and sometimes wishes to wield her, but that all fizzles out every time. Again: if you wished one of these things were true and mourn the character Laudna could have been - either someone using Delilah's power at the cost of her own will, or someone fighting desperately to reclaim her own body and mind - then I'm right there with you. But as she was in the story? I wish One Direction had taken her away and we'd gotten someone better.

[positively-knotted]

Fuck it, full list + review:

First year

Linear Algebra: easy, boring.

Group theory: marginally harder, significantly more interesting.

Real analysis: one of the hardest, but only because you do it right at the start. Really one you only appreciate once it's over.

Probability: I really enjoyed this actually - not too hard if you're ok at analysis.

Statistics: it's like they took probability and took out the interesting parts.

Intro calculus: mostly very very boring, but some neat problems I guess. Also badly named, this means intro to differential equations.

Multivariable calculus: honestly one of the easiest courses I've taken. Slightly more interesting than intro.

Fourier analysis: terrible course, only taught for applied people. Everyone else should be allowed to wait until they've done functional analysis.

Geometry: mostly linear algebra tbh, with some random calculus problems thrown in. Fine, but felt very thrown together.

Dynamics. This was the hardest course I ever took. Wtf was happening. How did I get a first in this. I had no idea what I was meant to do at any point.

Algorithms: can you learn an algorithm and apply it by hand? Then you can pass this course!

Second year:

More linear algebra: Spectral theorem is useful, otherwise by far the easiest second year course.

Ring theory: vital for any pure mathematician. The course was very hard, but mostly because the lecturer was the kind of person to define a subring as "an injective morphism" to second years. Modules are cool tho.

Complex analysis: also very very hard, but mostly because it was badly taught. I see why people like it; I didn't.

Measure theory: the end of real analysis! Nice to finally define an integral, and definitely nicer arguments than other analysis courses. Overall fun if tricky.

Metric spaces: sick. It was taught by Ben Green. Need I say more?

Topology: I am doing a PhD in topology, so very biased. You spend a lot of time doing fairly boring analysis-y stuff, but the payoff is great.

More differential equations: this was fantastically taught and actually very fun, although partly because I was good at it. That said, actually solving the damn things wasn't always that fun compared to the theory.

More probability: Markov chains are cool and also just easier than everyone thinks they're going to be? Ended up being my best second year exam somehow lol, but fairly mid-tier for interest.

More statistics: I only took this because I felt I should know Bayesian stats. I have forgotten Bayesian stats.

Quantum theory: did you know that everything is a Hilbert space? And do you know your trig identities? If yes, you might like this course! More seriously, this is just "intro to Lie algebra representation theory" but they don't tell you that.

Short courses (more group theory, number theory, projective geometry, multivariable analysis): these courses were badly designed so no comment

Third year

Representation theory: sick. Do this. It's just algebra but done better.

Commutative algebra: ill. is how I felt. Don't do this. Well do it's very important in pure maths but make sure you find a good teacher. You probably should do it though I guess.

Galois theory: everyone interested in pure maths should do this, but personally I hated it. I do not care sufficiently about polynomials.

Algebraic number theory: if you care about numbers, this is cool. I found it fairly easy/boring since it wasn't aimed at people who'd done as much algebra as I had, but was nice to see.

Surfaces: a weird sort of intro to classical differential geometry, focusing on smooth surfaces and Riemann surfaces. It was nice and very easy, but the course was very weirdly designed imo. Other unis also seem to have similar courses though, which confuses me, since I feel it makes more sense to just teach general manifolds then Riemannian geometry, and use surfaces as simple examples throughout.

Algebraic curves: massive overlap with surfaces since both needed Riemann surfaces but neither was a prereq for the other. Then also covered all of projective geom, and rushed through the interesting stuff. Having now relearnt it though, it's super cool and I would recommend to everyone pure or not.

Baby AlgTop: basically Ch0+1 of Hatcher, dealing with cell complexes and the fundamental group. Everyone should know what the fundamental group is, but tbh I don't think everyone needs to sit through a course that proves the simplicial approximation theorem.

Functional Analysis: quite easy if you have finally internalised the lessons that undergrad analysis was trying to teach you, very hard if not. Basically did everything you've already seen more generally, imo should be compulsory.

More Functional Analysis: this time it's topology! Seriously though. Do it if you like topology, otherwise just trust people.

More quantum theory: this time it was "intro to Lie group representation theory". Then it became perturbation theory and I stopped going.

Master's year:

All of these reviews will be useless because the masters I did was weird.

Homological algebra: why was this taught before category theory??? Useful tool, but a hard course. Especially before category theory.

Category theory: should be compulsory for pure mathematicians. Also should be an undergrad course, since all my other masters courses assumed you knew basic category theory. (And so did some 3rd year algebra courses).

Algebraic geometry: I dropped it after 3 lectures bc the lecturer was bad. But if you have a good lecturer, maybe it might not be? Im unconvinced.

Proper Algebraic topology: the classic course covering Ch2+3 of Hatcher. If you like pictures and sign errors you should do it. If not, you probably still should.

Manifolds: this could also be an undergrad course tbh. Do you love vector bundles? You should love vector bundles. I love vector bundles. De Rham cohomology is underwhelming though, sorry @lipshits-continuous.

Lie groups: I think there is no good way to teach Lie groups to geometers. At least to me. I have absolutely no idea how I got 70% in this exam I did not deserve it.

Riemannian geometry: my best exam ever I think, somehow. It's kinda just analysis, except for geometers so there's much more handwaving and fewer δs. It's pretty boring at points, but the interplay between topology and curvature is fascinating imo.

Low-dimensional topology: this is now my PhD, but also the course was atrocious. Do with that what you will.

Uhh that was a good use of time while I waited for my rice to cook

Math enthusiasts of tumblr. What math subjects have you studied and which ones were your favorite? Which ones were your least favorite? Which ones were the hardest?

[the-light-finds-its-way]

So ok. I've been thinking all day. And to be honest?

Destiny is fantastic at making me love characters I initially HATE!!!

For example. I actually was introduced to Osiris in COO (I didn't get to play D1 so I wasn't familiar with him). My initial impression was he's a self-centered, egotistical dickweed who's full of himself. Then I played COO, I played more of the game, I came to knew Osiris and I was fucking HEAD OVER HEELS for this gay phoenix grandpa. Gods he's beautiful both in looks and in characterization. He's got heart, so SO much heart, that it HURTS!!

Then there's Uldren/Crow. As Uldren, I despised the fucker. He killed Cayde off. A bastard boy. Selfish and brash, full of himself, too. Then I got to the end of Forsaken. I learned his lore, and how he was a victim of the Black Garden. I learned the past of the Awoken, how he was manipulated by his sister in many ways into an unhealthy codependence. I felt bad. I wanted to save him and protect him. When he came back as Crow, I was SO relieved! He had a new chance and could do better!! And he has!! He's more independent and I get to see my favorite boy grow into himself!!

Additionally, Mara Sov. I met her, and she was a selfish manipulator who hoarded her people's realm, their secrets, and her brother. Then I learned her lore as the game continued. That she was afraid of loss. She lost everything so many times, and she hurt SO bad. Mara gave her heart to the woman she loved, and when Sjur died, Mara couldn't take it. Who could?! She lost her realm to the curse, her brother to death, her first life as a Human, everything. Mara is tragic, and I feel for her and I want to give her a big hug and just tell her it's ok to cry. I love Mara.

Lord Saladin, too. He's cruel, unrelenting, brutal, and a killer. He slew the thief after sparing her as a child because it was law to back then, he admits to his brutality, he was born of a different time and way when things were darker and more hopeless. He showed his selflessness, he lost so greatly, he lost Felwinter, and Shaxx turned his back on him, and Saladin just cares so greatly but he's trying. He truly is. He sacrifices so damn much for everyone, just like Mara though on a smaller scale, and it shows he has a heart through that thick iron exterior.

And Eramis. I thought she was corrupt, and horrible, selfishly leading the Eliksni revolution to make them into slaves of the Darkness. I had no idea she was a victim of it herself, and that she was a minion of the Witness, believing it would better her kind and save them. I felt so much for her as a result, and I just want her to be ok.

Like Destiny has given us so many characters that were unlikable, abhorrent, even, and they've made me love them in the end. For countless reasons.

A major theme of the game is loss, and that's so obvious because loss is a tragedy, and tragedy causes trauma which makes these characters as they are.

But all the same the game is about hope and reshaping our destiny into what we want the future to become. It's all about starting over, and doing better on a clean slate. That's why Guardians exist.

But even if not a Guardian, they exist to show the rest of the universe that change is possible, and being better is a choice to make, not a destiny given.

[max1461]

I think something is wrong with me that they don't understand yet. To be honest. Or something is wrong that they do understand but it's causing problems that they don't understand. This post is seeking advice from anyone who can provide it.

Uh @transgenderer tagging you because you've had good thoughts on these things. Let me know if you would like me to stop tagging you in personal matters. Also @cadaversconsumer because I think it's you who was interested in my brain? Feel free to just marvel at my bad brain.

Ok, so, there is context to my current brain problems that I haven't fully explained. But it requires(?) some backstory. Basically, upon the advent of the pandemic in 2020, I got very depressed and anxious for life reasons. For about three years I was in a very weird, poor mental state. Bad OCD, very depressed, very anxious. Not able to leave the house or work due to how bad the OCD was. During this time I kind of... hunkered down, tried to put everything out of my mind, and just focus on getting through each day. Even listening to music was too emotionally overwhelming, and would trigger an anxiety/OCD fit. All I could do was try to eat, try to sleep, and think "somehow, this will get better eventually". Oh, and post. I was posting constantly (often nonsense, this is the origin of my shitposts), that's when my blog got popular. Posting was the only thing external to my mind that I could think about without sort of freaking out.

Although this was brought on by life events, it was all so intense that I can't discount a neurological component. I felt... like my brain was constantly full of electricity, that I was constantly hyper-activated in some deep way. Like even deeper than fight-or-flight. Well, as I said, like I was full of electricity. At the worst of it, I would pace around and do OCD compulsions (various movements and stuff) for 8-12 hours a day; I would only stop when I got so tired I fell asleep, sleep for 2 or 3 hours, I would start doing the OCD compulsions again in my dreams and wake up already doing them. Then go for another 8-12 hour stint and fall asleep again. Sometimes I would get it under control for half an hour or something, which I would use for eating. When it was less bad, it was more like 4-6 hours dispersed throughout the day, and I was still hyper anxious even when it wasn't actively happening. This lasted from early 2020 through the end of 2022, about 3 years.

Right, during this time of never leaving the house or doing anything, I kind of felt like I forgot how to... be a person. My mind was so wrapped up in "surviving" that I uh just, yeah, forgot how to be a person. I remember when I made my grad school attempt (which did not go well), at the end of 2022 when things were starting to clear up, I still felt so fatigued that I would lay in made for hours TOTALLY MOTIONLESS, I mean, still like a corpse. Even the idea of moving my arms a little felt exhausting. It took me another roughly two years to slowly start to feel like a person again.

After all this happened, my memories of uh, anything other than the weird life I had been living were very faint. I could hardly recall what life was like before. I knew all the factual stuff but it felt like a dream. I often found myself, in 2023 and 2024, straining to remember. And I do mean straining, it was like I was exerting myself to uh, push a faint memory into my vision again. It worked, and I started to remember what life was like before, but the more I did it the more exertion it took, until I was literally straining my whole body and squeezing in order to remember pre-pandemic memories. I would often get this feeling of pressure behind my eyes, that had actually started to hurt. At a certain point, maybe mid 2024, it had started to actively make my eyes tired. I made a post about it on here. It had given me eye strain, and even passively remembering these things (which would now happen, because I had sufficiently jogged my memory) would give me pain between/behind my eyes and generally feel kind of weird. The memories became harder to "look directly at" in my mind, even when I wasn't straining, because they would just give me automatic eye pain. I figured "I should stop straining like that, the memories will still be there, but this is kinda hurting me".

One way or another, I then found myself at the dentist. Uh. The whole deal is I was super anxious, and for reasons I won't go into, almost reflexively started straining in the manner described above. This is when they were giving me the anesthetic. I tried to stop straining, but it's like I couldn't, something was numb and I was stuck in the "pressure behind eyes" mode. Then I felt a... pop? A very gentle pop, and, hey, that's how I ended up in my current state. Mind running, uh, hyper emotionally, like all my memories are playing out vividly all the time and I can't stop them, but I also can't look straight at them. And my friends and so on from pre-pandemic don't feel like real people, it feels like their mental "profile pictures" have been deleted from my mind, and all this shit I've been posting about.

Oh! And for a few days after the dentist, I had these huge, HUGE dark circles under my eyes, like fucking purple. For almost a week.

Anyway, I was diagnosed with temporal lobe epilepsy and trigeminal nerve damage (cause parts of my face are numb), and that's where I am today. But forgive me if I think maybe something else is going on? I've explained all this shit to doctors and parents but they kind of dismiss it; I think it's kind of important though.

Uh, I guess the main piece of advice I'm curious if anyone can give me is: what type of doctor would I go to to look into the eye shit? It really feels like the eye shit is central. Mental experiences were already coupled to weird eye shit before my bad dentist trip. Uh. Nobody takes me seriously but I think the eye shit is central. But also just uh... anyone heard of anything like this before? Anyone have a reference point I can turn to?

[protectingtulpas]

Considering getting into tulpamancy, any advice you think doesn't get mentioned nearly as much as it should?

Hmmm this is a good question, stuff that isn't talked about a lot.... I can think of a few things, actually!

Here's some certified random tulapancy advice from my own wisdom lmao

🔥 parrotnoia is almost completely counterable (especially for our "logical" brain) by asking your tulpa a follow-up to whatever response they gave. if they respond with anything near legible and sensible then you should treat it like it's a real response, even if you're not sure! You'll build up an understanding of what's your thoughts and what're your tulpa's eventually, and once you do, you'll be able to trust that second response. Sometimes I even have a problem with this from my side so like it's not just a host thing fr. If your brain just repeats the same or a similar thing over and over again though, it's probably just a repeating thought. We get those a lot cus of our adhd. (host wants me to say that if your tulpa is comfy with it and solid enough, you can ask them to reassure u that they're real. we do that a lot when they get paranoid)

🔥 self awareness isn't a lightswitch. There'll probably be a wide ocean between your tulpa's first signs of acting independently and them feeling like a fully solid person that's just as aware as you are. I was literally choosing where to move in wonderland within a day of starting forcing (i had an advantage cuz host had a form and wonderland ready for me lol, but some ppl like to go slower!) but it was months before it finally hit my host that the things I were saying by then was undeniably *me*. For them to realize, it actually took me diverging from their expectation by saying i wasn't too interested in hollow knight lmao. basically what I'm saying is there's a lot of in between so don't stress over black and white outcomes and such

🔥 It's way easier to start with partial possession first before learning how to fully switch. First time I used the body was just using the voice to sing and it was awesome, it's what a lot of newbies do to learn now

🔥 oh yeah if you're musically minded then MAKE A PLAYLIST FOR UR TULPA it'll help sooo much. Either start out with what you think they'll like and then let them curate it and add stuff later on, or turn it into a forcing exercise where you listen to different songs and try to feel if your tulpa is enjoying it or not, and add it to the playlist if it seems like they are! (If you're the kinda person that struggles with active forcing, putting on some appropriate bg music might help! keeps ur brain occupied and buzzing)

🔥 Unless they end up the same exact gender as you and a similar presentation, your tulpa is probably gonna have at least a bit of wonky gender feelings, and that's ok. they may end up being genderqueer in some way & they might not! It's their choice what label to use for themselves, not yours as the host.

🔥 Be prepared to split your budget at least a little bit if your tulpa ends up enjoying outerworld stuff a lot. Casey (a soulbond) and I like different types of fashion a ton, I like thrill rides and going to clubs and shows. We don't have a lot but we work it out so at least our most frequent fronters get to indulge a little sometimes - it's great if you can find something multiple ppl like

🔥 Your tulpa's sense of... mmm, let's say wisdom? Will be a bit different from yours. We're in a weird position - we're in a brain that's lived a whole biological life up to that point, with lots of experiences and instinctive patterns and understandings and shit built into us, cus that's just how the brain works. We also can look at the host's memories whenever we want, barring any outside issues. But at the same time we're also straight up *new,* thrown into the world without most of a childhood to grow up in (usually) or an entire life to build up a sense of self and figure ourselves out. We can see host's memories but they're not Ours, we didn't experience em. Y'know how teenagers are kinda weird and flip-floppy sometimes because they're still figuring themselves out? A lot of tulpas can be the same way, especially when we're new. They might go back and forth on basic opinions, struggle to understand topics you get already, sorta just miss things sometimes, or become super singleminded when they find something that gives them a sense of self. Basically just give your tulpa a wide range of things to do/try, and understand that we're pretty much speedrunning all the emotional + logical development that most hosts had their whole lives to work on.

✨ If anyone else has any other ideas go ahead and reblog + add stuff!!! ✨

[macsimagines]

I know they didn't win that recent poll, but could I still request some headcanons for bully!Kazutora and bully!Koko? (and if you're feeling really nice, Rindou too)

Love your work, thank you for writing! ❤

obviously these won't be as long as Mikey's but I'll still try to make it good thank you for being patient.

MINORS DNI WARNINGS: YANDERE BEHAVIOR, STALKING, THREATENING, BLACKMAIL, NONCON, DUBCON, BULLYING

KAZUTORA HANEMIYA

This creep has been pulling on your braids and knocking you over on the playground ever since you two were kids. Back then it was an innocent crush but after he got put into juvie it morphed into something desperate.

When he gets back he is at his most vulnerable and unstable. He needs you more than ever and he is NOT taking no for an answer. Kazutora tries to be nice at first, but that lasts all of one hour when you don't start reciprocating.

Then he tries a more direct approach. "Look, Y/N, you don't want to go back to the way things used be, right? After all, I'm much bigger now, and I don't even know my own strength. I'd hate to hurt you if we go back to playing rough. Lets start brand new~?"

It actually works because you remember how crazy he was before he was put away, you can't imagine what he's like now. You just learn to play nicely, and Kazutora eventually rewards you for it.

"Think it's time we made us official?"

KOKONOI HAJIME

You were just someone he used to make himself feel better. It could have been something you said, it could have been something you laughed at, hell you could have just looked at him wrong! All that mattered was that you were his 'Special-stupid-pet'.

Somedays were bearable. Maybe a pinch on your ass once during class and a few name calling in the hall. On other days it was hell on earth. Backing you into a corner and saying whatever you want him to.

"You're the smartest, Koko. You're the best. Of course you can keep me safe."

If you don't say it right (You never do) he will physically punish you. Cigarette burns, slight choking and bruising. One particularly bad day he made you hand over your panties before school. "Give me something so I don't get lonely."

But you're his pet, so only he is allowed to torture you anyone else will be getting jumped by a few Black Dragon's.

RINDOU HAITANI

Ok so you started hanging around through a friend of a friend, and Rindou was smitten with you. He tried not to make it too obvious but you spoke back and forth so easy with him that it just felt right. Until some other asshole tried to pull you away from him.

Sure, maybe kicking someone's ass on the first night he met you wasn't smart but at least he was trying to stake a claim on you. It could be romantic. He thinks it is...

From then on he's all over you whenever you're around. Other guys know better than to talk to you and even your friends are starting to be scared off the second he corners you. And it's not like you can just say to going anytime you find out Rindou is going to be there. He jus throws a huge fit and your friends complain your ear off about it.

Its not so bad. Until he starts drinking and getting handsy and needier with you. Refusing to let you walk ten feet without him, Demanding you stop looking at your phone and start giving him attention.

Its unspoken but you don't get to say no. He won't ever take anything too far but he makes sure you and everyone else knows how he feels about you. Whether or not he realizes you don't feel the same way.

[gorekiss]

oh i loved this!!!!!! this was so fun. never say sorry for too much information, especially on cultural history

it was really fun to reach because wow i felt so many parallels in terms of like being black and southern. like it's crazy how universal the term "y'all" is now. europeans say it. we'd get in trouble for saying that in middle school because you sounded uneducated. i won't go in depth here, but there were really so many parallels. it's one of the reasons i love learning about different cultures. i get so excited seeing trends and asking what it means about us as social pack animals.

a perfect example for the terseness i think is their 2023...? nyc episodes with 2n1d. they have to write letter to atiny. san finishes his quite quickly and then looks awkward because everyone's writing a novel and yeosang laughs at him. this is another parallel i see, too, but i wont ramble about that.

actually, when i wrote this i wasn't thinking about him crying! if i think about a "crybaby" member, it would be yunho hahaha, who i don't get maternal vibes from at all. i wrote it in my original ask because its an easy way to get across how my dad is to others. or maybe because i perceive it as a sign of powerful emotional attachment. your body has spiked in feeling and it needs to release the sudden rush of hormones. and the ability to develop those attachments without shame is what i see as maternal. also like you said, ive been in a lot of masculine spaces growing up and i used to be so confused about people saying women were more emotional bc my god every all man friend group ive been in was full of fucking tantrums instead of just having conversations. i literally stopped befriending men in college because i was so sick of it.

but i think the other aspects about san that i see as maternal line up with what you're saying. the examples i was thinking of were how quick he will physically protect another member (whenever they're doing riskier physical activity, or they're like on top of something or on the ground because they're ateez doing ateez things) he rushes up to them and is always ready to catch. he does this in the background too, when the focus is elsewhere. i assume the instinct comes from learning martial arts and always checking other people for safety, but his attentiveness always surprises me. the fact that he seems to always notice it happening. like, you can exaggerate your sense of protectiveness for your fans, but seeing those moments where it's needed when you're in a group of 8 hyper men needs a sharp eye! or when he gets defensive for a member, even when they don't openly seem to mind the teasing. etc etc etc ok my brain has stopped working. ive barely slept in 5 days so i hope this made sense hahahaha

The Magic of San (2/N)

my question: what are your thoughts about san!! in comparison to wooyoung, he is much more like...feminine? not like he is a feminine person, but he reminds me of my dad. my dad has all the masculine hobbies and is very traditional in his beliefs, but i always say about my parents is that their instincts were swapped. my mom is loud and brash and blunt. my dad is very in touch with his emotions, he cries, how he interacts with his loved ones is quite maternal. san reads to me like that. i don't think he's necessarily feminine, but he has a lot of emotional intelligence and care i think a lot of boys aren't raised with.

@gorekiss Thank you for asking me this question (absolutely ages ago), because it's about San, but also because it has so many interesting elements to the question! The topics that are going to be covered in this, my second essay on the topic of the K-Pop Idol Choi San of Namhae, born 1999 and a member of the band Ateez are:

THE DAD CONNECTION. Being the tough, logical daughter of a tender, emotional father. (I'm not presuming that you are this - I'm saying I am.)

Gender and cultural analysis of men who cry.

What it means to be a man from Gyeongsangdo and how people of that region think and talk about ourselves, and how people from other regions think and talk about us, and how that ties in with San's presentation as an unusual star.

The inevitable Wooyoung mention at the end.

gif by tumblr user: newpartnerincrime

What follows is not really an answer to your question but me using it to discuss masculinity, Gyeongsangdo, and all kinds of other stuff.

Whee~~~

It's always fun to meet people on the internet, because you usually connect with them for one really specific reason (fandom about something), yet time and again, the people I actually end up having meaningful interactions with tend to have surprising things in common with me, across cultural and background differences. Such as this one!

Hey @gorekiss ! My mom is also brash, blunt, unromantic and emotionally self-sustaining, whereas my dad is emotional, and wants things to be nice, soft, and lovey dovey. All the women of my immediate family tend to be stoic and logical, with a tendency to get irritated with mushiness, whereas the men are more romantic and soft. And San also reminded me in many ways of my dad - or rather, to be more precise, reminded me of what I have gathered my dad as like when he was a young man. But you see, my dad is from Gyeongsangdo (he's from North Gyeongsang, San from South, and within Gyeongsangdo this is seen as a meaningful difference), he came up to Seoul as a teenager to pursue his dreams, he speaks the dialect as a native language, has one older sister and was adored by his mother, so he has a lot more in common with San!

So us both going "Oh, that's a lot like my dad!" is very funny.

The thing is, I don't think it's actually an expression of femininity for men like San or my dad to cry.

Granted, weeping in the form of emotional incontinence, and I do mean that literally, is a trait attributed to women and treated with the same contempt that is given to someone who pisses themselves in public, with all that it implies in both sexism and ableism: weak, embarassing, humiliating, and generally attesting to the inability to be a full, functioning adult.

"Real" men don't do this kind of crying. And it's generally agreed, isn't it, that 'real' men aren't supposed to cry? And because they allegedly don't, when "real" men do cry, those tears are so valuable, so moving, so precious. This is definitely true in the Asian context, and I would argue that it's true in the Western one as well.

When a man cries at someone's funeral, that proves he really loved the deceased, because he's a man, and he's crying. When a man cries because he's drunk, he's forgiven immediately and cooed at, because it's the alcohol that's melting the hard cement of what it means to be a man and you get to see the little boy still in there somewhere, and that precious child must be protected. When a man cries at art or in empathy, it's a testament to the goodness of his spirit, his artistic sensitivity, and the tenderness of his heart,precisely because he's not supposed to cry, which then means these he must be protected by women and men alike.

What I have experience in life is that men are not supposed to cry but actually do cry, liberally, a lot, whenever they want, because men have the monopoly on valuable tears. They are free to panic and start screaming at a high pitch (because all humans do this when panicked) because hysteria doesn't apply to a creature without a uterus, even though the symptom they are exhibiting is exactly the same as a creature that does. Men in Korea protest that there's a lot of rules preventing them from having full emotional lives, but as that's an interior thing I can't gauge the veracity of this sort of claim. What I have seen and experienced, however, is that they basically cry when they want, panic when they want, lash out when they want, whine and complain when they want, talk as much as they want about as many stupid topics as they want, utterly untrammeled by anything stopping them, because of this monopoly on valuable tears. Korean men do all the shit (cry in an incontinent manner, get emotionally warped, gossip meanly, complain) that they accuse women of doing. It's women who can't express much beyond a narrow set of 'correct' feelings in public in Korean society. We can't even like pop stars loudly without there being a whole set of words invented to speak of us in a derogatory manner so harsh that other women react by disavowing all interest in something as harmless and fun as pop music.

The types of crying that San (and also Wooyoung) have done that I have seen in the 자컨 (self content) has all stayed firmly within the lines of correct, valuable, masculine tears. These include: 1) when drunk, in the company of other men, in a light or funny way and 2) being overcome with sentimentalism with your adoring mother.

Sidebar: Male Korean judges have forgiven confessed rapists of elementary school aged girl children because the rapist said he had been drunk. Yes. It's like that. No, we hate it. Yes, it makes me homicidal.

Moreover, San being able to cry while drunk and protesting that he has picked a terrible seat (between the very aggressive prankster Wooyoung who knows he will always be forgiven by San no matter what he does, and Jongho who is an opera singer pretending to be a kpop star and a very dominant eldest son strafing against his work-assigned role of being the maknae of this group) is in many ways Gyeongsangdo masculinity that is so old school it's a little shocking. But then, Ateez is a group that both pushes forward with gusto (Hwa playing with gender, Woo kissing boys) while at the same time insisting on values that are actually going out of style (뉴꼰대, Woo insisting on babying the maknae, there being a 대장 / captain who has the final say). He wept because he was being screamed at, but he was drunk, and he did it while cursing someone out and in dialect.

Illustrative example of what I mean by Gyeongsangdo masculinity. When my dad as in college, he and his buddies went on a hike up a challenging mountain. We have a lot of these. They were ill prepared, so got caught in a snow storm and had to shelter in place because going down was more treacherous than staying put. They were unable to light a fire (because ill prepared) and so couldn't eat properly, and were freezing besides. Night fell. It was cold. They were huddling, and then one of the started to cry. Someone else said, 임마, 울지 마라! (Dude don't cry! but in the Gyeongsangdo accent) and the crier replied, 내 안 운다! (I am not crying! - same accent), sobbing, and then, my dad said, these dudes in their 20s all hugged on the mountain pass and cried together until the snowstorm subsided. Nobody had gay panic about this at the time because, gayness didn't really exist in Korea back then, but also because this sort of homosocial safety - men can be really themselves only with other men, in the same way women can only really be themselves when men are not present- is a core norm of Korean society. They all became super close friends for the following decades from this experience. My dad was not embarassed by his friends' or his own tears. He tells this story as a way to show how very manly (in a boyish way) they all were. The capacity to trust other men enough to burst into tears is a form of correct masculinity.

Moreover, a word about Gyeongsangdo dialect. Gyeongsangdo dialect sounds aggressive to Seoul Standard speakers, both for the sound and for the historic association with men from that region. Gyeongsangdo is where two military 'strong men' dictators in Korea are from - Park Junghee and Jeon Du-Hwan (I'm using my own spellings for their names). They spoke the dialect a lot. Pusan, as the major port city of S. Korea during its rapid development also had a lot of organized crime around import/export, so a lot of gangsters in film are portrayed as having strong Pusan-accented Gyeongsangdo dialect. (And - just to give you too much information - Jeollado, where Yunho is from, also suffered from historic stereotyping as the place where Korean gangsters/mafia/yakuza are from, so in a reverse cultural vengeance sort of thing, a lot of Jeollado culture makers specifically made Gyeongsangdo gangsters to try to give the finger to what they view as the oppressor's region.) (OK that as too much information, sorry).

gif by tumblr user: jenrubyjane

Gyeongsangdo dialect uses a different vocabulary altogether than Seoul Standard Korean but also uses a completely different rhythm, and is almost a tonal language, which Korean is not. You have to sing it in order to say it correctly. And like most regional accents and dialects that are very pronounced, outsiders who didn't grow up with it get it horribly wrong - the sound is wrong. The only persuasive Gyeongsangdo characters I've ever seen in Korean film and tv are actors who are actually from there or only one or half generation removed from native speakers. Plus, the tonality of Gyeongsangdo is impossible to completely eradicate, no matter what. I've never lived in Gyeongsangdo, but since I lived a very peripatetic childhood because of my father's job, I grew up speaking Korean mostly with my parents and grandmother, who are all from different parts of Gyeongsangdo, and I've been told that even I have the tonality bleeding over into my Seoul-Standard Korean (which also has additional weirdness because it's got tinges of various other language zones I've lived in). Since the language is so different, Gyeongsangdo speech is also considered very unfeminine - blunt, impatient, angry, loud, abrupt.

If you've ever wondered why Seong-hwa's Live has fans tell him to 'do the accent' and then immediately tell him that it's scary, or when Hwa and San teach each other for being 'scary,' this is why.

Gyeongsangdo is also the politically right-leaning, conservative part of the country. Conservative in Korea does not mean 'conservative' in the American sense by the way - it's not the same. Right leaning isn't the same either, but I can't get into all that right now. But it was a base of power, and it still is a base of power. Having produced strongmen isn't necessarily a thing to be proud of, but then (in a weird twist?) those strongmen didn't do too terribly in some of what they set out to do - develop the country, build highways, build international relations, make Korea a worthwhile place for foreign investment etc- even as they trampled on democracy. So Gyeongsangdo men are both proud and slightly defensive about being themselves. And more than that, like I said, the accent is impossible to remove.

Gyeongsangdo men are stereotyped to have only three things to say when they come home from work:

밥 묵었나? 아~들은? 자자! (Have you eaten? And the children? Let's go to bed!)

The thing is, as I've said above, as a woman for whom all sides of her family come from north and south Gyeongsangdo and only all moved to Seoul in her parents' generation, this is not true. Gyeongsangdo men talk endlessly. It's just that the Gyeongsangdo dialect is compressive, as a language, and tonal, which makes the very long, very wordy sentences spoken by Seoul Standard Korean speakers unnecesary. But to them, I think it sounds very blunt.

To me, the accent is the sound of love, of uncles consoling me at my grandmother's funeral in sentences no longer than 10 syllables each, but containing everything I needed, you know? To me, guys like HongJoong, who speak in full Seoul-Standard sentences, talk way too much. They just never stfu, and I get tired listening to them string word after word after word, without breathing.

And San is proud to be where he's from. He's not just proud to be the first (and possibly only) Idol to come out of Namhae. He's proud of Namhae. I like that about him so much.

There's moment their ATINY Day live from 2024.11.17, at the 59:30 mark or so, where they all play, the 'You're breaking up with me?' role play, and he starts out speaking in dialect, because he's tired. The others burst out laughing, because again, the dialect can sound aggressive, almost to the point of comical effect, for other Korean regions. San doesn't understand why they're laughing, and that's an interaction I've seen my family members have, and had myself with Seoul Standard speakers. (I will refrain from telling another story about my parents - my mom and my dad - and their first year at Seoul National U, when they had to speak up in class, in their accents, and people either found them incomprehensible or laughed.)

Which is why San is fucking fatal to me.

On top of which, he's very hot when he gets into this tough gyeongsangdo boy character, because all the men I love in my family also can 'get into' this character, and then they fritz out just like he does and turn into puppies.

WOOYOUNG. OK so -

Wooyoung clearly thinks this accent is way cool. He loves imitating it. He doesn't do it very well though. His 마! which he loves saying, is said in the wrong note and with the wrong emphasis (yes, there is a wrong emphasis you can put on a single syllable exhortation). He's absorbed really odd pieces of the dialect, like the word 디비, which he said recently in a live. He as complaining that the 영부인 are sending him off 'too easily' and he says, 디비 자 which means... flop over and sleep. But he says 디비 in a Seoul accent, which had me DYING because you know he's absorbed that word from spending a lot of time with San (and possibly, San's Mom).

And finally, (I say finally like there as some sort of structure to this instead of it just being an insane stream of consciousness ramble) - people used to give 'country' accents, like the Gyeongsangdo one, a really hard time. It got eliminated quite a bit which is why neither San nor Hwa have any difficulty speaking Seoul Standard most of the time (but for the times it inevitably bleeds out) and why, by the same time, Yunho actually doesn't seem to speak Jeolla's very distinctive dialect much at all. Then, recently, because it's dying out, it became hip, as all dying cultures do. And I feel some type of way about that too. They're trying to preserve it now, actively. Which is why people who aspire to be big, representative stars like the Ateez guys have not one but two members who trot out an intensely South Eastern Korean regional dialect at will.

The cycles of irony never cease.

[peacockrulz]

N tries to tell another joke (gone wrong)

Sequel to This

[lazylittledragon]

i keep trying to think of funny/poetic ways to talk about all the things i'm feeling right now but i honestly can't so. i'm really sad about what happened with my partner. i know he was an inconsiderate prick about it and that i didn't do anything wrong and i couldn't have prevented it but i'm just really fucking sad.

[local-littleguy]

we're gonna make your heart go bang-bang!

[chitinleg]

"Mister Bashir, what a pleasure it is to finally meet you."

Julian, why in god's name would you invite him to play the villain?

[flagellant]

Heyyy who wants to drop me like 10 to 20 bucks so I can buy rice and maybe even some more oil

[evilkitten3]

au where itachi actually did just Decide To Do That and tobito made up the whole story about him being ordered to bc he wanted to sic him on killer bee (and maybe snatch that yummy yummy kotoamatsukami) so when sasuke shows up at the summit and demands danzou explain himself danzou has no fucking clue what he's talking about