#than most of you all have considered

[oddlittlestories]

Look, I'm probably gonna delete this later

But I REALLY hate how tumblr treats professional authors, especially YA and new adult authors

"Oh, we're the anti-censorship website! Go read a horny book! Go read a banned book! No not that one, you're doing it wrong." /sarcasm (Seriously, ACOTAR was banned in Utah https://apnews.com/article/utah-school-book-ban-d7345be6a89cfa6cd2cb5ddd25fca700 and plenty of folks around here want to critique its sexual politics as unfeminist. Or those of horny monster books that are written by INDIE authors that actually have some things in common with books like ACOTAR. BTW, love that y'all hate big box publishing but also, indie writers who want to get horny with it are the devil. Because none of us around here ever like horny fics that get weird with it.)

"Oh, you should never write a book that's to-market! I don't write fanfic to market, only ridiculously rare rarepairs, hurt/no comfort only, with unsatisfying endings." /sarcasm (Most professional writers write to market in some way or another. But most fanfic authors do, too. You (generic) enjoy this as a reader, as long as its a market that's to your tastes.)

"No one ever does anything useful writing to market. There are no trends. POC writers don't use that as a tool to get their books published ever." /sarcasm (Listen to Deadline City to hear Zoraida Cordova and Dhonielle Clayton, two POC YA authors, discuss the tug of war with writing on trends, on markets, and getting published in general. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/deadline-citys-podcast/ and before you go saying that's just an issue of capitalistic pressures—are you SURE. people write, in part, to meet an audience and change people's point of view. even on a site driven entirely by community, people feel pressure to write for more popular fandoms on ao3. so, again, are you SURE.)

but uh yeah no this site has no issue with censorship, supports indie authors getting funky with it just as much as indie artists, and has full respect for indie YA authors and genres they, themselves, don't personally like

[knifearo]

ultimately when it comes to shipping and fandom space treatment of aspec characters i just don't accept "aro/ace people can still date/have sex" as an answer from nonaspecs. like yeah. mhm. okay. now i think we both know that you're not saying that out of real interest in the diversity of aspec experiences. so you can turn in your seventeen-page essay on why and how you plan to examine this character's aspec identity within the context of a romantic or sexual relationship complete with evidence from canon and peer reviews from multiple aspec people within the next week or i'm putting you in the pit from the edgar allen poe story

[dykedvonte]

You ever just see a Mouthwashing take that makes you want to bang your head into a wall? I literally just saw someone claim Curly couldn't have been emotionally abused by Jimmy before the crash because he was in a higher position of power than Jimmy.

-Shrimp Anon

The mouthwashing fandom has shown me that people genuinely do believe that certain types of abuse are not as detrimental as other types especially when they deem those immune/resistant, ergo, believing one is objectively worse no matter how it affects the person nor the intersections of power, history and dynamics at play.

Get ready cause this is a yap session:

Cause like it's heavily implied that Curly and Jimmy's friendship was toxic and abusive, pointedly in the direction of how Jimmy uses Curly's belief/comfort in him. Curly wasn't forced to enable Jimmy but he was emotional and mentally on edge around him in almost every scene in some way. Mental and emotional abuse are not contingent on what positions you have at work. Yeah, he's Jimmy's boss but he was Jimmy's friend first and it's like getting into Psych discussion to talk about how social power tends to overshadow any perceived organizational power in the human mind. People are concerned about their jobs ofc but they tend to hang onto and put more value/investment into their personal relationships, hence why there tends to be laws and restrictions around mixing the two.

I always see the sentiments that "Curly is a grown ass man", "Curly is bigger than Jimmy", "Curly is Jimmy's boss", "He just needed a backbone" as criticisms of Curly and while I do agree that on the surface level all of these to be true and viable ways Curly could've taken more control of the situation, I often look at the parallels of Anya and Curly as victims of Jimmy pre/post crash.

The way Jimmy talks to Anya post crash is how he talked to Curly in the pre-crash segments. It's hard to pin-point mainly because we know he hates and wants nothing to do with Anya compared to his contrary but similarly handled obsessions with Curly. It's a weird sort of "honey-moon" effect of abuse Jimmy does in terms of emotional and mental victimization. He is always horrid to Anya, always talking down or questioning her abilities and thoughts in a situation, this of course includes the harassment and assault. However, he has a moment of attempted gentleness/conditioning when he question her about the mouthwash when she's contemplating drinking it at the table. The key difference is he has no personal investment in Jimmy outside wanting nothing to do with him, meaning there is no sort of romanticized version of him that he can condition her off of. He knows this, hence, why he always reverts to trying to make her to scared to oppose him.

This sort of give and take of "kindness" doesn't work on her because she knows he is just doing it to take more from her than whatever he could possibly give but it reflects even the "softer" scenes between him and Curly where he always rewords or rephrases Curly's sentiments and concerns to sound more shallow. He is feigning a deeper understanding by reworking Curly's emotions into something bad and needing to be hidden. Everything is laced with envy and resentment, an outburst just around the corner, I mean he even slams the table in the birthday party scene, a tactic in emotional manipulation to set the victim on edge and cloud their ability to respond. Even if Curly knows Jimmy won't get physical in that moment, the physical actions is intended to make him back down in the confrontation in case it does. This is something that is just not person specific. It ingrains itself into how you interact with the world and life and it shows in major and minor ways with Curly.

Post-crash, the abusive nature is more in tandem to the physical victimization Anya went through and the stripping of voice and autonomy we see take place. Like the parasite in HFIM, Jimmy speaks for Curly most of the time and puts words in his mouth, similarly to how he takes Anya's plans as his own. He very commonly, with the both of them mind you, supplements the worst aspects of himself into them; pettiness, selfishness, lack of understanding... And tries to cover himself with their best qualities; kindness, planning, initiative, etc...

These parallel are just to say that positional power has little to do with if a person can be abused and how it can even be flipped to further the abuse. There is no doubt that Curly could've picked up on Jimmy's envy of his position hence another reason he never confronted him as a Captain but as a friend as doing so would immediately put Jimmy in a space to be confrontational/combative.

I think the disdain some people have when they talk about the heavily implied if not implicitly stated emotional/mental abuse Curly experienced being Jimmy's friend is when treating it as an excuse to why he didn't do more. I can understand that completely because it is not an excuse to why he didn't do more but is a very real reason people in his position in these scenarios can experience whether in the context of a work or social environment. However, I also think the way people talk about it really does demonstrate a bigger problem when talking about abuse when somehow who is/was abused is either part of the issue or enabled it.

Harkening back to the sentiments about Curly's inaction regarding Jimmy, I think the exact phrases I used/have seen show how there is an inherent belief that it is easier to overpower the effects of emotional/mental abuse that go in tandem with the perception of Curly as someone who should be able to. There is not an age you suddenly stop being susceptible to abuse nor a set point or low where you realize how it has affected you. You don't suddenly know to stand up or put a face on to face your abuser nor admit that you inadvertently enabled them to subjugate someone else to the same treatment. Maybe it's my psych brain but their is this growing belief that direct action is somehow easy or always the best method with the game shows you instances where it is not always the case. In real life that rings true too. He should have done more, but it's not impossible to see why he struggled to find a way or didn't even if it makes us mad.

It's not easy to suddenly gain a "back-bone". You don't immediately want to resort to aggression, especially if it mirrors the type you were a victim to. You don't want to believe you allowed yourself to be treated this bad, let it get that bad or allowed something bad to happen to someone else. It is easy to be in denial, to retreat to your thoughts or make excuses to avoid the painful truth. It's frustrating but in a way we know is relatable. It why we both hate and love Curly for it. We know we'd be better, we think we'd be better, we like to think we wouldn't falter in the same ways but it's always easier to say that from the outside looking in. It's easy to see what he was doing wrong because we are seeing it, not him, but the game really does make you picture what you would do if this was your raw reality and it's why this debate about Curly seems so never ending/contradictory. We can all say what we'd do but bottom line is that's much different when you're in the moment with all the emotions and human feelings attached.

I personally think Mouthwashing tackles the themes of rape culture, enabling, toxic masculinity, types of abuse and patriarchy in ways that are meant to deconstruct the typical straightforward views we mostly have of these concepts and how little subtilities of them are just as, if not more, detrimental than the overt/obvious parts. The game deals with the idea of little details and bigger picture in a way to show that sometimes the bigger picture is not the issue but the little details that make it up. It's why I have a personal dislike of depictions of Jimmy as the typical horrible person who would of course do something like this because the game is about noticing the little warning signs, the foreshadowing and foresight.

It's why I dislike the typical discussion of "bro code" and "boys will be boys" for the game because the game makes a point to avoid the standard depictions of such. It is about the type of men who still enable despite not condoning, agreeing or even perpetuating harmful beliefs because they can't see the little details or the ways it seeps into their everyday. The severity is not obvious to them as it was not obvious to Curly, Swansea or even Daisuke the way it was to a woman like Anya. There are little details about Jimmy that should ring alarms but if you are too naive like Daisuke, too distant like Swansea or too conditioned like Curly, they are just off markers.

There is 100% more constructive/concise ways to say "Curly was a victim of Jimmy's abuse on an emotional and mental aspect that clouded his judgements and perceptions in the scenario" while also critiquing on the side of "Curly still had a responsibility to protect Anya as a crew mate and Captain that he failed to do due to biases and stigma's he failed to surpass" without the weird condemnation people give him about should've knowing better than to let himself be manipulated by a person he considered a close, if not family/best-friend and had his own reasons to trust initially. Also stop being weird about victims of abuse in general with this fandom, like sorry not everyone has a like social epiphany the moment someone's nasty to them. People are treating it like you immediately know when you are in a toxic relationship immediately or comprehend when a person is actively dangerous and either it's your fault for not knowing how to leave/cut them off or you deserve it. Like the hypocrisy of people believing how certain fans treat the story reflect their irl views but not their own is crazy.

End statement is: I honestly don't even know man, I've been writing this too long and just like no man on that ship was perfect or really helped Anya when it mattered and I feel like pitting them against each other in discussion on who did the least or most or how it was justified sucks cause in the end Anya always did the most and best thing for herself.

[tswwwit]

Dipper gets saddled with all of Bills stuff when he dies and suddenly its a role reversal with him trying to reincarnate Bill

I imagine pretty much everyone is upset by this turn of events, including (especially) Dipper! But yes, getting Bill Back would be his top priority, if only to offload all this junk back on his thoroughly irresponsible husband.

[leroibobo]

etz hayyim (“tree of life”) synagogue in chania, crete, greece. the building dates to the 14th-15th centuries, and was originally a venetian catholic church. it was acquired by chania's jewish community and converted into a synagogue in the late 17th century. chania's jews were deported due to the holocaust in 1944, after which the building remained abandoned until restoration in the 1990s.

romaniote jews are the oldest jewish community in europe and one of the oldest in the world, thought to have lived in and around present day greece since before 70 ce. they have their own liturgy that is unrelated to the more commonly used european ones (ashkenazic and sephardic).

[retributory]

kind of irritates me a little bit when people act like it's weird or wrong or ooc for sy to have internalized homophobia as if that isn't probably the most realistic thing about the plot to begin with. he's a chinese man who grew up in the late 90s - early 00s and spent all his time online i would be frankly more surprised if he had ZERO hangups about being gay. this is explicitly presented as a character flaw so i'm not sure why people act like mxtx is homophobic for writing a guy with internalized homophobia. also he like gets over it in volume 4 anyways you gotta give him some time dude he died like 3 times and he keeps getting force-fed blood he's got a lot on his plate

[kiddokori]

his ass is NOT getting up for his 8am lecture

[quillkiller]

thinking about my favorite mortal enemies regulus and remus

[bigskydreaming]

Imagine if you were a gay or bi man who tried a certain firefighter show because of all the attention it was getting for one of its mains having a later in life bi awakening.....and between seasons you ventured into its fandom in search of material to tide you over til the next one. And you're greeted by a deluge of posts and fics that are just cheerfully homophobic towards one half of the newly out bi character's canon relationship on the basis of 'well he's not the RIGHT gay guy' and pushing the idea that actually its fine to cheat on him because Reasons and he's sexually predacious based on......behind the scenes implications people have divined like they're reading fucking tea leaves.

But don't get it twisted....this fandom, like all fandoms, really cares about representation!

Sorry not sorry, but we really need to kill this idea that fandoms are welcoming and inviting and inherently progressive when they're frequently insular and reductive as fuck. Every single fandom I've been in has had major trends of people doubling down on their own headcanons and fanon interpretations of the characters and willfully enacting trends aimed at running off people who like the 'wrong' characters (usually characters marginalized along one or multiple axes), like the characters in the 'wrong ways' or other bullshit.

Scott is a Bad Friend fics overtaking Teen Wolf fandom was not incidental, it was a FEATURE of the fandom, because the vast majority of that fandom did not want to share its space with anyone who had the nerve to like its main character. Survivors complaining about or criticizing the prevalance of rape fics in a certain fandom has in my experience always led to a reactionary UPTICK in those fics, with gems like 'this character can, will, must be raped' in the tags making it crystal clear that some of these fics exist because how fucking DARE anyone try and push forth a narrative not agreed upon by Fandom Main.

I could cite examples for so many other fandoms, with the commonalities always being that vast majorities in these fandoms are explicitly reacting defensively to being asked to be more mindful of fandom trends revolving around or exacerbating racism, homophobia, transphobia, rape or abuse apologia, ableism, etc....

With the most prolific fucking rallying cry across countless fandoms being "No the fuck we will NOT be doing that," because lolololol.....

Fandom is an inherently progressive space, didn't you hear?

[betaphannie]

any fellow phannies that went to the reading pa show remember when dan was like, "so glad to be here this is the better reading compared to where i grew up!"

and the whole audience was just like 😬

[customizablefriend]

My true self still loves Tommyinnit I am still an inniter at heart I have not changed

[optiwashere]

Huh, I didn't even realize it'd been a year since BG3 came out until I opened tumblr this morning. Kinda wild. I didn't think much of the game's release: I like Larian's games, and I like the BG series. I wasn't ever going to skip the game, but I didn't think I'd play it at launch because I was busy working on a novel in 2023 and not doing well financially.

Thankfully, circumstances left me with a little bit of extra money last year just before launch and it meant I could spend on a video game. I needed a pick-me-up after said 2023 novel failed to go anywhere, and BG3 was right there. Like most CRPGs, I played it in basically every moment of free time that I had and did as much as I possibly could in one playthrough.

It's so odd how these small happenstances can snowball into coming back to fandom, finding some friends I might've never met otherwise, and writing a lot of fanfiction along the way. I'll probably have something more interesting to say/share when it's the 14th, AKA when I sat down and wrote my first fic for this fandom.

Anyways, it's been a lot of fun and I'm looking forward to more years to come 💜

[dykedvonte]

Of all the themes in Mouthwashing, I think the themes of punishment and virtue are the most subtle.

It’s so odd because it’s a subversion where all the characters are punished for their virtues more than their flaws except Jimmy. Curly sees the best and people and tries to do right by all parties whether deserving or not. He is then forced to see everyone fall to their worst states while he can’t do anything. Daisuke is optimistic and hopeful, playful to a fault and a big morale. He dies in agony the one time he is forced to act in a serious event. Anya is kind and capable, knowledgeable in her field. Yet, she is treated like a dunce and does being treated like a dead weight.

The only characters who aren’t punished per se are those without direct virtues. Swansea is ornery and rude the moment we meet him, Jimmy is self explanatory. Yet, Swansea is still punished with Daisuke’s death, while Jimmy escapes in a way. Not having to face the final aftermath or even acknowledging how he could never really fix it. He suffers and is tormented, but he doesn’t really care because in his mind he didn’t fail in his head of proving something to Curly.

This is rambling y really but it really is the theme of no good deed but to the extreme. Good people punished for their attempts at virtue while the bad person victimizes themself over their suffering.

[stars-n-spice]

Questions TBB Better Fucking Answer Soon:

Where the FUCK is Tech??? Stop fucking giving us hope that he might be C2-X or whatever the fuck. Fucking show us his dead body or give him back to us!

Where the FUCK is Cody?? Huh??? Where did he go??? Only acceptable answer? He's on his way to Tatooine to be with Obi-Wan. You reveal that and all will be forgiven. I promise. Maybe.

WHAT THE FUCK HAPPENED WITH WOLFFE FOR LETTING REX AND THE GANG GET AWAY HUH??? I'M SURE THERE WERE CONSEQUENCES!! WHEN THE FUCK ARE WE GOING TO GET HIM BACK???

What the fuck is up with Omega. Straight up. What. How. and Why? Same with Emerie. How the fuck did they come to be? Are they trans? yes. next question.

Also why does Emerie get a last name and nobody else does, hm? Why is she Emerie Karr, is that like,, did she choose that or like?? Ok dumb question sure but like,, EXPLAIN HOW AND WHY OR JUST CONFIRM SHE'S TRANS OR SOMETHING C'MON NOW.

SHOW US WHAT THE FUCK IS IN THOSE FUCKING TUBES!

I'm sorry, I'm yelling but I've spent most of this season fucking confused and frustrated.

Where the fuck did the zillo beast go? And when is it going to eat Hemlock and Palpatine?

So...Senator Chuchi and Clone Revolution when?

And like...Cid is just...she's just going to be able to get away with what she did? We're just gonna forget about her? I mean sure, but I really thought they'd bring her back or something.

What the fuck happened to Crosshair on Tatniss? Wait, nevermind, don't tell me, I don't want to know, it'll only make me sad-

WAIT SO LIKE,, DID CROSSHAIR EVER ACTUALLY GET HIS FUCKING CHIP REMOVED OR NOT???

Explain again Hunter's enhanced senses and why the fuck he seems to have lost them in this season.

Also answer why Wrecker is the most perfect man ever? Why did they craft the most wonderful man to exist and then make him not real? You trying to kill me or what?

Feel free to add on because there are only the ones on the top of my head.

[daily-hanamura]

[edwinisms]

i like to think, as a hc or a theory (because it’s definitely possible), that charles has had a few kisses throughout his high school years, sure, but past that he’s undeniably a virgin– well, kind of undeniably, because I think he’d deny it if found out by trying to use technicalities (“I mean that one time there was friction involved–“), but to any reasonable person, and by occult standards (see: edwin being a virgin sacrifice), he’s a virgin.

and i think this because it seems like him to fib about his level of experience (like he did when agreeing he’d sleep with crystal, matching her level of casualness about it) when in the presence of people who do, actually, have experience, in the hopes he doesn’t come off as lame or childish. given what we know about his “friends” when he was alive, they seem like the type to have teased or bullied boys– especially in their own circle– who haven’t gotten laid, or at the very least would’ve thought less of someone for it. and given what we know about charles, i don’t think he’d be nearly as sleazy and inconsiderate as his group when it comes to landing girls with the primary intention of adding to his body count. and considering he’s only supposed to be 16? and has never mentioned any significant relationships pre-death? it just seems unlikely.

all that to say– I can see him maintaining that facade of experience and confidence literally right up until the moment it matters, and in the heat of the moment getting nervous and embarrassed because “uhhh. so I may have been exaggerating some things.” though he’s not totally clueless either, I think it’d take a bit of a soft heart to heart moment for him to be reassured enough that he won’t fuck up and hurt his partner to go any further.

anyway not sure what the relevance of this is, but it’s something.