#shit i may just have to draw polished sin more often

[t3chborb]

I'm one year older today, so I figured I gotta wrap a present or two~

.

..

...

... Wait...

... I got it backwards, didn't I...

... I'm supposed to be... uhh... the one opening gifts today...

... Oh, how incredibly silly of me...

Welp, I'm sure Ramattra doesn't mind~

[remmushound]

Bay/rise 34!! @brightlotusmoon @errorfreak88 @digitl-art-monstr @selfindulgenz @yarchurr @dakotafinely @yarchurr @sententiously-sarcastic @sprinklestheditty

“This is fucking stupid.” Raph was pacing anxiously, his frustrations coming out in the form of heavy breaths.

“I totally agree.” Donnie agreed, “But you know Leo. He’d not gonna let this go.”

“He he fucking ought to! We ain’t got time for this shit!”

The Leo’s were both separately getting ready for the spar, but with such an open space it was nearly impossible for them to get out of each other's line of sight. This resulted in what could only be described as a heated staring content between the both of them as they sharpened their katana and odachi almost passive-aggressively. The brothers and sister of both proud ninja were intermingled in a group together— their brothers’ antics weren’t enough to drive them apart completely, but it was enough for a wedge to be stuck between them.

“Is Leo gonna be okay?” Michelangelo appealed to Donatello, grabbing a hold of the older teens arm.

“I don’t know Michael.” Donatello sighed, sticking his nose in the air in his frustration, “Leon’s always getting himself in this kind of trouble! It’s gonna catch up to him eventually!”

“Hopefully not today.” Michelangelo said, looking to Leo. “Other Leo is very large. He’s jumbo sized!”

“Sadly, his brain didn't get the memo.”

Mikey was looking between both of the Leo’s with no small amount of guilt. Donnie had given him the clear after he had calmed slightly and the pain in his chest wasn’t so bad, but now the pain had been replaced with an intense sadness. Michelangelo nudged his brother and pointed to the sad box turtle, and then both brothers nodded at each other with similar intent as they marched over and each took a seat beside Mikey. 

“Why the long face?” Michelangelo pouted.

“I dunno, Mike, seems kinda… oblong to me.” Donatello motioned vageuly to Mikey’s face.

Mikey gave the slightest chuckle before he started to cry softly. Michelangelo frowned and looked to Donatello, who quickly pulled a tissue from out of his battle shell and offered it to Mikey. Mikey accepted it and, after a moments thought, said,

“You just carry tissues around wherever?”

“I never know when I’ll have to break out the dramatics~!” Donatello struck a pose.

“Are you okay?” Michelangelo gave Mikey a gentle stroke on the shoulder. “You look sad.”

“I’m just… useless.” Mikey hung his head.

That statement caused both Hamato brothers to erupt in loud, overlaying denial as they practically swarmed Mikey trying to convince him otherwise.

“You’re not!”

“You’re really not.”

“You’re incredible!”

“I once tried nunchucks for a day. Hit myself in the head, cried in a corner, slept in said corner. Very traumatizing.”

“You can do lots of things!”

“Except fight, apparently…” Mikey pouted, crossing his arms. “I just watched my dad and your dad get taken and I did nothing!”

“You’re not the only one who did nothing!” Donatello offered.

Michelangelo swatted Donatello and scowled at him a second before turning back to Mikey. “You panicked— that’s nothing to be ashamed of!”

“We were there! We— we could’ve helped stop them! We—“

“What could we have done…?” Michelangelo asked softly, laying a hand on Mikey’s knee.

Mikey gave a long, tired sigh reminiscent of someone far older with many more years of life bearing down on his shoulders. “Nothing.”

“Exactly.” Michelangelo said, “But what we could’ve done is gotten hurt! He took out all your brothers in one swing! All we would’ve ended up doing is getting taken out with them.”

“But don’t you think—“

“Come on.” Mikey’s words were interrupted by his Leo, who had lost what little patience remained as he strutted forward with the confidence of gods. “Let’s get this over with.”

Leo was the first in the dojo and he stood there as if he was still challenging Leonardo to back down at the cost of his honor. Leonardo didn't move from his place where he was still polishing his odachi.

“Well?” Leo prompted, “Come on! You challenged me to this, remember! Don’t you want to defend your honor?”

Leonardo thought for a second, and then shrugged. “Eh, never really had much of that to begin with. And I have all the time in the world baby!”

Despite his words, Leonardo seemed to accept his counterpart's challenge and stood from his seated position, giving his odachi a few experimental swipes before he came to join Leo in the dojo.

“This ain’t gonna end good...” April shook her head. Her face was painted to match Leonardo’s markings and she brandished a blue flag in support. Upon seeing Leonardo entering the dojo, however, she promptly cheered, “WHOOP WHOOP! YOU GOT THIS LEON!”

The rest of the gathered mutants— all except Raphael, who was still sleeping off his exhaustion— gathered in a tight group to watch as the scene unfolded. Donnie split from the group one last time in an attempt to appeal to his brother.

“Leo, this is crazy!” Donnie said, but it was like talking to a wall, “You can’t fight him!”

“Why not?” Leo asked calmly without dignifying Donnie’s concern with even a glance.

“Well, one, he's a child.” Donnie deadpanned, “And two, we need to be focusing on finding Master Splinter.”

“Trust me Don, this isn’t gonna take very long.”

“What you gonna do, punt the fifteen year old?!”

“He’s the one who picked a fight.” Leo growled.

“Yeah. Oh course he did.” Donnie leaned closer to his brother and spoke slowly, as if Leo were dense, “He’s. A. Teenager. A dumb, confident teenager!”

“So are we.”

“We’re gonna be twenty next month— I hardly think it counts!”

Leo didn't respond. He stared forward with a determined look and simply walked away from Donnie, leaving his younger brother staring after him with a frustrated disbelief.

Leo faced his counterpart. “Do you know the duel rights?”

Leonardo shrugged almost cartoonishly.

“Of course not.” Leo sighed, then carried on, “Rule number one: The offending party has the right to an apology and, if it is accepted by the offended party, then the duel will not carry to term.”

“Okay, so you gonna apologize them?” Leonardo asked, almost hopefully.

Leo narrowed his eyes and gave no answer. “If there is no apology met, then the next rule of order is to choose a second. The seconds are the judges— they try to reach a peace, and if a peace is unable to be met, then we move onto phase three. My second is my brother Raphael.” 

Raph grunted softly and split off from the group to hesitantly come to Leo’s side. 

“Don, you feeling up to it?” Leonardo looked to his brother.

Donatello gave it a moment's thought before shrugging and sauntering off almost in a bored fashion to Leonardo’s side.

“How do we win?” Leonardo asked.

“To win, you must knock down your opponent and hold your blade to their throat. Rule number three! The seconds try to negotiate a peace.” Leo gave a nod, and Raph lumbered forward to meet Donatello in the middle. The two of them quickly fell to a hushed discussion.

“Hello.” Donatello said, his eyes half-lidded and his voice dull.

“Hey— can’t you just try and get your Leo to apologize?” Raph almost pleaded, “You know this ain’t exactly a fair fight.”

“I know.” Donatello replied with little enthusiasm. “Your Leo’s gonna get knocked flat on his Gluteus Maximus. That’s science terms for buttocks. Aka: ass.”

Raph gave a half-amused snort. “No offense, pancake, but I think we both know that ain’t right.”

“Oh wowwwwww, so original.” Donatello slumped, “I’m so hurt. Then again you do have a good point.

Raph smiled, thinning himself victorious until Donatello added,

“I mean, there’s nothing Maximus about his Gluteus.” Donatello motioned to Leo with his thumb.

“No—” Raph growled and forced a smile as he addressed Donatello with slow words, “What I meant was that your brother is gonna end up with the same fate as a firework on Fourth of July.” He made an explosion motion and added his own sound effects, “I mean— come on! It’s like a dodge against a semi-truck— your bro stands no chance!”

“I think we can stand to disagree on that.” Donatello defended his brother calmly.

Raph fixed Donatello with a deadpan expression. “You’re not gonna back down are you?”

“Negatory.” Donatello finally smiled— little more than a slight curve of his lips, but still a smile. “Or way— would that be an affirmative? Eh. Doesn’t matter. Either way I believe we are done here.”

Without another word, he spun on his heels and carried himself confidently over to his brother’s side. Raph grumbled as he often did before taking his leave a few seconds after. There was a minute of stressful silence as both seconds reported to their brothers before Leo stepped forward again.

“Rule four. Draw your weapon only once there is a medic on sight with his back turned.”

Leonardo whistled. “I mean, not that I couldn’t beat you with my back turned, but seriously?”

“Not you.” Leo growled, “Donnie will be our medic on standby.” Leo motioned the tech genius to turn around, and Donnie hesitantly obeyed. This left only the Mikey’s watching. Once Leo was satisfied, he went on, “Rule five would usually include dueling at dawn, but I hardly think it matters down here.”

Leonardo looked up at the high ceiling and then down at Leo. 

“Rules six and seven are also moot given our particular circumstances. Unless you have a god you pray to…?”

“Eh, some may describe me as a God, but I think I forgive myself for my sins~”

It took everything Leo had to keep his cool. “Rule number eight. Your last chance to set the record straight.”

“Hey! That rhymed! Good for you!”

“Wait are you just getting these from the Hamilton Musical?” Donatello started to ask, but was interrupted; even as Leo spoke over him, he still continued to talk until he finished the sentence.

“Rule number nine! Look your enemy in the eye.” He and Leonardo locked gazes, “Meet your enemy in the middle…”

Leonardo and Leo took four paces each until they were directly in front of each other.

“Summon your courage in any way necessary.” Leo said cooly, giving a bow that Leonardo returned, “Take a minute to breathe, then take ten paces back.”

The Leo’s were almost in perfect sync as they took their paces backward, now several paces behind their seconds while still facing each other.

“Ready your sword…”

Twin katana and a single odachi were held at the ready.

“Take one final breath…”

No one in the room breathed.

“And count to ten. One… two… three… four...”

“...five...six…seven… eight... nine...”

“Ten.”

[eirian-houpe]

Witness Protection

Notes: Merry Rumbellemas, @killingkueen​. Here, at long last is the story I have written for you. It turned out that it developed a life of its own, so when I posted it to AO3, I split it into chapters.

There’s a great deal of backstory that, while referenced, didn’t actually make it into the story, so please feel free to send asks either to me, or of the characters, and we’ll answer as best we can :)

Rating: Explicit

Category F/M

Fandom: Once Upon A Time (TV)

Relationships: Belle/Gold

Characters: Belle French, Rumple Gold, Maurice|Moe French, Mad Hatter|Jefferson, Red Riding Hood|Ruby, Mother Superior|Blue, Fairy Fiona|Black Fairy, Emma Swan, Prince Charming|David Nolan, Killian Jones|Hook, Gaston, Sheriff of Nottingham, Grumpy|Leroy, Sleepy|Walter, Doctor Whale, Wicked Witch of the West|Zelena Mister Smee,

Additional Tags: Angst, Hurt/Comfort, AU, UST, Corruption, Bad parent, Kidnap, implied and almost non-con, Injury, Character death, Eventual Smut, violence, Non-cursed Storybrooke, First Time.

Language: English

The Wife and Daughter of Massachusetts’ Governor, Maurice French, have been kidnapped. As the authorities raid the compound where they’re being held, his daughter, Belle, makes her own bid for freedom, but is injured in the attempt before being taken into protective custody by Agent Milnor. Fearing for her life, Milnor calls upon an old friend to protect her; to keep her safe. A task that becomes imperative, as well as personal. Professional lines blur and the threat draws closer. 

Milnor risked a glance behind him at the figure in the back of the car.  She was still trembling visibly, even though he’d covered her with his jacket. It was the best he’d had available as he’d manhandled her into the vehicle at the last rest area where he’d stopped to try and take some kind of care of her hands and arms, and to the deeper slice across the front of her shoulder. It disappeared beneath her blouse, and he didn’t really want to know how far down it went.

A car horn just behind his left shoulder warned him he was drifting in his lane, so he dragged his eyes back to the road ahead, snatching at the wheel to right his position. A glance in the rearview mirror told him she hadn’t even reacted to the sound or sudden movement. She was in shock.  He was sure of it.

“Ah, shit!” The words rumbled out of him.  They couldn’t afford another delay. Not so soon or still so close to Boston.  If he were going to get her to safety… “Shit!” he growled again, and slapped his hands against the steering wheel before gunning it onto the next exit ramp, and following the signs to find the nearest McDonalds.

-------------------------------------------

Gold had lost track of time. It was something he did often, in part because it meant very little to him. Not any more. He had no one to answer to, nowhere to be at any specific hour of an evening, and certainly no one to hurry home to, so what did it matter if he was burning the midnight oil?

His slender, perfectly groomed fingers moved carefully, sensually over the polished surface of the writing box he was restoring, delicately easing the gold leaf into place within the barely-there indentations at the corners of the cherry-wood lid; his movements precise, practiced, controlled.

The citizens of Storybrooke may not appreciate his presence, may even dislike him, resent him… who was he kidding? Most hated him and who could blame them after all, since he probably owned a little piece of each and every one of them? However, the townsfolk also knew a good craftsman when they saw one, and as such trusted him with some of their most precious and delicate things.

Oh, how little they truly know.

He’d been in Storybrooke for almost twelve years, but, by tacit, mutual agreement between the town and Gold himself, it might have been a lifetime, longer. At least, longer than he could, or wanted to, remember. He lived comfortably in a large Victorian-style house, far enough toward the edge of town to remain private and to keep the riff-raff away, but close enough that he could easily keep a proprietary eye on his investment, and that - in addition to his place of business - meant most of the town itself.

He paused in what he was doing, tilting his head, and it took him a long moment to catch the sound that had disturbed his concentration. A frown darkened his face as he identified the sound that he had not heard in many long years, and he set down the tools with which he was working, wrapped the writing box in the soft, lint-free cloth to preserve its luster, and set it back on the shelf before clearing the tools from the top of the workbench. Only then did he leave the back room of the pawn shop. As he passed it, he picked up his cane and his gait became the smooth determined stride of purpose; no longer the sibilant shuffle of a man whose outer shell reflected the sins of his past.

He paused only to retrieve something from the cabinet behind the counter, before making his way to the door and extinguishing the lights. Then, he stepped out into the cold air of near midnight and locked the door behind him.

Please head on over to AO3 to read the full story.  Here are some friendly links:

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

[thesportssoundoff]

“For Christmas I  Want....” What the UFC needs per division in 2020

Joey

December 10th

Right around now the majority of us are desperately chasing down gift ideas and huddling our cash together to try and budget it out for the people we care about evenly. In MMA, December means that for one month we spend 31 days pretending that everything's going to be fine in MMA. That the sins of 2019 are gone and won't re-emerge in 2020 and we are about to embark on another insane run like 2015 or 2016. MMA's changing, growing and expanding and shrinking and evolving and degrading all at once around us and so as we embark upon what should be a hectic 2020,  I wanted to take a light hearted approach at examining what 2020 will be. What would the UFC request that the MMA Gods give them in 2020? What are the divisions asking for on their Christmas lists? Let's run down what each division is secretly wishing for when we enter the next year of MMA stupidity.

Flyweight and Women's Featherweight- A bullet

Simply put, both of these divisions would probably be better suited if the UFC just put them out of their misery. 2019 started with a UFC flyweight roster rapidly approaching the single digits and a threat of TJ Dillashaw stepping in to kill the division outright. It ends with a roster of fighters still not too far off the single digits with a champion who seems disinterested in defending the title and clearly has the plans to move up to 135 lbs full time. The likelihood is that the flyweight division will get a title fight or two and then fade off into obscurity as there's no real prospects of note, Benavidez as champion has long lost any luster and the Cejudo good vibes are dead and buried. For women's featherweight, it was a golden carrot to get Cyborg to stop feuding with the organization that hired her. The Cyborg championship era lasted all of two fights and the Amanda Nunes run with the title is dead and/or bloated. Nunes having a token title defense vs Megan Anderson might appease some folks but there's been no development and no real sign of progress. Let these divisions go and let Bellator and Brave/ONE find stuff for them to do.

Men's Bantamweight- Some sizzle for this steak

The UFC's 135 lb division has been one of the more promising developments over the past few years. While it took a slight step backwards for me in 2019, I still think this division is among the best in MMA even if it ranks slightly behind 170 and 155 lbs. There's depth, new talent, a variety of names and faces and personalities and barring something unforseen 20120 figures to keep the pace overall. What it needs in 2020 is for this division to finally get an ROI on some big time names. Henry Cejudo is a promising potential draw at the lighter weight classes but I think he's still going to need help to reach the high end mark on his upside. That requires some names to step up and give him an assortment of fun new challenges. Dominick Cruz needs to get healthy because Cejudo vs Cruz verbally at least has some compelling appeal to it. Cody Garbrandt still has SOME name value and I think if he goes on a streak, we'll see an reset in terms of how fans view him. Jose Aldo and Urijah Faber need to find ways to win tough fights and maintain in the title picture because while I may not care for Cejudo/Aldo or Cejudo/Faber, there are fans who very clearly love these guys and would be absolutely up for seeing them try to capture the title from Cejudo. Guys like MArlon Moraes, Sean O'Malley and Petr Yan need to continue to develop new fanbases and keep up their stretch of exciting fights. This division has a lot of talent but it might need to get a bit greedy in search of some big money fights.

Featherweight- A definitive Max Holloway solution

The UFC spent most of 2018 having open discussions about whether or not Max Holloway was long for the 145 lb division. They talked a bunch about wanting him to move up due to intense weight cuts, saw him move up and then immediately bailed on the idea when he fought Dustin Poirier. My take is that Holloway is still probably destined for 155 lbs and one loss to Dustin Poirier (who is a naturally monstrous dude at 155 lbs) shouldn't deter them. If Max Holloway is hurting his long term health at 145 lbs but may be "too small" for 155 lbs then he'll just need to adapt to that and overcome that the same way Frankie Edgar has done for years. Figuring out what Holloway will be doing in 2020 will probably be aided by the Volkanovski fight but even if Alexander Volkanovski becomes the latest 145 lber to come up short vs Max Holloway, I'm still not convinced I need to see Max toiling at featherweight. As a bonus item or a stocking stuffer if ya will, it SURE would be nice to see the likes of Zabit, Yair Rodriguez, Shane Burgos and Calvin Kattar continue to clear out the 145 lbers who have been sort of lingering in the same spots since about 2016 or so.

Lightweight- For their stars to actually fight

Easy enough, right? The UFC's lightweight division revolves around three names; Conor McGregor, Khabib Nurmamegodov and Tony Ferguson. I'd almost argue that Tony Ferguson is a level behind Dustin Poirier drawing wise but I think at peak value, those three guys make this division hum and draw the big numbers. Not even playing the "these guys fight three times a year!" card, the UFC got two fights out of those three guys and one of those (Ferguson vs Cerrone) was a desperation heave at the last minute. If this division is going to go places then Khabib needs to fight more, Conor needs to stay out of trouble and Tony Ferguson needs to come close to resembling the pace he had in 2016 and 2017. Even accounting for Khabib taking time off for Ramadan, this division cannot exist with THIS much talent in it without more fights from those three guys. I guess you could even throw in Justin Gaethje who expects to sit out until the Tony vs Khabib fight happens. You can't have 4 of your top 5 guys not doing anything with so much talent to be tested up and down the rankings.

Welterweight- A break

The welterweight division is the world's dumbest MMA riddle. It sure seems to trumpet out a finish or a "What the fuck is happening?!" fight on a per show basis better than any other division out there. I mean off the top of my head you have Vicente Luque, Tim Means, Mike Perry, Elizeu Zaleski, Niko Price, Geoff Neal, Robbie Lawler, Jorge Masvidal, Santiago Ponzinibbio, Muslim Salikhov, Matt Brown and that doesn't even begin to account for some of the dudes I can't remember off the top of my head. This division is loaded with dudes who exist to hit each other in the head really hard over and over and over until somebody falls down. It's the world's cruelest division in terms of raw violence. Unfortunately at the top of the division, we've basically had the same 4-5 guys hogging up spots and they more often than not tend to bring us fights that fall on the wrong side of the entertainment scale. Even if you like Kamaru Usman, Leon Edwards, Tyron Woodley and Colby Covington, you have to admit you're probably exhausted by four dudes with similar styles and similarly cringy trash talk skills sucking up all the air and hype in this division. The UFC could really use a break from these folks in 2020. If Edwards/Woodley and Usman/Covington go off without a hitch, it'd be nice for us to get somebody new and fun in there just to allow us all the chance to mentally reset. Maybe that's Jorge Masvidal even!

Middleweight- More Israel Adesanya

The UFC has been very fortunate with the health of its breakout star of sorts. Since coming to the UFC at the start of 2018, Israel Adesanya has fought four times one year and three times the next. He's been busy and consistent and either healthy or healthy enough to always make the walk. With some much instability around him, the UFC really needs Adesanya to continue to take fights throughout 2020. If the goal is to do Adesanya vs Jones then he needs to have AT LEAST two fights prior to this (say March and July of 2020) against top competition. Yoel Romero is seemingly going to be one of those guys and you'd assume a healthy Paulo Costa is the other. The goal should be to keep Adesanya busy because you won't have his freshness and ability to fight consistently forever.

Light heavyweight- A genuine Jones challenger

I feel like it speaks to the pain of 205 lbs that Jon Jones' two title fights were against former 185 lbers who had casually beaten the shit out of the guys who once held pole positions in the division without much challenge. 2019 was a weird year for the division as it felt old, stagnant and perhaps worst of all directionless. If you honestly asked the UFC, I'd bet they'd say privately that the biggest disappointment of 2019 revolved around the fact that the fighters they probably expected to move up and provide fresh challenges all failed. Chris Weidman was smoked by Dom Reyes, Jan Blachowicz retired Luke Rockhold, Jacare Souza's 2019 was abysmal and his LHW debut left nobody impressed while Yoel Romero and Anderson Silva stayed home at 185 lbs. If one was to remove Dominick Reyes from the conversation, the next in line would be two guys who have pretty much failed historically when given a major step up (Jan Blachowicz is not too far removed from a four fight losing streak and Corey Anderson has been KO'd by the likes of Gian Villante and Jimi Manuwa) while the likes of Nikita Krylov, Misha Cirkunov, Khalil Rountree and that one polish dude (Michal Oluwalewalebangbang) all sort of did nothing. Even prized prospect Johnny Walker had a topsy turvy 2019 punctuated by getting smelted by Corey Anderson. The UFC needs to end 2020 with one of two things set in stone; 1) A genuine challenge for Jon Jones or 2) an understanding that Jon will be leaving the division for good and the UFC will finally have to invest resources into rebuilding this morbid division.

Heavyweight- More of the same, baby.

Seriously. This division is A-ok. You got a bunch of new dudes beating the shit out of each other, every year 2-3 new doughy guys show up and make a bit of an impact, a new HW to get giddy about from Brazil or Europe or Russia every few months and the likes of Alistair Overeem, Derrick Lewis, Stefan Struve and Andrei Arlovski to tie this shit all together. Let's keep HW happy and dumb, right? The only complaint could be had in every division really; have your champs fighting more.

Women's Strawweight- ALSO more of the same

Seriously this division has really become one of the best in MMA full stop. It still has the well earned reputation of being a decision division but if one wants to be honest, the depth at the top of this place is UNREAL good. Joanna, Zhang, Andrade, Namajunas, Suarez and Ansaroff on their own merits are as strong a top six as any division can offer. Throw in a healthy mix of ladies like Alexa Grasso, Claudia Gadelha, Randa Markos, Carla Esparza, Cynthia Calvillo and Marina Rodriguez and you've got great depth below that. Even if there isn't an influx of exciting fun new names (I think Virna Jirandoba and Brianna Van Buren are really the only two new debutants worth really getting excited over), there's plenty of talent o be had here. This is MMA's most unpredictable division so keep giving us wacky madness then.

Women's Flyweight- An identity

I guess you could sum up a division by its champion and clearly Valentina Shevchenko is the perfect face for this division. She's really talented, sometimes compelling as a fighter but you can't name anything about her besides "She killed Jessica Eye and she has a bullet tattoo!" At this point, what could you say about the women's flyweight division? What's their identity? What makes the women's flyweight division unique? Is it not just a grab bag of fighters too small for 135 lbs, too big for 115 lbs and prospects who are still trying to cut their teeth throughout the division? Women's flyweight fights just feel like they exist, adding nothing but always appearing on shows. What's the key to figuring out this division? They need an identity that gets fans to better understand it.

Women's Bantamweight- Depth beyond Amanda Nunes

I think there's a really good chance that barring the emergence of some faces, this division will not see a woman on the same level of Amanda Nunes, GDR and Holly Holm. What this division needs is depth because Holly Holm is one foot out the door and GDR has already retired once already. Just sign a bunch of ladies!

[whenrockwasyoung19]

Time to address Ariana Grande’s friggin tan. So back in like 2014 there was a post showing Ariana in the first season of Victorious where she was looking all pale and shit. And they compared that to pictures of Ariana now with her tan. Essentially people equate Ariana tanning with cultural appropriation but I would argue there’s more to it than that.

So let’s address a few things. Ariana is white. She is not a person of color according to today’s standards. At one point in time she would’ve been considered ethnically ambiguous as all Southern and Eastern Europeans were. So the fact that she sort of is ethnically ambiguous has this loaded history behind it.

Also, Italian Americans can be ethnically ambiguous just innately. For instance, the surname Grande kinda sounds like it could be Italian or Spanish. The distinction isn’t really clear. The languages are similar (very very similar). I swear every time I see that Emilia Clark Dolce and Gabana ad I think she’s speaking Spanish. There are these subtle crossovers that can make it hard to distinguish who belongs to what camp. There is also the issue of skin tone. Italian features vary a lot. Some can be blonde and blue eyed. Others are olive skinned with brown hair and brown eyes. Some are mixture with fairer skin and brown hair and eyes.

It seems that naturally Ariana falls into that category. I wouldn’t say she’s pale. Like if you’ve seen videos on her old YouTube channel you’ll notice she’s got a slight tan. She also naturally has dark brown hair. She’s sort of the average Italian who doesn’t really look like the standard Sicilian but still looks very Italian. So she already has a very Italian look and whatever ethnically ambiguous qualities that come with that are innate. The tan came later, but we’ll get to that.

So for Italians who look more olive skinned, it can be easy to be perceived as Latine. I can personally vouch for this as after returning from summer vacation (and after spending my days outside, I naturally got very very tan) I would occasionally be told I looked Latina. Some would even assume it. And notably, I didn’t try to look this way. The summer sun just does that to my skin. So it’s not an effort on my part to look more Hispanic. And for those who naturally have darker, olive skinned may look ethnically ambiguous.

From this point on, I can really only refer to Italian Americans as I’m not from Italy. I don’t know much about their beauty standards.

Do y’all remember Jersey Shore? The original run in like 09? I do. I was in high school at the time (because I’m ancient). And I also grew up in New Jersey. So, I was around a lot of girls trying to be like Snooki. Girls wore the bump. They wore bright prints. And they tanned. Oh they tanned. I knew a lot of girls who made frequent trips to the tanning beds. And whenever school dances came up, spray tans were suddenly everywhere. There was an obsession with tanning. And Ariana is basically just like those girls I went to school with: obsessed with tanning.

This is a common beauty standard for Italian Americans. I don’t know the precise history behind these beauty standards. But I’ll make an educated guess. Sicilians are like the ideal Italians (in terms of beauty). They seem to capture all the Italian features. Their skin is darker, they have beautiful brown hair, amber eyes; and if you go off of American television, they’ve got curves. I personally take great pride in my Sicilian heritage (even tho I’m only part Sicilian and only kinda look it).

Sicilian beauty standards are also idealized on television. The women Tony Soprano often slept with were often Sicilian. On Everybody loves Raymond, Robert abandoned his plain Jane blonde girlfriend for a voluptuous Sicilian woman he met on holiday. In The Godfather, when Al Pacino is in Italy he practically forgets all about poor Diane Keaton and marries a beautiful Italian woman. In this case, unlike the other examples, Apollonia doesn’t speak much English. Their attraction is merely physical. In all of these cases, the somewhat plain blonde is seen as kinda of conventional but boring. The Sicilian is the attractive one drawing the man away from his woman. In other words, Sicilians are portrayed as this ideal beauty. Sicilian beauty types are similar to Latina beauty types as well which is where I think a lot of the confusion lies. Latina women have darker skin (sometimes very similar in tone) and dark hair. So when all the Italian American girls in my school were trying to look like more Sicilian, it can be perceived as looking more Latina. In my community, no one would mix that up. We know that pale skin is far from ideal. If you can look like you just got off a plane from the Bahamas, you’re looking good. And obviously have slightly tanner skin is popular in general. Self-tanner and bronzer are incorporated into a lot of beauty gurus makeup routine. The fact that someone wants to look a little tanner is not really shocking. But like I said, I can see where the mixup is. Ariana is basically just emulating a Sicilian beauty standard as many Italian Americans do. It can be misconstrued that Ariana is reflecting a Latina look but that’s not the case. But then we get into some phrasing issues. So I hear people say things like Ariana darkens her skin. Ok. Technically yeah. But that’s what tanning is. That’s what applying bronzer is. In reality, such acts are neutral. But the phrasing is definitely off. It does sound like Ariana regularly applies like brown polish to her skin. That’s not what she or other girls who tan do. If you use a tanning bed, it’s your skin naturally reacting to UV light. It’s no different than when I spend a summer riding my bike in shorts, and by August my thighs are very tanned. For girls who spray tan, you can throw a little shade at because it’s not their natural skin. But it’s also aspiring to a Caucasian beauty standard. So is it a cultural appropriation if it’s white people appropriating other white people stuff? Eh I don’t know. My point is the act of tanning really isn’t like problematic in and of itself. And framing it to be problematic by using carefully chosen language is perfidious and wrong. It creates a culture of shame around Ariana which isn’t fair to her or her fans. In era where cultural appropriation is a mortal sin, it’s unfair to accuse someone of that without really understanding the complexities of this situation. Being Italian American has complexity especially in terms of beauty and there is a deeper history there. If you think her music or singing is cultural appropriation, I’m not going to argue that point. But please stop saying that Ariana is tan, therefore she’s appropriating latine culture, therefore she’s cancelled.

[stop-him]

People Don't Change, Rules Change.

If you saw my last reblog of, and answer to, the poll by @supersoftly - this is further musings on the theme of my response, comparing old and new incidents. I may go on for a while. There may be a cut.

Anyhow, as I mentioned, I was once a moderator on the site Gaia Online. As such, I got to witness some of the worst behaviors that cropped up from time to time. An example: once a user named Cigarette announced that she had terminal brain cancer. This prompted a massive outpouring of support and well-wishing, including the "1000 cranes for Cigarette" community event based around the bit about folding up multiple little paper cranes for loved ones - and it all turned out to be a hoax. Some people noticed that nobody could get any real-life information about the hospital where she was supposedly being treated, and somewhere along the line Cigarette confessed to making everything up.

Most everyone thought that was pretty awful when the news hit. I don't even remember what, if anything, the admins of the site did to Cigarette herself - technically it wasn't against the TOS to lie about one's personal health. But I was involved in a related incident, where another user posted a Flash animation depicting his character, enraged by the news of Cigarette's deception, pulling a gun and (to the theme of the Mentos commercials) shooting her to death. It was actually more funny than my description makes it, and it would be understandable that anyone investing any emotion into Cigarette's purported illness would be legitimately angry and frustrated. But, after some discussion, we Mods decided to remove it from the site, because regardless of the circumstances, it was essentially a personal attack on another user, which was definitely against the TOS.

That was the standard we operated under at the time. You could say, "I think that is a stupid viewpoint to have, that idea is dumb," but you could not say, "you are stupid and dumb for having that opinion". You could not just call anyone a Nazi without direct evidence that they were literally part of a self-identified Nazi group, because it was well understood that calling someone a Nazi was a personal insult, and intended as such. "I feel that this person is like a Nazi" wasn't an excuse.

One's opinion was not a justification.

The teeth of Gaia Online's enforcement was their avatar system - for those unaware, GO's big attraction was that a user had a little anime-styled avatar that appeared by their posts. You gained currency by doing things in and around the forums, and you used that currency to buy clothes and other items for your avatar. Part of the outcry over Cigarette's stunt was that sympathetic users had donated high-value items for her avatar under false pretenses.

As Mods, we had the ability to not only ban users for infractions, but also monitor and undo trades and transfers of items between users. So if a user feared that a post they were going to make was going to break the TOS, they might want to stash their items with friends or in alternate accounts - only the Mods could see these actions and know they were attempts to avoid the consequences of their behavior, so often the items got confiscated anyway. What happened was that many users created a cache of "junk" accounts - no items, not much history, built up around the mass of free email accounts one could get. They would use these accounts to break the TOS, because they risked little if those empty accounts got banned. Some Mods had access to IP address info, so that wasn't a guarantee of safety, but it was a common practice among the more contentious users.

I explain all that for the sake of context in the following tale. After a few years of being a Mod, Gaia Online began to grow in popularity, and its userbase expanded, and after a while the Admins decided to outsource much of their Mod duties just to handle the load. I retired from being a Mod at that point, so no longer had access to any of those investigatory tools. I stayed on the site for a little while longer, but it's one thing to be in your 30s when the bulk of the site is 20-somethings, it's another to be pushing 40 when the bulk of the site is in their mid-teens.

But before I eventually left, i spent a bit of time hanging around in the forum's creator-oriented areas, notably in art, writing and comics-centered sub-forums.

There was a clique in those days of what I call "art snots", people who not only had ideas on what was the proper way to go around making art but who would aggressively advocate for their way as being the best way and anyone who didn't toe their line was not only wrong, but a fool. Many of them were products of formal art schooling, and many of them had open contempt for the trend of art styles emulating "that shiny animu shit".

One thing that could be done in the art community was to "give critique". Ostensibly, if you posted your art on the forum, you were making it available to be commented on, and were expected to be able to withstand a certain amount of unfavorable criticism. This (naturally) led to conflicts between very sensitive beginning artists who did not really want any criticism on one hand versus many of the aforementioned "art snots" who took the opportunity for "critique" as license to utterly verbally savage every tiny aspect of the poster's art, especially if it had any hint of anime influence. And so Mods were often called in to keep the peace, and when it was apparent that outright abuse would be disciplined, the "art snots" would, like many others, gather a collection of throwaway accounts to take the bans, using them as one-shot insult delivery systems. (Though, a few became masters at playing the TOS, making posts that were just within the boundaries of what was acceptable, and never needed alternate accounts...)

Near the end of my stay at GO, there was one user who was "art-snot-adjacent". They were a webcomic creator, whose webcomic at the time was garnering some popularity (as those things go) and critical acclaim. Obviously talented and well-spoken, it was apparent that they were sympathetic to the stances of the "art snots", but without nearly the same amount of vitriol. If they spoke on those matters, they spoke in civil, measured tones. Many of the "art snots" circled in their orbit, possibly due to friendships outside Gaia, or possibly due to simple sycophancy.

I took up reading this person's webcomic - it was pretty good - and while I didn't always agree with the opinions they stated on Gaia, I appreciated the way they kept their tone nominally respectful.

The front page of this webcomic had a few widgets installed, one of which was a feed of the author's Twitter account, back when Twitter was a lot newer and less ubiquitous. So there was a little sub-window on the page that displayed, say, the last five Tweets the author made.

One day I went to the webcomic to check if there were updates, and saw that one of the recent tweets mentioned Gaia, so I looked more closely. It has been ages at this point, but the general thrust of the message was:

"Looks like I'm going to have to burn another Gaia account so I can set this other user straight about how stupid they are."

And now immediately I knew that this webcomic creator that I had somewhat respected up until now was not any different than so many others, they were simply better at putting up a polished public face. They were just as eager to hide their true feelings in order to keep all the little virtual clothes on their Gaia account, until they could let fly with an alternate sockpuppet, and be abusive to their heart's content.

[As an aside: I think this was one of the only times I've ever been unable to separate the artist from their art. For a little while I still kept up with the webcomic, but one day, I found myself about to click the bookmark for the page and I just didn't feel like reading the story anymore. Just - "meh", and I didn't click to it, and never went back. It wasn't like seeing that Tweet enraged me, I wasn't scandalized, I just... didn't respect the creator anymore. I'm not sure why that killed my interest in the story, when I have few problems engaging with art by artists who I know have done far, far worse in their lives. But there it is.]

These Gaia anecdotes establish something I think is true: people were just as nasty then as they are now. But a site like Gaia - at least at the time - enforced a code of behavior that said, "as long as you're on our site, you'll behave with a minimum of respect towards other users."

And now, let's come to the present day. As I write this, YouTube has been sending me recommendations for videos about a bit of drama. Of course, YouTube has no shortage of drama. But in this case, it reminds me of Gaia in some ways, because it's an artist-related drama.

At one point, YouTube proposed I watch an artist draw a picture as they told a story about the worst commission they ever drew, and I did, and so of course YouTube then bombarded me with a thousand similar videos. Some I watched, if they had interesting subjects. Many I didn't. And one type I stayed away from was the callout videos, where while drawing some pic, the artists would detail the various sins of some other YouTuber and make the case for them being an irredeemably awful person.

But, I've been floating around the edges of this drama, because for a while I was watching the videos from Girl Artist 1 (actual name/account redacted - probably if you're actually an active part of that community you can guess who it is, and if you don't have any idea, well, count yourself fortunate). Only now I no longer get videos by her recommended to me, now I'm getting videos about her.

First it came to light that she was sockpuppeting on some site, pretending to not be herself in order to stir up drama/make herself look good/whatever. Then it seems she was involved in a harassment campaign, and even more serious charges involving downright illegal shenanigans are being leveled.

I'll make it clear that I don't know all the details, or whether any of this is true or not. I watched some of Girl Artist 1's videos when the subject interested me, but ignored many when it was clear she was calling out other artists, YouTubers and the like. I noted the name of Girl Artist 2 come up a few times, and even in the titles of other videos by other people. Apparently Girl Artist 2 had her own moment of being condemned. But now she's back, with her own video to speak out against Girl Artist 1, along with a host of others all dogpiling on the current object of ire.

Is Girl Artist 2 forgiven now? Will Girl Artist 1 undergo her own journey of redemption? Will that be possible? Who knows, and outside of the community, who cares?

YouTube doesn't. And finally I come to my point: This is the difference between an older site like Gaia Online and newer platforms like YouTube and Twitter - the incentives.

Gaia had its own economy based around its avatar system, and its own motivation to promote an even keel and keep drama to a minimum. The latter was achieved by using the former as both carrot and stick. The reward for good behavior was getting to keep your virtual items, punishment was their loss.

Twitter's reward is internet fame, reinforcement of things you say with likes and retweets and new followers. Drama is a path to this - sometimes a much easier path than actually creating a work of art to attract attention. YouTube is much the same, only with the added incentive of real money for select users. YouTube does not mind controversy in and of itself, because controversy drives views, and views pay off for advertisers, who pay YouTube.

Therefore, there is often little incentive to not be an asshole. Every judgemental soul can freely pontificate about the sins of others, and condemn them in the most explicit terms. In a practical sense, the accusations don't even have to be true. My example of calling people Nazis as an insult? Go ahead! It gets clicks. YouTube and Twitter like the clicks. Not only do you not have to show anyone any respect, it's almost expected to be actively disrespectful to anyone who annoys you in the slightest.

That's my thesis: the overall nastiness of the human race is, I think, much the same as it's always been. A lot of people have always been judgemental pricks. It's just that the rules have shifted just so, and now the nastiness is being rewarded instead of discouraged.