#that’s so. like. that is such inherent romance

[rachelmcewanart]

I know the Solavellan ending has sparked some intense discourse, with opinions falling sharply between love and hate. Personally, I’m in the 'love' camp, and while maybe my voice isn’t needed, I can’t resist sharing why it resonates so strongly with me. I don’t have anyone in my life who understands (or cares) about this, so here goes.

For me, the ending we got captures the essence of Solas and the Solavellan relationship beautifully. Solas is deeply passionate but also, as I interpret him, inherently reserved. Their relationship reflects this—intimate and private, removed from the public gaze in a way that other romances in Inquisition aren’t. Think of how Cullen’s romance unfolds on the battlements, Josie’s duel is a public affair, Blackwall, when being judged, had the option to be a more public declaration of love, and kissing Doran happened where anyone could walk by and see. These relationships have public elements, while Solas and Lavellan’s moments remain intensely private. Their first kiss takes place in the Fade, the second on Lavellan’s private balcony, and their final meeting is secluded in Crestwood. Even looking to their scene in Trespasser as another example. Their love is personal, something shared only between them.

To me, the reunion in Veilguard perfectly honours that pattern. The fact they even kissed with a small audience was new, but still, they spoke to each other in a language that kept things private. Also, Solas is severely injured and likely in a state of shock—it’s a vulnerable, raw moment rather than one for sweeping gestures. There’s so much they need to unpack, with conversations that may turn heated, but now they have the time to do it. That they even received a happy ending was a surprise, but a welcome one—I didn’t expect it, and it felt like a fitting conclusion.

(A final note that these are just my feelings and interpretation. Everyone's are valid, of course)

[olderthannetfic]

Quote from a post: "the things created within fandom aren’t real - an individual fic can’t cause actual, material harm to a reader, even if it contains tropes that would be harmful or distressing if they happened in that reader’s real life; an author’s use of certain tropes or interest in certain characters is not indicative of their actual morals and values in real life; thought crimes are not real crimes - but fanfiction is produced by human beings who are themselves products of the societies and communities in which we all live, and these societies and communities all have flaws and failings.

which is to say, those of us who prefer to read male friendships as romantic do need to be aware that, no matter how enlightened on gender and its foibles we think ourselves to be, we are nonetheless influenced as modern humans by a modern tendency to discourage platonic physical and emotional closeness between men - especially straight men - on the grounds that two men having this sort of relationship is inherently queer and, in being queer, implicitly sexual [an understanding of queerness which is another powerful societal influence on our thought, even if we know we don’t agree with it.]"

Okay this is from a big post from a big fandom account here please don't speculate who it is this is not about them specifically and has nothing to do with them i genuinely respect this poster and they are nothing but a supportive space and don't have any anti-nonsense. But I wanna talk about this point that they are making "the society is queering straight friendships" which is something also the anti-fujoshi crowd is saying and honestly I can't agree with that point.

I don't think its us the people who make fandom are queering the relationships between two straight men but the patriarchal system we live under and straight men themselves are doing it to themselves. They can't show love and affection to each other lest other dudes will call them gay not because there are secret fujoshis around that sexualize them. They can be vulnerable period lest everyone calls them whiney like women. I feel like (and most of the things I say here are vibes, not facts) men having close friendships with other men are green flags, and most women are excited to see men who have exact the strong relationship that are portrayed in media.

I'm confused by this talking point to be honest. I also understand that by saying everything I said above I sort of said the same thing as the original poster. In a sense that society is the problem here and we live in a society as we know, but... idk I feel like what they say is "we live in a society where everyone by default is sexualizing male friendships" which sounds like the standard anti-fujoshi talking point to me.

And regarding the point of romantic relationships being prioritized over platonic— I feel like is a complete bullshit to be honest.

Romantic relationships are prioritized over platonic ones across the board. Straight couples leave their straight friends behind when they get further into relationship too! I don't understand this impulse to constantly talk about romantic vs platonic thing when its about queer ships, and maybe there is somewhere straight ship discourse about romantic vs plantonic but its not as big as with mlm or wlw ships.

And honestly even with this take I feel like romantic relationships are also not prioritized but rather are more encouraged. And there is difference between encouraging and actually prioritizing I think.

(I want to add here that I'm not aroace so maybe its a blindspot and from that identitys point of view the dynamics might be different)

In reality I think both are equally hard to obtain and maintain. I always felt like the fandom being so shipping focused was not about people being hellbent on romance but just the fact that good love stories are few and far between both in fiction and IRL and we can't help but try to make something at least remotely good, or interesting or satisfying.

Again, my main problems is: 1) I don't agree that romantic relationships are prioritized to that high degree over the friendships like everyone claims. 2) I don't think that every single person is actually a secret fujoshi waiting to make any straight male friendship gay. 3) Fandoms are romantic ship centric because people just want more narratively satisfying romantic stories that are underrepresented in media (or they don't get to experience it IRL) rather than they are vehemently against platonic ships.

I don't know this hopefully came out coherent.

--

The person who wrote that sounds like a pretentious twatwaffle, and I am so sick of seeing otherwise reasonable people spout that crap. That's been true since the 90s and probably before.

The reality is that Western culture enshrines male friendship as the highest form of affection possible. This goes back to the Classical world. And, yes, they were probably fucking too back then, but the thing that all of the media is about is friendship.

The entire backbone of Western culture is built on the idea that men are spiritually, biologically, inherently more capable than women of this highest form of relationship. Romance is the big thing for women because we're not eligible for The Pure And Holy Friendship Between Two Men.

The epidemic of male loneliness is real, but we haven't gotten any less "Bros before hos". Fandom and m/m shipping behavior are irrelevant to this.

--

Furthermore, fandom has plenty of people who don't focus on shipping.

AO3 was built by slashers, so ship type is a top-level category, and the site obviously signals that it's about shipping and particularly non heterosexual shipping since you can filter out het.

Past sites often had more metadata that wasn't around ships (e.g. FFN's genres that work like bookstore genres) and almost never let you get rid of het. You might have been able to filter in The Gay, but straight stuff was literally unmarked.

~We do need to be aware of~

Bite me.

This naggy phrase is everywhere, and nothing good comes of it.

The only thing we need to be aware of is that Blorbo is great and s/he should be mashed together with Other Blorbo. If that's in gen adventures, you do you.

[cerealmonster15]

🫵 RAREPAIR SHIPS 🫵 beloved rookjade,,, sebejack maybe,, hold on I am spinning a wheel now for a randomized pair.... omg kalim/epel sounds FUN

HOORAY MORE RAREPAIRS LET'S GOOOOOOOO

freak4freak coulple im obsessed w/the vibe they bring to the table together. the problems they could cause. severely underrated combo. they match each other's freak tenfold!!!!!! remember that time jade literally fed rook like some poison ass food in culinary crucible and it temporarily paralyzed rooks tongue or made it swell or something and rook was like WOW THIS IS AWESOME. remember that time rook literally was following jade around and watching him from the bushes and jade was like "hmm i think someones following me. teehee." and then when he found rook in the bush he was like "oh. teehee." and rook was like "teehee" and riddle was also there and was like "ew. i am leaving this scene now 🚶" KJFKLSDHGKLDSJFLS like. no one is doing it like them. also i drew those^ during my therapy session today LOL

two of the most giant boys in school arm wrestling, which i realize isnt inherently shippy but also. it's first years. it's nrc. they are allergic to romance so if theyre gonna date they will do so via combat i think jfklshdflksdhflkjfkslhgdlkjfh

and then QUICK CUTE HUG FOR KALIM/EPEL CUZ I GOTTA GO DO THINGS BUT !!!! they could be adorable i think. kalim makes most everything cute 😌

[drarry-reccage]

When Times are Dire by @aibidil (130K, E)

Tags: Middle-aged romance, Wizarding Politics, Civil Disobedience, Fake Relationship

When Harry awoke the next morning, his body felt heavy and his eyes drooped. He had no desire to get out of his warm bed. That thought only lasted a moment, because his second thought was about yesterday's election. Rump had won. Harry jolted up in bed, heart pounding. He honestly couldn't believe it. They'd all been so sure that Penelope would win. The polls had all showed— Well, fuck. His third thought was that he'd agreed to marry Draco bloody Malfoy. To save Magical Britain.

(rec by @cailynwrites)

I don't normally editorialize on these things, but last week's political events were devastating inside and outside the U.S. As a U.S.er, I can only profusely apologize for my fellow citizens who seem to be intent on dragging us all down with them. If you're reeling from the election or, like me, not at all surprised but just disappointed, I can't recommend this fic enough.

@aibidil says that this fic was cathartic to write; it's also been cathartic for me to read and listen to several times. It's a reminder that resistance isn't futile, community is important, and there are glimmers of hope even in the darkest hours. It's a sweet and hilarious love story of soon-to-be grandpas, their adult children, and their fake relationship, but it's also a scathing political parody. It reminds me how all art is inherently political and never more so in queer spaces like Drarry fandom. I'm about to begin a re-listen because it's the only balm that will soothe my troubled heart at the moment. I hope you'll join me.

(Please direct all politics-related flames to me personally, not to Drarry Reccage.)

🎧 I mentioned listening because there's an impeccable podfic narrated by the author. If you need to just lie in a dark room and stare at the ceiling for a bit, this audio is the perfect accompaniment. 🎧

[sodomit]

4B is not inherently separatism. Many people are refraining from sex that can lead to pregnancy because in this country, healthcare during pregnancy can’t be guaranteed no matter who you are. If you’re against 4B, you think that men are entitled to sex Or relationships with women. Period. Even if a woman genuinely hates men with unhealthy vitriol she still has the right to not have sex with them. You can use whatever pseudo progressive language you want but it will always be a red flag to be against a movement of people opting out of sex for their own safety (again not even necessarily because of their male partners but because pregnancy without proper medicine can be deadly)

There are many people who choose to not have any kind of sex that could lead to pregnancy. Personally, I only had irl sex with someone who had a penis once in my life, and it brought me so much anxiety that I didn't do it since, and probably I'm not gonna do that for as long as I still have an uterus.

I am also pretty skeptical of sex being presented as some kind of a universal need, and I'm involved with discourse about sex aversion, romance aversion, and other similar things, and I believe in destigmatizing these things as a valid and meaningful part of human experience.

However, none of it is what 4B is about. I don't even need to ask you to read between the lines and consider context, you can just search it up right here on Tumblr and read the posts themselves. Filled with calls for increasing social distance between men and women in all spheres, generalizing accusations and hatred.

You know, several months ago there circulated a post about how cults work. I don't remember it verbatim, but there was something like, they're gonna test you by giving you some small rule, e.g. not eating rice on Wednesdays, and if you don't like it, they're gonna say "gee, someone loves rice too much!" As if it's all about rice specifically, and not the general principle. This is what you are doing now.

We're arguing against the idea of equating genders to morals and behaviors, and you're accusing us of telling people how to have sex.

[bgbrry]

On My Chemical Romance, dictatorships and comfort.

So my very initial reaction to the Black Parade tour announcement was, while not entirely negative, definitely frustrated. For the past several hours I have also been trying to understand why. I knew they were doing something based off TBP, but something about that made me inherently uncomfortable in an odd way.

Rationalising it to myself, it made perfect sense. This tour is almost a bigger scale version of one of my favourite stunts they ever pulled - WWWY2022. We have a parody of their old self, performing as a rotted corpse of the band they used to be for an audience that will cheer regardless, as long as they hear the songs they recognise, that dont put them outside their comfort zone. And then we have the very idea of MCR parodied as a dictator the very next day. It served not only as incredible satire of cash grab tours and nostalgia festival, but a critique of the way the band is perceived by the fans.

So if its not discomfort with the theme, what could it be? Maybe it is the subversion of the "secretary" character, who I have analysed in a completely different manner since the day i first saw that leg of the tour? Perhaps, in a way, it is odd to feel as though a concept you have been enthralled in for so long is snatched away from you and turned on its head. But isnt that what always made me like this band? The unconventional storytelling, the twists and turns they pulled?

In my initial post complaining about a hypothetical TBP continuation I proclaimed that any material that isnt entirely original would be a disappointment and underwhelming considering the themes of Return tour. But why do I think that? Isnt it hypocritical, for someone who values Return as a masterpiece to put this baseless boundary in place without knowing what I am talking about just yet? At what point does the idea of "Reimagining your own legacy through a corrupting force that forever alters it" become worse because it is more explicit? How am I not at that point complacent in being the very force that puts My Chem in a box of expectations i built up for them.

And that is pretty much what I came to for now. It is one am and I cannot get it out of my head. My own expectations for what "The New MCR project" were going to be, are held up by my own unconscious desires and understandings of what "good art" is, based on the very world that oppresses people like me and those with their head under the boot of this system. The idea that a new album has more inherent value than performance art, the idea that a tour is motivated by monetary reasons exclusively, the idea that the concepts and characters that bring people comfort and nostalgia are too precious to be tarnished by something new. The tour has not even begun and I already got caught in its trap of complicity to the system that can bring me comfort.

When I was recording a voice message about this announcement, I had to go past two cops, and I couldn't say the word "dictator" as I did not want to get in trouble with them.

I do not want to be this complicit. I wanna hear them out. Especially if it makes me uncomfortable

[suoulfillem]

what’s crazy to me is i remember nothing about the last season of house besides the last episode where house fakes his death to avoid going to prison so he can be with wilson in the few months he has left to live before dying of cancer and they travel off into the sunset on motorbikes together. peak romance

[rendevok]

Moon dance 🌕✨

[vaguely-concerned]

rook x lucanis: romance with a commentary track! solas and spite contribute with their thoughts and opinions along the way whether anyone wants them to or not. it's like a MST3K episode up in here as you try to get hot and heavy. in. in the pantry. love among the radishes at the end of the world (rifftrax version)

[mephoj]

late night chat

[frnkiebby]

literally me today~🎃

[yappacadaver]

Crazy wild shit man

[specialagentartemis]

something I see a lot, and feel like I have to remind myself regularly not to fall into the trap of:

It’s easy to relate to a character. It’s easy to see yourself in them, to see them as Like You. There’s power in that.

But I’ve met several people now who’ve gotten really angry and upset with me for not liking their fave, or for having a very different interpretation of the character than they do. People who relate so hard to a character, project so hard onto a character, that me not liking them, me acknowledging that the character is a villain, or me just having a different interpretation of that character’s relationships and motives, feels like an attack on them as a person—and they respond to me as such.

I’ve seen it happen enough that I try to consciously remind myself. Other’s people’s interpretations of a character are not an attack on me. I know who I am and that will not change if other people are wrong about have a different perspective on my favorite character.

[wyrmsgatebait]

You know how things can go so terribly south if you totally ignore a companion's questline...well I've been thinking about how none of the companions ask Tav about their own problems. I'm just thinking about what it might be like to reach the end of the adventure-everyone's questlines tied up in neat bows, the Absolute thwarted, city saved. Everyone's patting themselves on the backs and talking about settling down now that things are finally peaceful, all the while Tav is just standing there shattered. They let so many leads go. People they loved had died while they were tending to their party's problems. They helped others get well-deserved vengeance but no one has even asked why they need to leave camp to be alone each night. Tav just thought if they gave it their all to aiding others and kept patient then someone would offer a hand to them.

[spacedlexi]

so often i see people try to downplay violet and minervas relationship like it wasnt Real enough or was some Inferior Romance that her relationship with clementine could Never compare to, and i find it so annoying and boring

she LOVED minerva!! and its okay that she did!! she was her first love!! childhood best friends turned girlfriends!! seeing her being so heartbroken and miserable about what happened to minnie, how deeply and desperately she missed her, hugging that bed frame so pathetically. but clementine makes her CARE again. makes her LOVE again. slowly violet becomes comfortable with the idea of opening her heart up to people again, after trying so hard not to because the pain of losing people she cared about was too much to bear (especially when she blamed herself for them being gone)

then she learns minnie didnt die. shes falling in love with clem while grappling with the fact that minnie might still be out there??

then she meets minnie in the woods. but minnie has changed just like she has. theyre both different people now. and slowly violet is forced to come to terms with the fact that the person she loved so deeply isnt that person anymore??

violet at the beginning mourning minerva and blaming herself, to shooting her to save clems life. she LOVED minerva once, but she doesnt like the person she is now. and shes not gonna let her hurt anyone else she cares about. shes done mourning her by the time they get to the bridge, only crying out for tenn

like idk i just find their relationship evolution to be so interesting and sad as shit. the fact that they once loved each other so much and it has now come to this?? but violet makes her choice and she Chooses clementine, because she admires and loves clementine, probably similar to the way she used to admire and love minerva if the way she talked about her is any indication

i just think "i never thought i would ever feel this way again" is way more interesting than "wow minnie Never made me feel like This"

[kainebell]

shipwrecked is so fun when you don’t have a bitch in your ear yapping about how it’s just plotless smut. For one thing, it’s one of the least smutty 17+ books (it’s very obviously more focused on romantic development than sexual tension, especially since you have an easier time surviving the book if you’ve strengthened your bond enough), and for another, who would I be to turn my nose up at a begrudgingly tender relationship between two stubborn assholes, even if the plot is lacking 😌🙏