#thats not a good way to portray people with mental health issues especially if the issues are tied in with anger

[mental-health-advice]

cant talk to anyone irl about this so here i am lol. my mom used to make comments about my body, and how id be so much pretty if i lost some weight (when her comments started getting to me i looked up my bmi (ik bmi isnt the best assessment of weight/ health) to see if i was really that bad and i was normal leaning underweight) that kinda helped me, and i felt better for a while, and her comments on my body stopped (but her comments on her own never did) but i guess in quarantine it got to me more than i thought lol i started browsing the ed side of tumblr and downloaded a calorie tracking app, for two weeks i ate less than it recommended (im an overachiever lol) but i didn't lose any weight (technically i did but it wasn't visible so it doesn't really count lol) but the whole time i was terrified of depriving my body of fuel, accidentally starving myself, and overall doing more harm than good(which is why i refused to purge or fast) so i deleted the app and stopped. this was one or two years ago, so i thought it was over it, but lately the little nagging voice thats been telling me how much better id look and feel if i lost weight is getting louder (and more convincing). i want to lose weight but I don't want to do it unhealthy/obsessively or spiral out of control. any advice? (i dont think i had an ed, just an unhealthy relationship (ig fear would be more accurate lol) w/ calories/food in general)

Hey there,

Firstly, good on you for deleting that app, I know it wouldn’t have been easy at all! Being in quarantine was hard for a lot of people, and especially as it gave us more time to ruminate on the not so healthy things like our looks and weight like issues.

I am sorry that your Mum’s comments hurt you so much, is it a possibility that she wasn’t happy with her own weight and so was portraying that down on to you? I may not be right, just a suggestion!

Losing weight can be really hard and it can sometimes bring up unhealthy thoughts/ voices in our head whether you have or are suffering from an ED or not. I am wondering if you could see a dietitian? They will be able to come up with a meal plan for you which may help you to lose weight in a safe and controlled way. If you are not able to see a dietitian (completely OK if you aren’t able to – I know it’s not cheap) could you make an appointment to see your local doctor or GP about being concerned about your weight? They can also be great supports for people wanting to lose weight safely and help you to come up with a plan to help you to get where you want to be but making sure it’s a safe weight for you at the same time (like a dietitian would but the difference is that dietitians are specialised in food related concerns and especially for those who are struggling with their weight for any reason!)

In the meantime though I would encourage you to still eat regularly as this will help to keep you metabolism working, whereas if you don’t eat then your body will go into starvation mode and then consequently you may lose weight but as you know it wouldn’t be sustainable at all.

Try to eat healthy if possible and try and get some exercise at least a few times each week even if it’s just going for a walk. This will not only help with your weight but will also help to boost your mental health and how you see yourself!  

I really hope that this has helped a bit and please do let us know if we can help to support you in any other way!

I’m thinking of you and hope that you are going well!

Take care,

Lauren

[yaizl]

au where su doesnt have a shitload of racism issues

[fictitiousponies]

Rusty Quill Official: My thoughts

First I’d like to point out that I’m literally a nobody. I’m not a mod, I’m not a crew member of Rusty Quill, I am literally just someone who hangs out in the Rusty Quill Official discord (I AM a patron though, so I do have access to the Patron only channels). 

I’ve been seeing the people that are in this ‘group of 10 or 11 people’ stir things up in the server for a while now, and I thought I’d just give my own experiences and thoughts on the subject.  Firstly, the fact that I even have to ‘give my credentials’ about this is ridiculous, but these are the type of people who if you aren’t ‘xyz’ and you disagree with anything they say, you are automatically deemed racist, homophobic, ableist, sexist, etc etc, so I’d just like to point out I am a queer woman with both mental and physical health disorders and disabilities. I’m also white, cis and allo, so I do admit there are only so many things I feel comfortable commenting on without getting piled on for ‘not being allowed’ or ‘not understanding’ (because thats 100% what the folks who are responsible for that doc do in the discord) First of all, I’d like to discuss the fact that the RQO server has grown RAPIDLY in the last few months. I don’t have access to the statistics but I’ve seen them in the past, and the server went from less than 2000 people to over 8000 in a matter of like two or three months. The mods of this server are all volunteer, besides a select few(Anil(Community Manager), Bryn(who is a voice actor/talent for Rusty Quill Gaming) and now Autumn, who literally was just announced as Anil’s new assistant community manager YESTERDAY. Before yesterday, April, the production manager, was also a Mod. Besides those people NO ONE works for rusty quill. Everyone is a volunteer and a fan. Rusty quill is a SMALL PODCAST COMPANY that has seen a rapid growth of their fanbase over the last 9 or so months. They have stated many many times that they are working behind the scenes to plan a server overhaul, and have given us a suggestion form. They all work very hard to try and make RQO a place where people feel safe. There are topics of conversation that NEED a more intense style of modding to be handled correctly, and at the current moment they don’t have the ability to do that so that things can be discussed safely for everyone involved. They have stated multiple times that is being worked on as something for the server revamp, and it just seems to not click. There are conversations that happen in this server that they have a problem with getting ‘sideswept’ that I KNOW make MANY people uncomfortable, and that is mainly the policing of headcanons. Saying ‘it makes me uncomfortable when Elias/Jonah is portrayed as trans or gay’ is one thing. Its completely another to call someone who HC’s Elias/Jonah as trans or gay as transphobic or homophobic, use vomit emojis and basically sit there and completely bash someone for having that headcanon, which is what tends to happen and makes people SUPER uncomfortable, causing the mods to come in and go ‘okay enough of this’ (but they didnt screenshot themselves being nasty because why would they?) They also straight up bash you if you like certain characters, Daisy and Gertrude being two main ones I’ve seen. I understand the discourse surrounding Daisy, I really do, but to be treated like the scum of the earth for daring to like Daisy as a character, for automatically being labeled as racist or pro-cop just because you enjoy a FICTIONAL CHARACTER is...absolutely ridiculous. Its THIS that the mods are reacting to, NOT calling the characters themselves out. Its them blatantly being rude and making people uncomfortable about liking a fictional character.  Another thing I’d like to address is the server being ‘ableist’  towards people with ADHD by being strict about going off topic. This is something I’ve been EXTREMELY vocal about myself, as someone with ADHD, I DO feel frustrated with the fact that if things veer off topic we get told to take it to another channel. Its jarring, as someone who tends to go on tangents and it doesn’t feel great but I understand the need for it. There are specific channels for a reason. Just because something inconveniences you doesn’t mean its automatically ableist. if every conversation was allowed to run rampant in every channel it would be chaos. AS IT IS so many of the channels are far too busy for my liking and I don’t feel comfortable in them with the amount of people (something that has zero to do with the way RQO runs the server and everything to do with the fact that its just a very large server with a lot of people) I tend to like to stay in the Patreon section because its much smaller and calmer. Also the Gen channels for me(General, Court of Nobles) are great because unless its something super specific(a long discussion about food, a specific character discussion, etc etc) there isn’t a topic to follow, therefor my ADHD can run free. Thats just...how things have to be sometimes. Once again its something thats been told is being worked on for the server revamp, possibly adding more gen channels or such things because the server is getting so large. I’m sure there are other things I could address here, but Honestly I am tired. I’ve been in a LOT of Discords only to nope out of them within a few weeks because I don’t feel safe or welcome. Rusty Quill Official is the first server I’ve been in where I don’t feel like I am just a number, just a nameless fan, despite how large the server is. Its the first large server where I feel like I have a sense of belonging. Its a place I hold very dear to my heart. It might not be for everyone. It might not be everyones cup of tea, I certainly don’t blame the servers I’ve left for not being something I vibe with, but to hear it be ‘called out’ and bashed like this is really sad, especially when SO MANY of the screenshots were taken out of context/not shown the whole story/had bits cut out that would importantly show another side to everything.  To call the RQO server an unsafe space would be extremely unjust. If its not something you enjoy, then thats unfortunate. There are opportunities for you to maybe meet people in the discord that you vibe with and break off to your own smaller server. Thats perfectly valid, and in now way us telling you to ‘leave if you dont like it’. Do what makes YOU comfortable, but to continuously cause issues and drama on purpose when things have been addressed and you simply dont like the answer... Its not fair to everyone else on the discord who IS having a good time. Allow Rusty Quill time to grow with its fanbase. There are going to be hiccups. There are going to be snags. People are HUMAN and to expect things to be Absolutely Completely Unproblematic Or Else is unrealistic. Things ARE being addressed. things ARE being worked on.  Thats all I’ve got to say. 

[tfw-no-tennis]

mtmte liveblog issue 19

it’s 2021 now!! time for more transformers 

we start off w/a flashback showing tyrest retrieving ultra magnus’s body from the ship - and we get a look at magnus’s spark, which is the green color of a 0.1%er [eyes emoji]

tyrest punching magnus..... grrrrr leave my dad alone bastard man

‘the divided self’ what a good title 

rodimus is like listen man this is a lot for my poor thot brain to take in

in flashback land, we see tyrest immediately launch into a crazy person spiel about how he can and will edit the law as he sees fit to conform to the situation, because that doesn't seem like a blatant abuse of power or a huge conflict of interest or anything 

oooh the screen in the corner that says ‘thought warfare,’ I see that

oof, poor magnus. its gotta be rough to hear your boss rant about how bad at your job you are....especially bc this is right after overlord called magnus a joke and nearly killed him

its especially brutal bc as magnus says, his job is his life 

augh, I love the panel where the armor is falling off around minimus, and then the one where he’s holding the ultra magnus head...poetic 

its fascinating that there was an ‘original’ magnus who was an actual guy, and then tyrest chose to make him into this legacy symbol - I'm assuming the OG magnus had no say in this, and probably didn't even know that he was gonna become this lawman legacy figure

I do wanna know though - obviously everyone thought that ultra magnus was one dude, but how did the different guys wearing the armor deal w/that? like, did minimus have people coming up to him like ‘hey ultra magnus old buddy! remember when we fought those guys in that one place? good times!’ like, do they have to study up on the lives of the past armor wearers to prepare for the role of ultra magnus?

augh poor minimus, of course he’s been wondering about what happened with overlord after he was KO’d

oof, drift...I feel like minimus looks surprised and a little skeptical at the idea that drift was the one behind the entire overlord thing - which is interesting bc as we saw at the beginning of the story, he doesn't exactly trust drift, but it’s still pretty far-fetched that one person orchestrated the entire thing

tailgate :(

the concept of a load-bearer is SUPER cool, I love it so much

it also puts a much-needed limit on things - as in, there IS a limit to how much weight/mass a normal cybertronian frame can carry, which is why you don't see everybody upgrading to be Massive - bc they actually CANT

oof, the worst part is that tyrest is RIGHT, minimus essentially DID have a nervous breakdown after the war ended bc of the rigid way he views the world

mental health support is clearly in shambles for cybertronians, yikes. they literally have 1 therapist for their entire race, and he’s not even licensed anymore due to hipaa violations. what a mess

the ‘attention deflectors’ thing is so cool and clever and also a great explanation as to why ratchet or anyone else never said ‘hey wait a minute, you're actually a much smaller dude in a trench coat’ 

I love tailgate knowing all the stuff about the autobot code bc of magnus...my BOY

and THATS why minimus was asking about skids specifically earlier!

oh minimus, please don't put so much stock in tyrest being stable and resonable...

aaaand there's skids and swerve! brainstorm says it best - ‘because something unexpected hasn't happened for at least nine seconds.’ lmao ily brainstorm 

finally checking in w/whirl and cyclonus - god I love that. whirl asking cyclonus how many cons he killed and cyc is like psh I wasn't keeping count....................ok it was six

hhhhh cyclonus IS looking for a cure for tailgate, even though he told tg that there wasn’t anything to hope for....excuse me as I go be emo 

and now we flash over to the unethical medical conduct hell zone, where pharma is being weird and horny and ratchet is appropriately horrified 

I seriously love how unhinged pharma looks, the art & colors do such a good job conveying his feral energy 

ratchet has some massive dick energy for taunting pharma when he’s currently just a head and pharma has dual chainsaws for hands 

ugh, I love whirls speech about anger...and I feel like he really does see cyclonus as a peer, despite cyclonus wanting to kill him, which is why he tells cyclonus all of this 

I fuckgin love that cyclonus’s reaction to very suddenly getting stabbed thru the abdomen is to just glance down at the sword, looking mildly inconvenienced 

back over to ratchet - and at first its like oh wow I can’t believe pharma was stupid enough to let ratchet goad him into this contest....but then you see first aid and ambulon and its like UH OH this is gonna be BAD

the idea that getting sliced in half is no big deal for a cybertronian is wild

‘you're gonna let doctor djd cut us in half?’ yeahhhh that's an appropriate reaction, yikes

FUCKING LENGTHWAYS GOD

pharma you piece of shit

poor ambulon :( :( :( that's fucking brutal. amazing panel but....jesus

and like, to further my point from last issue’s liveblog - the fact that this very gore-y panel is okay, but swearing isn't...that's really funny honestly. I guess robo-gore is acceptable, while I'm guessing regular ole run of the mill human gore wouldn't be

then back to cyclonus, who is still looking only vaguely put out by the sword stuck right thru him

and then cyclonus just pulls it right out, which is a very bad idea for humans but probably not as big of a deal for big near-immortal alien robots

circle of light stuck in capitalistic urban hellscape cubicals 

poor skids, being asked to stand trial while having no idea what his crime is due to Big Amnesia 

OH SHITTTT I totally forgot that getaway shows up here

that is super clever though, with chromedome confusing the name ‘getaway’ with the concept ‘needing to escape’

cant believe tyrest is really dumb enough to tell minimus all his evil plans

BUT that means its time for some very important forged vs constructed cold lore

jro spelling ‘program’ as ‘programme’ made me remember when he said that he considers everyone on the lost light to be british, which is perhaps the least valid thing he’s ever said vhbghjsdbfjkhasbjk

the idea that they used the matrix - which is portrayed as kind of a holy object - in reproductive experiments is really interesting

AUGHHHHH this is all so good and interesting...im really fascinated w/this particular brand of like, alien robot racism/constructism/whatever you wanna call it - I feel like it does such a good job as a plot device, where many other ‘fantasy racism’ concepts from other franchises fail, bc there's not really a ‘human metaphor’ being used here (as far as I know/can tell) - as in, this isn't a thinly veiled metaphor for something that happened/could happen in human history

in fact, this type of bigotry (or w/e you wanna call it) isn't something that is even really possible in humans - I guess if there was a stigma against being born via ivf or something...? but there isn't, so there's no obvious real-world equivalent, which I take as a sign of good writing and worldbuilding - it makes the cybertronians feel more Real, bc of course they would have their own types of bigotry based off of completely different things than humans 

additionally - and this is crucial - tyrest is wrong: there’s no like, inherent moral corruption in cold constructed bots. there's no difference at all, other than method of construction. fantasy racism plotlines often flounder here, with the oppressors having a ‘valid reason’ for oppressing the oppressed, but tyrest is just operated on religious zealot bs and some biased science

like, dude, did you ever think that maybe there are other reasons why your trials only condemned cold constructed bots? like, maybe the trial itself was biased? or societal conditions were to blame? correlation is not causation, my dude, especially when the conclusion is ‘cold constructed bots are inherently SINNERS’ lmao 

like, tyrest rlly said ‘FUCK separation of church and state,’ huh

anyways I just think the whole cold construction vs forged thing is really interesting and well-done, and serves as a good precursor to the more fleshed-out functionism stuff we see later 

so tyrest is clearly off his rockers w/the whole drilling thing - dude, you accidentally gave yourself a lobotomy, okay - but I find it kinda funny that he’s right about a lot of that stuff he said at the end, about primus and the guiding hand and stuff being real 

cyclonus saying ‘tailgate and the others’...I see you, man, I see you

also cyclonus looks fine now??? didn't he just get stabbed??? 

ah, tyrest sprinkling a little light genocide onto his plan to find salvation. nice, dude!

MINIMUS NOOOOOOOOO

‘fully deserved’ SHUT UP BIIIIITCH

poor minimus is taking a lot of Ls this arc, geez

oof, great issue! again, as usual....I loved the lore we got this issue, its so interesting...and some good character stuff too. I love minimus, I feel like he’s gonna be my fav this readthru; my first read my fav was brainstorm, second readthru was whirl, and I feel like its minimus/magnus this time. I just love his character arc...

hype af for more B) 

[nbapprentice]

there’s so, so, SO much nonsense surrounding this game that i’m gonna do my best to separate it into digestible bits, with its own categories. even then this is... wow. it’s big.

Warning tags will be added at the start of every section, but the general gist is: incest, pedophilia mentions, fetishization of rape and abuse, fetishization of mlm, fetishization of people of color, racism, ableism, nb erasure and transphobia. aside of the warnings, this post will also touch upon Scummy Business Practices

let’s get going

Dana Rune’s and Elle’s lack of moral fiber: #incest #pedophilia#rape and abuse fetishization #homophobia

tl;dr: dana loves incest porn, elle loves guy on guy rape, and the both of them are friends with at least one pedophile

dana rune has run, is still running an incest zine (please visit my faq on what i think about “thats not really incest” and “it’s just fictional!”). The Arcana, as a dev team, clearly does not care, as shown in their e-mail responses.

dana also very much doesn’t care and has reacted to any criticism on this by dismissing people and blocking actual incest victims who tried to contact her about it claiming it was for her “mental health”

in some tweets she claims she “interprets” the characters as not siblings, but she never really cared enough to cover her ass when it all began (she happily admits she’d “cross the incest line”)

dana has commissioned artists who also ship incest, draw near-pedophilic art that’s supposed to pass as acceptable because the character involved is supposedly not a minor despite looking like a child down to wearing pigtails (the character is also wearing a racist-ass belly dancer outfit), AND even made white-washed fanart of The Arcana.

dana follows twitter user kapymui who also produces incestuous Fire Emblem art

dana has retweeted omocat long after it came out that omocat is, at the very least, consuming pedophilic content (on “omocat didn’t know what shota meant!”: yes they did)

moving on, elle has a long, long, LONG history of fetishizing mlm and the rape and abuse that comes with yaoi and had a rich, RICH “yaoi” tag before they deleted their tumblr

they curiously deleted their tumblr right after i made this reblog

shortly after that, tumblr user thalassiq remade and started attacking and insulting any blogs criticizing them - even people providing support in IMs. Since this doesn’t match Dana and Elle’s normal pity parties I’m personally willing to believe they were just a person wanting to start shit - but it’s so telling how Elle used this chance to dismiss everyone who disagrees with them by calling them “children” and did not even bother to offer a kind word to people who were harassed and even had their trauma mocked by this person. It costs 0 dollars to say “that was not me but I’m sorry about people who were hurt.”

Dana and Elle are close with Ava’s Demon creator Michelle Czajkowski aka that one person who endorses child porn of her characters, and even had her draw a promo image for the game. Michelle has been creating highly sexualized content of her minor characters for a while now.

ok so elle and dana are gross freaks, how is that related to the game?

oh it’s very very related

Dana Rune’s and Elle’s lack of moral fiber that’s Actually Inside The Game or The Game’s Blog: now with more #racism #fetishization of poc and mlm #whitewashing #fat hate #pedophilia #nb erasure #transphobia

tl;dr: the arcana is filled to the brim with racism! so much of it! haha holy shit! and that’s not even where it ends!!!

their game is rated PG-13 but includes incredibly sexual situations such as Julian making this fucking face while getting off on pain. This isn’t the only time Dana and Elle use their videogame aimed at young teens to showcase their kinks and fetishes. I have no issue with NSFW or titillating content, as long as it’s rated accordingly. This content is NOT and it’s a blatant disregard for their audience just to have a larger, more pliable demographic and have more money sent their way.

if you start your argument with “well, teenagers look at porn” 1. shut up 2. theres a HUGE difference between teenagers going after adult content aimed at adults, and adults creating content they know will be seen by kids barely starting puberty

as pointed above, dana has 0 qualms literally commissioning people who make whitewashed fanart of her own fucking game that’s supposed to be all about the inclusivity and safe spaces

thearcanagame blog has a pattern of reblogging whitewashed fanart (before you come in swinging with the good ole “ITS THE LIGHTING”: 1. no it isnt 2. the artist should’ve picked better lightning then 3. i draw and post shit online too so dont come telling me i just dont understaaaand),

fanart of their fat characters showed skinnier than they are in their sprites (although to be real for a moment - Portia is curvy at most and them behaving she’s fat rep is HILARIOUS).

going back to NSFW content: nadia and asra are overwhemlingly sexualized in the game, and were the first to have sexualized CGs and sprites introduced.

CGs: Asra’s here, here aND HERE, Nadia’s here with a NSFW warning because she’s just got her whole fucking ass out. Sprites: Asra’s thank god for whoever compiled it all in one image, Nadia’s and once again, NSFW warning lmfao!

Julian’s sprites on the other hand are noticeably tamer, including the one where he’s fucking strapped in leather. His only sexual (NSFW warning because its literally softcore tentacle porn WHICH, ONCE AGAIN, SHOULDN’T BE PUT IN A GAME AIMED AT 13YOS) CGs were also included months after Nadia and Asra received any of theirs.

Through all of the updates, people have constantly requested that Asra and Nadia’s sexualization be toned down, and time after time The Arcana just churned out fetishistic, hypersexualized content at an absurd rate, especially when compared to the one white love interest.

Oh, speaking of the one white love interest: Julian is based off of Jeff Goldblum (this is not spectulation - they p much bring it up at any given time) but like. If Jeff Goldblum was white. They base their favorite love interest off their supposed favorite man in the world but casually leave his skin tone behind. Lmao.

they also play favorites very obviously - in the prologue, Nadia and Asra have a romance paid scene each. Julian has a scene... that requires no coins. Julian was also the first LI to receive three CGs, two of them requiring no coins, while both Asra’s and Nadia’s first CGs were behind a paywall

Dana and Elle have been notoriously skittish about confirming or denying their characters’ ethnicities. After hyping for weeks on thearcanagame that they would confirm the character’s races they basically made a post that amounted to “well they’re not white lol!”

they only relented after the perfectly understandable outrage... and posted a thread about it on Elle’s twitter. Nothing on the actual thearcanagame blog. Anyway, here’s the thread. Note how there’s mention of Julian being Jeff Goldblum... but nothing about him and Portia being Jewish (or “fantasy Jewish” as it were).

The one time they did confirm their jewishness dana then backpedaled and said she shouldn’t have done that lol.

another fun tidbit of how well The Arcana handles race and how much it cares about feedback from fans: an ask was sent about an anon begging for Nadia to step on them. The blog, with the finesse of a bunch of horny dumbasses, didn’t just publish the ask, but approved of it (even though the fans of color had long, long, LONG been telling everyone not to fetishize Nadia into a “step on me kween” wet dream). People were outraged, of course, and the blog ~apologized~ and said they were still learning.... then a new chapter included a scene of Nadia stepping on the Apprentice. 🙃

not to mention elle, on their twitter, made a passive aggressive “women can be doms?” tweet, trying to twist it into a “yr oppressing women” angle (when the issue is that women of color are always constantly portrayed as aggressive and domineering)

Now for a wombo combo of racism and Elle’s fetishization of mlm:

the devs have spoken at length of how Julian’s and Asra’s relationship was quite unhealthy. In a paid scene in Asra’s route, they’re depicted as Asra being disgusted w Julian touching him+Julian following Asra to his shop when Asra refused his offer to go with him (aka julian... stalked him lmfao).

.......... this scene is promptly followed by a highly sexual scenario where Julian’s pain fetish is played up. Remember how this game is rated PG-13? Me neither. Asra’s previous disgust with Julian is also forgotten, for some reason (and by some reason i mean Elle wants to make them fuck w/o buildup or logic).

Then Asra’s route has yet another paid scene dedicated to Asrian, even though he’s supposed to not even like Julian! And be head over heels with the Apprentice! But Elle just has to make these two be entangled despite insisting their relationship was not good for either of them!

Now here’s the kicker: Julian doesn’t have any paid scenes related to his romance with Asra. Note how it’s one of the brown LIs whose route is highjacked by the white LI, but not vice versa. Hmmmmm.

Now, on the topic of Asra: thearcanagame has said repeatedly that he’s nb and uses he/him pronouns, and promised (since last year) that there would be dialogue where he speaks about his gender

as of the making of this post such dialogue still does not exist

so basically asra is the nb to dumbledore’s gay: anyone who just plays the game w/o keeping up with the official blog has no idea of what asra’s gender is supposed to be.

aka he’s not nb. he’s just a cis guy. the arcana just doesn’t want to put its money where its mouth is, i dont care if elle is nb themself. the team made a promise which has not been fulfilled yet and i suspect will not be.

instead, our introduction to canon nb characters is... these two.

By “these two” i mean neither vulgora nor valdemar are even fucking human, and stick out like sore thumbs with their monstruousness.

so our nb rep is... non-human villains. a few books later one of Nadia’s sisters with they/them pronouns shows up, but that’s too little too late on top of the fact that we should’ve known Asra was nb from the first to begin with. It’s a fucking embarrassment and an insult.

at least two villains are visibly disabled (Lucio’s missing arm and Volta’s blind eye+intentionally asymmetrical face). Julian’s eye doesn’t count because, spoilers, he’s not lacking an eye and even if he was it’d still be hidden behind a dashing eyepatch instead of grotesquely displayed as a sign of his lacking morality.

BUT WAIT! IT DOESN’T EVEN END THERE!

The Arcana Exploits The App Business Model To Price Their Full Game at $500, $1000 if the three extra routes make it out, and they never delivered their Kickstarter rewards:

tl;dr: you heard me

the original price per route was planned on being $1.99

they took that “subject to change” really seriously, it seems, because now each route, once the game is fully out, is estimated to cost around $170 each.

both those screenshots are taken from this post which explains in detail just how truly scummy all of The Arcana’s business model and decisions are: https://mysticmicrotransactions.tumblr.com/post/174308723344/dishonesty-from-the-arcana

the tl;dr is basically what’s listed in the beginning of this section, but other highlights from that post are: the use of addictive gambling mechanics such the Wheel of Fortune, and the dazzling calls to action in the new mini-game.

something that The Arcana supporters forget (or choose to ignore) is the fact that for a long, long time the game did not have the mini-game or the log-in rewards for coins. Players depended only on the gambling of the WoF or paying absurd amounts of money for the new chapters.

the devs went from playing the victims who were unable of controlling prices to (as spoken of in the link from mysticmicrotransactions) saying the making of the game (a pathetic little app game backed by a studio and a kickstarter) justifies the prices

they also gave people false hope about maybe changing the prices in the future, all while bleeding money from loyal players in “micro” transactions

the arcana literally added a $99.99 coins option on their latest update

in case it hasn’t sunk in yet: you can pay a hundred dollars upfront to the arcana, and you still will not have access to the whole game

there is no defense to this

none

“it’s free stop whining” let me explain:

“spend months on end accumulating fake currency or pay hundreds of dollars up-front to be able to play” is a scummy business model no matter how you look at it

if i can spend $60 upfront to play an AAA game there’s no excuse to demand more than that for a game with much smaller and, honestly, inferior content

the combination of there being already far and few games featuring lgbt characters and characters of color AND the little cult of personality set up by Dana and Elle makes people feel that spending money to support them is an acceptable expense.

it’s not

manipulating people into spending ridiculous amounts of money and then claiming “it’s their choice” is just scummy business, baby, and thats all the arcana does

the devs are brats who instead of admitting $500 is absurd for a game instead write petty little caricatures into their game - like, lbr: dana, elle, if i could afford diamonds in my hair i wouldn’t have even bothered with your shitstain of a game

despite bragging that ppl would get the full story w/o needing to pay, the paid scenes are pretty much required - the first few books of julian’s route have no romance without accessing any of the paid options. you dont even get so much as a kiss in without handing coins over. many, many people were baffled when julian had a teary break-up scene when from their perspective they hadn’t even started building a relationship.

wow that’s more than i ever thought it’d be

and i’ve been aware of their bullshit for near a whole year now!

i don’t have much of a note to end this on, other than: the arcana just isn’t even that good. it suffers from weak writing, pathetic character development and above all actually harmful content. do not try to argue with me on any of these points unless you’ve read all of that, because whatever you have to say i’ve likely mentioned before. if you still are that determined to yell at a me on the internet, please preface your argument with the phrase “I’m a pee pee poo poo man” so I know you’ve read everything in here. thank you!

[akajustmerry]

I just read your write up about the misogyny in Stranger Things and it's amazing! I wanted to ask, how do you enjoy problematic media? I LOVE Stranger Things but I hate Jonathan, I hate Eleven's vanity and her dismissal of Max. It takes me out of the show. I used to like a lot of media, but lately I'm picking apart everything. Which in a way is good, but almost everything is problematic in some way and it's tiring. I just want to enjoy things, while also understanding the societal implications.

heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeey!!! thank you so much for reading and I feel u, anon. I feel u! especially because the tv and film industries are built on toxic af infrastructures of racism, homophobia, sexism - it can feel overwhelmingly hard to find anything to enjoy. I also struggled with this a lot a couple of years back (i mean, the old’ depression monster didn’t help either) BUT I don’t struggle sm now so here are some tips 

WEIGH IT UP: face facts, friend. you’re never gonna find a piece of ideologically pure media because a) there must always be conflict in a story and b) human beings have and always will be ideologically flawed. WHAT YOU CAN do is decide how much of the bad in a piece of media outweighs the good and ultimately ask yourself if letting the bad get to you is unfair to the good parts and your own sanity. lord knows i hate jonathan and eleven’s misogynistic vanity, but man oh man do i love the portrayal of friendship between those kids and the wonderfully original sci-fi elements,.. I love so much more about it than i hate.

YOU’RE NOT JUST SUPPORTING THE BAD: for example, the ceo of marvel is a piece of shit and when i learned he donated to trump and is a zionist i stopped seeing marvel movies at the movies for a while but then thor 3 was announced and was being made by taika waititi (independant maori filmmaker) and he made an effort to employ lots of indigenous workers when he was filming here in aus so i went to see it because even tho i don’t wanna support marvel’s ceo, i wanna support the employment of my people in filmmaking more. same with black panther because i want to support the hell out of black superheroes

TAKE THINGS WITH A GRAIN OF SALT: criticism shouldn’t always be seein as a deal-breaker, it just means you’re aware of larger issues. when it comes to media you can always ignore the stuff you’re not a fan of. for example, I love The Nanny is one of my favorite sitcoms, but oh boy is there some really iffy misogynistic plotlines in that show BUT I know not to idealize that and i just roll my eyes and move on. watching a show isn't all or nothing. i mean i hated the last jedi and i won't be purchasing that bluray but i still love star wars as a whole

separate media elements between being problematic and compelling: there’s a big difference between a show, let's say, portraying rape culture, being ignorant of it and promoting it. a show can portray rape culture in order to criticize it without promoting it or validating it (shows like Jessica Jones). then, there are millions of romcoms where things like consent, respect for boundaries, etc. are disregarded in the name of running times (just ignoring it) and then there are films and television shows like game of thrones, etc. that promote really unhealthy uncriticised sex. basically, the fact there’s racism, crime, etc. in a show doesn’t make it problematic. the problematic bit comes in the way the media chooses to handle it. if something isn't handled well see: point one

SUPPORT SHOWS YOU LIKE AS WELL AVOIDING SHOWS YOU HATE: this is my favorite method of balancing my media consumption. shows like game of thrones will get made poorly regardless of criticism because it already has the ratings. boycotting won’t really do much but save yourself from watching it. so try and support a similar show that's less problematic (like into the badlands). i hate gal gadot and zionism in general so i make a big effort to watch and support palestinian films, as well as boycotting what i can.

DON’T WATCH THINGS THAT MAKE YOU FEEL BAD: Ultimately if you really aren’t enjoying something stop watching it. you don’t owe it anything 

It's okay to enjoy things that aren't harmful: Call-out culture has cultivated a practice where we do look at a lot of problems in what we consume. This is a good thing because media shouldn't be passively consumed but at the end of the day its meant to be entertaining too and its okay to be entertained by things that aren't totally perfect, especially when we are constantly bombarded with dismal news in this age. sometimes you just need to take charge of your own mental health and say, "yeah okay brooklyn nine nine could easily be considered police propaganda, but its funny, promotes positive thinking, good morality and gosh dang it watching this 20 minute sitcom is gonna make me laugh after a shitty day and thats okay"

If you (like me) love watching films and tv but you also wanna support good work then the easiest thing to do is well, what you can when you can. promote work you think is good, enjoy the things you can enjoy, stop watching the things you can’t. its hard sometimes but its just a matter of gauging what you can handle and what you know to be right and finding a balance.no one expects you to be perfect all the time (i certainly am not), but you can do what you can where you can and thats better than nothing and definately better than driving yourself mad trying to only consume ‘pure’ media

wow this is really long, sorry!! but i hope its helpful!!

for more resources on media representation, check out my tag:

https://akajustmerry.tumblr.com/tagged/media-representation

merry xxx

[actuallymentallyillart]

my friends and sister tell me my friendship with one of my closest online friends is abusive, I have issues with self harm and emotional abuse from my mother, and my friend doesn't even care. He's really interested in drugs and made me look up things for him a lot due to his parents, recently he's buying drugs online and i was uncomfortable. I talked to him about it and we got nowhere, thats when we stopped talking, a few days ago. And I can't stop fighting the urge to go read everything he said

abusive friend anon here, i told my friends about it and they're really supportive. i just feel awful, because, i dont want to lose him. and even now if i go back and read everything he said, it's just the same things. And he knows a lot about me.. a lot more than i should've let him know. And a part of me is afraid he'll harass me and people ive told him about because ive stopped talking to him?. I just. It's all one sided care. When I ask him if he cares he says he does, but. he doesn't show.

I wouldn’t call him a “close online friend.” If he ever was your friend in the first place, he wouldn’t use you for drugs. He used you. He didn’t care about your feelings or health at all. He wasn’t your friend and he isn’t a healthy person. He’s incredibly toxic imo.

A friend wouldn’t use you or not care about your health.

I also wouldn’t read any messages he’s sent since you stopped talking to him. At least I wouldn’t read them with a forgiving heart. You’re definitely right in that it’s one-sided care, and that’s very unhealthy for friendships. It’s good that you understand and realize this as many people in your situation would be in denial.

I can fully tell you that he’s going to say that he’ll “get better” and “change” but he won’t. He’ll probably say, “i care about you and you’re a good friend” but in reality he wouldn’t stop talking about such things if you asked him to, and he wouldnt actually listen to you or care about you despite what he says. If he hasn’t already done so.

It’s emotional manipulation at its purest state and it seems to be failing. But that makes it even easier to recognize. Consider that if he truly did care about you, he wouldn’t use you for drugs and he would respect your boundaries. You’re exactly right in that he says he cares, but his actions don’t portray it at all.

He’s attempting to emotionally manipulate you (abusive) and you’ve already caught him but are having a hard time to accept it. That’s normal and it’s ok to feel that way. But the important thing is to listen to your real friends and your family and to listen to your gut and instincts -- not your emotions -- and cut him off. Block him if you have to. Remember that this isn’t your fault, and if he tries to blame you, that’s more emotional abuse called “gaslighting.”

If he’s an online friend, then he shouldn’t be too hard to deal with. But chances are that if you have those fears, you have them for a reason. Maybe think back about if he’s ever gaslighted you or made you feel as if he’ll threaten to hurt other people if you didn’t stay his friend. Either way, I wouldn’t worry too much about it, especially if you get others to block him as well if you fear that much that he’ll try to harass your friends.

Sometimes we just have to let people go. Sometimes we just have to say “don’t talk to me again until you clean up your act and get help.” Sometimes we have to leave people and move on completely. Sometimes we have to block people.

Sometimes people are so beyond help that we just can’t deal with them anymore for our own mental health -- especially if they’re being emotionally abusive or are excusing their actions with utter bullshit -- and it’s perfectly fine to cut those people off.

You’ve already done the first step: stopping communication. The choice is yours now. Will you tell him to stop messaging you and block him? Or will you “forgive” him and continue being hurt for ages by his actions?

Life is an experience of change and it’s important to be able to adapt and accept the change. One toxic person out of your way opens the door to a better future, a healthier life, and lots of other true friends.

[meme-sauce]

Hi! What are some other reasons you dont like thirteen reasons why? People tell me to watch it but idk im not really sure? Id love to hear the other side too. (Love your blog btw)

Hi! Thank you! I’ve gotten a few of these in my ask box so I’m officially answering this one, but it’s for everyone else who asked too. There’s a lot of anger in here but it’s not directed at you anon! Just the book. (Please keep in mind I have not watched the show, nor do I intend to, so most of these are based on the book. This will also contain spoilers.)

1) Hannah Baker is a selfish hateful bitch. I really hate the B word, but honestly, I dont know what else to say. All suicides are selfish honestly, but she killed herself out of straight spite. She even says that its for revenge. Yes, there were some god awful things that happened, but she destroyed her family, her future, and honestly herself just so she could get back at the people that hurt her. Pathetic. I had a friend who’s client killed themselves, and they were devastated. It wasn’t even a person in their family and they couldn’t get out of bed for weeks. I could never imagine butting my family through that just to get revenge, and make people feel bad for fucking me over. 2) Basing off that, Hannah blames everyone for her suicide except for her own damn self.  Every single one of the issues she talked about sucked, but they could have been solved in so many ways other that suicide (again, I can not believe someone would do that to their family and friends.). If she talked to the people, or went to a real counselor, or did fucking online schooling whatever, she could have avoided it. There so many options she could have taken to better her self, but she allowed what people had done to her to control her. She uses the tapes to show how other people caused her suicide, but her hand was always the one on the trigger. 3) Blame of other people brings me to my next point, which is basically the same as number two only more specific to the School Counselor. I honestly cant remember his name right now, Mr Porter?  I have no clue so Ill just call him SC. This poor dude. He’s just a school counselor, but suddenly he’s the most responsible for her death? She says on that tapes that he’s the only person standing between her and suicide. What kind of god awful burden to put on somebody?? Who fucking does that?? Tells someone they’re the only thing stopping them from killing themselves?? Gross people that’s who. And the real kicker is, she didn’t even tell him. She didn’t even tell him half of the whole story. She said there was sexual things that happened with a guy, didn’t tell him if it was rape or not, and when he offered solutions, she wasn’t open to them. The poor dude did his best, but when who you’re talking too won’t help themselves, there’s really nothing more you can say. He told her to move on, because she wouldn’t press charges or even talk about what happened, and she twisted his words into inspiration to kill herself. And in the book, they talk about how horrible he is for that!!! She tells him he can take the tapes to hell, Clay calls him awful or something. He did his best with what she told him!! And even then, it is not his responsibility to make sure she doesn’t kill herself. Yes, counselors should help, but saying he was the one thing standing between her and her death is???? Crazy??4) This takes me to my next point. Clay. Clay Clay Clay. This whole time, shes talking about people who wronged her, and Clay is wondering how he got on the list. So when it gets to his tape, I’m like “Okay cool maybe the Author will explore the grey areas in this book, and how even good people can do bad things, or about how people you expect to be good can really fuck up, accidentally or on purpose, or fuck maybe it’ll only be a little thing and the author can use it to show how even small actions can impact a person (I wouldn’t say to a point of SUICIDE, but just show the impacts)” but then the tape comes on and its “Clay you don’t deserve to be on this list. You’re the odd one out”. How, fucking, convenient. Our Hero Clay Jensen, who didn’t do anything wrong!! He is exempt from all of her hate so we can have a likable main character. Wonderful. I rolled my eyes his entire chapter. 5) OH Also! talking about Clay’s tape, let’s also talk about (again), Hannah’s absolute fuckery when it comes to dealing with her problems. Literally pushes away anyone who could help her. She doesn’t even want to be helped, and at this point, shes going to twist every damn thing someone says to fit her own self justifying agenda. She says people caused her suicide, but she caused it her self by allowing it to happen. She didn’t help herself, even when she could, and wont take responsibility. Also, she fucking traumatized this poor boy for the rest of his life by making him listen to all the awful things on a set of tapes “he didn’t belong on”. Fuck off Hannah Baker. 6) The book is plain unrealistic. This is less of a character thing and more of something I noticed the second time i read it and it just made me hate it more. First off, literally no one does that shit. No one gives a fuck in high school. if someone cares enough to tell everyone that Justin felt up Hannah on the playground, no one is gonna care enough to believe it. When was the last time you heard a rumor about a girl getting felt up and went  “ wow this must be true what a slut I hate her”. It’s also unrealistic in the sense of the way it portrays depression, which is very poorly and Ill get to that more later. When I’m depressed I can’t even get out of bed, much less orchestrate an entire guilt trip with cassette tapes. Also the fact that Clay knows every single person on those tapes and their backstories despite having very different social groups as them? I’m not buying it. 7) It’s portrayal of depression and suicide. It makes it seem like its this beautifully sad pain. No. False. depression is like,  not getting out of bed because you’re physically unable too. It’s not taking a shower for weeks. It’s crying at two AM for no fucking reason. Miss me with this “I began to see the beauty in giving up” bullshit. You want to show suicide? Show what really happens. the wreckage people leave behind. Jay Ashter or whatever his name is goes into it a little bit when he’s talking about how her parents left for weeks and how the school counselor looked when he found out, but thats about it. Mainly it talks bout why she killed herself and how other people caused it, but not a realistic version of what the aftermath actually entailed. People, especially young people,  might look at this without knowing the true consequences of suicide or impacts of depression and get the wrong idea; namely they killing yourself is a revenge tactic to make everyone see how right you are and feel bad about what they did. Depression isn’t romantic emptiness and suicide isn’t a way to get revenge. It’s a serious issue and it just felt so… empty.8) While I’m not 100% sure, I’ve heard that not only does the Netflix series show the suicide, but also a really long rape scene. Can anyone say Yikes. Lets create a show about mental health and things that cause it,and then not give a fuck how said show will impact viewer’s triggers and mental health. There’s more but this post is already long as hell so I’ll end it here. I’m not the best writer, so there are some concepts that may have gotten muddled and not thoroughly explained, So i apologize for any misunderstandings someone gets if my words aren’t clear enough. I think you get the concept though.