#really living up to her name in this one

[mohntilyet]

continued rook-lucanis sketches from the last week or so <3

[blue-eli]

Skuld in quantum design :)

[babblingbonnabel]

🪡 + 🔨 | more yapping!!

NOTE: because so many bigger members of the Avarice Battalion are from the Omega clan, a big portion go to The Garden to celebrate the Omega Tree every Spring (a large symbol of longevity and legacy for the clan...before they burned down lmaooo!!!).

[puhpandas]

Tony and Vanessas relationship through Gregory can be something so personal

[hauntingblue]

Rewatching act 2.... yeah ISHA WATCH OUT FOR THE CYCLE ISHA!!!!! NOOOOO

[moeblob]

A succubus and a demon! (The succubi don't have names but the demon is Kronos and the succubus is one of his bosses in Hell and he's not /fond/ of the succubi for many reasons but they all adore picking on him)

Also because I love them and like to point it out, the succubi act more as pleasure dealers in the sense of they offer up whatever a human wants most in exchange for their soul. It's rarely of a sexual nature since it's what they want MOST in life. And most people's ambitions are outside of a bedroom. (happy pride, asexuals are able to get affected by a succubus now without discrimination)

[my-thoughts-and-junk]

finished hazbin hotel and what the fuck it's actually kind of??? good???

[angelmush]

i got a goose tattooed on the inside of my forearm today and it was a flash piece but it's my favorite tattoo already it means everything to me i could sob

[screambirdscreaming]

I used to like saying "gender is a social construct," but I stopped saying that because people didn't tend to react well - they thought that I was saying gender wasn't real, or didn't matter, or could be safely ignored without consequences. Which has always baffled me a bit as an interpretation, honestly, because many things are social constructs - like money, school, and the police - and they certainly have profound effects on your life whether or not you believe in them. And they sure don't go away if you ignore them.

Anyway. What I've taken to saying instead is, "gender is a cultural practice." This gives more of a sense of respect for the significance gender holds to many people. And it also opens the door to another couple layers of analysis.

Gender is cultural. It is not globally or historically homogeneous. It shifts over time, develops differently in different communities, and can be influenced by cross-cultural contact. Like many, many aspects of culture, the current status of gender is dramatically influenced by colonialism. Colonial gender norms are shaped by the hierarchical structure of imperialist society, and enforced onto colonized cultures as part of the project of imperial cultural hedgemony.

Gender is practiced. What constitutes a gender includes affects and behaviors, jobs or areas of work, skillsets, clothing, collective and individual practices of gender affiliation and affirmation. Any or all of these things, in any combination, depending on the gender, the culture, and the practitioner.

Gender encompasses shared cultural archetypes. These can include specific figures - gods and goddesses, mythic or fictional characters, etc - or they can be more abstract or general. The Wise Woman, Robin Hood, the Dyke, the Working Man, the Plucky Heroine, the Effete Gay Man, etc etc. The range of archetypes does not circumscribe a given gender, that is, they're not all there is to gender. But they provide frameworks and reference points by which people relate to gender. They may be guides for ways to inhabit or practice a gender. They may be stereotypes through which the gendered behavior of others is viewed.

Gender as a framework can be changed. Because it is created collectively, by shared acknowledgement and enforcement by members of society. Various movements have made significant shifts in how gender is structured at various times and places. The impact of these shifts has been widely variable - for example, depending on what city I'm in, even within my (fairly culturally homogeneous) home country, the way I am gendered and reacted to changes dramatically. Looping back to point one, we often speak of gender in very broad terms that obscure significant variability which exists on many scales.

Gender is structured recursively. This can be seen in the archetypes mentioned above, which range from extremely general (say, the Mother) to highly specific (the PTA Soccer Mom). Even people who claim to acknowledge only two genders will have many concepts of gendered-ways-of-being within each of them, which they may view and react to VERY differently.

Gender is experienced as an external cultural force. It cannot be opted out of, any more than living in a society can be opted out of. Regardless of the internal experience of gender, the external experience is also present. Operating within the shared cultural understanding of gender, one can aim to express a certain practice of gender - to make legible to other people how it is you interface with gender. This is always somewhat of a two-way process of communication. Other people may or may not perceive what you're going for - and they may or may not respect it. They may try to bring your expressed gender into alignment with a gender they know, or they might parcel you off into your own little box.

Gender is normative. Within the structure of the "cultural mainstream," there are allowable ways to practice gender. Any gendered behavior is considered relative to these standards. What behavior is allowed, rewarded, punished, or shunned is determined relative to what is gender normative for your perceived gender. Failure to have a clearly perceivable gender is also, generally, punished. So is having a perceivable gender which is in itself not normative.

Gender is taught by a combination of narratives, punishments, and encouragements. This teaching process is directed most strongly towards children but continues throughout adulthood. Practice of normatively-gendered behaviors and alignment with 'appropriate' archetypes is affirmed, encouraged, and rewarded. Likewise 'other'- gendered behavior and affinity to archetypes is scolded, punished, or shunned. This teaching process is inherently coercive, as social acceptance/rejection is a powerful force. However it can't be likened to programming, everyone experiences and reacts to it differently. Also, this process teaches the cultural roles and practices of both (normative) genders, even as it attempts to force conformity to only one.

Gender regulates access to certain levers of social power. This one is complicated by the fact that access to levers of social power is also affected by *many* other things, most notably race, class, and citizenship. I am not going to attempt to describe this in any general terms, I'm not equipped for that. I'll give a few examples to explain what I'm talking about though. (1) In a social situation, a man is able to imply authority, which is implicitly backed by his ability to intimidate by yelling, looming, or threatening physical violence. How much authority he is perceived to have in response to this display is a function of his race and class. It is also modified by how strongly he appears to conform to a masculine ideal. Whether or not he will receive social backlash for this behavior (as a separate consideration to how effective it will be) is again a function of race/class/other forms of social standing. (2) In a social situation, a woman is able to invoke moral judgment, and attempt to modify the behavior of others by shame. The strength of her perceived moral authority depends not just on her conformity to ideal womanhood, but especially on if she can invoke certain archetypes - such as an Innocent, a Mother, or better yet a Grandmother. Whether her moral authority is considered a relevant consideration to influence the behavior of others (vs whether she will be belittled or ignored) strongly depends on her relative social standing to those she is addressing, on basis of gender/race/class/other.

[Again, these examples are *not* meant to be exhaustive, nor to pass judgment on employing any social power in any situation. Only to illustrate what "gendered access to social power" might mean. And to illustrate that types of power are not uniform and may play out according to complex factors.]

Gender is not based in physical traits, but physical traits are ascribed gendered value. Earlier, I described gender as practiced, citing almost entirely things a person can do or change. And I firmly believe this is the core of gender as it exists culturally - and not just aspirationally. After the moment when a gender is "assigned" based on infant physical characteristics, they are raised into that gender regardless of the physical traits they go on to develop (in most circumstances, and unless/until they denounce that gender.) The range of physical traits like height, facial shape, body hair, ability to put on muscle mass - is distributed so that there is complete overlap between the range of possible traits for people assigned male and people assigned female. Much is made of slight trends in things that are "more common" for one binary sex or the other, but it's statistically quite minor once you get over selection bias. However, these traits are ascribed gendered connotations, often extremely strongly so. As such, the experience of presented and perceived gender is strongly effected by physical traits. The practice of gender therefore naturally expands to include modification of physical traits. Meanwhile, the social movements to change how gender is constructed can include pushing to decrease or change the gendered association of physical traits - although this does not seem to consistently be a priority.

Gender roles are related to the hypothetical ability to bear children, but more obliquely than is often claimed. It is popular to say that the types of work considered feminine derive from things it is possible to do while pregnant or tending small children. However, research on the broader span of human history does not hold this up. It may be true of the cultures that gave immediate rise to the colonial gender roles we are familiar with - secondary to the fact that childcare was designated as women's work. (Which it does not have to be, even a nursing infant doesn't need to be with the person who feeds it 24 hours a day.) More directly, gender roles have been influenced by structures of social control aiming for reproductive control. In the direct precursors of colonial society, attempts to track paternal lineage led to extreme degrees of social control over women, which we still see reflected in normative gender today. Many struggles for women's liberation have attempted to push back these forms of social control. It is my firm opinion that any attempt to re-emphasize childbearing as a touchstone of womanhood is frankly sick. We are at a time where solidarity in struggle for gender liberation, and for reproductive rights, is crucial. We need to cast off shackles of control in both fights. Trying to tie childbearing back to womanhood hobbles both fights and demeans us all.

Gender is baked deeply enough into our culture that it is unlikely to ever go away. Many people feel strongly about the practice of gender, in one way or another, and would not want it to. However we have the power to change how gender is structured and enforced. We can push open the doors of what is allowable, and reduce the pain of social punishment and isolation. We can dismantle another of the tools of colonial hedgemony and social control. We can change the culture!

[toujoursrani]

Caitlyn Kiramman the women you are. 😫😫

WOOF WOOF WOOF I get it Vi. I really do.

(But Vi also.... GAWD DAMN 😩😫😫😫😳🤭)

[cuteniaarts]

The weight of the world is a heavy burden

Especially for a child

(Or, in slightly less dramatic terms – I imagine that the first of her past lives that Avatar Suiren [who is the Avatar after Aang instead of Korra in my AU, and also Ghazan and Ming-Hua’s daughter] gets to talk to is Yangchen, because she is too plagued by memories not her own [including Jetsun’s death, fun fact]. And Yangchen wouldn’t want another child to go through what she did on their own)

(Or maybe someone just needed an excuse to draw @katkastrofa’s latest obsession in a context that interests them as well, just in time to maybe cheer her up a little? You can’t prove anything)

[maulfucker]

This song is making me want to start yet another fic to never finish,, "Tell me... Where is your hideout? Who are we running from? I'm starting to think that you were right, and now I'm afraid of letting go of your hand...." Maul giving up on his Mandalore plan and deciding to just stalk Kenobi to tell him about his vision. Staying illegally in Obi-Wan's room because I love putting these guys in situations (and because Maul would NOT leave him alone until Obi-Wan actually accepted Maul is right, which he won't). Following Obi-Wan to Utapau and helping him escape after the clones attack, feeling equal parts vindicated and enraged (because he was proved right but Sidious still won). Them being on the run together....

[navree]

beatrice baudelaire!

my girl!

How I feel about this character: I've always been really interested in Beatrice because of how mysterious she is. Like, as a fandom we have a lot of headcanons and stuff we've extrapolated from the books and supplementary material, but on pure canon there's a lot of gaps in what we know about her that makes her interesting, especially when it comes to fans trying to fill in those gaps. And I like that she was just this super cool and super hot woman that everyone was so incredibly obsessed with no matter what side they were on, everyone and their mother had a complex about Beatrice.

All the people I ship romantically with this character: If Daniel Handler didn't want me to become far too obsessed with Lemony and Beatrice as a couple, he shouldn't have written five hundred thousand words of Lemony going "Beatrice I love you so much let me list it all" as a way to reassure her when she asks 'hey do you still love me' in the 200 page break up book she wrote. That's just insane, of course I ship it. I'm also really into Beatrice/Bertrand as a couple too, people can have multiple great loves. And depending on my mood I can be really into the lemonberryice throuple.

My non-romantic OTP for this character: Beatrice and Kit's relationship is always gonna be interesting to me, and Olaf and Beatrice just seem to have had the most fascinating dynamic, legit friends in childhood to some more vitriolic friendship and then she murders his parents and then he torments her innocent children, it's Good.

My unpopular opinion about this character: I don't know if I've got any necessarily unpopular ones because this fandom in general, and especially the bit focused on the sugarbowl generation, is very small and most of the stuff I've seen I agree with. I guess I might characterize Beatrice as a bit, idk, colder than most? For all her other facets, Olaf was someone she knew and seems to have gotten along with well on a personal level, and she still doesn't seem to have spent much time outwardly agonizing over what might have been straight cold blooded murder. I don't think she was evil or unfeeling, and there's a reason she pulled back from VFD stuff especially after having children, but there might be a more ruthless streak there in my view than in some other people's.

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon: idk man, that she fuckin lived? It's a bummer that she's dead, she was a devoted mother and a good friend and an important part of a lot of people's lives and it seems like a bunch of worlds were dimmer without her in them, her kids are gonna miss her for the rest of their lives and Lemony is still deeply affected by losing her literal decades after the fact. I wish she'd been able to meet little Beatrice too, I think they would have gotten along great.

[nemesis-is-my-middle-name]

honestly i think the duskborn rune is really burying the lead narratively. like, "death restored" just seems so... patently false as a descriptor? fia & co are kind of trying to do the Opposite of that.

like, ok, those who live in death came about because of ranni's two-time fracturing of the rune of death—once to unleash a tiny piece of it, and a second time to split the death between her and godwyn. explicitly, because of that second fracture, godwyn exists trapped in an in-between state, simultaneously dead and unable to die. he is dead but his corpse is also a living thing, growing blindly without consciousness. TWLID are similarly afflicted. their bodies are reborn over and over without release, and do not seem to... uh, retain a consciousness.

presumably, putting the rune of death back into the elden ring would stop the cycle of rebirth for everyone, not just them. if death were permanently unleashed onto the lands between, i think even godwyn would probably find release. b/c it's not just that ranni split their deaths—she also did it using a tiny stolen fragment of the rune, with maliketh still holding onto most of it. and you need The Whole Thing to end the game. so these... tiny traces are not really doing it.

crucially, fia could, but does not, ask you to restore that rune. instead, she gives you a new one. the one that she created by merging ranni's half-wheel with godwyn's. that will embed "life within death" into the order. if fia isn't trying to spread undeath to everyone in the lands between, wtf is she trying to do?? why does the rune seem to want to imply that she's restoring the natural order, when she herself seems to be so strongly against that possibility??

[bardicbird]

sure i can get behind the ‘sopping wet sad cat of a man seeing the horrors’ theme thats going on for more popular horror podcasts BUT . when will we get sopping wet sad cat woman, nonbinary people. sigh. i always have to do everything myself (goes back to plotting my butch4butch lesbian supernatural murder mystery podcast that will probably never see the light of day)

[scoliosisgoblin]

doodles and some lore. I'm tired.