#sometimes *I* don't feel real or genuine

[itsahotminuteinbetween]

trying to be okay because if I'm not I don't know what I'll do

[blueskittlesart]

deeply refreshing to see someone critical of Swift who also like, genuinely likes her. Like i'm neutral to positive on her, but the online discourse has been absolutely rancid. flipping between "Taylor Swift has never done anything wrong ever and she's a fucking genius" and "Taylor Swift is the worst lyricist of all time and also a bad person" is exhausting, so thank you for like. nuance or something lmao

not to make it serious for a sec but i genuinely think that being able to like things that are bad is really important. like I think that it's an important skill to be able to look at something and see what you personally enjoy about it and then take a step back and acknowledge that objectively it's flawed. and to also be able to acknowledge that liking something isn't necessarily an identity or a moral stance. and i think that fandom space in general could really benefit from more people taking the time to learn how to do that. it's okay to like things that are bad

[moongothic]

You know we all meme about how Luffy doesn't give a shit about his parents/Dragon, how he seemingly has no interest in learning about the man or meeting him at all, and like yeah that is a Luffyism

And for a long time I figured Baby Luffy would be the same too; that Luffy in his naïvete just accepted he must've spawned from the ocean itself into Garp's care or something, not realizing he should in fact have parents, thus Luffy's seeming disinterest in them

But you know what

Luffy did spend most of his early childhood alone

Sure, he had Garp, but it seems like Garp wasn't always there to look after him every day, he had his duties as a Marine too. Had Garp been there 24/7 all year then Garp would never have allowed Luffy to interact with Shanks (a filthy pirate) to begin with. So yes, Luffy had his grandpa, but not all the time. And sure, Luffy also had Shanks, but Shanks didn't spend all his time in Fuusha Village either, he came and went whenever he pleased too until his final departure when Luffy was just six years old. And yes, there was everyone else in the village too, people who cared about Luffy and were helping look after him. But Luffy's early childhood was one without a stable family.

It wasn't until Garp yeeted the child into Dadan's care that Luffy actually gained a proper family, where after months and months of trying Luffy managed to win Ace's trust and gained Sabo as a brother too. But as we know, by that point Luffy already hated being alone

All of this to say; Luffy growing up essentially orphaned would explain why he's so afraid to be alone, the way he clings onto people

In some ways Luffy's POV is meant to be the reader's POV, to some degree Luffy's feelings and thoughts are meant to be how we the readers feel and think about whaveter is happening in the story. Not a 100% by any means, but somewhat at the very least.

Perhaps Luffy's lack of interest in Dragon isn't just "Luffy not giving a damn about blood family because chosen families are better" nor "Luffy is too stupid to understand where babies come from". Perhaps Luffy, who may have assumed he didn't have parents at all (as in "might've assumed they were dead or had intentionally abandoned him"), doesn't know what to think about the fact that he does have a father out there, one whom he has never as much as met. Because yeah, Luffy doesn't know why Dragon left him with Garp, why he never got to be with his dad. Should he be angry at Dragon, hate him for being left alone? Or did Dragon have a good reason for it, does Dragon wish things could've been different?

Perhaps Luffy's seeming disinterest in Dragon isn't because he doesn't care about blood family, but because much like us the readers, Luffy doesn't quite know what to make of Dragon, and figuring those feelings out hasn't been relevant to the plot yet.

[halojalex]

whenever people say jack and alex dated/g&c is about jalex/etc they're generally joking but i want people to know im being so real when i say that i think jack and alex were together for a brief time

[the-vibing-ghoul]

some people will be all about mental health awareness and leftist ideals of at least tolerating the mentally ill who show ''ugly'' symptoms until it's someone they know and ''care'' about having a bad day and acting like it in a way they don't find appealing

[ceramicbeetle]

finding a character that grates against your nerves and eventually thinking, well, that's not fair, you haven't done anything; why do i dislike you? and then you dwell on this for a while and discover 'oh! you are like me when i was younger' and decide well, i'll simply learn how to love the both of you. power in this.

[swinging-stars-from-satellites]

why is everything (showing other people respect. being patient and kind. not flying off the handle about stupid things. emotional regulation and self-control. et cetera.) so easy when I'm not around my parents and so so so so hard when I AM around them?

[quirkle2]

I was wondering if there are any rare happy ritsu moments in ur zombie au since hes always miserable I think,, like is he always miserable or is he happy/not miserable and feeling kinda good sometimes?

VWHDGDGD NO YEAH OFC HE'S HAPPY SOMETIMES im just horrible and enjoy putting him through misery

ive never been able to get a genuine smile to look right on his face in my art style either i think thats part of it. as ive said his face is just built to be mildly uncomfortable and bothered and i lean into it sm it's starting to get kinda funny

but yes ritsu is happy plenty! i think, canonically, he just seems like the type of person to me that tends to turn lemonade back into lemons. he's easy to scare and his first reaction to things is often Dread and Anxiety. he dwells on the negatives a lot and seems to be a "hope for the best, expect the worst," kinda guy, but there's a section in this post abt shigeo always loving the little things in life, and ritsu steadily learns throughout the journey on how to do that and how healing it can rly be. even if he had to grow up too fast during this whole thing and learn things a kid should never have to, the journey also gave him some good insight and lessons in other places! ritsu is smart, he figures it all out

in terms of little things here n there he's the happiest lil guy on the planet when he finds one of his favorite foods—swings his legs while he sits and munches on a kitkat bar like he's got absolutely nothin in the world to worry abt. sometimes mob does smth funny that he laughs at; for the longest time i've had this silly image in my head of mob accidentally knocking down a bucket from a store shelf and it lands on his head and he just kinda stands there and makes noises.when the noises continue out of pure curiosity about the weird echoey quality it's giving them ritsu cannot help but lose it

besides tiny things tho, when tome comes around ritsu in general is a lot happier, just cuz he has somebody to talk to that will actually respond in some way. they're sorta reluctant partners in crime at first (at least on ritsu's end) but over time and over bonding they grow to rly like each other's presence. they bicker constantly but it's almost always fond eventually, and they shove each other and playfight until mob gets antsy enough to get worked up about it. rly, tome is a godsend to ritsu's mental health—after months and months of being effectively alone with his thoughts, he finally has another person to converse with. a person His Age, too!

tome is rly good at knowing when ritsu is thinkin himself into oblivion and she's Also rly good at being the most annoying girl on the planet to yank him outta that and replace any misery with Oh My God Get Off Me You Freak. she doesn't even do this on purpose at first, but over time she learns how to tell when he's thinking too hard and, ofc, she's grown attached and she cares, so she's as obnoxious as possible to lighten the mood

when they find reigen n teru, ritsu gradually gets Much happier still. now that he knows they're safe and the gang is finally back together (and now that there's an Adult present and he can relax a lil and let himself be taken care of) his stress levels r exponentially lowered. having teru back is another instant lift to his mood—im always a big fan of teru and ritsu friendship, and i think adding tome to their dynamic simply makes it more chaotic. truly a trio of the 3 most normal teenagers in existence which will surely bring nothing but good (reigen sweats offscreen)

actually this makes me feel bad for forever torturing him im gonna go draw happy zau ritsus brb ,.,.ok imback <3

[katierosefun]

y'know, i do think that actors are probably the closest that humans will ever get to a shapeshifter because sometimes i'll go through an actor's filmography and be totally taken aback by the sheer range of roles they've played and how violently dissimilar one role is from the other, so much so to the point that i'll literally forget that they played someone else and oh my god

[trans-leek-cookie]

Catching up to CSM is terrible because all it does is make me wish JJK was more like it

[fluentisonus]

.

[gingerbreadmonsters]

its so important to me that you know how much ive already cried over this wip and its literally only been two days

[selchwife]

i also think we shoot ourselves in the foot when we justify fictosexuality with shit like "well i was rejected a lot but i found this" or "i was traumatized and cant trust real people so i do this." i do not necessarily deny that those are real and true motivators for people. trauma is not the reason i do this, although it is likely most of the reason i am not particularly interested in flesh and blood dating at present. i just have been doing this for since i was a little child. it's always been a massive part of how i've experienced attraction. that's fine. like. whatever.

it just kind of sets up this like "well of course sad messed up people have no choice but to turn to these inferior relationship models" thing that's like. well, uh, i thought the point was to demonstrate how this sort of thing is a source of joy for people and not necessarily inferior. why would attributing it to trauma or failure help? it's also like. not every ficto is disinterested in or unable to find flesh and blood relationships, in fact a lot are poly and some date each other, crazy if true

the thing i think would go over better is like. relating one's experience to other people. i think most if not all people have feelings and tendencies that could be categorized as fictosexual-adjacent, so there is in fact some nearly universal ground to explain this from. it's just that for some people those feelings are more intense and more of a priority in their lives. that's literally it. it's not like, inherently tied to some sort of supervillain origin story situation

[icharchivist]

Go off queen

It's your blog and you should be able to talk about whatever you want after all

aww thank you 🥺 i appreciate it <33

i do really not like spreading negativity esp when it's on a topic i have strong feelings about, and let's say the D.A fandom especially tends to be. extreme about the way it reacts to people disagreeing with them.

And look. I'm not immune to it because sometimes i get caught up by the genuinely rancid vibe in the fandom as well, and i think those games are designed for us to have strong feelings to start with.

but it also means i don't want to go too deep into controversial thoughts because i genuinely don't want to get to a point where i'll see someone screenshot my posts to dunk on it and say i'm the reason media literacy is dead and why the fandom is so toxic (citing things i've actually seen on said blog, for instance though not directed at me but at takes i've seen taken out of context. except i knew the context so knew this was a bad faith argument.).

Like can't even dislike shits in peace in here.

[agapestricken]

alright, yeah, manja may be kind of sly... BUT have you also considered that she's a seven foot tall partially moth-like woman with luxurious, long black hair and glowing yellow eyes? like she's honestly gorgeous and i'm tired of pretending like she's not okok (LMAO i'm just joking as i know this account is still new so i haven't talked about her much 💀 but even with the, uhhh, body horror thing's manja's got going on — she is stunning)

[jjoelswatch]

jokingly told my therapist "I think I'll make it" when he apologized to me for the only available appointment being 3 weeks out, but today I thought this week was 2 weeks from my last appointment (and that my appointment is next week) and it's NOT and boy howdy am I feeling the need for my appointment.