#parasocial relationship gone wrong <3< /div> Explore tagged Tumblr posts

[waitineedaname]

cumplane fic recs please 🥺🥺

i actually have not read that many!! but i did go absolutely apeshit in the tag recently and added like forty fics to my "read later" so that'll probably change soon. but of the fics I have read in the past week or so, here are some ones I enjoyed!

I've got $400 and a really bad idea: I actually finished this one last night, and it was a delight! it's a classic fake dating premise, where shen yuan needs to bring a date to his brother's wedding that will convince his family to stop matchmaking him with people. I really love Shang Qinghua in this fic especially!

isn't it pretty to think: this is a series made of two oneshots! in the first one, SQQ gets hit with a wifeplot that involves a red string of fate, but that red string is not attached to Luo Binghe. the second fic in the series is my real favorite though -- I'm relieved I didn't find this fic until after I wrote my own "Binghe learns about the System through SQH's dreams" fic because oh my god I would've felt seriously outclassed. the way the dreams are described is SO creative, and the ending nearly made me cry while eating breakfast. that fic is what made me go absolutely nuts thinking about Airplane and Binghe recently and I still haven't recovered

Every Card in the Deck: this is a modern au "didn't realize they were dating" situation and it is. so funny. Shen Yuan I need to crack your head open and see what's going on in that brain of yours. the leaps in logic he takes here are absolutely incredible and I love him to bits. Shang Qinghua deserves an award for dealing with his nonsense.

Shang Qinghua’s Reincarnation Survival Guide: not technically cumplane, but also not... not cumplane? it's complicated. you should absolutely read it regardless because it's so good. it's a really creative take on the transmigration situation and a fascinating fusion of Shen Jiu and Shen Yuan. I wasn't sure how the "Shen Jiu and Shen Yuan are the same person" thing would go but it turned out really interesting. is it cumplane? is it scumplane? is it platonic? is it romantic? i have no idea but a second fic in the series was posted today and I'm so excited to read it

[dollypopup]

Yeah, just gonna say that this fandom needs to shut the fuck up about Luke Newton and his love life. He's a grown man who was seen with a grown woman, and his relationship has no bearing on his acting ability. The parasocial relationship has gone too far.

This fandom has harassed him and people around him, bullied his ex-gf openly, and have already been horrifically misogynistic to the woman he's rumored to be dating. I've literally seen people calling him a groomer as if this woman isn't grown af at a whole 23 goddamn years old. He is 31. Some of y'all need to log off the damn internet. It's clear people are just mad that he and Nicola aren't an item and that he can't live a life outside of this work and doesn't exist to please like a paper doll they can go 'now kiss!' about. He dedicated years to this production that we've consumed and handled it with more grace than most of us would.

India and Corey had chemistry and didn't need to be together to sell Queen Charlotte. Simone and JB had chemistry and didn't need to be together to sell Bton Season 2. And Luke Newton and Nicola Coughlan have chemistry and don't need to be together to sell Bton Season 3. He can have a fucking girlfriend if he wants, he has literally done NOTHING wrong, and some of y'all are acting like he punted your puppy in the Thames and personally insulted you to your face.

Let the man live.

[saytrrose]

So, If any anyone ask you..Why you like kinger?...I better expect from you to give a Most logical 56 hours lecture with Long emotional story and A most Beautiful Argument on it....:3,...."So why you like Kinger?"

Why does one like anything?

There’s the relatability, his personality, his flaws and imperfections, his voice, his appearance, his judgements and interactions, and so on.

Why do you like your favorite characters?

To me, he’s simply someone who I really wish existed. He brings me an indescribable sense of comfort, he’s a goofy older man that is able to be genuinely kind and serious and helpful when the time calls for it. Hes funny, and makes me feel safe.

I grew up with my only parental figure ever being my dad, my biological mother was a monster and my stepmother is also horrible. He reminds me of my dad when I was little and was my only sense of support before I became an older teenager and adult where then, my dad changed and is emotionally unavailable to me and treats me differently.

I never connected with my distant family or siblings or anyone except my dad- not even close friends in my personal life so he brings me a sense of familiarity to my life that I have not had in a very long time.

Maybe comparing him to a parental figure is weird considering how much I am head over heels for him, but to be completely honest with you, I have a lot of trauma stemming around affection and what is romantic, familial, sexual, etc. I’ve said it before, but I have a hefty list of sexual trauma starting when I was around 6 years old, never ending until around 17.

I don’t know exactly why I’m sharing that, I guess it’s just a sort of needed for me to express and explain why I specifically find him attractive- I’ve been through.. things that make any parental/older figure invoke attractiveness to me but sjdjdj anyway

He reminds me of the one sense of support system I had when I was unaware of the innocence I was supposed to have and what was wrong and right- when I didn’t have any responsibilities and I didn’t comprehend that my childhood was stolen from me 👍

He’s my favorite character because he’s part of my biggest hyperfixation in the current moment, and he fits the criteria of what comforts me.

My life has actually gotten really bad, I’m also currently in my lowest moment right now and I’m struggling with.. everything hshsh so I have been using him as my only support system, and because he’s the only thing that’s been keeping me really happy, giving me serotonin and such I’ve developed a very personal relationship to him, a parasocial one. It’s gotten to an unhealthy standpoint with my obsession and I acknowledge that but I also don’t see any reason in correcting my behavior around him due to it being my ONLY coping mechanism at the moment.

Sorry for the giant long ramble, my past and experiences and everything I have gone through play a very huge role into how much Kinger means to me and how much I hold him dearly.

I just latched onto him more than anyone or anything else to give myself a false sense of stability

[aintmyjewelry]

hi! could you explain what the love/hate gloves are? if you feel like it <3

hello!!!! of course I can <3

ok this one is a little bit more sad than the butterfly mural but still an insane part of time in the Swiftie History Books. I also had to do a little bit more research on it because i vaguely remember this part of time like idk why but it was a blur. I'll link my sources at the end!

a lot of the posts, photos, etc. from this time are like almost completely gone, except for the glove photo lmao

ANYWAYS

so to set the stage, it's 2015. taylor had been on tumblr for a while now and interacting a lot with fans both online and in person. following the 1989 secret sessions, we saw a lot more of taylor sending gifts to fans (eventually we got Swiftmas from this), following/replying to fans on tumblr, etc. she was like such a big part of the community in ways outside of just being the celebrity we all loved. she genuinely felt like a friend (and this was before we really knew the concept of parasocial relationships lmao)

so, as taylor got to know us online she also would get to know online fans in person. this included seeing that fans were at events and award shows and actually making it a point to seek them out. that was sort of the start of the domino effect for what would eventually become the love/hate glove situation.

I believe it was at the Brit Awards where taylor met and took a photo with a certain fan. I do not want to name them here bc I don't know them, I never interacted with them, I never saw anything, etc. But this fan she had, from my understanding, went out of her way to take a photo with was known for being just nasty online (on tumblr, in particular, i believe). The fan would bully other fans in some pretty disgusting ways and was just genuinely not a good person

It also didn't help that taylor had sent this fan a Valentine's Day gift just a few weeks earlier. This person had the full love and support of taylor despite being a gross human online.

naturally, swifties got VERY upset with this. and rightfully so. many fans started sharing their experienced with the fan in question and i think even twitter swifties got involved and started calling out taylor and i think even calling for her to quit tumblr (I'm not sure if this stems from them having experiences with this fan or if they were just annoyed taylor was on tumbr lmao). Also in my research I just learned that the hashtag "#SwiftiesWantTaylorSwiftDead" started trending but idk what the HELL that's about!!

Flash forward a few days I think and taylor is beginning to elude to taking a social media break. this did send some fans into a frenzy mhm bc of course dfjalsfjlkj some people's only business on this sight was trying to get noticed by taylor and weave their way into her group of favorites LMAO

and a lot of people began really coming to taylor's defense and that turned into them defending the bully fan. it got really divided!! I honestly think this was her first swiftie community controversy since joining tumblr

but it was, you know, a genuine concern for most fans that people could be like "taylor this person is very mean we don't think you should give them your attention they don't deserve it" and have taylor just ignore it or, as her tumblr likes eventually showed, want to move on. but we have we seen that behavior again recently

so, in the midst of all this shit online, taylor decides to take to instagram to post this photo with the caption: choose the right one <3

all hell breaks loose. people were like ???? what the hell??? it genuinely felt like taylor was taking the side of the bully fan and ignoring the victims. it was SO weird and hurtful for people to see. it was like she just didn't get it or didn't want to think she could do something wrong.

this ended up with a lot of uproar and eventually the bully fan did come out to apologize and explain his actions in a giant tumblr post. and even the victims began worrying about what they had done and had made taylor feel. and the main fan who had called out the bully fan was getting some unsavory comments directed toward her. this probably should've been when people noticed how peculiar her relationship with fans was getting

however, eventually this all trickled down and everyone did end up moving on. now The Gloves get posted at the most random times and have become almost a ridiculous joke in the fandom lmao it was a whirlwind and really only was the beginning for taylor on tumblr!

---

*source 1 - this source has some screenshots from this time

*source 2

(they aren't the most reliable sources but sorry there are no published journal articles on this situation lmao)

[struggle-but-its-all-ocean-floor]

Sorry this turned more into me venting than a question lol. Your blog just kinda feels like a safe space 🙃

My appreciation for jungkook has grown so much this year. I've just never seen an idol genuinely care and appreciate his fans the way jk does. I know he goes above and beyond, so what he does shouldn't be expected... but I can't help but feel a bit disappointed that no other member has gone live. Maybe it'll change in the next few hours, but if it doesn't, then it just sucks because don't they want to say goodbye to us? We're not gonna see them for 18 months :( I know they did the group live but it was so chaotic 😅 I would think they might want to do a solo one to just say everything that's on their mind like jungkook did. I know a lot of people have been coming for jk about parasocial relationships and whatnot, but I honestly believe it goes both ways. Like you could just feel how much he cares by the way he stops and makes sure to greet and bow at every fan or the way he always rolls down his car window no matter what (even when we don't deserve it). I've seen how other idols sometimes just walk past fans/crowds without a glance. Jk comes on lives just to chat with us, while other idols usually only go on when they're promoting. Jungkook isn't my bias, so maybe that's why I'm feeling a bit hurt and jealous lol... how are you handling the enlistment news?

Thanks! My blog is always a safe space for asks like these! <3

It's true that Jungkook has really connected with Army this year. He's always loved us, but I think now he feels so much more confident being himself around us and has developed the kind of relationship he wants with us, so he's much more comfortable going live. Maybe before negative comments affected him more, and he was careful in what he said or did, but now that he can shrug off the haters and be himself fully, I think he's gotten closer to us and our relationship has improved! I think Armys really became friends to Jungkook in a way we weren't before. But maybe I'm wrong. I've only been Army since 2019, and the COVID era was an anomaly. Jungkook also had more free time to go live in the beginning of the year compared to before.

But, yeah, all the other members went live! Jimin went live for a short while, I think V went live too (I'm not sure), but he shared many pics and goodbye letters so that was enough! I'm not sure if RM went live but I think he might've a while back. He shared so many pics, letters, song recs, etc. though - his goodbye letter was so Namjoon and more than enough... I think they all said goodbye. Jimin probably did the least, but since he doesn't seem to take pics and doesn't know what to say during lives, I think he went more quietly.

The parassocial accusations for Jungkook are pure bullshit. Kpop stans need to unlearn that word. That man has drawn clear limits - he's told stalkers off multiple times, said fans need to deal if he does something they don't want even though he understands everyone likes different things (ie. Seven explicit lyrics) - so I don't get why JK calling Armys his girlfriends (usually when they ask) or talking about how much he loves us is such a big deal. I'm sure if any fan seriously told him not to date someone because Army was his girlfriend, he'd tell them off politely.

I think people just want to assume the worst of Jungkook. And kpop stans sadly hate other stans so they can never understand the idea of an idol genuinely liking their fans...

Anyway, I thought I was going to be so heartbroken when Jungkook left but I'm too sick (with the flu) and busy with work to process it. I still can't believe Suga is enlisted... He went so quietly it feels like he's just in one of his phases where he goes off the grid lmao.

Tbh, even with Jin and Hobi, though I miss Jin especially, what I miss most is the group and not any individual member. I'll miss Jungkook a lot though for sure - just not now.

BTS is all enlisted... There is no BTS now... They'll come back in two years... I think it's too early for us to process what this means. For the next few months nothing much will change. We already have content lined up. But somewhere down the line, it'll hit us more.

Thanks for the ask! How are you coping with the enlistment?

[allamericansbitch]

So you can either ignore this whole ask or only answer certain aspects because I totally get if you don't want to.

While you were gone/your inbox was closed, there were ofc (as always) a lot of things happening in the fandom and there aren't many blogs line you that have constructive criticism (someone who can criticise taylor when it's due but not blame her for unnecessary things) so all the blogs and in general everywhere I was on (tiktok, twitter, etc) was either completely babygirling taylor for her actions or hating her for every single breath she was taking. So I have some following things that happened in the last two weeks and if you'd like to, I'd love to hear your honest opinion on them and if you think criticising taylor for these things is valid.

1. "Taylor is a mean girl because she dragged Lana on the stage when she won aoty and made fun of her since she was nominated in the same category."

2. Taylor's gonna bash/drag the hell out of Joe in the new album. It's unfair when she names songs like 'So long London' when he was there for her when the whole world hated her."

3. "Taylor (apparently) smoking at the superbowl after party in the club while she knew people were recording her is so irresponsible and she's such a bad role model for young girls when she smokes in public"

Please don't feel pressured to reply to all of these and if it makes you uncomfortable, dont reply at all :) Love you <3

I think this is fine to answer because tbh i think all of this is pointless and has no merit.

it bothers me more that taylor is friends with lana, who's a zionist and racist (also other things), and actively praised her during her speech. i feel like that's the issue people should've focused on.

Taylor has every right to write about her life and going through a breakup of a 6+ year relationship is hard for anyone, so of course she's gonna cope with it the way she knows best which is through writing. the real issue is how the fans act/react to it. they act like her emotions are just 'tea' and that they should fight anyone who does her wrong, just overall being incredibly immature and disrespecting her art and craft. it's one thing to listen to the album (what we assume it'll cover topic-wise) and be like 'oh this is why the relationship ended, this is how she felt at certain moments and im sure he also has his side', that's healthy and mature... it's another thing to be like 'he never valued her, he was terrible, joe is a terrible person i cant believe him she's so innocent and hurt' and that's the way it's probably gonna go, just immature mindsets, making blind and harmful assumptions, infantilizing her and her role in the breakup, diminishing her songwriting to map out a relationship no one truly knows about, and never actually will. they disguise their behavior as analyzing her art when in reality they're just analyzing gossip and reducing her art to feed their parasocial behavior.

she's a grown woman who can do as she pleases, there are way more important things to be angry about, from her own actions that are actually serious to just around the world.

[wattpadscapcons]

Thinking about completely restarting my account or just permanently moving to my alt and just doing the requests there. I literally almost have the same amount of posts as I do followers and it's overwhelming.

I could restart so easilyyyyyy! It's so tempting. And don't get me wrong when I say "restart" I don't mean deleting this account. Not that I hadn't thought about that before either with the way some people behave online.

Though I know either way that I'll have to update my DNI and make it clearer bc I've like... been triggered quite a few times this week alone? If you're going to follow me and still disrespect me that's fine, but triggering me? Ohhhh nooo, no, no, no, no, no, I won't put up with that shit.

=

Plus ppl have been like lowkey kinda just bothering me w/ the way they act??? Like I get when you make content other people like and become popular for that you can fall victim to parasocial relationships or idolization but I find that so dumb. Like, I'm a person, not some celebrity? Hello?? So to everyone who's been "afraid to talk to me" or suddenly pop up in my dms with no prompt (and have interacted with me less than 3 times in any setting) + have no interest in talking to me past the point of like sending those spam chainmail things that are all like "send this to [#] of people who made you happy this month" can you like....stop?

It's honestly really discouraging to think that someone from the fandom is messaging me just to give me some spam.

=

It'd be different if someone came into my dms and was all like: "Hey I really like your work/I find your work to be inspiring/It makes me really happy whenever you post about [character] bc I love them sm and the way you write them is comforting/whatever etc!" That actually starts a conversation, gives me feedback on my work, and overall creates more mutuals for me to just interact with.

Tagging me in those like "create your character" threads bugs me too bc I've already told people NOT to tag me in those and I guess some people missed that memo? I mean I know a lot of you interact that way for like fun, but I'm just not into that. You can talk to me in the comments or you can yell at me in the dms. Reblogging is for starting fights and sharing other people's art/writings/edits/articles/videos.

And don't come in here being all like "well I like your stuff all the time isn't that enough??" like that only tells me you bookmarked my work. That doesn't tell me that you actually enjoyed the piece & aren't just looking to make fun of me on some secret discord group chat or something. How do I know you even read what I wrote if you're in here just liking several of my posts and then never interact with my blog again?

=

And god forbid someone not want to interact with me bc of my age, WHY ARE YOU EVEN FOLLOWING ME THEN??? I get it, I must be a dinosaur to some of you. Respect your own DNI! Or even better yet, they don't agree with the people I'm friends with, like I have any affect one what they do with their time.

Give me back my anons that would just send in asks just to say hello or check up on me. This isn't fun anymore. I feel like every time I've talked about this stuff before it's gone totally under the radar.

'People don't care about what you think outside of your fandom writings blah blah blah.' I have the right to be sensitive here. I have the right to feel how I do. If you guys don't give a damn about me, my opinions, and my feelings then just unfollow me right now bc I honestly don't need that in my life.

[kazhan]

I'll be honest anon, I think popularity and BNFs cause more harm than good, for everyone in the fandom.

Being in the spotlight and "worshipped" is a potentially dangerous spot to be in because one wrong move can turn crowds against you and said wrong move doesn't have to be much ("Oh wow, I can't believe X ships [insert potentially "controversial" ship]", we've all seen it); it creates those parasocial relationships that shouldn't be a thing in fandom because we're all really just a bunch of nerds enjoying the same thing; I also think it literally kills creativity in the fandom and makes things boring too (BNF makes headcanon popular, now everyone is using the same to the point where people can't even tell it's not canon and if you don't use that headcanon, things can go from people not interacting with your stuff at all to people hating on you and your ideas).

And guess what, it also makes people think that if they write something that doesn't follow the current fandom trend, it'll automatically crash and burn.

You don't know that it will. Your "unpopular" idea might be something people have been desperate to finally read, it might make people go "oh wow, this is different, I like it". Sure, it might only be a handful of people, but that doesn't mean you failed, or that you could have "done better" if you'd gone with the popular idea.

Yeah, it sucks when you pour so much into a fic and end up with little to no engagement, but there's a difference between being a BNF and just some dude who gets a decent amount of engagement. I think wanting to be "(one of) the most popular writer/artist" of one's fandom is not something to aim for and if that's the goal then you should definitely take a step back to examine where this is coming from, but wanting to form precious connections with others, to get some positive feedback and all that? That's normal and no one can blame you for that, but please, don't let it stop you from writing about things you enjoy.

Honestly, I think being different where people tend to all use the same tropes, headcanons, characterizations, is a strength and something to be proud of.

Is it easy? No. Is it okay to wish you could work with those popular ideas most people seem to be into, or that your ideas were the popular ones? Yeah, totally (something something they don't know my blorbo like I do). It can take a while to finally feel confident enough in your capabilities and your ideas to be able to say "what I create isn't for everyone and that's okay".

Maybe it's only for you and the 3-4 freaks who will comment on it, but those are what you're looking for, they're the people who will make writing and fandom fun, because you'll be true to yourself and they'll love you and your ideas for it.

Don't let the numbers ruin your creativity.

It's not an easy journey, it can even be a painful one, but your uniqueness is someone's oasis in the desert that fandom can be, and that's pretty fucking cool, actually.

TL;DR: fuck fandom trends, popular tropes and headcanons and ships and characterizations. Don't be boring, write your weird/unpopular/freaky little fics for the other little fandom freaks who will thank you because FINALLY, some good fucking food.

my biggest obstacle as a writer is that i desperately want to be a popular and well-known fic author, but my main fic inspiration comes from characters most fans don’t want to read fic for, or ideas that go against popular fanon/characterization and so are doomed from the start. i end up feeling paralyzed and like i can’t write the unpopular ideas I want to write, because i hate knowing i could have done better by writing something with broader appeal. but whenever i try to write solely for numbers i lose motivation while the halfway through the fic. so i end up unable to write anything and feeling miserable because of it.

i want to see my unpopular ideas come to life, but i don’t want to see my fics crash and burn and keep missing the chance to create fic that people really love. so most times, i don’t write anything, but i hate that i’m so hamstrung by my own anxieties. i so desperately wish i could create one of those extremely well-known long fics that most people love and always rec everywhere, but i feel like i’m completely incapable of that. i know i should be writing for myself, but i’m greedy and want results and for people to like my fic, however unlikely that is. wanting to write my ideas but knowing i’ll limit my audience if i do is something that’s constantly on my mind. do you have any advice for me?

My biggest question after reading your ask is simply: why?

You're very clear about wanting to be a popular writer. You want to write a fic that lots of people talk about, and you want people to know who you are. Have you examined that desire at all?

You say that the things you actually want to write are not the things that will make you a popular author. That means you have a choice:

write things you don't care about with no guarantee of becoming that Big Name Fan or

write things you love and enjoy spending time writing and know that BNF status will probably never happen.

Writing fanfic is really not a great way to try to become popular. It's an even worse way to try to become "famous" in any kind of way. So dig into what it is that you hope to get from the "broader audience" that you could appeal to by writing something you don't really like.

Are you trying to get a feeling of being liked? Respected? Looked up to? Do you want to be someone other fans look to for advice or for setting the tone of the fandom? Do you want love? Power? Some kind of community connection? Recognition of the effort you put into your works?

Some of those things likely will require you to pretend to be someone you're not. You might even manage to write that one big fic that gets thousands of comments and tons of people talking about it on tumblr (or wherever else you care about, social media-wise).

Others you can probably still get by writing your "unpopular" ideas but seeking out your fellow fans. It will take more legwork to find them and you'll need to be willing to be the first one to reach out for a conversation, but it can definitely be done.

I'll leave it up to you to decide what you actually want, anon. But take your time and scrape off the top layer of shiny thoughts about popularity first. Then you'll be able to see what's underneath.

[wirewitchviolet]

Twitter is absolutely dying and that is an unambiguously good thing.

For those who somehow missed it (which I doubt because hey you’re looking at Tumblr again, Elon Musk recently bought Twitter and seems to be doing some kind of speedrun for how quickly he can burn the whole site to the ground and salt the earth so nothing will grow there again. From where I sit it looks like half the userbase has already jumped ship, plus all the advertisers, so, yeah, probably dead by the end of the year. Consequently I’m seeing a ton of people posting various reasons they think this is a great and terrible tragedy and... basically I just want to quickly run down why all of these are wrong and/or deeply selfish.

News

So let’s start with the biggest and most obvious example. People are lamenting how Twitter is such a great way to stay on top of current events and always be informed about everything that’s happening.This is so wildly untrue I want to slap people. Stuff does indeed get shared around twitter super fast, but actual factual useful information kinda never does? Like, nobody ever fact-checks a damn thing, or takes a good look at the source of something. Every day I’m seeing people who should know better because it is literally their job to know better retweeting straight up nazi propaganda from accounts which if you take a look at them for 3 seconds are literally nothing but bigoted hatemongering. People pass around links to news articles, but the article is always A- behind a paywall, and B- given a profoundly misleading headline, frequently saying the exact opposite of what the actual article says, and people will routinely read the headline only, or not even read the headline, just the often disingenuous framing of whoever wrote it. People will form lynch mobs against totally innocent people at the drop of a hat, sometmes because someone is spreading straight up lies, sometimes because a comment about one situation goes viral and the way it’s wording it plausibly fits in another unrelated conversation about a completely different person, or it mentions someone with a similar name to someone else, and everyone starts shooting first and asking questions later.

And that’s not even getting into the way Twitter has completely destroyed the ability of basically every journalist on the site to actually do their jobs anymore. Somehow it became this expectation that if you report the news, you have to live on twitter, scooping up everything getting any buzz as it happens. And also doing your socialization there, and invariably getting swept up in gossip and cattiness and straight up neo-nazi propaganda, and after a while the lines between the three blur away completely for basically everyone. Look how many “news articles” are literally just someone pasting the last 20 tweets on their feed into a template and posting it. Look at how many reporters get into these weird parasocial relationships and sic their followers on people who disagree with their takes on things, or just start hunting people for sport. Hell, look at how basically every single member of the press in England managed to get recruited into a dangerous bloody-minded transphobic cult and literally no longer talk about anything else in any situation. None of these people cover news anymore, they’re just mentally back in high school sharing gossip or worse. Pull the plug for them, kick everyone who’s clearly too far gone to ever come back to the curb, and let’s go back to people actually researching stories, writing something coherent, editing it, fact checking it, and putting it into print.

Friends

A whole lot of people say Twitter is how they keep in touch with all their friends and... again, probably the worst possible way you could do that? Getting Twitter to display posts from everyone you care about instead of whatever random crap it feels like throwing at you is kind of a huge pain in the ass, and even when you go to the trouble it routinely just... drops messages. Like if you do the list feed thing, and eve if you individually load all your friends profiles up one by one, read everything from the past day, and hit reload, you’d be surprised how many things will appear or disappear because the software does not at all reliably fetch everything. And they’ll do weird shadowbans or have netsplits and just blank out entire people, incoming tagged messages only get logged for like a day or two at best, sometimes just a few hours, sometimes never at all. Direct messages are a massive memory leak and bad about showing when there’s updates. Plus you know, personally speaking half the people I know have formally left the site so far. You are far far better off if you keep in touch with everyone you care about through Discord, or Slack, or Skype or IRC or VR Chat or Second Life or really like anything that has ever existed as a means of getting some arbitrary number of people into a shared space that live-updates whatever people type into a feed. Way better archiving too. Or you know, there’s blogs. You’re reading one.

All the Things in One Place

I wish I still had the quote but I saw someone all waxing romantic about how looking at his twitter feed he got live news updates, AND people making dumb jokes, AND getting on the ground POV reports on life in Uganda or whatever, “all in one app.” And... OK so this was just a guy admitting to having a serious social media addiction. Like all the stuff I mentioned above will also give you that variety of info. Just get in a big discord with a lot of friends or on a webforum or something. Or look at youtube now and then. If you’re on the internet in the year 2022, trust me, ALL THE THINGS will be shoved at you constantly, that is in no way unique to Twitter.

Verification

Before this stupid $8 thing, some folks claim, Twitter verification was the clear way to tell if someone really was who they say they are and a way to tell who to take seriously. No, no it really wasn’t. If that were actually true, literally anyone would be able to get the little verified sticker just by proving to the company that they are who they say they are, but what they actually had was an incredibly prejudiced and politicized system where regardless of one’s notoriety, it was exceptionally rare for any woman in any field to get verified, and random nazi propaganda accounts would routinely be granted them. The whole $8 free for all is plainly worse, sure, but it never guaranteed accurate info and was pretty plainly used to marginalize people with some weird arbitrary haves and have nots deal.

I’ve similarly seen people expressing shock at how abuse reports about people posting “kill all the Jews” or whatever have been coming back saying “we reviewed this post and found no violation of the rules” and like... that’s actually what has always happened when you file a report. I guess some people are only just trying it for the first time now, or whoever made sure to actually look at reports from a handful of noteworthy people by hand got fired.

Self-Promotion/Begging

A friend just a little bit ago expressed a concern about how there’s a whole swath of the population whose basic survival depends on people making patreon donations or whatever and Twitter is the only real viable place for rattling the ol’ can. Same boat for freelance artists putting it out there that they’re open for commissions. Her concern was when the site fully goes under, or just from all the people who have already abandoned it, such people won’t be able to make ends meet.

Now, that one is a valid concern. I’m such a person myself, here’s my Patreon. It’s my sole source of income. It’s been my sole source of income for a few years now, and yeah, Twitter is the only place I really plug it. But here’s the thing. Twitter is also the place where malicious scumbags routinely organize efforts to convince anyone who gives money to me to cut me off, where they hunt donors down and harass them, and where they organized all the smear campaigns that burned down all my professional contacts and completely destroyed my ability to ever find actual work again. It’s been on a steady decline for years, and every time I really start desperately begging and get it up a few dollars, another character assassination sends me two steps back. And Twitter’s algorithms down rank any such links to boot. So... honestly as things stand I am going to be living on the street before the end of the year if I don’t have some sort of sudden windfall and I don’t think twitter dying is going to have any particular impact on the speed where that happens. I’m officially out of savings this month, just scraped out what’s left to pay my rent, and my projected donations are $500 short. I’m dead either way, but seriously, the vector for hate outways the vector for begging by far.

So yeah. Watch the whole site burn, watch the scumbag who bought it lose all the money he spent, celebrate, avoid any urge to create some sort of replacement, just go back to forums and chats. You’ll be happier, healthier, and better informed.

Oh and here’s that link again if you want to maybe help me live through the end of the year or whatever.

[freakygirlie]

well hello everyone! how are y’all holding up??

it’s been a painful couple of days and all of us have been through quite a rollercoaster myself included. plenty has occurred and as of now things have calmed a bit down. I have too and I have several thoughts regarding of what happened and I want to talk about it. About j2, perfect relationships, PR, what happened then and what happened after and how we progress from here on.

there’s no denying what happened was painful and shitty. there’s also no denying that the entire event brought out to the front that quite a lot of us idolized j2′s relationship a lot. we put it on a high pedestal, many of us have the tendency to do that. the thing is in the past 16 years, 99% of what we have seen between j2 has always been <3. we’ve seen the highs and this was the first time we saw quite a low. none of us expected it. and when it happened we were left shocked. for a lot of people this has destroyed that ‘’perfect j2′’ image. it has changed the way people see them now. and in my opinion, that is what lingers now. the fandom and their feelings on this situation. i know. i know some of us are hurt, angry, disappointed and deeply upset. and all of that is valid, but now it us up to us to work through this. we got caught up in this situation because we love j2, we love their relationship. but while this took place in public and over a public platform, it wasn’t about us to begin with. this was a private matter between the j’s and it is up to them to resolve this, something I believe wholeheartedly they are doing. and with this i also want y’all to remember: we do not know what happened behind the scenes. we do not know what took place behind the screen. it is very clear that there is more. more at play than we know/can see, and more people involved in this. the situation is more complicated than what we can comprehend. however that doesn’t erase the fact that what happened was shitty and something that shouldn’t have. and that’s the thing about humans and relationships. real humans and real relationships. humans fuck up and sometimes we hurt the ones we love the most. relationships get tested then, they go through painful bumps and like Jared has said once: ‘’these are the moments you figure out if it’s worth it’’. and it’s very obvious that j2 have figured out it’s worth it. that they’re figuring it out and working through it. and well that makes the relationship even more significant, strong and deep right? that they go through struggles, and they put in the effort to work through it, BECAUSE they love each other so much? that’s what makes the bond stronger, when you come across obstacle and then you overcome them, together. j2 talked, and they’re resolving this. and i have faith that they will be okay. in fact that’s what i believe right now. I don’t think that they’re a 100% but that they’re working towards it. they’re Jared and Jensen! they’ve been through a whole fucking lot in their life, and I know they love each other and I know they will fight for each other.

Some of us had started to heal, after Jensen tweeted and then a few other things happened, such as Kripke, Kelli, Jensen tweeting again, and him out with The Boys cast and just recently Jared tweeting. Kripke deleted his tweets and then from Jensen’s account we got tweets regarding to the prequel. Which makes one thing very clear: After j2 resolved this somewhat over Twitter (mostly for our benefit and then have continued to resolve it in private, let’s be real here, we’re never going to hear the full story, and the whole matter and what not, because as a fandom that is all we were owed. this is up to j2 to work through which I’ve already said they will), and then Kripke deleted his tweets, Kelli deleted her tweets and tweets/articles regarding the prequel were sent out, this is what the PR strategy is right now. J2? resolving it. Now what to do we do? Pretend this never happened and continue moving on. J2 really need to get a better PR team. with that said the last three tweets, the Natalie Fisher qrt, and the other article ones, they weren’t Jensen. Jensen has never before tweeted multiple links to a project of his. It was PR. like I said: move on, and pretend it never occurred- that’s the PR strategy here. And then the Jensen at Erin’s birthday party happened. I am still not okay with what Jensen did, but let’s please be rational here. Every single cast member from above and beyond was over there. Jensen looked tired and like he was trying to have a good time. In that video of him singing, the video was barely over before he reached for his phone. Which makes me hmm, he could have been texting Jared for all we know, or sorting through this as best as he can. We have no idea the PR management pressure he’s under. And I’m not going to berate him for going to a co-worker’s birthday party. Lots of us have very different coping methods with dealing with shitty events.

Jared tweeted twice today. He’s always been a man driven by emotion, and over the years he’s expressed himself a lot publicly and with us(something he’s done because of Jensen’s help). When he had a bad birthday, he said it. When he had his breakdown, he asked for well wishes. When he didn’t know about the prequel and found out about it PUBLICLY, he reacted PUBLICLY. He shared his pain. I truly believe if somethin bad had broken here between j2 he would have said it. Instead he’s said he’s working it out with Jensen. ‘’once brothers, always brothers’’. <3 and he interacted and wished Felicia and a fellow fan ‘’happy birthday’’. That puts me at more ease, because it show that not only is he seeing our love, he’s also healing.

In the end, even the strongest and the most best relationships aren’t without their up and downs. What happened was out of character, and there’s more at play here. and we’ll most prolly never find out why. a lot of us want explanations, but that’s us and our parasocial relationships </3 in the end, it’s between j2 to work through because it’s their relationship and how they’re solving it is not for us to witness, they’re in uncharted waters, unfamiliar circumstances and distance is playing a big role in this. it’s terrible as hell but in my heart, I know they’ll be okay. They have been through worse, and they’ve always fought through it and have come out stronger in the end. They’ve never given up. And they won’t now. J2 will be okay. and I know all of us are wondering how Jared is doing particularly.

@/jarpackles is a trustworthy person, can confirm <33 whether you choose to believe this or not is up to you entirely. but like I said previously, Jared tweeting today makes me feel lighter.

~

I know for some of us that magic of j2 is gone. and i’m very sorry for that. but i hope you remember that one shitty fight does not remove 16 years of the love they’ve shared with each other and them. that them working through this and still being together, fighting for each other, is meaningful and makes their relationship that much more <3

heal. that means taking a step back, breathing, sorting your thoughts out, and patiently working through this. i’m here for all of you. take as long as you need. your feelings are valid, and this situation was scary so deal in the way you see best.

before i wrap it up: i am still a fan of jensen. i still love him. i acknowledge very well what he did wrong and i have no doubt he is making amends for it. there is no off button for my feelings :) and i’m still a hat, still a j2 lover.

Jensen and Jared will be okay. They’ve come too far to give up now and they love each other far too much for that. They are solving this and healing together. Bumps in the road happen but the truest and the best of all relationships are those that work through them. And that’s what our beloved j2 are doing.

❤️

[youtuberswithalex]

Alex, your message and every word you said in the video were absolutely valid criticism. You were clearly upset, but after your personal direct experience with the company, your feelings and the way you expressed them are also valid. I certainly understand taking a break from an exhausting fandom, pockets of which flat out refuse to engage in critical thinking skills and are warped in a parasocial relationship with a content creator they believe is their friend. I only hope this decision was solely your own and that you weren’t trolled into silence by gaslighters and bullies.

I got a fair amount of messages like this when I was gone. To each and every person who sent one, I just want to say... thank you.

I struggle a lot with allowing myself to be angry and upset. It’s a very deep-rooted thing in me that I need to work on, the idea that for me, “Angry” means “Wrong”. The backlash I got from expressing my emotions-- thankfully, not much on here, mostly on Youtube --did, in all honesty, push me into making the decision to abandon everything. But you know what? I’m allowed to be mad at the team. I don’t have to like them. And I’m allowed to express that online.

A lot of what I was upset about got taken way out of context, both by folks online and myself. The video I posted was only part of the reaction video I’d made, and I regret not waiting to edit the first half, where I talked about a lot of the other stuff I’m mad at Thomas and crew for. “Mr. Infodump” and “Cranic Attack” were far from the first things that pissed me off. It’s been a long time coming, a lot of frustrations that I bottled up in fear of the backlash that inevitably exploded like it did.

There’s so much with the fandom that I’m frustrated with, the biggest being the parasocial relationship you mentioned, Anon. Thomas is not our friend, and we’re not his. I don’t want to get too deep into it in this, since this reply is already getting pretty long, but... there’s a lot to talk about there.

Thank you again to those of you who sent your support. I really appreciate you all. <3

[momtaku]

not the same anon but i also have a culture question. In regards to the poll discourse (lol), I'm not saying people can't post salt or that people reading said salt can't respond to it. my question is, is it really that serious? like really. it genuinely baffles me. it's the same thing with ship hate or sending mean anon messages. does this plague people so severely they have to pick fights with others on the internet over it? why does fandom have this effect on people? psychologically speaking.

I’ve learned a lot about fandom culture this week from the poll discourse. The most important being that yes, it is serious.  After having many conversations, some comforting some damning, I think I want to address this.

First things first, if you read this post, read it closely. Think about it. Do not have a knee jerk reaction to it. And for the love of all things good in this world, DO NOT SEND HATE TO THE OP.

It’s going to be a long post, so consider these conditions seriously. If you agree, by all means, read on…

I was baffled by the poll post as well. I’ve been doing a monthly poll since chapter 87. That’s a year and a half and more time and energy than I care to admit. In my mind it was something like the Reddit SnK Status Chart, something cheeky, fun, off color at times, but a monthly highlight and tradition that many fans enjoy.

Fact 1: I was successful in this. The vast majority have loved the poll and appreciate the time and effort that has gone into it. It’s a monthly highlight for many people. Fact 2: The bulk of poll respondents are from reddit and discord servers where I am a nobody.Fact 3: It has alienated and angered some people. The OP being one of those people but she is not alone.

I’m going to link to the OP post via a reblog that best expresses how I feel about it. It will save me from addressing each and every point of it. 

Let me add that while the original post blasts the poll, I know that the poll is not the real issue in it. The OPs feelings are rooted in a character debate that has nothing to do with me or my poll.

Was the OP wrong to write this post and tag it as Eruri? A friend of mine likened it to wrapping herself in raw meat and throwing herself into a pack of wolves. 

Did she have the right to do it? Sure.

Right or wrong, does it speak to a larger issue of fandom culture? Yes. And that’s what I want to talk about.

Let me get this over with as well. I was hurt. I was angry. Hell, I created a room in my discord server called “pet me feed me love me” because I selfishly and humanly needed some unconditional love and support from long time friends who were not a part of the eruri fandom. 

Fact 1: I have gotten a huge amount of love and support over this from all corners of the fandom. I am blessed to have the friends I do.Fact 2: If you send me support I will read it and appreciate it but if it is anon I will probably not reply to it because I don’t want to feed this debate further.Fact 3:  If you send anon hate or any hate at all to the OP you are making her life worse, my life worse, and further cementing the fandom culture thing that this post exposed me to. It is this:

“Cool blogs” can influence a fandom and alienate people who do not find such bloggers cool.

This is the fandom culture phenomenon that I was made aware of through the poll discourse. @valisi-clark‘s reblog addresses the nuts and bolts of that concept and provides many good thoughts about it. 

While not true of me, the fact remains that fandom gatekeepers, overlords and BNFs do exist and some use their power in a harmful way. That is a conversation for another day.

Fact 1: I am considered a big name fan in the snk fandom.Fact 2: This didn’t happen through coercion or voodoo. People like and respect me because I am friendly and reasonable and put a lot of time into the community. Fact 3: While I have not seen it, I have been told that the OP is getting hate because of my BNF status.

A friend of mine told me this recently:

“there’s a lot of emotional content in what you write–since you write in a friendly and casual way–and so there’s a sense of you being, well, fandom’s mom. or a figure a little bit like that.

This was part of a conversation about “parasocial relationships” which is not exactly related to this, but maybe speaks to the need of people who feel the need to defend me.

Defending me is humanly understandable. When my friends are unfairly targeted, I too see red. My first instinct is to eviscerate the person who has hurt someone I love. But whether op was right or wrong, whether such a reaction is human or not, sending hate over something like this is not ok. It only serves to further emphasize the perception that BNFs do exist, that challenging them is “brave”, and that having an opinion contrary to them can be isolating and make you the target of fandom bullies and minions of the BNF.

What I am personally struggling with at this moment of my fandom existence is how do I express my thoughts but not influence the conversation in such a way that it hurts people.

Fact 1: I can’t. Perception is as powerful as reality.Fact 2: I have tried so very hard for this exact scenario not to happen.Fact 3: It has happened. 

I’ve been aware of my status and influence in the fandom since my summer hiatus. While not perfect, I’ve tried to use it for good. As one dear friend put it:

Yeah, you’re popular. You’re a BNF. But you’re a fucking person first, and the responsibilities of the former have made you neglect the latter….in my respectful opinion. and now I have pizza to eat so typing is hard

(side note: this need of mine to make people happy, while a nice quality in general, and how it relates to the time I spend of tumblr is something I should probably explore at a later date  👀 I’m gonna drop this post on Obsession and Fandom into the “things to think about” category as well.)

 I love this fandom and wanted to do my part to make it a happier place. I feel like was largely successful in that but let me quote the vast wisdom of Armin Alert, because this is an snk blog after all.

Meta writers can be mistaken as authorities. The reality is that some people take my posts as gospel truth. There exist people who believe, “well momtaku said this and she is respected so she must be correct. If I feel differently I must be wrong.” There also exist people who see things differently than me and feel isolated by it.

Fact 1: THIS IS TERRIFYING.Fact 2: I can’t stop it from happening.

So the decision is now how to live with it. Can I accept that my posts and my fandom contributions can serve (have served?) to hurt and alienate some people? I don’t know. It’s weighing heavy on my mind.

I’m stopping here. I don’t know if it’s because I’m tired of writing or if I’ve said what I want to say. I will address the existence of the poll at some point. I have two weeks to decide about that.

Thank you for reading this!