#so I guess we can't be a community and I have to dedicate my whole online presence to fighting women in my own community 💔

[virtue-boy]

Went on a transandrophobia truther blog and instantly saw this ..

1) love the slight of hand where he says "being trans" instead of actually identifying any positionality or god forbid mentioning WOMANHOOD as a type of positionality in his post which allows him to call trans women men and completely disregard the experience of the closested trans WOMAN. Telling that your argument hinges on "after transitioning to a man I am exactly the same as a woman undercover as a man"

2) just say you're not on T and you don't know anyone who is. Like as someone who's passed as male on an off for my whole life and now fully passes as male all the time thanks to T I low key snorted reading this... Liiike let's be for real here passing as a man (and doubly so if u are binary and have the pronouns to match) and passing gives you privilege out the fucking wazoo and I literally think about it every time I leave the house, meet new people, take blue collar jobs, interact w people on public transit, walk around at night, go to gay clubs, bond w male overseers, look for roommates, etc. This is obviously extremely racialized as much as it is gendered, but there is literally not a single "privilege" I had as a girl (that was assumed to be a guy 50-70% of the time) that I lost as a guy.

3) Also how do trans men "inherently defy patriarchal manhood" I literally know a trans guy who went to jail for domestic violence against a woman like trans men are incredibly capable of accessing and enacting patriarchy and thinking ourselves justified in accessing patriarchal homosociality. Like we are literally becoming men and we don't just magically exit the patriarchal society because we aren't the men at the top of the make food chain.... a la R.W. Connel. Being trans men means we lose some for being trans but we win some because we are men. Like gay men are frequently denied their masculinity but it would be dodo brained to act like gay men have no male homosociality they can access or that no gay man has ever accessed male homosociality. Like if u believe that you actually don't know any gay history Attttt Alllllll 😭 like genuinely. We also earn more money per dollar than women in our same gender modality, that doesn't sound like "inherently defying patriarchal manhood" to me that sounds actually like a pretty typical social positionality for oppressed and marginalized men. Like in my own friend groups, at school, and in my music and promotions scene being an (openly trans) man actually has granted me actually a lot of homosociality that I can draw on.

[tardis--dreams]

Me panicking because i have 9 missed calls and 5 emails talking about my absence and how "a colleague could take over for me" vs. Me knowing it's really not that important no matter how pushy a client is and that on top of it I'm underpaid and have way to much overtime so i shouldn't even care

[ihopesocomic]

Sorry for the mini-essay but I think people massively underestimate how much hard work and dedication goes into a Passion Project. People think that creators who make free content, who do their work as a hobby and not as a job, must only get enjoyment out of it.

That’s not how it works. Doing it purely because you want to doesn’t automatically make the more challenging, frustrating, or (gasps) TIME CONSUMING parts of the project any less burdensome. If anything, it makes it worse because you aren’t being paid for all of that labor. You’re just doing it for the sake of doing it, and as rewarding as it can be, it can also be demanding.

Im finally publishing a fanfic for the first time and don’t get me wrong, it’s been great to get feedback on my work and interact with a community. I love that there are usernames and profile pictures I can actually identify because they’re regulars on my work.

But does that mean I don’t have to constantly redo work because I don’t like how it turned out? No. Does that mean I always update on time? No. Never get burnout? No. I still very much go through all of the things paid writers do, because the Creative Process is difficult and demanding no matter what they paycheck is or isn’t.

And all of that is just if you guys WERE missing updates, which you’re NOT. So like… these complaints are not only very entitled and ignorant, but also just confusing. People really just be mad for the sake of being mad, I guess?

Anyways yeah, free content creators are still content creators, and passion-driven hard work is still hard work. You two are cranking out absolutely STUNNING visuals, compelling characters and engaging worldbuilding every single week and that’s amazing. Thank you for your hard work and I’m sorry about the twerps that don’t appreciate it enough!

Ah the price we pay for being human and having a brain, amirite haha

It's to be expected, to a certain point, that people simply don't understand that things like comics and cartoons take time. General impatience is something that can be ignored. If people asking for updates bothered us, we wouldn't post anywhere ever haha You gotta have at least SOME backbone if you want to do a comic. Or anything really.

Comics are a TON of work, and I knew this going in cuz I've done shorter comics before. It is not to be treated as if its easy. (Well, its easier than animating a whole series by yourself LOL) There's a lot of pre-comic planning that people don't tell you about. And that's just the stuff you have to do before you even start drawing. Of course this only applies to long-form storytelling, there's different rules for different kinds of comics.

And I won't even get into what it takes to making the comic itself, there's a lot of parts that need to be considered like formatting, time-management, what shortcuts you have to take to save on labor, and getting across as much information as you can in a short amount of time, while using mostly visuals. It's a skill, so it can be learned haha

A lot of doing comics is on-the-job training. Which I know can be frustrating for perfectionists, but from a reader's perspective, part of the joy of webcomics is seeing how far the art has come. And you can't exactly get out a webcomic if you keep redoing things over and over. You'll burn yourself out even faster. This is why it's important to have a plan lol it just makes it easier to adjust if you have to change things, than if you have no plan at all.

Even if RJ and I for whatever reason no longer felt passionate about this story, and wanted to move on to something else entirely, we wouldn't leave everyone hanging. We'd tell everyone what happens one way or another. Because too many people just abandon a story just to tell another one, and that's not fair to people who were here to read a story that appealed to them.

But the entitlement of people sucks, the constant heckling, the fact we can't moderate our own comment section, and more importantly Webtoons just sucks as a site anyway. - Cat

[rodrigoincolors]

I didn't really plan on posting anything but the art I had prepared for the Halloween season. But, unfortunately, Liam passed and I feel I had to have this artistic outlet for what feels like a (sad and unexpected) closing.

As a kid, I had no friends and I was truly an outcast. Then I became a teenager, found my passion for pop culture and became a Directioner. Coincidentally, that same year, I went to a new school downtown and made friends who appreciated me for me and shared all the same passions. This gave me an immense sense of community I used to long for. I also find a much broader community online and that was just as powerful.

I used to have blogger websites dedicated to Demi Lovato and One Direction (they were my faves). I was fortunate to find my creative side through this. I discovered I'm quite good with words and started writing fanfics and other kids of texts. But my webpage needed a design and this necessity led me to the other side of my creative self. Long story short, here I am still posting illustrations, alongside many other of my creations.

I can't understand this... I've never met Liam in person, but still, I find it kind of scary that his art had such impact in me. This whole week I've been listening to my One Direction CDs and flipping through the magazines I used to buy every week, where Liam was present among so many of those pages.

Almost every song has a memory or a feeling attached to it. It's been more than 10 years since my world first changed. I admit it's been time enough... Way too many things happened that made me forget some of those feelings. I learned about other songs... Met other people... But I guess none of that mattered, because I felt 13 or 14 all over again.

Liam, dear, I wish those feelings I know I share with millions of other people could've been enough to keep you from giving up. Now there's nothing else to do but to thank you and wish you finally found the light you were looking for. You helped so many of us and I know this has got to mean something.

I love you. We love you. We're half a heart without you...

[dogboyklug]

part 1 - [you are here!] - part 3

yepyep . making true on my promise to make this a three parter i guess! hopefully the final part will be out soon

disclaimer: i am not blaming trans women as a whole for my trauma, nor am i saying that the patriarchy doesnt exist. lol. ok bye

text transcript / partial id once again under the cut!

UH-OH! part 2: no lol

i was a

uh

xenogender kid? double-rainbow freak?

[a drawing of very slightly younger me, awkwardly smiling and going "yaaaay".]

we don't have any slurs i think which is good but you get the idea

i tried a

[caps] LOT [end caps]

of other terms before i really settled with this one

[a drawing of a man with a shadow over his eyes. he has two sharp horns protruding out of his head. the drawing is captioned "genderfaun".]

[a drawing of little me singing "lemon boy" by cavetown, captioned "soft boi".]

[and, finally, a drawing of a slightly abstract creature with a long dress and tall horns, drawn in grey, and with vines crawling around it, captioned "voidpunk [hi fomes]']

it wasn't an instant click.

it took a lot of hearing the word, seeing the community in the corner of my eye, and finding 15 subreddits before i started thinking

[a drawing of younger me, looking at a subreddit, and going "oh, shit,"]

[followed by a decently well-drawn frontal sketch of me, genuinely smiling, sparkles around him, going "it me!!!"]

okay, so, like,

[caps] THIS. [end caps]

this has to be it.

i'm happy

i know who i am

i know [caps] WHAT [end caps] i am

i found an amazing community with amazing people working together to create something beautiful

[caps] THIS [end caps] is the end [caps] RIGHT?????

[a drawing of me, sobbing cartoonishly, my glasses foggy due to the tears.]

[followed, in the next page, by a half-view of my face, my glasses clouded due to light shining on them harshly.]

turns out knowing yourself and who you are and where you belong

isn't always quite enough.

[a drawing of me, face down, cushioned by my arms, my glasses next to me. below the drawing, black spikes rise, covering the bottom half of the comic.]

a lot of things happened very very quickly.

at least it sure felt that way

[a drawing of me, white against black, staring in horror at my phone.]

turns out my brother wasn't the only person who didn't believe my identity made sense.

there was - and probably still IS - a group of trans people dedicated to making sure trans men know their place.

we are the oppressors, we cannot be oppressed, no men can be oppressed.

no men can be [as in, feel] harmed. no men can be kind. no men can be loving. no men should be allowed to exist

testosterone is poison. it makes you violent, and it makes you cruel. it makes you ugly, and unlovable.

you are encroaching on trans territory by simply existing as a trans man.

anything you do or say or think or feel or know is at the expense of the oppressed. of trans women

your existence harms them and must be stopped.

[a crude, nearly featureless drawing of me, holding my glasses, staring in shock.]

i was fourteen ish when someone i knew on a discord server asked,

"if all men were to be killed and you were included would you feel gender euphoria?"

[a drawing of younger me, looking at his phone, one eye obscured, going "huh?"]

she was a trans girl and i think her name was lily.

but, uh, obviously,

men are oppressors

[a drawing of me, looking to the ground.]

men can't be oppressed

men can't be hurt! so

it's fine.

so if you really ARE hurt or oppressed,

[caps] YOU'RE A WOMAN [end caps]

and that means you feel dysphoric

[a drawing of me, gripping at my own shirt, staring at the camera, smiling in fear.]

and you wouldn't want to feel dysphoric, right?

that's

[caps] REALLY

THE WORST

PART OF

THIS

SITUATION

RIGHT?

[an incredibly messy, quickly-scribbled drawing of me, quite literally falling apart, now grinning slightly wildly, massive bags under his eyes.]

[caps] THE WORST POSSIBLE OUTCOME [end caps]

[in large font] ...uh oh.

[a small drawing of me, a single tear coming out of one of my eyes, a hand raised up as if to brush it away, obviously scared.]

[wc-confessions]

Going to sound like a loonie who deserves to be locked away but: warriors should end with the clans getting rid of the code and maybe their lifestyle while we're on it. Like, I know that's basically their rules and you can't have a society without rules. But honestly, it's been proven by many occasions that the code does more harm than good Hollyleaf going beserk? That was the code

Leafpool having to hand her kits to someone else? Code + Starclan with their bs

"The leader's word is the warrior code" this sounds like a recipe for a dictator to come to power but alright I guess. Lets just pretend Tigerstar didnt happen.

And many other incidents, but I don't feel like talking about them all so I'm just gonna continue my rant

I wish I could excuse all of this, but the more I think about Warrior Cats worldbuilding as a whole, the less it seems like a community dedicated to help one another and it begins to look more like a cult, right with the xenophobic views on clanless cats and other minor groups like Sisters. I wish we had more characters that openly question their lifestyle and their rules. More characters like Nightpelt, who actively question Starclan. Imagine if we had a leader character that went against the code to help other cats in need, clan cats or not. More anarchistic characters. Heck, maybe even characters that get fed enogh with code bullshit and ditch the clan lifestyle altogether.

but anyway, just gonna say this: If your rules in your story bring more harm than good, maybe you should reform them.

also anarchy is fun

.

[ed-recovery-affirmations]

So I occasionally browse the notes of this blog just because I know some people Can't Resist Being Shitty in the notes and I occasionally need to go through and block just to keep this blog's engagement positive. However, this evening I found something in the notes that's not exactly...shitty...and more, uh...okay, it's hard to explain. But I felt it's something I wanted to address.

Apparently one of my original posts made it into some fandom drama blogs. I don't really place any restrictions on what blogs people are allowed to reblog my posts to, so I don't necessarily take issue with that. Just a handful of people who Really Like a certain male celebrity (me too btw, but that's not what this is about) and have blogs dedicated to him and have a chain post arguing with each other in my notes.

And I guess in this small segment of the Internet people are getting angry that one blogger made a "woman's issue" about a rich white man. While I never intended my post to be about this certain celebrity, I did want to address something. I am a woman, a cis woman, and so a lot of my posts are about issues that primarily occur in women. But I think it's better if my blog is not exclusive. It's not ONLY women who have these issues. I don't want to make ANYONE'S struggle invisible on this blog.

For example, the original post mentioned things like cellulite, which occurs more often in AFAB bodies than AMAB bodies. However, trans men have AFAB bodies, and some enbies do too. That might be something that causes them to have body image issues, and I would never want them to feel like they can't engage with/relate to a post I made (that never specifically mentioned women btw). Women of course are free to relate to it too!

The post additionally mentioned things like stretch marks and aging wrinkles. AFAB and AMAB bodies both get these.

Not specified in the post, but it's also a natural part of the human experience for disabled people to have stigmatized body differences, and need to love their own bodies as well. Physical disabilities can occur in both AMAB and AFAB people.

I don't know, maybe I didn't need to make this a whole thing. I chose not to engage in that post or respond to anybody on it because it had so little to do with what my blog is actually about, just a lot of people loudly disagreeing on how to be a fan of That One Male Celebrity. Really just Tumblr Being Tumblr. But I think it's important for us to talk about this in ED recovery communities, and recognize it.

It's okay for us to want our own struggle seen and recognized. But we should also take the time to recognize the ED experiences of people whose stories are very different from ours. The traditional ED public narrative tends to be a skinny white cis girl who has anorexia or bulimia. But those who don't fit that narrative still need support and healing. I just want to create a space where everyone can experience that and learn in a positive way.

So unless I make a post that specifically mentions that it's about women - my posts are generally not just for women. I don't believe it takes away any specific resources - since access to my posts are not on a first-come-first-serve basis - for people who do not identify as women to engage a post that many women also identify with. In fact, I hope it might help us to better build a stronger, more understanding recovery community with a diverse understanding of ED experiences.

Off soapbox, send post.

[autogeneratedkahootnickname]

Yeah so I'm an Amber apologist until the day I die.

I do think there's potentially a minor writing hiccup but I'm gonna set things out as best I can from my understanding.

What a lot of people don't pick up on, and what the show tries to convey in episode 5, is that Mark has been a phenomenally shitty boyfriend to Amber. We only see a few brief snippets of him cancelling some dinner plans, but this has been a constant, unfaltering issue for 3 months. 'He's late, he doesn't show, and he always has some shitty excuse.' From Amber's point of view, it wouldn't be unreasonable for her to think she means nothing to him.

But she recognises that the situation is complex, and she cares about him, and she sees that he IS trying, if not enough. So she gives him second chance after second chance. Honestly far longer than she should have done.

But yeah, their relationship is on the ROCKS for a LONG time. But since we see Mark superheroing throughout most of that, we can't put ourselves in her shoes.

So then, flash forward to Upstate U and the reveal. My controversial theory, but the one I think most makes sense in terms of writing, is that Amber didn't know Mark was Invincible until he tells her.

Amber is visibly startled when she sees Mark flying in her room. Granted she would be even if she knew, but it leans more to her not knowing than the contrary.

Amber does not know who Invincible is at Upstate U, and she never refers to him by name in the confrontation: 'I know you're a superhero', 'fly away, flyboy'. If she had known 'weeks beforehand' a cursory google would have been likely. She would be more likely to refer to him by name.

Amber is very intelligent, she's quick-witted, she's an expert at putting up walls as a defence mechanism and she hates being lied to. She would be capable of concealing her surprise, and wouldn't want to lose control in the conversation, but honestly she doesn't have to. Because her reaction seems genuine, even if its less premeditated than she puts on.

Amber goes into that interaction thinking Mark is a liar, a coward, a flake and an asshole. That interaction recontextualises him as a liar, a flake and an asshole. In different ways sure, but the end result is the same. Amber's whole issue is that she doesn't feel valued by Mark, and she's just been told that he was hiding an entire secret life from her because he didn't trust her. Also, Mark is not 'trusting her now': he's using Invincible as a retroactive get out of jail free card for being an asshole for 3-4 months. He frames it in a way that, even if its unintentional on his part, makes her out to be small, and petty, and irrational: 'because im out saving lives or protecting the planet.' It sounds like he's blaming her for being mad at him, and he's SO SURE she'll forgive him everything in that moment. She doesn't want to let him off the hook for being shitty, and Mark's behaviour isn't helping. This is supposed to convey that the way he treated her isn't ok even if he was a superhero, and he shouldn't expect it to be.

And she isn't happy about being angry with him! The scene ends with her looking pensive, conflicted, because the walls she put up in that scene do not reflect her character! She goes back to Mark to make sure he's alright, because she sees his actions in a different light, and bear in mind, at this point, Mark is still viewed by the public as someone who played a pretty substantial role in killing around 50,000 people at a guess. She's not going back to him because he's a hero now. He's public enemy number 2. That is an INCREDIBLE amount of integrity and dedication, traits she's displayed repeatedly throughout the season through her grassroots support of local communities.

William literally says in his pep talk to Mark:

'But you were a shitty boyfriend to Amber and you got what you deserved'. This is Mark's number 1 fan. Laying it out in front of us.

And last, but of course, not least,

Guys she's fucking seventeen cut her some slack jesus christ she's not a calculator

[kalgalen]

Open letter to my mother

(or, a rebuttal to the 1k email my mom sent me about my upcoming transition. Tw: transphobia, self-harm)

First, and I say this will all the love in the word (and an healthy dose of disbelief): what the fuck is wrong with cis people?

I'm gonna skip right over the fact that you had the gall to call this a "text analysis" when you actually dedicated only one paragraph to actually describing the text I got published and used the rest to utterly dismiss my community and I. That disappointment, though, is nothing compared to the anger and grief that the rest of your email has awaken in me.

You talk about respect, but you refuse to respect my decision to make my own body more comfortable to me. Worse than that, you disrespect my friends by deciding you get to be the judge determining who conforms to your outdated ideas on gender enough to be allowed to transition. How dare you?

Speaking of daring, how dare you imply that we, the LGBTQIA community, need to be more tolerant and inclusive of people who don't understand us? Do you realize that in many cases it means they want our death? You're a white woman. You've never had to deal with a huge portion of the population wanting you to stop existing, or at least to stop "putting your identity in everyone's faces" - aka, essentially, to (hope you guessed it) stop existing. I'm not asking for understanding from every single old crusty conservative guy, just that they leave us the fuck alone.

You make wild assumptions about me in your email. Do you really think my therapist helped me accept myself? I only came out to her last year when I decided to medically transition, because I was finally confident in my ability to make that choice. We had never talked about gender before. Why would you want to take that away from me? Why would that "self-respect" you're talking about entail me going back on my steps? Why can't it be about me embracing my identity, making my body mine in a way that doesn't involve self-harming?

On that subject, you've never shown concern when I was cutting into my arms on the daily. You acknowledged it, sure, but what did you do except demand that I stop? You have no right to criticize my choice of changing my body. You lost it long ago.

You encouraged me to get a breast reduction last year when I started the process of wanting to transition. You still thought I was cis then, but since it was a surgery for cis people, it was fine and dandy. Now that I want to cut it all off so I don't have to deal with binders anymore (which are indeed quite dangerous for the person wearing them, not to mention uncomfortable) you believe you can go against that. You have to see how irrational that is.

You talk about detransitioners but I'm willing to bet you haven't done more research past "some people regret transitioning." Do you know most people stop transitioning because of transphobia? You, cis people, are killing us one way or another.

Why do you fucking think you can explain gender to me. "We all have a part of masculinity and femininity inside of us" yeah no kidding?? You're telling that to a nonbinary person, that's the whole concept (although not only - but I won't get into it since it'll just confuse you more.) You dare "explaining" to me what androgynity is and why it would "fit me more". You think your couple of hours of half-assed research are enough to compare with my lived experience? With my discussions with like-minded people? With decades of self-determination by a community that is older than you? Also fuck you for implying I've only decided to call myself nonbinary because it's "fun". You don't know anything.

You ask me if sexuality is involved in choosing a gender - and it might be for some but newsflash, trans gay people exist. Additionally, I am asexual - not that you bothered to do research about that. "Before loving a sex we love a way to be, a philosophy, a way to think" fuck off I've known that since I was old enough to fall in love.

Anyways. You'll never read this, because you would only think I'm throwing a tantrum - because you're so sure you're right, and not ready to listen. Whatever, I don't give a shit. I will try and answer your concerns later when I'm not so pissed off, but for the moment I cannot help you.

Lovingly, your child.

[sarandipitywrites]

saran's year of writing (2023)

hey y'all! saw a couple posts like this floating around and thought i'd hop on the train, because this year has been WILD for my writing (in a really good way). let's start with the bullet points version and i'll put the details under the cut. here we go:

I JOINED WRITEBLR

shared snippets of my work with other, actual humans!

made friends?!

started (and finished!) draft 2 of Dead Roots, Dark Water

wrote 1 short story for every week in october (that's 5 stories in a month! that's great for me!)

first NaNoWriMo in 10 years (and i finished it!)

drafted and re-drafted The Art of Empty Space

started draft 3 of Dead Roots, Dark Water

details, links to projects, me getting maybe a tad too personal, and those all-important wordcounts under the cut:

I JOINED WRITEBLR

i just realized i only started participating at the beginning of october, but it feels like i've been hanging out with you all the whole year 😅 maybe that means i should cut back a bit? nah...

really though, this year was the year i started taking my writing more seriously (not in a 'gotta get published' kind of way, but in a 'writing makes me happier than anything else and that's enough reason to set aside time and energy for it without feeling hella guilty' kind of way) and seeing you all posting your work and being so positive and encouraging to each other was what helped me get up the nerve to join in. and i can say without a doubt that it's the best choice i've made all year. y'all are such a supportive community and i've never once felt like i was encroaching or didn't belong here (and for me, that's really saying something)

so i guess what i'm getting at is: THANK YOU! i've loved reading your snippets and projects this year, and i'm way more confident in my own than i've ever been 💜 y'all are good peeps

Dead Roots, Dark Water

word count (edited and written): 187,789

that's a lotta words! DRDW is both my longest work wordcount-wise, and the work i've dedicated the most time to... probably ever. and i'm SO happy with it, it's a little concerning (/positive)

DRDW is now on its THIRD draft, and (assuming i don't do a massive re-edit) should be ready to start posting in 2024! *excited screaming* i've never released anything i've written in its entirety (the snippets i've been posting are actually a lot more than i've ever shared before), so this is MASSIVE for me and i'm both excited and terrified! overall, though, it's a very, very good thing

Short Stories

this october, i decided to challenge myself to do several things i don't ever do: write short stories; write them on a timeline; and share them. and i did! i wrote one short story for each week in october, and posted them here. they're far from my best work, and due to the timeline, they never could have been my best, which oddly i think helped make it easier to post them? they were also the first pieces i shared here (or anywhere)! they're not awesome, but i'm proud of them and i'm proud of myself for sharing them

NaNoWriMo and The Art of Empty Space

i've done nano once before, ten years ago. i was in college and had a lot more time then (and a job where i could spend the entire day just writing - i didn't know how good i had it), and even so i remember struggling to reach my word goal. but by the power of writing everything in wingdings so i can't second-guess my word choices, i made it this year! and even though i decided to challenge myself by writing a romance-heavy project (something i've historically avoided because IT'S HARD FOR ME, DAMNIT), i love AES and its characters and that feels fucking awesome.

even though my brain decided to spring a surprise plot restructure on me and now i have to rewrite like half of it. it'll be better for it, though, so it's all good 🥲

What's Next?

my plan for early 2024 is, of course, going to be to work on draft 3 of DRDW with the hope of getting some chapters posted (they are LONG, so i'll probably post to tumblr in chunks and the full, unbroken chapters on Ao3 due to formatting). once that's ready, i'll be able to return my attention to AES and getting draft 1.5 all written up. i've mostly figured out where the plot's going there, so it'll just be writing it up to figure out the gaps. if i'm able to write something for november again next year (which i really hope i will; nano did some great things for AES), it'll probably be one of the other Jak & Daxter fics i have kicking around in my head, because i am Obsessed (and switching it up between working on fanfic and original fic seems to work well for my brain).

i've been not super active here for the last month or so because Real Life Work is kicking my ass, but hopefully that will calm down and i'll be able to do more of what i want: writing wild shit, reading your wild shit, and screaming about it together 💜

good vibes and best wishes to everybody in the new year 🥂

[oiblackestsheep]

Letters to MBTI: ESTJ

Dear ESTJs,

Webster's dictionary defines "realist" as:

Nah, I'm just kidding, I'll get right to the point. I know that's how you Te-doms like to do things, anyway!

If you hadn't already guessed, my definition of a realist is, without a shadow of a doubt, the ESTJ.

I can't help but notice how few ESTJs we see interacting with the online MBTI community, and while it is too bad because I think they can have such useful insights to things, it really is no surprise why.

So, exactly, why is it?

Between dom Te making what feels like all of the practical decisions (for themselves and their own organizations/friend-groups/communities) and aux Si constantly storing and updating their internal database of relevant details to continuously inform their choices going forward, ESTJs really do find themselves at the center of it all!

They are focused on making real and measurable change/impact on the environment around them, and, it's usually well within the reasonable realm of possibility, too, which makes them all the more likely to be successful! This can be professional impacts at work/school, or it can be personal impacts at home/with friends.

Either way, ESTJ knows how to set their own goals, take the appropriate steps to achieve them, then cross the goal off their list in the most satisfying way. Only replace it with a new goal in mind!

All of this to say, there really is such little time to spend on hypothetical musings like MBTI (to an extent) on the internet. And while this has manifested itself in my own life as not having a whole lot of common ground for sharing interests with ESTJs, I have truly come to respect and praise the dedication that ESTJs have to their own craft (similar to how I view the ESFJs, too).

ESTJs, like all of the xSxJs / high-Si users, make the world go round. They keep us on track from day-to-day. Whether it be heading up the group project at school, keeping employees/co-workers on track throughout the work week, or simply navigating all of the necessary logistics that inherently come with a big day out with your friends, the ESTJs are on top of it, and they do it well and with pride.

Especially in social situations, they can be the unsung hero because it's often that having all of the boring logistics satisfied and taken care of that allows everyone else to have fun. Nobody has fun when the social circle gets to the event late, doesn't have enough food or money, or forgot their tickets. Who makes sure that doesn't happen? The ESTJ, that's who.

So give thanks to your local ESTJ. They work hard to make sure everything goes smoothly because it satisfies them, but also because, deep down, they care that everyone else has everything they need to be their most effective self.

[mosspapi]

hai ok prefacing this by saying i know ur not a medical doctor butttt im just getting community input i guess so i have some form of motor/vocal tics and like. idk i definitely wouldnt say it's a CONSCIOUS decision for me to tic (like jerking my arm or whatever) but i feel it impending... like i know im going to tic within the next second or wutever. or there's like this looming energy that i will tic.

im wondering if im gaslighting myself into thinking that it's not conscious decision when it actually is, if that makes sense. like if i am subconsciously deciding to jerk my arm. i wonder that then i'll hold a skewer and accidentally stab myself with it without realizing until it happened lol like... input pretty please? i guess what i want you to answer is if you know of some factor that will let yourself know whether or not you're ticcing on purpose. or something like that. pretty please. this has been going on for 3 years but it stopped happening for over half a year and there's been breaks in between, does this sound like tourettes to you? it's just so confusing cuz i have no reason to tic, it's genuinely so annoying

dont answer anything ur not comfortable with of course, im just kinda at a loss and i'll ask my parents to go to a neurologist or something soon. thank you so much by the way

Hello anon! No worries, ur all good. And that's definitely a very common thing with Tourette's as far as I'm aware- like for me it won't be every tic, but I can definitely tell when it's gonna happen for a lot of them. I've even been thru a whole branch of therapy dedicated to helping notice those warning signs and being able to counteract the tic if it's smth hurtful/dangerous (like I had one that was punching myself in the head which. Isn't ideal lmao. So we spent a few weeks finding out how it felt to do the tic, where it came from, how I noticed it, etc, and developing an "inverse" action to do instead so it wouldn't happen as much, such as stretching my arm if the tic felt like tension, if that makes sense).

It's also very common that thinking about a tic will make you tic when you have Tourette's, so if that's part of what's worrying you (IE "oh I'm just faking it/doing it on purpose without realizing because I do it when someone mentions it"), that's ironically a sign that it's Not fake lmao

And Tourette's does sort of come and go, there will be "better" times and "worse" times- I don't know for how long it's considered normal to be "better", so I can't say whether 6+ months of Nothing would make it not Tourette's, but it very well still could be, or at least some other tic disorder.

I would definitely recommend trying to see a professional abt it since there are potentially other causes for tics that aren't Tourette's, but at least from my personal experience it does very well sound like that's what it could be. Hopefully it all goes smoothly for u! And hopefully this all made sense lol, I'm a little tired atm so if anything is incoherent just lmk and I'll try again /g

[barbieb0y]

journey: INTERNET OVERDOSE.

yeah yeah shameless song reference in the title but hey it fits my acc's theme

if you can't guess it yet, in this one i'll be talking about my relationship with the internet. of course, i still mostly am on the internet, or at least on my pc and phone, but i'm doing a whole lot better than i did a few years back lol

anyways sit back bc this is gonna be a long one.

i've always had a fascination with modern gadgets, considering i grew up with gaming consoles and a dad who's a computer science graduate.

but i never used these gadgets to actually engage with the wide community on the internet - it was mostly for playing video games, to nobody's surprise. not that i was old enough to really understand anything that's being said on the net; then again, even toddlers are being let on to social media these days.

it truly started when i was around 11. though technically it doesn't classify as a social medium, i remember being on quizup. it was there where i had my first real taste of online social interaction - it's just that it wasn't too memorable so i buried it in the depths of my mind. what came after is much more interesting (despite the sudden onslaught of... graphic pictures of the popstar that clogged the taylor swift quiz community section at one point, but i digress).

it was there where i discovered about amino - a friend of mine there shared a screenshot of what seemed to be a community dedicated to blogging exclusively about taylor swift (i was a swiftie okay you don't have to rub it in) and curious, i asked them what it was. they told me it's an app called amino and you can join any community within the app. for whatever reason, that dragged me in.

i installed amino. i joined my first ever community - the swifties community (or as we call it, swifties amino). while amino is notorious for its roleplaying community, i participated in none of that (i would argue that there is nothing roleplay about in a community about the worldwide popstar taylor swift but terminally online people are well... creative enough to come up with anything). if anything, i think i barely chatted with any of the people in that community. i mostly did my own thing, which is lurking. the only thing i remember posting was fan-made gifs of the song "out of the woods".

no, what really started my chronically online phase was none other than the sims amino. and here's the funny part - i wasn't even a massive sims fan at the time. my only exposure to it is playing the sims freeplay and the sims 2 on my old psp. but since the app was still new (or at least, the main app - there were always the standalone aminos that were their own apps, including a sims amino app i believe), it was one of the only aminos available at the time that didn't really intimidate me. so i joined, for whatever reason.

it was a small community. almost everyone was new. i remember using basic gif filters to edit pics of sims was mind-blowing back then. most people actually play the sims 4, which was new (and paid; expensive at that) at the time, and it made me jealous - i only had a mobile game and an old game to speak for. and that year, i actually begged my mom to buy me a copy of the game. once i got good grades for an exam that year, i got my copy i ordered online which was, funnily enough, the first instance of online shopping i did that i can recount. (fun fact: i also got the get together expansion pack but i don't remember if that was the same year or not)

i wanted to be like everyone else, posting their sims with a pretty gradient background. i read blogs on how to edit. i wrote my own nonsensical, corny stories that i keep cancelling because i couldn't commit. there was a point where i'd post everyday. a point where i put my deepest, darkest thoughts into an amino post because i thought it'd be entertaining. honestly, it would've been simple if it was just that.

but there was a desire for approval.

if you didn't know, aminos have this section called the "feature page" and upon entering an amino, you're instantly greeted with this section. mods can pick certain posts they think are feature-worthy and put them there. we called it "featuring" posts. it's supposed to bring attention to these posts that deserve more attention. i can't remember the first time i got featured but by god was it exhilarating.

logging in and seeing my post, sometimes at the top if it was still newly featured, was like being fed food after not having eaten for a week. i didn't know i was so starving for attention until that moment. or maybe i never craved it - that amino only sparked that need, that thirst.

i remember i would feel particularly down if a post of mine (that i think deserves to be featured) was ignored and only got 20 likes instead of 300. it's funny to think about that now because nowadays, from what i've check briefly on the web, even featured posts get only 12 likes at best. it's eerie to see an amino in such a state. it's like a graveyard.

it kind of give me the image of what it would be like if we actually destroyed the internet.

this is also where i found my first ever friend group. i remember all their (user)names still. back then, i had a tendency to "fictionalize" the people i knew, including myself. i remember making sims that "represented" us. they were even color-coded, with mine being red because that was my favorite color at the time. i've also fictionalized friends outside that group. wrote a fictional story including us living fictional lives, loving fictional men i created, even straight-up putting these characters in situations that should've made my friends uncomfortable. but they never said anything about it. i was lucky. but also not.

one of the members of this friend group actually inspired me to start writing because they were a writer themselves. and after time, they decided to make an amino of their own, exclusively for writing. all four of us joined and some others - including my very own biological sister. i still think of that place as a safe haven; it's a small place with mostly familiar faces and i can write anything i want with little to no judgement.

eventually we all started leaving amino. or at least, they did. i always had trouble moving on when it came to friends leaving, for whatever reason. but perhaps it's because i always had a small glimmer of hope inside of me that told me "but what if they come back?" and that i have to be there when they come back. but they never did.

i was feeling dejected by then. i tried searching for another amino to belong in. fortunately, around the same time, i've been joining my sister in on her danganronpa marathon so i've taken a liking to the franchise. and so that meant i was more than eligible to join danganronpa amino.

i joined. everything happened in a blur - yet it feels like i could remember it all crystal clear too. i remember posting my first ever fanfic there. i don't remember what my first post was. i remembered what was probably could only be described as falling platonically in love with your best friend. i don't remember if i had breakdowns there or not. i remember fictionalizing people and them enabling it yet again. i don't remember what i said to make people even like me.

i remember being ghosted by the girl i loved.

and i remember it cutting deep.

after all the posts i wrote about her, for her, after messaging her "i love you" everyday even after she left, after everything.

i held on. just in case she came back. but she never did. they never do.

i couldn't read any instances of her name for a while after that. being there made me yearn for all the good times again and finally, after a while of holding on to that little glimmer of hope, somehow, i left.

either i was already a part of it or until after i left danganronpa amino did i join bandori amino. i had little to no negative experiences here - if anything, i was the negative experience. i had a deep hatred for this one character back then and for whatever reason, i often had to make it known to others. but otherwise, all i really did was post edit sets, post blogs explaining why i love the characters i love and sell reroll accounts (and no the price is not real money. it's amino coins). there was a point where i did lose my game account to a scammer posing as an account farmer though.

but things really went down once i joined a3! amino, a bit after i joined bandori amino. i simply wanted to be surrounded by people who enjoys the same game i do but boy oh boy did i get more than i bargained for.

don't get me wrong. a3! amino is still a memorable place for me and i have friends and family i made through it that i am still connected and close with to this day. but to say that it was all positive would be a lie.

underneath the facade of a welcoming community, i could see fights breaking out and users making fun of each other behind each other's backs. i thought i wouldn't ever be a part of all that but well, life is unpredictable, isn't it?

i had these 3 friends. 2 of them were adults, 1 around my age. these adults does not get along with the 1 kid - and honestly, i do not blame them because this kid is insufferable and i was just too naive to really accept it earlier. that i was just friends with her because i pitied her.

one of the adults told me to tell this kid that she has problems, blah blah blah, whatever. i told my friend to get her shit together and solve her own problems and not drag me into it. well, guess what? i got dragged into it. she got mad at me instead, telling me i shouldn't listen to my other friend.

it's to the point where i would feel uncomfortable interacting with any of them. i didn't know what to do. and i don't remember what the resolution was anyway. i only remember how the whole situation made me stressed out like never before. i simply wanted everyone to get along. it seemed so easy before.

another minor dilemma i experienced was when i joined this entertainment team. and though that was where i met my younger sibling and close friend, it was also where my inferiority complex grew. everyone in the team was an artist - except for me. i was the only writer accepted, for whatever reason. though i am honored, at some point, it just made me feel small.

we published a new edition of our magazine, which was in the form of a post. everyone's submissions were amazing - and to close it all off, my fanfic was featured at the very bottom. i had hoped it would make people happy - and now i have no doubt but it must've - but one comment, though innocuous, i took to heart. the user praised all the art featured in the post,

but did not comment on my writing.

i thought that my work is not worth reading. not worth consuming. not worth experiencing, just because you can't just take it in by simply looking. and knowing me, i'm known for how quickly i lose motivation. that one comment was enough to bring me down. i brought it up with my other teammates and they sympathized with me, but eventually i had to leave due to my lack of motivation and, again, inability to commit to anything.

i left both the team and amino altogether. i couldn't take what this app was doing to me anymore. i needed a new start. and somehow, somehow, past me thought twitter was a good idea. most likely because some of my friends were already on twitter by then.

i moved. i made an account. behaved like any other twitter user would - with delusion. eventually, i made two accounts. then 3. then many more. there was my public account, my private, a writing account, a gimmick account, roleplaying accounts (ironic how i got into roleplaying after leaving amino), bot accounts, the works. i was still desperate for attention, for approval, for acceptance still.

again, just like amino, i've had positive experiences with twitter; as amusing as it is, i've met most of my current friends through twitter, through the many, many accounts i made. i fondly remember how a friend of mine messaged a roleplaying account i ran and told me that i'm doing such a great job and how they really appreciate me. i didn't think my actions held so much meaning and significance to someone. and to think there might be more out there who holds the same regards but are not bold enough to tell me.

i've had my dark moments of course. who hasn't impulsively, secretly deactivated when they were feeling like garbage to see if people would notice if they're gone or not? it did work once for me so it's not completely foolproof; but it is also, obviously, unhealthy. it's done nothing but feed into my delusion that nobody cared about me when, really, they do but they need to care about themselves - or even someone else who needs it more - at that time.

i've felt isolated too. it seemed like everyone was good at something, or at least part of a majority, except for me. it was like secondary school all over again. i remember being one of the only men in the self-shipping community and even then, i didn't self-ship romantically and/or sexually so it basically meant nothing. i was nothing.

then came the thing that pushed me to the edge.

it was an innocent tweet. out of curiosity, i was simply asking fellow aroaces at the time if they mind being in a non-platonic relationship. suddenly, a mutual of mine came into my replies with a screenshot taken from my rentry. the screenshot read "i don't think all the bandori girls are lesbians". the caption read "now what is this".

i didn't think much of it at first. it's unrelated to what i was asking and besides, shouldn't have they known that when they checked my rentry before they followed me? it barely took a few minutes for people to come and attack me for it though. first it was just 2 people. then 3. then suddenly hundreds were quote-retweeting me with nasty comments and even some death threats. only 2 of my friends defended me. only a gimmick account i liked was respectful to me.

i laugh at the incident now but at that time, i felt myself break. when i hugged myself, i could hear cracks. i asked myself if i should listen to those death threats after all. maybe they'll be satisfied if such a terrible person like me, who dares misrepresent some anime girls, died at their hands.

i held on, for the sole reason that national exams were nearing and that it's a bad decision to let a bunch of stupid terminally online maggots decide whether i live or die because of fictional girls. but it still affected me greatly. i went private.

one day, i was having it particularly bad. i remember that evening vividly: i forgot i accidentally released one of my cats and i had no idea where she went. she's been out since morning and hasn't come back for a few hours now. i start crying while studying, feeling guilty for not just her but everything. i never seemed to be able to do anything right. i called myself a cursed child, that i'm nothing but a burden and an abomination.

i deactivated, thinking it's just one of those times.

i cried, until the cat showed up at my door eventually. i felt relieved by then, that maybe im not such a failure after all. i debated reactivating now that i felt better but i thought that i could probably focus on studying better if i didn't. so i didn't.

the days i went on without twitter were the most liberating and peaceful days i had. nothing else was on my mind other than studying. i'd study while listening to my favorite albums, with a tinge of curiosity as to what's happening on twitter at the time. but i persisted.

eventually, i came back - but only to announce that i'm quitting twitter and make sure my friends know how to keep in contact with me. it only lasted a few days.

then i deactivated.

permanently.

it felt like a huge burden's been lifted off my shoulders. to this day, i haven't attempted to make a new account at all, even though i had the urges. but i'm proud to say i've been clean of twitter for a year and a few months now.

fast-forward to the present day, i am now on tumblr again and it's a peaceful alternative. plus, i'm not on here all the time like i was with twitter. it's just easier to search for content here, what with the tags and all. and it's the only social media i need.

people can say that i'm missing out for not having instagram or tiktok all they want. i'm comfortable where i am right now.

plus, maybe they haven't overdosed like i have just yet.

crazy to think ive been on the internet for like what 7 years now? but it was my only safe space for a while (and still is to some extent) so i dont blame past me

tomorrow will be the last day i post something for this miniseries. i already have a draft in the works so stay tuned~

[scoops404]

this is late! but i'm always curious with rpf writers: how do you consider the 'characters' you write about against the real person? as in, how do you personally manage the separation between the two? especially in regards to shipping as the fandom as a whole seems to veer more towards truthing and an assumption that we, as fans, are able to truly perceive these people.

i see you're very respectful of the creators boundaries in regards to personal information that hasn't been freely given. has this ever been a struggle for you? it's almost impossible not to learn things about creators that has been obtained by shady means as there's an obviously toxic community dedicated to stalking and doxing creators and then using that information to harass fans by shoving it in their face. hopefully this hasn't happened to you but if it has and you've been unwillingly shown personal information about the people you're writing about, how do you personally deal with that while writing to ensure you're respectful of their right to privacy?

sorry if this is a bit more esoteric than you were asking for! i won't be offended if you choose not to answer :) love your writing! you're definitely one of my go-to authors if people ask for recs!

It took me a while longer to get to this ask because I wanted to think on it, hope you don't mind :)

Also, this got super long so it's below the cut

I never for one second have thought I actually know the ccs, in any of the rpf fandoms I've been in. I was trying to think of how I've always felt that distinction, and honestly, I think it's because I've read so many AUs that it's easier to separate fic!cc from irl!cc - dunno if that helps, but for me it's like the written versions in stories are so different because they always have the tone of the author in the style of the piece, the "characters" are filtered through their eyes, no matter how grounded in their quirks and vernacular the author is, they can't 100% take themselves out of it. That's how I always see the distinction, i guess. No idea if this is making sense to anyone else.

Moreover, I've also always believed the ccs deserve their privacy, so for someone to write a story about them and think they haven't missed any nuances of who these people are as people, is like so dumb? We can't 100% know them, and we SHOULDN'T 100% know them. There should be a wall dividing us from them.

As far as writing them--some stories they are completely different but you have to reach at something true about them and expand on it. I'm talking mostly about AUs like thief and cop AU or king and knight AU because those obviously have dynamics that aren't inherent in our Dream and George. For the style of fic I like to write, which is mostly IRL or "reality" based with a twist, you can only guess at what you think is real and true to each one of them and focus on drawing that part of them out, in regards to whatever the plot needs. With "Fallen," George's mom's divorce is the catalyst that draws them together, so we needed the angst of George seeing that relationship fall apart and wondering if his relationship with Dream will inevitably go the same way. In "Deep in the Dream of Game" their lives are at stake and so the protective side of each of them comes out and the strategist side of Dream that works to get them home and keep everybody together and alive. I hope that makes sense. In "Shine Here to Us" George's jealousy of Dream having a child with someone else prompts him to rearrange his life (again) in order to be the closest person to Dream, to do it with him.

We've seen snippets of private George, of how he keeps information close to his chest, how he doesn't talk about past relationships, etc and I channeled that into Fallen. We've seen Dream be protective over George -- the cooking stream and telling him not to put his hand in hot oil, "Tiktok fix your shit", etc and I channeled that into Deep in Dream. Anytime Dream expresses interest in someone else, George gets jealous (I feel like this happened with Foolish) -- and thus a nugget for Shine here to us.

I do try to be respectful of their boundaries. Before George's last name was in his meet-up vlog, I'd seen it in lots of stories and that never sat right with me. Not in a way where I'm passing judgment on those writers, I wouldn't, it's just a line I myself wouldn't cross. I've made guesses at things based on stories they've freely told us, but I've been lucky enough to avoid doxxed info. I came into fandom twitter space (where most of it seemed to leak) after that seemed to die down--or I was lucky enough to avoid it, I dunno. My friends said there were times doxxed info would be in replies to cc'd tweets and I never saw that, which I'm grateful for. I've been on tumblr a LONG time, but on this account, I've never gotten critblur asks like most of the big blogs did (So I've been told after the fact, and also THIS IS NOT AN INVITATION TO SEND THEM TO ME, DO NOT). So, I don't go looking, and I don't incorporate private information into my stories.

I think if I had been shown private info, I'm pretty good at forgetting things. I have to double check stories with my friends and betas all the time, so I think I'd be okay at not using that info.

It's interesting to me to see the line of fandom moving as I've aged in fandom. A lot of people in this community are young (which is great!) but the "rules" of this fandom are a lot different from other fandoms. Though, I do think it's really cool to have the main three--dream team--cool with being shipped and written about. I think Dream made a really smart choice when he was blowing up. (not to say I think he played into queerbaiting--he's a person not a corporation and can't queerbait. I'm pretty sure he and George are just like that.)

I firmly believe he did a lot of research on cultivating a fandom when he started popping off and when he realized his audience was primarily LGBT and leaning female, he embraced it and encouraged them in things that female leaning people tend to do in fandom, which is, mostly transformative works. There's an interesting article that i can't find that talks about the traditional "roles" of men vs women in fandom spaces and men do more archiving and collecting ((think racecars, pokemon cards, mcc reddit spreadsheets, etc)) which is not to say women can't do that, but apparently women lean more towards writing fan fiction and drawing fan art. I think that article didn't talk about trans or nonbinary people but I see a LOT of them in this space, which is, again, amazing.

Anyway, Dream's growth in large part is tied to not only his creative videos and terrific editing skills, but the cultivation of a fandom that he allows full creative freedom--edits, tiktoks, analysis videos, fanfic, and fan art!! I don't know any other cc who encourages artists as much as Dream and I think that's really helped him.

But I do think that sometimes people confuse him being open with his fans to being open in the sense that they are owned information about him. They aren't. They never will be. He tells us way more than we deserve to know and way more than other ccs tell their fans. I block those people and keep it moving.

Sorry that this got way off track, lmao. Clearly I just needed to ramble about fandom stuff for a while. Sorry.

Thank you for reccing my fics, that's lovely to hear! I really love writing for this community :D

[moa-broke-me]

ok I'm sorry but.

This warrants an essay I think. Because in just 11 words, this dedication has sparked such primal rage within me that I have to sort through my feelings via tumblr textpost before I straight up bite something.

First of all, the use of 'neurodivergent' is already pissing me off because I can fucking guarantee you, they don't actually mean the whole neurodivergent community. Or at least, weren't thinking of them when they wrote the book.

Neurodivergency is a term coined by activists who wanted a way to include everyone whose brain differs from most people's. Autism and ADHD is included in that, yes, but so is down's syndrome, dyslexia, personality disorders like NPD and BPD, mood disorders like depression, anxiety, and bipolar disorder, eating disorders, PTSD, retrograde and anterograde amnesia, synesthesia, aphantasia, schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorders, DID and other forms of plurality, tinnitus and tourettes and epilepsy, fetal alcohol syndrome, survivors of strokes and physical brain trauma who have to learn how to function all over again, and SO much more that I haven't even thought to cover.

And yet, once it entered the mainstream lexicon, the neurotypical hegemony did what it does best, and redefined it, paring it down to a handful of specific experiences that it deems acceptable to talk about through a euphemism. Because that's what 'neurodivergent' has become to most people now. A euphemism. A way to say 'autistic or adhd (because whats the difference anyway)' without actually saying either.

And I'm not gonna speculate on the author's possible neurodivergence here, that's not my place, and I can't possibly discern it from the little information we have in the pictures. But it doesn't matter anyway, because either way, they're perpetuating this very problem, and in such a flippant, empty, marketing-firm-esque way.

Now that I've said my piece about the first... what, 3 words of this dedication? Let's move onto 'girlies'.

Listen. I'm not typically a literature snob. I'm not someone who harps on about professionalism most of the time either. But this... Is going too far. The use of 'girlies' (and honestly the entire dedication) reek of relatability pandering, and it's not a word any author should use in their book, like, ever, in my opinion. The only way it's acceptable is if it's in dialogue, and only then, if the word... Fits the character's mouth, so to speak. I guess inner monologue would be an acceptable place too, but even then, only in VERY specific circumstances, and even then, you should use it VERY sparingly. Because it's fucking grating.

Also, just outright assuming all your readers are women. That's nice. That's definitely hip and progressive, and doesn't at all make me question how you act around trans people.

Moving onto the rest of it, and at this point, I feel nothing. The whole thing about 'getting railed' is kinda gross and makes me wonder if the author thinks 'railed' is a more polite way of saying 'fucked' because like. It's not. If anything it's more graphic. Or maybe it's just the tiktok panopticon slang making its way into the real world, in which case, like... I hate it, obviously, but it also kinda makes me think.

In conjunction from the use of 'spice' as a euphemism for sex, the dedication is even more confusing and awful than it once was. Like, clearly, what they really mean by 'neurodivergent' is 'autistic', specifically the kind of low-support-needs sheldon-cooper type of autistic. But even then, two of the first things you hear when learning how to talk to autistic people (by a competent advocate at least) is not to talk down to us, and to use plain, easy to understand language, not euphemism or figures of speech. And this fucking author does both, in 14 seconds and 11 words.

Your book isn't for 'neurodivergent' people. You may think it is, but it's not.

i've never wanted to read a book less

[baltimorebullets]

BACK AT IT, this time with BIRD (2024) and A REAL PAIN (2024). topics include CHILD ABUSE/NEGLECT, SUICIDE, and GENOCIDE! as always these are MOSTLY MY THOUGHTS ON THINGS and NOT EVEN NECESSARILY ABOUT THE CRAFT (TM)

BIRD - dubiously gendered black white trash representation ???

nah for real though like. damn. damn. the thing i loved most about it is primarily that it exists and was so wholly dedicated to seeing what it depicts, even through the hallucinogenic frog situation, and it's hard to convey that in a secondary form.

i guess the most pressing thing to me is the awareness that this movie, in america, is rated R, which means it's Not For Kids, and especially in the age of censorship we live in are barreling into an even worse state, which is like—

so, in the florida project, the whole thing is that Bad Situations TM are not so obviously bad, and are, in fact, maybe not in fact so morally bad and dirty, if you have an ounce of sympathy in your heart.

bailey of bird is still a kid. but she's too old to buy into bullshit, too. her perspective through this film is, if not a true neutral, then a sort of honest that feels very important, and real. there's a split, watching something as an adult, and thinking, "oh ho ho ho. oh no." and wanting to protect kids and yada yada. but there's also the reality that so, so, so many people live through, that kids are living through, and it's just. like. fucked. that we """protect""" kids from """adult""" themes that are absolutely their lives. and it's the sort of thing that happened to cuties (2020), where that protective, paranoid flinch completely overwhelmed meaningfully engaging with the story, the reality of what kids live through. like we have to keep proving Pedos Bad and Violence Bad and Drugs Bad like that reflexive, overwhelming disgust is a hot take instead of deeply embedded in our culture, a culture that, uh, ultimately does fuck-all to effectively protect vulnerable kids. and when those kids are left shouldering those experiences, and the disgust and the judgment and the shame, and we can't talk about them, with them part of the conversation, because then we might taint The Good Kids—

i don't know where i'm going with this. it's a truly beautiful movie. i do think it's notable how much stress and tension comes within bailey's life — how much love and community — and how it took a character who checks a lot of conservative narrative Potential Predator boxes to give her some fresh perspective. i wish— i don't know. for a million things. i wish panic and fear and anger was less contagious; but i get it, too. sometimes i get bowed over that i am too much for a lot of people, and i just developed an anxiety disorder, nevermind the true breadth of human experiences, that people claaaim to care about—

also fuck the guardian for calling this movie "feral" and saying the director was coming from a place of empathy. it's just real, bitch! we out here!

A REAL PAIN - hoo boy. also a beautiful movie, but talking about it —it's hard to know where the line between appropriate sympathy and Uncomfortable When Not About Me is.

there's a part in a real pain where benji, culkin's character, snaps at their gentile holocaust tour guide that, perhaps, he could stop listing off little factoids just sit in the reality of them being in a cemetery, where real people actually died.

so a reoccurring thought in my Sea of Things I Feel Guilty About, is that i sometimes worry that how i relate to jewish pain, jewish struggle for identity post-calamity is inappropriate, appropriative, dodging the real question, whatever. part of that is, like, having been expelled from whiteness, if i get the same test on What It Means To Be Black, and fail, i am beyonddd fucked. i might already be fucked. certainly there is a critical mass of people who already view my existence as a dilutive betrayal, and i have hard time counterarguing, other than "ow." but being clocked as a goy? yeah for sure no problems, no doubts. i'm just trying to listen, and hopefully listen well. and if i don't, hey, that's fair and expected. we can keep things moving.

the other part of this movie that's hard to talk about is, like—

there was this standup bit i saw forever ago at this point that seems to have been scrubbed from the internet, but i think it was by mitch hedberg, but, again, impossible to be sure at this point, that basically boiled down to, when everyone is talking about a death by suicide like, oh, such a tragedy, unimaginable, why would they... while you're standing there like, "what do you meannn you can't imagine why they did it, lol."

and i'm, like, fine, i'm doing fine, i am semi-recently, ironically doing fine, and it's annoying to have to say i'm fine, because the switch between fine and haha lol was so completely arbitrary. the pro | con list never budged. and it was. uhhh. weird, i suppose. to get an outside perspective on The Logic. The State of Being. and i guess it's in the name. like. they're on a fucking holocaust tour, before visiting the home of their dead grandmother. those are some real fucking pains. benji wants them to be a true, meaningful pain, while they're on a little commercial vacation, and their grandmother's childhood home is just some house, and he experiences that tension so obviously.

and like. when cheslie kryst died. and people were like but she's so beautiful and smart and successful. and there was a brief awareness that black women and children are dying by suicide at a massively increasing rate. and i was just like. well. the absolute fuck are you really wondering about. be serious. be so fucking serious. there's no god or justice or peace or fairness or better or—

my thing is, i don't still think these conclusions are incorrect. and i think that's the real frustration benji (and i) run into. like if we were wrong about things then that means things could be different and then we could feel different. and if we are right about things, and if we are in fact loved or at least liked occasionally and insightful and yada yada then why the fuck—

and also why the fuck can other people just—

a million things. a million things, and whether i (or benji) feel, in my heart or whatever, like a life defined by the effects of capitalism and bigotry and impending doom is "worth" "it" is, ultimately, not actually defined by rationale. it is literally a feeling. the scales can be so heavily weighed, or not, but it is just a feeling. and that's some fucking bullshit. but it's real.

this is also, like, a very charming movie. eisenberg's writing really had a way of pinpointing moments that define a relationship. benji wants to fuck jennifer grey so bad. this is also real.