#oops discourse

[star-anise]

I heard an LGBTQ+ rights lawyer say once that we've gone from "the love that dare not speak its name" to "the love that will not shut the fuck up" and honestly I think that's beautiful.

[conretewings]

Bitches be like "let men express their eMoTiOnS and be vulnerable and toxic masculinity is bad blah blah"

Then turn around and when men express their emotions are like "omggg they're ✨️GAY✨️ that's the only explanation!!!!"

[mmso-notlikethat]

You know what this fandom should stop doing that might solve hell lot of problems? Self insert

Babe, you are NOT buck, and as much as I love having him as a representation for adhd/Neurodiversity, he can't be the same copy of me, that simply is not actual representation.

You feel being infantilized when someone take cares of you? Ok! Your feelings are valid, and you can discuss that with people around you and work there. But thats it, they are YOUR feelings, not bucks

"But i have adhd and i know that he hated when xyz–" no you don't actually. Every single person who have adhd/ is neurodivergent, is different, yes we may have some common ground, but how we process our feeling, how we deal with our hyperfixations, and how we want people to be around us is actually very distinct from one to other, you know since we are different human beings ig 🤷🏻‍♀️

And Buck is a 30ish years old grown up man. Believe me, he can take care of himself if he is feeling infantilized or whatever you are seeing. there is no need to defend him against his ooo so scary boyfriend 👻

Buck is shown multiple times that he does love when people take care of him so i personally dont think he was feeling the dismiss you are seeing, but well thats me 🤷🏻‍♀️

You didn't like it? Cool say that and move on. Don't feel represented enough? Again not every single neurodivergent is the same. No need to throw a tantrum until every single soul agrees with you

Yeah, just stop self inserting and hating on every single interaction YOU personally wouldn't like. Thats annoying and harmful, especially for people who see themselves more in buck than you do

And maybe you'll enjoy the show more! Who knows. Bet that will be a plus point, no? 🤭

[sleepanonymous]

I usually don't get into discourse or discussions of Sleep Token lore for Reasons™️but I would like to bring forth a proposition that Sleep Token's songs are not offerings about Sleep but offerings to Sleep.

[hearthpunk]

Trans Trauma Olympics are Bullshit (TW)

As someone who was assigned AFAB and experienced CSA, rape as a youth, and continued SA in adulthood (99% from cis men)...

I totally get why so many cis women and queers have fear and loathing toward men. I hated men for awhile. I was coping. I didn't want to stay in that mindset because it didn't align with my values or beliefs in humanity, and it was just too prejudicial and defeatest to believe that all men are evil (even if I saw evidence at school, church, everywhere, etc.,). But I never interrupted my similarly traumatized female friends when they needed to vent. I related to the wounds. I understood the need for a safe place to express the pain without being silenced. I eventually corrected myself and spoke in more balanced ways, trusting that they would arrive at greater balance in their own time. And most of them have.

I spent several years identifying as nonbinary. And in that time I became a mother to a son. And it became even more important to me to end the association of man = evil. My child is a child. I want for him to have healthy masculine role models and a healthy relationship to all aspects of his identity. I never want him to feel ashamed for being born in a certain body, or even with a certain privilege.

And over the last few months I've been realizing that I'm transmasc. And apparently I'm behind on years of online discourse about transmascs + trans men supposedly having privilege over trans women and inherently oppressing trans women.

And it's one of the most delusional arguments I've ever seen. Please tell me more about how someone who has been oppressed by misogyny since birth somehow is just no longer affected by it the moment they announce themselves to be a trans man.

Not only does identifying not equate to passing, and not only does transitioning not equate to passing, but passing does not erase the trauma of oppression. Passing also does not guarantee adequate and equitable reproductive care. Passing does not eliminate the harm of being erased and marginalized even within the queer and trans communities.

When a perceived-male comes out as a trans woman, she is stigmatized as a "failed man." She is vulnerable, targeted, harmed, and sometimes killed. And cis women who are TERFs claim that trans women make the bathrooms unsafe because they're just predators and pervs. The harm done to trans women is criminal.

And also, when a perceived-female comes out as a trans man, he is seen as a "failed woman" and a "new predator." A villain who makes women and femme enbies unsafe. He is also vulnerable, targeted, harmed, and sometimes killed. He is alienated from his peers because he chose to become one with "the enemy."*

*I'm talking about no longer being allowed in certain queer spaces that are designated for women and enbies only. (Which is not to say that women shouldn't have safe spaces. It is to say that trans men are losing access to safe spaces that they once had access to and equivalent spaces are not readily available, and trans men are generally not endangering women.)

Do you realize that many trans men have spent their lives primarily befriending, being perceived as, and surrounded by women?

Do you realize that trans men are not granted widespread acceptance as men by society, and thus are not - systemically, as a demographic - capable of oppressing anyone else on the basis of their gender?

A trans man who passes may experience some instances of male privilege, and that still does not equate to trans men as a demographic being socially empowered to oppress anyone else. IT IS EQUIVALENT TO HOW CIS WOMEN ARE SOMETIMES PERCEIVED INACCURATELY AS MEN AND RECEIVE INCIDENTAL INSTANCES OF MALE PRIVILEGE WITHOUT BEING CAPABLE OF OPPRESSING CISGENDER MEN. In case you havent noticed, transphobic cis men are not building new gender thrones for trans men. And trans men don't want to oppress our queer cousins. (Relatedly, the number of times I've seen a trans man communicating in good faith be deliberately misunderstood and villified is disgusting.)

Because everyone loves She-Ra-Ra, gurl power! But what must be wrong with you to want to be a man? And the jokes aren't jokes when they cause trans folx to be alienated from the only communities that were supposed to be guaranteed safe spaces.

Because we all agree it's okay to want to be a girl. We can point to so many iconic trans women who bravely paved the way for more trans women to be themselves. But we transmascs don't have as readily accessible representatives and trailblazers for our identity acceptance...because even queer and trans folx often agree that it's not okay to want to be a man.

A trans man doesn't just automatically become TME because he transitions, and - I would argue - the multifaceted aggression of bioessentialist gender politics means that both trans men and trans women are negatively impacted by sexism and misogyny.

And I will sustain that the average trans woman who has only recently begun to experience and study direct misogyny has less understanding of misogyny than the average trans man who has lived most of his life experiencing, learning about, and dismantling misogyny. In short, transandrophobic trans women can stop preaching to the choir now, we been here. (And just like trans folx can have internalized transphobia, folx of any kind can have internalized misogyny. So stop invalidating trans masc experiences with misogyny in order to villify us because that is literally perpetuating erasure.)

And finally...

WHO GIVES A FUCK ABOUT COMPARING THE MILLSTONES AROUND OUR NECKS WHEN WE'RE ALL BEING THROWN INTO THE RIVER?!?!?!?

Some of you out there with complexes who are determined to be the loudest and proudest victims, while ostracizing and intentionally demonizing your trans cousins, should be ashamed. And trans women could learn from trans men ways to navigate misogyny, just like trans men can learn ways to navigate male-coded privilege from trans women. Because the truth is, trans people share more experiences than not. Tearing each other apart is wasting our precious time and robbing future generations of a coherent community.

And anyone who starts ranking BIPOC trans folx as oppressing white trans folx needs to check their privilege and educate themselves with an open heart before they make embarrassing, bigoted, racist statements. That's not how intersectional oppression works and - once again - that mindset further divides parts of our community that are fighting the same fight...for our collective liberty.

- Signed an African-descent mixed race transmasc genderqueer who is fucking disappointed by the in-fighting.

And if anyone fucking deliberately misconstrues me as belittling trans women's voices or rights to safety and respect then you're proving my point that stigma against trans men promotes our erasure, including by the queer and trans community at large. I already wrote this dissertation to be as precise as possible because Osiris forbid I leave any reading comprehension or critical thinking up to the seething masses.

[thecircularsystem]

[prince-liest]

I’m a sex-repulsed ace, and reading the latest chapter of 666 (as well as your analysis here on Tumblr) made me realize that I have been subconsciously thinking about MY OWN sexuality from an allo perspective? And that it has kinda been messing me up?? Like, ever since I learned that sexual attraction was actually a Thing and that it’s Important To People, I had been carrying around a fear of being deficient in some way and not being able to love to the same extent as allos. (1)

Even though I know logically that’s complete garbage and totally untrue, I felt left out of the loop because people seemed to care strongly about this thing I couldn’t even imagine. Whenever it looked like a relationship might happen I panicked for a reason that I couldn’t understand. But now I’m starting to realize that it’s because I was subconsciously terrified of an ‘ulterior motive’ behind the other person’s reasons for wanting to be with me. (2) That part of the reason they even cared was because of something I don’t experience. So thank you, because this realization just clicked into place while reading your work. The thing is, this way of thinking was just internalized in such a way that I didn’t even realize it was there until literally this week. And I think you’re right; one of the main reasons behind that is because I’ve always consumed media written from an allo perspective. (3) If ace/aros are shown at all, they’re depicted as “lacking” and their character development usually revolves around being “fixed” by the story. When I was ~10 years old my mom sometimes let me watch the Big Bang Theory with her (looking back, maybe not the best decision). Anyways, there was one episode deep into the series where Sheldon (who for the past nineish seasons was probably the closest thing to mainstream ace rep) has sex with his girlfriend for the first time. (4) Afterwards, he says something along the lines of “that was better than I thought it would be”, and it’s presented as a Very Good Thing and a big step in their relationship. I think a lifetime of stuff like that makes it very easy to internalize aphobia and feel like the lesser part of the relationship. Or to feel like the other partner is making a huge sacrifice to be with you. That got wayy too long, sorry. All that was just a lot of words to say that I appreciate you. Take care of yourself!(5)

The portrayal of asexuality that you see in media being almost exclusively as you described is very tedious to me because it presumes that something is inherently lacking in aro/aceness rather than that feeling of "lacking" being something that is induced by societal norms. Actually, one of the things that I find additionally alienating is that fandom spaces specifically have been getting better and better about ace characters - but got damn does fandom not jive with aromanticism. Like, a character doesn't want to fuck? That's becoming a liiiittle more fine, it's 2024, we stan consent. But not shipping someone romantically?? Not so easy, now.

I'm glad that my work has been something that resonated with you in this respect! Alastor cares a lot about his reputation as a demon but is pretty blatantly a person who could not possibly give less of a shit about being "wrong" for not being experiencing romantic or sexual attraction. The explanation Viv gave at one point for his own understanding of himself (that he thinks he's just "waiting for the right woman") actually stuck out to me a lot because it's a very "well, nothing is wrong with me for not feeling anything, it's the world that's failed to produce a suitable person" perspective.

But having that kind of confident perspective of your own rightness in the world is really not often portrayed in media, or even in fandom, which even ten years ago was still in the throes of standardizing "Oh, no! Me, gay? These feelings are so wrong!" style m/m content and is honestly not that far off from essentially that for aro/ace characters.

Anyway, all of that is to say that there's not yet much out there that doesn't frame allo/amatonormative values as the default that "even aro/ace people can (and should want to) achieve," and that it's really fun to write a fic that is unequivocally from the perspective of a character who is aroace and doesn't see it as even remotely a fault in himself. Does he have moments where he's a little confused and trying to process how things fit for him? Absolutely. But he just doesn't strike me as the kind of guy who thinks he owes romance to Vox of all people, hahaha. I've written him trying to conform to allo/amatonormativity more with Mimzy, because I think the social standards of their time could push him into it, but Vox? Absolutely not, he does not respect Vox enough for it to even enter his mind.

And then, on the other hand, writing it from an aroace perspective centers the way that romantic and sexual interest can feel like a betrayal of a good thing. With a character like Alastor, it frames romantic and sexual attraction the same alien way that we usually see aromanticism and asexuality framed as.

In the end, this is just one of a plethora of different experiences that aro/ace people can have, but it's one that I really wanted to see represented more, so I'm very happy to write it. I'm glad that you're enjoying it!

[avoidcrowdraws]

I can see both Chil and Laios as switches but I was wondering who was your favourite as a top? :)

I can't answer this without my lawyer present

But seriously I'm top!Chilchuck/bottom!Laios generally

When I first started shipping them I was pretty evenly switch, but I got kind of frustrated by

how few people were drawing top!Chilchuck

seeing a lot of bottom!Chilchuck portrayals that I didn't agree with

so now I tend to lean pretty heavily to top!Chilchuck

Top/bottom is of course not an orientation, but in my personal headcanons I feel like given Chilchuck's character background, he would be less instantly enthusiastic to jump to being a bottom, especially for someone so much bigger who could hurt him

But there is a fair bit of top!Laios in my files too so obviously I'm not immune

[wisteriagoesvroom]

inside me are two urges: landoscar multichap romcom vs oscmark dog crate fic

[lilietsblog]

just want to contribute a little something to the anti discourse

so for a while now, arguments in favor of making whatever you want have felt kinda incomplete to me. I mean arguing from the principle of "it doesn't actually harm people while harassment definitely does" is fully valid and very true but that's not all there is to it

what does art do? what is good about art? what IS art?

art is a form of thinking

When you create or perceive art, when you engage with art in any way whatsoever, you are inevitably thinking about what is depicted in it. Your brain is making connections. You are gaining new associations. From conscious philosophizing to subconscious info gathering, you get Thoughts about it.

So this is the question then, people who want to ban every icky topic that makes you upset: do you want people to stop thinking about it? Do you want people to not think about sexual assault? Racism? Abusive relationships? Most of the time people encounter the concept of these things, said out loud and defined as such, in art. In real life you can have an abusive relationship for your entire life and have no clue that's what it is. People who do not experience Nasty Shit are almost exclusively taught how to sympathize with people who do by art. (Their friends and family who experience it are frequently too busy trying to survive said nasty shit to do an educational dance for them)

This is why conservative/oppressive political forces dislike art. It's for the same reason they push back on science that doesn't support their narrative: they don't want people getting ideas. They don't want their children to think anything more than what they tell them! That's why they demand everything "icky" be censored and combed out in the name of thinking about children: you wouldn't want your child to have an opinion on a scary, difficult and complicated topic that you didn't teach them, would you?

This is why the nasty icky art that upsets you so much not only deserves to exist, but needs to. "Don't even think about it" is not a workable harm prevention strategy. Imagine an architect about to build a bridge: if you tell them "don't even THINK about the bridge collapsing", would them actually NOT THINKING about it make the bridge more or less likely to collapse? We are all architects of our own behavior. And we all need to spend some time pondering over notebooks full of calculations of what to do so the bridge stands.

You might ask then, why fiction? Why porn? Why not serious philosophical tomes and psychology textbooks? Why disrespect the serious and important topics so? Why should people play with them?

Well, first, because play is essential to mental wellbeing. We all need to unwind and relax, and for most people philosophical tomes and psychology textbooks are just not something they can fit into their limited rest & relaxation time, not without sacrificing more than they gain in terms of ability to control their mood and behavior. People need to play, and if there's a way to get shit done while playing, well, that's just a productivity hack right there.

Second, more importantly, humans learn best through play. Bat the concept around, try it on like a hat, draw a smiley face on it, then erase it and draw a frowny one instead. Let it permeate your imagination, spread itself around through it, infiltrate your thought patterns. THEN you will remember it. Then you have the material basis to have serious thinky thoughts about it. Basis for comparison. Material for contemplation. Memories of engagement.

And yes, this includes being sexual with it! Sexual thoughts are not actually so sacred, special and separate that they would be importantly different from other sorts of voluntary play. If that's how people want to engage with the material, if that's the toy room their brain conjures most easily, well there's straight up just, nothing wrong with that, is the thing. From the point of view of education and serious thinky thoughts it's just a tumbler you put the thing in to be vibrated and tossed around.

Now, a crucial word here is voluntary. A classroom environment is a whole different beast, that warrants a whole separate discussion. Hopefully nobody out there is proposing to make it mandatory for middle schoolers to read abusive incest pornfic in class out loud; I sure as hell haven't heard this idea from "proshippers". In fact, privacy and comprehensive safeguards to make sure people ONLY engage with what they want are pretty key values to the abusive incest pornfic community.

Do people write abusive incest pornfic in order to make other people think deeply about it and engage with the concept? I mean, not always, and I would venture to guess it's not usually the primary motivation, though I'd guess it's A motivation for more people than you'd imagine offhand. But here's the thing: the fact the primary motivation is different is exactly what creates so much engagement and propagates the thinky thoughts. Few people like to think upsetting thoughts for their own sake on their own free time. Making it play is how you get it out to a wide audience (and what I mean by it, let's just say, the topic as a whole); and yes, abusive incest pornfics don't usually have that wide an audience. What audience they do have benefits from them, though. (Shoutout to Lolita, which did and does have a pretty damn wide audience, and is an abusive incest pornfic if you don't squint too closely at definitions and authorial intent)

And if someone's reference pool is so shallow they don't pick up on the "bad" part where things are bad, well... honestly, the fic community is their best chance to mend this gap in education. Because people who are into writing about bad things often love to not spare any detail in rendering how bad they are. People have figured out they are in a cult from researching how to write about a cult for a fic before.

The purpose of art is play, and the effect of art is thinking.

Thank you for your time.

[deirdra-hearts-nadia]

I've been thinking about the fandom for The Arcana, and I have come to the conclusion that it's weird as hell. In my 20+ years participating in online fandom spaces, I've never seen a fandom quite like this one. I've seen drama, sure, but the core of most fandoms is a large community of people who love the same media and come together to celebrate it.

The Arcana fandom is not like that. From the very beginning we're more fractured, more factional, more fragile than most. You just have to look around at all the posts lamenting the death of the fandom every 2 weeks to see that something is really wrong here.

And I think a lot of it has to do with the nature of the canon. I am not saying this to criticize The Arcana, the devs, Dorian, or my fellow fans. I have just noticed that, as a piece of media, this game occupies a very unique space that is reflected in the way its fans interact with canon and with each other.

Welcome to the TED talk ain't none of y'all asked for.

Part of what makes this fandom unique is the evolution of fandom as a whole in the face of new types of media. As gaming becomes more mainstream and games themselves become more complex, the way we engage has necessarily changed in response.

Books/ movies/ shows are slightly more static in terms of canon than video games; canon is what it is and how you interact with what is there is largely to do with who you are. Everyone has the same base material to engage with, and that results in a certain amount of constancy. You can't interact with The Princess Bride in a way that changes the movie, only in ways that change your own perception. There isn't a whole lot of room for OCs without rewriting canon, so fans tend to consume OC-based fiction and art with the assumption that it's likely to be self-insert wish fulfillment fantasy time. That isn't always true, but there is a reason the term Mary Sue was coined.

Otome games and other choice-based video games make a very different fan environment, because the way you interact with canon is completely different. You have to build a character in order to interact with the story, and your choices directly impact your experience of canon.

But most western choice-based games are in the context of a larger RPG universe, e.g. Fallout or Dragon Age. There is a lot more to the story than the romance plot and so there's a lot more world to experience, contextualize, and build upon. There's certainly plenty of unhinged ShepxGarrus erotica, but there's also an abundance of fanworks that engage with the plot, the worldbuilding, and the canon characters with relatively little of the player's character needing to be on the page at all.

By contrast, most otome games that make it to English-speaking fandom spaces are Japanese. The romance is the point, but we also start from a place of wariness of our fellow fans. Because there's a huge difference between "harmless weeb" and "orientalist fetishizing creepo," and you know going in that both ends of the spectrum are possible, there is an amount of caution. We curate our space, looking for the creators who align with our expectations and values before we ever begin to interact.

The Arcana falls in a very unique and odd space because it is an otome, but made by Americans, with an attempt at a diverse fantasy cast. It's intended to be for American/ English-speaking audiences and is marketed as such. But making a romance game in America is challenging. Our way of approaching online media, especially smartphone-accessible media, is super fucked up, right? We are constantly trapped between the dichotomies of moral duty (Must Protect The Children) versus appealing to the customer base (Boom Anime Babes with Tig Ol Bitties). Because this is a mobile game, the developers can't make money if the game is removed from the app store, so they want it to be rated teen at the most. But the enticing bit, the thing that captures a potential fan's attention, is the flirtation and sexy implications. So from the jump they're in a weird space purely because they chose to make a mobile game instead of an indie video game released on Steam or similar.

So now you have an inherently split audience: mature adults who know they're getting into a potentially explicit romance game, and young adults/teens who have grown up in a more insulated internet culture where normal words are replaced with Orwellian doublespeak, like "unalive" and "spicy time".

THEN you add in the fact that the developers tried to build a diverse fantasy world, which is a fantastic idea both from an inclusionary standpoint and a broader audience standpoint. But because they didn't employ any actual sensitivity readers (did they think they didn't need them because fantasy can't have racism? Did they justify it as not being in the budget? Would love to know what's going on there) they fell right into a lot of the classic traps. We've been over these time and again, so I won't get into them here. Suffice to say, there has been Discourse. The presence of those issues means that more experienced fans will see those things and call them out, and that criticism causes even more of a split: the zealous apologists versus the critics. And critics can fall into two further categories: those who love the canon and want to see it do better, and the bitches who just love having something to bitch about.

Unfortunately, this combination means that there are inherently factions to this fandom, with staunchly opposed approaches to the media. So even before you enter a fandom space, it's already wildly fractured simply because of the nature of base canon.

THEN add to that the fact that this game is a dating sim. And to engage with a dating sim, you have to build a character and make choices based on that character. Some people will approach this work as storytelling, and some will approach it as an escapist expression of self. Neither of these ways of engaging with canon is wrong. Enjoying a dating sim as Me But Better is fun and completely valid! Engaging with a dating sim as a storyteller collaborating with the developers is fun and completely valid! But the two approaches are opposed in purpose, and that can make it difficult for the two types of fans to engage with one another's work.

Storytellers will well and truly invest in building a character. They may even build out communities, countries, cultures, and languages to make their world all the richer. They are investing hours of blood, sweat, and tears into Their Craft, pouring themselves into an opus of quality fanwork. Unfortunately, this can sometimes lead to big feelings. Fan artists and writers may feel underappreciated if all they get out of their hard work is 2 likes and a gif of a wolf making AWOOGA eyes. They may feel that critique of their work is unwarranted, or that there's no point creating if no one will engage.

The romantics will engage with canon and fanwork from the perspective that "this is my fantasy romance time". Their OC isn't so much Original Character as Optimized Characteristics--that is, their perfect self. They are here for wish fulfillment fun times in the relative privacy and anonymity of the internet, and good for them! But that may mean that criticism of canon or their fan work feels excessively personal--it is very hard to detach the ego from the OC when that OC is a projection of your best self. They may view any critique as a personal attack as opposed to a good-faith attempt at engagement or conversation. This can lead to defensiveness, or to leaving the fandom outright if it feels too hostile.

Unfortunately all of these factions cause rifts in the community. This sometimes turns into fandom vigilantism, where people begin to see any fan who doesn't wholeheartedly agree with them as an enemy. I've seen friends experience bullying and cruelty over their OCs and their art. I've seen predators use the isolated nature of the fandom to further isolate and prey upon already vulnerable individuals. I've seen some really shitty stuff.

But I have also seen beautiful community flourish. I've made friends who feel more like family than my actual relatives. I've seen people work through struggles and overcome deliberate attempts to tear us apart, finding forgiveness and friendship along the way. I've seen myself and others grow because of the community and inspiration we found here. And I saw all of that because I found my people. And I hope, Arcana fandom, that the rest of you can find your people too.

[justsumtransdude2000]

hot take but you guys care too fucking much about how queer people look to non-queer people and it shows in the inter community discourse. like, the he/him lesbian thing (which was kind of terf-y im sorry im sorry im sorry) i felt was less about queer people being upset about the 'rules' of a label being defied and more about certain gay people being upset at how the defying of that label made the queer community look, because if labels aren't extremely strict that means there aren't rules, because the queer community's substitute for rules is labels, and if there aren't rules we aren't like the cis straights, and if we look to dissimilar from them and then we can't sit at their table for lunch! like whether you'd like to admit it or not cis straight people (regardless of 'ally status' because honestly I don't think any straight cis people are genuine allies to this community) are kind of the enemy when it comes to queer rights because there is no differentiation between the good cis straight people - the 'allies' - and the bad ones - the ones who actively campaign against us - because everyone has led them to believe the queer community is something we are not, so 'allies' allyship only extends so far (only extends to binary trans people, or people who 'pick a side' or normal trannies - did I say that? I meant trans people!). like you guys are watering the entire community down for the enemy!

[gaylactic-fire]

It's 2025 and Tumblr still hasn't learned from ace discourse

[dipperscavern]

Okay, I'm not into Jace, and I also write experianced Robb, but here me out:

Robb being a virgin makes more sense, since he grew up raised by Ned and Catelyn. He's taught to respect honour both his own and other womens, considering in the books he marries Jeyne to protect *her* honour, not his own. So, him being a virgin makes more sense because he wouldn't want to put women in that situation at that point in his life, and is fine saving his own for his future wife.

Jace, grew up with literally no boundries about relationships. His father might not be his father, because hes pretty sure his mother was actually banging the commander of the city watch but he doesnt know if his father knows or if hes supposed to know. But then his supposed father "dies" and its rumoured to be by his mother and her uncle so that they could then marry right away.

Jace did not grow up with the boundries about love and marriage and honour. He just logically is more likely to not be a virgin because he didn't have good role models growing up in regards to sexual relationships. But Robb did, so he'd be more likely to not sleep with someone before he was married or willing to marry them.

I mean, my Robb fucks don't get me wrong, but logically, I think Jace not being a virgin makes more sense considering he did not have a stable example to grow up following in regards to that sort of thing.

Robb grew up valuing honour and seeing a happy, loving marriage between his mother and father. He had the better role models to value his own virtue and other womens virtues in regards to premarital sex. Jace did not.

Just my two cents.

u summed up my thoughts so well it’s crazy. i just didn’t wanna start virgin jace discourse again 😭

robb was raised with ned & cat as example, and the starks are inherently respectful — ned’s parenting of honor aside. he seems like the type to save himself for his future wife. he was raised as heir to winterfell, he knew he’d have to marry eventually anyways, and that’s just duty. it’s not even mentioning his character and the way his parents raised him

rhaenyra has pretty much excused all of her sons actions/enforced no boundaries (aemond losing his eye example A), and that combined with his parentage discourse definitely makes me think jace would have experience. he’s a prince, he’d never be denied, and he’s never been taught anything different 🤷‍♀️

[sketchehm]

(Ty to DteamLatam)

[comfortingevanbuckley]

I think it is important to remember as 8B comes back that Buck's arc is still his. There seems to be this sharp divide over how his arc is seen based on who you ship and Buck has really gotten lost in his arc entirely. Ship who you like, but remember his arc is not a path for another character's journey and they can still co-exist based on what they mean in terms of his arc.

Whether or not you ship Buddie, Eddie's arc is still his own and Buck's arc is still his own. I've seen suggestions that Buck realized he had feelings for Eddie in the final scene of 8x08 (which was literally written into a best of 2024 article in Us Weekly that I saw with my own eyes so I know people think that) but we do not know that FOR SURE.

So please remember when the show comes back, this is not something that is a sure thing. Buck's feelings about Eddie moving is not necessarily romantic and Eddie's arc is not centered around Buck and vice versa. Headcanon it all you want, but don't get mad if it doesn't turn out that way.

If we're lucky enough to get Tommy back, then Tommy's arc is also still his, but he is still part of Buck's journey since he was so integral to Buck as a character. And while there is discussion to be had over how we can see him continue to grow past the person he used to be, there is also no reason to go so far that we headcanon an entirely new character to find reasons to hate him. Because no matter what, he is an important person to Buck's story.

I don't know, I just think that Buck has gotten lost on all sides of this and I want to make sure we remember who this is really about REGARDLESS of shipping. Thank you for coming to my TED talk.