#thanks to the folks who have seen this more times that necessary

[murielles-crowsnest]

Meiloorun Margaritas

I am sure that most of the Kalluzeb fandom is aware of the... interestingly worded comic cover announcement made recently on some of the official Star Wars socials... and maybe you also saw the comment Steve Blum made about it... I was inspired. I swear, let these boys have a nice vacation somewhere sunny and mild with lots and lots of alcohol available cheaply at a nearby cabana.

Kallus's shirt is based on a shirt you can actually buy from @tinymangojunior it's super cute and has meilooruns and lothcats all over it.

Zeb's is basically Magnum PI with maybe purple Morai instead of parrots. The color scheme worked and Tom Selek is a kinda fuzzy dude. It made sense at the time.

(Hera is so jealous of those drinks.)

[salemlinnet]

hey everyone!

a few news items right before we start up chapter 5. firstly i just wanna say thanks to everyone who follows my comics, it's been a pleasure as always. i've been keeping a longer buffer on patreon than usual, mostly for my mental health. publishing takes a lot of energy and i've really felt it necessary to just focus on production for a few weeks. at this point, patrons have seen most of chapter 5, there's only one more scene and about a page to be drawn. the quiet has been nice, i've caught up on a lot of house keeping, though i'm obviously very excited to present it! and on house keeping,

DOMESTICATED IS NOW LIVE AT IT'S NEW HOME!

to not go into the boring details (the old domain got trapped between to hosting sites in the middle of a buyout), it's not hosted at cod-domesticated.com (rip custom url you will be missed) it will instead be hosted at salemlinnet.com/domesticated (now you live at my house like you're my son why didn't i think of this sooner). if you find any errors in the pages i am so sorry i just formatted so many buttons TTuTT it would be super helpful to me if folks could report any specific buttons that don't work if it's convenient, it's been beta tested by the discord (thank you guys so much) but i'm just a dunce and i can't be trusted so there might be errors.

the simons are all wearing a little beret this chapter is my third point of business, i am losing it over the ghost beret. oh and the devil may care is up to chapter 18, will be chapter 19 within a few days. page 21 is out for patrons.

finally, to the people lurking for thistle and spade. i've wanted to say for some time, i'm really grateful that you've stuck around while i've been too sick to work on a bigger project. if you were here to see me start production for and then pull ghost #1, the story behind it is that i sort of suddenly learned i wouldn't always be as sick as i was, that i didn't have to rush anything, and that i could produce thistle and spade in chronological order with a bit of patience. that left me with no smaller project to draw and release in the mean time, except, see, i really like this game, call of duty. i was still on bed rest when i started domesticated, and with a ton of physical therapy i've been able to draw longer and longer hours. it's trained me up to be a better comic artist than i ever was before. it's grown into a sturdier project at the same pace. it's so unlike thistle and spade, whose chapters were written and edited over years and planned to every gesture and expression. i'm just winging it with domesticated, i'm usually rewriting massive swaths of dialogue as i sketch the scenes out, i just keep throwing out ideas until it's something i'm excited to draw and present as my imaginary "what happened outside of the games" day dream land. it's reminded me what i love so much about story telling and comics. it's made me excited to see thistle and spade go live again down the road. but first i have to rebuild its website too TTuTT

all right i'll see everyone pretty soon! thanks for hanging around as usual!

[mcflymemes]

PROMPTS FROM THE MANDALORIAN SEASON 2 *  assorted dialogue from the tv show, adjust as necessary

enjoy the fights.

they say it lives here. they say it sleeps.

i know you're good at killing.

where did you get the armor?

i'm sure you call the shots where you come from, but 'round here, i'm the one who tells folks what to do.

take it off. or i will.

i'm prepared to pay you for the information.

i'm not leaving my fate up to chance.

thank you for coming to me.

give it to me now, or i will peel it off your corpse.

you must promise you won't kill me.

i promise that you will not die by my hand.

that wasn't part of the deal.

you don't understand what it was like.

i've got an idea. get its attention.

maybe we can work something out.

they might be open to some fresh ideas.

i hope someday our paths will cross again.

we've heard the stories.

what am i supposed to do with this?

am i under arrest?

you might be in luck.

oh, stop your crying. you'll rust.

i'm not a taxi service.

i paraphrased.

what can i say? i'm an excellent judge of character.

i'll let you know if i see any.

how much will it cost me?

thank you for letting me know. i'll get right on it.

what the hell are you doing?

this was not a part of the deal.

if you hadn't guessed, we're in a tight spot.

that old thing's gonna break apart in this atmosphere.

are you sure you won't join us?

there's something i need to do.

this is more than i signed up for.

that planet is cursed. anyone who goes there dies.

i can lead you to one of their kind.

do you copy?

put some tea on. we'll be up in a minute.

i'll let you live.

we've been hitting them pretty hard.

this was the best you could do?

were you able to eliminate them?

looks like we made it. get ready for landing.

according to records, you're quite a soldier. we could really use you.

that was some pretty impressive flying.

can i at least buy you a drink?

i believe you two have met.

i'm surprised to see this place is still standing.

i'll take my chances down here.

we'll watch the doors.

can we talk business?

i'm only here for repairs.

you wanna come back here and try this? be my guest!

i'm sure we can work something out.

i cannot train him.

you've seen what he can do.

i must get back to the village.

i've seen him do things i can't explain.

show yourself. i've been expecting you.

you will learn nothing from me.

surrender, or face the consequences.

we must find a way to free them.

my price is high.

i believe this is your payment.

you made me a promise, and i held up my end.

your bounty hunter failed.

if you want my armor, you'll have to peel it off my dead body.

i give my allegiance to no one.

nice shot.

you look like you've just seen a ghost.

you may think you have some idea of what you're in possession of, but you do not.

it's all the same to these people.

hey, i'm just a realist. i'm a survivor, just like you.

let's get one thing straight. you and i are nothing alike.

everybody's got their line they don't cross until things get messy.

you did what you had to do.

everybody thinks they want freedom, but what they really want is order.

we got company. hang on.

you get to the roof. i'll drop in and pull you out.

hey, if you want to accuse me of something, then just say it.

let's just say they might recognize my face.

you're not going alone. i'm coming with you.

that's not how this works.

that was some nice shooting back there.

wish i could say it looked good on you, but i'd be lying.

i can't go in there.

are you a jedi?

that's who you belong with.

may the force be with you.

you're a disgrace to your armor.

i've heard your voice thousands of times.

i thought you were dead.

don't be afraid.

drop your weapon.

don't worry about me. just be careful in there.

i need your help.

you're sparing my life?

open the doors.

i suggest you shut your mouth.

[heavycreamy]

Hey Matt Gazy

This post is for Australian Journalist Matt Gazy.

Apparently you've been contacting members of our feedism/erotic weight gain community in order to discuss our very multifaceted, heavily misrepresented lifestyle.

As someone who has been in this community for 3 decades, has seen most if not all of its forms, understands the ethical connections between Feedism and Fat Liberation, and deeply cares about how folks in our community are represented to the general vanilla public, I hope that you are entering into this project/article/episode with the necessary due respect, empathy, intelligence, and kindness that you would bring to ANY oft-misunderstood and ridiculed subculture.

No one needs another sensationalist piece of journalism wilfully and lazily misrepresentating our community, sexuality, and lifestyle, which only EVER serves to further stigmatise and shame us.

We have been taken advantage of on many occasions, cast as freaks and pathetic fools with mental problems, so neither we nor the general public need more of that.

EVERY time a piece about feedism appears in the public eye, our community experiences a massive wave of trolls and judgemental, deeply fatphobic tourists coming into our online spaces and abusing us.

Please don't debase us nor yourself by making a surface level hit-piece on our community, whether intentionally or unintentionally, due to a lack of thorough research and basic respect for perspectives and life experiences outside the norm.

Feedism is INFINITELY more than simply heteronormative power play. That corner of the community represents less than 10% of what actual contemporary Feedism culture is, and ironically harbours 90% of the toxicity present in the entire culture.

Feedism is so much more than heteronormative, coercive power play. It is extremely queer, extremely feminist, extremely sensual and emotional, and is a major facet of many people's lives and psychologies.

While it may seem like simply a niche genre of porn to the casual tourist, Feedism exists outside of porn. It exists outside of kink. It exists outside of fetish. It can and should be considered an orientation, rather than simply a freaky outlier bedroom interest worthy only of reactive disgust.

Please don't be yet another unscrupulous journalist exploiting our incredibly vulnerable community for shock bait bullshit.

If you're going to try to represent us, do it comprehensively, and do it PROPERLY.

Truly speak to us. Do the work. Don't just find an extremely popular female model and falsely imagine that her experience is a stand in for ALL Feedist experiences.

If you truly want to represent Feedism, you NEED to represent it as the complex, multifaceted diaspora that it is, full of people of all kinds, all cultures, and ALL SIZES.

Should you be committed to pursuing this topic, I can offer links and connections to extremely well informed writers, thinkers, professors, and others within this community who are doing INCREDIBLE work on understanding, exploring, and expressing the deeper truths of this desire and lifestyle. There are people doing the work. You need to do it too.

We're humans. Treat us with respect, dignity, and kind curiosity.

Be better than every journalist who has come before you.

Thank you.

ps. Dear feedist pals, if you feel that what I've said here resonates with you, and mirrors your feelings at all, please feel free to reblog the shit out of this in the hopes that more visibility may help it reach its intended audience. Thanks gang ♥️🍰🍕

[fairuzfan]

I don’t ask this expecting you have THE answer or that there is one, but I follow a non Palestinian white man on insta (in addition to many Palestinian folks in diaspora and in Palestine) who mostly shares things from Palestinian ppl/sources.

He has several times criticized / shared criticism of charity dinners, music festivals etc raising funds for Gaza with the perspective of, it’s not appropriate to have a dance party or dinner while people are undergoing genocide, but also that in this moment, art isn’t resistance because there needs to be physical resistance, blockades of weapons, etc.

I’ve seen this echoed from some others especially critiquing white folks trying to claim “joy is resistance” right now, which makes sense to me, but i also wonder if it’s reductive to say art or music is not resistance because I feel like it can have a lot of power especially alongside social movements… was wondering if you had thoughts on this or perhaps knew where I could look to learn more.

Please ignore if this is too much, and thank you

I think things like writing and illustration and music feeds into the spirit of revolution and is necessary in that way. You have to energize the masses somehow, and to ensure that your message spreads as far as possible. A good way is to make art, or to sing a song, or write a story.

That's why Wisam Rafeedi wrote his book and different resistance factions make posters and videos — to spread their ideas and garner support among the masses.

It's not as important as putting yourself in immediate physical danger to incapacitate the colonial entity — but I think for Palestinians and other colonized peoples, they do need to make art to really process their thoughts. Of course there's a difference when a Palestinian in Palestine, a Palestinian in the diaspora, a nonPalestinian ally of color, and a NonPalestinian white ally do this. I won't deny that there's a nuance when it comes to this.

But writers who write about Palestinian Liberation historically have been assassinated because of how they participate in liberation actions and also spread ideas of liberation themselves. I don't know which white guy you're talking about but I feel like this is mostly a conversation that should be led by Palestinians if we're talking about Palestine because they understand the nuance of saying statements like "the only resistance is physical." I understand what he's saying to an extent but that does erase a lot of Palestinian resistance the past few decades by making sweeping statements like "art is not resistance" and kind of simplifies the issue at hand.

Charity dinners and galas and that stuff... I don't know what I think about them, I think that people are going to do it either way so my opinion doesn't really matter. Hey, if you're going to raise thousands of dollars for Palestine, I'm not going to stop you at all. I personally think you should try to avoid posting pictures and stuff like that from the gala itself if you're going to host one just out of courtesy.

I guess overall what I'm trying to say, art resistance becomes physical a lot of the time. I think its really reductive to say "art isn't resistance" and also personally insulting considering I have family members and friends who were journalists, creative writers, and artists and killed/targeted for their work.

Here's this article by Fargo Tbahkhi about the role of writing during a genocide that might be a good read. They also mention how Israeli propaganda (calling Palestinians "human animals"/"Amalek" as an example) is specifically a use of culture and writing to energize people to commit genocide. An especially poignant part that I completely agree with, and am trying to get at:

Palestine requires that we abandon this catharsis. Nobody should get out of our work feeling purged, clean. Nobody should live happily during the war. Our readers can feel that way when liberation is the precondition for our work, and not the dream. When it is the place we stand, and not the place we shake ourselves towards. In this way, what the long middle of revolution requires, what Palestine requires, is an approach to writing whose primary purpose is to gather others up with us, to generate within them an energy which their bodies cannot translate into anything but revolutionary movement. This is what Boal modeled for us in his theatrical experiments, which were dedicated to empowering audiences to act, to participate in a creative struggle to envision and embody alternatives. For Boal, theater was not revolution, but it was a rehearsal for the revolution, meant to gather communities together in that rehearsal. Creative work readies us for material work, by offering a space to try out strategies, think through contradictions, remind us of our own agency.  

[kentocalls]

jiraiya | breadcrumbs nsfw. it’s a situationship but the good kind, i wanted to thank @actuallysaiyan for writing all those prompts. also the gif 🥵

he groans, crosses out the line that’s lived for only three seconds, the words dancing around his eyes, mocking him. he’s the renown author of the Icha Icha series. he can write, move his audience with his captivating comedy and well timed eruptions of emotions. but this, this piece of work is draining everything from him.

his cup is empty, his snacks gone. tense and frustrated he snaps his pen across the room. he could find something, someone to help take his mind off of it all. except he’s causes enough of a racket, his mission isn’t an easy one and he’s not exactly kept low key about his presence. it’s going to mean more paperwork and an earful from superiors and writing was supposed to help. the editor would be less person to yell at him. alas. the night is not in his favor.

the village is silent, most folks already asleep. he can hear cats fighting if he really tried but even then, his stares at the blank wall ahead. a flash of the prettiest lips fills his mind and he aches.

his mind trails after the confident, youthful, smart shinobi who had his knees gracing the ground with a simple ask. he doesn't know how it started, doesn't care where it goes, wants more. maybe there's enough clues if he looks for them, maybe his favorite has graced him with kindness and left a morsel.

enough is enough, he’s leaving tomorrow. the change of pace necessary, he has to keep moving. because who he’s seeking isn’t here and the mission is at a dead end too. t

he wind offers another pause from his thoughts, tempation, cool against his skin gentle, inviting. he closes his eyes, takes half a second to let his body relax, half a second to imagine it’s not the wind’s gentle caress but wait! he didn’t open the window, he wouldn’t this late and—

there’s your scent and something medicinal permeating the room.

you’ve always been fast. confidnet. slipping into unsavory places with ease.

making the most excellent shinobi and his worst habit.

by the time he’s done looking at the window your seated on his desk, writing pad in arms as your eyes trace over the latest pagse written. you’ve always loved spoilers, itching to know what happens before everyone else.

it makes him feel smug, after all these are fresh words, something exclusive only he can offer. gods, he’s missed your face, notes swollen lips and tired eyes, ignores the scratches near your chin. what you both do is dangerous, tedious, necessary. he won't ask because you can't tell. still the thought, did you rush over immedidately after a succes?

eyes rake your beautiful form spilling over his work desk.

your uniform has seen better days but he’s so so so pleased to see exposed skin. your legs look so smooth, nevermind new scratches and old scares greeting him.

he’s staring, gawking like an inexperienced brat, it would be embarrassing, you’d tease him endlessly for it, however, you’re so engrossed in his writing. swaying your legs softly, they dangle freely off the desk, and yet managing to cage him in. his palms reach up, kisses at a small cut on your knee, large palms soothing, fondling, massaging your thighs. itching to admire.

you’re here.

skin is hot, face is a bit flushed though you’re hiding it behind a stoic expression, eyes stealing more and more words. it’s not that long of a chapter, he sighs and pulls you closer, face nuzzling into your stomach, you can feel his kisses through your uniform. needy.

he’s usually wordy, jokey, loud. leaves no space for the outside world when it’s just you two, but right now he’s being such a good boy. you wonder how long it’ll last, the fact he’s being gentle and slow with his movements is trippy. especially when you know how tough he is, have seen him snap men in half so casually. flaunts his reputation, his height, his fame like he’s breathing but right now? letting you read unreleased, unedited writing?

letting you sit on his precious desk, your scent will drive him mad when you’re gone in the morning. he doesn’t have to be nice, could’ve easily stopped you from slipping into his room. taken you against the wall, you wouldn’t have protested. except he didn’t, he’s being the most gracious host.

that’s the only reason one of your hands plays with his long locks, eyes pulling away from his writing pad when your fingers, inevitably, tangle. “hair’s gotten too long.”

“to match yours.” he muffles, before leaning back and looking up almost innocent. like his hands aren’t squeezing and molding and clawing at your thighs. like his mouth isn’t kissing lower and lower, as if he isn’t inhaling that sweet scent that’s evaded him for months now.

you hum, spreading your legs wider, tilting your hips a little higher, his hands know what to do, moving to the waistband of your bottoms, “why’s this one so serious?”

“if you read the other two you’d see why.” he grins, a lazy hand drawing circles from your bellybutton down to your clothed sex and your hand snaps to his wrist with such power. “i like my uniform, i need it clean.” your glare sends shivers down his spine, you’d be mean for him if he asked right?

“and where are the other two?” he doesn’t want you to move, he doesn’t want to spend time playing writer and editor. he much rather gather more field experience, engaging in physical activities has always been his forte, he’s a hands on learner afterall.

crumbles the second your hand is patting at his cheek, pulling his hair and crashing your lips to his. it’s greedy, messy, hungry. you’ve been pent up too. the missions come one after the other and you’re such a high rank, all those secrets and no where to bury them — who knows the weight of all the pain you cary better than one of the legendary sannin?

it’s why you seek him out, over and over again

he doesn’t ask for more, doesn’t push and always pulls you close.

“i wanna…” he nips at your lips, stop distracting him, moves his hands under your top and up, squeezing, groping, pulling, “need too, ah, read the other two first.”

“you’ve worked hard enough,” finally your legs wrap around his hips, he lifts you up so easily, grips the back of your neck firmly, earning a moan, oh you need him, “let me take care of you.”

laying under him, he’s extra careful peeling your clothing off, aware your previous warning still hangs true. you’d take a kunai to his arm if he dirties another uniform. in another setting, he'd like that very much. but he's barely containing his urges, forces hands to work with extra patience, despite his pressing need making itself known. makes a haste of kissing, licking, biting, bruising what can be hidden. for both your eyes only.

you’re so pretty for him.

he tries to pace himself, tries not to get caught up in spite of all his reasoning to go slow he’s a frantic mess. hands clasping with yours, using one arm to hold both your arms above your head, you comply so easily, mouth open and wanton and how the fuck is he going to do all the things he wants to do if he can’t stop kissing you?

a hand snacks down your chest, pinching, fingernails lightly scratching before reaching your core and the gasp you make; drives him insane, let him be a little mean, a little rough, the sounds he makes deepening your need further. his own hips canting against your thigh and sheets.

part of him still doesn’t believe you’re here. that you're not an illusion. that he doesn’t need to wreck his brain and imagine the sounds slipping freely from your lips, that he can take you in with all his senses. have you falling apart in all the ways he knows you adore.

“pretty pretty thing…” he’s sucking and biting on your neck, sliding another finger in and the sloshing sounds cause your cheeks to burn. you want more, hips bucking up on their own, you want so much more but he’s breaking a rule.

“no ma-marks, jiraiya, don’t—“ silencing you with a heated kis, hand frees your arms, one to squeeze at your neck; it’s just enough pressure, how you like it; brain almost turning almost mush. but he’s pulls back, grins wide with a third finger in you now. you’re so wet, sounds absolutely filthy.

“let’s ruin ourselves for anyone else, yeah?” and fuck, he can’t say shit like that when you’re like this, body clenching around him. call it lust, call it longing, call it satisfaction whatever he has you chasing is where you want to go. the softest kiss on lips and he starts to trail down, praises and naughty things whipsered into your skin.

editing his draft can wait.

that’s not why you snuck in anyways.

[astriiformes]

not trying to debunk any part of your trans hc but just wanted to drop in and say i was born thru IVF and egg donation in 1998! i was created in the lab a few years before my birth and put in a cryogenic freezer for a few yrs basically until the rent was up for the freezer space and my parents decided to try one more time with the last batch of embryos, and then i was successful. so it’s possible for 1990s IVF and egg/sperm donors! i hope this can add to your hc, not detract. why not throw in some craziness like my creation and birth was for my parents lol

First of all, congratulations on the absolutely fascinating backstory. I love that there are actual living human beings about my age who can say the phrase "I was created in the lab" in complete honestly.

Second, this ask sent me down an equally-fascinating research rabbit hole. Because I knew that IVF as a technique actually originated in the 70s/80s, but I was a little fuzzy on the different types, since reciprocal IVF (which is one that I know is fairly popular with LGBTQ+ parents) was invented in more like 2007-2009 or so. Realistically though, it's a pretty similar process to using an egg donor (just with the egg coming from one of the parents), which people have been doing for longer. I think the difference is in part the exact procedures used, which were different in the 80s-90s than today, but it's not completely clear to me.

Regardless, as far as trans headcanons (and time travel goes), I could still see Marty and Jennifer choosing to do some time travel nonsense in order to go to a clinic that serves LGBTQ+ couples, since I'm guessing a trans man in the 1990s would have run into some issues with egg donation being seen as a "woman's health" issue. But I will say that I love being wrong about that sort of thing! I currently work at a queer history library and am constantly surprised and delighted by the ways trans folks in particular have showed up throughout history, far earlier and more openly that I would have expected - no time machines necessary. :)

Anyway, this is not a tangent I expected to go down but I love your willingness to play in this space with me. I think more people should get absolutely ridiculous with their headcanons, so thank you.

[maddiem4]

Well, I wanna be working on a novel right now, but apparently it's time to make a certain kind of post again, as is periodically necessary, because young queer folk keep trying to reinvent the Hayes Code for a variety of misguided reasons. So you know what? Let me lead with the TLDR, and then give my reasoning. If you DNI stuff like incest, I am not just going to unfollow you, I am going to block you.

Now, if you're the type to make assumptions, you might be surprised to hear that I'm not into incest. Sorry to disappoint. Well, unless you count selfcest, but people don't usually lump those together except by technicality. But incest is really not my thing.

That said, I have mutuals who are into it, and harmless about it. Whether it's fictional, RP, or consensual, it's not my business and it hurts nobody. Get used to those words, they're gonna be a mantra here. Further, I've seen how Hayes Queers (hey, I needed a term for them) talk about harmless members of their own community who give them The Ick. The post I'm writing here is a direct reaction to seeing a Hayes Queer post from someone I followed! Reading that, and the comments on it. And lemme tell you: y'all are very quick to throw your peers under the bus with the exact same logic (respectability politics, personal disgust, "making a bad name for us as a larger group", lurking threat to our moral purity) that the conservatives are using to argue for the mass extermination of queer folk. You are bringing pitchforks and tiki torches to the party. So no, I am not going to give you access to my vulnerable mutuals. That's the heart of it. You are a danger to your community, and I'm going to limit the scope of harm you can do. The broader queer/kink communities have worked hard to define harm more carefully than "well I just personally think it's gross." Scat and piss are gross to me, but my mutuals who are into those things do still deserve love and safety, not to be sacrificed on an altar of conservative family values for imaginary "one of the good ones" points. I have a responsibility to look out for my people. So do you, FYI.

So here's the recipe for living online with people whose kinks aren't your business and hurt nobody: learn to scroll past those posts or block those tags, or even block that person. Be an adult. The world does not exist to be personally palatable to you. You are not being harmed, you're being inconvenienced. If you can't handle that, you're the one bringing real-world (rather than imagined) danger to your community. Fuck's sake.

This also finally convinced me to look up what "proshipper" means after seeing it in discourse for years, these dreaded dangerous devils who apparently must be purged from the internet, and... holy fuck, how is this contentious? It literally just means you can disagree about fandom pairings without harassing people? That's just mature behavior in a shared space. That's what the argument is about? Oh my god. If you're arguing about this in 2024, your Aunt Maddie is fully ashamed of you for real.

The dumbest part is that people get doxxed for saying the stuff I'm saying, and maybe it'll happen to me. Guess I'll roll the dice. Which comes full circle: if you're looking at this post and trying to decide how to punish me for it IRL, you are literally being the danger. Stop and think for 30 milliseconds. Maybe I have a point that you are a bigger threat than two trans girls who like to pretend to be sisters for sex reasons. And I don't wanna hear no trauma excuses from any of you little monkeys, fetishes come from trauma a decent percentage of the time, so a lot of the people you're persecuting are victims of the same kind of assault as you.

This is more words than I ever should have to write about a self-evident topic. I know if you're young enough and still figuring out a lot of life stuff from scratch, it may not be self-evident to you. But hopefully it is now before you fucking hurt somebody. Thanks.

[indignantlemur]

hello! I was wondering are there any etiquette rules for andorians that would confuse humans and vice versa? Thank you.

Hello, Skygirl! Sorry for taking so long to answer - still a bit broken, so typing is a bit uncomfortable!

To answer this question, first I'm going to break down what etiquette actually is. I'm going to keep it pretty simple, because literal tomes have been written about the nuances of etiquette in various cultures, and I'd rather not rehash the last five hundred years of social standards across the world.

Etiquette is defined in the Oxford dictionary as "the customary code of polite behavior in society or among members of a particular profession or group." This code is usually determined through a combination of majority opinion, traditional values, religious proscriptions, and social hierarchies.

From there, etiquette can be further divided into categories of politeness and manners, and business etiquette.

Politeness and manners basically come down to self-regulation to follow a social code of conduct by following normative behavioural standards and being, overall, pleasant company. A person has good or bad manners depending on whether or not they can adhere to these social standards, and an individual may have good or bad adherence to different types of manners relating to hygiene, courtesy, and social norms all at the same time. So, hypothetically, you could have a perfectly polite person with terrible hygiene and a weird disregard for others' personal space. Or, conversely, someone with impeccable hygiene, middling social awareness, and absolutely terrible manners. Literally any combination is possible, and one can see this just by looking at the folks who surround us every day.

Now, business etiquette is a little different in that it's much more goal-oriented and involves the necessary adherence to ethics and norms required to successfully facilitate transactions and generate profit. Business ethics can vary quite a bit between corporate bodies, and it's difficult to standardize a universal code of conduct because of the unique nuances each culture has regarding business, which usually results in a kind of culture shock for all of the parties involved.

A common example is the practice of napping at work, which in Japan is often seen as a sign of something called "inemuri" - earnestness and dedication to one's work, resulting in one working so hard that one is exhausted and falls asleep at their post. In North America, however, napping at work (when not on your break, and sometimes not even then) is a good way to get written up and fired. The two approaches are somewhat incompatible, as you can clearly see.

So, looking at all of the above, I think we can pretty confidently say that there are definitely going to be some things Andorians and Humans trip over when dealing with each other - after all, it still happens regularly within Human cultures, and we at least have the benefit of at least being the same species!

So! What would some common sticking points be?

In terms of politeness and manners, I could easily see Humans stumbling over the highly ritualized customs of the Andorians. Andorians society has developed over time to be very rigid in structure and social norms in every day interactions as a means of preventing internal conflict, which often gives Humans the impression that Andorians are cold and unfriendly. In truth, Andorians are only cool and distant with strangers, but their demeanour and a lack of expressiveness in their faces (due to chitin) makes them seem stoic and really quite unapproachable to the uninitiated even well past the initial introductions and early acquaintanceship.

Additionally, while Humans and Andorians largely agree on standards of hygiene and personal grooming there are a number of differences in how some of these things are treated within the different cultures.

For example, Andorians would sit and soak in mineral hot springs all day, if they could reasonably get away with it, to the point of conducting family meetings and minor business while soaking - unlike Humans, Andorians do not easily overheat and faint, nor does prolonged exposure to high heat bother them overly much. This habit of languishing in the water for hours on end is something which Humans tend to find excessive and, when it comes to meetings, inappropriate. Additionally, Andorians are fastidious about bathing prior to soaking, and forgoing that step is considered not only rude but incredibly unsanitary - a step which some Humans skip, or roll into a single event with soaking, to the horror of the Andorians. Adding further complications to such things, the Human tendency in certain cultures to view all nudity as inherently sexual baffles Andorians, who frequently soak together in familial, bonded, or mixed groups and see no issue with such things.

Similarly, grooming each other is often a sign of trust and affection amongst Humans and therefore not something we allow strangers to do outside of specific circumstances (barber/salon, wedding prep, etc.) As a very social and physical species, Andorians have no such compunctions about contact with others ranging from family to work colleagues and acquaintances. Andorians are very touchy and mean absolutely nothing by it most of the time, but they don't always remember that Humans do things a bit differently and have different ideas of what is and is not appropriate.

Cosmetics as part of personal hygiene and grooming can also be a point of confusion, as Andorians are fond of using brightly pigmented colours around their eyes and mouths across both sexes, even in professional environments. Humans, meanwhile, primarily market cosmetics at women, using products ranging from subtle to neon, and such a strongly gendered association would be considered bizarre on Andoria to say the least.

In terms of personal conduct in social situations, Humans can find Andorian customs to be extremely rigid and difficult to navigate without prior research. Andorians use a number of visual and verbal cues to indicate who they are, what Clan they belong to, and their station in society that are lost on most Humans who haven't taken the time to prep in advance. An Andorian can tell at a glance what most Humans need to play 20 Questions to find out. In fact, the very act of inquiring about these details inevitably irritates the Andorian being interrogated for information which, to their mind, should be quite obvious.

On the opposite side of this dynamic, Humans are infuriatingly vague to Andorians at times. Unless a uniform is involved, it is remarkably difficult to discern whether one is speaking to a social subordinate or superior when conversing with a Human and often times lower ranking and higher ranking Humans conduct themselves in the same manner.

And in terms of business etiquette, Andorians are very formal during business dealings and are not generally receptive to friendly overtures, which they regard as deeply suspicious - and small talk falls under friendly overtures.

When Andorians enter into a business meeting, they are there to reach an agreement, exchange goods and/or services, and leave. They do not want to be friends, they do not want to hear about your children or have you ask about theirs, and if they wanted your opinion on the weather or decor they would have asked for it. Honestly, when dealing with Andorians on mercantile matters, it is best to stick to business topics only until such a time as it is concluded. Discussing business over dinner, as some Humans are wont to do, just doesn't fly with Andorians; dinner is dinner, business is business, and never the two shall meet.

In the workplace, Andorians find they their work days and deadline schedules are not fully compatible with Human ones; Andorians work on a 36 hour day, requiring very little sleep at a time, and Humans function on a 24 hour day. Andorians receiving deadlines from Humans, such as "I need this done by the end of the day" often have to double and triple check if that means today-today or tomorrow-today. And Humans never seem to be available to cover shifts, since they always seem to be sleeping! It's very frustrating for both sides.

Hope this helps! If you have anymore questions, do let me know!

[genderqueerdykes]

how can someone be a lesbian and a man at the same time? and a traswonan and transman too

hello! thanks for your question!

while people broadly interpret the term lesbian to mean 'woman who loves women', there is a far broader nuance to the identity and label that goes beyond a simple description.

lesbians have a nuanced and complicated experience with gender. butches and femmes both have unique experiences with gender and presentation. nobody likes to talk about us, but some butches *do* identify as men. there are a lot of trans men who start out in lesbian spaces because they are safer, and don't want to leave the community and live as lesbian men. drag kings also are often lesbians. genderfluid lesbians, polygender lesbians, multigender lesbians, genderqueer lesbians, all types of trans lesbians are lesbians regardless of whether or not they are men all the time, or part of the time

lesbians also have a complicated relationship with nonbinary identities and a lot of us find that we fit somewhere under that umbrella. many lesbians find that pushing the boundaries of gender and expression are necessary for survival. i would recommend reading stone butch blues by leslie feinberg to gain a better understanding of lesbians who live this way, or, you are free to visit my lesbian and dyke tags!

as for your second question, i am an intersex person, meaning i was not born with a body that fits into the strict "male" or "female" binary. after i hit puberty i was routinely told i wasn't a "real girl" by someone then told i wasn't a "real boy" by someone else. i was completely stripped of the ability to be gendered correctly by anyone because my body has such a strong mixture of both "masculine" and 'feminine' traits like growing a full beard, having broad shoulders, buff chest, flat breasts, big arms, etc. and an hourglass waist and long shapely legs, high pitched voice, etc.

i am trans "both" or sometimes trans 'everything' as i call myself. my ability to identify as a boy or a girl was completely taken away from me and i am resisting that actively every day. i am a boy and a girl! i'm some type of nonbinary creature, sure, but i am in fact a woman and a man at the same time, but i've had to fight and claw tooth and nail to be seen correctly due to things that weren't under my control.

HRT was kinda my big power move. after i get top surgery and find a good quality packer, i think people will finally understand me and how i identify, but basically, the answer is intersex people, and some other folks can live experiences that make it so they can be both transmasculine and transfeminine at the same time for a multitude of reasons. my experience is just one of many, but it is possible, and we exist!

hope that answers your question! if you need more help, feel free to ask again! take care, stay safe!

[cyle]

Hi! I'm wondering if you can offer any insight into something that's been bugging me with all of the changes. This is genuinely not a hostile ask - I know first-hand how hard (necessary) change management is. I don't envy the position y'all are in.

That being said - I'm having a hard time making sense of the strategy around the roll out for the last few big changes/"experiments"). It seems like the folks doing the messaging vs the actual feature management are not on the same page.

It has been stated several times that:

"We’ll be testing [our new] ideas in an opt-in basis with people who’ve been using Tumblr for years, and more especially with people who’ve never even heard of Tumblr (a difficult group to find)."

We've also seen, repeatedly, that

"Tumblr is a place where you can tailor and customize your experience to individual preferences."

With those statements in mind, the choice to roll these new features out to folks who *didn't* volunteer - and not offer any way to "customize our experience" seems like a strange one.

An expectation (which was positive) was established only to be directly violated within a few weeks. It makes it challenging to get a read on what y'all actually mean -- and to extend good faith or trust when communications do come out.

If you say you're going to do something, then do it, it builds trust. If you don't, it erodes trust. And that just makes your already difficult jobs harder - and the userbase even more reactive and knee-jerk resistant.

Can you give us a sense of what's going on here? Or can you at least pass this feedback on to whoever is handling the messaging around this stuff? We can see that y'all are striving for transparency, but that's only effective if it's honest/consistent.

[TL;DR: Tumblr's messaging emphasizes testing changes with volunteers, and offering the ability to customize - but that doesn't seem to be what's actually happening. What's up?]

this is a really great question, thank you for asking it. you've accurately pointed out some glaring holes in our communication strategy -- some of that is even my fault, to be honest, as someone who tries to help shape our public communications.

the easiest answer is that there's a lot of work happening on the internal tumblr side, and not all of it is the same kind of work, and therefore not all of it is being communicated consistently. that's a huge problem if you're not inside of it, as you point out; the contradictions seem weird for anyone paying attention.

i'm currently a part of the @labs group and we're trying to come up with radical ideas for reshaping tumblr, prototype them quickly, show them to people, and iterate on them, and reject them quickly if they don't make sense. the Tumblr Mini thing recently is an unfortunate example of that -- something leaked way too early, before we even got a chance to really understand how the thing we prototyped would be received. that may never go beyond the thing people saw, for good reason: it doesn't make sense. we're learning from it, but it's unfinished.

in that Labs group, we do want volunteer-based feedback, and we're actually starting that very soon with targeted user research. you may see some surveys soliciting that feedback soon, or invites to be a part of the testing. i'm extremely excited by that, because some other ideas we have feel like they should've been a part of tumblr since the beginning.

but.......

there's a whole different group at tumblr that are making "core product" improvements, and a lot of their work is reflected in the recent staff post about product strategy. their aim is to alleviate a lot of common points of confusion and frustration, some of which will seem counter-intuitive to people who have been on tumblr for many years and learned (what i call) "the hard way".

a lot of that core improvement work will be rolled out, experimented with, and iterated on, the traditional way: involuntary A/B tests, rather than volunteers. that is standard industry practice, because when you're trying to understand the behavior of millions of people, just asking for volunteers introduces too much selection bias.

however, it's important to note that even today's rollout of the new desktop navigation was released to some XKit devs beforehand, so we could get early feedback. so sometimes we do roll these core things out for feedback first, before "regular users", before we A/B test it. usually those small initial experiments are hyper-targeted though... in this case, because we do actually care about XKit and third party developers. you don't see that though!

so full transparency: not everything we do is going to be volunteer-based, not everything we do can be communicated adequately before we test it, not everything during testing will be customizable, because how much we want to customize is dependent on the outcome of these tests. it's a bit of a chicken-and-egg problem.

and furthermore, this is kind of how it's always been, for better or worse, since around 2016 when tumblr started believing in A/B tests and experiments, rather than just "ship it and we'll see"... the common denominator, though, is that we want your feedback. we don't do a good enough job soliciting that feedback, but we do want it. (i kinda wish we had an easy feedback button for the new layout.) we do make decisions based on feedback, but we augment that decision-making process with hard data from experiments.

i hope that makes sense? there's too much to cover to provide you with the full context. i could write a book about it. all i can confidently say is that we're trying as best as we can to balance the ideas of keeping tumblr special and unique, while trying weird/bad/good/uncomfortable new directions to help the platform grow and thrive. status quo and complacency aren't acceptable; tumblr needs to change to survive. i am just as uncomfortable and upset by that fact as anyone, and i worry every day and night about it, whether the price of survival is worth it.

we'll see, hopefully together.

[amethystfairy1]

I just wanted to say how cool it is that all these courting ritual thingys are so intimate and yet not even remotely s3xual <3

As an ace person it always feels a bit like being left out when there's all these s3xual innuendos and it's seen as a necessary part to any romantic relationship but then you come along with all your beautiful couples with all the fluff and angst and these courting rituals that are so innocent and beautiful 😭😭😭

Like please, 'giving shiny gifts?' 'Dancing?' They're all so so sweet and it makes me want to cry that so many authors act like it's impossible to write romance without s3xual intimacy and then your stories are so so romantic but the couples have so much more character and depth because it isn't all about s3xual attraction and they have all these wonderful little courting rituals and they're just so sweet!!

Sorry I went on a lot there, but on behalf of myself and everyone else who feels the same, thank you so much for how you write and how you write couples. You are a genuine gift to the world <3

Lemme let you in on a little secret my friend...

It's very easy to write non-sexual courting rituals when you're ace yourself 😉 🖤🩶🤍💜

Not to say things won't occasionally get a lil steamy with these guys, but I myself am not a fan of the sexy times, so to speak, which is why I don't write smut. I very much enjoy writing physical intimacy (note: the mild body worship tag on 'Sun-Burned Beauty') buuuuuuut I think it's nice to see how a relationship works it's way up to that point. That's why the courting rituals ramp up in terms of intimacy, and none of them of inherently sexual. I mean, some of them do involve touch, yes, but I'm a big proponent of the fact that physical intimacy, even pretty intense physical intimacy, doesn't immediately need to lead to them doing the diddly do.

Again, not to say some of these characters won't be doing the diddly do...but it's gonna happen off-screen. Sorry y'all, best you'll get from me in that regard is a steamy make out scene and then a fade to black. 😆

But in all seriousness, I'm so happy that you like my work! Considering I am one of the folks who feels the same, I try to write in a way that I find romance would appeal to me, and I guess it's working out! Thanks so much! 💖

[neopronouns]

Hi! I asked this a while ago but I think tumblr might have eaten it :(

I haven’t been able to find any queer presentation terms that I think describe me well - I was wondering if you could find one (or more) for me?

I’m an average height, chubby, mildly hairy, young nonbinary person with a casual masculine presentation and quiet personality. I want to start T and eventually get hairier, which may classify me as a bear at that point - but that’s a long time away and I want a term that’s more accurate to my current body.

Thank you in advance, really appreciate what you do here :)

here's a couple terms (most of which i found on @presentationflag-archive) that might fit in combination!

exotic cat: for people who want to gain more weight/body hair and feel they are not a bear yet

bearish: not quite a bear, but on the 'bear spectrum'

chub: similar to bear, but without the hairy requirement. used primarily by queer men, but like bear, can be used by other folks

casualic: casual/minimalist/low-effort queer presentation

casumasc: casual/minimalist/low-effort masculine queer presentation

chuckwalla: alternative, chubby, average height queer (though this may fit better without the alternative aspect, which i'd be willing to coin for you!)

lemon cake: nonbinary person who is fat/chubby and seen as gentle/sweet/etc.

blueberry muffin: masculine person who is fat/chubby and seen as gentle/sweet/etc.

harbour seal: chubby, slightly hairy, and laid-back. typically a gay man, but not necessary

[velvetvexations]

My strong sense is that the really horrible experiences that girl was talking about on the male socialization post as proof of not being treated like a boy… kind of demonstrate your point in that “socialization” pretty much always falls on queer people who don’t conform as “violence to try to force you into conformity because they can see you aren’t”. Which is maybe what “transfem socialization” is trying to get at—that attempts to socialize gender-conforming boys which “stick” and attempts to socialize gnc ppl (whether they turn out to be gnc or femme guys or nb or women etc) for whom it isn’t “sticking” can over time start to look different from each other and the latter in particular can be pretty brutal, even including things like sexual and physical abuse. I get the desire to have some sort of specific language that speaks to the particular violence of socialization-of-the-nonconforming, but idk that “transfem socialization” is the best term in that it happens to anyone who’s gnc and/or intersex (hence treated as biologically ‘nonconforming’ and often subject to medical abuse sometimes literally from birth). It happens to transmascs, butch women, gnc women too, including the sexual/physical abuse part; one of the things I was struck by is actually how many of the traumatic things she described as being done to her when people were treating her as “not a real man” happened to me (right down to the locker room shit) at the hands of girls as a cis butch lesbian. Which doesn’t make her trauma any lesser, or unconnected to her gender nonconformity/“failure” to “be a boy properly” at that age or her transness now! She’s far from the only egg to endure abuse and bullying and discrimination while egg-ing, from everything I’ve seen it’s really common.

But, the point is that it really fucking sucks to have someone try to force you to be someone you aren’t, and I think for some people their experience of the language of socialization has been almost exclusively TERFs using it to *shut down* the type of discussion that would raise this exact sort of thing: sometimes the answer to “What would YOU know about [form of trauma that’s extremely common for women & queer/gnc people both] you were Raised As A Boy” is “Bitch that’s WHY I know so much about it,” actually. TERFs just can’t see that because them the entirety of “male socialization” is “going to Male Privilege School, where you learn how to use your privilege over women to abuse them”, which sucks because they do actually identify a lot of the violence and trauma that gendered socialization does… but only when it’s to girls, and they’re often loathe to address the maltreatment of gnc girls because it comes too close to acknowledging that sometimes not every “girl” who doesn’t conform ends up being or staying a girl and because it often means acknowledging that women and girls have just as much capacity to be abusers as men and boys (see: locker room assault above).

But because of that there are probably always going to be some trans folks whose knee-jerk response is to see a phrase that reminds them of other posts that have triggered them and stop reading. You did your best there but it’s not your fault that she didn’t end up agreeing. You weren’t wrong, she just might’ve not been in a place to hear it (and I hope she feels better).

You are more generous to the motivations of people who misinterpret these things than I am. Thank you, though. Being more empathic than a narcissist with severe anger issues is necessary.

[milfzatannaz]

Hello, so taking your offer about the NOLA questions, though it might be more speculation than anything (or maybe not, I've only seen the show and the 1994 movie and not the books so who knows). I'm from Brazil and I only know NOLA from movies and TV shows really, but there are some social and cultural aspects that feel somewhat similar to my country... Brazil has a large Black population, famous musical genres, traditional dishes etc created by Black people and even though most of the country is Christian (specially Catholic), non-Abrahamic, Afro-Brazilian religions are quite present here too. Now, I'm not religious at all, I have a weird and maybe even complicated relationship with religion/faith/spirituality in general, maybe for being queer and neurodivergent, but that's another convo lol... But I do think it's nice to represent other kinds of faith. I know most of the main characters were raised Catholic, but do you think they could do that on the show with Africa diaspora religions to some extent? Even if it isn't the main focus? And do you think they could do it in a respectful way that doesn't feel like dismissing, stereotyping and demonizing them like we see on fiction (specially fantasy) all the time? Obviously, I'm not making assumptions about your religion or if you even have one, and if you don't know what to answer it's okay, I just think this is an interesting topic that nobody ever talks about. Specially when it comes to American media, because it seems to be more based on Christianity and Judaism, but having a show that is so heavily set in NOLA could maybe explore other types of faith we barely get to see. I think it could be a good opportunity if they can do it right. Anywaaaaaaaay lmao, sorry I rambled so much and this got too long. 😅 Thank you. 🙃

Hi!!!!!! Thank you for your question!!! It wasn’t too long, I loved reading every line.

I think the similarities between black cultures is fascinating, even if our people are separated by entire continents.

As for the inclusion of folk religion into the show, I’m setting that at a firm “maybe…?”. In the 1994 movie and in the original book, voodoo, or voodun, is loosely included. Anne Rice took mild inspiration from that part of New Orleans culture but I think it might be a bigger part of the Mayfair witches, I don’t know.

Louis is a creole Catholic but as an upper class man he wouldn’t have participated in what we call “African folk Catholicism” , considering the time period he was introduced in. Like Brazil, New Orleans has a version of Catholicism heavily informed by the African diaspora. in the show, he attends historically majority black church. St Augustine has always been the church where free people of color and even slaves attended mass.

So Louis’s religion is probably more in line with traditional Catholicism. St Aug as I know it does not perform any rituals outside of typical mass. If season 3 is in the modern era, I’m not sure if the voodoo informed practices would be included. I do trust the showrunners to be accurate and informed, it just probably won’t be necessary to the plot. I’m not sure.

[cillyscribbles]

🎁 and 🔥 for the ask game!

thanks so much for writing in and an even bigger thanks for coming up with the game, it's great fun sending out questions and writing answers :))) gratitude all around!!!

🎁 If you could give any of the ensemble cats a song, who would it be? What would it be about?

ooph, hard to decide! i think i'd like to hear from jellylorum or asparagus jr - i mostly headcanon them as a member of gus' family somewhere, so i think it'd be fun to hear what it's like maybe trying to live up to your relative's greatness, or managing adoring kittens, or just overall being gray little cats that run the show without having spotlight on themselves, you know? like jellylorum in particular is there all the time, singing for jennyanydots, singing for gus, singing bewares for grizabella - what's that like? is she happy with her small role? does she feel like it's rewarding? this would totally throw off the whole groove of the musical but i'd love to hear a post-ball song with jellylorum ushering away kittens, telling mistoffelees to put away the sparkles, telling munk and tugger to quit running around and sit with old deut because she's got this handled and has run cleanup on more jellicle balls than most of them have attended combined, hahah. great question!

🔥Share one (1) hot take/opinion about the show/fandom/etc

ooh! you know, i think i can share a thing i learned in adaptation theory! it'll definitely make it into that essay i'm working on (one of its main points, actually) but my Hot Take(tm) is that a lot of folks don't realize the grip that nostalgia can have on them when they're looking at adapted media (cats, cats the book, cats the movie, cats the insert production here). this is by no means meant to be a criticism because it's not something you can unlearn or avoid - i feel it, you feel it, most folks feel it, it's often the default! it's just something you can become aware of and consider on purpose, and i believe that it's very important when criticizing (and trying to be objective, of course - anything goes when it comes to subjective opinions and that's good!) this sort of media. you need to separate where you believe a change (be it reduction or addition) to be ill-fitting because it doesn't work for the purpose of the media, and where you believe a change to be ill-fitting because you have seen The Thing done differently and believe that was a better/more fun/more impactful way to do it.

to take an example, whenever i hear about a cats production where cats aren't Actual Cats, i feel less inclined to seek it out because the animal element is what i particularly enjoy about the musical. that being said, changing this element to better suit the purpose of an adaptation can be an important or even necessary choice for what the production is trying to achieve! it's all about the Purpose. you'd be shocked how many things are about the Purpose. this doesn't change my inclination to enjoy cats!cats More, but recognizing this subjective-objective separation can in fact help me enjoy not-cats!cats adaptations More because i know what the nagging ">:(" feeling is and so can discard it as source supremacy sinking its long sharp nails into my heart, lol. i hope that makes sense!