#so all of those are really shit arguments

[hotvintagepoll]

Marjorie Main (The Women, Summer Stock)—a world weary dame who wore her midwestern accent on her sleeve. marjorie main kills it as a reno ranch owner in "the women" (1939) and as warm mother hens <3 she was no shabby actor either! this scene with her and humphrey bogart fucking haunts me [link]

Zero Mostel (A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, The Producers)—Archetypal. Comedian of all time. The worst combover in cinematic history, probably. Could make more laughter with one muscle in a singular eyebrow than 98% of all men across the face of the earth. Hardcore Committer to the Bit. Man of all time, and also told HUAC directly where they could shove it, which is a primally appealing and scrungly quality.

This is round 1 of the contest. All other polls in this bracket can be found here. If you're confused on what a scrungle is, or any of the rules of the contest, click here.

[additional submitted propaganda + scrungly videos under the cut]

Marjorie Main:

Zero Mostel:

"The chase scene in FORUM is just. it's fucking iconic. It's one of the funniest pieces of cinema I've ever seen in any context, everything about it is genius, and the heart and soul of it is Zero Mostel as Pseudolus. Casting him alongside a young Michael Crawford (of later Phantom of the Opera fame) really highlights the differences between the young romantic lead and the older, sensible, and yet entirely scrungly middle aged man (Mostel was 55 at the time) somehow manages to come off as even more desirable. He has no shit together, not very good plans, is panicked for most of the story, and the charisma of a champ. His flailing, helpless attempts at fighting the gladiator is so... he's so scrungly. "

"He's not fancy, he's not pretty, he's not good at much of anything, but he is Genius despite that."

"There is a magic to Zero Mostel that he manages to bring to roles where he is simultaneously the worst person ever, and also, compelling in every possible way. He had his biggest period of fame in middle age after he got taken off the Hollywood blacklist, and being a fat middle aged man with thinning hair is what gives every single bit of his characters power. As the original Max Bialystock he would eat the entirety of The Producers except that Gene Wilder as Leo Bloom is a genius casting decision, as Mostel's intensity against Wilder's deep discomfort ends up being the right chemistry. In many ways he reminds me of Buster Keaton, the pinnacle of hot scrungly little guy—a unique and expressive face, an instinctive understanding of comedy, active at the same time, and also they were both in FORUM together. Mostel came from an Orthodox Jewish family, was a trained painter with a degree in art, spoke four languages, and when he was blacklisted during the Red Scare and brought before the HUAC, he didn't just refuse to name names, he made fun of the senators. He was disabled after an accident, and still did dancing in movies and things like stunts in FORUM. He did a ton of work on Broadway too, including originating Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof, making the musical more Jewish as he did so. Frankly, I don't think any of those roles (or the eventual later film versions of Fiddler/musical version of the Producers) would work with anyone else. It had to be a fat balding middle aged leftist Jew from Brooklyn. The scrungly is essential.

"the scrungle factor of max in every version of the producers is through the roof but nathan lane does it as suave scrungle. zero mostel does not do suave scrungle. he does old jewish man getting into an argument with the rabbi at the full synagogue passover seder about how much wine has to be in the glass for it to count as "one cup" scrungle; he does old jewish man whose entire fridge is full of pickled herring scrungle. it's offputting in all the ways that make it genius."

[papikyoo]

/fandom rant

i told myself I won't bring this up again bc the post is already deleted. but I think fuck it, I have a free will. when I (even if they don't mention my name) got dragged because I said I like fetishizing Mith's chest and hourglass figure (in a joking manner, I didn't even do shit, my art is tame as fuck.) and some people suddenly went on a rant on how they didn't see Mith as feminine (I didn't mention anything about femininity) and oh my god a lot of people come out and so pressed about how Mith's depicted in the fandom. (like they don't like how "feminine" and "submissive" he is) all of those are fine opinions to have, even if I disagree, but people aren't true to themselves and moralize their opinions to win internet arguments. Like you have to say "those who draw mith cutely always draw kab with straight hair"

And people have the gall to say that I'm delusional when the truth is... I'm not saying Kui sexualizes him or whatever, bc maybe she would say she got an inspiration from her weird neighbor again. But I, as someone who draws, am just aware that there's a lot of conscious and unconscious choices and she definitely appreciates these figures, and she used these qualities to appeal to people, close-fitting armor to emphasize softness and curviness, all of these to gives you emotions, to make you understand that elves are beautiful creatures by our world's standards (tallmen), even if the subject itself isn't aimed at eroticism, sexuality WILL always have a play in art. And you can disagree because you find this world setting boring or you can have a critique about the ideal of beauty or how art objectifies real people, but I just think... Kui isn't fail to arouse feelings as an artist, and to be frank, I don't think it's a main subject of her art to critique those things either... she has her own taste which I really appreciate. this is like me go on rambling nonsense bc no more gaslighting... I'm tired of concern trolling when sometimes a big acc decides to be silly, and suddenly I'm subject to bad takes with thousands likes. I want to remind people that THIS. This is mith I know.

[skele-bunny]

I write desperately requesting some Dewdrop/Sodo/Mountain stubborn hurt/comfort of any kind. Just a crumb is required for sustaining my existence.

I appreciate you fully,

Jude 🦇🩷✨

OIGHGIII...... I got a few for you, my friend........ Plus just some general ones!!

When Mountain was first summoned, he came out kicking and PISSED. Ready to maul just about anyone and everything that came into his sight. Back then, the assigned ghoul was the one to calm the newly, and that happened to be Dewdrop. Mountain just slowly calmed down at this tiny water ghoul, letting him reach up and pet over his jaw and ease him down. Earth ghouls are STUPID about water ghouls they look ridiculous sometimes. Mountain was like the giant pup who still thinks he's a lap dog, constantly following or laying on/against Dewy. There was ONE time Mountain hurt Dew and it was by giving him a rose with thorns still in. Dew cut his finger, and even to the current day, Mountain will dethorn roses before giving them to Dewdrop.

Now, when Dew had his transition, he was so deep in a depression he didn't really... Function. That time is when Mountain and him fought a lot. "You cared for me, so now let me care for you!" / "I just want you to leave me ALONE." When it wasn't Aether, it was Mountain who changed his bandages. Whispering to Dew that he's almost done as he gently rubs ointment into scars and open wounds, feeling terrible as his rosemary sobs uncontrollably from the pain and guilt of what's been done to him. There's been times Dew will try doing it himself and being a dick to Mountain about it, but always ends up with Mounty doing it, being so careful and letting Dew lay on him afterwards.

Dewdrop also had a lot of concerning behaviors after, always ashamed but one night just being too much as he cried silently against some run down gas station after sneaking out of the hotel. Pressed down immediately on Mountain's phone "Can you please come get me?" When Mountain finally came in view, Dew just ran straight to him and sobbed on his shoulder. Led to another argument as Mountain staged a small intervention but Dew is thankful about it in more recent times.

One of Mountain's bad traits is he doesn't know when to stop pushing himself and to put his own needs/health first. Hunched over his desk working on something one of the others or Copia asked him to, or helping the others with their mental health and venting needs while he's just quiet and won't speak about his own. Too many nights Dew has leaned against his doorway, a certain look on his face before pulling Mountain away and to bed. "I have too much to do—" / "Shut it. How long has it been since you slept? You look like actual shit." / "How kind of you." Dewdrop using his warm hands to ease his physical pains as much as possible, massaging him into a calm state before falling asleep. Dew won't leave his side and even sometimes sleeps with him.

Mountain, when he gets overstimulated, reacts in anger as he doesn't know what else to do. Flapping his hands and baring his fangs, and with each passing moment he's showing more and more warning signs that he's about to lose himself. If Dew's around, he just grabs Mountain's face and brings him down to his chest. It irritates him more at first before his other ear is cupped to help silence, Mountain able to focus purely on Dewdrop's heartbeat and letting himself ease down. It helps when Dew rubs his jaw, just like he did all those years ago...

[acefictionwriting]

Scout’s Med Bay Stay (TF2 Bang)

-Hi! This is my contribution to the TF2 Big Bang Event! Scout wakes up after being injured to find some new strange people he’s going to get to know.

Made with Artists

@ermg33 - here is their Art Post

@sicc-nasti - here is their Art Post

As the man awoke, he had no idea what was happening. He had no idea where he was, no idea what was going on, or why he was here. It started coming back to him, but before he could put everything together, the pain shot up his legs.

Ow. Right, the enemy grenades. Shit, I hate enemy Demolition bombers. What did you get yourself into, Jeremy? 

Jeremy opened his eyes and looked around, discovering he was in a med bay. The Scouting mission must have gone wrong, really wrong, since the other scout wasn’t there. He didn’t recognize anyone in the room.

“Ah! You are awake! I was hoping to harvest your organs, but at least the replacements worked!”

“What?” 

The Scout looked at the man, and he nearly pissed himself. 

Oh no, not the medic guy again. 

“Uh, I don’t—” Jeremy tried to make an excuse for the man not to get too close, but before he could, the Medic was pulling him up from the bed to sit him up. 

“You stay here Späher, I will get you the new medicine. You will make a great first test!!”

Jeremy didn’t have time to stop the man, nor did he really want to. He also didn’t ask why the American medic was German. 

His legs were still killing him, and despite the dread he felt thinking about everything that could have happened to him, he ripped off the sheets anyway out of impulsive curiosity. They looked perfectly fine, besides the fact they had been cut off and reattached and left a giant scar. That’s probably OK. He moved his foot to find out if they still worked and jumped up in pain. 

“He is brutal, but he always succeeds. Your legs work alright, Erreur?” 

Scout looked to his right, and a man he hadn’t noticed before was there. The man had a bandage covering most of his face and was standing in the shadows enough that the rest wasn’t showing. It sounded like he smoked enough to kill him twice a day. 

“Jesus, man, didn’t see ya there. Yeah, they work. If they didn’t, I dunno what I’d do. I’m a runner. I do the Scout work, finding out where the Germans are gonna be and making sure there’s no trouble. And if there was trouble, well, I took care of it.”

“You aren’t supposed to do that on scouting missions.”

“Well, I did. And that’s gonna make me a hero or something when it works out. Then I’ll go home to my girl, and she won’t be able to resist me!” 

“WE WILL GO HOME TO OUR WOMEN WHEN WE WIN THIS BLASTED WAR. KEEP AT IT SOLDIER. WE’LL KEEP THOSE GERMANS AT BAY AND—” 

Scout turned his head to see a man in full restraints on a bed, wearing an oversized helmet over his eyes. The Medic seemed to know this man and definitely didn't like him.

“Nein… not again. You are not a soldier. How do you get in here…” 

“I AM AN AMERICAN SOLDIER THROUGH AND THROUGH—” 

“You have a head injury, du verdammter Idiot.” 

Scout turned his head away from the half-shouting match, half-desperate argument. The bandaged man in the shadows had disappeared, which Jeremy thought was fucking weird. 

With nothing else to do, he pulled out his locket with a blurry picture of Pauline F. Pauling. 

She’ll like me for sure now that I’ve got manly scars and stuff. I’ll come home her hero, and we’ll get to kiss and— 

“MMMFF MMMH MMM.” 

“GAH— WHY ARE YOU ALL SO QUIET UNTIL I’M TRYING TO FOCUS?” 

Scout turned to the bed on his left, seeing the not-a-soldier and the medic fight in the background, and someone entirely wrapped in bandages in the bed close to his. 

“Jesus, what happened to you?” 

“Mmmhff mmmhb mffhh mmmmffhhhh mmm MMMFF mmmh.” 

“Ja, we don’t know who that is. Don’t even know what side they’re on. I’ve just been using them for my experimental injections. Beyond that?” The medic shrugged and resumed his argument with the American. 

“I gotta get out of here. We gotta get out of here; you gotta be real messed up from that.” 

The burned patient muttered a muffled something that sounded like a verbal shrug. They then pointed to the locket. 

“My girl? Yeah, she’s a real beaut, huh?” 

“Is that ‘your girl’ mon étrange collègue enfantin?” 

“OK, we’re getting you a bell.”

The French man sighed and stepped away from the shadow of the door. He stuck to the shadows and the wall, but stood next to the scout. Despite not knowing the man, Jeremy felt like a stray cat had sat next to him while not getting close to anyone else. It would be some sort of honor if the stench of cigarettes wasn’t so overpowering. 

“Écoute, mon ami, you have been injured. Is there anyone you would like to inform? This girl? Perhaps your mother?”

“Well, I gotta tell Ma about this. I bet Pauling would love to hear about me and my cool battle wounds now.”

“Right… I’m sure. I will get the communications officer.”

Even Scout could see the man just wanted to leave the conversation.

Why’d he look so uncomfortable? 

There was silence then, or as much of a silence as there could be in the overcrowded room. Scout never liked not being part of a conversation in a group of people. He felt left out. His brothers always seemed closer to each other than to him, so he was pushed out of conversations often, even when they did not mean to exclude him. Scout looked around the room. He supposed the same thing had kept happening in the army. He had had brief conversations with everyone in the medical area, but they all ended suddenly. He preferred the chaos of everyone popping up suddenly to the emptiness of everyone ignoring him. Jeremy looked over to the burn victim to his left, but they had fallen asleep, it seemed, as they made a cartoonish mimimimimi sound from under the seemingly infinite bandages. The silence was uncomfortable, but not uncomfortable enough for Jeremy to wake up someone with severe injuries.

“Ah. You’re no help.” 

The Scout briefly considered talking to himself, but remembered when he was caught and teased by his brothers for that. Ma had said they meant well, but even so, Jeremy never wanted to seem crazy. At least not in a nonviolent way. Instead of talking to himself, he decided to do what he usually did when he was nervous or unsure. He counted all the ways he was the coolest person alive who would totally live the most incredible life anyone ever had. He was on reason number seven (he had miscounted severely. It was the 16th reason) when the door opened again. 

“Hey, face guy! You’re back! Is this that letter guy? Make my injury sound really bad so it looks better when I go home. Hey, wait, there's two guys.”

The first man was tall and had an eyepatch. Scout thought that was awesome. He had a bottle of… what smelled like 100% alcohol in his hand and was leaning against the doorway, half asleep, half on high alert. Scout thought it best not to disturb this man until he became more aware of his surroundings. Instead, the scout turned his attention to the other man, with papers in his hands.

The second man was short and had other features that Scout immediately ignored in favor of the robotic arm the man had. 

“WOAH, ARE YOU A ROBOT?”

The man laughed warmly, as if he’d heard it before from others. 

“Well, I’m technically a cyborg,” said the man, with a warm smile, “and I’m also the correspondence officer until we find another guy who isn’t dead to do it. I’m Dell, but they call me Engineer most of the time.”

“Can I ask, like, a bajillion questions about the—” 

“No, you may not! But my friend here is gonna ask you a few questions before we get this letter written. Tavish, I think you’d better do the talking.” 

Scout had thought Dell was friendly, and he generally seemed to be, but there was a tone to the man’s voice that said another question about his arm would make him far less friendly. So Jeremy decided to do the most difficult thing he’d ever done, and be quiet as the Engineer stepped aside to make room for the hulking man with the eyepatch. 

“My name is Tavish. I’m a demolitions expert addicted to alcohol and explosives—” 

“Wrong speech, buddy,” said the Engineer encouragingly, as though this had happened many times before. 

“Aye, right. Ahem.” 

Tavish took out a piece of paper from his back pocket that was surprisingly pristine. He took a stick of dynamite out from the other, put it back, and looked around for something else. The French guy handed him a small gun as though knowing what he was looking for. 

“Right, thanks.” The demolitions expert shot the ceiling twice to gather everyone’s attention. He handed the gun back and took reading glasses out of another pocket. 

“You are all hereby requested for a special secret mission. The people hiring you will not reveal their names or the mission’s purpose, but we assure you that it is of utmost importance. You will be relocated to a strategic and secret area that may turn the tide in this war. Each of you has been selected due to the special skills you possess, as well as a general lack of morality. Also, we will pay you. We know some of you are here to be paid. We implore you to consider this opportunity and join our team.”

“Hey, where did your British accent come from there, weren’t you Irish or Scottish or somethin’? Also, yeah, I’m gonna do that. Can I tell my Ma?” 

“Aye. Any other questions?”

“Ja, will there be room for my experiments there? Also, mein vögel, can they come? I can go with du all if I’m not taken from my work.”

“Aye, your experiments are why you're here, and experimenting with test subjects is encouraged.” 

“Oh, then Ja!” 

Each person asked questions, but since Scout had already accepted, the Engineer gave him one of the papers to sign and started writing Jeremy’s letter on another paper that was not a contract. Jeremy let everyone else fade into the background as he told his mom and his girl all about his injuries and how much he missed them in the letters. He took a while to sign his name, struggling with the letters, but Dell was quite understanding. Jeremy decided that he enjoyed the Engineer’s company. 

The only thing that seemed off was the Spy. He did not seem excited about the contract, but he did sign the papers. 

Each of the men, now called The Teufort Mercenaries, were helped out to the vehicle, except for the burned one, who was driven in a personal ambulance since they couldn’t move. 

Scout wondered how they signed the paperwork. He wondered how his Ma would take it, with him being gone even longer than planned, but how much longer would it be? A week? Probably a week. Ma would be alright, he explained everything in his letter. She had his brothers to take care of her. He smiled, excited to drive off to a new, exciting, and important life. 

The Spy, Demo, and Engineer stayed behind longer than the others. 

“These letters, they will not be sent, non?” 

“No, unfortunately, we have to burn ‘em. Gonna tell everyone these guys died in battle.”

“What about ze medic?” 

“Oh, we don’t know where he came from. He just started saving lives by making abominations to god, and we let him.”

“What ze fuck is wrong with you all?” 

“Ask the higher-ups.” 

Meanwhile, Tavish was getting paid by a woman who addressed herself as P. He assumed that was because of her purple attire. 

“So you’ll take them all to the desert location, right?”

“Aye.” 

“And you won’t ask questions?”

“Aye. Not my job.”

“You’ll be perfect. Here’s the hundred. Go take them to Teufort.” 

The woman then started calling her boss and walking away, and Tavish walked away as well. He thought he had heard, “They’re out of our hair now,” but he did not question it because it was his job now not to ask questions.

They all rejoined the group in the van, everyone having been ignorant of their absence. The lively chatter continued as everyone awaited their trip to a new life. A life that was not the heroic one they had expected, but simply a way to rid the world of these strange people. 

[dalekinapaintedparadise]

Stumbled upon a Reddit thread (don't ask) where people still whine and bitch about having to pick the "Nah, fucked that up too," dialogue option at the Oil fields to have a good relationship with Johnny. Saying that it needs to get fixed, calling it 'antagonizing' him, further proving that they don't understand him or his friendship with V at all. Sorry, but what's still not clicking? Holding him accountable for what he did and being honest with him is the only way you can have a good relationship with him for a reason.

It's not scolding him, it's not being mean, it's just V telling him 'No, what you did hurt me and I can't trust you anymore.' And he needs that, he needs someone who won't let him get away with the shit he does, he needs someone who is honest with him and won't just agree with everything he says so that he can grow and change. He knows he royally messed up, but he needs to hear that from V too. How do you expect V to have a true friendship with him if they just let him walk all over them and act like he did nothing wrong and everything's fine?

And it makes sense that the devs chose this as the secret ending unlocker because you can't have them storm Arasaka Tower together in full synergy when some parts of them are still at odds with each other.

Listen, I love Johnny as much as we all do here, but he needs to be called out when he messes up, and that's that.

[mokeonn]

Before I go to sleep I leave you all with this piece of advice: sometimes you don't actually have to answer big political questions, sometimes you can just say "I am not smart enough to know that, I just know the small things I do to help." Like you can often times completely avoid making a fool of yourself if you just say you don't know.

[the-acid-pear]

Y'know this little throwaway gag is so bizarre to me and I know this game is a bit very different to 2 and 3 but look at Matt's reaction when Jack raids the place in 3:

You'd argue he's simply stopping Jack bc he hates this guy and he also hates this job which Could Be True but i highly doubt bc overall despite his virginity and overall cursed vibe, Matt seems to be a good employee, by all means (I mean, Peter literally gave him a vacation instead of firing him in 2, so that says a lot).

Plus, Dave hates this guy as much as he hates him! He literally always calls him creepy and, AND!

This is the only footage you get of the prize corner in 2. Which is also the first game to show Matt and Dave's disdain for one another, Dave being likely more scared of Matt than Matt will ever be of him.

Which is all very curious. 2 does set a drastic change for Matt too with him going from being just strange to outright creepy, so was the old pizza place closing something that actually affected him or was he consistently that creepy all along? And if the later, did he just start hating Dave after that or did they always have beef and they simply had some sort of arrangement (or even higher word from Steven who tended to let Dave do whatever he wanted in general) that let him do so?

[tswwwit]

I know Bill's the big bad demon everyone is afraid of and he will protect his husband at all costs (when no one's looking), but I think it's also worth mentioning that Dipper, even being the dorky, squishy human that he is, also cares about his dumb demon hubby and wants to keep him safe, even if it annoys Bill, and really, he doesn't need protecting the way Dipper does. He isn't going to puff out his chest and get in someone's face like some macho man, but I think Dipper knee-jerk reaction when Bill's in "danger" isn't to just shrug because he's an all-powerful demon who can handle it. If a blast that could level a whole town was aimed at Bill's head (for him, this just means a bad hair day and a new body), Dipper's immediate impulse is to push him out of the way or defend him against whatever wants to kill his familiar. Because he's not thinking "Bill could literally end this match in .3 seconds." He's thinking "if you touch even one hair on that asshole's head, I'm going to knock yours clean off your shoulders." I don't know what the point even is in this post, just that Dipper is this nerdy, unassuming guy who ends up being viciously protective under the right conditions. Like I think Dipper pulls off the bloody and vengeful look SO well that Bill immediately melts and just lets him handle the situation, even though it's not really Dipper's fight to begin with. He's beating the guy to a pulp with zero reserve, and Bill's off to the side swooning and twirling his hair over his man for getting his hands dirty for him.

It's true! While Bill's not the type to enjoy being underestimated, he has to admit! Seeing his adorable husband all riled up on his behalf is a hell of a sight.

The thing is, Dipper's a good guy! He can't help but put himself in danger over others. Even when all reason and logic say that Bill would be absolutely fine if he got his head exploded or a shiv in his kidney, Dipper's instinct is to fully and immediately get in the way of that. To, in fact, be protective.

Mostly this is only evident when Dipper has to stand up to Ford. Yes, yes, Bill's a vile horrible monstrosity, but he didn't do that particular thing you're accusing him of. Watching him stand up to his uncle is a particular treat!

For bigger threats, though - Well. Bill's gonna be absolutely fine, no matter what happens, thank you very much. But he's definitely not opposed to seeing some guy who was about to literally stab him in the back get a few of his teeth knocked out.

[oozeandgoo-art]

[screamingay]

someone on here will literally say "encouraging plastic surgery for the sole purpose of conforming to eurocentric beauty standards isn't actually feminism" and 200 other people will come out of the woodworks and chant in harmony LET WOMEN BE HAPPY and WHAT ABOUT TRANS PEOPLE AND BURN VICTIMS as if the post wasn't clearly 1. about womens' self image & insecurities being strongly influenced by the richest and whitest of society and 2. not about trans people or burn victims at all

[snekdood]

Your impulse to believe every last bad thing people say about a guy and then if that guy is victimized by those people or the people who spread the rumors you dont even try to look into if thats even the case, you just assume hes bad by default-- yeah thats incredibly unfair to guys who are victims of abuse.

[communistkenobi]

I know being like “communism is religious” is an extremely annoying thing to say but I’m reading a book called red demiurge which is about the legal history of the soviet union and honestly that title is not hyperbole

[stellarsightz]

What is the flavor of fear?

Sublime, my Brother.

(Alternate version under the cut)

[sagehaubitze]

I write a lot to deal with my emotions and to process (right now I am processing a lot of anger, still). I don't share a lot of it, but I did write something to post on fetlife yesterday having to do with my friend, Remy's, death. The circles of people I have over there have no real context or frame of reference for any of it though. Since I'm still vaguely furry-adjacent, I figured maybe people (all like.. five of you) would get more mileage out of it here, so I'm crossposting it.

This is a small tidbit of furry history. Before you fly off the handle and send me anon hate, please take a minute to read all of this through. Plus think about what type of person would absolutely fucking loathe both queer people involved in WWII reenacting, and queer people dressing in uniform to do weird kink shit. (it's supposed to be fascists that idealize the era, they would have an aneurysm, but this is a trick question because apparently everybody loathes it)

Anyway. Pushing the Feldpost Envelope (furries and nazis and death in here.)

"History lesson.

I'm at the third year of my home furcon in 2005, attending opening ceremonies, wearing my officer's cap. All day, I've been nervously eyeing someone also in an officer's cap, albeit a different branch, worried that they're either going to be confrontational, or that they're a bad actor and a bigot. We'd unknowingly run in the same circles for a couple years now, but had yet to cross paths in any significant way until today.

"I like your hat" he smiled and piped up after the ceremonies were over. I, a very anxious sixteen year old girl at the time, had a flood of relief wash over me now that the ice had been broken and he didn't seem like a total asshole (joke's on me, Remy was still an asshole, just usually the good kind). "I like yours too..!" I chimed back. And the rest was history. "Living history", actually.

A couple months prior, Remy had created the Nazi Furs community, which I wound up co-running and co-moderating. The goal was to create a space for people with a genuine interest in history and reenacting (which despite the name wasn't limited to the German side of things) and/or for those who get their rocks off in uniform, a little more tucked away from early 2000s internet shock value, and most importantly protected from actual racists, bigots, and all around pieces of shit (which took a hell of a lot of work). Furries tend to cover the whole gamut of kink, and while Remy and I both leaned further towards the leather subculture, we tried to make space for all of the spectrum as long as it was related to that specific time period in some way.

We were not a popular or well liked group. But we were a necessary group. This is the south, if you weren't a cishet good ol boy, it was frankly just not safe to venture into any reenacting groups around here at the time. So, we made our own space for it, to be gay and weird and ourselves while we ran around in the woods. Even in kink, we tried to push the envelope for what was "acceptable" in the eyes of larger communities and carve out a little trench for ourselves, because often in the most accepting places, people would still take issue (and still do). We did our best to push back against people feeling closeted or ashamed for what they were interested in, kink or not. Don't be a shitty person is all we asked. We were young and we stumbled a lot, but we tried our best.

Ultimately, with the shifting perspectives in the fandom, in kink, and in general with online spaces being cleansed to be more palatable and marketable, we lost the fight. Part of it came from the evolving political environment in the US, it did become impossibly hard to weed out bad actors, and not be seen/assumed as a bad actor yourself. But part of it is from lingering social norms on what is "okay" and "acceptable" (even in alternative subcultures), instead of remembering that some interests can be solely academic and not a reflection of your own personal world views. Bleeding over to kink, it's exactly the same, and some people have forgotten that kink should be weird and ugly and not acceptable, it should challenge your emotions and perspective sometimes. It is the opposite of social norms, it's not meant to be sanitized and diluted down for the masses to consume. It's meant for you, and your self expression, self exploration, and your kameraden who share that with you.

Remy died on January 26th. He was one of my very best friends, and there are not many people left on this planet who know me like he did. I rushed to clean his house of things his mother did not want, or need, to see, because I was the only one left to do so. He is survived by communities that did not want him and refuse to see the work he put in for people to have a place they felt accepted.

I have no place in community anymore. But if anyone reading this feels ostracized for their interests or kinks, I feel the same so deeply inside me that it hurts my soul. You shouldn't have to feel that way. I do not have it in me anymore to try and create a space like Remy and I worked on in the past, but do know that you're not alone. I'll be here. I'm still here somehow."

-----

I would also like to add this summarized post that Remy made to the original group, the last post in the group, in 2017.

"In the wake of recent social unrest, we would like to take a moment to make a statement regarding this community.

Nazi_Furs was created by a bunch of nerds. Yes, you read correctly. A bunch of big old nerdy nerds started nazi_furs to post stories, art, historical articles, images from WWII museums, reenacting and living history events, and sometimes little animated gifs of dancing hitlers that we thought were funny.

Most of our members were card carrying homosexuals. Almost all of our moderators were gay, trans, or some other color of "unacceptable" to ACTUAL NEO-NAZIS.

Many of us have well researched and thought out fursonas that inhabit a world set during WWII era Germany. The setting used in many movies like Bed-knobs and Broomsticks, Indiana Jones, Iron Sky, and Dead Snow lends itself well to fantasy. Setting talking animal people into this backdrop did not seem like such a huge clusterfuck at the time.

Nazis are a cliche', relegated to "the bad guys" in popular culture. The sharp uniforms, advanced military weapons and tactics, crackpot schemes, and paranormal ties are used all the time in modern media. They are a caricature of what they were 70+ years ago, much like ninjas (paid assassins) and pirates (murderers and thieves) are today. Once you have been relegated to a children's Halloween costume you no longer have the influence to command respect or fear.

Let us allow nazis to be just that, a cliche condemned to be the "bumbling bad guys". Let us laugh at them and rob them of any authority they feel they may have. There haven't been any "REAL" nazis since the downfall of the NSDAP in 1945, and any members of that movement would be pushing 90 by now.

The "alt-right" are not nazi_furs. They are hateful individuals putting on costumes pretending to be like people they do not understand who have been dead for years. These people WANT you to associate them with nazis, and calling them that only feeds their egos. Lets try not to do that.

If you take anything away from our group, let it be a reminder of our origins as nerdy nerds pouring over history books, saturating ourselves in history to better understand what happened in the 1930s and 40s. Take a look at our current situation we find ourselves in and ask yourselves if we are all doomed to repeat our past mistakes. Then focus your rage and disapproval in a productive manner. Get out there and vote the real racist out of office. Mobilize in peaceful protest, advocate for the oppressed and downtrodden. Make the world a better place than you found it."

I stepped away from the fandom when my home convention, RCFM, ended after a decade. I had been run into the ground, my wallet taken advantage of entirely too much, and I was burnt out beyond belief. Remy stayed more up to date on fandom things, I know there were issues with other "nazi" groups popping up that were inundated with the alt-right. There was no avoiding getting lumped in with them, so we eventually just enjoyed our interests in silence, away from everyone else.

To be completely honest, the majority of our time was spent in museums and hunting down weirdly specific esoteric research topics, which we'd then attempt to discuss while drunk around a fire (this is the academic way). It wasn't to idolize these people or politics, it was to understand an extremely complicated time period and what was born out of it. There are SO MANY absolutely fascinating aspects to study, not just "woo big scary gun death ubermench". What people saw most though, convention-wise at least, were the room parties where we could let our hair down and be WEIRD. Furcon room parties are fucking weird just as a baseline, throw some uniforms and sadomasochism in, sometimes some LSD, and... I mean yeah. And of course that's all that stuck in anybody's mind. Though, tbh, a lot of the time for the majority of the night, it was just a small circle of friends watching war movies and drinking. We came up with this (not) great idea to take a shot every time there was a depth charge in Das Boot, yeah I can't recommend that lmao.

Even from the reenacting standpoint, Remy was putting together a US medic impression (not even German! *clutches pearls*) over the past few years, because he was an EMT by trade. I've always reenacted a very inept Wehrmacht artillery officer who is a touch cowardly, not great at their job, and is usually relegated to office/paperwork. It's far from the edgy internet shock value people associated us with.

Nowadays I am usually running around in the woods alone, or getting the shit kicked out of me in uniform (consensually). I'm just less visible about it. I wish I didn't have to be. It feels very lonely, extremely so now that I've lost Remy. I think there was a good opportunity somewhere in there to push back against the alt-right by being very VERY gay and trans and queer and weird in uniform, destroy the image they were trying to create for themselves, but the current culture of the internet wouldn't have allowed that. I'm still going to keep doing that, just.. y'know, in my own space, on my own time.

I hope other people are out there being weird too. I'll be weird with you in spirit.

[clockworkcheetah]

why did the fandom decide that todd hates people/socialising when hes clearly the most comfortable/happy when he gets to socialise

[todayisafridaynight]

interrupting non-rgg posting with non-rgg posting do you guys wanna look over my pros-vs-cons list of grocery shopping today thanks